The Train Ticket Girl

Chapter Two

The Frozen Girl

Upon seeing the hand before me, I released the ticket and jumped backwards, taking in a deep breath of freezing air, and almost choking myself in the process. The blue hand, it's tiny fingers clenched around the ticket, fell lightly against the snow on the top of the mound, unmoving with no signs of life. I quickly turned away from the mound of snow and began to hurry back down the street, my hands shoved in my pockets as I tried to look as casual as I could. But once a few feet away, I stopped dead. It seemed that the cold air around me hand frozen my innards. What if that hand was connected to a body? What if that body was just barely alive? Swallowing the bile that had risen in my throat, I turned around, my wide brown eyes landing on the dormant hand. It suddenly twitched and I flinched back. I then mentally slapped myself. The stupid shadows were just playing tricks on my brain. I was scared out of my whits; things were bound to seem more frightening when I was scared.

So with immense caution, I took a few steps closer to the hand. Then a few more when nothing popped out. Finally finding my courage, I reached down to the hand when I was close enough to touch it. The skin of the person was a light blue and pale white around the knuckles as it help on to the ticket. Touching the flesh of the hand sent shivers up my spine. It was so cold. Colder than the air around me, that's for sure. So I took the wrist of the person with both my hands, and pulled. At first, just like the ticket, nothing moved. It was as if it had been frozen in to the snow. But with a few more tugs, the arm began to appear, and then an elbow, and a shoulder covered in a shirt. Before long, I had discovered the whole upper torso of a girl. She didn't seem too much younger than I was; thirteen, maybe fourteen at the most. She wore her dark brown hair short, stopping at her shoulders. The bangs she had hid her face from my view, and once I pushed them back, I gasped. Her whole face was blue as well. Her eyelashes were frozen, her lips were a darker blue then her skin... if this girl was alive, it'd be a miracle. I checked her pulse with my fingers on the side of her neck, just like Kloppman had told us to do if we found someone just laying in the street. There was a pulse there, alright, but it was so faint, I had to strain to find it.

I finally unburied the rest of the girl after a couple more minutes, and found she was wearing clothes like a newsie; button up shirt, pants that were too long, a vest, shoes... but no jacket. Who would go wandering around, even if it was just to go to the train station, without a jacket on? Finding no sort of jacket in the pile of snow she had been buried in, I took my jacket off and wrapped it around her upper body, hoping it might help a little. Of course, now I was freezing, but I could deal with it; and obviously, this girl couldn't. I carefully picked her up in my arms, cradling her as gently as I could. Her now wet hair chilled my shirt as her head rested on my shoulder, but, again, I was fine with it.

She wasn't too heavy, but she wasn't exactly as light as a feather, so I struggled to keep her in my arms the entire way home. Only when we were a few blocks away from the lodging house did the sun start to light the sky, even if it had not yet shown its' self along the horizon. By the time I reached the lodging house steps, the pale orange sun had risen to the horizon, warming me only slightly in the chilly air. I labored the girl up the stairs in my now tired arms, and leaned against the door for a moment to catch my breath. I then balanced her between the door and one of my arms as I began to knock wildly on the front door, calling for Kloppman. I knew that would wake him up; even the slightest noise awoke him.

I once again took the girl in my arms and stepped back for the door to open. And that it did. The door opened to Kloppman, dressed in his pyjamas and a tired look on his face.

"What is it? What do youse-?" Kloppman paused once he saw me standing there were a frozen girl in my arms.

"Mush... what're ya doing outa bed?"Kloppman nearly growled, his eyes going from me to the girl.

"I was jus' walkin' around las' night, Kloppman, an' I found her." I looked down to the girl in my arms, who had started to shiver violently, "Please jus' take a look at 'er? She's shiverin' badly, an' when I found 'er, she was blue." She still was slightly blue, but the colors were starting to lighten, and she even had rosy cheeks now.

I did desperately want to help this girl; I mean, who deserved to die like this? Frozen in a pile of snow before she could even make it to where she was going? Where ever that was...

Letting out a sigh, Kloppman ran an old, weathered hand over his wrinkled face as he thought on it.

"Fine. Bring her in." He said reluctantly as he stepped aside to allow me in. I flashed him a relieved smile as I headed through the door and around his counter to his room. He had an extra bed in there for anyone who was sick, so none of the other boys fell ill. Kloppman had been a doctor's assistant during his younger years, and knew everything there was to know about medicines and sickness. And it came in handy when you had a bunch of dirty news boys who liked to scrape themselves up living with you.

