I never referred to Toby as anything but my brother. Never foster brother, half brother, adopted brother or anything like that. Just brother. If anyone wondered why we didn't have the same last name, I said that we had different fathers. Which of course was true, what people didn't have to know was the fact that we had different mothers as well. If anyone asked why we were at the same age if we had different fathers, I said that I actually was one year older than the other first year students but was born in October and hadn't had my eleventh birthday when the kids who were born the same year as me went to Hogwarts. That was also true, but it was true for Toby as well. We both had our twelfth birthday shortly after arriving to Hogwarts.
At home, we were not at all that close to each other as we were at Hogwarts. It was the way it always had been: Toby lived downstairs with Mrs. Lovett and helped her with the pies; I lived upstairs with Sweeney and helped him with cleaning up after his victims and burn the corps we didn't put into pies. Toby feared Sweeney, Sweeney was mostly annoyed at Mrs. Lovett and Mrs. Lovett sometimes was jealous at me for being so close to Sweeney. Sometimes Toby feared me as well. It was complicated, but somehow we were still a family.
And as soon as we got to Hogwarts, so far away from home, Toby and I really were as close as brother and sister. We were each other's last piece of home in a new magic world.
But even if Toby suspected and feared Sweeney, he still didn't know the truth about the meat pies. Toby was an honest boy who would have run to the police as soon as he could if we told him, while I had a different background. I had seen my father beat my mother to death, heard her cry and seen her blood all over the floor. I was nine years old, and that was when I lost all my faith about goodness in the world.
And when Sweeney told me about his fifteen years in a living hell, the family he longed for and the feeling of coming home to find out that they were forever lost, I understood him. In the people who´s throats he slit I saw my father, and that's why I agreed with Sweeney.
There's a hole in the world like a great black pit
And it's filled with people who are filled with shit
And the vermin of the world inhabit it
But not for long
They all deserve to die

Maybe that is why Toby was sorted into Hufflepuff, while I ended up in Slytherin. With people who mostly were mud blood-hating freaks.
Toby quickly made friends: in Hufflepuff everybody was nice and friendly. In Slyherin everything was much harder. It was not the way I'd heard it would be, that every Slytherin student was evil and wanted all muggels to die, but there was a Scorpius Malfoy and some other boys who had kind of that attitude. But they had it all from their fathers, I was told by a Gryffindor boy whose father had gone to school with Mr. Malfoy.
I made two friends: Veruca from the train and another girl, Felicity Starr. But I never grew close to them. Toby could tell his friends that his parents were dead and that he now lived with his new mother, Mrs. Lovett. I didn't have any short and easy story like that one. Nothing was easy in my life, everything was a mess.
Sweeney was the only one I could ever talk to. So I wrote him long letters every week, told him everything about my magic school.

"… and then, he told me that I am maybe the most beautiful girl he has ever been dating, he kissed me and we…"
"Maybe? How does that feel? Being only maybe the most beautiful girl in his life?"
Felicity blushed. "Why do I discuss this with you at all? I don't expect you to understand true love, Veruca."
"Well, I understand enough to realize that Scorpius Malfoy won't take you home to introduce you to his parents until he surely knows your blood status. My cousin, Roxanne Weasley in Gryffindor, knows everything about the Malfoy family, her father went to school with Mr. Draco Malfoy."
"I don't care about your cousin! Scorpius loves me, and he surely will take me home to meet his parents this Christmas!" Felicity yelled and walked across the common room and out.
Veruca shock her head. "Stupid girl. How can she stand herself?"
"Silly little nit…"
"What?"
I blushed. "Mrs. Lovett use to say that…"
Silly little nit, had her chance for the moon on a string
Poor thing…
"Mrs. Lovett, is that your mother?"
When I didn't answer, Veruca sighted. "Seriously, Ruby. I've known you for four years and I still don't know anything about your life outside Hogwarts. Your family can't be worse than mine, right?"
I smiled. I actually liked Veruca's family. Mrs. Paige was a Healer at Sankt Mungo's and Mr. Paige had a shop in the Diagon Alley. Veruca had three brothers and one sister, so when I was at her place last Easter holiday everything was kind of a mess. But her parents were absolutely wonderful to me.
"Remember, Ruby, I'm your friend. I won't judge you."
Friendship is about trusting. Maybe it's time to tell her…
"My biological parents are dead." That was only half the truth, but I hated my father so much that I wished he was dead. "I live in London, Fleet Street, with Mrs. Lovett, Sweeney and Toby. Toby is an orphan as well, and he is not actually my brother. It was only the easiest thing to tell people. We were both saved from the street, he by Mrs. Lovett and I by Sweeney."
"Is THAT what you have been hiding all these years!Nothing worse than the fact that you are adopted and that Toby is not your brother!"
If you only knew, Veruca. My foster parents kill people and put them into pies…

I tried not to tell her too much, I really did. But she was stubborn. And the more I told her, the more interested she was.
"Veruca wants to come to Fleet Street and see my family this Christmas." I said to Toby when we met in a corridor.
"Well, that's fun, isn't it?
"No. Because she can't."
"Why not? I'm gonna ask Mum if Brian and Luke can come home with me."
"Yes, but…"
"What?"
But you can pretend to be normal, Toby. You have a mother who makes pies for you, I have a killer who is… my best friend. Never father. And nothing is normal with me and Sweeney. We are both too angry, sad, hating and still searching for revenge on the whole human race.
"…but Mrs. Lovett will allow you to bring friends home. I'm not that sure about Mr. Todd."
"You can always send him an owl and ask."
I did. And he said yes.

