AnnouncementHello and welcome! This is a short story I wrote for my Patreon a while ago, and I'm now putting it up for everyone to read.

  It has no content warnings, so you may read without worries.

  Enjoy! :)

  I closed the door behind me, trying to make as little noise as possible; I looked around, my eyes nding on the light switch, but I decided against turning it on – after all, I was doing my best to avoid being noticed, and enough light filtered from outside through the transom window above the door for me to be able to see anyway.

  I shouldn’t have been doing this, but the temptation was too great: I would never get another chance like this.

  Moving slowly, being careful not to trip over anything, I made my way across the unused cssroom which had been converted into the drama club’s costume shop for the end-of-year show, my eyes fixed on my prize, draped over the mannequin: Juliet’s dress. Before I knew it, I was standing right next to it.

  I gulped, and nervously licked my lips.

  I really shouldn’t have been doing this.

  Off came my jeans and my ratty T-shirt; I thought about shedding my underwear, too, but decided against it. Then I unzipped the costume – the club’s costumers were good like that, never making anything too complex to wear, so costume changes during a show were remarkably quick – and removed it from the mannequin.

  With trepidation, I stepped into the dress, and pulled it up and over my shoulders; then I reached behind my back and zipped it up, putting the hours I’d spent trying on my sister’s clothes into practice.

  I turned around, looked at myself in the mirror, and smiled at the sight reflected back at me: I’d always been thin so the dress fit me reasonably well, if not perfectly; and the dim penumbra of the room obfuscated my facial features enough that I could just pretend I was looking at a girl.

  I absolutely shouldn’t have been doing this, but I just couldn’t resist the euphoria.

  The picture wasn’t complete, though: I still had short hair. I gnced around until I spotted the wig on the mannequin head, on the next table over, right in front of the door; I stepped over to it, being careful not to trip and not to get the long skirt of the dress caught into something. I reached for the wig–

  Suddenly the room became brighter, more light filtering through the transom window: someone had turned the lights on in the corridor outside. I heard footsteps coming towards me, and a few voices calling back and forth.

  “Are you ready yet?”

  “Almost, I just need to grab my phone, I left it in the costume shop!”

  I felt a chill run down my spine. I realised I had to hide, but where, exactly? I was standing right in front of the door. There were many tables in the room, true, and I could’ve just ducked behind one of them, but most of them were desks, and wouldn’t hide me from sight. There was a good hiding spot, with some rolls of fabric stacked by its side, about five metres away: I could get to it if I dove and rolled. But if I’d dived and rolled, I’d risk ripping the dress, and–

  My indecision was my doom: the door opened, light flooding the room and illuminating me brightly, exposing me to the world, and I froze like a deer in headlights.

  And there she was, standing in the door, giving me a bewildered stare: Julia. The girl who was to py Juliet in the drama club’s end-of-year production, the girl whose dress I was wearing right at that moment.

  She just looked at me for a few moments, then, to my great surprise, she didn’t shout or scream or anything like that: she just brought her finger up, put it briefly against her lips in an unmistakeable gesture, and then mouthed “I’ll be right back” to me.

  “Julia!” the other girl called from outside. “Did you get your phone yet?”

  Julia stepped briefly into the room, grabbed her phone off a table next to the door, and then stepped back. “Yeah, I got it!” she called back as she retreated into the corridor, shutting the door behind herself, leaving me just standing there, wondering what had just happened. Wondering why she hadn’t immediately ratted me out.

  -----

  “And I still say this decision is wrong!” Julia shouted, smming her fist into the desk. “The drama club is full of very talented people! Considering that, we could put on a much better show than fucking Romeo and Juliet!”

  “Still,” I replied as calmly as possible, “we’ve put the question to a vote, Julia, and the majority of the club voted for that py.”

  “Twelve to eleven is not a fucking majority! Especially not with the third option coming in at eight!”

  “Still,” I repeated, painfully aware of the looks we were getting from the other club members, gathered all around us. “That’s what the club decided. I didn’t vote for that py, either, but we’d agreed to let the majority decide. It’s a bit unfair to compin about it after the fact, don’t you think?”

