Author's Note: Well, I figure, a nice week's break will return my love for this story and, voila, it has. I'm not entirely sure that this is exactly where I wanted to go with this but as the two portions of the chapter are parts that had to come eventually, I figure it works out. And, to those who are reading Obsession: Cuts like a Knife (the rewrite of Cuts Like a Knife which ties in closely with this story), points if you see parallels with this chapter and some chapters from that story.

A little bit of disturbing stuff is in the second half of this chapter. It's not overly bad but, in case someone is offended, you've been warned. Trust me, though – it's not near as bad as earlier stuff had been. Woot.

Disclaimer: These are always mandatory when dabbling in fan fiction. If there is anything at all that is reminiscent of the 1992 musical Newsies, then it probably belongs to Disney. The characters of Luke/Rip & his family, Caitlin/Spindle, and Jessa, specifically, are mine, as well as others that may work their way into this story. Any others belong to their respective authors and will be noted in individual disclaimers.

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A Virgin's Touch

08.30.06

They say that what men desire is a virgin who is a whore.
Maybe that's what I was looking for. It's what I made her, after all.

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PART XIV

It was not until mid-September that Rip saw Spindle again. Which, of course, given how much he changed in the short time (four months) since he saw her last, was not a good thing.

The visit was no where as long as the previous one, in May, nor was it as pleasing. Spindle, it seemed, came with only one – no, more like two – purpose in mind: she desired to check up on Rip while, at the same time, trying to convince him to return to Far Rockaway, Queens with her.

Just like the other time that he ran into her – actually, just like every time that Rip had encountered Spindle – she saw him first.

He had been sitting in a park, a few blocks away from the Harlem House. It was early afternoon and the sun was still shining; despite the early autumn chill, it was still warm and he was eager to enjoy the last of the beautiful weather. He was sprawled out on a rather large pile of leaves – the leaves had already begun to fall and, after selling the afternoon edition of the paper, he had wanted nothing more than to gather a great pile of crinkly leaves and lay among them. So he did.

Rip had rolled up the sleeves of his faded blue shirt before scooping up armfuls of the various red, orange and yellow leaves. It had not rained in a few days and the leaves were dry; many of them were brittle and fell apart in his hands. He liked the feeling of breaking apart leaves within his fists. It made him feel strong and powerful but in a more childish way. He did not need to strangle a person to feel superior, he found. A handful of leaves sufficed.

He playfully jumped into his pile, for once acting like the child that – given different circumstances – he could have been. Could he have been born in a different time or to a different life, he might not have had to grow up at the age of fourteen. As it was, he was only three months away from his sixteenth birthday and Rip Divenize felt that he was at least three times that age. Outwardly, with his smooth face – only a hint of facial hair had begun to grow – and wide eyes, he appeared as a child. Inwardly, Rip was as bitter and haunted as a fully grown man – a fully grown man who had suffered.

But for that one day – that one day – he let down his guard and relaxed. He had not done so since Maria's death almost a year and a half ago and, even then, he had thought himself to be grown. He had been wrong.

So it was in a large pile of leaves, his hands folded behind his head as he gazed up at the blue sky, that Spindle chanced upon him.

It is hard to say which of the two was more surprised to see the other. He never knew how she knew where to find him but, just as she had done before, she was there. He had opened one of his blue eyes lazily, intending to tell, by the position of the sun, just how late it was, when he saw her. She was standing there, a few feet away, looking down on him. Her hands were on her hips, a smirk was playing out on her face. "Rip."

"Spindle." He nodded before closing his eye again. After all, it had been another four months since she had left him again. That time, he thought, had been the last. He was surprised but that was it.

If his eyes would have been open to see it, a flash of hurt crossed her face. But she was almost as skilled as he was when it came to hiding emotions. When he chanced to open his eyes again, the smirk was back without even a hint of her face's earlier betrayal. "How are you?"

He could not believe her tone of voice. She sounded cool, calm, collected – and very much like she belonged in Harlem. Maybe she was returning, then? Could that be why she's here? He was slightly more interested then; he pulled himself up before resting back on his forearms. "Alright. You?"

