People used to ask me why my friend was a crip. They'd wonder if he got in a fight, or had been hit by his dad. None of us ever knew. Crutchy wouldn't tell a soul. He would always just smile and let us think what we wanted. I think he wanted us to believe he'd gotten into a fight. It made him seem tough, you know? Yeah, he used a crutch to walk, but he wasn't some floppy wuss.
Sometimes I wish he had told me. Crutchy always used to tell me things- beautiful things, things about the world far away from New York. The stories Jack told about Santa Fe were full of adventure, horses, and deserts for miles. Crutchy's stories were about countries far, far away. He painted pictures for me in my mind of fields covered in purple flowers and little girls in white dresses braiding blooming dandelions together to make crowns for their hair. He talked like he knew all about those huge, rambling white houses in the country with the carriages parked in front. He knew that I loved his stories, even if the other young newsies rolled their eyes and pointed out how the tales were impractical. I loved to hear about rambling castles with ivy creeping over the aging stones, and knights with heavy iron swords. Part of the reason I humored Les so much was because the boy always wanted to sword fight with me. We would fold the unsold papes from the previous day into hats and then battle with each other.
Once, when Les and I were leaping over rocks and cobblestones, laughing and crashing into trash cans and gates, I saw Crutchy watching us with those brown eyes of us. His smile was terrible, all sad and hopeful at the same time. Sometimes when he talked about the countryside he would get that smile, or when he spoke of wizards battling giant dragons that came swooping down out of the sky. He straightened his hat when he noticed I had been watching, and waggled the fingers of one of his hands in silent greeting. Les charged on, but I halted and waved back.
After that I always included Crutchy in our games. The first time I asked, he was doubtful that he could play it as well as we did. He said as much, but I convinced him he could be the wizard and his crutch could be his sword. Les was eager to have another newsie join our games, and the moment the three of us had sold our papes, we would gather around the statue of that giant man. I've slept in his lap a few times- Crutchy told me 'bout him once. His name was Hornald Greenly, or something to that effect, and he'd been running papes since before even Pulitzer was born. I don't usually care to listen about the affairs of dead people, but Crutchy could make even the most boring historic fact fascinating.
Crutchy was real good at playing pretend with us. He was so good I asked him if he'd invented our games at one point, and he gently reminded me Les and I had been the ones to begin them. Whenever I saw Jack or Dave treating Crutchy like he was an idiot, I got real angry. Crutchy was gentle, that was all, a soft soul in the midst of the rest of us. He was a white flower blooming in a mountain of thorns.
Then he got sick, real sick. I don't think he ever forgot his days in the Refuge- once when I'd had a terrible dream, I had tried to wake him up and when I tapped him he bolted upright, cowering. I don't know what those boys there did, but it must have been something awful. I had known him for almost a year before he got beaten up by the Delanceys and arrested, and when he came back, his eyes were different. Even when I begged him for stories he would smile funny, and there wasn't so much violence in his tales. I was glad that he joined in the play fights with Les and me, even though he got tired real fast. Jack once told me quite solemnly that I was in charge of making sure Crutchy stayed tough.
We were playing that Crutchy was a brave knight and Les and I were dragons when I first realized how sick Crutchy was. He started coughing so hard that he nearly fell to his knees. He hadn't been moving around much today, and ten of his papes lay on the stones at his feet. I knew Crutchy couldn't afford to not sell, but I didn't say anything.
He didn't get up that next morning. I dunked my face in the sink of rusty water, drying it off with my shirt. Crutchy wasn't anywhere to be found. Snipeshooter mentioned that Kloppman was talking with Crutchy, and they were being real serious. I actually went with the rest of the boys that day to sell papes.
Crutchy didn't come.
Les and I didn't feel like playing without Crutchy. Our group of newsies was strangely subdued as we settled at the feet of the statue to play marbles. I always had good marbles, white ones with green and blue in the middle. I sold a pape a day to a schoolboy in exchange for three marbles. We had a special deal going.
That night when we went to the Lodging House, Crutchy was in his bunk. He was looking terrible, pale with bright pink spots on his cheeks. His hooded eyes were sunken and the whites of them were a reddish color. The bags on his face were a deep black, and it almost looked like he'd been given black eyes. He could hardly move, and he was breathing so loudly you could tell it was hurting something awful. Every so often he would cough, the sound thick and unnatural.
