ᯓ★ Rebel Girl, you are the queen of my world!
Two girls run away from their problems. One endures, one withers ft. Ramona Moore and Juliet Kelly + Darrel Curtis for like two seconds
wc: 1.5k
Warnings: mentions of murder, not in detail but still. Internalised homophobia that lowkey becomes externalised.
They had been sitting there for an hour, maybe two, when quiet sobs starting ringing through the grass. It ticks Ramona off for a fraction of a second. She gets Ramona caught up in a murder she commited and now she's crying?
She knows it unfair to Juli even as she thinks it. That bastard deserved what he got. If Juli didn't do it than Ramona would've in a heartbeat.
It stirs up this new anger inside she doesn't know quite what to do with. So instead she goes over to Juli and starts whispering. "Hey, Jules. Don't cry. It'll be okay. I'll figure something out for us, alright?"
Juliet only sobs louder and more insistent. "No, Mona! Nothing's goin' to be alright! I murdered a boy! I dragged you into all this and you're still out here tryin' to comfort me."
Juliet looks up at her with eyes, red rimmed and glossy. Oh, Ramona hates when she looks like that. All sad. "Glory, Ramona. You're an angel. What could I have done to get blessed with you?"
Nobody had ever referred to Ramona as an angel or a blessing before. She was a brat and a troublemaker. She was troublesome and brash and honest and everything she knew people hated in a girl. "You don't mean that, Jules. Out of the two of us, you're the angel. You're behaved, you're smart, you're beautiful. You're perfect."
Juli laughs, not with any mirth or joy. A dead laugh, a hollow one. "Yet I'm the murderer and you're not. Funny how that spins out, huh? Go to sleep, Ramona. We probably won't get much from here on."
Ramona wants to keep arguing, because when doesn't she? But her throat chokes on her words and her unshed tears. So she turns away and they don't speak until morning.
Ramona wakes up first and she groans. Juliet slept like damn horse, she'd probably have to roll her off a cliff to wake her. She does the only logical thing and shakes her like she's trying to empty a bag or something.
Juliet swats at her like a fly. "Gee, way to wake a girl up easy!"
Ramona wants to laugh, but she can't enough energy for it. She cracks a grin instead. "We gotta get movin'. Probably not wise to stay in all one place."
A bit of tension enters Juli's shoulders. Ramona supposes she's remembering they're fugitives and not deciding to have a sleepover in the grass for kicks.
Ramona wants to think that too, just for a little bit. Maybe in some other universe her and Juli just got distracted and fell asleep in the field. They'd walk their way back home with their tails tucked between their legs. They'd be in a world of trouble too, probably practical house arrest.
It makes Ramona more bitter than it does hopeful, because they are in a world of trouble and they'll have much wore than house arrest if they're caught.
Ramona stands up with a huff. "Besides, I can't spend another night in the grass. If I get back problems at age fifteen because of this I'll never forgive you."
Juliet laughs, a real one this time. She hoists herself up as well and they start to walk together.
They find themselves this abandoned house on the way. It has rats everywhere and she suspects there's a very good reason it's abandoned. Beggars can't really be choosers though. So she makes peace with it.
Her and Jules huddle up to eachother when they sleep, to fight off the cold and because both of them get nasty nightmares if they don't. Ramona gets a food supply for them with her emergency money. She gets them both a small blade. Despite the fact Juliet is to the one with a murder on her back, Ramona thinks she might be more willing to use it then Jules ever will
"Mona, I've been thinkin'." Juliet starts off. Ramona groans dramatically because nobody starts off anything she'll enjoy with that.
Juliet powers on, because after years of them together she's gotten quite used to it. "You know that book we read together last year? About that girl who fakes being a boy to be a soldier in the war?"
It was a good book. Ramona kind of wishes she could read it right now. "Yeah, and she gets this sword and..." Ramona pauses. Glory. "You're not thinkin'...?"
"It would hide our identities, we could pretend to be boys for a while, lay low. And maybe in a couple years, once nobody knows what we look like anymore...we could be girls again or somethin'!" Juliet explains.
And Ramona knows the plan is half-baked and she knows it probably won't work the way they want. But she wants to be able to live normal again. She wants to feel the sun on her face without worry.
So, Ramona picks up her blade. "I'll cut your hair first."
Ramona accidently gives Juliet some mediocre looking bangs. She's ninety-percent sure Juliet cut her hair way shorter than she instructed as revenge, but she can't prove anything.
Ramona doesn't look half bad as a boy, she can live like this. Juliet doesn't look bad either, is what she observes as they sit outside on the grass again.
Juliet always been beautiful. In that natural sort of way that Ramona could never pull off. But as a boy she feels more real, not because she's gotten any less handsome. It just...feels more alright to look at her this way.
Jules looks right back at her. The sun hits her just right and her hair and eyes practically glow. The blonde and the blue complimenting eachother perfectly. This feels like the moment that something big would happen. The boy would kiss the girl and they'd run off into the sunset.
Juliet seems to think so too. She leans in a gives a short kiss which goes just as quickly as it came.
Ramona looks at her in shock. It feels like the world pauses and it's jus them looking at eachother. Then she remembers what's happening, and who they are.
Jules gets up the same time she does, but Ramona senses she ran a bit quicker.
They don't speak for what feels like forever. They just eat and think away from eachother. Ramona is angry. So, so, angry. Sure, she'd thought about kissing Juliet before, but she never would have done it! She wouldn't give Juli that false hope. She sure as hell wouldn't make it as weird and strained as it is right now!
She still wants to talk to Juliet desperately. This might be the longest in years they've gone without speaking and Ramona feels like she's lost a limb.
When Juliet does approach her, she doesn't act like nothing happened like Ramona was secretly hoping she would. "Why aren't we speaking, Mona?"
This might be the first time in her life she's been this angry at Juliet about anything. "Because you made it weird, Jules!"
Juliet looks angry as well, she can feel the fight that's undoubtly about to ensue. "No, you did! We could be speaking right now, Mona! But you don't want to and for why?!"
Ramona can feel herself tearing up. "Because we couldn't be together even if you wanted! It's not right, Jules! You've just—"
Juliet interrupts her. "Killing Michael wasn't right, but it happened and honestly... maybe it should've! Who cares what other people think is right or wrong? Certainly not you! When did you become such a coward, Ramona?"
Ramona sobs and catches it with her fury. "...well, if I'm such a coward then I'll just leave!"
Ramona storms out and Juliet doesn't try to stop her. She just shouts something at Ramona's back and storms the opposite direction.
She's in Oklahoma by the time she reaches a beacon of hope. She's sobbed more than she would care to admit. She shouldn't of left Jules. She was right. Ramona is a coward.
There's a guy in Tulsa who keeps his door open, for his friends. But she thinks she could make deal with him...maybe.
She opens the door and hopes this is the right house because she can't deal with the police right now. A guy walks out, and he looks like he traversed hell thrice and then had to do hard labour for ten hours.
"Uhm...a little birdie tells me you let people sleep on the couch sometimes..?" She tries, she kind of feels bad bothering the guy, but she's probably considered a person in need. So.
"Kid, I really don't—"
"I can help around the house! And I'm really well-behaved, honest! I won't be a bother, really!" She practically begs, because she might just have to accept her fate if this guy bails on her.
The guy lets out a long suffering sigh. "Okay, okay. But if you bother anyone I will kick you out. Who are you, anyway?"
Well, she couldn't exactly say her name was Ramona. People in Tulsa were of the belief she was a boy.
"For never was a story of more woe than this of Juliet and her Romeo."
"People call me Romeo...uh, sir?"
