A Trip Through Time

 Ava was ready to go home. She tapped her foot impatiently, leaning against the hood of her car. As vehicles whizzed by her on the road, she couldn’t help but wish she was one of them. By now, she would’ve been at home, telling Ben all about her camping trip in the mountains. Ava could picture her little brother’s wide awed eyes, and chuckled to herself.

She’d been so excited to get home to her brother, that she had been driving a bit too fast. Usually, that wouldn’t be a problem out here in the countryside. Unfortunately for her, a nearby traffic cop noticed her speeding, and pulled her over. And so, here she was, parked on the side of the road. Waiting.


The officer said he’d check her identity and record her speeding, and then let her go. “It’ll only take ten minutes,” Officer Vasquez promised. Well, over an hour later, she was still waiting.


The sun was beginning to set, the sky turning a warm shade of orange-red. The cars driving past began to reduce in number, and the trees rustled their leaves lightly in the breeze. Ava shivered. She should’ve packed a scarf.


Just as she was about to get into the car to warm up, Officer Vasquez finally came back from wherever he had disappeared off to. Although Ava felt relief, and a bit of annoyance, the look on his face erased all of that. Instead, she felt a pit in her stomach, matching the shocked and scared look on his face.


“Ava Sinclair, yes?” He said, glancing between the notepad in his hands and her face. His hands were gripping onto the clipboard for dear life. “Residing in New York, working as a teacher?” Ava nodded slowly.


“We, uh,” His voice cracked, but he continued on valiantly. “We verified your identity based on your responses to my questions. Everything checks out.”


That didn’t seem like everything, though. “What’s the issue then, officer?”


“The thing is, a missing person’s report was filed for one Ava Sinclair, living in New York, working as a teacher,” Vasquez explained, his demeanour clearly shouting his want to be anywhere but there.


Missing? Her? But she’d only been gone for three days. And she’d told Ben, her only family member, exactly where she was going and for how long, before leaving him with a babysitter. All of her close friends had come on the trip with her. Nobody would have filed the report.


She explained the same to the officer. His shifty eyes finally hardened. He stood up a bit straighter, and Ava finally felt a modicum of respect for the cop.


“Ava Sinclair,” He repeated, reading off of his clipboard. “Residing in New York, working as a teacher. Reported missing fifteen years ago, after going on a camping trip with her friends. None of the campers ever returned.”

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