Falling for Hamlet

by Michelle Ray

Barnardo: You dragged him to that party knowing that bad publicity would come out of it.

  Ophelia: No, I didn’t.

  Francisco: Admit it. You and Horatio arranged the whole episode knowing it would further undermine his credibility and unravel their family stability.

  Ophelia: That is not why. We wanted Hamlet to have fun—

  Barnardo: Bull. You knew photographers would be there.

  Ophelia: In four years, no one had ever taken a picture of him at school unless it was official and prearranged.

  Francisco: How convenient. So you knew you could catch him by surprise. Who did you pay to take those pictures?

  Ophelia: Why would I do that? I’m the one who got the most grief for that. A guy can do whatever he wants with whomever he wants. But a girl? Forget it. Everyone had something to say about my skirt, how drunk I was, Christ, even how I kiss!

  Barnardo: Small price to pay. A little humiliation for—

  Ophelia: For what? What do you think I gained from those pictures?

  Francisco: Sympathy from Hamlet.

  Barnardo: A great cover. It got him back to the castle.

  Ophelia: Yeah, that worked out for everyone so well.

  Barnardo: My point exactly.

  13

  Zara narrows her eyes at Ophelia as she leans back on the cream couch. “The queen could not have been happy about that kind of publicity.” Ophelia clears her throat and says, “Happy would be an overstatement. But she was pretty understanding. Don’t forget, Gertrude was young once, too.”

  “And your father?”

  “He was… less understanding.”

  One afternoon a couple of weeks later, I was in my room supposedly reading about the painter John Everett Mil ais but real y staring off into space thinking about the fact that I should be reading. I had just looked at my book again when I heard Hamlet cal ing, “Ophelia?” I jumped up, a thril passing through me at the sound of his voice. But as I ran down the hal , Gertrude’s angry face popped into my mind. The image slowed my step, and when I saw Hamlet, as desperate as I was to touch him, I checked myself. Standing at the end of my hal and forcing myself not to go into the entry area, I cal ed to him, “When did you get back?”

  “This morning,” he replied, kicking off his shoes next to the elevator.

  He was going to stay, and I couldn’t al ow it. “Get out of here, Hamlet. I’m not supposed to see you right now.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” he said, flopping onto the couch. “We’ve been on the phone and texting since I left. What’s the difference?”

  “There’s a big difference. You have to go!”

  “Why? Because your dad said so?”

  I crossed my arms, not liking his tone, and added, “Yeah, and your mom.”

  He rol ed his eyes.

  “Hamlet, I’m not kidding.”

  He peered over the back of the couch at me, cocked his head, and smiled. That charm was why the people of Denmark, myself included, loved him so.

  Except at that moment I didn’t want to be charmed. I turned to walk away.

  He said, “Ophelia, seriously, what are they gonna do about it if we hang out?”

  I spun around, even more annoyed by his stupidity. “Oh, wel , your mother could fire my dad, for one. I could get thrown out of here, for the other. They both told me as much.”

  “I doubt either of those things wil happen.”

  “I can’t take that chance. I have to put everything I want aside like always. I have to wear this mask and be who everyone else wants me to be al the time.”

  “And my girlfriend. Is that part of your act?” he asked.

  My heart was racing. How could he even ask that? I wanted to smack him as much as I wanted to kiss him. “No. That’s the only time I get to be myself.”

  “So enough phoniness. I can’t take it anymore. Let’s go be ourselves and show the world that we’re meant to be together.”

  “No. One time I real y cut loose and look what happened.”

  “So you’re embarrassed. So what?”

  He always got his way, and this time I wanted to win. I leveled my gaze at him and said slowly, “Get out, Hamlet.”

  “I can’t believe this,” he said, standing. “How long am I supposed to stay away?”

  “I don’t know. Until this al blows over, I guess.”

  He smirked and said, “I’ve spent some time studying those pictures, and I can honestly say that if I were one of our parents, it’d be a long time til I’d let it blow over.” I nodded, and he sauntered toward me suggestively. “I’m afraid that’s going to be too long.” Despite myself, I felt my resolve vanishing. “Then go back to school and it won’t seem so long.”

