Saving Juliet

by Suzanne Selfors

  "Please stop, you're hurting me," I whimpered.

  "There is no need for violence," a kindly voice said. An old man in a brown robe stepped forward. A large silver cross hung around his neck. "We should give this woman a chance to explain." He placed a speckled hand on the soldier's arm, melting the tension. I pulled away. Then the speckled hand patted my shoulder. "You are frightened, my child. Take a moment to catch your breath."

  Frightened? More like scared out of my mind! A crowd of onlookers gathered around.

  "Well?" the soldier asked impatiently. "Who are you?" He leaned close, enveloping me with his halitosis. "Lavender and gold are Capulet colors and like I said, it's against the law to pose as a noble. I have to arrest you if you're not a Capulet."

  I couldn't find my voice.

  The old man patted my shoulder again. "Have you come for the party?" he asked. His hair was cut in a strange ring encircling his head. "Capulet cousins have been arriving all week long for tonight's party. Is that why we do not recognize you? Perhaps you have traveled far. Is that why your dress is soiled?"

  "Yes," I managed. Dear God, what was I saying? But for the first time in my life, telling someone that my name was Mimi Wallingford great-granddaughter of Adelaide Wallingford was not going to help me. I just wanted that soldier to go away. "I'm a Capulet cousin."

  "Ah, there, you see, we have an answer." The old man clapped his hands together.

  The soldier adjusted his red hat. "Then you'd better get to Capulet House. There's no telling what might happen to you on the streets." It was a blatant threat and his sinister expression terrified me.

  The old man watched the soldier saunter away. "Holy St. Francis," he mumbled. "Everyone is so hot-tempered these days." He picked up the hem of his long robe and smiled. "I must be off, as should you. Heed the soldier's advice and get to Capulet House tight away. And if you need spiritual guidance of any sort during your visit, you can find me at the Church of St. Francis, the most beautiful church in Verona."

  Verona?

  "Just ask for Friar Laurence." He hurried off, his sandals kicking up bits of dirt.

  Friar Laurence was a character from Romeo and Juliet.

  The onlookers continued to glare at me. I wanted to hide. To curl up into a little ball someplace dark. So I ran back into the alley from which I had come. Back up the rabbit hole. Please, oh please, back to reality. But I found no stage door. Stumbling, I followed the alley, winding here and there and down a little hill until it widened into a lane. I passed under a series of archways, then rounded a sharp corner where the lane came to an abrupt end. I reached up to swat a fly from my face and found myself gazing at a horizon dotted with tall trees and rolling hills. Not a single skyscraper or yellow taxi or pedestrian anywhere to be seen. Directly in front of me stood a crumbling stone wall. Rows of fruit trees lay to my left. Goats grazed in a field to my right. The shock wore off. I plunged into the icy waters of reality.

  New York City was gone.

  Six

  ***

  "An honest tale speeds best, being plainly told."

  I could have freaked out, again. Certainly, that would not have been out of character these days. But I didn't. It didn't have anything to do with courage. I think I was simply too exhausted to freak out. I sat down on the wall and took a centering breath, like Dr. Harmony had taught me. Then I remembered the ashes and waved my hand through the air, expecting psychedelic colors to bleed from my fingertips. But no colors bled. I didn't feel drunk or spacey. Just confused.

  It seemed that I was in a bit of a predicament. Insanity occurred to me. I really, really didn't want to be insane. My mind could have snapped from all the pressure--a classic nervous breakdown. Actors have nervous breakdowns all the time. My mind could have created this place as a coping mechanism because I couldn't handle my real world anymore. But if I were truly insane, I wouldn't be worried about it, would I? If I were insane I'd have no problem with the fact that one minute I'd been standing outside the Wallingford Theatre in New York City and the next minute I was half a world away in Verona, Italy, where characters from Romeo and Juliet walked the streets--speaking English, no less. That would seem perfectly reasonable to an insane person and it didn't seem perfectly reasonable to me. So, not insane.

