Little Shack of Horrors
My first day in Maycomb had gone smoothly. I'd met the neighbors. I'd met the town sheriff. The judge and the butcher and the baker. Just about everyone.
But not the Radleys.
I sat on a bench, wondering about the strange family the town gossip Stephanie Crawford had recounted for me. The young one, Arthur "Boo" Radley, who had stabbed his father, Nathan in the leg with a pair of scissors. The mother, whom upon seeing her husband limp down the hallway, blood flowing down his ankle, had burst into the street, screaming at the to of her lungs.
"That there woman was in hysterics," Miss Stephanie had commented dryly. I didn't disagree.
She told me about how old Boo had been locked in the courthouse for many a year, then removed from that basement and now supposedly haunted his old home. The feeble and worn hutch that creaked when the wind blew and seemed to devour the happy light that shone during a warm summer day.
It gave me the shivers.
So, on a whim, I strode down the street to investigate.
It was about four thirty. The sun was just about over the horizon. It was cooling down a bit. From half a block away, I could see why people had suspected the place of being haunted. It was run down, weathered from years of nature's punishment. I decided to get even closer.
I now stood right in front of the fence. I put a hand down but recoiled at the revolting feeling of dry, cracked wood, covered in green watermarks. It poked at it again.
The fence itself was over a hundred years old, most likely. The gate had been ripped off its hinges and was lying on the cobblestone path towards the house. Weeds had overtaken it.
I glanced around the yard. Yellowed grass everywhere, brownish spots… Trees stood around, looking grayish and dead, some rotting. Flower patches looked like they had been romped through and every other square yard had some item of interest: the skeletal remains of a squirrel; a baseball here, one over there; a car tire was lying by one of the trees. I shook my head in... "whatever".
I looked upon the porch. An ancient rocking chair, covered in cobwebs, stood silent and still. I could imagine old Miss Radley, knitting as she rocked back and forth, back and forth. Beside the chair, the screen door lay flat on the wood. The door ahead had once been painted white, but was now an unsightly brownish green. All the windows visible were either shattered totally or just cracked.
I turned my attention towards the roof. Tiles were missing and moss had overtaken most of the roof. The chimney had cracks and a good portion was stained black from smoke.
A glance at my watch told me to hurry, as it was 5 o'clock. I'd spent a half-hour just staring at the front of the place!
So, I jogged around to the back. The side had a few minute trees but that was all. The back though…
The back of the house was just as bad as the front: weathered and miserable. The yard itself had patches of yellowed grass and the old gardens were now just dirt piles. A football lay beside the garage…
The garage was falling apart. Windows missing/cracked, the tarp had several tears and dirt stained the walls. Inside, a rickety old car sat, unused. I saw cobwebs over it as well. The stench of mildew was strong. I had to cover my nose.
Again, I looked to the yard. I looked into a window and saw the shutters… wait, did they just… no, nobody's inside. Nobody could've closed them…
With a sigh of forgoing, I turned around and walked back to the street. The street lamps had turn on, offering pale light to the pedestrians. I followed them back to my hotel and began to write. I wrote about the house, and the people in it. I wrote about the neighbors and the situations.
I wrote in hopes of giving the truth.