It’s so unexpected that Jessup can’t process it. All he can do is smile with relief. It’s not Ricky.
“You’re okay with that?” his mom says.
“Sorry,” Jessup says. “I just . . . I need a second. What do you mean we’re moving?”
“It’s not a new idea. Your mom and I have been talking about it for a year or so,” David John says. “Just talk. A fresh start. But I haven’t been able to get myself to do it. I didn’t like the idea of leaving the church behind. There’s a part of me that feels like I owe them. They were here for you when I wasn’t, and they’ve welcomed me back like the prodigal son or, oh, something like that, something that Earl could probably say better. And the church has been something I could share with you and your mother and Jewel.” He pats his chest with his hand, a twisted smile coming to his lips. “And Ricky, too. The church has been my home for so long that it’s like a family. And that’s the problem. Because the church isn’t family. You are. We are. We’re a family. Simple as that, really. Like I said last night, maybe I put the wrong things close to my heart. I know the idea is . . .”
Jessup’s mom jumps in. “After what happened this weekend, we think it would be good. There’s just . . . Well, it’s all of this. A police car outside our house all night, to keep you safe? And some boy attacked you at school today?” She’s still holding Jessup’s hand, and now David John reaches out and takes his other hand. He should feel weird about it, but it’s a familiar gesture, thousands of meals started with joined hands, bowed heads.
“Jessup,” David John says, “when I say a fresh start, I mean it. I know you don’t care about going to church—”
“That’s not true.”
“It is.” Tender. Insistent. “I think you believe in Jesus—”
“I do.”
“But I understand that the Church of the White America isn’t your church. Not anymore. Hasn’t been for a while. Not since Ricky killed those two boys. And that’s okay. And after what happened this weekend, it’s not our church either. I’m not . . .” He chokes up. Stops. Tries again. “You kids. Your mom. You come first. Family before anything. If I have to choose between the church or between Earl and you and your mom and your sister, that’s the easiest decision of my life.”
“What about Ricky?”
David John starts to speak, but Jessup’s mom holds up her hand, cuts him off. This surprises Jessup as much as what she says: “It’s too late for Ricky.”
Nobody speaks. There’s nothing to say.
It feels like both the worst thing and the best thing that’s ever been said. Jessup feels an immediate sense of relief, and then shame at feeling relief, and he doesn’t know what to do, so he looks closely at his mom, sees the puffiness around her eyes, sees the weight of the last few years on her face.
David John squeezes Jessup’s hand and says, “When I say a fresh start, I mean it. For you. For Jewel. Somewhere away from here. Out west. Boise, Idaho. Guy I met in prison has a brother-in-law who has a plumbing business. He knows who I am, but he’s a good Christian, believes in redemption. Said he’ll hire me on. Give me a chance.”
There is so much unsaid. So many things that Jessup knows he and David John will have to talk through in the coming years, but right now, that’s not on the table. He looks over at his sister. She’s looking back at him. She shrugs. “I don’t care,” she says. “I’ll be fine.”
And he knows it. Knows that she will be fine, but only if they leave, only if the Blessed Church of the White America is buried in their past, knows that the best thing he can do for his sister is to bless this, to make it easy for David John and his mother to follow through, to go to Boise, Idaho, to start a new life, unknown, unencumbered, her family history unshackled from anything that has happened here in a way that his can never be.