In a play that covers global terrorism, mass murder and heartbreaking loss, it is the image of a single earring finding its missing partner that carries the most power. Locating the minute and personal inside the cataclysmic sums up the essence of Fuselage, Annie Lareau’s three-hander elegy to the 35 friends from Syracuse University that she lost when Pan Am flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie in 1988. It is a deeply personal piece, born of student routines and everyday moments, all of which can be snatched away in a second by a combination of fate and human decision. 

Lareau wasn’t on flight 103, simply because she couldn’t afford the £75 fee to switch and fly home with her best friend, Theodora Cohen. In a bitter irony, Cohen had suggested Lareau switch her flight so they could be together for the journey, after Lareau had developed a fear of flying following recurring nightmares of aeroplanes exploding in the months before the tragedy. 

What Fuselage does sensitively and cleverly is shift the perspective of the bombing itself from the foreground to the background; instead it places centre stage the university lives of the victims. The events we are familiar with are present, charted in news broadcasts that punctuate the main action. Lareau also makes space to pay respect to the people of Lockerbie whose diligence and care enabled families to reclaim their loved ones’ possessions. But most important to the play are the moments that give the victims their humanity; laughter, arguments, bad jokes and borrowed jewellery. 

Fuselage, Pleasance Courtyard, until 25 August, 3.45pm; main picture: Giao Nguyen.