for a long time. When I was waiting for your
next direction, I must have fallen asleep. I might
have been flying for days, or weeks, or even years.
And now look: this looks very much like the
Maasai Mara National Reserve in Kenya! I can’t
believe that you knew the way, and that I flew
us here.”
“I can’t believe it, either,” I said to Laurence.
114
I had a feeling inside my body that I’d never
experienced before. It was like a million happy
butterflies were fluttering their wings while
singing a pleasant song. I wasn’t even worried
about how we would get home; I could probably
figure that out while taking an afternoon nap.
It was Laurence’s dream to travel here, and
together, without even trying, we’d actually
done it . . . while dreaming!
“DO YOU SPEAK ENGLISH?” Laurence was
shouting at the giraffe.
The giraffe looked at us with her very big eyes.
“COULD YOU GIVE US A RIDE?” he said
slowly, this time doing a little mime.
The giraffe smiled and lowered her head so
that we could climb on. She circled one of the
tall trees, with Laurence and me balancing on
her head.
Laurence turned to look at me. “This is great,
isn’t it?”
Chapter
Nine
116
It really was. I’d never
even dreamed of traveling,
but now here I was, balancing
on a giraffe’s head in Kenya.
Beyond the trees, behind a
low fence, there were lots of
children with their moms and
dads. They were all pointing and
laughing and having fun.
117
The giraffe lowered her long neck to the
ground, and Laurence and I hopped off.
“THANK YOU VERY MUCH,”
he shouted, doing a bow to show
how grateful he was. “Are you
all right, Marcus?” Laurence
asked. “Your skin . . . it looks a little dry.”
I’d been enjoying myself on the giraffe so much
that I hadn’t noticed that my body was shriveling
in the dry heat of the sun. I tried to answer
Laurence but couldn’t move my mouth to speak.
“We’d better find some
mud for you to cool
off in.” Laurence
picked
me up in
his beak
and flew
over some
bushes and trees.
“There’s a swamp!” he said,
forgetting that I was in his beak
and accidentally plopping me
headfirst into the mud, which was
cold and gloopy like thick dark
chocolate frosting on a birthday
cake. I sank to the bottom, and it
felt totally wonderful.
I heard Laurence call to me with
a muffled voice. “Everything OK
down there?”
“Fine and dandy,” I said,
emerging from the swamp and
feeling like new again.
A big piglike creature watched
me wriggle out of my muddy bath.
119
“Hello, piggy,” I said, trying to be friendly
just in case he thought I was a chocolate-covered
snack.
He snorted in my direction, giving me a shower
that washed away the mud.
“Thanks, piggy,” I said, keeping the
conversation going just in case he now thought
I was some kind of savory snack.
“That’s not a pig, it’s a pygmy hippo,” said
Laurence, who was reading a sign. “I must say,
it’s very organized here in the Maasai Mara with
these informative signs.”
There were signs everywhere. And there were
also neat paths edged with little fences. It did look
quite different from Laurence’s Africa books.
Laurence must have been thinking the same
thing.
“It’s not how I imagined it would be here,” he
said, hopping along a path. “I do like it; it’s very
spaces and dusty plains. It seemed more natural.”
“I said it before, and I’ll say it again, Laurence.
That’s progress for you.”
Laurence nodded. “That must be what it is.”
I remembered that I was great at navigating,
and I had the butterflies-in-my-tummy feeling
again. “LAURENCE,” I said, a little too
enthusiastically.
“Yes?”
“Let’s go and find that Lake Nakuru.
It can’t be far from here.”
Laurence gasped.
122
“We can meet the flamingos,” I said.
His eyes lit up. I wondered whether I needed
to be asleep to find the way, or whether I might
be able to find it just by using my worm instincts.
“Maybe one of these signs will direct us to the
lake,” Laurence said, hopping speedily along the
path. “Ooh, there’s a map here as well,” he called
out. “Can you come and look at it?”
Silly Laurence, he had obviously forgotten
that I don’t need a map to navigate.
“Psst,” said the pygmy hippo. “If you’re
looking for the flamingos, they live in the
middle of the lake on the other side of
the giraffes’ house.”
