Crow Flight Read online

  “That could be cool. I’ll let you know when it’s ready,” she said. “And then maybe we can make sure their prospective dates aren’t like the square root of -1.”

  Lucas gave a half-laugh, half-snort, the type that was both awkward and endearing. Suddenly Gin wondered who, if anyone, Lucas would be matched with.

  “You know, when Love Fractal’s done, I can run it on you if you want?”

  He paused for a second, fingers frozen over his keyboard, and scrunched up his nose. “Um, maybe.”

  “What—you don’t want to see if your true love is out there?”

  Lucas tapped his cheek and pushed his glasses up. “It’s more that I don’t know if I’m ready. My mom always says that guys like me are best after college. You know, that we age well.”

  Besides the fact that Lucas was probably right—guys like him often were appreciated more a few years down the road—there was another truth in his insight. A great match could fail if the timing was off, while a so-so one could take off if the timing was good. Gin was suddenly thinking of her model—she had accounted for length of time since someone’s last relationship, but maybe there was a second timing layer she could add.

  Truth was, Love Fractal was getting overwhelming. With so many variables, so many little shifts and causal effects, sometimes it seemed impossible to predict anything.

  But she remembered what she and Felix had done with the weather model. Kept it simple. Accounted for only the main variables.

  Maybe that was enough.

  When Gin got to school Monday morning, Hannah was already sitting in front of Gin’s locker, slumped forward.

  “Hey,” Gin said, nudging her.

  Hannah looked up, her eyes red and makeup a mess.

  “Whoa, what’s the matter?” Gin slid down next to her. The floor and the lockers were cold. It was frigid outside—single digits—and from the weather reports, it wasn’t getting warmer any time soon.

  Hannah shook her head and rolled her eyes. “Nothing is wrong. Not really. At least, nothing real.”

  Gin leaned closer so they were shoulder to shoulder. “Well, something’s going on. It doesn’t take a computer model to see that.”

  Hannah sighed. “It’s nothing you couldn’t have guessed. Aidan is an ass. With a capital A. And to be honest, I’m not surprised. Maybe the model thing had me more interested in him than I should’ve been, you know?”

  “Oh, Hannah, I’m so sorry.” Gin’s stomach fell. Mostly because Hannah was upset, but also a little bit because now Love Fractal was 0 for 2. “What happened?”

  “The usual. Hot football guy decides it’s best to date several girls at once. Apparently, it increases your attractiveness when you have a girl or two in the wings. Exponentially. I can see the graph. One girlfriend, and you stay steady, but with two, your attractiveness goes up. Which makes more girls like you, and so it goes up again. It feeds itself, you know?”

  “But you guys were good together. And he liked you.”

  “Yeah, well, tell him that. Apparently, he likes that soccer player, Liv, better.”

  “So he’s dating her? Are you sure?”

  “Oh, I’m sure.” Hannah nodded, her eyes wide. “I went to his house last night. Just to say hi. I walked right in, which I’ve done before plenty of times, because his parents work late, and the door’s always open. Anyway, he was with her. Silly me, thinking he’d want to hang out with me when all he wanted was another girl.”

  “Did you see them . . . you know?”

  “No. I did, however, see them both without their shirts on.”

  Gin put an arm around Hannah’s shoulder. “Oh, Hannah. I’m sorry. That’s awful.”

  Hannah pushed her face into her knees, her unwashed hair falling forward. “Ugh, how stupid.”

  Gin squeezed tighter. “You know, he’s a jerk. He definitely doesn’t deserve you. And I’m sorry the model has been so off. I wish you had called me.”

  “I knew you were working. And I needed to deal for a little, you know?” She reached over and lifted the flap of Gin’s bag. “Any chance you have a granola bar in there? Or chocolate? I’m starving.”

  “Absolutely.” Gin handed Hannah a bar. “So, we should go out Saturday night. I bet the 9:30 Club has a good show. You might meet someone. We’ll try the old-fashioned way.”

