After all the murder, blood and Beverly doing her best to recover, something of a lighter nature had been called for. Thankfully that presented itself rather quickly with Abigail's fifteenth birthday. She'd been content to ignore the occasion entirely, had gone so far as to use the phrase 'no big deal' when asked about it. Although, Will hadn't been inclined to agree and had insisted she have some sort of celebration – a pot calling the kettle black situation if one were to ask Hannibal. So, the day of her fifteenth birthday finally arrived and the mates had gotten the whole event planned out. They'd not throw some loud party but rather sit down to an exceptional lunch with presents and birthday cake. As Will had put it: 'nothing excessive but still a birthday.' Hannibal had cleared his schedule for the day just to ensure the cake was as fresh and perfect as possible. Birthday cakes were something Hannibal would surely have to perfect now he had three children. Not thinking birthdays to be all that important was something he, Will and Abigail shared, but after so long locked up in the House, the mates had felt she deserved a taste of a normal family life; and normal families took notice when their eldest daughter's birthday rolled around.
Arrangements had been made for Price to bring her closest friends over from the House at noon to join them so the lunch wasn't just another family meal but rather something a little more festive. Getting Brian and Beverly to interact with Hannibal more was also something he'd planned; they might not have fled to a corner every time they saw him now, but Beverly clearly still didn't trust him – exceptionally smart was that one – while Brian seemed to go out of his way to avoid any form of conversation with him. Will had noticed these things and they'd upset him, he wanted his dearest friends to accept Hannibal into the bizarre friend group he'd managed to form.
Getting the majority of the omegas out of the House for a while would also work in their favor because, as of three days previous, Omega Lives – and therefore Hannibal – had officially purchased the land and building from the government. Frankly, the government had seemed happy to have it taken off their hands. With the deeds to validate their reason for being out in the woods, Hannibal and Alana had made arrangements for some of the building's issues to be repaired. The place had no proper heating or ventilation so a HVAC system needed installing, but the foundations needed properly evaluating before any of that happened, so Abigail's little get-together would surface for the evaluation. Barney and Josh had been placed in charge of overseeing it while Hannibal and Alana were away – though they had far more faith in Barney than Josh.
Of course they'd told Abigail what they'd planned, surprising her wouldn't have turned out well and, knowing it was only a small gathering without Hannibal's traditional overly formal flare, she'd eventually conceded. So when she answered the door at almost exactly noon, she wasn't surprised to find their guests gathered on her doorstep, just greeted them and ferried them through the foyer and into the ornate living room.
Normally Hannibal hired a staff for his dinner parties, had a series of regulars to hand out canapés before the meal itself, but this was to be a significantly more casual occasion and so Hannibal was an army of one. Knowing Will was upstairs getting the twins dressed properly after they'd been playing with Winston in the yard, Hannibal finished the mirror glaze and moved the cake to set before he donned his suit jacket and made his way into the dining room to play perfect host.
"Good afternoon everyone, thank you for joining us." He flashed them all that practised smile he'd worked so hard on over the years. "Would any of you care for wine? I do also have beer, Alana."
Soon chilled wine had been poured as well as a beer for Alana, and Will had joined them all with the twins who toddled between people intent on getting as much attention as they could. Veronique a vision in the jacquard white and beige dress she wore, while Claude was a carbon copy of Hannibal in his shirt and dress pants. Will had insisted children as young as the twins didn't need clothes from Fendi, but, while Hannibal allowed Will to wander around in jeans and off the rack shirts most of the time, the twins were born Lecters and had standards to keep. Ultimately it was Hannibal's money so Will had just gone along with it.
Since having the twins, Hannibal had grown accustom to finding either Will or Abigail sat on the floor, so he hardly batted at eye at Abigail sat beside the chair Will occupied stroking Winston. Casual wasn't something which came naturally to Hannibal, but that didn't in any way mean he was incapable of it. So, after returning from the kitchen with the drink he'd made specially for Abigail, he handed it over and took his own seat.
"What's this?" She asked while inspecting the fizzy concoction filled with blueberries in her hand. "Smells great."
"While you may be another year older, you are still below drinking age, so I thought a mocktail would be to your tastes. A mixture of blueberries juice, club soda, honey and fresh mint with vanilla infused blueberries."
God, even his mocktails had to be dramatic. That said, Abigail seemed pleasantly delighted with her drink and even let Veronique have a sip. Conversation went on for a while as they enjoyed their drinks and waited on lunch. Hannibal had invited them over for noon with the intention of serving thirty minutes later, a polite and appropriate amount of time.
