Slow, sleazy music played in the background of a dark, devious Irish pub in Brooklyn. Men with beautiful locks of red, dingy hair grinned at each other in foolish manners as they threw their large mugs together in celebration.
"Aye! Aye!" They shouted in drunken tones over the ruckus of the room. "Maddie Malone" was being sung by a man in the back of the room, his deep voice cutting through the individual conversations that went on around him.
"Girl, what do ye say, huh? Be me goil for de night, eh?" A man with thick, blond curls asked the waitress who walked past him with a tray. Her full bust spilled out of her tight corset and her big green eyes sparkled dully as she frowned down at the man.
"I wouldn't die foah yer comp'ny, McGregor. Nor do I need it!" With that she broke away from him before he could forcefully change her mind. The blond drunk giggled to himself before downing another whisky.
There were boys of all shapes, sizes and ages to boot. Cigars hung out of their mouths and hats placed on top of hair that was oily from neglect. Their still growing faces were disfigured from the coal dust and mud that caked it. And yet their voices were chipper as they passed around the beer, the smokes, and their lives. Some were not over the age of 14. Many had even been to the bed with a woman. A few were lucky enough to have jobs, and money in their pockets. Most of them were poor street trash, however, who had not a penny to their disgraceful names.
"An' dis is what I get? Eh? Foah bein' a good man! I get pain. I get... beer." An upset drunk howled from his place on the floor. His turned over chair sat next to him, on which he had lined his empty beer mugs on, where they balanced precariously. He sat in a puddle of his own waste.
"Shut your bloody hole, man!" Came the cry from a 12 year old boy. His face was hidden by a stack of cards that he was playing in a game of poker. His supposed "lucky" hand would give him enough money to feast on candy and cigars for the rest of his life. Or so I thought to himself.
The bawling, drunk man whimpered lightly to himself before passing out on the floor, his face covered in his regurgitation. His eyes flickered under his swollen eye lids while his hands and legs thrashed about him in a drunken manner. His left hand stole out once to hit the chair that had been holding his collection of beer mugs. They crashed to the ground, shattering and spilling left over beer all over the man. He cried out in his sleep, and no one seemed to notice.
A young man of 18 sat at a booth, staring glumly at his untouched mug of beer. A stack of newspapers, hot from the afternoon presses, sat beside him as poor company.
"You goin' ta finish dat, mate?" A large, rugged man asked him as he pointed to the mug in front of the boy.
The younger of the two nodded slightly, his square chin bobbing up and down in a slow manner as he locked eye contact with the other man. An impression of shock grazed the other man's eyes as he noticed the set jaw and the utter seriousness of the younger fellow. Feeling all of a sudden uneasy, the large man grumbled obscenities in his native tongue before stomping away to find a sucker to buy him a drink. His woman had just given birth to a bastard child, (which just so happened to belong to his brother) and he needed liquor. He would teach her who was boss when he got home.
The young man sighed inwardly as he turned back to his drink. Absentmindedly, he ran a large and ink covered hand over his stack of World papers next to him. It seemed second nature to him. He spent most of his time in some various pub, staring at a drink as if he knew he was supposed to drink it. It was different than the time that he used to spend drinking or in bed with a dirty woman. The simple truth was that he didn't know what he wanted anymore.
As he looked around him, his cool, blue eyes roaming around the dark room, he took in the faces of all of the people. Men who were sloppy drunk, screaming profanities to each other. Other men who kept their hands attached to a woman's hips or thighs. Young boys, not old enough to be away from their mothers, gambling their day's money away. And this was so-called life. Not only life, but LIFE as they would probably know for the rest of their dingy lives.
New York city was a trap. A trap of dreams... and a spider web for dreamers, only to be caught, wrapped up in the sticky strands of disappointments and betrayal, and slowly eaten alive by humanity.
"Snoddy! Got a quartah?" An unusually deep voice of an adolescent asked the young man. The smirking, dirt covered young boy had been standing next to the young man's elbow for a few seconds unnoticed.
"Oh, uh, yeah." Snoddy reached into his worn pant's pocket and pulled out an old quarter that had lost it's shininess long ago. He looked up into the face of his friend, Snipeshooter, who was only eleven years old. The boy smiled triumphantly as he held the quarter up to his hazel eyes to examine it. Then with a wink to his older friend, he scampered off to his marble game that he had his paper money for the next day bet on. Snoddy tilted his head in thought. He had changed that quarter almost a year ago out of 25 pennies that he had received from selling papers one day. He kept it in his pocket that long for the sheer fact that it gave him comfort knowing that he had a quarter when some people could barely scrape five cents together for a hunk of bread. It had seemed right to give it to Snipes, who had recently suffered from anemia.
