On the morn of the seventh day, James told Harry what it was like to be a conduit for Silent Hill.
He explained it like this: he was trapped here. Harry wasn't going to learn the circumstances that led to it at this time, and he had to be prepared that he may never get that from him. Regardless, the town chained him to South Vale after realizing that he could be used as an energy source. It took ages for him to figure this out on his own. The concept itself was so strange that it seemed implausible, and if James had to admit it, kind of egotistical of him to think it. No one was that special.
Harry silently disagreed.
Silent Hill gave him no extraordinary powers - or James didn't consider them as such. He couldn't control them. They were curses. The town thrived on negative energy. The more wicked and torturous it was, the more powerful it grew. It took some time (in the unidentifiable span of three years) for Silent Hill to become strong enough to infest James. It then took another couple years of field testing to develop the best method for sucking on him like a deranged vampire.
James didn't know how to elaborate on how he knew that. The best he could offer was that he began to notice how the tantrums and hallucinations it inflicted upon him, combined with his psychotic depression, coincided with a surge of stifling energy in the atmosphere. A side effect of Silent Hill's choice to use him as a generator meant that it in return, it fed him the ability to gather knowledge about what it wanted, what it was 'thinking', and tentatively, what it planned.
Telling Harry the reason behind that good morning wakeup call was not as hard as disclosing his depression. His empathy towards James was honest, though he neglected to look surprised. James couldn't blame him. He didn't really make it much of a secret at all. Having to say it out loud for the very first time was the difficult part. There was more than a fair amount of shame attached to such a deep-seated issue. As nonjudgmental as Harry appeared, James felt like a fool for allowing himself to stoop so low.
He went back to refining Harry's understanding of Silent Hill. When he said he could sense what it was up to, he stressed that it didn't speak to him with words. The town spoke with visions, emotion, and pain. It was up to James to interpret what any of that meant.
"The feelings swim around in my head like goldfish," he described. "I get dizzy and sometimes I think I black out. At first I couldn't make any sense of what was going on. Then as it happened more often and it became a regular thing for a while, I learned that I could turn all that into words. It's like translating a language, I guess, but that doesn't mean I can always do that. You know how sometimes things just don't need words in order for something to be said?"
Harry looked like he knew all too well.
The games had dwindled lately. He couldn't put a time frame on it or any of these events. James assumed that the town was letting him recuperate longer so it could get a nice filling meal out of him.
"Did it feel any weaker to you during that time?"
"Mm... no," James said. "It felt pretty strong. Probably the strongest it's ever been." He paused, taking his eyes away from Harry's. "I think it was waiting for something."
"And any idea what that something is?"
James procrastinated while he sucked on his teeth and tried to pick the words out of the dingy carpet. Maybe Harry would believe that he was taking his time to find the best way to articulate it. After the minor collapse of their trust the day before, James came to the conclusion that that probably wasn't going to pan out.
More white lies would have to do. "Yes, and no. It's still bottling up its reserves. The.. feeling I'm getting from it is that something big is going to happen, or supposed to happen. What, or how, or why.. I'm totally in the dark." James lifted his head and locked on to Harry's dispirited eyes. "You can believe me, or you don't, it doesn't matter to me. I've told you as much as I can."
"As much as you're willing," Harry corrected despondently.
James spread his hands and dropped his back against the chair. "Sure, whatever, as much as I'm willing. I don't know how much you knowing about these things is going to be used against you, Harry. That's why I kept it from you before, and I have to pick and choose what I can tell you. You have no idea what this place can do to you, and I really don't consider myself an expert on it."
He shook his head and rubbed the tiredness from his face. "I'm sorry. I could have just put us both in deep shit trouble by telling anything. You get how it works now, right?" James glanced up and saw Harry nod. "So does that prepare you for when it happens in the future? Because it's going to happen. I wish it wouldn't, but.."
"Yeah.. it'll have to. I'm gonna go out on a limb here and guess that I'm probably not going to get insight about it when it does happen again."
James sighed and weakly shrugged his hands in his lap. "Probably not. We'll have to take it on a case-by-case basis."
Harry's scoff was quiet. James downcast his eyes when he heard it.
"So.. can I ask just two more questions?"
James rolled his head back like an impatient teenager, but agreed.
"What's with that water thing you do? How bad does it get?"
