I was sentenced to six months of community service. The service was to stay in jail. I plotted an escape. The key to my plan would focus on one central element: waiting until the guard left, and then, before he got back, escaping. For complicated reasons, the escape never worked out.
Uncle Lou made it back to America with the Golden Monkey. Hawaii requested that it be sent back, but Uncle Lou told them to perform oral sex on him.
Am I angry that Uncle Lou stole the Golden Monkey from me? Of course I am—what kind of a question is that?
I thought about going back and stealing the Golden Monkey from Uncle Lou, or at least vandalizing his house. But every time I mentioned this idea to anyone I got an electric shock in my tooth. At least I got to keep the Nobel Prize and the gun. And really, what else do you need in life?
In case you’re worried about the black pepper bug, don’t be. I released him in Honolulu. The town never had black pepper bugs before, but then, for some reason, it was swarming with them.
The Wedding
DOCTOR PONZARI survived the sharp sticks and the fall, although he spent nearly a week in the hospital. I billed him for my belt and my new glasses. Don and Leilani went to work for him, developing medicines from leaves. Great, that’s all we need, more medicines. Maybe one day Doctor Ponzari will turn his jungle estate into a place for good. Maybe a carnival. With a sideshow of freaks.
Leilani said she would give me pekoocha if I would sign the stupid insurance paper Doctor Ponzari kept waving at me. I signed. But it turned out pekoocha is just a kiss on the cheek. It sounds a lot better than that, doesn’t it?
Bizzy became head of the Tourist Board. It was he who came up with the idea of adding an extra “i” to Hawaii, so it’s now Hawaiii.
Don and Leilani got married. Leilani was radiant in her skirt of rarest ivory grass and her bra made from two albino starfish. And Don didn’t look like the total jerk he is. At the ceremony Leilani did a hula dance that made my little statuette look like a stupid souvenir on a spring.
Picking Up the Pieces
I DECIDED to stay in Hawaiii. It was Pingle free, for one thing. I got an apartment down in Appliance Town and started my own business. It was a boardwalk booth where you paid to shoot me with a blow dart. If you didn’t believe it was real poison, you could shoot a bum that I hired. Some people said the bum was just faking it, but you can’t fake convulsions like that. The only catch was I had to keep changing bums before they got used to the poison, too.
I was making good money. And there were the little rewards. You never forget the look on a child’s face the first time he hits you with a blow dart. “I got him!” they squeal.
I continued to practice Pelicanism, but it was a less strict form of Pelicanism. I even made some headway on my novel, Muscular Angry Clown. I got to the part where the other clowns accuse him of using steroids and he gives them all karate chops.
Then my whole world came crashing down.
It All Falls Apart
THE CHIEF of the Patangis was sitting on the edge of my bed when I came in. He held up my little stenchite hula girl and began shouting angrily at me. He raised his spear. I flashed my medallion at him, but he threw the spear anyway. It stuck in the door as I dove out.
The chief dragged me back inside. He began pounding my head against the radiator. I know what you’re thinking: a radiator in Honolulu? Look, don’t worry about that right now. The main thing is, I was getting killed.
Every head bang brought me closer to unconsciousness. And jolted the hula girl closer and closer to the edge of the bed. Would she be the last thing I ever saw? One final, tremendous head slam sent her tumbling onto the wooden floor. The building began to tremble. Everything was cracking and splitting apart, plaster falling, pictures on the wall tilting so they weren’t lined up straight anymore. I broke free and stumbled out into the street. People were screaming and tripping as they fled in all directions. Building after building collapsed, like dominoes. Big pieces of debris were flipped into the air, like tiddlywinks. The noise was tremendous, like shaking dice in a giant Yahtzee cup.
As I ran, I tried to help out where I could. I helped an old man in a wheelchair get out of my way and into a ditch, where he’d be safe. I helped some people carry some things out of a store. I led a group of young nurses into a dark culvert, where we huddled together for safety. Finally the noise stopped. The whole of Honolulu lay in ruins, as it does to this day. What had caused it? An earthquake? Gophers? The wrath of the Pelican God?
