Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/802703.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Hannibal_(TV)
  Relationship:
      Will_Graham_&_Hannibal_Lecter, Will_Graham/Hannibal_Lecter
  Character:
      Will_Graham, Hannibal_Lecter
  Additional Tags:
      Alternate_Universe_-_High_School, Teacher-Student_Relationship, Alternate
      Universe
  Series:
      Part 1 of The_Nature_of_Inviting
  Stats:
      Published: 2013-05-14 Words: 4498
****** The Nature Of Inviting ******
by loghain
Summary
     The first time that Hannibal Lecter had a conversation with Will
     Graham, it was because one of the more kindly of the teachers
     recognised that the bruise high on Will's cheekbone was not a product
     of student brawling. Obligatory High School AU: Hannibal is the
     school counsellor. Will is sixteen. It ends in porn.
The first time that Hannibal Lecter had a conversation with Will Graham, it was
because one of the more kindly of the teachers recognised that the bruise high
on Will's cheekbone was not a product of student brawling.
"Student bullying maybe," Alana Bloom said, "but he didn't have it yesterday
and he was in my first class this morning. Talk to him, Dr Lecter, find out
what's going on." She'd made to leave, and then turned back, and said, "He's
not like the other boys here. He's anxious, easily uncomfortable. It's why I'm
not dragging him into the principal's office or holding him back after class."
Hannibal nodded. "The gentle approach, then." He tilts his head at her. "Did
you never consider going into psychiatry, Miss Bloom? I believe you would find
yourself quite adept."
She raised an eyebrow at him. "Did you never consider getting a job somewhere
that wasn't a run down high school?" Alana tapped the doorframe with her
fingers and smiled, and then was gone, shutting the grey door of his office
behind her.
At lunch, Hannibal found Will Graham in the library. It was a pitiful place,
really, with books that were out of date and held together with tape, scrawled
in by a hundred students who didn't care about property that wasn't theirs. It
was consistently quiet though, and it sounded exactly where Will might hide.
Hannibal was glad to be right. "Will Graham?" He kept his distance. Will looked
up. The bruise on his cheek shone purple and yellow in the dim light. "That
looks quite painful," he said, and gestured to his own cheek.
"It looks worse than it is." Will never quite met Hannibal's gaze, seemingly
only looking at his face at all in order to ascertain who was addressing him.
Hannibal wondered how many teachers and fellow students had taken that for
insolence and disrespect.
Hannibal waited a beat, watching Will stare into the depths of some banal book
before speaking again. "Do you know who I am?"
"Dr Lecter? The school counsellor?"
"That's right. I'm sure you've noticed that your fellow students require quite
a bit of counselling."
"I didn't think counsellors were ever actually doctors." Will paused and looked
up, his eyes lingering somewhere around Hannibal's jawline. "Sorry."
"No need to apologise, Will, it's an astute observation." Hannibal looked at
the rickety old wooden seats, and then to the lone woman in charge of the
library. He thought about asking to sit, and then thought better of it. He
would prefer not to talk to this student in the company of people who have
nothing more to do than eavesdrop. "Would you consider coming to my office so
we may have a conversation?"
"No offense, but I don't really wanna be psychoanalysed." 
"I won't psychoanalyse you. I'm a counsellor. Your teacher Miss Bloom wanted me
to speak with you." That got Will's attention, a very silently relaxed shift in
his movement. It was clear the teenager liked Alana. It seemed likely that she
was the only adult who treated Will like he was anything more than the rest of
the student pack. "Unless you are studying for something important."
Will's brow furrowed and he looked between the book and Hannibal and then
admitted, "I wasn't studying."
Hannibal smiled. He could tell. "Then you have no reason to say no."
Will didn't seem to relax when they got to his office. Hannibal sat behind his
desk and Will anxiously paced the small room, coming to a stop to stare at the
framed doctorate hung high on the wall, out of the reach of meddling students.
He seemed curious. "Please speak freely, Will."