Harry was shot a challenging look tinted with just enough play that it snapped a rubber band on his old heart. "Are those both your questions?" James asked him, even the corners of his mouth hinting at a smile that was a bit puckish in nature.
"Uh.. no," he laughed distractedly, to James's mild amusement.
"So pick one, and then pick another. You asked for two and I'm only letting you have two. Choose wisely."
"Jeez, put some pressure on a guy, huh?"
As Harry scrambled to prioritize his thoughts, the resident's rare roguish humor died. It was funny how those small instances could tip his glass a little. The man sought lighthearted commentary from a source that wasn't accustomed to giving it. Back in Ashfield, James hadn't been known for being a cheery man in the first place. Frank used to describe his son as being quiet, a little too serious, and even a little too boring. His one friend hesitated to call him a great guy to bring to parties; more like he was socially awkward and difficult to convince that he could have fun.
It appeared Harry made his first choice by the way he leaned over, set his elbows on his knees, clasped his hands and pointed both index fingers at James's chest. "Okay. First one. What's with the water thing?"
"I don't know," James boldly lied, and Harry believed. "It probably has something to do with why it's all wet around here. I don't know everything."
Harry opened his mouth like he was going to ask a follow up, then shut it, and grinned. He wagged his two pointed fingers at him ( Aah, you said only two! ) and took a breath before pitching his second question.
"Can you feel it if people come to Silent Hill?"
If James could've chosen from a list of questions that Harry had for him, that one would not have made the top five. That was a loaded one. James looked away. He was forced to pull the wool over Harry's eyes now that some of their tense air had cleared. It'd be best to give him the lightest fib he had. He searched for yet another way to weave a rug of deceit. He also just wanted the conversation to end. This is the most talking he's, very possibly, ever done in one sitting. It was going to burn him out.
"No. I don't think so. I mean.. I didn't feel you coming in. I think if I were able to feel something like that, a person would have to be a pretty big deal for Silent Hill to clue me in to it."
Harry drew his lips inward. He looked like a hungry dog seeking a savory morsel from a dinner plate. James never fed animals from the table. There had to be discipline. The questions were answered and he had nothing left that he wanted to give him.
Realizing that his Q&A session was truly over, Harry sat up, pushing his hands up and down his thighs. The information he took in was heavy, complicated, and left him unsatisfied. James could tell he didn't meet Harry's personal requirements. He guessed his cravings for every detail stemmed from his occupation as a writer. Outside of Silent Hill, James had also kept his life private, even from those close to him. Even from Mary.
Towards the end of her suffering, he had made himself a stranger to her.
It felt like his energy for the day was wasted. Accompanied by Harry's zesty life force, ever bright in the wake of their demoralization yesterday, James felt drained from head to toe, and he needed to recover. Harry's slow meandering across the floor attracted his dull stare. It seemed like their suffocation was mutual. Harry took up his favorite weapon and prematurely dug his hand into his jacket pocket.
"I'm gonna take a walk."
He got a nod of acknowledgment. Harry turned, opened the unblocked door, and shut it securely behind him.
James closed his eyes and drank in the lonely silence.
The men felt worlds better after some lengthy time to themselves. When Harry returned he was feeling renewed, and James recharged in his misery. The map reappeared. They deduced that they'd cleaned out the town so well that Harry had to find a backpack to hold their supplies. Their wealth of ammo and first aid necessities ensured they'd be ready for their run of the mill encounters as well as "oh shit" moments.
Harry chose to shoulder the bag, not that James offered to. They were heading to the observation deck that supposedly housed James's car. Going back up the trail to his fated starting point left a bad taste in his mouth, but he couldn't summon the right excuse to change Harry's mind.
"We might find something you missed on the way down," was his argument. "I can't imagine you were looking for anything in that moment, anyway."
James wondered if it was coincidence that they were staying in the Ridgeview Medical Clinic, which sat directly on the eastern corner of Nathan Avenue and Lindsey Street. It was convenient for their route. They'd head south and turn off at the third street, and from there it was pretty self explanatory.
After walking down the road, they hitched a left at Wilson and Sanders and followed a street large enough for only one car. Harry provided commentary along this stretch, starting with the Roadrunner sign and its establishment lost in the fog. James couldn't help him identify what lay behind the barbed wire border; he hadn't been up this way since he came down it. It never piqued his curiosity.
