Newsies Oneshots 2.0

Missed Opportunity-Smallsper

Sniper wasn't the best at dating, although it would be a lie to say she didn't want to. It was a skill she hadn't had the time to develop, like learning a new play in the middle of a game. She was unequipped with the skills necessary to be on a date, let alone ask someone to be on one with her.

No one had bothered to ask her out in high school, the boys finding as much interest in her as she did them, and the girls avoiding her as if she had a virus only women could get. Lesbianism was the name, and many people believed the cure was social isolation. There were few girls in her science and history classes who wanted to experiment, offering a night of fun to the local gay girl for the chance to say "I'm cool because I did it", but then they'd avoid it altogether the next day, and Sniper was right back to where she started.

She was pushed to wearing skirts, and crop tops, and whatever the highest fashion was at the time, often by adults who didn't know fashion if it hit them in the face, the baby boom generation taught tradition to be the most important principle of human society. People like Sniper, the girls who dressed in men's clothing or did their best to find masculinity in the women's section at the mall, were met with reinforcement of their ideas, and were demeaned for being anything different. Unfortunately for them, Sniper was smart, and comfortable in wearing the borrowed clothes she got from her brothers' at foster homes and orphanages, and she learned to stopped caring what people said.

Their words were added noise to an already loud city, smothered by Sniper's false confidence. There was a persona she'd built for herself, one shrouded in confidence and boldness, and attracted other outlaws—the people rejected by society for being themselves, and being loud about it. She learned to find pleasure in yelling over the noise, grin and beat it.

It wasn't until she'd found herself at a rock'n'roll bar in Manhattan, nearing two in the morning and listening to a band she'd never heard of with a beer in hand did she find peace in what was a whisper, just a few words muttered into her ear.

"You're really pretty", she'd said, and Sniper turned to her with surprise. There was a woman next to her, around her age, wearing a pair of blue jeans and work boots, accompanied by a Queen t-shirt and a drunk grin on her face. She was a few inches shorter than Sniper's own height, but she felt ten times taller. Her eyes were a soft brown, mixing unflatteringly with the lights of the bar, but Sniper found her liquid courage charming, sweet even. "I...I like you."

Sniper chuckled, careful not to touch this drunk girl who clearly had no idea what she was doing. On any other day, they'd be on a date by the hour, but Sniper had morals, and drunk girls didn't align with them. "I think you're pretty, too. What's your name?"

The girl hummed, smiling silly. "My name- My name is Smalls."

"Yeah, I can see that", Sniper commented, carefully grabbing her hand. "Do you have a friend here, Smalls?"

The girl shook her head, and Sniper sighed frustratedly. The bright reminder of her flushed cheeks and hooded eyes shined like stop signs in Sniper's head, putting the idea in her head that this girl could very much not remember being friends with anyone in this bar, or that she had any at all. Sniper looked around for anyone looking for a short, very drunk woman, but everyone—every man, anyway—seemed very focused on the drunk girls wearing two pieces two sizes too small. Admittedly, she would be right there with them, but she had more sense to look, not stare.

Shaking herself back into reality, Sniper looked at the bartender, who was serving drinks left and right with a smile. She looked at the babbling drunk girl, who was touching her face delicately, as if touching the canvas of a painting. Her self-conscious but at her with a vengeance, and she knew she had to get this girl somewhere safe yesterday. "You wanna make a new friend?"