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waiting for the end of the world / something is always happening somewhere / what i wish i knew
The road the house is perched above is a narrow route that twists through the woods and straightens only slightly where a smattering of houses cluster around it. It’s like all roads out in the countryside; small and rural with foliage crowded thick on either side and dangerous at night or in bad weather.
What amounts to traffic is just people cutting through between the villages and downwards into the valley, drivers familiar with the blind turns and lack of lights. Will likes it here, private but still a living place. Of the five houses on the road, one is either unoccupied or a second home. It’s a quiet place, the kind you can disappear into if you want.
It’s gone past midnight when they arrive back and the neighborhood is already asleep by the looks of things, an upstairs window is the only source of light that Will can see. He looks out from the passenger side towards their across-neighbor’s house as Hannibal slows and turns the car up the sloped drive to their own property, headlights cutting through the dark. A professional couple in their mid thirties lives opposite them Will thinks. He’s waved to the woman from behind the wheel once or twice. They don’t really know their neighbors all that well yet.
Their house is cold and still when they let themselves in. It feels much later in the night than it is and Will is exhausted from the drive home.
Hannibal finds him in the front room, standing at the window in the dark. Will is handed a glass of bourbon and crushed ice and when he brings it close to his face he can smell vanilla. Hannibal stands with him in the dark, sipping his own drink peacefully.
It’s still early spring. The days are lengthening but the air is cold, the leaves are yet to fill out the trees. The silhouette of the garden looks bare without a wintery dusting of snow. There’s been a restless wind all week, shaking the trees and urging them to bloom faster.
There are no streetlights here, even with the neighbor’s upstairs light on there isn’t much to see in the dark. Will knocks back the rest of the bourbon and turns away from the window.
He tells Hannibal that he’s tired, he’ll go on up. Hannibal takes his empty glass so it doesn’t end up in the bathroom counter or left on his bedside table.
He doesn’t hear Hannibal come to bed and he manages a solid five hours sleep, which is better than some nights.
-|-
“Are you going out today?” He asks when he sees Hannibal at the breakfast bar in the kitchen dressed down and reading a newspaper.
“I don’t have anything planned, why?”
“I wanted to use the car, I’ve got an errand to run.” Hannibal shrugs with one shoulder and hums agreeably, scanning a story in the newspaper.
“As you wish.”
-|-
Hannibal is a monster, but he was born to human parents. Will thinks about it with a sort of grim obsession every time he sees a young family radiating that particular shade of tired contentment. When he sees a new mother protectively fussing over a tiny shape in a pram and wonders What if your child was born wrong?
-|-
Will could have his own car, he did for a while in Norway, but he hasn’t really thought about getting one since they moved here. It’s not because he doesn’t want to put down roots, this house, this place is easily the most stable and relaxed Will has felt in god knows how long. The moment they arrived it felt like coming home at the end of a journey. They’ve settled so quickly into routine it feels like they always planned to end up here.
It’s the comfortable rhythm of their life here that has Will on edge though. He’s reluctant to relax into it too much in case it doesn’t last.
It’s still early and the air feels undisturbed from the night before when Will pulls out of the drive and heads north, where the thickness of the trees eats up the weak morning light and forces him to turn his lights on until he comes out the other end and descends into the valley.
He takes most of the day for himself, driving around and exploring the area in a way he hasn’t yet. Browsing in local stores and saying hi to people as he passes by because they seem to do that here. He goes for something to eat and to pick up groceries before he starts back, makes small-talk with the cashier as she scans his items and lets her hear his accent and try to guess where he’s from. The afternoon has started to fade away as he reaches home, the light thinning out as the sun gets ready to sink towards the treeline.
As he turns into the driveway his attention snags on the house across the street and the upstairs window visible through the branches of the huge oak in their yard. The bedroom light is on, curtains open.
Hannibal is in the front room reading when he lets himself in. He looks up at Will when he comes in and frowns.
“Is something the matter?”
Will squints out the window past the trees and shakes his head.
“Got a bad feeling. I’m probably just being paranoid...”
Instead of letting the matter drop Hannibal closes his book and looks at Will with interest.
Hannibal for his part isn’t sure if Will is looking at something out through the window, or if it’s something he’s seeing in his mind’s eye. It can be hard to be sure with Will.
“The Voight’s house?” He asks over Will's shoulder startling him out of his thoughts and back into the living room with Hannibal.
“Jesus don’t sneak up on me.” Hannibal’s amusement is tangible.
Arms wrap tightly around him and Will can feel the vibration of Hannibal’s voice through his back when he suggests perhaps they investigate Will’s uneasy feeling.
-|-
By the time they are standing on the doorstep of the Voight house it’s dark enough that lights have been switched on in some of the other driveways and houses. A single lightbulb continues to burn in the Voight’s upstairs window, the curtains pulled wide open. All of the other windows remain stubbornly dark.
When Will tries the handle of the front door it opens easily, the lock splintered apart. He glances from the lock to Hannibal who raises an eyebrow and motions Will in ahead of him.
They don’t announce their presence as they step into the house, don’t knock or shout hello. The knot of anxiety in Will’s stomach tightens as he takes in the unnatural stillness to the house.
Hannibal is moving silently behind him so maybe he senses it too. Will pauses at the end of the hall and glances at the doors leading off the hall, then he looks at the stairs leading towards the second floor. Hannibal waits patiently for him to decide.
He starts feeling his way up the stairs towards the pitch black of the second story.
Hannibal follows behind him with the barest hint of sound and when they get to the top he silently gestures towards the door down the hallway with a strip of light shining out through the gap at bottom. It’s the only light they’ve seen inside the house so far.
The only noises they’ve heard have been their own.
Will’s heartbeat is going triple time and he holds his breath as he opens the door to the room because he knows before he even sees it.
In the grand scheme of things, in the grand scheme of Will’s life and the thing’s he’s seen, it’s not that bad.
But at the same time it’s the worst thing he’s ever seen because his neighbor is lying on the bed naked, her legs spread at a hideous angle. Her face is gone, instead there’s a pulpy mess of flesh and blood. Will can’t bring to mind what she looked like beyond pretty brunette but he knows he will always see her like this in his mind now.