  “I’m too depressed to go back to school. I can’t be without you,” he answered, creeping even closer.

  My heart started pulsing, and invisible hands pushed me to him. “Yeah, you seem real depressed.” Standing right in front of me, he winked, and it was over. I gave no resistance. My dad wasn’t there, and there were no cameras in the apartment, so what harm could it do? I stretched up and let my lips brush his. His mouth twitched into a smile and he took a mini step forward; our bodies were close enough to exchange heat, but we didn’t touch.

  “Should I go?” he asked.

  I shook my head, took his hand in mine, and walked him toward my room.

  He stopped in the doorway and kissed me, pressing his whole body against mine.

  Something in his sweatshirt pocket jabbed into my ribs. I yelped and stepped back.

  “Oh,” he said, frowning. “Sorry.” He stepped away and reached into his pocket. He pul ed out a gun and set it on my dresser. Seriously. A gun.

  I took a few steps back, my face suddenly numb. “Why do you have that?” I asked, afraid I might know.

  “Claudius is trying to have me kil ed. What am I supposed to do?”

  I leaned on the wal , unable to take my eyes off the jet-black handgun, as if watching it closely could keep it from firing on its own. “I’m not a fan of Claudius either, but are you sure you’re not just being paranoid?”

  “He canceled my security detail, for starters. That’s how the photographer was able to get into the party. And I got some information from Marcel us that makes me real y suspicious about Claudius’s other plans. I’d rather be paranoid than dead.” The word dead hung in the air between us. Hearing it felt no more significant or real than talking about characters from a play. Yet this was his life, our life, so I tried to be sensible. “So you’re not planning to, like, do anything to him first, are you?” Hamlet grabbed a hat that was hanging on my closet handle and threw it over the gun, which released me from its hypnotizing effect. When I final y looked back at Hamlet, his face was eerily calm given the subject at hand. His blue eyes were soft and his voice soothing as he said, “You’re worrying too much. I knew you were miserable, and I wanted to see you.” Stepping forward and tucking strands of hair behind my ears, he added, “But you didn’t expect me to come back home unprotected, did you?”

  I shook my head slowly, hoping he was tel ing me the truth.

  He took my face in his hands and kissed me gently. It almost made me forget about the gun.

  The next day he came back, and the next, and the next. We got pretty comfortable with our routine and our privacy. And complacent. We didn’t take into account the possibility that my father might have a budget meeting requiring files that he might have forgotten in his study. I was trying to finish a paper while Hamlet sat on my bed flipping through magazines when we heard the elevator door open. We froze. My father walked directly to his study, so I was nearly ready to consider us safe. I listened to his footsteps come down his hal then stop abruptly in the sitting room. Double-time he pounded through the apartment and fil ed my doorway holding a pair of sneakers. Hamlet always kicked them off when he walked in. My father looked at Hamlet and then at me with ferocious disappointment, almost more than the morning we came back from Wittenberg. He dropped the sneakers an
d whipped back around without speaking. I heard the elevator doors open and shut, and then silence.

  I put my face in my hands and listened to my breath echo off my palms. The veins in my neck were throbbing, and my ears fil ed with a panicked whine.

  Hamlet sank to his knees next to my chair and gently pul ed my hands away from my face.

  I squeezed his hands in mine and said softly, “You should go.”

  “Cat’s out of the bag now.…” he replied.

  I didn’t even want to think about the cat or the bag or the little mouse the cat was going to murder when it finished with its meeting upstairs. “Go, Hamlet,” I insisted.

  He looked up earnestly and explained, “But I feel so much better when I’m with you. Don’t make me go off by myself. I think too much when I’m alone.” I sat picturing my dad’s disappointed face but also knowing that Hamlet did think too much when he was alone and that he’d been almost himself since he’d returned from Wittenberg and that I real y did want him to stay. Even so, I couldn’t. Not that day. I shook my head.

