Chapter Seven
Two years had passed since that afternoon when Mush pushed Adele away from him. They had seen little of each other. He still delivered her papers until the Irish maid told him that Miss Adele was too upset to see him, especially since he had delivered her papers twice with another girl, just as white and just as blonde as Adele on his arm.
He had tried to push her out of his head with nights with cheap women, relationships that lasted a short while...but none of them would compare to Adele. but he knew he couldn't have her, he had made his mind up that she was much too good for him, she deserved to be with someone else.
After the strings of girls, Mush finally met one who seemed to be a close second to Adele. He knew no one would ever match her, but he could love this girl just the same. Her name was Rachel, a pretty black girl who's father, by some chance in fortune, was the only black man that Mush knew of in Manhattan to own a store. Mush had courted her under the watchful eye of her father (her mother had died a few years hence of influenza) and asked her to marry her the day she turned 18. The plans for the modest wedding were in preparation and her father had told him he would have a place in the store as soon as they were wed. Until then, Mush spent his days selling newspapers in order to save up so he wouldn't look too ridiculous when he and Rachel settled in together.
The lodging house was changing and many of the newsies he had grown up with had gotten married and moved out, or had plans on it or had made entirely different plans that included leaving the the life of a newsie forever in their histories.
One morning, Kid Blink (who was planning to ask his long time sweet heart to be his wife as soon as he gathered enough money) gathered the paper with Mush and then sat down to read it to find a good story to expose to the masses.
He turned open the paper to the New York Society pages with a laugh.
"Ah yes, one day you'll see me in there won't you?" he kidded Mush.
Mush laughed and then stopped suddenly as he looked down at the paper.
"Lemme see dat."
"You got your own, stop tryin' ta scam me papes."
"I ain't! Look who's pictuah's in it."
Kid Blink looked closer at the woman who stared back at him from the paper. At first glance she looked like any other woman in the New York Society pages: heavily made up, hair in tight curls, jade hair combs but he took a closer look at this one.
"Adele?" he asked scrunching his nose. "What's she doin' in heah?"
Mush grabbed the paper and read it aloud.
"Baronesse Adele von Tussel, 18, will wed Gregory Heinrich, 26, the son of the famous oil tycoon by the same name. The couple will wed on May 24, 1902 at St. Mark's Church in the Upper East Side and honeymoon in Niagra Falls before heading to Paris and the bride's native Germany. Upon their return they will live in one of Heinrich, senior's homes. The Baronesse will complete her high school education one week before the wedding and Heinrich will simultaneously be earning a degree in business from New York University."
"Ain't dat fancy." Kid Blink said sarcastically, grabbing his paper back.
"Shoa is." Mush retorted, trying to mask the hurt in his voice.
Mush went through the rest of the day in a daze. Adele, marrying someone else? Of course he knew it would happen. He was marrying Rachel...he couldn't be in denial that Adele could have a new life herself. But now, she was even more pervading his mind and he was powerless to stop it.
Nevertheless, he continued his life with Rachel. He married her subsequently thereafter and he started what seemed to be on the surface a blissful life.
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More to come soon!