12 Hours of Hell
“Amina don’t run in the store,” Salma called a 9 year old girl who was running in the store. She was desperately trying to control her for 10 minutes now. When she suddenly ran into an elderly couple at the counter.
" I am sorry for my daughter, she is just hyper active,” she said all apologetically and tried to pick her up as she fell down.
" I am not your daughter. I don’t recognize you.” She said jerking her mother’s hand off.
As she said it everyone at the counter looked surprised and concerned at her. She turned red as everyone’s eyes fell on her. ” I came with my dad” she further added.
Suddenly a man came from behind, ” baby here you are,” he said and hugged and picked her in his arms. Salma kept looking at them with surprise and fright. ” she is my daughter.” She felt her voice choking as she saw the man and everyone else at the store ignoring her and taking her daughter outside of the store without even confronting her.
After a while she regained her senses and ran after them.
“Leave her she is my daughter,” she tried to free the girl from his grip as the girl was watching amusingly.
“Get off mad women!” He pushed her away.
" Someone call the police, please!” she said looking around as no one believed her and thought that she was mad.
" Stop it,” a women came close to her and reprimanded her. “You should feel lucky the kind man didn’t press kidnapping charges against you or you would be in jail now. Be wise and go from here.” She pushed her away derisively and walked away.
She stood there shock as everyone moved around.
After regaining her senses, she rushed to the police station and filed s kidnapping report. The police returned at the scene of crime to gather information about the incident and the kidnapper. The police gathered information from the store employees and collected their CCTV footage. The witnesses at he scene and the cctv showed the girl playing around the women but didn’t interact with her, not even once. But she went to talk twice with the bald man.
Now instead of looking for the missing girl the police started questioning her for attempting a kidnap.
She kept begging them to look out for her and investigate her later as she knew the first few hours are crucial in recovering a kidnapped victim. But the police didn’t pay her any attention and started to investigate her.
“You had a daughter 6 years ago but she died when she was 3!” Maria, the investigating officer questioned her and tried to bring her back to reality as she was speculating that Selma was still suffering from the trauma caused by her daughters loss.
Selma swallowed bitterly, “yes, I had a daughter and yes, she died. Amina is not my biological daughter but adopted. I adopted her almost three years ago. She is my daughter and I have the adoption papers to prove it. Now please will you try to find her.” Selma begged the officer.
Maria went outside the interrogation room disappointed as she was expecting a confession. But as Selma was adamant that Amina is her daughter the investigators tried to change the direction of their investigation and for once tried to see her as the victim instead of the offender.
The police searched the data base to try to find information about Amina. But there was no information about her having a daughter. The investigators were getting frustrated as they didn’t know what to believe. If she was true, they were wasting time instead of finding her. but for the moment the odds were against Selma.
Maria and her college returned to the investigating room. “You haven’t filed a daughter. There is no record that you have a adopted someone.”
Selma felt cornered and began to explain. “I have moved here a month ago. And I was told I can’t file her without my adoption documents which I left at my mother’s house. She sent me the documents which I received 4 days ago. And since it is July, I thought I don’t need to hasten it and thought that I can file her in time before school start”.
Maria´s colleague, Allen, didn’t roll his eyes as Maria and showed patience. “Do you have a picture of Amina so that we can start looking for her? We can investigate this matter later.” Amina frowned at him as she was doubting Selma´s whole story but he waited for Selma to show them Amina´s photo.
Allen’s words relieved Selma and she hastily took her phone to show the officers Amina´s photo. But as soon as she turned to her phone, she turned blank. She couldn’t find any photo. The photo gallery was empty. Looking at her ghost expressions Allen went by her side and took her phone. He looked surprised at Selma. And Selma began to cry. “I don’t know what happened and where the photos are. We have hundreds of photos. I don’t know how they got deleted but I promise she is my daughter.” Selma knew it all was looking very bad for her.
Maria got frustrated., “why are you wasting our time.” but Selma kept insisting. “I have photos of her at home. Please believe me and try to find my daughter.” she begged them.
This time Allen wasn’t convinced but Maria wanted to give her a chance and they went to her house.
Selma was shocked the moment she entered the house. she could feel something was wrong. The photo frame she placed at the entrance was empty. She ran around the house but there wasn’t any photo of Amina. And when Maria went to Amina´s room, the closet was empty. There wasn’t any children cloth. Selma went to her room to get Amina´s adoption documents but they were gone. Selma was sure she placed the envelop on her table. But it wasn’t there anymore.
Maria asked Selma if she had anything that belonged to Amina. But Selma was exhausted and collapsed to the ground. “I don’t know what is happening. I have a daughter. She lives with me. We have photos together. But I can’t find anything that belongs to her.” she began to cry. “Someone must have entered and took her belongings.” Everyone thought she still wasn’t over the fact that her daughter had died. And thought Selma was making all this up.
As maria was thinking to arrest Selma, Allen entered and showed Selma a photo. This is my Amina. It’s her” Selma cried with joy.
“Where did you find it?”
“From veronica. She lives in the apartment downstairs. She has confirmed that Amina is Selma’s daughter and that they moved here a month ago. And that she occasionally babysits Amina.
The police turned the direction of their investigation towards the man in the footage. His name was john and he lived in the same neighborhood as Selma. He was a convicted sex offender and was convicted in two separate charges and had spent a year in jail and currently he was on parole. The investigators were disappointed that they have wasted 6 hours investigating Selma when their investigation should be focused on John.
The police got a search warrant of his house. There they found Amina´s photos things belonging to a female child which surely were Amina´s. The police even found Amina´s adoption documents. The possible explanation was that he broke into Selma’s house and stole Amina´s belongings to mislead the police and it bought him some time to run away.
Now the police had to act fast. They issued an amber alert and searched the CCTV that was outside the store. According to the footage he hopped on a bus with Amina. The police got the buss number from the footage and found the driver who was driving it at that time. The bus´s CCTV wasn’t working and the driver didn’t know where they got off.
As time was passing by, everyone was getting very frustrated and scared for the little girl. Amina´s photo was released to the press and the police was waiting for a lead that will lead them to john. A hotel manager called the police. He doubted the man was the same person he saw on the news, and he had a girl with him.
When the police arrived at the room, he in fact was john and Amina was with hm. During interrogation he was adamant that Amina belonged to him as she loved him.
What the police couldn’t understand was how he kept the girl from screaming?
And how he convinced her to go with him?
He told the police they had been interacting soon after she moved there. Amina reminded john of his daughter he could see because he lost the custody battle, and his wife took her to another city.
John told the police that he would wait for her in the play area that was in front of her house. He would bring her chocolate and they would sit and talk. Selma never knew because he would ask Amina to sit on the bench with her back facing their apartment and he would sit beside her, but he was blocked by a bush, so that Selma never got to know she was sitting with a stranger.
A week before he took Amina, he asked her to steal the house key so that he could enter their house when Selma wasn’t home and the days the babysitter wasn’t available. The day he saw the adoption papers in Selma’s room was the day he made the plan of taking her.
He further admitted to the police that he knew Selma didn’t have any other documents that she was Amina´s mother. Amina got along with his plan as she he told her they were pulling a prank on her mother and as part of his plan he convinced Amina to delete all the photos on Selma’s phone. He took all Amina´s belongings, the photo album and her photos to wipe the evidence that Amina ever lived there.
He was sure by the time she would convince the police that she in fact was her mother he would have left the country with Amina.
Everyone was disturbed at the abhorrent nature of John´s plan. He was arrested and sent back to jail.
Finally, after 12 hours Selma got to meet her daughter.
