Cruel winter rain poured from the dark, mournful sky, soaking each unfortunate surface that laid beneath it.
The people that fled from the treacherous weather had grown used to its dismal ways; as to the populace of London every day ended in such a way. Some where left feeling grateful as the heavy droplets cleansed away all the thoughtless sins that had been committed in the hours of daylight, whereas others found the persistent fall a nuisance, drowning out the possibilities of good presenting itself, seeping through any chances of meaningful deeds.
Nellie Lovett's steady eyes wavered as she studied the lone man that stood in the building above her. The womans deep brown irises barely differed from the pitch black pupils that traced over his slender frame. She let her scattered mind sink deeper, blending through confused segments of thought.
"Poor thing." The womans musical voice rang through the deafening silence that smothered her shop, she continued her speech, absentmindedly watching over the lone man as if he where an unknown, mythical creature.
"It's horrid to see him like this, he used to be such a happy man." Mrs Lovett reminisced on the days when she had watched the young man in awe, she always knew there was something special about him, but now, something shone from him, something she needed. Something she wanted.
A black lace dressed hand traced the cool murky window, the freezing glass stung her warm fingertips, coating her deathly pale skin with thick, ash grey dust.
"He's a good man…" The woman confirmed, frowning lightly, aiming her defensive discussion to herself. "If only others knew him better, they would see how much pain he's in."
The man that had tensely paced the wooden floorboards above Mrs. Lovetts shop gazed through the window he stood by with narrowed eyes. Dull grey rings shadowed his cool features, mirroring his restless soul.
His arm folded as he leant against the weak restricting glass. His steel eyes penetrated the thick panes of smoke stained glass that concealed him from the dull streets of London. Hiding him from the people that doubted his sanity, obscuring him from the people that wished to steal his last, pained breath.
His lifeless, mournful gaze stared blindly past the slight woman who admired him from the place she soundlessly observed his careful actions.
"I'm in pain too you know." Nellie raised a dark eyebrow, trying her best to follow the mans fixed gaze, she scanned the horizon searching for the object that caught his focused attention but failed to see the fixation.
High cheeks bones sculptured the mans saddened features, his unseeing eyes traced the rooftops that silhouetted against the colourless sky with bitter hatred.
"I lost the man I love. In different circumstances so be it. But I still lost him." Nellie sighed nodding comfortingly to herself.
"We're like two peas in a pod."
The woman turned, lifting her heavy, crumpled skirts, cautiously avoiding the thickening layers of filth that coated the uneven floor that creaked achingly beneath her slight movement. She sighed with dismay noting the trails her dress had gathered, from sweeping across the grotty surface.
"But this isn't normal…" Her distorted speech rang out again, she ran a delicate hand over the weighted wooden counter that stood, dividing her humble pie shop.
She frowned unconsciously, the expression aging her features with disgust as she examined the trace the make shift surface left on her paled skin.
"It's like he's alive but dead." The woman carelessly wiped her dust covered hand over her creased skirts, her puckered expression relaxed as her distracted eyes lifted back to the ever still man who glared motionlessly at the darkening horizon.
"I don't know whether I should mourn for him or talk to him."
"He's so quiet he might as well be a ghost." Nellie's unfocused eyes caught hold of her own weakened reflection that stood in the pie shops dingy window. "Just a whisper in the wind of the beautiful man he was…. Is, He's still got the looks, if only a little dishevelled.." She stretched up a delicate hand, guided by her dull reflection, pushing away a stray wild curl that fell across her pale porcelain face. "But there still there, any one can see that."
"But he's in love with her." The womans previous frown returned to her expression, knitting unsure lines over her smooth skin. "Her and her yellow hair… her and the poor little mite who was taken from him."
"I should put him out of his misery." The woman raised her head as she fought to convince herself. "Cruel to be kind as they say. After all it could help him move on…" She tilted her head to one side feeling the hair she had tucked away fall once more over her debating features. "It could help his blinded eyes see other women. It could give him the chance to see me.." The womans speech echoed through her thoughts. "Maybe even in the same way as I see him."
"What am I talking about?" Sadness singed her weary, indecisive voice. "His love will never die for Lucy nor the little 'un. He'll never love me as he did them."
"But that's just me that is." Nellie turned from the window once more, not bothering to lift her skirts away from the filthy ground.
"Typical." The woman moaned to herself, as if she was giving a lecture to a child.
"Like a moth to a flame I am, he's the flame…" She paused, her voice trailing from her. "Dangerous and dark with smouldering eyes that see both everything… and nothing at all."
"But he'll soon see." The woman encouraged herself half heartedly.
"Sure enough he will…" She continued, nodding in doubtful agreement.
"We're meant to be together." Nellie straightened the skirts of her dragging dress, dusting away the speckles of dirt that decorated the dark velveteen fabric.
"I just need to give him a little more time."
A reassuring smile curled the edge of her ash tinged lips.
"It's fate. Me and him, it really is."
