"soon to be divorced couple obnoxiously painting the walls wacky colours every time the other paints over it" for rosvolio, if you'd be so kind
It starts with a can of 10-year-old orange paint.
Well, actually, it starts with a bright orange envelope on adark brown second-hand kitchen table. Mainly, the cream-colored papers encasedinside the envelope, but it all ends with the same outcome.
Orange envelope to orange walls. Divorce papers todistracting paint.
If she’s being honest with herself, which Rosaline tends tolike to be, the divorce papers don’t surprise her. They had a deal. Get marriedfor the taxes, distract their families from the fact that Romeo and Julieteloped, share insurance until Rosaline got a job that provided her with herown, stay married until they were secure enough to get a divorce.
Two years into their relationship, Rosaline is close tomaking managing editor at her newspaper, and from the last time she actuallyspoke to Benvolio, he was close to making partner.
So, they were close to reaching the end of their agreement.
Add on the fact that she hadn’t seen her husband in almost amonth made the papers even less surprising. The bright pink post it note on topof the envelope promises he will be home in a few days from a last minuteconference, so she decides to paint the walls orange to pass the time.
The paint can is ten years old, and according to her googlesearch, on its last legs. It was bought with her first ever paycheck, when shewas 15 and still living with her aunt and uncle. Rosaline promised herself thatthe first thing she was going to do when she moved out was paint her bedroomwalls orange.
Instead, she married a Montague for the taxes, moved into ahouse that his uncle payed for, and the paint can sat in the back of theirgarage.
She only has enough to paint two of the walls. The rest ofthe living room is baby blue, the color the house came with, and it clashesterribly with the orange. It’s quite possibly the ugliest orange Rosaline hasever seen in her life, but she can’t help but love it.
It’s extremely satisfying, seeing the paint that 15-year-oldher wanted finally up on a wall, even if she knows that she has to paint overit tomorrow.
In about two weeks, everything she has known for the past 2years of her life will probably be gone. But she doesn’t want to think aboutthat yet. Instead, she pours herself a glass of wine, collapses on her misplacedcouch, and takes about 100 pictures of her ugly orange walls.
Bright and obnoxious and slime colored green.
Rosaline drops the beige can of paint to the ground and juststares at the walls. Her orange was an act of teenage rebellion 10 years toolate, but this just seems like an act of defiance. They agreed to two weeks toget the house in order until the realtor would come. Once they put the house onthe market, they would sign the paper and then go their separate ways.
Painting the walls green wasn’t exactly a step in the rightdirection.
And maybe, because she’s feeling slightly petty herself, ormaybe because the green is just terrible enough that it gives her a headache,Rosaline grabs her keys and drives back to the hardware store she just left.
She picks the ugliest color purple they have, ignoring theodd look the cashier gives her.
They only had asingle can, so she can only paint 3 of the walls. With the rest of the paintshe writes. There’s a small grocery list, and the date the realtor is coming,but most of the wall is covered with her name.
It’s satisfying, in the same way painting the walls orangewas. She spent a lot of her life hating her name, hating the weight and historythat came with being a Capulet, but it’s who she is. And she’s lived in thishouse for two years of her life, and painting her name on the wall feels likeshe’s leaving her mark upon it.
Also, is covers up more of his terrible green paint with herown terrible purple paint, which makes her feel like she’s won an argument thatthey aren’t even having.
There’s a fresh pot of coffee and two drops of blood redpaint in the kitchen on Wednesday morning. She’s two sips into her coffee whenit hits her there hasn’t been a fresh pot of coffee waiting for her when shewoke up since Benvolio moved out without telling her.
It takes her another two sips to realize there’s paint inher kitchen which means, there’s paint in the living room.
Three of the walls are painted blood red, and Rosaline’s notsure, but it almost looks like the exact color of her lipstick the day they gotmarried. The light reflects oddly off the color, making the room look twice assmall and almost like a vampire’s lair.
