Monkey Business (11 page)

‘Thanks!’ said Felix as he walked towards the kitchen. ‘Flo’s not here yet. Do you want a drink?’ he called over his shoulder.

Mum came out to say hello. ‘I wouldn’t recommend the coffee,’ she said, raising one eyebrow.

‘Why not?’ Felix protested, but he didn’t really care. He was in too much of a hurry to open the present.

Zed grinned. ‘It’s OK. I’m not into coffee any more, sis,’ he said. ‘Gives me the shakes, y’know?’

Mum smiled wryly. ‘Oh?’ she said. ‘OK, well have some mint tea if you like. I’ll put the kettle on.’

‘OH WOW!’ Felix yelled, holding up the object he’d just freed from the brown paper. ‘Look at this, Mum! It’s soooooo wicked!’

Mum frowned. ‘What is it?’ she asked.

‘It’s a butterfly and moth kit! I’ve ALWAYS wanted one!’ he cried, dancing round and round in a circle and whooping madly. ‘You put the caterpillars in the
caterpillar home with loads of sugary stuff and then you watch them change into butterflies or moths. Woooo!’

‘Lovely,’ said Mum, mentally clocking up how many mini-beast houses and other animal homes she was going to have to dust around from now on.

Dyson rushed in from the garden and was soon adding to the commotion by barking and leaping all over the place.

‘DYSON, OUT!’ Mum yelled, pointing to the back door. ‘OOOOH, there’s mud everywhere, and just when we were ready to go.’

‘Can I see what’s in the bag now?’ Felix asked.

Zed nodded and handed it over, carefully taking the caterpillar kit back so that Felix had a free pair of hands.

The contents of the bag resulted in even more jumping and leaping and shouting: ‘A BIRD’S NEST!’ Felix shrieked. ‘FOR MY COLLECTION!’

‘Yeah, it’s an abandoned blackbird’s nest, man. Make sure you label it.’

‘WHOOOPPPEEEE!’ Felix yelled, punching the air in delight with the hand that wasn’t holding the nest.

‘Can’t you lot shut up?’ Merv emerged, low-slung pyjamas revealing more than anyone would ever want to see, his hair sticking up in so many different positions that he looked
more like a porcupine than any real live one.

‘Merv!’ Mum admonished. ‘You could at least say happy birthday to your brother.’

‘“Happy birthday to your brother”,’ Merv sneered, and then for good measure he added: ‘Squirt!’ and disappeared back up to his bedroom, slamming the door
behind him.

Felix put the nest down on the kitchen table before throwing his arms round Zed and squeezing him. ‘You are the best uncle in the whole wide world.’

Zed laughed.

DRIIIING!

‘Yay!’ Felix shouted, hurling himself at the front door. ‘That’ll be Flo – time to GO!’

Felix ran to the front door and flung it open so hard he almost caught Zed in the face.

‘Wow, chill a bit, man,’ said Zed. ‘Have you been at your mum’s coffee or something?’

‘Hi, Flo!’ Felix almost screamed he was so toppled-over with excitement.

Flo did actually scream. ‘Aaaaiiiiieeee!’ She jumped up and down and up and down, sending her mad hair into an even madder frenzy of frizziness.

Mrs Small stood at the end of the drive and waved cautiously. ‘See you later, darling. Have a lovely birthday, Felix!’ she called. ‘Good luck . . .’ she added, raising
her eyebrows rather pointedly at Zed.

Flo waved vaguely in the direction of her mother and then continued shrieking and bouncing up and down.

‘OK, OK. That’s enough,’ said Mum, coming out of the kitchen wearing a pair of rubber gloves and carrying a bottle of cleaning liquid in her hands. ‘This has been a very
long morning as it is, what with Felix ‘Dawn Chorus’ Stowe here giving the house a make-over with mayonnaise and ham and then Dyson charging in and redecorating it all over again with
mud.’

‘What?’ said Flo, stopping in mid-scream to stand and gawp at Mum.

‘Never mind,’ said Mum. ‘Are you ready to go?’

Flo’s excitement withered under the force of Mum’s glower and she stopped jumping. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said breathlessly, ‘but this is just about the best day of
my whole life and that’s pretty amazing as it’s not even
my
birthday, it’s Felix’s, but it’s still the best day ever because we are finally going to get our
hands on some real mon—’

‘BLEURGHOOOOW!’ Felix let out an almighty spluttering cough while crunching his eyebrows together very fiercely indeed in Flo’s direction.

‘Felix! Put your hand up, please,’ Mum admonished. ‘Flora does not want to be covered in germs and breakfast and goodness knows what else.’

