All right, everyone, this is my first Newsies fanfic ever and I'm hoping you will all enjoy it. I hope I'll get a lot of people to R&R, so please do! I love to hear what all of you think, so, yeah, I just can't wait to hear what you all think and I hope all of you will enjoy it. I tried to make it all as realistic and in character as possible. Enjoy:)
Savin' Me Money
Chapter 1
"How do I look, Mom?" the girl asked.
"I'd swear I didn't know you; you look just like a boy," the woman replied.
"Really, no hair stickin' outta my hat or nuttin'?" she asked, straightening her hair and tucking a few stray stands underneath it.
"You look fine, trust me, I'd never know the difference," her mother assured her, chuckling. "But, Jenna, girls can be newsies too, I don't know why you feel like you have to dress like a boy to be a newsie."
"Ah, Mom, I ain't gonna have a bunch a guys thinkin' that I can't take care of myself, plus, I'll make friends easier dis way, and Mom, there ain't hardly any girl newsies 'round here," she said, listing the reasons behind her disguise.
Jenna Thomas was a spunky seventeen-year-old with beautiful, long red hair and blue eyes that sparkled with excitement. She wasn't afraid of anything and was quite the tomboy. Her mother had come down with cancer a year ago and now she couldn't even work anymore. Her father had died three years ago leaving them without much money to begin with. The situation had just snowballed after her father's death. Her mother had cancer and they could barely afford pain killers, which was all Jenna could give her because they couldn't afford a visit from the doctor. There was nothing else for her to do except leave school and become a newsie. She didn't mind though, she was ready for a change of scene. School bored her and all of the girls made fun of her because of her boyish ways. Life would never go back to the way it was, she knew that. More than likely her mother would die and there was nothing else to do but either bear up under it and accept it or cry, which she refused to do. Jenna wasn't one to break or cry without a dang good reason.
Her mother didn't doubt that she would fit in fine with the newsies; she just wished that she would act a bit more grown up. Jenna was much more grown up than her mother knew though. She had no other way to deal with her current situation but block it out, act like it didn't exist. Maybe that was another reason she was so eager to leave school where the teacher asked her at least once a week how her mother was doing. She carried all these burdens herself and she was afraid that if she got too close to someone she would loose them or pull them down with her own problems so she was always a little hesitant to really get close to someone. She never complained though, especially now that she could roam the streets and gamble without anyone thinking it was "unladylike." She felt free somewhat. The only thing pulling her down was the issue of money because everything she didn't spend on more newspapers she had to save for her mother. She almost felt as though she had her mother's life in her hands, which scared her.
"Fine, Jenna, you just get out there and be yourself," her mother laughed.
"That's just what I intend ta do," she said with a nod, waltzing out the door.
"Dear me, what have we got here?" The boy nudged the one next to him with his shoulder, his hand occupied by a cigar through two of his fingers. The boy next to him turned his head and followed the other's eyes to where he was staring.
"I dunno, new guy more'n likely," he replied.
"Hey, Jack!" the first boy cried as a boy much taller than he with a cowboy hat hanging down his back turned, a stack of papers over his shoulder.
"Yeah, Race?" he asked.
"Look at what we got here," he said, nodding toward Jenna's figure as she approached the group of newsies.
"New guy?" Jack asked.
"Must be," the third boy said.
"Well, why don't we just introduce him to New Yawk?" Jack decided as he walked up to Jenna and the other two boys snickered softly. "Hey, kid, ya new 'round here?"
"First day," she replied in the voice she had practiced over and over. She had finally gotten the tone perfect and after a few days it became easy to switch from one to the other.
Her costume was also easy to adjust to since she hated dresses and anything that came with them. She wore a dirty, old tan hat flipped backward so that the brim covered her hair in case some came loose. Her shirt was a dirtied white that was extremely loose so as not to give away her identity. She may have acted like a boy but she was built like a girl and couldn't ignore that. Her pants were tan and loose as well with a matching pair of suspenders and a few patches and holes here and there.
"Ya got a name?" Jack asked.
"Jim," she replied smoothly.
"Well, Jim, it bein' your foist day we wouldn't want ya to get lost," he said as the two boys behind him snickered even more.
"I can make me way around this city by myself, and I can sell me papes too," she said proudly, waltzing by the three.
"Pretty confident for a new guy," one of the boys said.