Basically, I'm about to delve into miniscule plot holes that you might see if you squint. I'm sure we're all well acquainted with James' iconic encounter with Laura perched on the wall. Though something that's always had me scratching my head is when she remarks, "Huh? Are you blind or something?" when he asks her what she's doing in Silent Hill. It seems to me that Laura is pointing out that her presence in Silent Hill should be obvious to him--but why would she imply this if James only really gets acquainted with her in Silent Hill? James doesn't know why Laura is there until she tells him. My only guess is that when he visited Mary in the hospital, she may have been present, and therefore expected to him to remember her. Him not knowing who she is beforehand could only be attributed to a faulty memory on his part--maybe through his self-induced amnesia, he forgot about Laura. This only really makes sense when you think about the fact that Laura, like Maria, acts as a trigger for James' buried memories ("It was last year"; "I'm turning 8 next week", ect.). So to counteract this, he forgets about her,
just as he forgets about killing his wife.
The fact that Laura didn't want James to know her name ("that big fat blabbermouth") yet not much earlier asks him if he's "blind" only furthers my confusion. I guess we could attribute this to a child's volatility--maybe she reasoned "Fine, if you want to act like you don't know me, I won't tell you anything at all" kind of thing.
But here's another thing--in the Born From A Wish scenario, Maria enters a room with a teddy bear and comments that Laura would love it, yet this most likely happens before James even meets Laura. So, assuming that everything Maria knows is channeled from James' knowledge and memories, how would she know this? Unless you adhere to the idea that Maria might actually be some sort of reincarnation of Mary and not truly a manifestation, brought to fruition though the Otherworld.
Or maybe I need to turn my brain off. XD
'Bout as dead as anyone's bound to get.