The elevator opened up to the resort's guest hideaway. In spite of the sinister way they were beckoned to the tiny death trap, the arrival was rather anticlimactic. It brought them one short, simple floor down and Harry blew a raspberry once he realized how easy it would have been just to take the stairs.
"Well, thanks. To be fair, I guess we didn't come down here at all. I didn't even notice there were stairs. Maybe it would have been done earlier if we, I dunno, had a map of the place." He rolled his eyes sarcastically to the ceiling to address the hotel itself. "Thanks for the help."
There were two doors on their left to explore, and the one to the half sized kitchen turned out to be the only one willing. It was a pretty tight fit in there. "I think there's a larger one upstairs. For the restaurant," James quipped, and Harry didn't really care either way. The swing door to the adjacent room seemed jammed, which was befuddling, so they continued. Beyond the kitchen's third door showed them a narrow concrete area clearly for employees only.
The vicinity had a smokey, dense smell to it, again synonymous to the scorched and boggy ladies they were well acquainted with. "I love the consistency with the themes," the author commented, studying walls damaged by a previous fire and thick black mold meeting the wispy shadows almost halfway. "Though the combination never fails to make the nose hairs curl." James could've agreed if he weren't distracted by the black fungus measuring thigh high. Evidently the flooding had drained itself since his visit. On one hand, he was glad they weren't wading in it; on the other, the leftover stains made him sore.
However, Harry's remark provoked another topic to mull over: the theme of fire and water. James could guess the water symbolism, so the fire must've been related to Harry. The riddles piled on. He'll have to figure it out later.
Directly to their right, a plaque marked the liquor storage. Being so convenient, it was a no-brainer to make it their first stop, armed with the vain hope for a swig.
And naturally, the bottles were too tight or simply empty. "So much for a refreshing drink," Harry mumbled. "Two strikes. No drinking on the job." Both were hankering for a warm forget-it-all and it was a toss up on which one needed it the most. Since nothing of real interest presented itself, they took their departure; though James looked longingly over his shoulder before he went. Oh, what he would give to finish off the night blissfully drunk. The burden of a budding alcohol problem hadn't evaporated yet, and the teasing left him wanting - as was intended.
Their biggest obstacle then was to find a door that opened. Three additional plaques described the essentials formerly running the place were stationed behind them, but the pair weren't repairmen, and so had no business poking around the boiler, pump, and electrical rooms. (James chose not to mention the boiler's former availability to him, deciding it wasn't crucial information.) That left a fifth and final chance, the store room, and both failed to be surprised that door number five was the winner.
In the storage they found the usual fare: canned goods, powdered goods, ("Yuck. I hate powdered milk. And creamer. Ugh, gross, there's actually powdered creamer here!" Harry sniffed. "Maybe this place was cheaper than I thought." James didn't say it, of course, but he kind of liked powdered creamer. If known, Harry would surely distrust him more) and some packaged dry food that would never see pot nor plate. Large, unlabeled cans stacked unevenly on the shelves and most importantly, two keys glinting off their flashlights on a higher rack got their attention.
Harry grunted just like any ol' dad would do as his reach finally got them down on the third try. ("Always third time's the charm, eh?") One key was silver and plain, the other brassy and attached to a tag. The plastic holder was dirty as ever and barely-seen numbers baited them from within. Unfortunately it needed some assistance to get it open, and nothing in here made itself readily available. Thankful for some kind of information and lead, the duo returned to the kitchen to find a knife to pry the thing apart.
"This is another great idea that's not going to have any reparations," the older man muttered under his breath, taking up a filet knife from the magnetized rack. Much to Harry's dismay, he had to go without the makeshift protection of a hand towel, as they were nowhere to be found. Instead, he tried to carefully position himself to hold the tag with the least likelihood for a slip that could slice his palm while James supervised from a distance. Calling it a "distance" is pretty generous, considering James had mastered the art of invading Harry's personal space bubble awhile ago. Because of this, the dangerous task was just a little more nerve wracking than it needed to be. Harry paused to frown at him. "Hi."
There was a small delay until the acknowledgment kicked in. James met his eyes. "Hi."
"If you get any closer, James, I'm gonna be expecting to be taken out to dinner later, or people will talk."
That didn't seem to compute, so Harry took a different approach. "Breathing down my neck is only gonna up my chances of de-gloving myself before I get this open, bud." Nope; still too vague for him. Perhaps the third time's the charm, indeed. "James, please, at least take a step back to watch the amateur work. I'm nervous as it is, so unless you wanna give it a go, I'm gonna need a small sliver of comfort so I don't take a not-so-small sliver out of my hand."
