I Never Planned On You (a Newsies fanfic)

New Kids

Winnie's POV:

As sure as I had predicted, the Paper Bell peeled, and Weasel's annoying voice cut through the air. 

"Papes!  Newsies!  Get your papes!"

I groaned and rolled my eyes as Crutchie placed a friendly, reassuring hand on my shoulder.  We looked each other in the eyes.

"Trust meh," he said, "Jack didn't mean any of it."

I nodded, but apparently my expression told otherwise.

"Why don't you go talk to him," he suggested.

My eyebrows raised and eyes widened in disbelief.  Talk to him?  After that little episode?  There was no garentee I'd even get one sentence in.  The best thing I could do was just let Jack cool down.  Maybe tomorrow I would address him.

But instead of pouring out my thoughts to Crutchie, I put on a fake smile and simply nodded.  He nodded back, and we both headed towards the World - aka, the newspaper stand.

Already there was a long lines of newsies waiting for their papes.  I noticed Jack was one of the first in line, who'd already gotten his papers and was currently sorting through them.  Just to make sure he'd gotten what he paid for. 

I turned my attention to the long line and quickly got behind it, Cructhie following soon after.  Together, we talk and chuckled, my glance occasionally landing on Jack.  However, our gaze never met and that kind of disappointed me. 

I shook my head and continued my conversation with Crutchie, until we were standing in front of the really fat Weasel himself.

"How're you doing today, Mr. Weasel?" A satisfied smirk crawled over my lips.  He despised anyone and everyone that called him "Weasel" because his actual name was "Wiesel."  Pretty sure Jack started that name.

"Actually-"

"Wait!" I stopped him, holding up my hand.  "I forgot, I don't care."

An eruption of laughter sounded behind me, and I mentally give myself a pat on the back. 

"How many papes do ya want?" he grumbled in between his gritted teeth.

"Sixty papes, if ya please," I said with a sickening smile.

"60 PAPES!!" he cried over his shoulder.

I noticed Oscar, who was in charge of counting and giving the papes, standing angrily at me with a bruised jaw and a black eye.  I stuck out my tongue as he heaved up a stack of freshly printed papers.  I sniffed them.  Ah, there was nothing better than the smell of freshly printed papes!

I fell among the mingling crowd of newsies as I began to count my papes.  I read the headline and groaned.  "Trolley Strike Goes into 3rd Week..."

I heard several other groups from other newsies.

"How can they do dat!" I heard Mush cry. 

I adjusted my newsie cap and rolled my eyes.  Sometimes I felt like the newspaper reports hated our guts.  Which they probably did.  But sometimes it felt like they purposely made the headlines so uninterested, that even Pulitzer himself wouldn't bother reading it.