The saddest thing for me was that my lovely hula girl was now buried under rubble. She deserved better. She should be sitting on a wooden mantel at the White House. Or on the throne of England.
The Death of Uncle Lou
I DECIDED to leave Honolulu. There was nothing left for me there. I moved over to Diarroa, which turned out to be a shithole.
Will I ever get back to America? Will the Golden Monkey ever be returned to Hawaiii? Will I ever find true love? These are questions that only the writer of this book can answer, and I cannot.
I was pondering this when a messenger arrived with a package. The monkey who lives in the garden jumped into the open window, thinking it might be food. But it wasn’t. It was a letter saying that Uncle Lou had died. His body had rejected his new Tomlin. The note said he had left something for me in his will. Which was in the package.
I couldn’t help feeling sad at Uncle Lou’s death, yet also pleased that all those dinners at his house were finally going to pay off. I opened the package, and there was one of Uncle Lou’s old boxing gloves. Huh?! A button said “Press Here.” I did. The boxing glove shot up on the end of a spring and knocked me out.
When I woke up, the monkey was chewing on my glasses.
Acknowledgments
Thanks, most especially, to my wife, Marta Chavez Handey, for her tireless help with this project. Many thanks also to Bill Novak, George Meyer, Kit Boss, Maria Semple, Chris Hart, Max Pross, Tom Gammill, T. Sean Shannon, and Lev Novak.
Thanks, too, to my editor, Ben Greenberg, and my agent, Jin Auh.
Apologies to the people of Honolulu.
About the Author
JACK HANDEY is the author of the “Deep Thoughts” series of humor books. He lives in New Mexico.
OTHER BOOKS BY JACK HANDEY
Deep Thoughts
Deeper Thoughts: All New, All Crispy
Deepest Thoughts: So Deep they Squeak
Fuzzy Memories
What I’d Say to the Martians and Other Veiled Threats
Thank you for buying this ebook, published by Hachette Digital.
To receive special offers, bonus content, and news about our latest ebooks and apps, sign up for our newsletters.
Sign Up
Or visit us at hachettebookgroup.com/newsletters
For more about this book and author, visit Bookish.com.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Welcome
Dedication
Don’s Offer
Warnings
The Gift
The Bible
Uncle Lou
The Flight
Honolulu
Coca-Cola
Supplies
The Sights
The Souvenir
Angry Don
Reality
Eating Crow
No Way Out
A New World
You?!
A Rocky Start
Up the Paloonga
Memories
The Pelican God
The Institute
The Grounds
Breakfast at Ponzari’s
Theories
Escape
The Point of No Return
The Ruins
An Ancient Clue
Ride the Wild Wind
Mementos
Carrying On
Leilani
Leilani Joins Up
Mars
The Red Boat
Gloating
A Pirate’s Laugh
Radio Shack
Fishing
Drums
Turtle Man
Leftovers
Puppets and Pulp
Blow-Dart Dreams
Hangover
More Darts
The Helicopter
Lost
The Laughter of Children
Patangis
The Feast
Decisions
Adiós, Patangis
Dump Leilani
A Distant Crash
Devil in a Grass Skirt
Red Hot Chili Gum
What Kind of World
What a Fool I’d Been
Killing Don
The Plan
The Cave of the Golden Monkey
You’d Do the Same
Diversions
Vines
The Coconut
The Skeleton
The Tracking Device
The Airplane
Highway 14
The Wedding
Picking Up the Pieces
It All Falls Apart
The Death of Uncle Lou
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Other Books by Jack Handey
Newsletters
Copyright
Copyright
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Copyright © 2013 by Jack Handey
Illustrations copyright © 2013 by Jim Cook
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
Grand Central Publishing
Hachette Book Group
237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017
hachettebookgroup.com
twitter.com/grandcentralpub
First ebook edition: July 2013
Grand Central Publishing is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
The Grand Central Publishing name and logo is a trademark of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.
The Hachette Speakers Bureau provides a wide range of authors for speaking events. To find out more, go to www.hachettespeakersbureau.com or call (866) 376-6591.
ISBN 978-1-4555-2239-2