GAH ZOMG IT'S SO LOOOONG
Ahem. This is an epilogue of sorts. It's not really an epilogue; it's more of a bonus (?) story that occurs within the 5th chapter. I used some lyrics near the end. I don't own any of the lyrics (I only own the very tiny alteration I made to these)—they belong to Mr. Steven Sondheim.
Also, I apologize for how incredibly out of character Sweeney Todd is in this story. I watched the movie yesterday and was struck by how I had completely ignored how…bitchy Sweeney actually is when I was writing my fics. Seriously. He's an ass. I still love him, though (sigh…I'm exactly like Mrs. Lovett. Only not quite as crazy. I hope.).
"Mr. T, that was awful rude of you to slam the door on us like that," Mrs. Lovett said upon entering the barber shop.
But Sweeney Todd had more important things on his mind. "Mrs. Lovett, might I inquire as to who it was that you were in love with?"
Mrs. Lovett paused. He could tell she was annoyed that he had asked the very question she'd so obviously longed to avoid.
"Because if I'm not mistaken"—he wasn't—he never was—"it was Albert who proposed to you."
He saw her swallow. "And why would you know a thing like that?" She asked.
Todd shrugged. "Lucy told me. She said that you didn't seem too happy about it, though—I always thought that was strange. Why would you say yes if you didn't love him? If it wasn't your husband you were in love with, who was it?"
"It wasn't me I was talkin' about," she murmured as she lingered in the doorway. "I was just sayin' things in a way Toby would understand, is all."
Todd smirked at her. "Oh really?" He asked.
"Really," she said.
She was lying. It was plain for him to see.
"Tell me the story, then."
Mrs. Lovett looked blatantly surprised. "Mr. T, you want to hear me talk?" She asked. "Are you feelin' okay?"
He frowned at her. "Just come and tell me the story," he snapped.
She came over to him cautiously, as though she expected him to attack her. Was she frightened of him? He didn't think so.
Was she afraid of embarrassment? More importantly, why did he care?
She sat down in the vacated chair, gripping the arms as though clinging for life. He rolled his eyes and sat across from her, on the chest by the windowsill.
"Well, let's see. It was a long time ago. My friend—Margery, her name was—she loved her neighbor. He was kind and gentle and beautiful, and she loved him with all her heart."
Todd realized that, as she spoke, Mrs. Lovett was looking past him—out the window, he supposed. She wasn't talking directly to him—he found her a bit difficult to understand.
"Mrs. Lovett," he growled, "could you look at me when you speak? I can barely hear you."
Her eyes flickered to his face and he was surprised to see the emotions swirling in them—fear, sadness and what appeared to be a deep melancholy. Or something to that extent.
He looked at her eyelashes. They were long and curly and a shade lighter than her hair.
"…Margery loved the man, but she knew that he could never love someone like her. She thought he loved someone else. So she left him be. But as time passed, she grew lonely and desperate for affection. There was a man who was interested in Margery. He was kind and lovable, a good friend—but she didn't feel the way for him that she felt for her neighbor."
Todd's eyes strayed from her face as she spoke. They trailed over her forehead, which he noticed now was sweaty. Was it due to exertion from running up the stairs? Or was it due to nervousness? Was she really nervous?
Did it matter?
"Then one day, the neighbor came over with a woman. He was over to tell her that they were to be married. The girl he had brought along was gorgeous—Margery knew she could never compete. They were married in the spring. Margery tried to be friends with the woman and succeeded. They became good friends, close confidantes. And then the man who was interested in Margery came over to see her—and he proposed."
As she said this, Mrs. Lovett's voice grew quiet. Todd had to lean in closer to her to hear her voice when she continued. His eyes grazed her wild hair and her cheekbones. She's actually attractive, he thought.
He mentally slapped himself for thinking such a thing.
Why was he looking at her in this way? Was it due to their close proximity to each other?
"Margery was prepared to tell him "no" when she saw her neighbor and his wife wandering around outside, so in love and so happy. Margery told her suitor that she would marry him and that was that."
She kept licking her lips. He could smell perfume on her.
"Margery and her fiancée were married in the fall. It was a cool day in late September, and Margery acted like she was very happy, but really all she wanted was her old life back."
Todd's eyes focused on Mrs. Lovett's lips. They were darkened by her lip makeup but he could tell that, without the makeup, her lips would be as pale as her skin.
"…And then one day, suddenly, for no reason, Margery's neighbor moved away and he took his wife with him. Margery was heartbroken but she tried to move on. After all…Mr. T, are you listening to me?"
He was still staring at her lips. At the sound of her tone his eyes found hers. "Yes," he muttered. "Yes, yes, of course. Continue."
Mrs. Lovett rolled her eyes and began again. "After all, nothing had ever happened between her and her neighbor anyway. She began to immerse herself in her life with her husband, who she did care about. She just didn't love him like she had loved her neighbor. As their years together passed, Margery's husband grew sick. She did everything she could to try and save him but he grew sicker and sicker until one day he died."
