How much blood would a flea suck?

The answer, most likely, is that it would suck and suck and suck, gorge itself, and continue, and continue, and double its own body weight, pressure its gut into collapsing onto its knees, then to the floor, immobilising itself, then more, to the point that it cannot see, it cannot breathe, it chokes itself, and still more, its dying. And eventually, more liquid than life, it bursts apart.

Hannibal could not quite tell what the insect on the window sill was, but it did seem like a flea. He had cut his finger on a piece of splintered wood as he was sanding it down, and now the little dark thing bathed itself in the tiny droplet of his blood, and drank. It seemed to be growing.

"Cunt," he called it. He squashed it. Ugly thing, nasty intent. Although he had known butterflies to drink blood from time to time, at least they looked pretty doing so.

Pris was sleeping in their room, and he was still hard at the DIY, now working on the windows in the living room, painting the frames, sanding the sills. Soon enough he would buy fresh flowers for a little display in a vase. How serene life would be, the pregnant wife sleeping, the father making the home. He loved it so. He wiped the dead thing from his fingers and washed them.

Easy, he thought. Now it was forgotten. It rolled into the plughole nothing but black grit, sort of like the stuff that crumbled beneath Pris' eyes when they were younger, and she'd been laughing or crying too much. Mascara. Mostly it happened after she'd been crying. And God, she cried the last time, that one time.

In her room? Had it been in her room? He couldn't remember which room, but her skin had looked overly bright, contrasted again the wall she had been lying against. Deep red walls, like her living room, the colour of a beaten vulva. Why did he remember her lying against the wall? She had been in the foetal position, and she was naked, she was completely naked all but her dressing gown draped over her, soft and black like a body bag. She was curled up, and her hands were all over her face, the nails biting into her forehead.

It had been such a horrible dream, he reminded himself. A dream.

He walked upstairs. She was lying facing the ceiling spread eagled, asleep, so tranquil and bloated, it was beautiful.

She had cuts in her forehead.

Jacob Niccals was lying across the sofa in the living room. A strange, sewery coloured goo was dribbling from the corner of his mouth, his one leg was bent crookedly across the floor, he had his hair stuck to his forehead with a kind of garlic oil scented sticky man-grease produced from his hairline. Murdoc mused for a moment how satisfying it might be to kick that wonky leg, but then decided against it.

For the past few months they had been feeding entirely on chips and supermarket tub noodles that tasted like boiled, salted mushrooms. He shook his head and shrugged his jacket sharply up over his shoulders.

"We need some proper food."

"I've got a quid for t'chippy," his father answered.

"No, I mean, food. We're getting ill."

"I can't afford anything," was the reply. Jacob's voice was scratchy like the prongs of a fork sliding against a butter knife.

Murdoc turned and shook his head, his eye hurting, and caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. Perhaps it was the partial blindness, but he seemed genuinely a rather handsome thing now. Yes, with the dull, squished, vibrant red eye of a filleted fish, but he liked this look. The longer hair and the thinner face made him look a lot older, perhaps eighteen, and rough and bad like something from Mad Max. He grinned at himself, winked. Why, he did not know, but he had always fantasised about her sort of, swooning at that. Simpering, even. Oh Murdoc, you're so charming!

He thought of her every day, wanked twice. It wasn't a bad sort of wank though – what he liked to think as a rather flattering one. It wasn't just few minutes of closed eyes and mad jittering picturing her being humped into insanity – as it was usually. He liked to think of kissing her, holding her first. Every time he remembered her he hated himself for not thoroughly touching every bit of her body, the little patches of smooth skin on the inside of her elbows, the delicate blue vein that wound up from her thigh and split into two, like the cold tongue of a viper, on the curve of her bum. Or that delta of bones on her pelvis, or the elegant, milky prairie of her stomach, flat desert land.

He wondered how her body might fit into a wedding dress, just then. The picture was strange, Pris with the demented, pale blue eyes, the shaved white hair, the man hands? She'd look ridiculous. Seeing as she had not replied, he'd wish her well for the wedding, and say yes, yes I hope you have a wonderful day, you'll look like shit in a dress, because being nice, being honest and – yes, that's right, he wouldn't stop himself from admitting it now, being in love doesn't fucking suit you; it makes you look ten times uglier than you already did.

The phone was still sat in his room, the plastic becoming painfully hot in the sunlight through the window. He checked it for messages as often as was physically possible, nonetheless – although if it rang he wasn't sure he'd even have the balls to pick up anymore.

When she woke he was lying above her, the length of his body stretched across the bed. His nose was on her face, on her forehead, sniffing thickly, like a dog to a bitch on heat. And how she longed, longed to be on heat; inside, though full, she felt cold.

Hannibal's breath now seemed, for the first in a long time, something welcomed on her face, warm breeze, like summer at the seaside. He was pressing her down into the mattress with his weight, and sort of slathering, his teeth slightly grinding against her cheekbone.

"Hans?" she asked meekly.

"What're these cuts, on your face? Someone's cut your face."

"What cuts?" she begged him, pushing the flat of her hand against his shoulder. "Please, can you just let me sit up?"

