Re: Jake R/Jack C: Gotham city quick-log
[Jack knew something about saying goodbye to ghosts, but as he watched Jake face down his own apparition, Helen wasn't standing beside him. She was still coming and going, more present now than she'd been in years. It had to be something about Silent Hill that had brought her back, about buried and hidden things The further he got from it, the less he saw her.
He understood why Graham might have wished for his wife. Personally, he hadn't trusted the hotel not to alter that wish, to twist it, to bring Helen back wrong, or to hurt her doing it. More importantly, it just felt wrong. Dead too young or not, it wasn't up to him to resurrect her just because he wanted her. She'd been a person, more than the cipher who comforted him and trailed a few steps behind him ever could. She'd had things she wanted, and a full life. Wishing her back would be his decision, and it would be about what she'd meant to him. It wouldn't be about what she might have wanted, or what crossing through death would do to her.
It didn't escape him, too, how long it had been. Almost ten years stretched between her death and now. The image of her that he saw was still as young as she'd been then - soon enough, he'd be old in comparison. It was a reminder or how slowly he had let go of her, how long it had taken to be able to think about her as dead, how much further he still had to go.
Watching Jake say goodbye to his mother, he felt a faint, strange sense of jealousy. There had been no chance for him to say goodbye. He was there for her last moments, but they'd been violent and agonizing. He had watched her suffer, watched her die, and fallen unconscious almost immediately. By the time he woke up months later, she'd already been buried. No sweet farewells, there, no 'closure', no softening of the blow when he felt as if he'd been in suspended animation from the moment of her death to waking up again in the hospital.
But maybe that didn't matter. Jake had said goodbye to his mother before, and he had still run for miles rather than face her.
The spectre said goodbye in her own way, and she vanished. A moment later, Jack closed the gap between them.
He stood just behind Jake for a moment. Then, when the silence felt appropriately measured, he spoke again.] How do you feel?