Proof of Heaven
Since the dawn of time there have been moments when a man loses control – when the animal inside takes over and does what it wants, damn the consequences. Sweeney Todd has been around long enough to hear stories of such instances in graphic detail. While he always shuddered at these tales of powerless men – slaves to their desires – he never considered he might become one of them.
In that one instant, those few seconds when Mrs. Lovett had looked up at him – brown eyes wide and guileless, her body so close to his he could feel the heat radiating from her – Sweeney realized he wasn't exempt from those stories. No one was. Something inside him had taken over, and he had decided to take what he wanted no matter how his conscience railed against it.
Almost as if observing someone else from behind a sheet of glass, Sweeney had watched himself pull Mrs. Lovett close, bend his head and capture her mouth. When she hadn't objected, but instead gasped against his lips and clutched at him desperately, there had been no stopping him. And no going back. Even when he'd wrenched himself away from her and stumbled up the stairs to his wife, he could not forget the way Mrs. Lovett felt pressed against him. The feel of her lips against his burned into his memory like a brand – permanent and searing.
Even now, sitting in the pie shop, Sweeney finds his mind wandering. Concentrating solely on overlooking the waning evening crowd gathered around the pie shop's battered tables and studiously ignoring Mrs. Lovett's cautious glances in his direction, he curls his hands around his glass of gin and wonders how he'll look Lucy in the eye again without thinking of last night.
In the far corner of the shop, Mrs. Lovett wipes down a table, damp tendrils of copper hair curling at the nape of her neck. Sweeney catches himself looking for the fifth time in as many minutes and swiftly averts his gaze just as Johanna collapses onto the stool next to him.
Startled, he stiffens, hoping she hadn't caught him staring.
"Where is your young man?" He asks, casting her a sideways glance over his glass.
Johanna brightens at the mention of Anthony. Pushing blonde hair behind her ears, she fights back a besotted smile. "He's meeting some friends at the docks. They've all decided to drink or skip rocks or whatever it is sailors do together." She laughs. "But he said he would leave them early to wish me goodnight."
"So long as he doesn't come in drunk," Sweeney mutters into his own drink. He doesn't particularly like Anthony, but he's slowly coming to terms with the fact that the young sailor isn't going anywhere any time soon.
Johanna reaches over and covers one of his hands with her much smaller one. "Don't worry, Father. Anthony doesn't care much for drinking. He's going more for the company than anything else." Glancing over her shoulder, Johanna sees Toby scurrying to keep up with their customers and smiles. "I'm on my break and we still have an hour or so before Mother comes home. Do you mind if I have a glass of gin and ask you some terribly intrusive questions about marriage?"
One of the many things he's learned about Johanna since returning home is that Johanna's curiosity is insatiable, and when she asks a question, she expects a well-thought out answer in return. Nodding guardedly, Sweeney eyes his daughter with a small smile, wary but not wishing to deny her.
"Why the sudden interest?" He asks, grateful for the distraction.
Rounding the counter to find a clean glass and the bottle of gin, Johanna shrugs. "I've heard so many stories about you and Mother, from Auntie Nell and from Mother herself. I suppose I just want to hear your side of things – I want to hear what my parents were like together." Finding what she's looking for, Johanna gives a pleased hum and returns to her chair beside Sweeney. "Mother always puts such a fanciful spin on things, and for some reason, Auntie Nell is never quite detailed enough for my liking. I've decided you are the only one who can satisfy my curiosity."
Sweeney nods appreciatively at her as she tops up his glass and tries not to nervously fiddle with his shirt cuffs. "What do you want to know?"
"Well…" Johanna trails off and Sweeney can almost see her scanning her mental list of questions, discarding the ones she deems too invasive to start with. "What did you like to do together? For fun, I mean."
Having been expecting something far more difficult to talk about, Sweeney nearly slumps into his seat in relief. Casting his mind back over the years – another lifetime ago – he tries to recall what he and Lucy used to do when they were courting. The memories come back with relative ease – during his time away, he clung to the precious moments he spent with his wife and child, to the point of pushing every other memory aside. He didn't have room for much else in his head but them.
