Chapter Text
"Palermo is the largest barrio in Buenos Aires," Hannibal murmurs into Will’s ear.
A mess of shops and signs and faces are speeding past their taxi window – far too quickly for Will to be able to distinguish anything in particular. It doesn't help that his eyes ache. He's hardly slept at all for the past few days. His head droops down towards Hannibal shoulder.
"There are a great number of parks here," Hannibal continues, "and the botanical gardens are said to be quite lovely. You will like them. Better than you will like the museums and the stores, I suspect."
I chose this place for you, is what he means.
He speaks in a soft, coaxing manner, the way Will might have spoken to one of his dogs, and Will's lulled by it, by him, by the rolling of the taxi beneath them. They could sink into a new life here, he thinks drowsily. A life of monstrous violence. A life of soft domesticity. The latter, perhaps, as monstrous as the former – in its own way. Neither of them deserve domesticity. But then again, few people ever do get exactly what they deserve.
Maybe, thinks Will, that's something can go in his favor for once.
–
The apartment that Hannibal brings them to is large, warm, and aggressively bland. The windows in the living room are enormous. The sills bloom with potted plants. The bookshelves in the study are filled from top to bottom with a matching set of Western classics – acquired almost solely for decorative purposes, if the books' gaudy, too-uniform spines are anything to go by. Hannibal must not have decorated this place himself. He would never have allowed it.
Half-dizzy with exhaustion, Will's too impatient to take more than a cursory glance around. As he stumbles by the kitchen doorway, he spots Hannibal inside, inspecting the inside of the cabinets and tut-tutting ostentatiously. No doubt Hannibal will have great fun refurbishing their new home. At least that might keep him occupied for a while.
He will buy a harpsichord, Will thinks vaguely – of course he will. He's Hannibal Lecter. There'll be no stopping him.
Then Will has stumbled his way into a random bedroom. Then he's collapsing atop the bed in his sweat-damp traveling clothes. Then he’s falling asleep right away, indifferent to the fog of dust that's come swirling up from the bedclothes, and he sleeps for fifteen hours straight while dreaming of nothing at all.
--
The first two weeks in their new apartment pass in almost total silence.
From the day they first arrived, Will holes himself away in the bedroom which he's claimed as his own. He comes out only at odd moments, to fetch himself a book, or a meal, or, more often than not, one of the bottles of wine which Hannibal gets at the market on his shopping trips.
The bottles disappear quickly. Hannibal silently replenishes them.
If Will has nightmares still, he has them by himself. If he passes Hannibal in the hallway – which he can't help but to do, once or twice – he averts his eyes and slinks away.
–
(Weeks they'd spent, cramped together in that little boat – sleeping in the same bed and breathing in the same air, eating the same meager, cozy meals side-by-side on the deck. They'd never been apart. They'd very nearly merged into one creature. Perhaps, if they'd stayed a little longer, they would have.
Now, of course, the opportunity has passed, and Hannibal – yes, Hannibal – finds himself struggling with the most puerile urges; he longs to linger by Will's door in the morning and put his ear to the wood. He longs to retrace every step that Will has taken, following the lingering trail of his scent through their apartment. He smells Will's touch on the knobs of their doors, on the fine wooden backs of their chairs, on the tasteless spines of their books. He touches each of these places again with his own hands.
Will is very neat these days – far neater than Hannibal remembers him to be. Will puts away the books he reads in the same places that he found them. He washes Hannibal's plastic containers and stores them away in the right cabinets. Was this tidiness a habit that Will acquired during his time with Molly? Was it something that he learned from her, learned for her, as he was fashioning himself into the sort of man that she would want to marry?
Hannibal wonders about this, in idle moments. Then he forbids himself from wondering.
It hardly matters anymore.)
–
Soon enough, they get into a habit of having lunches and dinners out.
Hannibal loves trying new restaurants. Will loves trying new drinks. Will's trousers begin to fit a little tighter. Hannibal's hair grows out.
Hannibal's cast aside his plaid suits for lighter, more weather-appropriate wear; his top two shirt buttons are always unbuttoned. Will has never before been so interested in the hollow of another man's throat.
The days are blazing and bright with sun. They both begin to get quite tan.
–
Hannibal seems to derive an unsettling amount of satisfaction from watching Will eat – but, then again, Hannibal seems to derive an unsettling amount of satisfaction from watching Will do anything at all.
His eyes track Will constantly: from the mornings when Will wanders blearily into the kitchen with his hair un-brushed and his shirt rumpled, to the evenings when they sit together in the front room and talk comfortably in low voices. He'd probably try to follow Will into his bedroom, even into the bathroom, if he thought he could get away with it – and not for any reason in particular, only due to his conviction that they should never be apart.
