"Mama?"
Katherine had to resist the urge to scream as she heard her six year old daughter, Maggie, exiting her room and approaching her mother's desk, where Katherine was attempting to get some work done. She didn't have any idea what time it was, just that it was much too late at night for a six year old to be awake. Rather than screaming, she put a tired smile on her face and turned away from her typewriter and towards her daughter.
"Yes, sweetheart?"
"M' not tired."
"You're not?" The little girl shook her head. Katherine tapped her fingers thoughtfully on her desk. "You know, I think that if you go back to your bed in lay really still, it might make you tired."
This did not have the desired effect, and Maggie started laughing. "That's silly!"
Katherine sighed. "You're right, I'm sorry."
"I want a story."
"I already read you your story for tonight, remember? We started reading the one about Peter Pan?"
Maggie nodded, but it was clear that she didn't care for her mother's logic. "I want another one."
"You only get one story a night, that's the rule."
"But, mama!" The girl whined. It was times like these that Maggie reminded Katherine of the girl's father - she'd obviously inherited Jack's impeccable reasoning skills.
Katherine didn't want to give in to her daughter. She knew if she did it too often, it would become harder and harder to say 'no'. But right now, the only thing on Katherine's mind was that she needed to get Maggie to sleep, because the sooner she did that, the sooner she could get herself to sleep. So, she let out a breath, and nodded.
"Fine. One more story. But you're going to sleep right afterwards, no questions asked."
Maggie nodded enthusiastically. "Thank you, mama!" She smiled sweetly, and held her arms up to her mother. Katherine couldn't resist the smile, and lifted her up into her arms and took Maggie back to her bedroom, setting her down on the small bed. Katherine walked over to the bookshelf, and looked at her daughter.
"Which book do you want?"
Maggie shook her head. "Not one of those books."
"Maggie these are the only books you have."
The girl shook her head. "I want one of the books in your head."
"One of the books that I..." That confused Katherine for a minute, until she realized it meant she was going to have to make up a story. "Ah, I see. Alright."
She walked back over and sat down next to Maggie on the bed. "What type of story do you want?"
Her daughter immediately scooted over to Katherine and leaned on her arm. "One about Papa. You hardly never tell me about him."
"'Hardly ever'." Katherine absently corrected Maggie's grammar as she thought. She'd never talked too much about Jack around her daughter, she'd always thought it was still too new and painful. But it had been five years. It was probably about time that Maggie learned about him. She took a deep breath.
"Okay, I'll tell you a story about Papa."
"Yay!" Maggie clutched Katherine's arm excitedly, and Katherine couldn't help but grin at her child's excitement.
"Once upon a time, there was this big group of newsboys who all lived and sold their papers here, in Manhattan. They all sold the newspapers from The World."
"That's where Grandpa works."
Katherine nodded. "Right. So these boys they were all very close, they treated each other like brothers. Your father - his name was Jack - was sort of the leader of them all. They were all content with their lives until someone (Katherine decided to leave Joseph Pulitzer's name out of it until Maggie was older) raised the price of the papers that newsies had to buy, so that it was harder for the newsies to buy the papers, they could barely afford it."
"Why not?"
"Well, unfortunately, most newsies don't have a lot of money, and that's why they have to sell newspapers when they're so young."
"Oh." Maggie sounded a little sad about this, so Katherine continued.
"So, then Jack - "
"That's Papa?"
Katherine nodded. "Yes, that's your Papa. So he got upset, because he didn't want any of his brothers to go hungry because they were paying too much money. So he decided to go on strike. Do you know what that means?"
Maggie shook her head.
"It means that all the newsies stopped working until the papers went back down to a price that they could afford. That's how I met your father, really."
"How?"
"Well, remember I write stories for the newspaper for work?" Her daughter nodded. "I did that back then, too. I decided to write a story about the strike for the paper. I met Jack because he was the leader of the strike, so I talked to him a lot to get information for my story."
"Was it love at first sight?"
Katherine let out a soft laugh. "Not exactly. The love part came later. Once we got further into the strike - I started helping them with it, too - I came up with this idea, that we, the newsies and I, would print our own newspaper talking about the bad things happening to newsies and the other kids who had to work in the city. And it worked."
"Did you win?"
Katherine nodded. "We did win, and afterwards, I became really close with all the boys too. You know some of them, actually. Remember Uncle Davey and Uncle Crutchie?"
Maggie stared at her, amazed. "They were newsboys?"
"And Uncle Race."
"And they all knew Papa?"
"They did. I'm sure you could ask them about him, they probably have plenty of stories."
The girl looked very pleased with this information. "Is that the end?"
"Of that story, yes. I'll tell you more later, but for now, bedtime."
Maggie nodded. "Mama?"
"Hmm?"
"Where's Papa now?"
Katherine froze. She didn't want to answer that question. "Well, he's in heaven now."
"When's he coming back?"
"I'm afraid he can't."
"Why not?"
Katherine took a deep breath. Death was such a simple concept, but she hadn't thought about the fact that someone as young as Maggie might not be able to grasp it.
"He got really sick, about a year after you were born, and so God had to bring him up to Heaven, so that he'd be okay."
"Oh."
"But he's watching us, from Heaven."
This seemed to cheer Maggie up considerably. "He is?"
Katherine nodded. "And I know that he loves you so much. He always has."
"And he loves you, too?"
"He loves me too." Katherine repeated, and she realized that she didn't really feel sad. Because she knew it was true. Jack still loved her. He always had, and he wouldn't stop.
"Time for bed now."
Katherine hugged her daughter and gave her a kiss on the forehead, so grateful to have this little girl with her to remind her of what's important. Love.