He lifted his head
to point out the direction to go.
“Thank you very much,” I said. Even though
he’d told me the way, I probably could have
figured it out with my natural worm instincts.
The hippo gave me another spray of water.
123
It didn’t have quite the same impact, but
hopefully he appreciated the gesture.
I rejoined Laurence, who
looked like he was using
all of his bird brain to try
to understand the map.
It lifted me along the path like a water
slide. This water spraying thing
was probably a local
custom. I filled my
cheeks with water from
a puddle and sprayed
him back.
“Come on,” I said. “I’m the navigator.”
I jumped up onto his back without waiting for
him to lower his neck. I missed and slid down the
side of his wing. Laurence picked me up with
his beak and threw me onto my usual seat.
We flew up past the
tall building, over some
lions and a group
of penguins.
In geography
class at worm school,
we learned that
penguins lived in
cold countries.
Why were there
penguins here in
Africa? Maybe they were
on a safari. That was probably it.
125
“Oh, I see,” Laurence answered.
Just then, I could see something
glistening in the distance.
“They’re on vacation,” I said
confidently. “They’re on the same
safari as the penguins.”
“Oh, look, there are k
angaroos over there,”
said Laurence as we flew over a big hill. “I
didn’t expect to see kangaroos here. I thought
they only lived in Australia.”
126
“Laurence! There it is. . . . It’s over there. I
can see it! I can see it! We’ve made it! It’s Lake
Nakuru!”
We landed at the edge of the lake next to some
tall trees. To celebrate this moment, Laurence
was singing a song. I think it was a song; I didn’t
recognize the tune or the words, but he looked
like he was enjoying the strange noises that were
coming from his beak.
I was about to do a happy
dance, when, from the corner of my eye,
I saw a squirrel. It was a familiar-looking
squirrel. It looked just like the one with
the awful teeth who was friends with
the evil mole.
I had a funny feeling in my belly.
“What are you looking at?” Laurence asked.
The squirrel had darted away, and I was
staring at an empty branch.
“Do you remember that squirrel from before?”
“Ooh, yes,” said Laurence, doing a weird body
shake. “That was when we were almost a stew!”
“I think that I just saw her, Laurence.”
“Why would she be here in Africa?” Laurence
asked. “You must have imagined it.”
“Yes,” I said, laughing. I laughed even though
it wasn’t funny.
I looked up at the tree again, to double-
check. No squirrels. It must have been my silly
imagination.
Chapter Ten
I turned back to Laurence. He was staring
straight ahead with his beak open. He looked
like he’d just seen something spectacular, like a
unicorn or a pile of nachos with cheese on top.
“What is it?” I asked, looking to see if there
was a unicorn, or cheesy nachos.
“It’s them! My flamingo family!” he said with
a soft, crackly voice.
132
Laurence was looking at a small group of pink
birds with long, thin legs who were standing on
an island in the middle of the lake. A tear was
rolling down his cheek.
They really were flamingos. We stood in
silence, watching from a distance. We stared at
them for so long that I started to wonder if the
flamingos were actually real. They were bright
pink with unusual beaks and legs that looked
like twigs. Maybe they were made out of plastic
and twigs?
Then one of the flamingos gracefully bent
down, scooped a fish out of the water, and gulped
it down.
“I think they are real,” I said out loud.
Laurence sighed. “This is where I belong. It’s my
true home. I can’t believe that we actually made it
here,” he said, staring ahead.
I couldn’t believe it, either. I looked at Laurence
and then at the flamingos and then at Laurence
again. He still looked like a chicken — a little, fat,
round one. I thought about telling him. Maybe
he hadn’t noticed. But then I remembered about
trying to be kind and that in Laurence’s mind
he was a flamingo. It was probably best to try to
support Laurence in whatever he believed. That’s
probably what a friend would do.
“I’ve always dreamed of meeting other
flamingos, and now it’s finally happening,”
Laurence continued. “I’m one of them.”
“Yes, you are,” I said, lying to Laurence.
