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He’s hunched over his laptop across from Hannibal in an overly-crowed, tiny café. The table is too small for his laptop and what they’ve ordered, so Will balances it on the edge to make space. Some might call a place like this cozy, but Will thinks it lacks the Southern charm required to tack that quality to it. Another one of those places that pop up and close down in a few years, not to mention the atrocious hours of operation — 10 to 3 — because God forbid a business be open any time except peak business hours. Not everything needs a brick and mortar, it could have stayed a little food truck, but it didn’t. The flooring is freshly tiled, and they’ve named it Pluff Mud Coffee; not to entice the locals, but rather the tourists.
The café has a mural of the marshes on one wooden wall, with a large crane standing stock still, and is black brick around the rest, it’s narrow and smells like everything else here—thick and damp with mold.
Mold is a part of life in places like this. It creeps up walls and in pipes and suffocates the people who don’t know they’ve taken to rotting. It lives in lungs, and blood, and meninges. That was a lesson he learned early in life, as he bleached the rot from his dad’s trailer walls in Louisiana, as he scraped it off of everything he has ever loved.
That’s the nice thing about Hannibal. He isn’t built of the mold; it doesn’t course through him like blood. Everything in him that’s rotting is new, different, and so neither of them are particularly overtaken. It’s, in the way lovers are sometimes, self-contained, and they have learned how to clean it off of the other when necessary.
But he’s got a nose for the rot that exists in cities like this. When they moved here, after staying away from the US for years, it was almost like coming home.
This place is rotting though, truly rotting. Founded one year ago and Will can see the mural wall has warped from the humidity and they’ve been poorly bleaching the ceiling. Most people (if they weren’t attracting tourists) wouldn’t whine too much about a speckling of mold, or a warped wall, but the couple that opened this place sold their souls as far as Will’s concerned, but he needs the wifi and they’re close to home, so he hasn’t pushed the subject with Hannibal about why these people should die. He does, however, have a copy of their business card—apparently made in case any large company might want to work with them—tucked away in his wallet. The time will come. Hopefully sooner rather than later.
They don’t have internet at their house, and it’s taking an absurd amount of time to get the wifi installed, so they’ve gone old school, which only makes Will paranoid about someone recognizing them in some way, and paranoia makes him unforgiving to the mildest of inconveniences. Such as listening to men talk loudly on the phone while chewing cold sandwiches, or the college students huffing and puffing behind him about an assignment, or—and this is a new inconvenience for Will—people with untrained dogs on leashes whimpering.
(The dogs are the worst. He wants to tell the owners how horrible they are for not adequately conditioning their pets to the leash and people. There’s no reason that one that nips at passersby should be more or less free roaming. It isn’t the dog's fault, it’s theirs. They don’t see that though. To them, their pets are playful, not untrained.)
These inconveniences amplify the vigilant paranoia that has developed in him. Looking around with ease, taking special notice of people who are too interested in them, being ready to move at a moment's notice. This has always been a talent of his, but it's grown profoundly since they ran, and he’s too skeptical to shoulder it off despite thinking he would enjoy life a little more if he did. This quality benefitted him at 12, at 21, at 35, and now at 50. It has kept him safe and without it, he worries that something bad would finally happen.
Over ten years and no one has recognized them, at least not enough to accuse them of anything, but they’ve also moved around constantly, never getting too settled somewhere before Will itches to move. He’s become his father in that way, but he makes sure Hannibal isn’t just following him. They’re partners, where Will goes, he wants to bring Hannibal.
After so long, it’s time they rooted themselves somewhere, which Will has always wanted, even before Hannibal, but he isn’t stupid. This can go bad very quickly.
Once, in a café not unlike this one, a man said he thought he knew Will from somewhere. Maybe is was college or maybe they attended the same work conference once. A week later, they slit him open and served him at a church event that was requesting donations. They moved two days later.
“You need to relax, Will,” Hannibal tuts, crinkling the newspaper in his hands, “this is a small town. We have been out of the public eye for several years now.”
Small town in comparison to Baltimore, maybe, but hardly small. The city they’ve decided to settle in is a major tourist destination, with thousands of new people coming and going everyday. The permanent population may remain below 10,000, but even that is large by Will’s standards. This was Hannibal’s choice though—for the food scene—but Will can always tell when his husband is feeling restless and craves his old infamy; the risk of being found out. It beats through him like a second heart, pumping something far more life giving than blood.
The infamy is still prevalent regardless of Hannibal’s itch, there are Lifetime movies, documentaries, and books about them. Freddie Lounds has made quite a bit of money for herself. A disgusting amount, if Will gives it any amount of thought, she’s asserted herself as the expert on the matter of Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham and their relationship, although none of it is quite right, not that it’s ever been. Everything she says is them viewed as a mosaic at one point in time, viewed through a veil.
She can’t picture them in cafés on side streets, drinking black coffee and sweet lattes, hunched over laptops and reading the local newspaper. She can’t see their feet intertwined under the table, pretend-fighting about the tension in Will’s shoulders, kissing each other’s fingers when people aren’t looking.
To Freddie Lounds and most of the human population, they live as two constant pulling forces, bloody in ways that soak the Earth and cries out to heaven, and that drowns all the good that could be between them. This is true of their nature to some degree, but it isn’t all they are. The violence can be quiet, and they can hold each other in gentle sweetness. That’s what no one seems to comprehend — they’re lovers too, the way anyone is.
They watched one of the Lifetime movies once, it was an awful rendition of what happened, and in the end Will was a stockholm syndrome zombie that wasn’t allowed to leave the house, no better than a dog kept for beating. Hannibal said he thought it was interesting to see what people thought of them, but Will could tell it bothered him. It bothered him too.
Will glances over the laptop. “You’ll say that, and then the FBI will be here. I know how this works.”
Hannibal shakes his head, always diluting Will’s worry. “I know you do, but Jack Crawford has retired, and there are more pressing matters for the FBI than two old men.”
“We’re active and living in the US.” He looks back down, lip stiff. “And you’re old, not me.”
“50 isn’t 60, you’re correct.” He snatches the newspaper loud enough that the crinkle momentarily drowns out everything else.
Will works his jaw as he types, his molars grinding. A bad habit he’s picked up in the last year or so, to the point he has to wear a guard at night. They do this, they go round and round until Will starts to feel like his vigilance is unfounded, but he knows—he’s seen them before—or he thinks he has. Agents hidden in plain sight; a man that takes too much interest in Will, a college student who moves into the house next door, the new woman at the market. They don’t do anything that tells him that they’re FBI, but he thinks so anyway. He’s taught plenty of classes, been in the field, and he recognizes them through posture alone. Or maybe he’s reading too much into it. He’s always been good at that.
“We are unassuming,” Hannibal continues, “we dress as the locals do, spend our time as they do, and rarely call attention to ourselves—as you’ve insisted.”
Will eyes him, his pinstripe suit and sunglasses are how the older, rich men here like to dress, although Hannibal can’t fully fit in anywhere. Hannibal refuses boat shoes, which all the men wear, so Will has taken up that cross. Will dresses in more casual versions of Hannibal’s own clothes, it balances them out in onlookers eyes. There is a level of normality to it. It makes them approachable.
