A Rose by Any Other Name

By Jamie Lackey

Juliet is the perfect daughter to her cold parents. She's devoted to her magic studies, studious and serious, and she even spends her weekends at home.
If she's a little lonely, well, that hardly matters.
Romeo writes poems, collects fancy pens, makes wine, and is, according to everyone who cares about him, a romantic disaster. He does his best to ignore their knowing looks and disregard their entirely-too-practical advice.
Juliet hates the upstart, uncivilized Montagues because they're her family's enemies. Romeo does his best not to think about the wretched and pompous Capulets because he doesn't need that kind of negativity in his life.
But then one morning they wake up in each other's bodies, and everything changes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jamie Lackey
• Release date: Jul 4, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005533342

Jamie Lackey

Jamie Lackey lives in Pittsburgh with her husband and their cat. She has had over 160 short stories published in places like Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Apex Magazine, and Escape Pod. Her debut novel, Left-Hand Gods, is available from Hadley Rille Books, and she’s created three successful crowdfunding campaigns to self-publish a novella and two flash fiction collections. She also has a novella and two short story collections available from Air and Nothingness Press. In addition to writing, she spends her time reading, playing tabletop RPGs, baking, and hiking. You can find her online at www.jamielackey.com.

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Copyright © 2021 Jamie Lackey

All rights reserved

The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

ISBN-13: 9798985021615

Cover design by: Jamie Lackey

Cover art: The Mirror by Sir Francis Bernard Dicksee

Printed in the United States of America

A Rose by Any Other Name

by Jamie Lackey

Juliet knew something was wrong the instant that she woke to the morning sun slanting into her eyes, which should have been impossible, as her bedroom faced the west, and she was certain that she had gone to sleep in her own bed last night.

It had finally happened.  The Montagues had finally kidnapped her. 

She cracked her eyes open, hoping to take in her surroundings before anyone noticed she was awake. 

But there was no one else in the room.  And if she had been kidnapped, then her captors were lax indeed. 

She was in a huge bed with soft sheets and a mountain of pillows.  A blue braided rug softened the tiled floor, and the morning sunlight and a soft breeze streamed in through a large, open bay window that looked out over a field of grapevines.  Beyond the fields, the mountains rose in the distance, stately and snow-topped. 

The room was spacious and tidy, with a desk tucked into the corner by the window and a wardrobe dominating the opposite wall.  High white ceilings arched overhead. 

This was not at all how Juliet had expected kidnapping would go. 

But if she hadn’t been kidnapped, how had she ended up here?  And where was she? 

She started to fight her way out of the nest of silken sheets, then froze, staring at her hand. 

It wasn’t her hand. 

For one thing, she wasn’t wearing her ring, which she never removed. 

For another, it was a man’s hand. 

She made a fist, and the hand moved just as she willed it to. 

She scrambled out of the bed and stood, the floor pushing farther away than it should, and looked down at her feet. 

She had seen naked men in art before, but never from this angle. 

Her nurse was going to murder her. 

She rushed to the wardrobe and yanked the door open, desperate for something to cover up with. 

She was confronted by a full-length mirror. 

The man whose body she was trapped in had the most beautiful face she’d ever seen.  High cheekbones and a firm chin, soulful eyes, silky hair that swept just-so over his brow.  Full lips that looked so soft that she found herself touching them. 

His body, now that the shock of his nudity had worn off, was also very pleasing.  She guessed he did quite a lot of walking, based on his calves and thighs.  His arms and chest, though not large, were well-defined. 

Juliet blinked, and the beautiful man in the mirror did, too. 

She grabbed a flowing green tunic, a pair of soft cotton pants, and what she hoped were appropriate male undergarments, and dressed. 

This was some magic, though none she was familiar with.  She had no way to tell if it was a curse or a spell, something gone awry or aimed at her specifically.  Perhaps it had been aimed at the beautiful man, and she was collateral damage.  She’d need to run some tests. 

She was still alone in the room.  Whatever was going on, her best bet was to learn all she could. 

She strode toward the desk, stumbling for a moment on her longer legs.  Everything on the desk clearly had a place, pens slotted into spaces carved for them, papers filed carefully, and what looked like a leather-bound journal placed carefully in the middle of a clear, uncluttered writing space. 

Surely it would give her some clues about the owner’s identity. 

The first handful of pages were set up as a planner, with events jotted on dates with times and places.  Today’s date—assuming she hadn’t lost or gained any time—had Mercutio’s show, written in large block letters and underlined three times, followed by a time and address in smaller print. 

The later pages were filled with notes on wine tastings and poems.

Juliet snorted.  Poetry.  How utterly useless.  Still, she wanted as much information as she could glean before she ventured out of the relative safety of this empty room. 

So she read.

The poetry wasn’t bad, actually. 

Some of it was rather good. 

There was one near the end about heartbreak and loneliness and moonlight that brought unexpected tears to her eyes. 

A faint knock sounded on the door.  Breakfast time, sir. 

Juliet took a deep breath.  Should she confess that she was not who she appeared to be?  Or should she try