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“Forgive the dust. It has been quite some time since I’ve been able to return to this property and I never properly covered the furniture before leaving.”
—
Will wandered the halls of Hannibal’s cliffside house, waiting for Dollarhyde to come to them. Hannibal, ever the cheeky gentleman, followed him from room to room explaining its function, its decor, etc, as if Will had ever asked him to do such a thing. Was the man fucking trying to distract him or something?
Well, he could use a distraction. Singing bird automaton boxes, a Claude glass, an articulated iguana skeleton. Will’s various thoughts and feelings chafed at him so he set himself the task of interacting with all the different objects and furnishings he encountered to offer a small amount of distance from the scene they had found themselves in.
Still, he found ways to ruminate. Will’s life—he wasn’t sure if there was anything left to salvage. He wasn’t a good person (—though what is “Good” anyways he tried to reassure himself—) his wife was just out of the ICU and his stepson wanted nothing to do with the insane man the yellow journalists painted him as. He never should have let Jack Crawford rope him back into the field. He never should have come back.
This insanity, this plan he “developed”, what did he think it was going to solve? Was it even really a plan at this stage?
Dollarhyde was going to die, that much was certain. The man did almost murder his family, had murdered plenty of innocent families, and so he would die through a wave of righteous violence.
The rest he had no idea. The FBI was ready to kill Hannibal if the need arose. Will wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He wanted Hannibal Lecter dead, but only by his hand. At the same time, he wanted and needed the man very much alive. He knew there would be an unbearable hole in his universe if the other man were truly dead and gone.
It was like he was setting up the pieces and just watching how they might fall to make any further decisions. It all felt very touch and go.
And what would become of him? Will would have to see. He was trying to live in the moment. Not see this as enacting self-destructive revenge or one last hurrah. As if there was any other inevitable conclusion.
—
Hannibal knew something was wrong. Will was distraught and while Will’s suffering was always a beautiful thing to witness, he seemed resigned, finished. Hannibal wanted so badly to cradle the man’s mind in his hands and assess the damage, how deep it went. Instead he reached for the coping tool he knew Will loved—avoidance. While it was not one he wanted to encourage, the man seemed reluctant to voice his concerns and Hannibal was only using it as a short term solution while he tried to reevaluate the situation.
Hannibal watched him play with each object behind amused eyes, until Will found himself in front of a locked door. Will suddenly stopped beside it. “Abigail‘s room was here.”
Hannibal’s gaze bore into him. “Yes.” He didn’t ask him how Will knew. While Will probably had developed his own internal scenario about how this room was chosen for Abigail, his imagination wasn’t so much needed as an understanding of floor planning.
“It’s—it’s unchanged?”
“Yes.”
Will stared at the door for a moment longer before he started walking towards the next room.
Hannibal put his hand on the other man’s shoulder, slowing him. Hannibal’s head tilted towards the door like he was pointing to it, his eyes still seeking Will. “Do you think it would be therapeutic for you to see her room?”
Will offered a low chuckle that suffocated under the weight of its own disheartenment. “You’re a real fucking bastard sometimes, you know that?”
His eyes panned from the floor, the doorway and eventually to the other man’s face. Hannibal didn’t interrupt him as Will found his words. “Do you think it would be therapeutic for you to see her room? I can wait outside.”
Hannibal knew it was typical Will Graham deflection but also a genuine offer to let the man revisit the home he shared with their shared daughter-in-spirit. This was probably the first time Hannibal had ever returned here since he took Abigail back to his home in Baltimore and gutted the girl right in front of Will’s eyes.
“Therapeutic, no. I’ve taken my time processing our hands in her death and her role in my life. And while she no longer lives, my memory of her remains.” He noticed Will didn’t argue the role he played in her death. “The most powerful thing I had at my disposal at BSHCI was my mind,” continued Hannibal “and if I were to return yet again, never again to step foot in that room right here, I would remain content in my understandings of its surrounding history. However, I admit that I am keen to pilfer a few mementos before I get going wherever the road takes me.”
Will finally entered back into the conversation. “You gonna stuff a photograph or something up your ass in case you’re sent back to BSHCI?”
