so so silly this is based off/inspired by an actual real life conversation i had

tw again: mention of rape

Everything falls away the second she catches a glimpse of Rudolphus. The people, the laughter, the music, the entire room. Some invisible force has her in its fist and tears her from reality, back to the last place she'd ever want to be. And then Rudolphus is on her again, pressed too close, touching her in too many places. And that horrid feeling of not even being able to think resurfaces, once again her mind is a loop of leave, leave, leave.

Juliet isn't in her body as her feet rush her towards the hall, away from the crowd, away from him. She doesn't feel the bodies of the people she runs into, doesn't hear their angry complaints to watch where she's going.

"Juliet!"

The world is still coming in and out of focus and her mind becomes more frantic: leave, leave, leave, leave, leave.

A hand clamped on her wrist stops her mid stride and abruptly forces her back into reality.

"Stop! Stop, don't bloody touch me!" Juliet wrenches her hand free and clutches it to her chest, wrist almost burning with the remnants of his touch.

"Sorry, I'm sorry..." Rudolphus stands there dumbly and looks anything but sorry as the silence curdles between them.

"Juliet... I'm sorry about..." he brings his hand up to his neck for a second, is he bloody nervous?, "I'm sorry about this summer. I shouldn't have- I handled everything badly. I was stupid and I'm sorry."

And Juliet can't help it; she bursts out laughing. Ear splitting grin on her face and laughter that leaves her breathless for a very different reason than a couple seconds ago. Is he serious? Is he bloody serious?

"Are you laughing at me? Juliet, I'm trying to genuinely apologize, I don't understand. I know this is out of the blue, but- I'm sorry" He sounds even less sorry now, if that's possible, and anger is seeping into his voice. 

The absolute ridiculousness of the situation that caused Juliet to laugh is wearing off, his anger lighting a spark on the dry hay of her rage, and all her questions she thought she'd never get an answer to are surfacing once again.

"Why? Why, Rudolphus?"

"Why am I apologizing...?" She wants to slap that stupid confused look right off his face.

"Why did you do it?"

"I just- I really did like you. I liked you all of my last year. I just- I know I didn't handle it correctly but I did it because I liked you." He looks almost sheepish, embarrassed. Juliet feels sick. So sick she can barely form a sentence.

"Oh," and then she speaks without thinking, "that's a shit explanation."

"I know, I know. I just- look, I was really dumb, a right wanker. I screwed up, ok?" He pauses as if trying to gauge from Juliet's face if he's "apologized" enough—he hasn't. "I wish it had gone better, but it didn't, and that's my fault. I'm so, so sorry."

"You're just repeating the same shit over and over." Juliet's on the verge of laughter again, how could she ever have thought this might amount to a genuine apology. "Do you even know what you really did wrong? What are you apologizing to me for?" The second the words are out of her mouth they feel too bold, but Rudolphus doesn't seem to notice.

"I just- I did things while drunk and I feel like I made it seem like I only did them because I was drunk. And I- it's just been bothering me how I treated you and I feel bad for that. I apologize from the bottom of my heart." He looks like an actor about to be boo-ed off stage for the insincerity in the performance. Bottom of his heart? Who does he think he is? And what the hell does he mean? He was in no way as drunk as I was. Does he truly not know what he's done?

"That's... not what I wanted an apology for."

"Oh." Juliet can almost see the tiny cogs in his tiny brain working overtime to scramble for another half assed apology. "What... what did you want one for? It's definitely my fault, I already know that."

It is your bloody fault, you absolute piece of shit.

And now that she has her chance—Juliet can't say it. She still can't say the word that's been bouncing around in her skull for months but has never once left her lips. Juliet has two paths available: to speak now or forever hold her peace. And fuck holding her peace.

"I... You..." Her mouth is dry and her hands are shaking and everything is wrong again. "I feel like you just... kept trying stuff even when- even after I said I don't know and leaned away and was- I was too drunk." She can't look him in the eyes as she says it, they're firmly glued to the floor and her hands are frantically wringing her sleeves.

"Shit, Juliet I- Merlin. I'm sorry you feel that way." And there it is. Feel. Fucking feel. He has no goddamn idea what she feels—has felt for the past months. "I was just- I was also really fucked up that night, so... I wasn't in the right place to make good decisions. I'm sorry, that's- that makes me feel horrible." You feel horrible? What do you think I bloody feel like?

Juliet's throat is dry and closed up and couldn't squeeze words out even if she tried. Because again it's all just so wrong. It's a sorry, but it's not an apology. It's excuses. It's an acknowledgment but it's really not.

"Um... If there's anything, anything at all I could do? To make it up to-"

A choked laugh, "there's not."

"Yeah, um... look, I'm sorry. It was stupid, I was stupid. We were just drunk, I'm sorry you feel like it ended so badly." Fucking feel again.

"It wasn't stupid. It was a bad thing, Rudolphus." She can almost see the defensiveness come to life and pull shutters across his face.

"Juliet. I was drunk. You were drunk. Yeah it was wrong but- you can't hold me accountable for what I did that night. I'm sorry, what more do you want?"

And Juliet has to leave, she has to get out, because that vase is looking like it belongs cracked over his head and that would never end well for her. And so she does the only thing that's been a reliable coping mechanism all those years: lie and leave.

"Nothing, yeah. Thanks for the apology. We can- let's just forget this." And then she's gone and the pent up emotions find escape as tears and the bile is still creeping up her throat.

Juliet wishes so desperately she'd said what she'd meant.

Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck off and die. I hope you're never happy again. I hope you never come within a mile radius of a girl again. I hope you're miserable. I hope you're as bothered by this as me. I hope you know you're a bad person who did a bad thing and it eats you alive.

She should've screamed it in his face until the words pounded their way through his thick skull and settled into his brain and rotted like everything rotted within her.

She should've hit him. Kicked, slapped, anything. For all the pain he caused her, why shouldn't she be allowed to hurt him. Juliet wished she'd left as many scars on him as he'd left within her.

It burns that she was raised to be polite over honest. A people pleaser over taking care of herself. He deserves everything she wants to do to him and worse.