When Michael Met Sydney

Chapter 1: Family Matters

Aroyo Highschool

Friday afternoon

The clock tivked back and forth. Tick Tock, Tick Tock, Tick Tock and it never seemed to stop. The second hand that loudly rotated around the numbers, seemed to be moving in slow motion; and she could hear each tick and each tock as loud as a jackhammer that was crushing through rock hard cement in her hears. She sat back in her chair, slouched, legs crossed, with her right leg over her left, her right foot lightly bouncing in the air, her left hand playing with a few strands of hair that slightly blocked her view. Her eyes fixed on the clock they didn't seem to budge, they didn't move at all not a bit. Her teachers words were spoken but blurred, all the backround noises were more like an ambience, like grocery store music. She heard it but not payed any attention to it. All her focus was towards the clock that simply went tick-tock. As the seconds passed by slowly like minutes her movements began more, she fidgeted in her seat. She couldn't keep still. Five more minutes and she was free of class for the rest of the week. But sadly that last five minutes wouldn't come soon enough. Instead Ms. Moulder kept on blabbering, flapping her old, wet and squishy gums. When she spoke her spit flung across the room spraying on the kids in the front row, thank god I chose a seat two rows back, she thought. She never really liked Ms. Moulder, she was old, annoying, and she always spit when she spoke; however, Ms. Moulder adored her more than any one of her students. She spoke her mind and Ms. Moulder loved that about her most, despite all attempts to escape Ms. Moulder she failed. She calmed her nerves by thinking to her self, Ms. Mouder is seventy-nine years, she already outlived the average life span for an American female, she'll be dead soon, with in a couple months.

As the clock hands finally made their way to the big twelve pointed directly towards heaven the bell went off. The students hurried to gather their belongings. Pencils, pens, papers and binders shoving them away as Ms. Moulder gave them their assignment. No one ever really payed any attention to poor Ms. Moulder. All they could hear was the bell, an old woman blabbering on about what they presummed to Ms. Moulder giving them their assignment and the loud banging of feet into the floor, shoulders smashing against the door as the students made their way out. She was now free of Ms. Moulder and class, but more importantly Ms. Moulder. She grabbed her belongs, pens, papers and notebooks and headed for the door, ignoring Ms. Moulder say goodbye to her. She ran up to her locker, emtpying her books inside and slamming it shut. When the locker finally slammed shut she found her boyfriend leanining agaisnt the lockers with a sly cute grin on his face. He walked up to her grabbing her around the waist and placing a sweet kiss on her reddened lips, tasting her strawberry lip gloss. He pulled away, stopping the kiss and smiled at her grabbing her hand they walked hand in hand down the school hall, whilst all the other kids watched them jealous and envious of what they shared.

Bristow Residence

Friday night

After she left school she hadn't comeback home right away as her parents had ordered her to, instead she went to get her nails done with her friend and then got milkshakes before returning home. She knew she was in trouble but quite frankly she didn't care, she hated rules, so she never followed them. When she arrived home she parked her care in the driveway and stepped out grabbing her back-pack and cellphone.

The Bristows were a wealthy bunch they were. They lived in a mansion up the hills of Hollywood. Their house, or rather mansion was sandwiched between other large house, The Murrays and the former Caldwells. They had recently ran into money troubles they were forced to sell their home among their priceless collection of beautiful ancient Oriental artworks that consisted of paintings, jewelry and artifacts. Her father, Jack Bristow was a lawyer who owned his own law firm. He had made his fortune off of other peoples hardships, and his entire career as a lawyer he had never lost a case, not once. Her mother Laura Bristow was brought up modest, she hadn't come from a rich family and she worked as a literature professor. She had met Jack when they were both young, at the time she was working in a library and he had came by to pick up some lawbooks. Their attraction was mutual and they fell in love.

As she stepped through the front door to her suprise she wasn't greeted by her mother, wearing an appron tapping her three inch heels into the mahogany floor. She was instead greeted by her older sister, Natalie.

Natalie was, well Natalie was Natalie...she was in her younger days as she explained a wild child. She bent the rules more than her sister had and by doing so led her to some unexpected sudden life changeing events. Nonetheless supported by her parents and younger sister.

