Authors Note: I've placed this in the Silent Hill category, as it seems the most befitting of the idea and where it will lead - but I'm not sure where it will all be taken just yet. The root of this inspiration was certainly Silent Hill, but I shall have to see where it all ends up.

Original Characters in the appropriate setting

Dear Pippa,

I understand that I have a lot of explaining to do. When your Mother left us it was exceptionally hard, the circumstances of it were harder to swallow than the largest of pills. If she had passed away then there would have been something to grieve, to mourn, to bury and to eventually put behind us. But Andrea, she didn't die. She didn't give us anything to lay to rest; she just vanished in the middle of the night. You were nine at the time, if I recall correctly; the years haven't been kind to my memories.

I do remember asking her if she was all right in the fogginess of my sleep, she promised me yes so I fell back asleep. In the morning she was gone. I'd over slept; I thought she had gone to work. She often did that before I awoke. I was working odd hours at the factory at the time. She was working at the school you went to; you were often gone and I awoke to an empty house. Yet on this particular day, you woke me up. You asked me, "Where's Mommy?" over and over. I told you she was working, made excuses for her having forgotten to get you ready for school.

For the first time in months we had breakfast together that morning, and I took you to school myself. You were late. I was angry. I didn't even try and see Andrea that morning. If only I had done, maybe things would have been different, maybe she would still be with us, we'd have found her or had the answers that we both desperately want. Instead I went straight home to that apartment we had back then. The one with the smelly bathroom? And spent the day like I had done for time as long as I can remember. I put the television on and watched some dreadful day time television before changing and getting ready for work.

You were sat in front of the door when I got home that evening. You'd been crying, none of the neighbours offering to help you. You'd walked home from school by yourself. For the second time that day I was angry, but for very different reasons. I let us into the apartment, cooked us a quick dinner and then phoned Maggie – Andreas friend, the one who'd gotten her the job at the school. I couldn't understand why Andrea was still there and hadn't brought you home herself as she always had done. It was then that everything started falling apart. My first thought was that there was someone else; maybe there was? Maybe there still is, I'm not certain.

Maggie told me that your mother didn't come in to work that day.

Right away I called the police, hanging up on Maggie – she'd never been supportive of our marriage, but she'd been unbelievably good to you during that troubling time. I can't fault her for that. The police asked how long your mother had been missing. I told them since that morning; they laughed and told me to ring them back when Andrea had been gone for longer a day out the house didn't make a missing person. I argued with them telling them it was out of character for her to be gone for so long. To ignore the needs of her daughter, but they insisted that Andrea might just be at the mall.

I took you to Maggies so that I could drive around and try and look for her. I even called her parents, but they were as responsive as ever. They told me they knew nothing. For some reason I believed them, beyond their claims of not having a daughter I could hear their fears.

That night was sleepless and obviously, your mother didn't come home.

After the appointed time, I rang the police again and they came to talk to me at the apartment. You were at school at the time. They just covered all the based that I'd done on that night you were at Maggies. They asked me where she could go, any family. Any reason I could think of for her leaving. I tried to keep it together, but the way they asked the questions – it sounded like they thought I had something to do with her leaving. I don't think I did. Even now. I cannot put down in enough words how much I love your mother.

It was after the police officers left with the information I gave them and the duty bound telling that they would do what they could that I poured my first drink. I wish I hadn't. How I wish now that I hadn't. The burn offered an instant comfort, numbed everything; especially the pain of her leaving.

Days passed; all I could do was wait for the telephone to ring and hope that it brought some news. Anything. I was still hopeful in those early days that they'd find her and bring her back home to us. As time passed the hope for good news turned into the hope that I would just hear something. Anything. Just a fragment of news about Andrea, that she had found a new home somewhere and was happy with a new life; I just wanted to know she was safe. In the end I feared to hope they'd find a body. So we had the truth finally.

The bottle became my comfort when that news didn't come.

I lost my job at the factory. With no reason to leave the apartment I didn't. I should have clung to you, instead I pushed you away for the comfort of that alcoholic burn. Years passed, we argued more than I care to think about. You were right to pick out my faults; for I have many. I drove your mother away, I couldn't raise you for my weaknesses of living without her.

I tried moving us away, in the hope that it would help save us, but that just bred more resentment. You didn't want to leave your friends behind, but my delusive opinion that I could just quit the bottle after so many years and get a job in another factory won out. I promised a better life that I couldn't deliver.
It started off all right, you got on well at your new school; but the job for me never came. You were encouraging, even through our arguments. Said that I should find someone new, I dated, but it wasn't right. I tried, please understand that I tried; but that first drink is fatal.
I fell back into the bottle harder this time, from the moment I first woke I'd have the bottle in my hand. I turned violent and hateful towards you; you adapted to our new life so well and I so badly. I was disgusted with myself – I don't remember much of this time, I know now that I blacked out for days on end, not wanting to spend a minute in the real, waking world. My tormented dreams were so much more a comfort to me, for in them I was punished for my crimes against you and Andrea.

I should have clung to you, but my actions drove you away. You met that man, what was his name? Left our new home to be with him, but our new home wasn't new at that point any more was it? How many years have passed? So I lost you as well, my little girl, gone. Just like her mother, only different. You're still here with me, but I am no longer with you. I promise you I can change, and I will. I will this time.

Not like so many broken promises like the ones I've made in the past.

I'll bring her back with me, the dreams I mentioned, they're more than that. I saw a name in the fog on a board. Underneath it, I saw myself sitting there, distorted and broken. I remember waking from that dream without the taste of stale bourbon in my mouth. A renewed feeling of resolve.

There was a direction, a place to go.

Somewhere to start looking for answers.

Since the first day that I had given up on daring to hope, there is a glimmer of light. I don't know what I will find there; the dreams I fear are only the beginning of something far, far worse. Even through that feeling of dread, I know that I must go.

Your Father,

Michael Carter.