The smell of salt and sand filled the air around Benvolio and I. The cool colors of the merchant’s tents suddenly became blindingly intense. I escaped my dizzy haze while adrenaline rushed through me. I returned my focus to Tybalt’s evil presence. Just behind me, across the road, the tide was roaring, signaling the late afternoon in Verona. The number of spectators on the stone pathway gradually increases as tensions between him and I rise. God has been late to change this man’s cold heart. Today will be the day he goes to hell. I quickly looked up at the torch burning bright red. I then glanced over at a crow perched up on a vendor’s cart. After seeing the bare bones of an old, dead dog, I realized signs of death were all around me. I tried to shake it off. With an unsteady voice, I said,
“Good king of cats, nothing but one of your nine lives, that I mean to make bold withal, and, as you shall use me hereafter, dry-beat the rest of the eight. Will you pluck your sword out of his pilcher by the ears? Make haste, lest mine be about your ears ere it be out.”
Romeo and Benvolio laughed, and satisfied, I smiled nervously. I saw Tybalt’s eyes grow with excitement. His shrill voice cut through the air.
“I am for you.”
In one swift, elegant motion he draws his sword. Good lord, that’s a scary looking sword. Without thinking, I drew my sword out of his sheath. Surprised, I dodge out of the way of his first strike. My heart must be about to explode, I can feel it everywhere.
“Draw, Benvolio; beat down their weapons. Gentlemen, for shame, forbear this outrage! Tybalt, Mercutio, the prince expressly hath forbidden bandying in Verona streets.”
Romeo began to feel distress. The look on his face was as if his closest brother was about to die. I shall be guarded by Romeo and Benvolio. Romeo dives in and screams.
“Hold, Tybalt! good Mercutio!”
It felt like lightning. It felt like God pooled up all the pain in the world and administered it to my abdomen at the speed of light. One second I’m quarreling, the next I’m on the ground, head throbbing, sounds muffled. It was surreal. Emotionally and physically, nobody could ever replicate this feeling. A raging tsunami of regret, betrayal, and hatred flood through me. As I look down, my plain white shirt is getting infested with red more and more by the millisecond.
“I am hurt.”
Those were the only words I could manage to put together.
“A PLAGUE O’ BOTH HOUSES! I am sped.”
There is no love in this world, I thought. Love will destroy you. Absolutely stunned, Benvolio continues to ask,
“W-what, art thou hurt?”
“Ay, Ay, a scratch.”, I replied. “Marry ‘tis enough.”
This is not how I imagined death. Laying around traitors and the prophets of evil.