He had met Snipes long ago when the lost nine year old was but a poor boy on the streets. Cold and hungry, abandoned and hopeless. He was pure American because of his parents who immigrants from Germany. They traveled the harsh journey from their home in Warsaw when Gretchen, Snipes' mother, was four weeks pregnant. Leaving that early gave her time to prepare for her new son at their home in the Bronx. When he was only three years old, however, Snipes' father was killed in a brawl at the local pub and his mother was forced to work as a maid until she contracted tuberculosis. She died When Snipes was just turning five. With no other family left in America, the young boy was placed in an orphanage that he escaped from.
Shortly, Snoddy found him and took him to the lodging house, where he and his friends lived. Soon enough they formed a certain bond, and the boys made a newsie out of the gutter snipe. That was the pessimistic side of the deal, though.
In a way, the city had ordered the boy to be hung and Snoddy and the other newsies had tied the knot in the noose. Sure, the newsie business was one of freedom in some respects. You could roam the dirty slums of Queens, the Bronx, Midtown, Harlem, or Manhattan, and pretend it was made of gold. So many boys could confess to pretend in their dreams that the mud was a delicacy of candy, or other luxurious foods, like their parents told them before they came to America.
"Oh, Leo, just think! When we get to America, there will be every opportunity for you! An education. A job. Money. Oh, and love! Just think of the pretty American girls you'll find in America!"
Just when they thought they were out of the sewers, more water just came in on them, drowning out their cries as the smog covered their noses and mouths. The city nevertheless gave hope, though. So much hope for all who were young at heart and still pertained images of the all mighty American Dream. Yet again, the dream still remained...
Grimly, Snoddy pounded a strong fist on the table in front of him. Low. That was it. If you lived in New York City, you were either rich and prosperous or poor and low. As Jake had said one time to him, "Damn it all. We can fight and we'se only gonna get pushed back more. Damn it and drink up."
Jake had been Snoddy's first newsie friend, and his role model even though Jake was a few years younger than himself. His big brown eyes held traces of defeat, and yet he covered it well with joy for appearance. Unlike some, he took graciously to the back burner rather than the spotlight. During meetings or what not, he pretty much was determined to keep to himself. Whenever he was asked about his past, Jake would grin and say jokingly, "I survived it, dat's fer damn sure!" All that he would tell was that his dad was a sailor and his mom used to work in a dress shop as a tailor. When he joined the troop of Manhattan newsies, however, he mentioned no other family or friends.
He was a boy who believed in dreams and golden streets, puddles of candy rather than mud, and the smells of rich and luxurious foods all around him. Walking down the street you would find Jake laughing richly as he twirled his brown, ever-present, bowler in his hands, leaping and dancing about on his golden streets. Snoddy thought it was wonderful to have hope, like Jake did. He wished that sort of happiness for himself.
"Aw, why so glum?" Jake had asked Snoddy early one day as he shoved a flask towards him. "Why doncha have a little drink on me. It'll take the ease of a yer pain, mate." That night Snoddy and Jake traveled into Queens and got sloppy drunk. As they were leaving the bar that they had been in all night, however, a mob of Queens newsies enticed them into a fight. Snoddy was slightly hurt, banging his wrist into the side of an alley wall besides the numerous gashes and cuts he received. He still remembered the moment that the group of boys had run from the scene as a police officer began to chase them off into the night. He was left in the dark alley with the broken figure of his good friend, Jake, at his feet.
Jake had several broken ribs and his leg was damn near ripped apart by one boy's club that was taken to him. He stayed in the orphanage hospital nearby the lodging house for months, and although he was out, he still had to limp to the circulation office each morning with a cane to help him walk. He remained in a depressed disposition, his image of candy covered streets and so forth dimmed by his tragedy.
Snoddy's life seemed to be on a whirl... spinning away from him so that he was losing his footing on everything that seemed real. Jack was gone to a better place with the love of his life, Sarah Jacobs. Kloppman had died and left the lodging house to Crutchy who had no other means for a future. Even David, the Walking Mouth who had led them to victory in the strike three years earlier, had left for college to study journalism. He knew that he had what it took to end up better than his friends back in New York City. The Unfortunates.
"We'se so unfortunate dat we'se got our own official name!" Racetrack Higgins joked one night after a rich woman had gracefully threw a penny at the small Italian.
"Bless you unfortunate children. May God love and protect you." She had muttered before hurrying towards the coach that had stopped by the side of the street near them. No matter how nice she displayed herself to be, there was still a tad amount of fright that was held in the tension of her lips and the wideness of her eyes as she turned her long, slender back towards the dirty boys.
