Beverly Hills Maasai (3 page)

A figure pushed through the edge of the crowd. There stood Nebala, at last!

I rushed over and threw my arms around Nebala. I felt myself on the verge of tears, but I bit down on the inside of my cheek to drive them away. Crying seemed so … so babyish. Tears, I knew, would not be respected by a Maasai warrior. He wouldn’t cry if he was impaled on a spear.

“It’s so good to see you,” I said softly.

He pushed me an arm’s length away and looked at me intensely, like he was studying me. “Good to see you, Alexandria, too. Very good.” He nodded his head.

I turned and pointed to the other two warriors, who were standing with Olivia. “I thought they were you.”

“Them?” Nebala sounded shocked. “They do not look anything like me!” He paused. “I am
much
more
beautiful
than either of them.”

He started laughing, and I suddenly felt relieved.

“Come, meet my friends.”

“Okay, so those guys really are with you, right?”

“Of course. Did you think three Maasai warriors all appeared at once by some chance?”

“Well, I had kind of figured that it was too strange to be a coincidence.”

“No coincidence. They are with me.”

“Just the three of you … right?” I asked, very nervously. One Maasai warrior was going to be hard enough to explain to my mother. Three was going to
very
difficult. A whole tribe would be
impossible.

He pointed at himself. “One.” Then at the two of them. “Two, three.” He held up three fingers. “Yes,
tatu
… three.”

Okay, three was a lot, but it could have been worse. And I didn’t think my mother would be three times as freaked out as she would have been by one.

“This is my friend Olivia,” I said.

“I’m so pleased to meet you,” she said as they shook hands. “Alexandria has told me so much about you! About how you were her guard, and how you saved her from a herd of charging elephants and everything!”

“Maybe I saved the elephants from Alexandria,” he said.

“What?” Olivia looked more confused than usual.

“He’s just joking, Olivia.”

“Oh, okay,” she said, and giggled nervously.

“These are members of my village, of my tribe,” said Nebala. “This is Koyati.”

Koyati stepped forward. His expression was frozen and fierce.

“He is of my age group. He has killed three lions and is
very
brave.”

“I thought all Maasai were brave,” I said.

“All Maasai
are
brave,” Nebala confirmed. “But Koyati is without fear. His bravery is known to all Maasai.”

“I’m happy to meet you,” I said.

He bowed his head slightly but neither moved nor changed his expression. He looked scary.

“He understands some English but speaks almost none.”

“That should make for some interesting conversations,” I said.

“And this is Samuel.”

“I
told
you that was his name,” Olivia said—again.

He stepped forward the same way Koyati had, but rather than just standing stoically and staring blankly, he smiled until his whole face lit up. Even his eyes were smiling at us.

“He is younger. His group has just come of age. He killed his first lion just two years ago. And he has learned some English.”

“
Jambo
, Samuel,” I said, greeting him in Swahili.

He reached out and grabbed my hand and began pumping my arm up and down.

“Hello,
dude,”
Samuel said.

Both Olivia and I broke into laughter, and for a split second I thought we might have hurt his feelings, until he started laughing as well.

“Perhaps I should have mentioned that there were three of us,” Nebala said. “Does your house have room for three?”

“Her house has room for thirty-three!” Olivia beamed.

“There’s space,” I said. “I’m glad to have your friends as well. I was just a little surprised, that’s all. I’m sure that—” I saw a parking control officer standing by my car, and it looked as though he was writing a ticket.

“Hey!” I screamed as I ran over to my car.

The parking officer looked up at me and scowled. He didn’t look any friendlier than Koyati.

“I’m right here!” I protested. “You don’t have to write me a ticket!”

“It’s a little late for that,” he said. He ripped the ticket out of the book and handed it to me.

“But I was just over there picking up some—”

“The sign says no stopping, no parking.” He pointed at one of the gigantic signs that were on every pillar in both English and Spanish. “Can’t you read?” he demanded.

“Of course I can read. Probably better than you!” I snapped.

“Well, guess what? I can read what I just wrote on that ticket.”