  I don't know how long I sat there--long enough for my arms to start to sunburn. Deep in thought, I didn't notice the little boy until he tugged at my skirt.

  "My lady?" His eyes were wide with curiosity. He tilted his head and scrunched his freckled nose. "My lady, are you injured?"

  It's so much easier to admit confusion to a child. I had an overwhelming urge to hug his little frame, to feel the warmth of another human being. "I don't know where I am." A few goats had followed the boy from the field. One started nibbling at my hem.

  The boy frowned. "You're sitting on the old city wall, that's where you are." He came closer. "Did you bump your head on something? Once I bumped my head and it made me forget for a little while."

  When I fell into that puddle, had I bumped my head? Dorothy bumped her head and woke up in Munchkinland. It made perfect sense that I had woken up in Romeo and Juliet land, having lived the story for the last six months. I felt my scalp but found only the regular bumps. Maybe I had inhaled too much of that ash and it had knocked me out? Could this simply be a dream? Could I be lying in the alley next to the theater at that very moment, with Fernando leaning over me, worried about me smudging my mascara? Clarissa had probably gone back to the dressing room, ecstatic that she was finally going to get her chance. I didn't care. Let Clarissa entertain the stupid admissions committee. I'd take a break in dreamland while she did her thing onstage. My mother could yell at me about stage fright, but she couldn't blame me for being unconscious. A dream, then.

  "I might have bumped my head. I don't remember," I told the little boy. "I'm kind of messed up right now."

  "I guess your dress is a bit messy." The goat tugged at my dress. "Get away," the boy said, pushing the creature's bony rump. It ambled off, taking half my hem with it. "I'm sorry about your dress. How'd a lady like you get it so dirty?"

  I held out my mud-splotched skirt. "I fell in a mud puddle. And last night I vomited all over the front of it." I laughed weakly. "I hate this dress. Your goat's welcome to eat the whole thing."

  "Are you hungry?" the boy asked, pulling something from his pocket. "This one got a bit flattened but I know where we can get more. Come on, I'll show you." He took my hand and tugged. "Come on. After I got that bump on my head, my mother made me eat. She said food would help me feel better. Come on." He tugged again.

  Such a nice little boy. Maybe he had come to guide me through my dream. If I followed him I would probably figure out what the dream was about. Dreams took girls to wonderful places like Oz and Wonderland. I let him pull me through the grass until we came to a tree, heavy with apricots. He reached up and plucked one, then bit into it. Juice dribbled down his soft chin. "Go on. Try one." A black and white goat affectionately rubbed its head against the boy's back.

  I picked an apricot and cupped it in my hands. It seemed so normal. "I don't know what I'm doing here," I confessed.

  "You're eating apricots, that's what you're doing." He stuck the rest of his apricot into his mouth, then spit out the pit. "They're delicious."

  The apricot had absorbed the sun's rays and its juicy center burst on my tongue. I hadn't realized how hungry I was, and it felt as though I were actually eating. The boy climbed to the thickest branch and began to throw apricots to his goats. I wandered deeper into the field, munching as I went.

  The summer grass tickled my ankles and apricot juice clung to my fingers as I stared at the outskirts of my dreamworld Italian city. Too bad we can't choose our dreams because I most certainly would have chosen someplace else, as sick as I was of the Capulets and Montagues. But thankfully, my subconscious wasn't forcing me to speak Italian, or even Shakespeare's lingo. In fact, there is no goat herder or apricot orchard in Romeo and Juliet. A
t least my subconscious had changed the story.

  The boy took a bell from his pocket and jangled it. The goats lifted their heads and began to amble toward him. "I have to be off now. I've got another job to get to." He started to walk away, jingling the bell a few more times. But after only a few steps, he turned and ran back to me. "You shouldn't stay out here by yourself. There's a Montague over there." He pointed to a large tree, then scampered off. A Montague over there?