Race looked towards Skittery and Snoddy, who were with him on that night, and snorted. "Getcha gun!! Quick, b'foah she gets away!" He screamed through his cupped hand. They had a big laugh as the woman whimpered and leaped into the coach, ordering the driver to "take her away from this filth."
"See ya 'round, sweet thing!" Skittery had called after her with a grin standing out on his slender face. Race and him took turns blowing kisses at the departing coach. Then as a grand finale, Skittery threw a large hunk of horse manure through the open window, right into the woman's lap. She shrieked, and then the coach disappeared around a corner and out of their sight. Snoddy congratulated Skittery for his wonderful improvisation by buying a round of drinks that night. He was older than Snoddy by a month, and he would be dead before his 18th birthday a couple months later.
Snoddy closed his eyes for a moment, a flood of nasty scenes coming back to him of that night. Bloody papers on the wall, sounds of struggle, grunts of pain... it had all ended so quickly, as everything does in the city. Lights come on and burn themselves out, sparking slightly and then leaving a shattered bulb in the place of what was a wonderful orb.
"Drink it up," Jake's echo filtered through Snoddy's tired mind as images sweltered behind his closed eyelids. If he could only go back to the way his life was before he had began to think about such things. There was a time when he was blind to such ways of life. Bad things would happen and it would automatically be erased from his mind, only to make room for the next event to happen. If he could only do that, everything would be salvaged, he would still be the same person that he was in his youth...
"Snoddy, baby, come to bed..." A soft, alluring voice beckoned from the cot behind him. The "flavah of da week", as Kid Blink called it, was lying on her stomach, smiling as she peered at Snoddy while he looked through the window and onto the street below. They were in her husband's apartment in the Bronx, and Snoddy was highly drunk. He swayed back in forth as he tried to concentrate on the horse drawn wagons rolling below him. He didn't even know her name.
Scenes like this, which took place months ago, happened all the time. Snoddy got drunk, blacked out, and all of a sudden found himself in a girl's building or in a dark alley with rats crawling around his naked body.
"Low cost ta pay foah da action, right, Snoddy??" Kid Blink had mentioned to him one night at the lodging house. The thin blond blue eye sparkled next to the other one that was covered in the brown patch. "Trust me. LOW cost."
Night after night, Blink, Snoddy, and a few various other newsies would walk the streets to find them some action. Some flavor. And they usually found it for a low cost. One night the women were so enticed with Snoddy and his newsie friends that they had a little party in a alley next to the lodging house. Kloppman had stated before that he forbid any women friends inside. Snoddy awoke the next morning to a prostitute, throwing up on his naked chest.
"C'mon, try dis one!" Snitch ventured with a lopsided grin. "You'se gonna like it... bettah den da stuff I had last week, I sweah." He pushed cup of rum apparently laced with an opium-like substance toward Snoddy. He bigger of the two took the tonic and drank it, his eyes swimming with tears after the second swallow. Although he preferred alcohol to other vices, sometimes he was curious enough to try other means of passing the time. Itey's constant badgering didn't help, either. After too many nights in the washroom of the lodging house, turning green and feeling as if his insides were falling out, Snoddy decided to decline all of his younger friend's future offerings.
Alcohol. Nicotine amongst other narcotics. Gambling. Women. The days were occupied with selling while the nights were free to the young men to make their dreams come true.
Sometimes, Brooklyn himself would come to Manhattan to gamble. Spot Conlon, the small and mouse-like young man seemed to bring danger in his midst. A fight always broke out after a disagreement over the card game, and someone always ended up with a bloody nose or worse. Snoddy was never really the gambling type, but he remained on the side lines to watch the growing tension as Brooklyn would lean over the table and slap his hand down.
"Foah of a kind!" He declared triumphantly, tipping his cabby hat back on his head with the top of his ever present golden cane.
The other players quickly folded save for one. Skittery looked up grimly at Spot, who smirked across the table at the larger boy. Every young man in the small space held their breath. And then Skittery broke into a grin.
"Full house." He said carefully and deliberately, laying his cards on the table so slowly that they smacked against the surface of the wood. As everyone cheered, threw their caps and cards up into the air and applauded Skittery, Spot's smirk slowly slipped off of his lips and was replaced by a grim wince. He continued to stare at Skittery reached across the table, holding his hand out his opponent in a friendly hand shake. Spot then swung his cane at Skittery, catching him off guard, as the side of the cane connected with the side of his face. A long gash appeared on his cheek, spilling blood onto the cards that lay strewn on the table. An all out fight broke out soon, the Brooklyn newsies trying to control their leader as the Manhattan newsies held Skittery back as blood continued to ooze down his face and onto his dirty white T-shirt.
Snoddy remembered holding onto Skittery's left arm as he thrashed in defiance, that night. He didn't know it at the time that not a month later his friend would be dead from an infection caused by the cut on his cheek.
