Clarice sat alone, perched on the edge of the vast marble tub, one of six scattered around the upstairs apartment of their sprawling home in the heart of the city. There was something oddly incongruous about the bathrooms; the manse was a bastion of beauty, an artwork in itself, every inch of it given over to the display of tasteful elegance and refinement, and the idea that the architects behind this marvel of grace had spared a thought for the base practicalities of human need had seemed almost strange to her when she first arrived here. To her mind it had seemed as if the sort of people who could inhabit such a place would surely be above such crass urges; La Bella and the Dottore were not entirely human, in their opulence and their calculated dignity, but they were only the parts Clarice and Hannibal were playing, and when they shed the skins of their second selves at the end of every day they were still very much in need of a bathroom or two and the services provided therein.
This particular room was her favorite of all of them. It was cavernous, twice as large as the bedroom that had been hers a lifetime before in the duplex she'd shared with Ardelia. The thought - where is Aredlia, these days - floated through her mind, but only briefly. Clarice had long since honed her mental reflexes, and she did not dwell on things she could not change, did devote much of her inner life to pondering the world she had belonged to, before, or what had become of it in her absence. In fact, it was hard to believe the duplex had been real at all, when it seemed so pale and lifeless in comparison to the place she called home now. The old reliable shower and toilet and sink she had known back then had been replaced with this, with miles of mosaic tiles adorning the walls and a vast marble tub that could have comfortably accommodated four grown adults, with a sparkling chandelier and a frosted bay window overlooking the city, with golden candelabras and plush towels, a single pair of which had cost more money than anything she'd ever owned in her old life. Her cosmetics sat in perfect crystal jars along the vanity, toothbrush and comb elevated somehow from their plain domesticity by the artwork of the canisters made to hold them, but there was nothing that could disguise the base roughness of the item she had purchased and set there on the counter, the item that had left her sitting on the edge of the tub, staring into soft golden glow of the chandelier contemplatively.
Technically, she had not purchased it. Technically, Rosa had; Clarice had cornered her favorite of the servants just after breakfast, and sent her into the city with a pocketful of coins to make the purchase on her behalf. La Bella was too well known in their little neighborhood; it wouldn't do, for someone to see her at the chemists and learn what was afoot. Perhaps seeing Rosa there would arouse suspicion, but Clarice was certain none of her peers would guess at the truth, certain they would instead assume Rosa needed it for herself, that they would forget having seen her the moment she passed from view. They paid very little attention to servants, as a rule. Rosa had performed her task quickly and quietly, and had not asked a single question; perhaps that was why Señora preferred her to the others. Curious servants did not last long in this house.
Rosa had delivered the package into her hands, and Clarice had retreated here, submitted to the mortifying ordeal of opening the package, juggling its contents in trembling hands, reading the instructions, and finally, starting the process that would lead, eventually, to the answers she sought.
In two minutes' time she'd know for a certainty whether Hannibal's tongue had the right of it, whether she was, even now, carrying his child. Two minutes; an eternity, and an instant, all at once. Two minutes to wonder, to question, and then, finally, the relief of knowing. But would it be a relief? She wondered. If she found she wasn't pregnant she would be spared the onerous task of deciding what to do about a potential baby, and perhaps that would be a relief. Perhaps not, however, for the idea had now been planted in her mind, and it had begun to take root.
Hannibal wanted a child. A legacy, a piece of themselves to live on in the world after they were gone. It was precisely the sort of answer she expected from her husband, precisely the sort of idea she imagined would thrill him. He was much concerned with chaos, and the questions of existence, and a child would give him an opportunity to study first hand the molding of a mind. Any child of theirs would not settle the debate on nature versus nurture, as far as Clarice was concerned; with Hannibal's blood running through his veins, and Hannibal for a father, it would be impossible to tell, she thought, whether the child had been born or made any particular way.
But this child will have you for a mother, a little voice whispered in the back of her mind. What would she have to teach a child? Everything she was, Hannibal had made her. The clothes, the manners, the languages, the arguments; he had slipped into her mind the moment they first met, and carefully, coldly, judiciously stripped her of her ties to everyone and everything save for him. Was it not her introduction to Hannibal that had led to her questioning her work with the FBI? Was it not Hannibal's refinement that had her subscribing to Vogue, purchasing shoes she could not afford, eschewing her relationships with other men when they all paled in comparison to him? Was it not Hannibal who had allowed her to put to rest the long and bitter struggle between her heart and her father's ghost? The operas she adored, the books she trailed her fingertips against so reverently, the music he played for her, the symphony of his panting breaths against her skin; everything she loved in this life he had given to her. What of Clarice remained, now?
