Alias Disappeared

1 The paper airplane soared upward, grazing the bottom branches of the sycamore tree before skidding to a stop on the grass. Sydney raced across the yard to retrieve it, the plaid pleated skirt of her girls' academy uniform swirling about her long, thin legs. "Daddy! Daddy, look! I made it fly!" Mr. Bristow's head remained hidden behind the front section of the Los Angeles Register. "Daddy?" Sydney asked, taking a few steps toward him. "Daddy, you aren't listening to me. I made a good plane! It flew really far! Didn't you see?" "Yes. I saw," came a flat response. "No! You didn't!" she yelled, stamping her burgundy penny loafer. "You weren't watching, you were reading! That's all you do all the time! Read, read, read!" The paper lowered and Mr. Bristow's blank expression fell on his daughter. "Stop being dramatic, Sydney," he said. "You're acting like a child." But I am a child, she thought, angrily tossing the plane into the air again. It sailed straight up for a few seconds before becoming wedged in a tangle of twigs. She turned back toward her father, hoping he would offer to pull it loose. But his newspaper barrier was raised once again, and all Sydney could see were the large black letters screaming SPACE SHUTTLE EXPLODES! "Hey? You awake?" Todd de Rossi's voice penetrated the daydream. Sydney jerked her head slightly. "Huh? What?" The childhood memory dissolved as she found herself back in her American History seminar, her pen still poised over her spiral notebook. Professor Baldridge was lecturing in his tired drone, his words melding with the steady whir of the old building's air-conditioning system. On the giant screen behind him loomed the famous image of the Challenger exploding high in the atmosphere. "Sorry," she whispered, smiling weakly at Todd. "What did you say?" Todd grinned. "I said it takes a special kind of boring to make a major disaster dull. Guess I made my case. Where were you just now? In orbit?" "No. I was just . . . I was just remembering where I was when I first heard about the Challenger exploding." She rubbed her eyes and sat up straight, trying to shake off the residual anguish stirred up by her memory. She could practically smell the olive trees shading the Bristows' old front porch and feel the light weave of her school uniform, as if her body had carefully recorded every sensation for careful replay later on. It had been one of those pivotal childhood moments: the point when she'd finally understood that her father was lost to her. The tragic car accident that had taken her mother seemed to have completely diminished her father. He had never been the cheerful life force her mother was, and yet Sydney had never doubted his devotion to his family. But that day on the front lawn, all hope that he might someday come back to her shattered like the hull of the ill-fated space shuttle. From then on she stopped consciously trying to please him and began preparing herself for a life alone. "You know, I don't remember what I was doing when I first heard about the Challenger," Todd mused, rubbing his chin. "Probably standing in front of my mirror doing my best James Dean." Sydney rolled her eyes. "Why does that not surprise me?" "Excuse me? Professor Baldridge?" Sydney glanced up to see a tall guy with shaggy red hair rise from his aisle seat, his left arm high in the air. "Oh, goody. Burke has something to say," Todd whispered, leaning forward in his seat. "This ought to be entertaining." Most of the other students in the lecture hall were also shifting to get a better look. Sydney let out a small moan of frustration and slouched back in her chair, folding her arms across herMason, Lynn is the author of 'Alias Disappeared' with ISBN 9780553494006 and ISBN 0553494007.