Chapter Sixteen #3
He stood there for a moment. Finally, he took a small step toward me, his arms outstretched as if to grab me.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
He stiffened, his eyes widening as he stammered, “I—I…” His voice faltered as he searched for words.
“Were you sleeping out here?” I asked, noticing the blanket bunched up beside him, his notebook resting on the edge of the bench, and a half-empty bottle of water at his feet.
He ran his hands over his face before exhaling a deep breath. “Yeah.”
“Why?” I asked, but I knew the answer. I knew before he said it. I could see it in his eyes, a look that Daddy had given me the first time he caught me sleepwalking. “You know,” I said, barely hearing the words myself. “You know that I sleepwalk. Did you catch me doing it?”
Jackson nodded.
“How long have you known?” I asked, my heart pounding in my chest.
Jackson hesitated before responding. “Since the first bonfire.”
Noises blurred and my throat tightened. Jackson couldn’t know this about me. I thought I was being careful, barricading my door at night. “Why didn’t you say something? How many times have you caught me?”
Jackson moved toward the door. “Let’s go inside.”
The warmth of the room contrasted starkly with the chill of the night air. I collapsed onto the bed, my mind racing as I faced him. “What happened?” I asked, my voice laced with embarrassment.
“Leigh…”
“I want to know. Please.”
Jackson settled into the chair next to the bed, his arms resting on his knees, his expression serious but soft. “I couldn’t sleep, so I went for a walk. I looked up and you were there, standing in the field.”
“What was I doing?” I asked, gripping the edge of the bed as if it could anchor me.
“Nothing,” he replied quickly. “You were just standing there, staring into the darkness. I came over to you, and you put your hands on my chest. You were freezing, so I carried you back here.”
“And then?”
“I put you in bed.”
“Is that it?” I asked, fearful of the answer.
He looked away. “You were sleepwalking. You didn’t know what you were doing.”
“What did I do?” A shiver ran down my spine.
“You kissed—”
I raised my hand to stop him, my face warming. “We didn’t—”
“No, of course not,” he said quickly. “I would never take advantage of you like that. I didn’t touch you,” he said. His emphasis on the pronouns suggested my fear was correct: My dream hadn’t been a dream after all.
“I’m so sorry, Jackson.” I lowered my head in shame.
“There’s nothing to be sorry about. You haven’t sleepwalked since then.”
I furrowed my brow, looking back up at him.
“I come check on you a few times during the night. Sometimes I stay.”
“You did that? It’s been a month.”
“I don’t mind. I wanted to. I want to.”
“Why would you do that?”
“I want you to be safe,” he said. And I knew he meant every word.
I felt it. Jackson had been my silent guardian all this time, protecting me in ways I hadn’t even known.
He had been so many things to me—a friend, a protector, a confidant, and so much more.
But I couldn’t handle his goodness. It triggered me because I wasn’t good.
I remembered I was angry at myself. Jackson was what good looked like. Not me.
“Please stop doing that!” I started pacing the room.
“Stop what?”
“Being…being so good. I don’t deserve it.”
“Why would you say that?”
“Because I don’t. I’m not a good person. You don’t know me, Jackson. You don’t know what I’ve done.”
“Leigh…what’s wrong? Why are you so upset?”
I couldn’t stand still. I paced the room, feeling the walls close in. “I didn’t want you to know that about me. Not that.”
“What? That you sleepwalk? There’s nothing wrong with that.”
I stopped, turning to face him. “It’s not the sleepwalking. It’s why I started sleepwalking in the first place.”
“Leigh…talk to me. What’s wrong?”
“I saw myself today at the Outlet. Not Deacon Ridley. Not Mama. Not Daddy,” I said, the words tumbling out in a rush.
“You went to the Outlet today? Why?”
“Tibb said I was blocked and that he thought it would help.”
“That’s why you’re so upset,” he said to me but more for himself. “What did the Outlet show you?” He knew I’d learned something, because he’d been there himself.
I took a shaky breath. “That…that I’m angry. I’m so angry!” I clenched my fists, the rage simmering underneath my skin. My entire body tightened with the pressure of emotion rising from deep within me.
Jackson stepped toward me. “Why? Why are you angry?”
“I don’t know!” My voice cracked as I shouted, my breath in ragged bursts. I wanted to scream but the words wouldn’t come. I felt as if I was choking on my own emotions, drowning in them.
