The mother of a toddler who disappeared from a Washington state bowling alley more than 12 years ago is hoping renewed interest in the case will result in new leads.

"I have been through hell in the years since she has been gone," Theresa Lewis told AOL News. "My daughter vanished out of thin air and nobody knows anything. All I want is closure. I need to know what happened to my daughter."

Two-year-old Teekah Lewis was last seen at about 10:30 p.m. on Jan. 23, 1999. Lewis said she had taken her daughter with her to New Frontier Lanes on South Center Street in Tacoma. There, Lewis, along with some family and friends, rented lanes 7 and 8 in the 32-lane bowling complex.

missingkids.com
Images from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children show a photo of Teekah Lewis at around the age of 2 and an age-progressed image of Teekah as she might look at the age of 12.
A friendly competition began, but Lewis said she kept her eye on her daughter -- who was playing at the wheel of a race car video game some 10 feet away -- for all but a single moment, when she turned to watch her brother bowl.

"I turned around for a second and Teekah was gone," Lewis said. "There was no sign of her."

Family and friends launched an immediate search for the 3-foot-tall, brown-eyed, pony-tailed girl who was dressed in a green Tweety Bird sweatshirt, but were unable to locate any sign of her. Frantic, they notified an off-duty police officer who was working at the bowling lanes, and he made the announcement that a child was missing over the facility's public-address system. Fearful someone might sneak away with Teekah, her uncles ran outside and began looking into all of the cars.

"Teekah would not have gone to a stranger. She was a mama's girl," Lewis said. "She only trusted her mama, her sisters and her baby sitter. She would not have gone near strangers.