Days In The Sun

The artists attic

As the lost french kingdom and the village of Villeneuve were hidden away from the rest of the world within a time lock, the rest of France was also suffering. For the plague had spread rapidly throughout the entire country.
One young family was no exception to this awful turn of events.

As the young man paced around the attic, hand in hand with himself - murmuring - he could feel his knees weaken each time he turned to take another lap around his easel. He breathed onto his hands in an attempt to warm them as he paced, before he felt the hair on the back of his neck stand as he heard a soft cough come from the bed where his wife laid.

The young man turned to her and quickly rushed over, his palms shaking and his face red with fear;
"Oh. Mon amour. Are you alright?" He panicked as he grasped the woman's now fragile pale hands into his own.

He didn't get an answer right away, for the woman was barley well enough to speak. The sores on her face, pale complexion, weak voice, and dull eyes said it all. But her husband refused to believe it.

"The doctor will be here any minute now. He'll prove that there's nothing wrong with you, Mon Cher." He picked his wife's hands up to his face and placed a soft  kiss upon them as he stared into the eyes that had inspired all of his work - his life's work - his reason to wake up in the morning - his everything.

He watched as the woman slowly pulled her hands off of her husband so she could give an attempt to cover her mouth while coughing - so the speckles of blood that did shoot out didn't get onto him. She inhaled as she placed her hands onto her chest.

"You're.......to close....." she stated as she watched his eyes as they shot up with tears.

What she had said was true, yes. How close Maurice sat beside his wife's bed was very dangerous - because he wasn't wearing a doctors mask or anything else to protect him.
"I am never—" Maurice got cut off by the sound of soft wailing coming from the distance. He jolted up quickly as he turned his attention from his wife to his newborn child who laid in a bassinet in front of his easel.

His palms shook as he stood up and approached the bassinet, reaching down, and carefully grasping his daughter into his arms. "What's the matter, Beautiful?......." he spoke softly as he rocked his child back and forth soothingly in an attempt to calm the infant.

Through his wife's coughing, heaving, gagging, and the sound of his daughters crying - Maurice could feel his world spinning.

Once he calmed his daughter down, he placed her back into the bassinet once again as he finally made his way back over to his wife - whose eyes began to sink in the back of her head.

Before Maurice could even get a good look at his wife, there was a pounding knock at their attics door. The man felt the hairs on the back of his neck stick up as he knew the doctor was in a hurry - for he had to see hundreds of people that day - but Maurice secretly hoped after he saw their situation, he'd take a better look at his wife before saying the dreadful word so quickly.
Maurice stood and approached the door, he wiped the tears that had formed with his bottom downs sleeve as he opened the door, revealing a man with a heavy overcoat, a long-point doctors mask, black boots, and a small bag.

As Maurice allowed the man to enter, he couldn't help but feel he should've just kicked the man out after seeing how this so called doctor was handling his fragile wife. But perhaps he was doing his job.
Maurice was just an artist after all. He was skilled in the arts, not medicine.

He sat beside the doctor as he watched both he and his wife with somber eyes.

The doctor grabbed onto the woman's chin and turned her head quickly to get a look at the back of her neck - causing the woman to groan at the sudden movement. Then, he had no problem lowering the collar of her dress without even asking to look at the top of her chest, where more sores were found.
The doctor then went on to take out some odd liquids, have the woman drink them - then just repeat everything again. After about half an hour of no change at all - but his wife's heaving did intense - The doctor turned to Maurice;