holy, holy, etc.

by cervviidae

Summary:

Christmas meant lights turned on early. Christmas meant warmth was still possible somewhere, even if it didn’t belong to you. Snow drifted down, quiet and thorough. Will’s leg burned. His ribs felt wrong. His hands were slick and numb at the same time. He tasted copper when he swallowed. Still, he moved. He took Hannibal with him.
- or -
Will and Hannibal spend Christmas in the woods, as best as they can. <3

Notes:

merry christmas everyone!! here’s a little sweet gift from me to you. i hope you all have a lovely holiday, full of warmth, love, and gentle moments. please feel free to leave any thoughts in the comments, as well as telling me your christmas plans!! <3

 
December 11th

Then I think of you in bed,
your tongue half chocolate, half ocean,
of the houses that you swing into,
of the steel wool hair on your head,
of your persistent hands and then
how we gnaw at the barrier because we are two.

How you come and take my blood cup
and link me together and take my brine.
We are bare. We are stripped to the bone
and we swim in tandem and go up and up
the river, the identical river called Mine
and we enter together. No one’s alone.
Anne Sexton
 
 
 
 
Light has a way of pulling him backward.
 
He remembers his father at the docks, Louisiana, or maybe not Louisiana. The exact states slide around when he tries to pin it down. Gulf-adjacent. Salt-heavy. His father had worked the docks, long hours, rough hours, the kind that left salt in your hair and cuts on your knuckles you didn’t bother naming. Will had been small then. All knees and elbows. A narrow little thing with more eyes than sense.
 
He had stood there while his father worked, probably with a couple of bandages on him already. There was always something wrapped. A palm, a knuckle, sometimes a wrist. He had been clumsy in the way boys are clumsy when they grow faster than their awareness. His eyes had been bigger then. Blue and open and unafraid of what they took in. 
 
Sometimes, when it got close to Christmas, the boats would be decorated with lights. Not anything official. Not neat. Just strings someone brought from home, bulbs that didn’t match, colors bleeding into each other. Reds that leaned toward pink. Greens that looked almost blue. White lights that were never really white, more like a tired yellow. They’d drape them along the rails, around the cabins, wherever they’d catch. It was casual, half-assed, done by men who weren’t trying to make something pretty so much as they were trying to make something feel less heavy.
 
The boats would sit there, lolling in the water, slow and patient, taking the lights like they’d been waiting for them.
 
Will remembered standing at the edge of the dock, toes curled inside shoes that were probably a size too small, staring. The water moved. The reflections broke and stitched themselves back together. Every time the surface rippled, the lights fractured, multiplied, became something else. He could have stood there forever. He almost did.
 
The men noticed him, sometimes. Dock men, fishermen. They’d try to talk to him. He wouldn’t answer. Because his whole attention had been taken hostage by the lights and the way they floated, untethered from sense. Eventually they’d laugh, not unkindly, and go back to their work. Kid’s in another world, someone would say. 
 
Christmas didn’t always happen at home. Sometimes his dad couldn’t get the day off. Sometimes the dock was where they ended up. They’d bring food wrapped in foil. Someone would have a radio. The lights would already be on by the time it got dark, humming faintly, fragile against the vastness of the water and sky. It wasn’t sad. It wasn’t joyful in the way people expect joy to look. It just was. A small pocket of warmth carved out of a working world.
 
He remembers it clearly: the way the fog would roll in sometimes, thick and unannounced, swallowing the water, swallowing the horizon. The boats would disappear except for the lights. Just points in the dark. Calling to him without sound. He had felt safe then in a way he hasn’t felt often since. Not protected. Not cared for in a soft way. Just anchored. Or maybe tethered. 
 
Years later, Wolf Trap had done the same thing to him. The house had sat there like a little boat on a sea, especially when the sky went foggy. Especially at night. There were times all he could see were the lights of it, glowing low and steady through the mist. The world beyond the property line would vanish. No road. No trees. No sense of distance. Just that soft, stubborn glow saying: here. Still here.
 
In those years, he would stand sometimes and watch the house the way he’d watched the boats. Not thinking anything as articulate as a thought. Just letting the image settle into him. Light against dark. Shelter implied rather than promised. A place that didn’t move even when everything else did. It wasn’t happiness. It wasn’t peace. It was something quieter. Something functional. The absence of fear, if only for a moment.
 
Back then, he didn’t connect it to his childhood. He didn’t think about docks or his father or Christmas lights strung up by tired men with rough hands. He just knew his body responded the same way. The same loosening. The same sense that if he stayed still enough, nothing would come for him.
 
He thinks about his father more now than he used to. The way his back looked bent over the work. The way his hands moved with a certainty Will never quite learned. He thinks about how his father must have known, on some level, that those lights mattered. That letting his kid stand there staring wasn’t wasted time. That sometimes you let a boy be quiet because he’s building something inside himself you won’t see until much later.
 
The memory doesn’t make him sentimental.
 
He knows now that the reason those moments mattered wasn’t because they were rare or special, but because they were honest. No one pretended the docks were magical. No one pretended Christmas was perfect. They just turned the lights on anyway. They made a small, defiant shape against the dark and stood inside it together.
 
Darkness sits in him the way water sits in a hull. He thinks about how blood looks black in moonlight. It stops announcing itself as injury and starts looking like gravity. He doesn’t soften that truth anymore. Hannibal didn’t put the darkness there, but he touched it. He warmed it. He showed Will how it moved when it was allowed to breathe. There is a difference between being hollowed out by darkness and being asked to look at it in the light. 
 
Still, Will took the boat.
 
That matters. He thinks about that often, the way choice lives alongside influence. The way Hannibal stood on one shore and Will stood on another, and there was water between them. There was distance. There was danger. And Will stepped into it anyway. He didn’t drift. He didn’t fall accidentally. He took his boat out onto the sea because something in him had already learned how to follow a light.
 
Lithuania comes back to him in pieces. Fireflies first. The way light floated there, unbothered by human ruin. He remembers following them through the dark. Will had known him by then. Or thought he did. Or maybe that was the first time he truly did. And when Will found his footing again, it was because he had something to stand on at last.
 
Light. Even if it came from a firefly. He remembers telling Hannibal about Wolf Trap once. About the lights. It had come out sideways, the way personal truths always do with him. Hannibal had listened. Will remembers the look on his face.
 
After the fall, it was moonlight that guided them. Will remembers it. The way everything hurt. The way his face was slick with blood, pouring out of him, warm and unstoppable. The way Hannibal’s skin had glistened in the same pale light, wet and cold, almost luminous. They had looked unreal, both of them, creatures hauled out of the water, gasping, stripped of all pretense. Will’s vision had swum. His eyes had felt too large for his skull again, the way they had when he was a boy on the docks, staring at Christmas lights reflected in black water. Wide. Unprotected. Taking everything in.
 
In that moment, pain and wonder had braided together. He had once been lost. That part is true. Lost not in direction, but in permission. He had been blind in the way men are blind when they refuse to look at what they are capable of loving. Now he sees. He sees too much sometimes. But he sees. He hadn’t been afraid. He had been hurt. He had been bleeding. He had been close to the edge of everything he understood about himself. And yet, there had been that same old pull, light against dark, something steady calling him forward. He had followed it out of the water. He had followed it to shore. He had followed it to Hannibal, even when doing so meant acknowledging the full cost of who they were together.
 
How many losses does it take to stop a heart?
 
He knows the rooms it walks through. He has left enough behind to recognize the echo. Each loss came with its own sound. Doors closing. Mouths open. Last words flying up into the trees and never coming back down. People frozen at the moment of understanding, too late to change anything. And still, his heart beats. Still, desire speaks.
 
He thinks again of the docks. Of the lights swaying gently as boats shifted against their ropes. Of how the water swallowed and reflected everything at once. He understands now that darkness didn’t erase the light there. It made it visible. It gave it contrast. Without the dark, the lights would have meant nothing.
 
What Will understands now is that he has always followed light out of water. Always swum toward it even when his limbs were tired, even when his chest burned. He followed it on the docks as a boy. He followed it to Wolf Trap. He followed it across the Atlantic. He followed it off a cliff, with blood in his eyes and the moon hanging overhead.
 
He followed it off the shore.
 
Hannibal had been on his knees first, coughing, retching, giving up saltwater and blood and something more tender than either of those. He emptied himself and Will onto the sand. Grudges. Hurt. Old names that no longer fit in the mouth. His voice went with it. When he tried to speak after, nothing came out right. Just breath, thin and ragged.
 
Will had stayed close. Close enough to feel the shuddering, to smell iron and seawater and cold and past betrayals. Close enough that when Hannibal reached, blindly at first, his hand closed around Will’s sleeve.
 
Will remembered the ring then. Or maybe he remembered it later and folded the memory backward into that moment because it made sense to do so. Either way, it was gone. His wedding ring, slipped off at some point, during the fall, during the struggle, during the water swallowing and unmaking everything that wasn’t held tightly enough. It was back in the sea now. He didn’t go looking for it. He didn’t even turn his head. Some things were meant to stay submerged.
 
They stood together eventually. Or something like standing. Will had one arm around Hannibal’s back, felt how slight he seemed then, how the structure of him felt temporarily rearranged by pain. Hannibal leaned into him without resistance, his forehead resting briefly against Will’s collarbone like he had forgotten where he was supposed to keep himself upright.
 
They moved inland.
 
The forest began almost immediately past the sand, dark and wet and unwelcoming. Snow had started falling while they were still at the waterline, light at first, then steadier, flakes catching in Hannibal’s hair, melting against his pale skin. Will felt it soak into his clothes, felt the cold try to get ambitious. But adrenaline had made him reckless. Love had made him warm in a way that didn’t argue with reason. He could admit that now, later. He loved him. He loved him in a way that did not ask to be safe, but was, finally.
 