  Curious, I walked slowly toward a gnarled willow. Grapevines coiled around its trunk. Sure enough, on the other side, a young man sat, his head resting on his bent knees. He sighed a few times. "Oh Rosaline." He sighed again, wrapping his arms around his black tights. He was dressed just like the Montagues in our play.

  A shiver of excitement ran up my spine. I didn't have to ask his name.

  Seven

  ***

  "One pain is lessen'd by another's anguish. "

  Lost in thought, Romeo Montague didn't notice me standing next to him. Not even when my apricot pit plunked into the grass. He mumbled words like woe and agony. There sat the true Romeo of Shakespeare's story-- the depressed-out-of-his-mind Romeo. You see, Romeo is supposed to begin the play in a deep state of melancholy. He could be the poster boy for the antidepressant pill of the week. But Troy never quite got the fact that a depressed person wouldn't strut onto the stage. A depressed person wouldn't wink at the audience. Troy, who had probably never spent a depressed moment in his sunshiny life. Troy, who probably had no idea what it was like to be attracted to someone but have that someone ignore him or outright ridicule him with offers of kissing lessons.

  "Rosaline," Romeo murmured. That is the reason, or I should say, she is the reason for his despair. Romeo tightened his arms around his legs. His puffy shorts were dyed the color of an apricot and his white shirt had come untucked. A breeze blew the willow's graceful branches so that their long shadows seemed to caress him--as if the tree felt his pain. I felt his pain. It flowed from every pore in his body, tumbling forth with each breath.

  Would it be rude to interrupt him? Possibly, but how could I walk away from an opportunity to talk to one of the most famous teenagers ever? Even if he were only a figment of my imagination it sure beat waking up and going back onto that stage. I cleared my throat.

  "Leave me alone, Benvolio." He spoke softly, then buried his face deeper.

  "Hello," I said.

  He leaped to his feet, and I took a step back. We looked at each other with equal surprise. Then he bowed. "Forgive me, my lady. I did not hear your approach." We stood in silence as he composed himself, running his hands through his short brown hair and wiping his cheeks dry with his billowy sleeve. His gaze was almost unbearable, the sorrow penetrating.

  "I'm Mimi."

  "I'm Romeo." He bowed again but did not straighten all the way. It took effort for him to stand. His shoulders slumped like the branches of an overabundant fruit tree. To ease his burden, I sat down in some matted grass. He sat next to me. I wasn't sure where to begin. It wasn't like I had prepared an interview sheet. Fortunately, he took up the conversation for me. "I mean to say that I was Romeo. I don't feel like him anymore. I fear that I have lost myself."

  "I'm lost, too," I said excitedly. We had something in common. "I don't feel like myself either."

  He scooted closer to me. He smelled sweaty, but in a nice way. My dream Romeo looked boyish and cute, with smooth skin and only a light dusting of fuzz on his upper lip. A late bloomer. "Is love the reason you are lost?"

  Where to begin? I was lost on so many levels. "I've never been ... in love."

  "Nor I, until last Thursday, when I first saw Rosaline. I told her that I adored her. I offered my heart." He sighed and gazed into the distance. "She said she would not have me so I told her that I possess chests overflowing with gold coins. Still, she would not have me." He clenched his fists. "She has vowed to live chaste. Why would a woman turn away from love?"

  I knew it wasn't personal. According to Shakespeare's play, Rosaline would not have any man. She had chosen a chaste life, to enter into God's service. Strange, but even though I was aware that I was in a dream, I wanted to help Romeo feel better. I wanted to tell him that soon he would see Juliet at a party and he would fall in love with her and never think of another woman again.

  And then he would be too dead to think of any woman. Maybe I shouldn't tell him that.

  "Forgive me, but I can think of nothing else. All day she torments me. All night her beauty haunts me. Lady Mimi, do women suffer for love as much as men?" His sorrow pierced me all over like straight pins. "Tell me what you know of love."