The lodging house was still as the newsies mourned for their lost friend. "Maybe it's bettah dis way." Skittery's brother, Dutchy, whispered to the pale and still form on the bunk in front of him. He had his older brother's hand in his and he stroked it with his fingers as his eyes traced the outline of Skittery's face. "You'se wit' mom and pop now, Skitts. Ya don't gotta worry bout no papes being sold. Ya don't have ta worry bout... me..." He choked up then, his sore, red eyes closing tightly as the tears seeped out from behind the lids. Snoddy sighed and patted his mourning friend's back as he continued to clutch on to his brother's hand.
Skittery's death had been a surprise to the newsies. "Life seemed so safe." Bumlets muttered one Sunday morning to Snoddy as they kneeled at the back of a church in Manhattan. "Like da beer was preservin' our blood or somethin'. What a crock." Snoddy had accompanied Bumlets to the church on a whim. He had always been curious about other's religions, though he had never even set foot inside a church. He looked on in a fascinated way as Bumlets fiddled his mother's rosary. It was the only thing he had left of her since she had left him on the stoop of the orphanage.
Newsies left and new ones came in. A new newsie, Shaker, took the bunk that had once belonged to Skittery. Spot Conlon supposedly found a girl and traveled up north. Just as fast as it had once been going, life seemed to slow down... and then everything ceased to exist. A sort of cloth was being held over Snoddy's face and his vision was blurred. The strange women, the drinking, the pace of New York City seemed to have no importance to him anymore. He didn't know what to do now that his life seemed to have no reason for being lived at all.
"Snoddy, lighten up. Dere's always moah good to be had!" Itey exclaimed one night as Snoddy lie on his bunk, dreaming to himself of different worlds with different people. The small boy with curling black hair smiled down at his friend. "C'mon, I know a good piece of women would love ta have ya tonight. What do ya say?" A dirty, dark complexioned hand was shoved in front of Snoddy's face as Itey offered it to him. Snoddy shook his head slowly and deliberately, causing Itey's grin to tremble on his lips. He pulled his hand back to himself and wiped it on his chest as if he had dirtied it. Then he slipped out of the room, leaving Snoddy by himself.
Snoddy's eyes were burning with bitter tears. When did it all stop? When was the time that he could actually stand to look at his life and say that he'd accomplished anything? Was there a point when he could no longer feel as if he was on a downward spiral? Certainly the world was still the same, so why did he feel so alienated all of a sudden? Maybe it was him that had changed.
"You okay, Snoddy?" Snipes asked as he suddenly re-appeared next to his friend. The noise in the bar had quieted down and the cloud of cigar smoke had lifted slightly. The smaller boy's big eyes narrowed slightly as he noticed the dreamy look on his friend's face.
"Snipes," Snoddy began in his slow, rumbling speech, "You evah think of us as 'The Unfortunates?'"
Snipeshooter's left eyebrow went up in surprise, the question was that sudden. "What do ya mean?" He asked curiously. He had noticed that Snoddy hadn't been himself for the past couple weeks. Ever since Skittery died, it seemed, Snoddy had pulled himself away from the other newsies. He hardly ever showed up at the local places and he hardly ever talked to anyone except when he was approached. What happened to the beer guzzling, partying, woman lover that he had once been?
"D'ya evah look at a street and see gold, when ya know it's nothin' but a dirty street?" This question was hushed. Snoddy wrapped his hands around his now warm beer, concentrating more on the condensed water covering his skin than the reaction of the smaller boy. Snipes smiled. Snoddy was turning into a man.
"Shoah, why not." Snipes said in reply as she shrugged his small shoulders.
"You evah think we was born beaten?" Came the next question. Snoddy's cool gray eyes raised to meet Snipes' round blue ones.
Snipes thought over this for a moment. When he opened his mouth to answer, a bright shine lit his eyes. "Da way I see it, we'se beat when we admit it to ourselves. Look at da drunks back dere," he pointed to the remaining men who were either passed out or drinking the remaining beer that the other fellows had left behind. "Dey'se beat 'cause dey gave in. But ya know what? We don't 'ave ta be unfortunate like dem! 'Cause we'se newsies! One day we'se gonna be out dere in da woild sellin' papes, improvin' headlines, and bein' superior to all dat is out dere. An' da woild will know 'bout it!" He finished his speech with a flourish of hands that he threw over his head.
Snoddy pondered for a moment, taking into everything that the other boy had said, studying the other boy's sincerity in which he spoke. And then his face broke into a smile. "Yeah. Dey will, won't dey?"
A few minutes later, Snipes and Snoddy left the pub in Brooklyn, walking together on their street of gold, stepping over puddles of candy, and smelling the smells of rich food. They were happy with the sheer fact that they were alive. And for that they were not unfortunate.
