Chapter 6: Late Night Rendezvous

It was well after 2 am when Hannibal Lecter let himself into the Washington D.C. suburban townhouse. As always he could not turn on any lights, suspicions would be aroused. It was alright, he preferred the darkness anyway. Darkness held a calming aspect for him. He was intrigued by the way darkness played on the visual cues from your mind, obliterating most colors and giving surroundings a surreal, dream-like effect.

Lecter slipped the keys into his jacket pocket, removed the jacket, and hung it on the coat rack near the front door. Over the last four years or so, he had become quite acclimated to moving through the townhouse in the darkness and stillness of late night. He moved easily through the living room and halted at the hallway that led to the rear of the townhouse where the bedrooms were. His acute hearing picked up the steady sound of rhythmic breathing from someone deep in sleep.

He smiled and instead of going down the hallway, turned left and made his way into the spacious kitchen. For a moment he admired the adept cookware, from the stainless steel pots and pans that hung suspended above one of the counters to the finest cutting utensils that money could buy. Yes, the cookware had cost him a pretty penny but it was uncivilized to cook with anything less.

Lecter strode to the refrigerator, opened it, and pulled out a bottle of water. He swallowed half of it, capped it, and returned it to the fridge. He glanced at the small plant on the windowsill, a Bleeding Heart plant, and noted that it needed water. He took a glass from the dish drainer, filled it with tap water, and poured the water into the plant's soil. The Bleeding Heart would have to be planted out doors within the next month if it was to thrive and grow, he mused.

He left the kitchen then and walked slowly down the hall to the bedroom where the rhythmic breathing came from. As he approached the doorway, he slowed his pace even further, listening for any sounds of stirring that would indicate arousal from sleep, but he heard none. Lecter smiled to himself. She was sleeping rather soundly tonight, she must have had a busy day.

Lecter paused in the doorway and looked down at his sleeping Clarice. She was wearing her pink silk pajamas tonight he noticed. Her deep chestnut hair was drawn up in a ponytail and her angelic face was freshly scrubbed and shone even in the dim light. He smiled as her mouth opened slightly and a faint snore emitted from it. He wondered what she had done today to cause her to sleep so soundly tonight.

He had followed Clarice, as he did every night, home from FBI Headquarters when she had left at 11 pm. For her, that hour of departure was early. Usually she worked until at least after midnight, ironically, diligently working to locate him. Lecter had parked in his usual spot down the street from her townhouse in his Jaguar XKR convertible. Lecter had always appreciated fine material objects, but he found the older he got, the more he desired to be surrounded by fine things. This car was no exception. Fortunately for Lecter, because of the late hour that Clarice returned home at night, Lecter and his fine automobile generally went unnoticed by the slumbering neighborhood. In addition, police officers rarely patrolled this neighborhood, he had noticed. They were generally occupied with the slums of the inner city and left the prosperous neighborhoods on their own.

He would sit in his car, usually reading or working on his memoirs. He would watch as Clarice would eventually turn out all the lights in her townhouse, then he would wait until he saw the flickering light coming from her bedroom window as she watched TV go out. Once he observed the TV going off, Lecter would wait for an hour or so before entering her residence. He used to pick the lock before Clarice had had the locks changed. Then all he had had to do was lift the key off the locksmith, make his own copy of it, and return it to the locksmith before it was given to Clarice and no one was the wiser. Once inside, Lecter always made sure that Clarice was sound asleep before continuing through the home. Some nights he would wander her home, studying pictures, photo albums, books, or correspondence, just to feel closer to her. He did not have to worry about leaving fingerprints that would identify him, for he did not have any anymore. He had slowly but surely removed his fingerprints by applying small amounts of acid to his fingertips, thus he could roam her house with no misgivings. On other nights he would lie on her couch and listen to her breathe throughout the night. But most nights he would sit in her room on the floor, his back against the side of her bed, lay his head down and watch her sleep. Some nights he even worked up the nerve to touch her hand or her face but because she was quite often such a light sleeper, he usually did not dare. Tonight, however, because of her deep sleep, he reached his right hand out and gently stroked her cheek.

Ah, just to touch her was like oxygen to his weary soul. He wished for the thousandth time in the last four years that he could climb in bed with her and hold her until the sun rose. What he would not give if he could live with her by his side, to have her smile up at him gently and tell him she loved him. Lecter removed his hand from her cheek and closed his eyes. He was feeling rather melancholy tonight which was not like him. Suddenly, he felt old beyond his years. He was old and tired. Tired of running, tired of hiding, just plain tired. He longed for a "normal" life. A nice house in the suburbs, two cars, maybe a dog, even a white picket fence perhaps? The American dream. And of course that dream couldn't be possible without Clarice by his side.

A poem he had read in his book tonight occurred to him suddenly. Normally, he found poetry to be overly dull and sappy but he had observed this particular book, a collection of poetry, upon Clarice's bookshelf and had bought a copy for himself. This particular poem was titled "Bid Me to Live" by Robert Herrick and it had touched Lecter deeply. It had reminded him of his relationship with his beloved. He recalled the poem now as he listened to her steady breathing next to him.

Bid me to live, and I will live

Thy protestant to be;

Or bid me love, and I will give

A loving heart to thee.

A heart as soft, a heart as kind,

A heart as sound and free,

As in the whole world thou canst find,

That heart I'll give to thee.

