Jack x Crutchie Oneshots (Newsies)

Spiders

A/N: Hello! Thank you so much for 1.9K reads and nUMBER ONE IN JACKCRUTCHIE HOW????? You guys are amazing and you have no idea how much your support means to me <3 Thanks as well for the requests and while I'm working on those here's a short fluffy pre-relationship thingy. Hope you enjoy :D

Jack PoV:

A scream pierced the air, causing Crutchie and Jack to jump.

"What was that?!" Jack asked, looking up from his drawing.

"I dunno. Sounded like it was comin' from downstairs. Should we go check it out?" Cructhie asked, grabbing his crutch and pulling himself to his feet.

"Ugh, fine," Jack grumbled, putting down his sketchbook. "Al probably just stole Racer's cigar again."

Jack helped Crutchie down the ladder, following closely after him. They entered the lodgehouse, closing the window that led up to the penthouse behind them.

"What's goin' on down here?" Jack asked, crossing his arms, "We can hear you guys screamin' from the roof!"
Romeo shakily pointed to the ceiling. Jack followed his gaze, his eyes landing on the small black dot crawling across the ceiling.

All the color drained from Jack's face as he spotted the spider.

"Jack..." Crutchie started but was cut off by Jack screaming and jumping behind the nearest bunk bed where a group of other newsies were huddled in fear.

Crutchie sighed. You would think after living their whole lives on the streets surrounded by bugs, the newsies would be used to spiders. Despite that, all the newsies, especially Jack, were petrified of spiders. Everyone but Crutchie.

Crutchie rolled his eyes as he walked past the group of terrified boys. Once he was below the spider, he stretched up, holding out his hand to the bug.

All the newsies screamed as the spider crawled onto Crutchie's outstretched hand.

"Calm down," Crutchie laughed, "It's just a little spider. It ain't gonna hurt ya."

"Just get it out of here!" Jack squeaked.

Crutchie smiled as he carried the spider to the nearest window, opening it with his free hand.

"There ya go, little guy," Crutchie murmured as the spider crawled off his hand onto the fire escape. Crutchie closed the window and watched as the spider disappeared from sight. According to Crutchie, spiders were adorable.

Jack watched in awe as Crutchie smiled at the bug. It should be illegal for someone to be so brave and so adorable at the same time. Jack couldn't help but smile at the blond. That boy was going to be the death of Jack.

Crutchie turned around and was almost knocked off his feet as Jack crashed into him. Crutchie barely had time to balance his crutch so he didn't topple over. He shifted his weight to his good leg to return Jack's hug.

"You'se my hero," Jack said with a grin.

"I still think you should have killed it." Race added unhelpfully.

"Shut up, Race." Jack and Crutchie said in unison.

Race held his hands up in defense, "Whatever, Lovebirds."

Jack flushed bright red and let go of the shorter boy. "We weren't— we were just—" Jack stammered, struggling for an explanation.

Race laughed, his blue eyes sparkling with amusement, "Sure Cowboy, sure."

The awkward silence was broken by Les tugging on Crutchie's pant leg.

"So the spider's gone?" He asked.

"Yep. All gone." Crutchie replied. Ruffling Les' hair.

Les gave Crutchie a quick hug before running off to play with Elmer. "Thanks, Crutchie!" He called.

"So, the great Jack Kelly is afraid of spiders?" Davey asked with a laugh.

"Hey, you was hiding behind the bed too," Jack grumbled.

"Yeah. Jackie's been afraid of spiders since he was real little." Race said with a grin.

"You don't gotta be embarrassed, Jack. I think it's kinda cute." Crutchie smiled.

Jack felt a blush creep up his neck to the tips of his ears.

Race smirked at his expression as Crutchue walked away calmly, like what he said was completely normal.

Jack stood frozen as Race said something he didn't even comprehend. He was too busy replaying what Crutchie said over and over.

'Crutchie thinks I'm cute. Crutchie thinks I'm cute. Crutchie thinks I'm cute.'

The rest of the day, Jack couldn't focus on anything, not even his drawings. His brain was preoccupied with over-analyzing every detail of the exchange.

Even after the moon was high in the sky and Crutchie was fast asleep on the other side of the penthouse, Jack couldn't sleep.

A big dumb grin spread across Jack's face as he pulled up his moth-eaten blanket.

'Crutchie thinks I'm cute.'

A/N: Gotta agree with Crutchie on this one I think spiders are awesome, lol