Spot walked into his apartment and set Tyrant down on the table in the kitchen. When he turned to get something out of the cabinet, Jessica crawled up on the table and sat beside her new friend. Spot took a rag and placed it against Tyrant's mouth.
She pushed it away. "Ouch. That hurt." She yelled at Spot.
"It's supposed to hurt." Spot replied. "You've got a split lip."
"I can take care of myself. I don't need your help."
"Fine. There is a bathroom in there." Spot said pointing to a door. "Go clean yourself up. You're a mess."
"And what if I don't want to?" Tyrant yelled at him.
"Its not an option" he said and once again pointed to the door. She glared at him, stuck her tongue out and then walked in the direction of the bathroom
*****
Snipes and the rest of the boys sat around the bunkroom of the lodging house, anxiously awaiting their leader's wrath that was sure to come. A few minutes later, they could hear footsteps walking up the stairs. Jack walked into the bunkroom, shortly after, and was anything but amused!
"I wanna know who started the fight and why and I want to know now" Jack demanded sending a glare around the room. Most of the boys looked at Snipes, who just sat there and shrugged his shoulders "Well?" Jack demanded again, getting more impatient by the minute
"Well, we were playing cards, minding our own business when she demanded that we let her play" Snipes started and the other boys nodded in unison
"And you guys wouldn't let her" Jack said finishing that part of the story, which he already knew, just by looking at the parties involved
"Yeah, so eventually she got mad and then socked me" Snipes said defensively. Jack, on the other hand, tried not to laugh at the sight of Snipes' black and blue eye, as well as the rest of the boys' injuries!
"Why must you guys be so mean, especially when Jessica is a little sister to Spot and to take on you guys, she doesn't even need Brooklyn" Jack said grinning and not able to suppress his laughter any longer. The boys sent Jack a small glare for laughing but didn't do anything else besides that. After all, Jack was still their leader!!!
*****
Spot got a piece of ice out of the icebox (Ok, they did have these at that time. Basically there were boxes that had two layers of wood. In between the two layers would be filled with sawdust. The ancestor to the modern refrigerator.) and placed it in a clean rag. He sat down next to Jessica and placed the rag against her swelling eye.
"That's cold." She said trying to get away from it.
Spot placed his arm around her to hold her still. "It's going to help though. It will help keep the swelling down. Now, tell me what that fight was all about."
"That boy…" Jessica was still so upset about it that she couldn't even bring herself to say his name.
"Snipes?" Spot asked.
Jessica nodded. "I was trying to be polite, honest I was, Spot, but he is just so…so… so annoying. I asked if I could play cards with them and he told me that I couldn't just because I was a girl. I told him that I was just trying to be nice, but it wasn't working and he asked me what I was going to do about it. I was so mad, I just had to hit him Spot." By the time Jessica got all this out she was nearly in hysterics. Although she pretended to be tough and not care what anyone did or said to her, only when she was talking to Spot did her true feelings come out.
"It's alright Jecca. I know how annoying he can get." Spot said trying to comfort the little girl.
"What'd you do to make her cry, Mr. Brooklyn?" Tyrant asked walking back into the room.
"Shut up, Tyrant." Spot snapped at her.
"Why should I?" Tyrant retorted.
"Tyrant, stop please." Jessica asked softly.
"I'm just trying to stick up for you, girl." Tyrant said.
"You don't have to stick up for me, I can take care of myself."
"Oh, sure, like you took care of yourself earlier?"
"Thank you for your help then, but I don't need your help when it comes to Spot."
"Sure. Whatever you say, girl." Tyrant said, her voice dripping in sarcasm.
"I have a name you know." Jessica said hopping off the table and glaring at Tyrant.
"I haven't heard it yet."
"My name is Jessica Conlon."
"Oh, so you're Little Miss Brooklyn, huh?" Tyrant asked, her face only inches from Jessica's.
"What are you talking about?"
"Well if this idiot here," Tyrant said pointing to Spot "is your brother, that makes you Little Miss Brooklyn, because he's Mr. Brooklyn."
"Ok girls, break it up." Spot said, not wanting another fight on his hands. Both girls looked up at him and glared.
***
After getting a little lecture on how to treat girls, Snipes and the boys left to the distribution office to get the afternoon edition of the paper. Soon Jack and some of the other newsies, returning from lunch, joined them.
