The Blue Button

Mira had a Tinker Table in the corner of the playroom. There were jars of silver screws that sounded like rain when she shook them. Soft wires lay in loppy loops, red, blue, and yellow, like spaghetti. A friendly computer named Pip smiled from a bright screen and said, "Hello, inventor," in a cheerful voice. And on the floor, no bigger than a lunchbox, rolled Blink, Mira’s tiny round robot with gumdrop wheels and two wobbly antennae.

"Today," Mira said, tapping her chin with a marker, "we build the Sock Sorter!"

"Beep! Sorting socks," Blink chirped, zipping back and forth. He opened a little drawer in his middle. Inside were gears, stickers, and a very important part: a shiny blue button. The button would start the Sock Sorter when everything was ready.

Mira loved buttons. She loved the click, the press, the little jump her heart made right before a machine woke up. She wanted to press the shiny blue button first. She wanted to feel that click.

She peeked left. She peeked right. Blink was busy counting socks. Pip was humming a gentle tune. Quick as a whisper, Mira slipped the blue button into her pocket.

They built together. Blink held screws while Mira turned the tiny screwdriver. Pip showed a picture of two socks on the screen. "Matchy-matchy," Pip sang. They made a slide for socks, and a soft basket at the end. When they finished, the Sock Sorter stood on four little feet, tidy and proud.

"Button, please," Blink said, opening his drawer.

He blinked. The drawer was empty. "Missing: blue button," he said.

Mira’s tummy gave a tiny twist. She patted her pocket and felt the cool, round shape. "Um…" she said, and her words wobbled. "Maybe the button rolled under the rug."

Pip’s screen flickered into a map with a glowing line. "Searching under rug," Pip said kindly.

Blink zipped to the rug and lifted its corner with his little arm. "No button," he said. "Beep. New idea?"

Mira’s cheeks felt warm. "Maybe it bounced into the shoe," she said, pointing.

Blink stuck his antennae into the shoe. He sneezed. "No button," he said, blinking dust from his eyes.

They looked behind the plant, under the couch, and inside the toy teapot. Pip showed them paths like firefly trails. Blink whirred and zoomed, his wheels going faster and faster. But there was no blue button anywhere, because the blue button wasn’t lost at all.

Mira watched Blink bump gently into a pillow and softly bonk his nose-lights. Her tummy made another twist, bigger now, like a knot. She put her hand in her pocket and felt the smooth button again. She listened to Blink’s little motor, to Pip’s hopeful humming, to her own thumpy-thump heart.

"Stop," she said, very quiet. Then louder: "Stop."

Blink paused. Pip made a tiny question mark on the screen.

Mira took a deep breath. "I have the button," she said. "I put it in my pocket because I wanted to press it first. I’m sorry."

The room got very still for a blink. Then Blink’s antennae bobbed. "Thank you for true words," he said in his bright, beep-y voice. "True words help my map."

Pip drew a new line, straight to Mira. "Found it," Pip sang with a happy little trill.

Mira held up the blue button. It winked in the light. "Let’s make a plan," she said. "We can press it together. Or we can take turns."

Blink’s eyes glowed green. "Together," he said.

Mira smiled. The knot in her tummy untied itself and floated away like a loose ribbon. She snapped the button into its place on the Sock Sorter. It fit with a snug, friendly click.

"Ready?" she asked.

"Ready," said Blink.

Pip counted down. "Three… two… one…"

Mira and Blink pressed the blue button together. Click!

The Sock Sorter hummed to life. The slide wiggled. The basket opened its mouth like a yawning kitten. Socks zipped down the slide—stripy with stripy, polka dot with polka dot—plop, plop, plop! Blink clapped his little arms. Pip clapped with pictures of tiny hands.

The doorbell rang. Mira’s friend Jay peeked in. "Whoa! A sock machine!" he said.

Mira grinned. "We made it," she said. "And I learned something. When I said a maybe-that-wasn’t-true, the search got all mixed up. When I told the truth, everything worked right."

"Truth is good data," Blink added, pleased.

Jay laughed. "Let’s sort mine, too!"

They fed the machine more socks. It sang its soft whirring song and did its tidy work. Mira’s heart felt light as a bubble. The blue button gleamed, and the whole room seemed brighter.

And from then on, when they built things, Mira kept her pockets ready for tools—and her words ready for truth. Because in the Tinker Table world, true words made the best kind of click.