8

Last night I had a dream that he took me back to the little pond. It was smooth and shiny as a brand new window. I laced up the skates and picked my way through the clumps of snow until I caught the sky mirrored in the frozen space. My blade took to the ice gently and soon I felt myself folding into the figure eight.



Eights were always my safe space. The other kids in skate class struggled and fell out and couldn't keep the edge, but not me. I don't know when my obsession for the eight's began, but from as far back as my memory goes, Dad called k8. Sometimes he said I was crazy k8 or busy k8, or sad k8, or silly k8. I could follow the figure for hours, going over and over and over the same line. My world was contained. My world was organized and controlled. I wouldn't fall out and nothing could fall in. I was perfectly safe within my 8. I don't know where it went wrong. Dad says now everyone is just "chasing k8." Maybe she is back at the pond...