Throughout It All

20 | It's Always Been You | July 21, 1914

Aaaaaa here we are!!

And it is in fact July 21st because I believe that they have officially hit midnight haha.

Oh my gosh, I'm imagining what's going to happen in this chapter, and my heart-

Enjoy! :)

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After Race and Spot get the tigers and lions back to their respective circuses, after Al Capone says his final farewell to them, once the police have taken the last gang members away, when it's just the nine of them again, they go into Sardinia and Dave's (even more secure than before) apartment and crash for the night.

They all sleep in until noon of July 21st.

Well, most of them wake up at noon: Race and Spot are still asleep, in each other's arms on the couch with blissful faces.

Jack woke up this morning with his arm around David, whose head was resting on his chest. Jack smiled, content to just stay like this forever. He stroked David's face, running his fingers softly through David's curls.

Mush, who had been one of the first ones to wake up (he had been sleeping in a chair facing the window), had started quietly making breakfast for everyone, Dave not too far behind him.

Finally, they all wake up, and start moving around.

"So," Sardinia starts, "what's next? Where are you guys all going to go?"

"Not that we don't want you," Dave adds quickly.

"Oh, of course," Sardinia agrees. "It's just ... this house wasn't made for nine people."

"You know we are going to be out of your hair soon enough," Kid Griffo points out, Chick Tucker nodding in agreement before he plants a kiss on top of Kid Griffo's head.

"Of course I do, I wasn't asking you," Sardinia huffs in a good-natured brotherly way.

"Well, we'd all go back to our normal lives, I guess," Jack says first. "I mean, we all have our own places, our own lives."

They all agree, but their hearts aren't in it. The idea isn't the most appealing.

Sardinia eyes all of them, knowing something is up. But he doesn't push it. "Okay."

Chick Tucker huffs. Clearly he won't stand for this. "You can't be serious."

They all stare at him curiously.

"Surely I can't be the only one who sees it?" Chick Tucker asks, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. "You all belong together. I don't care what happened in your past. You can't just split up. Your souls would hurt too much."

"It's not that simple," Jack tries to tell him.

"Isn't it?"

"We all parted ways a long time ago. We've ... we've built our own lives."

"And what's stopping you?" Chick Tucker presses. "What's keeping you all in your separate lives you don't want?"

None of them have a good answer. Stability? Security? Certainty? It's what society expects from them? 

It's what society expects from them. Definitely. Where had the fire gone? The fire that filled them as newsies, as teenagers who had despised the system, despised society?

But he's right. They do belong together. They never should have separated.

"For the record," Race breaks the silence, "I love my job. I ran away with the circus and became a tiger tamer. And you all saw how handy that ended up being."