"Aye! Aye!" They shouted in drunken tones over the ruckus of the room. "Maddie Malone" was being sung by a man in the back of the room, his deep voice cutting through the individual conversations that went on around him.
"Girl, what do ye say, huh? Be me goil for de night, eh?" A man with thick, blond curls asked the waitress who walked past him with a tray. Her full bust spilled out of her tight corset and her big green eyes sparkled dully as she frowned down at the man.
"I wouldn't die foah yer comp'ny, McGregor. Nor do I need it!" With that she broke away from him before he could forcefully change her mind. The blond drunk giggled to himself before downing another whisky.
There were boys of all shapes, sizes and ages to boot. Cigars hung out of their mouths and hats placed on top of hair that was oily from neglect. Their still growing faces were disfigured from the coal dust and mud that caked it. And yet their voices were chipper as they passed around the beer, the smokes, and their lives. Some were not over the age of 14. Many had even been to the bed with a woman. A few were lucky enough to have jobs, and money in their pockets. Most of them were poor street trash, however, who had not a penny to their disgraceful names.
"An' dis is what I get? Eh? Foah bein' a good man! I get pain. I get... beer." An upset drunk howled from his place on the floor. His turned over chair sat next to him, on which he had lined his empty beer mugs on, where they balanced precariously. He sat in a puddle of his own waste.
"Shut your bloody hole, man!" Came the cry from a 12 year old boy. His face was hidden by a stack of cards that he was playing in a game of poker. His supposed "lucky" hand would give him enough money to feast on candy and cigars for the rest of his life. Or so I thought to himself.
The bawling, drunk man whimpered lightly to himself before passing out on the floor, his face covered in his regurgitation. His eyes flickered under his swollen eye lids while his hands and legs thrashed about him in a drunken manner. His left hand stole out once to hit the chair that had been holding his collection of beer mugs. They crashed to the ground, shattering and spilling left over beer all over the man. He cried out in his sleep, and no one seemed to notice.
A young man of 18 sat at a booth, staring glumly at his untouched mug of beer. A stack of newspapers, hot from the afternoon presses, sat beside him as poor company.
"You goin' ta finish dat, mate?" A large, rugged man asked him as he pointed to the mug in front of the boy.
The younger of the two nodded slightly, his square chin bobbing up and down in a slow manner as he locked eye contact with the other man. An impression of shock grazed the other man's eyes as he noticed the set jaw and the utter seriousness of the younger fellow. Feeling all of a sudden uneasy, the large man grumbled obscenities in his native tongue before stomping away to find a sucker to buy him a drink. His woman had just given birth to a bastard child, (which just so happened to belong to his brother) and he needed liquor. He would teach her who was boss when he got home.
The young man sighed inwardly as he turned back to his drink. Absentmindedly, he ran a large and ink covered hand over his stack of World papers next to him. It seemed second nature to him. He spent most of his time in some various pub, staring at a drink as if he knew he was supposed to drink it. It was different than the time that he used to spend drinking or in bed with a dirty woman. The simple truth was that he didn't know what he wanted anymore.
As he looked around him, his cool, blue eyes roaming around the dark room, he took in the faces of all of the people. Men who were sloppy drunk, screaming profanities to each other. Other men who kept their hands attached to a woman's hips or thighs. Young boys, not old enough to be away from their mothers, gambling their day's money away. And this was so-called life. Not only life, but LIFE as they would probably know for the rest of their dingy lives.
New York city was a trap. A trap of dreams... and a spider web for dreamers, only to be caught, wrapped up in the sticky strands of disappointments and betrayal, and slowly eaten alive by humanity.
"Snoddy! Got a quartah?" An unusually deep voice of an adolescent asked the young man. The smirking, dirt covered young boy had been standing next to the young man's elbow for a few seconds unnoticed.
"Oh, uh, yeah." Snoddy reached into his worn pant's pocket and pulled out an old quarter that had lost it's shininess long ago. He looked up into the face of his friend, Snipeshooter, who was only eleven years old. The boy smiled triumphantly as he held the quarter up to his hazel eyes to examine it. Then with a wink to his older friend, he scampered off to his marble game that he had his paper money for the next day bet on. Snoddy tilted his head in thought. He had changed that quarter almost a year ago out of 25 pennies that he had received from selling papers one day. He kept it in his pocket that long for the sheer fact that it gave him comfort knowing that he had a quarter when some people could barely scrape five cents together for a hunk of bread. It had seemed right to give it to Snipes, who had recently suffered from anemia.
