was my choice to give up everything, but this time I need something. I need to obey my father for a while. Let me do this.”
“Let you? What kind of relationship do you imagine we have?” He yanked on the hood of his sweatshirt, but didn’t go. “Do what you want.”
“Like you? You let yourself be manipulated by responsibility and by your mother. You might hem and haw, even break from what’s expected once in a while, but you always come back to what you have to do. You always end up agreeing to what your mother wants.”
“Not anymore,” he said, his fists clenching and unclenching. Then he touched his pocket, where I could only assume he was keeping the gun I’d seen earlier.
I didn’t want to think about it, so I refocused on our fight. “Well, she still controls me. And if I’m with you, she always will. She will be the wedge between us forever. How long can we stand up to that? And at what point will your responsibilities come between us?”
“It’ll be different when I’m in charge.”
“When will that be? Claudius is young enough that he could be in power for twenty years, easy. Are we going to sneak around until then? This is crazy. We should just—” I stopped myself and stood frozen but for the rise and fall of my chest as irregular breaths escaped. I had thought it but couldn’t bring myself to say it. Couldn’t think about the pain I would cause him. Couldn’t think of what it would mean for me. And I loved him. How could I say it if I loved him?
“What?” he asked.
Drawing strength from the core of my being, I forced out, “End it now. Before it gets even harder.” Pressure on my lungs ceased my ability to say more. I wanted to take back what I’d just said and hold him. I wanted to push him out the door and start a new life for myself.
He stared at me. Only the traffic outside filled the silence. He pulled his hood lower on his forehead and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Is that what you want?”
“Yes,” I said. His face fell, and my stomach contracted. “No,” I whispered. I had thought that once I said it, it would be real and done and I would feel better. But it only made me more confused. All strength left my legs and I sank against my desk. “I don’t know.”
He grabbed the magazines I had left on the floor and threw them across the room before racing out. He forgot his sneakers but didn’t bother to come back for them. I sat in misery, watching the empty doorway, hoping he would return and hoping he wouldn’t.
That night, my father didn’t come speak to me, which was actually worse than if he had yelled. I spent the balance of the afternoon and evening worrying about Hamlet, and feeling both sorry and relieved that we had broken up. I waited for my father to lecture me, to share allegories and sayings meant to defend his point of view, and to have him remind me for the umpteenth time about the public nature of our private lives. I would almost have welcomed being reprimanded over what did happen. I had given up on dinner, which had grown cold and clotted-looking, and sat on the couch watching the television absently when he entered. He looked around to see if I was alone, sighed, and walked to his room, shutting the door behind him.
My insides roiled. If my father wouldn’t even give me the chance to tell him that I’d finally done what he’d asked, then what the hell was the point of having broken Hamlet’s heart? And my own. But maybe I had actually been looking for an excuse to end things. Hamlet was scaring me. Talk of murder and suicide and ghosts was too much, and I knew if I stayed close to him, I’d get sucked further into his plans. And that thought scared me more than trying to come up with a Hamlet-less identity. Completely wrung out, I went to my room.
Francisco: By cutting off communication with Hamlet, you intentionally drove him deeper into madness.
Ophelia: Is that a question?
Francisco: Yeah, smartmouth, it is.
Ophelia: You’re wondering if that was my plan? (pause) I felt terrible about it, but my father asked me to.
Francisco: He also asked you not to date Hamlet from the outset.
Ophelia: I tried to be a good