um . . . about this high.’ I hold my hand at about waist height. ‘She’s got blonde hair, and she’s wearing a pink coat, pink wellies and a sparkly silver bobble hat.’
‘Can’t say that I have. Let me ask the others.’ He turns and shouts to the two teenagers that work behind him, slicing rolls and folding napkins, before turning back to me. ‘Sorry, darlin’, we haven’t seen her. We’ll keep an eye out though, yeah?’
‘OK. Thank you.’ I try and muster a smile, before turning back to the field. I scan across the crowds, my eyes seeking out that distinct glittery bobble hat in the dark but to no avail. Spying the admissions table, where three PTA mums sit all bundled up against the cold, I start to hurry towards them, cursing the mud for hampering my progress.
‘Hello, hi.’ I am breathless with the effort of trudging through the churned-up mud as I reach the table. ‘Can you help me? I’m looking for a little girl.’
‘Is she lost?’ A caramel blonde woman, wearing an expensive waxed jacket and perfect make-up speaks first, her eyes widening as her hand with its long, manicured nails flies to cover her mouth.
‘Yes, I think so . . . I mean, she followed her mum to the loo and . . . look, we can’t find her, her name is Laurel Jessop, she’s four . . .’
‘Laurel?’ One of the other women gasps, strands of her dark hair sticking to her lip gloss as she jumps to her feet. ‘I know Laurel, she’s a friend of my daughter, Daisy.’ As she says the words I recognise her as the woman my friend Jessika nannies for.
‘Yes, Laurel. Please, have you seen her? She’s going to be frightened if she’s wandered off and she can’t find us.’ My fingers knit together anxiously as I look from one to the other, my feet itching to get back to the field, to start looking for Laurel. The third woman, pale and mousy, who I recognise from the school gate but can’t match to a child looks up with wide eyes but says nothing, her fingers pausing briefly in their tidying of admission tickets.
‘We haven’t seen her,’ Caramel Blonde says, ‘and we wouldn’t let a little one out on their own. Oh my gosh, this is terrible.’ She turns to the dark-haired woman, Daisy’s mother, an accusatory tone creeping into her voice. ‘I told you we should have set up a lost children zone.’
‘Please . . .’ I say again, ‘are you absolutely sure she hasn’t been past here?’ Even as I say the words I know Laurel hasn’t – she would have stopped and asked Daisy’s mum to help her find us, as per Fran’s strict rules.
‘Absolutely sure,’ the woman says firmly, shouldering her way past Daisy’s mother to come and stand next to me, her eyes scanning the field. ‘Right. Where’s Mr Abbott? The head will need to know about this – we have a process to set in place when a child goes missing. You two,’ she turns to the women next to her, an officious air about her now, as though she’s used to taking charge, ‘you need to get this gate closed off before things finish and people start to leave.’
Daisy’s mother starts nodding frantically in agreement, twisting her hands together as she looks anxiously between the open gate and the hordes of people watching the fireworks burst over our heads, panic starting to creep across her features. The mousy woman tidying the tickets whispers something, but before I can ask her to repeat it, there is a huge cheer as the grand finale of the fireworks goes off, and to my horror I see people start to turn to depart, gathering up small children with their glow sticks, stumbling over discarded polystyrene cups and sweet wrappers as they make their way through the field back towards the still open gate and the darkened lane that leads out and away towards the main roads.
‘Anna!’ Fran careers across the field, her feet almost sliding out from under her, her hat pushed right back on her head. Her eyes are glittery, and her cheeks flushed, and I think at first that it’s all OK, that Laurel was just locked in the loo after all. ‘Did you find her?’
My heart sinks. Fran is flushed from her frantic searching, not because it’s all over.
‘Anna? Did you find her?’ Fran repeats, and I shake my head.
‘No. No one has seen her. I checked with Pete at the barbecue station, and I asked the PTA mums at the admissions table, but none of them have seen her.’
‘Fuck.’ Fran pulls her hat off and shoves her hand through her glossy black bob, her eyes combing the scene behind me, as people now flood towards the open gate. ‘LAUREL!’ she shouts, grabbing my hand and pulling me back into the field, back into the thick of the dispersing crowd. ‘LAUREL!’ We both take up the cry, and a thick knot of fear rises up in my chest as the thought skitters across the back of my mind that maybe, maybe Laurel hasn’t got lost.
‘Mrs Jessop? Mrs Smythe on the PTA tells me we have a missing child. Is that right?’ Mr Abbott, head teacher at Oxbury Primary appears in front of me as I struggle to keep up with Fran.
‘I’m not Mrs . . . yes, she’s missing. Laurel . . . her name is Laurel,’ I manage to stutter. ‘We can’t find her.’
‘Right, try not to panic, the chances are she’s just wandered off somewhere.’ His voice is calm, but his brow is creased with concern. ‘Where did you last see her?’ I ramble on about Fran getting drinks and using the bathroom, before impatiently pushing past him and catching up to Fran, who is yanking open the doors to the portaloos again.
‘I thought maybe I missed one,’ Fran sighs. ‘I thought she might have gone in there after I checked. Did you ask the people who were serving at the bar?’
I glance towards the bar area, where Mr Abbott is talking to the parents and helpers behind the table, gesturing across the field with one arm. Behind him I see the PTA mums gathered at the now closed gate, a crowd of people waiting to leave bottlenecking in front of them. ‘The head teacher, Mr Abbott, is talking to them now.’
‘The head? He’s looking for her too?’ Fran looks up at me, a look of blind panic behind her eyes. ‘Dominic!’ she shouts suddenly, her hand flying to her mouth. ‘Dominic was meant to be here . . . what if he turned up and saw her . . . maybe she was cold, and he took her home?’
‘Maybe,’ I say doubtfully, but Fran is already fumbling in her coat pocket, dragging out her mobile phone and dialling Dominic’s number. ‘He’s her dad after all,’ she says, phone clamped to her ear. ‘I mean, why wouldn’t he take her home . . . and he wouldn’t think to ring me, not that I would have heard it even if he had . . .’ she trails off before she hangs up without speaking. ‘Voicemail,’ she says, bitterly.
Mr Abbott appears by her side and gives us both a tight smile, as we hear the sound of Laurel’s name being called in an announcement over a loudhailer.
‘Mrs Jessop.’ I point at Fran and he turns to her. ‘I’ve spoken to a few of the parents over at the bar area, but none of them have seen Laurel. We have implemented the first stages of our missing child process. All exits have been closed for the moment, and several people have already volunteered to start searching the immediate area for any sign of Laurel. What time did you last see her?’
‘I don’t know . . . the display had started, I think. Anna?’ Fran turns slightly, throwing the question to me, her eyes already looking past me, still searching the field for any glimpse of Laurel.
I have no idea. I haven’t checked the time all evening, and my heart thuds in my chest, a frantic double beat that makes my breath stop in my throat for a moment.
‘I’m not sure,’ I say. ‘Just after the fireworks started?’ Mr Abbott flips his wrist and checks his watch.
‘So, she’s been missing for around half an hour now?’ He frowns, and I feel sick – I hadn’t realised how long it had been, it feels like seconds ago and a hundred years all at the same time since I last saw her. ‘OK, I think perhaps it’s time we made a phone call . . . I think we need to get the police involved.’
I turn to Fran, and see my own fear written all over her face.
‘I’ll do it.’ She gulps