Hannibal just stared at him, half appalled, yet oh so mildly amused at finally prompting the outburst. To be fair, the other man looked incredibly sheepish the moment the words left his mouth. “It’s what I would have thought to do,” Will then offered with a shrug, albeit with no other apology or explanation.
“I’ve found my brain a much better deposit for such mementos. And, god forbid, Chilton, if he were in such a state to care, would have a field day if he found I had such a picture of a young girl inside my ass.”
The tension of the moment released, through Hannibal’s profanity, Will offered a genuine chuckle at the image as Hannibal tsked in an artifice of annoyance.
“I’ll come in with you.”
—
Will knew he saw too much. He had stared at many crime scenes but there was something too intimate about staring at someone else’s bedroom. He wasn’t sure why he agreed to come in. Perhaps it was for some sort of closure.
The room was a redecorated secondary or guest bedroom. It was nice, but for Hannibal’s house all the esoteric styling pieces were rather hidden or dialed down. He supposed it had been stripped back so someone else could contribute to the room. The wallpaper was some sort of Japanese foliage design, the deepest green with bits of purple flowers coquettishly peeking out just behind the vines. The bed was largely made but the covers had been slightly shifted by an open suitcase on top, wheels shifted to be off the bed.
Hannibal stared at the suitcase for a moment before he grabbed an opened luggage rack from the corner, slightly taller than the kind they keep in hotel rooms, and put the bag on top of it. There was a slight perceptible difference in the color of the quilt from the lack of dust where the bag had once been, causing the often stoic man to wriggle his nose in a manner Will found adorable. He finally went into what must have been a linen closet and laid down a folded sheet atop the bedspread before he finally sat down beside it, pulling out various items and laying them on top of the fabric.
“If a house of mine is going to be a crime scene yet again, I’d rather take some things with me while I can. I am loathe to let the government seize some more personal items.”
“You seem so sure it’s going to be declared a crime scene.”
Hannibal looked up and regarded the other man’s choice of words.
“No, but you have a tendency of bringing crime scenes to my home. I feel some elements of whatever you planned have gone awry. It is much better to know the territory in which you must conduct battle.“
While it was said with a degree of humor the man made both the possibility of civil/criminal forfeiture and the sudden deadly change in their Dollarhyde ‘situation’ seem utterly pedestrian. How he’d toss away money and objects and properties so easily was something Will could never comprehend. He’d have thrown it away to be with Will and threw it away because he couldn’t have Will. He guessed it wasn’t as big of a deal he was making it out to be; It seemed the man always somehow still had more money secreted away. It seemed almost reckless at times and yet the man still had a few items he did not want to fall into other hands.
“I must note you haven’t tried to dissuade me from taking anything with me. Is ‘Hannibal the Cannibal’ going to succeed in his disappearance?”
Will turned away. This was the man who tried to kill his family, he reminded himself. He chose to caress the heavy velvet curtains covering a side of the room from floor to ceiling. He wasn’t sure how one would even go about cleaning these. It hid an alcove window that spanned the entire wall. “Investigators found a suitcase filled with a young woman’s clothes at your house after they declared it a crime scene. Why didn’t you bring this one?”
The room was a capsule of a singular moment in time. The suitcase, half packed, lay open, mostly stuffed with various items and only a little clothing. Will could see the abruptness Hannibal brought her back to his Baltimore home, not bothering to take everything. Short notice. Perhaps that was Hannibal’s design for her. Because Will betrayed him he didn’t let her finish packing, bringing her straight to her doom. At the same time, it didn’t fully line up with the evidence after the fact.
“I put her in charge of the bag but I was going to finish it. There was still time to change your mind about leaving early.”
But I already knew I had been betrayed.
“I have enough money to check multiple bags, Will. I just thought they weren’t as necessary. They’re more heartfelt things.”
It clicked. Hannibal didn’t ever bring it because he was heartbroken. He was trying to leave those memories behind.
Hannibal kept rifling through the suitcase, passing up knickknacks wrapped in tissue or bubble wrap.
