To Kiss a Mockingbird ~~~ A Mockingbird fanfiction

Part 1: Macomb, 1901

Macomb was an old town, but it was a tired old town when I first met it. In rainy weather the streets turned to red slop; grass grew on the sidewalks, the courthouse sagged in the square. Somehow, it was hotter then: a black dog suffered on a summer's day; bony mules hitched to carts flicked flies in the sweltering shade of the live oaks on the square. 

People moved slowly then. They ambled across the square, shuffled in and out of the stores around it, took their time about everything. A day was twenty-four hours long but seemed longer. There was no hurry, for there was nowhere to go, nothing to buy, and no money to buy it with. 

The first time I stepped foot in Macomb was August 2, which happened to be the hottest day of the year. Flies swarmed at my feet and bit my bare legs. Eyes followed me through shuttered windows and doors rattled in their sockets as children ran outside, oblivious to the scene walking down their street. 

My brother and I were so covered in dirt that we were barely differentiable, and my sister, ever the perfectionist, was stooped over to brush her dress every three steps. Feet aching, I stopped to catch my breath and wipe the sweat from my eyes. 

The idea that Jack, my younger brother, and Alexandra, my older sister, and I should move to Macomb for a few months came from my father. Farming was slow this year, and due to the immense drought, there weren't any crops to help harvest. Father decided that the best thing for his children would be to send them to a completely alien town and force them to go to school for the first time in their lives. Where could that possibly go wrong? 

About an hour into our carriage ride into town, both of our front wheels became loose and fell clean off. After another hour of me and my brother trying to help Father fix the broken carriage, he sent us on our way to walk the rest of the way into town. A phantom feeling of his arm resting on my shoulder stuck with me on the long walk into town. I was trusted with delivering a handwritten note from my father to Mrs. Dubose, the woman who my siblings and I would be staying with until the next crop season, and I wasn't going to let my father down. 

A yell shocked me out of my exhaustion-induced daze and back into the present time. 

"Hey, you there, watcha doin' out in the middle of the road like that? Gonna get yourself hit by a wagon, stupid." 

A group of girls was sitting on the porch of a light grey house, and one of the girls was standing up yelling at us. 

"Aint nothin' wrong with walkin' in the road, that's what it's there for, silly," Jack hollered back. 

"Hey," I hissed, "don't go makin' a mess of our first day here, we've gotta make a good impression on them."

One of the girls, the one who yelled at us, walked down to the road. 

"Who are y'all anyways? I've never seen you around here before. My name's Maudie Atkinson, what's yours?" 

The girl, Maudie, asked the question like it was for all of us to answer, but she was only looking at Jack when she said it. 

"My name is Alexandra Finch, pleased to meet you, Maudie," Alexandra said with her arm outstretched. Maudie looked down at Alexandra's hand and made to spit in hers and shake. Alexandra jerked back her hand too late; the damage was already done and her hand was enveloped in Maudie's spit. Alexandra screamed and frantically began wiping her wet hand off on her now-dirty dress, while Jack and I tried to hide our silent laughter. Alexandra stormed off in the direction of Mrs. Dubose's house. 

"I'm awfully sorry if I offended y'all by my handshake. I really didn't think y'all would be that different than us here." Maudie said, dejectedly. 

"Naw, it wasn't you, honest! Alexandra's just like that. I'm Jack and this is my brother, Atticus." Jack spit on his hand and laughed at Maudie's eagerness to shake his hand. "What other kids live around these parts?"

Maudie smiled and replied "While there's a lot of us runnin' around. There's me, Stephanie Crawford, and Rachel Haverford, we sit out on Stephanie's porch. There's a few other families like the Cunninghams, real nice folks, and the Ewells, you'll wanna stick away from them. Oh, and I almost forgot about the Radleys. They've got Nathan and Boo." 

A little shiver went down my spine as I heard the name Boo. "Boo? What kinda name is Boo?" Jack asked. 

"Don't be sayin' those things around Boo, or he'll beat you bloody. Don't tell anyone I told you this, but Boo's real name is Arthur. Ain't that funny? He likes being all tough and mean-like, but he ain't all that. Stick away from him though, he's not one to mess with." 

A yell loud enough to wake the earth echoed throughout the street. 

"Jack Finch! Atticus Finch! You boys had better get over here this instant before I come over and get you myself!". 

Jack and I looked at each other with confusion until realization dawned on me. Alexandra must've just gotten to Mrs. Dubose's house. 

"Was nice meetin' you, Maudie" I said politely.

"Yeah, good seein' you boys too. Don't be strangers, ya hear?" Maudie shouted at our backs as Jack and I ran towards the source of the racket.

While I was running, something in one of the old houses caught my eye. Two small eyes were watching me from behind a dirty glass window. I only saw them for a second, but something about the emptiness of them caught my attention. It seemed like they were looking right into my soul. A chill passed through my body, and I ran after Jack as fast as I could.