Chapter 1-
Hannah Starling sat on the window side of the bus seat looking outside the window at the glistening snow while also listening to her I-Pod. Angela, her best friend since daycare, was sitting beside her; chatting away with Tom the Football Quarterback. Yeah, Hannah was friends with him but all they really did was chat over Email or at Lunch, nothing really that serious. Angela was a cheerleader, blonde hair and pom-poms to complete the set. Hannah just wasn't that go-go cheer kind of girl, no offense. She liked to draw mostly, and type on her lab-top which she carried almost everywhere with her, mostly to school.
A few humming birds flew by over the bus, from what Hannah could hear over her I-Pod. Oak wooden telephone polls stretched along side the road. To be honest, the road was the only thing that was half-snowed on. With the sun shining, you would think the snow would melt, but no it stayed right where it was. There were a few houses that they passed by but they were a few acres apart from each other.
Hannah sighed looking back down at her I-Pod to change the song. She needed something 'Nickelback' or 'Three Days Grace', something solid but with a certain up-beat to it. She had classics on here too, for example: Beethoven, Mozart, some of 'Hootie and the Blowfish', a little bit of Latin music you could dance too; oh and of course Phantom of the Opera. She loved that movie.
Finally, they got to her bus-stop. Hannah's house was only a few miles away and she got off here with Angela and Jason Bradley, who also lived a few miles up from where Hannah's house was to be exact.
She grabbed her backpack, which had her trusty lab-top in there and her textbooks from school, and followed behind Angela and Jason. The bus started to drive away from them when they were completely off the side of the road.
The trio started to walk forward down the snowy road. Angela turned left, walking into her rocky driveway looking back at Hannah smiling.
"You'll call me, right?" Angela asked moving her sunglasses up into her hair, why someone was wearing sunglasses in the Winter, Hannah it seemed would never know. Angela was just that kind of person she guessed.
"Course'. Email me or MSN, okay?" Hannah asked as she walked backwards with Jason, making sure no cars or trucks were coming any time soon. She smiled flashing her white teeth in the process. That's why Hannah didn't need braces, she had straight white teeth. It wasn't anything to brag about, not in Hannah's eyes, she found it a little odd to tell the truth.
"Sure!" Angela hollered running to her front door of the house she lived at, there stood her father, Mr. Davidson.
Hannah didn't know that much about her own father, only that she smiled like him. She learned that from her mother, when one time she asked her mother why she was staring at her. She told Hannah it was because of her smile, she looked like her father when she did that. And then just left the room saying Mr. Crawford was calling, he wasn't. Just another lie.
"So, you think you pasted Coronal Sanders quiz today?" Jason asked smirking, holding back a laugh, looking at Hannah. She smacked him on the shoulder, in a playful friend way.
"Don't call him that. It's rude, Mr. Bradley." She said slightly mocking him too
"Oh really, Ms. Starling?" He asked picking her up and twirling her like a dancer then setting her back in place. She was giggling the whole time and smiling of course.
"Jason! That wasn't funny." She said in between giggles but Jason was a good friend. A trustworthy friend.
"Yes it was, and you know it." He said smirking at her, while shifting his back pack to his left shoulder now. He sighed and looked at her.
"So, you still want that little search stuff you asked me about?" Jason asked her looking up at the birds passing on by then back at her.
"Maybe later. My mom might need me to help with dinner or something; she might have to work late tonight…again." Hannah said with a sigh of disappointment, but still half-heartily happy. That was a kind of mean thing to think but that gave Hannah time to ride her horse in the stables out back behind her house or update her stories on some fan fiction sites.
"Is it Crawford again?" Jason guessed
"No, Mr. Crawford is not calling for her. I think he's retiring soon, but then again it's just a rumor." Hannah answered, that's when Jason started tugging on her sleeve slightly looking now at the long driveway leading up to her house. Why was there a car in the driveway? That wasn't her mom's car. Her mom owned a Cadillac, and that was defiantly not a Cadillac.
"I'll see you later." She told Jason, who nodded smiling and waved a quick 'bye' before starting to run down the road to his house. Hannah started walking down the driveway past the strange unknown car. It was the color silver and had four seats inside. Instead of going through the front door, she went around back through the kitchen door which was…unlocked? She opened the door as quietly as she could and did the same with closing it. When she turned around she could hear two voices from the living room, one was her mother's voice but the other was a man Hannah didn't know. Who was he? She was going to find out. All Hannah had to do was go through the kitchen, pass the front door and stairs leading upstairs and she'd be in the living room but she wasn't going to do that. No, she was going to listen to this conversation first. Hannah could be quiet as a mouse when she wanted to be. As a child her footsteps barely made any sound at all, according from her mother she was also a very curious child.
Hannah stepped quietly behind a wall of the kitchen, glancing out to the living room. She could see her mother sitting properly on the couch but no man. She tipped toed out behind the wall to near the stairs and went behind a wall of the living room. She could see the man properly now. He looked like a gentlemen, the kind she usually saw on TV or the movies. He looked old yet proper and intelligent from what and where Hannah could tell that was of course.
"When does she usually get home from school, Clarice?" The man asked her mother, having a velvet like voice. Manipulative and gentle, and collective. He had on what looked like a two three piece suit on, Italian made and on the expensive side. That was another thing about Hannah Starling; she absolutely wanted to go to Florence, Italy. She had posters of the place on the walls of bedroom and other places in Europe. She'd never been out of the United States, as far as she knew she had lived here her whole life almost.
"She should have gotten off her bus five minutes ago." Clarice Starling replied to the man, remaining calm and didn't look that nervous, maybe she was covering it up to make it looked like she was brave. Hannah saw her mother as a brave woman, her protector against the world as a child. Her mother. Clarice Starling.
"Then she should be here already, yes?" The man asked Hannah's mother giving a small smile to her mother.
"Yes." Clarice answered blinking quickly twice, that's when the man looked directly towards where Hannah was hiding for the moment. Hannah's eyes grew wide slightly as she turned running up the stairs attempting to reach her bedroom. And that was just instinct to her. Her mother had told her if she felt scared or in danger to run, she felt both. That man, her mother knew him. She had seen him before, from somewhere.
They had been at lunch when Tom showed her and Angela a book about the twp #100 killers or was it the top #10 Wanted, she couldn't really remember. But he had shown her one of the killers in that book and that was the man that was in her house. Tom said he was the best one in the whole book, oodles for him. Hannah disagreed and why hell would someone be making these kinds of books from beyond Hannah's understanding. It was kind of idiotic when she started to think about it. Why was her mom just sitting there too? Why not like grab a gun or perhaps call the FBI? But no, Mummy was to busy chatting with the generous Cannibal there in the living room. But yeah, Hannah could tell that was him. The man who was in her house was Hannibal Lector…
(A/N: I hope you like the first chapter, please be constructive and no flames when reviewing this story, thanks for reading it
Disclaimer: I own nothing of Thomas Harris or his characters, and of course not Hannibal Lector. All thanks to these characters except Angela, Jason Bradley and Hannah Starling belong to me. I know I posted this story once before, so you can re-post your comments or change them if you want, and thanks to: Sylistra the scholar; I added some of those songs you told me about, and thanks, seriously even I thought she was a little Mary-sueish, so thanks for being sarcastic I am sarcastic too and suck at grammar and honest)