There was no en-suite off to the side. Will was hoping to see the soaps and other toiletries. He wanted to know if they were mostly Hannibal’s or Abigail’s. He wanted to know how the preferences of a middle aged bon vivant might combine with an outdoorsy teenage girl. Would the soaps have all been from Hannibal’s collection? Something told him the other man had special soap just for guests like they do at hotels. Were the soaps something so generically “Mall of America,” from the back of a Bath and Body Works? Perhaps he was mischaracterizing what Abigail would lean to. Garret Jacob Hobbs seems like he would make his own bar soap with lye and ‘animal’ fat, but he thought Abigail would have wanted something closer to what her peers would use. He may have been her legal guardian but Hannibal had spent much more time with her inhabiting his space.
The thought flashed through Will’s mind that he’s not sure what he would use if he lived with Hannibal. If he had lived with Hannibal, Will corrected. He quickly pushed those thoughts aside and turned his attention elsewhere in the room.
He found himself wandering closer to Abigail’s desk. There was a set of Copic brand markers and a collection of drawings that through a closer inspection revealed recreations of several of Goya’s Black Paintings. It seemed Hannibal’s artistic side had rubbed off on her.
He opened one of the markers and tested it on a blank sheet. It still seemed to work. “You know, it’s funny. The reason I did this, this investigation to find the Great Red Dragon, was to protect families. Protect families like my wife and child. It didn’t turn out very successful. In the process, it ends up with someone siccing the man on my own family. And now, through a cockamamie plan now torn to pieces, I find myself here, back to the beginning. Staring at the remnants of a family that could have been.
“I think I’m not meant for family. I just can’t keep them…whole. They’d be better off without me.” He was rambling now. Shut up shut up shut up before you get too deep. Before you say too much.
“There’s a danger we let our insecurities blind us to how important we are in others’ lives.” Hannibal looked up from his spot. “I found them.”
He pulled out a bright blue crochet hat and another purple from underneath it. It had been so long but Will recognized them immediately.
—
Will had purchased it while the two of them had stopped by an open air market when stuck in a little artist colony town for a case. Hannibal kept it in his little home by the sea where he kept Abigail, sometimes wearing it with her as they went for walks along the beach. There was a silly little face embroidered in it, the inside of its mouth slightly sunken into the surface giving a wry, knowing grin. This was sometime after the death of Tobias and they were all feeling incredibly sentimental towards each other. They passed by the different vendors hawking their wares and stopped at this one, looking at the odd hats.
Will was in a fairly good mood. Almost chipper, if such a thing were possible. For once he was largely unaffected by the crime scene. There was a lack of passion, drive. Only efficiency and a small amount of compassion to limit the victim’s suffering. The man was killed in his sleep, swiftly, his index finger removed after the fact. He told Jack it was the work of an assassin and the person who hired him needed the victim’s biometric data, or wanted to prevent its access. Perhaps it was to access a safe or important documents.
"Caps for sale," Will had muttered. Hannibal gave very little indication he recognized the children’s book reference and seemed to take it as an indication Will wanted to look at the wares closer without directly saying such.
Hannibal pulled up to the hats to inspect them while Will watched him. They were interesting, colorful creations. Dogs and cats and little faces and haphazardly playful designs.
"They are cute hats, very animated," Will eventually mused to the creator.
The woman and Will continued their conversation, Will managing to make barely any eye contact by constantly looking at the different hats.
"Is this alpaca?" Hannibal finally asked in a small lull in the conversation.
He held a sapphire colored hat that he thought complemented Will’s eyes but also Hannibal’s own skin tone. Despite its cartoonish countenance, it reminded him of the prickly, dry humored man and he wondered if he could get Will to wear it.
“Yes, it is," the woman hummed happily. "Right on the money. I spent a long time trying to find yarn that I liked. I know my designs are a bit strange but I wanted my creatures to bring comfort and warmth to the people who want them.” She pointed out some other hats she made with different yarns, like merino wool also on the table.
Beneath his own hat Will smirked at their ongoing conversation. Of course Hannibal knew what type of fabric and yarn was being used in any one piece of clothing by touch. If it didn’t bring on unwanted associations he wasn’t ready to tread, he’d love to blindfold the man and scrounge through his wardrobe, quizzing him on the materials by touch alone. Will asked him once about the often garish fabrics he used and the man had replied that he mostly knew and appreciated natural fibers and while he didn’t avoid them, he did not always appreciate synthetics. There were good ones he found; Hannibal preferred the fabrics engineered to be breathable and flexible or stain-resistant to accommodate his various hobbies. Hannibal Lecter was not just particular about what he put in his body but what he put on his body.