He had met Snipes long ago when the lost nine year old was but a poor boy on the streets. Cold and hungry, abandoned and hopeless. He was pure American because of his parents who immigrants from Germany. They traveled the harsh journey from their home in Warsaw when Gretchen, Snipes' mother, was four weeks pregnant. Leaving that early gave her time to prepare for her new son at their home in the Bronx. When he was only three years old, however, Snipes' father was killed in a brawl at the local pub and his mother was forced to work as a maid until she contracted tuberculosis. She died When Snipes was just turning five. With no other family left in America, the young boy was placed in an orphanage that he escaped from.
Shortly, Snoddy found him and took him to the lodging house, where he and his friends lived. Soon enough they formed a certain bond, and the boys made a newsie out of the gutter snipe. That was the pessimistic side of the deal, though.
In a way, the city had ordered the boy to be hung and Snoddy and the other newsies had tied the knot in the noose. Sure, the newsie business was one of freedom in some respects. You could roam the dirty slums of Queens, the Bronx, Midtown, Harlem, or Manhattan, and pretend it was made of gold. So many boys could confess to pretend in their dreams that the mud was a delicacy of candy, or other luxurious foods, like their parents told them before they came to America.
"Oh, Leo, just think! When we get to America, there will be every opportunity for you! An education. A job. Money. Oh, and love! Just think of the pretty American girls you'll find in America!"
Just when they thought they were out of the sewers, more water just came in on them, drowning out their cries as the smog covered their noses and mouths. The city nevertheless gave hope, though. So much hope for all who were young at heart and still pertained images of the all mighty American Dream. Yet again, the dream still remained...
Grimly, Snoddy pounded a strong fist on the table in front of him. Low. That was it. If you lived in New York City, you were either rich and prosperous or poor and low. As Jake had said one time to him, "Damn it all. We can fight and we'se only gonna get pushed back more. Damn it and drink up."
Jake had been Snoddy's first newsie friend, and his role model even though Jake was a few years younger than himself. His big brown eyes held traces of defeat, and yet he covered it well with joy for appearance. Unlike some, he took graciously to the back burner rather than the spotlight. During meetings or what not, he pretty much was determined to keep to himself. Whenever he was asked about his past, Jake would grin and say jokingly, "I survived it, dat's fer damn sure!" All that he would tell was that his dad was a sailor and his mom used to work in a dress shop as a tailor. When he joined the troop of Manhattan newsies, however, he mentioned no other family or friends.
He was a boy who believed in dreams and golden streets, puddles of candy rather than mud, and the smells of rich and luxurious foods all around him. Walking down the street you would find Jake laughing richly as he twirled his brown, ever-present, bowler in his hands, leaping and dancing about on his golden streets. Snoddy thought it was wonderful to have hope, like Jake did. He wished that sort of happiness for himself.
"Aw, why so glum?" Jake had asked Snoddy early one day as he shoved a flask towards him. "Why doncha have a little drink on me. It'll take the ease of a yer pain, mate." That night Snoddy and Jake traveled into Queens and got sloppy drunk. As they were leaving the bar that they had been in all night, however, a mob of Queens newsies enticed them into a fight. Snoddy was slightly hurt, banging his wrist into the side of an alley wall besides the numerous gashes and cuts he received. He still remembered the moment that the group of boys had run from the scene as a police officer began to chase them off into the night. He was left in the dark alley with the broken figure of his good friend, Jake, at his feet.
Jake had several broken ribs and his leg was damn near ripped apart by one boy's club that was taken to him. He stayed in the orphanage hospital nearby the lodging house for months, and although he was out, he still had to limp to the circulation office each morning with a cane to help him walk. He remained in a depressed disposition, his image of candy covered streets and so forth dimmed by his tragedy.
Snoddy's life seemed to be on a whirl... spinning away from him so that he was losing his footing on everything that seemed real. Jack was gone to a better place with the love of his life, Sarah Jacobs. Kloppman had died and left the lodging house to Crutchy who had no other means for a future. Even David, the Walking Mouth who had led them to victory in the strike three years earlier, had left for college to study journalism. He knew that he had what it took to end up better than his friends back in New York City. The Unfortunates.
"We'se so unfortunate dat we'se got our own official name!" Racetrack Higgins joked one night after a rich woman had gracefully threw a penny at the small Italian.
"Bless you unfortunate children. May God love and protect you." She had muttered before hurrying towards the coach that had stopped by the side of the street near them. No matter how nice she displayed herself to be, there was still a tad amount of fright that was held in the tension of her lips and the wideness of her eyes as she turned her long, slender back towards the dirty boys.
Race looked towards Skittery and Snoddy, who were with him on that night, and snorted. "Getcha gun!! Quick, b'foah she gets away!" He screamed through his cupped hand. They had a big laugh as the woman whimpered and leaped into the coach, ordering the driver to "take her away from this filth."