“And that’s probably the most complicated thing you’ve ever read,” I said sarcastically.

“No, the most complicated thing would be the summons when I have a car towed away! You move it now or I’m going to have it—”

He stopped mid-sentence and I realized why.
On all three sides we were hemmed in by Nebala and Koyati and Samuel. They stood, holding their shields, forming a wall that surrounded us.

“Is this girl your wife?” Nebala demanded.

“What?” the parking officer asked.

“This girl you are talking to, is she your wife?” he repeated.

“No, of course not,” he scoffed.

“Is she your daughter?”

“My daughter? Look at her!” The parking control officer was black, and you couldn’t get much whiter than me.

“Is she even of your tribe?” Nebala asked.

“I don’t … I don’t have a … a tribe,” the man stammered.

“If she was of your family or your tribe you could perhaps use such a tone of anger and disrespect,” Nebala said. “But she is not, so you have no right to talk to her this way. You need to apologize.”

The three pressed in close until he was hemmed in against the side of my car with no escape. Now all three wore the same fierce expressions, and he looked terrified.

“Back off!” he yelled. “Or … or … I’ll call for backup!”

They pushed in even closer. This was definitely going to end badly. I’d learned in Kenya that the Maasai didn’t think it was murder if you killed somebody who
wasn’t
a Maasai. I had to do something right away, or the only part of Los Angeles they’d see would be a jail cell.

I shoved back in between Samuel and Nebala and got right into the ticket officer’s face.

“I demand that you call somebody!” I trumpeted. “Get on that radio right now and call your supervisor so I can complain about how you have treated our guests! Do you have any idea who these men are?”

He shook his head vigorously, his eyes still wide with fear.

“This is
King
Nebala’s son. He is a prince.” So maybe the Maasai wouldn’t use that term. Whatever. What else would you call a king’s son?

Nebala’s shoulders straightened and all three moved back a half step.

“He is royalty, and you have treated him with inexcusable disrespect.”

I reached down for his radio and plucked it off his belt.

“Call right now and get your supervisor. You might find that this is the last ticket you’ll ever write.”

“I’m really, really sorry,” he sputtered. “Really sorry … I didn’t know. I didn’t mean anything … I’m sorry, really.”

I turned to Nebala. “Is that apology sufficient for you?”

“He needs to apologize to you, Alexandria, for his harsh words and tone.”

“I’m sorry to her, too!” he exclaimed. “I didn’t mean anything! Here, let me take that.” He reached out and took the ticket back from me and ripped it in two, and then in four and eight, and dropped the pieces to the pavement.

I handed him back his radio.

“Thank you,” I said. “Now is it good?” I asked Nebala.

He didn’t answer at first. He looked as though he was studying the situation, studying the man. Nebala finally placed a hand on the man’s shoulder. “Friend. All is good.”

The man grabbed Nebala’s hand and began pumping it up and down. He reached out and did the same with the other two, and then with me and finally with Olivia.

“You just sit here as long as you need,” he said. “Do you have to get luggage?”

“Oh, yeah, luggage,” I said. “Where is your luggage?”

“Samuel has all our belongings,” Nebala said, motioning to the canvas bag that was on the ground beside him.

“Talk about travelling light,” Olivia said. “My makeup bag is bigger than that.”

I looked at the crowd that was surrounding us. It had continued to get bigger and bigger. There had to be hundreds of gawking people, all watching, all waiting for something to happen. And then, through the crowd, I saw two policemen moving our way. I wasn’t going to count on them being as agreeable—or gullible—as the parking control officer.

“Okay, everybody into the car!” I exclaimed. “Quickly!”

I picked up the bag—it was heavier than I’d guessed—and tossed it into the back seat. It landed with a metallic clatter.

“Olivia up front, and the three of you in the back!”

Olivia opened the door, and I grabbed Samuel and practically pushed him into the back. The other two followed. It wasn’t a very big back seat, and the three of them, their bag, and their shields were all squashed together. Olivia climbed in to the passenger seat, and I circled the car, jumped in, and started it up.

“Nice meeting you!” the parking control officer yelled out.