The longer he stands in the doorway the more his brain is able to make sense of the scene in front of him.
Stabbed. She’s been stabbed so many times in the face and chest that the bed is saturated in blood. There are two knives lying on the floor, the blade of one has been snapped off and Will looks back at the body.
There’s something on the headboard and it takes Will a couple of seconds to figure it out. Breasts. Two women’s breasts sliced off and placed on the headboard in display.
Hannibal must make a noise or a movement beside him because Will’s gaze is torn away from the bed and he sees the other body. On the floor laying face up is a woman staring at the ceiling, her eyes glassy and sunken in death. Her throat has been slit. Will can see her larynx protruding from the gaping wound, surrounded by fatty tissue.
Hannibal takes a step closer to the body on the floor and peers down at her.
“The cut is so deep she has almost been decapitated.” He appraises. It takes a lot of strength to decapitate someone, or a lot of anger.
“We need to get out of here.” Will says, his voice comes out rough and dry.
Hannibal’s gaze sweeps over the room one more time and then he nods curtly in acquiescence.
They make their way quietly back down the stairs and go out through the door pulling it closed behind them. Will looks around as they cross back over and disappear up their own driveway. It’s dark, their neighbors are far enough away, he doesn’t think anyone has seen them.
-|-
“You have good instincts Will.”
“Good old law enforcement training” Will says tightly. “and being on the run from the law.”
Hannibal is handing him a mug full of something hot. He takes a cautious sip and realises it’s mint tea. He brings the mug back up to his face and breathes in the steam coming off the cup.
“Did you know them?” He asks and Hannibal shakes his head while manhandling Will into a chair. He rummages in the fridge until he comes back with a pan full of rows of prosciutto rolled and filled with cheese. Some kind of herb has been sprinkled over them in the pan.
He doesn’t want to ask. Should he want to ask? He doesn’t think Hannibal would do something like this. Murder their neighbors just as they were getting settled and force them to uproot and flee. He should at least be more alarmed at the possibility.
He leans back in his chair and rubs at his eyes, Hannibal pushes the appetisers towards him and he snags one and takes a bite. The cheese is nutty and the meat has a surprising citrus tang.
“S’good” he says and pushes the dish back towards the middle of the table. Hannibal nods and waves his hand in an invitation for Will to continue eating.
“The police will come and wish to speak with us.” He says and Will has no doubt about that. He thinks about officers coming to the house with their questions. Trying to paint a picture of the victims and their neighbors.
Will looks at Hannibal, imagines him engineering this situation and then sitting back and watching the chaos and suspicion of a murder investigation descend on the small community. The image comes to him with weary ease.
Pulling the pan back over to him he selects another roll and sinks his teeth into it, savouring the sweet nutty cheese. He finishes it in two bites and wipes his fingers clean on his shirt sleeve.
Will didn’t read the crime scene while they stood in the room, not the way he might have in another life. But it doesn’t matter because he looked and he seen and that was enough. Enough for him to revisit the room in his mind now and keep looking.
He thinks about how the first body was brutalised beyond recognition, but the second victim only had her throat cut. Like Hannibal said it was still a violent attack, her throat had been cut so savagely her neck had almost been severed from her body, but the overwhelming majority of violence had been reserved to one victim.
“Do you think it happened last night? The sound of our car might have spooked him.” Will asks, thinking about the second victim, the unfinished one.
Hannibal plucks a roll from the middle of the dish and eats it thoughtlessly. “It’s a possibility.” He says. “From my observations the victims have been dead not more than 48 hours.” Will makes a noise of agreement, the scene had looked fresh. He’s still caught up in the overwhelming brutality of the attack on the first victim.
Hannibal covers the prosciutto rolls with saran wrap and a wry smile creases his face. “These were supposed to be for tomorrow,” He says looking down into the half empty pan. “I will have to make more now I suppose.”
The adrenaline is starting to wear off and Will feels exhausted. “Do you not think you should maybe reschedule dinner? You know it’s going to be a circus around here when they find out what’s happened”
Hannibal lifts one shoulder in a shrug, “I have no reason to reschedule, and besides I’m sure it will give our guests plenty to discuss” and Will resists the urge to roll his eyes. Honestly, why would something as mundane as murder derail dinner plans? He feels a headache coming on and rubs a hand down his face tiredly.
-|-
Will wakes up just after six and can’t get back to sleep. He goes downstairs and opens the back door and stands out on the top step enjoying the chill in the air. There’s a wet fog seeping out of the woods and the sky is an unyielding expanse of cloud, with the sun never quite managing to break through and burn off the fog as it starts to rise.
He spends the morning in the garage at the back of the house, sanding down a bookshelf from top to bottom and washing the wood clean with a damp cloth before applying a thin layer of varnish. He sets the thermostat on low heat to let the first coat dry slowly and wanders back into the main house.
Hannibal has gone out, the car keys aren’t on the table where they usually are. Will paws through the fridge and finds enough ingredients to constitute a salad. There’s a fresh lot of the prosciutto rolls they ate yesterday chilling on the top shelf and something further down in a dish with a ceramic lid on smelling strongly of marinade.
Will eats the salad in the kitchen and listens for any sounds out on the road but the few cars that pass by don’t stop. It’s a quiet, peaceful afternoon, disturbed only by the sounds of the Lexus pulling up to the house when Hannibal returns and finds Will still in the kitchen.
“Did you get your bookshelf done?” he asks as he moves around Will, clearing away the remains of the salad and pulling various things from the fridge.
“First coat.” He says distractedly and accepts the glass of wine Hannibal sets down in front of him wordlessly.
“All quiet on the western front?” Hannibal asks cheerfully and Will reflexively looks towards the front of the house, towards the road and the house opposite.
“Nothing new.” He takes a sip, tries to set a slow pace because it is far too early to start drinking.
