The Queen of Brooklyn~A Spot Conlon Fanfic

Chapter Nineteen: In Your Face, Pulitzer

For the rest of the day, the newsies run around the different parts of New York, handing out articles like it's going out of style. I go around Queens, working with Race and Mush. Spot's in Brooklyn, handing the papes out to his newsies who didn't come with him to Manhattan. Jack's in Manhattan with Sarah, and Davey and Les are in Queens. The rest of the newsies are just sort of scattered around New York in different places—Flushing, Richmond, Woodside, the Bronx.

Race doesn't mess around. He goes up to every working kid he sees, saying "Hey, kid, can you read?" If the kid said no, then he'd hand the article to him or her anyway and say, "Give it to a friend." If the kid said yes, then he'd thrust the article at his or her chest and say, "Well, then read this."

Mush and I were a bit less...forceful about it. We handed the articles to the kids who wanted them. I met a few really nice kids—one named Josephine, a thin, frail girl with curly dark brown hair who worked in a clothing factory, and one named William, who had green eyes and blonde hair and worked in a sweatshop. A few kids were hesitant to join the strike, but I told them the same thing I told Spot when he was hesitant: "Don't you want to make a change?" After that, they'd take the pape article.

By the time Mush, Race and I were out of papes, we headed back to Manhattan—which was quite the walk, by the way. Spot was still in Brooklyn with his newsies, 'cause the walkin' distance from Brooklyn to Lower Manhattan is, like, three hours. They's gonna come here overnight and join us in Newsie Square in the morning.

"How'd it go?" Jack asks me once we get back. "Did ya give away all of your articles?"

"Yep. I told them to make their own strike signs or banners, too."

"Good job, Red." He gives me a gentle noogie, then smiles mischievously. "Y'know, I've seen you and Spot hanging around recently. You guys should be boyfriend and girlfriend. Have you two kissed yet?"

"Ugh, why is everyone saying that?" I groan, rolling my eyes. "No, we haven't kissed, and no, we're not boyfriend and girlfriend."

"We're saying it because it's obvious that's what you want," Race says, pointing to my face. "See? You're blushing."

"Shut up." I self-consciously run my hands through my hair. "I'm not blushing."

Race shrugs, smirking. "Whatever you say." 

It's dark by now, so we head to the Lodge House and call it a night. But I can't really fall asleep—ever since Race's and Jack's teasing, even if it was meant to be friendly, I can't stop thinking about that time Spot and I almost kissed in the dark of Medda's theater.

I dwell on the idea of us going out together for a minute, then brush it off and focus on something else instead: The strike. Tomorrow morning, there'll hopefully be thousands of kids in Newsie Square, yelling and screaming and pumping their fists in the air and holding their strike signs up proudly.

That's my dream.

I fall asleep with the thought of us winning the strike. We have a pretty good chance—there's hundreds, even thousands of kids on our side now. In your face, Pulitzer, is my last thought before everything drifts into darkness.

-The Next Day-

We wake up to the sounds of screaming...but not I'm-in-pain screaming. Thousands-of-voices screaming, all repeating the same word, over and over again: "STRIKE!"

Us Lodge House newsies practically trip each other shoving our way to the window. Sure enough, there's too many kids to count—at least a thousand, two thousand even—screaming in Newsie Square. They're jumping around and smiling, all positioned in front of The World's office building.