Disclaimer: This is a non-commercial work of fanfiction. Anything recognizable from Newsies belongs to Disney and not to me.


Chapter 51: Evasion at Newspaper Row

"Sadie, stop dawdling!" Margaret urged, grabbing her friend's hand and impatiently pulling her down the street.

"I don't understand why you deem it necessary to rush like this, Megs," Sadie grumbled, securing her hat with her free hand as her friend continued to drag her along.

"It's necessary because our lunch recess will only give us long enough for a quick look," Margaret responded. "If things are still as congested as they seemed to be this morning, we'll have a hard time moving quickly, and you know how much Mr. Crowell hates tardiness."

"We could have just gone to the park for lunch as usual," Sadie pointed out. "Then we wouldn't have had to worry about the time."

"And miss out on what's going on at The World?" Margaret turned the corner, still pulling Sadie after her as they arrived at the edge of Newspaper Row. "Something big is happening, can't you see it? There was already quite a crush of people heading in that direction this morning. The newsboys must have had some kind of breakthrough, or they wouldn't all be rallying together like this."

"I'm sure we'll find out soon enough," Sadie protested. "We have no business being here - "

"We have completely legitimate business being here," her friend countered smoothly. "Our classmate - your neighbor - is one of the leaders of the newsboy strike. Don't you want to find out what's become of this protest of his? Don't you want to make sure he isn't being beaten up by the thugs of the newspaper owners or hauled off to jail for causing a disturbance?"

"I'm sure he'd be too careful to let something like that happen," Sadie contended, "and even if that weren't the case, we'd have little to offer in the way of helpful intervention." What did Margaret think they could do, anyway? Throw themselves in front of the police wagon? The thought of violence being loosed against the newsboys was always a disturbing one, but practically speaking, there wasn't anything two schoolgirls would be able to do to stop it.

"You mean to tell me that you aren't the least bit curious as to what David's up to?" Margaret asked, suddenly dropping Sadie's hand and turning to look her in the eye. "You don't care what happens to him, or to this strike of his?"

"Of course I care, Margaret." Sadie smoothed her skirt. "I only said that I didn't think our presence would help him in any way. If this is the big city-wide protest that he spoke of a few days ago, he's likely preoccupied with organizing the newsboys or negotiating with the newspaper owners. Our presence would be an unwelcome intrusion."

"You're avoiding him, aren't you?" Margaret accused. "It's because of that little misunderstanding on the way to the park - you've been brooding about it for the past two days!"

"Megs, we both spoke out of turn in that conversation and you know it."

"So apologize to him and move on!" Margaret exclaimed. "It's not so hard as all that."

"I've tried, but the times I've seen him he's been in a hurry. He doesn't seem to want to talk to me."

"That didn't ever stop you from cornering him before."

"It was different then, Megs," Sadie insisted. "He was new in class, and a little shy I think, and he simply didn't know what to make of my friendliness. This is something else entirely. He's putting up a barrier of some kind, and I haven't the faintest idea of how to get past it."

"Well, if he's petty enough to let a little comment like that get to him, then maybe he's not worth your time."

"He's not being petty, Megs," Sadie retorted, taking the bait for the sake of clarifying the situation. "He hasn't been rude or unkind. He's been perfectly courteous to me since then. He's just...more guarded, I suppose." She sighed regretfully. "We'd finally managed to reach a comfortable understanding before all of this happened, and I only want to regain his trust so that he'll talk to me the way he did before."

"He must have a lot of interesting things to say for you to be so taken by his conversation," Margaret said, raising an eyebrow.

"You know that Davey's extremely bright, Margaret," Sadie answered coolly. "His ideas are fascinating." She brushed at her skirt again. "Anyhow, we shouldn't make a nuisance of ourselves by showing up at the protest with no real purpose other than to satisfy our curiosity. I'd rather not go, and we'll already be cutting it close, as you said. You can go on if you'd like, but I'm going to head back to school."

"Don't be like that," Margaret wheedled, grabbing at Sadie's hand as she turned to walk away. "I'll leave off teasing you for now, but at least wait for a moment and let me find out from someone what's happened. Maybe you aren't the least bit curious, but I certainly am, and it would be a shame for us to have walked all the way here only to return without having any of our questions answered."