I set the cold girl on the bed and turned to Kloppman who had entered behind us. He then closed the door behind himself and locked it so he wouldn't be disturbed.

"Now Mush... where'd you find her?" Kloppman asked as he sat down gently on the bed by the girl, examining her and every once in a while checking for a vital signs.

"Over by da train station." I mumbled, watching as he did his work, "She was buried in a huge pile ah snow."

"Mhmm..." Kloppman said, more to himself than to me as he put his hand to her head, "Doesn't look like she's suffered from frost bite, the lucky girl... but the obvious signs of hypothermia are appearing..."

"Hypo-... what?" I asked, unable to understand what he was saying. I might have listened to him speak about medicine and different problems while I had lived here... but I could only understand about a quarter of it.

"Hypothermia. If you're stuck in temperatures lower than about 34 degrees, your body starts to... malfunction, per say. The shivering is apart of it. It's the body trying to keep its' self warm." Kloppman explained to me, and although I didn't understand some of it, I got the general idea.

The girls shivering started to become more violent, and all of her limbs were flying. Her breathing had become loud and quick, as well as her heartbeat picking up. All signs of the body trying to keep warm, Kloppman told me.

After a few more moments of watching the girl and thinking his strategies over, Kloppman turned back to me.

"We need to get her outa these clothes." He told me before looking back toward the girl.

"Wut?" I did a double take and stared fearfully over at Kloppman and the girl from where I sat on his bed.

"The ice on her clothes has already started to melt. It'll just make it worse if we don't get them off of her. Run upstairs and grab a towel for her head, and I'll change her." Kloppman told me, his focus still centered on the girl.

"Wut about the guys? Wut if they wake up? Wut do I tell'em?" I asked; I mean it was passed the time Kloppman woke us up, and I wasn't even in bed. They were bound to think something was suspicious.

"Tell them no ones sellin' taday. They get to sleep in." Kloppman muttered quickly, "The towel, Mush."

I nodded to the old man, and left the room with one last glance to the girl. Her skin color was coming back, and her lips were even a soft pink now.

I gently closed the door behind me, and quietly made my way up the rickety stairs. When I reached the top and opened the door, I found everyone still snug in their beds and snoring. Letting out a sigh of relief, I made my way into the washroom and grabbed a, hopefully, clean towel. It looked clean enough. But once I exited the washroom, there were a good six or seven pairs of eyes on me. I paused in my tracks and watched as some of the guys sat up and stared at me with curiousness in their eyes.

"Kloppman hasn't gotten us up yet." Jack said, his feet hanging over the edge of his bed with his arms crossed over the top have of his underwear.

"And you're already outa bed and dressed." Boots added in, looking at me from his bed.

"Uhh.. Kloppman says no sellin' taday. Youse can sleep in." I said quickly, making my way through the rows of bunks toward the door... that was already blocked by Racetrack.

"Come on guys. I gotta get down to Kloppman." I growled, trying to push Race out of the way of the door.

"Not till ya tell us what's up." Racetrack told me, cigar between his teeth as he held his ground.

"I found dis goil." I finally growled, trying to push passed Racetrack once again.

"A goil! Man, you was out all night again?" Racetrack crowed, shoving me back as he glared at me.

I rolled my eyes to myself and finally got him out of my way. As I raced down the stairs, I could heard quite a few pairs of feet following behind me. At Kloppmans door, I knocked quickly, hoped he had put clothes on the girl and slammed the door behind me, right into Race's face.

"Aww, come on Mush! Can't we'se see 'er?" Racetrack begged after he let out a curse and rubbed his noise.

"Go back upstairs." Kloppman yelled over his shoulder. After I heard some not-so-happy foot steps go up the stairs, I turned to see Kloppman leaning over the girl. I supposed she had new clothes on, but she was covered up by the blankets of the bed. I quickly handed the towel to Kloppman, who rapped it around her hair.

"Why ain't she shiverin' anymore?" I asked as I came to his side, watching the tiny girl lay there.

"She fell unconscious after I took the clothes off of her. Now all we can do is wait."

The three reviews I've gotten have been absolutely amazing ^^ I love you guys!

So thanks you Izabeal Finley, xXEmiShaeXx (my bestest friend!) and Saya. Hikari. Uchiha for the entertaining reviews!

Emi: No, not creepy at all =D And don't pout; you were the first person after me to even HEAR about this!

Saya: He probably would have XD I just didn't want to have him soil himself and look a bit whimpy, lol

Love you!

~Scree