If I Was a Toy: The Trilogy

By Sarah Smith

Welcome to Sallys world, where the impossible becomes possible. Where imagination has no boundaries. Travel with her and her friends through countless journeys from the Amazon rain forest to the end of the universe with fun, laughter, a tinge of sadness and learn along the way.

Witness Sallys transformation into a lion with an attitude, her doll Sarah transforms into a bird as mad as a March hare. A cross dressing frog Trichobatrachus and his long -suffering Brother Robusius.

They begin their adventure to find a name for a little elephant as only Parents together can name their babies, and with her Mother Rebecca Alice Pompadour Numpty by her side off they go into the great unknown.

You will meet a crocodile called Gum Drop with a bad case of halitosis, a heart as big as the sun, with a philosophy in life to smile, think, give, laugh, love, dream and not to look back as he wasnt going that way.

A family of giraffes that will have you laughing you socks off, but that is okeydokey as a very big pink hairy yak called Zak likes to wear a pretty one.

Follow these animals and more and build up a kaleidoscope of wonderful colours and memories, to enjoy whenever you wish.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Jun 1, 2018
• ISBN: 9781546293101

Sarah Smith

Sarah Smith is a copywriter-turned-author who wants to make the world a lovelier place, one kissing story at a time. Her love of romance began when she was eight and she discovered her auntie’s stash of romance novels. She’s been hooked ever since. When she’s not writing, you can find her hiking, eating chocolate, and perfecting her lumpia recipe. She lives in Bend, Oregon, with her husband and adorable cat, Salem.

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© 2018 Sarah Smith. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse  05/24/2018

ISBN: 978-1-5462-9306-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-9310-1 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

CONTENTS

Dedication

Book One

If I was a Toy

by Sarah Smith

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Book Two

My Toys and I

By Sarah Smith

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Book Three

We Are Toys

By Sarah Smith

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Epilogue

DEDICATION

To Rebecca and Barbara.

For my Daughter Rebecca who has patiently edited these books for me.

For Barbara, my good friend who has supported me unconditionally throughout my writing journey.

BOOK ONE

If I was a Toy

by Sarah Smith

CHAPTER 1

As Sally went to bed, she waited for her mother to read her favourite bedtime story to her. If her mother was honest, she would admit it bored her now, and she wished her daughter would choose another one.

Her mother began, yawned, and fell asleep. Now what? Sally called to her father. Perhaps he would read it to her. But he yawned and fell asleep too. Now what? So, she called to her brother, Jonathan, and he yawned and fell fast asleep.

Obviously, there was a yawning disease. But Sally was still wide awake, bright-eyed, and bushy-tailed. She had a little laugh to herself and hoped she wasn’t bushy-tailed. She checked to make sure. All good in that department.

Tomorrow was her birthday. She hoped her family would not sleep through and miss it. Sally had been a little naughty earlier that day and had looked for her presents. She searched high and low and found nothing. Then she decided to look in the back of her wardrobe, and there they were. Clever, she thought, but not quite clever enough!

As Sally was remembering her present-hunt, there was a bright white flash, and she had to close her eyes tight. When she opened them, her doll Sarah was beside her. And not only that, she was talking to her! Unable to believe what was happening, she shut her eyes tight again and then opened them, just as Sarah said, Hello.

Sally pulled her covers up over her eyes and thought she must be dreaming. Dolls didn’t talk… or did they? She sat bolt upright in bed and asked Sarah, Are you real and talking?

Oh, yes, Sarah replied.

Sally’s wardrobe door suddenly opened, and all her presents walked towards her, shedding their wrapping paper as they did so. Being a very tidy person, her mother would have something to say about the mess.

Sarah introduced Sally to a little toy soldier. He had a black hat upon his head and was dressed in a smart uniform of blue with shiny silver buttons. His gleaming black shoes were so polished you could see your face in them. And she did. Oh, dear, what am I like? I haven’t brushed my hair. ’Scuse me. I wasn’t expecting visitors.

She asked the soldier his name, to which he replied, I prefer to be called Small Soldier.

That was odd, but she felt he must have his reasons and thought no more about it. Sally was then introduced to two teddy bears, holding hands. How cute, she thought. One was called Bruno, and he had a yellow bow tied around his neck. He introduced Tessa, who also had a yellow bow; hers was around her head. Next, she saw a very big, hairy, pink yak. He introduced himself. My name is Zachariah, Zac to my friends. Sally was about to ask him why he was pink when he said, Don’t you dare ask why I am pink. So, she didn’t. But even stranger were two puff balls on his back, both blue. She and was about to ask their names when Zac said, Don’t ask their names as they don’t have any.

