Let's Fall in Love at 17

Let me see you

"Love is helpless,
I did not intend this,
Yet our eyes kiss,
In the dead of night the touch of your gaze do I miss."

***

The rain had stopped but the clouds still lurked overhead, stubbornly blocking the twinkle of the stars. The wet edges of the cliff sprinkled my hands in particles of sand as I sat down, my feet dangling over the edge not caring if the heels slip off. The dress was probably ruined too but I didn't care.

It was just a crush.

It was just a crush.

Romeo was just a crush.

The night was quiet, the complete opposite of the chaos reeling in my mind. Juliet. The name played its horrific tune like a broken record in the recesses of my mind. Juliet. The waves roared against the rocky shore, their sound a cacophony of mockery. Juliet. The sun kissed a burning hole in my heart, leaving it empty and broken.

I remember that first day he had called me that, I admit I had loved it. Even the L-word had somehow maneuvered its way to camp right at the edges of my eyes. But it was just a crush. I might have played along with what I was feeling but it was just that. I didn't know this could happen. I didn't know this would happen. It happened.

"Juliet." A voice called in the dead silence of the night, the croaking of a frog echoing beneath at the bank of the river, sending faint sounds up to the cliff.

I didn't turn around when a presence hovered above me. Instead my hands tightened gripping the edge of the cliff.

"You could fall, you know." Romeo voiced his concerns as he sat beside me, too close for my liking at the moment. His shoulder playfully bumped into me in an attempt to lighten the mood but it didn't work.

"I would if you bumped into me again like that." I referred to his comment on me falling into the river or most probably on the bank and breaking my bones and dying.

He scoffed.

A wind had started to blow, the rustling of leaves mixing with the croaking frog turning the night into a beautiful melody. My hair danced with the wind, leaving my face bare to the earthy after-smell of rain.

I heard Romeo take a deep breath which made me look over at him, his lips were turned down, eyes screwed shut as if he was reminiscing a moment he couldn't bear to remember. My hand involuntarily reached out to smoothen the frown on his forehead.

His eyes opened but he didn't look at me.

Romeo turned to me, taking my hand in his and pulling it down to his lap. The blue of his eyes was striking against the night sky. I had to look away, if I hadn't I would've lost myself in them.

"Don't call me that." I remembered why I was at the cliff in the first place.

"Don't call you what?" He asked.

"Juliet." Was my simple answer.

"Why?", this made me turn away from gazing off into the distance and shoot him a glare I most definitely reserved for Danny.

"Because..." I voiced but didn't know how to say it. Would he think I was crazy? Hell, I was crazy. "Because-" I stopped again.

"Juliet, if you don't tell me how would I understand?" He intertwined our hands and I felt a box of butterflies being let loose in the pits of my stomach. Holy shit.

"I told you not to call me that!"

"Again...why?"

"Because you called her that." I looked away from him, back to that point in the distance I was admiring like Romeo admired that white wall in Mr. Hugh's class.