Author's Name: Becky
Rating: PG-13
Content: Slash, fluffiness
Disclaimer: I do not own the Newsies. Disney does.
Author's Notes: This popped into my head without any pre-planning on my part--I blame the sucky weather. I was wondering what sort of job Jack might have when he gets too old to sell papers, and it went from there. Anyway, a Daguerreotype is an old form of the modern photograph in case anyone doesn't understand what the heck I'm talking about later on in the fic. I'm no expert on the things, though, so...yeah. Reviews much appreciated--but that's a given.
--Puzzled--
If Les thinks about Jack too hard, it makes his head hurt.
Back in his sixth year Math class, the professor was fond of giving the students complicated puzzles that seemed to have no answer--or an answer too complicated to comprehend. That's sort of what Jack is like. No matter how often Les sees him, speaks to him, he can't figure him out. No answers in those laughing eyes.
He can feel a migraine coming. It's hard not to think of Jack, even if it goes against logic; there was a time when Jack wasn't Jack, he was the Cowboy, he was a hero. But now he's all too human, very real in an exciting sense that Les only began to notice when he turned thirteen. By then, Jack was moving on, upward in the world. None of the papers would give him a higher position than newsboy (unpleasant memories of the strike, Les supposes), so Jack bought a cheap little place on 14th Street and opened a Daguerreotyping studio. Everyone was shocked--David joked that from listening to him, you'd never have guessed Jack knew what a Daguerreotype is, let alone how to go about making one.
"Light an' scenery, that's mostly all a fella needs in this business," Jack winked conspiratorially at Les when he asked, cautiously, why Jack chose such an unusual trade. "I'm pretty damned good at it, in any case, ain't I?"
And he is. Les doesn't pretend to be a professional critic or anything, but he's looked at some of the Daguerreotypes, and they're fantastic. Women and men, children, scenes of Lower Manhattan and the Brooklyn Bridge, and the thing is, Jack makes it all seem new. Even the fruit vendor on the corner, who Les passes by every day, and the solemn face of his own elder brother, even those familiar sights are novel, different, captured forever in monochrome.
There are other Daguerreotyping studios, but Jack's sunny smile and friendly manner attract more customers a day than many of them--something that Les is extremely proud of. Jack is doing great, just great. Maybe he dreams of Santa Fe, but he seems to be enjoying himself well enough right where he is.
Still in school, Les can't wait to start his own life--because school is so far removed from the world of umph and go that Jack inhabits. He doesn't want to work in a factory, like his father, wasting away and worrying about money every second of the day. When night falls, and the lulling sounds of the Jacobs household (Papa snoring, Sarah murmuring something in her sleep, David drifting in and out of the room, trying to catch up with his work for the Sun) fill the small tenement, Les silently reaches underneath his mattress and pulls out the pages and pages of writing, scripts scrawled down hurriedly, scripts he hopes to perfect someday.
How Jack, ex-street-urchin, managed to run into an instructor of photo-optics, no one can say, but Jack claims that he's been studying under a genius in the field for ages--which with Jack can mean a decade or a year. But however it came about, Jack now makes what he calls "real money"- -dollar bills instead of pennies and dimes.
Les finds himself drawn to the studio much too often. He's fifteen now, old enough to spend time with his school friends at places he'd never dream of telling his mother about. But again and again, he politely declines any invitation to play stickball or take a trolley uptown and instead walks the short distance to 14th Street and the man he once called Cowboy.
The puzzle confronts him at least once a week, and it's impossible to ignore the fact that Jack hasn't offered to marry Sarah, hasn't shown any interest in doing so, though he still grins and swings her around whenever they meet, kissing her cheek and waggling his eyebrows suggestively. "He's probably waiting until he can support her better," David says absently if Les happens to mention this. Makes sense, Les thinks, disheartened.