Harry felt cheated that there was a pocket of nature so close to the neighborhood. James pointed out that he didn't ask, so why would he have said anything? For that he was called a spoilsport, and the winding road led them further away from familiarity. The white, rusting traffic barrier that sporadically guarded the drop to a canal gave way to a concrete tunnel in sore need of repairs. As James pushed open the creaking metal gate, Harry called attention to the warning sign hung at their eye level.
"Hey, this says 'DANGER - Keep out'! You think anyone's gonna catch us?"
James turned his head, paused, then completed the look over his shoulder. "No. Someone might run us over, though."
"Oh, yeah," Harry reckoned. "This is a pretty tight road."
He observed the rotted and unreadable posters that were pasted to the tunnel walls and until they stepped out onto an even narrower dirt path. "How did anyone expect to drive down this way?" Harry scoffed. "This is only safe enough for a motorcycle."
"Probably not even that," James muttered, not too interested in staying in a conversation. Harry heard the wryness in his voice and took the hint for the time being.
Their observations were contradicted when the route suddenly expanded and they found cars, unloved and abandoned, parked tightly to the fence.
Seeing the Silent Hill Ranch sign jogged James's memory. The graveyard wouldn't be that far off now. He grappled with his resentment of stepping into that sorrowful place and the reminders it harbored. Since he was too busy preparing for the past, he tuned out of Harry's speculative remarks about the ranch and pressed on. The fog here was thicker than it presented in South Vale and heavily obscured the nature that the older man wanted to admire. Despite that, James heard him whisper ' Wow, it's kinda pretty up here' and he would have liked to agree with him.
The arched gate somberly welcomed them to a place of worship and eternal rest. Passing through it onto sacred ground silenced Harry. He respected the dead. James's feet became heavier as the unkept grass crunched under his soles and the grey haze somehow appeared even more dense than the way it'd hung on the path behind them. The arrangement of gravestones disoriented him its thick, and he easily lost Harry in the maze.
He wanted desperately to get through the cemetery as soon as possible. An oppressive weight encompassed every miserable inch of it, watching him and accusing him. He felt like he was being tried for a case of severe neglect before a ghostly jury. The victim herself felt present, and the remorse of mistakenly finding the grave where he first found her kneeling caused him to duck his head.
Somehow, it didn't feel right to mourn her here. Angela had been as lost as he was. She knew the way to Silent Hill when he didn't, but misplaced herself in her own troubles: a tendency that they both shared. They came to find people that knew them, beckoned them, had loved them and hurt them. Neither of them understood what the other had been through. All accusations and perceptions of each other were born from the strife of their existence.
Their misfortunate souls were rattled so badly that they didn't care what would become of them in Silent Hill.
Poor, helpless Angela. She was the sole person he didn't feel guilt for, but relief. She had thanked him for saving her, but James knew he hadn't. He'd never would've been able to, for her path didn't require a savior. Nobody could heal all her pain. Her gift to him was the strength he lacked and the comprehension he internally sought, and that he had vehemently denied for three years.
James found the mouth for the stone-walled path out when he heard Harry call for him from within the low cottony clouds. He stopped and looked out into the veil. He'd completely forgotten about Harry, and he was the reason he was here in the first place.
The embarrassed guilt was much lighter than it generally was. "Harry? Harry!"
"James? Where'd you go, bud?"
"I'm over here."
"That's great, let me just find 'over here' on my map and I'll get right to ya."
God almighty, Frank Sunderland would be proud to know him. "Just follow my voice."
"You're gonna have to keep talking."
"Harry, just get over here."
James could tell that he was within feet of finding him, and Harry likely knew too. It didn't stop the blithe older man from calling out, "Marco!"
"Polo," James replied automatically. The response was so natural and ingrained in him during childhood that he didn't think twice about it, and Harry stepped out of the mist with the sneakiest 'gotcha' grin James had ever seen.
"There you are. Somehow that always works. And now I know where 'over here' is!"
Harry earned himself a great roll of James's eyes and the view of his back.
The trail after the well forced them to play follow the leader. They hiked single file with James in the lead up a winding path that was treacherous in this weather. What would have been a beautiful journey was sullied by the inability to see more than three feet ahead of them, and the muffled effect the fog had on the atmosphere. It made the noise of their feet crunching dirt and dry pine uncomfortably loud. Harry tried to keep his labored breathing under control, as it aided the unpleasant experience.
