NEWSIES????? HELLO??? THIS MUSICAL WAS THE SHIT YEARS AGO AND NOW YALL ARE DUMPING IT.
the plot, the political references, the SONGS, the harmonies…. not to even mention the fact its based off true events???
lets also talk about the ART IDEAS? animators, please. god. yall know that one song thats like “uh uh yes sir yes sir, ima meet you in the passenger, you’re the prize, you’re a pulitzer..” PLEASE SOMEONE DO THAT WITH JACKATHERINE. spoilers: katherine says her byline is plumber when she first meets jack, however- its later revealed that her real last name is pulitzer, and that she’s the daughter of joeseph pulitzer (a real person!) who jack and the newsies were striking against. they later get together anyways- but wouldnt that fit??? please???
I had a spark of inspiration so enjoy! Maybe it’s a phone background? Maybe it’s just pretty! Who knows! But I hope you enjoy!
If you like it.... Don’t be afraid and don’t Delay....I’m just an ask away!
tw: no real warnings. jack’s a lil sad and a lil anxious that’s all :)
summary: it’s been a rough few weeks and jack hits a wall. katherine comes home to find him crying in the dark.
wordcount: 1948
notes: @prettyinlimegreenboots, i am your secret santa for @newsies-secretsanta! i really hope you like this because honestly idek how i feel about it. It’s definitely different than what i usually write, so it was a lot of fun but also i don’t know how i did lol. hope you’re not too disappointed. merry christmas!!!
notes 2: i entered the secret santa thing on my main, @pricelesstrashpanda. i’m just posting it here because this is my fic account. hope that’s okay!
It was a small place. It was in a rough neighborhood. Something new broke everyday, and that was incredible seeing as the single-room apartment had very little in it to break. But it was their place. That was all that mattered to Katherine.
Jack didn’t care about any of that for him… heck, trash as it was, this was still the nicest place he’d ever lived. But for her… content and happy as she was… he couldn’t help but look around and feel so, so inadequate.
She treated every new breakdown as a new adventure, laughed and stole kisses as they fixed it together. But didn’t it ever, ever cross her mind… what she’d left, the riches of the Pulitzer family, for this… this dump she now called home?
Of course she’d never say if it did. Fierce and outspoken as she was, she knew Jack’s pride was still fragile, and she knew what that would do to it. So of course, she’d never say it if she shivered at night and wished for the warmth of her father’s home, or if she ever sat down with him to budget the next week with her earnings and what little was left of his after he made sure all the young newsies were taken care of, and thought about all of the rich men out there who she could’ve had in a heartbeat.
The knowledge that no matter how miserable she was, she’d never say anything until she was halfway out the door forever, hung over Jack like a dark cloud. Somedays, they were just so… happy… that he got ahead of it. Others, she’d be working late and he’d stumble home to an empty, pathetic little room, and everything would hit him at once.
It was one of those nights.
Headlines had been awful for a few weeks now. He wasn’t selling like he usually did, and that meant the younger newsies certainly weren’t, so even the steadier pay he earned for his art was quickly being swallowed up to keep them fed and warm.
He hadn’t even seen Katherine much the past few days… she was desperately trying to chase down a decent headline and having little luck doing it.
As he unlocked the door and stumbled inside, dripping from the pouring rain he’d absorbed all day, he could feel the weight of the world crashing down on his shoulders.
Their tenement building had no electricity, so he was left to fumble in the dark for the nearest lamp, shuffling across the room with hands stretched in front of him to feel for the old crate which functioned as their nightstand. When they found it, one also quickly found the gas lamp sitting on it, but the other nicked against something sharp.
He swore and jerked back, clenching his fist around a mildly bleeding cut on his palm to keep the blood from getting everywhere.
He must have forgotten his knife that morning.
He couldn’t see the cut, but he knew it wasn’t bad. He’d forget about it as soon as he could stop worrying about staining the things on and around him.
He was largely numb from the cold outside that their thin walls couldn’t keep out, and it mirrored so perfectly the emotional state he’d been in lately, that the pain was almost a relief… it reminded him that he could still feel something.
That thought broke something inside of him… something that had been holding back all of the stress and shame and heaviness of his life and making him feel that numbness in the first place… and suddenly, he felt a hot tear running down his face.