The permission seemed to help. Will shifted and pushed his glasses up his nose.
"If you're a real doctor, how did you wind up working here?"
"I was a surgeon for many years in an emergency room. I found that treating
minds instead of bodies was much more palatable, and a high school appealed to
my philanthropic side." Being open was, more or less, the only key to get Will
Graham to trust him.
Will scoffed, remarking, "Philanthropic side?" and finally sat in the chair
opposite Hannibal's. The desk divided them. No doubt it was some small comfort
for Will, who seemed to dislike intimacy of any kind. A physical barrier in
such a small room, to keep him safe.
Hannibal linked his fingers. "Is it so hard to believe that I have one?"
Will went quiet, staring at Hannibal from beneath his glasses. For the briefest
second, he looked into Hannibal's eyes, and then away. "No, actually."
"You'll find I'm quite the humanitarian." Hannibal leaned forward, just a
little bit, examining Will quietly. He was starting to figure out this boy. He
was a strange one. "How did that bruise come about?"
"My father and I don't always agree."
Ah. Hannibal could piece him together clearer now. "This is not the first time
this has happened, yet you don't hate him. It isn't something you consider a
problem." 
Will seemed surprised. He nodded.
"And your mother?"
Will's response was calculated. "She doesn't live with us."
"You don't know her," Hannibal surmised.
Will's laugh was abrupt, uncomfortable. "Yeah, I guess so." He deflected.
"Where are you from, Dr Lecter? I can't work out your accent."
"Northern Europe. I was born in Lithuania. Miss Bloom tells me that you've
moved schools lot."
"My dad moves around a lot for work."
They talked for most of the lunchtime hour. Hannibal understood Will, by the
end of it. Though it was not a talent he recognised or cultivated, the teenager
was capable of extraordinary sight, into the minds and movements of others.
Were he to ever take it upon himself to sharpen that talent he would be
formidable.
Will was adrift in a sea of people who could not understand he was not arrogant
or insolent or any measure of unkind, but simply drowning in the collected
emotions of everyone around him. People around Will failed to see that he
teetered on the edge of unwilling and unable to connect, and that was how an
argument with his father had resulted in his father lashing out.
Hannibal recounted their conversation to Alana and she was pleased to hear that
although Will was complicated, there was generally nothing untoward going on at
home or in his life to give cause for concern. The bruise would fade, although
Will's father was likely to be guilty forever.
After such a lengthy probing conversation Hannibal was surprised, though by no
means unhappy, to have Will knock on his door during the next lunchtime.
"What brings you back here, Will?"
He hesitated in the doorway. Then he said, "Miss Bloom suggested that if I ever
felt like... having someone to talk to then I should go to her or you."
Hannibal shifted his weight. "You would prefer to talk to me?"
Will stared up at Hannibal. It was easy, somehow, to forget that Will Graham
was only a boy comparatively speaking. He was not particularly tall, and he had
something of a hunch, no doubt from years of drawing in on himself to avoid
other people, but he had a messy beard persisting around his jawline; Hannibal
suspected that father-son bonding had rather failed in the department of
teaching Will how to shave.
With the glasses and the way that Will tucked in his shirt, he looked much
older. Hannibal absently wondered if Will's inability to shave adequately was a
result of occasionally shaking hands. Or perhaps a nervousness when holding
something that could draw blood. Hannibal glanced downward to look at Will's
hands, but then Will spoke.
"I don't really know if I even have anything to talk about," Will admitted,
fidgeting uncomfortably in the doorway, and he said, "I'm sorry for bothering
you during lunch, Dr Lecter, I'm gonna just go - "
"No," Hannibal spoke up, as he began to turn. Will stopped. "I'm sure that
we'll find something to discuss. Come in." When Will hesitated, Hannibal spoke
more firmly. "I insist. Your company is by no means strenuous."
This time Hannibal took it upon himself to eat whilst he spoke with Will.
Perhaps not the most polite thing to do, but it was lunchtime. Impeccable
manners couldn't be achieved all the time.
