My One and Only

A rainy day

CRASH!

The sound of lighting startled her and made her rolling pin fall to the floor. "Bloody storm..." she muttered to herself, feeling quite foolish she would be afraid of thunder despite being a grown woman. She had always been afraid of thunder ever since she was a child but she managed to outgrow that fear as she got older.

"Mum? Is everything alright, I heard you scream" she heard Toby coming into the shop. "It's alright dear, just a bit of thunder that gave me a fright, is all" she answered once the boy entered the shop. Toby gave a reasonable nod and walked over to the counter where his mother was.

"Ya bored?" She asked, Toby gave out a sigh of obvious boredom. "I feel trapped in here..." he whined. Nellie felt his pain, she wished she would go to the park to have some fresh air with the two people she cared most but then a bloody storm came and ruined it.

"Why not we do something to distract ourselves, maybe play a game of cards?" She asks him. Toby was about to answer but was startled by a sudden loud bang, it wasn't thunder. It was the sound of a door being opened by force and left with a loud slam.

Nellie and Toby looked to where the noise was and saw Sweeney standing in front of the back door. The poor thing was drenched with no jacket on him except for his usual clothing and he seemed angry for some reason, but then again he always has a reason to be angry. But his anger seem to subside once he made eye contact with Nellie.

"You alright..." she tried to speak but Todd trotted towards her and grabbed her shoulder and took her a few steps further into the pie shop and muttered some words to her. He was aware the lad was in the shop with them but he wanted to speak to Nellie immediately.

"What's all the fuss about?" Nellie whispered to him. "When do you think the judge will come?" He grumbled, Nellie almost let out a sigh of annoyance but stopped herself thinking that Todd might threaten her if she were to show her dislike of his obsession of getting his revenge on Judge Turpin.

"I don't know love, but obviously he won't show up in this kind of weather, you have to wait till it gets better".

"I'm sick of waiting!" He spat, making Nellie jump and Toby very nervous. Nellie glanced her eyes away a little and remembered Toby was still present, "Toby dear, can you please go to your room", the boy seemed hesitant but obeyed anyways. She looked back at Sweeney who looked agitated. "Here" she walked towards the pantry and pulled out a bottle of gin and two glasses. She placed them on a nearby booth and poured the gin in the two cups. She guided Todd to take a seat where the two glasses were. "Drink it down" she instructed and almost immediately, Sweeney took one of the glasses and took a quick gulp leaving the glass empty and slamming it harshly on the table making it crack a little.

She sat next to him and hesitantly placed her hand on his shoulder which seemed to relax him a little. "I promise it will come, you just need to learn to be patient. Besides, do you even have a plan on how this will go?" Sweeney looked up at her, he never thought of that. He never thought how the plan would go, all he wanted was the judge to be dead and hopefully it'll set the ghosts haunting him to be free and Johanna will be off to safety. He took a deep breath, and placed his elbow on the table where he placed his head on the palm of his hand. She was right, he needed to think of a plan, but what?

"Do you have any solutions?" He asks her hopefully, giving her puppy eyes, she was always the voice of reason and could easily say a lie without a stutter nor reluctance and she was always quick on her words, Nellie Lovett was his only chance now to think of any ideas to kill the vermin. "I could think of somethin" she answered, "but we should wait till this bloody storm leaves, no one wants to be out at this kind of weather" she spoke again, Sweeney only nodded at her response.