Chapter 7

A/N: What does one do when endometriosis stops you from doing uni work? Why, one marathons the Indiana Jones films and then writes Newsies fanfic. Also, we love insecure and injured Jack and I am going to keep torturing him. I'm sorry. (I'm not.) Thank you for the lovely reviews! Please keep them coming, I do a little happy dance every time I see one posted :)

…

Jack doesn't know what his mother looked like. He imagines that she looked something like Esther Jacobs, with curly hair and soft brown eyes and laughter lines around her eyes. He imagines that her hands would have been red from laundry, like Esther's, but they'd still be softer than his. He imagines that the feeling he gets when Esther pats him gently on the shoulder, a tingling, buzzing sensation that itches under his skin and makes him want to let himself be looked after, would be the same feeling as when his mother touched him.

His old man hadn't ever touched him, not if he could help it. It was like he thought Jack was still covered with his mother's blood. Sure, he'd bathed him until he was old enough to do it himself, scrubbed him raw, in fact, but that was about the extent of it. Jack remembers the way his father recoiled from his touch, the revulsion on his features when Jack had stretched out his arms. Jack is still amazed every time Katherine doesn't pull away from him.

It's fine, though, because Jack doesn't need to be touched. It's fine, he assures himself, that the Jacobs won't want to have him over again. It's fine that Katherine will ditch him for Arthur Brooks once she sees the bruise blooming across his face and realises that he'll never fit in at her high society dinners. It's fine. Jack is fine. He has an apartment. He has Crutchie's playful punches for human contact. Besides, it's not like touch ever did him much good anyway. Whenever his father had touched him, it had stung, and not in the vaguely pleasant, under-the-skin kind of way that Esther had managed. No, this sting was fiery.

Esther's pat on the shoulder is an appeal for him to stay. Davey offers up his bed at his mother's request without a second thought, confusingly blasé about being kicked out of his room. Jack doesn't understand why Davey isn't fighting harder for his bed. Once people realise you don't need something, why would they ever give it back to you? Well, Jack won't be the reason Davey doesn't get to sleep in his fancy bed.

He rolls his shoulder out of Esther's grip and assures the Jacobs, a crowd of worried faces clamouring around him at the door – a crowd of blurry faces, god, Delancey had got him good – that he's fine, he just needs to sleep it off.

Jack does make it back to the lodgehouse, which he counts as a roaring success considering that his head span enough on his way that he fell over twice. A couple who look like the kind of people that Katherine would have dinner with were strolling along the pavement, long wool coats wrapped tightly around themselves, and looked down their noses at him. It takes Jack a few moments to realise that they think he's drunk. The second time he falls he falls onto his broken wrist. He doesn't scream, just grits his teeth and bears through the pain, telling himself that it's just like stubbing his toe, it'll pass. The pain doesn't pass, but it ebbs a bit, enough for him to pick himself back up and time his footsteps to the steady throbbing of his wrist.

He thanks five different deities that he doesn't believe in when he figures that all the boys are asleep when he gets back. As he sneaks through and climbs the fire escape, Jack wonders whether that's actually something to be grateful for, that nobody was waiting up for him.

There are tears on his cheeks. He doesn't know which pain is causing them.

…

He takes the next day off selling papers. He manages, even though his arm hurts like a bitch and his face feels like it's been attacked by bees. He stays up on the roof, sketching with his good hand, and it must be well after lunchtime when he hears footsteps on the fire escape. Laying aside his work, he looks over.

"Jack – oh my lord." Katherine peeks her head over the edge of the roof only to stop dead in her tracks. "What happened to you?"

"You should see the other guy." He deadpans, shooting her a lopsided grin that makes the bruise on his face burn.

Katherine scrambles over the edge of the building. She's holding a large parcel wrapped in brown paper. Jack eyes it suspiciously but she just sets it down and hurries over. He's about to tell her off, as much as anybody can tell off this whirlwind reporter, because of course she'd taken it upon herself to buy him the first birthday present he's ever received. Her thumb skims across his cheekbone feather-light, inspecting him. It hurts, but he doesn't let himself wince, instead closes his eyes and brings his hand up on top of hers, keeping her palm pressed against his face. It's better than an ice pack. She's warm and soft and real and he can't quite believe his luck.

"Jack, what happened?" Her voice is softer now. She doesn't take her hand away.

"Oscar Delancey." He shrugs.

"Jack-" The hand drops. Damn.

"I didn't mean to, alright?" Jack sighs, not daring to open his eyes. "He was gonna hurt Les. 'Kay?"

He hears her sigh in response, but knows that he's won this round. When he opens his eyes, she's holding out a parcel to him.

"I've got something for you."

"What is it?"

"Open it and see."

He eyes her suspiciously, but dutifully takes the parcel and slides off the twine wrapped around it. Inside is a soft charcoal material that unfolds as he removes it from the packaging. It's a fucking suit. It's fucking new. Jack has never touched anything like it before in his life. It's an everyday suit, sure. It's nothing fancy, simple, three pieces. Undecorated. But it's new and it's his.

