Nothing Is As It Seems

Alyson and her husband Dewayne decided that they would take their 7 year old daughter Abagail; Abbey for short, to Disney world for her 8th birthday. Abbey’s birthday would be in a couple of weeks, so they began planning. They couldn’t decide rather to fly, take a train, drive, or catch a bus. They compared all the prices and decided that driving would be the most affordable and they also had control over how many stops they could make and not to mention all the sites they could see.

It would take them 16 hours to drive from Cleveland, Ohio to Orlando, Florida. Alyson suggested that they rent a RV and Dewayne agreed, saying that it would be the most comfortable choice and they wouldn’t have to pay for a hotel.

It was now two days before Abbey’s birthday and they are packing up and loading their things in the RV. Alyson yells, “Abbey don’t forget to grab Mr. Bear.” This was Abbey’s security bear she never went anywhere without him. She yells back, “he’s already in his car seat buckled up and read to go!” Dewayne looked at Alyson and both smiled and slightly nodded their heads.

“We’re off to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of oz,” they began to sing as the skipped to get in the RV! “We are on our way,” says Dewayne, and Alyson jumps up and down with excitement! 4 hours into the drive Alyson told her husband to stop at the next rest stop because Abbey had to use the bathroom. They pull in to the rest stop and she looks to the back seat and says, “let’s go.” They get out of the car and as they approached the doo Alyson turns around and run back to the car and reaches under the front passenger seat and grabbed her pen and “little black book” saying, “I have to add notes to our life story!” She sat down at a table writing in her book waiting for Abbey to come out the bathroom. Minutes passed by and there was no sign of Abbey. Dewayne approached the table and said “hun where’s Abbey?” She gets up and goes to the rest rooms; Abbey are you done? No answer! She said it again but a little louder and used her full name; "ABAGAIL ARE YOU DONE!??" Still no answer; by this time she is in a state of panic; knocking on stall doors, looking under each one and hysterically yelling for Abbey. She realizes she not answering because she’s no longer in the bathroom. Running at top speed to Dewayne and screaming “she’s not in there and I can’t find her!” They both start searching and asking everyone had they seen a seven year old little girl with red hair and freckles on her face? No one had seen her and Abbey had disappeared without a trace. Dewayne grabbed his cell phone from his pocket and dialed 911 and told them that his daughter was missing and their location.

The police arrived and asked Dewayne and Alyson what happened and Dewayne told them that their daughter went to use the bathroom while I went in the gift shop and my wife sat at the table waiting for her to come out. Several minutes had gone by and I came out the gift shop and noticed that my wife was sitting at the table without Abbey, so I asked her where she was. Alyson said, “that’s when I went in the bathroom and she wasn’t there, so we began to search the rest stop and asked had anyone seen her, but no one had seen her!" The officer asked if that had a picture of Abbey and Alyson reached in her wallet and pulled a picture of her out. The officer walked around asking people had they seen the little girl in the photo or if they could recall seeing her come in with her parents. No one recognized the little girl. Most people replied that when they saw Dewayne he was in the gift shop by himself and Alyson was sitting at the table by herself but they didn’t recall seeing a little girl with neither of them.

During all of the commotion Alyson realized she left her little black book at the table. She ran to go get it but it was gone. She screams out, “no, no, no, where is it? I have to find it! My notebook is gone!”

The officers began to ask one another, “what is so important about a little black book?” Little did they know that this little black book had everything in it they needed to solve their case!