Here's the first look at the assignment. They pick parts and do a read through!

DISCLAIMER: Don't own the characters, just the story.

….

As the day slowly came to an end, I was still left to face my last class of the day: Drama. To be honest, wasn't all that excited for it, either. You know, with the whole 'Will's my partner' thing. Yeah.

But, I managed to drag my feet along the way until I reached the theatre, sighing as I pulled open the door and found my spot closer to the back next to Leo who was my only friend in this entire class of fuckboys and weirdos.

It wasn't long until everyone started to pile into the class, sitting and chatting with people like they haven't seen them in two years. Fuck, you saw them like a few minutes ago, calm your shit.

Leo looked more on edge then normal, his leg jittering restlessly. He shook his hands on his knee, wiping the sweat off of them on his pant legs.

"Dude, clam down," I tried to get his attention, placing my hand on his shoulder.

"Sorry, it's just…"

"Yeah, I get it. It's your first full day of working with Callie, but if you keep doing that, she'll think you're even more of a freak than already."

"Really," he looked at me and spoke softly, eyes wide.

"Yeah, you just have to at least seem calm. Fake it until you make it, huh?"

"Yeah, you're right," Leo breathed out, a sigh escaping his lips.

"Alright, tiny Satans, sit down and shut up while I take attendance," the teacher yelled, sighing.

After a few moments of her looking around for people, she stepped out from behind her computer that she had on the usual podium. She walked in front of the class and clapped her hands to signal for the class's attention.

"Alright, so as you guys know, in two weeks your term project must be completed and presented in front of the class. You will have these days in class to work on them and get any extra work you may have overdue handed in. You may get with your partner and begin. If you were absent or don't know what to do, come see me."

Everyone started to get up and walk around at different paces, some running to hug their partner, some didn't even move; was part of the latter. But after a few moments of pretending I wasn't in that class and just a ghost looking in on the boring world, I got up and pushed a nervous, shaking Leo in front of me down the stairs.

When we reached the bottom, I noticed the group of friends that I tried my hardest to avoid splitting up, heading in different directions to meet up with partners or to find a good place to start. I had to kick Leo to get him moving, heading towards where a pissed off looking Callie stood, her arms crossed and brows furrowed.

I refused to move, forcing the ignorant blonde to have to come to me. When he made his way over to where I stood, he had his hands shoved in his pocket, a somewhat blank expression on his face.

"You wanna get the book or something?" he asked, gesturing with his thumb to the door that lead out to the library door a crossed the hall.

"Fine."

The two of us headed towards the library, heading straight for the literature section. We split up into different sections, going over book by book looking for the right one. I turned my head to the side, finger skimming gently over the spines of the books, searching for the right title.

When I reached the Shakespeare section, I crouched, eyes skimming slowly over the titles. Just as I found it and was about to pick one up, a hand had reached for the same one I had, brushing my hand ever so gently. My hand flinched back; my body following when I heard Will speak almost directly into my ear, slowly and quietly, sending chills racing down my spine.

"Found it," he spoke like ice, almost breathy, each word only lingering for a second longer than normal.

He grabbed the book before I could regain my balance, looking at me who was on the ground with a blank expression passing through his cloudless eyes. I scowled at him, pushing myself off of my butt, and grabbing the book, standing up, and brushing myself off as if there was dirt now scattered on my clothes.

We made our way over to the librarian's desk in silence, a scowl painted on my face the entire time, burning holes in the back of his head. When we got there, we checked out our books and headed to the theatre with me falling slightly behind, falling out of pace.

I couldn't explain it, but something felt weird, but I pushed it aside, flinging the closing door open to enter the theatre. We took a seat in the audience, closer to the back, but not as far as Leo and I usually go.

As we sat down, Will looked relaxed as he opened his book, running his hand over the cover beforehand, a smile pulling softly at his pale lips, eyes heavy. It was a weird thing to notice, but I guess there could be weirder things…

"Alright, so what is it again?"

"Act five, scene three," Will replied, some sort of emotion seeping through.

"Alright," I say, flipping through the well-used book to find the right page. When I reach the proper scene, I skim through it, looking over the lines. "Dude, this has like, four other people in it and it's, like, several pages long."

"We'll shorten it up, much like they did in the movies. We'll take" – he leaned over, his face mere inches from mine – I could feel his breath on my cheek and neck, sending shivers spiralling down my spine – and flip a few pages ahead, pointing to a single line that Juliet speaks – "that line and put it after the Romeo's death. Try and go original text as much as possible."

When he finished showing me the text, he took out a pencil and marked it with a star, turning the page again and marking one last line. He still sat close to me and I could feel his body heat radiating off of him.

"This line will be added, but we'll cut the line, 'Go, get thee hence, for I will not away' only because it's addressing Friar Laurence. So the two lines in a row that she has will be said instead."

"Hey, why are you marking this on my book. I am not playing a girl," I exclaimed, pushing him away, only slightly hesitant with the sudden touch.