The last wall is still a mix of green and purple, red wordsnow added into the mix. He added items to the grocery list. In the top corner,he wrote My Uncle thinks we’re due for ababy soon.
But the largest addition is to her name. He circled Capulet,and drew a line down to Montague (untilfurther notice).
It’s ridiculous enough to make her laugh. The only time shewas called Rosaline Montague is when Mercutio introduced them at their wedding.
It’s still early, and she has some time before she has toleave for work so she grabs one of the smaller paint brushes that Benvoliokeeps in the kitchen cabinet and adds some more red to the wall. She draws astick figure family in near his baby comment. She adds some butterflies becauseshe can, not because they are the only thing she knows she can paint well.
When she finally does have to get ready for work the wall iscovered in more streaky butterflies than she intended, and it makes the walllook like even more of a headache, but all the red paint is gone.
Rosaline finishes her coffee and tries her best to not thinkabout how nice it felt when she realized Benvolio was home.
It’s well past midnight when Rosaline gets home, exhaustedafter putting the finishing touches on her article, meaning, in less than 15hours, the realtor is coming to appraise the house, and their walls are stillthe color of blood.
But, there’s music coming from the living room, and Rosalineis almost certain she can smell pizza.
Three out of four walls are white. Benvolio glances up ather from where he’s pouring paint into a tray, and smiles. “Morning, Mrs.Montague.”
“Hi.” Rosaline finds her way to the pizza and falls next toit, not even bothering to grab a plate. There’s an open bottle of wine next tothe pizza, but not glasses, so she takes a sip right out of the bottle. Sheglances around the room, which almost looks like it could be put together,except for one wall. Her butterflies are still flying, and her name still takesup most of the wall, but what sticks out the most is the stick figure family.Which isn’t comprised of stick figures anymore.
The baby has curly hair and blue eyes, Benvolio is wearing arendition of his favorite tie, and Rosaline is holding a newspaper in her handreading that she’s the new editor in chief.
Once she finishes her pizza she pushes herself up and towardthe wall, right past where Benvolio is currently painting the walls beige.
“Why does our hypothetical child have blue eyes?”
Ben wanders next to her, paint roller still in his hand.“They’re my best feature.” He holds out his hand for the bottle and Rosalinepasses it to him.
The song changes to more upbeat, and Rosaline takes thebottle of wine back. “Pass me a roller, husband.”
They’ve never been good at being married. Logically, thatwas reserved for people who actually wanted to be married, or at least peoplewho could be friends. Two weeks before Benvolio proposed they were stillarguing over whatever could be argued about. They barely even counted asfriends when they officially said ‘I do.’
But, they were good at the other things. Like painting roomstogether, or buying furniture, or making grocery stops.
She had forgotten this, how easily they could fall intocomfortable silence around each other, and still get things done. They start onopposite walls, and inevitably meet in the middle. She splashes the last of herpaint on him, which almost results in an all out paint war, but she calls atruce and offers him the last bit of wine, resulting in the two of themcollapsing on the floor next to the couch, with three out of four wallsfinished.
It’s some ungodly hour in the morning, and Benvolio pullsout a second bottle of wine, and Rosaline is hit with the comfort of it all.Benvolio is telling her a story about Romeo and Mercutio, and he has a smile onhis face that could light up the entire world, and Rosaline realizes, she’senjoyed being married to him. What they have is a little bit messy and a lotbit complicated, but it’s theirs, and it’s safe and comfortable, and in a fewdays, it will all be gone.
“What?” Benvolio pauses, and takes the wine from her. “Whatare you staring at?”
She didn’t mean to stare, but here they are.
“I was just thinking.” Rosaline pauses for a moment, and shecan almost physically feel the moment end. “Why did you leave?” The words areout of her mouth before she can stop them, and they take Benvolio’s smile withthem.
“I, uh,” he runs his hand through his hair. “I think we bothneeded some space.”
“Ben.” She glares at him and takes the bottle back.