  “Having no run-off is unfair,” she muttered sullenly; she crossed her arms in front of herself and sat back down, still wearing her awful mood pin and clear on her face.

  I looked at her for a moment, then cleared my throat. “Alright then. As the club president, I decre the choice made: the end-of-year show will be Romeo and Juliet. Any objections?”

  I looked pointedly at Julia, but she just grumbled and looked away.

  “Okay. Then, I think we can move on to choosing the roles for the py. As is club tradition, I’ve put all the major roles here in this urn: everyone will draw from it, and py the role they get."

  I set the urn – which was actually a vase – down on the table, and Julia raised a sceptical eyebrow. “Wait, hold on, how did you know what py to prepare the urn for?”

  I smirked at her. “Well, you see, I’ve prepared five urns. One for each option.” I reached down and grabbed the shopping bag I’d stored the vases in, lifting it up for everyone to see. “This way, no matter which way the vote went, we would be ready.”

  “Fair,” Julia hissed out. “Alright, let’s get this over with.”

  I nodded, lifted the urn off the table, and offered it to her. “And no compining,” I reminded everyone. “Not even if the role you get doesn’t match your gender: drag is a time-honoured tradition in theatre, after all.”

  There were nods all around, and Julia put her hand inside the urn, drawing out a strip of paper.

  “I got… Juliet Capulet. Fuck,” she said.

  I felt my heart drop for a moment, but still managed to smirk. “No compining, I said!” I chided her, passing the urn to the next person.

  “No, Roman,” Julia said. “I will absolutely compin. I will do my part, I will py the role, but I will never not compin about having to act like a love-struck thirteen-year-old who makes terrible decisions.”

  I frowned as I moved the urn on to the next actor. “Juliet was thirteen? Seriously?”

  “Seriously,” Julia nodded. “And Romeo was sixteen. Dumbass teenagers, both of them.”

  “‘Dumbass’ and ‘teenager’ are synonyms,” Eden, the next-to-st in line, said. “It’s true. It’s in the thesaurus. Look it up.” She looked down at her strip of paper, and frowned. “Prince Paris? Wasn’t he named Escalus? And wasn’t Paris a count?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, but we don’t have nearly enough actors for all the roles, so we have to meld some of them a bit.” I handed the urn to Sam, who drew her role.

  “Friar Laurence. Okay,” she said.

  “So this leaves only myself,” I said, looking around the assembled group. “And I have…”

  I drew out my own strip of paper from the urn, unfolded it, and read it.

  And I looked up at Julia.

  “Romeo Montague.”

  Julia frowned. “Wait, does that mean I have to kiss you?” she asked. “Because I really don’t want to.”

  “…What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I asked indignantly. “I could be offended by that. And besides, it’s going to be a stage kiss, not a real one.”

  Julia looked at me for a moment, without saying anything: that, more than everything else, irked me. “Well, the script calls for it, so we’ll have to do it. And that’s final,” I said.

  She kept looking at me, then grumbled in the back of her throat. “Fine.”

  I kept staring at her for a few seconds more, then nodded, and turned to the rest of the drama club. “I’ve put in a request to use an empty cssroom near the auditorium for the costuming department, y’all can set up shop there. And we’ll start rehearsing next Monday, after school, so please don’t be te.”

  The club made noises of agreement, and the meeting was over; as we left the room, heading home, I could only hope the end-of-year show didn’t end up being a disaster. I was the club president, after all, so in the end the buck stopped with me.

  -----

  Over the course of the next several weeks, production was in full swing: the costuming department took measurements of all the actors, so the costumes would fit perfectly, and the stagehands started working on the huge paintings which would be the backdrops of the scenes, as well as procuring the props.

  And Julia and I, along with the rest of the actors, started practising the py.

  It was slow going: no one seemed to have any enthusiasm, and I could hardly bme them, since Romeo and Juliet is an exceedingly banal and trite story; like I said, I personally didn’t vote for that option. But, on the other hand, the majority – or “Plurality!” as Julia kept reminding us – of the club did vote for the star-crossed lovers of Verona, so we couldn’t go back now. I couldn’t go back now, not after insisting that the vote was final.