They walked and walked.
 
Will didn’t know for how long. Time did not behave normally anymore. Something out of Exodus or Judges, like they had wandered into a story that only counted distance in suffering. He thought of Moses leading people through wilderness without knowing how long the wandering would last. Thought of Jacob limping away from the river after wrestling an angel, injured and changed, carrying proof in his gait. Thought of Christ stumbling under the weight of a cross, bloodied and stubborn, moving forward not because it would end well, but because stopping was not an option.
 
He limped. His leg protested with every step, pain sharp and bright enough to keep him awake. Hannibal was worse. Hannibal dragged slightly, his breath shallow, his body burning through whatever reserves it had left. Will could feel his pulse when he pressed his palm flat to Hannibal’s back, too fast, too thin. Still there.
 
They held onto each other because there was nothing else to hold.
 
Branches scratched at them. Snow dampened sound. The forest smelled moldy and metallic and old. Will followed instinct the way he always had, reading terrain, reading absence, reading where something had moved recently enough to make a path. He did not trust roads. He trusted continuity. He trusted the way the land bent around human habitation.
 
Hannibal looked sick in the moonlight. There was no kinder word for it. His skin was luminous in the wrong way, stretched too thin over bone, eyes too dark against the pallor of his face. And still beautiful. Hannibal’s mouth was bloodless, parted as he breathed. His eyelashes were wet with snow. He looked like something pulled out, newly born. Blue-lipped and sleepy, slick with blood and vernix, shock-bright eyes opening to cold air and rough hands who did not arrive triumphant but stunned, shivering, barely assembled, laid down in hay because there was nowhere else to put him.
 
They walked and walked.
 
At some point Will realized he was following something. It was faint at first. So faint he thought it might be memory bleeding into perception. A suggestion of color where color should not exist. He stopped without meaning to. His body did it before his mind could argue. He stood there, breathing hard, staring through the trees.
 
Hannibal bumped into him lightly, confused. Then nudged Will’s temple with his chin, a small, wordless question. Go on. Will swallowed.
 
There it was again. Between branches. Red. White. Green.Real. String lights, caught and held, twinkling like they knew exactly what they were doing there. Like stars someone had dragged down and nailed to the dark out of spite. The lights glistened behind the trees, blurred by snow, steady despite the wind. They did not flicker like something unsure of itself. They stayed on.
 
Will stood frozen, heart hammering, eyes wide in that old way. For a moment he was eight years old on a dock with his hands wrapped in gauze, staring at lights that floated and refused to sink. For a moment he was standing in a driveway in Wolf Trap, fog pressing in, the house reduced to glow. For a moment he was nothing but a man who knew exactly what he was looking at.


He followed the lights. He did not question why they were there or who had put them up or what waited beyond them. He had never needed to know that part. The light was enough. The lights led them to something smaller than salvation and larger than coincidence.
 
They broke through the last line of trees and found a trailer sitting by itself. It was old. Pale blue once, maybe, the color now thinned and peeling, sloughing off in flakes that curled like dead leaves. Snow gathered along the roofline and the sag of the awning, settling into every seam and crack as if the cold had decided to make a study of it. There were no tracks nearby that Will could see. No car. No voices. Nothing that suggested welcome.
 
Only the lights.
 
They were strung along the edge of the roof and around the small front window, red and white and green, the colors softened by snow. Christmas, he realized then, distantly. Less than a few weeks away. Christmas meant lights turned on early. Christmas meant people leaving them up too long, because turning them off felt like admitting something. Christmas meant warmth was still possible somewhere, even if it didn’t belong to you.
 
Snow drifted down, quiet and thorough. Will’s leg burned. His ribs felt wrong. His hands were slick and numb at the same time. He tasted copper when he swallowed. Still, he moved. He took Hannibal with him.
 
He led him toward the trailer the way he had led dogs toward shelter before, steady and careful, keeping his body between Hannibal and anything unseen. Hannibal leaned heavier now, his weight an argument Will refused to lose. Each step felt like theft, stealing another second, another inch of ground, another breath that hadn’t yet been claimed.
 
It felt like a miracle. Will had never believed in miracles. He had always understood them as stories told by people who needed their suffering to mean something other than endurance. But this, this felt close enough to the word that he didn’t bother correcting himself. Lights in the woods. Shelter when the body said no more. A door where there should have been nothing but trees. Maybe God wasn’t laughing at the both of them, finally. Maybe God had looked away. 
 
He guided Hannibal to a picnic table beside the trailer, the wood silvered with age and half-buried in snow. He eased him down carefully, hands sure despite the shaking, and Hannibal folded into himself with a quiet sound that hurt Will more than any scream would have. Will crouched in front of him for a moment, just long enough to check that he was still breathing, still here. Hannibal’s eyes flicked up, unfocused but present. Will nodded once, a promise.
 
Then he stood and went to the door.
 
The porch creaked under his weight. The door looked solid enough. No wreath. No welcome mat. Just chipped paint and a handle dulled by years of use. Will knocked once, hard enough to be heard, not hard enough to sound like a threat. He waited, counting his breaths, aware of how he must look. Wet. Bloody. Bent. A monster who had come out of the woods at night with snow in his hair and violence written all over his posture.
 
The door opened fast.
 
The shotgun came up faster.
 
The barrel filled his vision, black and absolute, close enough that he could see the wear on the metal, the faint tremor in the hands holding it. Behind it, eyes. Wary. Awake. Measuring. The kind of eyes that had learned the cost of hesitation. Will didn’t raise his hands. He didn’t step back. He held still and let the moment take his measure.
 
Wrong place. Wrong time.
 
He was not a big-eyed kid anymore, standing on docks watching lights float. He was a man who knew what happened when you froze at the wrong second. He was a man with something behind him worth bleeding for. He felt it settle in him, the shift that always came when the line was crossed. Calm, not cruel. Focused. Protective.
 
“I’m hurt,” he said, because it was true and because it mattered how he sounded. “My friend’s worse.”
 
The eyes flicked past him, just for a second, toward the dark where Hannibal sat slumped and pale under the lights. That second was everything. Will moved because he had to. He did what needed doing the way he always would, from now on. For Hannibal. 
 
By the time Will finished dragging the body farther out into the trees, his shoulder was screaming . It was the same shoulder he had landed wrong on earlier, the same one that had taken the brunt of too much weight, too much torque, too many decisions made without time to brace. Every pull sent heat down his arm, white and immediate, like something tearing itself loose and snapping back. He gritted his teeth and kept moving. 
 
The body was heavier than it should have been, or maybe Will was weaker than he wanted to admit. Snow clung to fabric and hair and skin alike, adding weight, adding drag. The ground fought him. Roots caught. Branches snagged. He hauled and repositioned and hauled again, breath sawing in and out of him, vision tunneling at the edges. He didn’t look at the face. He didn’t need to. 
 
He pushed the body into a shallow dip between trees, scraped snow over it with his boot, then with his hands when his boot slipped. Snow was generous that way. It took shapes easily. It forgave rough handling. He packed it down enough that the outline blurred, enough that it looked like nothing more than drift and shadow. Cold would do the rest. Cold was honest work. Cold would keep it. He could deal with it later, if there was a later that required dealing.
 
Right now, there were more important things.
 
He stood there for a moment afterward, bent at the waist, hands on his knees, letting his breath find him again. His shoulder throbbed. His face felt wrong, skin split, blood stiffening as it dried. He wiped at it with the back of his sleeve and left a dark smear there, immediately useless. He turned back toward the trailer without ceremony. He had used up all the ceremony he was ever going to have.
 
Getting Hannibal inside took everything he had left.
 
The steps were narrow. The doorframe unforgiving. Hannibal was dead weight now in the way only the very sick become, heavy without resistance, pliant in a way that scared Will more than struggling would have. Will hooked an arm under Hannibal’s shoulder, braced his legs, and lifted with a low sound he didn’t recognize as his own. Pain flared so bright in his shoulder he nearly dropped him. He didn’t. He adjusted instead, inch by inch, breath by breath, until Hannibal was inside and the door was shut behind them.
 
The trailer smelled like old heat and dust and something faintly sweet, like pine cleaner used too sparingly. The air inside was warm in a way that made Will’s knees go weak with relief. A single lamp burned near the kitchenette, yellow and low. The walls were thin, paneled, holding decades of small lives and smaller hopes in their grooves. A crocheted blanket was draped over the back of a chair. A calendar hung crooked near the door, the date circled in red ink for reasons Will didn’t try to imagine.
 
He locked the door.
 
Only then did he let himself really look at Hannibal.
 
The gutshot was bad. Will had known that already. Blood had soaked through layers, dark and tacky, the fabric stiff where it clung to skin. Hannibal still wasn’t speaking. He hadn’t been for a while now. His eyes were half-lidded, unfocused, lashes clumped together. His breathing was shallow, each rise of his chest an effort negotiated and reluctantly agreed to. Will pressed his hand gently to Hannibal’s abdomen, feeling the heat there, the wrongness of it. 
 
He eased Hannibal down onto the couch, plaid-patterned and sagging in the middle, the fabric worn thin enough that the stuffing showed in places. It was ugly. It was perfect. When Hannibal sagged sideways, Will sat and dragged Hannibal’s head onto his lap, cradling it there like his legs were hay, like this was a manger and not a lonesome trailer in the woods with blood on the floor.
 