Hannibal gave a polite smile. "I thought it was. I've always appreciated crochet and wanted a crocheted hat for myself but most all the hats I've found made in recent years were made from acrylic." His face stretched into a thin lipped smile which made Will wonder what grave sin acrylic yarn had committed against him and/or fashion.
"I'm surprised you never learned how to crochet yourself to correct this error, Dr. Lecter."
"I know I could never devote as much time as I'd like to such a craft. There are much better artisans on hand than I who can do much better. I don't make my own suits."
The woman smiled at their exchange, clearly as enamored with their banter as they were.
"Anyways, crochet is very unique. Because of the crochet hooks and steps involved, crochet cannot be properly replicated by a machine like knitting can. Only a facsimile is produced. Making it an extremely desirable skill as an artist." He had his posture slightly towards Will and while Will found Hannibal harder to read than most it seemed he was trying to give the woman the opportunity to join in or provide corrections to Will’s meager crochet education, and not seem like he was lecturing her . Once Will told him his lengthy monologues to a woman on topics she knew more about could come across as mansplaining, to Hannibal’s disguised horror. It hadn’t been a problem since.
They kept chatting, about crochet and places in town they should check out. Hannibal held the blue hat for quite a long time, trying to hatch a scheme to get Will to try it on and then purchase it for him. He couldn’t think of one that wasn’t blatantly obvious so he flattened it smooth and placed it back on the table. He’d have to ask the woman if she’d make him a hat that would go with his classic men’s wear.
Will smiled and turned to the woman and asked her how much the hats were.
"Oh, you're interested in adopting a hat?"
"Sorry?"
"Oh, that's what I call it when people want to bring one of my pieces home. I try to make them all special. The pieces all have names but you're free to rename them if you want."
"They have names?" Hannibal asked, slightly amused and choosing to show it. His eyes caught her whimsical sign Lisa’s Lovelies.
"Yes," she said, turning to the one Will was holding. When Hannibal’s back had turned he somehow got hold of the one hat. "That one's name is Will."
"I beg your pardon?" Neither of them were sure they heard that correctly.
"I named the hat Will," she repeated.
"You'll have to forgive my companion," Hannibal stepped in. "He was just surprised because that is also his name."
"I suppose it is a common name," she giggled. "I had no idea I was talking with a Will."
Will blinked and then laughed. "Well, that settles it. Looks like I'll have to get you the hat then so you'll never have to be without a Will."
Hannibal tried to beg him off from buying the hat ever so slightly, trying to imply it was not in his style without insulting the creator’s work, but the man was so determined to purchase the hat that he relented. He had wanted it for Will. It was not something Hannibal would normally wear but it was one of his first gifts from Will and the man obviously wanted to give him it. After all, when there's a Will, there's a way.
The idea of Will getting him the hat quickly grew on him. Will was claiming possession over him, marking Hannibal as his with a little hat.
As Will was pulling out his wallet he decided to throw in another hat, for Abigail, he specified. He asked Hannibal for help and the two settled for a bemused purple one that matched her pale complexion and had stripes of herringbone detailing. Hannibal noticed the woman gave him a lower price than what was marked as she smiled and chatted at the two. Friends and family discount, she said, when prompted.
They kept up their friendly conversation; It was obvious to Hannibal that she thought the two were a couple visiting the seafront town and Hannibal did nothing to dissuade her of this notion.
“So what brings you to the artist colony?" she asked, taking a sip of her apple cider. Hannibal would have to make Will a mulled drink someday. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed Will put a large cash tip under the iPad she used to ring him up.
"We're here with the FBI to assist with an ongoing murder investigation,'' Will replied. There was an ungainly long silence before he took pity on the woman and resumed speaking. "We have some free time at the moment so we're just checking out the town and getting lunch."
"We just wanted to see a bit of what the town has to offer while we could." Hannibal said smiling. “Despite the circumstances it is nice to have the opportunity to do something outside of work.”
