But soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun. Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon...
Cynthia shook the wistful image from her head. “Too romantic. It’ll confuse everyone. Let’s skip to the poison and the stabbings.”
She took her place on one side of the dais and motioned him to the other.
As dramatically as possible, she pantomimed unstoppering a bottle and drinking the poison within, making certain to stagger drunkenly for a few steps before crumpling to the floor like a corpse.
Only then did she remember how Romeo died.
He entered Juliet’s tomb and kissed her lips before consuming the poison himself.
After which, Juliet awoke, and kissedRomeo’s lips, before resorting to the dagger.
Her heart clattered.
In this version, there would be no kissing.
Would there?
No, definitely not. She just had to lie there with her eyes shut, corpse-like, whilst Nottingvale pretended to break into her tomb and become overset at the sight of her death, causing him to swallow what remained of the poison.
She held her breath.
Was he in her invisible tomb?
Had he drunk the poison yet?
The trouble with charades was the lack of dialogue to let one follow along with one’s lover’s path to self-destruction.
There was no way to know if it was time to wake up unless she peeked.
Cynthia cracked open one eye.
Nottingvale’s face was inches from hers.
A tiny, un-corpse-like gasp escaped from between her parted lips.
He wasn’treallygoing to kiss her... was he?
If he did, she would have to play her role, and kiss him back when it was her turn. Here, on the dais. In front of three dozen hopeful debutantes and their gimlet-eyed chaperones.
She hoped he would.
She prayed he wouldn’t.
His face retreated from hers, and her heart lurched in... Relief? Sorrow?
She squeezed her eyes shut.
He lifted her hand, which was not in the script at all.
He drew her fingers to his lips, which wasdefinitelynot in the script.
He pressed her palm to his chest, beneath which, his heart beat as erratically as her own. Her entire body seemed to pulse in syncopation with his. Wanting. Waiting. Wondering.
She couldn’t look.
She daren’t look.
