One spring afternoon a mother met her greatest fear head-on. Crystal Beck and her three-year-old son Travis were shopping for a new spring and summer wardrobe at a local mall. The mall was very hectic for the middle of the afternoon and to make matters worse Crystal had forgotten her sons stroller at home after taking him for a walk earlier that day. She had told her inquisitive son to say by her side. After visiting a few stores Crystal began to notice that Travis was becoming very anxious.
So she made the decision to finish her son’s shopping in JC Penney at the far end of the mall, the two made their way to the children’s clothing section located on the third floor.
As Crystal searched through the cluttered racks looking for the perfect outfits for her son, still glancing back at Travis who was looking through a bin of stuffed toys. She looked back to the rack for a split second to find the size she needed, and when she looked back up to check on her son he was gone.
Crystal began calling his name, waiting for a response, no response ever came. She called again, but louder this time “Travis, where are you?” With every call for her son her heart began to beat fast and harder inside of her chest. She could feel herself beginning to tremble and shake, her vision became gray and distorted, she then began running though the store call her son and crying uncontrollably.
A salesperson stopped her to try to calm her down and find out what had happened. Crystal explained to her still crying and shaking what had happened. The salesperson assured her not to worry, that he would be found. The girl notified security for the store, they brought Crystal to their office and asked for a description of the boy. She told them that he was a three years old boy, with blonde hair and blue eye, and standing 36 inches in height. He was wearing a blue baseball cap, a red long sleeved shirt, blue jeans, and a pair of white Reebok sneakers. When she was done with the description of her son the security officer offered her a glass of water, but she refused it. Her stomach felt as if there was a solid piece of metal lying at the bottom of it.
As Crystal sat in the office so many horrible thoughts ran through her head, thoughts that no parent would ever want to imagine might happen to their beloved child. Just then an officer walked into the office with a stone gray look on his face. He asked the officer sitting behind the desk if he could step out into the hall. At that moment Crystal had an overwhelming intuition of fear come over her. She knew that when the officer returned it was not going to be good news. After a short moment, which seemed to her as an eternity the officer returned into the room. He informed her that a surveillance camera had taken some footage of a man carrying a small child who was kicking and screaming out of the door that fit the description she had given of her son, Travis. Crystal immediately began crying again; she felt herself become nauseous and lightheaded. The officer said ” Ma’am, we need you to take a look at the video.”
Crystal knew that she was the only one, who could positively identify her son, so she agreed to look at what the camera had captured. The officers led her out of the office and down a corridor to the monitoring room. This walk seemed like the longest walk that she had ever had to endure. She took a seat in front of the monitoring television. The officer asked her ” Are you ready?” Crystal could never really be ready for what she was about to see, but she responded with a quiet and unsure “Yes.” As the tape played out, to her relief the boy in the video was not Travis. She responded with ” Oh thank God, it’s not him.” Again she began to cry and sob uncontrollably with relief. By this time two-and-a-half hours had gone by since Crystal had last seen her son. She decided that she wasn’t doing herself or her son any good just waiting for news. She decided that she was going to help in the search for Travis. After seeing the video she felt that her son was somewhere in that store, and she wanted to be the one to find him.
She started in the last place she saw her son and followed her mothers’ intuition. Her intuition led her to the back of the store to the bedding department. With her eyes she scanned the area. A twin-sized bed with Mickey Mouse bedding caught her eye. On that bed she noticed an oddly shaped ball in the middle of it, as her heart began to pound she walked up to the bed and pulled back the covers. To her surprise and delight there lay her blessed child sound asleep unknowingly what was going on around him. Crystal heart immediately filled with joy and relief. She quietly lay down beside her son, holding him in her arms while she sobbed.
Fifteen minutes went by when one of the security guard walked by. He immediately saw the two laying in the make-shift bed, standing there in the distance he watch a mother lovingly hold her lost treasure in her arms. He radioed in that the boy had been found and to call off the search and all was back to normal in the store.