Though things were much more relaxed with the guests only consisting of: Alana, Beverly, Brian and Price, there was one person who didn't quite seem inclined to slip into casualness so swiftly. Beverly had only been rescued from Oliver a handful of months ago and couldn't have been expected to simply bounce back in that time. The others were all people she knew and trusted, but trusting an alpha who'd rescued her in the middle of the night while wearing a plastic suit was something which would take time. Via Omega Lives many of the House's former omegas had found therapy with Hannibal and a handful of other doctors such as Bedelia Du Maurier, but Beverly had resisted the idea of speaking to anybody when Alana had raised it. Burying trauma would only hurt her in the long run and, unfortunately, they could only wait for her to realize that.
Hannibal let none of his thoughts regarding Beverly distract him from the day though, his pups were happy, his mate had even laughed a few times, so all was well. Eventually that half an hour passed though and lunch was served, a lunch which began with wilted rainbow chard and roasted garlic tarts wit a lightly pickled salad, and ended with the birthday cake Hannibal had worked so hard on with a fish course in between. Fish wasn't Hannibal's favorite thing to work with since he'd not encountered very many rude fish, but Will had caught them himself and Hannibal hadn't wanted to put Will's hard work to shame. Once lunch had finished, Hannibal was pleased to see his guests happy and full, seeing people enjoy his food would always be gratifying.
He didn't get to linger in it too long though for Alana soon insisted it was time to open presents – presents Abigail hadn't been expecting – which had found them all back in the living room. As it turned out, the majority of them had all had the same idea to get Abigail books and writing paraphernalia to help assist in her regaining her ability to read and write properly. Alana had even been kind enough to top it all off with a rather adorable pencil case shaped like a fox. Will had opted for something a little different with waders and a starter kit for fishing; Hannibal wouldn't ever understand the appeal, but Abigail enjoyed the outdoors just as much as Will and this was something he hoped they could do together. Hannibal's present came last and was by far the heaviest. A fairly large rectangular box wrapped delicately in black paper with a green velvet bow which she'd eyed suspiciously for several moments before opening. Inside she found a brand new laptop which both astounded and confused the teenage girl.
"What's this for?" She questioned curiously as she lifted the lid.
"Well, you have shown great interest in your education, so I thought a laptop to assist in your online classes would be best."
That had Abigail's brow furrow deeply as she peered up at Hannibal who pulled a small envelope out of his inner pocket to give her. That contained a set of papers and what she eventually determined was adoption requests.
"I still don't understand, Hannibal, I thought you couldn't adopt me because it would bring the police to us."
"True." He nodded. "Look at the name though. Abigail Jones rather than Abigail Hobbs."
"You know people who can get you fake identities?" That was the first proper sentence Brian had ever said to Hannibal and it earned him a nod.
"Indeed I do. It has taken months of work but Abigail and Will both have identification good enough to stand up to all but the most through of tests. With Alana's assistance, I and Will have made steps toward adopting Abigail officially. It will be some time yet before all the paperwork is completed and I'm told there will be 'home visits' to check on her, but other than that, Abigail is our daughter. With official guardianship of you, I am perfectly within my rights to sign you up for online classes."
Physically attending class wasn't something she felt ready for and Hannibal wouldn't push her; online courses would do just fine.
"Is this okay with you, Abigail?" Will questioned with a sudden wave of nervousness. "You don't have to worry about being a Jones for very long, it's just a common name is all."
"You're really going to be my dads?"
The mates nodded in unison and that was what finally had Abigail bolt into Will's arms. She'd not had a proper family since the age of nine and here were two men who'd gone to such lengths to make her part of theirs. Omegas usually struggled to be adopted for a few different reasons, the main one being many beta families didn't know or want to know how to properly care for an omega and their needs, but there were some others. Adoption services often didn't like to place young omegas in households with alphas due to the possibility of an alpha father going into rut and forcibly mating said omega. Evolution had come up with a handy little trick to avoid inbreeding where an omega in head would smell heavenly to all alphas except those of the same bloodline, they'd find the smell repulsive. Of course, with adoption, that handy trick of nature was null and void. Though infrequent, there had also been cases of omega parents treating the new omega child as a threat to their mate's attention as well. Abigail was sixteen though, two years and she'd be a legal adult capable of doing as she pleased by their standards, then there was Hannibal's stellar reputation and total lack of a criminal record. He was well beyond financially stable, publicly associated with an established omega charity, mated with children of his own and Lithuanian nobility; if that didn't help to shift things along then nothing would. It hadn't even been three years yet Hannibal had gone from a confirmed bachelor to father of three with a loving mate … and Hannibal wouldn't change a moment of it.