Bid that heart stay, and it will stay,

To honour thy decree;

Or bid it languish quite away,

And 't shall do so for thee.

Bid me to weep, and I will weep,

While I have eyes to see;

And having none, yet I will keep

A heart to weep for thee.

Bid me despair, and I'll despair,

Under that cypress tree;

Or bid me die, and I will dare

E'en death, to die for thee.

Thou art my life, my love, my heart,

The very eyes of me;

And hast command of every part,

To live and die for thee.

Indeed, Lecter would die for Clarice if it ever came to that. He would do so gladly if it meant her safety and happiness. That was one reason why he had severed his own hand in Paul Krendler's summer home in Chesapeake Bay instead of hers when she had handcuffed herself to him. He could never harm her, harm himself, yes, but never her.

Lecter smiled faintly as he recalled the instant he had dropped the kitchen cleaver down through his left wrist. Searing, blinding pain had bolted through him, Clarice had screamed in agony at his barbarism, and he had struggled to remain conscious. He remembered Clarice had collapsed onto the floor. Blood had poured from the stump of his left arm. He remembered he had used a kitchen towel and tied a tourniquet around his arm to keep from bleeding to death. He recalled filling a Zip-Lock storage bag with ice cubes and plunging his severed hand into it. Then, fighting to keep from slipping into shock, he had picked up the bag, bent down and planted a kiss on Clarice's head, and stumbled out into the night. He had been able to hear police cars coming up the road to Krendler's home as he made his way clumsily through the brush and surrounding woods.

The remainder of that night was a blur now. He vaguely recalled stealing a truck and driving to a hospital where he had snuck in and bandaged himself up and loaded himself up with pain medication before driving to the Baltimore/Washington International airport. He had managed to board a plane before the FBI had sent its warning out to the area's airports with his description. From there he had flown to Quebec, Canada where he had called in a favor from a former patient of his, an orthopedic surgeon who specialized in limb reattachments. The surgeon had flown to Quebec and reattached Lecter's hand in time to make the reattachment successful. There had been many long hours of painful rehabilitation but now, five years later, Lecter had regained almost complete use of his left hand, although he still occasionally had trouble grasping things. And thanks to the miracle of cosmetic surgery, his scar was just about gone. Getting rid of the scar helped to insure that when he donned his various disguises he would not be recognized because of it and so there were few places that he hesitated to go.

But he did not dare be around Clarice when she was not sleeping, for she would know him anywhere and with any disguise. So rather than being around her physically, he made sure she knew that she was always in his heart by sending her notes or gifts. The Bleeding Heart plant had been a gift two months ago on the five year anniversary of their kiss at Krendler's home, as had the cookware on different occasions. He wished that he could have seen her face when the plant had been delivered to her office. He smiled as he recalled what he had written on the accompanying card, "My Darling Clarice, Happy Anniversary, You are always in my thoughts, Forever your humble servant, H." Despite the way Clarice felt about him, Lecter was tickled that she retained the presents he sent to her on a regular basis. Subconsciously, he mused, she must have feelings for him, not just because she kept his gifts but also because she rarely if ever took a lover. In the last five years, she had only had two lovers. One had been an agent in the FBI's violent crimes division. Their relationship had begun shortly after Clarice had returned to work after Lecter had escaped. It had only lasted four months however, because the agent was killed in the line of duty. What the FBI and Clarice did not know however, was that Lecter had paid a heroin addict a hefty sum to ambush the agent and kill him. Lecter had made the decision to have the agent killed after he had discovered he was sleeping with another woman besides Clarice. Clarice had briefly grieved the loss but in the long run she was better off. Lecter would make sure she was always happy and safe. Her second lover she had picked up in a bar about two years ago after she had been wounded in a mini-mart robbery one evening. She had stopped in just to pick up a bottle of Pepsi when the thief had drawn his gun, ordered everyone down on the floor, and demanded the money from the cash register. Clarice had thwarted the robbery attempt but a bullet had grazed her thigh, and came mere millimeters to severing her femoral artery. She had been so shaken by the incident that she had gone to a bar and picked up the first man she could find. It had been a one-night stand and she had never seen him again.

Granted, it had been difficult for Lecter to have to wait in his car as he watched the candle light from inside her bedroom flicker and imagine another man's mouth and hands on her. But they had been fleeting relationships and Clarice had not developed any strong personal attachments to either one of them so Lecter had gritted his teeth and endured them. After all, she had a bond with him, not with those other men. It was him that she would one day realize she loved and needed and always had. Lecter just knew it.

To be continued. Please review!!

Nanci: Your reviews are great. Thank you for your kind words. Will Graham as a character intrigues me and I have a lot of fun getting into his "head" (much as he would with the serial killers he tracked) and writing him. Thanks for your continued reading and supportive reviews.

Luna: Thanks for reading and reviewing. Yes, I love to throw in little tidbits like "the lamp post thing" and tease you guys with it! Thanks again.

Steel: Thank you for your review. Can I ask, why DO you hate Will Graham? I haven't quite figured that out yet! Thanks for reading.

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Shattered Mug: I love getting your reviews, they're great! I'm so glad that you are enjoying this story. It's a huge compliment to me when you say that despite the fact you are not a huge Will fan, I have your "undivided attention" even when it comes to him. I really appreciate that. You will have to wait a little bit longer for the GD and Clarice's meeting, but I promise, it is coming! Thanks again.