Hannibal's house in Baltimore, Sunday evening

[sharp_as_knives]

The FBI and the local press were scampering about like ants whose hill had been disturbed. Hannibal supposed one presumed-dead agent returned to life, a convicted murderer gone missing, and a nearly convicted insane man proved innocent would do that.

For the moment, though, he'd taken a break from watching the amusing chaos in order to ready one of his guest rooms, stock his beer, and make a hearty and relatively simple - for him - dinner. He was rather looking forward to hearing what Sparkle had thought of the drama workshops.


[OOC: for one, but open for phone or whatnot; NFB due to distance!]

Comments

[myownface]

"One of Fandom's weird rains," Sparkle agreed. "There were cats and dogs, and most of them went away, but he just sort of attached himself to my shirt and stuck around."

Hence the name.

"He'd be the best-fed cat... pretty much ever, if it came to that," he added, grinning a little. "Maybe then he'd get past that gangly teenager cat stage and actually start looking like a proper tom."

Velcro did not particularly seem to care what anybody thought of his gangly teenager cat stage. He would not be shamed while he munched his kibbles.

[sharp_as_knives]

"Growing teenagers do need their food," Hannibal answered. "And yours is downstairs, if you're ready. I promise it will taste better than his," he confided.

[myownface]

"I didn't know we were setting such a low bar these days," Sparkle teased, grinning a little as he gave Velcro a scratch behind the ears and muttered a little, "You'll be okay in here for a little while, buddy?"

Velcro, munching his kibbles, declined to comment. Sparkle was going to take that as an okay to stand up again, and then give Hannibal a nod.

"Yeah, I'm ready. I can get the rest of Velcro's stuff set up after dinner. Lazy bones here'll probably just take this opportunity to sleep, anyway."

[sharp_as_knives]

"He is a cat," Hannibal pointed out. "I've been led to believe they're very good at that."

He led the way back down to the dining room. "I went with a simple meal tonight, and one in honor of my guest. Tourtière with beet salad." There was also homemade bread and beer, but that went without saying.

[myownface]

"East meets west," Sparkle mused, smiling on his way down after Hannibal. "I'd say you were going to make me homesick, but I never really actually ate that good back home."

Frozen meat pies really, really didn't count. Especially when compared to Hannibal's cooking.

"Sometimes when the home has more mouths to feed than usual, Lewis will make bouilli - Acadian food, you know? Because he's from that part of New Brunswick. Throw everything in a pot and let it boil, but it was still better than most of us were used to."

Harder to smuggle leftovers into his room, though.

[sharp_as_knives]

"I know some very good dishes that are essentially 'put everything in a dish and cook it'," Hannibal answered with a smile. "And when you've many mouths to feed, it's certainly easier. Are you looking forward to spending a bit of time there again?"

[myownface]

"I guess so. I mean, even if it's just a couple of weeks, it's the closest thing to a home I've got. Bonus points for not actively trying to kill me with, like, dinosaurs and shit on a regular basis. I'm not really close to any of the other teens in the home or anything. Lewis is good to us, though."

Us, him in particular, nobody, everybody... Lewis was good, period, and Sparkle was harbouring no small crush on the man for it.

"I'm supposed to be going back for an assessment, you know? See if I'm making progress. Seeing as I haven't been arrested once since going to that island, he'll probably decide it's good for me and send me back in time for fall classes."

He wrinkled his nose a little. He wasn't going to lie and say he hadn't been hoping to just getting back to his life Canada, fucked up as it was. He was pretty sure Hannibal would see through that, anyway.

[sharp_as_knives]

"I think it probably is good for you," Hannibal answered, smiling. "As odd as it may be. You know a lot more about yourself and your capabilities now, don't you?

