Disclaimer: The characters and concepts in this story are the property of Thomas Harris, Bryan Fuller, and their related affiliates. This is an amateur writing effort meant for entertainment purposes only.
Summary: You can take the man out of the psychiatric hospital, but you can't take the psychiatric hospital out of the man. Will recovers from Baltimore after his release. Post-Savoureux.
Author's Notes: The title of the story is taken from a poem by Stevie Smith called "Not Waving but Drowning". It's about a man who is drowning, but when he tries to call out to his friend, they think he is waving and do nothing. Will does both in different measure.
"Your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not
Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither
Living nor dead, and I knew nothing,
Looking into the heart of light, the silence."
~The Wasteland (I 38-41)
Chapter Ten: Waving and Drowning
Alana arrives at the same time as the day before with sandwiches in one hand and a leash in the other. Winston tugs steadily but not powerfully, because excited as he is, he knows better than to frazzle anyone. Especially Will, who looks even more exhausted than he did this morning.
(He's been walking laps in the courtyard, half-expecting Hannibal to show up. The fence, he notices today, would be an easy climb, and all the orderlies are far enough away they couldn't stop him if he tried.)
Winston buries his nose immediately into Will's palm before sitting and tucking his head against Will's bicep. It's the closest approximation of a hug Will has ever received from a dog. He drinks the gesture into every fibre of his being: hands combing through Winston's soft fur, scrubbing around the dog's ears. Winston smells of damp earth, pine, and sweet grass, not quite home but close enough that Will closes his eyes and walks through the flat fields in Wolf Trap. His house is alight in the distance.
He trembles when rising, thoughts racing between Lampman's endgame, Chilton's methods, and Hannibal. Hannibal, Hannibal, Hannibal... Winston nuzzles Will's palm again and moans, rousing him from his panic. Will ruffles Winston's neck, "Alright, alright." He will worry later.
They eat, this time without much conversation. Will's too occupied with Winston anyways. The mutt sits with his head rested against Will's thigh. Will thinks he's looking for food at first, but Winston shoots him a surprised expression whenever Will offers him something. Whatever he's looking for, he's found it simply by being there.
Alana broaches the subject of Will's case without being asked. Jack's making some headway, she tells him, but Abigail's body hasn't exonerated Will in the eyes of the court for the other murders. "They won't find anything they haven't already," Will says.
"Do you remember anything?" Alana asks.
Will can't help but laugh lightly. Hers is a last ditch effort. They must be pretty desperate if she's asking him that. "I know I didn't kill them," he replies.
Her silence indicates that she believes him at least. Will takes comfort in that. The fact that they don't mention Hannibal once? Doubly so.
Will paces his room that night as well. Spends his session with Lampman being cryptic, monosyllabic, or just silent. He's about to feel bad for alienating her when she suggests a visit to their group therapy session afterwards. To get him acclimatized. Will isn't forced to sit in the circle and participate, but he is given a whole score of new perspectives to adopt. Neurotic, obsessive, mildly psychotic, eccentric: Bethesda is the human brain in front of a funhouse mirror.
He distracts himself by playing Hannibal again, by viewing the world from outside itself through a telescope. He winces when the nervous teen stutters his way through what he considers to be a good day; tunes out the minor victory of the pert, freckled redhead with OCD who turned her lights on and off only seventeen times this morning instead of twenty-five; and gets halfway through an elaborate murder fantasy involving the southern boy with a wicked tongue before he has to stop. He has to leave. He can't, he won't, he's not supposed to be here anyways.
Will hugs himself. The stories about Baltimore, about Minnesota, about Hannibal are clawing away at his insides. They're ripping and tearing and peeling him wide open. He closes his eyes and he's strapped to a chair in a concrete room as Chilton wonders aloud, "Just when were you planning on eating the rest of Abigail Hobbs, Mr. Graham?"
Lampman's fingers are brought to rest against his shoulder blade. He feels the apology in her touch, the gentle way she gestures for him to rise, the equally gentle way she excuses them from the room. She takes Will back to his room and sits him down on the side of the bed. A nurse – the linebacker one – joins them without being asked directly.
"We normally have at least one insomniac in residence," Lampman watches as the nurse checks Will's vitals. "How many days has it been?"
