The Boy Who Swallowed the Moon

Chapter 1: A Very Big Yawn

Leo was the kind of boy who yawned like a lion. Not a polite little yawn, the way you might yawn at a boring story, but a great, wide, cathedral-bell of a yawn, with his arms stretched out and his eyes squeezed shut and his whole face turned up to the sky.

This was fine, most of the time. Nobody minds a big yawn at bedtime. But on this particular night, Leo had been drinking a cup of moonlight.

It had not been his idea. His grandmother had left a cup of it on the windowsill to 'steep,' she said, the way you steep tea — moonlight, she insisted, was at its best when it had sat in the glass for an hour and gone all thick and silver. Leo, who was thirsty and not paying attention, had drunk it down in one gulp.

It tasted of cold and silver and the quiet part of the night. It tasted like the answer to a question he hadn't asked yet.

And then he yawned.

It was his best yawn, his biggest, most enormous yawn, right up at the moon. And the moon — which had been sitting in the sky, round and pale and not expecting any trouble — was caught in the updraft. It wobbled. It tilted. And then it slid down out of the sky, through the open window, and straight into Leo's mouth.

Leo swallowed.

There was a soft, round *glug*.

The night went dark.

'Oh no,' said Leo, with his hand over his mouth. 'I've swallowed the moon.'