Storm Catcher

STORM CATCHER

Humidity blanketed central Mississippi, clinging to life and choking its pores.

Justin and Emily’s inaugural harvest was the catalyst for their determined agenda. Mother Nature obliged the urban transplants. Through osmosis, they sprouted their own roots of internal growth. Working the land side by side was more therapeutic than weekly couch sessions with professional grief counselors.

The couple’s synergy focused on fifteen rows of organically-grown tomatoes. Persistence was ready to divvy up her trophies to the reigning champs over summer’s toughest challengers: fire ants, relentless heat and nutrient-starved soil.

In the final bout, another contender lurked beyond heaven's shadow, seeking subjugation. The sun beamed its predictable warmth through stationary alabaster clouds, while in the distant sky, impending volatile storms were harnessed like wild stallions forced into abidance by an evil warlord.

An edge of shade from row ten granted slight relief. Nine rows harvested in less than five hours and scarcely a ten-minute water break claimed. Now only six rows remained—awaiting release from their vines, stretched thin from weeks of nourishing citron green buttons into luscious red-skinned wonders.

Justin pulled a hand towel from his shirtless coveralls and absorbed beads of sweat from his chest. "I'll go hitch up the trailer. We'd better load up soon in case the storm moves our way." His straw hat was tipped low, shadowing the permanent sadness in his eyes. He brushed the brim up slightly and stopped to gaze at Emily.

"You’d better grab the parkas just in case." Emily turned her perspiration-licked face up toward the heat-stoked air to focus on the western horizon. Her head was framed with long, dark amber hair, braided and hidden from the sun. "And maybe a few more bottles of water." She smiled at him, fanning her tomato-stained tee shirt.

Justin hopped onto the well-preserved tractor. "Okay, be right back." He resurrected the relic after being left for dead by its forgotten owner. His body swayed in sync with the tractor as it retreated across the softened ruts of the well-trodden path. He glanced up at their Acadian home, wrapped in generous sun porches, lined with seldom-used antique rockers at the southern edge of Paradise, patiently waiting to relieve their tired bones.

Justin's determination and Emily's faith meshed with the land, thriving and nurturing with mutual ease. In their previous life, Justin had reaped the benefits of a successful investment analyst and Emily thrived in the high profile arena of corporate banking. They found each other inside that world four years earlier. After the attack on the World Trade Center, dumping it all for a simpler life was more appealing than continuing as if nothing had changed. Justin’s older brother, Mike, and her sister, Beth, were both gone now, like so many others. Evenings of consoling each other could not extinguish their grief, renewed daily by walking the granite canyons of New York.

With open minds and grieving hearts, they rediscovered God and the perfect country home, offering a fresh start in Mississippi's farming heartland, close enough to Memphis for Justin's parents to make monthly visits, yet far removed from corporate structure.

Emily crept gently through the corridor of towering feathery bushes, retrieving dozens of natures plump jewels from each fuzzy stalk. Her wide-brimmed hat and the seven-foot tall bushes concealed the ominous clouds rapidly approaching from the northwest. Advancing dry breeze brought forth a sigh of relief. "Thank you, God," she murmured to no one except Him.

Justin entered the rustic kitchen to a screaming phone. He grabbed the receiver while plucking a few grapes from a nearby fruit bowl. "Paradise Farm," he answered while wiping the sweet juice from his lip.

"Hi Son."

"Oh, hi Dad, what's up?"

"Your mom and I are concerned about that storm. Looks like it's headed your way."

"We're watching it. We've been harvesting all day. I just came back to get the trailer so we can pull everything into the barn. We'll stop if it gets too close," Justin said, while chomping on another grape.

"Don't fool around out there, Son. Some twisters have been spotted along the storm's path."

Justin sighed under his breath. Ever since Mike's untimely death, Justin had tried to convince his parents he would outlive them both. The move to Mississippi granted them a license to monitor his commitment. They’d probably always worry.

"Okay, Dad, thanks for the heads up. I'd better get back to Emily. I'll call tonight."

Justin hung up, snatched two bottled waters and stuffed a cluster of grapes inside his bib pocket as he bolted out the back door. Sprouting raindrops reminded him of Emily's request, so he darted back, yanked two rain parkas off the back porch coat hooks and headed for the barn.

Emily plucked armfuls of ripened tomatoes while losing herself in meditative thought. A sudden wind gust blew through adjacent vines, animating them into spidery tentacles, lashing out until twisted and conjoined. The wind exploded into a micro-burst as yet-to-be harvested specimens became airborne projectiles detonated against the same vines that nurtured their growth. Emily stood frozen, watching two unfilled baskets twirl with pinwheel accuracy. Subsequently, her prized crop spewed from within its cylindrical confines, mimicing a gushing oil well of fleshy tomato salsa. Ravaging wind ripped the floppy hat from her head and propelled it into a vagabond rotation. Every bush on the row flattened outwardly, forced to the ground and creating chorus line limbs that placed her at the center of an inescapable bull's eye. With full unobstructed vision, she gazed up at the impending challenger, as if an ant about to be sucked up by a malevolent lawnmower.

Accepting her fate, she fell to her knees to pray for God's absolution and the salvation of her soul, before succumbing to the storm's vortex.

Justin pulled the flatbed trailer through the barn's erratically-swinging wooden doors. The structure trembled from the crack of the oppressor's whip, corralling the wild steeds overhead and firing large rounds of hail bullets down upon him.

"Emily!" Impervious to the onslaught of skin-piercing ice stones, Justin dropped the trailer to straddle mount the tractor seat. He jerked the equipment into compliance, bouncing frantically through the uncooperative ruts. He charged closer to the spot the twister had claimed. Only minutes ago, Emily was standing there, at the farthest edge of row ten. Now, all he could see was hell's umbilical cord attached to overhead darkness, frosting the sky with terror.

