Stormy Peaks
or the story of a new Cathy Earnshaw.
"If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be;
and if all else remained, and he were annihilated,
the universe would turn to a mighty stranger:
I should not seem a part of it."
Catherine Earnshaw
"Wuthering Heights" by Emily Brontë
Gatlinburg is a small town in Tennessee that, despite its small size, can attracts many tourists.
Like any small town, Gatlinburg has a special feature: each of its inhabitants know every little insignificant detail of the lives of their fellow citizen. Therefore it wasn't strange that when Emmett Dale McCarty disappeared on the evening of May 3, 1935, in less than an hour the whole neighborhood was aware of the fact.
That was the day when Cathy Stevenson received the biggest disappointment of her life.
3 May 1935, 7:57 p.m. - McCarty family's house
The small living room of the house was packed with people. While I was shaking from agitation, I absently wondered how could so many people be crammed into the tiny room.
I was sitting on the floor next to the couch and I embraced my legs with my arms. I rocked up and down, repeating to myself that it was all okay, as if it was a mantra. My skirt was creased, but in that moment the detail was irrelevant.
Beside me, sitting on the couch, my mother occasionally reached out to caress my cheek. My red ribbons, which had tied my hair with great care for all the day, were now loose, and my braids, expertly made that morning by my mother, were now sagging and my uncombed hair made me look like a cocker.
Another irrelevant detail.
My father was standing next to the small square table, where at that time usually the McCarty's had dinner, but in that moment the idea of eating hadn't crossed anyone's mind. The appetite had left.
Mr. McCarty and his brother were animatedly conversing with my father. Both were agitated and walked nervously back and forth, unable to stand still. I understood them, they were concerned about their children. I really wanted to get out of the house and run toward the woods.
The anxiety that hovered in the living room was due to the fact that Emmett and his cousin Henry were late. Both had left that afternoon to go to the woods for a hunt. A pastime among relatives that was now worring everyone.
They should have got back an hour earlier. The sun had set long ago and in the thicket of the trees was definitely dark.
Another tear escaped from my eyelashes and moistened my cheek. I couldn't imagine my Emmett lost in the woods, in the dark, cold, frightened.
I shivered.
My mother's hand settled immediately in my hair. "It's okay, honey," she whispered in my ear while I rocked up and down stronger than before, agitated.
The mothers of Emmett and Henry were sitting on the couch and were crying. They tried to stifle their sobs, but it was clear how much they were troubled. Their children hadn't returned. No one knew where they were.
The three men were discussing whether organizing som research groups.
"No," my father had exclaimed just a moment before. "It's too dark. Someone might get lost."
"We will ask for volunteers to help us out!" Emmett's father had screamed. "We will split in groups of three or four, so no one will ever be left alone."
"It's too dangerous!", my father had continued. "We cannot ask our neighbors to risk so much for us."
At that point my excitement skyrocketed. "Dad", I had cried, suddenly standing up. I wasn't able to bear his coldness anymore.
My father had turned to me and had stared at me with dazed expression.
"Please," I begged him, while the tears continued to fall down my cheeks. "Please, we have to find them."
My mother had grabbed my arm and pulled me toward her. "Cathy, my child...". I had turned to look at her, looked for a second at her distraught expression and had ritracted the arm abruptly. Then I had sat back on the floor, rocking up and down as before.
Only now I did realize how little my scene served. It seemed that nobody cared about me, about what I wanted. My fiancé was lost somewhere in the woods, but no one cared about what his seventeen-year-old girlfriend felt.
I felt invisible and it was horrible.
8:32 p.m.
The situation was still stalled. No one had done anything. My father and the McCartys were still debating what to do, but now they were sitting at the dining table.
About half an hour before, Emmett's father had called the police and explained the situation. On the phone, he was told that it was too dark and that it would have been dangerous to send someone in the woods. We would have to wait the next day for someone to go in search of the two boys.
