at the same time) moment of Beatrice`s life happened in the central hall of St. Mariana Home for Girls. Miss Denver, the nurse, was standing near the front door with some unfamiliar woman. Beatrice noticed them at once from the upstairs. There was nothing unusual about the woman: lots of adults were visiting this place during the day. Having got nurse`s order to come downstairs, Beatrice humbly executed it. The first thing little girls were taught within these walls was to behave respectfully and do what you`re told.
Nevertheless, discipline problems weren`t a rarity in here and the punishment wasn`t always fair. For instance, the one imposed this week concerning an incident in the bathroom, when four girls during the evening bathing covered Beatrice`s head with a pillowcase to scared her and have fun. They were pushing the poor girl from side to side, chortling and singing “Weird Bea, crazy Bea, always spills her tea! Stupid, ugly, crazy Bea looks like monkey!” Nurse Denver, who had a unique ability always to come at exactly those moments when Beatrice looked bad in her eyes, entered the bathroom, when Bea was trying to kick one of her bullies back. Four little foxes hid the pillowcase and blamed Beatrice in everything. Since Miss Denver was too tired to figure it all out, so she made the easiest decision: Bea was punished for the fight and had to spend a night on her knees without the permission to sleep in bed. That was a perfect opportunity for her roommates to finish what they`d started in the bathroom, so they were pecking Beatrice till getting bored and falling asleep. Bea was enduring every word with quite tears and prays. Next morning she woke up on the floor with disheveled hair, watering eyes and pain in her back. Actually, she hadn`t lost much: sleeping in those hard beds was not that different from sleeping on the floor.
After the afternoon nap Beatrice had to spend some hours in Miss Denver`s office to pray and think out the benefits of her punishment. It was the usual rearing and religious practice in St. Marianna Home. Therefore the offenders cleared their sinful souls and expressed gratefulness to God for giving them a spiritual guidance.
Miss Denver closed the door to be sure Beatrice had no way to escape and went outside. According to the time table, the next three hours till the supper were devoted to playing, drawing, reading or any of the other wonders of leisure time. Beatrice had to spend them alone in the stuffy hot room, like a prisoner in a prison cell. She was hearing girl`s high-pitched voices and laughing from the backyard. Sitting in Denver`s office wasn`t the worst option for Bea, because even if she was outside, other girls wouldn`t let her join them in whatever they were doing. Most of them laughed at her for everything ranging from weird color of her red hair and freckles all over the face to her strange behavior at night. Once Zoe Becker swore she saw Bea`s eyes were glowing blue in the mirror reflection. Since that time the girls started considering Beatrice to be even weirder than they had considered her to be before. They called her a vampire or a witch, avoided her everywhere it was possible. Bea`s sleepwalking scared them, and her screams at nights irritated more than scared.
September wind was permeating through the open window, however it didn`t save from the candent sun rays, which were literary frying everything they could reach: an old brown dusty carpet, a heavy wooden desk with lots of papers and books on it, a whole-wall bookshelf with all kinds of Christian literature. It seemed the sun was able to burn this room. Beatrice was sitting inside of this heat flow and didn`t dare to move her chair somewhere in shadow. She was sure this heat was salutary and it would burn out all the sins. The girl felt them deep in her mind and actions. Yesterday she`d wished all the worst to other person, almost cursed them. Anger, insult and hate settled down in her heart and took control over her mind. “It is necessary to be mild, without evil, peaceful and have Christian love” sounded in Beatrice`s head “Do not plot harm against your neighbor”.
The girl looked at the big wooden cross above the desk and her blue eyes filled with tears and fear. If the God existed, he would be looking at Beatrice with disappointment. The girl hastily fell down on her knees, lacing her fingers. The sun heated up her lowered head and pale skin. Her red unbraided hair was glowing under its rays.
“Our Lord” whispered Beatrice with trembling lips “Show me the path. Don`t let the devil own my soul and mind, banish him from my dreams. Take my envy away and clean my heart from anger. Forgive my sins. Save my sleep from the nightmares. Let this sun burn out the darkness inside of me…”
Beatrice was praying hard, clenching her fingers to the pain. Her voice was already inaudible when nurse Denver entered the room, but her lips were still moving in a silent pray.
“Good, child” said the nurse, touching Bea`s shoulder “Hope the prays helped”
Beatrice stopped praying, got up off her knees and silently left the room.
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