Chapter Text
“Does your wife know what I was to you, Will?”
“No.”
“Do you have any plans to tell her?”
“None at all.”
“So I am to remain the ‘skeleton in your closet’ per se?”
“Oh Molly knows what you did to me. That’s out in the open. Has been since a little while after we got together.”
“That’s not what I’m asking. You’re avoiding the actual question.”
“...”
“Answer the question, Will.”
“You know the answer, Hannibal.”
“I wouldn’t ask the question if I knew the answer.”
“Yes you would.”
“Are you going to keep what we were a secret forever? It’s been three years. It must be eating at you.”
“Three years ago I was being conditioned and had an untreated medical problem. I’m... in a much better place now.”
“You faltered, Will.”
“You’re pointing out useless observations, Hannibal.”
“Let me ask another question, then. Three years ago, would you have followed anywhere I led?”
“Yes. You know that.”
“Then why didn’t you?”
“I did. It just took me a few weeks of recovery to catch up. You stabbed me in the stomach, if you recall.”
“I was under the impression that real friends stab you in the front. But I guess real lovers can do both.”
“Don’t say that. That’s not what we were.”
“Wasn’t it? I was inside you, you were inside me, mind, body, and soul. That sounds like a lover to me.”
“...”
“Did you ever love me, Will?”
“You know the answer to that, Hannibal.”
“Say it anyway.”
“Yes.”
“As I did you. But you turned on me.”
“I was confused.”
“Confused? Telling Jack the entire plan is your idea of confusion?”
“I told you to run. To go without me.”
“I never would have done that.”
“I would have followed you.”
“Would you have? Truly?”
“Yes. I would’ve followed you to the depths of Hell. You know that.”
“I suppose I did, once.”
“Don’t look like that. It’s unflattering. Any more questions? I think my time is almost up. Alana doesn’t want me around you, for both our benefits.”
“Could you love me again? If I ever got out of here, could you love me again?”
“...”
“Could you?”
“I don’t know, Hannibal. But I don’t think we’ll have the chance to find out.”