Romeo Cappalletti was in high spirits. The highest his close friend Marcuccio had seen him in for a few weeks. And that meant only one thing – a new love in his life. And that meant he was fair game for his torments.
The two men sat in one of the illegal dens where Othmen pipes were available for smoking that dark oily substance known as Othmen Dreams. The room had a low ceiling and the windows were darkened, the light being provided by a few stubs of candles on the tables. A low blanket of smoke hung throughout the room adding to the gloom.
The two young men shared a tankard of cheap wine, served by women with low-cut tops and wide hips. Marcuccio watched them carefully as they walked close to him, but Romeo paid them no heed. Clear confirmation that there was a new love in his life.
“So,” said Marcuccio, “I’ve arranged a special banquet this evening in a private chamber, just for you and the Lady Rosaline and me and a woman of my choice.”
Romeo looked at him and frowned. “You shouldn’t have done so without consulting me.”
“When does a friend need to consult to do a favour? It will give you and the Lady Rosaline a chance to spend some precious time alone. That’s what you’ve been complaining about a lack of for the past month, isn’t it?”
Romeo looked a little pained and took another puff on the pipe on the table. It was a tall brass device, like a large vase, with four snaking red tubes coming out of it, like some sea creature. Each of the tubes was for inhaling the simmering Othmen oil through the water in the base of the pipe. It bubbled softly as Romeo took a long breath in and slowly exhaled.
“Things are – complicated now,” he told Marcuccio.
“Complicated? Marcuccio asked. “I don’t understand. You are a man and she is a woman and let me see if I can recall how that works?” He made a circle of the index finger and thumb on one hand and raised his pointer finger on the other hand. He stared at them as if not understanding how they might fit together and waved his fingers around as if unable to connect them. “Am I doing something wrong here?”
Romeo rolled his eyes and took another puff on the pipe, the soft bubble sound his only response.
“Aha!” said Marcuccio, sticking his index finger into the circle made by his other fingers. “That’s it! Now I remember. Do you remember too?”
“It’s not that I don’t appreciate your efforts,” said Romeo, “but I am not in the mood for such an intimate dinner this evening.”
“Not – in – the – mood?” asked Marcuccio. “Lay down and rest, I will fetch an apothecary. You are clearly very ill.”
Romeo looked more pained and then said, in a soft voice, “I have met someone else.”
“Aha!” said Marcuccio and slapped the table hard. “I knew it at once.”
Romeo frowned. “So there is no meal organized for this evening with Rosaline?”
“No, no. I just wanted to hear you say it,” said Marcuccio, laughing. “Oh dear, poor Romeo has another wench to try and win.”
Romeo didn’t share his mirth. “You don’t understand. This time it’s different.”
“Yes, yes,” said Marcuccio. “It’s the same song every time. They are the fairest wench and the one your heart most desires until you bed them and then you lose interest.”
“Not this time,” said Romeo.
“How so?” asked Marcuccio. “No don’t tell me, let me guess. Her bosoms are fairer than any other maiden you have seen. Wait, that was Lady Rosaline. It is her hair, it is soft and like a web of silk that you desire to get entrapped in. No, that was Lady Valeria. It is her smile and her lips. They desire to be kissed and you cannot wait to drink from them. Or was that the Lady Rosaline too?”
Romeo punched him hard on the arm. “You are a villain,” he said, “to make so light of a friend’s love so easily.”
Marcuccio looked at his arm and said, “I think a gnat just bit me.” Then he asked, “Who is she? Anyone I know, or perhaps anyone I’ve known!”
Romeo punched him on the arm again. Harder. This time Marcuccio pretended to fall to the floor as if he had been knocked unconscious, but he could not stop laughing, and picked himself up and dusted himself down. “The insects in here are something to be contended with,” he said.
“You are the worst villain ever,” Romeo said. “And to think I was foolish enough to ever consider you a friend!”
“A friend indeed,” said Marcuccio. “Who else but a friend could advise you of the folly of your ways and expect to be thanked only with a beating?”
Romeo took another deep breath through the pipe. “We will be wed,” he said.
Marcuccio’s smile broadened even wider. “Wed? That is a statement you should be saving to try and convince her of your intents, not me.”
“We will be wed,” Romeo said again. “There is enchantment between us.”
“Yes, Othmen enchantment,” said Marcuccio.
Romeo shook his head. “I have it all planned out. We will disguise ourselves as two lesser gentlemen, and make our way out of the city, convincing the city guard we are merchants or some such, and run away to live in some distant city such as Verona.”
“As two gentlemen?” Marcuccio asked.
“We only need to disguise ourselves to get out of the city.”
“I take it her parents don’t approve of the match. Indeed, I suspect her parents don’t have the slightest idea of the match.”
“No. I don’t think they’d approve.”
“Then who is she? My curiosity is aroused as much as your appetites for a woman are clearly aroused.”
But Romeo shook his head.
“Would I not know her?” Marcuccio asked, and then added, “In the most gentlemanly of ways, of course.”
“You know her,” said Romeo and looked around the room carefully.
“Then why not tell me her name?”
“It will do you no favours to know it,” said Romeo.
Now Marcuccio finally stopped jesting. “She’s married, then?”
“No.”
“Betrothed to another?”
Romeo shrugged.
Marcuccio rubbed his chin and thought hard and then his jaw dropped. “Oh no,” he said. “What is her first name? Just tell me the first name?”
“Giulietta,” said Romeo softly.
Marcuccio took hold of a pipe and drew in deeply, causing the water to bubble like a cauldron. “Dio mio!” he exclaimed finally, sending a puff of thick smoke out of his lips into the air between them. “You have a death wish. You will start a war between your houses. You will bring ruin to the city’s peace. You are mad.”
“We will be wed,” was all Romeo said.