Author's Note: I thought of this one day when I had a writer's block with Jealousy. What if Mrs. Lovett bought the deathly poison and tricked Lucy into taking it? Sure, Lucy still is insane, but she just gets help with her suicide attempt. This is my first evil-ish Mrs. Lovett fanfic. Read and review. Enjoy!
It had been two fortnights since they sent Benjamin away. Mrs. Lovett let Lucy and Johanna stay above her shop. Everyday Lucy would stay in her room with the child, waiting for Benjamin to return. But Nellie knew that Lucy was waiting for no reason. He would never return. No matter how much Lucy, or Nellie, prayed for Benjamin to return, he never would. Praying was a lost cause. Mrs. Lovett knew that the judge had an infatuation with Lucy and she knew that he wanted her to be his. The one night when the Beadle called on Lucy, Nellie watched Johanna. She had put the little thing to bed and not long after Lucy had returned. She was sobbing, unable to control herself. Nellie had to give the little nit some gin to calm her down. The gin didn't work though and then Mrs. Lovett realized that she was already drunk. So she just had to sit by Lucy and try to figure out what Mrs. Barker was saying.
When Lucy finally told Mrs. Lovett what the judge had done to her, Mrs. Lovett was appalled. She was shocked. How dare he do that to her. How dare he use her in such a horrible way. Nellie felt terrible for Lucy. After everything that had happened, being violated in public was never a good thing.
Lucy went through the days in a haze and Nellie had to abandon her baking to help take care of Lucy and little Johanna. Mrs. Lovett took over Lucy's place as mother to the sweet Johanna when Mrs. Barker became sick. She had lost the will to live. Even when Nellie brought up Benjamin to Lucy, Mrs. Barker would glance at her with a confused, glazed stare.
The glazed over, lackadaisical stare frightened Mrs. Lovett sometimes. What was going to happen to her? This Lucy was so different than the Lucy that Nellie knew. The Lucy Barker that Mrs. Lovett knew cared for and loved her daughter. And she loved her husband and missed him terribly. It was like Lucy's soul left her body and her corpse was just rotting away.
A fortnight after the judge had violated Lucy, Nellie became sick of it. All Lucy did was just lie in bed. Her soul was dead but her little precious organs were still pumping blood to her small brain. Mrs. Lovett had to get rid of the body. Nellie had devised a plan. She would scurry off to the apothecary and buy a small flask of arsenic. Then Mrs. Lovett would trick the soulless widow into drinking the poison. Mrs. Barker would pass on and then Nellie would take care of little Johanna.
And that's what Nellie did. She lied to her Albert, told him she was running to the market, and then Mr. Lovett watched the insane woman. Mrs. Lovett hurried to the apothecary and bought just enough arsenic to kill, to help, Lucy. Nellie told herself repeatedly that she was helping Lucy by putting her out of her misery.
When Nellie returned home she went upstairs and visited Lucy. In Mrs. Barker's insane state it was very simple to get her to drink the fatal poison. Two days later, like Nellie had been told, Lucy did not die. She just became more insane and Mrs. Lovett had to turn her onto the streets.
Fifteen years later, to Nellie Lovett's surprise, Benjamin returned. But he was a changed man and Mrs. Lovett noticed this. He no longer had a warm and kind heart but a dark and insensitive one. He had even changed his name. No longer was he Benjamin Barker but Sweeney Todd. And even though he was a changed man he still asked the question that Nellie dreaded.
"Where is Lucy? Where is my wife?"
In the back of her mind, Mrs. Lovett had a lie planned. She always had a lie planned since she gave Lucy the arsenic. "Poisoned 'erself. Arsenic. From th' apothecary 'round th' corner. Tried ta stop 'er. But she wouldn't listen ta me."
And after repeating it, practicing it, for the past fifteen years, Mrs. Lovett believed her own lie. Even though Nellie believed her own lie, the truth was hidden deep down in her heart and at the end of the day Mrs. Lovett knew her statement was false. But she would never admit it to the man she loved. She would never admit it.