35Disclaimer: I don't own the characters of "Mary Poppins Returns," they belong to PL Travers and Disney.
Author's Note: Takes place in the same continuity as my other MPR stories, though it's not necessary to read those first. Unless you want to, I won't mind ;)
The lovely London sky wasn't so lovely this morning. It was the first big crack of thunder that made his eyes open. Jack blinked and looked out the small window of the bedroom. Rain pelted the glass. Unconsciously, he shivered. Rain still made him a little twitchy, considering what had happened during the last big summer storm. His left arm ached, though he suspected it was from sleeping on it accidentally as opposed to the weather. Although it could be the weather, he thought to himself. He wouldn't be the first leerie to complain of sore joints and aches and pains when the weather turned. It was the nature of the job.
He glanced around. Angus was still asleep, one arm and one leg hanging off his bed, and Thomas was snoring. The three leeries split the rent on the flat together. Jack was the oldest of the three and as such often felt like the responsible adult, making sure Angus and Thomas went on their routes, and more importantly, that rent got paid.
But just because he was the 'adult' didn't always mean he had to act like one.
Time to get up, Jack thought to himself with a smile, and swung himself out of bed. On his way out of the room, he grabbed Angus's leg with his good right hand and pulled. Angus yelped as he hit the floor, swiping good-naturedly for Jack as the older man laughed and pulled Thomas's pillow out from under him.
"Good mornin'!" Jack grinned as he gathered his clothes.
"What's so 'good' abou' it?" Thomas groaned, finding his pillow and burying his head under it.
"Always somethin' good to be found," Jack reminded him. "Now move along, the both of you."
He was whistling as he left the flat and went downstairs to get his bike. No amount of rain was going to stop him from seeing Jane Banks that evening. The two of them had plans for dinner at her flat.
Jane Banks woke up to the rain, too. Lovely. She swung herself out of bed and grabbed her robe, wrapping it around her as she glanced outside. Puddles were already forming in the street below and cars and horse-drawn carts splashed through them. She looked at the clock. "Time to get moving," she said aloud. She wasn't excited to be going out into the rain, but people were counting on her. SPRUCE-the Society for the Protection of the Rights of the Underpaid Citizens of England-was going be holding a rally to protest the cuts to the unemployment fund. Rain or shine, the unemployed workers would be there, and so would Jane and her team.
She dressed quickly in a pair of black slacks and a green blouse, brushing her hair quickly and throwing her favorite beret over the top of it. I wonder if Jack will be there, she thought to herself, and then blushed at herself in the mirror. Silly. Jack has a job to do, he can't be at every rally. And you're seeing him tonight anyway.
Jane made herself a quick breakfast and then, picket signs in hand, she left her apartment and headed for their chosen meeting site of the day. The rain was relentless, and she wondered briefly if maybe they should cancel when they got there. The Slump showed no signs of letting up anytime soon, much like the rain. There would be other days.
We'll see what the crowd looks like when I get there, she thought, one hand on her hat to keep it from blowing away. Perhaps if no one shows, I can find Jack a little earlier! The thought made her smile.
Jack was soaked through by his second street. Fortunately, the thunder and lightning had let up, and he was grateful for it. It seemed silly, that a grown man should be scared of storms, but when one is shot and then abducted during one, every crack of thunder suddenly becomes a gunshot, or a kick to the ribs, or…
He blinked. Nothin' out here but you an' the rain, Jack, he reminded himself. Still…he couldn't shake the feeling that something was…off…about the day. "Ridiculous," he said out loud as he flicked the gas off , extinguished the flame in the lamp he was currently propped against, and hopped off the ladder. "Just a bit o' rain, nothin' more," he said, catching the curious looks of a few passersby. He tipped his sopping hat to them with a smile. They smiled back. Most of the people on Jack's route weren't too surprised by the leerie talking to himself. In fact, most of the time, he was whistling or singing.
He tied the ladder back to his bike, looking down across the intersection to his next light. Except the intersection was filled with people. Lots of them. Loud people.
