The Only Girl Newsie

Chapter 5: Pain

"What happened?!?" Someone yells as Jack runs up to me, placing his hand gently on my now bruised face.

"Snyder," I say quietly, really not wanting to deal with everyone right now.

Jack can tell I'm not totally okay, and his face shows concern. He pulls me into a hug. "Did he do anything else?" he whispers in my ear, not drawing more attention to the problem.

"No."

A few other boys come over and wrap their arms around me, trying to comfort me. More boys keep doing that till everyone is in a big group hug with me at the center. I smile, knowing the boys care. Our hug soon breaks up, and the boys start heading to bed.

Jack pulls me to my bed, sitting me down. He grabs a rag and gets it wet, and comes over to clean up my face. He sits next to me and pulls me closer with one arm while cleaning up my face with the rag with the other.

"You know I can take care of myself, right?" I ask him.

"Ise know, I just wanna help a little," he says.

I smile a little, knowing he cares. I bring my hand up to brush my hair out of my face and out of my way, but Jack sees my now bleeding knuckles.

"I thought youse said he didn't do nothin else to ya?" He asks quietly, looking at my busted-up hand.

"He didn't," I answer while looking down, already knowing Jack won't like how I injured my hand.

Jack gently grabs my hand in his. "How do you explain this?" He asks.

"I.. Um... Punched a wall....." I say very quietly.

"Madie, you know you shouldn't do that; you always hurt yourself," he says as he starts cleaning off my knuckles.

I let him finish before wrapping up my hand with some random scrap of fabric. I lay down as the boys all settle down in their own beds for the night. Someone turns the lights off, and the boys get quiet.

"Night, boys," I say, just like I do every night. I get a chorus of night and goodnight from everyone in their own ways. I smile, knowing I'm safe in this room with these boys I consider my brothers, and close my eyes, drifting off to sleep.