Ohio, 15 December 1990 C.E.
The mall is crowded, on a Saturday with only a week and a half until Christmas. Anna has been given very specific instructions from her parents: Stay with us.
And she means to. It's just one of those things that happens, in the crowds and the chaos. Anna gets distracted by a display of nutcrackers when her parents decide split up for five minutes, and when she looks up again, she is alone.
(Her mother and father -- not that Anna knows this -- are meeting each other at the other end of the department store, with horrified statements of I thought she was with you.)
Anna looks around, puzzled and a bit worried.
And then decides that if her parents are lost, well, she's just going to have to go find them.
And she means to. It's just one of those things that happens, in the crowds and the chaos. Anna gets distracted by a display of nutcrackers when her parents decide split up for five minutes, and when she looks up again, she is alone.
(Her mother and father -- not that Anna knows this -- are meeting each other at the other end of the department store, with horrified statements of I thought she was with you.)
Anna looks around, puzzled and a bit worried.
And then decides that if her parents are lost, well, she's just going to have to go find them.