A Time and Place for Us

Revelations

10 minutes earlier...

With a firm grip on her wrist, he led and she followed. Dutifully, not questioning him, as it should be. If her first foray into that blasted institution, so convenient as it was bothersome, had taught her anything, was that for their marriage to be fruitful, she had to make some sacrifices. Letting him manhandle her and possibly take her roughly when she wished she could remain in her fantasy for all the eternity, was not the worst she would have to let slide.

Because as soon as Harold yelled her name and she snapped back to the real world, she was suddenly painfully aware that her dreams were at odds with reality. That her fancies and aspirations were merely that, and the life she'd built around them, a chimera. It was not the first time that the fog of her delusion temporarily dissipated, but she had never seen so clearly: she could never be happy— the way she dreamed it, with the man she dreamed it— because that man, that life, simply did not exist.

In the darkest days of Nellie Lovett and Sweeney Todd's relationship, she had almost convinced herself that it was Benjamin she was in love with and that she stuck around, put up with every single one of Sweeney's demands, with his indifference and yes, his abuse, because deep inside, there was still that sweet family man he once was, and with love, she would fight for that small fragment of him that wasn't yet corrupted.

Now she saw it, the fault in her thinking. The image she had of Benjamin, the paragon of kindness and gentleness and romantic love, was as distorted as her own sense of morality. Because she had barely known the man, back then. She didn't have the time, since he was transported only a couple of months after she married Albert. Yet she saw it, glimpses of him, of the perfect husband and father she wished she had herself. Those few images evolved, grew into that fantasy that disembogued in a tale of obsession that knew no bounds.

If there was still Benjamin in Sweeney, she couldn't have recognised him. So, what did exactly feel for the demon Barber? It couldn't be love, or not love in the way she had always understood it; that senseless devotion. It could be just that, an obsession. A sick, maddening, ill-advised obsession she'd been indulging in for so long. But the fever was beginning to break, it seemed. And she could now see Sweeney (and Benjamin, she guessed) for what he was, not what she wished he were. Nellie couldn't help but imagine how things would have gone, had she realised earlier. It would have saved them plenty of heartaches, she reckoned.

Her reverie came to an end as the light around them dimmed, her heels no longer muffled against the carpeted floor but clicking on hard cold metal. Wherever was Harold taking her!?

"Harry, dearie, are you lost? This is not the way to our cabins" she pointed out, trying to keep calm. But the deeper into the underbelly of the steamship they went, the more agitated she became.

He did not say a word, not even did he acknowledge her question and at this point, her survival instincts had kicked in. She tried to break free, tried removing his hand with her left one, digging her nails in his flesh. When that didn't work, she tried kicking, biting, but he remained impassable. It was, as if he didn't even feel it, as if he were possessed. She was very familiar with blind jealousy and its particularities by now, and that is how she knew this went beyond that. There was a distinct sense of foreboding that prompted her to fear for her life, but there was little she could do now. Yet...

He pushed open a metal door that she'd previously only known to open with a key, that of the loading dock, the location of her rendezvous with Sweeney that turned sour only a couple of days ago. She recalled now, meeting Harold at the door when she fled fearing for her life, a teary-eyed mess that did not even question what a man like him could be doing in an area restricted to all but the ship personnel. Why would he be taking her there? There were lifeboats, did he perhaps intend to force her to go on one, row away to God knows where? Or had he chosen this room because it was isolated? Because right here, he could do anything he wanted to her, be it rape her or worse... and nobody could hear her screaming.