Welcome back, sorry it's taken so long to update. Been busy.
Enjoy! R&R, please and thank you. :)
Life as a widow was quite agreeable to Nell Lovett. There were so many freedoms she hadn't been allowed as a married woman that were now available to her. She had no one to answer to but herself and that suited her just fine.
It had been ten years since Nell took charge of the Barker home. She persuaded Lucy to sign over the deed to her (which was not a hard task, as Lucy wasn't quite herself anymore), and turned it into a meat pie shop. Nell had never really been a very good cook, a point which her late husband has often pointed out to her, but she got by on what little money she made.
She had pawned many of the Barker's valuable family items, considering the house and all the items therein legally belonged to her. She did, however, save some things. A dining set of fine bone china painted with delicate blue flowers, two large oriental rugs, a fifteen piece silver tea set, and a case of chased silver razors in a velvet lined case. All these things she proudly displayed in her new home, welcoming the praise she received from the ladies who came to visit her.
"What a lovely dinette! Such intricate patterns for you china!" they would say. Or:
"How elegant! Your tea set is simply beautiful, I must have one!"
But no one understood the value of the razors. Although they were beautiful, the women she entertained tended to see it as a bit macabre, so Nell hid them away under a floorboard and only took them out to admire on very special occasions.
No guilt plagued Nell Lovett. She had everything she had ever wanted; a home to call her own, a (sometimes) successful business, enough money to preserve her into her later years and, because of the judge, a few higher end social connections. The only thing that was missing was someone to share it all with. Lucy had been released from Bedlam, but her mind was not all there. She took to the streets as a beggar and prostitute and could hardly remember her own name, let alone the life she once led. After a month, Nell assumed she was dead. Even if she wasn't, it was an easier thing to think rather than the truth. She thought she saw her on occasion, but it was hard to tell as most beggars tended to look the same in London. Dirty and rotting, they were almost more animal than human.
So Nell moved on, although part of her still longed for a companion. She remembered how tender Lucy's husband had always been with her, how she had always wished she could have the same kind of sweet love, but Albert was callous and had no romantic instinct whatsoever. The pangs of jealousy she felt when her dearest friend had written about her pregnancy and the birth of her lovely little daughter made Nell bitter and resentful. Nell had lost two children in her married life, one to miscarriage and another stillborn, and Albert remained indifferent.
One day she came upon a framed portrait of the little family and it made her yearn for a loving partner of her own. Maybe someday, she thought, she might have a chance at finding her own love. A marriage she was able to choose for herself with a gentle man who would maybe not mind retiring to the country in their later years. Or perhaps the shore, as Nell was partial to neither. Should she ever find such a man, she thought, she would never let him go.
R&R, thanks!