Hi. I'm OakeX, and this is my first time writing for Sweeney Todd (not for this site, but just specifically for this fandom). I kind of wrote this out of compulsion, because I was having a bit of a breakdown when I realised that I had just invested a lot of time and effort caring for characters who aren't even real, so to continue the illusion of reality I delved into the depths of ST fanfiction.

I wrote this to the best of my abilities (although fluff isn't really what I'm good at), so this shouldn't be too bad, but I'm always open to criticisms or suggestions, or even just a review saying hi. I know my dialogue's a bit shaky, so if anyone's got tips, I'd be glad to hear them.
Being a narcissistic human, if you say compliments and adorn your reviews with nice flattering things, I wouldn't mind that either.

This won't be a oneshot cause it'll continue on, but it won't really be a multichaptered story cause there won't be any overarching plot lines. It'll be more like a series of vignettes, slice-of-lifey kind of stuff.

I don't know whether I wrote these characters in-character or not. They feel in-character to me, but I'm not a great judge on this kind of thing.

It's at night (of course it is, isn't that when all soft tender moments happen) that she touches him on the cheek and looks pointedly at him. He glances over at her and smiles, and then goes back to reading his book (well, 'reading', he doesn't really know how to read books even if he can read maps). She shakes her head a little and leans into his shoulder, and he bends his neck a little because he likes the feeling of her hair on his neck, and she reads with him (well, 'reading', she can't really read either, because Turpin had associated literacy with mobility, and mobility with freedom).

Together, they open their mouths and articulate slow hesitant sounds, like children, curving their lips over the shape of those funny symbols written in neat lines across the page. After a couple minutes of faltering steps, they make it to the end of the sentence.

Anthony kisses her on the cheek. "I think we're doing quite well."

She laughs. "You always do."

"I'm the expert. I would know." He picks up a sheet with twenty-six funny symbols on it, and waves it gently. "After all, I know how to make these sounds, and you don't."

"They're on your maps. It's biased on your part."

"Think what you like. But I say we're getting better." And he covers her hand with his, like a bear paw over a bird wing, with his coarse skin (which he hates), and her unworked hands (which she hates).

And she wonders what it would be like to work on a boat all day, smelling salt air and living on land which is open to the skies. She doesn't envy him, no she fears the outside world, and on a ship in the middle of the sea one must work and talk and fight with others, but she wonders.

And he wonders what it would be like to be locked away in some mansion with a demon for a father, and he shudders at how his princess had swapped her tower for a madhouse, and he squeezes her fingers a little, but he wishes his hands could be smoother for her, like the gentleman he wants to be for her, because she's had enough of dull ragged edges for one lifetime.

She doesn't seem to mind though. She runs a hand along his shoulders, and the tension he seems to always carry along with him relaxes a little, and she lets out a breath that she didn't know she had been holding.

"You're always so stressed."

He twists his lips into a smile, broken out of his reverie. "Don't be silly, of course I'm not."

Johanna looks at him in the face, and knows he's lying. Of course he is, she can see it clear as the stars outside, because he's got a thousand tells (and no, before you ask, one of them is not his eyes —this may be a romance fanfiction but it's not that cliche— because eyes are just ocular organs, not the windows into the soul that Shakespeare loved to paint them as), like the twitch in his jaw, and the way his eyelids flicker. She's only known her husband for the better part of a year, but looking outside a window for your whole life (minus three days) will grant you some fairly keen observational skills.

But she'll let him off for now. He wants to try and play the hero who saved the princess, and she's content to let him be. She doesn't answer him, just kisses him quickly, and touches his shoulders again, feeling his muscles loosen more and more (Turpin was always tired after a hard day bullying vagrants, and would often solicit her massaging services). As he finally begins to relax, she feels the nervous energy lingering inside her begin to dissipate.

Perhaps her husband's a little foolish, to stress about her and then never tell her. But she can't deny the fact that she does the same, and if she's so concerned about his worrying, it's partially because she can't relax until he does.

He rustles the book again, and clears his throat. She closes her eyes and smiles, listening to him slowly and gently fracture the english language.

After all, she can't do much better.

Thanks for reading. It's short, I know, and cliche, but hopefully I'll get more chapters out later.

I probably won't write anything really dark and heavy until much later; for now it's just light, easy fluff, as I come to grips with ST.

Cheers for taking the time to read this.