Besides, they were only talking. This wasn't a counselling session.
"Do you not have friends you can spend lunch with, Will?" He liked to repeat
his name. To personalise things. If he couldn't have the boy's eye contact, he
would have Will know their conversations were real in other ways. "Surely they
would make better company than myself."
"No," Will said, simply enough. "Most of the guys here are... different. To me.
I don't particularly share their interest for sports or smoking weed or...
girls." He blew out a long sigh with the final word.
That was interesting information. Hannibal didn't let his curiosity show on his
face and glanced down at his bowl of salad, topped with the chopped liver of a
plumber who obnoxiously tried to overcharge. "What are your interests?"
Will shrugged, his fingers running along the arms of the chair he was sat in.
He peered around the office. "Dogs. Fishing. Boats... I like the ocean."
"Interests you inherited from your father."
"He hates dogs."
"You want to own one?"
"Yeah." There was a long pause and Will said, "Dogs are easier than people."
Will spending his lunchtimes in Hannibal's office started to become something
of a habit. It only took a few visits for Hannibal to realise that Will never
had food; seemingly he couldn't afford it and there was not much at home.
He never embarrassed Will by asking, but he did begin to quietly make too much
for himself. At first took persuading to make Will finish his leftovers.
Will never noticed when Hannibal had gradually begun making
deliberate separate portions for them both. He simply accepted a tupperware
bowl and a fork with a grateful smile. Smiles, Hannibal noted, that were often
only for him.
Alana was the first person to notice how much time Will spent in Hannibal's
office. "Is he alright, Dr Lecter? I see him go into or come out of your office
nearly every day." She rose an eyebrow, as she was prone to doing, in a way
that should've been impudent but instead came across as charming. "I hope
you've not gone full psychiatrist on him. He's not your patient."
"Will Graham is lonely," he told her. Hannibal pondered on how to explain it in
a way that didn't reveal that things, of late, were... different, less simple
conversations and probing of a clever young man's mind.
It was lucky that lying came as easy as breathing, lest he slip the way that
Will's ears had taken to burning red when Hannibal complimented or was kind to
him. "He seeks the company of those who would not ridicule him. Company not
found with other sixteen year old boys whose only interests are football and
young women. He disquiets them as much as they disquiet him."
"And you think you're appropriate company for him?" Alana questioned.
Hannibal thought about his answer to that. "I think I am his only option. We
think alike."
"Be careful, Dr Lecter," Alana warned him. "You wouldn't be the first school
counsellor in trouble for spending too much time with a student. If you
empathise too much with him he may form an attachment that could be problematic
for the both of you."
Hannibal gave her his sweetest smile. "Miss Bloom, you really should have
considered psychiatry over a teaching position." She cast him a dark look. He
cleared his throat. "I assure you of this: we are friendly, but Will is a
student and I am a counsellor. Our relationship is limited to the four walls of
my office and perhaps the halls of this school."
That seemed to satisfy her.
Will, of course, was already attached. Hannibal saw it. Yet his mind was
constantly alert and overrode urges, and he tensed beneath even the lightest of
touches - like Hannibal passing him a fork for lunch and letting his fingers
linger against Will's.
Hannibal wondered, after three weeks of thinking on the best way to coax Will
towards him, if the direct approach wasn't the best. Of course, no pinning the
young Will against a wall and claiming his mouth; like a deer faced with a
hunter, it would only make him flee. Will would never return to the office.
Something more subtle.
He waited until Will was relaxed in the midst of a Wednesday lunch and broached
the subject. "Do you remember our second conversation, Will?"
Will paused, picking at the pasta and bacon (taken from the belly of a petulant
receptionist) in his bowl as he thought and admitted, "No."
"You told me that you do not share the interests of your male comrades. You
specifically mentioned girls." Hannibal watched Will carefully as the teenager
looked down uncomfortably. Hannibal tilted his head, ever so slightly. "Was
this to mean that you simply do not find yourself embroiled in the same teenage
hormones as your fellows, or do your interests lie elsewhere?" When Will didn't
respond, Hannibal urged, "Perhaps with men?"