[myownface]

"Well, yeah," Sparkle admitted, maybe a touch grudgingly. "I mean, it's been a learning experience, sure. And if the place wasn't so hell-bent on either killing me or driving me insane, I'd probably be a little more fond of it. But, like, I just got a month and some change away from all of the crazy, living in a normal city with normal people, and aside from a couple of phone messages and some trips to a galaxy far, far away, it was... good, you know? Like, I went to sleep not worrying about if I would be me the next day, or if I'd wake up and look out the window to see zombies chewing on the neighbours, and I was going to classes with other students who have no idea what it feels like to be a dog or to die or to k-kill somebody."

Deep breath. Slow exhale.

"And I know I can handle life on the island, and knowing that this shit could happen any time. Some Sith bastard could show up and try to kill one of my best friends, or maybe tomorrow I'll wake up as some other version of me with scars up and down my arms from writing lines for some psychotic magic-bitch, or maybe I'll die. Again. At this point that's not even new. But there's nobody in Toronto I'm going to be able to talk to about any of it. Like people there are used to me making things up and lying right to their goddamn faces and maybe I don't want them to believe me when I tell them bullshit like I'm a shapeshifter or I killed my parents or someone threw some kid right into the tiger pit at the zoo, and keeping people second-guessing even the truth is fine, but nobody is ever, ever going to be able to relate to this."

He frowned a little, and then shrugged his shoulders.

"But I guess that's what acting is for."

Nobody had to know that bothered him when they inevitably laughed it off, either.

[sharp_as_knives]

"They won't relate to it, no," Hannibal agreed. "But that gives you a difference. Another part of yourself that they can't touch. And you are more of a survivor now than they will ever have to be; you know that you can kill somebody if you have to, and you know your limits. You may find it puts many more petty things into perspective."

He gripped Sparkle's shoulder for a moment. "There's a temptation to slip back into old habits when you return somewhere. Don't forget the strength you've learned here when you do."

He smiled. "Now, eat your pie and tell me about acting. Did you enjoy it?"

[myownface]

A part of himself that they couldn't touch... Sparkle could live with that. It was a perspective that he was going to cling to like glue, if he had any say in the matter.

"I..." Sparkle took a half second to change gears, but he looked thankful that the conversational topic was swapping all the same. He shrugged his shoulders as he sat himself down at the table. "Yeah. It was pretty great. Actors are pretty nuts, you know? Like, not in a bad way, more like in a throwing themselves around being stupid but having a good time doing it kind of way. It takes a certain sort of person, you know? Like, the kind who doesn't give a damn what people think of them, so long as what they're thinking isn't 'this guy can't act.'"

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal chuckled. "And are you that sort of person? Or would you prefer to try something else?"

[myownface]

"Well, nobody can deny that the attitude is right," Sparkle replied as he reached for his fork. "You don't last long in the places I've been without developing a thick skin, and I'm pretty good at the improv stuff, apparently. It's all quick thinking and adapting to whatever scenario is set out in front of you, and once you've met your adopted daughter from the future that's never going to happen, or taken a drama class taught by the Norse god of thunder or spent a month just turning into different versions of yourself, you get pretty good at adapting, or else you just go insane."

A beat.

"I'm pretty sure I went with the first one. Like, mostly. And it was good enough for... you know, that other me, that one time. Not that he's me, granted. But it... could be an option?"

[sharp_as_knives]

"I'm fairly certain you haven't gone insane," Hannibal agreed, "and I can offer a professional opinion on that.

"It's good to have options. It isn't as though you need to make a decision at this point, only find out which options you might want to explore. So," he added with a grin, "accounting classes next?"

[myownface]

Sparkle couldn't help but laugh at that, shaking his head.

"No goddamn way," he replied, smirking. "I hope you're not too disappointed, but I'm really the last person you'd want cooking your books if you ever went mobster again. I still add and subtract by counting on my fingers."

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal grinned back. "I won't fire my accountant. What, then - music? Fashion? Medical school?" he added with a wry smile, knowing that probably wasn't very attractive to Sparkle.

Then his smile got a little more wicked. "Maybe law school."

[myownface]

"The only instrument I can play is the tin whistle," Sparkle replied. "Fashion... maybe. But I'm pretty sure you need more than crappy elementary school math to be a doctor or a nurse, and... oh god."