He remembers strolls through the park when their courtship was new, both of them glancing at each other shyly, too nervous to say anything. He remembers resting his back against the trunk of a tree and letting Lucy sketch his profile, trying valiantly not to laugh and ruin the picture. He remembers that their idea of fun after their marriage had been chess and wandering through the market. He remembers late nights where neither of them could tear themselves away from Johanna's crib – both of them desperately needed sleep, but going to bed meant missing Johanna's mouth twitch in her sleep, missing her little fist curl into her blanket, missing sleepy sighs and kicking feet.
He and Lucy hadn't done anything spectacular in their youth, but they had always taken such delight in simple things. Sweeney opens his mouth to say all this, but his tongue can't seem to wrap itself around the words. What comes out instead is a soft, "Your mother loved to play chess; she always beat me." He twitches a smile. "I could never quit staring at her long enough to concentrate on the board."
Johann grins broadly and clutches at his arm. "Oh, this is exactly the sort of thing I wanted to hear! What else? Did you always spend time together? You seemed so happy…but you must have argued! What did you disagree about?"
In the middle of downing a generous gulp of gin, Sweeney freezes as a memory comes to mind unbidden. It's fuzzy, the picture unfocused and blurred around the edges, the voices muffled and lacking distinction. He tries to hold onto it with all his might, struggling to wipe away the cobwebs.
They had argued. Not often, but enough. He can barely remember it, time having worn away most of the bad memories, leaving him with only the things he truly wanted to remember. They had argued over money, like all couples. Benjamin accused Lucy of spending too much on a new bonnet. Lucy said nothing of what he spent on his razors, but Benjamin could tell she didn't approve.
And something else…Something important – just before he had been shipped off to Botany Bay.
"Children."
While Lucy had adored Johanna, she had been content with one child. She'd said Johanna was so perfect they couldn't possibly make any improvements with future children. Benjamin had wanted several – wanted them climbing all over him when he walked through the door in the evenings, wanted to hear half a dozen voices calling out for "daddy", squabbling over dollies and who had a bigger piece of pie for dessert.
Johanna is looking at him, brow furrowed. "Children?"
Startled, Sweeney realizes he had spoken aloud. "I'd always thought your mother and I wanted several children." He manages a small smile, even under the weight of his newfound revelation. "But she was quite satisfied to have just you for the rest of her life."
Time is a funny thing – making one forget all about the past's troubles and coloring everything in rosy, yet deceiving perfection. Sweeney had forgotten all about their argument until now. It has come back to him with startling clarity.
Benjamin had been so upset that Lucy hadn't wanted another child – they'd still been in the midst of arguing over the matter when he'd been taken. It had been his idea to take Johanna to the flower market, hoping that Lucy would enjoy their day out and realize how full Johanna had made their lives. Surely more children would only improve what they had?
Johanna looks saddened, but just as she tightens her grip on his arm and opens her mouth to speak, the door to the pie shop opens with the merry jingle of a bell and Anthony calls her name. Her whole face lights up at the sound of his voice, but she leans over and kisses Sweeney's cheek first.
"I'm sorry, Father," she murmurs. "We can talk more after Anthony leaves for the night, can't we?"
He nods.
Sweeney watches Johanna skip off to Anthony, both of them illuminated in the light from the doorway, neither of them paying the least bit of the attention to the evening crowd eating and drinking around them. Anthony delivers a mock bow and kisses her hand, and Johanna blushes prettily as he leads her out to an empty table in the garden.
Absorbed in watching them, Sweeney doesn't even notice Mrs. Lovett rounding the counter until she's standing right in front of him. He stiffens at her proximity and she raises an eyebrow at his white-knuckled grip on his glass.
"Sorry, Mr. Todd," she says, avoiding his gaze just as devoutly as he avoids hers. "Didn't mean to startle you – just need this." She reaches under the counter and grabs a large pitcher.
Sweeney can only frown into his glass. Mr. Todd? He can't remember the last time she hadn't addressed him as 'Mr. T', 'love', or on one memorable occasion, 'bloomin' insufferable man'.
Straightening, pitcher in hand, Mrs. Lovett glances at him just as he risks a fleeting look in her direction. Their eyes catch and for a moment, neither of them breathes. If his memories of last night had been vivid before, they're explicit now, with Mrs. Lovett's dark eyes boring into his. Lips parted in a gasp, she stares at him with unadulterated longing and Sweeney is helpless to do anything but gaze back. He tightens his grip on his glass, if only to keep his hands off of her.
