We Could Get By

viii.

"Aren't you tired?" Sweeney murmured, the surprising softness of his lips tickling Nellie's ear. A pleasant shudder rolled through her body, and she leaned back into him. The sheets were crisp and cool against her skin, but his sharp angles held a velvety warmth that she could not get enough of.

"Of what?" Nellie teased, tilting her head back to brush her nose against the sharp line of his jaw. She had caught the barber in some rare mood, his eyes twinkling mischievously in the flicker of the lamp that cast their room in soft reds and oranges. Outside, thunder rumbled deep in the rain-bloated bellies of the grey clouds that hung low over the sea. With a storm rolling in, there was certainly no harm in settling in early.

He hooked his arms around her, and she wondered if he could feel her heart thudding against the palm of his hand. Nellie's breath had been caught in her throat since Sweeney had unlaced the back of her dress a mere hour before, his spindly fingers dancing playfully along the curve of her spine, and she wondered briefly if she would ever breathe normally again. The rain poured in heavy sheets, a melancholy symphony tapping itself out on the roof that covered them.

The ocean had breathed some sort of youth into them, ignited a spark of life that neither had felt in years. Nellie twisted herself around in his arms and pressed her forehead lightly against Sweeney's. She ran her nails across the peak of his shoulder blade and smiled to herself when he inhaled sharply, a soft, slight sound that he perhaps thought she had not heard. Never in all her life would Nellie have thought Sweeney to have freckles- not on his face, but sprinkled like stardust across his chest and arms. His hands settled comfortably in the hollow of her back.

It was still strange and electrifyingly new to have him reciprocate so easily; Nellie had wandered into some sort of alternate universe somehow, and she knew she could never bear to leave it. The white-capped waves crashed angrily on the shore beyond their window, agitated by the storm.

Nellie thought of her wedding often- not the first one, to stuffy old Albert in a stuffy old church, but the real one, beneath a stained glass mural by the seaside. The lace gloves she had worn that blessed day were folded neatly in the drawer with all her knickers, the flowers from her bouquet pressed carefully between the pages of one of the books on the shelf in the living room. She had thought then, all dressed in white, that it was the happiest day of her life. Perhaps, in a lot of ways, it had been; but right there, nestled in the unusual calm of that very moment, she at last felt like a proper wife.

"Are you really up to it again, Mrs. Lovett?" He asked, a teasing lilt coloring his tone, as if perhaps she was not up to the challenge with which he was presenting her.

"Well, Mister Todd, I am if you are. Unless you're gettin' tired, old man." She chuckled lowly and draped her leg over the sharp, jutting angle of his hip, pressing herself against him. He wrapped one of her curls around his finger and gave it a tug.

"Mum, look wha' I found!" The bedroom door flew open, and they jumped hurriedly apart. Sweeney cursed under his breath, angry that he'd forgotten to lock the door. Just like that, he had folded in on himself again. Toby stood proudly oblivious in the doorway, soaked clothes dripping water onto the floor.

"Was you outside, Toby? In this weather? What was ya thinkin', lad?"

"I was mostly asleep, I was, but I kept hearin' this noise outside the window and-" He thrust his arms out towards them, a muddy cat wriggling in his grasp. "He was stuck out in the rain! I couldn't leave 'im all alone."

Sweeney looked at Nellie, as if trying to determine how exactly to react. Nellie, herself, was not quite sure what to make of it all. "Take it into the kitchen, Toby," he said finally. "Dry it off. Hell, dry yourself off, too. You're getting Mrs. Lovett's carpet wet."