All rights to Hannibal (TV) belong to NBC.
To all of you who celebrate today: Merry Christmas!
This chapter is dedicated to LisaxDeanshipper97.
Special thanks to Chocoholics Unite, Mellimeldiseil, Twelia, Codenameyikes, inari of the skies, and Ghouly-Girl, Sevotharte, and Imperia Phantomhivefor your support!
Also, the television timeline and this one are a wee bit different.
Hannibal Lecter's Office, Baltimore, Maryland
Will looked marginally better as he settled into his seat.
Hannibal never missed the way others dressed, the things they told him without speaking, especially when it came to Will Graham.
And today, Will came to him with honesty, with loyalty.
He forwent the jacket he must have been wearing before, the underlying navy vest hanging on his shoulders unbuttoned, a beautiful contrast to the stone blue shirt underneath, one that compliments the very color of his own eyes. He is just the right amount undone, in Hannibal's eyes. His dark hair tousled, but, at least, brushed, and his beard was less unruly - something that was changed in the past twenty four hours judging by the smell of aftershave. Though a part of him wanted to cringe at the smell, he was too pleased at this undoing, the trust Will is placing in him.
He did not hesitate when Hannibal offered him a drink.
His hesitance came when Hannibal asked him what brought on this impromptu visit.
Will's sigh tells him it wasn't out of reluctance, but out of loss.
"I found her outside at three in the morning," he began, closing his eyes, allowing the memory to flow into his mind and out his lips.
Slowly, his mind flooded with the sight of her sitting on the porch, staring up at the night sky with a look of agonized wonder. He would have thought she was sleepwalking if it wasn't for Winston, who was lying beside her, his head lovingly placed on her lap as she gently ran her fingers through his fur. She didn't acknowledge him, not until he sat beside her. When she looked at him, when she finally looked at him, his worries left him.
When she looked at him, he was untouchable.
"I tried not to wake you," she told him, an apologetic and weak smile on her face. He didn't know whether she expected a response from him, and, if she did, he didn't know what to say. It didn't matter, though. His silence must not have bothered her too much, as the next thing she did was move, laying her head on his shoulder.
He could remember the breath that left him, heavy and tired and so very relieved.
He didn't ask her why she was awake. Based on what she was willing to recount about her time in that white room, he imagined that he, too, would want to drown on the fresh air far from the city. These were the first nights where she could see the sky without a window to separate her from it. It was already hard enough for her to sleep under a white ceiling in a colorless room (he made a note to pick up paint sometime this week). at the hospital, she didn't slept easily, not without taking medicine, which she took all too reluctantly. Despite the dark circles under her eyes, the tire carving its way onto her face, she would go as long as she could before he had to ask, his voice pleading, for her to just take it.
"Why do you think she fights sleep?"
"Aside from nightmares?" Will asked wryly, watching as the wine sloshed around in his glass from his half-hearted attempt at swirling it. "I think she's scared."
"Of?"
"Of going to sleep and waking up back in that room with that woman," Will answered before bringing the glass to his lips, taking a gulp far too large to truly savor the taste. Hannibal forgave him. Consolation, he told himself when Will let out a breath, small, restrained, but entirely fragile. Here was a man just on the edge of shattering. "I keep thinking of how many times she went to sleep, dreaming of getting out and waking up there." He was speaking in a whisper, but even then, Hannibal could hear the scathing hatred in Will's voice. "How many times did she wake up and realize that we-" He closed his eyes.
There was a burning in his chest. Shame. Guilt. Rage. All of it rising, almost frothing from his mouth.
To Hannibal's disappointment, Will swallowed it all, burying it deep as he could.
"Will," Hannibal called, leaning forward until his elbows touched his knees. Will's eyes slowly slipped from his glass to Hannibal's, and he was met with a profound amount of - of what, he could not exactly determine. But he recognized it. They were a reflection, an echo, of Bella's own eyes, looking so strongly, feeling so strongly.
For a man as refined as Hannibal, there was something so untamed about the look in his eyes in moments like this.
How could a man possibly convey that much emotion with eyes alone?
Will shifted in his seat, trying to draw up the walls that kept almost everyone out. He thought to reach for his glasses, to place them low on his nose and hide behind the rim of them. He couldn't. Not under those eyes.
He was seen.
He was exposed.
"I want to help her." It was one of the few things he said with certainty. "I just don't know how," he admitted, his resolve crumbling to dirt. "I even considered going back to my teaching post - to staying there."
"Considered," Hannibal repeated as a single brow pulled into a fine arch.