James obliged. An irritated sigh was his thank you. In monitoring the delicate chore he also just now noticed that Harry worked the knife in his left hand rather than his right. That was unusual. In thinking about it, he couldn't recall if this entire time Harry had been swinging and working predominantly with his left hand, but his idle rumination got cut short by success. Harry exhaled relief, his shoulders dropping their tension.
"Whew. Thank god." The insert bore two numbers out of a smudged quartet and the last three, tiny letters of an address. How unforeseeable. "And we have another puzzle, folks," Harry grumbled. An effort was made to clean some filth from the tag via his sweater's hem, the result futile. He clipped the paper back into its safe box. The brass key went into a pocket, leaving the silver key to play Cinderella with.
None of the aforementioned doors wanted it. It too got pocketed. Passing through the kitchen one more time inspired Harry to give the swing door another shot. This time there was less resistance, and scraped open to a little lounge venue.
Electricity mysteriously chose to grace the saloon in the form of the colorful glow of a jukebox in the corner. Upon entry, James automatically looked for differences (the jukebox not being one) and found that the desk lamp had relocated from the far edge of the bar to its middle. It stood upright and empty - which was not how he left it. Seeing the lamp made him realize the can of lightbulbs had also gone missing from the kitchen. Little details like these pinched his brow until the skidding draw back of a stool snagged his attention. All of a sudden, James realized he stood in the bartender's spot.
The memory of a dive bar overseer silently serving him vodka tonics rose to the surface. Twelve a.m. and on his last leg of the three day journey to Silent Hill with a letter against his breast, James chose to drop in to wet his throat. Three drinks later, he chose a shot of whiskey to wash it all down - a glass that was rapped twice then overturned. He'd felt, ignored, and hated the eyes of the poor man's psychologist behind the counter taught by experience and thus lacking a fancy PhD. James knew he saw right through him. The guy would see many more like him in as soon as another hour. This didn't count as therapy, as nothing was said or solved in his favor. It only piled on the guilt harbored for the past three years of the lonely, pathetic life without Mary.
No one stopped him after he paid, or when he tried to hide the drunken wobble upon dismounting the stool, or when he headed for the door. No cop would be called on him that night. So standing here in a place where self-made psychiatrists treated their patients with alcohol, overlooking a man that sought professionals in a small room decorated with degree after degree to prove their expertise rather than at the bottom of a glass, felt very symbolic and downright degrading.
James began to wonder if this was another instance of mockery, or if he was looking too far into things. It sure felt like the former. No matter which was the truth, these buried memories cropping up after all this time annoyed him.
It's incredible how much reminiscing and philosophical thought could fit into less than ten seconds. The whole event played in the background of James's consciousness, coinciding with him staying present enough in the foreground to have seen and heard Harry make an important discovery.
"Are you fucking kidding me," the father had breathed when he took the seat, and so triggered James's flashback. Between them on the counter sat a notepad. It was standard sized and thick with thin, white pages. It lay glued to a red plastic backing, and a cone at the top held a fountain pen. Harry stared down at the notepad like it was some museum-quality artifact. James watched a writer's natural instinct remove the pen from its holder and twist the middle to reveal it only a ballpoint.
He also noted for the second time in their entire adventure together that Harry balanced it in his left hand. Even the pipe rested to his left. What an odd little detail this is to have gone undetected this whole time. "What's that?" James finally asked as Harry tried to turn on a lamp that didn't work, adjusted his flashlight for better reading, then began to flip through page after page of writing.
"They're my notes," came the awed reply. At the middle he shook his head in disbelief, his eyes darting over the page, and then dropped them. Harry supported his jaw on his palm, pen angled from his cheek, and stared up at his stoic guide. "They're my notes," he repeated firmly, as though their apparent significance should mean something to James. "From my first visit."
"You took down notes?" James eyeballed the pad. Harry sighed and directed his eyes down to it too.
"Yeah. I found notepads like these everywhere. But the first time I found one was when I woke up in the diner." Now, when James heard the CliffsNotes version of Harry's story, there was no mention of waking up in a diner. All he said was that he'd woken up from the car crash. James became steadily fascinated by how very private and vague Harry chose to tell the tale after being so open to telling other stories of his life. One would think sharing the nitty gritty would be beneficial in this situation, particularly after demanding the same from James.
Hypocritical bastard.
"You woke up in a diner?"
