“The Starboardia series is much darker than most of your work, especially the history about American slavery. Were you worried that might be too much for your younger audience?”
“Not once,” Mr. Bailey said. “I will never sugarcoat history so that certain people sleep better at night. The more we shed light on the problems of the world, past and present, the easier it will be to fix them.”
“Now let’s go to the boy in the front,” Mr. Quinn said.
“How many of your characters are based on yourself?”
“All of them—especially the villains,” Mr. Bailey said with a wink.
“Now we’ll go to the young man in the middle,” Mr. Quinn said.
“What inspired you to write the Fairytaletopia series?”
The mischievous twinkle in the author’s eye grew so bright, it practically shined like a searchlight.
“Would you believe me if I told you it was all autobiographical?” he said.
The crowd giggled, and Mr. Bailey’s children collectively sighed at their father’s remark—not this again. However, Mr. Bailey’s twinkle never faded. He looked around the room as if he was disappointed the audience wasn’t taking the answer as seriously as the others.
“It’s true,” he said with conviction. “This world is full of magic if you choose to see it, but it’s a choice I can’t make for you.”
The comment inspired a little girl in the third row to stand on her seat and wave her hand energetically in the air. Whatever her question was, she was more desperate to ask it than anyone else in the room.
“Yes, the young lady wearing pigtails,” Mr. Quinn said.
“Hello, Mr. Bailey,” she said. “My name is Annie and I love your books. I’ve read all six Fairytaletopia books a dozen times each.”
“I appreciate that more than words could describe,” the author said. “What’s your question?”
“Well, it has to do with what you just said, about Fairytaletopia being true,” she said. “Everyone knows Fairytaletopia is about a pair of twins who travel into the fairy-tale world, but I bet a lot of people don’t know you’re a twin yourself. I looked you up online and saw you have a sister named Alex. So I assume you based Alec and Connie Baxter from Fairytaletopia on you and your sister.”
The question took Mr. Bailey off guard. His readers were usually so invested in the worlds he wrote about that they rarely asked him questions about his personal life, especially ones about his family.
“That is both creepy and correct, Annie,” Mr. Bailey said. “I’d say you have what it takes to be a private investigator some—”
“That’s not my question,” the girl said. “According to my research, Alex Bailey attended school in Willow Crest until the seventh grade, but then she vanishes from all public records. I’ve looked everywhere but can’t find a single document about where she went or what became of her after that. So I guess my question is less about the books and more about your sister. Whatever happened to Alex?”
The world-renowned author went dead silent and the twinkle faded from his eye. He was shocked, not because of the question, but because he couldn’t remember the answer. He searched every corner of his patchy memory, but he couldn’t recall where his sister was or the last time he had spoken to her. The only memories coming to mind were from when Alex was a teenager, but he refused to believe that was the last time he’d seen her. He was certain he’d had some communication with Alex since then. She couldn’t just have disappeared, as the girl in pigtails claimed… or could she?
“I… I…” Mr. Bailey mumbled as he tried to focus.
It was obvious something was wrong, and the crowd began to shift in their seats. When the author realized his audience was growing uncomfortable, he laughed at their reactions like he was only playing a joke on them.
“Well, it’s a simple answer,” he said. “What happened to Connie at the end of Fairytaletopia?”
He phrased the question like he was playing a trivia game with the young girl—but secretly, the author couldn’t remember the conclusion of his beloved series, either. Trying to recall the whereabouts of his sister made him realize how much information was missing from his memory.
“She and Alec both had a happily ever after,” Annie said.
“Did they?” the author asked. “I mean, of course they did! Then that’s your answer.”
“But, Mr. Bailey—”
“Well, this has been a wonderful evening, but I have to cut it short,” the author said. “I would love to stay and answer all your questions, but my four hours of consciousness are almost up.”
The author yawned and stretched like he was tired, but it wasn’t a convincing performance. In truth, the mental void had terrified him, and he didn’t know how much longer he could keep his fear from surfacing. Mr. Bailey always made jokes about his fading memory, but it wasn’t until tonight that he’d realized it wasn’t a laughing matter.
Later that evening, once his children had dropped him off at home and made sure he was settled, Mr. Bailey searched his house for any clues he could find leading to his sister’s location, but he found nothing—not even a photograph. His children already treated him like a toddler, so he was afraid to ask one of them what had happened to her. For peace of mind, he had to find her on his own.
The author could envision every detail of his sister’s face. Her pale skin, her rosy cheeks, her pale blue eyes, the freckles on the bridge of her nose, and her long strawberry-blonde hair were instantly accessible every time he closed his eyes and thought of her. However, this was how Alex had looked in her youth. She most certainly would have been an old woman by now—so why couldn’t he picture it?
“Oh, Alex, where did you go?” he said to himself.
Mr. Bailey knew only one thing could jump-start his memory. He locked himself in his study and searched his bookshelves until he found copies of the Fairytaletopia series. Just as he’d told the audience at the bookstore, all six books were based on true events he and his sister had experienced when they were much younger. If he couldn’t recall the information on his own, perhaps one of his stories would trigger the memories for him.
Mr. Bailey eagerly pulled the first Fairytaletopia book off the shelf, but remembering the events that inspired each book wasn’t as easy as he thought it would be.
“Think, old man, think!” he said. “Fairytaletopia: The Wishing Charm was about our first trip to the fairy-tale world…. We were collecting something…. There were things we needed to get back home.… Oh, I know—the Wishing Spell! Our dad’s journal helped us navigate and find all the items! We were chased by the Big Bad Wolf Pack and barely survived our encounter with the Evil Queen! That’s also the year we met Froggy, Red, Jack, and Goldilocks!”