‘Yes, Felix,’ said Flo. ‘You are being utterly gross. And why are you growling and frowning like that?’

Felix rolled his eyes and mouthed, ‘Shut up about the you-know-what!’

‘Oh, OK,’ she said carelessly. ‘Anyway, happy birthday!’ Her voice rose to a squeak at the end of the sentence and she started jumping again while she thrust a parcel
into Felix’s hands. ‘I couldn’t wait to give you this.’

Felix grinned. ‘Thanks, Flo.’ He started ripping the paper off and revealed a slim plastic box with cartoon images of animals all over the front. Felix stared at it, completely
speechless, his jaw hanging open.

‘Don’t you – you do like it, d-don’t you?’ Flo stammered, waiting like an anxious puppy for Felix’s reaction.

‘Like it? Are you kidding?’ he finally whispered. And then: ‘I LOVE IT!’ he shouted, flinging himself at Flo as if he was about to hug her and then changing his mind in
mid-fling and messing up her crazy fluffy hair instead.

Flo was grinning so hard that every tooth, and every gap between every tooth, was on show. She was in danger of starting another performance of the high-pitched variety, when Zed gently prised
Felix’s hands from her hair and said, ‘Are you going to tell me what it is?’

Felix looked at him as if he had just said something in Japanese. ‘How can you not know what this is?’ he asked in total disbelief, waving the box in front of his uncle’s face.
‘It’s Zoo Mania!’

Zed smiled and shook his head. ‘Whatever you say, dude.’

Flo shook her head and sighed impatiently. ‘Honestly, don’t you even know what Zoo Mania is? What kind of an Olden-Fashioned-Day person are you? It’s a computer game, of
course. You get to build up your own zoo with animals and feed them and look after them and be a real zookeeper, except not really in real true life, obviously. Not
yet
anyway,’ she
added cryptically, shooting Felix a knowing look.

Zed caught her at it and said, ‘Yet?’

Felix’s face twisted itself into a mask of horror, but luckily Mum re-emerged at that very moment. (She was looking rather weary considering the day had only just got going, Felix
thought.)

‘OK, no more time to stand and natter,’ she said. ‘Dad’s getting the car out and the lunch is packed and we’re all here. So let’s go!’

The driveway to Shortfleet safari park was the longest driveway in the world, according to Flo.

‘You’ve been down a lot of driveways in your time then?’ Dad asked, chuckling.

‘Oh millions,’ said Flo airily. ‘And this is definitely the most longest of the lot. Which is rather annoying,’ she added grimly, ‘as it means it’s going to
take us even more time to actually arrive in the safari park.’

Felix agreed. ‘It has been
such
a long journey. Are we nearly there yet?’

‘ARRRGHHH!’ chorused Mum and Dad.

‘Hey, chill,’ said Zed. ‘Time is all in the mind, y’know—’

‘
Clive
,’ Mum warned.

Zed bit his lip and made a zipping motion with his hand while giving Flo and Felix a mammoth-sized wink.

‘I wonder if, like, the dude himself will be in residence today,’ Zed said, gazing out of the window at the huge house at the bottom of the Longest Drive in the World.

‘The who?’ asked Flo.

‘Lord Basin,’ said Felix knowledgeably. ‘He is a Very Important Person in the World of Conversationism. Isn’t he, Zed?’

‘I think Flora would win the prize for “conVERsationism”,’ giggled Mum.

‘It’s “conSERvationism”,’ Zed explained as Felix and Flo looked at him with a puzzled expression. ‘And you’re bang on the button, man. Lord Basin is
cool on conservation and he is way far out too.’

‘Far out where?’ said Flo.

Zed laughed. ‘“Far out”, as in he’s a wacky kinda guy! He dresses in these awesome long cloaks and he always wears a funky hat. And I’ve heard stories about his
house like you wouldn’t believe, man. They say he has carpets that move and buttons in the wall that you can push to open secret passageways. And there are all the artefacts and sculptures
that he’s brought back from his travels in Africa.’ Zed had a dreamy look on his face now. He often got that look on his face when he started thinking of Africa. Felix sometimes worried
that his uncle would end up going back there and then he wouldn’t be able to see him so much.

At last, after far too many verses of ‘She’ll Be Coming Round the Mountain’ (which included a distinctly unusual ‘She’ll be wearing big bananas
when she comes . . .’ from Felix who could hardly breathe for laughter by the time it was over) the Stowes, Zed and Flo arrived at the entrance.

‘Welcome to Shortfleet Safari Park,’ read a placard. ‘Please read the safety notices and stay in your vehicle at all times.’

‘Oh no!’ Flo cried. ‘Why do we have to stay
in
the vee-high-kel?’