Without looking away from him, Mrs. Lovett puts the pitcher on the counter and begins, "Mr. Todd, I - "
The bell above the door chimes once again, and Mrs. Lovett instantly turns her eyes to the door to see who has arrived so late in the evening. Her gaze hardens and her mouth sets into a thin line at whoever she sees, so Sweeney forces his eyes away from her and turns to look.
In the doorway, looking down his nose at Mrs. Lovett's customers and perhaps the establishment itself, Judge Turpin is the picture of upper class disdain. His eyes scan the crowd searchingly and Sweeney feels a wave of rage come over him – he knows exactly who Turpin is looking for.
He grits his teeth against a growl, clenching his fists at his sides. Calling attention to himself will help nothing – the last thing he needs is for Turpin to recognize his face.
"Can I 'elp you, sir?" Mrs. Lovett calls to him, her voice devoid of the warmth it held just moments ago. She raises an eyebrow at him, expression hard and unwelcoming.
Sweeney almost smiles. Every time Turpin ventures into the pie shop, Mrs. Lovett treats him as rudely as possible while still maintaining a professional air of politeness. She treats it like an art form.
Turpin regards Mrs. Lovett like he would a speck on his polished leather shoes. "A drink, if you please." He sweeps further into the shop with reluctance in his eyes, sitting three stools away from Sweeney.
Mrs. Lovett busies herself with preparing Turpin's ale, and Sweeney can't help but notice that she picks up a used glass from a pile of dirty dishes to pour his drink into. If Turpin wasn't looking, she'd probably spit in it too. He hides his amusement in another gulp of gin.
"Where is your little helper this evening?" Turpin asks, his eyes still scanning the crowd even as Mrs. Lovett sets his drink in front of him with more force than necessary.
Sweeney doesn't let his gaze drift to the outside garden, where Johanna sits with Anthony. Her break will be over soon, and she'll come back inside. Considering Johanna's reaction the last time Turpin showed up at the pie shop, Sweeney sincerely hopes the lecherous rat is gone by then. He won't be held responsible for his actions if Turpin so much as winks at his daughter.
"My service not good enough for 'is judgeness?"
"Your service is as lacking as ever, Mrs. Lovett," Turpin replies, gazing suspiciously into his smudged glass.
Mrs. Lovett tosses her curls and offers a charming smile. "So glad to 'ear it, sir."
Sweeney hadn't known the word 'sir' could sound so much like 'pompous git' until Mrs. Lovett uttered it.
Turpin takes a tentative sip of his ale and grimaces before putting it back down. He spends several moments watching Mrs. Lovett scrub at the countertop with unparalleled vigor. Johanna will be walking through the door again any moment. Sweeney taps his fingers restlessly against his glass and mentally urges Turpin out the door before he breaks and does something irrational and marvelously violent to get rid of him. It would be so easy to lure him upstairs for a shave, to lull him into relaxing against the barber's chair with false pleasantries and the promise of the best shave he's ever had. It would be so easy for Sweeney to sink his razor into the flesh of Turpin's neck and feel warm blood on his hands…
Finally, just as Sweeney is about to snap, Turpin casts one last glance around before pushing aside his glass. He tosses a couple of coins onto the counter carelessly. "Give Mrs. Barker and her daughter my best," he says, moving toward the door.
"Leavin' so soon?" Mrs. Lovett asks, her cheerful grin somehow managing to convey malice.
"I am, as always, delighted to depart from your company, Mrs. -" Turpin stops suddenly, his gaze falling on the outside patio. Through the window, Johanna and Anthony are visible, heads close together at a table. Johanna shoves at Anthony's shoulder playfully, her grin wide and unabashed.
Eyes narrowed, Turpin watches them, unmoving in the middle of the shop. Mrs. Lovett's nervous gaze darts to Sweeney as she wrings her hands, practically bouncing up and down in her anxiety. Sweeney gives a small shake of his head and she bites her lip.
In a far corner of the shop, some overzealous customer drops his tumbler, and the following shatter of glass and shout of, "Oi, watch it!" from Mrs. Lovett is enough to jar Turpin from his stupor. He blinks twice, rapidly, before turning resolutely from the scene of Anthony and Johanna. Something in his expression is unsettlingly familiar. It makes Sweeney's stomach turn over. Then, just as quickly as he'd come, Judge Turpin breezes out of the pie shop, his coat billowing behind him in the winter air as he stalks down the street.