Instead of starting immediately on the preparations for dinner like Will had expected, Hannibal coaxes him up out of the kitchen and upstairs into a bath he draws for him. The tub is fitted into the corner of the room, sunken into the floor with one side taken up by a floor-to-ceiling window. Looking out over the back of the property, Will relaxes back into the water with his wine and takes a measured sip.
Hannibal comes around and sits on the ledge next to the bathtub, threading their fingers together when Will takes his hand over the edge. “I thought about calling it in anonymously.” He says and Will hums in his throat.
“But you didn’t” He says and rolls his head to look at Hannibal when he doesn’t answer immediately.
“...No” Hannibal supplies “I didn’t.”
Will’s eyes shutter a little, he takes another drink, longer this time.
How long until someone finds them? Who is it going to be, stumbling onto the scene like they did. A family member who can’t get in touch? A boss who becomes concerned when their employee stops showing up for work? Someone from the cleaning service with her own keys who lets herself in and gets hit by the smell. It’s been a few days, the bodies will start to smell something awful soon.
How long will he and Hannibal be the only people who know what is in that house. Their neighbors bloating and putrefying in the upstairs bedroom. He allows himself another mouthful of wine. It’s better this way. That they don’t get involved. Let everything play out as it would had they never been there.
Will wonders how far gone the corpses will be when they are found. He reasons to himself that open casket funerals were already off the table.
“He might return to the scene.” Hannibal says suddenly into the silence.
“He would be stupid to. They’ll be found sooner or later, and a strange face around here will be remembered.”
“Unless he isn’t a strange face around here.”
Will closes his eyes and takes another drink. Sinks a little deeper into the water. “Hannibal, tell me you didn’t murder those women.” He mumbles into the steam coming up off the water. It didn’t feel like Hannibal in that room. He doesn’t think it was him, but who really knows with Hannibal.
“You already know the answer to that Will.”
Will snorts rudely and swirls the wine in the glass. Hannibal lets go of his hand and moves behind him.
“Let me wash your hair.”
Will is agreeable to having his hair washed. The bath and the wine have worked their magic and left him relaxed and pliant under Hannibal’s ministrations. “I had nothing to do with what happened in that house” Hannibal says down to him as he lathers shampoo into Will’s hair. “Ok.” Will says and chooses to believe him because he doesn’t want to fight. He’s too busy stressing about how sooner or later their sleepy little neighbourhood is going to however briefly become a crime scene. Will’s entire life is one extended play crime scene reel.
After the shampoo has been rinsed away Hannibal remains in place, running his fingers through Will’s hair and massaging his scalp slowly. Will shivers in pleasure and stretches his legs out, feels his body wake up under the touch and his pulse thud sluggishly. He feels sleepy and aroused from the heat and the wine. He rubs one calf against the other, disturbing the water in the bathtub.
Hannibal reaches over him and takes his glass, finishes the remaining wine and stands.
“Don’t take too long, the guests will arrive at six.” He says and leaves Will alone in the bathtub. He wants to get himself off as much as he wants to nap but in the end he lays in the water too long doing neither until he’s out of time and has to get out and get ready for dinner.
-|-
When he makes it down to the kitchen Hannibal herds him towards the end of the counter and directs him to open a new bottle of wine. Will browses the labels through the window of Hannibal's fancy temperature controlled wine cabinet and picks the one with the most interesting name. If Hannibal cared about the wine he would have picked it out himself.
The sky is heavy and overcast still but now the wind has picked up. Will flicks the lights on in the back yard and stands at the window looking out. The oven hums in the kitchen and outside the wind whips through the trees at the edge of their property.
“It seems a storm is coming” Hannibal intones and Will raises an eyebrow at him without turning around because he refuses to encourage his sense of dramatics.
Within a few minutes fat noisy raindrops are hitting the back window and the wind is battering the side of the house. Will doesn’t know how long he has been standing at the glass but when he turns around Hannibal is no longer in the room. He’s half way through topping up his wine when Hannibal returns and guides him by the elbow into the sitting room where the fire is already going.
-|-
Poppy stumbles into Will’s life like countless other strays... cold, wet and hungry.
-|-
After dinner Isabel and Emmannuel politely make their excuses and after heartfelt compliments to the chef reluctantly take their leave so they can get back home to relieve the babysitter. Sandrine and Yves meanwhile live practically next door and have no children to get back to so as usual they stay for a nightcap. Hannibal ushers them all into the lounge, procuring a bottle of Auchentoshan from his office on the way.
Will doesn’t pretend to know good whisky, but Yves looks pleased on seeing the bottle.
“1973 Sherry Oak Cask…” Hannibal intones as he pours them a measure each and the four of them toast to health. In no time Hannibal is deep in a discussion about single malts with Yves by the fireplace which allows Sandrine to corner Will on the sofa.
“So Will, tell me all of your secrets…” She implores with a hand on his arm and Will raises an eyebrow at her.
“Oh don’t give me that look! I am old and boring now,” She isn’t more than five years older than him. “I need to find some young thing like you to live vicariously through!”
Will laughs and takes a drink, the motion dislodging her hand from his arm. “Sorry, I’m really not that interesting.” He assures her.
“Bah, I know that’s not true William, that rich husband of yours is always spoiling you with gifts and trips abroad! I can’t remember the last time Yves took me away somewhere...I just wish something exciting would happen around here for once, you know?”
Be careful what you wish for he thinks bitterly. Across the room Hannibal catches his eye and smiles, unconcerned.
-|-
There are two police cars and an ambulance joined later by a second ambulance, there are no sirens. A sedan parked on the main road is probably an unmarked police car. The officers who got out of that car will have been detectives. They might be the ones that come around and interview them later, or that job might fall to the uniformed officers.
Will and Hannibal have come to stand towards the bottom of their drive, they are not the only ones. All of their neighbors are out, standing either on their drives or on the road itself. Clustered in pairs or little groups. Looking stoically towards the Voight’s house and not speaking. None of the faces look excited or curious. They look like they know something terrible has happened, that they know they don’t want to know what it is, but for some reason they feel the need to stand there... like it’s somehow required of them. To be witnesses to what has happened on their street.
