Warhol's Prophecy

the latest pop sensations. Twelve monthly pictures of more one-hit wonders, Hailey had thought.

Business as usual.

Then, Becky was gone.

My child is dead.

Hailey had felt a grip of panic almost immediately, but that grip was tightening now. Like a noose around her neck, it was forcing her to breathe more deeply, to fill her lungs, because now it felt as if her head was swelling. As if she couldn’t get enough breath. She could feel her heart hammering against her ribs, so hard it threatened to shatter them – and all the time she looked around. And around.

Dead!

She couldn’t see the little red coat that Becky was wearing

(you nearly said had been wearing. You already half believe she’s dead, don’t you?)

despite the fact that it normally stood out like a beacon, even in crowds.

Jesus, how far could Becky have gone?

Where could she have gone?

Hailey looked around the shop again, towards the games area, towards the T-shirt racks, and the cassettes. She hurried in that direction, pushing past a woman who was picking slowly through the bargain bins. The woman muttered something under her breath as Hailey shoved her aside, but Hailey didn’t hear her words. They didn’t matter; nothing did, other than finding her daughter.

Two men in their thirties were playing on one of the Playstation consoles, shouting and cheering their progress on a football game displayed. Hailey passed them. She passed two youths checking through the other games on the shelves, complaining about the prices of them.

No sign of Becky.

Hailey walked to the far end of the aisle, her pace hurried, eyes constantly darting from side to side.

Please God, let me see that red coat.

Past yet more computer games. Past the huge video screen that dominated one end of the store’s lower floor. Back through T-shirts and ‘Easy Listening’.

Becky might have gone upstairs.

Hailey made her way towards the escalator, which carried her up to the first floor containing the Video Department. She stood still on the moving stairway until it had reached halfway, then could stand it no longer, so began hurrying up its metal steps, the heels of her ankle boots clacking loudly as she climbed.

The Video Department wasn’t as crowded as the lower floor. So if Becky was up here, she should be relatively easy to spot, Hailey told herself, searching for any shred of comfort in her despair.

On three walls there were monitors showing the same selected video, but Hailey had no time to guess what it was. The images of Al Pacino flickered around her unnoticed.

On the screens he was shouting, but his rantings were silent, the film’s dialogue drowned by music drifting from other speakers.

Hailey hurried around the video racks.

Al Pacino continued to scream silently.

No sign of Becky.

Hailey hurried back towards the Down escalator, taking the steps practically two at a time.

She stood, panting, at the bottom.

Now what?

If Becky wasn’t inside the store, then she could truly be anywhere – hopelessly and irretrievably lost.

Dead?

Hailey tried to think. Tried to think where her daughter might have gone.

If Becky realized that she had become separated from her mother, which by now she must have, how would she react? After the initial panic, what would she do? Where would she search? Would she stand obediently outside the store, just waiting for Hailey? Would she ask someone to take her to the store manager, to convince the staff to put out a message over the tannoy for . . .

(she’s five years old, for Christ’s sake! Get real. Get a fucking grip)

Get a fucking grip.

Outside the HMV store the sight that confronted Hailey was even more daunting. The wide concourses separating the rows of shops were swarming with people. At least inside the store she had a chance of finding her daughter. If she could be sure that the little girl had stayed within the confines of HMV, Hailey could continue her relentless, desperate circuit of the display racks. Just walk and walk until she finally found Becky somewhere between Metallica and Texas. But if Becky had left the store, then it was hopeless.

Hopeless.

Pointless.

My child is dead.

Perhaps Becky had retraced their steps. Perhaps she had remembered which shops they’d been in before entering HMV, and was – even as Hailey stood helplessly outside the main entrance of the store – trailing vainly around Dorothy Perkins or Next or WHSmith.

Or not.

If you can’t think straight yourself, how do you expect your five-year-old to?

Hailey tried to remember what her instructions to Becky had been, should she ever become lost in a crowded shopping centre. Surely at some time, when the child was younger, she had been told what to do. That was what responsible parents did, wasn’t it? They took their offspring to one side, and calmly and clearly told them what to do and how to behave in any emergency.

Didn’t they?

And while their kids were behaving calmly and collectedly, the parents sat around and waited for them to return safely. That was what happened, wasn’t it?

Hailey tried to swallow, but felt as if someone had filled her throat with chalk.

She scanned the mass of shoppers.

So many faces.

So many expressions.

Hailey wondered how many, passing her by, looked with puzzlement at her own tortured features. Not that she cared. She just wanted to scream Becky’s name. That if she bellowed her daughter’s name aloud, it would be heard in every corner of this vast shopping complex and that, as if by magic, the child would appear at her side.

Shout? Scream? Run back and forth? Retrace your steps?

She had no idea what to do.

Hailey felt like a child.

The thought of what Becky herself must be going through now only intensified that agony.

Please God, let me see that red coat.

Her voice cracking, Hailey spoke her daughter’s name.

She spoke it again, slightly louder this time.

Then again, with growing volume. She was close to shouting it now. And then, after that? Shrieking uncontrollably?

Hailey knew that she was close to breakdown. Tears of panic and fear were just seconds away. Becky was probably already sobbing somewhere else, running helplessly back and forth, calling for her mum, unable to find her in that vast amoebic flow of faceless shoppers.

My child is dead.

Hailey felt the first hot tear cut its way down her cheek, burning the skin as fiercely as if it was acid. She realized there was only one thing she could do now. And she had to do it before it was too late.

Then she saw the red coat.

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