  Hannah wiped her eyes. “Okay. Maybe. But first, I’m going to try for Noah.”

  “Noah?” Gin shook her head. “He’s definitely not your type. Anyway, I’ve got more data now—we could run the model again with a bigger pool of candidates.”

  Hannah threw the crumpled wrapper at Gin. “Come on, now. You know you don’t change an experiment midstream. Anyway, give yourself some credit. You’re smart. And your model says Noah might be a match. If he’s not, he could still be a good friend. You know what they say about nice guys.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Then, you’ll just have to wait and find out.” Hannah stood up, stretched, and pulled her jacket back in place. She almost looked like nothing had ever been wrong. Even her smudged mascara could somehow pass as stylish. But her eyes were still damp, and her face was slightly pale. “See you at lunch.”

  Gin watched her go, striding down the hall, trying to act like she owned it.

  // Nineteen

  Gin and Felix worked on the weather model all week. They wrote sections separately, emailing bits of code back and forth, and spent afternoons in the library finishing it up.

  By all accounts, it ended up being a success. Ms. Sandlin gave them a 97 percent, the highest grade in the class. And Gin had finally started to understand Felix’s “soul bits,” which were sort of like the Monte Carlo Method of introducing randomness, only more random.

  The only issue was that they couldn’t get the model to work. It did predict weather—just not accurately. It’d call for wind and cold, but the next day would be warm. Or it’d predict rain for three days, and every day would be dry as a bone.

  “I don’t get it.” Gin was scrolling through the code, Felix twirling his pencil. Ms. Sandlin was giving them class time to work on their big projects, but Gin and Felix still hadn’t started. “I’ve been inputting actual weather data to see if somehow the model will auto-correct, but it’s not working.”

  “I was playing around with it too.” Felix started doodling in his notebook, which was so full of blank pages, Gin wondered how he remembered anything from class. “I think we have the right basics. But maybe it’s too basic. Or, maybe actual weather has been too similar. Like, we need some major weather event or something.”

  “Anyway . . .” She put her finger on his notepad to stop his drawing—but he traced around it. The touch of the pencil along the curve of her fingertip was so intense, she nearly pulled her finger away. “We have to figure out our big project. I have a few ideas.”

  “Let’s hear them.” His pencil moved to another corner of the page. Her finger throbbed.

  She tried to think through her list of ideas, but suddenly, none seemed that good.

  “You know, I don’t think well in school at all.” Felix looked up at her, eyebrows furrowed. “All of these lights and desks and people. We should work outside.”

  Gin leaned back and folded her arms over her chest. “You want to windsurf.”

  He grinned. “Sure, I want to do that, too. But we don’t have to meet at the river. Just outside. Where things move and you can smell the earth and you feel . . . alive.”

  Gin glanced at the clock. They only had ten minutes left, and she could use the time to review for her history test. “Okay, fine. We’ll meet outside. But we have to pick a topic and start working. How about tomorrow?”

  “It’s a date.” He closed his notebook and she tried not to blush.

  When the bell rang, Ms. Sandlin stood. “Winter break is almost here, which means it’s nearly time for our final project check-ins. Bring your topic and preliminary research.”
r />   It was so soon it made Gin want to groan. Felix, however, didn’t seem to care—he was the first one out the door.

  // Twenty

  That night, Gin tried to brainstorm for the final modeling project. But her mind felt like mush. She had a bowl of vegetable soup—her mom had made a Crock-Pot full while Gin was at school, a blessed break from takeout—and she ran the weather model.

  The prediction was a surprise. The model showed snow. Up to eight inches by the next morning. Enough to shut down the whole city for at least a day.

  She felt a leap of excitement—a snow day!—and then remembered the prediction was coming from their weather model. She looked online and found no other sites were predicting snow. Not even a flurry.

  “Stupid model.” Gin said as she raised her window to check. The sky was dark and full of stars, not a cloud in sight.

