chapter 23

Heathcliff and Catherine

Tuesday, April 16

I’m early to lit circle for literally the first time ever and, while I wait for everyone else to arrive, find myself skimming my now well-worn copy of Wuthering Heights. For me, Wuthering Heights has always been one of those novels prone to transformation with repeated readings, but as I glance at a particularly compelling passage from the early pages of the book, I realize it’s not the story that’s changed.

I’m the one who’s grown.

I was thirteen the first time I read Bronte’s seminal masterpiece. Having only read a handful of other classic works of literature by which to compare it, I’d been discouraged by Heathcliff and Catherine’s unrealized love affair. I fixated upon the story’s main character, certain Heathcliff would eventually metamorphosize into the classic, romantic hero I’d been envisioning: dark and brooding at the start, fiercely loyal and adoring by the end. Of course, he never did and I was devastated, tossing the book aside, certain its pages held nothing more for me.

The following summer, out of boredom and lack of inspiration, I’d reread the book, more cautiously this time knowing Heathcliff would remain malevolent and abusive until his death. Through this filter I was able to concentrate on other facets of the work, most importantly Edgar, Catherine’s dutiful husband, whose cowardice and naivety made him as unlikable as Heathcliff. This rereading provided little insight about the true nature of love I’d been expecting to find, and only served to reaffirm my disappointment.

When Leonetta mentioned Wuthering Heights was on our spring reading schedule for lit circle, I’d initially balked, as this particular Bronte sister had always left me wanting. But the selection was the selection, and I convinced myself fresh insight might be gained through discussion with this new groups of friends.

“Wuthering Heights is two love stories in one. True or false?” Mrs. Alexander begins once everyone has arrived.

Rashida speaks up immediately. “True. Heathcliff and Catherine. The younger Catherine and Hareton.”

“Anyone disagree? Anyone argue it’s only Heathcliff and Catherine’s story?”

Everyone shakes their heads. “Two love stories,” Will says, giving a thumbs-up to Rashida.

Mrs. Alexander looks pleased with our assessment. “If that’s the case, what’s the point? There has to be a reason Bronte chose to present us with two love stories in this one novel.”

“We’re obviously supposed to compare them,” Lashanda says. “One’s good. One’s bad. One works out and one doesn’t.”

A murmur of agreement floats around the room.

“But why?”

I consider Mrs. Alexander’s question—why Heathcliff and Catherine were never able to find happiness together while the younger Catherine and Hareton were. And suddenly it hits me.

“Heathcliff and Catherine never embrace change,” I say. “Young Catherine and Hareton do.”

Mrs. Alexander beams at me. “Go on,” she says.

I’m still mulling it over, flipping through the novel for an example to share when Leonetta pipes up.

“Heathcliff and Catherine act like children their entire lives,” she says. “They never grow up. Their feelings for each other never mature. They keep fixating on what they had as kids, the relationship of their youth, but instead of growing up and becoming mature adults who deal with change effectively, they stay frozen and that’s why they can never pull it together.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Roy pipes up. “Like how Catherine keeps going on about wanting to go back to the moors where she was a kid and doesn’t remember much of her life since she was twelve.”

“A grown woman would make her decision and go with it,” Rashida adds. “Either go all in with the highfalutin guy and give up on Heathcliff altogether or choose love and say screw society and its class system. But she waffles between both without committing to either. She needs to change and she doesn’t.”

“Heathcliff is no better,” Leonetta adds. “He carries the same grudges with him from childhood all the way to his deathbed. He never accepts change; he lets it tear him apart which is why he never turns into the proper romantic hero we expect him to become.”

Listening silently to the group’s spot-on analysis, I’m struck by the lesson Bronte is attempting to teach us about love. What she’s been attempting to teach us all along.

Love which doesn’t grow and accept change is destined for destruction.

Oh, God.

Zander.

There was a point, before Connor’s bonfire party, when our relationship shifted. Hormones were probably to blame, but the sad truth is we did begin to see one another as more than the friends we’d always been. Looking back now, it’s obvious. The way he would linger outside the barn on evenings he knew I was out there, making up reasons to come around. The times I caught him staring at me in math class instead of solving for Y. The way he’d casually find ways to brush against me, letting his hand rest against mine a little too long.

Then that night happened. The cornfield. The blood. And everything after.

Someway, somehow, we’d both decided without a word between us we could never be together in that way.

Our love could never grow from childhood friendship into something more.

We would always be just friends.