She looked a bit better; summer must have been better for her. She was still thin but had gained some of the weight back – at the very least, she did not look like a walking skeleton. She had exchanged her blue shirt – the shirt she was wearing last time – for a yellow one of the same make; she was still wearing brown slacks. Her green eyes were shining brightly, her red hair had grown even longer – it was now to the mid of her back.

"I'm doing alright," she answered finally, as if she wanted to say something and did not know how to phrase it. It seemed very unlike her. Spindle was a very impulsive person and usually said (or did) what was on her mind without another thought for the consequence. It seemed, to him, that this girl standing before him was almost hawing.

It was a quiet and Rip took the opportunity to perform a bit of a test. In the past few weeks, he had only been able to sustain an erection when his thoughts turn inappropriately towards his sister. He did not go to Cecilia Rayner's brothel to relieve his sexual frustrations – and he would not allow his own tainted hands to touch himself – because he was afraid that he would be unable to perform. Could he do so, as he had done countless times before, with Spindle?

Nothing seemed to work right away. But that might not have been because he was no longer attracted to her. It might have been because he was taken aback at the red-head's proclamation.

"Rip…I love you."

He almost thought that the words were folly. But one look at her face – so serious – told him that she was, in fact, serious.

"Come with me. To Queens. We could rule together, Rip. I…I got that place in my pockets," she added. It sounded almost like she was bribing him.

He did not answer her. He could not. He looked at the girl, all of a sudden standing as if she was bare in front of him, and he felt nothing.

So he said nothing.

The longer she stood there, facing off against him, the darker her features became. He could see that she had gone angry with him – she was clenching her fists at her side – and, as much as she longed to say something to him, she remained silent. She was still hoping their was a slight chance he might reply. Any second now…

But seconds turned to minutes and yet Rip remained, motionless (frozen), on his pile of leaves. And, rather than Rip, Spindle snapped. She grimaced and shoved her hands – still balled up as fists – into the back pockets of her slacks. "You will love me, Rip," she said, almost hissing. "You belong to me."

And, before he could reply, or strike her for her insolence, or do anything, she was gone – running down the streets as fast as she could.

Only then could he speak. "What the fuck?"

--

The appearance and subsequent departure of Spindle drove Rip to finish the entire bottle of Old Tom Gin that he had stowed away under his bunk. Normally, his tolerance for liquor – as high as it had become since that first sip of wine alongside his brother, Gabriel – enabled him to drink two or three glasses of the spirit without being effected. After drinking half of a bottle, he was more than affected; Rip was ill.

Maybe if he had not been alone in the bunkroom when he reached for the bottle, he might not have swallowed its contents without stopping for a breath. But he was alone and he was upset and he drank it. He did not even bother with re-hiding the empty bottle. Instead, he placed the glass on the floor and rolled it away from his bottom bunk. It was hidden underneath one of the bunks, further away and he did not care if that boy got in trouble instead. All he cared about was forgetting the red-head.

Considering he had not eaten anything prior to consuming the alcohol, the effects were almost instant. He was on his back, moaning, before he knew it. Everything seemed foggy to him and his head was spinning. But, at least, it was better than dealing with reality.

Until Mack arrived. If he had been sober, he might not have appreciated the good fortune (and eventual irony) that Mack Turner was the one who returned to the House first and was, therefore, the one to find him curled up on his bunk. But he was not sober; when Mack, standing beside Rip's bunk, tapping his boot against the wooden floor, arrived, her was just relieved. "Mack…"

The older boy shook his head, sending his shaggy light brown hair about. When he paused and looked down on Rip with a scowl, his hair fell forward into his hazel eyes. He left it there. "Rip, what the hell happened to you, buddy?"

"Gin."

Mack shook his head again. This was worse than the time he found the boy passed – half-naked, to boot – on the stairs. At least, then, he had a hand in the boy's predicament. This time, Rip had chosen to get drunk on his own. Dumb ass. "How long?"

