Josh propped his head on his hands, doing his best thousand yard stare out the open bedroom window. It was spring break of his junior year in high school, and that meant all anyone wanted to talk about was SAT’s and ACT’s or making plans ASAP. School was the last thing he wanted to think about at the moment. It was spring break, not spring strategy session.

As much as he wanted to play video games, he had to at least pretend to study to get access to his console granted, so he locked himself in his room. Hence the open window and the closed books.

He looked out at the yard. His room was on the only floor of the house, which sat on a raised foundation, and that meant... he could probably get a paper airplane to go pretty far. His dad was still at work and his mom was in the kitchen with no view of the yard. Yeah, this’ll do.

Josh started with a few different designs to see what would fly and what wouldn’t. He hypothesized only one would reach the fence, which was thirty feet from the backside of the house. He held the first design up, eyed it, and threw it out the window. It swerved into a vertical dive and crashed magnificently. It didn’t even reach the bird feeder, which sat ten feet from the house.

Time to get to work.

The cardinal ruffled his beautiful feathers. They were as smooth as oak leaves, and red like the blood of his enemies. He quite liked them. Yes, they would woo any unpaired female that spied them.

But on to business. He needed to grab a snack and practice posing, and he knew just the place.

The cardinal swooped out of his favorite tree, wings lifting him up into the sky. He flew over the big boxes that covered most of the nearby land until he reached one in particular. It was his favorite box because this box had a smaller box with a very tasty supply of seeds. One graceful landing later and he was perched on the small box, raising his crest and preening in the sunlight. Yes, today was a good day.

Hm? A movement caught his eye. Another bird? There’s another one! No no no, it was his time on the small box today. This would not do.

When the next bird flew by he flared his wings and tail at it. Back off! My box!

But... hm. The cardinal watched the bird smash into the ground, unmoving. This wasn’t right. Birds don’t do that.

He fluttered over to get a closer look. These... aren’t birds! Then what are they? They were flying, sort of.

He clicked his beak. Strange.

Woosh. AH! That was close! This one landed not too far from him. The cardinal hopped over to investigate, only to notice several more not-birds also lying nearby.

Click click. Too strange.

Josh watched with amusement as the little cardinal eyed his paper airplanes. He hadn’t gotten one to hit the fence yet, but he was clearing the bird feeder every time now. Most of his designs still dropped like flies at the end of their glide. Josh blamed the wind.

Now... how long would it take for the bird to figure things out or get bored?

The cardinal couldn’t make heads or tails of the situation. He decided to observe from the seed box. He still needed a snack, after all.

Several things became apparent as he nibbled from the small box. One, the not-birds were coming from the big box. Two, the small box had much better seeds than it did the last time he was there. And three... he could’ve sworn there was another thing. Hm. Maybe later.

He hopped around the small box while nibbling seeds a bit for good measure. It was time to move on. Swift as a breeze he flew up to the top of the big box. Now... should he return to his tree? Or go searching for a female? Or both?

Deep in contemplation, it took the cardinal a moment to realize something had emerged from the big box. Ah! Of course! It was a box-dweller, a potential source of seeds most delicious. It would make sense if this box-dweller were the source of the not-birds. You could never tell what a box-dweller would or wouldn’t do.

Investigation... could wait. It was a box-dweller. There probably wasn’t a reason, at least not one the cardinal cared about. He fluttered away.

Josh was a little disappointed when the cardinal left, but that meant he could retrieve his paper airplanes. Leaving them lying around would get him in trouble. He could snatch some paper from the printer for tomorrow; he was curious to see if the bird would return, since he’d have to repeat the same ‘studying’ routine to satisfy his parents.

The next afternoon brought Josh back to his room with more loose paper. It was fairly close to the time the cardinal had shown up the day before, and well past the time his mother started bugging him to study.

To whatever delight Josh could derive from this situation, the cardinal showed up three airplanes later.

The cardinal fluffed his feathers at the small box, munching on seeds. That box-dweller he’d spied before was still hurling not-birds from the big box. Hm... maybe it was envying his ability to fly? All birds knew box-dwellers were clunky, flightless things. The cardinal couldn’t help but pity it. He’d show it how flying was done; it was only right that he provide it an example when faced with such abject failure.

Josh was amazed at what he was seeing. The little cardinal was... racing his paper airplanes? That couldn’t be right, but there it was, flying alongside the paper airplanes every time he tossed one. It would sit at the bird feeder to wait between throws.

So strange.

It wasn’t working. Neither the not-birds nor the box-dweller seemed to be learning from his glorious display. Oh well, he was full, and there would be time tomorrow if he felt like gifting them with his presence again.

The next day, the cardinal showed up first. He’d eaten a couple seeds already, but there was no sign of the not-birds. Hm. Investigation time.

He flew up to the opening in the big box from whence the not-birds appeared. Gasp! There was another male cardinal already there!! Absolutely unacceptable, this was his big box to explore!!!

Josh stared once again in amusement as the little cardinal pecked and flapped his wings at the window. He didn’t think cardinals were the kind of bird that fought their reflection, but this one seemed determined to. Thankfully it got tired of the window by the time Josh folded the first plane.

The cardinal huffed and puffed atop the small box. An opponent at last! But a coward to hide behind a barrier the whole time. Witchcraft, in his opinion.

Ah! There goes a not-bird. At least they didn’t seem to be hitting the ground as hard anymore. His lessons were helpful after all.

He fluttered alongside the not-birds a couple times before he felt it was enough. Now... that other cardinal should be gone from the big box by now. He’d put a couple berries on the box-dweller having scared it off. Investigation... commence!

A chirp sounded from the window. Josh looked up to see that the little cardinal had gotten bold. It sat on his windowsill, hopping and flaring its crest, head cocking from side to side in curiosity. It chirped again before zipping away.

Goofy thing.

Ugh! Just a dumb box-dweller with its big, clunky, scary limbs. He didn’t know why he bothered.

The dynamic duo’s routine continued for another two days, paper planes slowly gliding further across the yard, until finally one made it to the fence.

The cardinal watched from his perch on the wooden wall. Hmph! Slow, silly thing. Couldn’t even see the barrier in front of it. He flew back to the small box. It seemed the box-dweller got what it wanted from the not-birds, since no more came from the big box. The cardinal was sure that his help had been crucial to whatever success the box-dweller found.

Alas, it was time to move on. He was eighteen months old; it was high time he found a lifemate! Perhaps he’d return to guide the box-dweller some other day.

Josh watched as the little cardinal swooped from the bird feeder and out of the yard. He went to retrieve the final design: a broad-winged glider with trailing edges flared like spoilers. He’d tried to glean inspiration from seeing the cardinal every day without much success, but he had to admit that spying on the bird made his ‘studying’ time pass more pleasantly.

Reality came knocking at his door. It was the last full day of his spring break, since he’d convinced his parents to let him go out with friends tomorrow. Although that was on the condition of studying and doing all his schoolwork. And he did actually have an assignment he needed to finish...

Josh cast one last glance out to the yard as he closed the window. Maybe he’d see the cardinal again someday. Paper airplane folding wasn’t a bad hobby to pick up on the weekends.