Everyone in existence has their own story. Some stories are formed from half truths and exaggerations. Some are created from other's opinions. Still others are forged from a legend. In my opinion, a legend can be one of two things. It can be a story that may, or may not be true, or a legend can be a person. A larger than life person. Someone that has changed their own little part of the world. They have changed their little part of the world by raising their own standards. The greatest people in the world didn't get to be the greatest because they aimed for mediocrity. They aimed for the sky. Spot Conlon wanted to own the sky. But he didn't start out as the greatest newsie this side of Manhattan. He didn't even start out as a newsie. He started out as little boy. A little boy that had a lot to learn. For if he was to become the best, he needed to grow.
Like most little boys, he was born to a mother and father that loved him. His father carried him on his shoulders when they walked down the street to run errands. His mother sang him to sleep every night. When he was five years old, his mother kissed him goodnight, and wrapped her best shawl around herself, and turned and walked out the door, her arm linked around her husband's. They were on their way out to eat dinner together to celebrate their anniversary. He had lived with perfect parents for five happy years.
The next morning, he awoke, freezing cold. The fire that his father had so lovingly built up to create warmth for the little house, had gone out. The little boy had never had this happen before. He pulled his blankie around his shoulders, and took off, softly padding on bare feet across his bedroom, and down the hall, and into his parents bedroom. He stopped suddenly in the doorway. The bed was still made from the morning before, when he had helped his mother make it. They hadn't come home last night...
That little boy did the only thing he could think of, he crawled on top of his parent's bed, snuggling his blue blankie around his shoulders, burying his face in his mother's pillow, catching the slight scent of flowers from her shampoo.
Wrapped in his parents quilt for warmth, it was not the temperature that woke him up a few hours later… it was hunger.
"Momma?" the little boy cried out into the silent house.
After receiving no answer, he crawled out of bed, pulling his blue blankie along with him. He sped into his room, trying his hardest to keep his bed warmed feet off of the freezing cold floor. He giggled to himself as he pulled on his house slippers. They were a gift from his mother a month ago at Christmas. She had made him and his daddy matching slippers.
Scurrying into the kitchen, he crawled onto the kitchen counter to look into the cupboards. Excitedly he pulled down the jar of peanut butter, and rummaged in the breadbox for bread. After eating his very messy sandwich, and washing the peanut butter off of his hands, he ran to his room to play, still keeping his blankie around his shoulders as the chill crept in farther and farther into the little house.
Pulling the wooden horses from the shelf that his father had whittled for him, he galloped around the room, making up adventures as he went along, until his breath was coming out of his mouth in clouds, freezing in the air. When the adventures ran out, he decided that he would surprise his mommy by getting dressed all by himself while he waited from them to come back home. Because of the frosty temperature in the room, he quickly pulled on his warmest clothing, and topped it off with his favorite sweater. Sneaking a look into the mirror in his parent's room, he admired his reflection, and the good job he did dressing himself. He failed to notice the two belt loops he had missed in the back, the fact that his socks didn't exactly match, and his pants were slightly off center. He was proud of himself.
He went to bed that night still proud of himself for dressing properly for his mother.
He spent a whole week being proud of himself for dressing properly for his mother. Then he ran out of food. After climbing on top of his parent's dresser to reach his mother's sewing basket, he pulled out a money pouch where his mother kept the grocery money. Not knowing how much he needed, he rummaged through his father's sock drawer, and pulled out the stash of bills that his father had kept there ever since he could remember.
He carefully got ready to go, remembering to tie his shoes and put on his hat, like his parents taught him. Then, after getting the house key that always dangled on a nail behind the front door, he slipped it in his pocket, and turned to open the door.
As he started to unlock the door, there was a knock at it. Pulling open the door in anticipation, thinking it was his parents he looked out expectantly. Instead of his parents, it was a nervous looking middle-aged man with a thick moustache, fingering a worn out hat, and dressed in a brown woolen suit. The man looked at him in surprise, and asked, "Who are you, son?"