Les would rather spend the afternoon in the studio silently watching Jack as he adjusts this and that (muttering to himself about shadows and chemicals), than spend the afternoon anywhere else in the world. And that's the part of the puzzle he has trouble with. When he wakes in the morning, breathless and aroused, trying desperately not to stir David, it's Jack he thinks of, and when he stops by the theatre (the few times he has enough money to do so), and sees the promotional posters of handsome men staring down at gorgeous women, he blinks and suddenly it's Jack and him.
He wishes more than anything that he could talk to his brother about this, but the very prospect of facing rational, down-to-earth David and his blue eyes that snap with sarcasm and mellow when he's in the grip of some book--well, it makes Les's stomach churn.
Why Jack, out of the millions of people in the world, why is it Jack his mind always returns to, why Jack when he should be preoccupied with long flaxen curls and taffeta skirts, why Jack? That eternal question, knocking through his brain. After that come the lesser questions, in a confusing flood: what would his mother think, how could he ever face his family again, and what about the other boys (the newsies and his schoolmates)? And, most importantly, what if Jack ever figures it out?
Ignore him, Les tells himself. If you take this street a ways and turn right, you won't even have to see 14th, or his face. You never have to see him again.
...But he can't do it.
So here he is, cross-legged on the floor, a schoolbook open on his lap, eyes darting from dry equations to Jack, shifting the position of his latest subject. "Now, turn a bit--great, perfect, don't move a inch." Voice deeper than it was a few years ago. The whole process is a mystery to Les, and much of it takes place in a dark room that Jack won't allow anyone to enter. But at the moment, Jack stands behind a large, complicated device about two-thirds his height--a camera--biting his lip in thought. Across the room sits a young woman, her shoulders straight and thin mouth unsmiling. The smell of the chemicals combined with the heat is stifling, but Les is used to it by now.
Jack fiddles with the lense, then nods decisively. "Ready, ma'am? Here goes--"
Seconds pass, and then it is done. The woman waits patiently while Jack retreats into the dark room and returns at last with the completed picture.
Les is pretending to focus on his mathematics when a shadow falls over him and Jack hauls him to his feet, the book, paper, and pen falling to the floor, forgotten. "Hey, kid, you gotta be sick 'a that stuff. Whaddya say we take a break...get supper?"
"Oh--yeah!" Les exclaims, blushing a second later when he realizes how pathetically eager that sounded. Just make yourself obvious, he thinks irritably. Just go on and lick his boots.
They're waiting in line at an ice-cream stand--Les's mother will kill Jack if she ever catches wind of this, no matter how strongly Jack insists that ice-cream is a suitable meal--when Jack suddenly looks at Les as if it's the first time he's seen him in a long time. "You," he remarks, left eyebrow going up, "you ain't a kid anymore, though, Les." Blinks. Tousles Les's smooth brown hair, completely unlike David's twisted locks. Les offers to help pay, but Jack won't hear of it and instead offers up seven cents for their two cones, both chocolate.
They walk as they eat, both making utter messes of themselves. Les notices the ring of chocolate around Jack's mouth, dribbling down his chin, and snickers. "You look like one of them, whaddyacallem's, Genies."
"Quick," Jack teases, large hand resting on Les's shoulder, "make a wish."
I want to lick that ice-cream off your face. Mental slap. Les chews his tongue. "I want..." Helplessly shrugs. "I dunno. A notepad," he finishes weakly.
"Ha ha, nice try. Eh, c'mon, Les, you know you want a pretty girl or...or an aeroplane, or somethin' like that. Somethin' excitin'."
"You're plenty excitement enough, thanks," dryly stated, hiding the double meaning.
"I think Davey's bein' a bad influence on you. Makin' you almost practical and stuff." Smiles so gleefully it makes Les's heart ache. "Ya need to hang around the ol' Cowboy more often."
"I hang around you too much as it is," protests Les. "I'm always in your way after school and, and on the weekends too."
"Nah, you ain't in the way."
Oh. That puzzle, again, its walls thrusting forth the little things-- all the times he's wanted to touch Jack, take off the bandana they both love, kiss that incredible mouth--and nearly forcing Les to lose himself in...oh, so he isn't in the way.
So maybe Jack likes having him around?