"But you've been hurt," he snapped. "Who did this? Tell me!"

She cringed.

"I don't know, I probably did it by accident, to myself."

His eyes finally opened slowly and gazed into her. She could see the white little pellet of his canine tooth against her own face, pushing into the flesh, and she gulped.

"Please, Hans, darling, please. Ya really heavy on me."

He seemed determined to continue this however, desperate to. She was acutely aware of that tooth, and the look in his eye now, hard and shiny and empty – large but deformed, the way she imagined the eyes of the little thing, weak and pluckable and crunchy like a prawn's eye.

"And so you say you did this to yourself?"

"I must've, babe."

"And you did it when, when did you do it?"

"I was sleeping, I think."

"You accidently scratched yourself in your sleep?"

"Yes."

"It wasn't me?"

"No."

"No," he nodded, and then swallowed, and finally sat back. This reminded her of the old days, after they'd done it, and he'd sit back and scrub under his face and around the back of his neck with his fingers and forearm and stared at her, panting, the sweat glimmering on the supple curve of his back. You're sweet, Pris, he used to tell her, and then kiss her, and hand her that slimy wet pouch, full up, smelling sour. Bin this, sweet, will ya?

She watched him for a moment and sighed, sitting up. She was beginning to forget everything, the way it used to be. The lump was pressing onto her thighs now as she sat, and left two circular red blotches of heat, so cold it burnt.

"Sometimes," he said distantly, staring out of the window. "Sometimes, I feel like – I dunno – like I did summat bad."

Pris noticed had the suffocating epiphany that this room had also been sampled yellow – thick streaks of mustard, sunflower, lemon and cheesy coloured paint had been lashed onto the bare wall in equal lengths for cosmetic comparison. She had no idea when he had done this, but it hardly mattered, seeing as he wasted his days filling and painting and sanding and polishing and sampling things about the house.

The yellow of her bedroom had been a more buttercup yellow; and she knew this was what he was attempting to imitate. She shuddered.

"What do you mean?"

"Like, like I'm bad. Like I've done something."

Pris waited for a moment, but he did not speak again. The part of her, the part that was still her, that still remained, inside, not yet drained by the thing, was desperate for her revenge. She wanted to hurt him, to play. She settled now to simply push him a tad – she had realised long ago now that she had no physical control over him, but perhaps she could claw back a piece of his heart and chew it up.

"I don't think you mean it to be bad," she whispered.

"What?" His voice came out soft and careful, as though he'd spoken the final word of a sonnet. He turned his head slightly, at a strange angle, so that she could see the muscles working in his jaw as he began grinding his teeth.

"I don't think you meant it to be bad."

"Meant what?"

"I – "

"What are you on about?"

He snarled at her, and then vaulted up into a standing position, grabbed her ankles and yanked them up into the air, so that even the humungous pregnant weight of her arse was pulled from underneath her, her arms flew back and her head smacked down against the wall.

"Hans!"

"What do you mean?" Two of his meaty hands, now covered in wall painted rather than spray canned graffiti paint, held her down hard, so hard that she could feel the tight pressure of a spring, hard metal in the stuffing, digging in. The one hand came up and pinched her cheek between overgrown nails. She could feel a warm well of blood tasting the air, giving scent.

"Get off me, you dick!"

"Explain," he elongated his vowels, the way he had used to when he said Murdoc's name.

"I don't know, I was just trying to help!"

"Don't make it a repeat performance, you little slut," he hissed at her, and then walked away.

Within a few minutes she could hear him whistling Snow White's Whistle While You Work. The paint roller was running against the wall.

"Did you want a cup of coffee, Pris, angel?"

She dabbed the cut on her cheek with her fingers.

"No, thanks," she answered, entirely at loss for words, and even more so for understanding of what, exactly, was going through his mind.

A few minutes later she had locked the door, staunched the blood on her face, and sat on the edge of the bed, with the letter open in her hands. How sweetly infantile the script was, capital letters in the wrong places, the I's dotted with huge empty circles. I think that I love you.

She decided even the thought of it was enough. He kept the phone in the bathroom, because she couldn't access that room alone; he always insisted on helping her to the toilet, helping her boil the kettle, rubbing her feet. She hauled herself up by grabbing onto the bedside table and tugging violently. He had made all the bedrooms perfect, furniture, paint, carpet, everything – although the rest of the house was hollowed out. She could hear him clunking around because the only owned a radio, sofa, little plastic table, 'borrowed' gas stove and mini fridge. Everything echoed. The place was as barren inside as she wished to be.

She had managed, finally, and so plodded into the bathroom, clutching the letter; although she had memorised the number written on the back just in case.

She dialled it. The tone rang once, twice, three times, four.

"Hello?"

A/N: And there we go, the end of the third chapter!

Sorry for the cliffhanger ;) and the lack of Young Muds – I promise the next chapter will be purely Murdoc-based, however.

Thanks and love to Guest and Super gazellian for their lovely reviews, and to the new favouriters and alerters :)

I hope you all enjoyed, please let me know what you think!