"Considered," Will confirmed with traces of defeat slipping into his tone. There was a shift in the look in his eyes, a changing of the tides. Something resentful appeared in them, but not towards Hannibal. Never for him. "I can't. . ." He trailed off, not knowing how to put the feeling that has been weighing heavy on his weary heart into words. "I can help," he settled on. "No one else has gotten this close to catching him."
Cold blond hair and stormy grey eyes flashed before his eyes, but Hannibal blinked, not a fault on his concerned face.
"Whether I'm teaching or chasing a killer, I can't help her. Not in the way she needs." Will leaned back into his chair, closing his eyes before he began to massage his temples in gentle circles. His perpetual migraine does not lighten in the slightest. Not until his eyes opened, finding Hannibal's. "That's why I'm here."
Hannibal's expression did not betray the thrill of this admission, but he did allow a look of understanding to cross his features. He looked every bit a savior. Not entirely surprised, yet all the more willing to do what he was asked.
"She won't accept help. Not from a stranger," Will added, thinking back to her time in the hospital. She wouldn't give full honesty. Filtered truths, telling her nurses and doctors with a remarkable resolve everything that she imagined would get her out of another white room faster. Her ability to lie was somewhat unsettling, but as soon as they were alone, she would let it fall and look at him. A silent promise of honesty. Fidelity.
"Alana Bloom has a familiar face," Hannibal challenged.
Will scoffed, shaking his head and letting a bitter laugh escape his lips. Hannibal knew Bella enough to know that she would not trust Alana Bloom. Not in the way she trusted Will. Not in the way she trusted him. Even with all his charm and expertise, she almost turned him away.
"Alana Bloom isn't someone she trusts. You are," Will insisted, a pleading look in his eyes that was unnecessary.
Hannibal was already imagining how he might lead her, how he might help shape her into something new.
"You imagine she would share an intimate trauma with me rather than you?" It was a genuine question, a genuine concern.
"No," Will answered, breathing the word with some relief at his own certainty. "I imagine she will be more willing to accept you. Whatever help you might offer."
"More willing," Hannibal repeated, a ghost of a smile on his lips. He was met with a knowing glance. A silent reflection on Bella's reluctance. It was not a joke, but he felt his heart quicken as though one were made. A shared truth. A shared experience. A shared companion.
"So," Will began, breathing a bit easier, already knowing the answer but needing to hear it aloud. "Would you be willing to. . ." He doesn't want to sound as though he were asking Hannibal to watch over her, as though he didn't trust her enough to not be watched. "-to keep her company." It still felt wrong. "I can't - I'm not what she needs, but you might be." It didn't feel as painful to say as he thought it would be.
Hannibal's back straightened, looking taller, stronger. He looked every bit the rock she needed to hold onto. He looked of comfort, of stability.
"I would never turn away a friend in need."
Will gave a rueful look. "I wouldn't doubt that. I do doubt her giving you a chance to turn her away."
"You doubt her ability to ask for help."
"No. She has the ability. It's her willingness to do so."
Hannibal remembered the first time she came to him, doe eyed and terrified by just a hint of his nature.
"Why do you feel she is unwilling?"
"I feel-" Will stopped in a moment of clarity. "She feels she is someone else if she does."
There was suddenly a distance in his eyes, a slip in when he was.
"Will," Hannibal said, slowly, drawing out the single syllable with a gentleness. The man blinks until he was present again. "Is something wrong?" He knew the answer, but Will shook his head all the same.
It would be a lie to say Hannibal was not disappointed, but, for now at least, he would permit dishonesty.
"Well," he continued, settling down in his chair in hopes of Will doing the same. He wanted him to relax. He wanted Will to trust him. Will allowed a taste of what that might be, but only after finishing off his drink. "It would be remiss of me not to offer my help all the same."
He would offer to be her guide, to lead this doe-eyed girl into the forest so that she might become acquainted with who she could be.
Abigail Hobb's Room, Port Haven Psychiatric Facility, Baltimore, Maryland
"For you or for me?" Abigail's first words upon her arrive, nodding to the box of cupcakes in Bella's hands, the bag with two glass bottles hanging from them.
She recognized the gift immediately.
Two cupcakes and lemonade, more expensive than she'd usually spend on sweets and better than what was served. It was the first thing they ever knowingly shared.
"I'm surprised you remembered," Bella said casually, moving to the nightstand by Abigail's bed, unpacking their sweets. She was quiet in the process, so much that Abigail began to wonder if things had changed, if she would have to become what Bella was to her.
As if hearing her thoughts, Bella's eyes rose, something foreign yet familiar within them.