Hannibal’s mouth is set in a neutral line, but his eyes are sharp, he’s drinking in the scene eagerly. Next to him Will is shivering. It’s not from the cold.
Will does a quick sweep of the gathered crowd. “There is a good chance he’s here you know.” He can’t see any strangers standing around amongst their neighbors. “Maybe not right here but, close by.”
Crime scene tape is going up on the gate of the property, at the front door where police officers go in and out. Another car pulls up and the police woman stationed on the road at the entrance to the crime scene ushers the man that gets out on up to the house.
Closest to them, Sandrine and Yves have ventured all the way out from their driveway and onto the road in front of Will and Hannibal’s gates. They are standing in a somber huddle with another neighbour and exchanging hushed whispers. Will sees Sandrine, wrapped tightly in a fur collared coat, as she glances over to where they stand. She catches his eye for a moment before looking away again.
The other man breaks off from the couple and makes his way up the drive toward Will and Hannibal. It’s Daniel, an architect, three kids, Will doesn’t know what his wife does.
He comes to stand by the two of them and follows their gaze out towards the house across the street.
“It is a terrible thing, what has happened.” He says gruffly. Will isn’t sure how much everyone knows about the terrible thing that happened. He realises he has his arms wrapped around himself tightly and shoves his hands into his pockets instead.
“It must have been very serious.” Hannibal says and nods towards the ambulances parked on the road. “I have not seen anyone come out of the house yet?” He says as though it’s a question. Daniel shakes his head in answer and then shakes his head again cursing under his breath. “The police have not said anything yet, I’m sure they will not say much. But make sure you take care tonight, lock your doors.”
Will shivers harder and steps closer to Hannibal, moving in to leech heat from him. Hannibal wraps an arm around his shoulders and Will leans into his chest.
With no fanfare there is suddenly a burst of short-lived activity from the door that everyone has been standing in the cold watching intently for the past hour. A gurney is wheeled down the sloping driveway, a black body bag is loaded into an ambulance.
“Putain.” Daniel spits at the ground.
The ambulance drives off and the police officers disappear back into the house. There is no further activity.
The crowd have grown restless and people have started talking amongst themselves, speculating no doubt.
Will’s hands are clenched tightly in his pockets. He turns his face and speaks quietly into Hannibal’s neck in English. “What if it’s about us. What if someone is trying to draw us out? They could have recognised one of us-”
“Hush.” Hannibal puts a hand on the back of Will’s head and rubs his back gently. Daniel gives Hannibal a nod over Will’s head and then takes his leave politely, making his way back down the hill to rejoin Yves and Sandrine.
“Now is not the time William.” Will doesn’t reply to him, just keeps his face hidden and leans into him. He can only manage one monster at a time.
There is no further activity from the crime scene while they stand there. It is late enough that they are losing sunlight and the air temperature has dropped noticeably. When it seems clear that there won’t be anything more to see a few onlookers start to move slowly back to their own homes, the crowd thinning finally. Hannibal and Will give it a few minutes and then follow suit.
-|-
Three weeks and two days after Will finds the mutilated corpses of his neighbor and her sister Hannibal tells him they are going out for dinner. It’s a six hour round trip. The next month is a gallery opening followed by michelin star dining, on the drive back home Will stares out the window and wonders why Hannibal has established a three hour perimeter around their house.
-|-
“How did you both meet, if I can ask?” Poppy looks brightly between them.
Will skewers a piece of meat and some carrot onto his fork “...introduced by mutual friends.” he says lightly, ignoring the look Hannibal is probably giving him. “It’s not a very original story I know.” he laughs a little as though he’s embarrassed.
“I think the old fashioned way of meeting people beats all these internet dating apps. You never know who you’re talking to on those things.”
“Hmm” Will bites down on a mouthful of rich meat and nods in what might be agreement.
-|-
The police come and ask them questions and Hannibal invites them into the house. Will listens to Hannibal show them into the sitting room and offer them something to drink and he tries to breathe through the rising panic. Resists the urge to smash something valuable.
Hannibal summons Will to the sitting room where he has to answer a familiar litany of questions. No he didn’t know the family past a wave and a nod. He might have been to the house to borrow a ladder, he thinks, when he and Hannibal first moved in. He didn’t see anything suspicious the night of the murder, they weren’t home that night. They’d gone to a concert recital and dinner. Left by 10pm for the long drive home. Neither of them remember seeing any unfamiliar cars parked on the street when they returned.
The officers nod and take notes and then thank them both for their time. Leave their contact details on the way out in case either of them remember anything relevant.
Will feels relieved when they’ve gone but there’s still a fog of anxiety around him. He looks up an indeterminable period of time later to find himself alone in the kitchen. It’s nightfall and he’s apparently half way through a bottle of Reisling. He refills his glass.
Will doesn't know if Hannibal has had this house for years or acquired it more recently but the kitchen is very typical of him. Will can admit that he feels comforted by the sheer indulgence of it. In the evening the soft glow of lights suspended low over the kitchen island cradles them in a circle of well crafted intimacy.
He sits in the circle of the light drinking his wine, staring at the thick twisting coils inside the light bulbs and tells himself not to imagine things prowling the shadows beyond the light.
Among the reasons that the kitchen is so comforting to Will is that it’s full of weapons. Knives and cleavers and corkscrews. Metal skewers and scissors. There’s also a gun. Hannibal doesn’t approve of keeping guns in the house, but Will knows one day he’ll need to use it. So he keeps it hidden away, behind a kickboard under a kitchen counter.
Within reach for when he needs to use it.
-|-
There are no pictures in the house. It takes her a long time to realise what’s so strange about the place, but that’s it. The walls are covered in huge pieces of artwork that obscure the fact that there are no family photos anywhere in the house. At least not in any of the rooms that Poppy has been into.
-|-
The investigation into the deaths of the two women in the house across the street from them hasn’t amounted to anything. Or at least no suspects that they are aware of...nothing released to the public. Breathless headlines crowd for space on the newsstand for the first week, but the shock and awe has now faded taking with it the story from the newspapers.
Will is left holding his breath, his lungs burning while he waits for everything to crash down on top of them and tear their life apart. He is sleeping less and less every night.