The little lord laid his sweet head down. Hannibal was no lord. Will wasn’t either. They were just two men who had crossed too much ground and paid too much for it. Still, Will let the thought stay. He let it warm him the way the air did. He ran his fingers carefully through Hannibal’s hair, mindful of how close the edge was now.
 
The Christmas lights outside glowed through the thin window, red and green bleeding softly into the room. They looked down at them where they lay, witness without judgment. Will leaned back against the arm of the couch, shoulder screaming its objections, face throbbing where it was split. He ignored both. He focused on the rise and fall of Hannibal’s chest.
 
“We’re just resting our eyes,” Will said quietly, because it mattered that Hannibal hear something. “That’s all.”
 
Hannibal made a small sound that might have been agreement or might have been pain. Will didn’t press for clarity. He kept his voice low. He talked about nothing. About warmth. About staying put. 
 
Will hoped with all his might that Hannibal would stay close by him forever. It was a simple, animal thing, born out of exhaustion and love and the terror of almost. This was standing in the warm light of a borrowed place and asking the world, quietly, not to take something else away.
 
Adrenaline ran out the way it always did, without warning. His body claimed what it was owed. He shifted slightly, careful not to jostle Hannibal, and let his head fall back against the wall. His hand stayed where it was, fingers tangled in hair. The heater kicked on and off. 
 
Will woke up an hour or two later swearing under his breath, the word dragged out of him by instinct before his eyes were even fully open.
 
Hannibal shifted against his lap. It was subtle at first, muscle tightening, a knee drawing in a fraction, but it was enough. Will’s thigh had gone numb beneath the weight, pins and needles blooming sharp and ugly, but he barely registered that. What he registered was the tremor.
 
“Easy,” he muttered, blinking hard, forcing his eyes to focus. “Easy, easy.”
 
The lights were still on. He breathed out a shaky sort of relief at the sight of them, like they had been keeping watch in his place while he was gone. Hannibal was shaking now. Not violently. Not yet. Just enough that Will felt it through his legs, through his hands. A low-grade tremor, the kind that meant the body was losing ground. Hannibal’s lashes fluttered, his mouth parted soundlessly. 
 
Once, Will had thought he might like to see Hannibal like this. Stripped of control. Brought low. Vulnerable in a way that erased all the polish and artifice and threat. Now it just made his heart ache. He didn’t want Hannibal sick unless Will was the one doing it. 
 
“All right,” he said quietly. “All right. We’re moving.”
 
Getting them to the bathroom felt impossible. The trailer’s bathroom was barely worthy of the name, narrow, yellowed linoleum curling at the edges, a tub so shallow it looked apologetic. Will braced himself, slid Hannibal’s arm over his shoulders, and hauled him up inch by inch. Hannibal sagged immediately, boneless, his head lolling forward, breath coming in thin little pulls that scraped Will raw.
 
“I’ve got you,” Will said, more firmly than he felt. “You’re fine. You’re just… we’re just changing locations.”
 
He half-carried, half-dragged Hannibal down the short hall, knocking his own shoulder into the wall hard enough to see stars. He bit down on a sound and kept going. He got Hannibal into the bathroom, turned, and eased him down into the tub with more care than the space allowed. Hannibal slumped sideways, chin dropping to his chest.
 
“Stay,” Will murmured, absurd and automatic. “Don’t go anywhere.”
 
He knelt and peeled Hannibal’s sweater up, the fabric sticking where it had dried stiff with blood. Hannibal made a small sound as the cloth pulled free. Will froze, waited for it to pass, then continued. When the wound came fully into view, Will felt his stomach drop.
 
It was bad. The entry wound was ugly and inflamed, the surrounding skin angry and dark. Blood had soaked everything. The exit, there wasn’t one. The bullet was still in there, lodged deep enough that Will could feel it when he pressed carefully around the area, a wrong hardness beneath the flesh.
 
He turned and rifled through the cabinets with shaking hands. There wasn’t much. Cleaning supplies. A half-empty bottle of something citrus-scented. Towels that had gone threadbare long ago. Then—mercifully—a small medical kit shoved to the back, yellowed plastic, snapped shut like it had been waiting for this moment its whole life.
 
He found crackers in the kitchen next and broke them in half. He stuffed a piece into his own mouth first, chewing mechanically. Then he crouched and pressed the other piece gently to Hannibal’s lips.
 
“Open,” he said. “Come on. You’re going to want this.”
 
Hannibal complied sluggishly, jaw slack, and Will eased the cracker in, holding it there until Hannibal bit down. Will laid out what he had on the edge of the tub. He stripped his shirt off and rolled his sleeves up, blood cracking on his skin where it had dried.
 
“This is the best we’re going to get,” he said, conversational. “We don’t always get preferences.”
 
Hannibal’s eyes flickered at the sound of his voice. That was enough. Will cleaned the area as carefully as he could. He talked constantly, a low stream of words meant to fill the silence Hannibal couldn’t.
 
“I’m going to press here,” he said. “That’s going to hurt. I know. I know. You’re doing fine.”
 
He thought about light as he worked. About how when all the lights bleed together, red into green into white, they create something new. A glowing, indistinct color that doesn’t belong to any one source. He thought about docks. About fireflies. About Christmas lights melting snow. He focused on that instead of the heat under his hands, the resistance of flesh.
 
Finding the bullet took longer than he wanted. Removing it took longer still.
 
“All right,” he murmured, breath shallow. “I see it. That’s good. That’s progress.”
 
Hannibal didn’t answer. Didn’t move except for the shaking. Will pretended not to notice the silence. He dug the bullet out, jaw locked, vision narrowed to the task. Hannibal made a sound then, low, involuntary, torn out of him. Will didn’t stop.
 
“There,” he said softly, when it was done. “That’s the worst part.” When he leaned back, hands trembling, Hannibal lifted one hand weakly and reached out.
 
His fingers brushed Will’s cheek. Blood smeared under Hannibal’s touch, warm and tacky. Will froze, then leaned into it despite himself.
 
“We’ll take care of that later,” Will said gently, catching Hannibal’s wrist without pulling away. “You can do it. I want you to.”
 
Hannibal’s fingers lingered, light even in weakness.
 
“If I do it,” Will went on quietly, “I’ll end up ugly.”
 
Will eased Hannibal back, settled him as best he could, and rested his forehead briefly against the tub’s edge, breathing through the ache in his shoulder, the split in his face, the pounding in his chest. The lights outside hummed on, faithful and indifferent. He stayed awake this time.
 
He stayed.
 
By the time Hannibal was stitched up and more conscious, the room had taken on that strange, suspended quality that came when pain stopped escalating and settled into something survivable. Not manageable, just survivable. Hannibal’s breathing had evened out. His eyes were open now, tracking Will with intention. Still mute. 
 
“That’s it,” Will said quietly, as he tied off the last stitch and taped the gauze down. “That’s as good as it’s getting tonight.”
 
They sat there for a moment, both of them breathing, the tub creaking faintly beneath their combined weight, water long gone cold around their calves. The bathroom light buzzed overhead. Christmas-themed clutter crowded the narrow counter: a ceramic Santa holding a candy cane chipped at the beard, a snowman soap dispenser with a cracked red scarf, a cheap plastic wreath suction-cupped crookedly to the mirror. Tinsel dangled from a nail.
 
Will swallowed and shifted.
 
“Okay,” he said. “Your turn.”
 
Hannibal’s brows lifted a fraction. Questioning. Will met his eyes.
 
“My cheek,” Will clarified. “And the shoulder. It’s… not great.”
 
Hannibal studied him for a long second, gaze moving despite everything. Then he nodded again. Once. Agreement. Will maneuvered himself carefully, ignoring the protest from his shoulder, and straddled Hannibal’s lap right there in the tub. The position was awkward and intimate and exactly what Will needed. Hannibal’s hands came up automatically to steady him, warm now where they touched Will’s thighs, fingers curling.
 
Will closed his eyes as Hannibal cleaned the cut on his cheek, the sting sharp enough to draw a hiss through his teeth. He leaned forward instinctively, forehead nearly touching Hannibal’s, breath tangling. When the needle went in, pain flared bright and clean.
 
“Hannibal—” Will cursed, then laughed softly through it. “Yeah. Okay. Do it. Don’t go easy.”
 
Hannibal’s hands were steady. Gentle without being hesitant. Each stitch pulled Will back into his body. He rode the pain, leaned into it, felt it clarify him. Wanted more of it in a way that felt honest and unashamed.
 
Will opened his eyes between stitches, watching Hannibal’s face. Watching the concentration there, the faint tension around his eyes. He asked questions not because he needed answers, but because he wanted reactions.
 
“Think it’ll scar bad?” Will asked.
 
Hannibal’s mouth curved, just barely. A shrug. His fingers tugged the thread through with careful firmness.
 
“I don’t mind,” Will said. 
 
Another stitch. Another sharp inhale. “It’s going to be a pain hiding from the FBI,” Will added, conversational, like they were discussing an inconvenience instead of a future shaped by evasion. “You know that, right?”
 
Hannibal paused, eyes flicking up to Will’s. Then he resumed. “But we’re alone here,” Will continued. “For now. No one’s looking this far out. No one ever does. We’ll have time. We always buy time, you and me.”
 
Hannibal tied off the last stitch on Will’s cheek and lifted his hands away slowly. Will let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. The shoulder came next. Will bit down on a folded towel as Hannibal worked, pain blooming deep and wrong where muscle had been pulled and torn. Will cursed freely, words muffled, body trembling.
 
“Don’t stop,” Will said hoarsely. “It hurts, but—don’t stop.”
 
Hannibal didn’t.
 
