loud and clear
pt. 2: brooklyn
The only newsie who sells at this fine establishment, a'course! Which begs the question, who are you?
Spot Conlon isn't very good at making friends.
At nearly eleven, he is one of the best sellers in the Brooklyn lodging house, and even Sting, the King of Brooklyn, knows it. Spot is on his radar to be second in command by the time Sting ages out. And for a shorter than average ten-year-old, Spot can soak as good as he gets, unless the odds are too uneven. Even some of the bigger kids are a little nervous around him because he can be a bit prickly.
That's the problem, really; Spot is prickly, and there is no way around it. Nobody in the Brooklyn house has more than one or two fast friends, but Spot…Spot doesn't have anybody. He isn't afraid to admit it to himself: he's pretty lonely, and doesn't exactly have the friendliest personality to boot. Of course, he would never admit it to anyone else; God forbid they know he's a pathetic loner.
Spot's candle of hope, however, is the soulmark wrapped around his right bicep. 1): His soulmate is a newsie, too. Which means that if Spot soldiers on and sells papes for as long as he can, someday he'll run into them. 2): Spot's soulmate sells somewhere that nobody else does, so the chances of meeting them are higher with every new place Spot sells. (Spot's newsie name came from the old leader, Osprey, complaining that he couldn't ever be tracked down because he never sold in the same spot twice.)
And yeah, Spot is supposed to be tough—all the Brooklyn kids are—but he can't help but hope that when he meets his soulmate, they'll get on the way Spot doesn't really get on with anybody; that maybe they'll even be fast friends like Sparrow and Coal, like Osprey and Sting were before Osprey aged out.
He spends his days in a blur of routine: wake up, think about soulmate, buy papes, sell papes, think about soulmate, buy food, eat food, think about soulmate, buy his bed in the lodging house, sleep, dream about soulmate. This is only interrupted sometimes by: insult somebody, get soaked. Or maybe: get insulted, soak somebody.
It's not an easy life, but it's not always a hard life either, and, well, what else could he possibly ask for?
Spot has everything he needs, for the most part. He's really good at what he does, he's on the rise through the Brooklyn ranks, and he can play a mean hand of poker.
He's just…looking forward to having someone to play a good game with who doesn't get nervous or irritated around him.
Spot leans against a strut on the Brooklyn Bridge a few down from some moron kid who is dangling his feet over the side. He sighs and slings his bag of papers over his shoulder as he stares out into the water. Someday.
Someday.