It’s probably started to drive Hannibal up the wall, Will’s a little surprised that he hasn’t started mashing sleeping pills into his food yet.
-|-
Will laughing is an endearing raspy sound Poppy hasn't heard before and she thinks I've had too much to drink and that's probably why she doesn't notice the car pulling into the driveway, or the sounds of someone getting out marked by a driver’s side door thumping closed. At the sound of the front door rattling open though she becomes aware and sees the humour fall away from Will who pulls himself a little more upright on the sofa.
A man's voice calls out Will’s name from the entrance, and then again closer as he moves down the hall towards them.
The bottle clinks against the rim of the glass as Will sloppily tops them up.
The door swings open to the third repetition of Will's name and Poppy sees a man in a suit stop in his stride at the sight of them on the sofa.
Will looks sidelong towards the door as he passes Poppy her refilled glass.
“You're home earlier than expected.”
The man has a jacket over his arm and an impassive expression on his face. “A liquid lunch, Will?” he asks with precise, clipped words.
Poppy thinks she catches Will roll his eyes a little and cringes internally but Will just shrugs awkwardly with one shoulder.
“We were working on the car”
“I see” The man says in a tone that suggests he doesn’t, quite, see.
“Will’s helping to fix my car” Poppy blurts out and both men turn to stare at her. “The wine was um, a thank you gift.” She presses her lips together and waves a hand vaguely at the glasses and mostly empty bottle. She’s definitely drunk, she shouldn’t have had wine on an empty stomach.
The man considers her for a moment before approaching and offering her his hand politely. “You must be Poppy then I presume? Will mentioned you suffered some car trouble.”
“Poppy, this is Hannibal.” Will introduces.
“It’s nice to meet you.”
“Likewise. Will you be staying for lunch Poppy?”
“Oh no, really I’d better not take up any more of your time.”
Will puts a hand on her arm to stop her when she tries to stand up. “No it’s fine, I got you drunk at one in the afternoon, the least I can do is feed you. Hannibal can drive you home after.”
“Of course, it won’t be any trouble.” Hannibal insists politely and Poppy sits back down. “Well, as long as it isn’t a bother.” She says and Will smiles at her dryly.
“I told you he’d probably try and feed you the first time he met you.”
“There is no better way to get to know someone than a proper conversation over a good meal,” Hannibal says lightly from where he is standing by the arm of the sofa. “wouldn’t you agree Poppy?”
“Oh um yes, certainly.” Poppy says wishing she wasn’t so tipsy, her face burning hot.
Will tips his head back into Hannibal’s stomach to look up at him. “What are you making for lunch?”
“You’re in luck, I happened across some very nice steak while I was out yeste-”
“No” Will interrupts rudely. “Not that. Something else”
“Will...” he chides.
“I don’t care if it came from an actual butchers Hannibal. I don’t want it. I don’t want...bloody meat on the table.”
Poppy looks away awkwardly at the sudden argument and picks her glass up from the table for something to do with her hands. But after a long moment of silence between the two men finally Hannibal clears his throat. “Ok, we’ll have something else.”
Later when they sit down to eat the stew is exquisite.
-|-
She looks maybe ten years younger than Will, but that could just be because she’s sitting cross legged on the floor in front of the fire wrapped in a blanket, her wet hair fanned out across her back. He hands her a mug of tea and settles down next to her and she gives him an awkward smile.
“I’m so sorry about this, if you don’t mind me using your phone I’ll call a taxi and get out of your hair.”
Will shakes his head, smiles thinly at her. “It’s no bother. You should get yourself warm first though, you don’t want to end up getting a chill.”
It’s immediately apparent that she’s also a foreigner, not american but english. Her accent is soft and round as she explains to Will that her family have a second home in the area and she’s planning to stay for a few months. Just her by herself. She had had no idea who to call in the middle of the night, stranded with her car broken down on the side of a country road.
She’s lucky that the car stalled just past their house, otherwise it’s miles through the woods to the town and the road isn’t lit.
Will suggests he can take a look at her car tomorrow, maybe save her the cost of an emergency callout, or at the very least offer her a tow to a garage.
Poppy thanks him for the offer and for the tea and they finish their drinks in silence.
“Let me uh, go and get my phone, you can call a cab.” Will says eventually and takes both their mugs out of the room with him as he goes.
-|-
There are men’s voices, a conversation too low to make out the words or the tone but she wonders if it’s about her, then she wonders who is talking. Poppy wakes up and realises with a chill she has fallen asleep. She’s still on the floor, leaning with her back up against the sofa. The fire looks to be burning the same and it’s still dark outside. She shrugs the blanket off her shoulders and starts feeling around in the dim lamplight for her bag and shoes.
She can’t believe she fell asleep in a stranger’s house, this guy could be anyone, he could be some creep. He could be a total nutter for all she knows. Her heart starts to race a little and something like shame curls in her stomach as she fumbles for her things.
Will comes in as she’s checking through her bag just to make sure everything is still there.
“The taxi will be about 10 minutes, they’ll call my cell when they get here.” He says gesturing with the mobile phone in his hand.
Poppy smiles back reflectively and runs a hand through her hair, it’s still damp at the ends. She wants to wait for the taxi outside just so she doesn't have to linger awkwardly in the house, but she doesn’t want to appear rude so she stays inside with Will.
As they stand waiting some of the adrenaline fades and she starts to feel silly for panicking when she woke up. Will seems awkward but nice. Obviously not good at small talk but he hasn’t done anything to justify her skin crawling or the gut feeling to get out of the house as fast as possible. He’s wearing a jumper that looks too big for him and his glasses are a little crooked. She probably woke the poor bloke up when she knocked on his door earlier.
Regardless, she’s glad when headlights stop at the bottom of the drive. Will walks her out and opens the front door, holding out a business card and wishing her a safe trip home. She take the card and thanks him before leaving. She has to make her way down the sloping driveway carefully so as not to slip.
She makes it to the car in one piece and lets out a tired sigh as the driver pulls away.