"Ace-"

"I got you this, too." She interrupts him, thrusting a small card at him. Jack squints at it. "It's a different one – a dinner suit – but it's only rented. I was going to buy you one, but then I realised you'd not have much chance to wear it, so I thought I'd get you an everyday one and then just rent a dinner suit for you for tomorrow night. I didn't want you to feel like you didn't fit in, you know, when you come over." She's immensely focused on the laces of his boots and there's a flush rising in her cheeks despite the frigid wind which is blowing across the rooftop. "I know you don't like me spending money on you, but I really just wanted you to have something nice and-"

He shuts her up with a kiss, cradling her face in his hands. It's quick, as much as he doesn't want it to be, because his face hurts.

"Thanks, Ace." He says pulling away. His voice is low and gravelly and it makes Katherine a little weak at the knees.

Jack doesn't quite know how to react, but he does know that he doesn't want her to think that he doesn't like it. So he pushes down the sick feeling in his stomach which is telling him that he should be the one buying her expensive gifts, not the other way around, and thanks her because he knows that if he doesn't he'll try and give it back. It crosses his mind to sell it – surely even opened it'd fetch enough to feed all thirty boys for almost a month if he's careful – but he shakes the thought away. He couldn't do that to her. At least, that's what he'll tell himself so he feels less selfish.

"You're not angry with me for spending money on you?" She asks, smoothing down his shirt collar with gentle fingers and not quite meeting his eyes.

"I'm sad I's can't do the same for you, but I ain't angry." Jack mumbles, half embarrassed, half coaxing, nosing at her jaw.

"I'm glad that you can't." Her hands tighten in the fabric of his shirt. "I'm fed up of people thinking that they can buy my affection with expensive gifts. Well, I want you Jack Kelly. No matter what you have or haven't got."

"Hell, Ace, what'd I do to deserve you?" He asks, dropping his tired head onto her shoulder.

"Something awful, I'd imagine." Jack can hear her grin.

He pulls back, chuckling, then reaches into his pocket.

"I do have somethin' for you, though."

"Jack, it's your birthday." Katherine admonishes, falling back into a slightly more upright kneeling position beside him, but he can tell she's excited by the smile that tugs at the corner of her lips.

"It's more o' a present for me, really." He pulls a key out of his pocket and presses it into her palm, taking a deep breath. "I's got an apartment. I moves in in a couple o' days. Now, this ain't cos I's expectin' anythin'; I ain't tryna push you to do nothin' you don't wanna do. I jus' want you to know that you's got somewhere to come to if ever you gets to worn out wi' that old man o' yours."

Katherine takes the key from his palm, dirty bronze between delicate fingers with manicured nails. Jack is suddenly immensely interested in the half tied laces of his boots and rubs his good hand up and down the back of his neck, feeling the short stubbly hairs there and wondering whether he ought to ask Crutchie to tidy up his hair before he goes to meet Kath's parents.

Then those fingers have taken his chin and he's looking at her.

"You impossible boy." She laughs softly, shaking her curly head, and leans in to kiss him.

…

When Jack turns up at Medda's theatre the next afternoon as the sun is beginning to dip below the brick chimneys of the New York skyline, it takes her a good five minutes to coax an answer out of him. She looks him up and down, taking in the bruises and the bandaged wrist and the large suit cover he has slung over one arm as he shuffles his feet and mumbles and rubs at the back of his neck.

"You want a favour from me? The famous Jack Kelly wants a favour from little ol' Miss Medda?" She folds her arms and leans back, raising one perfectly groomed eyebrow.

"I ain't famous, Miss Medda." Jack shrugs uncomfortably.

"Well, spit it out then, baby. I ain't got all day."

"I's meetin' Kath's family. Tonight. An' I was hopin' you would help me look the part." She almost falls over. Well, that was certainly unexpected.

"And in there?" She gestures at the suit cover Jack has folded over his arm.

"My dinner suit." Miss Medda whistles low.

"Well, baby, ain't you goin' up in the world?"

"Medda-"

"O' course I'll help you, Jack, anythin' for my star set designer. C'mon, let's get you set up." She puts one arm around his shoulders, noting the way that his shoulder blades dig into the soft flesh of her arm. She makes a mental note to make sure she gives him more sandwiches the next time he's here. And to watch him eat them.

His hair is their first battle. Medda plonks him down on a stool in the girls' dressing room though, much to Jack's relief, she doesn't bother to turn on the lightbulbs surrounding the mirror. He already feels like a prize idiot; he doesn't need any more help. His dark curls are so unruly that two of the teeth in Medda's comb break off and hide themselves in the matted mess usually hidden by his newsboy cap. They both swear at that.

"Lord, boy, don't cha' ever run a comb through this hair o' yours?" She grumbles, plucking the broken teeth out and turning around to pick up a sturdy wooden brush instead.

