BENJAMIN'S BIG MOON SECRET (Word Count 1431) (standard:adventure, 1417 words)
Author: Rosie Jay	Added: Oct 18 2006	Views/Reads: 3602/2347	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
With his bigger-than-life imagination, Benjamin loves to play at pretending. One weekend, it all backfires as he tries to undo a problem he's created.

BENJAMIN’S BIG MOON SECRET 

By  Rosie Jay 

Benjamin Baxter Blake had lots of friends.  They played lots of games. 
But the game he loved best was the game of pretending—simply 
pretending.  With a super-size imagination like his, how easy it was!  
None of his friends could match it—no way, no how.  But one weekend, 
all that pretending got him into quite a fix 

Oh, it began simply enough on one Friday night.  Benjamin had gone to
bed and couldn’t fall asleep—not one wink.  Too much moonlight was 
streaming through the window.  He tossed, he turned, for quite a while. 
 Finally, he decided to climb out of bed and pull the curtains closed, 
and that’s when he saw it—really saw it—for the very first time. 

The moon, bigger and brighter than he had ever seen, had a face! 

“Sparky, take a look at that!” he cried out. 

Sparky, curled up on the rug beside Benjamin’s bed, wagged his tale,
just a little.  Moonlight didn’t bother him at all.  He was already 
nodding off, with no problem at all. 

By morning, Benjamin was eager to tell Dad all about it.  But moon-talk
would have to wait.  Dad was too busy with over-the-fence talk with Mr. 
Rooney, the neighbor next door.  Then it was phone-talk with Mom, 
promising her he would paint the living room today while she was 
visiting Aunt Harriet in Chicago.  Opportunity came a half-hour before 
lunch when Dad was practicing golf shots with his shiny new putter in 
the backyard. 

Benjamin described his moon tale in such fine detail.  “It was truly
awesome,” he said gleefully. 

Dad listened carefully as he whacked a golf ball into a tin can across
the yard.  “Yep, but did you know that face on the moon was formed by 
craters long ago?” he explained. 

“Craters, Dad?” 

“Craters, Benjie.  They are large deep holes on the moon’s surface. 
From far away, that’s exactly what they look like—a face.” 

Somehow, explanations like that always seemed so boring, but that was
the end of it.  Since Dad had a busy day ahead, Benjamin said no more.  
He watched as Dad returned the putter to the golf bag in the garage 
before going inside.  “I’ve got a lot to do today,” he reminded 
Benjamin, “but first it’s lunchtime, so I’ll call you in a few 
minutes.” 

Except for Sparky, Benjamin was all alone now.  The whole backyard was
his.  Being who he was, he began to pretend again as only he could do.  
He would be the world’s greatest golfer!  He went to the garage and 
pulled the shiny new putter from the golf bag.  In moments he was 
walking back and forth, measuring the distance just like Dad, waving to 
the crowd and then swack!  He putted that little golf ball clear across 
the yard into the tin can.  What it took was a lot of hard work.  He 
missed a lot.  When Dad called him for lunch, he was so hungry from all 
that effort, he dropped the putter and hurried inside. 

Dad was already stirring paint, so Benjamin sat alone, except for the
radio, that is.  But, hey, the ballgame was on!  All the while he ate 
his peanut butter sandwich, his banana, and gulped his milk, he 
listened, pretending he was behind home plate at the ballpark.  
Stee-rike!  But he wasn’t finished being the world’s greatest golfer 
yet, so when he finished he went outside again—and, oh, how shocked he 
was! 

The tin can was there.  The golf ball was there.  Sparky was there.  The
only thing NOT there was the putter, right in the middle of the 
backyard where he had dropped it.  It was nowhere in sight—just gone, 
gone, gone! 

Looking about, Benjamin scratched his head.  Could it have disappeared


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