James wasn't bothered by the uphill walk, nor by the two flights of stairs that awaited them. He climbed with ease, his heart tapping a nervous dance of anticipation instead of exertion as Eddie's derelict van became clear in his sights.
The sign pointing to Toluca Lake stood before him. He took a deep breath to ready himself for whatever there was to see behind him when he heard Harry's feet scraping on the cement steps. James purposefully turned towards the sign's point outward so as not to spoil his first look at a parking lot he never meant to visit again, and watched his companion trudge to meet him.
Harry was utilizing the round handrail well. He stopped at the two final steps to the deck, trying to swallow the dryness in his throat and rejuvenate his lungs at the same time. James looked on impassively while the other man leaned into his elevated thigh and caught his breath.
"Fuck!" he exhaled, glowering up at James. "How are you not tired? Jesus Christ, that was a climb." Harry rolled a shoulder and groused under his breath. "This heavy backpack really isn't helping, either."
James had no words for him, and simply waited for Harry to finish the ascent. When he shuffled to his victory beside James, Harry let out a solid 'whew!' and adjusted the straps slung over his shoulders. "Well, thanks for the workout. I'm gonna look really good by the time I get outta here."
He again received silence. James faced the sign. He heard the wayward father observe the vehicle parked immediately to their right ("That's kinda creepy" was the verdict), and closed his eyes.
This was his third, and had better be his last, time on the observation deck. James remembered leaning on the stone border when he first arrived, taking in the last clear view of Toluca Lake. His head had been muddled and he'd tasted the heat of alcohol when he breathed through his nose. Better judgment had been thrown out the window for an undetermined matter of days, and James drove the twisting road to his personal hell drunk. He didn't feel sick from from the drink nor the drive, but from the letter that was folded safely against his breast.
The second time James made the hapless trek up the hill, he wasn't even aware of where he was until he had his hands on the steering wheel. The seatbelt was already strapped to his chest and secure over his lap. Beyond the half wall, the trees were giants, casting themselves as black behemoths in the grey haze. James had set the car in reverse and laid his arm across the rim of the bench seat as he eased backward. He didn't want his bumper to hit the fence. It could get scratched.
The stone should have made his plan unobtainable. James's head was empty and he felt indifferent to the car thrashing his body and the glass exploding as it tumbled violently down the hillside.
The lake was colder than it looked, and James took a deep breath as his shared coffin took the Sunderlands to the deep.
"Hey, a billboard for Pete's Bowl-O-Rama. It must've been a pretty good attraction back in its heyday."
James looked up at the decaying advertisement. "Eh. It isn't anything to brag about."
Harry snuggled his hands into his leather pockets and looked at him. "Not a fan of bowling, huh?"
His green shoulder lifted. "I don't have any strong opinions either way."
While nothing was said, the way that Harry departed from the conversation uttered, You don't seem to have many opinions about anything .
James heard, and knew it.
He wasn't ready to turn around. James didn't think he'd ever be ready, and outcome of his fears was thrust upon him when Harry made a short noise of excitement.
"Hey! Your car's still here! Can you believe it?" James's shoulders tensed hard, his back tightening and his fists clenching. He squeezed his eyes shut, dropping his chin to his chest. "Jeez, man, you left your door wide open. You're lucky no one's around to try to steal it. This looks like a classic. What year is it?"
No. No, no, no, no, no. James whipped around, his eyes wide with terror. Harry had begun circling the car, pouting in sympathy for the sorry state a long ago James let it deteriorate to, and still appreciating its craftsmanship. Though his legs had become so tense that they hampered his immediate ability to run, he found the freedom of voice in his throat.
"1977!" Harry stopped short of the small, triangular widow above the back wheel. He looked interested, and chose to ignore the way that James seemed frozen in place. It was for the good of both of them.
"Yeah? It looks like a Pontiac."
He could move again. His approach was brisk. "It's a Pontiac Ventura. She was my dad's," James elaborated when he got closer. "He bought her fresh off the line. He uh, wanted to keep her at her best and make her a show car one day."
