Come home

I laugh as I watch you play. I get so much joy out of watching you running around playing with your brothers and sisters and your friends, watching you interacting and communicating with those who surround you. You love to make people laugh, you love to make people happy, you are filled with love and are yourself very much loved.

You are only seven but yet you seem to have walked this world before. You defiantly are an old soul. For such a young person you are quite wise and knowledgeable. Having an older sister and older brothers has taught you so much already about life. You are the shine in their eyes the smile on their faces and the love in their hearts. You are our everything.

Nothing has been the same since that day I watched you playing at the playground, our lives will never be the same again until you are found. I havnt left the playground since you left five days ago. I sleep in my car and I wait, I wait here for you to return. Will you return? Will you ever come back to us?

At only seven years of age you have given us a lifetime of love, a lifetime of happiness. You are the cutest little button with your chubby cheeks that puff out when you smile. Your big brown eyes that shimmer in the light. Long brown hair that likes to drape over your face that needs pinning back. The personality of an angel, always so sweet to everyone and always so giving to others.

It was your birthday that day at the park. You were so happy to be having your birthday there, it was your choice. The weather was perfect, the sky was so clear and blue, the sun shone bright and warm and there was no wind at all. Your siblings, cousins and friends all were there to help you celebrate. We had a table right by the barbecue which is where the adults set up and prepared food for your guests, we even done a bit of decorating.

I watched you play tag with everyone you even invited some other kids who were at the playground to join in with you all, this made them very happy and that is what you loved, making people happy.

After playing for a while lunch was ready so everyone sat around at the table and on picnic blankets and filled their stomachs with party food. So much happiness was coming out of everyone. So much laughter was to be heard around the entire playground, everyone would look at us enjoying ourselves.

Everyone went back to playing and running around after they had eaten. You were even sweet enough to take some lollies over to other kids who were at the playground, such a sweet little girl.

The other adults and I had cleared all the food and rubbish away and now it was the best time of all, it was cake time. We wrangled you all back in and everyone crowded. I lit the candles over by the barbecue then brang the cake over to your seat. I started everyone in singing happy birthday.

When I got to your seat, you weren’t there. One of the kids said they seen you sit down then get up and go and ask some other kid who was playing by themself to join us. But, you didnt return. I placed the cake on the table and started scanning the playground in search of you but I could not see you anywhere.

Panic set in. As soon as I realized I couldn’t see you my heart sank, my chest tightened, I felt dizzy from extreme fear. I yelled out to you, I called out to you over and over again. I watched everyone rushing around the playground searching every nook and cranny, behind every tree. No one could see you. No one could hear you. You were gone.

I fell to the ground. I was so terrified for you that I couldn’t even stand. My heart was in so much pain. I felt not only scared for you but for myself too. I could never have imagined a life without you in it. I could never have imagined any one day of not hearing your voice or feeling your soft body cuddle me. That day you went missing, I went missing too. I too had become lost to the world as my world couldn’t be anything without you in it.

I tried so hard to keep strong for your siblings, they needed me too but I just couldn’t, I was paralyzed stuck in a world that I no longer wanted to be a part of. I managed to pick myself up off the ground but only got as far as the table where your cake sat, candles melted and cake untouched. This cake was for you, without you there is no cake.

The police arrived and took statements from as many of us as they could and from other playground visitors. No one seen anything. How could that be? There was twenty of us and another thirty or so people at the playground that day, how could it be that no one, not a single sole saw a thing. No one seen what happened to you once you got up out of your seat to invite that child to join us. According to that child you didn’t even make it as far as asking him to join us.

Where did you go my baby? Where are you? I need you. We all need you. Please be safe and please be alive. Please please my baby come back to me. I have never felt so desperate for anything in my life before. Iv’e never felt so weak both mentally and physically and I have never felt so damn scared.

After the police questioned everyone they all separated and went off in search of you in all different directions. Some by car and others by foot. The police had a couple of their tracking dogs who picked up your scent but lost it in the car park. It was obvious that where ever you have gone, you were taken by vehicle in that car park.

Its now getting a bit cold, the sun is disappearing to allow for the moon to appear. Soon it will be dark and once dark it gets a bit cold. I’m so worried for you, you weren’t dressed to be out doors on a cold night. You were in your party dress that was designed for day time, warm day time not cold.

Five days have passed and not one clue on your whereabouts has been found. Over these five days so many people have been out searching for you handing out fliers with your picture on it. People have searched the near by woods and other secluded spots but nothing.

I myself stay at this playground. I stay here in case you return. As night time hits I crawl into my car and try to get some sleep, it doesn’t work out to great though as my heart needs to know your ok for it to be able to rest. As soon as the sun comes up in the mornings I emerge from my car and I search the entire park again in the hopes that at some stage through out the night who ever took you may have returned you. I check in all the bushes and trees that surround the park but only to be disappointed over and over again.

Some say Im punishing myself. I say I am a mother who wants to be here for her child when she returns. I am a mother who wants nothing more than to have her little girl back in her arms, who wants to take you home and give you a nice warm bath and tuck you into your bed and kiss you good night. I know I cant stay here for ever, but for now, this is where Ill be. I will be right here waiting for you.

I spend my days and nights hoping and praying that who ever took you only done so so that they could love you. That maybe they need you to fill a void in their own lives. I have to think this cause if this isn’t their reason for taking you then I fear over any other possible explanations. Who ever they are and for what ever reason they have taken you, when I get a hold of them they will be sorry.

Be brave my baby, be brave and be safe for one day very soon one of us will find you, we will bring you home and tuck you into your bed and kiss your cheek and tell you how much we love you