"Yeah," he confirmed distractedly. "And there was a notepad like this sitting on the counter. So I just.. I dunno, I thought I'd start journaling what was happening to me and maybe someone would see it? Maybe help me, or it'd help them? Yeah," he parroted himself, rifling through the beginning. "I just stream-of-consciousness jotted down a whole bunch of stuff just to get it out, then I found more of these here and there so why not write some more since it kind of helped me.. process? Remember things? I— I don' t know. It's not like I was standing there for hours writing the whole fucking story with every little detail. I mean, there were details that I thought would be useful for someone coming along and needing something, but.."
Harry shrugged and slumped forward. "It's all here," he sighed, gesturing at the pad. "All of it. I mean, all of it," he continued, folding his arms on the bar. "I wrote maybe, god I dunno, six pages max at a time? They were probably a third of the size of this one. I don't think I ever filled out an entire notepad. They were scattered all over the place, James. I never took one with me. I mean, look at it," Harry urged, lifting the bunch from a random spot, the paper cascading from under his thumb. "Every single thing I wrote packed into one easy, convenient booklet. It's nuts! It's like someone went around and found everything I wrote and compiled it into one, in order . I don't know how many pages this could be. A hundred? Maybe more? I didn't even think I wrote that much. The pages are so small so it looks bigger, but I am just.." He slowly shook his head, dragging his hand over his mouth, and set his cheek on his fist. "I can't believe it. It's spooky."
James lay the shotgun across the anti-slip rubber pads on his side of the bar and leaned into his spread, locked arms. He couldn't read upside down but tried to study the veteran's penmanship. Harry wrote in cursive (old fashioned, he thought, though his vintage school years probably influenced him for life) and at first, the jagged, flustered words were drawn at a modest size. Halfway down the page the letters got smaller and calmer, and when Harry turned to the next, smaller again. A glimpse of the mostly-obstructed second and third pages suggested the size stayed that way to fit in as much as he could and still be legible.
James inclined his head to try to read some of it, and Harry turned the pad around for him. In his peripheral vision the older man rubbed his eyes and ran his hands repeatedly over his hair. "You should read it," a weathered mumble told him. "I wrote a lot about the Order as I learned about it."
He looked down. Harry's handwriting 'looked' like him. The loops and drops were thin and masculine despite coming from a heavy hand. Their forward slant was steep, likely to compensate for essentially having to write backwards. Even if the words started hasty, they were readable. Perhaps James expected an author to have a doctor's interpretive scribble. Harry's cursive script was better appreciated right side up and suited him very well. James thought it handsome.
The first page read:
My name is Harry Mason. I got in a car crash coming to Silent Hill. I have a daughter, Cheryl. She's 7 years old and has short, black hair and dark eyes. She wasn't in the car when I came to. I'm looking for her. I don't know how I got to this cafe. I
Instead of going on, James parted the heap under his thumb as demonstrated earlier and inspected the rapidly descending pages. "It's a hefty read."
"Yeah, but be grateful it's no Tolstoy or Victor Hugo." The joke dropped flat for a man who didn't indulge in books for fun or even bother to think about them. He picked a random spot to get some spoilers.
about her. She looked as lost as I felt but it's different to be lost in a place where you grew up suddenly turned into nightmares than a nobody waltzing in. She's young. No older than 25. I asked her if she'd seen Cheryl + she said she didn't. So I asked her about the stuff I found in the basement. She said she didn't know. 'Strict orders to never enter the basement.' Still don't know if I believe her or if I'll see her again.
He thumbed through a few more pages, eyes grazing the words rather than reading, then lifted another section. Harry gave his permission to read it, after all. Well, no - he insisted he should. This wouldn't only cover the Order, but fill in all the manholes that broke up Harry's story. It's something to look forward to, and in the meantime, the suspense might drive him crazy.
James's preoccupation with this memoir throwing back the curtain on the Mason family took dominance over his brain, enabling a tiny, watchful presence in the back of his head to stealthily peek through his eyes at the monumental account to go unchecked.
He turned the notepad back to Harry. "We'll take it with us. Obviously." James affirmed, wriggling the backpack off his shoulders and setting it atop the shotgun. He'd just unzipped it when Harry jerked back, wincing split seconds before a particular churning headache hit him, too.
James knew exactly what that was.
"Ow!" Harry hissed, squinting hard down a red square glinting off the flashlight. The square filled up the page as much as its specific dimensions allowed, leaving white borders to frame it at the top and bottom. "Oh, what is— ugh!" He slammed his palm down and flattened the pile, grimacing until the tight pain subsided. "Okay. I'm over it. I don't know what that was, but I'm completely over red things giving off headaches from hell. Oof." He pushed the makeshift journal at James to put away. "That one felt bad and weird. Like someone was groping around inside in my skull."
"Might be brain worms. Could've picked some up here."