The men took their eyes to the vehicle that hadn't seen proper love and care for years before it came to rest in this haunted parking lot. Its paint bathed it in skymist blue from hood to trunk and must've been stunning waxed up all pretty, with the rims glinting under the sun. The classic vinyl bench seats matched the blue exterior and boasted a thick white stripe down the middle. It made for a nostalgic sight. A car collector would have paid well to get their hands on it back when it was kept young and healthy.
Harry felt sorry for it. James was flashed a tarnished, bygone memory of the way his father would look at him spitefully when he passive-aggressively commented on the neglect his son showed the car. Those things had been shucked from his thoughts for ages. He even stunned himself by recalling these little details that he was sure he wouldn't've been able to retrieve if he'd been asked three days ago. Why did he remember them now ?
"So.. she, huh? Did she have a name?" Harry leaned in to take a look at the original interior. He kept his hands respectfully in his pockets and contentedly examined what he could easily see. Nothing about him was truly a car man, but he'd picked up a thing or two hanging around those types of guys. He hummed in recognition of some of the bells and whistles while James stood anxiously behind him. One thing he did notice was a dangling plastic yellow keychain near the steering wheel. A tilt of his head showed him that the key was still in the ignition. Harry had the choice: comment on it, or pretend he didn't see it.
"Uh, yeah. Madeline."
"Oh, that's a nice name." Her owner noted that Harry didn't sound committed to the compliment, but was too polite to say otherwise. James's distress was climbing steadily towards panic as the curious writer peeked over the back of the blue seat.
"My dad chose it. I didn't really think she looked like a Madeline."
That drew Harry's interest away from his examinations and straightened to look at James. "What would you have picked?"
James began to relax. He felt like he was in charge of the scene. "Sherry."
The vintage name made Harry's head shake in astonishment. "Sherry? Well, I didn't expect that."
James laughed uneasily. "Why do you say that?"
Harry sucked in a breath and twisted to get another look at the car. "Weeell, I.. I dunno. I thought you'd name her Bluebell, or.. Sapphire, or something along those lines."
He thought he should have taken more offense to that statement than he currently did. James squinted slightly and for the first time since they met, he tucked his hands into his green pockets. "Yeah?"
Facing James again, Harry's second round of surprise was softer. The troubled man before him looked at ease. Calm. He tried to take those moments with a grain of salt, knowing what lurked behind those deadened eyes. Even still, to him in this moment, James looked more like an actual human.
A whisper suggested to him to play a ruse in order to lower Harry's guard. James wasn't as comfortable as his posture projected. The little voice didn't sound sinister, and that convinced him to trust it. He knew it worked, and he was sorry that Harry was emotionally gullible.
Harry smiled. "Yeah."
James nodded slowly and moved his gaze to the car. "My, uh.. one of the first songs I remember hearing in that car was 'Sherry Baby' by The Four Seasons."
It was Harry's turn to misread emotions one after the other. He thought he saw James shed his mournful facade and slip into a happier time, just for a moment. This kept him reverently quiet, watching a tortured man find a crumb of peace.
If James knew what Harry was thinking he would have bitterly laughed. Though he had been revealing more details about himself than ever before, these felt like throwaways to satisfy Harry's desire to know him without encouraging further interrogation. As soon as he told him about his should-be-fond memories, they were ejected from all connections and went up in flames. In the scheme of things, he found he didn't consider them to be important at all.
That was how it had to be. Being anchored for so long, far away from his home and the people he knew, caused them to slip away from his memory in the name of acceptance to his fate. This was the first time he'd thought so much about his father in an overflowing handful of years. Frank Sunderland bubbled to the surface and those tidbits along with him, and James was mildly perturbed that they were so easy to see. He suspected Harry's robust life force had something to do with it, though felt that was overreaching. There was no reason to blame him, so the accountability fell on Silent Hill once again.
These memories were things that weren't relevant anymore and didn't give him that homesick regret that they used to incite. They meant nothing, and so James forgot them one more time.
He came back to the present when Harry drew his attention to the lever that opened the trunk. Without asking, he pulled it and the back popped open, much to the surprise of both of them. James's shock stemmed from the brazenness of Harry's action, while Harry seemed to not anticipate it to function properly.
"Oh. Uh," he started sheepishly, catching the incredulous stare he was being given, "Sorry. For some reason I didn't think that'd work."