Rip knew what Mack meant but he was not sure if he would be able to answer him. For the first time in a long time, he was feeling weak. He was shaking slightly and feeling nauseous. I'm never drinking a drop again, he vowed. It was one thing to get drunk and forget everything – that was the outcome he had been looking for. But to get violently ill by drinking too much… Never again.

He groaned and, using the bit of strength he had garnered by remaining curled up for so long, he looked over pitifully at Mack. The boy was still waiting for an answer to his question. "Couple…coupla hours…" he spat out before burying his head into his pillow. The material smelled vaguely of sweat, body odor and Old Tom Gin. Suddenly, he was upright.

Mack was rubbing his forehead when he saw Rip sit up straight in his bunk. His hazel eyes widened slightly as he saw the normally olive-toned boy go almost green. He recognized the expression on Rip's face at once and, before the younger boy could react to his touch, Mack had placed his hands on each of Rip's arms. As quickly as he could – and, considering he was almost four years older and about thirty pounds heavier than Rip, it was pretty quick – he pulled Rip out of his bed, forcing him on his knees.

He was no a moment too soon. As soon as Rip had hit the floor, his mouth (involuntarily, almost) opened and a mess came pouring out. His body was expelling the liquor in the only way it knew; he was vomiting.

Torn between wanting to laugh at Rip and wanting to yell at him for making the bunkroom smell foul, Mack crouched down beside him and began to run his hand across Rip's back in a soothing manner. "'Atta boy, Rip. Just get it all out."

If Rip was in a better state, his first instinct might have been to break Mack's arm – first for dragging him out of his comfortable bunk, then for touching his back. But he felt like he was dying, every heave that followed that initial one verifying his thought, and he was glad to have someone care for him. It felt almost nice to have someone watch over him as he got sick.

He remained on the wooden floor, beside his bed, for a further quarter hour before the nausea subsided and he felt strong enough to get up. Mack, at some point in between his third and fourth heave, had left his side; he soon returned, carrying a spare sheet. As soon as Rip stumbled his way to his feet, Mack covered the mess up with the sheet before helping Rip over to the water pump.

He felt better but still did not have the strength to tell Mack to leave him be. So, as Mack helped to lower his head into the stream of the water pump, he let him. Rip used the water to rinse out his mouth and wipe away the cold sweat that slicked his forehead and shoulders.

By the time he was done with the water pump, he was feeling almost like himself. He refused Mack's help as he all but crawled back to his bunk. The nausea may have gone but his head was now pounding. He wanted nothing more than to climb into his bed and go to sleep.

Mack crossed his arms over the beige shirt, partly soaked from helping Rip with washing up, and watched as Rip – without a damn word, mind you – climbed back into bed, purposely ignoring the sheet-covered mess to the left of his bunk. He stomped over to the bunk, making extra loud noise with his boots to aggravate the headache that the younger surely must have. "You owe me, Rip."

Rip had returned his face to his pillow; the smell of it no longer bothered his stomach. "What do you want from me, Mack?" he asked, his words muffled from the pillow.

But Mack seemed to understand him perfectly. He was on Rip's right side and the boy's backside was to him. Slowly, he got down to his knees and moved forward so that he could lean his torso into the bunk. He did not say anything right away; instead, he took his hand and slipped it under the back of Rip's blue button down shirt; the hem of the shirt, originally tucked into his black slacks, had fallen loose during his earlier tossing and turning.

Rip, despite his illness, tightened at the contact. Only one person had so much touched that spot – his spot - before and Spindle was back on her way to Far Rockaway. His head was still foggy but, at that moment, he was fighting his way through the strange mist within his brain. Something's wrong…

Mack's coarse fingers squeezed Rip's side and he chuckled lightly at the sharp intake of breath he heard come from the boy. "Don't worry, Rip," he said before pausing – or maybe the pause was only introduced by Rip hours, days, months, years later as he relived the incident. And, he may have forgotten whether or not the nineteen-year old boy (man) paused but he never forgot what Mack said next. "It's not something that I haven't had before…or won't have again."