Disclaimer: I don't own the movie characters, Disney does. I do own a few in this, others are borrowed from ppl.
Something abnormal about the air was bothering the dark emerald eyes of a seventeen-year-old girl. Her stomach lurched as she grabbed her newspapers roughly out of the tall man's hands, ignoring his bird-like eyes glaring after her. Her eyes searched for her normal selling partner, who she had not seen since the night before. Shootah's never late, she thought to herself, scowling at the newsboys who were staring at her from their places in line.
Bitter did not believe she was much to look at, making sure she hid her figure with an oversized men's short-sleeved dress shirt and a pair of dark khaki shorts that only stayed up with the help of a pair of suspenders hidden well under her outer shirt. She hissed inappropriately as one boy let out a high pitched catcall directed towards her and smirked happily as he took a step back from her.
"Hey Bittah, need a selling partner?" a girl called from behind her. She turned to see a thin, athletic looking girl running to catch up to her, decked out in mostly black, a trace of sweat on her forehead as she approached.
"Yeah," Bittah stated simply, shifting her papers and pushing past the crowding newsies, heading straight into the depths of Brooklyn.
"Hoid Spot got in a verbal fight wit someone last night," Irish Flare said, trying to start up a conversation.
Bitter's eyes flickered. "You know who?" she asked.
"From de sounds of de voice it was a goil, why you ask?" IF said, scanning the streets for a decent place to sell.
"Jist wonderin'," Bitter stated without emotion.
Irish Flare nodded and stopped to convince a young man into buying a paper. He took one after looking her over. Her cyan eyes winked intentionally and fingered through her black hair for a minute as he handed her the coin. Bitter rolled her eyes and looked around, using more skillful tactics to get a kindly old woman to buy a paper from her.
"So wheah's Shootah? You two are usually inseparable," IF asked as she made her way back to Bitter's side. Bitter cringed slightly at the sound of her best friend's name. The two had been fighting lately, although no one seemed to know what was going on between the two girls.
***
"Bittahsweet Harmony, I will not be around forevah, ya know," Shooter screamed at her friend.
Bitter took a drag of her cigarette. "Don't use my full name," she stated.
"I'll call ya what I want, I gave ya yer nickname an' can use it anyway I want to," Shooter threw up her hands as Bitter didn't respond and left the room. "You're hopeless!" she shouted behind her.
***
"Bittah?" IF repeated her name for the third time as the girl dazed in and out.
"Oh sorry, what was dat?" she asked, snapping out of her memories.
"Nevermind," IF said.
The day was grueling, the heat overtaking the pleasure of being out in the streets and neither of the girls talked much as they sold newspaper after newspaper. As soon as Bitter was done selling, she let her body rest on the warm street, fanning herself with one of IF's unsold newspapers.
Irish Flare nabbed her newpaper back from Bitter with a snide smile, causing Bitter to growl lowly and stand up to stretch her legs. She watched IF beg the crowd to buy her last paper, but did not see who had taken it as she looked past the crowd and into an alley where she saw two people pulling knives on each other.
Bitter shoved her way through the resistant stream of the crowd and hollered for IF to follow her, hoping her voice carried over those in the street. She saw the girl fall to the ground, clutching her side and ran quickly across the street and into the hidden alley. She kicked the boy in groin, making him instantly drop the knife in his hand and pushed him off to the side, kneeling down next to the girl.
"She's from Manhattan," IF whispered, out of breath from running after Bitter.
"Think ya kin carry her back there?" Bitter asked, seeing the girl's blue-green eyes disappear as her body collapsed on her.
"Looks skinny enough," IF said, eying the brown haired girl. With Bitter's help, the girl was soon safe in IF's arms and just in time, for the short, muscular attacker was regaining some dignity and glaring steadily at the girl who had disabled him for a few moments.
"I'll take care of him," Bitter said, seeing IF's eyes flicker from her friend to the boy.
IF nodded as she swayed out of the alleyway, glaring at anyone who gaped at the short girl, standing at only 5'2", winking at Bitter as she shifted out of view. Bitter giggled, but it was short-lived for the boy was on his feet, grabbing at a knife and lunging at her, insanity glinting in his eyes.
She dodged out of the way and shoved him up against the wall, glancing quickly around to see if he had done any damage to her. Satisfied that he hadn't, she easily broke his wrist to make him release the knife and set to work on his face, with no retaliation on his part.
Bitter kicked him once in the stomach after he fell to the ground, making sure he was unconscious and spat on him, throwing the knife into a nearby gutter as she exited the alley. She cursed as she stopped to gaze into a nearby store window, seeing blood covering one of her sleeves. Musta knicked me wit dat damn knife, she thought to herself as she walked back towards the Brooklyn Lodging House.