"How could I forget?" Abigail asked, her voice barely above a whisper. She tilted her head one way then the other, trying to see her better, to see how she reacted. Bella's lips curled, her eyes shifting to the cupcakes as she replayed the memory of their first meeting. There was comfort in her eyes and the sight of it brought some to Abigail. She was afraid Bella was lost, yet here she was, standing as a survivor.
Just like me.
Unlike their first meeting, she accepted her cupcake with ease, taking bites between words. Abigail knew Bella wouldn't want to talk about whatever happened. She, like Abigail, wanted to move on. So, Abigail tried to move on. This entailed long stories about the happenings in the hospital, how she hated the girls in her support group, how much she missed Bella. She spoke as though Bella had been away willingly, and, as strange as it was, it felt nice to pretend. To have just a shred of normalcy.
Bella learned that Will had visited Abigail, that he attempted to "sub in" for her and failed to do so.
"He sucks at conversation," Abigail complained with a classic teenage roll of the eyes. "But he tried, so I guess that has to count for something."
Bella nodded, a pleased smile on her face. Between the two of them, Abigail did most of the talking. Not that she minded. She missed having someone to talk to, even if it was about trivial things like how she hated the new medicine they gave her for her nightmares. She said, "They make me feel like a zombie. I already got a taste of what it's like to die, I don't need it again."
"I don't take mine," Bella admitted without much guilt. "I should, but I don't."
"Freddie Lounds says I shouldn't, that it might bring some clarity or understanding to everything that happened," Abigail explained. It was the first time she mentioned the journalist.
"Then you definitely should," Bella adds, half jokingly.
"I will when you will," Abigail countered with, crossing her arms, a smirk playing on her face. It didn't phase Bella in the slightest.
"Nice try, Abby," Bella somewhat sarcastically commended. "But, it doesn't work like that." There was a lightness in her eyes, in her lungs. She was sure now that seeing Abigail in "her current state" was not a mistake.
"Why not?" Abigail asked, her face contorting with an obvious confusion.
"Because I'm an adult," Bella shrugs, smiling at the phrase she hated so much when she was younger.
"That's not fair!" Abigail argued, leaning forward, a healthy amount of anger and outrage in her eyes. Nothing too heavy or concerning. It was the kind of anger that Bella wanted. The kind that people would swallow out of worries that she would break under the pressure of it. It was the kind of anger that made her feel like herself, that nothing had changed, that nothing would change.
"Life's not fair, kiddo," Bella said, a smile betraying her serious tone. Abigail tried to keep her face stone-like, but it softened into a reflection of Bella's. In the end, she threw a wadded scarf at Bella and continued onto another topic.
Time passed and the two found themselves falling into their old routine, flipping through magazines - Abigail made sure to tell her what she missed in news, be it actual news or gossip - and daydreaming while lying on a blanket covered floor. She listened to Abigail as she painted a possible future. Going somewhere outside the U.S., where no one knew them, just living a quiet normal life, the one they were both denied. Bella was the one to tell Abigail that "it could happen." She told Abigail about how she saw her home in Wolf Trap, how she dreamed about it every night in "that place." Abigail asked if she had a place in that life.
Without any hesitance, Bella turned her head, her eyes, to Abigail, and she said, "Always." There were no tears in Abigail's eyes nor Bella's, yet there was that same heartbreaking fragility resting in them. A silent and pained plea for that to never change, for "always" to mean just that.
The words echoed in Abigail's mind after Bella left.
When that time came, she gave Abigail a promise to come back soon, giving her hand a squeeze. Abigail didn't let go at first. Even with her acting as though nothing had changed, it had. She was scared - terrified - that something would happen, that Bella would disappear as she had. Abigail knew it wasn't her fault. She didn't blame her. She was just scared of being alone again. She didn't want to let go, so she didn't. She held on tightly, a lost and scared look filling her blue eyes, drowning Bella with all her sorrows.
"I promise," Bella whispered, not pulling away. Instead, she turned back to Abigail, using her free hand to cover Abigail's, both of which clung to her other. She held on until her words sunk in, until Abigail believed her.
Benny's Stop and Dine, Virginia
She dropped her bag on the table, the metal strap striking the surface should have drawn eyes. It didn't.
Nobody was there to notice her.
Gas prices were too high for people to overlook the state of the establishment.
She wasn't here for the gas, however. She was here for the food. She wanted one of those too greasy, too salty, too sloppily made burgers.
She thought about simply going behind the counter, making her own plate. If she left cash behind, she doubted anyone would have minded, but it wasn't her place. Not anymore. So, she settled into a chair and took in diner that she once hid in. The checkerboard tiles were still stained and cracked. The leather seats were still peeling, tearing, and fading. The paint on the walls were still chipping. The light up signs didn't work, but the jukebox did. Everything was almost the same. Everything other than her was the same. That was good, she decided after some time. Her old self may have had a simpler life, but a hallow one. Despite all the stress in the one that she was currently living, at least she was just that: living.
