Page 44 of The Hundred Loves of Juliet
But no other Juliets have ever remembered our past, save Helene. She may not remember overtly, but the memories are there.
She knows our love stories.
Why?
Because I tried to cheat the curse by leaving the last version of her alone,I think ruefully.And now we’re paying the price for my arrogance, with a curse renewed in force.
But that isn’t what I tell Helene. What she needs—what she’s asking for—is how it began.
“Mercutio cursed us as he died,” I say.“A plague o’ both your houses.”
Helene wrinkles her nose again. “That was just an admonishment to the Capulet and Montague families for their feud.”
I lift one shoulder in half a shrug. My friend Mercutio’s dying words have never stopped haunting me. It was my fault he was killed; he died in a duel, defending my honor. I can’t think of any other way the curse could have engendered, and I don’t know exactly how it came to power, other than there was a confluence of blood and pain and those final words uttered on his deathbed—all stemming from events I set into motion. I was selfish then, impulsive. I saw Juliet at the Capulets’ ball and had to make her mine, regardless of the consequences to my family and friends. And Mercutio died because of it.
His words, too, are apt—for other than Helene, Juliet keeps being reincarnated without any memory of the past, and I am doomed to watch her die over and over again. That seems to me the definition of a plague on both the Capulet and Montague lineages.
“We find each other, fall in love, and then catastrophe strikes,” I say. “No children, no growing old together…Juliet always dies. What can it be but a curse?”
Helene frowns as she digests what I’ve said. Then she laughs once—quick and short, the sound of a skeptic. “So you’re sayingthatI’mJuliet. That the women in these paintings aren’t just my characters, they’reme,born again. That’s why you said the stories I’ve written are actually memories.”
“Yes,” I say softly. “You’re Juliet.”
“That’s…not possible.”
“Yet it is. I’ve loved you again and again, across lifetimes. Our story defies reason and science and everything we’re taught to know about the world, but itispossible. And I think, perhaps, you know it, too.”
Her breathing quickens, and I can see the jittering panic, the crush of being overwhelmed by this gallery and its possibilities. I want to cross the room and hold her in my arms, tell her that it’ll be all right.
But I can’t promise that. It has never been all right for us. I’ve tried breaking the curse before.
And I have always failed.
So I sit helplessly on my bench like a ship adrift, the gallery between us an ocean keeping us apart.
She stands suddenly, fingers fluttering restlessly. “I can’t do this here. I need space to think.”
“Of course.” I rise, too. “I’ll walk you back to your room.”
“No.” Helene holds up a hand, as if physically pushing me back. “I need to not be near you.”
I falter and sink back onto the bench. Every time Juliet comes into my life, it knocks the wind out of my lungs, as if she’s a prizefighter and I merely the punching bag with the dubious privilege of receiving her blows. But this time is exponentially worse, because I can feel fate mocking me. And it’s also worse because I induced Helene into disliking me, and now I regret that deeply. I can withstand the whole world blaming Romeo—Juliet’s death was my fault, and I loathe myself for each and every time she dies—but I can’t bear being hated by Juliet herself.
Still, if space is what she wants, I’ll give it to her. I’d give her anything.
“Whatever you need,” I say quietly, “it’s yours.”
Helene nods, then pivots abruptly on her good foot and limpshurriedly out of the gallery. I listen to her uneven footsteps echoing down the hallway and the stairwell, until they’re too faint to hear anymore.
Then I fall backward on the bench and shut my eyes tight, knowing that I’ve been in this position before, telling Juliet who she is.
I can only hope Helene reacts better to the revelation than Isabella did.
SICILY—1395
After fleeing Mantua, I live on the streets as a beggar for many years. Wretched with guilt over Juliet’s death, I try to take my life many times. Yet somehow, my wounds are always superficial. If I stab myself, it manifests as only a surface wound. If I try to let the heat of the midday sun dehydrate me, a kind old woman will wander by and offer me a drink, refusing to leave until I imbibe it all. Even drowning fails; my body can no longer sink. I am by no means invincible, but it’s as if a curse will not allow me to die.
Grief tries but cannot kill me either, so I drift from year to year in a swamp of sorrow. Some days, I subsist on stale heels of bread and rotting apple cores cast out in the garbage. Other days, I don’t eat at all. I have no identity, no purpose, no anything. I am gutter trash, and it’s better than I deserve.