When Mr. McCarty told everyone the answer which he had received, my hysteria reached its peak. Without thinking twice, I got up from the ground, stared for a second at the environment around me with eyes full of tears and ran out of the house, slamming the door behind me, regardless of manners. I ignored my mother calling me and my father's voice telling her to let me go: I was determined not to return.
I stood motionless on the porch for a few seconds, while copious tears flowed, then I sat down on the wooden rocking to try to calm down.
It was the worst thing I could do. Sitting on that rocking alone caused me severe pain in the chest. I planted my feet on the ground and tried with all my strength not to swing, but I couldn't.
The slow lull made millions of memories resurface in my mind. In the fresh spring afternoons Emmett and I always sat there, crouched on the cushioned rocking chair, while chatting or - always after a lot of my insistence - reading some novels together. My fiancé was a lover of books, but since we had engaged, he begun to appreciate them a little more because of my passion for novels.
But in that moment I was alone. I didn't feel the strong arms of Emmett and that caused me a sense of abandonment that I couldn't hold up.
My mind began to wander among my many thoughts and pulled out a memory of about a month before.
Emmett and I were sitting on that same swing as the sun set. The shadows lengthened as the sky turned red. I held the book open in my lap: at that time we were reading "Wuthering Heights" by Emily Brontë, that my best friend had recommended me.
We were reading the ninth chapter and we reached the point where Cathy - which ironically had the same name! - was arguing with Nelly - her nurse - about his impending marriage to Edgar Linton. The girl was explaining how the prospect of marrying the man scared her because she believed it wasn't the right choice. She confessed that she would become his wife only for his money, because she wanted to take Heathcliff away from his brother. Nelly told her he couldn't marry Linton for that reason, but Cathy replied that it was the best reason to do so, because she cared a lot about Heathcliff and believed that a piece of his soul was contained in her and vice versa.
Cathy was declaring his love for the boy to Nelly.
I read a passage out loud: ""If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger: I should not seem a part of it. My love for Linton is like the foliage in the woods: time will change it, I'm well aware, as winter changes the trees. My love for Heathcliff resembles the eternal rocks beneath: a source of little visible delight, but necessary."
Moved by those words, I closed the book while holding a sign with my finger and I leaned my head on Emmett's shoulder. His arms hold stronger and he kissed my hair.
"You know how much I hate love stories," he whispered with a hint of irony in his voice.
"Yes." Of course I knew. Emmett loved adventure novels: "Robinson Crusoe" by Daniel Defoe was his favorite book, but he had also begun to appreciate the science fiction novels of Jules Verne. Ever since the first time I had tried to read with him 'Pride and Prejudice' by Jane Austen and he complained saying that the plot was not to his liking, I hadn't tried to pour him some romance.
But we had absolutely to read "Wuthering Heights" together.
Emmett sighed. "And I despise this one even more because I don't see a happy ending to the story."
"Yeah," I replied, staring at the cover of the book.
"Yet," he continued, "I cannot but agree with Cathy Earnshaw."
I looked up and looked at his hazel eyes. "Really?".
Emmett nodded. "I understand her words, her feelings." He paused for a moment, then continued: "The world could crash around me, but I'd continue to live if you stayed with me. If the opposite happens - if you would go away - I think I'd die. I'd rather die. "
"Emmett..." I muttered, not knowing what to say. Maybe I wanted to tell him that he shouldn't covet death, because it was nonsense. He would have been able to survive very well without me, he would have found someone else.
Then I realized that I used to think the same about him. I couldn't live without my Emmett.
"It's the same for me," I finally said.
His sweet smile drew on his face, then he kissed me. The book slipped from my hands and fell on the floor of the porch with a thud.
That was one of the few kisses we had exchanged since we were officially engaged. It would have remained in my memory forever.
In that moment, sitting alone on the porch, in the faint light that filtered through the windows from inside the house, I felt the lack of Emmett's strong arms, there to protect me. I didn't feel the warmth of his body wrapping mine. I was alone in the cold. I cried.
All of a sudden my shadow drew on the wall of the house: the headlights of a car were pointing in my direction.
