When I think of home, I think of my dogs. There were so many, my God. Once Molly and I moved into that bigger house, they were even happier. She enabled me, in a way, to keep taking in strays. That house we moved into, though… it wasn’t really home, just a vessel for a home to be made in. And she was like a distraction to building the home I tried to never think about.
When I really, truly, actually think of home, I think of that inexplicably snowy terrain around my secluded little house, something that feels so impossible for Northern VA, or in Wolf Trap, no less. A sort of fantasy of what a place like this should be. I think of long stretches of barren land, plenty for the dogs to run around in, and the ice-covered rivers I was excited to fish in come spring. I’m close to that life now, only there’s more suburb than seclusion, and I have a cat now. It doesn’t snow much anymore, but I’m 40 minutes away from that place I called home for so long. I’ll take what I can get.
I think of what home could’ve been, with Abigail and with Hannibal, if I hadn’t lied and if I had just gone along with everything.
But mostly I force myself to think of what I have. And I pretend that that’s enough.
- Will Graham (NBC Hannibal/Red Dragon fictionkin)