rite of penance
anonymous
August 5 2012, 08:46:33 UTC
The door of the confessional closes with a soft click, and in the semi-darkness and the expectant quiet Esmeralda takes her place, kneeling on the wooden plank before the window. The shutter rises, and the priest’s silhouette becomes visible against the thin muslin membrane that separates them. He takes a breath, and raises his hand to his forehead. “We begin in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”
She rustles her skirts, the movement just enough to create sound across the barrier - he will think she has signed along with him, though she would never. Still, that voice is instantly recognizable: the Justice of Paris, Judge Claude Frollo, so distinct in his precise tones and practiced contempt. Her smile is a cat’s smile. He is at her mercy now, though perhaps he believes otherwise.
He finishes his opening prayer, the quality of his silence shifting. Is he irritated? Bored? Does he maybe expect another merchant with weighted scales, a penitent who carries guilt over his inability to give more generously to the coffers?
She gives him the ritual words he expects, honeying her voice with innocence:
“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.”
“My child, we have all of us fallen short of the glory of The Lord. Tell me your sins, that you may be given absolution.”
She licks her lips and shifts on her knees, breathing in the closeness of the air, the comforting scent of worn wood. “I have - urges, Father,” she says.
A pause. “Go on.”
She makes her voice wistful. It is difficult. “I am a single woman, Father, with no family to offer me for a bride. I know that - to lust - “ and here, here it’s an easy thing, to drop her voice to a whisper, to pretend at shame - “is a sin, but I see so many women whose rounded bellies announce their pleasures to the world, and I think, and I wonder -“
Esmeralda hears Frollo’s sharp breath. She wonders about priests, really, that vow of celibacy. How often has he lusted? How often has he denied himself even in the privacy of his mind? She has a wild thought for a moment that she could push him, fill his head with desires that will make torturous his solitary evenings, and can’t let go of the thought. Does he touch himself? Might she bring him to it?
“Father, forgive me, my heart is so wicked,” she says. “Pictures play in my mind, fantasies of all the things I might do with a man - to have him bed me, his hands working over my body, thrusting -“
A rustle of fabric from the other side; a grunt. “The pleasures of the flesh are indeed most tempting, particularly for such a wanton creature as a woman,” he says, and does she imagine that his voice is a little rougher?
“There’s more, Father.” She shifts again - let him think she is as aroused as he, let him be unsettled and heavy with heat! “I have found men as weak and willing as I, men who have taken me roughly against walls, lifted my thighs up around their waists and plunged into me. One man ordered me onto my knees before him, and gave his prick unto my mouth, and ravished me that way; another -“
“Well can I imagine what more uncouth men may have asked of you,” Frollo interrupts. “But pray, say no more on the matter, lest you taint me also with your wickedness!”
“But Father,” she pleads, “I have not yet told you of the whippings, or the reptiles!”
“I require no further details of your damnation!” His voice is nearly a shout, as close to hysterical as she’s ever heard him.
“You have indeed debased yourself and are barely worthy of the righteous wrath of Our Lord - and yet in His boundless mercy He sees fit to forgive you. Consider your sins absolved in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; go now and pray, and do not fall into sin again.”
Esmeralda wants to cheer at the barest tremble she hears in his words, the harshness of his breath between them, as much a victory over his iron control as his admission of taking on her filthy fantasies. Let him be tainted, let him be sullied and broken before his vengeful God! Let him be as human as she, and no more - or less - worthy of eternal paradise.
The door of the confessional closes with a soft click, and in the semi-darkness and the expectant quiet Esmeralda takes her place, kneeling on the wooden plank before the window. The shutter rises, and the priest’s silhouette becomes visible against the thin muslin membrane that separates them. He takes a breath, and raises his hand to his forehead. “We begin in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”
She rustles her skirts, the movement just enough to create sound across the barrier - he will think she has signed along with him, though she would never. Still, that voice is instantly recognizable: the Justice of Paris, Judge Claude Frollo, so distinct in his precise tones and practiced contempt. Her smile is a cat’s smile. He is at her mercy now, though perhaps he believes otherwise.
He finishes his opening prayer, the quality of his silence shifting. Is he irritated? Bored? Does he maybe expect another merchant with weighted scales, a penitent who carries guilt over his inability to give more generously to the coffers?
She gives him the ritual words he expects, honeying her voice with innocence:
“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.”
“My child, we have all of us fallen short of the glory of The Lord. Tell me your sins, that you may be given absolution.”
She licks her lips and shifts on her knees, breathing in the closeness of the air, the comforting scent of worn wood. “I have - urges, Father,” she says.
A pause. “Go on.”
She makes her voice wistful. It is difficult. “I am a single woman, Father, with no family to offer me for a bride. I know that - to lust - “ and here, here it’s an easy thing, to drop her voice to a whisper, to pretend at shame - “is a sin, but I see so many women whose rounded bellies announce their pleasures to the world, and I think, and I wonder -“
Esmeralda hears Frollo’s sharp breath. She wonders about priests, really, that vow of celibacy. How often has he lusted? How often has he denied himself even in the privacy of his mind? She has a wild thought for a moment that she could push him, fill his head with desires that will make torturous his solitary evenings, and can’t let go of the thought. Does he touch himself? Might she bring him to it?
“Father, forgive me, my heart is so wicked,” she says. “Pictures play in my mind, fantasies of all the things I might do with a man - to have him bed me, his hands working over my body, thrusting -“
A rustle of fabric from the other side; a grunt. “The pleasures of the flesh are indeed most tempting, particularly for such a wanton creature as a woman,” he says, and does she imagine that his voice is a little rougher?
“There’s more, Father.” She shifts again - let him think she is as aroused as he, let him be unsettled and heavy with heat! “I have found men as weak and willing as I, men who have taken me roughly against walls, lifted my thighs up around their waists and plunged into me. One man ordered me onto my knees before him, and gave his prick unto my mouth, and ravished me that way; another -“
“Well can I imagine what more uncouth men may have asked of you,” Frollo interrupts. “But pray, say no more on the matter, lest you taint me also with your wickedness!”
“But Father,” she pleads, “I have not yet told you of the whippings, or the reptiles!”
“I require no further details of your damnation!” His voice is nearly a shout, as close to hysterical as she’s ever heard him.
“You have indeed debased yourself and are barely worthy of the righteous wrath of Our Lord - and yet in His boundless mercy He sees fit to forgive you. Consider your sins absolved in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; go now and pray, and do not fall into sin again.”
Esmeralda wants to cheer at the barest tremble she hears in his words, the harshness of his breath between them, as much a victory over his iron control as his admission of taking on her filthy fantasies. Let him be tainted, let him be sullied and broken before his vengeful God! Let him be as human as she, and no more - or less - worthy of eternal paradise.
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And then the comment about reptiles came through, and I almost cracked a rib laughing. Esmeralda, you wicked creature!
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