"Good riddance," Mrs. Lovett mutters. "Bugger didn't even leave a tip."
XxX
After a visit from Anthony, Johanna usually floats around with the silliest grin Eleanor has ever seen. Not even Eleanor's taunts about lovesickness are enough to remove it – which is exactly why the baker finds it so odd when Johanna walks slowly through the door after Anthony bids her goodnight, face ashen.
Eleanor watches from one of her customer's tables as the girl ties her apron around her waist again and gets back to work, helping Toby usher out customers and clean up the messes they've left behind. Though she chats with Toby and departing customers as usual, Eleanor's shrewd and searching gaze detects the faint tremor in her hands and the lack of usual good humor in Johanna's eyes.
Frowning to herself, Eleanor bids her regulars goodbye and begins picking up the dirty dishes left on the table. She supposes Johanna is having troubles of her own in love. After all, her first tiff with Anthony had to come about eventually. At least Johanna can be secure in the knowledge that Anthony bloody well adores her. Eleanor's only reassurance is one passionate kiss in the wee hours of the morning that neither of them has acknowledged since. If it wasn't for the fact that Mr. Todd refuses to look her in the eye, she would have thought her love-starved brain had merely conjured up the kiss in a dream the night before.
As it is, one kiss in the dead of night is hardly reassuring. People do all sorts of things in the dark that they regret in the unforgiving light of day. Mr. Todd probably isn't meeting her eyes because he's so ashamed of himself – he had betrayed Lucy, after all. His precious wife, the one he would do anything for. Considering his devotion, Eleanor is surprised Mr. Todd isn't trying to throw himself in front of a bloody carriage out of guilt.
If it wasn't for Turpin and his ill-timed entrance, she might have been able to get Mr. Todd to talk to her again. She's certain he'll never want a repeat of what happened last night, but she doesn't think she could get through her days knowing he wants nothing to do with her ever again. She wants to at least hold onto her gin nights with him. She looks forward to those nights – when it's just them, sitting across from each other, nursing a glass. Sometimes they talk, and sometimes the silence between them is so easy and comfortable that Eleanor has fallen asleep at the table, Mr. Todd's dark eyes on her. It isn't much, but she'll take what she can get.
It isn't until Eleanor has locked the door to the pie shop and flipped the sign to closed that Johanna utters a word to her. Setting a pile of precariously stacked dishes on the counter, she wipes her hands on her apron and turns to Eleanor. Her voice is so quiet and so small that for a moment, Eleanor doesn't recognize it.
"I thought we were going to do something about him."
Eleanor takes one look at Johanna's pale, distressed face and knows.
"You saw 'im, then?" She breathes out slowly, brushing curls from her eyes. "I was 'opin' Anthony would distract you long enough for 'im to go away."
Johanna shakes her head. "I don't want Anthony to know, so I managed not to react but I'm scared, Auntie Nell." She looks away, her eyes filling up. "He follows me everywhere! I don't know what to do."
Unable to handle the distance between them anymore when Johanna looks so small and lost, Eleanor closes the space between them in several short steps and gathers Johanna into her arms. "Oh, my love. I'm so sorry." She runs a hand through Johanna's silky hair.
"You said I should leave it to you…" Johanna sniffles into her shoulder. "Have you thought of something?"
"I 'ave." Eleanor swallows heavily. "But you're not goin' to like it."
XxX
Settled comfortably into an armchair in the parlor, Johanna looks between Eleanor and Mr. Todd with something akin to horror. "You can't possibly be serious."
Eleanor can barely believe it and she's the one suggesting it. This independent young lady sitting in front of her was once the darling girl who curled up on her lap and begged for a story, sweet face young and so innocent. It feels wrong – Eleanor doesn't want to be the one to taint her, to put out that light in her eyes.
But if she doesn't, then Turpin will.
Gathering herself, Eleanor forges ahead. "We 'ave to get rid of 'im, love. I know it seems harsh - "
Johanna's laugh is high and a little hysterical. "Harsh? Auntie Nell, you're talking about - " She stops, lowering her voice to a hiss. "You're talking about murder!"
"I'm perfectly aware of what I'm talkin' about, Johanna," Eleanor frowns. "But it's necessary."
Johanna shakes her head firmly, looking at her father with wide, pleading eyes. "Murder is never necessary. There must be another way."
