The Romanov Series Book #1: My Rogue Girlfriend

Chapter Thirteen: The Street Urchin

Ferrer's POV
Everyone who thinks they know me know some simple facts about me. I'm an immigrant orphan from Spain who worked hard to become a doctor. For many it's an inspiring story and I have turned down so many author's who want to tell my story. It's too painful to relive and I don't think a book can capture a fraction of what I have been through.

I was born to two poor people in rural Spain. I call them poor because we lived beneath hand to mouth. Most days there was nothing to eat. My mother, Lola was a kind and happy woman. Regardless of what we went through she would always tell me the sun will come up. I tend to still tell myself that when I'm going through something hard. She was a beautiful woman. I loved my mother. Even when we had nothing, I had her. Just having her arms around me, knowing she was the only person who loved me in this world was reason enough to keep going. We lived near the ocean. It was a small village and he everyone knew each other. Children played together. But when it came to the domestics of a household, everyone minded their own business until the next day when they would gossip about it. That is how my father got away with the violence. In his drunk mind he believed that my mother was a whore. That is the first bad word I learned when I was just five. He would refer to her as such everytime they argued. I didn't understand what it meant then. But I understood there was a problem between them. He would lock me in a small room that he put away most of his fishing things and then he would proceed to beat her up. I would sit there listening to her beg and weep. Later on she's the one who would let me out. She was black and blue by the time he was done. She would assure me itsy not as bad as it looked but now that I'm a doctor and I understand the impact of violence on a human body, it was bad.

My father was a big man back then. Perhaps it's because I was small but in relation to my mother who was dainty, he was a big man. It's like Bruce and Dani. If he decides to beat her up, Dani doesn't stand a chance. That is what it was like for my mother. She took the insults. She took the beating. She never left him. She loved him. She loved him so much she accepted the ill treatment as part of her life.

Whenever we went a few days without food, she would beg the neighbors for help. Whatever they gave she gave to me. We would do this during the day when my father is out day drinking or passed out somewhere because he had too much to drink. He said it's embarassing to beg and we are shaming him yet he wasn't providing anything for us.

During the day all the other kids would go to school miles away but I stayed home because my mother couldn't afford it. It often made me sad because I wanted to be like the other kids.

One night, things changed. I overheard my father telling my mother that there was a rich couple in need of a son. He called me a burden they don't need and one less mouth to feed. He wanted to sell me. The next morning, he took my hand and told me we are going to town. There was no trace of my mother.

He met the couple and they spoke in a language I came to know later on was English. He was paid and the couple took me. I was crying and begging him not to leave but he was too busy counting a handful of cash that would buy him a few days worth of liquor. The first chance I got when the couple wasn't looking, I ran away from them.

It was days before I found my way home. I was happy to be home even if it's a place riddled with misery. It will always be home because of my dear mother. I saw how the neighbors sympathized with me. They were all gathered around our small house. One woman, the one who peddled all the gossip in the village actually stopped me. She told me not to go into the house. I ended up running into the house and that is when I saw something that has stayed with me since.

He murdered my mother. That is what the neighbors whispered and the police too when they kept asking me where he is. The coward took my mother's life and ran away.

I remember sitting in the pool of her blood looking for the warmth she always showered me with but it was gone. She was still, lifeless and cold. The police separated me from her and I followed them chasing after the old car that carried her body away. I was running barefoot on rough ground with tears blinding my eyes. I couldn't see but I kept chasing the car till it was gone from my line of sight.

Part of me wonders toll now if I could have had a better life if I went with the rich couple.

I didn't go back home after that. I found my way to Madrid where I became a street urchin. I begged for money. I ate from the left overs of those who could afford food. I learned how to steal. I'm not proud of that but it kept my stomach full. I had one pair of clean clothes. A grey pair of pants and a white polka dot shirt. I stole them off a hanging line. I would go to school in those clothes. I couldn't get into the classrooms but I sat outside the windows listening in and learning. That is how I got through the basics of reading and eventually I learned how to write. One particular man who used to give me food at the back of a restaurant taught me the little English he knew. He told me he was going to America, the land where dreams come true. He told me I can come along but he won't be able to take care of me.

I was ten years old then and I strongly believed that the streets have taught me enough to survive on any streets. My was I mistaken! When I got to America, there was something called social services. They took me off the streets and put me in a shelter. There were perks to it. A warm bed to sleep on, steady meals and the best thing ever! School. I loved going to school. I loved reading books. I took every chance possible to better myself even when I was constantly laughed at for having an accent.

But one thing got to me. Most of the friends I made got placed in nice homes. Couples and families would adopt but I was never chosen. When I asked the woman who brought me in, she explained that I'm illegal and she will get in trouble if anyone finds out. That's how I came to know that immigrants can get deported. I didn't want to go back to Spain. I was finally in the land of opportunity and I was getting an education. I was not starving and I was not out in the cold. I stopped feeling bad about getting adopted and accepted I'll be here until I'm old enough to live. Over time I saw many children come and go but I stayed in with the bad batch that no one wanted.

When I saw twelve, a woman saw me in the hallway of the children's home. She was a blonde woman with kind brown eyes. I remember how she smiled at me and beckoned me over. We spoke and we exchanged names. Her name was Catherine Black. She took interest in me and told the woman who brought me to the shelter that she wants to adopt me. When she was told why she couldn't, she laughed and said money fixes everything.

That's how I found myself in Winchester New York in a mansion living like a rich kid. Catherine was a doctor. She wasn't married and she didn't have any children. She had a lot of pets. Dogs, cats, birds and several aquariums. I loved her because she reminded me of what it felt like to have a mother. She put me through the best school money could buy and that is how I found out, I'm actually smarter than most people. She called me a genius and because of that I skipped classes and by the time I was fifteen, we were taking about colleges.

My bliss however came to end one day when she didn't wake up in the morning. Catherine passed away in her sleep when I was just fifteen years old. It was yet another painful moment in my life. She didn't have a family but droves of them turned up after the funeral. Aunts, uncles, nieces and whoever else just to claim her wealth.

I was the street rat she took in and that is where I was put. In the street with nothing but the clothes on my back. Because of Catherine, I wasn't illegal anymore. She wanted to change my name but I chose to retain my identity so that I never forget where I came from.

I found myself in the streets again, homeless and with nothing. I moved from shelter to shelter. I worked odd jobs and with the money I had saved up with the allowances she gave me, I applied to Harvard. She wanted me to go to Harvard and study medicine. It was the dream and that is how I ran into Cole Michael Harrington, the man who gave me a dollar to clean his car. It's an interesting story.