When it was done, Hannibal’s skin underneath was so cold it startled Will. Pale. Bruised. Collarbones sharp and beautiful in the harsh bathroom light. Will’s fingers lingered there, tracing the lines gently. They cleaned themselves up as best they could. Yellow iodine, staining skin and fingertips. Gauze wrapped. Tape pressed down. Their movements were slow now, synchronized. Will had no idea what time it was by the time they finished. The lights outside glistened on, unconcerned with clocks. Snow brushed softly against the window.
 
Will leaned in and pressed his mouth to Hannibal’s throat, just below the jaw, breath warm against cold skin. He stayed there longer than necessary, willing Hannibal’s voice back with nothing but proximity and want.
 
Want is a self-fulfilling prophecy, built to trip over its own feet.
 
Still, Will lifted his head. He stared at Hannibal in the cramped yellow light of the bathroom, in the narrow world of the tub where their knees knocked and their breath mingled, and he saw that look again, the one Hannibal got when Will was being cruel with him, or tender, or when the line between those two things blurred so completely it stopped existing. Soft-eyed.
 
Will had seen that look across tables and glass walls and distance measured in years. He had seen it when Hannibal was caged and composed, when his suits were immaculate and his hands clean. Seeing it now did something to Will’s chest.
 
He kissed him because he could. Because there was no one there to stop him. No rule left intact enough to matter. He kissed him because he wanted to, and he was done pretending his wanting was some kind of weakness that needed managing. He leaned in, careful at first, mindful of injuries, of stitches and breath and pain, but Hannibal didn’t pull back. He tilted his head instead, mouth parting just enough to meet Will where he was.
 
The kiss was not neat. It tasted like seawater and iron and the lingering bittersweetness of whatever Hannibal had coughed out onto the beach hours ago. Hannibal’s lips were cool, softer than Will expected, or maybe Will was simply more aware of softness now. Hannibal breathed in sharp, uneven pulls through his nose, each one shuddering a little, like his body hadn’t yet been convinced this was allowed.
 
Will kissed him again. And again. The world narrowed until it was only that, mouth to mouth, breath to breath, the faint scrape of stubble, the quiet urgency of contact reclaimed. Christmas lights reflected on black water, of a little boat rocking gently at its moorings, strung up with bulbs that refused to go dark. In the tub, with the lights glowing through the window and snow brushing against the glass, he could imagine it clearly.
 
They were on the sea. Not drowning. Not falling. Floating. For the first time in a while, longer than he cared to count, things felt safe. Safe with Hannibal.
 
His killer. His mirror. His ruin. Will didn’t want to play coy with his longing anymore. That game had gone on too long. Hunger had grown old and tired between them, worn thin by restraint and denial and the endless circling. This wasn’t hunger now. This was need.
 
Hannibal’s tongue brushed Will’s lower lip, tentative, exploratory. Will made a sound low in his throat and kissed him harder, careful not to jostle the wound in his face, careful in all the ways that mattered and careless in the ones that didn’t. He tasted salt again. He tasted warmth. He tasted something alive.
 
Will thought about how long it had been since Hannibal had been touched like this.
 
Three years. Three years of distance enforced by walls and glass. Three years of hands kept to himself. He deserved it. Will missed him. The thought tightened something in Will’s chest, sharpened his focus. He kissed Hannibal more for it, poured time back into him with his mouth.
 
Will pulled back just enough to look at him. Hannibal’s eyes were dark, blown wide, reflecting the light. His mouth was red now, bruised by kissing, parted like he might speak if he could. Will could almost hear it. Of what secret lights are we made? Of what densities? Or maybe Hannibal wasn’t thinking at all.
It has been a few weeks now, and Christmas keeps moving closer whether they acknowledge it or not.
Time behaves differently here. It stretches. It settles. It stops pretending to be urgent. Will measures it in bandages instead of days, in how often Hannibal’s color improves, in how long he can stand before the room tilts. They are still here, still in the trailer, still breathing. That feels like an accomplishment worth not questioning too closely.
They are less injured now. Not healed, but less broken. The desperation has eased its grip. Death has left them alone for the moment, and they are careful not to call her back by speaking her name too loudly. Hannibal’s abdomen is a lattice of healing tissue and careful stitches. Will’s shoulder still aches, but it has stopped screaming. His cheek has begun to close, the scar already deciding what kind of future it wants. It wants Hannibal’s lips on it. 
Will has learned the pressure Hannibal tolerates when the gauze comes away from skin. He has learned which movements make Hannibal’s breath hitch and which ones make his shoulders loosen. Hannibal, in turn, watches Will. He cleans Will’s wounds when they need it, hands steady, eyes intent. 
They eat canned soup mostly. Whatever they found stacked in the narrow cabinets. Tomato. Chicken noodle. Something unidentifiable with beans. Whatever was left in the fridge the man kept stocked. Will eats more than he thinks he should. Hannibal eats less than Will wants him to. Will watches anyway, memorizes how much goes down, memorizes how long it stays.
They touch as much as they can. Hannibal’s foot hooked over Will’s ankle under the thin blanket. Fingers brushing as one of them reaches for the radio dial. They touch because they need to. Because bodies heal better when they are reminded they are not alone.
The radio stays on most days. Static-ridden, drifting between stations. Christmas music bleeds through occasionally, tinny bells, voices too cheerful. Will doesn’t turn it off. Neither does Hannibal. Sometimes the news comes through instead, muffled reports of weather, of traffic accidents, of things happening far enough away to feel theoretical. Two killers on the loose. Hannibal The Cannibal, is he dead? They listen without comment. Sometimes Will laughs. 
The television works, surprisingly. Rabbit ears bent at odd angles, reception temperamental. They watch the news there too, Will standing close enough to shut it off if something gets too specific. Hannibal watches intently, head tilted, eyes sharp. Will can almost feel the gears turning behind his silence.
They spread a map out on the little table one afternoon. It’s old, creased soft as cloth. Will traces roads with his finger. “There,” Will says. “That’s town. Couple miles. Maybe more.”
Hannibal leans closer, shoulder brushing Will’s. He points with his finger, then looks up at Will, questioning.
“Not yet,” Will says quietly. “Not like this.”
Hannibal accepts that. He writes in the small notepad Will found in a drawer, the paper already half-filled with lists and dates in someone else’s hand. Hannibal’s writing is neat and spare. Soon. Just that. 
Will finds the truck a few days after that.
He goes alone. Hannibal watches him get dressed in layers of borrowed clothes, eyes tracking every movement. Will reassures him without words, pressing their foreheads and lips together before he leaves, hands warm on Hannibal’s ribs.
The truck is a couple ways down, half-buried in snow, exactly where it should be. Will doesn’t linger near the body this time. It’s frozen solid now, kept honest by cold. Will takes the keys, checks the gas, checks the tires. It will run. Not today. But soon.
When he comes back, Hannibal touches his face like he’s checking for damage.
They keep Hannibal warm. They share clothes without comment. They sleep tangled together on the couch some nights, in the bed others when Hannibal can manage the climb. Will wakes often, hand pressed to Hannibal’s back, reassured by the rise and fall there. Hannibal wakes less, but when he does, his eyes find Will immediately.
The notepad becomes a quiet third presence between them. Hannibal writes when he feels like it. Not constantly. A word here. A line there. Sometimes Will catches him writing and doesn’t ask to read it. Sometimes Hannibal turns the page toward him deliberately, waiting.
Will still doesn’t know why Hannibal went mute.
He hasn’t asked. He doesn’t need to. He has always liked reading. He likes the way Hannibal chooses words when he can take his time. He likes the intimacy of it, the way writing slows thought down.
He can still hear Hannibal’s voice in his head. It never went away. It sounds the same as it always did. It narrates things Will doesn’t say out loud. It asks questions. Hannibal’s silence hasn’t erased him. It has only changed the medium.
Their life here is small. It is waking and checking wounds. Heating soup. Listening to the radio argue with itself. Reading the same paperback twice because there’s nothing else to read. Sitting on the floor together while snow piles up outside like the world is trying to close the door gently.
It is Hannibal’s hand resting on Will’s knee while Will watches the news. It is Will brushing Hannibal’s hair back from his face and leaving his hand there longer than necessary.
Will stands at the little counter with two mismatched bowls, pouring cereal that’s gone slightly stale but still serviceable. He adds powdered milk, stirs it with the handle of a spoon, and carries both bowls to the small table.
 
Hannibal is already there. He sits with the blanket drawn around his shoulders, wrapped tight the way he does when the chill lingers in his bones. The sweater underneath is stretched, softened, faintly familiar with Will’s shape already even though it was worn by someone else. Hannibal’s hair is still a little damp from where Will washed it the night before. Hannibal looks up when Will sets the bowl down, eyes following the movement.
 
The radio murmurs from the corner, low and persistent.
 
“…county roads remain blocked due to snowfall,” the voice says, tinny and official. “Authorities advise against non-essential travel…”
 
Will snorts quietly and sits across from Hannibal.
 
“Christmas is soon,” he says, like it’s a thought he’s just had instead of one that’s been circling him for days. “Week or so, maybe less.”
 
Hannibal’s gaze flickers. He reaches for the notepad and pen that live beside his bowl now like an extension of his hand. He writes slowly, then slides the page across the table.
 
I would have liked to cook something nice. Something warm enough to forgive the weather.
 
Will smiles, small and real. “I know,” he says. “But we still can’t go into town. Roads are a mess. And… we’re not exactly inconspicuous.”
 
Hannibal watches him, searching his face for something, regret, maybe, or resentment. Will doesn’t offer either. He shrugs.
 
“It’s fine,” Will adds. “We’ll watch a movie or something. Eat whatever’s left. Make do.”
 
