Becoming Johanna
Page 1
Becoming Johanna
C. A. Pack
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When she was younger, the prime curator of
The Library of Illumination wished her life away …
1
Peakie’s Foundling Home was not a pleasant place to grow up. Children—while clothed, fed, and educated—were given little more than the basics, and often found themselves hungry, cold, or abused for not learning their lessons properly. Josefina wished she would grow older quickly and couldn’t wait for the day she’d be able to escape the home forever.
She’d been brought to Peakie’s when she was three years old. She had hazy memories of a woman, Fina, clutching her, and she anxiously awaited Fina’s return. But as the months turned into years, the child finally realized no one would be coming back for her.
When Josefina turned seven, she summoned up the courage to question the matron in charge of her ward. “Why am I here?” Josefina knew there was life outside of Peakie’s; wisps of it survived in her memory. The matron waved her away, but the child would not be deterred. Every day she asked the same question. Weeks passed before the matron brought her to see the headmaster. He nodded toward two straight-back chairs in front of his desk, and the matron and child sat down.
“You are asking about your past life. I’m here to tell you it is dead to you. No one is going to come and save you from your chores and schoolwork. There is no idyllic haven that you will be whisked away to in the outside world. You are here until you reach majority, young lady, and I expect you to behave and to stop bothering the matron with questions about your past.
“I will tell you what I know of it now, and there will be no further discussion.” He stood up and paced the width of the room. He was a tall, gaunt man with prominent features, and when he stopped walking, he placed both hands on his desk and leaned forward, staring at Josefina with humorless dark eyes. She shivered. “An old man brought you in and said he found you in a dead woman’s arms in a library. He told us your grandmother was dead and your parentage was unknown to him. The only thing identifying you was the name embroidered in the hem of the apron you wore—Josefina Charo. We alerted all the proper authorities, but no one claimed you. We searched for relatives, but found none. Your parents are probably dead. Thus, you are here to stay, Josefina. Go back to your classroom and tell your teacher to double your homework to make up for the lesson you missed this morning.
“Let me repeat: No one is coming back for you. Ever.”
The matron returned Josefina to the classroom, and the child had a hard time concentrating on her lesson. She usually loved learning new things, but not on this day. Instead, she held her text book up high to shield herself so no one would notice the tears streaming down her face, or the tiny sniffs that punctuated the wretched stillness of the dimly lit room.
Josefina had always been exceptionally bright and had excelled in the curriculum available to her. She quickly surpassed the other students until there were no more classes for her to take. She questioned the matron about continuing her education, but was told flat out that Peakie’s Foundling Home would not provide a university education “by any means.” Instead, the matron sent Josefina to work in the laundry by day and wait on the younger children during mealtime each night—a tedious existence for a teenage girl overflowing with intelligence and imagination.
Josefina’s work schedule prevented her from participating in outdoor recess. Each day, regardless of weather, students were herded out the door into a side yard surrounded by an eight-foot cement block wall. Half the area was covered in concrete. The other half had a few trees and benches for people who preferred to sit and contemplate life. The sparse crabgrass surrounding the base of the trees had a green tinge, but the rest of the grassy area was brown and would remain that way. Peakie’s staff would never spend money on something as trivial as grass seed or fertilizer if they thought children would trample the resulting lawn to death in just a few weeks. So nature took its course, and dozens of feet pummeled the dried up blades of grass, making mowing unnecessary.
During Josefina’s long, boring work periods, she planned her escape. Sometimes, when she dragged the trash out to the alley at night, she looked longingly past the gate. It looked dark and forbidding, but she could see lights beyond the alley, and hear threads of conversation and bursts of laughter coming from what lay beyond. All she had to do was climb over the wall.
One night, Josefina witnessed something unusual. A tall boy wearing a hooded sweatshirt ran down the alley, but stopped for a moment to pull money out of a wallet he held in his hand. To Josefina’s amazement, he stuffed the money in his pocket and threw the wallet into the gutter, where it nestled among the trash that had found a home in its crevices and corners. Josefina’s heart beat faster. Her imagination got the best of her. She furtively searched the surrounding area to make sure no one stood watching her and climbed the fence to retrieve the wallet. She had never climbed a fence before and found it daunting. It was not unyielding, and it swayed under her weight. The top had a roll of barbed wire fastened to it, but it looked like others may have taken this route before; the wire was flattened and easier, if just as painful, to climb over.
The wallet was like a small treasure trove. It held no money—the thief had seen to that—but it contained a driver’s license, a credit card, and a library card. She scrambled back across the fence. She considered finding the wallet a sign that she should leave. I have to make plans. She didn’t consider the idea of turning the wallet in. She already knew the matron would throw it out, rather than invite the police into the foundling home. They would probably accuse Josefina of the theft, after all, she had left the grounds, so who’s to say she didn’t mug the owner? No. This was providence. She had been sent this wallet as a means to an end, the end of her association with Peakie’s Foundling home.
She didn’t think of the blood the barbed wire left dotting her hands and legs until another girl commented on it.
“I fell,” Josefina lied.
“Klutz,” the girl replied. “You’d better repair your skirt before the matron sees it.”
Josefina looked down and saw a tear in the fabric. “Right,” she muttered. She quickly finished her tasks and rushed to the shower room where she washed off the blood and kitchen stench. That night, after mending her skirt, she lay in bed under the thin blanket allotted to each child, and she planned her future. The name Joan A. Carr was printed on the driver’s license. Initials J. C. just like Josefina Charo. According to the birthdate on the license, the owner was nineteen years old, just a couple of years older than Josefina. This can’t be coincidence. It must be fate. The library card held an additional morsel of information—Joan Alice Carr. Of course, she couldn’t become Joan Carr. Someone with that name already lived nearby and was probably in a police station at that moment reporting the theft. No. That name would never do at all. She would have to come up with a way around it. But first, she had to figure out how she would get away.
The state forced the foundling home to pay Josefina a meager wage, because she held two positions, exceeding the hours required to satisfy her room and board expense. At first, she carried the money she earned in her pockets and then tucked it in her socks and underwear. When it became too bulky, she slipped it inside the lining of her winter jacket by cutting the stitches on a pocket and then re-sewing it. It wasn’t that she had a lot of money, but she was afraid to exchange small bills for larger denominations, because someone who didn’t have her best intere
sts at heart—which would be everyone at Peakie’s—might try to steal it. No. She would continue to collect her earnings, and when the time was right, she would disappear.
An elderly man with a thatch of wispy, white hair arrived at Peakie’s Foundling Home one evening and asked to speak with the headmaster. The girl manning the reception desk relayed the message, but was told the headmaster was too busy for visitors. The man smiled at her when she gave him the answer. “Would you try again? Please tell him Malcolm Trees is here with my annual gift to the home. I wouldn’t want to leave with the donation still inside my pocket.”
She reluctantly returned to the headmaster’s office and cringed when he blasted her for not handling the visitor on her own. “But he says he has a gift—a donation—and he’d hate to go home with it still in his pocket.”
That changed everything. The headmaster rushed out with a smile plastered on his face. “Mr. Trees, what a pleasure to see you again.”
“As you know, my organization likes to present a small annual endowment to the home for the betterment of the children here.”
“Yes, I know, and we fully appreciate it.”
“I originally