  A few weeks after our initial meeting, the first costumes were ready: Tybalt, Mercutio, the Nurse, and Juliet. We all assembled in the auditorium as the actors tried them on and stuck poses for the benefit of the rest of the club, and we all congratuted the costuming department on the excellent job they’d done.

  Julia, however, didn’t seem happy: the whole time she was dressed up as Juliet she had a sour expression affixed to her face, and she kept looking in disgust at the long skirt on the dress she was wearing, which made me frown. What even the hell? The costuming department went to the trouble of making a dress from scratch for her, and that was the way she was thanking them?

  I simply didn’t understand it. Anyone would be happy to wear such a nice dress, wouldn’t they? I, for one–

  I shook my head to shoo away the thought. No, Roman, don’t. Don’t go down that path: you’ve been there before, and you know it leads to nothing but disappointment.

  After all, every time I’d worn a dress before (for the drama club or, sometimes, on my own) I’d been disappointed at how I looked: my shoulders were too wide, my chest too ft, my waist not narrow enough. So it was best to avoid wearing a dress altogether.

  But still, I couldn’t help but keep staring at the Juliet costume. I mentally compared myself to Julia: we weren’t that different, really, we were the same height, and her shoulders were about as wide as mine – apparently she’d been part of the swimming team through junior high, before switching to the drama club in high school.

  So maybe that dress would fit me? Not perfectly, but close enough.

  I shook my head again. Again: no. Seriously, don’t.

  But some part of me, deep in my subconscious, kept wondering: why not?

  To my credit, I managed to hold on for a full week before I succumbed to temptation.

  That day, we’d finished rehearsals early. It was a Friday, so everyone wanted to go home as soon as possible to rex and unwind: the costuming department had done little work, they’d just done a couple adjustments on the Juliet dress before going home in the mid-afternoon.

  After everyone had left, I stayed behind in the clubroom for a few minutes more, to finish tidying up, before realising this was my best and, probably, only chance – after all, with no one around, there was no risk of me being exposed: I could just go in, try on the dress, and then put everything back the way it was.

  I really should’ve listened to that voice, way in the back of my mind, which was screaming, don’t do this.

  But the temptation was just too strong.

  Licking my lips nervously, I pushed down the door handle, and went in.

  -----

  It took ten minutes for Julia to come back.

  Unlike the first time, she knocked before entering: to avoid startling me, I think, not to announce her presence, because I knew full well she would return.

  While waiting for her, I’d sat myself down in a chair, right in front of the mirror. I kept looking at my reflection: if I angled my head just right, if I narrowed my eyes, I could see the girl I knew I was sitting there.

  But I knew it was an illusion; my body didn’t look like that at all. And Julia would surely make me take off the dress, and swear up and down never to do something like this again, on pain of being outed to the whole school.

  Except she didn’t.

  She just walked carefully across the room, pulled up a chair, and sat down next to me, pcing a hand on my shoulder. At first I flinched away from the touch, but she didn’t remove the hand; instead, she gave my shoulder a reassuring squeeze, and just sat there, without speaking, for a long while.

  Until I took a deep breath, and let it out.

  “Why are you doing this?” I asked. “I… What I’m doing is wrong. This,” I motioned down at myself, “is wrong. Why aren’t you looking away in disgust? Why aren’t you running off to tell everyone what I’m doing? What I really am?”

  Julia sighed deeply. “Because…” she began, but then hesitated. “Wait, it’s better if I show you.”

  She stood up from the chair, and walked across the room, until she was standing next to the mannequins holding the costumes; she started to unzip her hoodie, but paused. “Um… please don’t look,” she said.

  I dutifully averted my eyes, looking elsewhere for a few minutes, until I heard her move back across the room and touch my shoulder.

  “You can look now,” she said.

  I turned around, and looked at her: she had shed her usual clothes and put on…

  “Mercutio’s costume?” I asked.

  Julia nodded. “Yes. This is me.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “You’re Mercutio?”