I turned towards the light, covering my eyes with one hand to avoid being blinded, then the lights turned off as the motor of the car. A shadow got out of the car and walked around, then opened the passenger door, from which another shadow emerged. The latter was higher and more robust than the first. Was it...
"Miss," cried the first shadow. He was a man.
"Yes", I replied, but my voice cracked.
"Does the McCarty family lives here?".
"Yes," I replied in a louder voice. My heart spoke to me, suggesting something, while my mind was trying to put it in silence. I couldn't hope. Not before I was sure that I understood whose was the other shadow.
I got up from the rocking chair and went down the stairs of the porch, approaching the two silhouettes. When I was about thirty feet away from them, I recognized the higher shadow.
My heart leapt for a second and a smile made its way to my lips. It was Emmett! He was back, safe and sound!
I increased the pace to approach them faster. I stumbled once, but I managed to find the balance immediately and continued to advance.
"I found this guy in the street," the man continued in the meantime, while I shortened the distance between me and them. "He told me his name was Henry McCarty and showed me the way to bring him home."
I stopped a few feet from them, in the midst of the garden, staring at the two shadows. I still couldn't see their faces because we were immersed in the dark.
My heart leapt again, threatening to stop.
Henry? That was Henry?
Where was Emmett?
"The boy is shocked, it is best that you let him come in," said the man. He walked over to me, helping the boy to walk as a crutch, and passed me, heading for the house.
I didn't move an inch while the two were passing on my side. The idea of helping the man to bring in Henry didn't touched my mind. I continued to stare in front of me with a blank stare, while tears fell down copious because of deep disappointment. It seemed to me that I stood still for an infinite time.
Suddenly I woke up from my coma and turned back. It was only a few seconds. The man was helping the boy, wrapped in a blanket, up the steps of the porch.
"Wait!" I exclaimed. There was something wrong. Where was Emmett?
They both stopped. I joined them.
"Henry," I called him, staring into his eyes. The boy's expression was terrified.
"Henry, what happened? Where's Emmett?" I asked. The tone of my voice was maybe too high.
"Emmett...," he murmured. "A bear... we couldn't avoid it... ". His voice seemed to come from beyond the grave. It was as if his mouth was disconnected from the brain and moved by itself.
"What happened?" I shouted, grabbing the blanket and shaking it violently, while drops fell from my eyes and from the sky.
"The beast attacked him. Emmett was wounded. He fell to the ground."
"And you left him there?" I exclaimed, as the door of the house opened and my father came out.
"Henry," cried, then went down the stairs and came toward us, hugging the boy and thanking the man who had brought him with his car. Then Henry was brought inside the house and the man went back to the car.
I was alone in the garden in the rain, which begun to fall heavily. I didn't move while the car engine and the lights were turned on and the man went away. I froze when I heard the screams of despair coming from Emmett's parents from inside the house.
A bear had attacked my Emmett. Henry said they couldn't to avoid it. Why? Why had they reached the point of being so close to that animal? Why had they been so careless?
Henry said that Emmett had fallen to the ground after the attack. He had left him there. Why? "Was he dead? Was Henry sure? Or had he fled in panic?
Perhaps he hadn't made sure that he was dead. Maybe Emmett was still alive.
He was lost in the woods, wounded, waiting for someone to save him.
I stood there for a while, waiting for someone - my mother or my father - to came out and brought me into the house, consoling my tears. But the door didn't open.
They had forgotten me.
My family could live without me? They could live without Emmett?
I could not.
Some words flashed to my mind.
"If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger: I should not seem a part of it."
I couldn't live without Emmett. He was the only reason for my existence. My days would have been empty, full of sadness and pain. I would have never found someone else that could make me smile like Emmett could. No one could entertain me more than him.
I would no longer felt part of the universe, as Heathcliff without Cathy.
In that moment I made a decision: I was going to look for my boyfriend, even till the world's ends.