James's face downgraded slightly to indignation. He flatly replied, "The car isn't that worn down."
At the very least he expected Harry to look sorry for his misstep and he was not disappointed. Now James was an authority figure scolding a delinquent. If he hadn't been so on edge about the trunk being open in the first place, he might have felt a touch of silliness about it.
The critical air kept both of them in place. James wanted to rush over and slam the trunk closed and pull Harry out of this desolate lot, but he knew he had to keep composure. If the car had resurfaced and graced the earth as it had been abandoned like some museum piece, there was a high chance that its contents had been looted by the hands of sunken pirates, as artifacts often were.
There was also a high chance that his cargo was too precious to be stolen away, and patiently awaited James's return.
Since James made no effort to move, Harry assumed he was waiting for him to close the trunk as his apology. It would be the polite thing to do, and strolling guiltily to the back of the car, he drew the lid upward in preparation to give it a sure and sound closure.
In fact, this was the direct opposite of what James wanted. His hands ripped from his pockets and he reached to stop him, but it was going to be too late. The lid was high and Harry paused, his eyes cast down to make sure his strength met the car's needs. James held his breath.
He shrugged his shoulder at what the trunk contained and closed it tight. James was stationary. As a round of consternation creased his brows, Harry turned to him.
"You travel light, huh?"
James lowered his hands to his sides. What? The expression must have equally bemused Harry, as he then gestured to the back of the car. "It's empty. Hope you didn't have anything important in there. I can't imagine someone or some monster coming up here and cleaning you out."
The resident's lips parted. He should feel relieved, but couldn't evoke the feeling. The car had been restored as though its tumble had never happened. With that in mind, it would have been logical to assume that the cargo was also intact. And yet, it was gone. What he knew about Harry so far meant that he was too reactive to lie; he wouldn't be able to, and never about something like that.
The silence left Harry to wonder what made James temporarily jumpy, and the younger man uneasily turned to lay his hand on the rim of the open door.
James looked out into the dense grey mist. Toluca Lake's beauty lay unknown behind its curtains. A part of him wanted to see it; the view was breathtaking and serene, a last look at peace.
There was no way to relive that. James distractedly rubbed the metal frame made slick by dewy humidity and brought his eyes to the neglected interior. He wanted to get out of here. There was nothing left to see. The things that wanted to rise to the surface of their graves were pushed back into the soil of his mind. No more memories, no more reminiscing.
No more prolonging his deceit.
"Harry."
The better man of the two lifted his chin ahead of his inquiry. "Yeah? What's up?"
James drummed two fingers on the door and turned his body sidelong to look at him. "I think Heather's here."
He got the reaction he wanted. Harry's lips parted and his body straightened with full attention and giddy optimism. "Really? Heather? Are you sure?"
His blond head nodded and he stepped away from Sherry, his arm sliding off her door. It'd be the last time he'd get to have a moment with her, and yet he forwent giving her a fond farewell, like a heartless former lover. James's hands found his pockets again and he strolled closer to his companion.
"Yeah. I'm sure. Well.. pretty sure. Silent Hill just said, 'she's here'."
Harry's breath came quick through his nose and he lowered his eyes, darting them at the ground as he worked out the trepidation. When he snapped them back up, James was still staring at him, awaiting a reply.
James didn't blame him that he looked distrustful. "You're positive that's what it said? I thought you said you couldn't feel people coming in," Harry asked him, wary to be so hopeful. "I just.. expected it to— for you to react more.." He trailed off, trying to formulate the right structure to explain himself in a way that wouldn't offend his guide. His hand rolled in the air in an attempt to prompt James into finishing his thoughts, but the gesture didn't speak for itself. "More.. outwardly.. affected."
That was fair. James's forced theatrics set a tone for other urgent memos from Silent Hill. For so important a message, he was too collected and too nonchalant about it.
"I don't think I was meant to hear it," James deceived, avoiding his failed attempt at fraud from earlier. "Sometimes I hear and feel things that I suspect I wasn't supposed to know about. I'm stuck to the town, Harry. I'm pretty much a part of it. It can control a whole lot of what happens to me, but like I said, it also means that I can pick up on things that I'm guessing I wasn't supposed to know about."