  My terrible attempt at humour was rewarded by a smile and a chuckle. “No, silly. I’m not Mercutio. And you’re not Juliet. But this is me,” Julia said.

  My other eyebrow joined the first, and my eyes widened in understanding; I pointed at Julia. “This is you.”

  A nod. Julia pointed at me. “And this is you.”

  I gulped, and nodded. “Alright.” Then, after a pause, I continued, “I feel a bit silly asking this, but, um… pronouns?”

  “He/him,” he said with a smile. “What about you?”

  “Oh. Um. Oh, God,” I mumbled. “…She/her? No, sorry, that came out more as a question.” I gulped again. “She/her.” I paused again. “Jesus, it’s the first time I’ve actually said it out loud.”

  Julia put his hand on my shoulder and squeezed again. “It’s a privilege.”

  We looked at each other for a long moment, just enjoying the kinship.

  “So what do you want to do now?” Julia asked. “Do you want to swap roles? I’ll py Romeo, and you’ll py Juliet.”

  “Can we do that?” I asked in return. “After all, I distinctly remember saying…”

  “…No compining,” he finished the sentence for me, lowering his voice as deep as it could go, and we both ughed. “But seriously, we can absolutely do that. You’re the club president, after all: just say you’ve changed your mind, and also offer everyone the chance to swap roles with someone else if they want. I doubt they’ll be upset.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, I think we can do that.”

  “Also,” he continued, “if you want to do something special with this py, and not just some old production of R&J, I’ve had a few ideas bouncing around my head for a while now. Are you interested? Wanna do a bit of brainstorming?”

  Julia had a pyful and mischievous glimmer in his eyes, and I found myself nodding. “Yeah, sure. I’m listening.”

  -----

  “Alright,” I said, looking around at the assembled drama club. “We’ve called you all here today, because I’ve been talking with Julia, and… we have a proposal for the drama club. We want to change the py.”

  “Change the py? But we’d voted for Romeo and Juliet,” Eden objected. “And it’s only two weeks before the premiere, it’s too te to switch now: we’d have to redo all the backgrounds, all the costumes…”

  I shook my head. “No, we’d still be doing Romeo and Juliet,” I expined. “But Julia and I wanted to… change it up. Switch things around a bit. To make it more fun.”

  “Hm. Interesting,” Sam said, putting a hand to her chin. “Switch things around how?”

  “I think Juliet should be a badass lesbian who also has a sword,” Julia said. “And since her family doesn’t approve of her behaviour, she switches pces with her cousin Tybalt, who is a trans woman, and goes around disguised as ‘him.’”

  Sam blinked. “Sold,” she said; Eden nodded in agreement.

  “And Romeo is a trans man, who’s had to fight really hard to be recognised as a man,” I added. “So when he realises what Juliet is going through, he decides to help both her and Tybalt escape.”

  “I already said ‘sold,’ you don’t need to insist,” Sam said, eliciting a bout of ughter from the whole drama club.

  “Costumes and backgrounds can stay the same,” Julia said. “Roman and I will work together to revise the script. But we wanted to be sure we’re all in agreement: it will be much more difficult than just doing the usual, boring, R&J. Especially since we’ll have little time to rehearse.”

  I nodded. “So we wanted the decision to be unanimous. If anyone doesn’t want to do this, we’ll just not do it.”

  “And miss the chance for a queer retelling?” Eden said. “Not likely. I’m in.”

  Everyone else nodded in agreement, and I smiled: I was really gd we’d managed to get the club to go along with the pn.

  “Also, just another thing,” I said, and gulped. “Julia and I talked, and… we want to swap roles.” I paused, and looked around the group. “So I’d be pying Juliet, and Julia would be pying Romeo. And of course, if anyone else wants to swap roles around, by all means feel free to.”

  The whole group looked at us in puzzlement. “I think it’s fine,” Sam said. “It’s no big deal. But why do you want to do that?”

  I exchanged a gnce with Julia, and we both nodded.

  “To be more comfortable in our roles. Because each of us would be pying their gender,” Julia said.

  Everyone in the drama club frowned. “Pying their gender…?” Eden queried.

  I nodded. “Here’s us coming out, I guess,” I said, in a weak voice.

