Chapter 10
“Miss Juliet! Wherever could you be?!”
The Nurse burst onto the stage, her powerful voice booming through the entire theater.
With exaggerated movements and comically over-the-top expressions, she played to the audience exactly as they expected, drawing chuckles from every corner.
“I swore on the maidenhood I had when I was twelve that I’d find you! Oh, my poor knees! Miss! Where are you?!”
Just then—
Something darted across the top of the façade decorating the back of the stage.
Silky black hair fluttered for the briefest instant.
The audience’s eyes were instantly drawn toward it.
Strangely enough, only catching a fleeting glimpse made people even more curious.
Several spectators pointed toward the second story of the set and burst into laughter.
“There! She’s over there!”
By now, everyone had become completely absorbed in the play.
The stage grew slightly noisy, but the veteran actress playing the Nurse had experienced this kind of audience countless times. She flowed naturally with the interruption and even turned it into a joke.
“Where did you say?”
“Over there!”
“Oh, here?”
“No, over there!”
“Ahhh, heeere?”
The theater erupted in laughter.
During the commotion, a few sharp-eyed audience members suddenly realized something.
Juliet Capulet.
That woman…
…was the very person everyone had come here to see.
Luisa Messena.
The infamous villainess who had sold off the glorious treasures of the Duchy of Messena for practically nothing.
The shameless woman who, even after all that, had stepped onto the stage herself just to perform some vulgar play with a group of handsome actors.
Well… they say she’s beautiful.
Let’s at least see what she looks like.
As the audience’s ugly anticipation filled the theater—
Instead of appearing on the second-floor balcony of the façade, the woman suddenly peeked out from the very top of the rooftop.
“…!”
Everyone stopped breathing.
Some people had even come prepared with rocks and eggs, intending to throw them the moment the notorious villainess appeared.
But in that instant…
Even they forgot everything.
Because she was…
…too beautiful.
Below her neatly braided black hair, porcelain-white skin glowed beneath the stage lights.
Her large crimson eyes shimmered mysteriously.
Her straight nose and thin lips curled into a wicked smile.
“You foolish Nurse.”
Her short remark dripped with arrogance.
Yet somehow…
…it sounded adorable.
Just like an actual fourteen-year-old girl.
That’s… the infamous villainess?
Elise stared blankly, bewildered.
The Luisa Messena she’d heard about looked nothing like this.
According to every rumor, she ruined every party she attended.
Years of drinking and debauchery had supposedly left dark shadows beneath her eyes.
She constantly spat venom in a shrill, hateful voice.
She was the Empire’s greatest disgrace.
So she should’ve looked…
At the very least…
…far worse than this.
Granted, there was something oddly sinister about her face.
Still—
What exactly had I been expecting Lady Luisa to look like?
Having finally seen the villainess with her own eyes, Elise found herself completely confused.
And she probably wasn’t the only one.
Everyone had forgotten what sort of face they had imagined for the infamous villainess.
Instead, before they knew it, they had begun sympathizing with nothing more than a mischievous young girl.
Just then—
Young Juliet flopped onto the rooftop in her dress with a loud plop.
Like a carefree child.
Sitting there, she opened a book and began reading.
While the Nurse ran around frantically beneath her, Juliet secretly enjoyed watching her panic.
Of course…
She wasn’t hidden for long.
“Miss! Your mother is looking for you!”
At the Nurse’s stern shout, the wicked grin disappeared from Juliet’s face.
She instantly became nothing more than a timid little girl.
“My mother?”
“That’s right! Come down this instant! Right now!”
“…”
Juliet glanced toward the audience.
At that single moment…
Everyone read countless emotions from her face.
Not because she displayed a wide range of expressions.
But because…
A fourteen-year-old Juliet truly stood before them.
That’s right…
I used to feel exactly like that whenever Mother called me.
That strange mixture of annoyance and fear.
The resentment and anxiety only an adolescent girl could feel.
Elise was completely drawn into Juliet.
And as a result…
The next scene made her heart sink.
“Count Paris wishes to take you as his wife.”
The instant Juliet’s expression froze, Elise bit her lip.
Without realizing it, she desperately wanted to shout—
Big sister, don’t marry that man!
If Count Paris married such a beautiful, innocent Juliet…
Then what would become of all those handsome actors she’d seen earlier?
Especially Romeo.
He looked like the very definition of a male lead.
Growing increasingly anxious, Elise waited impatiently for the moment the two lovers would finally meet.
Fortunately…
It wasn’t long before it arrived.
Soon, the Capulet family hosted a masquerade ball.
Romeo, who had secretly fallen for Juliet’s cousin Rosaline, disguised himself and attended.
There…
He met Juliet.
To the soft, beautiful melody of a minstrel’s song, the two laid eyes on one another.
Love struck instantly.
The two quietly slipped behind a curtain together.
What are they doing back there? What are they doing…?
Just as Elise felt the urge to drag both actors back out by their collars—
A light suddenly illuminated the curtain from behind.
The backstage glowed brighter than the front of the stage, revealing only their silhouettes.
That nose bridge! It’s clearer than my future!
Big Sister Juliet!
Big Brother Romeo!
By the characters’ actual ages, they certainly weren’t old enough to be her siblings.
Yet she’d unconsciously started thinking of them that way.
Their sharply defined profiles drew closer…
Closer…
Closer…
Then—
The light went out.
