A white fog drifted in front of my face with every breath I exhaled. It's been two days since Hannibal left. The cold surrounded me even with layers on. I wanted to stay in the make-shift-bed a little longer. It was too painful going up and down the stairs so I slept on the couch.

The heater went out. I kept Mischa inside my shirt to protect her from the cold but it didn't do much, her lips had a blue tint to match mine. The phones were gone too. Hannibal must have taken them. and I couldn't leave the house to find help either. The closest road is a couple miles away. We wouldn't make it in the two feet of snow.

I crouched in front of the fire place. My numb fingers almost dropped the lit match before it reach the pit. I watched the flame eat away at the wood. The crackling fire was drowned out by the chattering of teeth. I laid Mischa in front of the fire and her cheeks instantly filled with color.

I walked with a limp to the kitchen. My stomach still ached with every step. I would take aspirin but it only dulls the pain slightly and I already ran out. I turned on the gas stove. I watched the flame wave back at me. I started to heat up oil in a pan and surveyed the fridge to see what food was left. There were packages of meat. Human meat. I reached around them and pulled out a wilted broccoli head and a small bell pepper. We were running out of non-cannibal food.

The oil jumped and bit my hand when I dropped the vegetables in. I didn't pull away. The searing heat chipped away at the cold. I didn't bother with adding salt or pepper. Everything tasted the same in this never ending grayness.

I fed Mischa bottle formula and let her continue to rest in front off the fire. I fell asleep next to her.

Minutes blended into hours. Time dragged on. By the fifth day I gave up I knew Hannibal wasn't coming back. The only food left was human organs. The wood to burn in the fireplace was running low.

How could he do this? Leave his own daughter and wife to freeze to death. I let the wall hold me.

My knees wobbled as I stood on my own. Tears started to fall down my face. I held onto the side of the couch to steady myself. On the small table there was a picture frame with Hannibal and I in it. In the photo he had his arms around me, I looked up at him adoringly. If only I knew then what I know now. Hannibal's snarky smile that I found cute at the time now left a sour taste in the back of my throat. It was like he was staring through the frame at me. He was mocking me.

I marched towards the table and swung my arm back. "Fuck you!" My fist broke the glass covering Hannibal's face. I stomped on the shattered frame and screamed. Once I opened the flood gate I was unable to close it. I felt every emotion there was to feel and then anger saturated it all.

I thought to all the nights he came home late. It was a nauseating feeling to now know that those times I stayed up waiting for him, would be hours after he drove a knife into someone and watched their blood and soul drain from their bodies.

I shoved the remaining frames and decor onto the floor then kicked, grabbed, and punched the furniture.

He fattened me up with his lies and I was stupid enough to believe them. He framed innocent men for his crimes. Even worse he killed innocent men. Lying came so naturally to him. Who's to say a single word he told me was true?

I took my campaign to the kitchen. I threw his favorite glassware and dishes against the walls. The shards of glass exploded and sparkled like snow under the dusk sky. One smash after another, the pieces of glass collected on the kitchen floor. I held one more plate over my head, ready to launch, but the weight on my shoulders pulled me to my knees.

That's when it clicked. I was no better than Hannibal. I let my child-like infatuation with him blind me to the truth. For Christ sake I was his wife! I lived in the same house with him for two years! I should've known! I made every excuse I could for him, I defended his name. If I'd believed Will in the first place, then countless lives would have been saved. But that's not how things played out. And now I share the blood on Hannibal's hands.

That's when I felt a warm liquid dripping down my arm. I opened my palm to find a large gash from one of the glass shards. I took a towel and bunch it around my hand. Then the crying started.

I pulled myself off the floor and to the crying baby. Mischa's arms were curled to her chest while her face contorted into sobs under the firelight. I offered her the last of the bottle formula but her screams soaked into every wall of the house. She didn't need a change of diapers, she wasn't hungry. I didn't know what she wanted so I sat there. The dark circles under my eyes got darker with each ear piercing cry. Why did I have to take care of that baby. I never asked for it, in fact I even tried to get rid of it. It's Hannibal's fault. He got me pregnant. He delivered the baby. He left me.

I stared at the shadows the fire painted on Mischa's face, then at the fire. The crying continued.

I tried to hold her but she just pushed me away. In a last attempt I wrapped her in a jacket. Maybe she was cold. Her sobs quieted and her small hands held on the ends of the jacket. But then I realized who's jacket it was, Hannibal's. She missed him. She was crying because she missed her psychopath murderer dad. I pulled the jacket away from her and threw it in the flames. Hannibal doesn't deserve to be a father. The crying started again.

This time the cries were worst. They were more shrieking than crying.

The noise pounded against my skull. I was just tired, so tired. The screaming wouldn't stop even if I gave her a new jacket.

It was too loud in the house no matter where I went I could here the baby scream. I opened the front door and stepped into the snow.

The cold licked the soles of my feet and bit my skin. My eyelids were heavy. I was tired.

I let the snow catch me, it bended against my weight and shifted to make room for me.

A faint outline of the trees could be made out but everything beyond was black. The white snow looked grey under the moon light.

There was no sound, the quiet drowned out my rumbling stomach and cries from inside the house. It pulled my eyelids down and tucked me into bed under the snow.

Hannibal was everywhere, in every crack and crevasse of the house. He was in Mischa's blood. He was in the snow and the night sky. He was everywhere inside my head. I couldn't escape him.

So,I didn't resist, I let the cold swallow me.

~~~

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