Samuel stood up and waved to him. “Good night,
dude!”

I squealed away from the curb and Samuel almost toppled out of the car. I looked back through the rear-view mirror. The parking guy continued to wave goodbye. He was now flanked by the two officers. I’d got away without a second to spare.

I kept one eye on the road and the other on the rear-view mirror as we swerved away from the terminal. I was relieved that my backwards glances continued to reveal no police cars following behind. What they did reveal was the reality that there were three Maasai warriors, clutching their shields, in the back seat of my Mustang convertible. Somehow Samuel, who had got in first, had managed to get into the middle. His face, his wide smile, filled the rear-view mirror.

I turned the mirror, angling it so I could see Nebala.

“Nebala, this is all a pretty big surprise,” I said, yelling loud enough to be heard over the roar of the wind.

“No surprise. You invited me, so I came.”

“I mean I was surprised by you being here now.”

“Now is the time.”

I wasn’t sure what that even meant. Was it like Maasai philosophy?

“I figured you might have called to tell me you were coming.”

“I did call … That is how you knew to come to the airport to get us,” he said.

“I didn’t mean call me from the airport. I meant why didn’t you call me from Nairobi and let me know you were on your way?”

“There was not time. I just found out. We had to come now.”

“Why now?”

“It is the time. It is when it will happen.”

“When
what
will happen?” I questioned.

“The run … when the run happens.”

“What run? What are you talking about?”

Nebala pulled out a piece of paper. He reached over the seat to offer it to me.

“I’m driving! Olivia, can you take it?”

Olivia grabbed the crumpled piece of paper and straightened it out.

“A cut above the rest,”
she read out.
“You are invited to the inaugural Beverly Hills Marathon on Sunday, February 25.”
Olivia turned around in her seat. “You’ve come all this way to watch the marathon?”

“Not watch. Run. We are here to
run
the marathon.”

“I had no idea you were a runner,” I said. “How long have you been training?”

“We are Maasai,” he replied simply.

“What does that mean?” Olivia asked.

“They spend their whole lives running,” I explained.

“Without stopping. Never rest,” Nebala added.

“I guess if you’re running a marathon you can’t stop or—” I caught a glimpse of something in the mirror. I took a quick glance backwards. Samuel was standing up, his arms extended into the air as if he were flying!

“You have to make him sit down!” I yelled.

Nebala said something to him in Swahili, and Samuel answered but didn’t sit down.

“He says he is too happy to sit. Too excited. He has never been in a car before.”

“You’re joking, right?” Olivia asked.

“No.”

“But you live hundreds of miles from Nairobi, so how did you get to the airport if you didn’t come in a car?”

“Walked.”

“You walked … hundreds of miles?” Olivia said. “Close to three hundred.”

“Wow! I don’t even like it when I have to park too far from the entrance to the mall,” she said. “Thank goodness for valet parking.”

“What does that mean … ‘valet parking’?” Nebala asked.

“It’s nothing,” I said. “Just something lazy people use so they don’t have to walk.”

“Hey! Hey!” Olivia protested. “You use valet parking. I’ve been with you!”

“I didn’t say I wasn’t lazy.”

Olivia turned around in the seat to face Nebala. “I just can’t believe that you walked hundreds of miles.”

“That’s nothing. We are—”

“Maasai,” I said, cutting him off. “We know, we know.”

“I guess that’s great training for a marathon,” Olivia added.

I noticed the people in the car beside us gaping and laughing and pointing. I’d forgotten about Samuel. He was still standing. In fact he seemed to be standing even taller, as if he was on his tippy-toes. His blanket was blowing and flowing behind him like a cape. If he’d had a big “S” on his shield he could have been “SuperMaasai.”

I looked all around. Once again we were the centre of attention. All we needed now was a police car to pull us over. I was sure that none of the guys had their seatbelts on—they wouldn’t have known what they were.

“Samuel
has
to sit!” I yelled. “Tell him it’s dangerous.”

Nebala said something to Samuel, who said something back and then started to laugh. What he didn’t do was sit down.

“What did you say to him?”

“He said he is not afraid of danger because he is—”