"Oh, yuck. Don't say that, though you'd probably be—"
The transfer from bar to backpack jostled a rectangle folded several times over from its spot tucked between the last page and plastic backing. It flopped onto the line of overturned glasses separating service from customer then slid right off, presenting itself to Harry. All it was missing was a 'tada'.
James hovered the notepad over the open backpack while Harry unfurled to unveil what they'd been searching for since the first day. "Oh, thank fuck!" He eagerly flattened it on the counter as best as one could a deeply creased page and looked it over. Yes, there it is: the elusive map of Old Silent Hill. "Ha, ha! About goddamn time, eh? Whew. I hope that's a good sign."
James leaned in again, eyeing it under their white lights. "I thought you were superstitious."
The veteran warily searched his face. "A bit.. why?"
"I dunno, I seem to recall you scolding me earlier for jinxing puzzles." Harry huffed and slapped the counter. James curbed a wide smile for a more acceptable small one at Harry's expense.
"James, I'll— I swear to god—"
"So is there a way to take back what you just said so we don't get jinxed? Like how you're supposed to throw salt over your right shoulder after you knock it over."
"No, you take a pinch from the spilled salt and you throw it over your left shoulder," Harry schooled the misinformed. "You throw it over your left and into the devil's face. It's reversing the bad luck to good luck. Some people take it a little farther and crawl under the table and come out the opposite side, but one: that's not always practical, two: probably makes things awkward in polite company, and three: a little much, don't you think?"
James slowly lifted his chin, turning his end of their staring contest playfully dubious. Harry's low brows wrinkled further and, when the moment sank in, let James have another undeserved victory. He looked at the map. "Dickhead."
The print was unmarked. Harry remembered jotting down annotations here and there with a red Sharpie he found in the cafe. When he'd gotten home, he couldn't find the map in his jacket or his jeans. It'd up and disappeared. Ever since, Harry flip flopped between wishing he had it and never wanting to see another damn map of Silent Hill ever again. While enormously happy to have one in his hands for this rollercoaster ride, he was crestfallen that the original could be lost to the ages.
"There are two maps we're going to need," he reminded James. "This was only for Old Silent Hill. We need one for the neighboring Central Silent Hill, so keep that in mind, and eyes peeled." James likewise told Harry to keep in mind that they needed to reorganize the backpack. The older man winced his apology: he'd totally forgotten about it. As the safely folded treasure found a home in the breast pocket of his leather jacket, he promised they'd get to the backpack later.
Cheeky curiosity tempted Harry to try the silver key in the lounge main door. Lo and behold, it unlocked and spit them right back out at the elevator. "Because that makes sense," Harry grumbled.
The elevator had concluded its duty and so closed its doors on them forever. A staircase 'round the bend took them up to where they started beside the Lake View Restaurant. Both were itching to get out of this twisted funhouse, having finally found the valuable and long sought after map. Harry paused at the shut double doors and gazed wistfully at the handles. If there's time for one more song, he'd come back, he promised piano within.
Unfortunately, there would never be a 'one more time' here.
James cast his eyes away. The tender dalliance with peace had been a surprising and welcome gift he had Harry to thank for, and the self-made widower would cherish that new memory. It's unlikely he'll ever hear him play again. For as unhappy Harry might be about it, the loneliness of the piece foretold the hollowness that James would undoubtedly feel when the Masons had left for good.
What a bizarre feeling to have.
A most wonderful sight hailed them when they entered the lobby. Grey light filled the windows and did its minimal best to brighten the room. Harry jogged hopefully to the hotel's main doors and pulled one wide open.
There would be few instances where seeing the fog would be so relieving, and this marked one of them.
"Oh, finally. James, c'm—" Harry started to call back over his shoulder to find his companion not only within shouting, but spitting distance next to him. "I still think we need to get you a bell."
"I'll put it on the to-do list."
"Right, cuz number one is fucking leaving . Let's blow this joint. This place is gonna get a scathing review on TripAdvisor."
Yet again a joke that required knowledge he didn't have soared over his head. The explanation went unasked and unoffered as the pair of damned travelers departed from the Lake View Hotel armed with evidence, clues, and improved morality (even in the face of the fresh, gut-ripping traumas). They left behind a piano in tune after all these years, an argument that nearly cost them their partnership, and Room 312.
The father and the murderer, all in all, felt pretty good about their progress in spite of the zero star experience; they'd canvassed the place well and found what they went in for. Or so they believed. Or so they hoped . A question hung over them as they crossed the border of property to street: we didn't forget anything, did we?
No, they silently reassured themselves and each other. We got everything we needed.
The open medical book on the Lake View Hotel's reading room desk fluttered its pages, then flipped itself closed.