Will stabbed a piece of pasta viciously. "I've found that you quickly become
unpopular if your classmates believe that you're looking at them in the
showers."
"You've had previous experience of this."
"A girl called Freddie Lounds found out and told everyone."
The experience was clearly uncomfortable. Hannibal decided to move immediately
on. "You know, the thoughts and feelings you have - the urges you feel - are
normal. There is nothing wrong with them, or you."
The muscle in Will's jaw clenched. He was no longer paying attention to his
food. His eyes darted all over the room - anywhere but Hannibal. "Do you have
urges?" He challenged.
Hannibal resisted the temptation to smile. "I have urges," he told him.
Will looked Hannibal directly in the eye, and Hannibal caught and held the
gaze. It can't have been more than five seconds, yet it was longer than Will
had ever done before, and the boy turned bright red when he finally looked
away.
The tension was palpable until the moment that Will left, and the smell of his
nerves lingered long after. It was strong enough to negate Hannibal's
irritation over the uneaten food.
Will didn't show up the next day.
Or the day after that. Hannibal would be lying if he said he didn't feel the
urge to find the young man. He had to wait for Will to come to him.
Which he did, on the third day, with worn eyes that said he hadn't slept.
Hannibal welcomed him inside without a word. He flicked the lock on the door
when Will's back was turned.
"Dr Lecter," Will started, hovering beside his usual seat. "I think that things
may be becoming inappropriate. Unhealthy."
Those didn't sound like Will's words at all. Hannibal's neck nearly cracked at
how fast he turned it, looking at Will. "I've been spending too much time in
here," Will said, looking at his feet. "I'm a student and you're the
counsellor, you're not... you're not my friend."
Hannibal narrowed his eyes. "Has Miss Bloom spoken to you?"
Will guiltily rubbed the back of his neck.
Hannibal breathed back his fury. He enjoyed Alana Bloom, but she would do well
to be careful where she stepped. This was not her territory.
But he could make it work. Hannibal was nothing if not good at improvisation.
"I don't believe anything inappropriate has transpired between us, Will." He
stayed beside the door, speaking from behind the student. Will kept his back to
him yet his head was tilted, his ear turned as he listened.
"I don't know if that's quite - " Will started, and then Hannibal hushed him.
"I told you," he said softly, "that there is nothing wrong with the urges you
feel." It was a leap. A chance. A just barely calculated chance. 
It paid off. Will turned, eyes wide. He seemed not to think about it when he
met Hannibal's eyes this time. Hannibal relished the connection. "My - urges?"
"Our urges," Hannibal corrected, tipping his chin down.
Will seemed not to understand. And then he did, and his chest swelled and he
steadied himself on his chair. "What are you saying?" His voice had an
accusatory tone to it.
Hannibal stepped towards him. Closing the gap between them. "I believe you know
full well what I'm saying, Will. Things are not inappropriate - yet."
"Yet," Will repeated slowly.
"But they could be."
Will finally broke their gaze. His mind seemed to be grasping for the last
vestiges of morality, of sensible choices, and he said, "You could go to jail
just for saying this, right?"
"I could." Hannibal contemplated. "I believe some risks are worth taking." 
Will looked up at him, his eyes wide, and in them Hannibal saw his soul bared
open at last.
Hannibal silently thanked Alana for her inadvertent assistance and kissed Will,
warm and firm on the mouth.
Will tensed beneath him, yet Hannibal could sense it was inexperience that
caused his anxiety. Hannibal coaxed kisses from his lips, and revelled in the
way Will would desperately gasp for air as though Hannibal was stealing it from
him.
Will's fingers searched for a place to hold and found the lapels of Hannibal's
jacket when Hannibal's hands found his waist. He was on the side of slight, as
boys his age tended to be, and Hannibal enjoyed the way his hands fit to the
skin beneath Will's shirt. It only took another half-step for Hannibal to nudge
his thigh up against Will's crotch; he was hard already, of course, armed with
teenage virility.
