Mrs Lovett was not a stupid woman.
She had known exactly what would happen the moment that scream had been ripped from her throat. It was all the Judge's fault, as it had always been; every little piece of misfortune that had lodged itself inside of them had been hammered in by him, and to a lesser extent by Lucy, both of whom had been lying cold on her bakehouse floor.
She had experienced a flurry of emotions when the Judge had dropped from the shoot, when his body had stilled and she was able to step over to his bloodied form and examine it properly. This was the moment they'd been waiting for; the entire building hummed with this victory, reveling in his shed blood on the windows, ceiling, floor and multiple walls. This was what they'd been working towards for months. She was practically frozen above Turpin's face, frightened to look up through the ceiling to catch the tiniest glimpse of the feelings emanating from the barber shop.
She felt a mass of acid settle in her stomach and throat.
Finally.
And yet, she still couldn't predict how this would actually affect Sweeney Todd, no doubt frozen in a similar reverent position with his razors upstairs. She had grown expert in predicting his emotions, his expressions, and his every minute muscle movement that had expanded quickly to fill her entire life. But having finally achieved his long awaited goal, she had feared the murderous satisfaction he had so longed for may not have provided the release he craved. When see saw him again, would he be a man at peace? A purposeless shadow of Sweeney Todd? Or simply, as she feared, still as raging as ever, furious that his vengeance had brought him no closer to the justice and serenity he needed?
So often, life provided unwelcome anticlimax. When you fought so hard for something and it never came, the resulting disappointment was crushing. Like so many times in which he had refused to acknowledge her existence, Mrs Lovett dealt using ever-building layers of denial. Sweeney Todd, the man born out of Benjamin's anguished ashes, dealt with anger.
Then she caught sight of the second body that had dropped unceremoniously through the shoot, broken like a ragdoll on the stone floor. Whatever shock had rooted Mrs Lovett's eyes to the Judge was doubled immediately upon catching sight of Lucy, more beautiful and sane-looking in death than she had ever appeared wandering the streets in life. Mrs Lovett allowed herself one more second of disbelief, feeling the bile rise up in her throat and pushing back nausea, before she went to move Lucy's shattered body to the oven.
It was a blasted, ironic miracle that had come at an entirely inconvenient time, because she knew Mr Todd would be down to the bakehouse soon for one reason or another. But Lucy's death was evidence enough of his continued ignorance of Lucy's true identity, and as long as she was able to drag the old beggar woman to the oven in time, the condemning facial features of Mr Todd's wife would crisp and melt right off within the flames.
Swift sparks of adrenaline filled her as Mrs Lovett set off towards the close salvation of the oven door. She had been very, very near to having all of her carefully laid plans come to blissful fruition, until she felt a hand constrict around her ankle.
The scream had been automatic. The Judge's bloodshot eyes rolled widely at her as he grasped at his last vestiges of life and vengeance. His claw-like hands were surprisingly strong for a dying man, and he spasmmed on the floor like the devil itself possessed him.
It sounded unearthly.
She heard rather than felt her shrill scream tear through the building, and in that moment she knew.
Even in death, Turpin would be the death of them.
Her initial shock was replaced with screamed obscenities, spat in the Judge's face in a desperate attempt to prevent what he'd inevitably caused. Despite her previous confusion, she knew in her gut with unquestionable certainty how close she had been to achieving her dreams, and now they had been wrenched away. She felt a trickle of the torrent of rage and malice Sweeney Todd had felt towards this man for similar reasons, and it tore her very soul in two.
She kicked him, as hard as she could, again and again, and yelled in his blood splattered face with a fury she hadn't known she previously possessed. "Why won't you die?!"
She was interrupted by Sweeney's electric presence in the doorway.
Mrs Lovett had known with a devastating certainty that he would come. Finally, in a hysterical, ironic twist of fate, he cared enough about her to rush to her aid. She had worked for months to try and tease, force and manipulate one caring act from this ungrateful, insufferable man, and here it finally was.
Lying motionless at her feet, the Judge was gone at last. Sweeney Todd finally had space enough to consider something other than his vengeance. And here he was, looking at Mrs Lovett with such concern that normally she would've melted upon the bakehouse floor.
"What's wrong?" he breathed, and despite the circumstances she felt twinges of love curl themselves around her at his beautiful words. "Why did you scream?"
She considered him for half a moment, standing so valiantly in the doorway. Tonight could be the ultimate anticlimax where all of her dreams died in the firelight, or it could be the night where one of her dreams was finally a reality.
It was an easy decision, really. She barely paused in her stream of words, or in her pace to open the oven door. She knew the script from here, knew how the story would end for the both of them. Her love had finally returned some of her feelings, and damn her if she wasn't going to savor that. No matter what happened, her work had not been for nothing. It would not be some tragic anticlimax. He felt something for her, however small the spark might be.
It may end tonight, but she was satisfied.
She urged the twistings of love in her breast to spread through her entire body. She stared into the licking flames when she wrenched open the oven door, imagining them enveloping her flesh. She looked back at Sweeney Todd, and despite her fear, she was satisfied.
She could've run. She could've fought back. She could've done anything, Toby thought later when he remembered the chilling scene that night, the way her blood-curdling scream had turned his skin pale and his eyes cold when the fire had taken her.
He thinks he had some idea of why she let the scene play out. Ultimately, her decisions had never had much to do with her. To understand why Mrs Lovett did anything, you would have to understand the finer details of what happened to Mr Todd.
A/N: Next chapter should be up soon, from Todd's POV that night. Then I suspect from Toby's...