Chapter OneGolden Spiral
Day 112 I.L.
David was convinced that this was the day Amie would escape the time loop.
“One hundred twelve,” he said as they walked past Eons Café. “You’re familiar with the Fibonacci sequence?”
Amie wracked her brain, trying to summon memories from middle school math. She hoped she was just imagining things, but the longer she spent repeating the same day, the harder it felt to recall pre-loop memories (especially the ones she’d already made an effort to suppress, a category under which most of her time in middle school fell).
“Every number in the sequence is the sum of the two numbers that come before it,” David continued mercifully. “Zero, one, one, two, three, five—”
“Bicycle,” Amie interrupted. She pulled David to the curb a few seconds before a bicyclist rounded the corner and sped past them.
“Wear a helmet!” David yelled. Amie joylessly mouthed the words along with him.
They continued walking without further comment on the bicyclist. The novelty of Amie’s prescience always swiftly faded for David. He was more interested in discussing the time loop itself than watching Amie continue to prove its existence.
“The Fibonacci sequence can be used to construct a Fibonacci spiral,” he continued, “which is a golden spiral that repeats infinitely.” He paused, giving Amie a pointed look.
“Like a time loop,” she said half-heartedly. She was having difficulty finding enthusiasm for this theory, but didn’t want to discourage him.
“Well,hopefullythis time loop doesn’t repeat infinitely,” David said.
Amie grew nauseous at the thought.
“But,” David added, “Fibonacci sequences are often found in nature. Fruits, flowers, shells. What if zero-one-one-two appears at the end of this loop?”
“Hey, from your lips to …” Amie waved her hand vaguely. “… ears.”
“You don’t sound convinced.”
They paused at the corner, David looking up and down the streets for cars. Amie knew they had about fifteen seconds before a break in traffic, so she said, “It’s just that yesterday you wereveryconfident about one hundred eleven being ‘the day.’ ”
She dropped the air quotes. “Something about magic and prime numbers. You said similar things about eighty-one, thirty-nine, twenty-seven, and …” Amie struggled to remember, “… fifteen?” She stepped out into the street as the red Jeep drove past, signaling the break in traffic.
“What’syourtheory, then?” David asked as they entered the grocery store. “I don’t need that,” he added as Amie headed for the shopping baskets.
“You will,” she responded, pulling the top basket from the stack. “I don’t really have a theory.”
David often asked her this question. Every time Amie gave her answer, she wondered if she’d have a better one the next time he asked.
“Excuse me,” Amie said, flagging down an employee as she and David exited the produce section. “There’s a woman in aisle two who needs help reaching the top shelf.”
“Have you ever tried picking the lottery numbers?” David asked. They passed aisle two, where a woman was thanking the employee for his assistance.
“Wouldn’t last long,” Amie said. “The money goes away as soon as the day resets.”
“But if you do it every day, eventually—” David trailed off as he noticed Amie was copying him word for word.
“ ‘—you’ll get out of the loop and still have the money,’ ” Amie finished. “Yeah, I know. I just feel like I’ll jinx it if I try to game the system.” She grabbed a jar of peanut butter from an endcap.
“That must get tiring,” David said as they turned down an aisle.
“It doesn’t,” Amie replied, knowing that he was referring to hearing people say the same things over and over again. “At least, not our conversations. But that’s because I try to switch them up. Like …” She picked up a bag of pretzels, pointing at the cartoon mascot displayed on the front. “Doesn’t this sort of look like Mr. Sanderson in 2A?”
David added a bag of chips to the growing pile in his arms. “Riveting conversation fuel.”
“Well, some days are better than others.” Amie returned the pretzels to their shelf.