Her old self was living for the ghost of her brother.
Her current self was living for so much more. A family.
That was one of the reasons for her reason for coming back to this almost abandoned place. She needed to remember her last change to withstand this one.
And remember it, she did.
She sat in Will's old seat. It felt right to assume his place. A table separate from the counter, distanced from the back rooms that had an "Employees Only" sign. Less because she wasn't an employee, more because she was an outsider now. She was ever since she first truly stepped outside the dirty glass door and into the confusing and dangerous life that was Will Graham's. She didn't know it at the time - how could she? - that meeting him would set her on a path to becoming someone else.
He was a major event, a happening, a deciding circumstance in her history.
There was her brother. There was him. And now there was that woman and what she had done.
Well, what the fuck happens now?
Bella didn't have the chance to dwell on the subject longer, her boss, a balding, tired looking, weary eyed man wandered out of his office, and with a gentle expression asked, "How may I help you?"
It didn't surprise her, the warmth that came with seeing him. Despite having barely a relationship, there was always an unspoken understanding, she supposed. He was the one who offered her a job, a place to hide with little explanation. She figured she might remind him of someone, be it himself or someone he once knew. Either way, whatever he saw in her granted her his favor and his protection.
She didn't need to understand back then.
She still didn't.
This was another comfort, just as Abigail was.
Whoever she might become is built on the person she once was.
Who I was, everyone I used to be, are all stacked upon each other, building and evolving.
She was given her burger just as a car, too shiny and new, pulled into the parking lot. He didn't park in front of the diner. He parked at a slight distance. The sole reason she could imagine why was to give her time, time to make a choice, time to decide how she was going to meet him. She should have watched him, prepare herself, but she couldn't. There was a sickness within. A nauseating feeling rising to the point where she couldn't bring herself to look at the food before her - not that it would have helped.
The bell on the door rang, and Hannibal was met with the sight of her, pale and pained.
Her eyes were closed, brows knitted together, lips likely bruising with how harshly she was biting them closed. One hand was gripping onto the table tightly, knuckles white. The other was bent. He couldn't see where it was placed, but he imagined it was on her stomach based on the disgusting slop gathered onto chipped plate that was set in front of her.
This place was deteriorating. If the outside wasn't telling enough, the inside was.
This was no place for her, he decided, looking down on her until she recovered.
When her eyes opened, he felt the disgust, the disappointment, the irritation in him vanish. Once again, he was reminded of the richness of life. Once again, he was met with a storm of emotions brewing within two brutally honest eyes.
He was reminded of how much he ached to see them.
He gave her the opportunity to speak first, and, in that moment, in her eyes he saw agony. So many words she wanted to say, to scream, but not a breath left her.
"I wanted to visit you at the hospital," he admitted, leaving out the part that the only one stopping him from doing so was himself. He wanted her starved of his presence. He wanted her to ache for him as he did in her absence.
"It's a good thing you didn't."
His brow rose as he took his seat and a smirk bloomed on her scarred face.
"I was terribly rude," she explained, not in the least bit apologetic. The corners of his lips twitched, almost daring to smile. That alone was a foreign feeling. It went against his principles to forgive her. Perhaps it was because he was not there to see it. Perhaps it was just something he was willing to overlook in order to continue to enjoy her company.
He watched her painfully try to choke down another bite. Her lips trembled, her shoulders pulled forward with a sharpness that was almost unnatural, the food - if one could call it that - threatening to rise up her throat. He watched the way her skin on her neck moved as she swallowed a second time. He watched the muscles pull tight like strings, playing to the tune of her own sickness.
Her name spoken caught her attention enough to stop her from taking another bite.
"Why did you choose this place?" He could have easily driven to Wolf Trap.
She set her burger down, settling into her seat, thinking. Minutes passed by in silence as though it were difficult to know the answer.
"I wanted you to see it."
Her words come out as a whisper, fragile despite the way she so harshly clenched her jaw.
"I wanted you to find me where he once did."
She wanted him to know the ugliness she came from. She wanted him to know that has changed before and that she is changing again. She wanted him to see it, to recognize it, to tell her, professionally, that there was no going back to this. She needed someone healthier than her. Healthier than Will.
Hannibal looked around the room again, letting everything sink in and carve its way into his memory.
"In hopes of what?"
