Safe Inside Myself

"Skittery… Skittery!" an old voice called, shaking him from his dreams of her. "Rough night boy?" Kloppman asked then sighed patting his arm. "C'mon… presses are rollin'," the old man mumbled before shuffling out of the room.

Skittery sat up and rubbed his eyes with a yawn, another fitful night with hardly any sleep. His nights were spent of dreams and memories… some good- some bad, mostly of the end and things he should have noticed.

"Morning Skitt," Specs said from his bunk as Skittery hopped down from his. Skittery nodded to him and made his way to the washroom rubbing the back of his head, his shoulders slumped. He walked to the sink with his eyes down trying to avoid the other boys frolicking around him.

"Today ain't gonna be good for him," Race said slipping his vest on and buttoning it up his cigar in one of his hands making him fumble.

Specs nodded. "He was dreaming about her all night. Made me miss her all over again," He said leaning against the bunk Skittery and him shared. Specs wanted to shake him from his dreams the night before, but knew how proud Skittery was. Skittery only had a few things left, and pride was one of them.

"We all do," Race mumbled around his cigar before clapping him on the shoulder and heading out of the room, digging in his pockets for his matches. One thing Race didn't want to mess with was a grieving Skittery.

Skittery walked out of the washroom into an empty bunkroom, after sitting in a stall trying to calm his nerves. Silence. Something Skittery had come to value. It was something he rarely received, something he only got when he was alone. Everyone always wanted to talk, to get that look in their eyes, that God Damned concerned look before asking 'How you holdin' up?'

Four words… four simple words… four hateful words. He wanted to scream every time he heard them. How did they think he was holding up? Why couldn't they just let him be, just not talk to him and let him think? No… that wasn't the way of the Newsies. Specs would tell him it was because they were family- but they weren't family. She was his family, and now she was gone.

Slowly over the last year the questions stopped and turned into a soft look, or a pat on the shoulder. Something about that form of sympathy hurt him even more. They were always so scared he was going to break. If they said anything about their girlfriends or a great girl they met, they would look to Skittery; to see if the broken one was crying all over himself in a pool of piss and snot. He never was, not because he didn't want to, but because he wouldn't. Not in front of them.

Skittery trudged over to the window and looked down at Duane Street hearing his friends shouting. He watched them throw snowballs and knock each other into the snow banks and found tears burning his eyes.

Didn't they know what today was? Didn't they…

He blinked his eyes quickly and clenched his jaw; he wouldn't cry… he was sure he had no tears left. He was dried up, just a body walking around hoping to forget her. He put his forehead against the window pane and sighed the cold glass reminded him he was still alive. It had been a year. The longest and hardest year of his life and surprisingly to all he was still breathing.

He blamed himself… of course he did. He blamed himself for everything he was sure he did wrong. He blamed himself for not giving her his jacket… for not making her go to the doctors when the cough wouldn't go away… for not ordering the others to give her their blankets and coats when she was shivering. Most of all he blamed himself for not seeing the blood in her handkerchief until it was too late.

As hard as it was to watch her die, it was harder for Bitter to actually let out that last breath. She had always been so strong and independent, not needing anything from anyone and she would be the first to tell you that. In the last month she couldn't even get to the washroom without help, Skittery hated watching her pride slowly leave her. She fought so hard the Tuberculosis took her slow. Slowly killing her for over a year leaving her a shell of the one tough Brooklyn girl that would do anything for him… even though he prided himself that he never asked her of anything. Except dying.

You still died… even though I begged you not too…