Father Figure
An Alias fanfic by JenC
Disclaimer: "Your mileage may
vary." Whoa! Wrong disclaimer
again. How did that happen? Okay,
"Alias" and the characters therein are
the property of J. J. Abrams, Bad Robot, and
other important people. Not me.Rating:
PG
Spoilers: none, really (maybe a small one
for Q&A)
Summary: There's always someone worse off
than you.
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Feedback: Yes, please! jen@fanfic101.com
Archive: Credit
Dauphine and Fanfic101--if
you're not one of the above,
please check first
***
The phone rings and rings, but he doesn't pick up.
Of course. Sydney
snaps her cell phone closed and stares down at it.
"God, I should know by
now not to sit around waiting for him."
"Boyfriend?"
She glances up as a girl sits down on the bench next to
her. Looking too
young to be in college, the intruder's wearing what
Francie calls the
uber-Goth look: clunky Doc Martens, layers of
velvet and leather and gauzy
black material, hair dyed a shade so dark it seems to
suck up all the
available light.
Sydney shakes her head. "My father."
"Fathers. Who needs 'em?" The girl
makes a face. "You want to talk about
it?"
"Not really." Sydney studies the
girl. There's something familiar about
her. "Do I know you?"
"European lit lab last semester?"
"Oh." Sydney tucks her phone away.
"You weren't there much."
"I've got things to work through." She
says it defiantly, as if Sydney's
comment about her absence had been overly critical.
"I'm Lyndra."
Memory clicks into place. This girl is the one
who'd refused to answer to
the name on the roll, insisting on being called Lyndra
instead. "I'm
making my own life now," she'd said. Sydney
nods at the image. She
understands. "It's okay."
"So what's the deal with your father?"
"It's complicated." She smiles a little
at the thought of all she can't
say.
"So what's his schtick? Physical, emotional,
sexual?"
"What?"
"What did he do to you?"
Sydney scuffs at the pavement with her toe.
"Nothing. He did nothing."
"Neglect." Lyndra's mouth, painted a
deep, vibrant red, turns down. "I
hear that's bad. Though to be honest, I would have
given anything for a
father that just left me the hell alone."
"My father's not that bad." He's not that
great, an inner voice whispers.
She's not sure why she feels the need to defend him after
all that's
happened.
Lyndra stands up. "Well, to hell with him
anyway. You want to go get
something to drink?"
There's a 'no' on the tip of Sydney's tongue, but she
doesn't want to be
sitting alone in the fading light any longer.
"The Caverns?"
"I'll take coffee if I can't get anything
stronger."
They walk down to the cafe in silence. Lyndra has a
coffee, plain black.
Even though there's a bite in the air as the day closes,
Sydney orders an
iced tea.
"My father drank iced tea," Lyndra says, as if
somehow this makes Sydney a
party to her dark memories.
"I could get something else."
"No." Lyndra takes a sip of the coffee
and makes a face. "So you're a
child of neglect, huh?"
Sydney thinks for a moment, decides she doesn't want her
father's bad
decisions to define her life. "What's your
story?"
Lyndra clutches the coffee cup in both hands. She
takes a deep breath,
inhaling the steam that rises off the dark liquid.
"I was twelve before I
realized not every kid gets hit."
The synopsis of her pain is extensive: broken
bones, bruises she can't
explain. The blind eyes of those she trusted to
help her, the friends
who'd vanished when their parents began to suspect.
It is not an
unfamiliar litany for Sydney, and she suspects that
Lyndra wants a
listening ear more than anything else. So Sydney
listens, nodding and
murmuring when it seems the girl wants a response.
It is a pain she will never fully understand. Her
own grief comes simply
from the absence of her father's light.
"I tried to tell my grandmother about it, you
know? Tried to explain why I
couldn't go back. You know what she said?"
Sydney shakes her head.
"She said, 'You have to remember everyone has his
own way of showing love.'
Can you believe that? She totally didn't get
it."