  Hamlet’s eyes darkened and he sat back on his haunches. “So you’d choose your dad over me?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You are choosing to play the obedient daughter rather than do what you know is right for you… and me? You’re not a child anymore.” My temper was starting to rise. “No, I’m not, but he asked me, and I have to respect that.”

  “And I’m asking you to be with me.”

  “I can’t.”

  He stood up. “Give me a break, Ophelia. If you real y wanted to be with me, you would.”

  “Don’t be so dramatic. This isn’t forever.”

  “Maybe it should be.”

  “What?”

  His eyes were ful of accusation and fury. “Choose. Choose now.”

  “Don’t,” I begged.

  “Choose.”

  “You don’t want me to do that.” It was both a plea and a threat.

  “Choose,” he said slowly, his eyes mere slits.

  I stood to match his gaze, fuming. “I have put everything aside to be with you. Everything. My friends. My ambition. Don’t make a face. I used to have it.

  But in the last few months, I let everything else slide. You want to know what I want? Wel , so do I! But I can’t see past this little world we have when we’re together. I can’t see a future that doesn’t include you.”

  He took a step forward, as if those last words were encouraging him, but I put my hand up to stop his progress and continued. “Hamlet, as much as it’s crushed me when we’ve broken up, it’s almost a relief, because it forces me to think about myself. But then you change your mind. And every time you’ve wanted to get back together, I’ve said yes. Every time you’ve asked for forgiveness, I’ve given it. Everything that’s mine has been yours. For as long as I can remember, it’s been this way. It was my choice to give up everything, but this time I need something. I need to obey my father for a while. Let me do this.”

  “Let you? What kind of relationship do you imagine we have?” He yanked on the hood of his sweatshirt, but didn’t go. “Do what you want.”

  “Like you? You let yourself be manipulated by responsibility and by your mother. You might hem and haw, even break from what’s expected once in a while, but you always come back to what you have to do. You always end up agreeing to what your mother wants.”

  “Not anymore,” he said, his fists clenching and unclenching. Then he touched his pocket, where I could only assume he was keeping the gun I’d seen earlier.

  I didn’t want to think about it, so I refocused on our fight. “Wel , she stil controls me. And if I’m with you, she always wil . She wil be the wedge between us forever. How long can we stand up to that? And at what point wil your responsibilities come between us?”

  “It’l be different when I’m in charge.”

  “When wil that be? Claudius is young enough that he could be in power for twenty years, easy. Are we going to sneak around until then? This is crazy.

  We should just—” I stopped myself and stood frozen but for the rise and fal of my chest as irregular breaths escaped. I had thought it but couldn’t bring myself to say it. Couldn’t think about the pain I would cause him. Couldn’t think of what it would mean for me. And I loved him. How could I say it if I loved him?

  “What?” he asked.

  Drawing strength from the core of my being, I forced out, “End it now. Before it gets even harder.” Pressure on my lungs ceased my ability to say more. I wanted to take back what I’d just said and hold him. I wanted to push him out the door and start a new life for myself.

  He stared at me. Only the traffic outside fil ed the silence. He pul ed his hood lower on his forehead and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Is that what you want?”

  “Yes,” I said. His face fel , and my stomach contracted. “No,” I whispered. I had thought that once I said it, it would be real and done and I would feel better. But it only made me more confused. Al strength left my legs and I sank against my desk. “I don’t know.” He grabbed the magazines I had left on the floor and threw them across the room before racing out. He forgot his sneakers but didn’t bother to come back for them. I sat in misery, watching the empty doorway, hoping he would return and hoping he wouldn’t.

  That night, my father didn’t come speak to me, which was actual y worse than if he had yel ed. I spent the balance of the afternoon and evening worrying about Hamlet, and feeling both sorry and relieved that we had broken up. I waited for my father to lecture me, to share al egories and sayings meant to defend his point of view, and to have him remind me for the umpteenth time about the public nature of our private lives. I would almost have welcomed being reprimanded over what did happen. I had given up on dinner, which had grown cold and clotted-looking, and sat on the couch watching the television absently when he entered. He looked around to see if I was alone, sighed, and walked to his room, shutting the door behind him.

