The Best Place to Be

"You got an email," Abigail's mom told her. "Looks like it's from Ellie." Abigail, whose family were missionaries in Nigeria, eagerly took Mom's phone and opened the email."Yesterday Daphne and Ashlyn and I went to an amusement park," Abigail read in Ellie's email. "I wish you could have been with us! We went on a pirate ship ride and on an alpine slide." Abigail sighed. Going on rides with her friends sounded like fun!"But the African safari river ride was the best one of all," the email continued. "It was so much fun! There were robotic elephants that sprayed water at us, and some mechanical monkeys were chattering in the trees. It seemed so real." Abigail laughed out loud when she read that. Ellie should come visit me here, she thought. Then she could see real elephants and monkeys.Just then Benji, Abigail's pet monkey, snuggled up to her. Benji loved being around Abigail and always followed her around the house. Abigail gave him a little squeeze. "You're better than a mechanical monkey," Abigail told him. "You're real."Abigail thought about all her other pets. Freddy, a baby antelope, was a pretty brown color with a black stripe. And a mongoose named Rollo was a family favorite.Abigail smiled as she remembered the time Rollo found a ping-pong ball on the floor. She apparently thought it was an egg--one of her favorite foods. She smacked it hard to break it, then jumped back in surprise when it bounced as high as her head.Of course, Rollo sometimes annoyed them by chirping a lot. But she made up for it by eating cockroaches and other insects. And Abigail knew that when Rollo got bigger, she would also eat snakes!Abigail grinned. Not many kids have pets like mine! she thought. And even though I really miss my friends back home, I have new friends at our church here, and I know God is helping our family tell the people here about Jesus. Even though it's hard sometimes, I know He brought us here and promises to be with us, so this is the best place for me to be. "C'mon, Benji," she said. "Let's go find Rollo and take some pictures to send my friends back home." –Charlie VanderMeer