Felix jabbed her firmly in the ribs. ‘It’s pronounced
veer-kul
, you loony,’ he cried, and then in a low voice ‘and shut up about getting out or anything like that
or you’ll Give the Game Away!’

‘But—’ Flo protested, rubbing her ribs.

‘Remember what I said about the plan,’ Felix hissed. ‘We don’t need to get out.’

‘Why?’ Flo persisted.

Felix started whispering and gesturing wildly at the car windows.

‘Oh, right,’ said Flo, sitting back and smiling smugly.

‘What are you two up to?’ Mum demanded, swivelling round in her seat to eyeball the squirming pair. ‘Can’t you squash them or something, Clive?’

‘They’re cool, sis,’ Zed said, putting an arm round each child. ‘They’re just excited, that’s all.’

‘No thanks to your crazy stories and all that stupid singing,’ Mum muttered.

‘Hey, look – a giraffe!’ Zed shouted.

Dad had pressed the button to open his window and was paying the entrance fee. Felix strained to look out of the windscreen at the enclosure beyond the car park. His eyes bulged. Giraffes were
grazing on nets full of leaves that had been strung up in the trees for them.

‘Wow, it’s weird to see giraffes in a field like that!’ he said. And it just proves that wild endangered animals
can
live in England, he thought.

‘Sit back down, Felix,’ said Mum. ‘You’ve got to stay strapped in.’

Dad thanked the keeper and put the window back up. ‘We’ve got a CD to listen to as we go round,’ he said, handing a square envelope to Mum. ‘It’s read by that Kitty
Bumble off the telly – you know the one that does the bird-watching programme with that old man with the beard?’

‘The ditzy, giggly, blonde one?’ Mum teased, taking the CD out of its packaging and posting it into the car CD player.

Felix thought the back of Dad’s ears had gone a bit hot-looking. ‘Kitty Bumble is a very intelligent woman who knows what she is talking about,’ he said, pressing the on button
so that Kitty’s voice drowned out what Mum said next.

‘
Hello and welcome to Shortfleet!
’ came the warm and friendly tones. ‘
This CD will tell you a bit about the animals as we go round. After you’ve finished in
each enclosure there will be a beeping noise. When you hear that noise, turn the CD off and turn it on again when you reach the next enclosure. At the end of your visit, please feel free to take
this CD home, or alternatively you can recycle it by handing it back to one of the keepers on your way out. Remember to observe the safety rules, keep your windows closed and stay inside your
vehicle at all times. And, above all, enjoy your visit!
’

BEEP!

‘So where do we go first?’ asked Felix. ‘Can we see the monkeys?’

Flo nudged Felix and giggled hysterically.

‘Shhh,’ he hissed.

Flo bit her lip and forced the giggles back down.

‘The monkeys are near the park exit,’ said Mum, looking at the map the keeper had given Dad with the CD and tickets.

‘So? Can’t you drive there first?’ Flo asked.

‘No,’ said Mum firmly, ‘You have to follow all the other cars around in a queue – you’re not allowed to take short-cuts.’

Flo huffed and slumped back in her seat, but quickly perked up as Dad began following an orange-and-black tiger-striped minibus into the giraffe enclosure.

Every square centimetre of Felix literally tingled with happiness. This was dreamy – a whole day of looking at giraffes, rhinos, lions, tigers, wolves and, of course, monkeys . . . The
best was yet to come, he thought with satisfaction, swiftly checking his rucksack to see if the peanuts were easily to hand.

‘You have got the bananas Mum gave you, haven’t you, Zed?’ he asked softly.

‘Right here, dude,’ Zed said, patting the bag on his lap. ‘You hungry?’

‘Erm, not yet,’ said Felix. ‘Oh, look! Wolves!’

Dad had driven through some big metal gates that had notices all over them saying how dangerous the wolves were.

‘It is very interesting to think that the mothers look after the babies and the fathers go and do the hunting, isn’t it?’ said Felix, listening to the CD. ‘I mean,
it’s a bit like humans in Real Life, isn’t it? Mum looks after me and Merv, and Dad goes out all day to the office.’

‘Ahem,’ Mum said, turning round and fixing her younger son with a pointed look. ‘I happen to go to work too, you know.’

‘I know that,’ said Felix impatiently. ‘But you do look after me too, whereas Dad only goes to work.’

‘Hey!’ Dad objected. ‘You make it sound easy!’

Zed held up his hands. ‘Cool it, guys. Life’s not a competition. Look at those wolves – they know how to chill out.’

Felix agreed. The wolves were lying around in groups, soaking up the spring sunshine, occasionally lifting their heads to look around.