Hannibal nods. He looks content with that. After they finish, Will moves, leans in, and kisses Hannibal’s cheek. It’s gentle, brief. Hannibal closes his eyes for half a second at the contact, then opens them again, watching as Will moves away.
 
His eyes track Will as he crosses the trailer, as he rinses the bowls, as he checks the kettle on the stove even though they don’t need it yet. There is something attentive about it that still catches Will off guard. 
 
Will feels it then, the restlessness. It stirs low in his chest, familiar and not-so-unwelcome, like an old dog waking up and testing its legs. The urge to move. To go. To set his teeth to the world and see what gives. He has become something more of himself over the weeks, sharpened by exposure and loss and choice. He can feel that edge now, waiting.
 
Soon, it will demand something. But not yet. Right now, there are more important things to worry about. Right now, there is Hannibal at the table, wrapped in Will’s blanket, eating cereal. Right now, they are here. And Christmas is soon.
 
Will thinks of the docks again. Food eaten standing up. Cold biting at exposed skin while warmth lived somewhere deeper. It hadn’t been pretty. It hadn’t been proper. But it had been real. Maybe they can celebrate like that.
 
Maybe they can celebrate the little chubby baby Jesus’s day, if they want to. Not the polished version people put in windows and churches, but the one born into inconvenience and blood and animal heat. Will thinks Hannibal would appreciate that version. He thinks he already does. This is the only holy kingdom. Kingdom of touching. This kingdom has no borders anyone else would recognize. It doesn’t need them.
 
The days keep going.
 
Will wakes first most mornings, not because he’s rested but because his body has learned to surface quickly, to check. He wakes with Hannibal pressed close, their legs tangled, Hannibal’s forehead tucked against Will’s throat like it knows the exact place to rest. The trailer is always colder in the mornings. The heater fights it but never quite wins. Will stays still for a while, breathing, letting Hannibal sleep another few minutes before the day begins asking for them again.
 
They sleep so close together it feels intentional, like they’re daring the world to try and pry them apart. Will kisses Hannibal often now. He kisses his temple when Hannibal writes something particularly dry in the notepad. He kisses the corner of his mouth when Hannibal brings him soup he tried dressing up as best he could. He kisses his throat when the weather gets bad enough that Hannibal’s eyes go sharp and distant. 
 
Hannibal helps Will clean up his beard after he shaves himself. The bathroom mirror is spotted and warped, the reflection unreliable, but Hannibal stands close behind him anyway, hands steady at Will’s jaw, guiding the blade down his neck. Will closes his eyes and lets him. He feels the scrape of steel, the heat of Hannibal’s body, the way Hannibal’s breath hits the side of his neck when he concentrates.
 
Will trusts him with his throat.
 
They live in the little trailer like it’s always been theirs. Like they didn’t arrive soaked in blood and snow, like they didn’t break in on the worst night of someone else’s life. Will keeps the place clean the way he always has. Hannibal folds laundry that isn’t really theirs.
 
The radio stays on. The television stays on. The world is having its freak out without them. There are reports. Speculation. Talking heads circling the same facts like vultures who haven’t quite decided where to land. Presumed dead. No confirmed sightings. Authorities believe—
 
Will turns the volume down before it gets too detailed. Hannibal watches anyway, eyes intent, cataloguing reactions. Will imagines what it must look like from the outside. Two men vanish into winter. Water involved. Violence implied. The narrative writes itself.
 
Maybe their past selves are dead.
 
Will likes that idea more than he expected to. They have been reborn, he thinks, and then lets the thought go without trying to make it holy.
 
Sometimes they are half starved, scraping the last of something from a can and pretending it’s enough. Will notices Hannibal’s weight, the way his clothes hang differently. Hannibal notices Will’s, the way his cheekbones have sharpened. Neither comments. They compensate in other ways, touch, heat, attention.
 
They read. Hannibal writes. Sometimes they don’t speak at all for hours.
 
A stillness settles over Hannibal again, his gaze unfocusing like he’s looking through the walls, through the trees, back to somewhere Will can’t follow. Will notices it immediately. He always does. He moves closer, presses his forehead to Hannibal’s, cups his hands around Hannibal’s wrists to warm them.
 
“Hey, baby,” Will murmurs. “I’m here.”
 
Hannibal blinks eventually. Comes back. His fingers tighten around Will’s like he’s checking that this part is real. Will doesn’t think about how he could be celebrating Christmas.
 
The thought doesn’t even arise in that shape. He doesn’t imagine trees or presents or dinners. He doesn’t imagine anything else. He just wants to be here. In this narrow space. In this strange, borrowed life that feels more honest than anything he’s had in years.
 
Everything is awful, technically.
 
They are injured. They are hiding. They are running out of food. The world would not look kindly on what they’ve done or who they are together. Will knows this.  And yet—this is the happiest he’s been in years.
 
The thought surprises him the first time it surfaces. He waits for guilt to follow. It doesn’t. He waits for dread. It doesn’t come either. The happiness is quiet. Outside, the lights keep glowing. Will knows that Hannibal has money tucked away in places. Offshore accounts. It’s a fact that sits in the back of his mind. They can figure that out after. After the roads clear. After Hannibal’s color stops worrying him. 
 
One evening, Will fills the bathtub as hot as it will go. He eases himself down into the water with a breathy sound, shoulder twinging, cheek pulling where the stitches have begun to knit. The heat spreads slowly, like it’s negotiating terms with his body. Steam fogs the mirror. The Christmas junk in the bathroom softens at the edges.
 
Hannibal lingers in the doorway.
 
He does that now. Lingers. He leans his shoulder against the frame, then drifts closer, curious and quiet, blanket slung around his shoulders like an afterthought. Will watches him watch. 
 
“Bills’ll come eventually,” Will says at last. He keeps his voice casual, but the worry’s been pacing him all afternoon. “Poperty tax. Water. All that fun domestic stuff.”
 
Hannibal’s eyebrows lift slightly. He steps closer and rests his cheek on the edge of the tub, the porcelain cool against his skin. His eyes stay on Will.
 
“We’ll cross that bridge,” Will continues, fingers idly tracing the water’s surface. “Not our place, technically. Might get complicated.” A pause. “But… we’ll figure it out.”
 
Hannibal nods once, small. Will shifts in the tub, water sloshing dangerously close to the rim. “Wish this thing was bigger,” he says. “Wish we could both fit without flooding the place.”
 
Hannibal’s mouth curves faintly. He reaches out, fingers dipping into the water, testing the heat, then resting on Will’s knee. Will’s hand comes down over Hannibal’s without thinking. He likes his hands there. Likes being strong for him. Likes the way Hannibal’s bones feel under his fingers. Likes the quiet ferocity of wanting and being wanted.
 
“Hey,” Will says, softer now. “I never told you this part.”
 
Hannibal’s eyes sharpen. He settles in, cheek still on the tub’s edge, posture saying go on.
 
“It was this one Christmas,” Will says. “Dad couldn’t get the day off. Again. I was… I don’t know. Ten, maybe. Old enough to think I knew what I was missing.”
 
He stares at the ceiling, steam curling. “The boss had a generator that kept coughing and dying. Wouldn’t stay on. They kept it going anyway. Somebody brought a busted string of lights and strung them along the rail of one of the shrimp boats. Red ones mostly. A few green. None of them matched.”
 
Hannibal watches him, unblinking.
 
“There was this guy—Earl, I think—who’d lost two fingers the year before. He kept trying to tune a radio that wouldn’t hold a station. All you could get was static and a preacher’s voice fading in and out like it was underwater.”
 
Will smiles at the memory, surprised by it.
 
“Dad gave me his gloves because my hands were shaking. Not from cold. I was mad. Mad enough I didn’t want to talk to anyone. So I stood there staring at the lights, watching them break apart in the water and come back together again. The generator finally died for good, and everyone groaned like that was the end of the world.”
 
He swallows.
 
“Then the tide shifted. Just enough that the boat swung, and the lights lined up with the current. They got brighter somehow. Or maybe my eyes adjusted. Either way, it felt like… like the dock was breathing.”
 
Hannibal’s fingers curl slightly against Will’s knee.
 
“Dad came and stood next to me,” Will says. “Didn’t say anything. Just stood there until my hands stopped shaking. That was Christmas.”
 
He exhales, long and slow. Hannibal doesn’t move. He doesn’t look away. After a moment, Hannibal reaches for the notepad on the counter. He writes while leaning against the tub, pen scratching softly, then turns the page toward Will.
 
Winter. Before everything.
 
Will shifts, water lapping. “Tell me,” he says.
 
Hannibal writes again. The courtyard was stone. I was small enough that my boots did not reach the ground when I sat on the steps, so my legs swung uselessly. I remember the sound they made against each other. Hollow. Like knocking.
 
There were candles—too many. Beeswax, thick and sweet. The smoke clung to everything. My clothes. My hair. Even afterward, when I was washed, I could still smell it. As if their warmth had a residue.
 
Will’s chest tightens.
 
My mother said not to touch them. Her voice was calm. Certain. I touched one anyway. I burned my thumb. I did not cry. I remember thinking this is what warmth costs. There was a tree indoors. A real one. They dragged it in whole, roots wrapped and bleeding sap. It leaned against a pillar, dropping needles everywhere. Servants complained about the mess, the fire risk, the impracticality. No one listened. Tradition mattered more than inconvenience.
 
The pen slows.
 
Lights were tied to the branches. Glass ornaments. Fragile things hung where hands could not quite reach them. I wanted to break one just to hear the sound, but I did not. I learned early that restraint was praised more than honesty.
 
Will leans forward, elbows braced on the tub’s edge. The water sloshes, unnoticed.
 