Sadie gave her grudging consent, promising Margaret that she would wait at that spot for another ten minutes, but that after that she was leaving whether the other girl had returned or not. Her friend promised to be quick, then quickly walked off, heading down the street towards Newsie Square.

Sadie sighed, curling her arms around herself. She moved off to the side a bit, out of the flow of the foot traffic which had gotten increasingly more congested as they'd neared the office of The World. There were plenty of people milling about, but there didn't seem to be a large crowd bunched together anymore, so maybe the protest was over.

Letting her footsteps meander a bit (she was sure that Margaret, for all her promises, would likely avail herself of all ten minutes that she'd been allotted, so there was no harm in walking around for a while), Sadie idly took in the various conversations taking place on the street, trying to piece together what had transpired from the little scraps of disclosure that she caught. Here a pair of well-dressed men, perhaps employees of one of the publications whose offices were housed on this street, were deep in conversation, one of them mentioning something about the governor and reform. Several yards away, a knot of child laborers clustered together, jabbering excitedly amongst themselves. People passed to and fro on the street, some walking quickly and others at a more leisurely pace, and Sadie found herself behind a slow-moving trio of young ladies who seemed to have only been passing through and hadn't expected the crowd of people. The tallest of the girls had on a particularly classy-looking hat, and Sadie was trying to figure out how she'd managed to pin it securely, when the sound of a familiar voice reached her ears.

"...I know it probably sounds overwhelming, but if you just take things one step at a time, it'll feel a lot more attainable."

It wasn't a particularly loud or a particularly captivating voice, but its tenor was unmistakable. Sadie crept a bit closer to the group of ladies in front of her, hoping that she could pass by unnoticed as the owner of the voice came into view, strolling in her direction with his head bent low as he listened to the response of the younger boy walking beside him.

They passed her, and Sadie let out a small sigh of relief, stealing a glance over her shoulder to ensure that she was in the clear, but to her dismay, the two boys had drifted off of the street and were straying in the direction of the place where she was shortly due to rendezvous with Margaret. If the other girl caught sight of them, she'd no doubt try to force a conversation, and Sadie really did not want her presence to be revealed just then.

Circling back, she found a moderately-sized group of bystanders and hovered unnoticed at the fringe of their company, keeping a wary eye on the two boys while simultaneously trying to catch sight of her friend. If she could head off the other girl in time, perhaps disaster could be averted.

With nothing to do but wait and watch for the time being, she found herself studying Davey and straining to catch what he was saying to his companion. He looked well enough, so there must not have been an altercation between the newsboys and the police, and his canvas bag was full of papers, which meant…

She inhaled sharply.

Which meant that the strike was over.

It must have ended favorably. The smile on Davey's face, the relaxed line of his shoulders, the fact that he was unhurriedly taking the time to converse rather than rushing off to the business of selling his papers, all pointed to a propitious conclusion to the cause he'd worked so tirelessly to advance, and Sadie suddenly felt a little bit of pride well up on his behalf.

It seemed as though he was trying to encourage a young worker from a different profession in his own efforts to lobby for reform. It was difficult to catch the conversation, but she overheard snippets of it here and there:

"...can't let the odds stop you…"

"...have to let the conviction carry you sometimes when it gets hard…"

"…if we can pull it off, I know you can, too..."

Davey was in his element, all sincerity and rambling enthusiasm. It wouldn't have looked like much to a casual observer - he was still far less demonstrative and far less charismatic than most - but Sadie knew that she was seeing him unguardedly alive in that moment, and she found the sight to be ever-so-slightly riveting.

"I thought I'd lost you!" came Margaret's chiding voice, and Sadie turned sharply to see the other girl coming towards her. "Why didn't you wait by the - " Margaret's admonition was cut short as she caught sight of Davey over Sadie's shoulder.

"Don't say a word," Sadie ordered, giving her friend a warning look. "We're leaving." She swept past Margaret in the direction of the street, leaving the other girl to hurry after her.

"Wait!" Margaret grabbed her arm. "We can't go back that way. I saw Oscar when I passed by. He was selling papers to the newsboys with Morris and that fat old man who usually works at the distribution center."