“Shall we go and meet them?” Laurence asked.
“Yes,” I said.
134
We flew to the island
in the lake and landed
next to a small group
of flamingos. I couldn’t
help staring at their legs.
Up close they looked
even more like twigs.
Laurence must have
been taking a good look
as well, because one of
the flamingos said to
him, rudely, “What
are you staring at,
little bird?”
“All of you,” he said
boldly, pushing his chest out.
I think he was trying to make himself look a little
taller. “My companion and I,” Laurence said in a
formal voice, “have traveled many, many miles
from a distant land to meet all of you.”
135
He extended his wing to
include me in the conversation.
He sounded and looked a little
like the Queen of England.
O
o
h
!
I cleared my throat and sat up straight,
to appear more regal.
He continued, “All of my life I’ve dreamed of
meeting flamingos and finding true friendship,
happiness, and a sense of belonging. Now that
time has come. As you can probably
tell, I am a flamingo, and it is my
honor to be reunited with all of
you, my brothers and my sisters.”
Laurence’s speech was
actually pretty good.
The flamingos didn’t
say anything at first.
They looked at us
with their beaks
open. I had a
feeling that they
might not be very friendly.
I was right, because then
something horrible happened:
a small flamingo with a scratchy voice started
laughing. It wasn’t the type of nice laughing that
you get when children are running around on a
beach, splashing in the waves. No, it was a cruel,
mocking sound. It made my skin hurt. All of the
other flamingos joined in.
I wanted Laurence and me to be somewhere
else, far away from these horrible birds. I imagined
us being in Paris on a tandem bicycle with two
freshly baked baguettes in the front basket. That
made me happy, being somewhere else.
And then I remembered again that I can’t ride
a bicycle. I felt sad.
Normally in a situation like this, I would have
found an excuse to wriggle away, but because
I was with Laurence and he was standing there
like a bronze statue with its beak wide open
in shock, I had to stand there as well, to try to
be supportive.
The first flamingo lowered his head to
Laurence’s level and whispered, “You’re not one
of us. You’re just a common, plain bird. No one is
interested in your type.”
140
He and his friends turned their backs to us and
walked away on their twigs. I couldn’t believe
how rude he was. I felt really angry. I wanted to
do something that would make a difference. I
powered up my worm brain to think of something
that would help Laurence.
“Should I go and hit him?” I asked.
“No, don’t do that,” Laurence said.
I was glad, because I’d never hit
anyone before. That was another thing
that they didn’t teach us in worm school.
As I stood there
, feeling like a tiny,
helpless worm, I remembered Robert the Bruce.
Well, not Robert, but the spider who inspired him
to never give up. If that spider were here now, he’d
probably tell me to go and stand up for Laurence.
With that in mind, I wriggled over to the
group of flamingos and said in my boldest voice,
“And WHAT do you THINK you are DOING?”
The flamingos turned to look at me.
try
try
try
again
141
They looked confused. “I said, WHAT DO YOU
THINK YOU ARE DOING?”
The flamingos looked at the ground with
sullen faces, suddenly
ashamed. I couldn’t believe
that they were listening
to me! I felt as big as
a tall building.
“We’re not doing
nothing,” mumbled the
one with the scratchy
voice.
“You’re not doing ANYTHING,” I said,
correcting his grammar while wriggling
slowly and deliberately in a circle around the
four of them.
“What’s he doing?” asked a flamingo with
a big beak, who was now looking pretty worried.
“I heard the way that you spoke to this bird,
Laurence.” Laurence flew and stood by my side.
building
me
“YOU flamingos have been very RUDE and
DISRESPECTFUL to him.”
One of the flamingos looked up for a moment,
her face full of indignation.
“I want you to apologize,” I said.
The birds crossed their wings and huffed
and muttered under
their breaths. “I’m
not going to
apologize,” one of
them mumbled.
143
“NOW!” I said, pretending that I was as big as
a skyscraper.
“Sorry, Laurence,” they said in unison.
That was good, I thought. I liked being a
skyscraper. “And WHY are you sorry?”
“For being rude and disrespectful,” they all
said together.