Chapter Text
“Shake it up baby now!” Will Graham sang loudly, as he was paddling fast down the road, heading home. “Twist and shout!” In his mind, he sounded just like John Lennon.
It was the end of July in 1964 and the Beatles had taken over the world, becoming a global sensation. Will was 16 years old at the time – a beautiful, young lad with curly hair and shining blue eyes – and he was proud to be a member of the phenomenon the papers had named ‘Beatlemania’. He had all the records they had released, both the albums and the singles, all issues of The Beatles Monthly Book that had appeared until then – some in doubles – and two full collections of trading cards (it had been such a pain to collect all the colored ones, but the black and white ones were signed so he liked them more). He had seen their movie in cinema 6 times and he would have gone to see it a 7th time if he wouldn’t have ran out of money. Needless to say, there were not many things that Will loved more than the Beatles, except for maybe his father, who was the only family he had.
As he got on his neighborhood street, Will noticed a long, black car that was stopped in front of the house right next to his. He stopped singing and started pedaling a bit slower, eyes never parting from the vehicle. A man and a boy, that Will thought to be about his age, were emptying the car, pulling suitcases from the trunk and the back seats. No one had lived in that house for over ten years. Will couldn’t even remember the last owners, since he had been a small child when they had moved out.
“May I help you?” he asked, stopping the bike in front of his house.
The man looked at him from head to toe once before shaking his head and walking to the door with two suitcases. He was wearing a three piece suit and a fancy hat and judging by the rigid way in which he walked – taking big, firm steps, his back perfectly straight, as if he had a big stick up his ass – Will could easily put a label on him in his mind: rich bastard. His father hated rich bastards. There weren’t many of them around there. Though that part of London wasn’t exactly poor, it wasn’t high class either. ‘Why would they move here?’
Will stared at the son of his new neighbors and when he passed by, the boy looked back at him, their eyes meeting. He had long, wavy black hair and the most intense eyes Will had ever seen. It wasn’t just the bright brown color, which made them appear almost yellow, it was the sadness behind them. That boy looked dead inside, soulless, as if something or someone had sucked the life right out of him. He was dressed in an expensive suit, just like his father, but Will didn’t feel like he could label him a ‘rich bastard’. He lacked the arrogance and entitlement that rich bastards generally possess.
“Hey,” Will told him, with a small smile. “I’m Will.” The boy kept walking and entered the house fast, slamming the door behind him. Will sighed and then chuckled a bit to himself. “Lovely people.”
He went inside his own house, pulling his bike after him and leaving it in the hall. Normally, he’d put his bike in the garage, which was in the back of the house, but he felt way too tired in that moment to bother with that. There was jazz music coming from the living-room and Will rolled his eyes. He hated jazz.
“You have shitty taste in music,” he told his father, walking inside the room.
The man laughed and shook his head. “As if yours is any better.” He was sitting on the couch with his feet on the table, holding a glass of whiskey in one hand and a cigarette in the other. “Are you hungry?”
“Nah,” Will said. “I went to Eric’s house after work and ate there.”
“Is that why you came home so late?”
Will nodded and sat down next to his father, lighting himself a cigarette as well. “A family moved next door, you know?”
“They came by like a week ago, to check the house out. I didn’t think they’d move in so fast though. Fucking Germans…”
“They’re Germans?”
“I think so. They have some really funny accents. I didn’t speak to them but I heard them talking.”
Will thought about the boy he had seen outside and shook his head softly, taking a long puff of his Lucky Strike. “I don’t think they’re Germans. They don’t look like Germans, at least. A lot of people have funny accents, dad.”
“Whatever they are, they’re not British. I know that they have a kid. Now don’t you go making friends with him. I don’t want no foreign rich bastard’s son running around my house.”
Will laughed then looked at his father with a smile. Sometimes, the things he said were mean, hateful or even disturbing, but Will loved him anyway. He knew that deep inside, his father was a good man. “Don’t worry, dad. I doubt that boy would even want to hang out with a nobody like me.”
“Hey. Don’t talk like that about yourself,” Mister Graham said, on an almost threatening tone. “You’re a beautiful, smart, hardworking young man, Will. And I’m very proud of you.”
He caressed his back tenderly and Will smiled, getting up. “I’ll just go to my room before you start cuddling me or something.”
“Yeah, yeah, run away. Close the door if you’ll start blasting that music!”
