(no subject)
Oh, look. Something old that the mun can still stand to look at.
Human beings are creatures of habit. Every morning, Clarice Starling gets out of bed on the left side, turns on her clock radio, and takes a shower before she goes to work at Quantico. After work, she hangs her coat on the second peg of the coat rack, puts her car keys in the dish on the sideboard, and kicks off her shoes in the same exact place beside the couch. And every night, she dreams.
Some nights, she wakes up to the sound of a quiet, swift, high-pitched scream, her thin bangs matted to her forehead. When that happens, she shakily makes her way out of bed and into the kitchen that serves to join her half of the duplex apartment to that of her roommate, Ardelia Mapp. And, as a creature of habit, Clarice Starling raids the refrigerator.
On a particular night in May, so late that it could have technically been considered morning, Clarice stood in the kitchen, feeling the linoleum cool under her bare feet as she squinted into the light of the open refrigerator door. Scanning the shelves in a sort of stupor, she couldn't help but feel a slow, steady pang of guilt. For some reason, Clarice had always considered her nocturnal kitchen-canvassing habits somewhat detrimental. Perhaps it was a fear of waking up Mapp. Perhaps, more likely, it was some throwback from the strictly enforced curfews at the Lutheran orphanage in Bozeman. Either way, Clarice came away from the fridge with a glass of milk and a handful of saltine crackers feeling as though she'd committed grand larceny.
Sitting down in her room once more, at her desk, with her comfort food, Clarice took a sip of the milk and let it coat the inside of her mouth, washing away that dry, metallic residue that rested at the back of her palate. She closed her eyes, and for a split second, she heard it:
You still hear them, don't you...
Clarice sighed, and her fingers brushed against the folder she'd brought home from the VICAP archives at Quantico. Technically, it wasn't the folder itself ... it was a copy. A copy she had made, for herself, while working in the basement archives. A copy which only she knew about. She opened her eyes and nibbled at a saltine before turning the folder open to skim a few lines of text, written in a neat copperplate:
The most stable elements, Clarice, appear in the middle of the periodic table, roughly between iron and silver.
Between iron and silver. I think that is appropriate for you.
The letter is only a photocopy. Some part of Clarice, the same part that made the photocopies in the first place, feels that inappropriate. After all, the letter was sent to her, wasn't it? It would only be fair that she should keep the original, and VICAP have the photocopy. But she didn't want to have to go through all the formalities, all the trouble. Especially since she would have had to explain herself - and she wasn't sure if she could.
Clarice turned the page, and looked down at Hannibal Lecter's face for a moment. He was smirking in the sort of politely demeaning way he had, his head tilted ever so slightly. She nodded to herself as she finished the saltines - it didn't take much of a stretch of the imagination to feel as though he were directing that look right at her. Finishing off the rest of the milk, Clarice turned off her desk lamp and slid back into bed.
Instead of counting sheep, she counted elements. She started at twenty-seven, at cobalt. She got as far as zirconium - a little more than halfway to palladium - before she fell asleep again.
Human beings are creatures of habit. Every morning, Clarice Starling gets out of bed on the left side, turns on her clock radio, and takes a shower before she goes to work at Quantico. After work, she hangs her coat on the second peg of the coat rack, puts her car keys in the dish on the sideboard, and kicks off her shoes in the same exact place beside the couch. And every night, she dreams.
Some nights, she wakes up to the sound of a quiet, swift, high-pitched scream, her thin bangs matted to her forehead. When that happens, she shakily makes her way out of bed and into the kitchen that serves to join her half of the duplex apartment to that of her roommate, Ardelia Mapp. And, as a creature of habit, Clarice Starling raids the refrigerator.
On a particular night in May, so late that it could have technically been considered morning, Clarice stood in the kitchen, feeling the linoleum cool under her bare feet as she squinted into the light of the open refrigerator door. Scanning the shelves in a sort of stupor, she couldn't help but feel a slow, steady pang of guilt. For some reason, Clarice had always considered her nocturnal kitchen-canvassing habits somewhat detrimental. Perhaps it was a fear of waking up Mapp. Perhaps, more likely, it was some throwback from the strictly enforced curfews at the Lutheran orphanage in Bozeman. Either way, Clarice came away from the fridge with a glass of milk and a handful of saltine crackers feeling as though she'd committed grand larceny.
Sitting down in her room once more, at her desk, with her comfort food, Clarice took a sip of the milk and let it coat the inside of her mouth, washing away that dry, metallic residue that rested at the back of her palate. She closed her eyes, and for a split second, she heard it:
You still hear them, don't you...
Clarice sighed, and her fingers brushed against the folder she'd brought home from the VICAP archives at Quantico. Technically, it wasn't the folder itself ... it was a copy. A copy she had made, for herself, while working in the basement archives. A copy which only she knew about. She opened her eyes and nibbled at a saltine before turning the folder open to skim a few lines of text, written in a neat copperplate:
The most stable elements, Clarice, appear in the middle of the periodic table, roughly between iron and silver.
Between iron and silver. I think that is appropriate for you.
The letter is only a photocopy. Some part of Clarice, the same part that made the photocopies in the first place, feels that inappropriate. After all, the letter was sent to her, wasn't it? It would only be fair that she should keep the original, and VICAP have the photocopy. But she didn't want to have to go through all the formalities, all the trouble. Especially since she would have had to explain herself - and she wasn't sure if she could.
Clarice turned the page, and looked down at Hannibal Lecter's face for a moment. He was smirking in the sort of politely demeaning way he had, his head tilted ever so slightly. She nodded to herself as she finished the saltines - it didn't take much of a stretch of the imagination to feel as though he were directing that look right at her. Finishing off the rest of the milk, Clarice turned off her desk lamp and slid back into bed.
Instead of counting sheep, she counted elements. She started at twenty-seven, at cobalt. She got as far as zirconium - a little more than halfway to palladium - before she fell asleep again.