~Author's Note:

Hey everyone! So this is my, what, third Newsie fanfiction.

It's my first time-travel fic, so I'm really excited about that! Basically what's happening here is the prologue, which introduces you to my OC, Cassie. She's living in the 21st century, just in case y'all couldn't tell.

Unfortunately, the newsboys aren't in this chapter (tear, tear) but they will be in the next one, promise!

Anyway, PLEASE tell me what y'all think and read&review.

Hugs!

lovelovelove, Julianna.~

Prologue

The phone's screen lit up, like the lights of a Christmas tree, bringing its own kind of gift. Carefully avoiding the teachers' gaze, Cass reached into her bag and slid the phone open.

1 New Message, it proclaimed. Using her practiced fingers, opened the message, glancing up every few seconds at the teacher to make sure she couldn't see her. Cass shifted in her chair so that she was shielded by the back of the boy in front of her.

Hey, said the message. Cassy rolled her eyes, and hit Reply.

Hey, she wrote and punched Send.

Settling back into her seat, Cass folded her arms over her chest, practicing her best pouty look in the teacher's direction.

"So," the teacher was saying. "It's important to realize that Puritans wrote in the 'plain style,' which was they way that they spoke. It might seem ridiculous to us, but that was, in fact, their simplest form of communicating."

Cass sighed and glanced back into her bag, where the phone was glowing silently and unobserved.

What's up, said Andrew.

English, Cass replied.

She sat up again in her seat, glancing around, bored, until her phone lit up again. Sighing, she opened the message, awaiting Andrew's usual one-word response and trying to think of a good way to change the subject.

Sneak out, he said. and meet me behind the gym.

A trill of excitement fluttered in Cass's stomach and her eyes flew to the clock on the wall. Three minutes left in class. She drummed her fingers on the desk and put all her things into her backpack.

K, she replied to Andrew. See you then xo.

The teacher looked at the clock. "I'll let you all go early. Have good days!" she called to them as they all heaved their backpacks onto their shoulders and exited quickly. Cass strode quickly past all her classmates.

They didn't call her back, just simply stared hatefully at the back of her head and thought bad things about her. Cass rushed to her locker and pulled out her coat and keys before walking surreptitiously toward the end of the hallway and the glass door which stood there.

Slipping into her coat and then glancing behind her, she pushed the door open and skidded outside.

The world was covered in white snow and this added to the excitement bubbling in her stomach as she sprinted toward the gymnasium, her nose and cheeks stinging in the cold air and her curls flying behind her.

When she reached the gym, Andrew was standing leaning up against the exterior of it. She ran over to him and hugged him around the waist. He didn't hug her back; just waited for her to finish.

"Hey," he said, flicking ash from the end of his cigarette. Cassie stuck her hands in her pockets and looked at Andrew. He had short black hair cropped close to his head and his body was stocky and muscular.

"Hey," she replied.

"Listen," he said. "How would you like to take a little trip?" He grinned like this was a huge treat.

"Where?" she asked suspiciously.

"The city," he said, and she knew that he meant New York. They lived in Jersey. "I got business."

She snorted at his idea of business. "Whatever," she said. "Better than school."

He nodded. "Come on then," he said and started to walk away, feet crunching on the snow.

She trotted up behind him, annoyed that he walked away, and caught up with his steps. Her breath was visible as she exhaled. When they reached his car, a beat-up old black Pinto, she saw that there were two others inside.

"They're coming, too?" Cass asked.

Andrew grunted yes and opened his car door as Cassie walked around to open hers. Sitting in the passenger's seat was Nate, a muscular blonde boy, and in the back of the car on the driver's side was his girlfriend, August, who had smoky blue eyes and straight, honey-colored hair.

Cassie thought that August secretly hated her, but never let on. Cass opened the metal door and slid into the car's backseat and placed her bag at her feet.

Andrew glanced in the rearview mirror with his cold brown eyes before pressing on the accelerator. The car lurched forward (it was a piece of junk) and they made their shaky descent down the hill toward the highway.

Reaching it, they took the northern route, which was the fastest and sat through the traffic that was building up on the slick and snowy highway.

Cassie looked out the window as Andrew and Nate talked about who-knows-what (cars or something) and tapped her fingers on the cold glass, leaving little clear spaces in the fogginess.

She turned back to face front, fidgety for some reason that she couldn't place. She took out her phone and started playing with it, flipping it open and closed rapidly. August gave her a sideways glance of annoyance.

Cass sat on her hands and glanced over at August who sat with her legs and arms crossed, her dark jeans stretched tight over her legs. Cassie looked down at her own legs, clad in tight but faded jeans and splayed in an unladylike way. She curled them underneath her Indian-style and pulled her iPod from the back.

Resting her head back, Cass put in the headphones and put the player on shuffle. Her music lulling her into a stupor, Cassie promptly fell asleep.

She woke up with a jolt as the car slid onto the rumble strip on the side of the road. Her eyes whipped open and she looked at Andrew. He and Nate were now laughing uproariously at his ridiculous and dangerous driving habits.

Cass and August rolled their eyes at each other, the first exchange that they'd acknowledged during the whole trip. Cassie glanced down at her phone on her lap and saw that she'd only slept for an hour.

Curling her headphones around the iPod, Cass announced, "I'm hungry."

Andrew rolled his eyes angrily into the rearview mirror to look at her. She met them skittishly. "Do you see any place to eat around here?" he asked her.

"No," she said, sinking back into the seat.

"'I'm hungry,'" he mocked. "God."

Nate laughed and Cass turned her face so that her cheek was on the plushy car seat and closed her eyes again. August patted her arm consolingly and Cass opened her eyes to smile at her before drifting off again. She was used to this sort of thing.

She woke up, again, as they crossed under the tunnel leading into the city. And that is the last thing she remembers.