  A single crow flew by, and Gin thought about messaging Felix. Something funny, like how the model predicted snow so there probably wouldn’t be a single flake this winter.

  But instead, she messaged with Hannah, who was happily watching a movie and ignoring a paper that was due the next day. Then, Gin went to bed, snuggled under her covers, wearing Felix’s fleece and her plaid pajama pants.

  When Gin woke, it felt different. It was warm. Quiet. The sun hadn’t risen, but she opened her curtains anyway and looked out. And gasped.

  It was snowing. Hard. Snowflakes fell in clumps, so fast and thick, they turned the night sky gray-white. A flat pillow smoothed over roads, yards, cars. Lines of white were carefully balanced on every tree limb. Bushes had become puffs of marshmallow.

  Nothing moved. It was as though the whole world had stopped.

  She lifted her window and stuck her head outside, letting the icy snowflakes land and melt, dampening her face.

  The model had been right. It hadn’t predicted anything correctly, except the one thing no one else could.

  She opened her laptop—the “Surprise Superstorm of the Year” was already being covered online. Local schools and government offices were closed, and it was strongly recommended that everyone stay indoors.

  “They should have checked with our model,” Gin said out loud, then laughed. She started to reach for TimeKeeper, as she had a whole day to plan now that schools were closed. But it was all so out of the ordinary, there was no way her program would work. So instead, she lay back and watched the snow swirl through the night sky.

  She woke to her phone buzzing and sun beaming through her window. It was eleven in the morning. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept that late. Usually, sleeping past eight made her feel frantic, as though she’d missed too much of the day already.

  Outside, it looked like a snow globe village. Sloping roofs were iced with snow, like gingerbread houses. Yards, sidewalks, and roads all merged together in one white surface.

  There were a few signs of life. The street, though free of tire tracks, had footprints down the middle, and people had been shoveling driveways and clearing off cars. Kids down the street were building snowmen and throwing snowballs.

  She checked her phone. Felix had texted: Score one for our weather model! Can you meet? I’m almost at the field, and I’ve got the crows.

  She wrote back that she’d see him there soon and started pulling on layers—long johns, fleece pants, a wool sweater. There was no time for Outfitter, and anyway, there weren’t that many options for this weather. She clamored downstairs for a quick bowl of cereal, and after digging her snow boots out of a box in the basement, she popped her head into her dad’s study.

  When routine was broken, her dad could either be something of a mess or strangely happy. Today he was in his armchair, eyes closed, hands folded over his chest. A large whiteboard was pulled up next to him, already covered with colorful words and symbols. She guessed he was happy.

  “I’m going for a walk,” she said.

  He opened his eyes. “Okay.” He didn’t blink for a few seconds, as though his mind was turning through some important concept. Then he held up a finger. “How about pancakes when you get home?”

  “Pancakes? But it’s not Sunday. That’s, like, anathema.”

  He nodded slowly. “You’re right. It is illogical. And not within our routine. But nothing today fits within routine. So pancakes, therefore, make perfect sense. And by then Mom should be up.”

  “Okay, pancakes. I’ll be back in a few hours.”

  He closed his eyes again and settled back in his chair, a faint smile on his lips.

  The snow was so light, it puffed out with each kick of Gin’s boots. The clouds were clearing, and every now and then the sun would burst forward, making icy flakes glint and tree limbs shine.

  There were a few other people out walking, but not many, and by the time Gin got to the field, it felt like the whole world had emptied. It was quiet. No revving engines or horns or squealing brakes.

  She saw the crows first. Just like last time. Glossy black bodies slipping through the sky, high above the snow. She stood upon the hill overlooking the field, watching as two of the crows flew away, flapping hard and fast. When they were gone, the field was almost empty.

  Except for Felix. There was a line of footsteps through the snow to where he stood. His body was straight and still, hands at his sides, eyes focused on the horizon.

