| AUTUMN The Jardin D'Anglais, next to Lac Geneve. The fountain is still; leaves from the trees scattered on the surface of the water. The paths and lawns are also strewn - a carpet of rusted browns and golds. There is a gentle breeze in the air, cold, warning of the oncoming winter. Along the path, their backs to the city, two men walk. Both wear long, black coats, unfastened to reveal the taller man's white shirt over blue jeans, and the short man's black trousers and claret sweater. The colour matches his eyes. They are deep in conversation, heads close together. The younger man's arm is linked through the elder's. And as they walk, as they talk, they laugh at a shared joke. Hannibal slides his hand down, threading his gloved fingers between Will's. However cold the winter might be when it comes, there will always be this warmth between them. ~ SUMMER Tourist season. I often wonder if all who come make it back on to the plane. There's a serial killer loose in the city. Not that the authorities know it. Nor does the media. We've kept a low profile. Geneva is beautiful. In the mornings, when Hannibal leaves for his small practice, I walk down from the old town to the lake and stand for a long time watching the swans. The fountain is at its element at this time of year. The sun's rays dance in the jets of water, and play on the never-ending ripples in the Lake. The first night we were in Geneva, we came down here and stood staring at the neon lights reflected in the water from the name's on the buildings along the lake front. I remember not being able to believe that we'd made it. Had Crawford cleared our route? I doubted it. The house Hannibal's ex-patient bequeathed him is next door to the cathedral. It's on a peaceful square in the middle of the old town. I'm happy living there, living here in this calm but lively city. There was a time, a million years ago, when I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Hannibal was the one person with whom I could be myself. After that night in his townhouse, nothing made any sense. I lost faith in myself and in everybody else around me. To trust him again has taken a long time. To be with him is easy. At the start, I expected death to greet me at every turn. I waited for him to kill me. I imagined myself waking and looking down to find only a bloody mess where my liver should have been, or to open my eyes in the morning and find him standing over me holding my still-beating heart. Instead, I woke each day to his warm body, and went to sleep each night held in strong arms. And slowly I started to believe what he kept promising me. That he wouldn't hurt me. That he loved me more than he'd ever loved anything. Turning my face up to the sun, closing my eyes and feeling the heat on my face, I know that I wouldn't be anywhere else, with anyone else. The intimacy we shared on the brink of death has always bound us. Now, finally, it has freed us. |