Mornings were always the busiest.
Usually Frau would see the inflated line of confessors leading to the confessional booth and quietly pity the person on duty that day. This time, Frau carefully poked his head out of the booth, saw the inflated line of confessors (some of whom he could swear were getting out breakfast baskets and settling down for impromptu picnics), and quietly pitied himself.
"Aw, shit." Well, as quietly as Frau could anyway.
It took over two hours and almost three to disperse the crowd, and once the last person finished confessing and hopped out of the booth in relief that his burdens had finally been unloaded, Frau, the poor shmuck that those burdens were unloaded upon (along with about thirty other peoples'), dropped his head against the screen door separating the two compartments of the booth, thoroughly exhausted.
Who knew it would be so tiring to sit here for a few hours and just listen to people?
It would be a while still for lunch, so Frau decided to ditch his afternoon duties (no way he was going to do those AND booth duty) and settled down for a quick nap.
The booth (at least on his side) included a padded bench. The whole bare wood décor idea had been ditched in favor of non-aching buns. Frau silently thanked whoever had been smart enough to make the change and leaned back on the bench, stretching his legs as far as he could, which wasn't very far even when he shifted his body to stretch diagonally across the space.
In hardly any time at all though, Frau soon fell asleep.
Later, the sound of a creak woke him up. Immediately, Frau opened his eyes. He had expected to see one of the other bishops or even the old man checking up on him but the door wasn't open.
False alarm.
Frau yawned widely as he pulled himself up into a sitting position, blinking tears from his eyes. He felt drowsy still, but now that he was awake the sleep was quickly disappearing from his limbs.
As Frau was wondering alternately how long he had been asleep and what he should have for lunch, a hesitant voice interrupted his thoughts from the other side of the booth. "Hello? Are you there, Father?" Oh, so someone had come in, and someone young by the sound of it.
Frau yawned again to rid himself of the last bit of sleepiness left and rubbed at his eyes with one hand as he slid open the screen cover between them. "Yeah, I'm here. What do you need, kid?"
Behind the screen lattice, the other figure twitched just slightly.
"I'm not a kid," was the quiet, but adamant reply.
Frau smiled at his spunk. "Of course you're not," he agreed not unkindly. "Why don't you tell me why you're here. You have something you want to confess?"
The kid paused for a moment, like he was unsure of how to start. "I…."
Frau remained silent as he waited, and he wasn't surprised when the kid went into the customary opening for the confessional. "Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned."
The next part however, did manage to surprise Frau. Thoroughly.
There was a gulp and a sigh, and then finally in his little-boy-kid voice, he confessed, "I killed my best friend."