That’s weird. Does he read minds? Sally didn’t find out the answer as she noticed a beautiful elephant walking towards her. She was dressed in a cloak of purple and gold. By her side was the cutest little baby elephant she had ever seen. The baby was dressed in a cloak of blue and pink. Both cloaks were edged in sequins of silver and gold that shone.

The mother elephant introduced herself. My name is Rebecca, but my calf doesn’t have a name.

Sally was delighted to also see a giraffe, who said, my name is Sweet Pea. Okey-dokey, Sally thought.

Sally felt very sorry for the no-names and asked Sarah why they didn’t have names. She told Sally that the mothers and fathers liked to name them together, but the fathers were missing. Sally asked how they could find the missing fathers and found out they were missing in Africa, but no one knew where.

Sally asked Rebecca where she came from and was told she couldn’t remember anything other than it rained all the time. She told them that wasn’t a problem; she just tied her ears in a bow and used them as an umbrella and demonstrated how that was done. The sight looked very funny. If she just held her ears out wide it would have been better! They continued to laugh as the baby calf tried to copy her mother, but she hadn’t mastered the art of bow making just yet. Perhaps in time.

Sally marvelled at all that was happening. She caught a glimpse of herself in the bedroom mirror and nearly died of fright. Staring back at her was a lion. And a very bright orange one at that! As she looked around, Sally realised Sarah had turned into a beautiful blue and orange bird and was preening and puffing in front of the mirror. The two teddy bears had turned into bright pink monkeys, and the small soldier had turned into a frog. The giraffe looked very sad, and Sally asked him, Why are you sad?

He replied, I am still a giraffe. Sarah explained that they needed him to stay the same. His height would be invaluable to them in Africa as he would be able to see above the treetops. He proudly announced, Yes, I am fourteen feet tall, taller than three adult men standing on each other’s heads.

Sarah explained that everyone was to be an animal so they could use their senses to find the fathers and that she, as a bird, would be able to fly high to see if there was any danger. The monkeys could swing through the branches and the frog can scour the ground. There’s a place for everyone, Sarah told her.

Suddenly, they all heard the whistle of a train and someone shouting, all aboard. They all scrambled on, arguing and trying to find a window seat, which they did in the end. Sally realised even toys argued.

The train rattled onwards and upwards, until it finally came to a halt, and everyone got off. The giraffe said, Not quite everyone. It looks like Tessa forgot to get off the train! But worry not, due to my height and grandeur, I can see she has gotten off at the next station. Oh, and she is talking to someone.

Bruno was shocked and said, No one should talk to strangers. He was told not to worry as they could easily walk to the next station. So off they went. At the next stop, Sally noticed a tall soldier and politely asked him what his name was, only to be told he preferred to be called Tall Soldier. She took a sneaky peak, and there on his name tag it said, Archibald. She asked Tall Soldier if he knew how to get back to the previous station where her friends were. She explained they were looking for a place in Africa to name the no-names. Can you help? she asked.

I know only parents can name their babies together. But I am looking for my brother, Small Soldier. He has a drum around his neck, and I have his drumsticks.

Sally told him she knew where his brother was. Just as she was about to say, He is now a frog, Tall Soldier disappeared. But not for long. She looked on her shoulder, and there he was… a frog! Sally suppressed a giggle. There they were—lion and a green frog. Hardly a matching pair, but at least they were not alone.

As they looked around, they saw everyone else. Tall Soldier jumped off Sally’s shoulder and rushed up to his brother. They were pleased to be together again. Sally said, Snap! A matching pair.

Sarah asked Sally if she had a map. I do, but it is back in my bedroom. Can we go back and fetch it?

Out of nowhere, a bus appeared in front of them all. Everyone scrambled on, trying to get a window seat, which they did. And before you knew it, they were back in Sally’s bedroom. Her family were still asleep, snoring their heads off. Sally hoped she did not snore like that. She wondered if an earthquake would awaken them, but one was not forecast, so that was a relief.

Just to be on the safe side, Sally told them to be as silent as a feather. When her brother stirred, they all tried to hide in Sally’s wardrobe. Two elephants, one yak and his puff balls, or his puffi’s as he liked to call them, a giraffe, two frogs, and a lion were impossible to fit into one wardrobe. So, the bird and the frogs hid behind the door, not that it helped. If her brother awoke, he would have seen two elephants’ trunks, a giraffe’s tail, a lion’s face, a lot of feet, and a pink bottom.