Looking down at the business card, Will's name and mobile number written hastily on the back, she wonders if it would be better finding a garage and paying them to come and get the car.
Flipping the card over she sees the print on the front.
Dr Lecter, Psychiatry
Oh, so probably not a nutter then, she thinks with amusement as she tucks it into her purse.
-|-
When Poppy mentions her family’s house in France to others she always downplays it. “Oh it’s just an old summer house, we bought it cheap because it was so run down. It needs a lot of work but none of us have had the time recently, you know how it is...” In all honesty the house had been in need of some renovation when they purchased it but it’s looking great now. A cosy four bedroom with a pond in the back garden. Poppy spent a couple of weeks last summer weeding out the flower beds and replanting all new flowers and they’ve started to come up lovely this year.
The thing is, she’s never felt scared to come and stay in this house alone before. She lives alone in London which has a much higher crime rate than the french countryside and she never worries about someone breaking into her flat there, why would she consider a tiny village like this unsafe?
She only hears about it a couple months after the fact, that a woman and her sister were found dead in a house just up the road. The old lady that lives next door has come over with some eggs from her chickens telling Poppy that she won’t use them all so won’t she please take some. Poppy doesn’t remember how the topic even comes up but the old lady seems shocked she hasn’t heard about it when she says as much. Poppy’s french is limited and the neighbour’s english non-existent so she struggles to understands the details but she gets the gist.
When the woman leaves Poppy gets out her iPad and searches for information on the murder. She checks on the BBC world news site for anything about a double murder in the region but it comes up empty so instead she has to look up local news articles and try to translate them into English.
It’s gruesome. A young woman in her thirties found stabbed to death in her bed. According to the husband he had been away on a work trip. When he couldn’t get hold of his wife her called her sister who lived nearby to ask her to check in on his wife for him. When he couldn’t reach his sister-in-law either he panicked and cut his trip short, returning home immediately. He was the one to find the bodies.
The article mentions “...indication de mutilation post-mortem...” without giving any specific details and Poppy’s mind tries to fill in the blanks for her with horrific images of disfigured corpses like a slideshow she can’t stop seeing.
Her search brings up a true crime podcast that talks about the case, but she has to turn it off halfway through because she’s getting a sick claustrophobic feeling.
Even after she’s turned it off the unsettled feeling stays with her. The more she tries not to think about it the more her brain fixates on the idea of someone who has been stabbed in the face and keeps trying to picture it. Knowing that it happened so close to where she’s staying makes it unexpectedly real to her. At some point she notices that she’s started biting her nails anxiously and tries to stop.
When she thinks about it she realises that she’s somehow more vulnerable here than in London. She doesn’t really know anyone in the area and she doesn’t speak the language all that well. If something ever happens to her she has no idea how long it would take anyone to notice and raise the alarm.
That night she lies awake in the empty house unconsciously straining her ears at every small sound. Her thoughts cycling through every terrible thing that could happen to her and whether she would be able to call for help in time. Eventually she either wills herself to sleep or nods off from exhaustion only to jump awake at the sound of branches hitting the window in a gust. When she looks at the clock it’s only been 30 minutes since she dozed off. She doesn’t get much sleep.
-|-
“I was listening to something the other day, this true crime podcast...” She says noticing that Will doesn’t look particularly enthused by the topic. She’s already brought it up though so she might as well tell him.
“The episode was uh, about the two women that were killed here.” Will pauses under the hood of the car and Poppy laughs at herself a little awkwardly. “It was so gruesome I had to turn it off. It’s actually got me pretty freaked out and they still haven’t found out who done it. I’m so paranoid about locking my doors at night now.” Will flicks his eyes from the engine up to study her face.
“I mean I know there are probably loads of murders in London every week but this just feels a lot scarier?” She continues into the silence. “Like, how can...how can you not be terrified?” She can’t figure out Will’s expression. “... do you feel safe here at night? Even though two people were murdered just across the road?”
“I don’t feel safe” he says in a disgruntled tone. “Who feels safe with a killer out there?” He doesn’t look particularly freaked out by it though and she says as much to him. He looks at her again with an expression she can’t quite parse.
“Look...Poppy…” he rubs a hand over his jaw “everyone around here is a little on edge right now I know, but don’t get too worked up over this. Statistically speaking it’s someone both victims knew, murder like this is usually personal.”
“What do you mean murder like this?” She asks and he looks away again, rakes his hand through his hair.
“An isolated murder in the victim’s home...it was probably a crime of passion. Revenge, an abusive relationship, an argument that escalated out of control... “ He shrugs with one shoulder. “In all likelihood it was the husband. It’s still fucked up but...”
Poppy shivers and doesn’t think about the description of the crime and the post-mortem body mutilation because that doesn’t sound very crime of passion to her and she badly wants for what Will says to be right.
They talk about something else.
-|-
Poppy scans the newspaper headlines as she waits in the queue. The local paper is folded over in half with a picture of a house showing above the fold with crime scene tape over the front door. The text underneath the picture describes a quiet family neighbourhood. Poppy knows exactly how quiet it is, up until lately it was one of her favourite things about the area.
The thing about fear in a small town is, it’s malignant.
-|-
She’s stalling, drawing out the last of the pinot noir in her wine glass. She doesn’t want to leave the roaring fire and company of her friends, doesn’t want to go home to sit in her cold house alone.
Will must pick up on her hesitation because he offers to give her a lift home, says there’s no point in her getting a taxi for a 10 minute journey, not at this time of night.
Hannibal leans over and pours another measure into her glass. A small one, just for the road he tells her with a smile.
She probably shouldn’t but...the world is warm and soft around the edges and she wants to stay by the fireside for as long as she can. To starve off the fear that eats at her her at night as she lies alone in that house trying to sleep.
“You know you’re welcome to stay over if you like...we have plenty of space. The guest room is available whenever you want it.” Will says gently and she feels utterly transparent. Like he knows how twitchy and paranoid she is when she’s alone at night lately.