At times, he reminds Will of an anxious puppy pining inconsolably for his owner. And at times, Will finds it amusing. Finds it, at least, understandable. They've spent years colliding with and dissociating from each other, again and again, like two metal balls in a Newton's cradle. With every collision, they grew increasingly entangled; with every separation, they left each other diminished. It is a sort of relief to settle together so intimately now. A relief to have Hannibal's cooking again for every meal – to see his face, to hear his voice. (Will missed him, he admits to himself – he missed him, all of those years they spent apart).
There are other times, however, when Will can't stand it. There are times when he feels like their pretty apartment – so charming and sweet, so full-up to suffocating with Hannibal's oppressive presence – makes him want to crumple things in his hands. There are times when Hannibal's constant interest in Will, and Will's activities, and Will's recovery, and Will's health, all feel too paternalistic, too grasping; when Hannibal's eyes feel overbearing, like a physical force sliding across and through Will.
Will isn't, he tells himself bitterly, a thing to be had. He tells himself that he wishes Hannibal would find some other things to do.
Then Hannibal does.
--
All at once, like a flower blooming, Hannibal seems to grow comfortable enough to rediscover his little amusements.
He sketches. He plays the piano. He grows a garden of potted herbs on the balcony, which bloom with outrageous ease under his careful care. By the end of their first month in Buenos Aires, Hannibal has even begun to acquire new friends. He finds them in the museums and theaters and shops he frequents – or perhaps they find him. Will, who has never been very adept at making friends himself, isn't totally certain about the process. He knows only that Hannibal exerts a strange pull on others.
There's something magical, Will supposes, about his obvious self-assurance. Something alluring about a man who seems to harbor no doubts about himself.
Will is relieved, really, that Hannibal’s gone more often. That Will has some more time to be alone. That he has the apartment to himself.
He misses Hannibal like he misses a sliced-away limb.
–
Will draws the line at accompanying Hannibal to his social events. It reminds Will too much of Baltimore – of when Hannibal was still nothing to him yet but a slick, well-dressed approximation of a man. Of when Will couldn't see into Hannibal, and Hannibal couldn't allow himself to be seen.
And so Will doesn't care that the Teatro Colón is one of the best opera houses in the world and that its acoustics are, according to Hannibal, exquisite. He doesn't care that Hannibal's enjoyment of the experience would apparently be greatly enhanced by Will's presence.
"I don't even have a suit," Will argues.
"I'll buy you one," Hannibal responds, just a little too quickly. But of course. Will almost asks whether that was Hannibal's motive all along. He imagines it: being dressed up like a doll in something tasteful, being spritzed with nice cologne, being dragged grimly through a gauntlet of Hannibal's starry-admired admirers while Hannibal preens …
"No opera," he says firmly. He ignores the way Hannibal somehow manages to exude the aura of a kicked puppy without moving his face.
Hannibal goes to the opera alone.
Will curls up on the sofa and watches The Big Lebowski on Netflix.
That evening, Hannibal comes back with his suit pristine and with only a single lock of hair displaced. He's smiling.
"Had fun?" Will says sleepily, setting his laptop aside.
Hannibal did, of course. He's always enjoyed attention. Still glowing with good wine and the admiration of others, still charged up by the excitement of playing to a room, he moves past Will to sit down on the other end of the sofa. As he does, the air moves too. The scent of his cologne flows over Will, familiar and comforting.
The scent of a strange perfume flows over him as well.
It’s citrusy and feminine. Dissonant.
Someone must have touched Hannibal, Will realizes. He imagines a woman's fragranced hand on his arm, her mouth by his ear.
Hannibal's own mouth – so fleshy and dangerous – is red with wine and eating. Most likely red from kissing as well, for it is the custom here to greet friends with a kiss to the cheek. Has Hannibal kissed someone's cheek? Has Hannibal kissed someone's mouth? No, of course he hasn't. Hannibal couldn't have kissed someone's mouth, because Will would have known if he had – except for the fact that Will wouldn't have known, of course, not at all.
"Will," Hannibal says, two times, and Will realizes that he's been staring at Hannibal's face with the sort of blank intensity. Hannibal's face is very nice and also rather terrible – all of those sharp angles in the dim light. Will knows Hannibal's face as well as his own. Better than his own, even, since he got the scar.
"Sorry," Will says, clearing his throat. "'m kind of tired. Stayed up waiting for you."
And perhaps Hannibal is content enough and drunk enough to leave it at that. Or, more likely, he realizes by the look in Will's eyes that it would be no use trying to coax anything from him now.
They turn off the lights and head off to their individual bedrooms to go to sleep.
–
The searing summer finally begins to cool into a sultry fall.