“Except you had to buy a historical home, you’re lucky they allow that to be anonymous around here,” he snickers.
“Why should we live in squalor, as you would say, in a place we intend to be our home?” Hannibal asks, and Will knows he’s right. Still, he could have bought something sensible. Something that doesn’t announce to people they have money, especially since they tell the select few people that they have associated with that they're living off of Will’s income as a professor at the local university.
Nothing here is reasonably priced, sure, but the house is so extravagant that when they first moved in, Will felt small compared to the grandeur of it all. Not so much anymore because they’ve slowly started to decorate and make it a home, but he doesn’t have the taste for luxury that Hannibal does, it isn’t in his blood the same way. He never thought he deserved it. He likes it though and he likes how happy niceness makes Hannibal, so there’s no cause for complaint regardless of the occasion discomfort it gives him.
Will grumbles, “You’re ridiculous.”
Hannibal tilts his head in the playful way he always does when he’s prickled him. “I adore you.”
Will reaches across the little table, the laptop balanced by his fingers on the keys, and takes Hannibal’s hand in his. “I love you.”
“You do worry too much,” Hannibal insists, but he knows well enough that if he stopped worrying Hannibal would hate that. There’s something rapturous about Will’s protectiveness that he couldn’t bear to lose. “Nothing has happened in years, Will, eventually what I say has to be truth. They’ve forgotten about us in every way that matters.”
“You know they haven’t, if they did, you’d remind them,” Will scoffs and takes his hand back so he can continue working.
No one in this café is with the FBI but each time someone comes in, he gives them a quick but thorough once over. The door chimes and he looks. Then Hannibal slides his foot between Will’s, making him sigh.
Hannibal grins. “They know to be scared.”
“I’m sure they’re not as scared as they used to be, they probably think you have arthritis.” Will sends an email to his students for his 9:10 class and then starts the email for his 12:05 class.
Hannibal rolls his eyes. Neither of them are particularly ailing with age. What bothers them are things that have accumulated from major injury, like Will’s shoulder, but that issue comes and goes so he never gives it much stock in the grand scheme of things. Give it another ten years and he’s sure he’ll regret it, but there’s too much to enjoy right now.
Their coffees are brought out, and Hannibal’s warmed chocolate croissant. Will watches him fold up his newspaper and sip his latte, a slight smile on his lips. He glances back down, happy at Hannibal’s own pleasure, and takes his coffee in hand to drink while he types.
Will finishes the last of his work at 2:37 PM. People are still piling in, despite how soon this place closes, but they pack up and go. No point in sitting around all day waiting for someone to take notice of them. Will slings his satchel over his shoulder, adjusts the gun on his hip, and offers his arm to Hannibal who takes it while leaning against his cane.
Fall has just started to settle in, which isn’t exactly a real thing here, but everyone is dressing like it it’s below 70 degrees outside, including them. Their coats are light, at the very least, and the walk home isn’t too far, so it isn’t like they’ll sweat excessively.
It feels nice to be this way, ignoring anyone that might look at them strangely. Will pets Hannibal’s hand, whispering sweet nothings to him so that he blushes a little. That’s his favorite trick, and he’s happy to be the only person in the world who can do it.
The sidewalk is covered in flower petals, the last of their neighbor’s summer blooms falling with the first bite of cold. To Will, it looks like a creamy river, and when wind blows and more come down around them, it’s as if they’ve been engulfed by the currents. Soft petals catch in their hair, and Will has to pick them out.
A young man shoulders past them as they turn the corner onto their street, so hard that Will has to take a step back and break their arms apart. He looks back, a flash of anger coming over him, but stops dead before he can scold him. The young man, an athletic looking kid with dark eyes that make the hairs on the back of Will’s neck stand, is already looking at him. His lopsided mouth is curled, not in a snarl, but almost. They hold eye contact for no more than a second, but it’s enough.
“College students,” Hannibal sighs and slides his hand back into the crook of Will’s arm, “they have no concept of the people around them.”
Will purses his mouth, eyes lingering on the young man as he disappears between brick fences and meticulously overgrown bushes. “Yeah.”
The rest of the walk home is quiet. Will continues petting Hannibal’s hand, but a cord of tension is pulled tight inside of him and he can’t loosen it until they’re back in the safety of their home. Hannibal must sense it, but he doesn’t say anything.
The afternoon sun is bright, and they go into their front gate and up the steps. Hannibal unlocks the door and enters; Will spares another glance around, taking in first their tiny front yard, and then the street before going inside. He shuts the door, locking both locks behind them, feeling marginally better.
Their house is a tall, narrow building that came lavender colored. No basement, unfortunately, there aren’t basements here, but it has plenty of rooms, and one they use for wine and butchery (the freezer was not easy to add and required Will do it without the city knowing). The other rooms have their purposes, and nothing goes to waste, but they aren’t exactly moved into all of them. It’s a slow process, considering Will could decide they need to more at any time, but the entry room and living room are done, along with the kitchen and dining room. The bedrooms and their private offices, along with the guest bathroom, still need work, but Will isn’t too concerned. It’ll all be done before Hannibal starts complaining.
They end up on the couch, stripped of their clothes, the television is playing a movie but the sound is off, and Hannibal is laying mostly on top of Will, dozing. His soft breaths and little sounds of sleep are what start to loosen the tension in him. Things are good, nothing’s happened.
His mind plays over the events of the day as he twirls Hannibal’s grey hair between his fingers. Everything has been going perfect, even with the inconvenience of no internet, until their walk home today. It was just a bump of the shoulder, a hard one, and while it isn’t uncommon for people to go out of their way to be rude, it sticks to Will like sap. His eyes had something there that was more than contempt.
His body softens, sinking into the couch, and Hannibal makes a noise and rubs his cheek against his chest, sleepily kissing his skin. Will shushes him and combs his fingers through his hair until he settles again.
It’s too early to move. If he suggests it, Hannibal will rail against him, even if he ultimately agrees. Which he will, he always agrees because once Will feels the need to go, it can’t be satisfied. Still, they’ve hardly lived here, it would be the shortest amount of time they’ve stayed anywhere (six months is the current record). Over what could be nothing more than inconsiderate behavior too. No, he decides, they can’t leave and he won’t make them. They’re safe, they’ve changed. People still see them how they were when they ran, those are still the pictures everyone circulates. There are new wrinkles, greying hair, scars that no one has ever known about, things that make them too different to be recognizable in the sense people expect. His instincts are wrong today, that happens with age.
Wrong, but he can’t shake it. The worry seeps into his gut and he knows he won’t be able to rid himself of it any time soon. He’ll just have to live with it the way he used to. Quivering.
As a boy, his father was rotting. Will could scrape the mold and grime from him to prop him up and play family, but it wasn’t surface level. It branched too deep for Will to core out, and his father never tried to do it himself. He was vigilant then, the same way he is now. Always worried that something might happen and that a pain he both knows and doesn’t, will come over him. He’s 12 again, in the humid South, and he knows exactly how this game ends.
Hannibal snores quietly, drawing his attention away from the upset he’s creating in his mind. They are old—older—and things are really good right now. The kind of good people fight for and never get. They need to stop moving every time Will gets alarmed by something, they need to exist somewhere, they need a place to get old together. Worrying all the time only serves to hurt them and what they’ve managed to create by cultivating resentment. He doesn’t need to cling, they aren’t going anywhere, no one is trying to take Hannibal away.
