In the Eyes of a Child - Part 4
I'd always wanted children. Looking back, it is now clear to me that I unconsciously sought out men who seemed the family type - strong, steady and caring. I guess that’s the main reason why I married Christopher, although I never realized until I came to Silent Hill. He was all these things, and kind of dull because of it. He was great even during my long plunge into depression, but when I found myself choosing between betraying his trust and saving Sharon from the nightmares, I ended up leaving him and his world behind. The love I feel, or felt, for Chris didn’t have a chance in comparison to what I felt for my daughter, but sometimes I just wish that he could’ve stayed with me, held me through the nightmare.
I guess the reality of my situation didn’t dawn on me until I sat down on my couch with Sharon in my arms. We were home and yet not, never again. The ashes still fell like snow outside the large windows, and somehow everything lacked colour. As time crawled by I adjusted to the strange light, to the fact that there was no day or night and that the electric equipment in the kitchen would start to scream whenever one of those creatures ventured near the house. I could have gotten used to anything as long as I had Sharon, as long as I kept my daughter safe.
The problem is, I thought as I hugged her close in my lap and looked out at the once familiar landscape, that she’s not all Sharon anymore.
She looked back at me, as if she knew what I was thinking, and just gave me a little smile. I sighed and stroked my hand over her hair before resting my cheek against her thin shoulder.
I just wished I didn’t feel so alone. There was only the two of us left now, since the massacre in the church. I spent time playing with Sharon, cooking for her and making sure she was properly dressed, but somehow it was not the same anymore. She behaved so differently, and although I tried I could not pretend that she was a child anymore.
Silent Hill showed me what monsters really are, and they are not the featureless abominations that shuffled past the window and woke me up with the sounds as they tore each other apart. They are people, and I was one of them. In the name of protecting my daughter, I had become a monster.
I gave Sharon a smile and gently set her down on the couch before heading up the stairs. Perhaps I could find a new book to read in the small library. Sometimes, new books just seemed to appear on the shelves, but I didn’t think too hard it. I was good at not questioning things nowadays.
“Mommy?”
I couldn’t have children of my own, and after a year we finally sought help to find the cause. The doctor had that look on her face when she came back with the test results. I’d never seen it before, but I saw it many times afterwards. The survival rate of ovarian cancer is not great, especially not when it has spread to the uterus. I was lucky, they said, that they’d discovered it as early as they did. I don’t really recall much after that. Chris later told me the lucent version of those shattered two years, but even when I was well enough to listen I didn’t really want to remember the surgery or the chemotherapy, nor the therapists or my pathetic suicide attempts.
I blinked, halting halfway up the stairs, and rested my hand against the cold iron of the railing. “Yes, sweetie?”
“Do you feel lonely?” Sharon peered up at me from the bottom of the stairs, and I felt my heart melting once again at the sight of my daughters eyes. I could never stop loving her, no matter what.
“No. No… not at all. It’s like a long vacation, right?” I smiled and brushed some imaginary dust from my shirt.
Sharon just looked at me for a moment, tilting her head eerily to the side. “You had a friend with you when you came here. She tried to save me. Would you like her here?”
I swallowed hard and gripped the railing tighter to keep steady. In the weeks past, Sharon had not once mentioned Cybil, and I shied away from the very thought of her. I shook my head and forced my jaw to relax. “She’s gone, honey. Like all the others. Don’t worry about it, okay? Go play with your pencils, pumpkin.” I waited until she’d turned away before I went up the rest of the way, my hand shaking lightly as it gripped the railing.
-
I owed Christopher so much. Once we got Sharon, he never mentioned my illness again, and he never once looked at me as if I was crazy, like some of our friends did. I owed him so much, and yet I could never bring myself to love him again. It’s as if something had shifted within me once I’d gotten my senses back, and Sharon was the only one I really cared about.
Perhaps I never really got out of that dark place at all, considering where I ended up. I looked out the window and lowered the book to my lap, giving up on pretending to read for the time being. The beauty of the falling ashes was long lost on me by now, and instead I focused my gaze on something moving through the woods. They often came close to the house but never entered; sometimes they lingered at the window, following our movements with eyeless faces. They always passed on eventually.
Alessa’s monsters. I sighed as I rested my head back against the armchair and closed my eyes, trying to shut out my surroundings. It never worked for long.
Of course, when at last I took Sharon and left for Silent Hill Christopher’s trust ended. I was furious when I realized that he’d blocked our credit cards, but not really surprised. It was a crazy thing to do, taking Sharon to Silent Hill because of her nightmares, but a crazy situation calls for crazy solutions, and I was quite familiar with crazy. He saw the drawings, and Sharon’s ever worsening situation, but Chris was always very down to earth. In the face of something unknown, he just reverted to his own reality, much like
Cybil.
I opened my eyes, hoping to chase away the images of her smoking corpse still tied to the ladder above the bonfire. The cop was as dead as everyone else now, but thoughts of her death still caused a sharp pain in my chest. Despite her annoying cop façade and her stubborn refusal to grasp the situation at hand, she actually seemed to care. She ended up sacrificing herself for what I believed in, and it was very hard to forget her eyes the last time I saw her alive.
“Mommy?”
I blinked and got out of the armchair, the book on my lap sliding to the floor with a soft thud. “Yes, sweetie?”
Sharon stood in the doorway, holding a drawing out for me to see, and I walked closer. “What have you got there, honey?”
The childish drawing depicted two people, one big and one small, holding each others’ hands. Judging by the colours, they were standing in a river of blood. In the background, the symbol of Silent Hill’s twisted faith
Symbol of our faith. Symbol of our unity
stood out against the sky. I took a deep breath, feeling shaky. “Honey, didn’t you have anything nicer to draw?”
Sharon smiled and closed the distance between us, wrapping her thin arms around my waist. I returned the hug, automatically stroking her dark hair. “It is nice, mommy! It’s us, taking revenge together.”
“That’s nice, sweetie.” I felt my brow tensing and tried to relax again, just standing still.
“Mommy? If Cybil wasn’t dead, would you want her to come here?”
I winced and responded automatically, “Weren’t, sweetie.” I took a steadying breath, looking down at her. “Yes… yes, of course I would.” Sharon disengaged from the hug, and I let her go as I gazed out the window.