Hannibal decides to host a party.
It is, Will feels compelled to mention, exactly the wrong sort of thing for an escaped fugitive to be doing. They argue about it for some while – which is absurd, considering all of the things that they haven't argued about yet. Will can't stand the way Hannibal argues: all cool and amused, like he's not even arguing at all. It too often leaves Will the only one grumbling and flustered, as he is now, and he has to go sit out on the balcony for a while by himself, glowering at Hannibal's potted plants.
By the time he collects himself enough to come back inside, he's made his peace with the whole thing. It was, he supposes, too optimistic of him to think that Hannibal Lecter would ever do something as mundane as 'laying low' in the first place.
"I bet you're the only internationally wanted criminal that hosts dinner parties," Will says as he ambles back into the kitchen. It's a concession, of sorts, and Hannibal smiles as he reduces an onion into neat pieces under his efficient knife.
"I always strive to be unique. Could you check the oven for me, Will?"
Will obligingly cracks open the oven. There's some sort of stuffed mushroom dish cooking inside of it. He isn't exactly sure what he's supposed to be checking it for. "Looking good,” he says. “I think." He lets the oven slam shut again.
When he turns back around, he finds himself momentarily stunned by Hannibal's broad back: the shifting of his shoulders, the flexing of his arms as he works the knife.
Will clears his throat. "So, do your friends know to expect me when they come over?"
"Of course."
"And do they know in what capacity I live with you?"
"In what capacity do you live with me, Will?"
The oven's timer spares Will from having to answer. Hannibal finishes with the last onion just in time, quickly rinses his hands under the sink, and strides past Will to lift the sizzling tray out onto the marble counter with a tea towel.
"I just want to know what role I'm expected to be playing, that's all."
"Just play yourself. They are all very eager to meet you."
"I'm sure," Will says glumly.
Playing himself has never exactly boded well for him before.
–
In the end, it isn't as bad as Will feared. Hannibal kept the guest list short, probably for Will's sake. A married couple are the first to arrive, and as Hannibal greets them at the door, he draws Will in closer by his elbow – like a parent nudging forward a recalcitrant child.
"And this," Hannibal says warmly, inclining his head towards Will, "is Theodore Gershburg."
Say hello to the nice lady and gentleman, Theodore.
"Hello," Will offers gruffly.
”Oh hello!” says the woman. Her Austrian accent marks her out as an expat. “How delightful it is that we finally meet." She's in her forties, all elegant and neat and knowingly impish – just the sort of person Hannibal tends to find amusing, in modest enough doses. She reaches for Will's hand, shakes it energetically. "Ernestas has already told us so much about you. Many things. Good things, of course. But, Ernestas" – her gaze swings back playfully towards Hannibal – "you never told us that Theodore is so young!”
"Kathy," says her husband.
“And handsome!"
“Kathy!”
"What? It is a compliment,” the woman drawls, playfully aware of her own impoliteness. "I always thought that Ernestas must have a handsome partner – and, you see, I was right!"
"Yes," says Hannibal, amused, "I am happy to say that you were." And his eyes slide over towards Will. That's something Will hasn't gotten used to yet – the open tenderness in Hannibal's eyes. Even if it's put on for their audience.
Even if it isn’t.
Something in Wills chest unfurls and he has to swallow hard to compress it. "I'll, uh, go back to the kitchen and – mix us some drinks," he says.
He goes.
More guests come. One of them turns out to be a concert pianist, who is quickly called upon to play. She begins with something light and classical, transitions to something jazzy and modern, and then ends with a spirited rendition of Bohemian Rhapsody – to the collective approval of the other guests. As the mamma mias give way to the for me – for me – for mes, Hannibal leads a few others out onto the balcony to enjoy the nice weather. Someone must be complimenting Hannibal on the fertility of his little garden; even through the balcony doors, Will can see Hannibal preening. Will mixes drinks and amusedly watches Hannibal primp and charm until there are no more drinks to mix. Then Will has to resign himself to making conversation instead.
It is well past midnight by the time the last guests trickle out. Will's eyesight has gone blurry by then. He collapses in a heap on the sofa and squints towards Hannibal, who's turning the locks on the doors and drawing all of the curtains.
"They think," Will slurs, and then pauses.
“They think?” prompts Hannibal.
“They think – that I'm your " – Will sniffs – "your boy toy."
With his back still turned, Hannibal makes a sound that would vaguely resemble a snort – if snorting were the sort of thing that Hannibal Lecter did. Perhaps it was more of a stately cough. "I wouldn't say that they think of you in those exact terms, Will."
"They do. They think I'm some kind of – kept pet or something. Your little American boyfriend."