He was setting down his fork for a moment to kind of just gape at Hannibal, because maybe he was the crazy one!?

"Why would you even say that?! That's practically sadistic!"

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal smirked. "You're saying you wouldn't enjoy the chance to throw the law back in the face of people who try to use it for their own ends? Or argue in public and get paid a lot of money for it?"

Yes, he knew there was more to it. He also felt he knew what the draw might be.

[myownface]

Oh, that was playing dirty, Hannibal. You were getting a good-natured stinkeye for that one.

"Well, when you put it like that, sure. That sounds like a great time. You know, if that was all there was to it. It's not all, like, those lawyer shows on television, and I'd probably stay the hell away from criminal law anyhow. If I wanted a life full of whodunnits, I'd just stick around the island for those 'everyone's gone weird again' weekends."

He reached for his fork again, kind of nudging at the meat pie with it before skewering some. It would make it to his mouth eventually, too.

"Real estate law would be boring as shit, I'm not going to chase ambulances, and family law..."

See, eating that bite of pie meant that his mouth would be full, therefore he wouldn't have to elaborate.

[sharp_as_knives]

"Hm. Well, if you aren't into the 'whodunnits', then perhaps not. Fashion, then. Or design of some sort? Or I can highly recommend cooking."

[myownface]

Oh, shit, the meat pie really was good. Sparkle had taken that first bite just so that he'd have a full mouth. He was taking a second while he mulled over those options just because it had tasted so damn good.

"People will always need food," he replied. "It's like the one industry where you know for a fact you'll always have a market. And, I mean, fashion, too. Especially up in freaking Canada where you go nuts looking at snow for so much of the year. Kind of a shame I can't combine all of those things somehow."

Unless he went into business designing edible underwear or something, maybe.

[sharp_as_knives]

...well, it wouldn't be anything Hannibal would do.

"You could go into a business that works with them all. Hospitality, party planning. You would need a bit of business schooling for that, but quite a bit of it is down to a good eye and good instincts."

[myownface]

"God, party planning would actually be fun," Sparkle admitted, blinking. "Now I'm half wondering if I've been missing out on important career training, not taking every possible class with, you know... the pink pony."

Okay, when he put it like that, it didn't sound like he was missing out too much.

[sharp_as_knives]

"From what I've heard of her classes, they may be somewhat more useful for other ponies than for humans," Hannibal answered tactfully.

He thought for a moment. "If you think you might be interested, I can enlist you the next time I throw a party. And you could speak to Mr. Wayne; charity galas would be good experience."

[myownface]

"They would be," Sparkle answered, though he was sounding a little dubious again. While Hannibal and Mr. Wayne both practically exuded 'wealth,' Sparkle still wasn't hugely inclined to want to get any closer to rich men who were a relative unknown than he absolutely had to. "Maybe I'll stick with helping you with yours once or twice first, um, just to see if it's my thing."

You know, before leaping into charity galas all willy-nilly.

[sharp_as_knives]

"Of course." Privately, Hannibal was amused at being the trustworthy one, but outwardly he just nodded solemnly.

"Although this does mean I may have to have some more parties."

[myownface]

Hey, nobody had ever accused Sparkle of having sound judgment.

"Put me through my paces?" He smiled faintly, ducking his head. "I mean, I guess I can figure out what fancy parties involve. You'd let me know if I was seriously fucking up, right?"

[sharp_as_knives]

"Have I ever struck you as the type to not speak up?" Hannibal asked. "You did fine at your final last session; I have faith you can become even better." He picked up his beer and toasted him.

[myownface]

Whatever else people could say about the mentor-student relationship between Hannibal and Sparkle, nobody could deny that the man was good for Sparks' self-esteem. He grinned a little, reaching for his own beer and lifting it right back.

"Well," he replied, "I had a good teacher."

There was no way he could have pulled that off otherwise.

[sharp_as_knives]

And because Hannibal was modest and self-effacing...AHAHAHAHAHA.

Hannibal grinned, nodded, and drank.