Will smirked. His father knew him well. Blasting the music was exactly what he planned to do. He had worked hard all day, except for the couple of hours he had spent with Eric. It had all started as a joke. He applied for the job at that bike shop thinking he would never get hired. After all, who would hire a kid to fix motorcycles, regardless of how good he was at it? But, to his luck, Mister Roberts was a man who had a lot of faith in the youth of Britain. After giving him a test that Will scored easily, he hired him, full time. He knew a lot of kids of his age who worked, but none who did it full time and none who got 80 pounds a week. That was almost as much as his father made. It was a great job and he was planning to keep doing it even after school started again in the fall, even if it would be quite difficult to keep up with both.
The record was already in the player, since he had listened to it in the morning, while getting ready for work. ‘A Hard Day’s Night’ was the latest album the Beatles had released and Will had been obsessed with it ever since he had first got his hands on it. He knew each song by heart, each note, but even so, every time he’d listen to it, he felt as if he was hearing it for the first time. He turned it on, setting it on the highest volume after closing the door as his father had asked him. Mister Graham didn’t like Rock’n’Roll, but he didn’t complain about it, which his son greatly appreciated.
He was feeling so tired, but as soon as the music started, it was like a beam of electricity ran through him, giving him energy. “It’s been a hard day’s night!” he sang along to the song, letting himself fall on his back on the bed. He closed his eyes and imagined what it would be like to actually see the Beatles in person, singing just a few feet away from him. A concert ticket was the only thing that he didn’t have in his collection and the thing he wanted most. They were rather expensive and they got sold very fast. He had never been able to get one, either out of lack of money or because he had arrived too late to buy them. ‘I will see them one day…’ he told himself.
While the record was still playing, Will reached into the drawer of his nightstand and pulled out his stack of weed cigarettes. He just had three left. Those weren’t going to last him too long. Making a mental note to go see Teddy the next day so he could get more, he got up from the bed and opened the window. His father knew about the normal cigarettes, but not about the weed and while Will doubted he’d cause a scene if he’d find out, he didn’t want to risk it, so he always made sure the smell wouldn’t remain in his room.
The first time he had smoked it, it had been amazing. He had seen lights and colors he had never seen before, he had felt as if he was floating and he had believed that he could do anything. At that point though, two years later, it was nothing more than a habit. He saw and felt nothing special. It just made him feel really calm and it helped him sleep.
“Can you turn that down, please?” A voice came from the window.
Will got up in a standing position and looked outside. The window next door was opened and the boy he had seen earlier was standing behind it, his hands pressed on the wooden frame, a disturbed look upon his face.
“What?” Will asked, getting up from the bed and walking to the window, with his half smoked cigarette in between his lips.
“I asked if you could please turn that down,” the boy repeated, a bit louder this time. “I can hear it from here.” He did have a funny accent.
Will laughed. “Mate, we could probably shake hands if we both stretched far enough. Of course you can hear it. What? You don’t like it?”
“It’s loud and obnoxious. I, myself, prefer classical music.”
“Wow… You’re worse than my dad.”
The boy’s irritation seemed to grow, though his expression didn’t change much. “Are you going to turn it down or not?”
“Maybe if you tell me your name first. I’m not gonna turn the Beatles down for no stranger.”
“Hannibal. My name is Hannibal Lecter.”
“Hannibal…” Will repeated. It was a strange name. Clearly not one he had ever heard before. He went to his record player and turned the volume down a bit before returning to the window. “Are you from Germany?”
“I’m from Lithuania.”
“I don’t even know where that is,” Will said, with a small smile.
“That’s not a big surprise, judging by the fact that you are nothing but a street punk.”
“Hey, fuck you! Who the Hell do you think you are?!”
They just stared at each other for a moment that felt like an hour, before Hannibal closed his window and pulled the curtains. Will walked to the nightstand where his ashtray was and pressed his cigarette on it so hard, he almost knocked it over. He was pissed. He had never felt so offended in his life. It wasn’t the fact that Hannibal called him a street punk, it was the way he said it, with so much superiority, as if he wanted to make Will feel like shit. ‘What the Hell is his problem? I haven’t done anything to him!’
He turned the music on again, just as loud as before, both to calm himself down and to piss Hannibal off. “Maybe he is a rich bastard after all…” he said to himself.