Sadie huffed in frustration, hesitating for a moment as she weighed her options. "Fine," she said tersely, allowing her friend to pull her around in the opposite direction. "But we're keeping a low profile. I don't want to risk running into - "

"David!" Margaret said brightly, looping her arm through Sadie's as the other girl stumbled into place beside her. "Fancy running into you here!"

Sadie felt her cheeks burning as she glanced up to see Davey standing in front of them, looking completely surprised at their sudden appearance. He'd apparently finished his conversation and was headed towards the street, probably about to begin selling his papers, and if Margaret hadn't forced the abrupt about-face just then, he likely would have missed them altogether.

"We've heard the strike has been settled," Margaret began conversationally.

"Yes, we've negotiated a compromise with The World," Davey answered, adjusting his bag of papers on his shoulder a little.

He's probably impatient to begin selling, Sadie thought.

"That must be a weight off of you," Margaret remarked.

"It is," Davey admitted. "I'm thankful that things have finally resolved." He regarded them for a moment, clearly trying to decide whether or not to say something, before his curiosity got the better of him. "Not that it's any of my business..." he said slowly, "but what are you two doing here?"

Margaret shot Sadie a look.

"We saw the crowd gathering on our way to school," she answered reluctantly, "and Margaret wanted to know what had become of the protest. We came over here on our lunch break."

"It was a mutually agreed-upon decision," Margaret interjected, ignoring Sadie's frown at the slight corrective.

"Oh." Davey didn't seem to know what to say in response. "Well, I hope you found the information you were looking for." He shifted the weight of his newsboy bag on his shoulder again, then after a moment added, "I should probably get to selling, but I hope you both have a good day at school." He gave them a polite nod, then turned and walked towards the road, pulling a paper from his bag as he did so.

"Well, you handled that well," Margaret jibed, giving Sadie a look as they began walking in the opposite direction. "Couldn't you have said something to the effect of, 'we wanted to know if your strike had been successful, David' or 'we wanted to make sure that you were all right, David.'"

"Better yet, 'we wanted to stick our noses into something we had absolutely no business meddling in, David,'" Sadie said irritably. "We might as well have spelled it out for him - we looked foolish enough as it was being caught like that."

"It's not as though we were sneaking around," Margaret pointed out. "We - or at least I - had nothing to hide. And if you'd taken my advice and had confronted him about the conversation we had on the way to the park beforehand, you wouldn't have had to be so stilted about it."

Sadie sighed. She knew that it was true. She could have tried harder to track Davey down so that she could apologize and ask him about why the comments she and Margaret had made on the way to the park had affected him so much. She'd given it a cursory effort, but had to admit that she'd been dismayed at his guarded responses and persistent (if polite) brush-offs.

Approaching Davey to draw him out of his shyness was one thing; coming up against his protective reticence was another, especially when she knew that reticence was in place as a result of her carelessness, and while Sadie was generally confident and quick enough with her words, she was not especially eager to confront Davey about this particular matter.

Why had she allowed Margaret to drag her to Newspaper Row in the first place?

The other girl was right, though - Sadie wasn't approaching the situation correctly, and she ought to have said something kind earlier, or at least expressed some congratulations. Her words had smacked of indifference and had in all likelihood driven the wedge between her and Davey deeper despite her desire to mend the rift.

Sadie pulled her arm away from Margaret's. "Go on without me, Megs," she said resignedly. "I have to go to talk to him. Nothing's going to get better unless I do."

Margaret looked slightly surprised. "You'll be late for class," she warned.

"I know," Sadie exhaled. She wasn't looking forward to facing the consequences of her tardiness, but she knew she wouldn't be able to listen to a word of the lesson if she didn't at least try to make some progress towards making amends with Davey. So she bid Margaret goodbye and set off in the opposite direction, her eyes scanning the street to see if she could catch sight of the telltale blue and white work shirt.

It would have perhaps been easier if she'd been a bit taller and could have seen further in front of her past the many people transversing Newspaper Row, but eventually she did locate him, selling a paper to a man in a smart-looking trilby.

Waiting until he'd completed the sale and had counted out change, Sadie drew near, hesitating as another customer approached the newsboy before he'd even finished putting away the money from the previous transaction. Clearly, the papers were moving well that day, most likely on account of the strike finally being lifted, and Sadie had to wait for a moment as several additional passersby made their purchases.

