Monkey Business by Anna Wilson Page B

‘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