"I. I'm g-glad," Les chokes. Needs to get away and process all of this. Put it together. Try to understand. Why Jack? Where's the exit, and what will he do when he gets there?
He isn't sure. But Les doesn't need a camera to imprint in his mind the image of Jack laughing, the wind blowing his hair about his face. They wipe their mouths on their sleeves, ice-cream devoured. "Er," Les says, unable to think of anything more intelligent. Jack must think he's a total idiot. "I kind of. Want. Well. I write, a little. In my free time. Just. Not anything really great." Staring at the sidewalk now, boy, isn't that crack interesting?
"Write?" Coarse chuckle, so unlike the feminine giggles he should be listening to. "Write what? Penny-novels?"
"No, no. Nothing like that." His hands make signs in the air, then drop back to his side. How to explain. "Like...like Medda. Broadway. Plays, scripts, but right now, just rough drafts. I don't have. Don't have a lot of time, you know?"
"Aaaaaaah, I get it. Our little Les is gonna be a reg'lar Shakespeare."
"Ha! Me? No way. It's just something...I like doing it."
"Mm hm." Looks unconvinced. But Jack doesn't push it. Les respects him for it. "I gotta be gettin' back. An' you need to be headin' home, ki- -Les."
Les wonders what Jack would do if he ever realized that Les would be content to sleep on the wooden floor of the studio, head pillowed on one of his schoolbooks. 14th Street again, in the studio, gathering his books and letting his gaze linger on Jack for a second before forcing himself to say goodbye.
"'Bye," Jack calls distractedly, his attention imprisoned by some picture or another.
The sun is getting tired, drifting wearily down from the sky. It's twilight by the time the Jacobs tenement is in sight. And Les isn't thinking of Jack, for once. Well, not really. He's thinking of the West, and the sunsets there, and how the horizon is clear and empty, no dead buildings and no streetlamps and maybe. Maybe if he and Jack were there, it would only be the two of them.
Steps lightly up the stairs, lost in thought. Throws open the door to Sarah's humming and his mother's furrowed brow and says, "I'm home."
Rating: PG-13
Content: Slash, fluffiness
Disclaimer: I do not own the Newsies. Disney does.
Author's Notes: This popped into my head without any pre-planning on my part--I blame the sucky weather. I was wondering what sort of job Jack might have when he gets too old to sell papers, and it went from there. Anyway, a Daguerreotype is an old form of the modern photograph in case anyone doesn't understand what the heck I'm talking about later on in the fic. I'm no expert on the things, though, so...yeah. Reviews much appreciated--but that's a given.
--Puzzled--
If Les thinks about Jack too hard, it makes his head hurt.
Back in his sixth year Math class, the professor was fond of giving the students complicated puzzles that seemed to have no answer--or an answer too complicated to comprehend. That's sort of what Jack is like. No matter how often Les sees him, speaks to him, he can't figure him out. No answers in those laughing eyes.
He can feel a migraine coming. It's hard not to think of Jack, even if it goes against logic; there was a time when Jack wasn't Jack, he was the Cowboy, he was a hero. But now he's all too human, very real in an exciting sense that Les only began to notice when he turned thirteen. By then, Jack was moving on, upward in the world. None of the papers would give him a higher position than newsboy (unpleasant memories of the strike, Les supposes), so Jack bought a cheap little place on 14th Street and opened a Daguerreotyping studio. Everyone was shocked--David joked that from listening to him, you'd never have guessed Jack knew what a Daguerreotype is, let alone how to go about making one.
"Light an' scenery, that's mostly all a fella needs in this business," Jack winked conspiratorially at Les when he asked, cautiously, why Jack chose such an unusual trade. "I'm pretty damned good at it, in any case, ain't I?"
And he is. Les doesn't pretend to be a professional critic or anything, but he's looked at some of the Daguerreotypes, and they're fantastic. Women and men, children, scenes of Lower Manhattan and the Brooklyn Bridge, and the thing is, Jack makes it all seem new. Even the fruit vendor on the corner, who Les passes by every day, and the solemn face of his own elder brother, even those familiar sights are novel, different, captured forever in monochrome.