"If there was, we wouldn't be having this discussion." On the surface, Mr. Todd's voice is frustration-filled and perhaps a little anguished that his daughter must do something so terrible, but underneath, Eleanor can detect the faintest trace of excitement. It's so small and so hidden that she's sure Mr. Todd doesn't even know it's there. She can hardly blame him – it's not every day a man gets the opportunity to exact revenge against the snake who ruined his life.
"But I can't!" Johanna looks on the verge of tears. With her eyes wet, her wringing hands on her lap and her brows drawn together, she looks close to throwing a tantrum. If she was still four, Eleanor might offer her a cookie in exchange for her silence. "You can't think I could possibly - "
"It's the only way he'll ever leave you alone!" Eleanor interrupts, hating the way Johanna flinches from her apologetic gaze. Her heart lurches in her chest at the crushed look on Johanna's face – like she's finding out for the first time that the world isn't story-book perfect. Too ashamed to meet her gaze, Eleanor glances away to stare at the carpet. "Do you really think that Turpin will just lose interest and walk away? We got lucky last time, love. It won't 'appen again."
Johanna merely stares at them, tears slipping down her cheeks.
Eleanor glances at Mr. Todd. He's staring a hole in the floor, his expression pinched. She can tell from the look in his eyes that he's a million miles away – probably thinking of what happened the last time he ignored Judge Turpin. She can't imagine what it must be like, going through this again with his daughter. Will he ever manage to remove his family from Turpin's grasping fingers?
Mr. Todd looks up, eyes still clouded as he looks at Johanna. "You won't have to…" He trails off, swallowing. "I'll take care of him. I just need to know -"
Johanna looks at him in disbelief. "Are you asking for my consent?"
Eleanor shrugs. "Might need you to help at some point, but we certainly wouldn't 'ave you do the actual killin'. Don't be silly, love."
"Yes, I'm the one being ridiculous right now!" Johanna chokes on a panic-stricken laugh.
"I know this is hard to accept, dear," Eleanor says softly. "But if we don't deal with this now, the blighter'll plant a necklace in Anthony's pocket and accuse 'im of stealing. Send 'im off to Botany Bay right quick, just like 'e did your father."
Johanna's face drains of all color, her fists clenched in the delicate fabric of her skirts. "Not Anthony."
Eleanor nods. "It will be, my love. Unless 'o course…we do somethin' about it."
Silence reigns while Johanna stares into the crackling fire, contemplative. Eleanor can hear Toby wandering around in the kitchen, probably trying to find her newest hiding spot for the gin. She almost smiles when she hears the clatter of pans and a young voice curse in surprise. The lad is growing on her.
At the sound of the bell above the door jingling in the pie shop, Eleanor almost calls out to the boy. He shouldn't be wandering off after the sun goes down and he's probably just going to steal alcohol. Irrational though it may be, she can't break the silence. Johanna is in such a fragile place – the slightest noise could tip her over the edge. So she lets Toby go and decides that they'll have a talk about curfews and theft tomorrow.
"Are - " Johanna stops when her voice comes out shaky. Clearing her throat, she begins again, stronger this time. "Are you telling me that if I don't…do this, then Judge Turpin will send Anthony away?"
"I don't mean to scare you, love," Eleanor says softly, and even as she says the words, she knows it's a lie. Scaring Johanna into cooperating might be the only way. Swallowing back the guilt, she comforts herself with the fact that while she may be scaring Johanna, her warnings are nothing but true. Turpin isn't a man to be trifled with. "But Anthony is standin' in the way of what 'e wants. Men like Turpin always get what they want in the end." She glances at Mr. Todd, relieved to see that he looks very much in the present for the moment, his eyes sharp and clear.
"Judge Turpin ruined my life and your mother's," he says, his voice nothing but a rasp. "Don't let him ruin yours, Johanna."
"I don't think that's quite accurate, Benjamin."
Just managing to rein in her look of wide-eyed horror, Eleanor jerks her head up to see Lucy standing in the doorway, her mouth a thin line of displeasure.
From the kitchen, another set of crashes and curses emanates. Eleanor bites down on her own string of obscenities. The sound of the bell hadn't been Toby leaving – it had been Lucy arriving.
Mr. Todd stares at his wife uncomfortably, his expression stranded somewhere between fading devotion and guilt. "You're early."
