My Life as a Belching Baboon with Bad Breath Read online

  “Let’s go, son.” The other soldier moved me forward.

  “But,” I said turning to argue, “he saved my life.”

  “Look, kid, do you want inside or not?”

  “Well, yeah, but—”

  “Then you come in, and he stays out.”

  I looked at Tomba with concern. But he nodded for me to go ahead. It was like he was used to being treated this way. Like because he was poor and everything, he was used to it happening.

  Maybe he was.

  I passed through the gate and started up the building steps. Then, turning back to him, I shouted, “I’ll be back, Tomba. I promise, I’ll be back.”

  The little guy gave me that great big smile of his and nodded.

  Chapter 10

  Wrapping Up

  About an hour later, I was sitting in the Embassy hallway when I looked up and saw my family coming toward me. I leaped to my feet and did the required trip-over-the-rug routine (which called for the required

  K-thudding

  on my face).

  Once I got those formalities out of the way, I ran down the corridor toward them, shouting, “Dad!”

  “Wally!” Dad yelled back.

  “Mom!”

  “Wally!” Mom yelled.

  “Carrie!”

  “Wally!” Carrie yelled.

  “Burt and Brock!”

  “Way to go, dorkface.”

  (Isn’t it nice to know some things never change?)

  Of course, Dad tried to be all cool and manly and everything . . . while Mom kissed me so many times I thought my face was going to get blisters. And when she wasn’t kissing me, she was asking me so many questions I thought I’d go deaf (or began wishing that I could). . . .

  “Wally, what happened? Wally, are you all right? What did you do to your feet? Where did you get those shoes?”

  “I’m okay,” I said, gasping for breath between kisses. “Really, I’m all right; everything’s perfectly normal.”

  “If he’s perfectly normal, then something’s majorly wrong,” Brock (or was it Burt?) said, smirking.

  I started telling everyone about all of my adventures, including the attack on the village.

  “It sounds pretty serious,” Dad said.

  I nodded. “It is. We gotta go back. We gotta help them.”

  “We’ll see,” Dad said. “But right now we need to get you to a good hotel, get those feet cleaned up, and have some decent food.”

  “All right!” Burt and Brock high-fived. “A hotel!”

  “But what about the village?” I asked.

  “We’ll tell Diggers. Maybe next time he can—”

  “Next time?? What about now?!”

  “Son, you said yourself you don’t even know where this village is.”

  “But Tomba does. Come on!” I grabbed his hand and dragged everyone back down the hall and out the door. But when we got to the gate, there was no Tomba.

  “Where is he?” I asked the soldier.

  “Who?”

  “The little kid who was with me.”

  “The police told him he had to move on. Said he was an eyesore.”

  “An eyesore!?” My heart sank. I looked up and down the street. “But . . . I’ve still got his shoes.”

  “Those are his shoes?” Mom asked.

  “Yes, he gave them to me. But it wasn’t a big deal for him. In fact, he was kinda happy to do it. It’s like the whole village, they were always happy doing things like that. Even though they didn’t have stuff, they seemed happy.”

  Dad gave me a little smile. “Even though they didn’t have things, they were happy?”

  “Yeah, how weird is that?” I shrugged. “In fact, in some ways they were even happier than us.”

  I looked up to see Dad’s smile turning into a grin. “Sounds like you may have learned a lot more than how to run from wild animals.”

  Now, to be honest, I wasn’t exactly sure what he meant . . . though I suspected it had something to do with why we took this trip in the first place.

  Anyway, after filling out a bunch of papers at the Embassy, we all crammed into a taxi and started for the hotel. I wasn’t crazy about not finding Tomba. I was even less crazy about hanging out in some fancy hotel when there were so many people who needed our help.

  “What about Diggers?” I asked. “Weren’t we supposed to pass out food with him?”

  “We already did,” Mom said. “The people were so desperate, it was gone in the first few hours.”

  “So there’s nothing I can do?”

  “It’s already been done, Sweetheart.”

  I gave a heavy sigh, then leaned back in the seat. The past twenty-four hours hadn’t exactly gone the way I’d planned. Finally, to take my mind off the disappointment, I dug out Ol’ Betsy and went back to work on my superhero story. . . .

