Lost and Found (Hannigram)

Lost and Found

Thank you for the prompt  @balanced-demons ! It was so fun to do this exchange with you! 🧡

And a huge thank you to  @madsmeetsmisha for your feedback and reassurance - I appreciate it so much dear! 💗

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After visiting the most recent Chesapeake Ripper crime scene, Will barely remembers returning home. He knows he must have made it home somehow, because despite not being able to remember how he got here, he is currently lying on the floor in his living room. Upon that realization, he tries to think backwards, struggling to recall the memories he knows must be in his mind somewhere. However just the act of attempting to remember anything right now is a strain - like trying to grasp smoke with your bare fingers. Tantalizingly close yet hopelessly elusive.

As he chases the wisps of memories in his mind, every time he thinks he is about to catch one, instead all he finds is a growing sense of unease and panic. Each time he thinks he is about to unlock a memory, a door slams shut in his face, locked. And it seems like the more he searches for answers, the more locked doors he finds - it's like diminishing returns, almost as if he's getting more lost the more he looks.

As he stares at all the doors before him, suddenly shiny dark red blood starts spilling out from underneath every single one, all of them threatening to burst forth at any moment. Gradually the area around him starts to fill with blood, the level rising with every second that passes. Instinctually he tries to back up as the scarlet liquid encroaches on him, closer and closer. No, no, no... It's too much, he feels trapped. For how can you run from the demons in your mind?

Out of reflex he reaches around for something he can use as an escape, an anchor, a weapon, anything. For he knows he can't weather this storm brewing in his mind alone, he needs fortification. The first thing his hand encounters is a whiskey bottle and he grasps it desperately, raising it to his trembling lips. It's already open and almost empty - did he do that? - but he takes a swig anyway, spilling some on himself in the process, desperate to do anything to stave off the panic attack he can feel building inside of him. The one blessing of having had so many in his life is that he can feel the early warning signs - the disconnection from reality, feeling trapped, isolated, and alone, somehow knowing that there's no way to escape...an impending sense of doom, like he's on the event horizon of chaos.

The whiskey burns as it goes down his throat, giving him a temporary respite from the feeling of helplessness, but it doesn't last long and soon enough he's back to feeling adrift without a paddle, lost in a sea of frightening thoughts. Frightening not only because he can't remember, but because he doesn't feel like himself at the moment. He can't remember enough about himself right now to feel like himself and it scares him. If anything the alcohol makes it worse, making everything even more fuzzy and elusive, yet equally terrifying. He drops the whiskey bottle in frustration, distantly hearing the thump of the bottle landing on the rug.

Grasping for any source of stability, his mind automatically prompts him to try the grounding exercise Hannibal taught him to keep him in the present moment. The thought of Hannibal makes him feel slightly better, less alone. Much to his surprise, the older man has actually become his friend. And if he's honest with himself he's probably his only real friend at the moment. Although he supposes even that presumption is based on questionable foundations. For Hannibal may say he isn't officially his psychiatrist, and that he's not officially his patient, yet isn't that what they are to each other? Sometimes Will thinks they could be more...wants more. Wants more than a doctor patient relationship, more than friendship even...but he's smart enough to know that no one as intelligent as Hannibal would want a damaged delusional man like him. That thought has him feeling more alone than ever, his breath catching as he can feel himself start to hyperventilate. Breathe Will, he tries to tell himself. Grounding exercise.