Break Neck Mountain

“Isn’t it a beautiful day Emily?” the old man said, holding his hiking sticks, one in each hand. He hit the trail head with a spring in his step that he hadn’t felt in decades. He carried a Blue Northern backpack, the same one he’d used to scale K-2 fifty years earlier when he was a spritely thirty year old man.  It was cold out, ten degrees, not counting a northern wind that blew around fifteen knots but the sky was clear, so perfectly blue that it stung the old man’s eyes just to look at it. His heart quickened a beat at the sight of the mountain in front of him, the same mountain he and Emily had hiked together on their honeymoon sixty years ago. He smelled the pine in the crispy, pure air and he heard a flock of geese squawking above, heading south as fast as they could.  He also heard music – someone nearby had a radio and Bob Dylan’s ‘Like a Rolling Stone’ was playing.

“Do you hear that Emily?” the old man shouted. “Remember when you and I danced to that song at Frankie and Elizabeth’s wedding?”

“How could I ever forget,” Emily said. “You wore that godawful cowboy hat you had bought in Texas when you were going through your cowboy phase.”

The old man chuckled. “I guess I’ve had a few phases now haven’t I?” the old man said.  

“I never told you this,” Emily said with a wink. “But I threw that old hat away not long after the wedding.”

“Why you devil,” the old man said playfully. He grabbed Emily and hugged her. “That’s why I love you so much. You never could keep a secret from me. Even though some secrets I guess take you sixty years to confess.”

 As the Dylan song played the old man began to sing and Emily put her hands to her ears.

“You’re killing me!” she shouted. The old man grabbed her and wrapped her in an embrace and they danced on the trail, swaying to the music as the wind rustled through the trees.

A young couple coming off the trail head saw the old man dancing and they chuckled. He danced as if he didn’t have a care in the world.  The old man was oblivious to them as they approached him.

“You look like you’re having a wonderful day,” the young man said.

Startled, the old man stopped singing and dancing and it took him a minute to get his bearings.

“I’m having the best day of my life,” the old man said. “I haven’t felt this great in years.”

“Make sure you’re careful up there,” the young man said. “A front is coming through and snow’s coming.”

“We’ll be fine,” the old man said. “Emily and I have hiked this mountain a hundred times. We came here on our honeymoon before your parents were probably even born. Isn’t that right my dear?”

Emily smiled at him and winked at him again.

“Are you sure you’re ok sir?” the young man asked.

“Absolutely,” the old man said. “We’re just going hike up and come right back down. You folks have a grand day.”

With that the old man turned with Emily and began his hike up the steep trail.

He wore a pair of his old khaki hiking pants with long johns underneath. The pants were loose fitting, his belt tightened to the last notch but they still sagged. His jacket was an old goose down filled thing that had once been orange but had long since faded to a dull brown. He wore a stocking cap to cover his head that was covered with the wispiest thin of white hair. 

“I should have thrown that jacket away too come to think of it,” Emily said. “That’s about the sorriest excuse for a coat I think I’ve ever seen.”

The old man laughed. “I can forgive the hat my dear,” he said. “But getting rid of this jacket would have been unforgiveable.” It was his turn to give her a wink.

They turned and started up the rocky trail. The pines towered above them and there were patches of snow scattered about in the shadows of the trees. They were about a quarter mile up the trail when they came upon a little lake that had still not frozen over.

“Would you look at that?” he said to Emily. “Remember when this was just a stream running through here? Now it’s a damned lake.”

“Darling,” Emily said. “Sixty years is a rather long time.” She paused a moment as if trying to find a memory. “I seem to recall us catching quite a few fish when we were here.”

“We did!” the old man exclaimed. “I taught you how to fly fish.”

“I also seem to recall that I caught a few more fish than you,” she smiled and batted her eyes and the old man felt the butterflies flit through his belly like he did when he saw her at the soda fountain all those years ago.  

“Now don’t go rubbing it in,” the old man said. “I also seem to remember a girl who didn’t have the stomach for cleaning all those fish.”

Emily punched him in the shoulder and kissed him on the cheek. She put her arm around his shoulders as they soldiered on up the path.  They came up to the base of steep cliff that soared at least three hundred feet straight above them. The trail they planned to take was a series of switchbacks right up that mountain. The local Coloradan’s called it Break Neck Mountain.

His thoughts floated aimlessly through his head and the picture of his son Frankie kept coming to the top. He felt a surge of sadness grip him.

“Do you still miss him?” the old man asked. As if she could read his mind she nodded her head and the old man thought he saw a tear at the corner of her eye.

“I think about him all the time,” Emily said.  

“God took him too early,” the old man said. Emily hugged him tighter and he felt his knees go weak. The memories of Frankie flooded his mind and he started to weep.

Emily wiped away his tears and held his face in her hands and stared deep into his eyes.

“Remember the silly way he used to dance?” Emily asked. “The way his used to gyrate those hips? Remember those silly faces he used to make when you gave him the sour balls from the vending machine at the grocery store? Remember the look in his eyes when we held him just before he passed?”

The old man nodded and thought his heart would burst at the love he felt from her at that moment.

“It’s important to remember. It keeps him alive in your heart. It's how we know we're not alone.” They stood and held each other and the old man had no idea how much time had passed.  

They started moving up the trail again and the old man noticed the sky was darkening and the air was colder.  A storm was coming and his legs were starting to hurt. He needed a quick break. He sat on a rock and Emily sat beside him. He slid the backpack off his shoulders and reached in and took out two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.  Snow began to fall in horizontal sheets.

“I made your favorite lunch,” the old man said. “Jiff’s peanut butter with some Smucker’s Strawberry Jam.”

Emily smiled at him but she made no effort to reach for the sandwich.

“Aren’t you hungry?” he asked her.

She gazed into his eyes. The sky grew even darker and the old man began to hear wolves howling somewhere close by.  

“I hope you know how much I love you,” Emily said.  

The wind stiffened and the old man shivered. He pulled his arms in close to his body. Emily didn’t look cold at all.

And that’s when he heard a faint voice in his head. It was a voice he hadn’t heard in years. He used to hear it all the time – it used to be loud and clear and it would speak to him whenever he thought about something, or read something, or whenever he tried to reason out a problem.

“Emily’s been dead for twenty years,” the voice said to him.

The old man shook his head and Emily was fading in front of him like mist. She mouthed one final word before she was gone forever.

“Hurry.”

The old man screamed into the darkening sky. The wolves were closer now and he could hear them howling into the wind as the wind blew what felt like near hurricane force winds.

“Where have I been for the past twenty years?” the old man asked.

“I don’t know,” the voice in his head said. “But it was dark there. And it was silent.”