"They assume that you are my lover," Hannibal accedes steadily, as he goes to shut up the balcony doors.
"You haven't taken great pains to disabuse them of that assumption."
"It is the simplest way of explaining the closeness of our relationship.” Hannibal turns and raises his eyebrows. A smile flickers around his mouth. “Didn't you have a good time tonight?"
"It – it was all right." Will lets his head roll onto the back of the sofa tiredly, lets his eyes fall shut. “Though I have to warn you, I didn't exactly pull off the whole 'charming little trophy husband' bit very well."
"I didn't know that 'charming little trophy husband' was what you were going for."
"No? Aren't you afraid your friends will begin to question your taste in partners, Ernestas?"
"Come now, Thomas, we both know that your self-esteem isn’t as low as that." Hannibal begins gathering cups and plates from the table. "Are you still trying to claim that you aren't very tasty?"
"If you will recall, I only said that my thoughts weren't very tasty."
Hannibal hums. ”All of you is tasty.”
Which is, of course, the single lamest thing Will has ever heard Hannibal say, and if he were even a hair less shit-faced drunk than he currently is, he would have choked. As it is, his mind is nothing but warm fuzz and his head is floating somewhere a few feet above his body, and when he manages to get over his total bafflement, he finds himself guffawing instead – long and loud and sincere. Still red-faced and heaving, he shakes his head. "Considering what you find tasty," he manages, "I'm not sure that was even a compliment."
“It was.”
"You know, it's kind of surreal to hear such a blunt, inelegant come-on coming from Hannibal Lecter, of all people." He means to sound chastising, and succeeds only in sounding rather arch. Almost flirtatious, really.
"Duly noted,” says Hannibal. "Do please forgive me. I shall strive to make my come-ons more elegant in the future." His mouth catches terribly over the fricative 'c' in come-on. Will laughs again, reckless and flushed.
"Forgiveness granted. On one condition.”
“Oh? I am all aquiver with anticipation.”
“Get me a dog."
"If you'd like."
Will props himself up straighter on the sofa. "Wait. Seriously?"
"Of course. I want you to be happy, Will."
"What about two dogs?"
"If you – "
"Three?"
"Will."
"How about seven? That's how many I had in Wolf Trap."
"Our apartment here is not quite as compact as your house in Wolf Trap was," Hannibal says ruefully as he moves towards the kitchen. "It will take much longer to vacuum."
That isn't quite a no.
A giddy, diffuse sense of warmth spills suddenly in Will's chest, like a cup has tipped over inside of him. He drags himself up from the sofa, swaying slightly as he regains his bearings, and then saunters over to the kitchen area, where Hannibal is now industriously setting things in the sink to soak.
"Come on, Hannibal." Will stumbles up close behind him. He lets his voice go drawling, distinctly Louisianan. "They'll be my responsibility, not yours. I promise I'll feed them, and walk them, and take very, very good care of them."
"Will you?" Hannibal counters, in the same light tone. He turns to face Will, cocks his head. Leans his hips back against the counter. "And what shall I do if you renege on your duties, hm? Shall I have to ground you?"
"Oh, no, of course not. I'm a good pet owner. I'm responsible." Will peers up, batting his eyelashes theatrically. Now here's the clincher, he thinks: he licks his lips, tilts the corner of his mouth every-so-slightly, and sighs out an exaggerated, "Please."
Something flickers alive in Hannibal's eyes.
"Oh," says Will softly, and he leans forward and kisses Hannibal on the mouth.
A second passes where they are both still and silent, where their mouths are slack and dry against each other. Then, in the next second, Will gasps, and his mouth falls open. His panting breaths blooms against Hannibal's lips, his hands reach up to hold onto Hannibal's shoulders. He jerks himself away, and Hannibal puts up no resistance. Hannibal looks, in fact, a bit stunned – like he's just been hit in the back of the head with a large bat. They both do.
Will keeps stepping backwards, and backwards, until he nearly breaks his back colliding with the counter behind him. "Oh God," he says.
"Will – "
"I – I think – "
Will rushes forward, leans over the sink, and vomits copiously.
When he's finished, he sinks down to the floor with a groan.
Hannibal can't recall anyone having vomited immediately after kissing him before. He is frustrated enough to think that Will might have done it just to spite him. He sighs and reaches down to heft Will up. "Again, we must talk about your drinking sometime," he murmurs.
Will only moans in response. He’s wilting against Hannibal’s side, eyes lidded, already half-asleep. Clearly, there will be no more sense trying to talk to him tonight. Hannibal has to half carry and half drag Will him back to his bedroom, where he passes out immediately on top of the covers of his bed. Hannibal turns him onto his side, flicks off the lights, and goes back to finish cleaning up the kitchen.
--