To Be a Newsie

Chapter Nineteen: Proposals?

Chapter Nineteen: Proposals?

    The next day, the pressing issue of Les and Sally's relationship was resolved. Sally brought the boy a lollipop in hopes of rekindling the relationship. Luckily, she had a backup orange one as Les immediately complained about the grape one. Both children were content and happy, and went to run around with Daisy and Jack in the Newsies' backyard.
David and Jack had been discussing the possibility of marriage recently, and they let the wrong people overhear them. The kind of people who will use your discussion to embarrass you without anyone else realizing it, and those who will steal your ideas and beat you to it.
"RATCAT MY BAE!" Spot yelled through the house, attracting the attention of all of the others as well. The rat ran over to the short newsboy as he got down onto one knee, a ring from one of those quarter machines in his hand. "RatCat, my lovely bae, will you marry me?" Whilst all of the newsies were thinking (and muttering) something along the lines of What the fuck is going on?, RatCat took the ring in his mouth and scurried away with it. Meanwhile, a certain blond's heart was racing thinking about what he was about to do.

"HEY SPOT, ALBERT, KENNY, YOU GUYS WANNA GET MARRIED AND BE THE ULTIMATE OT4?" He asked his boyfriends and girlfriend. They laughed along with the rest of the Manhattan Newsies Family™, but nodded along. Race grinned goofily, knowing that he had successfully put the idea out there and it had been well-received -- now he just had to actually pull off a proposal. While this had been happening, Jack stepped into the kitchen, pulled out the engagement ring he had bought for David, and smiled to himself as he looked at it. Closing the box quickly before anyone could see it, he went off to think about his proposal.

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 The next night, Race convinced Albert, Spot, and Kenny that it was the perfect night for a picnic down at the docks. All four of them loved it there; Spot had grown up roaming them with his boys, Albert had frequented them in the summer as he was an avid swimmer, Kenny enjoyed sitting and watching the sunrises and sunsets from them, and Race found it to be a calming place to smoke his cigars when he was stressed or anxious.

"So, ah, about yesterday..." Race started after they had been there awhile. "What do you guys think about... actually gettin' married or somethin'?"

"I dunno... how different would it be?" Albert questioned.

"Prob'ly not at all. There might be a little added pressure for us to move out -"

"And we could get away with doing more things romantically." Spot interrupted Kenny, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively. Kenny reached over and whacked the shortest of her boyfriends on the arm.

"I think it's a great idea, Race," the Kelly girl gave her acceptance. Albert and Spot followed suit, and Race grinned in full relief.

"Well, in that case," he pulled a flat box out of his pocket, showing it to the other three. "Money may be a bit tight between all of us, but I figured we should at least have something to mark this." He opened the box to reveal four necklaces. They were quite simple, just silver chains with washers strung onto them. Each necklace had three washers, silver and shiny and new, with the names of the other three in the relationship on them.

"Race, they're amazing," Spot said softly as he picked one up.

"I made it so that we can always have each other close, even if we're fighting or traveling or even not together anymore. I know it's not a lot, and they're certainly not fancy diamond rings, but -"

"Racer, they're perfect." Kenny cut off his rambling as Albert placed a kiss on his cheek. Race smiled as he helped Kenny get hers on and she helped him with his, while Albert and Spot helped each other. The four made their way home after that, laughing and running as they acted like children on their way.

Because they were too excited to act like the adults that they were supposed to be.

A/N: Ooh, look who added original content to the plot! Race's mock proposal at the beginning was "canon," but I imagine him as too sweet to consider that an actual proposal. I bet you thought I was talking about a Javey proposal with the title, didn't you? Don't fret, it'll happen soon enough ;)   - AB