Disclaimer: I don't own the Newsies! Nope, nope, nope…::tear::
A/N: Daydream's first shot in Newsieland at being semi-realistic and not funny! Wow:o)
Cigars
She propped her knobby elbows up on her knees and put her chin against the knuckles of her fisted hands. Enviously she watched him blow smoke through his crooked teeth with an experienced finesse. She didn't know why she was out there, her eyes trained on the sloppy trails of smoke that stood out in the sharp winter air. She didn't even like smoking.
Tightly rolled cigarettes had a stench that could crawl through material and cling to a person's skin like tree sap. The harsh, pungent odor of cigarettes was the smell of vaudevilles and dark alleys, of lust and the shame of a one-night stand. It was loneliness and the cold shimmer of a mud puddle in the light of a dying street lamp. A cigarette was a tease, fleeting and unsatisfying. They left you craving for another, and another, and another, and another…
Pipe smoke was the smell of money, old money. It was the kind of dollar bill where the design around the edges has been worn off because it has been fondled so many times by the same pair of hands. Pipes and the high-dollar tobacco stuffed carefully into their well-crafted wooden bowls were for the cultured and the upper class. Pipe smoke was the people who put money in the charity box on Sunday morning then spit at the street kids Monday afternoon. It was gilded, horse-drawn carriages and huge empty houses, crystal candle holders and lips turned up in a sneer.
She did, however, have an odd affinity for cigar smoke. That's why she was crouched on the front stoop where the ice from last night's snowstorm stuck to her rear end. Kloppman didn't allow anyone to smoke inside, and though a smart ass, he never broke Kloppman's rules. He would step outside onto the stoop and puff on his stolen Cuban cigars. She always followed him out here when he was tossing smoke rings at the moon like he was playing some solitary, twisted game of horseshoes.
Her lips parted, and she sucked in some of the grey, second hand smoke that had drifted her way. She didn't care if it was bad for her; as a good little Protestant girl, this was as close as she would ever get to actually smoking. It tasted thick and heavy, and she rolled the breath around on her tongue before blowing it out again through her pursed lips.
Cigar smoke was something different than the others. The smoke of a cigar was warm, lasting, and embracing. It was a night in front of a cedar-chip fire, the spice of a life from an older world, the friendly smile of someone who just cares about you. Cigar smoke was a fond memory that lingered in the mind for a while without being elusive.
A heavy weight was draped across her shoulders, and the tattered, empty sleeve of his old, hand-me-down coat fell beside her neck. She glanced up at him as he leaned back against the wall, shaking his head.
She watched the still-burning embers falls to the ground as he knocked the tip of the cigar with a finger. They went out with an inaudible hiss, and she drew a circle around the spot where they had landed. Cigar smoke was safe, a constant in her world of slippery slopes, empty pockets, and city nights.
"Crazy goil, they make coats for a reason," he grumbled before sticking the cigar back between his teeth and letting out another locomotive puff.
Of course, maybe it wasn't the cigar smoke.
Maybe it was just him.