What kinda stupid was he, thinking he could pull this off? An incredible girl, a home of their own, and a family of newsies he took care of? That was all way too perfect for his life. What in the universe had ever made him think he deserved it? What had made him think he could keep it. He’d lose it all, one by one, just like he lost everything in his entire life.
He felt his legs giving out under him and turned, trying to fall onto the bed, but slid right off the edge and onto the floor. He didn’t have it in him to move. He didn’t have it in him to try to get the light on again. All he could do was sit in the dark, the tears rolling down his face his only source of warmth, and feel like his world was slipping away from him.
The words of a cowboy song he didn’t quite remember where he’d learned slid into his mind, his voice shaking as he murmured them into the darkness.
He’s a worn, weary stranger, too old for his age.
He’s been fighting since he could first stand.
He doesn’t have any family, at least not one that stays.
They keep slipping right out of his hands.
He squeezed his eyes shut hard enough that colors exploded under his lids. It was more than he could see with them open.
He didn’t even know what he was feeling. He was just so tired… tired of fighting, tired of leading, tired of never feeling like he was enough.
He heard footsteps outside. A hand tried the door to see if it was locked, and when it wasn’t, it creaked open and back shut again.
“Jack?” Her bag hit the floor. “Jack, are you in here?”
She knew he’d never leave the door unlocked if he wasn’t, but what kinda person sat around in the dark, crying?
Right. His loser kinda person.
Her shape moved towards him. “Jack, I can see you down there. What are you doing on the floor?”
He didn’t trust himself to answer. Didn’t trust himself to pull off a lie, certainly didn’t want to be telling the truth.
She made it to the nightstand and reached out, and he suddenly realized the knife was still sitting there, waiting for its next victim.
“Kat…” His voice came out a croak. “Watch fa my knife.”
The shadowy shape of her arm moved more carefully, one hand finding the lamp and fumbling for a moment before igniting it.
Its uneven light tripped in its different directions… across the floor, over the bed, up the wall, and onto Jack’s face.
It illuminated Katherine’s as well, now etched in a confused frown as she stared down at him.
“Jack, what on earth are you doing?”
He looked away, all too aware that the evidence of crying was still probably very in his eyes, and that he’d barely even stopped.
“Nothin. I mean, I was jus thinkin’, ya know? Dark’s sometimes good fa that.”
“Right.” She drew out the word, making it clear she didn’t believe a word that had just come out of his mouth. “And is the floor sometimes good for that too?”
Jack shrugged, still not looking at her. “Sure.”
She scowled a little, but it wasn’t her I’m actually mad and you might wanna run scowl. No, this was her You are really worrying me scowl. Katherine didn’t like being worried. She didn’t like being anything that resembled scared.
But in his present state, Jack became aware of the uncomfortable thought that he was almost more scared of her worry than her wrath.
“Jack Kelly,” she stated at length. “You may be good at lying to idiots on the street, but I am not one of them.” She let the words hang between them a moment before her tone softened. “Now you’ve been crying. What’s wrong?”
He knew another fib wasn’t a good idea, but he just couldn’t bring himself to say anything else, so he opened his hand for her to see the place the knife had nicked him.
“I cut myself tryna turn on the lamp, thas all. Made my eyes water or somethen.”
“Yeah.” She sighed heavily. “Or something.”
She crossed the room to the makeshift counter he’d constructed to keep their food and single set of dishes off of the floor, grabbing a worn out rag and dipping it in the water basin, filled that morning.
He knew he should get up, see about supper, prove he was fine, but he just couldn’t find it inside of him to move, and he was still in place as Katherine walked back to where he was and knelt down beside him.
She took his injured hand in his, but he pulled back a little, muttering as he did. “You don hafta do that. I got it.”
Her grip just tightened, jerking his hand towards herself sharply. “We are not playing this game, Jack,” she said quietly, and he relented, allowing her to press the rag against the cut until the bleeding had mostly ceased.
When it had, she flipped it to its cleaner side and reached up with her free hand, removing his cap from his head and setting it aside before beginning to clean the day’s dirt, which had somehow appeared despite the rain, off of his face.
