Hey there! Sorry for not updating so soon, I had a REALLY busy weekend with a bunch of last minute plans, including a day trip to Disneyland (it was super fun! And apparently the main guy in the Newsies show was checking me out! EEEK!) and homework...
But I'm back! Here's fluffygirl236's prompt about Jack being sick! I hope that you enjoy this, and please review!
BTW, Jack and Katherine are just dating in this one! Thanks!
It all starts with a cough, doesn't it?
Jack knew this most of all. Whenever Crutchie got sick, he would hack up a lung each night, not to mention sneeze like there was no tomorrow. Jack took on the role of 'concerned yet paranoid older brother' and banished him to a room a few floors below him to make sure he kept himself as healthy as possible, not to mention to ensure that his polio stayed away.
The year the flu hit the lodging house hard? Jack barely spent five minutes in the common room every night, rushing up to his penthouse in the sky and escaping the moans of pains from the rest of the boys.
Colds that the Delancey boys caught? He debated going into work to keep himself from getting sick, and even took extra precautions (like having Race grab his papers for him instead of getting them handed to him) to not even touch them.
But there was no rest for the sickness, they say. And as it so happened, a string of colds had struck him with vigorous sneezes and bone-chilling shivers during the warm springs of New York.
He had woken up with the tickle in his throat he knew not to be good. The thought of being sick rocked him to his core as he felt his stomach turn uneasily. His head was spinning as soon as he heard the bell ringing to wake him up.
Crutchie was already fully dressed by the time he had woken up, and sitting at the top of the stairs with his good leg dangling off of the edge and swinging in the cool morning air that brushed Jack's burning forehead like the dainty hand of his girlfriend, Katherine.
"Get up, Jack." Crutchie mumbled to his best friend, poking a sock-covered foot with his crutch. "Bell's a-ringin'."
The leader of the Newsies could only let out a groan of pain as he turned over and felt the cool metal beneath him, pressing against his palms with a fierceness.
"Jack, let's go!" Crutchie said, more urgently this time as he turned his back to the view over the buildings of the city he loved and began to climb down the ladder.
"Fine, fine, I'm up." The boy murmured, shoving his hands over his face and reaching around the edge of the railing blindly for his vest and flannel shirt that held the same stench as the day before. Little did he know that his best friend was watching him with a weary eye from below.
He had called up to his friend quietly, trying not to alarm the rest of his street family. "Jack, youse feelin' okay?"
He tossed a hand at his friend, slipping on his shirt in one movement and pulling up his suspenders. Little did he know that he had put it on backwards. To be fair, little did he care as well.
As the leader of the Newsies moved at a snails pace down the ladder, the rest of his friends took note, each with smirks plastered over their ever present smiles that sold all the papers.
"You, my friend," Specs started out as he slipped on his suspenders and straightened his trademark glasses. "Are sick."
You might've thought someone had questioned his love for Katherine, with the piercing gaze in his eyes and a scowl that quickly crossed his face. "Now you listen here, you little-"
Laughter rang out as Jack's voice cracked and raised it's pitch into a register they'd never heard from him before. A cough took him over, as he leaned over into his fist, the hatred now directed at his lungs.
"Get inside, Mr. Kelly!" Romeo called out comically as they pushed him inside a room of the lodging house, chuckles filling the halls as several other sleepy Newsies pushed themselves into the hallway to watch their leader being locked into a room.
Revenge was sweeter than a free glass of water after a hot summer's day to all the Newsies, especially Crutchie. Watching Jack be sick was hard, since he never liked anyone being sick, but the satisfaction of the retribution for his years and years of being a 'mother hen' to the rest of the boys eased the pain.
Though he was shouting and coughing, the boys finally locked him away in an empty room with a working faucet and bucket near the thin mattress that served as a bed atop a tiny cot. While fuming from his fever, Jack's anger grew to be even hotter in the tiny room.
Hours passed as he sat in the cot, stewing over his friends' actions while coughs shook his chest and a rag in the room quickly filled with his snot. While the water was nice, the fact that it was still sort of hot didn't make it any better.
I'm gonna die from this damn disease…. The Newsie thought with a frown as his mind began to wander to his condition.
He finally fell asleep, his mind silencing his thoughts once his headache overtook his own head, pounding and pushing him to the darkness that was healing. The only thought on his mind while he slept was how much he felt like dying.
Even the strongest men get sick, his father used to say when he came home from working in the factories. And that means you, Jack Kelly.
Even if he was definitely a grown man, he wasn't just sick. He was dying.
When the pain in his head subsided for a few minutes, he awoke to a cool room, and a hot bed. The cot, though cozy, radiated with heat, much like his forehead. There was no end to this eternal summer in his mind, was there?
A quiet knock at the door drew him out of his thoughts, and he stood up to answer the door, though too quickly for his mind that was sent reeling, and the misty look that took over his eyes.
He was never going to get better, it was decided.
"Jack? Are you in here?"
Katherine's voice rang through the small room, sweetly and happily as Jack easily stepped over to his door and swung it open to see his girlfriend, a concerned smile covering her face.
"The boys, they told me you were sick so-"
Another cough cut off her voice as Jack leaned against the wooden doorframe, shutting his eyes to lessen the pounding in his forehead.
Katherine only nodded, pushing herself through the room and resting a bag on the tiny bedside table that Jack had decided was a great place to put his snot rag. With a disgusted look, she pushed the rag off the side and let it fall to the floor as she began pulling out different bottles for her boyfriend.
"Mother, before she left, taught me how to take care of sick people." Katherine explained as Jack sat back down on his bed, smiling a sick smile to his love. "My father, my brother, even the maids and other help in our house!"
"Well, then I'm in good hands." He mumbed hoarsely to Katherine before surrendering his eyes to the darkness and letting Katherine squabble away about her childhood days of medicine.
"Now, Mother always said to take this when you've got a fever," She began, pressing a cool hand to Jack's head and pulling it away in seconds. "Which you do…."
"I'm gonna die, Katherine." He moaned, lifting a hand to his head dramatically. "My head's gonna burst before I see the light of day again!"
His girlfriend chuckled as she drew another medicine out of her bag. "So you've got a headache as well…"
Five minutes of moaning and groaning from Jack and Katherine's constant reminder that she was doing this because she loved this boy, she finally had given him the right remedy that was sure to give him a speedy recovery.
She sat in the room with him, wiping his head with a cool washcloth from another sink before his hoarse voice piped up once more, as childish as it could get.
"Kath, my love, could'ja get me my drawin's from upstairs?" He whispered as if he was on his deathbed. "I want to say one last goodbye to 'em."
His 'love' rolled her eyes as she stood, pressing a quick kiss to a sweaty hand and quickly rushed up the fire escape towards Jack's penthouse, muttering under her breath about how stupid he was.
Once with his prized drawings, she slid down the ladder once more and sauntered into Jack's room, smiling as before to find her boyfriend sleeping soundly, the washcloth covering his eyes from the light.
"Oh, my Jack…" She whispered to herself, smiling wide as she laid the drawings next to him and silently took a seat next to the window, keeping a quiet watch over her sick boyfriend.
What did you think? Please let me know through a review, and I will try to get the other ones out in the next few days! Thank you for all the people that reviewed and followed and favorited this story, and I hope to see you guys soon! :)