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It wasn’t the first time Winston had run off, so Molly wasn’t worried.
More often than not, when she let the pack out in the morning, he would dart off into the shadows of daybreak. Most of the time he’d come home on his own, with his ears and tail low, just in time for dinner. This wasn’t one of those times, but Molly wasn’t worried.
After she fed the rest of the beasts and locked them safely inside, she started off in the direction she had trekked dozens of times in the name of locating Winston. There was a small lake in the woods that Will used to like to fish in. He’d take his boat out to on the water, and if he took too long to get back Winston would bark at the edge until Will was tired of telling him to knock it off. Now, Winston just laid in the mud and hoped.
Will had been out of their lives for nearly six months. Physically out of it, at least. His name still popped up on the news every once in a while and Freddie Lounds certainly had her say about him.
There were a lot of theories about what happened after the escape of Dr. Lecter, and the disappearance of Will Graham. A popular one with her parents at first was that Hannibal had taken Will hostage. It was supposed to be a comforting thought, Molly assumed. Her mother pushed it on her until she agreed to believe it, and her father assured her that Will was a strong man, and that he’d be alright. It was as if they wanted her to find peace in the thought that Will might still be alive, just held against his will somewhere. She wasn’t sure how she was supposed to do that.
They abandoned that theory quickly though. After the weeks turned into months, and more details of the crime scene were leaked to the public, Will Graham went from ‘missing person’ to ‘super hero.’
When they found Francis Dolarhyde’s body, they didn’t find much trace of Will or Hannibal. There was a lot of blood, she was told, but that was all. A trail of Will’s blood lead from the defeated corpse, and over the edge of the bluff. There weren’t any other bodies to be recovered, and there weren’t any further sightings of the infamous cannibal and his former patient. Based on this, the media theorized that Will, perhaps in a state of panic-filled righteousness, injured and possibly-already-greeting-death, saw an opportunity to put an end to Hannibal’s reign. He crawled, stumbled and limped until he was in a position to shove his monster off the cliff. Will fell with him, sacrificing himself and saving anyone else who might have found their name on the cannibal’s future menu.
Molly should have felt blessed to have such a man in her life, even if it was only for a short while. That’s what everyone told her.
The only problem was, Molly couldn’t put trust in those stories. The Will depicted in the tabloids was not the same Will she knew. It wasn’t that she didn’t think he was capable of being the hero; she had seen him preform many acts of greatness and he was a good man, she married him for a reason. She just didn’t believe that he would ever do something like that…especially not to Hannibal.
Everyone was so ready to believe that Will would kill Hannibal when Molly knew that was never what Will wanted. He’d never told her that, of course, but he had showed her.
She had commented on Hannibal dying once. Only once; it wasn’t a mistake she ever needed to make again. Will didn’t deliberately follow his extensive trial, but it wasn’t exactly easy to avoid. Media fed off it, so it was always on and stimulating some kind of conversation.
On one day in particular, his trial had sparked a debate on the justice behind the death penalty. Will seemed to be rolling his eyes as a woman tried to explain that all lives were equal, and that taking one did not equate for the loss of another. Molly just wanted to soften the room, so she said: “I hope they fry him.”
It wasn’t even something she would normally say. She wasn’t normally that dry or blunt about things, but it seemed like something Will might say if he were feeling better. So she said it in hopes of receiving a dry chuckle, or at the very least a nod.
Molly had never seen Will’s expression change so quickly. His head snapped her direction, with dark and narrowed eyes. He looked as if he may lunge at her and Molly felt scared of him for the first time since they had met.
It only lasted for a fraction of a second, and then was washed away with a look fo complete fear and embarrassment. Molly apologized and Will said it was fine, and they never talked about it again. They should have talked about it, but the moment was painfully awkward and uncomfortable. They both just wanted to forget it.
So Molly never mentioned Hannibal dying again, and Will stopped watching the news. Sometimes Molly wondered what would have happened if she had made him talk about it.
After only fifteen minutes of walking, the trees opened up for her. The lake was large and shaped like a kidney bean. The sun hadn’t set completely and the water had turned the same lavender grey as the sky. The water itself was still but shores around it were alive with unseen insects and amphibians, making low clicks and creaks as she crossed into their territory.
Winston wasn’t there, though. And there wasn’t any sign of him in the mud; no prints, no fur, no marks indicating where he had plopped his body. Molly sighed at this, but it wasn’t so much troublesome as it was inconvenient. Winston was an independent dog. He always had been. He always came home. She doubted this time would be any different.
As she started her own journey home, she called out for him. Anytime she heard a rustle in the trees she’d pat her hands on her thighs and hope for Winston’s freckled face to pop around a bush. She wondered if he might already be home, waiting at the door like “What took you so long?”
In the beginning, Molly had sat and hoped with Winston. She’d sit in the mud next to him until it swallowed her boots. She would mindlessly curl Winston’s fur over her fingers until she became worried about making the knots permanent, and then she’d brush them out. She of course knew better than the dog, and knew that Will’s boat wouldn’t appear from the mass of water, bouncing like a buoy. She knew he wasn’t going to magically walk up on shore, wring himself out, and give them both hugs and kisses. But she didn’t really think that he was gone, either.
Winston wasn’t at the door as she had wished for. He wasn’t under the stairs, or hanging out by the shed. The other dogs paced behind the front door with nerves that Molly left up to their missing sibling.
“Where are you, you goof?” Molly called under her breath.
Her fur-family had grown to a very full eleven now: The seven of Will’s dog, the three of her own, and the Leeds’ dog whom Will had adopted just before disappearing. She agreed to take them all in, although everyone kept reminding her that no one would blame her for leaving them behind. That just wasn’t who she was. It wasn’t their fault that Will was gone. Besides, she was a sucker for strays.
