Chapter Text
Nothing made sense.
For the last few weeks, Sophie had not been able to sleep, or really do anything. Except play that stupid game. She was obsessed with it. She hated it. At least she thought she did. She wasn't sure about much these days. Every night, she went down to that basement, carrying her journal and blanket. Every night, she would sit there until the sun came up, trying to decode the messages hidden inside. A new secret, a new gorey screen, a new familiar face. She wrote it all down, but by the morning, she couldn't even read her own scribbles she once thought of as words. The only thing she could make out was her memory log.
‘’My name is sophie walten.
I live with my girlfriend, Jenny letterson.
…’’
She had left a few pages blank to write more, but couldn't think of anything. She’d put her favorite singer, but she didn't care much for music. She would put the names of her friends or family, but she didn't have any. Not that she could remember, anyway. So she just continued her scribbles, pretending to understand what she was seeing. it all seemed so simple. But it didn't make sense. She couldn't even begin to imagine a timeline, just sending her into a panic whenever she'd try. It felt wrong. Everything. All she wanted was to be free. Was to remember. She didn't care about what it would do to her, she just wanted to know.
She saw the sun start to peek through the window, and knew it was time for bed, which just meant laying down next to Jenny and pretending to be asleep while running through the information in her mind. Charles. Jack. Felix. Rosemary. Susan. Sophie…
“Sophie? Sophie! You up?”
She opened her eyes to see Jenny standing in front of her, already dressed and ready for the day.
“You okay? You're usually the one yelling at me to wake up.” They smiled half-heartedly.
They crouched down to be at the same level as her. Sophie knew she couldn't say anything. Jenny wouldnt understand. No one would. Sophie knew she sounded crazy. She was not crazy. She's not crazy. She was not.
“Sorry- i need to go to bed earlier, sleeping in like this can't be good for me.”
She got up and rubbed the fake sleepiness from her eyes. Jenny still looked a bit worried, but they knew that the conversation had ended, and didn't bother trying to pry further.
“Alright, gotta go down for my shift, just wanted to say good morning before I left.”
They smiled and, just for a moment, Sophie forgot about the game. And her family. And her memories. And their deaths. The only thing she could think about was how gorgeous they looked in their little uniform. And how lucky she was to have them. But soon enough, that moment was gone, and reality came crashing back down. She was so lucky to have someone like them, and yet she spent every day lying to them. Every “goodnight” and “i'll eat later”. Every “dont worry about me” and “im fine”. All a lie. all just a mask she would wear for the day. All just an attempt to ‘help’ them, whatever that meant. she didn't know. She didn't know anything.
“Yeah, have fun.”
She smiled back, suddenly fearing that the mask would never come off.