Will's breathing stopped. Hannibal rocked his leg forward and Will clamped a
hand over his mouth to stifle a sound.
Hannibal wondered how well Will could hold in those noises if Hannibal were to
push him over his desk. Over Will's shoulder he admired the rows of pens and
neatly stacked papers and thought of how Will would reach for something to hold
onto, anything, how he would crumple papers and knock pots of pencils flying
and beg for more.
... A notion for another day. Will wasn't ready. Hannibal could feel the fear
and adrenaline that shocked through him even just now, just this, clothed
contact that was barely anything at all.
"Come with me," Hannibal murmured, and Will shook as he let Hannibal lead him
around to the other side of the desk that had always divided them. "I'm going
to sit down," he told Will, "and I want you to sit on my lap."
Will turned red from throat to ear, incredulous, but Hannibal allowed him no
protest. He sat, and he waited for Will to do as he bid.
Will was hesitant at first. He sat on Hannibal's knees, perching. "That won't
do," Hannibal said, and he pulled Will all the way back on his lap, so that
Will's back was pressed to his chest. 
He kissed the nape of Will's neck and wound his hands around to his front,
 pulling apart Will's thighs with one and unbuttoning his pants with the other.
Will squirmed and Hannibal did not whisper comforting thoughts to him - instead
he again mouthed at the skin on the back of his neck, a reminder of who he was
with, where he was.
The temptation to press his teeth there was heady.
Hannibal splayed his hand against the bulge in Will's jeans and rolled his palm
against it, and when Will wriggled desperately against him, Hannibal relieved
him of his pains, using both hands to nudge aside both pants and boxers so that
he could wrap his hand around Will's cock.
Just this was something to behold, to feel. Will wanted but never seemed quite
sure what; he panted and gripped the arms of the chair, deviating between going
boneless against Hannibal and being strained all over, his spine arching.
To have someone so utterly bewildered beneath his control was exhilarating.
Hannibal nudged his own knees apart to lever his hips, to seek some friction to
relieve his own tension, and when Will felt Hannibal's cock pressing against
him through layers of fabric he gasped and said, "Is that - Are you going to -
"
"Fuck you?" and Will hissed "Yes", somewhere between confirmation and desire.
Hannibal teased his thumb over the leaking head of Will's cock and  said, "No."
Will seemed both disappointed and relieved, so Hannibal clarified, "Not today,
good Will. But you would like that?" Will whimpered. "Have you thought about
it, during our lunches together? What it would be like?"
Will's voice trembled and stretched. "Yes."
Hannibal stilled his hand, curious. "For how long?"
"Weeks," Will breathed.
Hannibal wanted to probe further, to find out if Will had bitten his pillow at
home, jerking off at night whilst thinking about Hannibal, but he suspected
neither Will nor his fragile state could take much more.
He pulled Will's hips down against his own with one hand, pressing on Will's
stomach so that they were as close as could be, and he could feel every
movement Will made as Hannibal moved his hand again. 
He wondered if Will had ever been touched before. With no small measure of
pride he knew that if he had, it had never been like this; likely it was
immature, useless fumbles, nothing like this, nothing like the things that
Hannibal promises to do.
Will writhed downward and Hannibal's own groan caught him off guard. Will's
breath hitched in his throat and he gasped, "I think I'm gonna - "
Hannibal could feel it, in the way that Will's whole body was wound like a
spring, his stomach muscles fluttering desperately beneath Hannibal's fingers.
Hannibal was almost disappointed that he couldn't properly see Will's face like
this, as he sped up his hand and tempted Will over the edge. Will came with a
startled, cut-off cry, shaking against Hannibal, and Hannibal stroked him
through it with a smile on his lips.
Will's come was sticky, cooling fast where some had caught on his fingers. The
rest was on the carpet beneath the desk. Hannibal would give it a wipe over
later, but this carpet had seen worse.