Then Jonathan woke up. They all held their breaths as he made his way to the door, opened it, and left the room. Everyone fell out of the wardrobe and looked a bit blue (lack of oxygen did that to an animal) and as they tried to regain their composure they realised the bird and the frogs were a bit squished. The bird lost a feather or two and the frogs blew themselves back up again and were as good as new. The frogs disappeared and Sally noticed they were clinging on to her mam’s face by their tongues. She asked why they had done that as they could hardly take her mother with them, to which they replied, There was a nice juicy fly we were after.

That’s disgusting said the bird as they were all reminded they were not Toy Soldiers anymore but two amphibians.

Now left with the problem of detaching them. Rebecca said, Form a line behind me and together we will pull, so they did and still the frogs remained stuck! Now what? Suddenly the bird appeared and dropped a handy bar of soap slap bang in the middle of the frogs and said, Rub a dub, dub. At last they were free as the frogs stared daggers at her and said Charming, couldn’t you have used perfume-free?"

Sally said, Let’s get to the matter in hand, I will get the map it is in my wardrobe. Only when she checked she found it wasn’t there. She concluded that her brother must have borrowed it without asking.

The frogs took a bit of initiative and walked towards the door, map or no map they would have to do their best, only they opened the wrong door and landed in a broom cupboard! They ended up covered in a toilet brush, a few dusters and a hoover! Rebecca laughed and her and her baby elephant walked to the right door, but they tried to go through at the same time and got stuck! The frogs had a laugh about that, their problem paled in comparison to two elephants stuck in a doorway. However, they kindly said, We will assess the situation and report back. Which they did and said, Two elephants are stuck in the doorway, Mother and baby, doing fine.

The elephants were certain that no one had any sense and they would have to get out of this little embarrassing situation themselves, so the mother tied her ears in a perfect bow and they were all through the door in no time.

They looked at the frogs and one had a very rotund tummy. Sally asked if they had eaten too many flies, to which he replied, No I haven’t. I have swallowed a globe. As we couldn’t find a map I thought that was the next best thing.

Sally asked what was wrong with just carrying the globe out? Well he couldn’t answer that one and turned a dusky pink and looked at the ground. They heard the rumblings of another train approaching and boarded it, all quite despondent, knowing there was only one way to remove the globe and that it would not be pleasant. The frog was not too happy about it but they thumped him hard on the back and the globe shot out of his mouth as he said Scuse me.

However, the globe shot out of the train’s window and they all followed quickly. But, as with anything round, it rolled away so they all followed in hot pursuit. They quickly stopped when they realised that the giraffe now had a rotund tummy as she had accidentally swallowed the globe. They told her to cough and when that didn’t work they told her to jump up and down. When that didn’t work they told her to push, and she did and there it was… only it wasn’t. It was a tiny new born giraffe. After a lot of coochie coos they saw one frog being a bit rude and looking at the giraffe’s underbelly and proclaimed, The baby giraffe is a girl!

The bird decided to inform everyone that Small eared elephants are from Africa and that African elephant’s ears are like a map of Africa. Hey, we could use Rebecca’s ears instead of the globe!

Rebecca, however, was not happy with this and said, You will not be using my ears as a map, I have my pride!

The little elephant looked up at her Mother and said We are, and they can use my ears, I don’t mind.

But her mother told her, "Young lady, us elephants must maintain our pride and our dignity. We are not, and I say again, we are not maps."

A tiny Oh escaped the baby’s mouth.

The monkeys asked, Globe it is then. But where is it? And more importantly, where are we?

The rain lashed down and the monkeys shivered. The bird told everyone they must be in the rainforest in the African jungle and Rebecca said That’s right, I remember now. But she was talking to the breeze and wondered where everyone had gone? It didn’t take her long to realise they were all underneath her, protecting themselves from the rain, she stamped her feet in exasperation. Was she now a rain blocker as well as a map?! There was no need to use her as either because they were all as wet as umbrellas to begin with!

She felt a tickling sensation on both ears and realised it was the frogs and batted them away with her trunk as she heard, Scuse us, we were just looking at your map, and by our reckoning we are slap bang in the middle of the rainforest.

Everyone groaned and asked them to tell them something they didn’t know, to which the frogs replied, The globe is over there and there are a load of sloths playing football with it.

Right enough, there were some sloths paying football with the globe. Well that should be easy to get the globe back as sloths were slow. The bird said, Sloths aren’t slow under water."