He frowned. There a rally today? He pushed his bike along with both hands (not that his left was being much help). It was the only explanation he could think of as to why people were standing willingly in ankle-deep water, getting completely soaked by the rain, and Oh. Now he could see some of them holding signs. Most of the words he couldn't quite make out, but a big, bold UNEMPLOYED stood out on one of them. Sure enough, he thought. He'd stumbled onto a protest. He'd heard some of the sweeps and dockworkers at the pub talking about whoever was in charge taking money from the unemployment fund, the money that should've been going to help the men and women who weren't lucky enough to have jobs.
When there's a rally...His eyes caught a flash of green and blonde curls, and his smile lit up.
She's here!
"Lovely weather we're havin' innit?" Andrew Haversham took the stack of picket signs from Jane and passed them around. Andy was dressed in a tweed jacket that wasn't doing much for keeping the rain off. His blonde hair was matted to his head, giving him the look of a drowned Viking.
Jane giggled as she looked at the crowd. "I can't believe the turnout," she said. "Even on an ugly day such as this!"
"Lot of these boys work in weather like this no matter anyway," Andy pointed out. He shrugged. "Maybe the rain'll keep the opposition at home."
"Which does no good for us if they can't see or hear the message," Jane pointed out.
"No such luck, Andy," Fiona Walters said, ducking her head from the rain as she came jogging across the street, her flats disappearing in the puddles. She pointed up the road, where a couple of police cars had pulled up. "Someone called 'em," she added in her thick Irish accent, off Jane's confused look. "Apparently, we're 'blockin' traffic.'"
Jane waved a hand in all four directions. "What traffic?" she asked. She rolled her eyes. "That's a good one. Well, I suppose we can just move it up the street to the soup kitchen if we need to," she decided. "The press might be more likely to come to an indoor event anyway," Jane added. "And if I know these boys, they'll definitely want something hot to eat after this is over."
Jack was on his ladder replacing a wick inside a lamp when he saw the police show up. Up until that point, the rally had just been a lot of shouting and yelling and waving signs. Now, he had a feeling it was about to get a little more exciting. His eyes picked out Jane's bright blonde hair at the edge of it, standing next to a gentleman in a tweed jacket and a woman with bright red hair tucked under a hood. Forgetting about the lamp for a moment, he watched the scene unfolding with interest, and a heavy feeling in the pit of his stomach.
Thunder rumbled and he held onto the lamp a little tighter. Steady, Jack, he chided himself.
"Y'need to get these people out o' here," the first policeman was telling Andy. He didn't look happy in the slightest that he was out getting drenched this early in the morning.
"What for?" Andy asked him. "No one's done anything, they've got a right to be here."
"Your rally is blocking the street," the policeman replied. "Nobody can get through."
Jane crossed her arms over her chest. "Officer, up until now, yours is the only car we've seen. How can we be blocking traffic if there's no one about?"
The yelling and shouting intensified; someone in the crowd had seen the police.
"You're causin' a public nuisance," another officer told Fiona. "People are complainin'."
Fiona raised an eyebrow. "So either we're blockin' traffic or causin' a nuisance….which one are you stickin' with, then?"
The man did not look happy that Fiona had caught him in a cross, and he took a step forward toward her. Jane smoothly stepped between the officer and the fiery Irishwoman. "Officers, these men aren't doing anything they're not permitted to," Jane said, trying to placate the situation. "We've not seen a single car except yours, nor has anyone come out of these shops to tell us we're being too loud. I'm sorry whoever called you brought you out in this weather, but-"
There was a loud bang.
A moment of nothing but the rain. Then, someone screamed.
And a peaceful protest turned into a riot.
Author's Note II: I know the police did get called occasionally to break up protests during the Depression in England (like in the US), but I also know my scenario's slightly unrealistic. So I'm picturing it all happening like the strike in "Newsies" in my head, where they're just looking for an excuse to break up a protest. Someone didn't want 'em there, so they called the cops to come break it up.