There’s nowhere better than here for them to grow old together, he thinks, so he doesn’t need to ruin it.
Will kisses his hair, and then closes his eyes and sleeps, cradling the back of Hannibal’s head so it doesn’t lull.
They organically wake up close to 6 PM. That’s their usual dinner time, so their bodies demand it, but Hannibal doesn’t move until Will makes him, and even then he takes his sweet time peeling away from him.
Hannibal perches at the end of the couch while Will finds one of the paper menus he has collected from the many restaurants here.
Dinner is take-out. They have food from local restaurants once a week as a compromise to the two different lives they once lived. It isn’t Hannibal’s favorite thing, but Will has required this the entire time they’ve been together. One dinner a week isn’t going to kill him, at least, Will told him that while he was recovering in his sick bed. He made all of his demands while Hannibal was recovering, he got less push back. (When he originally said he wanted to move here for the food, Will knew that was a lie. Hannibal hates eating out regularly and did not try to keep up the image that he wanted to at all. The real reason they moved here is still unknown to Will.) However, Hannibal does mope around the house when it’s take-out night to make up for his previous weakness, which Will finds to be quite endearing.
“What do you want before I call?” Will asks, bringing the menu over for Hannibal to look at.
Hannibal looks at him with despair instead, so sharp that it’s hard to tell how much of it is manufactured and how much of it is genuine. “I could make any of this.”
“Come on, Hannibal, it’s my night. If you don’t tell me, I’m ordering you steak,” he chides.
“The lamb chops. Rare.” He stands up and stretches, the despair is gone away that quickly.
Lie as it is that Hannibal wanted to come here for the food, the food is good. No one can deny that. Fresh, luscious, decadent, leaving both of them with a desire for more. There have been few places that have made less than perfect meals, and they both know it, but Hannibal still complains that he can make it just as good. Will always agrees, because he can make it just as good, but it’s nice to unwind sometimes.
Will bends down and kisses him. “Thank you, sweetheart.”
For now, he puts away his worry, and orders dinner. Seared duck, lamb chops, creamed spinach, mashed potatoes, and bread. The girl on the phone says it’ll be about 35 minutes.
He redresses and grabs the car keys.
“I’ll be quick.” He gives Hannibal a lingering kiss. “I love you.”
Hannibal smiles. He grabs his hand and holds it until Will has to pull away. “I love you, Will.”
The restaurant is on the other end of the street, which spans 5 miles and can take 20 minutes to travel if people are being particularly slow. He’ll have to find parking too, which is hell, but he refuses to give these nights up, regardless of the inconvenience. On the occasion that Hannibal tries to convince him to, Will reminds him that they moved here for the food, and that shuts him up for a time because while he won’t keep up the mask, he won’t admit he lied either. He’ll take the 20 minute drive and god-awful parking if it means he can have a night that he doesn’t have to wash the dishes.
He pulls out of their tight driveway and onto the road, a little too vigilant again now that he’s out. He scans the sidewalks next to their house to try and find him again, because the FBI always stays close by. It’s confirmation bias, he knows, because he could be any man who lives in one of the studios on King or the newer apartment buildings and now that Will has noticed him, he won’t be able to stop. From the grocery store to the post office, he’ll see him, and it’ll slowly drive him crazy.
He doesn’t see him on the ride though. Will drives, the melodious sounds of people carry through the downed windows, and no one pays special attention to him. Wherever that young man was going in such a hurry, he must have arrived, and stayed put.
The air is tinged with salt and the warm city lights pour into his car like waves off the sea.
Living here has been like sleeping under a blooming fruit tree, everything around him moves at its own speed, and Will is—when he isn’t concerned about the FBI—resting, taking in the perfumed air. Hannibal rests next to him, their bodies weaving together with roots and fallen petals, all the scurrying things curling up between their intertwined ribs. They are both resting (rotting) under the tree and they are the roots. This is what he’s been looking for from the moment they met, this perfect, lenitive peace.
This is the best they’ve been, the most human, and Will doesn’t want to lose it for anything. Not for his own made up fears.
He picks up dinner, the hostess is too bubbly and her ponytail bounces as she hands Will his bags, and he heads home. His windows stay down as the city brims with the dusky changes of night life. He turns on his radio, the organism of sound coming from either side of the road sings along to what hums out of the speakers. Nothing throws him off kilter on the drive back, the city is as it always is.
The warm, yellow lights from the house illuminate their white curtains and a down-soft calmness comes over him. He smiles, not fighting it in the slightest.
He comes inside, taking care to lock the door behind him again, and sets up dinner in the living room. Take-out nights are always living room eating and old western watching events. (Which is what unmoors Hannibal. He doesn’t have it in his blood to eat anywhere but a dining room, but he never complains either.) Hannibal is already stretched out across the recliner, and Will takes him his food on a plate, pours him a glass of wine, and kisses him.
“How do you feel?” he asks, “still tired?”
“You look for reasons to call me old,” Hannibal mumbles, adjusting to eat, “age is not measured in years, Will, but rather in the intrinsic parts of ourselves, the piece placed there before we knew our bodies and minds were separate creations.”
Will settles on the ground, criss-cross, at the coffee table with a crystal tumbler of whiskey and his duck. Unlike Hannibal, he doesn’t mind eating directly out of the card-stock to-go boxes.
From the ground, he watches Hannibal eat his food, his eyes moving from the movie he’s put on to him every few seconds. It’s funny to watch Hannibal eat like this. The comfortable stretch of his body is gone, and now he sits like a tense little creature, trying to look like he’s always done this. Over a decade and he still can’t fake it. For all that they have changed each other, aspects of who they’ve always been remain, preserved in stasis.
“How’s dinner?” Will asks, an inconspicuous gleam in his eyes.
Hannibal chews slowly and then swallows. “Very well, but I could have made it.”
Will chuckles, fighting a smile. “I know.”
After dinner, they shower together. Will trims his beard in the bathroom, the door wide open so they can talk, and Hannibal is slouched down in the bed, glasses low on his nose, as he does something on his tablet.
Will’s hair has been greying for several years now, but it’s still mostly brown. Hannibal seemed to grey all at once, but that was because Will didn’t have the pleasure of watching him age so visibly. By the time they left together, Hannibal was nearly fully grey. He sees him age in other ways, but nothing is quite as satisfying. He knows, because Hannibal likes to rub his thumb over his beard when they’re lounging in bed, and it isn’t just to feel the prickle or observe his beauty.
Sometimes, he thinks he hates himself for denying that simple pleasure, but he knows that they wouldn’t be like this if he hadn’t denied himself. Denial is a key foundation of eternity, even the most beloved disciples did it. Knowing that hasn’t made this any easier.
He wipes his face and comes in, turning off his bedside lamp and crawling into silky sheets. They share a quick, chaste kiss.
“Will you check the mail in the morning?” Hannibal asks, “I forgot to grab it.”
Will nods, setting his hand on his husband’s belly. “Yeah, don’t worry about it.”
