I needed to do something. I had to look for Alba.

After a few more conversations with Inspector Awang, I somehow convinced myself that she was somewhere in KL, that she had perhaps been “adopted” by a wealthy couple. It was a thread of thought that was logical, that I kept to myself as there was nothing to prove any of my assumptions, and quietly went about my plan to map out certain areas in the Klang Valley where she was most likely to be. I also ascertained that she was probably in the most wealthy residential parts of KL, namely Bukit Tunku, Bangsar, Damansara Heights, Petaling Jaya—which was huge, so only the wealthier sections had to be considered—and Taman Tun Dr Ismail.

I got a map of the Klang Valley and pinned it on the wall of the dining room. Out came a stack of post-its, multi-coloured pins and marker pens. I traced the borders of those areas in black and then subdivided those in red. Each red section would translate to one day of searching.

My conclusions were this. Alba had probably been adopted by a family that was either half-expat and local, or all expat, or all local. The demographic of white-mixed couples in the Klang Valley had increased exponentially in the few years after the economic crisis, and especially since there was a renewed faith in the country. Expats loved living in Malaysia—the “expat package” was synonymous with top-notch housing, free international schooling for kids, a maid and or housekeeper, cars and a big, fat salary.

I stood back after marking out the map and I felt for the first time, a sense of purpose that I had not felt since I ran the streets of KL six years before. There was of course some measure of insanity and ludicrousness to this whole scheme, but I had to try, I had to try something. Not doing anything was more detrimental than anything else. No more drugs, no more alcohol. It was drastic but I had to get to a point where it all had to stop. I needed to have a clear head, I needed to be meticulous about it all. I knew in my heart that nothing would ever destroy my desire to find my daughter. It was the only thing I had left, the only thing that made sense, to keep living.

I don’t know how parents with missing kids survived. In my hours perusing the Internet for statistics and research on missing children, I knew that the percentage of marriages that were destroyed after children died or had gone missing, was high. Few survived. It was the worst nightmare for any married couple, one that took the light out of days and made it an eternal night.

Then, one bright morning Marina called me.

You remember that woman I was telling you about… one of the girls said that she has been coming around again…

What? I choked on my coffee.