The silent man walked stiffly to the over sized window which focused on the dull sky that hung heavily over his antique barber shop. He glanced down at his pale hands, rubbing his red, discoloured fingers together.
"As cliché as it sounds I've never known of such pain." His ghostly voice echoed dismally, haunting the empty room he stood in.
"I've never known for it to be physically possible for a living beings heart to be ripped from it's body…. yet the poor sod keeps living."
He spared a glance down to the grotty pie shop that stood under his own.
"But is that what I'm doing?" The man hissed angrily, squinting his eyes as they caught sight of the lone feminine figure that stood shadowed against the obscured window.
"Am I really alive?"
His unfocused vision hovered over the horizon searching for something that would catch his interest, but there was nothing.
"I never imagined life without the two people my heart would beat for because I could never imagine my world being taken from me as it was."
Heat pulsed through the mans veins as he pulled his vision away from the dull building it had settled on, a snarl pulled at the edged of his pain seethed expression.
"No, this vile creature did not reach into my chest and steal my heart, but they crushed it. I could feel the pain as they tightened their sadistic hands over it."
He paused, considering his speech before announcing his next sentence to the empty air around him. "It's not blood that flows through my veins. It's guilt."
He rubbed his blood stained fingers together again picturing his last client.
"It's not oxygen I breath. It's poison."
The man carelessly sighed without feeling. Without contradicting his actions.
"But there's no cure."
"She was my angel, a delicate petal that flies in the gentle summer breeze, dancing as it twirls past me.." The man ignored the dull sky that smothered his vision, choosing to picture another life, a time that had withered inside him, like a rose left without water or the light of sun.
"The skirts of her dress flowing around her slender figure, casting waves through the silky material that poured, pooling around her hidden feet with each subtle movement." He blinked away from the heavy rain clouds that hung like curtains over the present world, travelling back to a time he believed no longer existed.
"My wife, the fallen angel who came for me, she blessed me with a daughter who's smile was brighter than the fierce fire of a thousand suns." His dull speech quickened as he continued to talk to the image of his past self.
"Everything changed…. I was weak and taken from them, I allowed myself to be dragged from my world, with out raising a fist to fight back."
Anger beat through his hidden heart as the mans reflective thoughts darkened, mimicking the sky above him.
"I couldn't protect my girls from the filthy pig that eyed them, I couldn't save them from his bitter thoughts and attempts of stealing them for himself." His voice grew louder switching to a different pace, one that would chill the bones of evil itself.
"I hated the way he would eye my precious gems, he was a snake in the grass, waiting to strike when all threat was gone. He tore my family apart like parchment, crushing its delicate bonds in his grubby, claws."
The man seethed feeling another, usual wave of guilt penetrate into his skin like a poison tipped dagger.
"He broke her, my porcelain doll, he destroyed her with his poisonous ways, snatching away her pride with gruff, uncaring hands."
His voice wavered hushing to a gentle whisper as he directed his speech to the mournful heavens above him.
"I wonder what became of my bride every minute of the day and when I don't think of her I think of my ray of sunshine… I wonder if they think of me. I wonder if their delicate lungs still breath." The man waited in the silence before continuing.
"I wonder if my love still has the scent of freshly bloomed roses after a spring shower.
I wonder if my loves beauty has past onto her daughter, our daughter. Surely it must have. It must be flowing so strongly through her veins it should be oozing out of her and onto everything she touches." He silenced once again, waiting for an answer.
"Strength must be in her heart. Her merciful. Gentle. Heart." A frown creased his tired features as more questions fought through his persistent trail of unbreakable thought.
"Does her heart belong to that of another? And what be of my Lucy? Would my daughter be wed already? Is my wife the bride to another? Surely not." The man answered his own question, battling with the words he had previously announced. He changed the subject tossing away the question like unwanted rubbish that lingered in his mind.
"Does happiness radiant still from my daughter? shining from her blushing skin as she laughs with fearless happiness?"
Doubt blackened the mans already dull thoughts as they twisted, writhing against him.
"I have changed." He confirmed.
"They wouldn't love me." He paused, asking himself why.
"I can't be called that of Benjamin Barker anymore, he was weakened by the separation, and died in a six by six cell. He couldn't deal with life behind caged, metal bars. I saved him, I taught him how to live. How to survive if he ever wanted to see his world again.
If he ever wanted to see the sun again."
Another speech replaced the words the man had began with.
"I fought his battles when they came to him. Now I just have one more before his return." His steady eyes blinked back to the present, hovering over the bitter building he fought not to look at.
"But will he come back? I can no longer sense him. I can no longer feel his sadness weighing heavy on my human heart. I can no longer feel guilt tugging at my mortal soul.
I can no longer feel anything. I can't see though this darkness."
An unnatural smile sinisterly curled the mans thin, pallid lips.
"Barker is dead. Sweeney is here. Tragic but true…. He no longer breaths the air I breath…. he no longer sees the things I see."