At 7:15 AM, Will goes out to check yesterday's mail. It’s a Sunday, so he doesn’t expect to hear anything from his students, and Hannibal is still sleeping. He grabs the three white envelopes and scans them quickly for anything of importance; new identities means they’re prone to junk mail and that’s all this is. He closes the mailbox and steps back into their rod iron gate.
One of his neighbors is letting her dog out for the morning, and another is managing her little garden. He waves to both as he stalks up the steps. Will doesn’t particularly care for Mrs. Anderson or Mrs. Corben, but he knows to be polite to the neighbors. No one expects their friendly neighbor to be cannibalizing people behind closed doors, and kindness makes them all more likely to defend them if someone accuses them of being who they really are. It’s exactly how Hannibal managed to live so long without getting caught, and Will doesn’t see a reason to try out a new method.
Across the street, someone jogs. This isn’t abnormal to see at any hour, but Will spares him a glance and then catches a real look. It’s the same man that bumped into him yesterday, dressed in running shorts and a light blue hoodie, like he attends the military college on the other side of town. His jogging is more like speed walking, and his head is turned enough that he must see Will.
Will turns away with forced nonchalance, not wanting to stare at him or give away that he’s aware, and goes back inside. The junk mail is crushed in his grip, and he doesn’t soften until the door is locked and his shoes are off.
It isn’t strange to see the same person several times a week, or even several times a day. Their house is on the stretch of road headed toward the battery, and people love to run next to the water, but he doesn’t like that he’s seen that kid twice in less than 24 hours. It makes him sweat, and the scent of another kind of damp rot fills his lungs. Old, put away. From before they were this and Will was less… controlled. After they run but before the comfort of life.
Hannibal is in the kitchen with a mug of milky coffee, his plush, navy house robe is secured tightly at his waist. If Will doesn’t get up early, he won’t budge, but his body can’t rest without Will next to him, and he must have sensed he wasn’t coming back to bed.
“I know that look,” he murmurs, eyes barely open.
Hannibal is more human in the morning than any other time. His voice is rough, he leans against the counter on his bad side, his hair is unmanaged, and he’s nude under that robe. A thin layer of cream from his coffee is curled above his lip and Will, annoyed but never unloving, drops the mail in the trash and kisses him, wrapping his arms around his middle so they might stay like this for a little while.
“No, you don’t,” he mumbles against his lips.
“I’m acquainted with all of the faces you make.” Hannibal kisses him back once, then again. “Your paranoia has been a constant companion of ours.”
“One of us has to be vigilant,” Will grumbles, pushing away to grab his steaming mug of coffee. It’s hidden behind Hannibal, which means he was only going to get it if he kissed him anyway.
“You see someone too many times in the street and you believe they’re following us. Your training is both a blessing and a curse.” Finally, Hannibal sets his drink down so he can start on breakfast. He always has to wait for Will to be in the kitchen so he can cook.
Sunday’s are easy days for them. Tonight they have a reservation at a wine bar, one that Hannibal has been pushing to go to for a while, but other than that, they’re free to do what they want, but they do typically follow the same schedule, leaving room for spontaneity, but not too much. As much as Hannibal pretends he’s unmoved by the idea that someone could be watching, and his desires for risk that are always with them, he doesn’t want to go too far and lose everything either.
“Please refrain from analyzing me this early, Hannibal, I haven’t woken up yet.” Will takes a drink of his coffee and sits at the bar. “It’s Sunday.”
“I’m only trying to determine what’s upsetting you.” He sets a pan on the stove, dropping a fat pad of butter in the middle to melt, and starts taking out the ingredients for breakfast. Everything for pancakes, homemade sausage, fresh fruit from a market they frequent on one of the islands — persimmons and figs.
“I don’t want to play this game.” Will rubs his eyes with the heel of his hand.
Hannibal mixes the wet and the dry ingredients together. There’s a measured silence as he spoons batter into the pan. His shoulders tense and then drop. “What makes you think this one is FBI?”
Will sighs loudly, “I don’t know.”
“You always have a reason, Will, lying to me now won’t benefit you or change this fact." He has a sip of coffee. “I no longer accept them.”
“We know each other’s tricks.” He scrubs his hands over his face to clear his head but it doesn’t work. “The eyes.”
Hannibal casts a look over his shoulder. “The eyes?”
It’s never been the eyes before, but there was something there when Will looked at him. A poorly hidden recognition of them. Not the way a random person on the street might recognize them, it lacked the necessary fear. His eyes were filled with education. Textbook knowledge of who they are, not civilian.
“I could tell he was taught to hide what he knows, but he didn’t do it well.” It’s too early to start drinking, but he wishes he could have something to calm his nerves. They have started to prickle him, and a cold sweat forms across the back of his neck. He rubs his finger over the warm mug, biting the very tip of his tongue until it tingles with pain. “Maybe it was purposeful. He wanted me to feel his… knowledge of what we are—who we are. To him, he feels like this is power; and that he is a looming threat, a shadowed beast over our happiness. He feels like it gives him strength.”
He wants them to cower.
Saying this out loud after deciding to ignore it relieves him of every bad thought he’s had in the last 12 hours almost immediately. His body slackens and his breaths even. It helps that he can tell Hannibal isn’t angry with him. He never is, but Will always worries.
“Do you want to move again?” Hannibal asks. He’s no longer looking at Will, and while his tone is level, Will senses the disappointment in his words.
“No. I’ll… wait it out. I like it here. I like us here. Maybe I’m wrong.” He watches Hannibal flip the pancakes. “Age is making me skittish.”
“You have a natural desire to protect what is yours from perceived threats,” Hannibal says. “That isn’t something I view as a flaw.”
“It isn’t natural, it’s an instinct that came from years of everything being taken away,” Will corrects. “You don’t have to say it started with my mother, I know it did.”
And Hannibal has only made it worse. Taking Abigail, his freedom, his choices, but everything from the before pales in comparison to the now. Every morning, whether things are bad between them or good, Will wakes up and sees something he needs, someone he can’t live without. If, for any reason, they are separated, he knows he would die from the agony of loss. A piece of him will pop open and bleed into his chest cavity until his lungs and heart are suspended, floating in his own misery.
This is why he acts the way he does, and while he knows Hannibal is the same, he doesn’t know if he understands it the way Will does. If something happens and they aren’t together, and can never be together again, all the good in Will would surely die, and he would take to rotting and warping until he turns into his father and then dies.
Would separation kill Hannibal? Not only spiritually but physically? Sometimes he thinks to ask, but it doesn’t matter. Spiritual death for Hannibal is a worse kind of death than that of the body, and he knows the answer anyway. He very nearly died in prison.
Hannibal sets breakfast on the bar and Will eats. First the sausage, then the fruit, and he leaves the pancakes for last.
“Don’t you ever feel the need to protect me?” Will asks quietly.
“What I feel for you is balanced by your own protective nature,” Hannibal explains, cutting into his food, “I would do anything for you, Will.”
“I just want to be safe,” he says, “I don’t crave… the risk the way you do.”
Hannibal softens. “It isn’t that your craving for it is gone, but you understand what it could lead to.”
“And you don’t?” he laughs.
“I understand that you will never let the worst happen. An unfortunate part of all relationships that we haven’t escaped.” Hannibal smiles.