There are other Daguerreotyping studios, but Jack's sunny smile and friendly manner attract more customers a day than many of them--something that Les is extremely proud of. Jack is doing great, just great. Maybe he dreams of Santa Fe, but he seems to be enjoying himself well enough right where he is.
Still in school, Les can't wait to start his own life--because school is so far removed from the world of umph and go that Jack inhabits. He doesn't want to work in a factory, like his father, wasting away and worrying about money every second of the day. When night falls, and the lulling sounds of the Jacobs household (Papa snoring, Sarah murmuring something in her sleep, David drifting in and out of the room, trying to catch up with his work for the Sun) fill the small tenement, Les silently reaches underneath his mattress and pulls out the pages and pages of writing, scripts scrawled down hurriedly, scripts he hopes to perfect someday.
How Jack, ex-street-urchin, managed to run into an instructor of photo-optics, no one can say, but Jack claims that he's been studying under a genius in the field for ages--which with Jack can mean a decade or a year. But however it came about, Jack now makes what he calls "real money"- -dollar bills instead of pennies and dimes.
Les finds himself drawn to the studio much too often. He's fifteen now, old enough to spend time with his school friends at places he'd never dream of telling his mother about. But again and again, he politely declines any invitation to play stickball or take a trolley uptown and instead walks the short distance to 14th Street and the man he once called Cowboy.
The puzzle confronts him at least once a week, and it's impossible to ignore the fact that Jack hasn't offered to marry Sarah, hasn't shown any interest in doing so, though he still grins and swings her around whenever they meet, kissing her cheek and waggling his eyebrows suggestively. "He's probably waiting until he can support her better," David says absently if Les happens to mention this. Makes sense, Les thinks, disheartened.
Les would rather spend the afternoon in the studio silently watching Jack as he adjusts this and that (muttering to himself about shadows and chemicals), than spend the afternoon anywhere else in the world. And that's the part of the puzzle he has trouble with. When he wakes in the morning, breathless and aroused, trying desperately not to stir David, it's Jack he thinks of, and when he stops by the theatre (the few times he has enough money to do so), and sees the promotional posters of handsome men staring down at gorgeous women, he blinks and suddenly it's Jack and him.
He wishes more than anything that he could talk to his brother about this, but the very prospect of facing rational, down-to-earth David and his blue eyes that snap with sarcasm and mellow when he's in the grip of some book--well, it makes Les's stomach churn.
Why Jack, out of the millions of people in the world, why is it Jack his mind always returns to, why Jack when he should be preoccupied with long flaxen curls and taffeta skirts, why Jack? That eternal question, knocking through his brain. After that come the lesser questions, in a confusing flood: what would his mother think, how could he ever face his family again, and what about the other boys (the newsies and his schoolmates)? And, most importantly, what if Jack ever figures it out?
Ignore him, Les tells himself. If you take this street a ways and turn right, you won't even have to see 14th, or his face. You never have to see him again.
...But he can't do it.
So here he is, cross-legged on the floor, a schoolbook open on his lap, eyes darting from dry equations to Jack, shifting the position of his latest subject. "Now, turn a bit--great, perfect, don't move a inch." Voice deeper than it was a few years ago. The whole process is a mystery to Les, and much of it takes place in a dark room that Jack won't allow anyone to enter. But at the moment, Jack stands behind a large, complicated device about two-thirds his height--a camera--biting his lip in thought. Across the room sits a young woman, her shoulders straight and thin mouth unsmiling. The smell of the chemicals combined with the heat is stifling, but Les is used to it by now.
Jack fiddles with the lense, then nods decisively. "Ready, ma'am? Here goes--"
Seconds pass, and then it is done. The woman waits patiently while Jack retreats into the dark room and returns at last with the completed picture.
Les is pretending to focus on his mathematics when a shadow falls over him and Jack hauls him to his feet, the book, paper, and pen falling to the floor, forgotten. "Hey, kid, you gotta be sick 'a that stuff. Whaddya say we take a break...get supper?"
