Disclaimer: I don't own TKaM or the song in which this story is based (Crossing Muddy Waters cover by I'm With Her).
A/N: I'm still going to continue the multi-chaptered fic I started before, but I need to get my mind straight and figure out where I was going with it. This will be short, five chapters to represent the five stages of grief (not in order), and is standalone from my other fics.
"Left me in my tears to drown
She left a baby daughter
Now the river's wide and deep and brown
She's crossing muddy waters"
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
Jem had tried to kill the baby only days after their mother passed. Alexandra almost did not believe her eyes when she first came upon the scene. First, there came Jean Louise's usual cries for her mother that seemed to never end since Atticus first found his wife dead on the porch. Then, all she heard were muffled screams and sobs coming from the children's room.
She had been preparing a plate of dinner for Jack, who had just arrived for the funeral services, and had thrown it on the ground, not paying attention to the glass shattering and food splaying itself upon the floor as she ran to the room. She could hear Jack behind her, and that's when she saw what was happening.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
Jem was on top of the baby (though at two years old, Alexandra was beginning to wonder if they should stop referring to Jean Louise as a baby), his face red and furious and wet with tears, and he was sobbing as he pressed a pillow over his sisters' face. In response, Jean Louise was thrashing and screaming from under the force of her brother.
At first, Alexandra froze in the doorway, her hands pressed to her throat—almost as if she was the one being suffocated. She almost didn't feel Jack pushing past her, causing her to collide into the wall. With wide eyes, she watched as her brother nearly threw their nephew off of their niece, hurled the pillow across the room, and held the now-sobbing Jean Louise against his chest.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
She nearly collapsed onto the floor in order to get at eye-level with her nephew. His chest was heaving in and out rapidly, his cheeks were red and hot to the touch, slick with tears that seemed to never end, his breaths were short and jagged and desperate, and his eyes were clenched tight—almost as if he was trying to stop the tears from falling.
She took his small head in her hands. "Jeremy," her voice was rough, and sounded as though she was miles away. "Jeremy, why did you do that?"
He opened his mouth as if to speak, but instead strained sobs came out.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
She could feel his entire body shuddering with each attempt to stop himself from crying. She wiped at his cheeks with her thumbs – something her own mother had done in a distant past—even though she doubted it was comforting. "Jem," her voice was softer now, she attempted to calm herself in order to calm him. "Jem, why did you do that?"
He inhaled, shuddering again as he did so, but this time he didn't sob. His eyes still clenched shut, his wavering voice said: "she keeps cryin' for mama."
Alexandra inhaled sharply. She supposed perhaps she should have Jack address the situation on his own. He was much more comforting, and plus, the children preferred him over her any day. She was beginning to realize she probably wasn't the most approachable person.
With desperation in her eyes, she looked to Jack. He was on his feet now, and she was absolutely baffled about how he was able to calm the baby so easily. While Jean Louise's face was still red and tear stained, she wasn't crying nor gasping for air anymore. She was resting her head on Jack's shoulder, perfectly content while Jack gently swayed from one foot to another in order to keep her placated.
She was amazed. Even with her own child, Alexandra lacked the ability to calm children that quickly.
"Well, she misses her," Alexandra finally said, visibly uncomfortable.
Jem's eyes shot open, his face going a deeper shade of red. "I miss her, too!" He was nearly shouting. Her eyes went back to Jack. He caught her gaze and motioned his head, as if to mentally nudge her in order to keep her talking.
"Well, I know that, sweet," she said. The boy looked furious, absolutely furious. And yet, he still let her cup his face in her hands, her thumbs softly rubbing against his temples. "But Jean Louise, she's just so little, she doesn't understand—"
"Well I don't, either!" Jem stated matter-of-factly, his lower lip quivering. "I don't understand why mama's gone, either and Jean Louise just cries for her all the time and I want her, too. I want mama too."
He was sobbing again, his face contorted in a mixture of despair and anger, and Alexandra didn't know what to do. It dawned on her suddenly that during the past few days they were treating Jeremy like an adult. He was told his mother would never be coming home again and was expected him to be some sort of beacon of light for his father (who was so consumed in his own grief he could barely look at his children) and to be a role model for his sister, who needed him. But the boy was six, still so young, and he was expected to understand and accept that his mother would be never coming home again.
"I want mama," he sobbed again, his chest heaving in and out.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
She gazed at her brother again, tears filling her own eyes. "Hug him," Jack mouthed, and if it were any other situation Alexandra would have been angry that he was instructing her on how to be comforting. In a quick moment, she clasped her nephew to her chest, and at that moment he completely dissolved into tears. He sobbed loudly into her chest, a muffled 'mama' emerging almost every other sob. She held him tightly, as if the compression would somehow alleviate all of his pain.
After a few moments, she felt his small arms wrap around her waist.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
Mama.
Later that night, when the children were calmed (well, as much as they could have been), fed, and put to their respective beds, Alexandra almost screamed at Atticus. After experiencing the sheer grief and terror of that afternoon, there was a persistent bubble of what to her felt like anger resting in her chest. She was angry the children had to go through this, she was angry that she couldn't be more help, she was angry that her brother hadn't been there to help.
For the past three days, from the moment his wife was declared dead, it was almost as if Atticus ceased to exist in his own home. He rarely ate, rarely talked, rarely communicated. After making the arrangements for Jean's burial, he locked himself in his office, doing only God knows what.
And it made Alexandra furious.
He wasn't the only one grieving, he wasn't the only one who lost Jean, and yet he remained completely isolated from his children who needed him now more than ever.
"Are you gonna dry that dish, or are you goin' to keep staring at the wall?" Jack asked, breaking the tense silence that existed between them ever since the children went to bed. "If you keep clenching your jaw like that, it's going to lock."
Forcefully, she set the plate she was washing down on the countertop, causing it to crack. "John Hale Finch," her voice was harsh again, almost shrill. "I do not need—"
"I know what you need," he said, getting up and leaving the room.
She hadn't intended on driving him away—though she seemed to have that effect on people. Sighing, she began collecting the broken pieces of the plate into a washcloth to throw away. As she decided she would go apologize to him, he reentered the room, a bottle of amber liquid in his hands.
Scotch.
"I don't drink," she told him as she watched him grab two glasses and sloppily pour the liquid into them, spilling some onto the counter.
"It'll cut the edge off, I promise," he told her, and she made a silent vow to talk to him about his drinking habits at a later time. Hastily, he grabbed one of the glasses and downed it in one sip. She would definitely talk to him about his drinking habits later.
But for now, she took the remaining glass with trepidation and downed its contents, the liquor burning her throat like the anger that had been burning inside Jeremy just hours before.