  He wore a down coat, tall snow boots, and gray gloves. And a charcoal wooly hat that covered his ears except for the bottom tips, which, even from high on the hill, looked red from the cold.

  There was movement above the trees at the edge of the field. The crows were coming back, focused and fast. Within seconds, they flew to Felix’s hands, and he moved them to his shoulders. Then he blew on his hands for warmth.

  Gin started down. The movement must’ve caught his eye, because he turned, his hand popping up in a wave. He was walking towards her, fast, the crows balanced on each shoulder. She paused to take him in—how strange he looked in this frosted white world.

  “You made it,” he said. “I was getting worried.”

  “Don’t worry. I love snow. And anyway, my dad has an emergency GPS tracker on my phone, so I could never get lost.”

  They were several feet away from each other, but with all of the white space around them, she swore it was closer.

  “Good dad.” He reached out to squeeze her hand. One second, but enough to send a surge of warmth through her body. “So we did it, right? Predicted the unpredictable.”

  “I know.” Her breath was a white cloud and it felt as though her core temperature had shot up five degrees. “I almost called NOAA to see if they wanted rights to our work. But I figured that’d be too much, too soon.”

  “Yeah. They aren’t ready for us yet.” He leaned closer, grinning.

  “How’d you even get here?” It should’ve been her first question. Because no one was out on the roads.

  “My dad had to get to the office, so he had our streets plowed, all the way up to the main roads that they’ve cleared. And my car, though it might not look like it, is built like a tank. Plus, I have chains.”

  Gin shook her head in disbelief, though she should’ve known the Gartners wouldn’t slow down for a snow day. One of the crows on Felix’s shoulders, Beatrix, it looked like, flapped her wings and cawed.

  “Want to see them work? They still have to find some bells.” He stepped back, opening a space between them, and Gin immediately felt colder.

  “Absolutely. Beatrix and Frederick, right?” Funny how in a short time with the crows, they all started to look unique.

  “You got it. And Maggie and Rufus are in the box. Ready for some magic?”

  “You know I am. As long as we’re brainstorming—”

  “About our final project. Should be easy now that we have one working model, right?” He shifted the birds to his hands. “Let’s start the brainstorming now. What do you have?”

  Before she could answer, Felix whistled. The crows
flapped up, and Gin marveled again at the power in such small packages of feather and bone and blood.

  She waited for the birds to get across the field, above the treetops. “Okay. My school ideas first: predict how many kids fail out each year; predict how many kids get into Ivy League schools; predict how many kids get so stressed they fall apart before college even starts . . .” She snuck a look at him out of the corner of her eye. He was smiling.

  “Good. I like those. Especially the last one. What else?”

  “Modeling traffic jams on the Beltway. I mean, if we could make that model work, or find some pattern everyone else has missed, we could be rich. Or I could be rich, and you’d be richer.”

  “True.” Felix watched the sky, thinking. “It’d be fun to try. Especially to account for the use of the model itself. Once people start following what it says, traffic patterns would change. The trick would be to keep the model from making its own traffic jams. It could self-adjust for every user.”

  “That would be cool.” She was already thinking through the logic.

  “So which is your favorite?”

  “That’s the problem.” Gin hugged her arms to herself for warmth. “Nothing feels right. Maybe that doesn’t matter. But I was hoping to find one that felt . . . exciting. How about you—do you have ideas?”

  Felix shrugged. “We could model the success of golfers in different conditions and on different courses. All big CEO’s would love that one. Or model wind direction and speed for windsurfers. Or . . . I don’t know, it’s the same thing. Lots of ideas. None of them that striking.”

  The crows flapped back over the trees. They were each carrying something shiny in their beaks. Gin turned her head up to watch, the cold air stinging her eyes.

  The birds flew down to Felix’s shoulders, and as suddenly as they had appeared, Gin knew exactly what to do. “Crows,” she whispered.

  “What about them?” Felix opened his hands for the bells, and the crows dropped them in.