Author's Note: The film Newsies and the character of Jack Kelly, among others, aren't mine. Aislynn and Cassidy, however, are mine completely. With that being said, I'm going to take this opportunity to apologize wholeheartedly for this. I don't pretend to be particularly creative, or a good writer, and this crazy idea is the result of general insanity and boredom inspired by the Donnie Darko soundtrack - the source of the title is the song "Never Tear Us Apart," by INXS, the lyrics of which I may use later. So here's to hoping it's not half-bad. I'd like to write something that I can eventually say that I'm the least bit proud of.
February 5th, 2000
She didn't know what she was looking for. Come to think of it, Aislynn Fitzpatrick hardly ever knew what she was looking for, but this night especially. She'd known what she needed to do for months now, and here she was with a few hours left to do it, sitting in a nearly-empty parking lot at eleven at night smoking a cigarette and listening to 80's rock and roll music. 'Great, just great, Aislynn,' she thought between puffs of smoke. 'Eleven o'clock on a Wednesday night and you haven't managed to get your boyfriend one single fucking birthday present. Real great.' With a sigh, she opened the car door and extinguished the cigarette under the heel of her combat boot as she stood up. Not many stores were open that late in the middle of the week, but she was so desperate that she would get anything she would find, with the possible exception of something from one of the only stores open, selling clothes for young to adolescent girls.
The used books store wasn't particularly pleasing to the eye from the outside. The paint on the awning had faded, the lighting inside was dim, a faint musty smell lingered just outside the door, noticeable to anyone walking by. But on that particular night, something compelled Aislynn to walk in. She was greeted with "We're closing in a half-hour," from an employee, a man who looked like he was about college-aged, and she nodded slightly in recognition. 'There's no reason for me to be in here,' she thought repeatedly. 'Jack barely ever reads, it's not like he likes to do it a lot.' Yet in the bookstore she stayed, a small part of her certain that whatever she was looking for would be on the dusty shelves of the small store.
Aislynn wasn't sure how long she had spent looking when she came to a box of books with the word "Clearance" scrawled messily across the side with a black Sharpie near the register. They were mostly crime novels and romance novels, with spines so worn that some titles were barely readable; but somewhere in the middle of the collapsing cardboard box, there was a small black leather book that she would have described as 'ancient.' Her fingers brushed lightly over the worn leather, the feel of it sending chills up and down her spine. She picked it up gently, some of the yellowed pages nearly slipping out as she did so, and let the book fall open to the first page. It was someone's journal, it seemed, not really a book at all - a faded, wrinkled photograph lay on the first page, with a caption meant to be below it which read only, in a tiny, neat cursive script, "The Strike." It was of ten or so boys, all seeming to be between ten and twenty. Most of them had strange expressions on their faces, as if they had never posed for a picture before (one appeared to have stubbed his toe), but there was one boy in the middle, beaming proudly as if he had accomplished something fantastic. Her face went blank, her jaw dropped. "Jack," she breathed. For it was him, she would know him anywhere. Without a moment's hesitation, she stood up, book in hand, and placed it on the counter. "I'll take it," she said hurriedly, her voice breathy and anxious. The same employee who'd greeted her when she came in told her that it was two dollars, which she paid eagerly and then practically ran out of the store, clutching the book tightly in her hand.
When she got to her car, she was nearly panting to get air. She had a sensation like she was shaking; as she calmed herself, she stared at the plain black cover of the book. Whoever had owned it before had used it well - it was a wonder it was still held together ('Someone must have taken good care of this after it was used,' she thought briefly), and from where some pages were sticking out, it seemed as if all the pages had been filled with the same tidy writing which had captioned the picture that damn near terrified her. Hesitantly, she opened the book again, studying more closely the old photo. It appeared to be clipped out of a newspaper, she noticed, though left loose in the book rather than taped or glued in. She was certain now that the face in the picture was Jack; she had rarely seen him smile that broadly, but he was unmistakable, especially to her. She laid the photo down gently, almost worried that it would fall apart in her hands, and turned the page. A few words were written on the reverse of the opening page as if they were names, first letters capitalized. Some were illegible, the ink worn down and smeared through the years, but she could still make out some. Snipeshooter...Boots...David, Mush, Bumlets, Jack- "Jack?" she said aloud, stunned. She went back to the picture, and counted in by the names, those she could read and those she couldn't. Sure enough, where "Jack" was written corresponded with the boy in the photo. She shook her head in disbelief. "Who are you?" she asked the picture, cradling the picture in her hands and looking at the boy who was Jack. "Who are you?"