Will doesn't want her doing the math. It won't take a genius to figure out that their sessions plus Alana's visits has resulted in his anxiety. Lampman's already thinking about ways to change up his routine. He can feel her eyes darting back and forth across him. "This is the part where I tell you our time's up, Doctor," he says, glaring somewhere around her neck to give the illusion of eye contact. "Please, leave me alone."
"His heart rate's elevated," the nurse informs her when he's finished. "Temp's up too."
"Thank you, Neil," he's dismissed with a small nod. Will can sense him looming outside the door, though, even after he leaves.
"He doesn't need to stay there," Will comments, raising his voice so Neil can hear, "I'm not going to do anything."
"He's not standing guard," Lampman's a little distressed by his allegations, but she hides it well. "How many days has it been since you slept?"
Will's secrets are clawing at the root of his tongue just threatening to spill over in one hysterical retch of word vomit. He shuts his mouth tightly to keep them inside. Alana doesn't believe him; Jack still thinks he's crazy. The best Lampman can do is humour him for a while. He searches his mind for the words that will make her go away instead. "I'm transiting," Will says. "It's hard to sleep without the sounds of Christian television now that I've been in Baltimore."
Lampman looks neither impressed nor convinced, but Will knows she has to believe him one way or another. He's given her just enough of the truth to be convincing and withheld everything of importance. It's a perfect binding catch-22 for Lampman: settle and she's stuck with half-truths, grill him further and she will get outright lies.
Then again, she could always play her trump card. When he played games with Chilton, Will's meds got changed, or the lights in the basement were turned on and off earlier or later than usual. Lampman is God in this place. She holds all the keys, gives all the orders, and she can find other ways to open him up than conversation.
She passes a request to Neil so quietly that Will can't hear. He doesn't ask for her to repeat herself though. Lampman walks slowly to the window of the room and stares out at the day beyond as Neil goes off to carry out her orders. Will knows where this is heading and grips the mattress tight enough to tear it.
"If I ask you about Baltimore, will you answer honestly?"
Will's sure she's asking him a trick question. "I don't like psychiatrists," he responds.
"Because of Dr. Chilton."
"Because they're psychiatrists. They all want to get inside my head. Tie strings around my thoughts and turn my psyche into a puppet."
"Dr. Chilton is capable of many things, but I wouldn't credit him with being able to get inside your head," Lampman says.
Will immediately feels exposed. He opens his mouth to cover up, but Nail's back in the doorway just as he's about to begin with a cup in both hands: one with juice, the other with pills.
He is going to beg now. He doesn't want to, not with all that's happened today, but Will can't help himself. "I don't need to those," he says.
"Just Aspirin, Mr. Graham," Neil hands him the cups.
Lampman's glancing at him out of the corner of her eye as he reaches for them. Evidently, this isn't a game to her.
Will's given a reprieve the next two days. No sessions with Lampman, no visits to group therapy: just a lot of time on his own wandering, visiting with Alana and more of the dogs, measuring the wall around the courtyard and the distance between himself and the orderlies. He receives Aspirin at regular intervals to keep his headaches at bay.
When there's no session on the third day, Will has to ask. He questions Neil when he's getting his morning round of Aspirin, anticipating animosity but receiving none. Neil's perfectly affable. "I think she's at a conference today, Mr. Graham," he replies. "She has you scheduled back with her tomorrow."
(Three days to rise again. Lampman's practically biblical.)
He spends his morning sitting in the courtyard trying to figure her out instead of focusing on his previous psychiatrists. Lampman's showed patience, understanding, and generosity for absolutely nothing in return. Will knows his trust isn't worth as much as she's giving him. Either she doesn't give a damn, or she gives too much of one. Will doesn't know what to do with either. He misses Chilton's idiocy. At least he could run circles around that. Lampman's too smart for any games he could play.
"Mr. Graham?" Neil arrives. "You have a visitor."
Normally they don't announce Alana. Will's brow furrows. He turns to look back down the path towards his visitor.
His heart skips several beats and then plays catch-up. He feels the sweat bead on his upper lip, along his brow, and stream freely from his palms.
Hannibal Lecter stands behind him. "Hello, Will."
Will's mouth is dry. His voice comes out in shards of broken glass. "Hello, Dr. Lecter."
Happy reading!