“Like you need to be here! You have a practice back home you could attend to yet you’re slumming it with us!”
“First off, you don’t need to be here either. Your mental health would take a turn for the better if you kept teaching as you preferred. Secondly, it is not slumming. It is fascinating to see you work and I care that you maintain your mental health.”
“You are not helping your argument that you’re not slumming.”
The woman laughed at them pleasantly, seeing the image of an old squabbling couple. A pleasant smile shown in Hannibal Lecter’s eyes.
As they said their goodbyes Hannibal begged off for a moment. He said he’d follow Will momentarily. When they met up only ten minutes later they continued around the booths of the market, supplying color commentary to each other about all the different wares. What they liked and didn’t like. The day ended with them out by the edge of the water overlooking the market, sharing miniature pies and talking over the universe.
—
Will blinked to awareness. When he came to, he was sitting on the bed to look closer at the items. “You held onto the hat?” Not only that, Hannibal wanted to keep the hat? Both his and Abigail’s hat?
“It was a gift.”
“I thought you graciously accepted it and put it in the dearest trash receptacle.”
“I could never throw away a gift from you. It was named after you. I’m afraid I couldn’t just get rid of it. Also, Lisa has been incredibly sweet to me and I’d hate to do it to her work now.
“The woman who made the hats?” Will hadn’t remembered her name.
Hannibal nodded. “We stayed in contact and I commissioned her to create a new hat for me.”
“One more to your tastes?”
“You could say that.” He pulled aside a small box with brown paper packaging and pops his “Will” hat inside out to inspect it. Will isn’t positioned as close but he notices some shed blonde hair along the interior.
“Did you ever wear it?” Will finds himself saying. “The one I bought?”
Hannibal smiles. “I always wanted a crochet hat. It’s definitely useful for walks along the beach with a daughter, keeping out the chill and the sharp spray. It’s a bit casual for my other outings.”
“What about the other hat? The one you commissioned.”
Hannibal’s mouth falls a bit from behind his mask. “Unfortunately it was never worn.” He readjusts his face to a small smile again, looking up at Will and places the wrapped package in the other man’s lap. Will just stared at it, trying to decide if Hannibal was saying what he thought he was. His fingers itched to open it but the danger of opening it, whatever it might represent, felt too great.
He doubted he would last long enough to truly enjoy the hat anyways. But if he opened it, well, he could still appreciate seeing it.
When Will didn’t make any move and the two sat in a stilted silence, Hannibal turned to repack the non-hat items he’d taken out. “Lisa maintained contact with me in the BSHCI. She sent me a crochet kit. Said that she remembered how I didn’t have time before so now might be a good time to start the hobby. It’s a very belated message but she says hello.”
When the time came when Hannibal was doing his own stint at the Baltimore Hospital for the Criminally Insane, he was surprised to receive a letter and package from Lisa. She asked him if his boyfriend liked his hat and said she was somewhat surprised to learn of his recent imprisonment. With that in mind she packed him a crochet kit and suggested that if he wanted to he could spend some time learning to crochet, seeing his admiration for the craft years prior. They had a pleasant round of correspondences between the two of them. Lisa was nothing but polite and never prying, although she tended to jump to conclusions too quickly about what he meant in his letters. She didn’t get his extended metaphors like Will and for someone who found a way to get in contact with him she had a surprising lack of understanding of what all his crimes consisted of. It was not the most mentally stimulating, but it was endearing and he settled into a pattern of inquiring after news in her life and discussing their crochet projects. He came to be quite adept at crochet, creating new patterns, half paying attention while he explored his mind palace.
Will still clutched the package tightly but was grateful for the change in topic. “I’m very surprised Chilton or Alana let you have any kind of needles.” Will’s imagination whipped up the image of Hannibal cleanly stabbing a knitting needle down someone’s ear canal (ala John Wick).
“Crochet generally uses hooks.” Hannibal gently corrected. I believe they let me have them because they were soft plastic. Although I think Chilton also liked the idea of me becoming the crotchety grandmother of his ward. Slow, teeth falling out, making arts and crafts.”
“Did you end up creating anything?”