It probably wasn't the best time to try to initiate a conversation, she reflected. Of course Davey would be distracted with selling, and he needed to attend to his work. She'd only be in the way and would further bother him with her poorly thought-through decision. Why hadn't she realized that before she'd parted ways with Margaret? Now she was going to be late to class without being anywhere closer to reconciliation.

Deciding to abandon the endeavor, she stepped back, thinking that perhaps if she was willing to sacrifice her dignity and run just a bit, she might be able to catch up with Margaret, but before she could turn to go, Davey finished attending to his last customer and caught her eye.

He didn't seem entirely surprised to see her; had he known that she was there all along?

"Sadie?" He walked over, his conspicuously-lighter newsboy bag swaying just a bit at his side. "Is something wrong?"

It was the perfect segue.

"I…" she found herself suddenly faltering. Yes, something was wrong. She only had to bring it up now in response to his open invitation, only had to speak a few words to inquire after his feelings and to apologize for her part in hurting them, only had to broach the subject to clear the air between friends, simple and straightforward and...

...she couldn't do it.

"I was just wondering if you'll be coming back for tutoring now," she heard herself say, "since the strike has been settled?"

He clearly hadn't been expecting that question.

"Well…I suppose I should," he answered. "That is, if you're still willing to offer it." He added the last part quickly, as though realizing that his initial response could have been construed as ungracious, and Sadie felt her heart sink just a bit at this overcompensation. It wasn't out of character for Davey at all, but before the whole unfortunate incident had taken place, he'd been using such amendments a bit less frequently, as though finally settling into the realization that she understood him, and she wished that he hadn't felt the need to regulate his responses so cautiously again.

"The newsboys are having a meeting tonight," Davey continued, "but I can come by tomorrow evening - if that's convenient for your schedule." The reluctance was clear in his eyes, though she could tell that he was trying not to let it show.

"That would work perfectly," she replied. He thanked her politely, and the exchange probably could have ended at that point, but he seemed to intuitively know that she had more to say, for he made no attempt to disengage himself from the conversation.

"I also meant to express my happiness regarding the strike's successful conclusion," Sadie said, trying to avail herself of the unexpected boon. "I know how much you've labored towards that end, and it must be gratifying to see it all pay off. You ought to be congratulated for your part in the proceedings."

"Thank you," he answered, and she could tell that he was relieved and grateful and maybe rightfully even a little bit proud of what had been accomplished, though he didn't say anything further.

She decided at that point that she probably ought to let him go. "I'll see you tomorrow evening, then," she said, taking a step back.

"Yes, tomorrow evening," he agreed. "Goodbye, Sadie." His farewell was accompanied by the same polite smile he'd been giving her for the past few days, and as Sadie turned and made her way down the street in the opposite direction, she found herself feeling more discouraged than before at her failure to carry out her intention.

She mulled the situation over as she made her way back to school, enduring the chastisement of her schoolmaster upon her late arrival with wordless acceptance before sliding into her desk and immersing herself in the class assignment. She knew that she had blundered the opportunity that day, but the following evening would give her another chance at redemption, and she was determined not to squander that chance a second time. She had a day between now and then to figure out what she was going to say, but the rub was figuring out how to approach things differently so that she did not repeat the mistake she'd made at Newspaper Row.

After class was dismissed for the day, Sadie sent Abby home with Margaret while she fulfilled the requisite penance for her tardiness (thankfully it was only sweeping the schoolroom and cleaning the blackboard erasers that afternoon) and then started home herself, uncharacteristically grateful for the solitary walk back to her family's tenement, though she found as she arrived that her own rumination had not given her the answers that she sought.

Perhaps some outside perspective on the matter would be helpful; she and Davey shared very little in common when it came to personality and temperament, so she was at a loss for knowing how to approach him in this case, and it was probably time to ask for a second opinion.

As Sadie climbed the stairs to the third floor, a thought suddenly crossed her mind, and instead of heading down the hallway to her family's apartment, she stopped outside of the landlord's office, knocking lightly on the door before pushing it gently open.

Her father glanced up at her in surprise.

"Papa," Sadie said soberly, "may I talk to you?"