Lucy shakes her head, blue eyes bright with something indefinable. Possibly disappointment. In any case, it suits her – Eleanor doesn't know what Lucy would be without that permanent air of dissatisfaction and civility. "I'm on time. And you're telling our daughter stories."
Staring at Lucy, cast in shadows and firelight, Eleanor is reminded quite cruelly of why Mr. Todd would never look at a tired piemaker with anything remotely close to desire. Her blue dress faded and a little worse for wear but miraculously free of dirt and grime from her trek through the streets, Lucy somehow manages to look like a princess, stooping to visit the commoners. Eleanor has never had that sort of presence.
Mr. Todd flinches at Lucy's words as though she'd slapped him. He doesn't get a chance to reply before Lucy gives them all one last lingering look of disapproval and turns on her heel, continuing down the hall. In seconds, they hear her soft footsteps on the stairs. Mr. Todd swallows, standing stiffly. He shoots Eleanor a look on his way out. Johanna still needs persuading, whether he's in the room or not.
Inwardly rolling her eyes at Lucy's dramatics and the way Mr. Todd follows after her like a trained canary whenever she so much as gets a paper cut, Eleanor only gives the barber a terse nod in return.
When she hears Mr. Todd's boots on the stairs, Eleanor turns to look at Johanna, ignoring her puzzled expression. The last thing she wants is to get into another discussion about the ever-continuing saga of the barber and his wife. "Well?"
Immediately, Johanna's eyes harden, losing that curious light Eleanor loves so much. Refusing to look at her, Johanna stares at her shoes instead. "Do you understand what you're asking of me?"
Unrepentant on the outside no matter how much the inside of her weeps at the loss of Johanna's last bit of childlike innocence, Eleanor says, "Yes, love. And I'm sorry, but it's 'im or Anthony."
Johanna's face crumples. Hiding behind her hands, she cries, "I just…can't."
Tears in her eyes, Eleanor crosses the room and kneels in front of the girl. Wrapping her arms around her thin frame, she whispers, "One day, love, you might not 'ave a choice."
One day, Johanna will be faced with the decision to kill a horrid man who does terrible things or lose the man she loves. When that time comes, she won't have to choose. The answer will be obvious.
Love is the greatest motivator.
XxX
Sweeney finds Lucy in their bedroom, standing in front of her vanity and removing her gloves, laying them carefully next to her bonnet. She doesn't look up when the floorboards creak beneath him, and he hesitates in the doorway.
Sighing quietly, Lucy brings her head up and turns to face him. "I'd appreciate it if you didn't tell Johanna stories about Judge Turpin. I know you believe he sent you away for some nefarious purpose, but I don't want her believing the worst in people."
It takes Sweeney a moment to respond with something other than rage or indignation to Lucy's words, and he fumbles to say the right thing. He's tired of arguing with her. "She deserves to know the truth."
"What truth?" Lucy asks, shaking her head. "There is no evidence to support such claims."
Sweeney stares at her, jaw tight and shoulders tense. He clenches his hands into fists to hold himself back – from what, he doesn't know. He only feels the need to let Lucy know how incredibly livid her words have made him. If he loses control for just a moment, he knows he would do something he'd regret. So he keeps his fists balled tight, breathes through his nose, and says nothing.
Lucy turns back to her gloves, nervously smoothing her hands over them. The framed photographs of Benjamin and Johanna sit next to them. Lucy stares at their smiling faces and reaches out to lovingly caress the frame with slim fingers before turning to him, mouth set determinedly.
"No matter what you may think about Judge Turpin, I wish you would let it go and focus on what's happening now," she says, blue eyes searching his face. "It was a long time ago. If you would just stop living in the past and really come home to us - "
"I'm living in the past?" He asks, his voice cold. "I'm not the one who spends hours each night staring at pictures taken fifteen years ago."
Lucy breath catches. "How dare you, Benjamin. I - "
"Don't."
"Don't what?"
"Don't call me Benjamin." Gaze hardened, Sweeney stares at his wife and feels none of the glowing affection he'd felt a lifetime ago. It's gone – so faded and tattered that he barely remembers what it felt like to love her so much. "That man is dead."
"He isn't!" Lucy says so fiercely that it startles him. Her bright eyes are widened in vehemence and her cheeks are flushed. "I don't care how long it's been or what you went through, it doesn't change who you are."
"It changes everything!"
