No, I didn’t want to think about any of that ever again. Someone else could follow up on my years of research. When I went back to work, it would be somewhere that kept my mind busy with admin or customer service. No more researching or analysing or investigating. No field trips to delve back into the past.

I swung the car into Fig Street and wondered where to park. Although I was still two blocks from the playgroup, both sides of the road were lined with cars. In the normally quiet streets, small groups of people were walking towards playgroup. They had backpacks and water bottles. They weren’t wearing the orange SES overalls though; these looked like ordinary people off on a hike. But they’d been out all night, searching for my Tinker Bell. I loved them for their kindness, these strangers who didn’t even know my daughter. Their compassion, their ability to give without expectation. And then I hated them—for the simple fact that it wasn’t their child missing.

The laneway behind playgroup had been cordoned off and a TV news van was parked on the grass at the corner. At the sight of the camera, my hands began shaking again. How could I have been so stupid? Morning television. The twenty-four-hour news cycle. No time was too early.

Keeping my face averted from the searchers and the cameras, I nudged the car back into the main street, up the road towards the shops. The early-morning fog was lifting. Please, God, give us a warm, sunny day to find Bella. Please, God, help find my little girl. The prayer came easily, as though I hadn’t stopped praying years ago. Maybe God could prove that he hadn’t abandoned me after all.

The parking area for the shops was overflowing, with cars up on the verge. Searchers in plain clothes queued at the bakery for coffee, SES blokes wandered out of the supermarket clutching cartons of chocolate milk and bananas. Three weeks ago, on the phone to Phoebe, I’d been so proud of myself for overcoming my anxiety and walking up to the shop without Bella. But my anxiety had been sending me a message—Bella would be safe now if only I’d listened.

If only, if only, if only …

Inside playgroup, the room was buzzing with police officers and SES personnel. Every other morning, the scents of paint, baby wipes, bananas, milk and perfume wafted through this room. Now, I gagged on the bitter smell of coffee combined with McDonald’s hash browns and the stale odour of male sweat. Dora the Explorer was still sitting in the home corner where I’d left her yesterday, a reminder of my terrible negligence, a homecoming present for Bella. Superintendent Milson was huddled in a tight group with two SES men, examining a map on a laptop. Spotting me, he came over immediately.