  "I don't know anything about love," I replied. Romeo sighed and rested his head on his knees. I had disappointed him, but what wisdom did I possess? Me, the dateless wonder? Sure, there had been that crush thing, but I'd gotten over it. Sure, Troy had made fun of me and maybe I hadn't gotten over that part, but I didn't like him anymore. I didn't even think about him. What a waste of time that would have been. "You'll fall in love again" was all I could think to say.

  "My opinion exactly," said another voice.

  Now it was my turn to leap to my feet, bumping my back against the willow's trunk in the process. So caught up in Romeo's plight, I hadn't noticed the other man coming toward us. Unlike Romeo, this guy carried a sword, though it was tucked away in a scabbard. He wore similar black tights and puffy orange shorts. He hadn't bothered to tie his linen shirt so his chest glistened like some cover model for a romance novel.

  "Romeo, are you out of your mind? Talking to a Capulet and a woman nonetheless." I caught the disgust that flashed across his face when he said Capulet. I felt as if I'd been spit upon, which made no sense since I wasn't really a Capulet. But I felt it, all the same.

  "Huh?" Romeo peered up at me. "A Capulet?"

  The man shook his head. Black curls fell across his forehead. "So lovesick you didn't even notice her colors? Truly, you worry me, cousin." He turned his attention to me. "My lady, I advise you to continue on your way. It is my duty to look after my younger cousin and your presence endangers him." He pushed aside a short black cape, exposing a brown shoulder in the process. My gaze traveled up his long neck and over his stubbled jaw, stopping on lips that Fernando would have killed to gloss. Something took flight in my stomach. This was how those giggling girls in the front row felt when Troy walked onstage.

  "Romeo, your father has sent me to find you."

  "Leave me alone, Benvolio."

  "What? Leave you here to moan and groan on such a lovely day? Do you see this, my lady? Fifteen years of age, nearly a man, and he's devoted his heart to a nun. Cousin, I urge you to examine other beauties." Benvolio raised an eyebrow at me and my face went hot. His was the part that Troy should have played--the flirt. I stared at his classic face, at the aquiline nose and high cheekbones that the Italian masters had preferred to sculpt. The blood of the Caesars coursed through him. Embarrassing, lusting after a character from a dream. Totally pathetic.

  He crouched next to Romeo and placed a gloved hand on Romeo's shoulder. "Be ruled by me, cousin. Forget about Rosaline."

  "Forget about her?" Romeo's voice rose in desperation. "Then teach me how I should forget to think!"

  "You are hopeless." Benvolio stood and grasped his sword's hilt. "You should go," he said to me. "Romeo is in no condition to defend himself if the Capulet Guard come." His urging was gentle, yet firm. "You must get yourself to Capulet House."

  I was endangering Romeo, I knew that. But shouldn't I be able to control my own dream? I could just send the guard away. Yet the soldier, Friar Laurence, and Benvolio had each insisted that I go to Capulet House. Seemed to be the direction my dream desired. "I don't know how to get to Capulet House."

  "You are not of Verona?"

  "No. I'm from Manhattan. I've come for the party."

  "Well, that explains why you were sitting with a Montague. Do you not know the situation around here?" I played dumb. Truth be told, I liked his
attention and I could have leaned against that tree until my imaginary legs gave out, if it meant talking to him. "The houses of Montague and Capulet are at war, my lady. Whether you are from Verona or some distant land, your Capulet blood makes us enemies." He looked around, then folded his arms. "I will guide you to Capulet House but you must not walk beside me, not as long as you wear Capulet colors."

  "I understand."

  "Come along, Romeo. Your father has not seen you in two days and it looks as if you have not eaten or bathed in as many."

  "I shall remain here for a while longer," Romeo said. "I must figure out how to change Rosaline's heart."

  "Suit yourself." Benvolio rolled his eyes. "Good-bye, Romeo," I said.

  "Good-bye, Lady Mimi. Someday you will know love. I hope it is as deep and as true as mine."