"Closure?" she guessed with a bitterness in her voice. Her nose wrinkled, the corners of her eyes too as she felt the absence of the very thing she wanted. "I just. . . I don't know. I need you to know who I was before you met me. Isn't that something doctors need to know? Patient history." This was a part of her own. The place she settled after years of lost time spent looking for someone she might never find.
"Patient history is often medical."
"Everyone self medicates in different ways. This was mine."
The words hung in the air like some heavy but distant thing, and she turned her eyes away in slight regret.
Trying to set whatever baggage she carried aside, she looked again to him and found a comfort in his eyes. He spared no pity, no sympathy for her. It grounded her in the way seeing Abigail did, a brief moment in which she felt herself, or who she once was, again. Dust was settling, time was still, and she could breathe.
If only for a little while.
Her name was spoken again. This time she watched as the three syllables formed on his lips.
She wondered if he was purposefully saying it. They were the only ones present, after all.
Maybe he's reminding me that I'm an actual person.
It wouldn't be a surprise. She was robbed of a name in that room.
Maybe he just likes saying it.
He leaned forward, reaching slowly, attentively, for her plate.
She did nothing. She'd been doing a lot of nothing lately.
Was it strange? She didn't know. Frustrating? Yes. Stuck in a room for what felt like an eternity, doing nothing, and what does she do when she is out? More nothing with brief activity. What she did do was never for herself. For Will. For Abigail. For Hannibal. . .
"Perhaps I can recommend a better form of 'self-medicating'?" he asked.
She squinted a bit, searching his eyes. There was always too much there to decipher.
"It's not exactly 'self-medicating' if your doctor tells you to," she pointed out. She meant it to sound humorous. It just came out bitter.
"Perhaps, but it is certainly healthier."
Hannibal Lecter's House, Baltimore, Maryland
Walking into his house for the first time since she got back felt how she imagined religious people did when they walked into a temple, church, synagogue, or mosque. It was a place of worship, but to what, she could never tell. To art? To Hannibal, himself?
Regardless, she felt enlightened. When searching for a way to spite or defy the rules she lived by in the white room, she thought the diner would be perfect. It was the mess that the woman would want to burn to the ground. It had the food that she would never be allowed to eat. Ugly, unhealthy, and so, so very imperfect. Destroying herself in a place of ruins seemed like the right thing to do in the spirit of reclamation.
But all of that was wrong. It felt wrong after she was welcomed into his home.
It was colorful. It was filled. It was everything she was robbed of, returned to her.
She didn't know how long she spent, just memorizing everything again; looking and touching everything she could.
Hannibal didn't seem to mind.
He allowed her "a day of rest" - despite most of her days being spent with little strain - before they begin. She spent over an hour in his private study, tracing the spines of books and skimming through some of the English ones, before she settled on one. When dinner was nearly done, he came for her. He found her, hunched over on a small couch, legs folded underneath her, book so carefully placed on the other seat. She looked as though she were touching something sacred, light touches, carefully turning each page.
She looked starved.
Lips parted, eyes focused, her heavy breathes.
"Take it with you."
He half expected some sort of snap, a primal jolt of alertness when his voice broke the silence. Instead, her eyes moved towards him, head turning not long after. Her spine slowly aligned, gently pulling herself upright. Her hands moved away from the book, folding themselves and resting on her lap. Her lips moved, an apology waiting to fall. It didn't. Instead, she shut them, swallowed the words, and nodded.
"Thank you."
He asked her if she would like to help him begin to set out dinner. She accepted, expecting him to direct her, to tell her how to do it in the way he likes - she expects him to have a very specific method.
He didn't.
At least, he didn't direct her. He would offer advice here and there, but allowed her the comfort of doing things on her own. She knew how to set up. Her grandmother was rigorous in making sure everything was perfect. That woman was too. So, out of spite, Bella adjusted the silverware. A little crooked, a little uneven, a little more like home. When he noticed, when he did nothing, she didn't know whether to feel comforted or angry. Did he pity her?
She didn't ask.
He didn't answer.
When Hannibal served her, he, as he often did, he listed out what exactly was on her plate. The names did not make the different foods any more recognizable than they were before, but she didn't mind. It was more than a poached egg and half a grapefruit.
Eating was easier. There was no rush to choke down the bites, no urge to ruin herself out of spite. The food was too beautiful to waste on an unhealthy revenge. So, she ate slowly, savoring each bite, each taste. And it was something worth savoring. Had he been there when she was allowed her first meal outside of that room, had he brought her this, she might have cried.
She let him know. It's the best non-generic compliment she could think of.
He smiled. There was no sympathy in his eyes, for that she was thankful.
"Definitely healthier," she agreed, glancing up from her half empty plate.
There was a moment of silence, some thought stirring within his eyes. She didn't ask choosing to savor in the color, the richness.