  There was a moment of silence as everyone in the room turned over what we’d said in their minds.

  Then Sam cmped me in a ferocious, extremely tight hug.

  “Oh, God. Welcome, sister. I’m so happy for you both,” she said.

  “Yeah. Finding yourself is a wonderful thing,” Eden agreed: gncing to my right, I saw she was squeezing Julia in a hug at least as tight as the one Sam was giving me.

  After a moment, Julia and I were released from our friends’ grips, and they stepped back; a few other club members smiled at us and patted us on the shoulder in a show of support.

  “By the way, just want to make sure: who else knows?” Eden asked. “Just so we don’t out you two before you’re ready.”

  “No one outside the club,” Julia replied. “And we’d like to keep it that way, at least for the time being; we’ll think about coming out to everyone after the end-of-year show.”

  Sam nodded. “Yeah, that makes sense. So, still Roman and Julia for now?”

  “No, actually,” I said. “When there’s no one else around, we’re Juliet,” I pointed to myself, “and Romeo.” I smirked. “You know, just so we can get used to the names.”

  Romeo nodded. “And, who knows, I might actually keep it afterwards. I quite like it.”

  “Seriously?” I ughed. “You’re going to name yourself after… hold on, let me remember the exact quote. ‘A dumbass teenager who makes terrible decisions,’ I think it was.”

  “That was Juliet,” Romeo said, crossing his arms in front of himself.

  “But it applies to Romeo, too,” I rebutted.

  “Yeah, but I’m not going to name myself after him, I’m going to name myself after our Romeo.” He paused. “And what about you? ‘Badass lesbian with a sword’ is a good role model, isn’t it? Think you’re going to keep the name?”

  I hesitated: the thought was really tempting. “Um… let me think about it,” I replied. “I’ve got time, after all.”

  -----

  Two households, both alike in dignity,

  In fair Verona, where we y our scene,

  From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,

  Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.

  From forth the fatal loins of these two foes

  A group of young queer kids have had enough;

  Leaving their parents alone with their woes,

  They run away, their families rebuff.

  Their decision to make their own lives improve,

  And the quelling of their parents’ rage,

  Which but their children’s loss nought could remove,

  Is now the two hours’ traffic of our stage;

  The which if you with patient ears attend,

  What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.

  I watched from the wings as Sam, who’d volunteered to narrate the prologue (which wasn’t completely in iambic pentameter, but we’d done our best – writing like the Bard is difficult), bowed deeply and walked off-stage; despite the auditorium being darkened, I could just make out the distinct confused frowns of the audience in the front row – this clearly wasn’t what they were expecting.

  I smiled to myself. This was going to be fun.

  I kept watching as the py got underway, and a group of people started mock-fighting with prop swords on stage. It was just about time for me to make my entrance as Tybalt. Well, as Juliet disguised as Tybalt, to be more precise.

  I pced a hand on Ruby’s back. “Do you remember your lines?” I whispered.

  Ruby nodded: despite not being part of the drama club – she did wrestling instead, and she definitely had the physique needed for that sport – she’d been roped by her friends Eden and Sam into pying Prince Escalus, and she was quite understandably a bit nervous about it, having never acted in a py before. But we’d rehearsed her scenes together plenty of times, so I was sure she had them nailed down.

  “Alright,” I whispered again. “Break a leg.” I gripped the hilt of my prop sword tightly, and strode on stage. “What, you’ve your bde drawn in front of the servants? Shame on you, Benvolio. Face me!”

  The actor pying Benvolio wheeled around to look at me. “Tybalt!” he excimed. “I wasn’t going to fight! I was just trying to keep the peace!”

  I py-hesitated. “Keeping the peace? Seriously? Should I believe you?” I said, letting the point of my sword drop towards the ground.

  “Seriously,” Benvolio said. “There’s no need for us to fight.”

  I pretended to hesitate again. “Maybe–” I began.

  “ALRIGHT, WHAT’S ALL THIS, THEN?” Ruby-as-Escalus roared, running onto the stage. “Are you Capulets and Montagues fighting? Again?”