She was feeling the full effects of the wound by the time she arrived at the sturdy old building, going straight up the stairs as she entered, no one noticing anything abnormal about her. Bitter grunted as someone addressed her and crept into the girl's bunkroom, grabbing the only other short-sleeved shirt she had and running straight into the bathroom before anyone could get a good look at her.
Getting out of her shirt was a whole different story trying not to elicit any yelps of pain, slipping it off and glaring at the wound in the mirror. She cleaned it out and wrapped the nearest piece of a clean cloth around it, pulling on her other shirt and soaking the other one in the sink until the bloodstain was out. She threw it over a stall door and laughed as someone hollered at her for it, buttoning up her shirt as she fell out through the door in fits of laughter.
Bitter made her way down the stairs, calming her laughter before slipping into the main room of the lodging house, finding quite a few of the newsies back from selling. She scampered over to a table filled with people and pulled up a chair next to the only two girls there. A girl with short brown hair and blue-gray eyes was dealing out cards and looked up at Bitter, the light turning her hair a bit red and the freckles splattered across her tan face danced across her face as her lips turned up into a wide grin. "Deal ya in?" she asked.
"Nah Aki, I'se jist come ta watch ya lose yer money," Bitter replied with a smirk. The girl next to her snorted as Aki turned a shade of red and Bitter playfully ushered her to continue dealing.
The girl seated next to Aki was a short muscular girl of the age of seventeen with light brown hair, her long bangs pushed conveniently behind her ears, her blue green eyes glaring as her never smiling lips curled up at the sight of red forming in Aki's face. "Don't be cruel Miche, it's not like you're any good at pokah either," Aki retorted.
"Get on wit de game, I ain't heah ta watch all of ya jist get red in the cheeks!" Bitter stated. She watched the game proceed intently, focusing on the faces of the players involved in the game. She was too engrossed to even notice someone come up behind her until everyone was staring at her. "What?" she asked, finally noticing that all eyes were on her.
"Uh, Bittah? We gotta talk," a rough voice said from behind her.
She turned around to meet the blazing hazel eyes of none other than the leader of Brooklyn, Spot Conlon himself. She groaned inwardly and flashed a smirk at the table as she stood up, Aki wishing her luck as the stern look on Spot's face deepened. She stood at about his height and followed him as he silently led her up to his own private 'quarters'.
Bitter sat down, opening her mouth to explain what she thought he wanted to know, but he spoke before she could get a single word out of her mouth. "She's upped and left," he said.
She stared at him, mouth agape. "Oh that," she let slip out, relieved that he had not yet heard about the fight she had gotten in.
"What does that mean?" Spot asked, crossing his arms.
Bitter bit her lip and got up. "Shootah can take care of herself, I'm sure she'll be fine," she said, trying not to sound too desperate to leave the room as she reached for the doorknob.
"Do you know where she went?" he asked, moving towards her as she opened the door quietly.
"No, she didn't tell me anything," Bitter said. "If ya need anything else, ya know where to find me," she added as she slipped through the door.
Spot strode after her, grabbing her arm and pulling her back towards him. She let out a hiss of pain as he grasped her arm tightly and looked at the ground, trying to hide the fact that she was hurt.
Of course, Spot had seen her face swell up in pain and looked over her arm, pulling up her sleeve to reveal a bloodied bandage. "What's this?" he asked, attempting not to reveal the concern in his voice.
Bitter wrenched her arm away from him. "It's jist a scratch," she said.
"Bittah…" he started, taking a step towards her.
"Shove off!" she hollered, running towards the girls' bunkroom.
Bitter slammed the door to the bunkroom behind her and found she had the attention of two girls who had been in a deep discussion on their ratty bunkbeds. She opened her mouth to say something, but thought better of it and walked quickly over to her bunk, avoiding the eyes of the two girls.
"Do you think she's alright?" Relic whispered, tossing her light brown hair over her shoulder to get a better look at Bitter. Her clear cyan blue eyes swept over the girl's body as she painfully let herself lay on the bed, obviously hurt.
"I think she's hoit," Winter chimed in, getting up, the light catching the tiny daggers that were braided into her hair and her green eyes flickering from Relic to Bitter. "Shouldn't we go see if she's alright?" she whispered to Relic, who had not moved from her spot on the bunk.
"I think Spot jist tried de same thing," Relic said, "You know how she gets when she's hoit, never wants anyone fretting, let's just leave her be Wintah, we kin check on her later."
Winter nodded and followed Relic reluctantly out of the room. Bitter let out the deep breath she had been holding and closed her eyes to get some sleep, no one was likely to wake her up, or so she hoped.
