Don't Count Any Star Twice

Don’t Count Any Star Twice

 
On a new moon midnight, the father drives his seven-year-old daughter to a distant town, walks her into the middle of a large field, turns off his flashlight, hands her a toilet paper tube, and tells her to count the stars. He is saving her from herself; he knows her idea of drawing constellations couldn’t win the science fair.
 
Her cold fingers fumble with the tube pressed to her eye. When she counts eleven, her father grabs the tube to see for himself: “Don’t count any star twice!” She tries again: nine?. . .seven? Stars jostle and hide behind each other. Wet grass soaks her sneakers. Ten counts for each of six fields.
 
Parked in their driveway, her father shows her how to average numbers, but her brain is tired and she can’t stop shivering. She has forgotten the project is to measure light pollution; she only knows she can’t count. While her father finishes off the math, she looks out the windshield. Two . . . none. 
 
 
First published in Hermeneutic Chaos Journal