Chapter 13

A/N – Second to last chapter! Crazy, huh? I'm so sorry I promised you a fast update, and I didn't post anything… I'm so cruel to you guys. I'm so sorry, again. Anyways, hope you like this chapter! Just know - I still love you! And I hope that I can get the final chapter up for you very soon! :)

Mrs. Lovett's lips descended on his.

Sweeney froze. But – he couldn't bring himself to push her away. His lips moved tentatively against hers.

When Sweeney began kissing her back, Mrs. Lovett moaned and leaned in.

All of a sudden, Sweeney snapped back to reality. He shoved her away, hard. What had he done?

"Oh! Mr. T," she spluttered, stumbling back. "I, er, I was just – You were -"

Sweeney watched her stammer an incoherent excuse, his own mind still whirling at what he had just done. He was never this impulsive, never. What was wrong with him?

"Get out."

Mrs. Lovett made her escape, terrified and fully grateful of Sweeney's immobility at that moment. Not that he couldn't get out of bed if he really wanted to…

He'd gotten angry at her before for touching him while he was asleep, and that time she'd only been doing it because she wanted to help him. But this time, it had been for herself, not for him … and she had definitely crossed the line.

She locked her bedroom door for the rest of the night, just in case.

XXXX

Sweeney was confused.

He didn't know whether he should be angry at her, for doing it, or at himself, for… for enjoying it. And what she had said … it couldn't be. How could she possibly be in love with him? In love. It completely blew him away.

For one, he couldn't understand how. He was violent by nature, indifferent to anything that he didn't care about (which was, coincidentally, almost everything), and he was fairly sure that his disposition was quite a bit more than just cold.

He thought hard, trying to remember one time when he had outwardly showed her any form of kindness. He couldn't remember any time that he had.

Then he thought about all the things that she had done for him.

A seemingly endless flow of memories invaded his mind. Each recollection led to another, which led to another, which led to another. Mrs. Lovett bringing him food. Mrs. Lovett doing his laundry. Mrs. Lovett having the brilliant idea of what to do with his "customers." Mrs. Lovett finding him in the street. Mrs. Lovett holding him after his nightmare. Mrs. Lovett beating him with a rolling pin. Mrs. Lovett bringing him those awful romance novels, beaming as she dumped them into his lap. Mrs. Lovett laughing at him, chattering to him, taking care of him.

Mrs. Lovett loving him.

Sweeney sighed. This was going to be a long night.

XXXX

The next afternoon, Sweeney forced himself to get out of bed. His limbs were stiff, and they cracked painfully as he climbed out from between the covers. He was almost glad for the pain, knowing that he could actually feel something aside from confusion. His head was fuzzy from the illness and lack of sleep, among other things.

Sweeney dressed lethargically, in a daze, still wondering what on earth Mrs. Lovett was going to say to him when she brought him supper. She must have come to check on him and found him sleeping; for it was now well after midday. The woman could hardly make things any better for herself in this predicament; and he was fairly sure that there wasn't truly anything she could say that would make everything the same again. Her confession to his seemingly sleeping form had tilted his world completely off its axis, which was now whirling off in a completely different direction. He hadn't quite grasped how or which way his planet was spinning thus far, but it was slowly coming to him as he continued to think about it … and the kiss …

The kiss had been indescribable. It had been so heartrendingly familiar, comfortable even; and yet at the same time foreign and exotic and exciting. It just seemed to fit.

But the one thing he couldn't get over was just how wonderfully warm she had been. It had seemed to radiate from every fiber of her being, that warmth, and it had flowed into him from her lips like the sun streaming its vibrant colours into the sunrise. Now that it was on his mind, he found he wanted more of it. That warmth.

But wait – this was Mrs. Lovett he was thinking about. Eleanor Lovett, whom he'd known for years and years and never felt the slightest of anything for…

And it didn't change a thing.

Sweeney stood listlessly at his mirror for a long while, staring at his reflection, contemplating and wondering if all this was truly real. The man who looked back at him in the mirror was not the same as the one that had before this sickness. It wasn't a describable sort of difference, just … bizarre. His reflection in the mirror looked peculiarly unlike himself.

This man had a hint of colour in his cheeks, and he looked nervous. Despite his thin face, emaciated from sickness, he almost looked well. He didn't take proper care of himself, obviously. He wouldn't even eat if Mrs. Lovett wasn't there to coax him to do it.

Sweeney turned his head to the right. The man in the mirror imitated him. He opened and closed his mouth. The man in the mirror did the same. He lifted a hand and waved. The man in the mirror did the exact same.

Sweeney tried to smile, and he could see the man in the mirror having difficulty with it as well. He hadn't smiled for years … he almost couldn't remember how. After he'd arranged his features into some stiff semblance of a grin, he shuddered. Much as it was sort of a sad thing to admit, the look did not suit him. That mark of happiness did not belong on a face like his.

"Who are you?" he asked his doppelganger in the mirror, almost expecting it to answer. He glared at it, and it glared back.

Sweeney almost chuckled then. The anxiety and the sickness must really be getting to his head if it was making him talk to his reflection.

Suddenly, there was a knock at his door, shattering his window of thought. A mental image of the petite flustered baker the night before flashed through his mind. Sweeney's stomach leapt into his throat.

"Come in," he rasped, wondering why she had bothered to knock. She never had before.

Sweeney's voice was croaky and hoarse, and he remembered Mrs. Lovett's comment about his voice sounding like a bullfrog's. He winced.

The door creaked open to admit his visitor.

"Mr. Todd?"

Sweeney felt his stomach leap from his throat into his mouth, choking him and cutting off his voice box. At that moment he couldn't say a word, and even if he did, he wouldn't have known what to say.

The person knocking had not been Mrs. Lovett.

It was Lucy.