Editing DbS (section)

== EIGHT ==
⚇乂⚇ 

'''I MOVE TO ANTARCTICA TO GET A GIRLFRIEND''' 

WELL, WE WERE GOING TO a party to get a girlfriend for Romeo. That’s the next excuse I’ll use when somebody asks why I’m doing something.  

''Nate, why are you going to the store? To get a girlfriend.''  

''Nate, why’re you going to school again? To get a girlfriend.'' 

''Nate, why are you moving to Antarctica? To get a girlfriend.''  

See? The response “To get a girlfriend” is a good answer to any question you ask (even math questions, kids!).  

Earlier, after Benvolio had said that he was taking Romeo to the Capulet party to get a girlfriend, Romeo had given him a scathing look. After a couple of moments, Benvolio rephrased: “Because I told Romeo I’d help him forget Ros—” a mournful look from Romeo “—his ex.” 

The guys and I- for I was not integrated into their Shakepsearean culture yet so I couldn’t count myself as a ''guy'' yet- began the process of doing… stuff. Fresh clothes, gross water, wordplay, all of that.

Great, you’re caught up. On a different note, you may’ve been wondering earlier how my dear father hadn’t been worrying about my “sudden disappearances” every single day. Well, easy. He’d sent me off to a boarding school when I was eight.

It was right after Mom had died, and he couldn’t handle the grief of seeing me so he sent me off (evidently I have my mother’s eyes, but they’re brown instead of blue, so I’m not sure how to take that). Of course, I’d been allowed to go home every summer, but I’d never really had a full conversation with him.

I mean, I’d never really felt sorry for myself. I felt sad, sure, thrown a pillow at the wall when I was angry, yeah, of course. But had I ever felt sad for myself when I was sent off? No way. It was like a little adventure of my own.  

Somehow, I caught the attention of Major Bighe, or the guy who ran the agency, and the rest is history. Back to the topic.  

Romeo and Benvolio came into the room after about an hour, all dressed. Romeo wore some tights-looking-things, and a short dress.

To be fair, I guess it wasn’t really a ''dress.'' It was a tunic, but I’d seen shorter skirt things worn by girls in modern times, which I assumed would be scandalous in Romeo’s days. But with Shakespeare, you never knew.  

Benvolio wore a similar looking one to Romeo’s, but instead, he had one of those button-down shirts. Both outfits were blue and looked like you might find them in a storybook about… well, Romeo and Juliet.  

“Here,” said Romeo, handing me a folded outfit.  

“Uh… thanks?” I said, uncertain as to what to say. I had only just changed, what, a couple hours ago?

“They’re clothes,” explained Romeo, enunciating slowly. “To be specific, hosen, a jacket, and a doublet,” he said as if it were obvious and even a goldfish would know this. I did not.

“I just changed,” said I, trying to hide my confusion, struggling to put up a mask. “It’s a waste to wear new clothes and then have to wash them… really a waste of potential.”

Benvolio leaned over inconspicuously and said in a whisper, “It’s best to let him work this out. Don’t question the method to his madness.” 

I gave a small shrug and then nodded, clearing my throat before I spoke. “Thanks, Romeo.” I took the clothes, their fabric foreign and weird feeling in my hands.

Romeo gave a quick nod and practically waltzed out the door, spirits light, ready to go to the party that night. Probably, he was hoping to antagonize Tybalt—that is, the guy who had been messing with Benvolio earlier—and possibly smack him with a blade or something, I don’t know.   

Benvolio also followed, only slower than his younger companion, rolling his eyes at his behavior though a smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.

That left me to get dressed. And so, having nothing better to do, I did. I quickly put on the clothes and looked down at what I was wearing. I would’ve liked to see a mirror or something, but alas, Shakespeareans did not have glass or mirrors at that time. Which meant it was really a guessing game as to what I looked like in my present state.

That guess involved leaves and twigs sticking out of my hair, dark circles under my eyes, and a cut on my lip. Even thinking about the cut made it throb painfully, a reminder that you really shouldn’t go falling out the sky.

Romeo gave a nod of approval as I walked out, humming a tune to himself and tapping his foot against the ground. It sounded vaguely similar to the tune of that one song that plays over and over and over in the six hour version of ''Pride and Prejudice'', and I tried to remember when exactly Jane Austen had written the book.

Hearing Romeo’s brief stopping of his tune, Benvolio glanced over and gave me a once-over, having been studying a weaving of Jesus and His disciples on the wall. “Okay then, let’s go. The Capulets’ party is starting soon.” 

“Benvolio, you said it was to start at sun-down. There’s at ''least'' an hour left,” argued Romeo, the cheerfulness of the prospect of whacking Tybalt over the head not having faded at all.  

Benvolio held up a hand stopping him from speaking. “None of that. We should get going, it’s a bit of a walk to the party. Besides, the guests were invited to come early.” 

“And we’re guests…?” I butted in, speaking from my spot by the wall. I couldn’t remember the exact details of this particular part from the play. I was pretty sure they hadn’t been guests, but maybe Shakespeare had taken out the rebellious streak in his characters since I’d last checked. Either way, I was sure it wasn’t a good idea- I remembered reading once that all of Shakespeare’s conversations in plays were for a reason, especially in his tragedies.