"You want to play Romeo?" he asked, brows raised.

I almost replied, but I bit back my words, unsure of how to respond. I didn't want to play Romeo, but on the other hand I didn't want to play Juliet, either. All in all, I just didn't want to do this scene, or this play in general.

"Alright, so if you don't want to play Romeo, just be quiet, play dead, and let me do all the work."

It went silent where we sat; the only noise was that of the other students rehearsing their parts. I wanted to bite back, I really did, but what did I know? I knew shit about this kind of things. If he was willing to do all of the hard work, who was I to fight back and stomp on his dreams. I felt almost bad for what I said, but why? What had I done? I must have just been the way Will sounded like he wanted to bite me that got me riled up.

I debated on whether or not to speak again, but I was still confused. There was like, half a monologue before he even acknowledges Juliet as being 'dead', so where do we start?

"So, where does it start?" I asked skittishly.

He looked at me, nothing passing through his clear eyes. He raised his head to peak at my book, circling a line half way through the monologue with his pencil, putting a star beside it.

"There, that's where I'll come in. You'll be 'dead' already, so you won't have to worry about it."

"Okay," I said, dragging the word out and turning my head.

After a few more minutes of silence that had washed over us, I turn my head back to him and asked another question. I was really stretching it.

"So how are these practices going to go?"

"What do you mean?" he asked, turning his head to face me.

"Well, like you said, I won't be doing much but being dead, so…"

"Being it old English, most of it will be pronunciation and the small stage directions. A lot of memorization, really."

"Oh…" I didn't really want to prolong the conversation, getting at how I didn't want to even be near this guy in the first place.

"Alright, let's go through it once, see how it goes?"

I nodded my head with a bored expression. He took it as a yes and brought his book in front of him, settling it on the hand rest to face me. I could really have gone without that.

"O my love! My wife! Death, that hath suck'd the honey of thy breath, hath had no power yet upon thy beauty."

As he spoke, I don't know what came over me, but something abnormal swirled with in. His voice was smooth and heavy, never tripping up over any line, as if he was born to read and play this part. His lips formed in such weird shapes with every word he spoke, breath passing in and out of them when parted.

He continued to speak, but I wasn't listening; half because I wasn't paying attention, half because the words made no sense to me, but there was another small part of me that couldn't look away, the part of me that couldn't help but watch every small movement he made with his lips, the way the curled, the way they moved when he pronounced certain words.

"-from this world-wearied flesh. Eyes, look your last! Arms, take your last embrace! And, lips, O you the doors of breath," he paused, taking a deep breath, "seal with a righteous kiss." When he spoke the last words, he looked up and locked eyes with mine, unmoving. Then, after what felt like a life time, he continued on.

I almost missed my cue as he continued on, speaking several more lines after looking away. I rushed to turn the page, frantically looking for the words that were needed to be said.

"What's here? A cup, closed in my true love's hand? Poison, I see, h-hath been his… timeless end. O ch-churl…!" As I tried to speak, my words kept tripping, sounding pathetic compared to the way that Will had spoken just a few moments ago. If there was one thing I will admit, it is that he can read this stuff better than I can, but that's all.

After suffering a few more lines, getting to the last couple of lines, I realised that there was but another kiss that had to occur. I was not particularly fond of that idea in any sense of the word, but I decided that I would throw that thought away for now.

When the first read through was done, I was ready to get up and walk out of there and never come back, and I was half tempted to do just so. If I had to go over this every day for the next two weeks, I might just crawl into a hole and die. You know, if this assignment doesn't do it first.

Sorry for the crappy editing, but I'm trying my best. Thank you all for getting this far and sticking around, trust me, it'll get better.

So, I finally have a clear view on what I want to do with this story, major arcs and minor arcs. But I have a lot of room for minor arcs in any of you wanna see something go down.

So this story right now takes place around October, November-ish time and I don't seem to see much big emotional change until closer to May-June-ish, so hold on, I got some ideas.

As you can tell, I finally brought home my copy of Romeo and Juliet so I can right down some stuff. That's mainly the reason on why you haven't gotten it until now. You would have gotten it right away if I had.

After this R+J arc, there will be more Percy and Jason and the feels that will come with that. I'm not 100% sure if I want any real gags to happen during the performances such as actual kissing cause of what I have planned for later (!) so don't expect anything but angst for right now, and if you want to see anything angst-y go down, now is you time because I'm going to start giving them emotions soon.

For those three of you that follow X, this might seem like a weird update. Me posting this and not that. But I'm currently writing the entire play so that's going to be roughly 10 000 words long cuz I just started and I'm already at 4 000. So please hand on cuz it's all coming.

Thank you so much for sticking around and not dropping this story, it means the world to me. So much you don't even realise. I wish I could hug you all!

(On a fun note, I had my first bowl of Cheerios in eight years the other day! So that's great!)

I love the reviews, please keep them coming!

With shameless self-promotion, check out my other stories Side Friend and X.

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Kitty out!