Will takes a breath and returns to his coffee and pancakes. “Yeah.”
After breakfast, they dress warmly and walk down to the battery, arms linked, taking up too much of the narrow sidewalk so anyone on their morning run has to detour out onto the road to pass. At least it isn’t as busy on this end of the street, so no one has to worry about traffic.
The park itself has some people—families, runners, dogs, but this early the air off the water is chilly and the sun has a dull, morning warmth to it they haven’t found anywhere else, so it’s sparsely populated. The big oak trees that are scattered around the park give the place a nicer feel than it really needs, the low branches swooping out around them still have green leaves on them, and anyone would be forgiven for thinking this is an early Spring day.
They sit at the same bench every Sunday morning, facing the water although they can’t see it from here. Will wraps his arm around Hannibal’s shoulders—today he is mostly coat and scarf and very little a man at all—and they people watch. Or bird watch, occasionally, when Will is in the mood to point out local species to Hannibal. They’ve developed a game where Will tells Hannibal what he thinks a person is like, their job, their relationships, and Hannibal either agrees or disagrees with his assessment. Of course, they never know if Will is actually right, but he probably is.
“Do you think we could grow old here?” Will asks after some time of enjoying the sounds of people and nature mingling around them.
Hannibal’s eyes are closed, he rests his head on Will’s shoulder. “If that’s what you want, but if we stay is your choice, Will.”
Will rubs his shoulder. “But where we end up will be up to you.”
Maybe Will makes them move, but Hannibal always picks where they go. That keeps things equal. God knows how Hannibal would behave if Will decided when they moved and where they moved.
Hannibal opens his eyes, tilting his head to peer at him. Will is already looking at him, his lip between his teeth.
He squeezes Will’s thigh. “Then let’s stay here.”
As the sun gets higher, the cool air warms and Hannibal takes his scarf off, handing it to Will to hold. He folds it and places it deep in his coat pocket.
They’ll stay then, Will is going to make sure of it. If he has to do things he doesn’t want to, if he has to allow a certain level of risk, then so be it. He goes back and forth about how they’ll manage it, but his thoughts yesterday were true, they are the best they’ve been here, even if the FBI will always be looking. They could find them in Canada, or England, or France. Why can’t they stay here? Why does he always have to be scared.
The worry won’t ever go though, that much he knows. As he thinks about how much he wants to live here until they’re too old to kill, anxiety still turns his belly. How he’ll learn to live with the risk, he doesn’t know, but he’ll figure it out.
A dog, a labrador, bumps its nose to Will’s leg and lets him pet it.
“Hey, buddy,” Will coos, scratching behind his ear. “Aren’t you sweet.”
They had a dog the first five years of their lives together. A sweet little dog that Will picked up off the side of the road; she was covered in mud and fleas and ants, and he cleaned her up, named her Lily, and she was perfect. She loved Hannibal more than him, although Hannibal always would say that wasn’t true, but she had an embroidered blanket at the end of the bed that she slept on every night and she never wanted to be on Will’s side.
The length of her life was the longest they have stayed anywhere, and when he found her dead in the yard, they moved. Will was so sure then that someone had killed her that he went a little crazy. Hannibal insisted that she died naturally, but Will has never accepted that.
Maybe they should get another dog, but this isn’t the kind of place that has many strays, and their shelters won’t let him adopt because of how small the yard is.
The dog runs off as his owner calls and Will sits up again. He means to tell Hannibal the middle-aged man that has that dog is recently divorced and works in finances, but the words never make it out of his mouth. Across from them, on the sidewalk next to the water, he sees the man. He’s still in his running clothes, tapping away on his phone, a pair of cordless earbuds pressed snugly into his ears. He’s standing almost parallel to them.
It’s bad form to stare, but he does so anyway, waiting as the man shifts his weight from foot to foot before pocketing his phone and running again. He must have run the full circle around the peninsula and come back for a second round, or maybe he’s just running around their neighborhood.
Anger pulls at him, the thoughts he just had about finding a way to deal with the risk fades, and Will turns his face into Hannibal. He breathes in the scent of his spiced cologne and then kisses his neck, chaste at first, and then he sucks the delicate flesh between his teeth.
Hannibal brushes him off, not upset in the slightest, but painfully aware of decorum. “Will—“
“That was it,” he whispers, “sorry, I had an itch I needed to scratch, sweetheart, don’t be mad.”
He can’t ever be mad when Will wants to lavish him with affection, no matter where it is. It would be worse than denying a piece of himself!
“Should we get something sweet to hold us over until our reservation?” Hannibal asks, his cheeks are flush.
“Not from the place we went yesterday. It isn’t open on Sunday.” Will stands and offers his hand to Hannibal, who takes it with ease. “But I’m sure we can find something.”
“If we walk too far, I’ll be inclined to go into the shops,” Hannibal tells him.
“I know.” He’s happy to be getting away from here and that kid. “But it’s a nice day so I don’t mind. It would be a waste to spend it inside.”
So, they spend their day window shopping, although Hannibal finds a few small antiques he simply can’t part with. Or, that’s what he tells Will who has to carry them. They only have to stop twice for Hannibal to rest. He doesn’t bring his cane because he thought he didn’t need it for their walk so long as Will is with him. This is usually the case, but they also usually go home after two or so hours.
They stop in a bakery a street over and get food and drinks. Will would have liked to bring his laptop to do some work, but he doesn’t say that, and instead he eats his sandwich and holds Hannibal’s hand, rubbing his thumb across his knuckles. Most of the people that come in are young women, with the occasion man and woman on a date — none of them ever match. This time, Will tells Hannibal what he thinks of different people, especially the young couples, and they bicker about whether Will has lost his touch (he hasn’t).
After, they end up poking through the record store and a few of the local bookshops. Things Will wants to do rather than Hannibal, but it kills time.
By the time they make it to the wine bar, they’ve spent hours in town and Hannibal is tired and needs the rest, even if he won’t admit it. Will has his arm tight around his waist, allowing him to rest against him without looking like he’s lagging behind. This isn’t something that has happened with age, and they don’t really talk about it, but rather it’s a weakness that developed in his leg because of their short stent in the ocean.
If they talk about it, then someone has to take the blame, and they’re not in the business of doing that currently.
“We have a reservation for Banks,” Will greets. The girl at the front checks her books and then nods.
She grabs two heavy menus for them. “This way.”
The bar is dim, a bit moody, with rod-iron and wood tables. Narrow, the way a lot of places here are, but they’re not sat scrunched up next to anyone, and most of the people here are closer to their age. There isn’t space for live music despite how much it would add to the atmosphere, but a piano plays over the hidden speakers, so Will forgives them for it. They have to do what they have to do, he guesses.
The walls aren’t warped from the dampness, and when he breathes in, he smells circulating air; stagnation has not rooted its claws here. This place isn’t trying to be anything else either, it isn’t presenting itself as the Southern edifice like so many places try to do. It’s small, intimate, and is giving exactly what it promises.
He sets their bags on the floor next to them, their feet and legs intertwining under the table instantly. The afternoon has warmed up, but it’s freezing inside, and he thinks about returning Hannibal’s scarf to him.
“Do you know what you want already?” Will asks, picking up the menu.
Hannibal scoffs, “You assume I know their menu.”