I was still a child then, Hannibal writes. Which meant I was invisible and ceremonial at the same time. It meant nothing. It meant everything. People bowed. I did not look at their faces. Faces lie. I watched their hands instead. You can tell what someone intends by what they do with them.
 
Will swallows. “Did you like it?”
 
Hannibal considers. Really considers. Then writes.
 
I liked the quiet after.
 
The next day, the power goes out without warning.
 
There isn’t a flicker, no polite dimming to give them time to brace. One second the trailer hums with its thin electric life, the heater clicking, the radio murmuring to itself, the Christmas lights glowing like they’ve decided to stay, and the next second everything drops into silence. The lights die. The heater cuts off mid-breath. 
 
Cold rushes in like it’s been waiting its turn.
 
“Shit,” Will says, immediately, softly, because loud feels wrong now. “Okay. Okay.”
 
Hannibal freezes where he is, pen halfway to the notepad, eyes already sharp, already listening. Will is on his feet before the chill can get ambitious. He moves on instinct, on muscle memory, on the part of him that knows what darkness means when it arrives this suddenly.
 
“It’s fine,” Will says, though he doesn’t know that yet. “It’s probably just the lines. Storm. Snow.”
 
Hannibal watches him cross the room, watches him check the window, the door, the locks. Outside, the woods are black and unmoving. Snow drifts down soundlessly, swallowing everything that might have reflected light. The Christmas lights are gone now, erased like they never existed.
 
The cold sinks its teeth in. Hannibal’s shoulders tense. The blanket slips a little. Will sees the first shiver move through him, subtle but unmistakable.
 
“Hey,” Will says, already closing the distance. “Come here.”
 
Hannibal doesn’t argue. He steps into Will’s space like it’s where he was headed anyway. Will wraps his arms around him, tight, decisive, pulling him close until there’s no gap left for the cold to argue with. Hannibal’s forehead presses into Will’s chest. His breath stutters once, twice.
 
“I’ve got you,” Will says, voice low. “I’ve got you. Just stay.”
 
Hannibal shakes harder now, teeth clicking softly. Will feels it all, the tremor, the tension, the way Hannibal’s hands clutch at Will’s shirt.
 
“Okay,” Will murmurs. “Okay. We’re gonna layer up.”
 
They move together, awkward and close, grabbing blankets by feel in the dark. Will wraps one around Hannibal’s shoulders, then another, then tucks the edges. He keeps talking because silence feels dangerous right now.
 
“It’ll pass,” he says. “Lines come back. They always do. Worst case, we light the stove. We’ll be fine.”
 
Hannibal’s eyes flick to the door.
 
Will notices. Of course he does.
 
“You hearing something?” Will asks quietly.
 
Hannibal shakes his head once, small. His eyes stay fixed anyway. Will listens too. He strains for it, the crunch of snow, the scrape of a boot, the sound of a world that has decided to notice them again. Nothing comes. Just wind brushing trees. Just snow falling. Just the blood in his own ears.
 
“No footsteps,” Will says. “Nothing. We’re alone.”
 
He pulls Hannibal down onto the couch with him, settles them under the heap of blankets. Hannibal curls in automatically, seeking warmth. Will wraps himself around him from behind, chest to back, arms locked tight across Hannibal’s middle.
 
The shaking eases, then comes back in waves.
 
“Breathe with me,” Will says. “In. Out. That’s it.”
 
Hannibal tries. His breath catches anyway. Will presses his mouth to Hannibal’s hair, to the back of his head, kisses without counting.
 
“I know,” Will murmurs. “I know it’s bad. I know.”
 
Hannibal’s hand fumbles for the notepad, pen scratching clumsily in the dark until Will guides it, steadies it. It is so cold, Hannibal writes, the word shaky.
 
“I know,” Will repeats. “I know.”
 
They sit like that, minutes stretching thin, Will listening harder than he ever has. Every small sound makes his muscles go rigid. He catalogs them all. Branches. Wind. The faint settling of the trailer. He imagines footsteps that never arrive.
 
“It’s not coming,” he tells Hannibal. “Whatever you’re waiting for. It’s not.”
 
Hannibal goes still at that. Not relaxed. Focused. His hand tightens over Will’s forearm. Will swallows and keeps going.
 
“When we leave,” he says, because thinking forward feels like a spell. “When the roads clear. When you’re strong enough. We’ll get a boat.”
 
Hannibal’s head shifts slightly, attention sharpening. “A real one,” Will continues. “Not something half-dead tied to a dock. Something that floats on purpose.”
 
Hannibal’s breathing evens a little.
 
“We’ll go somewhere warm,” Will says. “Somewhere the cold doesn’t get ideas.”
 
Hannibal writes again, careful this time.
 
Cuba.
 
Will lets out a surprised huff of a laugh despite himself.
 
“Yeah?” he says. “Cuba.”
 
Hannibal nods once, decisive.
 
“Sun,” Will says, warming to it. “Water you don’t die in. No snow.”
 
Hannibal writes again. Salt. Music. Air that tastes alive. We would walk in the mornings. Drink bitter coffee. Let the heat argue with us until we give in.
 
Will smiles into the dark.
 
“Okay,” he says. “Yeah. I can do that.”
 
Eventually, the shaking fades into something manageable. Hannibal’s weight settles heavier against Will’s chest, trusting. Will loosens his grip only enough to breathe. “We’ll get there,” Will says quietly. “Just you wait.”
 
Hannibal’s pen scratches.
 
Together, Will? 
 
Will closes his eyes and presses his mouth to Hannibal’s hair again.
 
“Always,” he says.
 
Will makes them hot chocolate on the stove because it is the simplest thing he can think of that still feels like an answer. The power is still out. Will moves by habit and memory now, not by sight. He knows where everything is. He knows the particular give of the floorboard near the sink, the way the cabinet sticks unless you lift slightly before pulling. He lights the stove with a match he keeps tucked into a mug on the counter, the flare brief and decisive, the flame catching with a soft, reassuring whoomph.
 
He fills the kettle with cold water. It runs reluctantly, the sound too loud in the quiet, then settles. He sets it on the burner and adjusts the flame until it’s steady, low enough not to waste, high enough to mean business. Steam will come soon. He can already imagine it.
 
The powdered hot chocolate sits in a cardboard tin that’s been opened and closed too many times. The lid doesn’t quite fit anymore. He scoops it carefully into two chipped mugs, the powder fine and pale, clinging to the spoon, dusting his fingers. He taps the spoon against the rim.
 
Hannibal sits at the little table wrapped in blankets, knees drawn up, watching. He doesn’t write. He doesn’t need to. His eyes follow Will’s movements with that particular focus that feels like being listened to without sound. Will feels it in his back, in the nape of his neck. 
 
“Almost,” Will says quietly.
 
The kettle begins to hum. Will stands there with his hands braced on the counter, shoulders hunched against the cold, waiting. When the water boils, he pours it carefully into the mugs, the powder blooming instantly, darkening, dissolving into something thicker and richer than it has any right to be. He stirs with a spoon, watching the surface smooth itself out.
 
He carries the mugs to the table one at a time, mindful of not spilling. He sets one down in front of Hannibal and wraps Hannibal’s hands around it himself, fingers overlapping, sealing warmth in place.
 
“Careful,” Will murmurs. “It’s hot.”
 
Hannibal nods, eyes dropping to the mug, lashes casting shadows. He lifts it slowly, testing the heat, then takes a small sip. His eyes close on instinct. His shoulders loosen a fraction. Will sits across from him with his own mug cupped between his palms. The heat seeps into him immediately. He drinks and feels it travel downward, thawing something that had clenched tight without his permission.
 
Outside, the woods remain dark. Snow continues to fall, patient and thorough. The Christmas lights stay off. The world does not offer commentary.
 
Then the power comes back. The refrigerator hums. Somewhere in the walls, current resumes its quiet pilgrimage. 
 
He smiles into his mug, a quiet, private thing.
 
“Look at that,” he says. “And then there was light.” 
 
Hannibal looks from the light to Will. 
 
Christmas Eve arrives, sliding into the trailer the way everything else does now. Hannibal decides to cook anyway. He has the blanket shrugged off his shoulders and folded over the back of a chair. He has rolled his sleeves up. The space is small, hostile to ambition, but Hannibal occupies it like it’s a challenge he accepts gladly.
 
Will sits at the little kitchen table and watches.
 
He doesn’t offer to help. Will would eat anything Hannibal made him, burnt, cold, unrecognizable, but watching this feels like a promise deferred. He can’t wait for Hannibal to get back into a real kitchen someday. A kitchen with space and light and sharp knives. He misses Hannibal’s cooking.
 
The ingredients are limited. Canned goods. Stale bread. A few vegetables gone soft at the edges. And the organ meat Will had brought back weeks ago from the frozen body, wrapped and hidden away. Saved for a special occasion. Or an emergency. Christmas Eve qualifies as both.
 
Hannibal treats it with care.
 
He cleans it. He trims what little there is to trim. He fries it slowly, coaxing heat into it instead of forcing it, the smell blooming warm and metallic. Will breathes it in and feels something settle in his chest. Like sheep of whose hair is made of blankets and coats, Will thinks. Like sustenance taken directly from the body of the world. He wants to force from this fierce, sturdy, rampant love something useful. 
 
They eat together at the table. Will eats slowly. He watches Hannibal as he eats, the way his shoulders loosen, the way color comes back into his face when he swallows something warm. 
 
After, Will gathers blankets.
 
He layers them on the couch, then on the floor, then back on the couch again when he decides that’s where they’ll end up. Will rifles through the small DVD collection stacked beside the television. Most of it is junk. Forgotten action movies. A couple of scratched discs with handwritten labels. And then, improbably, an old Christmas movie with a cover so faded it barely holds its own color.
 