Picking up on Will’s implication Hannibal leans forward. “You’re living alone?” he asks, eyebrows raised slightly. Thinking of the picture of the house in the newspaper no doubt, with the crime scene tape across the front door. The house that looks exactly like hers, could almost be hers, if you just take a right instead of a left, follow the road a scant half mile in the other direction.
“Take care to lock your doors at night, I hate to think of you all alone in that house down there, what with all of this unpleasantness lately.” Hannibal cautions her.
“Will uh, he told me that it was probably a domestic dispute, or something like that. What happened with those women.”
Hannibal looks over at Will who’s not looking at either of them. “...perhaps.” He allows. “I wouldn’t be surprised however if we find out the woman who died this week was also killed in a similar fashion.”
“You think it was the same person in both cases?” Hannibal somehow gives the appearance of a shrug without moving. “Is that what the police have said? That the two crimes are related?”
“To my knowledge the police have not yet linked the two publicly.”
“Then why do you think it’s connected? Are you saying that we have a serial killer? Here of all places?”
Hannibal stares at her for a long moment, then blinks. “It seems rather a large coincidence, all things considered.”
Poppy leans back against the sofa and stares into the fire.
“And what about your theory Will.” Hannibal says lightly. “Do you still think the motive is personal?”
“I honestly wouldn’t know Hannibal.” he replies sounding tired.
Poppy looks over and sees that the line of his shoulders is tight, like he would rather be talking about anything else right now and she feels guilty for somehow managing to bring the topic up.
When she turns back Hannibal is considering her with a thoughtful expression. “If the two cases are related then I doubt the motive was personal. Serial killers rarely kill people they know.” She looks back at him not sure how to reply, she certainly doesn’t want to think about the possibility that something like that could happen somewhere like this.
“That um, that doesn’t make me feel any safer you know.”
Will speaks suddenly from his chair. “Serials killers pick victims that they think won’t be connected back to them, or won’t be missed at all.” He says dully, staring into the fire. His deep voice almost a monotone. “Usually they pick prostitutes and runaways, the less dead they’ve been called.”
Hannibal isn’t one to broadcast his emotions, but Poppy is sure she can see distaste in the corners of his mouth.
“Well, your neighbours weren’t exactly prostitutes or runaways, neither was the woman from my village…”
“Quite right, we shouldn’t make such generalizations. We should leave theorizing to the professionals. I’m sure the police will apprehend the responsible persons before anyone else comes to harm.” Hannibal sounds confident.
“I hope so.” Poppy says weakly, clutching at her glass.
Will grimaces around a mouthful of wine. “Can we please talk about something else? Anything would be less depressing than this...”
-|-
Une Femme de 31 ans retrouvée morte dans sa maison.
Alertés tôt mardi matin par sa famille, les gendarmes ont découvert le corps de Geneviève Sauvageau (31 ans) dans la chambre à coucher. Elle est décédée des suites de multiples coups de couteau portés au visage, au torse et à l'abdomen après avoir été violentée. L'affaire a été confiée à la brigade de recherches de la gendarmerie de...
Poppy clicks out of the article and back to her homepage.
-|-
Poppy invites him in, offers him a cup of tea. She has no idea.
-|-
Hannibal is cooking shrimp and bread salad, Poppy and Will are in charge of the drinks and Will is trying to teach her how to muddle the perfect mojito. Dinner tonight is obviously Will’s choice, the aggressively simple dishes are incongruent in Hannibal’s opulent kitchen.
When she’s done little bits of mint leaf are floating around in her glass, probably just waiting for their chance to get stuck in her teeth. Will’s drink meanwhile looks flawless, but he’s probably had lots of practice making cocktails for the guests at the fancy dinner parties he’s told her Hannibal likes to host.
“You don’t need to crush the leaves so hard, you just need to bruise them enough to release the flavour.” He coaches, laughing a little at her frown and passing her his glass to try instead.
She has another go and it turns out better the second time, but that’s possibly less down to an improved technique and more due to lowered standards after finishing off Will’s drink and her own.
She stands against the counter sipping her third drink slowly, nursing a happy buzz and watching as Hannibal pan sears the shrimp, a rich buttery smell filling the kitchen.
“So Poppy tell us, what are your plans over the summer? I take it you’re staying a while longer?” There’s a delay while she registers his question. She’s so enrapt in watching him toss the pale shrimp in the air over the flame, a dish towel slung casually over one shoulder, that it takes her a minute.
“I was actually thinking of learning to sail out on the lake.” She admits when her brain catches back up and Hannibal makes an intrigued noise.
“You should have Will give you some lessons then.”
“You can sail?”
“A little...my dad taught me the basics.” Will says quietly and Hannibal makes a disapproving sound.
“He’s being modest. A few years ago we spent six months sailing around the coast of South America. I don’t know how he managed it really, I was useless for the first two months.” He says with a self-deprecating smile.
“Oh wow that sounds fantastic! Six months really?”
“Something like that…” he mumbles.
She’s about to start grilling him for advice but she realises Will looks unhappy with the attention on him, his smile has become awkward, so she lets the conversation drift on to other things. Allows Hannibal tell her instead about the recipes he picked up during their trip, accepts his promises to make some of the dishes for her the next time she’s over.
-|-
Hannibal is seeing a gentleman about a dog one day, a young saluki with soft ears and a gentle personality who would be well suited to accompanying Will on his long walks.
A delivery van is parked behind him on the road and the driver is knocking on the door of the next house over as Hannibal leaves. He gives Hannibal a friendly nod when he sees him passing. Getting back into his car Hannibal sees the man’s back disappear behind the neighbor’s front door as it closes.
He sits for a few moments, and then carefully takes note of the van’s registration before leaving.
By the time he reaches home the dog has slipped his mind all together. The delivery driver wasn’t carrying a package is the thing.
It’s pure chance when he sees it again. The same company, the same registration plate, the same non-descript driver. Something about the man instinctively piques his attention and for Hannibal that’s reason enough. This time he follows the van and by the end of the night he knows where the man lives.
Over the course of the next few weeks Hannibal watches the man breaks into four different houses each at a different time of day, presumably when he knows the owners won’t be home. He never seems to carry anything into or out of the houses and Hannibal doesn’t know what he does inside.