Her spirit, perhaps, her fierce independence; he had given her so much, but left it to her to decide what she would accept. He had made no demands of her - she had chosen him. Would that be the lesson she bequeathed to her child, then, the one thing he would learn from his mother that his father could not teach? That to live was to choose, and that those choices were not so clear cut as others might claim them to be. In the Chesapeake house, a lifetime before, Clarice had been faced with a choice, between the life she had worked so hard for, the pursuit of what she understood justice to be, and Hannibal. Hannibal, a killer, a monster in the truest sense of the word, a man her sense of justice said ought to be held accountable for his crimes. By what right could they judge him, Hannibal who operated so far outside the bounds of ordinary society that their laws seemed so trivial in comparison to him? Hannibal had offered her beauty, and freedom, and the strength that came from standing beside him. A dead-end job, with no money, no respect, and nothing to show for all her years of sacrifice, or Hannibal. That was her choice, and in the end it had been an easy one.
And this child would be the product of her choice. This child would be theirs, made from both of them. For a moment she tried to picture it, Hannibal standing before her, holding a babe in his arms. Perhaps another woman, thinking of her beloved so, might feel a rush of fondness, of affection, of yearning for what might be. Clarice did not; the image faded before she could capture it, so at odds with her understanding of the world that her mind could not resolve the shapes and shades of it into form. Mother, father, and child, a perfect little family; how could such a tableau be made from the tools at hand, crafted from Clarice and Hannibal themselves?
That vision faded before it even swirled into being, and was replaced, almost at once, by the image of Evelda Drumgo, her baby in a carrier across her chest like a shield, a gun in her hands. Disgust washed over Clarice in waves so strong she nearly heaved out the meager contents of her stomach onto the marble floor right then. Evelda, the harbinger of doom, the impetus for the destruction of Clarice Starling, the poison that had festered in her veins and left her isolated and disdained by the FBI until at last Hannibal came to set her free. What would have happened to her, if not for Evelda? If they had captured her alive, if she had not known they were coming; how much longer would John have lived? Might Clarice have given in, late one night, to the affection she knew he harbored for her? Would her success have salvaged what remained of her career? Would she have been half so interesting to Hannibal had she not been so publicly mauled, left vulnerable and in need of his aid?
That was the last time Clarice had held a baby in her hands, that day at the fishmarket when she had washed the blood from Evelda's squalling son. A tiny, powerless thing, the boy had been unable to do anything but scream, and Evelda had put him in danger, had thought that his presence alone would be sufficient to protect her, had risked his life, in the hopes of saving her own. That was the source of Clarice's disgust, at present, Evelda's careless disregard for the responsibility that had been given to her when she bore that child. Instinctively her hand went to her belly, palm against her skin, as if she could, even now, reach the child within and hold him. If he was ever in danger, I would do anything to protect him, Clarice thought. He wasn't even real, yet, this could-be child, wouldn't be real until Clarice unstuck herself from the tub and went to read the results of the test, but already she felt fiercely, overwhelmingly protective of him. He was hers.
Had her mother felt this way, once, about the children she could not feed? Her mother who had shipped her off to distant relations thousands of miles from home, and never seen her again? Was that protection, or was it abdication?
I would let us both starve to death before I would send him away from me, Clarice thought, and found herself surprised at the heat of her own emotions. Was that really her own voice she heard, or Hannibal's? They had dealt with the matter of her feelings towards her father years before, but the wounds left by her mother's disregard were buried even deeper, and she could not even recall when last she'd spoken of her mother to Hannibal. This sudden, fierce wave of grief was unexpected; she had not known, before this moment, the resentment she still carried towards her mother, for having been sent away. Perhaps it had not been there at all, perhaps it had only come into being now that Clarice was to be a mother herself.
Her mother had not discarded all of her children, after all. Circumstances had not been so dire that all of the children had to be turned over to the state for care. Clarice's mother had chosen this cleaving, had looked at her children, and decided which she could stand to lose, and which she could not. And it was Clarice who had lost. Or won, perhaps; if she had not been sent to the farm, she never would have heard the screaming of the lambs, and she never would have run. If she had not run she would not have been sent to the Lutherans, and if she had not been sent to the Lutherans, perhaps she would not have developed the work ethic and deep-seated desire for purpose that sent her to the FBI. And if it had not been for the FBI, she never would have met Hannibal. Where would she be, now, if her mother had not cast her aside?
Cleaning hotels in West Virginia, with a pack-a-day cigarette habit and four bratty kids to feed, she thought. She thought, and was troubled by the thought, as the long forgotten twang of her youth filtered through the more cultured timbre her thoughts had assumed in recent years. Perhaps she ought to be grateful to her mother, for sending her away, for sending her here. To this beautiful house, to this beautiful, terrible man, to this moment where she sat on the edge of a great abyss, wondering what was to be.
Two minutes are up, Starling, she told herself. It was time, now. The die had been cast; now it was up to her to see where it had landed. She took one very deep breath, rose to her feet, and walked slowly towards the vanity as a condemned man approaching the gallows. One glance was all it took, to seal her fate.
Two pink lines.
Positive.
Pregnant.
The baby was real, after all, and he was hers. Clarice would not let anyone take him from her now, least of all herself.