He takes it anyway.
 
As he slides it into the player, memory catches him sideways.
 
He thinks of Louisiana. Of one Christmas when he was sick enough that his father had made him stay home. Feverish. Nose leaking like a faucet. Chest aching with every breath. He had lain on the couch wrapped in too many blankets, watching a Snoopy Christmas special on repeat because it was the only thing on that didn’t feel too loud. 
 
He had felt small then. Temporarily removed from the world he understood. The movie starts, flickering to life, light washing over the walls. Will sits back and lets it play. A birth that happens where it shouldn’t. A body arriving into cold and blood and animal breath. No control. No guarantee. Just the stubborn insistence of life pushing itself into a world that didn’t ask for it.
 
Baby Jesus, laid in hay because there was nowhere else. A mother exhausted beyond language. A child arriving not clean or radiant, but red and slick and screaming. Will thinks now that part mattered more than the angels. That love begins there, in inconvenience and mess, not in miracle.
 
He looks at Hannibal in the light and thinks about being born again. This narrow room. This shared warmth. This man who is alive beside him when he so easily might not have been. Love, he thinks, is not gentle by default. It is fierce. It is stubborn. It is useful in ways no one prepares you for. It builds shelter out of whatever it can reach. It makes blankets out of wool pulled straight from the body of the thing that fed you. It keeps you alive when nothing else is interested in the job.
 
Hannibal looks up at him while the movie keeps going, the light from the television sliding across his face in soft, unreliable shapes. Reds and blues move over his cheekbones, catch in his eyes, soften the lines of him until he looks younger than he has any right to.  So he leans over and kisses him.
 
The movie keeps playing, syrupy music swelling and fading in the background, something a little juvenile for men like them.  Hannibal kisses him back immediately. His mouth opens, lips warm now, responsive. The kiss deepens almost at once, not frantic, not sloppy, just hungry in that particular way that only happens when you’ve been waiting. Waiting for strength to return. Waiting for pain to dull enough that the body remembers it wants things.
 
They have energy for it now.
 
Will shifts closer, knees pressing in, the blanket sliding down around their hips. Hannibal’s hand comes up to Will’s jaw, thumb brushing the line of his beard, lingering where the scar pulls slightly when Will opens his mouth. Hannibal seems drawn to it. Will feels the touch spark low in his body, familiar and new at once.
 
Hannibal’s tongue traces the inside of Will’s cheek, following the uneven ridge where skin healed imperfectly. Will shivers at it. He responds without thinking, running his tongue along Hannibal’s teeth until they twine together, breath stuttering between them.
 
Will bites Hannibal’s top lip. Hannibal answers by pressing kisses along Will’s jaw, along the edge of his beard. He seems a little obsessed with the scar now. Will feels it get him going even when he’s tired, even when his body still aches in places that haven’t forgotten the fall.
 
Will’s hand comes up, fists in Hannibal’s hair, fingers threading through it with a grip. He pulls Hannibal back in, deeper into the kiss, mouths fitting together like they’ve had plenty of time to practice in theory. The kiss turns sweet without losing its edge. Good. Right.
 
Hannibal shifts, sitting up a little so he can kiss Will better, closer, their chests aligning. The movement dislodges the blanket completely. The room feels warmer anyway. 
 
He pulls back just enough to breathe.
 
There’s a thin line of spit between them,stretching and breaking as Will moves away. 
 
“Bed?” 
 
Hannibal shakes his head. He leans back in, stealing the rest of the distance, kissing Will again. His hands, still always a little cold, slide under Will’s flannel shirt. The contrast makes Will gasp softly, muscles jumping at the touch. Hannibal’s palms spread over Will’s skin.
 
Will lets Hannibal tug his shirt up and over his head, the fabric catching briefly at his elbows before it’s gone, dropped somewhere into the growing mess of blankets and clothes and lived-in softness. The motion leaves his hair wild, curls springing loose and ungoverned.
 
Hannibal’s hands are on him immediately. Fingers slide over Will’s shoulders, thumbs pressing into the sore muscle there, then down his back, mapping old tension and new strength. Hannibal’s hands linger on his biceps, squeeze just enough to register appreciation, curiosity. Will keeps kissing him through it, mouth slow and intent, tasting Hannibal.
 
He’s careful when it’s his turn. He lifts Hannibal’s sweater gently, easing it up and off, mindful of the healing wound. When the sweater clears Hannibal’s head, Will leans in and kisses his cheek.
 
“I want you,” Will says.
 
Hannibal nods. He rubs his nose against Will’s, and then he grabs Will’s face with both hands, palms firm against his cheeks, thumb brushing the edges of the scar. He lets himself fall back into the blankets, trusting Will to follow.
 
Will reaches out and shuts off the television. The room goes quieter without it, the flickering light replaced by the steady glow from outside, colors bleeding through the window and settling over them. Will kneels down between Hannibal’s legs and leans in, kissing his skin, his collarbone, the slope of his shoulder, the hollow beneath it. 
 
His fingers slide over Hannibal’s chest, tracing lines he knows by heart now. He rubs gently over one nipple, just enough to make Hannibal’s breath hitch, just enough to feel the response under his palm. Will smiles into Hannibal’s skin at that, something private and pleased.
 
He moves lower. The gunshot wound is still healing, still imperfect, the skin there rougher than it should be, scabbed in places, crusted with the remnants of what the body has given up and reclaimed. Will leans down and presses his lips right to it. Then, almost without thinking, he drags the flat of his tongue gently along the edge of the crust, lifting a trace of it, tasting. Salt and iron and the faint bitterness of old blood, dried and clinging. Hannibal’s healing.
 
He lifts his head slowly, breath warm against Hannibal’s skin, and then reaches for the waistband of Hannibal’s pants. He tugs them down carefully, along with the boxers beneath. Hannibal’s body arches slightly in response, trusting, open, present.
 
The fabric gives way easily, and there, lying against Hannibal’s stomach, is his cock, already fully hard and curved upwards. A single pearl of pre-cum beads at the slit, catching the low light. A flush of blood beneath the skin, the vein running along the underside, the way it twitches slightly under his scrutiny, as if yearning for a touch it already knows is coming.
 
He laps gently at the gleaming tip, collecting that first taste. It is the taste of his vulnerability, his wanting, and Will savors it, humming low in his throat. The sound pulls a shuddering breath from above him. Hannibal’s hips give a tiny, involuntary jerk, and his breaths are coming fast and shallow now.
 
Will presses his palm flat against Hannibal’s lower belly. The muscles there are taut, quivering. I have you, the touch says. He licks again, a long, slow stripe from root to tip, then back down. He nuzzles into the coarse hair at the base, pressing a soft, open-mouthed kiss there, feeling the jump of Hannibal’s pulse against his lips. 
 
He takes Hannibal into his mouth, sinking down slowly, letting his tongue cradle the weight. Will’s eyes flutter closed for a moment, savoring it. He can’t hear Hannibal talk lately, but he can hear him like this. He establishes a rhythm, deep and unhurried, one hand coming up to cradle Hannibal’s balls, rolling them gently, the other still splayed on his abdomen. He sucks with a focused intensity, hollowing his cheeks. He looks up, meeting Hannibal’s gaze. Hannibal has pushed himself up on his elbows, his eyes black and wide, fixed on Will’s face. Sweat gleams at his temples.
 
A hand, trembling slightly, reaches down and sinks into Will’s curls. The fingers tighten, then loosen, petting, stroking the damp hair as Will works him. 
 
Will increases the pressure, flicking his tongue relentlessly over the sensitive spot just beneath the head, and that’s when he feels it, the coiling tension, the impossible tightening in the belly under his hand. Hannibal’s back arches, a broken cry shaping his lips. Will holds him deep, swallowing around him as the first hot pulse hits his tongue. He takes it all, suckling gently through the waves, swallowing each salty-sweet release. He makes a low, satisfied noise of his own, vibration and all, and feels Hannibal jerk through the last aftershocks.
 
Will releases him, sliding off with a soft, wet sound. He rises up on his knees, his own breath coming quickly, his lips slick and swollen. He sees the dazed, satiated haze in Hannibal’s eyes, the utter surrender.
 
He leans in, cupping Hannibal’s jaw, and kisses him deeply. He pushes his tongue into Hannibal’s mouth, sharing the taste, transferring it back. It’s messy, desperate. Some of his cum spills from the corner of Hannibal’s mouth, a silvery trail, and Will chases it with his lips. He is greedy. He is selfish. He wants Hannibal to taste himself, to taste what Will has taken from him and is now giving back. To know that nothing is lost.
 
Hannibal’s hand strokes down his back, over the knobs of his spine. He doesn't move from his place against Hannibal’s side for a long moment. But his own need is a persistent throb now. It hums in his blood, a low-voltage current that pulls him from the satiated peace. He presses a final kiss, then shifts, rising up on his knees.
 
“Turn onto your side,” Will murmurs, his free hand coming to rest on Hannibal’s hip. “For me. It’s easier.”
 
Hannibal obeys. He presents his back to Will, a landscape of burn scars and taut muscle, the line of his spine a elegant dip. Will takes a moment just to look, willing himself not to get mad at the brand tonight. He pushes his own jeans and boxers down his thighs, kicking them off until they are both bare. The cold air touches his aching erection, a fleeting shock before the heat of the room and the sight of Hannibal swallows it.
 
He shifts closer, his knees bracketing the back of Hannibal’s thighs. He brings spit slicked fingers down to the cleft of Hannibal’s ass. Hannibal’s breath hitches, just slightly.
 