She woke up as someone knocked off her cap and her blonde hair flew all over the place. "Leave me alone," she muttered sleepily as she grabbed for her cap. IF was holding it over her head, trying to wake her up.
"C'mon silly, get up, I'se got news for ya, something ya wanna heah," IF said, laughing as Bitter still could not reach her cap.
"Aw go away, I'se tired," she muttered, glaring at IF.
"C'mon, it's important," IF said seriously, throwing the cap in Bitter's face, "It's about Shootah."
Bitter opened her eyes at the name of her best friend and groaned getting up. "What about her?" she asked groggily.
"Looks like she's staying in Manhattan," IF said.
"What?" Bitter asked astounded, as if the very idea of anyone she was close to being in Manhattan was absurd.
"Looks like she's right at home too, gots a boyfriend there an' all," IF added, grimacing at the tone of Bitter's voice.
"Yeah I know."
IF laughed, "Well I didn't," she said. She took a closer look at Bitter and frowned. "Bittah, ya look kinda pale," she said after a moment.
"I'se jist tired," Bitter explained simply, "An' you distoibed me rest."
"Oh so sorry," IF said mockingly, getting up to leave. She took another glance at Bitter as she rolled on her side, revealing a growing stain of blood accumulating on the sleeve of her shirt.
"Bittah, did ya get hoit in dat fight?" IF asked, poking the wound so that Bitter elicited a sharp hiss of pain.
"It's fine," Bitter murmured, pushing IF away.
IF smirked and went around to the other side of the bed, pulling the mattress up and tossing Bitter out of bed. She landed with a thud and growled lowly as IF approached her. "C'mon, let's go fix ya up," IF said, grabbing her under the arms and hoisting her to a standing position.
"Leave me be," Bitter said, pushing her weakly away, obviously a bit dizzy, which IF so kindly pointed out to her as she dragged her towards the bathroom.
"Maybe if ya let me clean this, I'll tell ya more about what I saw in Manhattan," IF said, sitting Bitter down on a chair as she ran around, getting some cloths, a bandage and some peroxide to clean out the wound.
Bitter resigned herself in the chair, letting IF peel off her outer shirt and then attempt to take off the dirty bandage that was sticking to Bitter's skin. She let out a groan as IF ripped it off, muttered quite a few curses under her breath as IF told her what had happened in Manhattan.
"They were awfully frightened to see a girl with a stab wound," IF laughed. "Like it had never occurred before," she added snidely, with a roll of her eyes.
Bitter would have laughed if her arm had not been burning as the peroxide was poured onto her wound, making her eyes tear up. "She'll be fine tho," IF continued, going on about how Jack had almost passed out at the sight of his girl wounded. "Yep, her name was Snicker I think, and I guess she's Jack's newest girl, no one had any idea what the hell she was doing in Brooklyn and with a knife nonetheless," Bitter laughed at that last comment, thankful that IF was almost done cleaning her up.
"But the weirdest thing by far was that when Shootah saw me, she turned pale and ran out of the room before I could even say hi to her," IF said, putting the bandage on tightly and throwing another shirt at Bitter.
Bitter pulled the shirt on, entranced in her thoughts of why Shooter was acting so weird. She shrugged her thoughts away and smiled at IF. "Thanks," she said.
IF smirked. "Anytime, an' trust me, I'se gonna be checkin' on dat wound," she said. Bitter shook her head and rolled her eyes, pulling herself up from the chair and feeling a bit light-headed as she headed back to the bunkroom.
Irish Flare made sure that no one disturbed Bitter as she rested in her bunk, watching the girls pass by from her bunk, staring intently at Bitter's pain-lit face when she was not hollering at the girls to keep the noise down. Most of the girls were gathered around the only table in the room, discussing their day's events as they played a game of poker. "Hey Irish, why don'tcha join us for a game, Bittah ain't likely ta die in her sleep!" a girl named Books called, pushing her long dark brown hair over her shoulder as she stood up from her chair and made her way over to IF.
Her emerald eyes glowed with compassion as she watched Bitter turn over in her sleep, hissing herself awake as she hit her bad arm and then falling back asleep as she corrected her body. "She'll be fine if ya leave her heah for a second, we'll get ya a seat so you can watch the door ok?" Books said, holding out her hand.
All of the girls watched, no one had really been close to Bitter except Shooter and now that she had disappeared, IF had seemed to attach herself like Shooter had. Bitter was known for the constant fights she found herself in and her best friend Shooter had always been the one to watch over her, making sure she was ok, no matter how hard Bitter had tried to get her to stop worrying. IF took the hand reluctantly and let the skinny, but taller girl lead her over to the table, where everyone had started to whisper to each other, as if the sudden silence had to be broken in subtly.