  When we last left Rhyming Dude, he was being seduced with the books of Dr. Seuss.

  “Hey, you just made a rhyme,

  And for a kid author, it’s

  pretty fine.”

  “Thanks, dude.” I typed. “But you’re supposed to be under Material Man’s spell of greed, remember?”

  “But do you think that will sell,

  Me being under his spell?

  Because if I’m right,

  Isn’t this where we fight?”

  “Don’t worry, I have it all under control. Now, if you don’t mind, let’s wrap up . . .”

  “You’re the writer.”

  “That’s right.”

  Our hero nods and continues reaching for the books. Closer and closer he comes. He sees only the books. He dreams only of owning them. He wants only to——

  “Excuse me, I don’t want to

  be a jerk,

  But do you really think that

  this will work?”

  Ignoring him (and deciding my next superhero story will star someone who can’t speak), I gave Material Man another menacing

  “Moo-hoo-ha-ha-ha”

  laugh.

  “Thanks, I was beginning to think you’d forgotten about me.”

  (Maybe my next bad guy won’t speak, either.) But for now...

  He continues his menacing materialism by telling our hero, “And to prove there are no hard feelings for all those awful rhymes you’ve made me listen to, I’ll let you have your big-screen TV back, too!”

  In a flash, our bad boy motions for one of his servants to wheel in the TV he’d stolen way back on page 19. It’s a nice idea, except for the commercial that’s playing on it. Well, it really isn’t a commercial, it’s one of those “Help Feed the Hungry” spots they’re always showing. You know the type, with all those starving kids with sticklike arms and legs...and flies.

  Now, Rhyming Man has seen these commercials a hundred times before. But for some reason, this time he really sees them. It’s strange, but he really sees them.

  “Not so strange, Mr. McDoogle,

  With all that you’ve seen

  Still running through your

  noodle.”

  Well, whatever the reason, as our hero stares at the screen, the sinister spell suddenly snaps.

  “What’s going on?” Material Man demands. “What happened?!”

  “Look at the people in such need,

  All the ones we can’t feed,

  All the ones you won’t heed,

  All because of your selfish greed.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous; my greed’s not making them hungry.”

  “But it’s your greed that’s not fixing it. It’s your greed that’s stopping you from helping others.”

  “Hey, wait a minute,” Material Man says. “What happened to your rhymes?”

  “Sorry, this is too important to fool around with rhymes.”

  “But that’s your thing.”

  “Not anymore.”

  “Really?” Material Man asks. “Wow, the next thing you’re going to tell me is that the upcoming fight scene isn’t important to you, either.”


  “That’s right.”

  “But that’s where you win. That’s where you save the day and become the heroically handsome hero.”

  “I think there are other ways to be a hero.”

  “Really? Without beating me? Without forcing me to give all my cool stuff away?”

  “I think you need to give back the things you’ve stolen.”

  “Oh, brother.”

  “But I think it’s okay to have stuff——”

  “Oh, great!”

  “But it doesn’t have to be the biggest, or the best, or the most.”

  “Oh, really?”

  “Really. I mean, there’s so many people we could be helping.”

  “You mean like all those faces on that TV commercial?”

  “They’re more than faces,” Rhyming Dude says. “They’re real people with real moms and dads and brothers and sisters.”

  “Hmm...I guess I never really looked at it that way.”

  “Think about it. Wouldn’t it be cooler to put your money into somebody’s life instead of some bigger, fancier gizmo? Wouldn’t you be happier saving somebody instead of buying the latest thingamabob that’s just going to break down and rust anyway?”

  “Well, now, that’s a good point. I mean, all thingamabobs eventually rust...but people never do.”

  “Exactly!”

  And so, as we come to another corny ending (that’s more than a little preachy)——

  “But preachy with a good point,” Material Man interrupts.

  ——(That’s preachy with a good point.) The music begins and we roll credits as our two characters continue talking over what they can do to help others. Eventually, they lock arms and begin strolling into the sunset. All this as Rhyming Dude sacrifices his extremely limited talent for rhyming——

  “Hey, I heard that!”