“You’ve been eyeing this place since we moved here.” Will hasn’t given this place much thought at all. “A bottle or two of red wine? French or Italian? Or one of each?”
Hannibal is coy. This is another one of the games they play, and they play it well. Hannibal pretends he doesn’t know what Will is talking about, fakes being flustered—which could lead to him actually being fluster later on, and Will makes his suggestions, which are really guesses. Sometimes he’s right, sometimes he’s wrong. He’s usually right because he knows his husband very well.
“They have a lovely selection of wines from France and Italy, and some rarer bottles.” Hannibal closes his menu without having actually looked. “I hardly know what we should get. There are so many options and ones I have never had the pleasure of trying.”
He scans the selection. There is an extensive list, much more than most places. “They have orange wine. You don’t like that very much—Spanish wine.”
“And beer if you would prefer.” Hannibal leans back in the chair. The slight twinge of pain has left his face, and he stretches his leg out. “They’re quite accommodating.”
“There’s no world where I’m drinking beer,” Will glibs, “not even if you brewed it.”
It’s never been to his taste, and he won’t start trying to make it so now.
“A bottle of the Chappelle Mission Haut-Brion. If you want Italian, we could do Marion or Istine.” Will looks at him, watching for any indication that he’s suggested correctly.
“We should get the duck prosciutto and taleggio, as well,” Hannibal decides.
At least one of his suggestions is correct then, probably the Chappelle Mission Haut-Brion, so he takes that little victory and continues.
“Foie Gras too,” Will smiles, “comté.”
Hannibal nods. “I’m glad we are in agreement.”
A young, but knowledgeable waitress comes over. She’s pretty, Will thinks, in all black except for her grey, pinstriped apron, and she’s aware of it. That doesn’t give her any form of immunity to his judgment, however, because he doesn’t care if she’s pretty or knowledgeable. She sets her hand on the back of Hannibal’s chair and talks mostly to him. It isn’t flirting, not in the literal sense, but it is aggravating.
They start with Chappelle Mission Haut-Brion, but Hannibal intends to give the rare selection another look before they go. Of their cheese and charcuterie, Hannibal orders significantly more than they agreed upon, but Will expects this and is happy for it because he’s hungry and there won’t be any dinner tonight.
“She is a nice girl,” Hannibal says when she goes to get their bottle.
Will stiffens his lip. “She wants a good tip.”
“And would you deny her that?” Hannibal tilts his head with a sly grin. “Out of jealousy.”
“I’m not jealous of her, she can’t be older than 25,” Will sneers.
He wants to say that Hannibal stopped entertaining flirtatious advances a long time ago. There was never any risk, he had no intention of pursuing the young men and women that flirted with him, he only liked to watch Will’s jealousy bloom. It was delicious, he would say, and far more satisfying than any meal. Will never agreed, it always made him feel filthy. That stopped seven years ago. He took it too far once, which was barely anything, but it was enough and Hannibal knew it as soon as he did it that Will wasn’t going to recover quickly.
“You’re not jealous of her because I have no desire for anyone but you,” Hannibal says like he’s arguing, but it’s clear that he’s thinking of that time too and means to soothe him.
The waitress comes back with their wine and pours them both a glass, and then she brings out the board.
They drink and eat, quieter than they ever are at home. They mean to eavesdrop of the other people here.
The wine smooths out worry, and Will, drunk enough to not watch every person that steps inside, runs the tip of his shoe across Hannibal’s ankle.
“Behave yourself,” Hannibal scolds.
“I am, I am.” Will sets his glass down and eats some. He’s floating. “This is good.”
“And you tried to convince me it wouldn’t be,” Hannibal sighs exasperatedly.
“No, I told you that we’d be too drunk to cook dinner,” Will corrects. He refills Hannibal’s glass and means to do his own, but he decides to pace himself. “And I’m right.”
Hannibal sits up straight. Oh, Will thinks pleasantly, he’s drunk too. “I can still cook dinner.”
“Just because you can, it doesn’t mean that you should.” Will has a piece of cheese. “I’ll have to order a pizza, I guess.”
Hannibal ducks his head back in genuine disbelief. He can’t be drunk and angry, it’s simply not possible, but he can be personally offended. “Don’t you dare.”
“My husband is too drunk to make my dinner, I don’t know what else to do.” Will shakes his head. “Pizza sounds good.”
Hannibal taps the stem of his wine glass, thinking. If Will asks what he’s thinking about, he knows that the answer will be his demise. “I can make pizza, Will.”
“Not greasy the way it should be.” Will has another piece of cheese as he leans back in the chair. He can’t fight the grin on his face and he doesn’t try. Hannibal is all but trembling at the mere suggestion that Will might order a pizza.
The young man doesn’t walk by, or Will thinks that. He’s too happy pestering Hannibal to really notice.
The walk home is short, and Will can feel the alcohol buzzing through his head, the sweet numbness of it warms him, and everything bad goes away. He touches Hannibal’s side as they come up the front steps, and once they’re inside, he pulls him against him.
“Not here,” Hannibal breathes out. “Upstairs.”
Will lets him go and follows him dutifully to the bedroom. He didn’t really think they’d fuck in the living room, Hannibal only ever likes to be pleasured in the bed if he’s drunk, and Will honestly feels the same way.
Sex, regardless of sobriety, is not meant to be something he does for his pleasure alone. If he wanted to get off, he would touch himself in his own time, but he wants to be with Hannibal. Being with him, as closely as Will wants to be, can never work if they’re fucking on the couch or the floor. (That isn’t to say they never do fuck in such locations, only that right now, he’s too needy for that to satisfy him.)
He’s careful with Hannibal’s clothes when they make it by the bed, no matter how desperate he is, he never pops buttons or tears seams. He undresses him with efficiency, rubbing his hands over his body like it’s the first time he’s touched him and when they’re both naked, he kisses him, holding him by the neck as his tongue pushes into his mouth. Their bodies are slotted together, Hannibal holds Will’s sides, and moans sweetly into his mouth. He lets him go, and Hannibal eases onto the bed.
“You’ll do whatever I want?” Hannibal murmurs, sliding down on the silk sheets until they’ve engulfed him.
Like this, Hannibal is perfect. Will’s chest warms with excitement and adoration and he wants so badly to rest between his parted thighs and kiss and touch him until he’s found his pleasure through that. Another time, he decides, when he’s sober enough to appreciate it.
Will nods as he takes the lube out. “Always.”
He rests beside him, kissing Hannibal and touching him until his breath hitches and doing anything but being inside of him is painful. Will rubs his cock and takes Hannibal by the hip, both of their bodies sliding until they’re flush, Hannibal’s weight falls against him as Will pushes as deep as he can go.
One of his arms rests under Hannibal’s head, the other rubs over his hip and belly as if to comfort him. He kisses his shoulder and neck the way he knows he likes, with teeth and then tongue to soothe the forming bruises. He moves slowly, shivering at the warmth of Hannibal’s body around him.
Hannibal writhes and moans, but he doesn’t try to squirm out of Will’s embrace.
“Do you want me to touch you?” Will breathes against his ear.
“Yes,” Hannibal mewls. “Firm, but slow. I want to be suspended here.”
