Prologue.
Jack Kelly's a fighting sort of guy. He doesn't like other people telling him how to talk, act, or live his life. He's always been a leader, even before he became a newsie, back in New Jersey when he was a young boy living with his parents: Jack and Elizabeth Sullivan.
Jack's young childhood was a very loving, nurturing one, until his ninth year of New Jersey living. Elizabeth became pregnant again. Everyone was ecstatic to add another member to their loving family. Young Jack had always wanted a baby brother. But instead, he got a baby sister named Anastasia Rose Sullivan. He also got a mother who died when Anastasia Rose was two days old.
Elizabeth's death caused Jack's father to spend most of his money and time at the local tavern. Jack was forced to grow up quickly and take care of his little sister who he fondly called "Tasia." One night, Jack's father came home at about two in the morning from Wally's Saloon, drunker than ever before.
Jack had put Tasia to bed hours ago, but he always waited up for his father, just to make still he still came home. When Jack's father came home on this certain summer night, Jack was scared for the first time. Usually, he just stumbled home and passed out on the floor. But tonight, he stormed into the tiny apartment they rented, cursing loudly. He saw Jack sitting at the kitchen table.
"What are you doing up, kid?" he asked, slurring his words slightly.
"Just waiting for you to get home," Jack replied calmly.
"Why? So you can tell me what a failure I am?" Jack's father stumbled closer to his son. "To tell me how bad of a father I am?" He was almost right next to Jack. "What a bad person I am?"
Jack quickly got up and moved towards his and Tasia's bedroom. He stood in the doorway when his father grabbed him by the collar and slammed him against the nearest bedroom wall.
"You think I'm a bad person, don't you, you son of a bitch!" his father screamed at him. His breath reeked of cheap rum and vodka.
He let go of Jack with one hand and laid a well placed punch on Jack's right cheek. He winced in pain; he knew there would be a mark there for a while.
Jack's father rambled on, "You know this is all your mother's fault. If she hadn't been so weak and died on me, I wouldn't be like this." He then wound up and punched ten year old Jack on the left cheek. Anastasia was up by now, the tiny one year old watched silently from her rickety crib. Jack had always wanted Tasia to have a better place to sleep, but this was all he could find in the landfills on the edge of town. Jack had planned to take his father's beating and just deal with it, but then he had mentioned Elizabeth. Jack had loved his mother more than anything in the world and now his father was blaming everything terrible in their lives in her.
Jack kneed his father in the groin and felt his father release his deathlike grip on Jack. Before his drunken father could react, Jack punched him as hard as his small fists could right into his eye and cheekbone. Jack's father fell to the floor, half because of pain and half because of his own drunkenness. Just to make sure he didn't get up for a long time, Jack, in a fit of rage, kicked his father as hard as he could in the stomach. His father groaned before rolling over and passing out.
Jack didn't give his father another glance before stepping over him and picking Anastasia up out of her crib. He then went under his mattress and found his stash of money, twenty dollars he had saved up from doing odd jobs around town.
Jack wrapped Anastasia in a blanket before walking out the door of his broken family's apartment. Jack didn't look back until he was at the end of the hall. Then, he turned and stared at the paint chipped door. To the other tenants, it was just an innocuous entryway to another identical apartment, but to Jack that door was the entryway to his past. He vowed neither he nor Anastasia would ever set foot in apartment number 23 ever again.