A note: This was written for the "Newsies Pape Selling Competition."
Task 2 – Write about a time when a newsy character was forced to let go of their freedom for something or someone
Word count: 1,625 words
oOo
With her fingers shaking and her eyes straining under the dim gas light, Sarah couldn't bear the monotony of piecework any longer. She had known how to crochet lace ever since she was a little girl, far younger than Les, but she had never had to work with her hands for so many hours in a row. Mama had told her that knowing how to make something, having a skill such as lace-work, could help the family in case something ever happened to Papa or David. And when that something did happen and Mama couldn't stop screaming at the sight of Papa's mangled arm that day after he came back from the factory, Sarah knew that she was trapped.
David and Les were the lucky ones. While Sarah had to leave after grammar school, David was allowed to attend high school; it was presumed that Les would follow in his footsteps. So, in the aftermath of the factory accident and David off selling newspapers with Les and their partner, Jack Kelly, Sarah Jacobs was left alone in the tenement with her mother – her father would spend time elsewhere, not wanting his wife and daughter to see him as a weak man who couldn't even provide for his family. For hours, Sarah and her mother would work to supplement what David earned, but the extra dollar a week they'd bring home wouldn't keep the family afloat for long.
Nevertheless, the Jacobs family got by, even if Jack Kelly swinging by for dinner meant that they always had to add a little more water to the soup. Life became a dull routine: David and Les would leave just after sunrise to sell papers, Mayer would visit friends just across the street, and Esther and Sarah would squint over delicate lace doilies until the others came on home.
Sarah tried her very hardest not to become jealous of David, to resent him, but it was difficult. Sometimes, she wished that she could cut off her hair and dress up like a boy and join them, out in the fresh air of New York. But, she knew that that could never happen. She had a duty to Mama, to Papa, to her brothers, and so she continued on with a hook and some thread, the lace piling up each day until it was sold to some factory man over on Allen Street.
Despite the monotony of the piecework, one of the few bright moments in Sarah's day was when Jack Kelly stopped by for a visit. It really was hard to explain just how needed his visits were, for Sarah found that Jack Kelly represented something far more than the newsboy's strike. When the boy with a bandana around his neck began speaking about Santa Fe and the daring life out west, Sarah found it hard not to be swept up in the fantasy. Most New Yorkers, from paper boy to bookseller to lawyer, were stuck in this life of anonymous work in the big city. A boy like Jack, full of dreams and excitement towards something other than the next paycheck or a full stomach for once, was rare and Sarah knew this.
When she woke up one morning, the morning after she had bought a paper with her brothers' faces alongside Jack's, Sarah was met by a boy outside of her window. It figured that it should have been Jack Kelly, for an unusual boy like him seemed just the type to do something as odd as sleep all night on a stranger's fire escape.
"Did you sleep out here all night?" Sarah asked, holding the curtains – lace made by her own two hands – to her chest, trying not to show her embarrassment to the boy she admired so much.
Jack smiled lazily at her. "Yeah," he said, running his hands through his hair and further endearing himself to the girl that was Sarah Jacobs.
"Why didn't you wake us up?" Sarah said, for David and Les had already left the tenement in order to plan the rally with the other boys.
"Well, I didn't want to disturb nobody," Jack said. "Besides, it's like the Waldorf out here. Great view, cool air."
Sarah just smiled, as she and Jack both knew that he had a few secrets of his own then, before motioning towards the fire escape. "Go up on the roof," she said.
She almost didn't see the rakish smile that Jack Kelly gave her as he left his spot just underneath her window, the lace curtains swishing back into place as she rummaged through the chest of drawers to find a skirt to put on. If Sarah was wealthier and if her father was a banker or something like that, she would have gone to meet Jack Kelly in the front room of her lavish apartment, wearing a silk housedress to receive guests. Instead, Sarah had on a skirt that Mama had found at a second-hand shop and not even a blouse. This was certainly a change from her average morning, Sarah mused, as she found a few bread rolls and a bottle of milk for the errant newsboy waiting for her upstairs.