Will does as he’s told, wrapping his hand around Hannibal’s flush cock. He twitches in his hand, droplets of fluid beading on the head and then dripping down. Will keeps kissing his neck, his own orgasm is building, but it’s the least of his concerns. Each roll of his hips, each weak sound Hannibal makes, is all his mind can focus on.
“Harder,” Hannibal cries.
Will cants his hips, bettering the angle, and thrusts a little harder. Hannibal’s breathing is uneven, and he holds Will's wrist but doesn’t try to stop him.
“Like this?” he whispers, nosing over his jaw and leaving tender kisses against his skin.
“Yes, perfect,” Hannibal shivers, “don’t stop. If you finish, don’t stop.”
The pressure in Will’s belly constricts. He presses his face into Hannibal’s neck, and when Hannibal tenses, swallowing a tightness in his throat, and comes, Will lets go and grinds against him, rubbing Hannibal through both of their orgasms.
After, Will doesn’t move. He holds him until his cock softens, and only then does Hannibal squirm to lay on his back. Will rests his head on his husband’s chest, letting him run his fingers through his curls. The thudding of his heart soothes something that always seems to ache in Will and he curls against him and whimpers.
“Try to sleep,” Hannibal directs in a gentle voice.
Will listens. His body is light, an internal part of him is undulating, and he is lulled by Hannibal’s breathing.
Monday, he grades tests all day and Tuesday, he teaches class online. Most of his classes are online, which his students prefer and Will does too, so as to lessen the chances that anyone recognizes him.
Wednesday is grocery day. The weekends are always too busy and everyone else thinks they’ll beat the rush if they go Monday. They shop together; Hannibal has succeeded in fostering codependency between them. Will might be the kind that gets cabin fever, but he doesn’t want to be apart for too long, and he likes to add things to the buggy that irritates Hannibal. Another one of those qualities Hannibal calls intrinsic. His devotion — and his need to irritate him. As if Hannibal isn't the same.
He hasn’t seen the man again, not that he’s been out of the house much except to sit in his office at the university so he can teach—the internet company promises they’ll have it all sorted by Friday, which Will is certain is a lie—but he starts to relax. He swore he would see him when they went to the store, but he wasn’t there. He hasn’t run by the house either. Will has been watching to make sure.
Maybe it is time to accept that they’re never going to be caught. If the FBI knew where they were, especially after the amount of dodging they’ve done, they wouldn’t send some fresh agent out to stalk them first. Their routine is too easy, they’d just come kick the door down one afternoon and arrest them. Too many years with the police and then the FBI, he thinks, it’s changed his outlook on life, it’s made him too cautious.
All he wants is to be here with Hannibal. To go to moody, romantic wine bars and walk down busy streets and lounge in bed until late afternoon. He hates that he has to watch everyone, that he thinks he’s being paranoid, and still can’t stop himself.
“There’s a temporary farmer’s market up the road,” Will says as he comes in from his office hours Thursday afternoon. “I saw a sign for it if you want to go.”
Hannibal looks up from his sketching. “Should I change?”
“I think a coat is good enough,” Will tells him. “It’s casual, and it’s not hot at all today.”
Hannibal gets up and changes anyway, and then comes out with his coat and scarf.
They drive down. Will lets Hannibal out on the sidewalk, anxiety tingling up his spine, but he needs to park the car and he doesn’t want to keep Hannibal from getting what he wants here. It’s only open for another hour.
“Here.” He passes him his cane. “I’m going to park, I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
Parking is atrocious, worse today than it’s been in weeks. Everyone with a car must be on this side of town right now, but he manages to find a spot, maybe the worse one imaginable, and walks the long way through the park, under the box of trees that borders the usually empty middle, his hands in his pockets as he locates his husband.
Hannibal is in conversation with someone at one of the booths. A man about his age, and they’re discussing the ramifications of producing fruit and vegetables out of season.
“Yeah,” the man’s accent drawls. Will’s tongue is heavy as he listens to it, usually he doesn’t feel the need to slip into the accent he used to have, but it’s always there. That’s the real reason Hannibal wants to live here, so that Will might return to his roots. “Nothing’s as sweet when it’s forced to grow, you know what I mean?”
“I do.” Hannibal already has two large heads of broccoli in their basket and more beets than Will cares to count. “We are lucky for the farmer’s market.”
Will places his hand on the small of his back. “Did you find what you were looking for?” he asks, careful to keep his accent neutral.
Hannibal turns into him slightly. “I have.”
They bid the man farewell and continue around the market, the basket passed to Will, and Hannibal chirping along with the people at each stand.
Will watches him, pleased that Hannibal is having a nice time. He figured he would. It’s good for him to associate with people outside of Will, he isn’t built for lonesomeness.
They end up with a random assortment of locally grown fruits and vegetables, but so much that Will wonders how they’re going to get through some of it without it rotting. They don’t have dinner parties, at least, they haven’t in a few years. Too much moving. It’ll be up to Hannibal to figure it out, but he trusts that he will. There will be squash in things it doesn’t make sense for squash to be in before it’s over.
When they get home, Will carries the basket into the house and sets it on the kitchen island. Hannibal needs to clean and categorize everything without him interfering, so Will kisses his cheek and decides to go out back. There’s a little work he still needs to do, so right now is as good a time as any. He does change first, Hannibal hates when he works in what he considers his nicer thoughts—not that he ever does! Yet, he always complains.
He rakes up leaves from the trees that lean over their back fence and starts to map out where they’ll put the garden. There isn’t much room, but they’ll make do. Will can make vertical plant stands if he has to, ugly as they’ll be, and figure out how to hide them to fit Hannibal’s aesthetic. Hannibal prefers the freshest produce, and a part of his desire to create includes growing and harvesting what he can.
The afternoon sun becomes oppressive around 4 PM. His shirt collar clings to his skin, and his hair sticks to his neck to the point that it starts to itch. Will comes inside through the back, in need of water and a few minutes in the AC.
The house is quiet. No music, no television, and no sounds of Hannibal in the kitchen or on his tablet. He glances around, although he can’t see far from the mud room, just out the door, and it looks like the hall light is off now. The hairs on his arm stand and his heart skips a beat, forcing him to cough. He means to take his boots off by the door, but he finds himself listening for any sign of life instead.
“Hannibal?” His tone is steady, only curious.
“Will,” Hannibal calls back, like a command.
He starts toward the kitchen immediately, his voice enough to drag Will from any place, any point. His body thrums, the beat of his heart loud enough to drown out everything else, and takes his gun from his hip as he stalks toward the kitchen, hackles raised.
Hannibal stands with that young man. His position is casual, leaning against the counter, but the kid has a gun in his hands, raised toward him. Will moves slowly, side stepping around until he can put space between Hannibal and the intruder. He hasn’t shot because he doesn’t want them dead — dead isn’t as good, not for whatever he wants to do.
“Were you worried?” Will means to look back, to smile a little at Hannibal, but he refuses to take his eyes off of this kid.
“I knew you would be back inside soon,” Hannibal answers, as calm as ever.
What if he didn’t come in though, he wants to ask. What if he stayed outside? How long would this kid stand here and wait? Hannibal can defend himself, that much Will knows, but he isn’t as fast anymore, not with that leg. What if he couldn’t disarm him fast enough?