“Yes. Lisa would also send me new patterns and advise me. We were pen pals and talked about what we had been making.
I was quite prolific for a while. I made a little blanket for Alana and Margot’s son, but I’m not sure they ever let him use it. I made hats for all the staff in direct contact with me. I even made these cute little stuffed animals, amigurumi I believe they’re called, but unfortunately my hooks were shortly confiscated after that.”
“ I think there’s more to that story than you’re letting on.”
“No, they were quite adorable things. I even made a couple resembling Alana and Chilton. How was I supposed to know Chilton would have a hissyfit if I made his doll have a removable eye and intestines hanging out?”
He may have also used it slightly like a macabre voodoo doll, sticking it with his hooks just to gauge the other man’s reaction. Still, he stood by his opinion the figure was downright adorable (much more so than the real Chilton) and should not have prompted a temporary ban on the oh-so-therapeutic hobby.
—
Hannibal began to pocket the two hats, before Will gestured him to stop. The brunet gestured to the hat loosely, then to the serial killer’s head.
“Ah.” Hannibal gave a nod and put on the blue Will hat, staring at the other man in curiosity. “Is it all you imagined it to be?” The fringe of his hair was pulled forward a bit messily when he put it on but he made little effort to move it.
“Perhaps even better. It suits you.”
“Sometimes the most contrasting things pair well together.” Hannibal folded the Abigail hat and put it inside his jumpsuit. “I always liked how the jeweled tone matches your eyes.”
“I don’t think the jumpsuit suits it though.”
“I agree it does not.”
He made a move to get up but he paused when Will spoke. “Hannibal?” It was a heartbreaking sound that escaped Will’s lips, even though Hannibal thought one of the most beautiful sounds in the world was his beloved saying his name.
“Yes, mylimasis?”
Will looks up. “Once you told me my job wasn’t good for me. That you didn’t care if I saved lives, that my life was the one you cared about.” His mouth resisted the next words. “Do- do you still believe that?” It was such a stupid question and he felt weak asking it. The man probably didn’t even think that when he said it previously.
Hannibal’s maroon eyes flared in its intensity. He offered a nod. “Of course, Will.”
Will sat with the silence that came after the statement, reveled in it, before he found his next words.
“Whatever happens, I’m not going back to the FBI. But I’ll-I’ll make sure you don’t either. It’s for the best.”
There were so many ways Hannibal could interpret that statement. With one hand he held his beloved’s cheek tenderly. ”Will, I speak not just for your skills and mind. You are worthy and valued outside of what you can do.” He placed his other hand on top of Will’s and stroked it lightly. The other man was still clutching his unopened gift tightly, knuckles almost white. “I hope you can see that there are people that love you no matter what.”
Don’t throw away your life, Hannibal wanted to say.
“I’ll…try to keep that in mind.”
Hannibal stood slowly and took off his hat before he beckoned the other man out of the room. He closed the door and pulled out a key, locking it. He stepped away, creating some distance between themselves and the room they explored. It would stay sacred for at least a bit longer. Dollarhyde did not need to contaminate it with his presence.
“I suppose the Great Red Dragon will come knocking at our doorstep any minute. Shall we get a drink?”
__
When Will left the booth Hannibal had turned to the woman and asked her if she took commissions. Perhaps a bit prematurely he asked if it was possible to make a companion hat, a Hannibal hat if you would, for Will.
Although they collaborated on a preliminary design and she’d update him through email, Lisa and her crochet booth remained somewhat of an afterthought until he was sent a hat in the post months later. It was every bit as amusing as Hannibal thought it would be, but unfortunately the time for gifts had passed. Will was at the BSHCI for Hannibal’s crimes and was in no mood for gifts from the man. And once he was released, there was no real good moment to try to give it to Will, He had become all sexy with his tempered and tamed hairstylings and nicely fitting coats that it seemed out of place to give him such a silly gift. He had given Hannibal his hat on a whim anyways, so Will probably hadn’t expected Hannibal to be wearing it on walks with not-dead-Abigail or at all.
So, the gift sat alongside the other hats in his seaside home in wait, untouched until he returned to the property fighting the Great Red Dragon.
A hat anticipating its owner, waiting to see if he’ll make a place for it in his life.