He brought his fingers to his lips whilst Will panted in his lap, recovering.
He sucked a thumb into his mouth and tasted Will on his fingers, the smell of
him, the bitter-salty tang of come.
A wonderful appetizer.
Hannibal thought of the way to handle the end of this encounter, but Will was
suddenly, shakily on his knees, braced between Hannibal's thighs. He stared up
at Hannibal, breathless.
"Will," Hannibal started, "You don't have to do that."
Will averted his gaze and undid Hannibal's belt, dragging down the zipper of
his pants with trembling fingers. "I've done it before," he said, and his words
were thick and clumsy, layered with a dizzied post-orgasm drowsiness. After a
long pause, he added, "I want to."
With defter hands than before, he pulled Hannibal's cock free from his
underwear and wrapped his mouth around the head.
It seemed Will Graham was fully capable of surprising Hannibal.
"Have you thought of this, too?" Hannibal asked, and Will pulled back to nod
before his mouth was on him again, wet and warm and more than welcome. 
It was sloppy. It lacked technique. But technique, really, wasn't everything.
It was the way that Will's eyes were fever bright, the way a little sweat
gathered on his temple and how his lips turned pinker with each little bob of
his head. His fingers circled what he couldn't take in his mouth, and he was so
incredibly earnest and determined and from the flush in his cheeks, still
rather turned on even if his body couldn't handle it immediately.
It was so beautiful, having this sixteen year old lonely boy on his knees so
desperate to please, beautiful enough to make the breath catch in Hannibal's
throat.
It's the way that Will responded to Hannibal encouragingly raking his fingers
through Will's curly hair that ends up unexpectedly driving Hannibal closer to
the edge, causing that heat to coil in his belly - Will pulled his mouth off
Hannibal's cock to moan, as though he wanted everything Hannibal could possibly
give him yet hasn't the strength or comprehension to cope with it.
"Will," Hannibal courteously warned, and Will diveed back to his task, licking
over the slit of Hannibal's cock - and then he pulled away, hunkering down in
front of Hannibal, his mouth just a little open and chin tilted up as he worked
both hands over him.
Hannibal came with a low groan, pleasure sweeping over him in waves - helped by
the sight of his come on Will's face, on the glasses that Will had
thoughtlessly left on, one streak clinging to his brown hair. Will tongued at
what was on his lips, seemingly more out of natural habit than a real desire to
taste it.
Hannibal pulled him up close without a word, smearing some of his come onto two
fingers before he held them out for Will. Will shook his head, hesitating, but
then he took Hannibal's fingers into his mouth anyway, sucking them
clean. Hannibal would have to teach him how not to waste.
For now though, for this, he rewarded Will with a deep and lingering kiss, the
kind he knew that Will wanted.
He looked at the clock on the far wall. "Lunch is almost over," he told Will,
whilst reaching for the top drawer where he kept a box of tissues (usually for
crying students).
"Oh," Will said. He seemed dazed.
"Will," Hannibal said, drawing the boy's attention to him. He held out tissues,
and used another to wipe come from Will's face. It really was a waste. "You may
wish to clean your glasses," he prompted, and Will seemed to wake up, his
cheeks flushing as he took them off and wiped them clean.
"What classes do you have this afternoon?" He inquired.
"Math," Will said. "French. And biology."
Hannibal watched Will tidy himself up with no small amount of awkwardness. He
did the same to himself, and crudely cleaned his fingers.
"This was," Will trailed off, leaving his sentence unfinished. It seemed likely
that he didn't know how he had wanted to finish the sentence in the first
place.
Hannibal stood up from his chair, approaching the door and quietly undoing the
lock in the process of opening it. He gestured for Will to leave, though not
unkindly, and Will lingered in the doorway, staring in Hannibal's general
vicinity. It seemed their encounter had undone all that good work with eye
contact. No matter.
"I will see you for lunch tomorrow, Will," Hannibal pressed gently, and Will
finally smiled.
"Tomorrow, Dr Lecter," he agreed.
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