I turned toward the forest, running along the road passing in front of the house. The trees projected a dark shadow against the sky, which was a slightly lighter gray. I could barely see the outline of the foliage, illuminated by the faint light of the moon.
Despite the dismal spectacle that showed at me, I felt no fear. I was determined and that was enough to put me courage.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, then walked toward the dense trees and whatever fate the cold and dark woods reserved for me.
It was since the dawn that the agent Garrett walked in the woods. It was now two hours he kept Cindy on a leash, a six year old female German shepherd, while the dog continued to pull in the direction of the wake left by the girl.
John Stevenson was with him, looking forward to hug his daughter. Garrett had tried to persuade the man not to come with him, telling him that they could find Cathy dead, because she had gone for ten hours now. But he didn't want to listen to reasons; Garrett had failed to insist more and in the end he acquiesced to the request.
Agent Smith walked a few hundred meters away from them. He was keeping a hound on a leash too, but they were following the trail left by Emmett McCarty.
Suddenly, Cindy began to pull harder. Garrett was forced to increase the pace to keep up.
Even John Stevenson begun to run. "She smelled something?" he asked with a glimmer of hope in his voice.
Garrett couldn't bring himself to break the man's confidence. "Maybe," he replied cautiously. He could neither confirm nor deny.
They walked for about two hundred meters, then Cindy turned around a tree.
Nestled among the huge roots, there was a brown-haired girl. Her hair was all disheveled and red ribbons were hanging on her shoulders.
"Cathy," cried John Stevenson, then flung on the girl.
"Wait!" Garrett stopped him, holding him by the arm. He dodged the man and walked over to Cathy, while Cindy, sitting beside him, was wagging his tail proudly.
The girl's face was cadaverous. Her lips had a bluish tint. The agent pressed two fingers to see if there was jugular pulse. He felt a weak and irregular pulse.
"She's alive," he cried heartened. "She has a beginning of hypothermia, we have to hurry."
At the news, John flung himself back on the daughter, wrapped her in the blanket he had brought with him and lifted her up.
Agent Smith came out from behind the tree with his dog. "You found the girl?" he asked comforted, seeing Cathy in the arms of his father.
"Yes, thank goodness," said Garrett. He pointed to the hound with a nod of the head. " Has Patrick sensed something here around?".
"Yes," replied Smith. "But the trail stops at fifty yards from here."
Cathy was semiconscious. She was able to hear what the agent had said, and images occurred to her mind because of those words.
She was in the thick of the forest, not far from there. It was really dark, and she could remember she had never been in a place so dark. The fear hadn't touched her, at least for the moment.
Suddenly she found herself in a clearing where the trees were less dense and the moonlight could penetrate that far below. Drops of water were falling from above, and had her hair wet, but she couldn't figure out if it was still raining or if that water came from the branches of the trees. Looking ahead, she saw a crouched figure. Cathy had moved a few feet to the left to see it better.
A girl - was she blonde? - was squatting on something. Or, rather, someone.
She had moved a little, revealing to Cathy who was lying on the ground. She saw dark curls.
Emmett!, she exclaimed in her mind. She opened her mouth, but she couldn't make a sound.
The blonde lifted Emmett and had him in her arms like he was a baby. Cathy was appalled. How could that girl lift him? Emmett was sturdy! His size was almost double of the blonde!
Cathy wanted to advance towards them, but couldn't move a single muscle. She was terrified. Who was that girl?
Suddenly the blonde and Emmett disappeared. One moment they were there and the next... there were no more.
Cathy leaped and a second later she was running - to the limit of her physical strength - to the point where the two were before. She walked a few tens of meters, then had stumbled. Probably she hit her head on some root because everything turned black.
In that moment, in the arms of his father, Cathy couldn't say with certainty whether the memories of that event were real or she had imagined everything. While shivering in the cold, she wondered if she had gone mad.
With the ear placed on the chest of her father, she could feel his strong and regular pulse. That pulse was an incentive for Cathy, a spurred to fight to stay alert.
"Hold on, my child," he whispered his father in her ear. "I'll take you home."