He closed his eyes, absorbing her closeness, forgetting just for a moment about everything that was crushing him.
Satisfied, Katherine sat back, and Jack reluctantly opened his eyes and forced them to meet hers as she stared at him pointedly. She really wasn’t letting this drop.
He held it for a moment before exhaling heavily and nodding to the empty floor beside him. “Sit with me, would ya?”
The ghost of a smile touched her face as she obliged, sliding into place beside him and wrapping her arm around his, laying her head on his shoulder.
He hesitated another long moment before finally asking softly, “Why are ya here, Kat?”
She squeezed his arm a little, pressing that much closer to him. “Because I love you.”
“But…” He faltered, choking tears which had been renewed by those three little words. “why?”
“That would be quite the list,” she replied softly. “But I guess for starters… because you are worth being loved.”
He pressed his lips together and squeezed his eyes shut, but the water ran down his face anyway. “I don… I don think I’m following ya there.”
She sighed, lifting her head from his shoulder to turn and look at him and reaching up to run a hand through his hair. “I know it’s been a hard lately,” she told him gently, “but I’m gonna need you to stop letting a hard life convince you there’s something wrong with you.”
He actually laughed a little. “There’s always been somethen wrong with me.”
“No,” Katherine countered. “There’s always been something wrong with the world. Learn the difference.”
“I mean, the world’s about as horrible as the world can be,” he agreed. “But I’m pretty sure I am too.”
“I’ve got a pretty convincing argument otherwise.” He heard a playfully flirty note enter her tone, behind the gentleness.
“And what would that be?”
Two soft hands found either side of his head, and then she was kissing him, deep and passionate, the taste of rain on her lips and the smell of ink all over her. She smiled as they pulled back for air, and Jack couldn’t help but match it.
“Good point.”
He kissed her again.
The more uplifting continuation of the song he’d been singing to himself a few minutes before came to him. He murmured it to her in between kisses.
She can turn a head for beauty, but her heart’s got so much more.
The kind of beauty broken falls for everytime.
She can love a weary stranger, kiss him through the pain,
QUICK GUYS: I have a game idea, an I need the help of the Tumblr fansies. Send me the most riddiculous ship names for two (main-ish) characters and I will have my mom guess who they are. (she knows Newsies, but please don’t put rare characters or OCs. It needs to be guessable.)
Hey anonymous! Thanks for asking me! I wasn’t sure if you wanted an edit or fanfiction, so I’ve done both!! Hope you enjoy!
Ship: Jack x Katherine
“Please jack, don’t leave,” Katherine pleaded, trying to calm her voice.
“Why not? New York ain’t got nothing I need,” jack replied.
Katherine started pacing, thinking of ways to make jack stay. If she confessed her love for the boy, that would definitely scare him off. Nope, no, confessing is off my table.
“Jack all of your friends are here! You have no one in Santa Fe! What are you going to do, make friends with the tarantulas and tumbleweeds?”
Jack stared in her eyes, he could almost see her brokenness at the thought of loosing jack. He was sure tears were building g up and threatening to fall. He wondered, just for a moment, if she felt the same. Slowly, he approached her, trying desperately to appear strong.
“Nothing any of you can say could make me stay, I’se made up my mind. I’m heading down to the train station tomorrow.”
“Jack,” Katherine struggled to find her words, “these boys need you here, you have a union to lead. What if something happens again? Who’s going to fight for them? They are just children, jack!” Tears started falling.
“Dave is gonna be fine leading them, he basically led the strike, I just spoke his words.”
Fine, if words won’t convince him actions might. Kath stormed closer until they were inches apart, staring straight into Jack’s soul. She is terrifying when she wants to be. She scowled and poked jacks chest then balled her fist, looking as if she would throw a punch at any minute.
“Are you gonna try and knock the sense into me? I’m going to Santa Fe, Kat, you can’t change my mind!” Jack spat out, anger boiling inside of him.
Suddenly Katherine grabbing his cheeks and closed the distance. To her surprise, jack kissed her back. They broke apart, both with laboured exhaling.
“Stay, for me.”
“I just might.”
She then sucker punched jack in the gut and burst out laughing. “Don’t EVER, threaten to abandon all of us again!”