"The first time I ate out of the hospital, I ate to the point where I couldn't keep much down," she admitted, remembering how Will spent a good hour holding her afterwards. He found her, hunched over, collapsed on the bathroom floor, just weeping in pain. It was insulting. She once thought she had a high pain tolerance, but that was stolen from her as well. Every emotion, every feeling, every sensation was overwhelming now. "I should have known better." She fasted before. Sometimes willing. Sometimes unwilling.
"Do you know better?"
She might have thought he was talking about after that night, but there was something in his voice, the lowness of it, the way the words slowly slipped out. She knew it was for now. For this meal. For this new method.
"I do."
"Would you be open to learning?"
It was a long stare down between the two of them, seconds ticking by as she thought of what she wanted, of what he was offering.
She had a taste of it once - showing up at his doorstep on a snowy night, asking for his help. He gave her that, and more. He gave her an opportunity to learn. Back then, she so hesitantly accepted, unsure of herself, of what more she wanted than Abigail's safety. What more could she have wanted back then?
What more could she want now, except for her sense of control back. . .
"Yes."
There was no raising of glasses, simply a silent, subtle, and shared celebratory drink.
The red ran down her throat, leaving her burning with a new sense of hope.
Grønne Haven, Baltimore, Maryland
She stood alone in front of a crate of oranges, carefully lifting one to smell. Satisfied, she plucked three more from the crate, setting them into her half-filled basket. She paused, for a moment, to admire all the colors, all the components of what she held no doubt would be a masterpiece. It would mark the first that she willingly participated in.
Taking in the colors in a new light, she smiled bitterly.
And I almost didn't think about it.
Lifting her head, her eyes swept over the small market, settling on a single man standing before a shelf of spices. It was fairly easy to spot him. Dressed down, he was a sight to be seen and admired. She was quiet in her approach, not wanting to disturb him, but, still, his eyes politely found her. He stepped aside, allowing her to catch a glimpse of what she would one day have to search through if he had his way.
Her eyes scanned the labels. Half of them were in different languages - none of which she knew.
This was the first time he didn't have what he needed. Though, she supposed that wasn't a surprise.
"You know, when you said you needed a few things from the store, I imagined a supermarket."
He didn't laugh, but she did, rolling her eyes at her own stupidity - of course he goes to fancy stores. At the sound of her breathy laugh, his lips pulled into a humorous grin. Their eyes met. No thoughts shared, only a pleasant warmth.
That familiar sense of warmth pulled her back into memories that felt more like a distant dream.
Look at how far we have come, Hannibal, she thought. How far will we go?
"May I?"
She lifted the basket, presenting him with the various fruits and vegetables he sent her out to collect. He was just as gentle as she was but far more elegant in the way he examined its color - its smell. It was hard not to think him properly beautiful in the smallest movements - a delicate flare to the nostrils, the smooth rise and fall of a satisfied breath, the fine muscles of his lips pulling into a smile, the approval in his eyes.
"You look a little too proud of me just grabbing some oranges."
"More proud of your choice," he corrected.
There was something effortless in the way he peeled it, offering a single slice to her. There was something within the offer that felt familiar. That same sense of approaching a point of no return that she felt all that time ago when she first dined at his table. She dismissed the feeling, telling herself that there was nothing so purposeful, nothing so gravitating in it. Still, the feeling of accepting something she shouldn't lingered.
The first thing she noticed was the smell, richer now without the skin. Tangy. Sweet. The next was the taste. Taking a bite, teeth sinking into the slice, she felt a burst of flavor. Citrus, but so much so that it almost needed a new word. And, finally, the texture. Soft and seedless. It felt impossibly right. Perfection in something so small and oddly shaped.
It left her smiling, a small chuckle leaving her lips as she now realized how right he was to smile.
"Okay, I'll allow you some pride," she said.
"'Allow'?" Hannibal repeated, brows raised above eyes dancing with amusement.
"You cannot have everything everything you want," she points out, with a daring smile.
"Can't I?" he challenged, something devilish in the curl of his smile.
Her eyes and smile lingered for a moment too long, her own fondness for him bleeding through whatever defenses she once had.
"Was there ever a thing in your life that you wanted and couldn't have?" She meant to sound humorous, but the words left too quietly, too slow, too close.
"We all have moments in our lives that we regret," he answered.
It was then she realized the pain she carried was not hers alone.
"I cannot help but feel responsible for what happened to you."
She could tell there were words he left unsaid. It left her with a taste of frustration and shame.
"The only one responsible is her," Bella said quickly.