"Oh--yeah!" Les exclaims, blushing a second later when he realizes how pathetically eager that sounded. Just make yourself obvious, he thinks irritably. Just go on and lick his boots.
They're waiting in line at an ice-cream stand--Les's mother will kill Jack if she ever catches wind of this, no matter how strongly Jack insists that ice-cream is a suitable meal--when Jack suddenly looks at Les as if it's the first time he's seen him in a long time. "You," he remarks, left eyebrow going up, "you ain't a kid anymore, though, Les." Blinks. Tousles Les's smooth brown hair, completely unlike David's twisted locks. Les offers to help pay, but Jack won't hear of it and instead offers up seven cents for their two cones, both chocolate.
They walk as they eat, both making utter messes of themselves. Les notices the ring of chocolate around Jack's mouth, dribbling down his chin, and snickers. "You look like one of them, whaddyacallem's, Genies."
"Quick," Jack teases, large hand resting on Les's shoulder, "make a wish."
I want to lick that ice-cream off your face. Mental slap. Les chews his tongue. "I want..." Helplessly shrugs. "I dunno. A notepad," he finishes weakly.
"Ha ha, nice try. Eh, c'mon, Les, you know you want a pretty girl or...or an aeroplane, or somethin' like that. Somethin' excitin'."
"You're plenty excitement enough, thanks," dryly stated, hiding the double meaning.
"I think Davey's bein' a bad influence on you. Makin' you almost practical and stuff." Smiles so gleefully it makes Les's heart ache. "Ya need to hang around the ol' Cowboy more often."
"I hang around you too much as it is," protests Les. "I'm always in your way after school and, and on the weekends too."
"Nah, you ain't in the way."
Oh. That puzzle, again, its walls thrusting forth the little things-- all the times he's wanted to touch Jack, take off the bandana they both love, kiss that incredible mouth--and nearly forcing Les to lose himself in...oh, so he isn't in the way.
So maybe Jack likes having him around?
"I. I'm g-glad," Les chokes. Needs to get away and process all of this. Put it together. Try to understand. Why Jack? Where's the exit, and what will he do when he gets there?
He isn't sure. But Les doesn't need a camera to imprint in his mind the image of Jack laughing, the wind blowing his hair about his face. They wipe their mouths on their sleeves, ice-cream devoured. "Er," Les says, unable to think of anything more intelligent. Jack must think he's a total idiot. "I kind of. Want. Well. I write, a little. In my free time. Just. Not anything really great." Staring at the sidewalk now, boy, isn't that crack interesting?
"Write?" Coarse chuckle, so unlike the feminine giggles he should be listening to. "Write what? Penny-novels?"
"No, no. Nothing like that." His hands make signs in the air, then drop back to his side. How to explain. "Like...like Medda. Broadway. Plays, scripts, but right now, just rough drafts. I don't have. Don't have a lot of time, you know?"
"Aaaaaaah, I get it. Our little Les is gonna be a reg'lar Shakespeare."
"Ha! Me? No way. It's just something...I like doing it."
"Mm hm." Looks unconvinced. But Jack doesn't push it. Les respects him for it. "I gotta be gettin' back. An' you need to be headin' home, ki- -Les."
Les wonders what Jack would do if he ever realized that Les would be content to sleep on the wooden floor of the studio, head pillowed on one of his schoolbooks. 14th Street again, in the studio, gathering his books and letting his gaze linger on Jack for a second before forcing himself to say goodbye.
"'Bye," Jack calls distractedly, his attention imprisoned by some picture or another.
The sun is getting tired, drifting wearily down from the sky. It's twilight by the time the Jacobs tenement is in sight. And Les isn't thinking of Jack, for once. Well, not really. He's thinking of the West, and the sunsets there, and how the horizon is clear and empty, no dead buildings and no streetlamps and maybe. Maybe if he and Jack were there, it would only be the two of them.
Steps lightly up the stairs, lost in thought. Throws open the door to Sarah's humming and his mother's furrowed brow and says, "I'm home."