  ——to help the poor and starving (not to mention sparing the rest of us all the extra ear suffering).

  “I heard that, too.”

  Because any sacrifice we make, no matter how small (or extremely limited), will be a way of doing good for others.

  I looked up from Ol’ Betsy. It’s true, it was a pretty corny ending. (Aren’t they all?) But it’s also true, it had a pretty good point. I turned and glanced out the taxi window just as we passed some supercheap discount shoe place.

  Suddenly, I had an idea.

  “Wait a minute!” I shouted. “Wait a minute!”

  “Now what?” Burt said, sighing.

  “What about shoes? Did those people you and Diggers gave the food to have shoes?”

  Dad shook his head. “Not that I could see.”

  “Then let’s stop the taxi and buy them some shoes!”

  It was Brock’s turn to sigh. “With what as money, brainless?”

  He had me there . . . but only for a minute. “With the money we save by not staying in a fancy hotel tonight!”

  “Yeah, right,” Carrie scoffed. “And what about dinner?”

  “We could skip that, too!” I exclaimed. Turning to Dad, I asked, “Could we? I mean, we’ve come all the way here, can’t we do some more things?”

  Dad glanced at Mom. “Well,” he said, “we know Diggers is sleeping in the plane tonight. And he has plenty of antiseptic that we can clean up your feet with. I suppose we could stay with him.”

  Mom nodded. “And pass out the shoes tomorrow morning before we leave.”

  After another moment, Dad called out to the driver. “Stop the cab.”

  “WHAT?!” Burt, Brock, and Carrie cried out in perfect, three-part agony.

  As the car slowed to a stop, Dad dished out the money to the driver and said, “Looks like our little mission trip isn’t entirely over yet.”

  As we climbed out of the car, Brock (or was it Burt?) leaned over and whispered in my ear, “You’ll pay for this, moron . . . believe me, you’ll pay.”

  I gave a nervous smile (the type condemned prisoners give in front of firing squads)—before we turned and risked our lives crossing the

  HONK! HONK!

  SQUEAL! SQUEAL!

  street to the shoe store.

  One thing you could say about Burt and Brock: They always kept their word—especially when it came to doing me bodily harm. Which meant our little shoe-shopping adventure would cost me a lot more than a missed meal or a night in a fancy hotel.

  But even that seemed a small price to pay, especially if it meant giving people the help they needed.

  And for some strange reason, as we entered the store, I felt my smile growing bigger. It’s like I was feeling a joy I hadn’t felt before. The type Diggers had talked about. The type I saw on the villagers’ faces when they gave me their food, or when little Tomba gave me his shoes.

  The type of joy I suspected Mom and Dad wanted us to experience when they first dreamed up this little trip. A joy that they couldn’t buy, but that made this the best Christmas present ever.

  Oh, and one last thing: It’s been a couple of months since our little trip, and I just got this e-mail from Diggers. It’s pretty neat, so I figured you’d want to read it . . .

  Sent: 22 Feb 4:10 p.m.

  From: Diggers

  To: Wally McDoogle

  Subject: hi

  hey, wally!

  i just got back from another trip to africa and read your book on the plane. thanks for sending it. very, very cool . . . (except you didn’t spend enough time describing how awesomely great i look). oh well, maybe next time.

  i also liked the part where material man finally learned his lesson . . . and i guess you did, too! double cool!!

  i ran into ben, that village chief you were with, at our latest food drop. he wanted me to say hi and tell you tomba and the rest of the villagers are doing fine. the militia gave them quite a scare but didn’t seriously hurt anybody.

  now they only have to fight the usual stuff . . .

  starvation and disease.

  listen, i’ve got a great idea. if any of the kids reading your book feel like they want to help folks similar to ben and his village, have them contact your Wally McDoogle Fan Club on the internet. that way you can send them links to cool ministries that will tell them how they can donate money and stuff to help.

  that’s all i know, bro. stay cool, and keep blessing God by blessing others!

  see ya,

  diggers

  So there you have it . . . another major mishap turned into a major adventure and an even majorer (don’t try that word on your English teacher) lesson.

  I’ll do my best to remember it. You do, too, okay?

  Cool.