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“No one needs to know” was Mercutio’s motto when it came to him and Benvolio. The older man would have rather died than people knowing he was queer with a male Montague.
No one needed to know they were in love. No one needed to know that Mercutio, a kinsman to the Prince himself, would rather lay in bed with a man than a woman.
Benvolio never dared to ask him why. Why would Mercutio rather have a reputation of being a libertine than being queer? Wasn’t Benvolio good enough to be known as his partner? Was Mercutio ashamed of him? Would have he preferred Romeo as lover instead of his lonely, short, good for nothing cousin?
Benvolio never distrusted Mercutio’s faithfulness or feelings for him but the young Montague had always been full of doubts about himself and Mercutio hiding their relationship didn’t help at all.
Rosaline, the ball, Juliet Capulet and Tybalt Capulet happened and no one ever got to know about them. Romeo and Juliet were the star-crossed lovers, not Benvolio and Mercutio.
*
“No one needs to know”. Benvolio whispered, clenching his fists as Mercutio’s coffin was lowered into the ground.
No one needed to know Benvolio had been forced to watch his only love being buried after getting murdered because of Romeo. No one needed to know Benvolio’s heart died along with Mercutio the day Tybalt Capulet stabbed his lover in front of him. No one needed to know it would be Benvolio’s last day on Earth.
And no one would probably care; he was a nobody, Romeo’s younger cousin, one of Mercutio’s friend. A friend, nothing more.
"Mercutio was probably right all along”, Benvolio thought with a smile as life was slowly leaving him and blood was sluggishly dripping on Mercutio’s tombstone. “No one needs to know about us, they don’t deserve to.”