Page 96 of A Lesson In Beginning

“You see, it’s not that simple. Not for any of us. Maybe you’re afraid to trust your feelings for Joel because you haven’t yet learned how to trust yourself, let alone anyone else out here in the real world. If you took the bait, hook, line, and sinker from that asshole Reverend Jacob, then how can you trust yourself to know what you really feel out here? You’ve not learned how to trust your own instincts, outside of what you were told to do. That’s how we all lived back then. We were told everything that made us who we are. What to wear, how to act, how to parent, what to be interested in. Nothing belonged just to us.”

Ruth nodded agreement. “Naomi is right. But Adah, I want you to think about these last few months. Really think about it. Look at how far you’ve come. You aren’t the woman you were a few months ago, let alone the woman that Zion told you to be. You are so much more, and you’ve really begun to find yourself here in these last months. I think you should sit with that truth. Learn to accept it. Learn to accept yourself. Maybe then you’ll see that you deserve someone like Joel. You are deserving. You are enough.”

Ruth’s words, echoing Naomi’s sentiments, struck a chord in me so powerful and strong, the tears welled up in my eyes again.

“Thank you.” I barely mouthed the words. Emotion caught in my throat so roughly it burned.

“We love you.” Ruth wrapped her arm around me, holding me to her. And for the first time in a very, very long time, I realized that I wasn’t alone in this world. I never had been. I just hadn’t known what was standing right in front of me.

CHAPTER 26

“Adah? Can you come down here?” Levi called from the bottom of the staircase. My pen stopped immediately, my thoughts pulled away from my journaling. I was grateful, as my hand had started to cramp nearly twenty minutes ago, yet the thoughts would not stop. I had no other way to process them, other than to write them down. I looked down at the page, noting how my scribbling had gone from prettily curling letters to frantic scrawling that pushed into the paper almost violently.

“Coming!” I hollered down, sitting up from where I was laid out on my stomach across the bed. My back ached, and I winced as a muscle in my lower back complained at the sudden change in position.

A few quick stretches later, I headed down the stairs, where Ruth and Levi both stood. My steps slowed as I took in their somber expression. Something wasn’t right.

“What’s going on?” I asked with heavy trepidation, finally stopping before them at the bottom of the stairs.

“Can we talk in my office?” Levi asked, glancing at Ruth, who nodded at him. Samuel and Theo were both napping, so I was available, but I had no real desire to hear whatever bad news they were about to tell me.

“Am I in trouble?” I laughed nervously, but when neither of them joined in, my own face fell. “Okay, guys, you’re starting to scare me.”

“Let’s go talk.” Levi turned, leading Ruth and me to the office. My stomach clenched, anxiety settling in. Whatever he was about to talk to me about was not good. When we were all in his office and he had firmly shut the door, he turned to me and held up an envelope.

My stomach dropped to the floor. My blood felt like ice in my veins. The roaring whoosh of my heartbeat flooded my ears as I stared at the envelope. I knew what it was.

“You received a letter from —”

“Josiah.” His name fell from my lips in a shuddering, breathy gasp.

“Yes.”

“Adah, we didn’t want to just hand it to you. We want to be here for you.” Ruth reached out a hand to comfort me. I pulled back as though her very touch would burn.

“You don’t have to read it if you don’t wish to.” Levi’s calm tone barely registered as I stared at the envelope. The telltale red stamp marking the contents as confidential gave it away. I’d only received one other letter like it, from my parents, only a few months after their imprisonment began.

My chest tightened, my ribs and diaphragm simply refusing to allow my lungs to draw breath. With short, shuddering gasps, I reached for the envelope.

My hands trembled as I struggled to open it.

Did I even want to open it?

If I didn’t, the worry would likely consume my every waking thought. No, opening it was the only way. Finally, my finger slid beneath the sealed edge, ripping it open. The sound of it seemed to echo through the room like a gunshot.

The envelope fell to the floor, a single drop of my blood marring the stark white paper from where it had sliced my finger. With trembling fingers, I held the letter in my hands.

Dearest Adah,

I need you to know just how important you and Samuel are to me. It took me months to track you both down, but I finally found you. Let me be clear, the divorce papers mean nothing. Nothing. We are married in the eyes of God, and I will not let you forget it. I will come for you both. You are my wife, and Samuel is my son. We will be together again. Before you know it. Man can not pull apart what God has sanctified. I will come for you both.

Bile filled my throat with a stinging pain, tears welling up in my eyes as I balled the paper up in my shaking fists. I could not, would not, read another word of the multiple-page letter. I couldn’t.

Brushing past Levi and Ruth, our shoulders bumping together, I ran from the room.

I could hear nothing. Feel nothing. Nothing except the pounding of my own heart as fear consumed me.

My feet carried me up the stairs towards my room, stumbling halfway up. My arms stung as I fell, my body hitting the harsh edges of the stairs before me, but I did not let that stop me. Scrambling to my feet, I continued racing to my room.

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