Natalie stood in front of the door, her left leg crossing in front of her right, arms folded against her chest with an agry expression across her face. This could only mean that she would get her scolding from Nat and not her parents, which led to her question, where was mom and dad.

For awhile the two sisters just stood their starring into each others chocolate brown eyes. Lips sealed shut and not even the slightest noise escaping from the two of them. As time passed she ducked her head down and looked at her feet. She was wearing high heels, silver ones, they looked good on my feet she thought. She had been focusing on her feet when she heard her sister call out to her.

"Sydney." Natalie yelled. Syd pulled her focus from her shoes to her sister, but not replying.

"Where were you?" her sister asked her. Syd stood there looking at her sister. She didn't no how to respond after she realized that she had forgotten to come home early because her sister had a date and she had to watch Juno.

"Nat, I forgot I am so sorry." She said with a sympathetic look on her face, but her sister turned around in disbelief.

"When Syd, are you going to think about some one other than yourself?" Her sister asked angrilly turning around to meet her brown eyes again.

"I said I was sorry Nat, I really am sorry." Syd pleaded with her sister.

"No you're not, all you think of is yourself, I simply asked if you could watch Juno after school so I could go out with Aiden, and no he thinks I stood him up, I tried calling him but he won't return my phone calls." Natalie replied angrilly looking at her sister for another five seconds before she kicked her shoes off, shook her head in utter anger and headed up stairs. She felt bad, and she hated herself for feeling bad, she never felt bad, she was always happy. She felt worse than she ever did, she knew her sister like Aiden a lot, maybe even more, and she screwed it up, after Natalie's last boyfriend disaster, Nat was certain she would never trust a man again, but she swore Aiden was different. He was kind and funny and could always make her laugh no matter how crappy the situation was.

She stood for about five minutes paralyzed in the entrance way before she even made an attempt to go upstairs then she looked at the phone and saw their were messages two messages on the phone. She walked over to the phone and pushed play. The first message was from Francie saying goodbye for the day official even though she's still probably call her again and the second was from Aiden.

*Aiden-phone recorded message*

"So, Nat I'm sure you got caught up in more trouble sorry didn't return your calls earlier I was sorta upset, then I realized Syd probably didn't come home on time to watch Juno so I'm guessing it's not your fault you couldn't make it...anyways as soon as you get this call me back so I can give you a real apology for not picking up, okay...uh bye."

And the phone went beep at the end of the message. She slumped into the chair that was by the phone feeling even worse now. Even Aiden knew that Syd wasn't all that great of a sister. Now shw was feeling her worst she couldn't possibly feel any worse. After she sat on the couch feeling bad for about five minutes she grabbed her belongings and her shoes that were now off and trailed up the stairs to her bedroom, the room that was all the way down the hall, her sister's bedroom opposite of hers.

When she came in her bedroom she tossed her shoes by the door, after closing it and throwing her jacket on the bed, she made her way to the bathroom and closing the door behind her. She stood in the mirror examining herself wondering why she did the things she did. She cared about her sister, didn't she? Of course she did. She turned on the shower and undressed and she stepped under the warm water.

The cool shower water rained on her head and ran down her pale back warming her up. She bathed herself in susdy bubbles of soap and then rinsed off she stepped out the shower grabbed two towels, one wrapped around her head the other wrapped around her body. She stepped out of the bathroom and let the steamy hot air escape the bathroom into her bedroom. She looked up to find her sister, Natalie sitting on her bed crossed legged with Juno on her lap.

"Nat, what are you doing in here?" She inquired still standing fixed outside her bathroom door.

"I'm sorry." That's all Nat said when she replied.

"For what?" Syd asked as she approached her sister sitting at the edge of her bed.

"About telling Aiden." She said as her eyes slowly puffed up with salty tears from the Dead Sea.

"It's ok, Nat, I mean it's true." Syd replied looking down at her lap, she fumbled with her hands in her lap.