"See ya 'round, sweet thing!" Skittery had called after her with a grin standing out on his slender face. Race and him took turns blowing kisses at the departing coach. Then as a grand finale, Skittery threw a large hunk of horse manure through the open window, right into the woman's lap. She shrieked, and then the coach disappeared around a corner and out of their sight. Snoddy congratulated Skittery for his wonderful improvisation by buying a round of drinks that night. He was older than Snoddy by a month, and he would be dead before his 18th birthday a couple months later.
Snoddy closed his eyes for a moment, a flood of nasty scenes coming back to him of that night. Bloody papers on the wall, sounds of struggle, grunts of pain... it had all ended so quickly, as everything does in the city. Lights come on and burn themselves out, sparking slightly and then leaving a shattered bulb in the place of what was a wonderful orb.
"Drink it up," Jake's echo filtered through Snoddy's tired mind as images sweltered behind his closed eyelids. If he could only go back to the way his life was before he had began to think about such things. There was a time when he was blind to such ways of life. Bad things would happen and it would automatically be erased from his mind, only to make room for the next event to happen. If he could only do that, everything would be salvaged, he would still be the same person that he was in his youth...
"Snoddy, baby, come to bed..." A soft, alluring voice beckoned from the cot behind him. The "flavah of da week", as Kid Blink called it, was lying on her stomach, smiling as she peered at Snoddy while he looked through the window and onto the street below. They were in her husband's apartment in the Bronx, and Snoddy was highly drunk. He swayed back in forth as he tried to concentrate on the horse drawn wagons rolling below him. He didn't even know her name.
Scenes like this, which took place months ago, happened all the time. Snoddy got drunk, blacked out, and all of a sudden found himself in a girl's building or in a dark alley with rats crawling around his naked body.
"Low cost ta pay foah da action, right, Snoddy??" Kid Blink had mentioned to him one night at the lodging house. The thin blond blue eye sparkled next to the other one that was covered in the brown patch. "Trust me. LOW cost."
Night after night, Blink, Snoddy, and a few various other newsies would walk the streets to find them some action. Some flavor. And they usually found it for a low cost. One night the women were so enticed with Snoddy and his newsie friends that they had a little party in a alley next to the lodging house. Kloppman had stated before that he forbid any women friends inside. Snoddy awoke the next morning to a prostitute, throwing up on his naked chest.
"C'mon, try dis one!" Snitch ventured with a lopsided grin. "You'se gonna like it... bettah den da stuff I had last week, I sweah." He pushed cup of rum apparently laced with an opium-like substance toward Snoddy. He bigger of the two took the tonic and drank it, his eyes swimming with tears after the second swallow. Although he preferred alcohol to other vices, sometimes he was curious enough to try other means of passing the time. Itey's constant badgering didn't help, either. After too many nights in the washroom of the lodging house, turning green and feeling as if his insides were falling out, Snoddy decided to decline all of his younger friend's future offerings.
Alcohol. Nicotine amongst other narcotics. Gambling. Women. The days were occupied with selling while the nights were free to the young men to make their dreams come true.
Sometimes, Brooklyn himself would come to Manhattan to gamble. Spot Conlon, the small and mouse-like young man seemed to bring danger in his midst. A fight always broke out after a disagreement over the card game, and someone always ended up with a bloody nose or worse. Snoddy was never really the gambling type, but he remained on the side lines to watch the growing tension as Brooklyn would lean over the table and slap his hand down.
"Foah of a kind!" He declared triumphantly, tipping his cabby hat back on his head with the top of his ever present golden cane.
The other players quickly folded save for one. Skittery looked up grimly at Spot, who smirked across the table at the larger boy. Every young man in the small space held their breath. And then Skittery broke into a grin.
"Full house." He said carefully and deliberately, laying his cards on the table so slowly that they smacked against the surface of the wood. As everyone cheered, threw their caps and cards up into the air and applauded Skittery, Spot's smirk slowly slipped off of his lips and was replaced by a grim wince. He continued to stare at Skittery reached across the table, holding his hand out his opponent in a friendly hand shake. Spot then swung his cane at Skittery, catching him off guard, as the side of the cane connected with the side of his face. A long gash appeared on his cheek, spilling blood onto the cards that lay strewn on the table. An all out fight broke out soon, the Brooklyn newsies trying to control their leader as the Manhattan newsies held Skittery back as blood continued to ooze down his face and onto his dirty white T-shirt.
Snoddy remembered holding onto Skittery's left arm as he thrashed in defiance, that night. He didn't know it at the time that not a month later his friend would be dead from an infection caused by the cut on his cheek.