"Benjamin Daniel Conlon, who are you?" He inquired, rubbing his running nose on the back of his sleeve.
"Well, kid, I'm Cyrus, Cyrus Briggs. Can I come in?" he asked, smoothing out his moustache.
"Uh, daddy's not home, sir." He said, and started to close the door.
Before the door could close very far, Cyrus stuck his foot out to catch it, and told him, "Well, Benjamin, that's what I want to talk to you about."
Curious, Benjamin opened the door wider, and the man slid through the crack and made himself comfortable, taking a seat on the couch.
"Sit down, kid." The man told him.
Silently following, Benjamin perched himself on the edge of the couch, and waited for the man to tell him what it was that he needed to say.
"There was an automobile accident." The man stated, "And lets just say, kid, that your parents aren't coming back home again."
"LIAR!" he screamed at the man, and ran into his bedroom for his toy gun.
The man went after him, flustered. He didn't know how to deal with kids; he was just the owner of the house the kid's parents had been renting from him. He didn't even know the kid would be here, he thought that the authorities would have looked for him before now.
The man walked into the little bedroom, not seeing the boy. He bent to look under the bed, and was hit in the shins by a toy shotgun before the little boy ran past him, trailing a blue blanket, and ran out the front door.
Benjamin ran across his lawn, and into the neighbor's yard, and knocked furiously on their door.
After what seemed like an eternity to the impatient little boy, the door was pulled open, and Mrs. Morrison said, "Yes? Oh, good heavens, you aren't dead. I heard you died when that automobile hit your parents."
"No, it's not true!" he shouted at her. "They're not dead!"
"Why it is so, I read it in the paper!" She informed him indignantly. "Get in, I do not continuously feed wood into my fireplace to heat the whole outdoors." She said, grabbing him by the shoulder, and pulling him through the door.
"Ronald!" she hollered out into the house.
Benjamin sneezed as Mr. Morrison walked into the entryway from the kitchen. "What now?" he asked his wife.
"Take this boy over to that refuge that's near here. Heaven knows we can't afford to feed another mouth this time a year."
The man looked Benjamin up and down before clearing his throat, and motioned for him to follow as he grabbed his coat and stalked out the door, not bothering to hold it open for the little boy standing there, with tears streaming down his cheeks, not knowing what to do.
Benjamin scurried out the door after the man, and climbed into the seat of the wagon next to him, having no idea where he was going.
"I heah they don't feed them kids at the refuge." Mr. Morrison commented.
Benjamin looked at him with surprise, and wrapped his blanket around his shoulders.
"An' that they get regular beatings." The man said before he spit over the side of the wagon onto the street.
Benjamin just stared at him with big eyes.
"I also heah they make the kids work until they fall ovah." Mr. Morrison continued as the large, foreboding building came into view.
Benjamin looked from the building to Mr. Morrison and back, as terror gripped his grief shattered heart. Sobbing, he jumped out of the wagon as it slowed down to stop at the gate.
Without a word, Mr. Morrison veered back onto the road, ignoring the little boy that was running down the sidewalk. He went back home to his warm house, and told his wife he dropped the boy off at the refuge.
Running along the sidewalk, Benjamin looked around for some place to hide. The only place he could see was the cart of a fish peddler. He scurried under the table next to the cart, and pulled his blanket in with him.
"Hey, this is not a playground!" The fish peddler said, kicking his heavy soled shoe under the table, and knocking the little boy out from under the table.
He nursed his bruised side, and ran down the street, sobbing at the injustice of it all.
After wandering the side streets of Brooklyn for a few hours, Benjamin walked into an alley, and curled up in his blanket, avoiding the edges that had dragged through a puddle, and had frozen solid as he walked in the cold.
He pulled his blanket over his head to try and keep his wind-chapped cheeks warm, and leaned on a wall, and fell asleep.
A/N: Hey. Thanks for reading. Please drop me a review on your way out.