  My insides roiled. If my father wouldn’t even give me the chance to tel him that I’d final y done what he’d asked, then what the hel was the point of having broken Hamlet’s heart? And my own. But maybe I had actual y been looking for an excuse to end things. Hamlet was scaring me. Talk of murder and suicide and ghosts was too much, and I knew if I stayed close to him, I’d get sucked further into his plans. And that thought scared me more than trying to come up with a Hamlet-less identity. Completely wrung out, I went to my room.

  Francisco: By cutting off communication with Hamlet, you intentionally drove him deeper into madness.

  Ophelia: Is that a question?

  Francisco: Yeah, smartmouth, it is.

  Ophelia: You’re wondering if that was my plan? (pause) I felt terrible about it, but my father asked me to.

  Francisco: He also asked you not to date Hamlet from the outset.

  Ophelia: I tried to be a good daughter.

  Barnardo: You failed Hamlet and your father.

  Ophelia: That is so—

  Barnardo: What?

  Ophelia: If I tell you to screw yourself, will you arrest me?

  Barnardo: Yes.

  Ophelia: Then never mind.

  14

  Zara shows a picture of Ophelia in her school uniform sitting close to Sebastian. “Who’s this?” Ophelia shifts in her seat, her face stony. “A friend from school.”

  “Just a friend?” Zara asks, her voice full of untold information.

  Ophelia looks at her hard. “Yeah.”

  “Mm-hm.” Zara flips her hair as another photo comes up of two college guys in Wittenberg T-shirts standing in front of Hamlet’s fraternity house.

  “Who are these guys?”

  Ophelia shrugs. “Friends of Hamlet’s, I guess.”

  A new picture comes up of Ophelia standing with the same guys while holding a cup of coffee.

  “Clearly you talked to them,” Zara presses her.

  Ophelia shrugs again and looks like she might yawn. “Peo
ple talk to me a lot. Doesn’t mean I know them.” Zara crosses her arms, looks at her producer, and then turns to the audience with a dazzling smile. “Well, ladies, they sure make ’em cute at Wittenberg, huh?”

  The audience applauds.

  I couldn’t sleep at al that night, tossing and turning and regretting what I’d done. How could I live without him? But how could I stay with him? I was damned no matter what I did. I missed him. It had been only half a day and I genuinely missed him.

  I watched the hours tick by. There was a part of me that thought Hamlet might sneak into my room as he had for weeks, and that we would embrace and maybe cry and definitely say we were both sorry for being stupid. At least I would. And he should. He should have been sorry for dragging me out of bed to the conservatory only to yel at me. He should have been sorry for bringing a gun to my room and acting like it was no big deal. He should have been sorry for throwing my magazines and tel ing me that obeying my father was wrong.

  My fury swel ed, and I tossed angrily in bed until I started thinking about him wandering the castle al night with no one to trust and no one to talk to, surrounded by people who would al profit from his downfal . I even sat up once and started to put on my shoes, ready to go find him. But then I thought again of that gun and slipped back under my sheets, watching the minutes pass and the sky grow light.

  After the sun rose, I went to the coffee shop across the street from the castle, intending to order whatever they had that was sweet and strong. Like I like my men, I joked to myself, but even thinking that put me in a snit.

  “Ophelia,” a voice said behind me.

  I spun around and saw two guys around my age whose faces I didn’t know. I turned back and paid for my coffee, planning to walk away from the counter as quickly as possible.

  “Damn, that’s rude,” said the tal er one to his friend, or me, or both of us.

  “Do I know you?”

  “Bil y Rosencrantz.”

  “Dave Guildenstern.”

  When I showed no sign of recognition, they went on. “We met at Wittenberg. You probably heard us cal ed by our last names.”

  “I don’t go to Wittenberg,” I said, even more irritated, used to confused posers but not in the mood to humor one just then.