His own way of showing love. The words lodge in
Sydney's chest, and for a
moment she can't breathe. She pictures the empty
seat in the bleachers,
the empty chair at the dinner table. She can feel
the weight of a picture
album in her hands, one that covers four years of her
life, one that only
holds a single picture of her with her father.
Scenes flicker through her mind, moments when he has been
moody,
dictatorial, critical of her decisions.
Distant. She recalls the time she
tried to make him say her mother's name, and he would
not. She thinks of
the desperate moments when he helped Vaughan steal her
from the DSR, how he
said, "Hey, honey," as calmly as if he was
picking her up from band
practice rather than turning her into a fugitive.
"His own way of showing love." She picks
up her glass. The beads of
condensation remind her of tears.
"I never spoke to her again."
Sydney sets the glass down. Picks it up and sets it
down again and again,
making a pattern of dark, wet rings on the wood.
"I am not my father's daughter," Lyndra
says.
"We are." Sydney pushes away from the
table and stands. "How could we not
be? They made us." She looks down at her
hands. They are strong hands,
well shaped. Her father's hands. "My
father isn't perfect. He's not even
what most people would call good. But . .
."
"You need to stop being his victim."
Lyndra's red, red mouth makes a tight
line, like a wound.
"Not that. Never that." What,
Sydney wonders, would she like to be in her
father's life? Trusted colleague? Friend,
perhaps? Or even what she
should have been, should have felt like all along--his
beloved daughter,
his pride, his reason for fighting. "My
situation's different."
"You tell yourself that."
Sydney smiles as she puts down enough cash to pay for
both their drinks,
and a tip besides. "You're forgetting your
Tolstoy. 'Happy families are
all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own
way.'"
Lyndra sniffs, clearly not convinced.
As Sydney leaves the cafe, her smile fades. Night
has crept over the city
when she wasn't looking, and it reminds her of the
shadows in her own life.
The secrets. The unanswered questions.
The hidden scars. Rather than
heading home, she gets into her car and heads for a place
she doesn't often
visit.
*
*
*
She hammers on the door, the wood stinging her
knuckles.
"Who is it?"
"It's me, Daddy." She can't keep the
tears out of her voice.
"Sydney?" When he opens the door, she
sees that he's holding an empty
glass, and the living room is dark except for a faint
glow that spills out
of the kitchen. "What is it?"
She shakes her head, knowing she can't trust her
voice. "It's nothing,
really. I should--"
She turns to leave, but he's caught her arm and he pulls
her into the
apartment. He lets go quickly; he doesn't touch her
often. As he reaches
around her to shut the door, she rubs at the spot above
her wrist where his
fingers rested a moment before.
"I'm sorry about tonight," he begins.
"I tried to get away, but--"
"It's all right." She forces a smile,
knowing her lips are trembling,
knowing he sees it. "Maybe I'm pushing this
too hard. Our lives are
crazy, it's been so long . . ."
"Maybe you're right." He turns away, his
face unreadable. The light from
over the stove casts his back in shadow; she sees a
burden, heavy despite
the fact that it has no physical manifestation.
"You're sure?"
"Sydney, what's wrong?" He's facing her
now, but he doesn't stand too
close. He always makes sure she has space.
Room to run. "What's this
about?"
There's an edge in his voice, and for a moment she thinks
he's annoyed.
Then it dawns on her. He's not angry. He's
worried.
"I'm fine, Daddy. It's just . . . I needed . .
." There are no words for
this, she realizes. Instead, she closes the
distance between them with two
quick steps and catches him in a hug, the sort of fierce,
bone-crunching
embrace that they used to give each other, once upon a
time.
For a moment, she fears she's made a terrible
mistake. He stands very
still, she suspects he's even holding his breath.
Then the glass he's
holding hits the carpet with a dull thud, and his arms
are around her. He
rests his cheek against her head, and she's not sure, but
she thinks she
can feel him smiling.
[Fin]
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