It’s All Maya!

I started reading a book called The Year of Fog by Michelle Richmond at the same time that little Haleigh Cummings from Satsuma, Florida went missing.  The novel is about a young photographer, Abby Mason, engaged to be married to a great guy.  He lives with his beautiful young daughter, Emma, who is six.  In a moment, in a twinkling of an eye everything changes from a dream life to a nightmare.        

In Abby’s own words: Here is the truth, this is what I know: I was walking on the beach with Emma.  It was cold and very foggy.  She let go of my hand.  I stopped to photograph a baby seal, then glanced up toward the Great Highway.  When I looked back, Emma was gone.

And so begins a tale about the disappearance of a small child.  What could be worse for any parent than to lose a child, but probably nothing could be more horrifying than losing a child and not knowing what happened to him or her!  Or whether the child is dead or alive.  At times, death can seem more tolerable than imagining the worst things imaginable, and one tries to block out images that creep into one’s mind.

Abby begins to count the seconds, minutes, hours, and days after Emma’s disappearance, searching for her endlessly throughout the backdrop of the Bay area.  Even after Emma’s father, Jake, and police are convinced that Emma more than likely drowned that day on the beach, Abby continues to comb San Francisco street by street, alley ways and back alleys, parks and neighborhoods that are good or bad, night and day in what becomes an obsession to find this little girl.

Months pass and halfway through the book you ask yourself, is she on a quest to find this child because she loves her or because she loves Emma’s father, although the relationship between Abby and Jake continues to deteriorate each day that Emma is missing.  How could it not?  How could you lose someone’s child and imagine that all is forgiven?  How could things possibly ever be the same?  Plain and simple, they can’t. 

Or do you really need to ask the question, because you know that the obsession is based on guilt and the guilt is slowly eating away at Abby’s existence.  The only way to reverse it is to find Emma.  But!  Statistics are not in her favor.  The longer a child is missing, the less likely the child will be found alive.

As I began reading this book, little 5 year-old Haleigh Cummings went missing.  A small child sleeping in her own bed, living with her father, her little brother, and the father’s 17 year-old girlfriend.  The young child was taken from her bed while her father, Ronald, was working the night shift.  The girlfriend, Misty Croslin, was the last person to see the little girl.  She noticed her missing when she got up to use the bathroom; there was no sign of forced entry into the Cummings home.  According to more recent reports, the little boy saw a man “dressed all in black” take his sister.

It’s now been one month since little Haleigh Cummings has been missing and the police are no closer to finding out who took her or what happened to the child.

Maya Muses:  Will the story about Haleigh Cummings end as it did in The Year of Fog?  I won’t say more for those of you who prefer not knowing how a book ends.  I will say I pray that little Haleigh is found alive and well.  No the odds are not in favor of a positive outcome, but there’s also that slight chance that maybe this time, this adorable child will beat the odds!

Photo Credits:  Google Images