I've just refurbished this chapter (again). They just get shorter and shorter.
"C'mon, Emma! What's a lovely lady like youse need wid' a cigar?" Racetrack wheedled. The girl opposite him was short, compact and heavily freckled.
"I'm a newsgirl, not a lady. Anyway 'syour own fault you don't got enough money to buy your own. And anyway," she cooed, fluttering her eyelashes, suggestively. "You don't think I'm half as pretty as Daaavie."
"Tragically, it's true." He dodged her sharp elbow and pulled an accusing face.
"Tightwad."
Emma swung round the railing and up the staircase to boy's room on the top floor. Girls' bunks were on the bottom floor, though most opted for alternant living space, if they could afford it. Emma couldn't. And besides, this week, waking the newsboys was her special privilege. (1)
"Why aren't you awake, yet?" She demanded, poking one boy in the ribs and tugging on another's ear. She made her rounds about the room, slapping and jostling the boys from sleep.
"Mercy, Jack, put on a shirt," she cried. He rubbed his eyes, mumbling.
"Mmm…Y'love it…" He rolled to his other side, pillow over his head.
"You're disgusting," Emma told him. She ducked, but he was quicker, and she retreated, rubbing her shoulder. Stopping at the far corner, she rested her elbows on one of the counters.
"Patch was on the left eye yesterday, Blink," she said.
"It was, wasn'it?" he mused, switching it.
"A little higher," she gestured with one hand, her other grabbing his hat from the wall peg where it dangled.
"That's better," she said, and wrinkled her nose, approvingly, before continuing her chore.
Emma took great satisfaction in being as awful as possible. Her tactics were simple and effective: all she had to do was make them angry, and they'd make enough noise to raise the dead.
Unsatisfied by the current progress, Emma pulled out the proverbial brass knuckles.
"Late night last night, huh, fellas. That's a shame. Maybe if I sang you a little son—" She was interrupted by curses and moans from around the room. She beamed, her musical talents were infamous.
"Come on, get the lead outta your pants. You've gotta wake up and sell your soul to Hurst for enough money for food, again, just like every— Ouch!" A cigar box had clipped her shoulder.
"I'm just being realis—dammit!" She made for the door, as they began to throw soaps, towels and shoes at her. In her experience their aim improved quickly.
"Don't get your suspenders twisted, I'm leaving—Mush!" She paused, fists on her hips.
"You watch that finger, newsboy. You'res'posed to be one of the nice ones."
Her job done, Emma set her feet towards the distribution center. She was always one of the first newsies there. It paid to be the first with a good headline.
(1) Courtesy of a bet lost to Crutchy and a direct result of a bet that Crutchy had lost to Kloppman. She should have known better to bet against him.
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