Todd's had strayed to Mrs. Lovett's hands. They were twisting the skirt of her dress, turning and twisting the fabric until it could no longer be twisted or turned. They were pearly white.
"Margery was on her own again. She worked at the shop she had owned with her husband for several years until a new person moved into what had been her love's home."
Sweeney Todd considered Mrs. Lovett. She was attractive, in her own way. She was kind—to both him and Toby. Actually, she was kind to everyone. She was loyal to him—how many women would shelter a murderer? How many women would help a murderer? Not many. She was also smart, and streetwise. She wasn't naïve at all.
He shook his head infinitesimally to clear his mind. Why was he thinking these things? All that "love" talk of Toby's must have caused some sort of malfunction in his brain.
He didn't love Mrs. Lovett. Love was roses and happiness and sunny days and yellow hair. Love was Lucy.
Love had nothing to do with contempt. Or overwhelming physical attraction. Or killing. Or waltzing. Or…did it?
Toby had asked what love was. Love didn't have to be one "kind" of love, did it? Couldn't it have many shades and colors and meanings and feelings?
But Lucy. He loved Lucy. She had been his life, his reason for existence. She still was. But Mrs. Lovett…he tried to imagine Mrs. Lovett leaving him. The thought was ridiculous, silly. She would never leave. She loved him too much. But if she did leave…if she was gone suddenly… "No," he said.
Mrs. Lovett stopped talking. "'No' what, love?" She asked.
He shook his head. "It's nothing. Continue."
She did.
"He was completely different from her old neighbor—there wasn't a trace of kindness in his face or soul. But he was beautiful. Margery fell for him hard and fast. But her new neighbor ignored her. He verbally abused her. He avoided looking at her, or talking to her. And yet she loved him and could not stop. That's the end, Mr. T.
Sweeney Todd stared at Mrs. Lovett. He didn't want to be away from her. Not ever. He wanted her to always be there, by his side, helping him in her own little way. She was helping him just by talking to him. Just by looking at him longingly. Perhaps knowing that one person needed and wanted him alive was the only thing that kept him alive.
He wasn't certain. He'd never thought about it that way.
"Mrs. Lovett…?" He asked. "Your friend Margery…did she ever get her second neighbor's love?"
Mrs. Lovett looked at him, confusion in her eyes. She obviously knew that he knew that the whole story had been about her own life and her relationship with Benjamin Barker, Lucy Barker, Albert Lovett and Sweeney Todd. "Mr. T…?"
Sweeney Todd thought about Mrs. Lovett and love in general for a moment.
He loved her, he thought. That had to be it. Why else would he have kept her alive when he could have killed her in seconds? Why else would he want to touch her right then and there?
"Mrs. Lovett…I think that Margery's neighbor…I think that he cared about her far more than she thought."
Mrs. Lovett looked at him in surprise. "Do you really think that?" She asked.
"I do," he murmured.
He was confused and flustered at his realization. His love for Mrs. Lovett—if he did love Mrs. Lovett—was so completely different from how his love for Lucy had been, who could blame him for thinking he hated her?
That wasn't true, though. He didn't think he hated her—sometimes he did hate her. Was that part of love too?
"Mrs. Lovett…what did you tell Toby love was?"
Mrs. Lovett looked surprised to see him interested. "Well, I said love had many different forms and that he probably wouldn't understand what it was exactly until he felt it for himself. Then I told him what "my" love—actually Margery's love—was like, and then I told him I had nothing left to tell him." She paused to think. "I also told him that love was painful sometimes, and wonderful at others. I guess I told him a lot."
Sweeney Todd stood up. Mrs. Lovett imitated him. She stumbled slightly as she did so, leading her to catch herself on Todd's chest. He blinked in surprise when her body hit his.
Love had many different forms. How true.
He held her to him. "Mr. T?" She asked.
"Shut up," he grumbled.
Then he let her go and she looked at his face, searching for meaning. "What's gotten into you?" She asked, though she didn't sound displeased. Just curious.
He then took hold of her again. His arms wrapped tenderly around her waist. He pressed his forehead to hers.
Mrs. Lovett was stiff against him at first, but she melted quickly. She nestled her hands into the folds of his shirt, her fingers touching his collarbone lightly.
"Mrs. Lovett…" he sang softly. He began to move his feet back and forth slowly. A slow dance. "You're a lovely wonder eminently practical and yet appropriate as always…Mrs. Lovett…how I've lived without you all these years I'll never know…"
Mrs. Lovett made a happy noise.
Sweeney Todd continued to sing to her. They turned in a circle so that he was facing the door. As he looked past Mrs. Lovett's wild mess of hair he saw Toby looking at them through the window of the door.
Under normal circumstances he would have throttled the boy, but circumstances certainly weren't normal. He wasn't in the mood.
Instead he thought that maybe, tomorrow, he would tell Toby that love was grand. Cryptically, because that was just how he was. But he would still tell him.