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Romeo does not see Mercutio for a full fortnight after his own death.
Or rather, he does not speak to Mercutio for a full fortnight. He does see him, flitting around the outskirts of his and Juliet’s own pocket of heaven. Romeo has not yet discovered how to leave their little garden, but in truth he has not tried very hard; Juliet is even more luminous in the full light of God, and he can barely pull his eyes from her long enough to register their unwilling guest.
Eventually, however, Romeo wakes in their bed of moss and leaves to find Mercutio crouching a little ways away, staring at him with a look Romeo cannot read. Romeo slips his arms from where they lie around Juliet and follows Mercutio to a spot out of her earshot.
“What brings Romeo hither?” Mercutio asks, after a few long moments of silence. “How came you to this garden from the streets of our fair Verona?”
“Love,” Romeo answers, leaning back against a broad oak tree. “Love for the fair Juliet, whom you saw lying hence with me.”
“I confess I had wondered of her presence, lying in such intimacy with you.” Mercutio’s brow furrows, a look Romeo had never seen on him in life. “I remember my friend Romeo sick with love for a Capulet of a different name.”
“And so he was, until, as was predicted, one fairer and gentler than she took my heart, in exchange for her own.” Romeo bites his lip, and then goes on. “We were not two hours’ married when you took your leave of the mortal world.”
“Married!” Mercutio’s face lights up, the first traces of his old humor smoothing the wrinkles from his eyes. “What, married, with no Mercutio there to toast you?”
“With none at all to toast us, save her wet nurse and old Friar Laurence. ‘Twas a hurried affair, but none the less sacred for it.”
“Sacred indeed.” Mercutio tips his head back, looking at the wide expanse of unbroken blue sky. “This, I suppose, lay at the heart of your reluctance to draw swords with Tybalt?”
“It did; I was full to brim with love of Capulet, and it sufficed to touch Tybalt as well. But rest assured, my reluctance lingered not a second longer than you yourself did, and I sent him after you. Did you not see him? I sent your kinsman Paris as well, although I regret that sending to a much greater degree.”
“I have seen no one,” Mercutio admits. “I have been utterly alone.”
Romeo steps forward and puts a hand on Mercutio’s shoulder. “No longer, friend, if friend I may still call you.”
“Why should you not?”
“I have not forgotten that it was my doing, my untimely intervention that stripped you of life. Is this not the reason you have refrained from speaking to me for so long? I have seen you, out of the corner of my eye.”
Mercutio sighs and meets Romeo’s eyes for the first time. “I confess it, yes. My anger towards you took long to abate.” He hesitates. “And I fear it was my dying curse that stripped you of yours, and your wife too.”
“Your curse was justly laid.” Romeo tightens his hand on Mercutio’s shoulder. “I was in the wrong, friend, and you paid the price for it.”
“And your intervention was well-meant.” Mercutio lifts his hand to mirror Romeo’s grip on his shoulder. “Let us call ourselves even, then, and friends indeed.”
Romeo pulls him into an embrace, clapping his back and squeezing. Mercutio holds tight for a moment, and then releases his grip. “Come,” he says, the solemnity of his face giving way to a familiar grin. “I must hear the details of your courtship and marriage, friend of mine, and how love led you to such an end.”
“I confess I do not know all of it,” Romeo says, leading him back to where Juliet is now blinking awake. “The tale shall need two tellers.”
And tell the tale they do, Juliet filling in the gaps that Romeo had not had the heart to ask about, and he doing the same for her. The sun sets by the end of it, and Mercutio falls back into the grass. He sighs, staring up at the stars. “A tragic tale indeed. And poor Benvolio is left alone. He will not do well in solitude, I fear.”
“He will join us one day, and your cousin the Prince too, and all we hold dear,” Romeo says. “All will be well in this world, as it could not be in the last.”
“Amen,” whispers Juliet. Her eyes are red-rimmed from the news of Paris’ death, and the recounting of Tybalt’s, but she holds Romeo’s hand tightly and leans her head against his shoulder.
They are quiet for another moment, and then Mercutio stands. “Tis quite the lullaby you have both sung me, and I find my eyelids drooping. This field is fair for sleeping, friends, so with your permission I will not return to my cold courtyard, but take myself off a ways and rest here.” His words are light, but his face is grim, the smile not as congruent across his features as it had once been.
“Of course, and welcome,” Juliet says, holding out a hand to him. He bends, presses a kiss to her knuckles, and trips away. “There is something of the melancholy about him, more than I expected from his reputation,” she murmurs, when he is out of earshot.
“Dying men’s words carry great power,” Romeo answers. “He has become a grave man. In time, it may lighten, and he will laugh again as he once did. Perhaps when Benvolio comes.”
“I know not whether to pray for that day to come swiftly or late,” Juliet says, laying down herself and opening her arms to Romeo.
“Nor I.” He settles himself down, head on her shoulder. “But it will come, and we will face it together.”