He was dying.
I was in a daze for the next few days. Crutchy never left the Lodging House, just stayed there growing thinner in his cot as Kloppman hovered over him. Every time I saw him he looked worse. His crutch had been kicked under his bed, and his thin frame seemed to shrivel like a drying brown leaf. He shook, too, especially when he coughed. The sounds of his dry coughing and creaking bed kept me up every night. I felt sorry for Blink, who slept above him.
Whenever I woke early, I avoided the end of the room where Crutchy lay shivering. One morning I could hear him calling to me. "Boots," He gasped thickly. I pretended I couldn't hear, lacing up the shoes that so long ago I had learned to blacken.
"Please," He whispered, then broke into a coughing fit again. Once I was done I quietly made my way over to where he was. It was so early, the sun hadn't even begun to peak through the tightly sealed windows. Everyone was asleep, and the room was eerily silent.
"Why are you so sick?" I begged in a whisper of him, falling to my knees beside his bed. I clutched one of his hands, mine looking darker than usual beside his sickeningly white flesh. He smiled that odd, sad little smile of his, closing his eyes. He wheezed when he breathed, clenching his teeth together until the pain had passed.
"I wasn't born a crip, you know." Crutchy was oddly rational as he spoke, detaching himself from the tale as though it was just one of the ones he usually spun to amuse me. "But I do have a disease. I used t' live in the country, y'know? In one of the fairy tale houses wit' a white fence and three dogs. The doctors didn't t'ink I would live 'til I was four, but I showed 'em. I learned how t' walk, even though they said I never would. My muscles are diseased, but I could run on both legs just like you. But even though I'd made so much progress, my muscles started t' deteriorate again. An' then one o' my legs really gave out, and I had t' use a crutch. My parents didn't like that so much." He fell silent. I waited a long time for him to speak again, listening to the troubled sound of his breathing. He was hurting bad, it was written all over his face. He never could hide his emotions.
"So I ran away. We was on vacation, an' I met up with Jack. I ran away t' become a newsie, an' have been ever since. I used t' think that the city cleared up my disease. Sure, I couldn't walk on one leg so well, but I was better than I'd ever been." Silence again. "But the Delanceys, they hurt me bad."
"Those lousy bummers!" I interjected vehemently. Crutchy just looked at me with a tolerant, quiet smile.
"'s okay, Boots. I t'ink it was the Refuge that sent my muscles back t' how they used t' be. It was cold there, y'know? An' there wasn't enough food. I ain't felt so good since. An' now..." The spots on his cheeks were a bloody red, the rest of his skin so pasty he matched his stained pillowcase and sheets. He had begun to sweat.
He never finished telling me the rest. He sought out my hand suddenly, grabbing it with both of his with a very strong grip. His brown eyes, those beautiful eyes of his, were too bright. "Tell me a story," He requested softly, like a small child.
My heart broke. I spoke in gasps, choking back the tears that threatened to break free from my eyelashes. I wove him a story of a castle, all of pure white, with silver flowers and a princess locked in a tower. A handsome price, with curling brown hair and brown eyes, saved her. I could tell my friend was slipping away as I told the story. Once he had closed his eyes, I no longer held back my tears. I continued to speak, aware that many other newsies were awake in their beds, listening to my words.
"And they lived happily ever after," I finally finished, biting hard on my lower lip to subdue a sob. Crutchy smiled slightly.
"Ever after," He mumbled, looking as though he was about to fall asleep. He took in a ragged gasp of air, his small chest expanding as he breathed in, then he halted. I squeezed his hands, not even aware that I was begging him to come back, begging him to please be better, please breath again, tell me another story, play with me, look at me, open your eyes and smile, that sad smile with your sad brown eyes and your heart so big and your hands so soft and your tales so sweet...come back, Crutchy...please come back...
Gently, I was separated from him by Blink. I buried my face in the older boy's shirt, struggling to not let the other newsies see my tears. Blink splayed a strong hand against my back. Jack was saying something, bending over the body, but I blocked it all out.
Crutchy was in one of his favorite tales now, the one with those strings of pearls and singing angels. He had never been afraid of death. But suddenly, I was afraid.
So, so very afraid.