"Look, I never meant those things, I was angry, you said you'd watch Juno and you didn't show up and...I'm the older sister, I should have said something instead of talking behind your back." Nat said, her eyses were now filled with tears and they began running down her cheeks. Syd moved closer to her sister and took her in her arms hugging her tightly. Natalie or Syd, hadn't budged for an entire minute. They just sat there in each others arms holding on tightly.

"It's ok, it's true, I should be more responsible, and keep to my promises." Syd said as the sisters began to part. Sydney pushed the hair the ws blocking her view from Natalie's face.

"I'm really sorry Syd." She said.

"I am too." And the hugged again. This time Juno approached them and poked Syd's leg. When she felt the little touch of a finger on her leg she quickly broke from her hug and looked down to see little Juno, little blue-eyed and brown hair girl who looked so much like her mother.

"Hey sweetie." Natalie said as she scooped up her daughter from the floor.

"Mommy." Her daughter replied opening up her arms wide for a hug. Natalie replied to her daughter's demands and sqeezed her tight. Syd watched as mother and daughter shared that special bond and hoped one day she could have her own special bond.

Natalie was just a freshman in college when she learned she was pregnant with Juno. When she told Juno's father, he wanted nothing to do with Juno, he even dropped out of college after Juno was born and Natalie took Juno to his apartment, he literally fell off the grid for Natalie.

"You know, Nat, Aiden called, maybe his still available for dinner." Syd said as she went in to the closet to change. "Maybe you can still go out, I'm home now so I can watch Juno 'til mom and dad get back." Syd said, a few seconds later she peered her head out of the closet.

"I don't know Syd." Natalie said as she got up from the bed, she picked up Juno with her. "I think I'll stay home today, besides Juno usually goes to sleep around now, so I'm going to put her to bed." She said as she made her way across the room with a very sleepy Juno. "See you tomorrow sis." And she closed the door behind her.

When Syd emerged from the closet she was wearing a white tee shirt and some shorts, brown khakis, fit for spending the rest of the night in your bedroom. She watched TV for a while, she then read some of Treasure Island and then she wrote in her diary. Time slowly pressed on and when she noticed time it was nine O'clock and mom and dad were still gone. Had mom and dad left a memo of some kind she hadn't recieved. She must have. Syd got up from her bed and walked down to the kitchen. She looked around for a note from mom and found one stuck to the microwave door. She made her way to the microwave and read the note.

*Mom's Note reads*

Natalie, Sydney, your father and I have gone and decided to spend the night out, so we won't be back 'til late in the morning, dinner's in the fridge. Make sure you go to bed on time and are up for school on time.

Love .

"Figures." Syd said to herself. She crumpled up the note and walked over to the fridge to find dinner. Wrapped inside aluminum foil, there was her dinner, simple steak and potatoes Nat and Syd's favorite home cooked meal. She un-wrapped the meal and placed it in the microwave she counted down the seconds until it was done. *Beep* and she took the hot plate from the microwave and placed it on the table when she heard a faint cry. Sounded like Juno she thought. Well Nat's here she'll get her. Syd sat down on the stool at the island counter and began eating, she had noticed that Juno was still crying so she excused herself from the table.

She dragged herself up the stairs, upset that she had barely touched her food and Nat was responding to her loud and crying child. "Nat." she yelled as she walked up the stairs. She kept calling her name but she didn't reply. When she had finally made her way into Nat's bedroom Nat wasn't there, there was no sign of her anywhere not in the bathroom, Nat was no where to be found. Syd walked over to Juno's cribbed and picked up Juno, who was reaching for her.

"Come on big girl, Sydie's got you." She said as she picked up the crying child. When Syd lifted her from the crib she stopped crying, her swollen eyes feeled with soft, salty tears. When she turned to exit the room she noticed a yellow sticky note on the desk from her sister.

*Nat's note reads*

You were right. I was wrong. I'm gone obviously. I took your advice. Rang Aiden. Went out on date. Will see you later tonight.

Love Nat.

P.S. make sure you change and feed Juno before she goes to sleep

Love Nat again.

"Figures." Syd said again as she crumpled up the note and tossed it in the trash can. Juno in her arm she walked out and closed the door behind her.