The priest and me

Chapter 1: The priest and me Rumors of the famous new priest William West were everywhere. He had arrived as the new father, of the Solstice of the Virgin cathedral where all the aspiring nuns were. He was, so to speak, the director of the school for aspiring nuns. I had heard many comments about him, that he was a very devout man and used to spiritual things, that is why he was famous, (although I had not heard anything about him until now), with great physical attractiveness, others said that he was a bit scary. his presence and that it caused fear, that his gray eyes seemed to consume your soul. I couldn't confirm anything about it because I hadn't seen it, I had had to go out to my parents' house for a week for a relative's funeral, but when I returned was when it all started. My life was never the same when I met him that night. ************* We were minutes away from starting Sunday night mass, almost all the seats were full, as they almost always are every Sunday, but everyone was waiting for the new Father William West to come out. "Celeste," said the Mother Superior, "come with me." I followed her without refuting, the mother superior was in charge of all the aspiring nuns like me, she had a lot of respect for her, I always liked that she took me into account for everything; I was almost her right hand and she saw a great future in me as the next nun and possible mother superior. I aspired to one day instruct other women to follow this path. We left the main hall where the mass was and entered the hallway of the main offices, entering the mother superior's private office, she took three long metal tubes and handed them to me, I took them confused. "I need you to take this up to the auditorium and leave these tubes there, Brother Richard needs them there to start moving forward with the renovations in the morning." "Now?" I murmured, mass was supposed to start and I wanted to see Father William that everyone was talking about, plus I was just imagining how exhausting it would be to climb the 7 floors carrying this. "Yes, do it quickly so you can be there before the mass starts," she said and without further explanation she left. I let out a sigh. That was the bad thing about being the right hand in everything. Of course, always when there was mass it was a complete stress and now that they were building an auditorium on the 7th floor the stress tripled. I went out carrying the tubes towards the stairs, going up step by step trying not to drop them, they were heavy, when I was on the 3rd floor I already felt that I couldn't even bear my soul and I decided to rest, when I reached the top I turned the tubes over to place them in the floor, but I didn't realize that someone was coming towards the stairs and I hit him on the head that knocked him to the ground. "Sorry, sorry, are you okay?" I said, finishing putting the tubes aside and I approached the body lying on the floor completely unconscious. But that was not the worst. I put a hand to my mouth when I saw the fine and delicate clothing he was wearing, it was a chasuble, which meant that I had murdered Father William West. ...Damn it, damn it. ...No, stop it, I’m not supposed to curse. I groaned. But why did these things have to happen to me? Now what was I going to do? They were going to expel me for murdering him. «Oh no». I had to think clearly, I approached, kneeling next to his body, placing a finger under his sharp nose, I could feel the air coming out, his breathing was slow, but the important thing was that he was breathing. I put my ear to his chest, underneath all that fabric I could hear something of his heartbeat. He was alive. What a relief. "Father."I murmured and started slapping his cheeks to see if he would react but he didn't do anything. I needed him to do something. "Father William," I insisted, "wake up!" He didn't do it, he didn't wake up and I slapped him harder and harder. Suddenly I heard footsteps approaching going up the stairs, I panicked, the father's body had to disappear somewhere. «God». ...I already sound like a serial killer talking about disappearing bodies. I grabbed him by the armpits and began to drag him hard, he was too heavy. I entered one of the offices that were open and closed the door, placing the father on the sofa, releasing an exhausted sigh. "Father..." I said in another useless attempt to wake him up, if I didn't wake him up now, they were going to come looking for him and I was going to get into serious trouble when they saw the mess I made. I got up and started hitting his chest with the palm of my hands as if it were CPR, but then I remembered that that was for revive people, uhm, although maybe... Yeah. Water. I looked around, I saw a vase with flowers on the desk, I quickly went to it and took out the flowers, taking the jug of water and pouring it on the father. Suddenly, Father William opened his eyes, sitting on the sofa, starting to cough, reacting, I screamed, leaning back from shock and slipping on the water that had fallen on the floor, falling on my butt. He ran a hand over his face removing the excess water and then it was the first time I was aware of his face, I mean I was so worried about him waking up that I hadn't noticed how attractive he was, thick dark eyebrows, jaw square, full lips with a perfect shape, and abundant eyelashes framing enigmatic gray eyes. Wow. As an aspiring nun we usually became indifferent to men or his beauty, but he was something amazing, because never in my life had I seen someone so dazzling that it took my breath away. Now I could understand why they gossiped so much about Father William West, it was... impressive. He looked around as if he didn't know where he was and then focused his gray eyes on me and my whole world went away feeling like I was being trespassed and I couldn't remember how to react. I had never felt so intimidated by anything in my life, much less anyone, but here I was, shaking and my entire face turning red. Father William got up from the couch and approached me at a slow pace. I swallowed heavily and reacted by getting up from the floor. I didn't know if he was upset or not, but he surely wanted an explanation of what had happened here. "Father, I'm sorry," I began to say, "it's... it's that I accidentally hit you with some metal pipes because I didn't see it and you fell and didn't react, and I had to pour water on you, I... you're still here. Uhm, time to go back to mass." He stopped a safe distance from me and frowned at me. If looks could kill... "Does the blow hurt?" I continued saying. He didn't answer me, he continued looking at me in that frivolous way. I swallowed heavily. "You can speak?" I asked without understanding if it was deafness or something like that. "Of course I can talk, you have me stunned with so much talk." He said finally, his voice deep and intimidating. I lowered my head, my hands shaking. "I’m so sorry, father." I whispered. "An apology doesn't take away your ineptitude." he continued. I swallowed again, I knew I had done wrong but I was surprised that he responded in this irritable way. «Uhg». I took a deep breath even without looking up. "I know, I'm sorry..." I started to say but he interrupted me saying: "Just don't come near me again, Idiot." I clenched my jaw, I knew I had done wrong, but the father's attitude was quite angry, not that of someone filled with divine love. I looked up and met his gray eyes again, I felt a strange pressure in my chest without knowing why, my heart beating uncontrollably as if something strange was happening around us, as if suddenly the environment became tiny and brought us closer. The father took a step towards me and I stopped breathing, but then he seemed to react by taking two steps back and then he turned around leaving the office. I let out the air I was holding. But... what had happened? I could not stop shaking. I walked to the couch recovering from everything that had happened. What a bad first impression, I would have to make sure I disappeared from his sight for the rest of his stay here or I risked bothering him again and being kicked out of my biggest dream of being a nun. But confusing fate had other plans for me.