“Yep,” said Benvolio nodding, copying my position, leaning against the wall.  

“You sure? Because it doesn’t seem like the Caps would do,” said I, trailing off, receiving a strange look from Benvolio. '' Right, people didn’t abbreviate during the Renaissance.''

“Yes, I’m sure. Besides, we should be going. Like I said, it takes a while.” 

I gave a sigh at this explanation before we started off to the big party. It took around fifteen minutes to get there by using shortcuts Romeo had discovered. (“You know, I wasn’t always this much of a free spirit,” Romeo had joked.) 

And thus, we were fashionably… early. Well, nerdily early, I suppose, if we’re going to be doing it that way. I honestly never did have a sense of fashion until I came to the Shakespearean era. Therefore, Shakespeare had heightened my senses. Thanks, Shakespeare!  

We arrived there early to see a young boy in reddish-brown, scrutinizing a piece of paper, his face scrunched up in concentration, blonde hair falling into his eyes as he looked down.

Benvolio was saying something along the lines of “You can always put out a fire by starting a new one. Find someone new, then focus on her and she’ll be true love. ‘Sides, if you make yourself lovesick by looking at someone else, you’ll get lovesick looking at them and not her.” 

Now that the time was coming to go to this large… ball, party, whatever, Romeo did not look very convinced that this was a good idea. In fact, he looked even ''more'' sorrowful (and doubtful) than he had earlier, and if he had been a dog, he’d look like a sad chocolate lab, tail between legs, amber-oak eyes looking down at the ground, fragile pools of tears right in front of them looking as if they might break at any moment.  

But aside from that, Romeo was doing swell.  

“Um, excuse me,” said a voice, tugging on my sleeve, and the boy from earlier— being able to see his face, he had green-blue eyes and a smattering of freckles— held out the paper.

“Could you read this for me?” he asked, looking up at me (because, alas, height differences). I looked to Romeo and Benvolio for a bit of help, but they were in a heated discussion about either llamas or ladies. The boy grew annoyed at my unresponsiveness.

Romeo walked over, having finally finished his conversation with Benvolio.  

“Good evening, good fellow.” 

“May God give you a good evening, too,” said the boy formally. Then, a follow-up question: “Hey, do you know how to read?” He frowned at the paper in my hands, casually taking it from them.

“I mean, if I know the language and dialect something’s in, I can read it.” 

“That’s a good, honest, answer. Goodbye then—” 

The young boy was cut off by Romeo giving a laugh. “Stay, stay. I can read. Lemme see that.” 

Rome was thrust the paper and skimmed it over. He read over it again and again and again, going from the top to the bottom of the slip quickly.

I had a transmitter that could translate stuff from the original language to English—modern English, that is. Unfortunately, nobody had come up with something that would make me read things differently (Contacts? Just a suggestion, tech department)). Old English is hard to read as it is, and the person who had written it down did not (as far as I could tell) have good handwriting. It looked a lot like a bunch of squiggles and crosses with a few p’s and h’s in between. I decided then and there that I never wanted to see what bad handwriting was in the olden days. It’d probably be morse-code-looking or something.  

Romeo, still reading over the paper again and again, was interrupted by a sigh from the kid before he read its contents out loud.

“That’s a nice group of people you’ve got there—” then, clearing his throat, he began: “Signor Martino and family, Count Anselme (and his beautiful sisters), the Vitruvio’s widowed wife, Signor Placentio and his nieces, Mercutio and Valentine, my uncle Capulet and family, my niece Rosaline and her sister Livia, Signor Valentino and Tybalt, his cousin, Lucio and the lively Helena. Where are all these people supposed to go?”  

The servant shrugged and said simply, “Up.” 

Confusion, death, and despair followed the answer.

“Up ''where''?” Romeo pressed.  

“Up to our house.” 

“Why?”  

“For supper.” 

“Whose house?” Romeo continued to interrogate.  

“My master’s house,” replied the child, looking down at his shoes and kicking pebbles every which way.  

That would explain his clothes. He was wearing a rust-colored outfit and had a very similar face to one of the two Capulet servants who had been fighting earlier. I figured he was the servant who had started the fight in the first place. After all, only a Capulet would start a fight. And Romeo. And pretty much everyone else in ''Romeo and Juliet.'' But the boy… he looked familiar.  

“I should’ve asked that earlier!” exclaimed Romeo, his hand popping up, finger pointing to the sky in a very “aha” sort of way. He looked like an excited three-year-old child pretending to be Sherlock Holmes.

“Well, I’ll tell you so that you don’t have to ask. My master is the very rich and very powerful Capulet. If you don’t belong to the house of Montague, you’re welcome to come on over. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to find these people,” and with that, the boy went off.  

But before he left, Romeo called after him. “Do you have a name?”  

“Peter,” the boy called behind him, not looking backward, continuing on in his journey.  

“Of course, it’s Sampson’s younger brother we ran into,” muttered Benvolio darkly, rolling his eyes.

And thus, the night was off to a good start.