“Easy,” Will whispers. He leans over Hannibal’s body, draping his torso along the length of Hannibal’s back. He wraps his left arm around Hannibal’s chest, pulling him close until their bodies are aligned from shoulder to hip. 
 
He presses a kiss to the nape of Hannibal’s neck, then to the shell of his ear. “Just tonight,” he murmurs, his voice a low vibration against Hannibal’s skin. “It’s Christmas. I’ll be gentle.”
 
And he is. He presses the pad of his first finger against the tight furl of muscle, applying pressure until it yields. He sinks in to the first knuckle, then deeper. The sound Hannibal makes is swallowed. Will closes his eyes, focusing on the feel. 
 
“That’s it,” Will breathes into his ear, his arm squeezing tighter around Hannibal’s ribcage. “You take it so well.”
 
Outside, the snow falls in a silent, endless curtain. The Christmas lights hum with a faint, electric glow. The only other sounds are the wet, soft squelch of his finger moving, their mingled panting. The room smells like sex and pine and woodsmoke and them. It smells like love. Will can taste it in the back of his throat.
 
He crooks his finger, searching, and is rewarded when Hannibal jolts against him, a sharp, broken gasp tearing from his throat. Will finds it again, that specific, sensitive spot inside him, and presses relentlessly.
 
Hannibal turns his head sharply, his face seeking, his mouth open and desperate. Will meets him halfway, slanting his mouth over Hannibal’s in a messy, breathless kiss. It’s all tongue and shared air. 
 
He adds a second finger, stretching him carefully, the burn a necessary preamble. He scissors them gently, working him open, his own hardness a painful, urgent press against the small of Hannibal’s back. He murmurs a constant stream of praise against his skin, his lips never leaving Hannibal for long.
The precipice is not a place to linger. Will withdraws his fingers slowly, after a while. He slicks himself with a few rough strokes. The ache is a white-hot point of focus, but it is a clean ache, an honest one.
 
He shifts behind Hannibal, aligning his hips, the head of his cock pressing where his fingers had just been. He wraps his arm around Hannibal’s chest again, pulling him back flush, erasing any space. Hannibal’s head falls back onto Will’s shoulder, his breathing shallow and fast.
 
“I’ve got you,” Will says. He pushes forward. He goes until he is fully sheathed, until his hips are pressed tight against Hannibal’s ass, until he can feel the frantic beat of Hannibal’s heart through the skin of his back.
 
They are so warm. It’s the first coherent thought that forms, simple and overwhelming. The heat is everywhere, inside and out, a furnace stoked by their joined bodies, by the fire, by the blood rushing in their ears. 
 
Will doesn’t move for a long moment. He just breathes, feeling the incredible, clenching pressure, feeling Hannibal breathe with him. He turns his face into the damp hair at Hannibal’s temple, inhaling the scent of sweat and him. He kisses the sharp line of his jaw, the shell of his ear, the vulnerable curve where his neck meets his shoulder.
 
“Alright, sweetheart?” he murmurs, his voice thick.
 
A sharp, jerky nod against his shoulder is the only answer. Will begins to move. With each slow withdrawal, each measured thrust back into that clinging heat, Will feels something in his own chest unravel and re-knit. He slides his hand down from Hannibal’s chest, over the plane of his stomach. He feels the muscles there jump and tremble under his palm. On the next inward stroke, he presses, his fingers splaying, feeling the soft give of Hannibal’s belly, squishing and holding him there as if he could pull him even closer, could fuse them. 
 
He knows Hannibal’s hurting. Will’s adding to it right now. He’s a careful man by nature, or he tries to be. Most times, when the need gets this sharp, he finds a different way. He’ll take Hannibal between his thighs, the squeeze of muscle warm and good, or use his hand, or just let Hannibal watch him take himself apart. It’s enough. It’s always been enough.
 
But it’s Christmas. And the world outside is a sheet of white. They have cheated death and god and every rule there ever was just to lie in this sorry bed of hay. They deserve this. The real thing. 
 
So he doesn’t stop. He presses deeper, and feels Hannibal’s body tighten, then consciously relax, opening wider, taking him in. You can’t get this – this feeling of being so deep inside another person you forget where you end and they start – without a little hurt. Hannibal is letting himself be broken, just a little, just enough to let Will in. And Will is breaking himself open too, hammering at his own walls with every roll of his hips. Hannibal is still soft against his thigh. Spent. He’s a tired thing under Will. And it’s alright. It’s more than alright.
 
He loves him so much in that moment that the thought has no edges, no beginning. Trying to think back to a time when he fought it, when he let principle and fear wall him off from this, is like trying to remember not breathing. A self-inflicted blindness. 
 
He wants to hunt with him. He wants to cook in a warm kitchen, the smell of herbs and searing meat between them. He wants the blood and the violence and the terrible, beautiful creations. His breaths start to come ragged, scraping in his throat. His body is beginning to ache with the effort. His thighs burn. But it’s alright. It’s a good ache. 
 
He is murmuring again. They are raw, half-formed things, pushed out on each exhale. “I got you… you feel… God, you feel…so good.” 
 
He shifts his angle, just so, seeking that spot from the inside now. When he finds it, Hannibal lets out a choked-off sound, his hand clamping down on Will’s wrist. Will holds him through it, his rhythm faltering for only a second before he finds it again, that perfect angle, and begins to thrust into it with a little more purpose, a little less patience. He takes Will’s relentless fucking with a deep, shuddering gratitude, his body offering no resistance, only a hot, slick welcome.
 
Will’s thrusts become less measured, more urgent. He buries his face in the juncture of Hannibal’s neck and shoulder, his open mouth pressed.
 
“I can’t—,” he gasps, the words torn from him. “Hannibal, I’m—“
 
His hips stutter, losing their rhythm for one glorious, chaotic moment. He drives in deep, as deep as he can go, and holds. The world narrows to a single, blinding point of white-hot pleasure.  He collapses forward, his weight pressing Hannibal deeper, but Hannibal doesn’t seem to mind. He turns his head, seeking Will’s mouth with a tired, tender insistence. Will meets him, their lips sliding together, slack and spent. 
 
Between panting breaths, against Hannibal’s lips, the words spill out. “Love you,” he gasps. A kiss. “Love you.” Another. “Love you.” 
 
Hannibal’s response is silent. His exhausted eyes, heavy-lidded and dark, hold Will’s gaze. His lips move against Will’s, shaping the words. I love you, Will.
 
Will goes still inside him, spent and softening, but he doesn’t pull away. He feels unmoored, adrift on a gentle, rocking sea. The lap of waves against a hull. Hannibal’s slow, deep breathing is the creak of timber. 
 
In the quiet after, with his forehead resting against Hannibal’s shoulder and the room breathing around them, the memory comes back to him the way it always does, by light first. 
 
He remembers standing at the edge of the pier with his hands shoved into his pockets, the gloves his father gave him too big, the fingers flopping empty at the tips. He remembers the cold coming up through the boards into his bones, remembers how he didn’t mind it. 
 
He remembers how the boats rocked gently against their lines, how the lights fractured and multiplied in the black water below, how it looked like there were twice as many boats as there really were. 
 
He thinks about following lights. How he followed them as a child without knowing that’s what he was doing. How he followed them to Wolf Trap, that house glowing in fog like a promise that refused to dissolve. How he followed them across an ocean, across borders and blood and fear, all the way to Hannibal. Fireflies in a foreign forest. Christmas lights strung up where they shouldn’t be. 
 
Hannibal stirs, an unconscious response, and Will stills again, smiling faintly into the curve of his shoulder. Vulnerable. Placed in a feed trough because there was nowhere else. Will has always understood that story better than he let on. Birth isn’t clean. Love is not clean. Salvation, if it exists at all, is improvised with what’s at hand.
 
They have improvised well.
 
Hannibal reaches for the notebook. Will lifts his head just enough to make space, watches as Hannibal finds the pen by touch, flips to a clean page. Hannibal writes lying down.
 
He turns the page toward Will.
 
I love you.
 
He looks from the words to Hannibal’s face, to the soft-eyed attention there, and he nods once. Not because nodding is enough, but because it’s honest.
 
“I love you too,” Will says.
 
Hannibal watches him closely as Will speaks, eyes tracking the way Will’s mouth shapes the words, as if he’s listening with more than his ears. Hannibal writes again.
 
It does not frighten you.
 
Will considers that. He presses his cheek back to Hannibal’s skin.
 
“No,” he says. “It doesn’t.”
 
That truth feels earned. He remembers all the times love did frighten him. This isn’t that. 
 
They lie like that for a while, trading warmth, trading small touches. Will traces absent shapes on Hannibal’s arm. Hannibal’s fingers map the edge of Will’s cheek. The notebook rests forgotten between them until Hannibal reaches for it again.
 
You are thinking about leaving, he writes.
 
Will exhales through his nose, a sound halfway to a laugh. “Yeah,” he admits. “I am.”


Soon.
 
“Soon,” Will agrees. “Not tonight. Not tomorrow. But… soon.”
 
He shifts slightly so he can see Hannibal’s face better, props himself on one elbow. “We need more food. We need supplies. And the truck—” He pauses. “The truck will run. I checked it again.”
 
Hannibal nods. He writes.
 
You will be careful.
 
“I will,” Will says. “I promise.”
 
Will has learned what kind of promises he can keep. This is one of them. “I won’t go far,” Will adds. “Just into town. I’ll keep my head down. Hat. Different coat. I know how to disappear when I need to.”
 
Hannibal studies him for a long moment, then writes.
 
I know.
 
“You’ll stay here,” Will continues. “Keep the lights on. Keep the radio low. Keep the lights on, so I can find my way back to you.”