The man moves with the confidence of experience and Hannibal takes note of how little attention passers by pay to him. He is quick and efficient at picking locks and his vehicle blends seamlessly into the general comings and goings of the street. It’s almost impressive Hannibal has to admit.
-|-
The first time, he skims over the newspaper and nearly misses it. The article reads: Woman raped in her own home, 27 year old nurse returning home from a night shift was sexually assaulted on Thursday night at knife point. The attacker broke into the woman’s house and ambushed her when she returned home. It doesn’t give a house number, but Hannibal recognises the street name. She’s the first.
As winter drags on Hannibal keeps an eye out for his new friend, searches for any sign of him in the newspapers. Three more rapes are reported in a fifteen mile radius and each time a woman is assaulted in her home by a knife wielding intruder.
The victims profile is easy to discern. He comes across his victims by chance, all of them young women who live alone or whose husbands work away. This is what he has been doing, breaking into houses, looking for the perfect victim.
Like most criminals, Hannibal knows the man will be caught because he’ll get brazen. He has already been breaking into people’s homes long enough to become skilled at it. The longer he goes uncaught the more confident he will become, and with each rape he committs the pleasure he feels will become increasingly short lived. He will need to act out more elaborate fantasies on each successive victim to achieve the same high each time and his cooling off period in between crimes will start to shrink.
Hannibal knows his pattern by now. The coil is winding tighter and tighter.
The third night in a row he observes the man parked in the same location, watching the same house, there is no doubt in his mind that his anonymous friend is preparing himself to take the next step.
After three days of lurking around their neighbors house Hannibal catches sight of the man driving in a familiar direction. He follows behind him until the van turns off into a lane that goes into the woods behind their neighborhood. Hannibal continues on past the turning without slowing.
The lane is a dead end, used only by hikers going into the woods. In the late evening, almost dark, no one is going to be using it. A good location to hide his vehicle and within walking distance of his chosen target. Hannibal knows he will do it tonight.
He returns home and collects Will, tells him there is a recital he wants to attend tonight when he asks. They are nowhere near the Voight’s house when the occupants are murdered.
-|-
Poppy has no idea who she’s inviting inside. The most dangerous killers are the ones that keep calm. That know how to put their victims at ease and maintain complete control over the situation. She has her guard down, completely unsuspecting right up until the moment he slides the knife into her stomach.
-|-
There isn’t a funeral, not one that Will can go to anyway. Her family have the body flown back to England as soon as the autopsy is finished to bury her in her home town.
Hannibal watches Will pace the house for days afterwards, watches his brain start to boil over into obsession as he goes over all the ways he failed to keep her safe. They knew there was a killer out there and they just let her go out alone. She fit the victim profile, what the hell were they thinking.
Will isn’t working this case, but he still knows how this works. Serial killers don’t kill people they know, their victims are complete strangers, which makes them hard to track. They seem normal on the outside. They are well known, go to church, have neighbours, a job, a family even. Despite the inhumanity of their actions though, they are creatures of habit like anyone else. They tend to commit crimes and dump the bodies within a radius of 14-40 kilometers of their homes. In theory, you map the two furthest crime scenes and draw a circle around them...there’s a good chance your killer lives somewhere in the centre of that circle.
The police will be looking at the crimes and working backwards, searching for a pattern of escalating behaviour. More than likely this guy has a history of B&E or sexual assault.
In a place as small as this, it’s only a matter of time.
Will wants to find him before the police do.
He lies in bed staring up the the ceiling. Every time he closes his eyes he sees Poppy overlaid with his neighbor; her face reduced to gore. His throat and his chest ache, a growing pressure is building at his temples. Time passes and Will drifts but he doesn’t sleep. He becomes aware of Hannibal lying next to him, observing him in the dim light.
When he speaks his voice is hoarse. “Help me find him.”
“Of course.” Hannibal doesn’t ask him if he’s sure.
-|-
Hannibal is familiar enough with their own little local monster that finding him when he needs to is easy enough. There is a satisfaction in breaking into the man’s home undetected. He is prepared to subdue him if necessary, but in the end he is already passed out in front of the tv when Hannibal finds him. He doesn’t wake at all as Hannibal slides the needle into him and presses down on the syringe.
The dose won’t kill him, but Hannibal doesn’t need him to be dead yet. Just incapacitated for a while. Long enough to give Hannibal time to work.
-|-
Poppy invites him in, offers him a cup of tea. She has no idea, she’s completely unsuspecting right up until the moment he slides a knife into her stomach. She makes it easy for him.
The wound in her stomach is deep, she drops to her knees with the pain. Her face is scared and panicked but he doesn’t give her time to beg. Slitting her throat silences her for good. He’s standing behind her when he does it so he doesn’t get caught in the arterial spray. He covers his clothes before moving her to the bed and finishing the task.
It takes less than an hour from start to finish.
It’s a good likeness, he appraises when he steps back to look at the final picture. It will certainly fool the local police...he wonders if it would fool Will. Thankfully it doesn’t have to because Will won’t ever see this crime scene.
In a short amount of time he’s back home and eating dinner with Will. The drugs he gave the man will take until morning to wear off and no doubt leave him groggy and confused.
-|-
When they finish burying the body Will doesn’t feel guilty, he feels righteous. Hannibal he can tell is proud of him.
-|-
Hannibal is delighted at Will, delighted to see him tip over that precarious crumbling edge he's been clinging to ever since Virginia, it was only ever a matter of time. Because he knows Will intimately, he knows that he is fierce and loyal and wouldn't stand by and allow someone he cared for to be hurt, that he would be moved to act. Poppy was a lovely perfect accident in their life. Stumbling her way in and endearing herself to them, to Will. Will never really suspected Hannibal for the murders, beyond the lack of vision Hannibal had taken great pains to ensure they were hours and hours away whenever their little local monster struck. And so Will won't ever have to know that the bad man he did bad things to, wasn't the bad man that hurt Poppy. It was only a matter of time until Will tipped over that crumbling edge, that Hannibal gave things a gentle nudge is neither here nor there really.