Romeo's Revenge

Chapter Nineteen: The Lake House

Eight Hours Before the Dinner Date

Jose barges in the doors of the royal mansion. He scratches his head in frustration while heading straight to the training room. He was in need to let out all his frustrations, and that he will do.

As he enters the training room, he went straight for the punching bag that  hung in the center. He screams his lungs out as he runs towards the sand filled bag, not caring of the hard impact between his body and the tool. He punches and kicks it. Minutes turned to hours as he continues to hit the bag senseless. He kicks and punches until his body gave up, and became sore.

His strength weakens from exhaustion. He falls down to the hard floor and tries to catch his breath.

Romeo was amused at the sight of his dear friend. The first time he's seen him like this was when Jose's biological father came to him for help, which was only to satisfy his drinking problem.

Jose also took the initiative to visit the family he ran away from only to witness that there were no changes whatsoever. His father is an alcoholic, while his mother is a druggie.

The one thing that took things too far was when they forced his youngest sister into prostitution to pay for all their bad habit expenses.

When he visited his little sister's room, he finally got to see her only for her to jump off the window and fall to her death. On her messy, unkempt bed was a note saying that she couldn't take it anymore. She didn't want the life that her parents forced her to be in which got her pregnant and had been forced to do an abortion. It was life in hell, and death was the easiest way out of it.

To this very day, Jose regrets that he could not save his dear little sister in time. He wished that if only he could take everything back.

After watching his friend lay on the ground, he approached him. He bends and hands him a towel to wipe off the sweat all over his body. "You really beat the shit out of that punching bag." Romeo shook his head.

Jose looked at his dear friend from the cool ground. He gladly accepts the towel and places it over his face to cover the shame he felt.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Romeo asks, feeling concerned for his only friend in the world.

Jose contemplated on how he should tell Romeo. Would he detest him for sleeping with an enemy, or would he forgive him? He came to a conclusion that Romeo hates liars, so it is best to come clean.

"Would you hate me if I tell you that Tybalt is actually a Capulet." He confesses.

Romeo stayed silent waiting for his friend to explain further.

"I found out last night in his apartment. There was a picture frame of him, Juliet, and Matteo when they were younger. On the bottom of the frame, it said "Best Cousins."" Jose scoffed at the memory.

"As much as it broke my heart, I wanted to enjoy our final night together and then broke up with him the next morning. It was painful and it still hurts until now because I have never felt like this for any one before. Not even with my previous boy toys." He chuckles.