Title: A Hero's Sin

Author: Buttons

Rating: PG-13

Genre: Drama/General

Chapter 1—The Year is 1920

When I was little my Uncle David's friends would come over for their weekly game of poker. Because we had a large lacquer table that my granddaddy let them use our residence was the usual spot on Friday evenings.

Mr. Higgins, as he is well known as now, would bring a deck of cards that they used week in and week out. He taught me how to play Go Fish on them. I can still remember the soft, worn edges of the cards. They used to call him 'Racetrack'.

Mama would sometimes let me go sit with Uncle David while he played. He would ask me if he should fold. I always said no. After the games I would get a tousle on the head and a penny pressed to my hand.

"Go get yourself a good night's sleep," Mr. Hunter would say, grinning widely, his cheek disappearing beneath his brown eye patch. Uncle David would kiss me on the forehead and send me back to my Mama.

I liked poker night until I was about seven years old when Mr. Higgins brought her along. She was only four years old. Small and plump and pretty, sitting on her daddy's lap, laughing as the men played poker. Mr. Higgins called me over.

"Nichole," he said, patting the girl on the head. "This is my daughter Alana. Would you mind taking her to your room and playing for a while?"

Deftly I nodded and reached for the girls' hand. She took it and I led her to my and my Mama's room.

Alana smiled in her four-year old way. "Doesn't your daddy play poker?" she asked, blinking innocently. I bit the inside of my cheek.

"I suppose he does."

That was thirteen years ago.

0o0o0o0

When I was little I would hear things about how much of a 'hero' my father was. People would say:

"Jacky boy, he was a hero, wasn't he Sarah?"

And my Mama would glance at me and nod sadly. "Yes, you're right. He was."

She never said anything bad about him. It was as if he could hear her. The people who would sing his praises didn't know about him, so I didn't hate them. I pitied them for being misinformed. For believing in a façade of a hero. For looking up to someone who would so easily just leave them, just like he did me.

0o0o0o0

My mama named me 'Nichole Sullivan'. Uncle David's friends all said that my daddy was running from the name 'Francis Sullivan'. Every time she heard this, my mama smiled. I think she gave me the name 'Sullivan' instead of 'Kelly' as her way at getting back at him.

Or maybe it was her way at getting back to him.

But the reality was that he was out somewhere in the west with a western accent and a big western family.

The closest I'd ever gotten to seeing him was in an old newspaper from 1899, the year he turned seventeen. 1899 were my daddy's glory days. His hero days.

In his seventeen-year-old picture he is smiling, surrounded by his friends, including Uncle David. 'Children's Crusade' read the headline 'Newsies Stop the World'. Quite vividly does Uncle David remember this 'Children's Crusade', when the newsboys of New York City fought against Mr. Joseph Pulitzer and Mr. William Randolph Hearst. Mama remembers it well too because that's when she first kissed my daddy.

0o0o0o0

The year was 1920. Pidge, Alana and I were sitting around Pidge's bedside table and shifting the marble tablets around.

"What's so great about this game anyways?" asked Alana loudly, brushing a curly black hair out of her face.

Pidge pulled her sweater tighter around her thin, low-necked dress. "It's the newest thing," she said, as if excusing the boredom of it all.

The tiles clicked; the green and white shifting about the table.

"Can't we go out?" asked Alana next, flipping over her tiles and lining them up, shifting others over to make the respected room.

Pidge shot a look at me. I was the oldest, I was supposed to be 'in charge', but the truth was, Alana usually took control, even if she was three years younger than me. I think she got it from her daddy, who was one of the leading distributors of cigars in all of Manhattan.

Pidge reached across the room and pulled a record out from under her bed. She dusted it off and flipped it onto the record player. The quick saxophone chords blasted through before the lyrics rang clear.

Alana forgot her complaints. "James Reese Europe! He's so darb!"° She squealed and pulled a pillow to her chest, knocking over her mahjong pieces. Pidge and Alana got up and danced. The piano kept pace.

"I wish I could go out with you!" Alana sighed wistfully when the song ended. The mahjong pieces were scattered about the floor. Alana collapsed into her skirts. Since she was only fifteen Pidge, Lyra—who was a year older than us and had an internship with the Sun—and I refused to take her with us.

There was a knock at the door. A spectacled man stuck his head in the room.

"Rachel," he sighed, "please turn down that music. I don't want calls from the neighbors."

Pidge reached over and pulled the crank off the record. The song stopped with a scratch. "Sorry daddy," she said sweetly. In all truth, Pidge could get herself anything with her smile. And I mean anything.

Alana began to go through Pidge's closet. I was still sitting on the floor, thinking intently with a pensive look on my face.

Pidge and Alana tried on clothes. I fingered the soft wrinkle of my skirt and felt a brown hair fall out of my bun.

People always said I looked just like my mama, that they wouldn't guess that I had any of my father in me. But Mama would tell me that I had his mouth and his ears. When I was little I would think that maybe he would come back to get his mouth and his ears, since it must be very hard to get along without it, but he never did and I stopped believing this and realized the stupidity of it.

Pidge threw my jacket at me.

"We're going to Peter's!" she cried, pulling her own coat around her. Alana switched the lights off and I followed them down the stairs, around the curving staircase.

"We're going out," Pidge told her daddy, who was sitting in the den, reading the paper. "Just to the Hunters'."

And then we left. Alana pulled open the front door and we stepped into the cold winter streets.

End Chapter

Vocabulary Reference: °Darb—a great person or thing

((So…I'm really sorry that it took me so long to update. I wish I had a good solid excuse to give you, but I don't. please review. And forgive me.))

Shoutouts:

Coin—Thanks! I'm happy to be portraying Jack in a realistic, yet rare way.

Ccat—Yes, I do like fighting the power. A lot.

Charlie!Muse: No you don't. you're a square.

Buttons: Hey, this fic is an ode to your reign. Shut up.

Charlie!Muse: Fine.

C.M. Higgins—Have I told you lately that I love you?

Lady of Tir Na Nog

Two-Bits—Don't worry. I cheat…wait….no I don't….(looks around cautiously) Email me for more info on the matter! This fic may be bugged! Dear God, I am so paranoid!

Nakais Aidan-Sun—I am updating! (cheesy grin)

And everyone else who reviewed the first time. I have your names somewhere, I'm just not sure where. I kind of lost it. PLEASE REVIEW!

Oh yeah! The pope has died! Being the good Catholic that I am, (rolls eyes) I should be more sad. SHOULDN'T I?