Love which doesn’t grow and accept change is destined for destruction.

But now our separation has stripped away the complexities of friendship to reveal a simple truth. I’m capable of loving him in a different way. In an adult way, with romance and passion and longing.

How easy it would be to act upon this revelation if he still lived next door.

If only I wouldn’t have squandered our final years together platonically instead of exploring the possibility of becoming a romantic couple. Why did we even care what the people in town thought, with their righteous stares and presumptuous natures? We should have let them talk. Let them say what they would about the two of us. Because we knew the truth—what we had together was pure and wholesome and true.

It was okay for love to change from something simple and childlike to something deeper and far more complicated.

Not changing would be the destructive thing.

These truths crash down upon me, consuming me whole in the way my dad always warned the feed would should I ever find myself trapped inside the silo. It spills over my head, building around me, threatening to suffocate me if I don’t keep pushing myself to the surface. It might be easier to surrender myself to it. To let it all overtake me.

To allow myself to love him.

“You okay?” Leonetta whispers, breaking me from my trance. A line of sweat has beaded along my brow.

I look at her, her soulful, ebony eyes full of compassion and concern.

“I don’t know,” I stammer. And I seriously don’t know. What I am certain of is I don’t want to be here anymore. Here at lit circle. Here at M.A. Hopkins Senior High School. Here in Fayetteville. I want to be in my barn or up my tree. Anywhere but here.

I stand without making eye contact with anyone else in the room, especially Mrs. Alexander who’ll block me from leaving if given the opportunity. I gather my books hastily into my arms and run for the door. After skidding into the hallway, I make a beeline out to the student parking lot.

By the time I get there, Leonetta is already waiting for me, leaning against the hood of my car.

“Shortcut,” she says as I approach. “There’s a delivery corridor behind the closest stairwell to Mrs. Alexander’s room. Comes out right over there.” She nods toward a door on the side of the building, not twenty feet from where we’re standing.

Despite the storm raging inside me, I grin at her. She’s a good friend. A great friend. I should’ve known she’d come after me.

“What’s going on?” she asks as I sidle up beside her.

I consider saying ‘nothing’ and leaving it at that. I don’t want to talk about my epiphany, but I can’t lie to her. She’ll see right through me.

“You remember the guy, Zander, my friend from back in Iowa?”

“The one you talk about all the time?”

I glare at her. “Not all the time,” I say.

It’s her turn to raise an eyebrow at me.

“Okay, I talk about him sometimes,” I concede. But then I stop. I can’t find the words to go on.

“What about him?” Leonetta urges, nudging me with an elbow.

“I…” I’ve never said the words aloud and it’s harder than I thought it was going to be. “I love him,” I say finally.

She makes a small sound. A bit like a laugh but more like a contented coo, as if she’s a baby and I’ve been tickling her toes. “I know,” she says.

It feels almost like she’s punched me in the gut.

“You know?” I say. “How is that even possible? You’ve never even met him.”

She lays a hand on my shoulder, and if it had been anyone else doing it I would have thought it condescending, but since it’s Leonetta I’m certain she’s being sincere.

“Honey, that wistful look you get whenever you talk about him… There’s never been any doubt in my mind about your feelings for him.” She narrows her eyes at me, searching for something in the lines of my face. “Don’t tell me you’re just now figuring it out.”

Am I just now figuring it out?

“I’m afraid we might end up like Catherine and Heathcliff because we’re exactly like them, and I don’t want that for us. We were kids together. We grew up together. We have this thing between us that’s so much bigger than simple friendship. When Catherine says ‘I am Heathcliff,’ I totally relate. Because I am Zander, whether I want to be or not. I can’t separate myself from him because so much of who I am is tied to who he is. Our history is long and deep. But since we’ve been apart, things have changed.” I take a deep breath, surprised at how easily all of this is flowing out, but I focus, forcing myself to come to the point. “What destroyed Catherine and Heathcliff was their refusal to embrace change. They didn’t let their love mature. If my friendship with Zander is going to survive, it’s what we need to do.”

Leonetta shrugs. “So, you gonna tell him?”

My heart stops. “Tell him I love him?”

She slides off the hood of my car. “Yeah.”

“I don’t know if I can. At least not right now. Not while we’re so far apart.” She scowls at me. “I will, though, eventually. Maybe this summer if he comes to visit.”

“What if he never comes to visit?” she asks.

Tears pool in the corners of my eyes. “He’ll come,” I tell her. “He has to.”