“You do know,” Jackson insisted, his tone firm.
“Feel it and let it come up. Why are you angry? Tell me.” It was the harshest he had ever been with me, the most pressure he had ever applied.
But I knew it wasn’t out of anger. It was from knowing the hardest part of the journey was the moment you faced the truth.
“Because…because…” The words and the truth fought to break free, but they were stuck, tangled, caught in a place I couldn’t reach. “I don’t…”
Jackson positioned himself directly in front of me. He stared into my eyes, and I saw the quiet determination in them. He wasn’t going to let me off the hook. “This is it, Leigh. What you’ve been working toward. And we’re there. You are there. Say it.”
“Because I couldn’t save them!”
There it was—what had been lodged deep inside me. What the work, the walks, the yoga, everything had worked loose. What the Outlet uncovered. I was angry with myself because I couldn’t save my family.
Without saying a word, Jackson pulled me to the bed and sat in the chair next to it. He didn’t push me to speak but offered an invitation to share. It was a steady presence, trust, he extended. It was as if he was waiting for me to open up, to share the burden that had been choking me for so long.
That was when I knew I would tell him what had happened to my family.
Maybe I’d known the moment I set the axe down at the Outlet.
Maybe even earlier. He had given me the space to do so, the opportunity to finally let it go.
We had reached the end of this journey together, and it was now time for me to trust him.
“They’re dead.”
“Who?” he asked.
“My entire family. I watched them die.”
I curled up on the bed, drawing the quilt up to my chin.
“I’ve been sleepwalking since I was twelve years old,” I began, my voice trembling.
“After Mama started sleeping with Deacon Ridley.” Jackson already knew some of this, was already aware of the Deacon Ridley chapter of my life, but not everything else.
“Sleepwalking has always been my body’s way of dealing with stress and new environments. ”
“Leigh…tell me what happened to your family.”
“Daddy said he would get help for the voices. And that he was done gambling. But it was a lie. He claimed he wanted his family back. But it was too late. We had already unraveled and the threads of our family frayed years ago, after Deacon Ridley’s first visit.
Mama didn’t want Daddy anymore, and he was a stranger to me and Lila.
Then one day, there was a knock on the door.
More like a bang. Daddy went to open it, and then—” My voice stopped as the scene replayed in my mind.
“A gunshot rang out. It didn’t hit him, just grazed him, but the blood—it was everywhere.
I can still see it sometimes when I close my eyes, the redness of it.
” I avoided looking at Jackson, but I could sense him flinch.
I swallowed hard and continued, “Three of Deacon Ridley’s men burst in. They dragged me, Lila, and Mama from our rooms and into the living room. They tied us up, except for Lila. I had been tying knots my entire life, so I could get out of mine; they didn’t know that, though.”
I looked down at my wrists. “Deacon Ridley paced back and forth. He had on a suit. I found that to be so weird at a time like this. He said he was there for Lila. That was his price. If she agreed to marry him, then he would wipe away all of Daddy’s debts.
Daddy didn’t move when he heard it. This didn’t come as a surprise to him.
But Mama screamed her refusal. Deacon Ridley shut her up by saying that this wasn’t the first time Daddy had used his family like this.
That’s why he came home, why he promised to stop gambling.
He owed Deacon Ridley a lot of money. This was happening now because he had said no to Lila before. ”
Jackson moved from his chair to the bed and eased next to me. He placed his hand over mine. It felt as if he were bracing me, as if he knew the worst part was to come.
“Mama looked at Daddy and started screaming at him. She had no idea that Daddy and Deacon Ridley even knew each other, that Daddy had been borrowing money from him. What’s really sad was, even then, I didn’t know if she was upset because he wanted Lila or because he didn’t want her.
But what she didn’t expect was that Daddy had already given Mama to Deacon Ridley.
She didn’t know she was being used as a pawn to pay Daddy’s debts. Now Deacon Ridley wanted Lila.”
The tears began to flow down my cheeks now, and Jackson’s grip on my hand tightened.
“Lila agreed to the marriage. She had watched Mama be used before. This was what she felt like she had to do, what she thought beautiful women must do. Plus, it was the life she wanted, everything we didn’t have.
A nice home. Money. She could have those things and help her family.
She couldn’t see Deacon Ridley for what he was.
She told him she would do it if he cleared Daddy’s debts and if he would help us get birth certificates and Social Security numbers. ”