“…Damn it!”
Someone cursed nearby.
“Will you shut up? I’m trying to watch the play!”
“I’m only saying what everyone’s thinking! If they’re going to kiss anyway, they should do it where we can actually see!”
Wasn’t that the same guy who called this ‘a trashy play’ earlier?
“He’s got a point!”
Even amid the audience’s chaotic chatter, Elise never took her eyes off the stage.
Eventually, the two learned one another’s true identities.
“Romeo… why must you be Romeo?
Deny your father. Renounce your name.
And… take me instead.”
Even after learning they belonged to enemy families…
They chose to love each other.
Their circumstances were tragic.
Yet neither of them hesitated.
When Romeo sought out Friar Laurence, he defiantly declared that being the daughter of his family’s enemy was no reason not to love her.
Juliet, for the first time in her life, rebelled against her parents.
She insisted she would marry the man she loved.
But tragedy awaited them.
“A plague on both your houses! By tomorrow I’ll be food for worms!”
Romeo’s friend Mercutio fell beneath Tybalt’s blade.
“Mercutio’s soul waits to take you with him, Tybalt!”
Consumed by vengeance…
Romeo killed Tybalt.
The fury blazing in Romeo’s eyes.
The astonishingly realistic sword fight.
The audience forgot to breathe.
How had the adults’ feud driven Romeo this far?
How had a young man who cared nothing for the families’ hatred become like this?
The entire theater watched in suffocating silence.
Eventually…
Romeo was banished by the Prince.
Juliet faked her own death so they could still be together.
Unaware of the truth, Romeo killed himself beside what he believed to be Juliet’s corpse.
The play rushed toward its climax.
“O happy dagger.
This is thy sheath.”
Juliet, her face twisted with grief, raised the dagger high as she looked out toward the audience.
Her crimson eyes burned.
Her expression was fierce.
The image of the beautiful young girl holding a blade etched itself into everyone’s memory.
Who would’ve imagined that such a lovely face could look so perfect stained by tragedy?
The audience was captivated.
And the moment the dagger pierced Juliet’s chest…
Every spectator instinctively clutched their own heart.
The destined love that had ended so meaninglessly.
The playful girl from the beginning of the play transformed into this tragic figure.
It hurt too much.
They were so happy at first…
They really were…
Elise felt exactly the same.
She had already begun sobbing when Romeo died.
But now…
It was as if a dam had burst.
No…
Please don’t die…
Her chest ached so badly she could no longer hold back her tears.
Hidden by the darkness, she wiped her eyes with her sleeve.
Then—
She heard someone else sniffling beside her.
“…D-Don’t die… Luisa…”
It was her father.
The man who had seemed completely unmoved throughout the performance.
His eyes were bloodshot.
His entire face glistened with tears.
“Hic… no… Luisa…”
“Father… that’s Juliet, not Luisa.”
For a brief moment, Elise stopped crying long enough to wipe away her father’s tears.
She wanted to explain that Juliet was only a character and that the real Lady Luisa was alive.
But her father’s loud sobbing drowned out every word she had intended to say.
Then again…
There was no reason for him to feel embarrassed.
The entire theater was crying together.
* * *
“Huff… huff…”
It was already time for the curtain call.
Still struggling to catch my breath, I climbed onto a backstage equipment box and watched the other actors file out one by one.
I needed a moment before stepping back onstage.
The audience got so emotionally invested… I ended up getting swept away too.
I had immersed myself so completely in Juliet’s suicide scene that parts of my acting had almost become too real.
That kind of thing often happened to actors who were born for the stage.
People called it having “stage instincts.”
Less kindly…
They called it being an attention addict.
Some actors performed one way during rehearsals but became several times bolder once an audience was watching.
They fed off the crowd’s attention.
Sometimes they became so overwhelmed by their own emotions during live performances that they ruined the entire production.
But that wasn’t usually me.
Still…
The audience had poured so much emotion into the performance that I couldn’t help getting caught up in it too.
I roughly wiped away the remaining tears and sweat with my sleeve.
The salt stung my eyes.
“Ow…”
“Hold still.”
Then—
Through my blurred vision, I heard someone’s voice.
Very close.
I instinctively shrank backward.
“I know you don’t like people touching you. Just stay still. It’s only a handkerchief.”
A handkerchief?
Soft silk gently brushed against my eyes.
After those surprisingly careful hands finished wiping my face, I slowly opened my eyes.
Golden eyes stared down at me.
“So…”
Leo smiled.
“So this is what my lady likes.”
“Not me.”
“The theater.”
The fake goat’s blood we’d prepared earlier still covered his face and chest in vivid crimson stains.
Even though I knew it was only stage makeup…
Goosebumps crawled over my skin.
My fists clenched instinctively.
At some point…
Everyone else had already left.
Only Leo and I remained backstage.
Outside, the audience roared with applause.
No matter how loudly I screamed, no one would hear me in here.
The man splattered with fake blood smiled faintly.
The moment his lips moved, I frowned.
If he tries anything weird…
I’m grabbing a wooden club and knocking him out before I run.
My resolve turned out to be completely unnecessary.
Because the ridiculous words that came out of Leo’s mouth were—
“But…”
He hesitated.
“…could you try liking me a little too?”
This lunatic.
He’s trying to flirt again at a time like this.