I always think about it as I found my soul mate that day. And though I wanted to die until I felt that razor against my throat, I think about it as I was brought back to life as well.
Life was hard in the streets. Especially for a girl at the age of eleven. I tried to survive the best I could, stealing food and fighting for shelter with other homeless children, but I was always cold and hungry. And I could never return home; my father had killed my mother and I know he wouldn't hesitate to kill me as well, if I gave him a reason.
Then that man Mr. Corlett found me. I shouldn't have trusted him, but I was so deathly tired of the life in the streets. And he didn't look like he wanted to harm me…
I followed him home and had the loveliest food I'd ever eat. I was even exhausted enough to fall asleep as soon as I laid down in the bed he offered me.
When he raped me that night, I swore to never ever trust anyone again. I was naïve enough to trust Mr. Corlett, and thanks to that I became his slave. He forced me to work for him under threat of raping me again. If I didn't obey, he beat me. And besides, I had nowhere to go. I was stuck.
Until that day he went for a shave. People used to say that Adolfo Pirelli was the best barber in London, but now everyone was talking about a man named Sweeney Todd. So Mr. Corlett went to him. And I followed him, dressed like a boy with my long hair hidden inside a hat.
I watched Mr. Todd while my master sat down in a chair in the middle of the room. The barber was pale as death and had black hair with a white streak. His eyes were deep, brown and very beautiful and I guessed I would have found him attractive if I had been older. But I was only a child, who should have had a safe home and a loving family…
Just in the moment I thought that, Mr. Todd slit the throat of Mr. Corlett. In chock I saw the blood of the man I hated spurt, saw him shake before he died. Then Mr. Todd turned to me, removed the corpse from the chair and put me there.
"I guess you need a shave as well, lad?" His eyes were cold as death itself and now I was shaking.
"No, sir. Please."
He got his razor, still covered with blood, and held it against my throat. I was so terrified I couldn't help I started to cry.
"I'm not even I boy." I sobbed, throwing my hat off and showing him my long, dark brown hair. "Please, don't kill me. Please. I'll do anything."
I was still crying when he put his razor down. Throw my tears I saw that he softened a bit, maybe he shouldn't kill a little girl after all?
He put his hand on my shoulder. "Then calm down, girl. Could you tell me who you are and why you are with that man, dressed up as a boy?"
I tried to stop crying, took deep breaths.
"My name is Ruby. He got me from the street, made me his slave. He told me to dress as a boy so no man would covet me."
Saying those words made me feel, stronger than ever before, how much I hated him. I looked at his bloody body and mumbled:
"He deserved it."
"Pardon?" Mr. Todd looked very surprised.
"He deserved to die, sir." I still don't know why I suddenly decided to broke my promise to myself and trust another man, a complete stranger. Maybe it was because of those beautiful eyes. Or maybe because he although had set me free from Mr. Corlett.
"You see Mr. Todd; the only man who would ever covet me was he. He raped me the very first day we met."
"How old are you?"
"Eleven years old, sir."
"God. You're only a child!" He was angry, I saw that." How come you're not with your parents?"
Well, I had already started to open up. So I started to cry again and told Mr. Todd the whole story about my beautiful mother and her soft hands, my father who hated us both and the feeling when I saw him beat her to death. The screams which still plagued me in my sleep every night.
When I was finished, he softly pulled me up from the chair and gave me a hug. A soft, consoling, warm hug of compassion. I closed my eyes, wrapped my arms around him and wanted to never let go of that hug. I hadn't felt so safe since my mother was alive.
We stood that way for a while. When he let go, I felt brave enough to ask:
"Why did you kill him, sir? Did you know he deserved it?"
"They all deserve it, Ruby. They all deserve to die. There's a hole in the world like a great black pit and it's filled with people who are filled with shit and the vermin of the world inhabit it…"
He sighted, his eyes were suddenly filled of pain. "I used to have a perfect life, you see. I had a beautiful wife and the most adorable little daughter in London, but it was all taken away from me…"
He started to sing.
"There was a barber and his wife
And she was beautiful
A foolish barber and his wife
She was his reason and his life
And she was beautiful
And she was virtuous
And he was…
Naïve
There was another man who saw
That she was beautiful
A pious vulture of the law
Who with a gesture of his claw
Removed the barber from his plate
Then there was nothing but to wait
And she would fall
So soft, so young, so lost and oh so beautiful…"
"Oh, Mr. Todd…" I had lost my family as well. The compassion I felt was for real.
"I returned home, Ruby. After fifteen years in a living hell I returned to London, dreaming I might find my family waiting. Instead I found Mrs. Lovett, who told me my loved Lucy poisoned herself and died and that the Judge adopted my daughter, my sweet Johanna…"
That pain in his beautiful dark eyes was so strong I could almost feel it. I took his hand and caress it, he didn't stop me.
"Well, I can as well tell you the whole story. Mrs. Lovett makes pies, but the price of meat is far too high. So we have our own enterprise; I kill the people and she makes the pies."
I looked at Mr. Corlett's body again. The thought of him inside a meat pie made me disgusted and Mr. Todd probably saw that, because he said:
"But I don't think anyone wants to eat him. I'll tell Mrs. Lovett to burn him instead."
I nodded silently. I wanted to say something to him, thank him for killing the man I hated and saving my life and especially for that hug. With blushing cheeks and without looking at him I mumbled:
"Mr. Todd, no one has been this nice to me since my mother was alive. I don't see you as a bad person for killing people, I have lost my family as well and I just saw my own pain in your eyes. I promise I won't tell anyone about what you have told me. Mr. Todd, can I live here with you? I can help you to burn the corps, or whatever you need help with. Please. I have nowhere else to go, and you hug made me feel so safe…"
He gave me another hug and again I felt warm inside.
"Dearest Ruby, of course you can live here with me. I promise I won't let anyone hurt you."