Once upon a time, a keyboard sat on a desk in a child’s bedroom. All day long it went tap-tap, click-click.
One morning, Mom Lisa walked past the desk. She tripped over a building block. Bump! Her elbow knocked the keyboard to the floor.
Crash! The letter keys popped out of their little places and rolled all across the room. Roll, roll, roll!
For a moment, everything was quiet. Then the letters opened their eyes and came to life!
The letter O was round as a wheel.
Under the desk, O found a toy car with one missing wheel. Click! O popped right into place.
Vroom-vroom! The little car could drive again, circling happily around the room.
The letter C was curved like a banana. It rolled into the fruit bowl and settled beside the real bananas.
Mom Lisa felt hungry. She reached into the bowl and picked up C.
“Hmm,” she said. “This banana is awfully hard!”
C giggled. “I’m not a banana. I’m the letter C!”
The letter S wiggled across the rug like a little snake. Sss-sss!
Mica the cat saw it and leaped all the way onto the wardrobe.
“Meow! A snake!”
“Don’t worry. I’m only S,” the letter hissed softly.
The letter A stood on two sturdy legs and looked like a tiny tent.
The stuffed bunny crawled right inside. “Hooray! We’re going camping!”
The letter B lay down sideways. What did it look like? A pair of glasses!
The teddy bear placed B across his nose. “At last, I can see everything!”
The letter U looked like a little swing.
A rubber duck climbed in and rocked back and forth. Rock-a-bye, rock-a-bye. Squeak, squeak!
Then Mom Lisa knelt on the floor. “Where are you, my little letters?”
The letters began to return. O arrived on the toy car. C hopped out of the fruit bowl. S slid from beneath the wardrobe.
The bunny let A leave the campsite, and the teddy bear returned his B glasses, even though he did not want to. U came back with the rubber duck still aboard.
Mom Lisa placed the letters back on the keyboard one by one. Click. Click. Click.
But one letter was missing. The letter Z!
They searched under the desk, behind the plant and inside the toy box.
Where could Z be?
Inside Mom Lisa’s slipper! Z was fast asleep, snoring, “Zzzz… zzzz…”
Of course. Z was the letter that loved sleeping most of all.
Mom Lisa smiled, lifted Z very gently and placed it back in its little spot. Click.
Then O yawned. C, S, A, B and U yawned too. Yaaawn!
All the letters were tired from rolling, rocking and camping. One by one, they fell asleep, and the keyboard became quiet.
No tap-tap. No click-click. Only a tiny, sleepy “Zzzz…”
Good night, little letters. And good night to you.
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