The lodging house was still as the newsies mourned for their lost friend. "Maybe it's bettah dis way." Skittery's brother, Dutchy, whispered to the pale and still form on the bunk in front of him. He had his older brother's hand in his and he stroked it with his fingers as his eyes traced the outline of Skittery's face. "You'se wit' mom and pop now, Skitts. Ya don't gotta worry bout no papes being sold. Ya don't have ta worry bout... me..." He choked up then, his sore, red eyes closing tightly as the tears seeped out from behind the lids. Snoddy sighed and patted his mourning friend's back as he continued to clutch on to his brother's hand.
Skittery's death had been a surprise to the newsies. "Life seemed so safe." Bumlets muttered one Sunday morning to Snoddy as they kneeled at the back of a church in Manhattan. "Like da beer was preservin' our blood or somethin'. What a crock." Snoddy had accompanied Bumlets to the church on a whim. He had always been curious about other's religions, though he had never even set foot inside a church. He looked on in a fascinated way as Bumlets fiddled his mother's rosary. It was the only thing he had left of her since she had left him on the stoop of the orphanage.
Newsies left and new ones came in. A new newsie, Shaker, took the bunk that had once belonged to Skittery. Spot Conlon supposedly found a girl and traveled up north. Just as fast as it had once been going, life seemed to slow down... and then everything ceased to exist. A sort of cloth was being held over Snoddy's face and his vision was blurred. The strange women, the drinking, the pace of New York City seemed to have no importance to him anymore. He didn't know what to do now that his life seemed to have no reason for being lived at all.
"Snoddy, lighten up. Dere's always moah good to be had!" Itey exclaimed one night as Snoddy lie on his bunk, dreaming to himself of different worlds with different people. The small boy with curling black hair smiled down at his friend. "C'mon, I know a good piece of women would love ta have ya tonight. What do ya say?" A dirty, dark complexioned hand was shoved in front of Snoddy's face as Itey offered it to him. Snoddy shook his head slowly and deliberately, causing Itey's grin to tremble on his lips. He pulled his hand back to himself and wiped it on his chest as if he had dirtied it. Then he slipped out of the room, leaving Snoddy by himself.
Snoddy's eyes were burning with bitter tears. When did it all stop? When was the time that he could actually stand to look at his life and say that he'd accomplished anything? Was there a point when he could no longer feel as if he was on a downward spiral? Certainly the world was still the same, so why did he feel so alienated all of a sudden? Maybe it was him that had changed.
"You okay, Snoddy?" Snipes asked as he suddenly re-appeared next to his friend. The noise in the bar had quieted down and the cloud of cigar smoke had lifted slightly. The smaller boy's big eyes narrowed slightly as he noticed the dreamy look on his friend's face.
"Snipes," Snoddy began in his slow, rumbling speech, "You evah think of us as 'The Unfortunates?'"
Snipeshooter's left eyebrow went up in surprise, the question was that sudden. "What do ya mean?" He asked curiously. He had noticed that Snoddy hadn't been himself for the past couple weeks. Ever since Skittery died, it seemed, Snoddy had pulled himself away from the other newsies. He hardly ever showed up at the local places and he hardly ever talked to anyone except when he was approached. What happened to the beer guzzling, partying, woman lover that he had once been?
"D'ya evah look at a street and see gold, when ya know it's nothin' but a dirty street?" This question was hushed. Snoddy wrapped his hands around his now warm beer, concentrating more on the condensed water covering his skin than the reaction of the smaller boy. Snipes smiled. Snoddy was turning into a man.
"Shoah, why not." Snipes said in reply as she shrugged his small shoulders.
"You evah think we was born beaten?" Came the next question. Snoddy's cool gray eyes raised to meet Snipes' round blue ones.
Snipes thought over this for a moment. When he opened his mouth to answer, a bright shine lit his eyes. "Da way I see it, we'se beat when we admit it to ourselves. Look at da drunks back dere," he pointed to the remaining men who were either passed out or drinking the remaining beer that the other fellows had left behind. "Dey'se beat 'cause dey gave in. But ya know what? We don't 'ave ta be unfortunate like dem! 'Cause we'se newsies! One day we'se gonna be out dere in da woild sellin' papes, improvin' headlines, and bein' superior to all dat is out dere. An' da woild will know 'bout it!" He finished his speech with a flourish of hands that he threw over his head.
Snoddy pondered for a moment, taking into everything that the other boy had said, studying the other boy's sincerity in which he spoke. And then his face broke into a smile. "Yeah. Dey will, won't dey?"
A few minutes later, Snipes and Snoddy left the pub in Brooklyn, walking together on their street of gold, stepping over puddles of candy, and smelling the smells of rich food. They were happy with the sheer fact that they were alive. And for that they were not unfortunate.