Author's Note: I really shouldn't be starting a new story but I've had this idea in my head for a week now and it just won't stop nibbling at my brain. I finally gave in and just got the prologue down – it's a Spot story, set in Brooklyn, about 7 or so years after the strike. I've never done an entirely Spot story before and I think it will be good to try. It's also based – loosely, mind you – on the story of Mack the Knife, in case you were wondering. Just thought I'd share that with you. Anywho, here is the first part – I would really like it if anyone who read this told me what they thought. I'm thinking about, maybe, putting Diabo on hold to work on this a bit. Would that work?
Disclaimer: Spot Conlon, as he is a character from the 1992 live action musical, Newsies, is the property of Disney. Anyone else mentioned in this fiction will be the creative property of me. The line "things weren't as sad and grim as they are now" is taken directly from the "Pimp Tango" from the Threepenny Opera.
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Ballad of the Street Rat
06.23.06
Spot Conlon is the most notorious street rat in all of New York. A womanizer, a thief, a murderer, Conlon can do no wrong.
That is, until he, on a whim, marries and begins a cycle of events that will change the city forever.
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Poverty is the mother of crime - Marcus Aurelius
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Prologue
They say that 'poverty is the mother of crime'; such was not the case for Spot Conlon. He was born into a life of poverty – that can not be denied. The only child of Margaret and Patrick Conlon, young Liam was undersized and underfed. He was the product of a violent father and weak mother – Margaret died shortly after Liam's birth leaving her son in the custody of his no-good drunk of a father. If it wasn't for her dying breath, giving her wriggly pink mess of a son the name of 'Liam', the child would forever be called 'It' by his father; Patrick blamed the boy for the death of his wife and very rarely called him by any name other than 'Boy' when he was drunk.
Patrick Conlon was the first blood shed by Liam's hands and it was all done by accident. In a drunken fit, Patrick told his son, pushing twelve at the time and, for all appearances, looking like he was eight, that his mother deserved to die. "She was a damn whore who couldn't even give me a decent boy in return for her worthless life," he had said before Liam attacked. A knife from the table setting had been the fatal weapon. Patrick was dead before he knew it. He was not the first – anyone who crossed Spot Conlon, in the years to follow, shared the same fate as his father.
The feel of the warm liquid across his hands opened the boy up to more opportunities. He packed the limited belongings he had accumulated over the years, discarded his Christian name in favor of a nickname – Spot for no other reason than it was the easiest name for him to spell at the time – and left his father's hovel.
He was a Brooklyn boy, born and bred. Rather than flee his home, he appealed to the street rats of the city. After a few well placed crimes – he had learned to steal what he needed years ago when his father refused to provide him with food or clothing during the direst of his binges – Spot was welcomed into the fold.
Within a few years, at the age of sixteen, Spot found himself the head of the Brooklyn newsboys. It was a position that awarded him with respect; in truth, he was the most infamous newsie in all of New York. But Spot wanted more.
He gave up the pretense of being a newsie just before he turned eighteen. He had a weakness for a pretty girl; if she was a good lay, she was all the better. By using the charm that came inherent to him, Spot Conlon gathered a group of girls that pledged their loyalty to him. He made most of his money by selling those girls and splitting with them a cut that he felt fair: ten percent and all the Spot they could want. Most were satisfied with the arrangement.
But the lure of stealing never wore off for Conlon. And, with every score he made, every item that was 'unstealable' that made it into his collection, his name spread even further. Every man wanted to be in with him, every woman wanted to fuck him, every lawmaker wanted him dead.
And Spot Conlon just smirked about it all.
Therefore, it must be said, Spot Conlon's crimes were not the result of his early poverty. By the time he was 20, in the year 1903, Conlon had enough money to retire to a more stable life. But he didn't. And the crimes continued.
Spot Conlon did not steal, did not murder, did not sell his women just for the money it earned him. He did it for his reputation. So, in the case of Brooklyn's most notorious street rat, poverty did not mother crime. Infamy did.
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The tale that I am prepared to tell is one of poverty and crime, of second chances and regrets, of love and lust. It is neither for the squeamish nor for the faint of heart – but it for those who have an affinity for happy endings.
This story is as old as the day is long and as long as the day is old; it began with the first sunset and will only end when dawn comes at night, bathing the dark creatures with a light so beautiful that it sends them to their doom.
The following is as true as any elaborated yarn spun about a notorious figure can be. Things weren't as sad and grim as they are now – for Conlon to find happiness after all the crimes he committed, it was more than understood. It was expected.
The ballad of the street rat, Spot Conlon, is more than just the chronicling of one man's rise, fall and, ultimate, rise again. It is, at it's innermost core, the written documentation of a love affair.
Spot Conlon and Brooklyn. Was there ever a pair more evenly matched? Would there ever be a couple that even rivaled the passion Spot felt towards his City? Or the affection that Brooklyn offered in return?
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The story of Spot Conlon begins in the summer of 1906. The news was spreading like the wildfires of the West that were dominating the headlines those days: Spot Conlon – the womanizer, the thief, the murderer – had gotten married...