Favorite

By Ben Morrow


"What's in this cake?" asked the nephew who had just learned not to trust adults.

"Hammers," I said.

"No there isn't," he replied, but I'd placed a seed of doubt.

"I can't taste any hammers, just chocolate."

"Of course," I said, "they're tiny chocolate hammers."

The Hammer Cake is his new favorite, coincidentally, also mine.

Bedtime

by Ben Morrow


"Once upon a time the end," said my older brother.

"What?!"

"Okay," he said with his annoyed voice, "I'll read it again."

"Once upon a time the end," he said, flipping the pages of the book under his thumb.

"That story is too short!" I protested.

"Too bad. You can't read. Now go to bed."