"We've got a game poker tonight. You should stay, it will be fun." Jack said.

We'd been together that whole day since I'd ran to him in the street. The last thing I wanted was to go home to my family. Also I enjoyed my time with Jack, he treated me different than everybody else.

"Sure, I'd love to." I smiled.

"Great. Do you know how to play?"

"Uh... No." I muttered.

"That's fine, don't worry about it. Faith never plays. You can talk to her. Afterwords some we have beers and have a pretty good time."

I got a bit nervous because I'd never had a beer in my life, I was worried I would throw up or faint.

"Hey Jack..." I mumbled.

"Yeah?"

"I've never had a beer. Can you make sure I don't have one to many?"

"I didn't expect you would have had one. I'll be sure to tell you when to put the bottle down."

"Who's going to be there?" I asked.

"Well all of us newsies from Manhattan and Brooklyn."

"Why not the other non of the other newsies?"

"Toss who's the leader of Staten Island is always turning us down and we don't talk to Bronx newsies or Queens newsies a lot."

I nodded. It wasn't long people started pouring into the boarding house. Soon it was practically filled with boys (Faith and I were the only girls).

"Maria!" I heard.

I turned to see Faith.

"Hi Faith."

"There are some people I want you to meet." She grabbed my hand and led me to the other side of the room. I met about twenty-eight boys all of them were Brooklyn newsies. There were so many I felt like the room was spinning! Eventually we came to a boy who she was most fond of. She tapped a boy on the shoulder. He turned around. He looked a little familiar. He had striking blue eyes. I don't mean he had bright blue eyes, his eyes were the first thing you noticed about him. He had blond hair poking out from under his cap. He was thin, tall and pretty cute. But not my type.

"This is Spot. You do remember I told you about him right?" Faith said.

"Yeah, it's nice to meet you." I said.

We shook hands. He was seemed pretty nice.

"Alright you guys!" Jack called out. "We're getting started in the other room!"

"Okay I got to get going." Spot told Faith.

He kissed her forehead then her lips. I saw the the way he acted with her and I wished someone acted with me that way. I looked up at Jack, who had treated me better than anybody who I'd ever met in my life. And for a moment the idea of us slipped into my mind, the idea of us together. Although this idea seem perfect in so many ways but I pushed it out of my mind. He didn't think of me in that way... Did he?

The boys played for the majority of the night. It was something different for me. A bunch of boys sitting around a table cursing laughing joking. Yeah I'd seen men play poker together. But they were rich powerful men sitting around a table talking about politics and other boring chatter. By the end Spot had won and I found out this was nothing new that he always won. Jack was practically making it his life goal to beat him in a single game. But that wasn't working out as of now. Race apparently was a compulsive gambler and also would dig pretty deep into his pockets too.

But after the game the boys broke out the beer bottles and started laughing and joking.

"Maria you want one?" Jack asked holding out a bottle of beer in his hand.

"Sure, why not?"

He handed it to me and I took a sip... Not bad. Not bad all. I thought. I drank some more. Good for me though I didn't get to tipsy after just a few little sips of beer. Although I did get a little tipsy after awhile... Only a little! It didn't really matter because so was everyone else.

"Do you like it?" Jack asked.

"I like it."I smiled.

It was more fun than any so called "party" I'd been to. My parties were women drinking tea and talking about the weather. But not this, this was different. Boys drank whisky and beer. They laughed and talked it was very different.

"Hey Porcelain, how's it rolling?" I heard.

The voice was unmistakable.

"Hi Racetrack. I'm good, how about you?"

"I'm pretty good other then the thirty cents I lost." He muttered.

"You lost thirty cents?" I said shocked.

"Well yeah... Hey at least I didn't lose an extra twenty like some people." He eyed Jack.

"Shut the hell up Race." Jack mumbled.

I giggled a little bit.

"Well maybe if it wasn't you life dream to-" Race started. Before he could finnish Jack grabbed him and put a hand over his mouth. They roughed each other up a bit, but after they just cracked up laughing. I thought either they were really comfortable with each other or they were to drunk to give a damn. In about an hour the guys started to leave. I said goodbye to all of the Brooklyn newsies (yes all of them) before they had to go. I felt a hand on my shoulder. I tuned around.

"Oh hi Jack." I smiled.

"I was just wondering if you wanted to stay the night because of... you know? I was thinking you could stay with me?"

I felt the heat go to my cheeks. Was Jack asking me to stay the night with him? Really? I was surprised but in a good way. First of all I didn't want to go home and speak or even see my father. And second Jack and I would be together for a whole night. It showed me how much he cared.

"I would love to." I said.

Jack gave a huge smile.

"Alright then," He pulled on my sleeve. "come on."

He lead me to his room.

"So you can just sleep in my cloths tonight. If that comfortable with you?" Jack asked.

"That's fine." I nodded.

He let me change on my own. Jack knocked on the door after I was done.

"Come in." I said.

Jack walked into the room.

"Ready for bed?" He asked.

"Yeah."

Jack and I made our way into this bed. I laid down in the bed next to him. After a moment of this. Jack wrapped his arms around me and pulled me to his chest. I was surprised but didn't mind. I could feel my heart pounding as if t was trying to come trough my chest. I snuggled up against Jack.

"Goodnight." He whispered.

"Goodnight." I said before I quietly drifted off to sleep.