✔️ Only I Can Feel You | Hannigram | Rye Ambrose

14

Hello! I just wanted to say thank you so much for reading this story! It means so much to me, and--honestly--2K reads??? I'm shocked! Thank you again, so so much, and please, enjoy :)

Will came home that night, feeling content and full, but with an aching hole in his chest. His mind still dully pounded with his and Hannibal's earlier interaction.

Hannibal... Death...

He laughed at himself, shaking his head. How could he assume such a thing? Hannibal was merely a therapist. Just human. A human who—oddly smelled of—

Will groaned and roughly sat at the edge of his bed, staring into the dark panels of his home. Still, despite the confusing and intense nature of it all, he couldn't get the image of Hannibal's eyes flashing into his out of his head; their close proximity and the demeaning atmosphere. Dare he say, he perhaps... enjoyed the threatening aura of Hannibal's stature.

He sighed, pulling the covers over him and staring up at the ceiling.

Hannibal is not Death, he reassured himself. It took a while, but as sleep finally ebbed down on him hours later, he believed it.

...

Unease stretched taut around Will over the course of a month. Long and dragging, neither the Chesapeake Ripper or Death had made any sign of activity. Sessions with Hannibal gave him little ease—after all, he always smelled so peculiarly of Death—and Jack, noticing this change in demeanour, kept Will at a safe distance from most of the cases. What made matters worse was Freddie Lounds and her conniving articles, leaving Will irritated, impatient, and most of all, burnt out.

"Can you believe they're calling Death the 'Vandalist Killer?'" Will expressed one day, agitated with Lounds' most recent article. "It's absurd."

Hannibal stared at Will cooly, a glint in his eyes. In the month of little action, they had brushed off Will's accusation of Lecter being the fated Death. He raised his glass and took a sip of wine. "And this makes you feel?"

"Cheated, maybe. Upset." He slumped in his chair. "Of all the names in the English language, she chose Vandalist. Death isn't—he isn't like that."

Hannibal hid a smirk behind another sip of wine. "What is he like then?" he muttered, eyeing Will with sharp eyes.

Graham pondered for a moment. "Respectable. Sophisticated, perhaps." He sighed and ran a hand through his unruly locks. "All I know is that Lounds could've gone with something a bit nicer. Leave it up to her to skew everything up."

"What I'm getting from you," said Hannibal smoothly, "is that you care for Death's image?"

Will scoffed. "Not many people believe he exists—in mortal form, I mean," he added with an irritated shrug. "In the end, my feelings are useless. They're not helping anybody."

Hannibal gazed calmly at Will. "Human emotions are never useless, Will," he said smoothly. "Further conflict, they may sometimes cause, but in the end, they are a means to better analyzing oneself." He set his wine glass down and crossed his legs. "Tell me, Will, why does Mrs. Lounds' article irritate you so? You care for Death's image, yes, but—could there be more?"

Will sat in silence for a while, staring at the floor and mulling over a response, anything. Still, nothing came up. Why did he care? He let out a strangled laugh and shrugged.

"I don't know," he said after a while, avoiding Hannibal's gaze. "Maybe I..." He shook his head at himself.

"You don't have to hide anything, Will," assured Lecter, leaning closer to him. Will sighed and leaned back in his seat, staring off at Hannibal's desk in the distance.

"Maybe I think of him as a friend," he admitted quietly.

Hannibal tilted his head, examining him.

Will's lips twitched in an embarrassed smile. "I-I've been... killing people—all these years. Just to see him. And now that he's been showing up, I feel like—" His brows furrowed as he searched for the words. "—maybe he'll actually do the one thing I've ever wished from someone."

"To meet you," Hannibal finished.

Will rubbed his face and shook his head. "Like I said. It's stupid. Never even spoken to him and I feel like we have something."

Hannibal knowingly smirked at that.

"Dinner's preparing in the oven," said Hannibal after a gentle silence. "If you'd like, you can join me. Perhaps it will make you more relaxed."

Will gazed at Hannibal, the fatigue clear on his face. After a pause, he playfully smirked. "Sounds like a date, Dr. Lecter," he teased. Hannibal rose a brow but, nonetheless, returned the playful jibe.

"I don't get romantically involved with my patients," he said, an amused smirk on his face. "But, if it makes you feel better..."

He let his words trail off, and Will chuckled to himself, standing up along with Hannibal.

"Sure," said Will. "Hard to resist your cooking."

Hannibal gave a sincere smile. "You can wait in the dining room. I'll be out in a few minutes."

With that, he agreed, and dinner was served not long after.

...

"Do you ever think of eating your kills, Will?" asked Hannibal as he finished a bite of tender meat, gazing at the other. Graham stopped mid-poke with his fork and glanced up at Lecter.

"I'm not in therapy still, am I?" he said with the hint of a smile. Hannibal merely rose a brow at him, and Will shrugged with a sigh.

"Maybe," he answered, raising his sliver of meat and examining it, letting its flesh glint under the light. "Why—is this human we're eating?"

Will chuckled and smirked over at Hannibal, whose eyes flashed as he returned the gesture.

"We'd both be in trouble if that were the case," hummed Lecter, gazing fixedly at Will as he ate the meat, lips sliding over the fork. Graham closed his eyes and sang at the taste, lashes fluttering and eyes looking over at Hannibal.

"Can I ask you a question, Dr. Lecter?"

Hannibal tilted his head. "Go ahead."

"Just how many patients do you eat dinner with like this?" he muttered, leaning an elbow on the table to lean closer to Lecter. "This feels..." He searched Hannibal's unreadable gaze. "Intimate."

Hannibal breathed in slowly, soft and measured. "Not many," he said quietly, staring just as intensely at Graham.

The air seemed to stir again, brewing with a binding, taut heat. Will hummed, eyes glancing down and up Hannibal's figure—which felt like an eternity—before he leaned back into his own seat. A smirk took his lips.

"This really is good meat," he said, breaking the tension in the atmosphere. Hannibal managed a slow, calculated blink and tipped his head at him.

"I'm glad you like it," he said.

And with a few more glances, and an electrifying silence in the air, they continued with dinner.

Thank you so much for reading!

Quick update:

Both my school and personal laptops are broken, so I can't access either of these sites and upload :( My phone screws up the format of my writing, too.

Hopefully I can fix it soon, but in the meantime, I'll be using the library's computers, lmao

Have a wonderful day!

-ambrose