Chapter Text
Laura kicked at a pile of rocks, watching as they skittered aimlessly down the road and disappeared into the fog. It had been fun at first, reaching the town only to find it abandoned. Exploring without the constant of adults telling her what to do, or where to be. But the novelty of being on her own had long wore off, and she found herself bored. Uncertain. Perhaps even a little scared, though she wouldn’t make her fear real by acknowledging it.
Her mind unconsciously turned towards a memory of herself sitting in the backseat of the car, happily dragging the tiny plastic comb through her favorite Barbie’s snarled hair while the rhythm of the highway beneath the tires lulled her into a state of comfort.
But the distinct sound of a nearby door being forced open startled her out of it, forcing her back to the present. Maybe she wasn’t as alone as she thought.
Curious and a little scared because she knew that not all adults were nice, Laura tiptoed closer to the sound and peered around a corner.
After the amount of time she had wandered on her own, she certainly wasn’t expecting to come across another person at all, but especially someone she knew. But she recognized the tall blonde man immediately. Mary’s husband, James. The one that wore a permanent scowl, only showing up to drive her home from appointments. Eventually, he stopped showing up at all, except to take Mary out of the hospital last week so she could go on a trip to Silent Hill. That had been the last time Laura saw her.
She was not very fond of him, and though she knew it was not very nice to feel that way about someone she barely knew, Laura couldn’t help it. Mary had told her to be patient with him, that he did genuinely love her but was going through a hard time of his own while dealing with her illness. And for Mary alone, maybe Laura would give him a chance. At least she wasn’t alone anymore.
Making herself as small and quiet as possible, Laura followed James into the abandoned apartment building.
***
It was dark inside. The complex had long lost power, leaving nothing but the dim light that streamed in through the broken windows. Laura used it to her advantage, concealing herself while trying to figure out what James was doing there on his own. She occasionally took breaks from spying on him to draw on the walls with her broken crayons, taking joy in doing something that she would ordinarily never be allowed to do.
Once she had vandalized the hall outside of the main office, Laura moved on and started exploring the apartments. Some of them had boxes of cookies and crackers that hadn’t gone stale yet, and she snacked on them as she wished, with nobody around to tell her what she could or could not eat. Most of the food in the refridgerators had long spoiled though, and Laura avoided looking in the freezers because of the risk of seeing something that reminded her of what she wanted to forget.
She was in the middle of drawing on one of the apartment walls again when she heard James stomping around outside and decided that maybe it was time to go and talk to him.
Peering into the darkness, she could barely make out his outstretched arm sticking through some grates at the end of the hall. His flashlight shone on something glinting just inches out of his reach.
Even though she was scared and longed for the stable presence of an adult after being on her own for so long, Laura couldn’t help herself. She ran forward and kicked the keys further out of his grasp, laughing as she stomped on his fingers.
“Hey!” James yelled, quickly pulling them back through the grate. “Wait!”
But Laura was already running back the opposite way, regretting the impulsive act of violence and still not sure why she had done it. Wanting to put as much distance between herself and James as possible, she ran up a flight of stairs and hid in the unit at the far end of the hall, locking herself in before collapsing on the couch, heart racing and out of breath.
A few minutes passed with nothing but silence on the other side of the door, and when Laura was certain James hadn’t followed her, she relaxed and pulled the letter out of the pocket on the front of her overalls. It had taken a lot of time to read it the first few times, especially the bigger words. But Laura broke them down by syllable and carefully sounded them out loud until they made sense, just as her teacher taught her to do last year. By now, she had read it so many times, the entire thing was second nature. She could probably recite it word for word without even looking at it.
She was careful not to let her tears fall onto the paper and ruin the ink.
“My dearest Laura, I’m leaving this letter to Rachel to give to you after I’m gone…”
***
Still feeling bad about stomping on James’ hand and longing for the daylight again - or what pever she could see of it throug the fog - Laura decided to leave the apartment and explore the town on her own again. If James was here, maybe that meant there were other people around.
After a couple hours of wandering and taking pleasure in more small acts of mischief, Laura gave up looking for other people. Silent Hill was no less empty than when she had arrived. She couldn’t even find any indirect signs of life among the stalled cars and smashed storefront windows. She ventured into the park for a few minutes, only to be driven back by the gut wrenching sight of an abandoned ice cream stand.
Trying not to think of that one memory, Laura scampered back the way she came through the underpass, and scaled a brick wall that gave her just enough height to get a good look around. Nothing but empty streets and dwindling daylight, the latter of which filled her with a visceral fear. She had no idea of where she was going to go when night fell. Maybe back to the apartments, if James wasn’t still there.
Longing for the only comfort she had, Laura once more pulled out Mary’s letter. She stared at the envelope for a few moments, too distracted to hear the footsteps.
“Hey! It was you, wasn’t it? You’re the one who stepped on my hand.”
Panic filled Laura at the thought that she might be in trouble, and more specifically, with the only other person she had seen all day. But James didn’t look mad. His face wore an expression of concern and maybe even a little relief. Laura considerd that perhaps he was also scared, even though adults rarely admitted it, and especially not in front of kids. She hated the half-hearted way they always tried to hide their feelings, as if she was too stupid to know.
“Hmpf. Maybe I did,” she responded, annoyed that James was no different than the rest of them.
“What’s a little girl like you doing here anyway?”
Laura kicked her feet, the same way she had while sitting in the back seat of the car, clutching the Barbie in the same way she now clutched Mary’s letter.
“I don’t know,” she retorted in a snarky voice, getting a thrill from talking back to an adult, something she ordinarily would not have been able to get away with. “What’s a big dumb dumb like you doing here anyway?”
“Hey. That’s not very nice. Didn’t your parents teach you any manners?”
Laura stared at the letter as her eyes blurred with tears. She knew James wouldn’t be like Mary. She had tried to convince Laura that it hadn’t been her fault, even though she knew it was.
“Whatcha got there?”
James moved closer, triggering a deep sense of panic in Laura. Adults were always trying to take things from her, but she wasn’t going to let it happen this time. Now when it was the only thing she had left.
“None of your business! You didn’t love Mary anyway!”
She turned to hop off the fence and ran into the fog, desperate to put distance between herself and James before he grabbed her letter.