***
As Tyrant, Jessica and Spot walked back to Manhattan, Tyrant looked back and forth between her friend and Spot. It took all of her will power not to start laughing. She looked at them again and giggled.
"What?" Spot asked.
"Nothing." Tyrant snapped at him. A few minutes later she looked at them again and started laughing. She was laughing so hard that she was having trouble walking.
"Out with it, girl." Spot said.
It took several minutes before Tyrant could stop laughing long enough to speak. She put an arm around Jessica's shoulder. "You know, I feel sorry for you." Tyrant said to Jessica.
"Why?" Jessica asked.
"Because you got the bad luck of looking like that ugly thing." Tyrant said, pointing to Spot. She began laughing again. Jessica turned to her friend and glared at her, putting her hands on her hips.
Spot tapped Tyrant on the shoulder. "What?" She yelled at him.
"Hate to break it to you. But you look like her, so I guess that means, you also have the bad luck of looking like this ugly thing." He said. All the color drained from her face and Spot began to laugh. Tyrant glared up at him, before storming off. "Come on, Jecca. Don't pay any attention to her, cause you know what?" he asked.
"What?" Jessica replied.
"I think you're cute." He said, tweaking her nose.
"Thank you Spot." Jessica said and then giggled.
"What are you giggling about?" Spot asked her.
"If I'm cute then I guess that means that you're not such an ugly thing after all." Jessica said. Spot looked at her for a minute before laughing.
He picked Jessica up and set her on his shoulder. "Let's get you back to the lodging house." He carried her across the bridge and when they got to the Manhattan side, they ran into a familiar face
"Took ya long enough" Tyrant demanded looking up at them. She had run the entire way across the bridge!
"Wanna go for a swim?" Spot asked as he put Jessica back on her feet, but more directly asked the question to Tyrant, as a sarcastic comment!
"Go jump off the bridge yourself, Mr. Brooklyn" Tyrant responded, making a face. Spot grinned
"Is that the best you can come up with? You must be getting slow" Spot retorted. Tyrant glared up at him
"Be nice, both of you" Jessica ordered, stepping in between both of them and looking at one and then the other
"Fine. Truce" Tyrant said shrugging her shoulders but also had her hand behind her back, with her fingers crossed!!
"Good, now you'll be the best of friends" Jessica said with a smirk and then pushed Tyrant into Spot. She laughed at the sight of Tyrant's surprised facial expression. From that point, they walked toward the main part of the city! As they passed, they ran into Snipes and a few of the younger newsies that were involved the fight, earlier that morning. Snipes walked up to them with his papers in hand. He silently handed each of the girls twenty papers and walked away, the other younger newsies following him.
"What was that about?" Jessica asked.
"I have no clue." Tyrant answered, staring after Snipes and the other boys. Spot simply stood behind them and smirked. Since, neither of the girls had no idea what to make of what had just happened between them and boy they considered their worst enemy, they looked back and saw a content and smirking Spot
"And just what are you smirking about, Mr. Brooklyn?" Tyrant demanded with her hands on her hips as she turned around to face him
"He was trying to be nice. Something that happens to be foreign to you, isn't Tyrant?" he said while keeping her smirk and Tyrant scowled at him.
"Why can't guys just apologize, especially since they started it" Jessica asked logically. Tyrant looked at her but didn't have an answer so she looked up to a still smirking Spot
"Care to explain, Mr. Brooklyn" she said and he narrowed his eyes
"Why do I have to" he asked and she grinned since she started to annoy him with her last comment
"Well, you're a guy so you would know better than us" Jessica confirmed with big eyes. Tyrant started to snicker and Spot started to glare
"Now, that's a matter of opinion" Tyrant added.
Spot sighed and sat down on a nearby curb. "Come sit." He said. Something in his tone told neither girl to argue. His tone wasn't his usual leader tone, but much softer. Jessica sat on his right side and Tyrant on the left. He sighed again and said, "You really want to know?" Both girls nodded. "It was just his way of apologizing. He couldn't bring himself to actually say it, so instead he bought each of you some papes."
"Does this mean we've can't pick on him now?" Tyrant asked.
"I give up." Spot said standing up and walking down the street.