She strolled through the entry room. The whole house was full of warm oranges and browns, cozy and soft fabrics, and lights handy in every corner. Dog beds acted as carpets and littered the floor in a pattern similar to a maze. They were a bit more organized than usual. Tidy maybe, if you could make that kind of clutter tidy. As were the leashes that hung on the rack in the kitchen. Walter must have picked up while she was gone.
Molly worked with dogs often, and had seen many come and go. Some were independent like Winston, some were overly protective like Buster, and some just wanted to laze around like Randy. No matter how different they came, one note was always the same with the lost and found.
They all carried shadows in their hearts, and in their eyes. Shadows of the past, shadows of those who loved them too roughly or cast them aside; shadows like Will had.
Will had tried to guard Molly from seeing them, and it had worked for a while. He spoke very rarely of Hannibal, and Molly had thought that it was because he was afraid it’d would scare her away. She had no intention of leaving him over his past, because she had her own and, sure, her’s wasn’t full of the same kind of catastrophe but…She understood. You don’t control what happens to you.
But when Molly was able to convince him of that, that she wasn’t going to get scared and run away, she started to notice the real things Will was hiding from her. His face lit up when he talked about his times with Hannibal, even when he ventured into the darkness and said he hated it. The corners of his mouth curved into a smile anytime he crossed his mind, and sometimes Molly would catch Will laughing at things he never explained- Things like classical music playing in an elevator. It was obvious to her that at least some part of Will missed Hannibal. She wasn’t sure if Will knew that himself, or would ever be able to admit it if he did, but him missing Hannibal didn’t bother her as much as others might tell her it should.
When a previously owned dog is welcomed into a new family, most of them adjust completely. Like most of Will’s dogs, and the dogs she’s brought in, they find their new pack and they build their new home with them. Sometimes though, there are dogs that wait by the door and hope that their old master is still coming back for them, even years after they’ve been left behind. They make new connections and they blend in, but a car will drive by or a certain smell will catch their attention…They’re always waiting for something to bring them back.
Will was Hannibal’s stray. Molly had only been his foster until he was ready to go home again, and she knew that. She knew that before things got serious between them, and before she agreed to be his wife. Molly had just always hoped that Will would build his pack with her, and he tried. She knew he tried, and she knew he loved her. But just like Winston, his home wasn’t a house with a family in it. His home was a person. Molly couldn’t resent him for that. She never thought he’d leave, though.
She still lived in the home she had shared with Will very much due to the fact that the memories she had with him lived there. She did know it was okay to move, another thing people tried to pressure on her as a way to help her. She knew she could do whatever the hell she wanted to, but her memories brought her comfort and a feeling similar to confidence- She had no interest in leaving that feeling behind.
Even the memories of The Dragon brought her some comfort because she had survived. She was a survivor, and as was the greatness of her house.
Molly opened the refrigerator door and dug through the bottom drawer. It was full of old bags lettuce and empty zip-locks of who-knows-what. She found a cheese stick smashed up against the back, stuck in the shape of a jay, and pulled it free.
She had been given plenty of time to think about Will and everything that could have happened between them. She had decided early on, sitting in the mud with Winston, that she couldn’t let herself cling the thoughts like that anymore. What had happened, happened. All she could do was move on and be happy. She hoped that Will was happy, too, where ever he was.
He deserved to be, even if his choice of happiness was unconventional. She knew it was a dark thought to have, maybe even a wrong one, but it brought comfort to her. Will had never intentionally brought any harm to her. He was a good man, and the concept of him being happy, even without her and even with someone like Hannibal, wasn’t something unappealing to ponder. It was better than thinking of him dead at the bottom of the sea.
She unwrapped the plastic on the cheese stick and gnawed on the end. It was rubbery and old, but it was the easier thing to grab. Normally, at this time of night she would start to prepare dinner for her and her son, but this would probably do for tonight. Walter was at her parent’s house with a friend in town, so she only needed to worry about her and the dogs.
Wait.
Molly felt her body shudder, and her limbs go cold. She peaked around the refrigerator door and looked at the neatly looped and organized leashes that had been a knotted cluster only half an hour ago.
She reached to cover her mouth and slowly closed the refrigerator door. The dogs still paced, but they were otherwise calm. They weren’t barking or lurking around. They weren’t growling and Buster always growled. Someone else being in the house didn’t make sense.
A stranger being in the house didn’t make sense.
A wave of terror washed over her like ice water. For a moment, she felt like she couldn’t catch her breath, and like she was floating off the floor. She couldn’t move, she couldn’t speak, and she wanted to scream.
Then, she became abnormally calm. She calmly reached for a knife in the sink. She’d start at the back of the house, giving whoever it was that might still be inside time to leave. She’d rather not face them if she didn’t have to, especially if it was anyone that she expected.
Before she could leave the kitchen, something caught her eye. She could have been painstakingly searching the home for hours before seeing the white rectangle of paper stuck to the fridge, if she had not moved in the exact way she just had.
It was the same place Will left notes when he had to leave before she woke up, or when he wanted her to get something from the store while she was out.
Cautiously, as if the paper may try to scurry from her grasp before she could take it, she grabbed at the magnet holding it in place. She let the paper slip and float to the floor, and she let it lay there a while.
It fell face up, displaying the crisp and neat calligraphy that was meant for her to read. She bent slowly to pick it up, and read it four times before she was certain of what it said.
“He’s safe, but he’s mine now. They both are. – H.L.”
Her hands shook as they gripped into the crinkling paper, but it oddly enough didn't come from a place of fear anymore. She felt herself smile and like a weight had fallen from her chest.
Will was with Hannibal and, for some reason, Molly wasn't worried.