  “We weren’t!” Benvolio protested.

  “Right!” I added. “We were–”

  “SILENCE!” Ruby bellowed. “I am right tired of you making trouble for everyone! If you ever disturb the peace again, I shall see that you are all given eternal peace!”

  She lifted a huge fist threateningly, and Benvolio and I both stepped back; ughter rippled through the audience.

  “What? What is happening?” the actor who pyed Capulet said, stepping onto the stage. “Are the Montagues being a bother again?”

  “The Capulets are being a bother again, I would say!” Montague replied, stepping on stage too. “You’re always bothering everyone! You’re just lucky my child wasn’t involved, or else I would give what’s coming to you!”

  “What’s coming to me? Why, I oughta–” Capulet replied, but Ruby grunted, raising her fist once more, and everyone stepped back from her, again to ughter from the audience.

  “But where is she? Where is my child?” Montague said.

  Romeo stepped on stage, dazzling in his costume. “I’m right here, father,” he said. “And must I remind you that it’s he once again?”

  Montague waved his hand dismissively. “Balderdash.”

  “It’s not balderdash, father. It’s who I am.”

  “This is absurd,” Capulet agreed. “Come, Tybalt, let us leave them to their family bickering and return home.”

  I nodded, but made sure to hesitate for a moment before walking off-stage; I looked at Romeo, and he looked right back: we paused for a second to make sure the audience knew we’d noticed each other, and then followed Capulet. As soon as I stepped into the wings I let out a deep breath, and nodded to the stage crew; I turned around and looked on as the first scene concluded – everything was going well so far.

  The curtain went down, and the crew scrambled to arrange everything for the new set: the second scene would take pce in Juliet’s bedroom.

  The curtain rose again and, after waiting for a moment to let the audience take in the scene, I stepped onto the stage. “Tybalt!” I stage-whispered. “Tybalt, are you here?”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the audience frown again: wait, why was Tybalt calling out his own name?

  “I’m here, Juliet,” Eden-as-Tybalt said, stepping out from behind a screen, dressed in the Juliet costume. “You’re te; the nurse almost found me out, but I managed to avoid her.”

  I smiled. “I knew you were resourceful like that, Tybalt. Come, let us switch back.”

  She stepped back behind the screen, and I followed her; we swapped costumes, while the stage crew produced loud rustling sounds.

  “I’ve met someone while I was out today,” I said. “His name is Romeo.”

  “Romeo?” Eden replied. “Isn’t he a Montague?”

  “He is,” I said. “But that’s not important. I saw how he looked, I heard how he talked to his father.”

  We stepped out from the screen, and the audience gasped at seeing that we’d swapped clothes.

  “I think he’s like you, Tybalt,” I said. “Only from the other side.”

  Eden looked at me, startled. “You mean…?”

  I nodded. “He’s a girl who is actually a boy.”

  The scene continued on for a while, and when it finally ended and the curtain went down once more, I snuck a gnce at the audience, and was happy with what I saw: everyone was carefully following the py with rapt attention – we’d clearly managed to put on a show that was much more compelling than the usual school py.

  -----

  The next two scenes were the most important ones: Romeo snuck into the Capulets’ party along with his cousins, and spotted Tybalt, but was very confused because it wasn’t the same Tybalt he’d seen that morning; then he saw Juliet, whom he recognised as ‘Tybalt,’ and was even more puzzled as a result; and Juliet saw him in turn, approached him, and invited him to her room ter that night, so they would be able to talk without being overheard.

  Thus, Romeo climbed the wall to get into the Capulets’ orchard, and climbed into Juliet’s balcony, where she and Tybalt were waiting.

  “So you’re like me,” Romeo said, pointing at Eden. “Only from the other side. You’re a boy who’s actually a girl.”

  Eden nodded. “That’s why we switch roles often,” I said. “She much prefers wearing dresses and spending quiet afternoons reading in my room, while I, despite being a girl, are fond of pants and sword-fighting.”

  “I see,” Romeo nodded pensively. “And, at a guess, neither of you appreciate how your family treats those who are different, do you?” Eden and I both shook our heads, and Romeo continued, “Yeah, I figured as much.”