His mind works fast, trying to figure out the best course of action. Obviously, this man has to die. They’re not usually the type to take hostages, it isn’t to Will’s taste, and he knows too much. If he ever escaped, he’d sing like a canary. He’ll have to disarm him, or shoot him, but shooting him means he’ll get shot too, or Hannibal, and that isn’t a risk he’s willing to take right now.
“This is how it’s going to go,” the man starts, his dark eyes wide, frightened, but beneath that is excitement.
Either he is the first person to ever find them, which Will isn’t sure he believes now that he has this confirmation, or he’s the first person to have the guts to confront them. His thin, lopsided mouth is pulled back in a snarl that Will returns. He wants to appear bigger, scarier, but he’s so young.
“The FBI doesn’t know you’re here.” The man takes a step and Will mirrors him. He doesn’t give him the chance to point the gun at Hannibal again.
“I saw you two weekends ago,” he says. “No one would believe me if I said you were here. Why wouldn’t you be somewhere else, somewhere far away? But I saw you and I knew who you were.”
Will sighs, smiling a little, “So that’s what this is.”
He must have just graduated from the Academy, and he’s already looking to make a name for himself. They would be a good way to do that, but singular glory is never the way to go about things like this. Not unless you’re someone like Jack Crawford. If he was smart, which he isn’t, he would have invited one or two of his friends to participate in this grand achievement. Not that it would have helped them, of course, but it would have at least evened out the playing field.
“Does that feel like a skin you can fit in?” Will asks, careful to keep his voice teetering around sympathetic. He finds that it helps to mentally disarm people. “Did you consider the consequences of doing this? This isn’t a game.”
There is no leaving this place, although he knows this kid thinks he can in some way. Hannibal is watching them intently, Will can feel his heavy gaze on his back as he talks to him, intent on keeping his attention away from Hannibal altogether. While they’re a partnership, he knows well enough that Hannibal is the prize, too many people believe Will is some victim without agency for this new agent to get any real valor out of it.
“They have your picture up,” the man laughs in disgusted amazement, “they say you saved hundreds of lives and that he took you, but I saw you, I’ve watched the way you interact. It’s almost like you love him.”
Will wets his lips. “Let me teach you a good lesson, one I taught my students—your biases about the people you’re trained to catch will kill you. You’ve made an assumption about us, and that assumption has made you stupid.”
“He’s lean,” Hannibal comments. It sounds like he’s cutting vegetables behind him. “He will need to be tenderized.”
“I know. They want them to be lean. It makes for fast on their feet.” The gun in the man’s hand is held too tightly. The excitement has started to drain from his face, and he’s starting to realize the situation he’s put himself in. “At least there won’t be too much fat to trim off.”
“None of him will go to waste,” Hannibal agrees.
“I’m not scared of you,” he grits out. His eyes are glassy, his lip trembles. “You’re going to come with me.”
Will tilts his head. “Your voice is shaking.”
The knife hits the cutting board again. “Don’t scare him too much, Will, his heart will be bitter.”
“I have faith you can make it delicious anyway,” he retorts. Then, he looks the young man over and sighs, “It’s unfortunate, I would have made sure you were kicked from the program before this ever happened.”
Will moves first, a sudden burst that knocks the man off center. He grabs him by the wrist and jerks his arm down, the gun goes off, and Will slams him back against the counter so hard he hears the air leaves his lung. The gun skitters across the floor and Will takes him by the hair and shoved him down against the countertop. His skull cracks across the marble. Blood gushes out in hot, thick spirts before a slow stream starts, and he seizes.
“He ruined the floor,” Hannibal sucks his teeth, stepping from behind Will so he can observe the man. “And you made a mess.”
“It was the floor or the ceiling, I can fix the floor easier,” Will huffs, “and it’s just a little blood.”
The man stops moving after about thirty second, all of his muscles tense, and Will steps away and watches his body slump down.
“Do you want to move again?” Hannibal asks before anything else. “I can pack us up tonight.”
For a few moments, he truly considers it. His body aches to run away from this, to find safety elsewhere, but they already decided that they are going to stay here. There’s no point in going back on his word now, not after he’s gotten rid of the problem.
“I don’t think he told them where he was going. He wanted all the glory for himself,” Will spits. “We’re… safe.”
“Pride can be a fate worse than death.” Hannibal touches Will’s shoulder, rubbing gently until the muscles begin to relax.
“Or lead you to it.” He leans back until his shoulder presses against Hannibal. “They have a picture of me at the FBI.”
Hannibal kisses his cheek and then his lips. He touches under Will’s chin so he has to look at him. “You were one of the best. It would be a waste to forget all that you did for them.”
“They’re using me as a cautionary tale.” Will moves away and hauls the body up. He needs to take it into the freezer before decomposition sets in. No point in wasting perfectly good meat.
Hannibal steps back over to where he’s started dinner. “I’m going to clean the blood and then finish dinner. Would you grab a bottle of merlot? And one of the nice whiskey bottles?”
It’s lucky Jack’s retired, Will thinks, he couldn’t afford to lose another person to Hannibal, not mentally. The light weight of the body pushes on his bad shoulder. It makes the nerves tingle, but he doesn’t switch sides. Occasionally, he likes to feel the pain, it reminds him that all of this is real and that he’s where he wants to be.
He takes the body into the wine room. He drops him to the center of the floor where the drain is and lets him bleed the rest of the way out before moving him to the freezer. He strips him completely naked and hooks him up; he swings back and forth for a second before he stills. There’s no way he could have predicted what would happen today — he thought he was going to get recognition and instead, he’ll be meat on their table, one that neither of them can name.
Outside of the freezer, Will bags up the man’s clothes and personal things, and then strips out of his bloodied shirt and stuffs it in the bag as well. They’ll burn them later; he’ll go out fishing or hunting and burn it until there’s nothing but ashes left. He’ll be nothing, with no legacy, but no one will know he died a fools death either. He picks a bottle of wine and whiskey, just as Hannibal asked, and brings them out. He needs to find something to wear, but he comes into the kitchen.
The rich aroma of steak fills his nose. Hannibal stands at the stove, more at peace than he has ever seen him.
This did something. Fixed something, maybe, or confirmed it. How long has Hannibal wondered what Will would do if his fears were true? Did he think he would fold? Did he assume he always wanted to run because he was scared his fickleness might return? He must have. Perhaps not in a real way, but the same way that Will feels insecure when people flirt with Hannibal. So, it doesn’t matter if it’s a real fear, tied to any semblance of logic, it matters that he felt it and that it’s gone now.
Will sets the bottles down and comes up behind Hannibal, placing his hands on his hips and kissing his cheek.
“You’re a clever boy,” Hannibal praises. He sets his hand atop of one of Will’s and squeezes it. “You always do what I need you to.”
Will doesn’t feel as if he’s rotting right now. He feels soft, ripe, and loved. Sometimes small acts are enough to settle all the bad emotions in either of them. He rubs his face against his neck, eyes scrunched closed, and clings to Hannibal. Somebody might try to take him again, but he knows he won’t let them. He knows they can stay here, whether the panicked part of his mind insists they go, they don’t have to always run.
Will swallows, tears burn in his eyes. He’s trembling.