JustaPan Untitled OneShot

    The church doors stayed shut. They kept prying eyes from peering in, and to invade on the people living within the walls. The young priest was shut out from the community. They said it was wrong for someone so young to step up into the footsteps of their previous spiritual leader. But it wasn't him, that he worried about behind these walls. It was the young purple haired girl who slept in the basement. She had fallen ill, and was abandoned and left with the young priest. He wasn't wanted, and neither was she.
    The wooden steps creaked as the young Father descended the steps, and looked in upon the sleeping girl. He approached her, and gently propped her head up, as he picked up the glass of water from her bedside.
    “Pandora, you need to drink some water.” He said softly, as the girl's eyes fluttered behind closed lids.
    He gently pressed the glass to her lips, and felt a small smile tug at his lips as she parted her own, and drank the clear liquid in the glass.
    Slowly her pale eyelids opened, and she stared up at the young Priest with dull purple eyes.
    “J-Justin?” She whispered softly. “What time is it? What day is it?” She asked. “How long have I been out?”
    “Hush. Hush, do not waste your strength to speak. You are still quite ill.” The young blond Priest smiled weakly down at her. “I have lost track of time as well, but it is only Monday. You have been asleep for three days now. Oh how I worried for you.”
    She could only nod weakly. He thought she was getting better, but the illness was eating away at her body, at her strength. She knew she was no better than she was when she first arrived at the church, and was put under the abandoned Priest's care.
    He gently rested her head against the pillow once more, and stood slowly. “Are you hungry?” He asked, as he looked down at her thin form.
    She shook her head, which caused his heart to sink, and he turned away from her. He couldn't hide the sadness in his blue eyes. That was the last thing she saw, before she drifted back into a painful slumber once again.
    Days had passed, and there was no sign of Pandora getting well. In fact, it seemed she was taking a turn for the worse. She couldn't hold down any food that Justin had managed to get her to eat, nor could she barely hold down water. The inevitable was coming, and Justin didn't want to accept it.
    He loved her. The day she had shown up on his doorstep, and he had taken her in, to care for her, he had fallen in love with her. He told her, as well as himself, everyday that she would get better, and when she did, they would live a wonderful, and happy life.
    But now, it seemed that was not to be. Justin sat in an office, only a room away from the larger room in the basement, and every night, he could hear her wheezing, and coughing. He always told her he was preparing a 'sermon' for the next Sunday, in which he only delivered to himself, and her if she was awake to hear him.
    But that was not what he would do when sitting in the office. He would close the door, and sit in the chair. He would bow his head over the desk, and grip his hair tightly in his fists, and he would cry. His prayers were going unanswered, and when he prayed and begged for a day of peace, and comfort for her, and he prayed for her to get better, she got worse.
    She was thinning even more. She couldn't hold anything down, and she would cough up blood. She could hardly move anymore, and when he assisted her in moving, she would wail in pain.
    He was angry. She was so young, she had a life ahead of her, and this illness was eating it all. Her dreams were shattered, and her only hope for the future was to survive through the night. When it became obvious that nothing could be done, Justin would wander to the main floor of the church as she slept during the day.
    The pain of her suffering became unbearable for him, and one day, he found himself opening the doors to the church for the first time. He wandered out into the forest behind the church, and gathered wood.
    He would tell her anymore that he was going upstairs to prepare for the next sermon, instead of retreating to his office, but she knew better.
    Everyday she could hear his slow footsteps on the stairs, as they creaked. She could hear his slow pace across the floor, to the doors of the church. She could hear the front doors open, and then the faint sound of a hammer pounding against wood.
    She knew what was happening, and she knew he was aware of the inevitable. When he returned down the stairs that evening, and tried to get her to eat, and drink, she confronted him.
    “J-Justin...” She muttered weakly. “I-I'm dying... Y-You know that... There... is nothing.. to keep trying for...”
    He was frozen by her words. He lowered the spoon into the bowl he held in his lap, and stared into the broth. It reflected his young face, that looked older due to stress and depression.
    “I.. I keep trying for you. To think you'll get better. I love you Pandora. I don't want you to go...” He said, as a tremble took over his body. Tears poured from his blue eyes, as he leaned over, and gently kissed her forehead. “I don't want you to go.” He repeated.
    “I love you too.” She whispered softly.
    Pandora died the following morning, and Justin was the only one to attend her funeral. He laid her peacefully in the casket that he had been building, especially for her. He made it as beautiful and as comfortable as he could.
    He sobbed like a child, as he closed the lid, and slowly lowered her casket into her grave. He had built a cross in which he carved her name into. He buried it at the head of her grave, and walked slowly back to the church. He collapsed at the head of the altar, and mourned for her alone.
    About a week went by, and Justin could no longer handle the loneliness without Pandora. Her presence seized to exist in the walls anymore, and he couldn't take it. He wandered to her grave, with a loaded pistol in his pocket. He laid on the ground, by her side, and pressed the barrel to his head.
    “I love you Pandora.”