"No! You're still you. Your name is Benjamin Barker and I refuse to call you anything else!" She stops when her voice catches, turning from him to put her hands to her face, crying softly.
Even if he doesn't love her the way he used to, Sweeney still hates to see Lucy so distraught. He wants to cross the room, to hold her and make everything better. Benjamin was so good at comforting his wife – a gentle hand, soft words, sweet kisses. Sweeney no longer has kind words to whisper in her ear and his touch isn't as tender as it used to be – he can only offer a few grasping kisses and fumbling sentiments. If he tried to go to her now, Lucy would pull away and he would only become angry again. There's nothing he can do for her now, so Sweeney flexes his fingers at his sides and he doesn't move.
Sniffling, Lucy presses her palm against the glass pane of their window. The sky is darkening, gas lamps lighting the way for those still walking the streets. "Why can't you be who you used to be? We could be happy, you know – if you would just stop this nonsense and be the man I fell in love with."
Nonsense? Being torn from his family, forced onto a ship heading to Australia and being beaten and spat upon in a penal colony for fifteen years is nonsense? He recalls the nights he spent lying awake, too afraid to fall asleep. He would spend the hours until dawn thinking of Lucy's warm smile, trying to preserve his image of her and keep is as crystal clear as the day he was taken. He thought of Johanna's laughter – the gurgle of a happy infant. He thought of running his fingers through Lucy's yellow hair as they lay close to each other at night. The agony he had gone through thinking he might never see his girls again, the things he endured just to get back to them; under the searing, merciless sun, beneath the crack of a whip and the loss of his innocence…He never gave up. His family was the only reason he kept going, the reason he tried to survive, the reason he hardened his heart and forgot how to be Benjamin Barker.
And it was all nonsense?
Sweeney spends several moments watching Lucy at the window as she attempts to calm herself. Her forehead pressed against the glass, her eyes closed and shoulders still hitching with suppressed sobs, she looks heartbroken. In that instant, more than anything else, Sweeney wishes he could be what she needs. He wishes he could have come back the man she loved. And just like that, his earlier anger vanishes like a smoke in the breeze. Lucy's distress always had that effect on him.
"He's gone, Lucy," he says, his voice barely a whisper. "I can't be him anymore."
Lucy whirls around with a sudden fire in her eyes and her cheeks tear-streaked. "You can - I can help you! We could try again…who's to say we couldn't have what we once had again?" She makes a sweeping motion with her arm, gesturing nervously as she speaks, but the sound of breaking glass fills the air. Lucy falls silent and they both turn their heads to stare at the mess on the floor. She had knocked the picture off the vanity.
Lucy stares in heartsick fascination at the broken pieces scattered across their floor. Mouth open in a silent gasp, she reaches out a shaking hand, as if she can somehow put the pieces back together by sheer will alone. In the splintered frame, Benjamin and Johanna smile up at them – a grotesque caricature of the happiness of their past.
Eyes red and blonde hair beginning to straggle from its elaborate twist, Lucy pins him with a look so resentful that Sweeney almost apologizes. For what, he isn't sure. For not being someone else. For not being close enough to catch the frame when it fell. They stare at one another, each coming to terms with what the other has become and wondering how they can be with someone who reminds them so painfully of what they lost.
Finally, Lucy turns from him and kneels on the floor, struggling to keep the tears at bay. Hands trembling, she reaches out and begins to carefully pick up the shards of glass, gathering them into her skirt and sniffling.
Sweeney watches her for a quiet moment, no sound in the room but Lucy's hitched breathing and the clink of glass. He wonders if she's aware that she just made her choice without a second thought. Lucy has chosen Benjamin over him. Instead of continuing their conversation and trying to convince Sweeney that what they had isn't dead, she chose to hold on to something beyond repair.
In that moment, Sweeney makes his own choice. Casting one last glance at his wife and saying a silent goodbye to what they used to be, he strides from the room and leaves Lucy alone to pick up the shattered remnants of their life together.
A/N - This chapter would not have been possible without Robynne, my darling beta, who literally emailed me with the words, "I want to see 250 words from you in my inbox by tonight OR ELSE." And of course, I jumped to obey – she's scary when she's bossy. Thanks so much for your reviews! I know I slacked on replies this time around, but I figured you would all rather I spent time on writing up a new chapter, rather than reply to old reviews. Right? Haha Enjoy and let me know what you think!