“I was becoming too comfortable, being married to you. And,the terms of the marriage were coming close to an end, so I needed some space.It wouldn’t really be fair of me to keep us married. Not when there is someoneout there who will actually make you happy.” He busies himself with the primer,not looking at her.
“Who said you don’t make me happy?”
Benvolio scoffs. “Escalus Prince came over for like twohours, and I never saw you smile like that.”
“Wait. Is this about Escalus?” Rosaline gently grabs his armso he’ll look at her.
“About Prince. No, come on Rosaline, this is about us.”
“You move out two days after he came over.”
Benvolio scrubs his hand over his face. “I was jealous okay!But I couldn’t tell you, couldn’t talk to you about it, because what would I say,hey, I know we’re only married for the taxes, but I don’t like the thought ofyou dating other people.”
“I never wanted to date other people.” Rosaline says, voicesoft. They’re standing close, close enough that she can see the flecks of painton his skin that he didn’t wash off.
“You don’t have to flatter me, Ros, we have like a weekleft.”
“I’m not trying to flatter you, Montague. I liked beingmarried to you too.”
Benvolio laughs. “Seems like were better at being marriedwhen we no longer are going to be married to each other, huh.”
“We do tend to do things backwards.” Rosaline says. And forsome reason, she tips herself forward, close enough to kiss. But, in the sameexact moment, Benvolio takes a step back toward to the remaining wall again.
“Why don’t we do that one in the morning?” She asks,suddenly feeling the effects of it being nearly 3 in the morning.
Benvolio looks back at her, and it must be the alcohol, buthe’s quite possibly the most beautiful man she’s ever seen. It’s only taken hertwo years to realize it.
“Yeah, we can get up early and do breakfast and then paintthe wall before the realtor comes.”
“Only if you make pancakes.” He says, putting the tops backon the paint cans.
He stops right before he passes her, and drops a kiss to hercheek. “Night, Mrs. Montague.” He makes it up the stairs before Rosaline canfully process when happened.
She makes pancakes, as promised. Even if he sleeps in late enoughthat she’s almost done with them by the time he wanders downstairs, freshlyshowered and all together to pretty for someone with less than 6 hours ofsleep.
“I honestly thought I was going to come down to eggs.” Hesays as he passes her to get to the coffee pot.
“Very funny, Montague.” She flips the last pancake and takesit to the table, planning out their day as she does. “So, after we eat, we haveto prime the wall, and then we can go around and make sure all of the room arein order, and then —“ She turns back toward the coffee pot where he should be,but he’s not there.
Well, he is, but he considerably shorter. And he has a limegreen ring pop in his hand.
“Just hear me out. Two years ago, I proposed to you in amotel parking lot with a ring pop from the vending machine. And for some crazyreason you said yes. For the past two years, we’ve been a mess. A good mess,but still a mess. We’re not conventional, by any means, and I know I’ve been ashit fake husband, but, we both said some things last night. Things that mademe realize that not everything about this was a mistake. Stop me now if I’mmaking a complete fool of myself.”
Rosaline just smiles at him, not sure what to say.
A look a relief washes over him, and he continues. “So, Iwas wondering, Rosaline Capulet, if you would do me the honor of staying marriedto me. But, maybe this time, trying it out for real.”
“Yeah, you know, staying together because we like eachother, not only for the taxes. Like we could go on dates, and hang out in thesame room, and maybe even kiss ea—“
She pulls him up from his knees and kisses him for real thistime, not like when they first got married. His hand slips around her waist andtugs her closer, her hands knotting themselves into his hair.
He smiles against her lips, and the butterflies she paintedon the wall fill her stomach, and she thinks, this is what it means to feelsafe.
He pulls back first, his hands disappearing from her skin,only to return with their wedding bands she had kept in their jewelry box sincethe honeymoon.
She rolls her eyes at him, and pulls his lips back to hers. “You’rean idiot.”
The ring slips over her finger, and he kisses her again, thecool metal of his ring sliding against her warm cheek. “Yes, but I’m yours.”