  “And you don’t, either,” I said. “I heard you talking with your father this morning.”

  Romeo screwed his mouth in distaste. “Right. But, this is actually a perfect chance, I would say.”

  Eden frowned. “A perfect chance for what?”

  “If we join our forces together, the three of us can teach our parents a lesson about respecting others, and about keeping this silly feud of theirs going, despite the wishes of everyone in town but themselves. And I’m probably going to be able to get Benvolio and Mercutio involved, too.” Romeo extended his hand towards us, palm down. “What do you say? Do you want to team up?”

  I smiled, and pced my hand on Romeo’s, as did Eden. “Absolutely. Let’s team up. What do you propose?” I asked.

  Romeo leaned in conspiratorially. “You see, I have this friend, who is a priest and an apothecary…” he stage-whispered, as the curtain went down yet again.

  -----

  And so it went that Tybalt killed Mercutio; Romeo, in return, mortally wounded Tybalt, and was banished from Verona as a result; and Juliet killed herself with poison, because she couldn’t stand the sorrow of her best friend Tybalt being dead.

  All the deaths were eborately staged, of course, thanks to Benvolio’s support, and using Friar Laurence’s potions to put every ‘victim’ in a deathlike state. In the end, Romeo snuck back into Verona, gathered the ‘bodies’ from their resting pces, and they all absconded in the night, leaving behind letters written on parchment, expining their reasons.

  Their families, upon reading their children’s writing, went with all speed to Prince Escalus, and demanded he send out the city guard to bring the children back, but the prince refused: the two families had made their beds by refusing to renounce their enmity, and now they would have to live with the consequences.

  “For there never was a problem which was solved more cannily than this one by Romeo, Juliet, and their chosen family,” Ruby concluded; she bowed deeply as the curtain fell, and the auditorium exploded into cheers.

  Romeo and I, standing in the wings, looked at each other. “Looks like the py was a success,” I said.

  Romeo nodded. “Yep, sure looks like it.”

  “Come on, you two,” Eden said, pushing us towards the stage. “The audience is waiting for you.”

  Sam nodded in agreement. “Yeah. Go get your round of appuse.”

  I shook my head in reply. “Nope, we’re not going out there on our own,” I said, and pointed at all the actors, who were standing nearby. “You’re all coming with us. This was a group effort, after all.”

  It took a few minutes to convince everyone – despite being comfortable on stage, actors can be surprisingly shy when it comes to being cheered by an audience – and to arrange us on the stage before the curtain was raised again; surprisingly, the crowd was still cheering and cpping, which if nothing else became even louder when we showed ourselves.

  We had to make three appearances on stage, the curtain falling and then rising again, before the audience calmed down enough and we could catch our breaths.

  And then it was time for the after-party: Romeo and I had arranged everything, there were snacks, and drinks (which I’m legally required to say were all non-alcoholic), and music. We all rexed and unwound after several weeks of intense and stressful work to prepare everything.

  “Well,” Romeo exhaled, plopping himself down on a chair next to me. “This was an adventure.”

  I nodded. “And to think it wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t caught me cross-dressing.”

  He ughed, and punched me in the shoulder. “It wasn’t cross-dressing, though, was it?”

  “Yeah, you’re right,” I agreed with a smile.

  We shared a moment of companionable silence, then Romeo spoke up again. “So what’s next?” he asked. “Are you going to stay like this?”

  He pointed at me: I was still wearing the Juliet costume, and he was still wearing the Romeo costume; I nodded.

  “Yeah, I think I will. Not in these clothes, specifically, but, you know.” He nodded in acknowledgement, and I went on, “I’ll have to come out to my parents, of course, but I think they’ll be accepting. We’ll see.”

  “And what about the name? Juliet?” he queried. “Think you’re going to keep it?”

  “Hmm… maybe,” I mused, putting a hand to my chin. “It feels comfortable enough for now, but I might change it ter. I’ve got time, after all.”

  Romeo nodded again, put his arm around my shoulders, and dragged me into a comfortable half-hug. “That you do, girl. That you do.”

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