The new born giraffe was now up on her feet, albeit a bit like a wonky donkey at her first attempts. Her mother, Sweet Pea, had something important to say and they all listened intently.

"I was born a giraffe

I had a wonky donkey

Scuse me, a wonky giraffe

She doesn’t have a name."

Feeling sad, they all promised they would find her Father for her. Sweet Pea had a little chuckle over that, as she knew the father was called Farter, but didn’t elaborate. Not to be outdone, the little elephant, with her trunk in the air, said:

"I am a little elephant

I was never a wonky donkey

I don’t have a name

I don’t have a Dad.

I am a little cutie."

Well no one could argue with that. The little giraffe felt outshone and walked around sadly, only to find the two frogs had got themselves stuck to her feet! Her mother rushed up to help and tried to pull the frogs off, which she did. But she soon realised that they were now attached to her ears and it looked as though she was sporting a pair of dingily-dangly flashing earrings.

The frogs looked at each other and thought ‘what are we like’ as they blamed each other for the predicament they were in. Not that that helped. The next thing did though, as the bird kindly found a bar of soap and rubbed it on the frog’s tongues until they dropped off. They fell on the ground and bounced straight up in front of Sally’s eyes and said. How diddly you do.

Sally replied, How diddly you do too, and everyone looked up and saw the frogs were now dangling from a tree branch. They whizzed around and around the branch by their tongues which made everyone roll around the floor in stitches.

Sally decided that they needed to get a move on and said, We need to find the globe and the Fathers and the little baby giraffes Farter.

Suddenly, the rain started to fall very heavily. They were all washed down the river and straight into a load of sloths, complete with their sloth moths flying around them and lurid green algae. They were playing football with the globe. Now what? Did they risk being covered head to foot in green algae and being attacked by sloth moths? They pushed the frogs forward, their reason being the frogs were green anyway, to the sounds of, Well isn’t that nice!

They tried to grab the globe and run, but found they were stuck to the globe, with no control over it though. Off they rolled with everyone else running after them when they found themselves mid-air spinning, around and around on the finger of one sloth, as the sloth said, Ha, got you.

They extended their sticky tongues and attached them to either of the sloth’s face and said, Ha, got you.

All that accomplished was a mouth full of sloth moths and a silly grin on the sloth’s mouth as they heard the little baby elephant in the background telling them a sloth is a mammal and classified as Megalonlonychidae or Bradypodidae or the scientific name Folivora. She revelled in telling them that it takes them a month to digest one meal and have a four-part stomach and could be called Bradypus, short for slow feet.

They sleep for fifteen to twenty hours a day and if they waited a while they should drop off.

The baby giraffe told them it was a good job they didn’t go to school as the little baby elephant added ten thousand years ago they grew to the size of an elephant. Not to be outdone, the giraffe continued by saying they swim using the breast stroke technique and thus began the rivalry between the baby elephant and the baby giraffe.

The poor frogs were more bothered by the three-inch claws and that big silly grin that never disappeared. Eventually the sloth curled up into a ball and soft squeaky sounds could be heard from their snoring. The frogs looked at each other and said, How cute, can we keep her?

However, the globe spun off towards a forest and the group ran after it. They were stopped by rather large tree root and ended belly up in a most ungainly position, looked at each other and said, Well this is embarrassing. What a fine mess we are in.

All of a sudden, the tree root moved and turned out not to be a tree, but a giant orange ape who said, I am not amused you have awoken me from my slumber and why is that yak pink?

Zac hid behind Sally and muttered, It’s my business and mine alone then found more clout for his voice and asked the ape Why are your orange?

That was the two of them glaring at each other, neither giving way. No one was getting anywhere fast, so the little giraffe said, Let’s start again and introduce ourselves, you my orange friend are an orangutan and we are… but before she could finish the orangutan said, A load of nutters.

Sally stepped forward and told the orangutan that they were on a mission to find everyone’s fathers so that they could help the mothers name their children. The orangutan said, So what? What do you want me to do about it?

Sally and her friends decided to leave the rude orangutan and continued on their way. Or at least they tried to until they realised the frogs weren’t there. They headed back and saw the orangutan spinning them around on the globe as she said, Lost something?

This spinning around wasn’t helping the frogs one bit and they looked like a pair of spinning tops and the decision had to be made of how to get both the globe and the frogs back. The baby giraffe crept up towards the orangutan, then shouted, at the top of her voice, Boo.

The orangutan dropped the globe and off it bounced, further into the forest. The frogs leapt onto Rebecca’s ears who reminded them that she didn’t want to be used as a map. The baby elephant and the