He couldn't lie.

"Horrible," was his only answer, as he inclined his head slightly toward her. "Ino did what she could, but she can't heal bone."

"I thought I could avoid a fight," Romeo said ruefully. "Talk him into going back to his Hell."

"I'm sure you could top it if you thought," Romeo tried, then went quiet.

"He challenged me," he admitted, and it was clear he didn't mean that in the normal sense. "I was angry."

A hesitation, than he nodded. "He didn't just decide to tell me about beaches as a point of general interest," Romeo explained. "And my mentioning a letter was saying I knew what he meant and accepted. At home duels are announced in letters, by tradition."

"Then I would have died," Romeo said, rolling his shoulder back and out of her range. "I cannot fear death at the hand of Capulets, and I saw no need to involve others in my dispute. I already lost one friend to that."

"I didn't want to fight him, remember, I was the idiot who thought he might see reason," Romeo snarled back. "He drew on me before I even loaded my gun. He is the one who comes back from the grave to berate me for the mortal sins of going to a party and talking to a girl."

"And I don't know what words to use to explain it," he said, wishing he could get out of this bed. "I thought meeting him was for the best, I swear it."

"If I had told any of you, you would have made it your fight," he said sharply. "It's not, it's mine. No need for me to smear Capulet blood on anyone else's hands. I should die first."

His cheeks were flushing, the color very red against his still-pale skin. "I do trust you. This is nothing to do with that."

"I hoped to only talk, I thought fate might be on my side for once and he would see reason," Romeo explained, very, very patiently. "But I am not fool enough to trust him with the safety of my friends."

Would she hit a boy in his hospital bed?

Something like comprehension flashed through his eyes at the mention of Benvolio. He could imagine the phone call she described too easily, and somehow it cracked through his bravado. She had a case.

"What would you have done if I had told you?"

"That makes you, myself, and everyone else who has been in a room with him," Romeo said, after listening to her explanation. It was not entirely unreasonable, and he had to admit there were reasons most duels involved seconds.

"... I should have told you," he admitted quietly.

"I can't walk away. I can't give him that satisfaction."

Romeo had odd notions of honor at times.

Romeo winced; he had never wanted to make her so angry. Hadn't thought much about her at all, in fact, from the second he saw Tybalt, and he was starting to see why she seemed to be cursing at him in Japanese.

It occurred to him, bitterly, that he was a fine one to scold her for keeping secrets.

"I'm alive. He isn't, though he didn't know that," Romeo agreed. "If the situation is to arise again, I shall remember that at least. And hit me, if you want. I won't tell the nurses."

It wasn't much, but it was all he had to offer.