When Sarah saw Jack Kelly getting into a fistfight with Mrs. Lubinsky's stockings, she smiled softly to herself, wishing nothing more than to ask Jack to take her away from the doldrums of New York City.
She walked up to him then, ignoring the tomato she saw that he slipped into his pocket. "Are you hungry," Sarah said, although she already knew the answer.
Almost startled, Jack looked up. "Yeah," he said, his hand unconsciously hovering over the pocket into which he had stashed the tomato.
"Good," Sarah said, placing the basket of food down in front of them. "I made you breakfast."
That wasn't exactly true, the two of them knew, but for Jack Kelly, a boy who had called a fire escape a fancy hotel, some bread and milk was as fine a breakfast as he could imagine.
"Papa's so proud of you and David," Sarah said as she took out the milk and a few glasses. "You should hear him talking about Jack Kelly, strike leader, who occasionally takes his meals with us."
Jack looked over at Sarah, clearly mulling something over in his own head, as he said, "Well, this is one strike leader who's gonna be very happy when it's all over and I can get outta here and go to Santa Fe. Everything's different there. It's all bigger, the desert, the sky, the sun."
There was a strange ache in Sarah's heart as she tried to smile at Jack, to not show him how conflicted he felt. "It's the same sun as here," she eventually said, looking down so that Jack wouldn't see how truly upset she was at the mention of that adobe city.
Originally, Sarah was going to tell Jack about her own wishes to escape her life at home with her family. She was going to tell him all about the things that she wanted: a new home with more than two rooms, a husband who wouldn't make her crochet all day long in order to put enough food on the table, a few children for her to dote over, as she would never let them sell papers or work away their childhood. Sarah was going to tell Jack all of this, desperately hoping that he would say to her that it would be all right, that he would be there for her, after the strike, after her father got his job back. But it didn't really matter, did it, what Sarah wanted?
Jack just continued eating his breakfast. "Yeah. It just looks different," he said, still talking about the sun, utterly unaware of the thoughts that Sarah was having.
Yes, Jack Kelly was his own person, full of his own dreams and hopes for the future. No matter how much she wished, Sarah knew she could never keep him here with her so selfishly. Such a special person as Jack Kelly didn't deserve to be locked up in the same way as Sarah had been, no matter how unhappy she had felt amongst her lace and her family.
"I should get ready for work," Sarah said, trying not to let her sadness seep through her words.
Jack must've noticed, for he lost his smile and looked Sarah straight in the eye, suddenly all-too-serious. Such a look didn't become him, Sarah noted. Jack Kelly should always have a smile.
"Sarah," he said, making the girl's heart stop beating for a moment, "I'm just not used to having whether I stay or whether I go matter to anybody. I'm not saying it should matter, but does it?"
And that was why, when Jack Kelly looked over at her, waiting for her to say that it did matter to her, her family, all of New York, Sarah kept silent. She couldn't keep a boy as special as this shackled beside her in a life of tenements and factory work. After all, she still had a family to provide for and her brothers weren't even selling papers now. She couldn't leave Mama as the sole breadwinner for the family.
With each lingering moment of silence as Jack finished his breakfast and as she got ready for work, Sarah knew even more that she would gladly give up a happy life with Jack away from factory injuries and lace doilies, as it wasn't in her place, or anyone else's place, to tell Jack what to do.
Jack Kelly was his own person and only he could make the decision to go or to stay. Sarah just hoped that he would at least say goodbye to her before he left.
oOo
Author's note: Yet another character-driven piece. I dread the day when I have to write an action-based scene. I know that not many people like Sarah, but I hope that this one-shot adds a little bit more depth to the character.
A historical note: There really was a lacemaker on Allen Street around 1898/99. His name was Isaac Lefkowitz.
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