"I ain't got a comb," Jack growls, grunting as she yanks the brush through his hair, "you think I's got the extra dough to be throwin' around on garbage like that? My fingers do jus' fine."

"Clearly not." Medda grumbles.

When she finally finishes getting the knots out of his hair (or, Jack thinks, ripping them out), she then takes up a pair of scissors and snips away until there's a dusting of dark hairs all across his shoulders. It's itchy and uncomfortable, but Jack does his best not to squirm, reminding himself that it's not as bad as the time that bedbugs decided to make their home in his straw mattress at the Refuge and he would wake up every morning with more fiery bites spread across his back and stomach. And then she gets out the razor.

"Whoa!" Jack jerks away as she flips the sharp blade out of its cover, almost knocking the stool over as he jumps off it. "Whaddaya doin'? I's already shaved." He runs his hand over his smooth jaw as if to prove it.

"Yeah, but you got quite the jungle goin' on on the back o' your neck. Sit back down, ya big lump." Medda rolls her eyes, pointing at the stool with the razor, no nonsense.

Jack sits back down slowly and squeezes his eyes shut. The cold metal barely touches the back of his neck before he lurches forward against the sideboard that runs under the row of mirrors, spinning around as he does so. His eyes are wild, the razor on the floor where he knocked it from Medda's hand. Slowly his hand comes up to the back of his neck where warm blood is trickling down and staining his shirt collar.

"Jack, honey." His eyes flick to Medda, her voice soft and low, her hands outstretched. "You're safe." He holds her gaze, just for a moment, then the tension drains from his shoulders.

"Sorry, Miss Medda – ma'am. I's – I didn' mean to – I –" He's mumbling, pleading, eyes flicking toward the door, heart pounding -

"Oh, baby." She shakes her head at him. Jack can't deal with the pity in her eyes. "C'mere."

Slowly, warily, he walks into her arms, dropping his head onto her shoulder despite her being almost a foot shorter than him. Her hands, firm and gentle, rub up and down his back. He curses himself for going soft. If the boys could see him now, they'd never let him hear the end of it.

"Sorry, Miss Medda." He mumbles, the words muffled against her shoulder.

"You ain't got nothin' to be sorry for, baby. Now, how we goin' to get you cleaned up, hey?" Jack steps back and lets her look him over.

"I'll be fine if you wanna carry on." Jack says quietly. "I won't jump no more."

"You sure, honey?"

Jack nods. She feels him flinch a couple of times as she cleans up the back of his neck, cleaning away loose strands of hair and then mopping up his blood with a damp cloth, but he stays put.

Her fingers, rough from years of hard work, brush occasionally across his skin and Jack drinks it up, the fact that she's touching him and not recoiling in revulsion, even if the brushes are accidental. It's even nicer when she takes his face between her hands and gently pats a thin layer of powder over his eye. It doesn't get rid of the bruise – she's not a magician, as she none too gently reminds him – but it certainly makes it less obvious.

Jack tries to convince himself that if he keeps his eyes lowered politely throughout the dinner then he might get away without people noticing. Who is he kidding? He blinks at himself in the mirror, hardly recognising the man who blinks back. He might scrub up nicely, but underneath are all those same layers of dirt – the kind that comes from living on the streets, the kind that doesn't wash off. They'll see right through him.

He pulls on the starched, uncomfortable dinner suit and realises that he looks like a mildly confused penguin before he's even got the jacket on. You're doing this for Katherine, he reminds himself, and bends down to tie his laces. God knows why, the voice in his head continues, when she's definitely going to quit on you after tonight, but he pushes the voice away and steps out of the dressing room.

"Well?" Jack asks, lifting his arms out on either side to show of the suit and immediately regretting it the fabric bunches up around his shoulders. Katherine had done pretty well with the sizing, he has to admit, but she hadn't quite taken into account the breadth of his shoulders. Medda's eyes widen.

"You won't be showin' her up, that's for sure." Jack shrugs a little at that, inadvertently rucking up the suit jacket even more.

"My looks was hardly gonna be what I was worried 'bout." He's aiming for cocky, but falls short with a half-hearted grin.

Medda stands up from her seat on the chaise longue and walks over to smooth down the wrinkles in the suit and fiddle with his tie.

"You gon' be just swell, baby."

"You don' think they're gon' think I's an idiot?"

"Nah, honey, you's gon' blow them away. Besides, who cares what they think? Katherine loves you."

"She might not if I screw this up."

"Like hell she will." Medda gently bats at the side of his head. "She hardly gon' be able to think straight when you scrub up like this."

"I ain't jus' a pretty face, ya know." Jack grins. She smiles back, shaking her head.

"Now get outta here. You don' want to be late."

Jack straightens himself up and heads for the door, tugging at his shirt cuffs, then turns around.

"Hey, Miss Medda?" The woman, watching him leave and feeling almost absurdly fond, raises one critical brow. Jack smiles, a quick tug at the corners of his mouth. "Thanks."