Chapter 2, Part 1 Summary

A moving van pulls up to one of the grey buildings on Brewster. It is winter and Mattie Michael is moving in. She notices her apartment will not have much sun and she thinks about all the houseplants she has brought with her from her last house where she has lived for the past thirty years. Entering the building, she catches a cooking odor that reminds her at first of freshly cut sugar cane. The smell takes her back to Tennessee and a memory, her beginning - Papa, Basil and Butch, and eventually her journey to Brewster Place.

Mattie is a young girl outside in the yard feeding the chickens. Butch Fuller is hanging around flirting with her trying to get her to laugh. Mattie knows her father thinks Butch is a "no-'count ditch hound." Her father has repeatedly warned her...