That information had more implications than Harry had considered, and would have to ruminate on later. James may have given him too much information then, but what was said was said and he couldn't erase the words. He looked on as Harry weighed his explanation against his uncertainty and, finding he had no other choice than to trust him, nodded his acceptance.
"Okay. I got it. So where is she? Where do we go?"
James inhaled a deep sigh. "Far away from here. The feeling was really distant. It was like it was out of South Vale. Like.. on the other side of it. Across the lake."
That was the truth. During their sweep and the following night's strained stay in their last apartment, James was listening to the wiretap he had on the town. The forces were too distracted with whatever was here that they weren't paying attention to James at all at the time. He liked it when town made those little mistakes. It gave him a taste of control. If Silent Hill knew it'd opened its private airwaves to his ears, he had to believe that it would have done something terrible about it.
"Across the lake.." Harry's eyes roved the sky as he quickly clicked the puzzle pieces together. "The lake.." James's gaze was waiting for him when his head snapped to look at him. "Silent Hill. Old Silent Hill! She's in Old Silent Hill!"
All that cautious tension dropped away. Harry laughed with pure jubilation and struck his palms together, then shook his fists victoriously in the air, high above his head. His celebration was only mildly infectious. James watched a man whose only real purpose in life was his daughter laugh and pace excitedly with a youthful bounce in his step. If only James could share his happiness. It felt wrong to have kept this to himself for a little over a day, but reasoned that he needed the time to make absolutely sure that his information would be correct. Besides, he wasn't sure if Harry would have had the same euphoric reaction that he observed now; though he had no doubt that if he'd spoken too soon, Harry would have missed this chance to feel real joy such as this.
Harry's body threw James's balance off kilter. He grunted, taken aback not only at the chance he could fall but the sudden strength of Harry's arms hugging him tight. Though the two of them staggered together, their feet struggling to help their bodies stay safely vertical in their haphazard dance, James's bewilderment kept him from processing what, exactly, was going on.
He was squeezed in a bear-like grip that felt like the first drop on a roller coaster. The vigor pushed a cough from James's lungs and Harry let him go at once. James was still wobbly on his legs when his shoulder was struck with good intentions, and his cheek and hair experienced a drive-by with a warm palm. James stared, amazed, as Harry grabbed the straps under his arms and started energetically off towards the stairs he'd griped about.
James trailed cautiously behind. Harry's physical exuberance felt violating to a man who hadn't engaged in physical affection in far, far too long. Perhaps someone would find it hilarious that it caused James to feel mild distrust and apprehension towards the other man. It was ridiculous, and James's uneasiness would go ignored.
Though at first Harry appeared to be beelining for the trail, he'd noticed the signs above the gated tunnel. James caught up to him, standing a couple feet behind the visitor, and observed the signs with hm.
Harry's voice sounded a little crestfallen when he spoke. "Fifty miles to Old Silent Hill."
"Mm. Seems that way."
He saw those poor shoulders slump a little. Fifty miles is quite a trek. They remained quiet, Harry concentrating on trying to calculate the travel time, and James feeling bland and apathetic. He didn't want to say it yet and ruin the mood, but he was in the camp of suspecting that he would not be able to accompany Harry all the way to Old Silent Hill. It'd be nice to get a change of scenery, absolutely, however the town had made it clear to him a few times already that it didn't want him wandering off. This would be another test of his ties and his destiny of Silent Hill as his god, though he couldn't feel confident about his chances.
Harry finished his numbers game and sighed. "Since we have to go all the way back down through South Vale and take Nathan, it's gonna be a shorter travel time than it would be if this tunnel was open. So technically, we have that advantage. It would have been nice if the map included mileage," he said disdainfully, " and it would have been nice to have a complete map of the area, but since we don't, I'm going to have to put it in the ballpark of four hours to get there."
James slowly nodded his understanding where Harry couldn't see it. "Okay. Glad we thought ahead and picked up everything we could."
Harry's laugh was soft and he looked over shoulder with a smile that matched. "Yeah, no kidding. We better start now. It's gonna get dark on the road and it's really gonna suck when we have nowhere to camp out."
"Can't dispute that."
James took a last look at the signs above. They were once proud to guide travelers to a place of beauty and respite, and now their tunnel served as a barrier to a depraved, sick town. They were sad and disgraced. The resident and tourist left the observation lot full of memories and preordained futures and began their, hopefully, last passing tour through South Vale.