Hannibal expected her to be detached. He expected her to be wounded, grazing the scars the experience left her with. He expected her trauma to leave her as lost as she was before. Instead, of a raw pain of an open wound showing, he heard hatred bleeding in her voice. The words leaving her lips in heated breath, a rage building in once delicate browns.
There was a delicious violence in her.
Sweet. Bitter. Divine.
Behavioral Analysis Unit, Quantico, Virginia
She tried to maintain an air of professionalism around her.
She was there on official business and if Prurnell heard a whisper that she had even the slightest conflict of interest, she would be cast out and be forced to fight her way back up all over again. Her boss was as ruthless as they came; too cautious and tough to ever allow one of her own to act "outside the department's interest." The wellbeing of a former lover was not in the slightest of their interest. . . until now.
Bellamy Bennet's kidnapping was blood in the water for Kade Prurnell. While Alejandra was curious as to why Prurnell was hellbent on poisoning Jack Crawford's career, she was more concerned with finding Bella.
Bennet. She had to remind herself to keep calling her "Bennet." It was easier that way, seeing her as someone else entirely.
She had been there when they brought her in.
She should have left earlier. She should have kept her distance. She should have set aside any personal feelings she had for someone she once knew.
Yet, she stayed.
She stayed and she saw.
Her hair was damp, hanging long and limp. Her face scrubbed clean. There was a dullness to her skin. Her cheeks now hollow. And her eyes - her eyes - were vacant as she stood alone, staring down the glass-walled hallway. She was lost. Lost in a memory or a dream and reality. And then, when her eyes found Alejandra, for a moment, she looked alive.
And it broke Alejandra's heart.
It all came back, for just a second, all the memories.
It was an overwhelming rush, too fast for her to comprehend. All she could understand was the warmth, the relief, the breath of air she had been holding for years finally letting go. She almost cried.
And then it was gone.
Will Graham had said her name - almost whispering it - and just like that Bella turned her head, and Alejandra was left.
Cold.
Alone.
Left behind.
She left then, fleeing to her hotel room, where she spent the night staring at the ceiling, following the jagged cracks in it. She tried not to dwell on what was long lost. Whatever future she might have had with Bella. She buried those hopes and dreams years ago. Even then, when a thought began to pull at her, trying to drag her back to the grief she long since let go of, she cut herself loose with five simple words.
Maybe in a better life.
She repeated those words again as she watches Will Graham leave Jack Crawford's office.
She refused to feel jealous of this man. How could she after reading his file? Still, something rotten in her began to form when she looked at him. It wasn't angry. She doubted she could ever be angry at a man as unsteady as him. Afraid, yes. She sat in on one of his lectures, and the chilling description of a crime was enough to make her squirm. But angry? No. He hadn't done anything to deserve anger. He hadn't taken anything from her.
If anything, she should be grateful for what he had done, what he has been doing.
"You studied to be a botanist."
The words caught her off guard. Her eyes searched his - something he allowed her to do, no longer hiding behind the frames of his glasses - before she realized that he likely knew about her. She was torn between shock and embarrassment. She shouldn't have doubted their intimacy. They lived together. She had a taste of that, but what little taste she had was that spent in the dark.
So you really have found someone who can reach you.
"Once," she corrected, as though he didn't already know.
He nodded.
She tilted her head, watching his expression change, a faint twitch of the brows, a slight struggle to grasp onto any words. She imagined this was as difficult for him as it was for her. Though, perhaps it would be less forced.
"It helped," he said. "It was her first case."
She reminded herself that Bennet had a job here before her abduction. "A man had been burying diabetics alive and plant fungi on top of them." She must have made a face because he was quick to switch focus. "Your - ah - mushrooms. She remembered them, stuff about them. It helped find him."
She would find out later, going through that specific file, that the cost of finding Eldon Stammets was being buried alive.
"Didn't think she'd remember something like that," she murmured, looking to the right, feeling as though she could just turn around walk into a memory she didn't know she carried. When she saw nothing but grey concrete and glass walls leading to the morgue and medical facilities, she was left with a hollow feeling in her chest.
Will cleared his throat, habitually averting his eyes when she turned her own back to him. She watched as he rummaged through his bag. She imagined it might be a file, that he was asked by Jack Crawford to deliver her one and decided to sooth her worries a bit. Instead, he held out to her a small envelope. In smooth, ornamental script was her name. She raised a brow, knowing full well that neither Will Graham nor Bellamy Bennet was capable of such elegant penmanship.
With a nod prompting her to open it, she broke the seal and procured an invitation.
"Dr. Hannibal Lecter requests the pleasure of your company for dinner."
Will shifted under her narrowed eyes.
"I don't know Dr. Lecter well enough to warrant an invitation."
