Alabama Moon

Moon fills in backstory that reveals how Pap died. Last summer, Pap and Moon learned on one of their infrequent, six-mile walks to the outskirts of Gainesville, that the paper company that owned the land where they sheltered might sell part of the property. Weeks later, Pap and Moon returned from trapping to discover surveyors looking at their shelter. Pap and Moon went back to town to ask Mr. Abroscotto, owner of the general store, for details. Mr. Abroscotto told Pap the paper company sold a tract of land to a lawyer named Mr. Wellington. The location included their shelter. Soon trucks cleared a road, and men built a large hunting lodge. By fall, when Pap and Moon brought vegetables to sell, Mr. Abroscotto told Pap that the lawyer was “gonna be moved in for Christmas” (15). On this trip to the store, Moon asked for sugar and canned peas, but Pap said no. He used the vegetable money for matches, bullets, nails, vinegar, and salt.

After two months of winter cold enough to snow but not stick, Pap fell from a beaver dam. His leg was badly broken. He instructed Moon how to splint and clean the leg, but Pap tells Moon he will surely die of the injury. He does not want Moon to go for help. He asks Moon to repeat back why they live the way they do: “Because we never asked for anything and nobody ever gave us anything. Because of that, we don’t owe anything to anybody” (18). He clarifies that it is “the government” who thinks they are owed, and that “When the war comes, they’re not gonna be able to take care of themselves,” referring to everyone in modern society who “relies on the government” (18). Pap instructs Moon to head for Alaska when he dies, where others have the same mindset and where “a man could still homestead” (20). Days pass and Pap tells Moon to stop tending to his leg as infection already spread.

Moon writes a letter to Pap soon after burying him, telling him he plans to sell Pap’s watch and see if Mr. Abroscotto “knows anything about getting to Alaska” (22). He burns the letter. Moon fetches the metal ammunition box where Pap kept his watch that Mama gave him, inscribed with their wedding date of 1968. Moon cannot find the key to the box. He packs the traps in boxes the next morning to keep near the shelter and prepares to leave for the store.

Mr. Abroscotto starts to call authorities as soon as he hears that Pap died, but Moon threatens to run. Mr. Abroscotto gives him a bologna and cheese sandwich instead. When he hears Moon’s plan to head for Alaska, Mr. Abroscotto tries to tell Moon that Pap “was an unreasonable person” for living the way he did and for telling Moon to travel across the country on his own. Mr. Abroscotto says Moon should now live with “a good family” (27). Moon leaps at Mr. Abroscotto, hitting him in the face repeatedly. Mr. Abroscotto takes hold of Moon until he calms down and tells him that he is worried about his view of the world. Moon demands money for the watch in the ammunitions box.

Mr. Abroscotto gives up trying to reason with Moon and cuts through the box lock. Old photos show a man who looks like Pap and Mr. Abroscotto wonders if Pap had a brother. Moon thinks Pap would have told him. Mr. Abroscotto gives Moon some money but will not take the watch. Moon leaves with the cash, the watch, and the photos in the box. As he walks away, Moon sees Mr. Abroscotto on the telephone and assumes he is calling “the law” (30).

Back at the shelter, Moon writes another letter to Pap telling him he plans to leave the next day for Alaska. He writes that he knows Pap would have told him if Pap had a brother. After he burns the letter, Moon becomes desperately lonely. He hears a small animal outside and goes after it, crying and telling it to come back when it runs off. Moon starts running through the dark woods until he comes to the hunting lodge. He can see a man through the window reading a book. He sits to watch him and falls asleep.

Moon wakes with Mr. Wellington standing over him. He figures out quickly who Moon is and tells Moon that the constable is looking for him. He gets Moon to come in and gives him a sweet roll. He tells Moon he might have some maps to Alaska and allows Moon to watch TV while he looks for them. Moon thinks an hour passes while he snoozes. A knock at the door reveals that Mr. Wellington called Mr. Gene, who runs a boys’ home. Mr. Hill, Mr. Wellington’s caretaker, catches Moon when he tries to run. He forces Moon into Mr. Gene’s car. Unused to car travel, Moon gets carsick. Mr. Gene pulls over when Moon is unresponsive and Moon throws up in the backseat. When Mr. Gene helps him out of the car, Moon hits Mr. Gene as hard as he can in the crotch and flees.

Moon sleeps one more night at the shelter. At daybreak he leaves for Alaska with Pap’s box and some other supplies in the wheelbarrow, struggling over rough and swampy land. As soon as he gets across a bridge, the constable stops him. The constable questions Moon and orders him to stop looking at the rifle in the wheelbarrow. He tells Moon to get in the police car, then says, “Damned if you ain’t the mean little cuss I thought you were” (44). Moon jumps down into the gulley near the river. The constable runs after him. The ground is soft mud, and he and the constable struggle physically. Moon punches the constable in the face and the constable threatens jail. The constable prevails, getting Moon into the car as Moon lashes out and bites. The constable places Moon’s rifle and other possessions in the trunk but throws the wheelbarrow into the gulley and leaves Moon’s deerskin cap on the road.

The constable drives Moon to the Livingston Police Department. He takes Moon in and tells a younger officer, Earle, to clean Moon up. Moon takes his first hot shower. Earle gives Moon clean clothes and locks him in a cell. Moon thinks jail is “the best place [he’d] ever been” (49). He enjoys the food. Moon tells Obregon, the man in the next cell, about his life in the woods. Earle says Sanders, the constable, will take Moon to the boys’ home in Tuscaloosa. Moon says he won’t go.

Constable Sanders arrives the next morning and tosses Moon back into the back seat of his police car like Moon is “nothing but a sack of coon hides” (54). Moon asks for his things, and Constable Sanders says Moon will get them back when “we’re good and ready” (55). He does not intend to give back the rifle, which incenses Moon. The constable stops at a gas station for chewing tobacco for himself, but he will not allow Moon to use the bathroom though Moon says he needs to urinate. Constable Sanders tells Moon he is “militia trash” (56) and that Pap never cared about him. Moon threatens to get Pap’s other gun from hiding, and the constable pulls over in an angry huff.

When the constable opens the door, Moon attacks him, hitting, biting, and chewing. But Sanders grabs Moon around the waist and squeezes so hard that Moon is incapacitated. He is in pain and involuntarily urinates. He vomits and lies still and remains dizzy and woozy until Sanders puts him back in the car. A short time later they stop at a man’s house. Sanders tells Moon, “Show you what it’s like to own things, boy” (58). A man named Allen tells Sanders he can pay him soon, but Sanders hits the man in the face. He indicates the man’s house is on land Sanders was left from his own grandfather, so if Allen asked Sanders’s father, a judge, about paying late, it does not matter. Sanders drives away, telling Moon, “That’s white trash” (59).

Reporters try to ask Moon questions when he arrives at Pinson, the boys’ home run by Mr. Gene. A large Black man named Mr. Carter takes charge of Moon. Mr. Carter gathers a bright orange uniform and shoes for Moon and allows him into a bathroom to shower. Moon turns on the water, but it comes out cold. Mr. Carter tells Moon there are 21 boys at Pinson; “it ain’t so bad if you follow the rules” (63). Later, Mr. Carter looks at Moon’s arm where Sanders left him bruised and sore. Moon tells Mr. Carter he intends to get away and get to Alaska. Mr. Carter tells Moon to stop talking like that and to avoid getting into trouble. Moon agrees he will stop talking about it.