This idea popped into my head one day as I was cleaning and saw a cowboy hat. Kinda random, hope you enjoy.


"Wear this hat and you'll always be a cowboy."

"Are we really going ta live on a ranch in Santa Fe?" the young boy asked his mother, pushing the too-large cowboy hat out of his eyes. He looked at her with wide blue eyes. She laughed and tipped the hat back farther.
"Yes, one day we will move out there and you can be a real cowboy."
But that day never came. The boy's mother didn't live until spring, catching sick that winter and dying just after the new year. The boy lived alone with his alcoholic father for a few years. Then one day, a policeman came and informed the boy his dad had killed a man in a fit of drunken rage, effectively leaving the boy an orphan-alone in the world and forced to live on the streets.


"No way! Pirates ain't as good as cowboys and dey neva will be!" The now-13-year-old boy, calling himself Jack Kelly after a run-in with the law, was having himself a run-in with his friend Kid Blink about which was better, pirates or cowboys. Blink, wearing his trademark eyepatch, (obviously) insisted pirates were the best. His friends thought he looked like a pirate, so they had to be cooler. Jack, wearing the cowboy hat from his mother, argued cowboys ruled. His mother had said he was a cowboy and that he was the best boy in the world. Mothers didn't lie, even when not alive, so clearly cowboys rocked.
"Ha! Dat's wat youse think! Ise could beat youse in a fight any day!"
"Pfft, wat can pirates do? Dey just go about stealin' from people." Jack crossed his arms and smiled proudly.
"Wat can cowboys do?" Blink retorted, looking slightly offended. He crossed his arms as well and scowled.
"Dey can do lots."
"Name one thing."
"Dey can ride horses and raise animals and do lots of neat tricks."
"Dat...it ain't...but-but-but..." Blink sputtered around for a few minutes as Jack smirked, feeling like a king. "Okay fine, youse can win dis time. But Ise still say pirates are better. Cowboy." Blink muttered the last part under his breath as he turned away and climbed into bed. Jack kept smirking as he climbed into his own bed. And from that day on, he was known as Cowboy by all the newsies.