"But you do know Bella."
Alejandra drew back, her spine aligning until it was as straight as she could ever be. She silenced the feelings that rushed at her - a skill she'd perfected over the years.
"She wants. . . She's sorry."
"It was years ago," she said quickly, swallowing her own anger - her misery. She didn't need Bella's apologies; Bella didn't need her forgiveness. She did not need to see Bella to know that she, too, had long since grew tired of grieving the loss possibilities.
"No. It's now."
It was his voice but Bella's words, and it left her aching.
Hannibal Lecter's House, Baltimore, Maryland
He allowed his true face to be seen when she looked at him. There is something in her eyes that he recognized, something bittersweet, something that took weeks to ripen. It was small but brightening look. Hope. Hope that he so carefully renewed and strengthened with each recipe learned, meal shared, and bite taken. It was only just for him to relish in the sight, in the knowledge that she cared and trusted him intimately?
He knew her almost as well as she knew herself.
He knew she could not sleep; Will could not sleep. The difference being when she did manage to find sleep, she did not wake up drenched in sweat, not knowing what was real and what was not.
He knew Will would stare at the ceiling; she would stare at the walls - walls Will painted a yellow, replacing the dull blues and greens that reflected the colors of the white room during the night.
He knew them as they knew each other.
And they knew him.
Not completely, but more than he ever felt known before.
"Hannibal."
The sound of his name stilled the knife in his hand. He could carry on. He often did in the company of others when he allowed them to join in his cooking. For him, though, Hannibal did stop and gently set the blade aside.
When his eyes find Will - all too easily - he found himself smiling.
Will cleaned up well.
It was a decently tailored suit - a brown woolen jacket with a charcoal colored dress shirt beneath. It was casual by design, but an improvement compared to his usual simple plaid button downs under jackets. And his hair, though dampened by the rain outside, appeared to be styled - a contrast to his usual messy curls. Even his aftershave smelled finer.
"I thought you were going to be late," he heard Bella say. He didn't have to see her to know she shared the same smile as him.
Will explained his "luck" - the recently found body of Nickolas Boyle arrived in the middle of their investigation into the human totem pole. Jack Crawford wanted his eyes on it - more importantly, he wanted Will's eyes to find Abigail - the last thing the three of them wanted, albeit for different reasons. Where his lips twitched, Bella's jaw clenched, and Will's eyes only grew wearier at the possibility of Jack bringing Abigail in.
Hannibal wondered what they - what she - would think of him threatening the girl. He did not regret it in the slightest. Her betrayal made made her an inconvenience, one he could not easily rid of. While he could not trust her, he could not kill her either. Abigail was too close to them, Bella especially. If she had not already accepted Abigail, if she had not so tightly tethered the girl to her own life, she would be more expendable.
But she was.
. . . For now.
Will rolled up the sleeves of his shirt, making his way over to their counter, eyes sweeping over an hours worth of food prep. He plucked the recipe card from in front of Bella. There was a time, once, when her eyes would have widened, lost without specific instructions. She might have quickly snatched the card back even - he was always delighted by how quick she could be. But now, she simply shook her head, smiling as Will butchered the name of the thick and decadent chocolate mousse. Her expression serene as she tipped a saucer of dark crimson into a pot of creamy white, delicately swirling the two with a wooden spoon.
"Sanguinaccio dolce."
The name rolls off her tongue with ease; the sound brought a smile to his face, one outshined by her own pride in it.
"Blood and chocolate," Will stated, finally looking to Hannibal again. There was not an ounce of surprise or revulsion on his face.
"And other things too," Bella added, dusting sugar and spices into the pot, powder floating through the air with each gentle tap. Will sets the recipe down, politely in the same place he found it, before moving to offer his hands to Hannibal.
They worked in a comfortable silence. It is not the same steadiness Hannibal was used to, but he found a love for it. Each movement slow, deliberate. Each motion moving him in a way he had long since forgotten.
They bring a pleasant warmth in his chest, one that only grows when they stay after diner and dessert - which they leave not a drop left.
"Are you sure you can't stay?" he remembered asking Will once.
Those words seemed so far away now as he watches them come undone before his eyes.
When the night is over and he lies in bed, the thought of them tasted of blood, chocolate, and wine.
An achingly beautiful combination.
God. I know I'm agonizingly late. If you're still reading this story, I adore you. This semester is over and I am taking one less class next semester so I will be updating more. I won't go over half a year before updating again.
Here's a casual preview of the next chapter:
Will Graham is having some ROUGH times.
Alejandra does some digging.
Murder?
. . . and an overall pick up in the pace of this story. We're about to hit the ground running!