"Emily, where are you? Emily? Just make a noise, any kind of sound, Emily, please?"

The wind tunnel swayed nearly stationary, defiling everything in its path. Surreally, he watched the gaseous wedge of wickedness violate their virgin land.

"Emily, please answer me," Justin's voice echoed panic and hope.

He scanned for clues to trace her last moments. A frayed piece of her hat wedged into an uprooted bush, provided a sliver of hope. Grateful to find a shred of her existence, he plucked the tattered remnant of woven straw and held it to his chest.

Justin scanned the green and red checkered explosion of wrath layered beneath him, yielding no clues. The leaching tornado was his enemy, compelling him to challenge it. This brotherless son, this financier of world trade, this novice farmer, was newly-defined by his most challenging career: STORM CATCHER!

Emily had often prayed in those fields. God's love had been clearly felt and duly honored in that very spot. The vile-wraithed entity had to be held accountable for blatantly desecrating their sacred place. Steadfastly refusing to accepting his loss, Justin faced his adversary. His adrenalin surged, pumping his heart hard enough to burst an overripe grape wedged inside his bib pocket, anointing him to knighthood with nature’s baptism.

"You wicked abomination, give her back. Emily doesn't belong to you, so let her go. God is here with us and you are powerless against Him." Justin fearlessly stood his ground on the flattened vines, and felt Emily's faith lingering in the wind.

"God please help us. Please save Emily," he pleaded while gazing up beyond the blackened sky.

Radiant energy swooped down and surged the horizon in a split-second flash as electrified fingers combed the sky and lassoed the spiraling-spurred Tasmanian devil. An internal wrestling match ensued within its wicked walls. Beams of iridescence burst through, piercing the monster's noxious belly from inside. What once was gaseous, swirling rancor became luminous, passive mist. The howling winds were silenced by the gentle whisper of temperate breezes. The incubus was banished back to hell.

Justin approached the perimeter of his fading foe, heart pounding and hoping for a clue about Emily.

Within the inner vortex of the once destructive whirlpool, there knelt Emily, unchanged since the moment she gave herself to God. With faithful eyes forever closed and reverent head humbly bowed, she had been spared knowledge of her forever twisting fate. Emily opened her eyes and slowly rose to her feet.

"Emily?" Justin whispered softly in disbelief.

"Justin?"

"Emily, is it really you?"

"Yes, Justin, I'm here. What happened?"

He pulled her to his chest and began to breathe. "You were spared only by the grace of God."

"The tornado?"

"Disappeared completely after a powerful lightening bolt blew it apart from the inside. Didn't you realize what was happening inside that thing?"

"The last thing I remember is praying for God's will to embrace me. It was over for me at that point. And then I experienced a kind of euphoria that guided me to a beautiful place and to...Beth and Mike."

"Beth and Mike?"

"They told me they were assisting in the Lord's work, helping us to seek our true path. I now understand so much, especially our move here. Mike mentioned something about summer camp. He said you'd remember."

"Summer camp? Oh my God! I had completely forgotten. Good old Double Oak Ranch. It's a deserted place on the lake about ten miles from here. We spent a couple of summers there. Mike once told me it held some of his fondest childhood memories. He even joked about going back there one day and buying the old place. Subliminally, I must have taken comfort in his words."

"Yes, he takes full credit for the inspiration to move here. Just as Beth provoked my spiritual journey. I've been flooded with memories of our late night talks while gazing endlessly at the star-studded sky. Sometimes we solved the world's problems by sprinkling our home-grown prayer dust over mutually-agreed individuals, families, neighborhoods, cities and sometimes, even whole countries--whomever needed it. Then we would pray for them to accept our good intentions into their lives and just let the star dust do its job. Sometimes, we were rewarded with answered prayers. I remember once we prayed for Lynn Reilly's dad. He had inoperable cancer. We aimed our prayer dust at him for four straight weeks; on the twenty-ninth day, he went into remission. Beth always inspired the faith within me, and that's what I still draw from."

"I thought you had been sucked up into oblivion and shredded until the life was beat out of you. Instead, you emerge untouched, with a glow on your cheeks, telling me you had a conversation with Beth and Mike. And I utterly believe it." He deliberately retained every contour of her face while gently stroking her flushed cheeks, afraid she might dissolve before him with all the answers.

"Justin, I've discovered that our souls can take a wonderful journey. It takes us further each day as we nurture our relationship with God. Birth is the beginning of the journey, and if our souls can remain faithful, they will ultimately take us where we long to be."

They supported one another as they walked down the gnarled path of destruction. Oblivious, they stepped through spewed remains of once-palatable treasures.

They reached the end of the row and headed toward the house. The rhythmic unison of grateful steps brought significance to the land beneath their feet. After a few yards, Justin stopped. He took instant notice of the dozen bushel baskets still filled to the brim with hand-picked harvests.

"They're all still here. All of the filled baskets!"

He ran back toward rows seven and eight. The vines were perfect. Incredulously, everything on row nine was standing just as before. He pondered the full implication of the event. Enthusiasm propelled him back to row ten, the only one destroyed. He ran to the five remaining rows of yet-to-be harvested tomatoes. After disappearing for several moments, he re-emerged.

"They're all still here. Only row ten is destroyed. And quite well at that," he yelled while racing back toward her.

His revelation was as profound as hers. Was it conceivable that the tornado had been fully contained within row ten?

Emily staggered a few paces and fell to her knees. Justin raced to her side and joined her in grateful prayer. The sun re-emerged and bathed their conjoined shoulders. Together they knew they could overcome anything the future held, on the terra firma of Paradise or in the midst of Manhattan's fallen ashes.