1.2 | blood in the water [zodiac fic.]

episode 01. mourning juliet hawkins

EPISODE 01 / blood in the water

MOURNING JULIET HAWKINS

JULIET WAS AN AMETHYST GODDESS with sugary plum saccharine lips, burnt vermilion skies dripping down her wicked salty tongue that rolled off silken threads of apricot lies frictionlessly, honeysuckle curls catching the lush sun in their gentle stagnancy and electric amber eyes with a never ending flame.

And according to Shuang, Goddesses like her are unbreakable. If she knew anyone death couldn't touch, it was her.

Yet here she was, at Juliet Hawkins' funeral.

She wondered what thoughts assaulted the mind of the dead girl when she was not-so-dead and alive and breathing, grasping at the thin wire of life before loosing her grip forever.

How did she react as death wrapped her cold, crooked fingers around her neck?

Did she cry for help? Did she pray to the God she never believed in before? Did she beg for her murderer to let her live? Or perhaps her words got all tangled up in her throat and she couldn't utter another word? Shuang wanted to know it all.

Juliet had always been different in an intimidating kind of way. Whenever she passed through a sea of people in a hallway, everyone would move a quarter away from her. She didn't have to push through the crowd like Shuang.

What was so different about her? Why did everyone stare at her as she passed by? Why was she so special? But then again, Shuang was not in the place to ask these questions when she herself couldn't take her eyes off her. Such was the Juliet effect.

Whenever Shuang looks back and thinks about Juliet, she is forced to paint her in some sort of divine light, something like a crestfallen summer afternoon on rainy sundays or probably something crimson sinking its teeth in the feeble heart. Yes, the latter. It suited Juliet's enigmatic aura more. After all, she was like redolent wine, wilting leaves with aching cinnamon veins and heedless catastrophes. Everything flamboyant. Everything Juliet.

Her death for Shuang was a proof that the Juliet Hawkins they knew was nothing more than a facade, concealing the dead girl from the lake.

It felt weird talking about her in past tense. Someone who was so fresh and full of life not so long ago now a calloused tragedy.

The world however, loves to dwell on those. Shuang is sure that even in her death, Juliet would still be remembered and loved. That her grave would not be dust and debris. That there would always be bouquets of chrysanthemums, hydrangea and hyacinths for her.

A soft, unintentional sigh escaped her lips as she brought back her attention to Juliet's parents.

Physically, the Hawkin's daughters' resembled them in every way possible but there was this air around their parents that made them unapproachable.