Will showering with Hannibal after killing together, a ritual baptism. It’s early days yet, when he looks into the bottom of one of their fine crystal glasses, he sometimes thinks he feels more shaken bottle than man, more instinct and need than person and mind.
Hannibal knows. He always knows— has always known— where and when the hairline fractures are webbing through Will. The only feverish heat drawn out from their appearance now is the muggy warmth of the hot shower, spray fogging in the air. Hannibal’s oily fingerprints transfer onto Will’s, juniper and jasmine oil daubed on the dark labradorite tile of the shower wall. Water is a source of nebulousness, of reflection, and they both know this intimately. Wild streams and lakes of lilies and swans inhabit the strange realm of their shared not-quite-memories. Water is a medium of liminality. Sparkling condensation blurs their forms until they can only tell which limb is whose through touch, iridescence arcing through the air.
They are a many-limbed being. Cellular division, a siphonophore’s ribbon dance, the reach of a heartworm through the ventricles and veins. Joined together as soulmates were intended to be, before the Gods were said to have separated them, fearful of their power. They are the only Gods upon the altars of each other’s love, now. Haven’t they just exerted power over life, death, and transformation? Don’t they create and destroy, punish and bless? The spray wicks away droplets of red, the iron tang of blood and sweat giving way to clean citrus and warm skin….. Will’s fingers trace the path of the blood washing off the topography of Hannibal’s veined forearms. Hannibal discards the washcloth in his hands to knead over Will’s shoulders, relishing in a moan that’s half the relief of old aches and half aching lust.
Friction is made smooth by water and suds, blood and the desire that pours from Hannibal so eagerly. Hips circling, the scent of blood on soapy foam spurring them on alongside the rough drag of stubble and hair, the leathery, raised lines of scars…. Sharks in the water, silken and flaying in turn. Risking the fellow predator with matching hungers in its belly in primal desperation, circling, joining. Their teeth cut into each other’s shoulders just as sharply, coating their cries with blood and drinking them down, lips sealed to skin, not a drop released.
Hannibal draws a bath, after, and they float together. They lean into each other, chest to chest, strong calves lacing between them, and wash with all the tenderness of holy men polishing saint’s bones. A candle that smells of seawater flickers in the dark.
Their reflections ripple into each other in the pinkened bathwater.
