Leukemia Survivor Shares Her Story of Her Queer Safe Space Lit. on Fire Books

Darting out of the main room, a small, but jam-packed area stuffed with pride flags, speakers playing Lo-fi hip-hop, and tall shelves tightly packed with books; with urgent excitement, Jessica Stephenson hurries to the check-out counter as fast as her legs can take her. 

“I think I’m insane!” she jokes to her friend and volunteer worker, Wendell, with a laugh. 

“Okay, hit me!” he laughs back, urging her to go on. She then ecstatically tells him of her new “insane” ideas for her queer safe space, Lit. On Fire Books. 

With the energy and passion she brought for her store, one would never have guessed she had spent the last nine months fighting cancer.

She first opened the store in 2015 in a small shop at Studios on Sheridan after being in the bookselling business for a few years prior. 

“And I thought, ‘Well, I just need to work for myself.’ And bookselling is just something that is very close to my heart,” Stephenson says.

She stated that she decided to follow her heart and began stocking up on books, which then led to her posting on social media that she was in the process of getting a bookstore up and running. 

“I had announced on social media that I was going to start looking to open a place in this neighborhood. And the owner of the studios on Sheridan actually reached out to me and said, ‘Hey, actually, we have space available. And we think a bookstore in this neighborhood would be a great fit for Studios on Sheridan, so come take a look!’”

And so, after only two months after quitting her job, she had a bookstore to herself for two years, before moving into the shop you see now on Main St. Although it was not originally meant as a safe space for the queer community. 

Stephenson stated that what pushed her to make the store more inclusive was the “utter lack of representation” in Peoria.

She had been out most of her life as a bisexual, but only came out in 2016 as a lesbian, due to many things causing her to “push it back down”. Before coming out, she had been in a straight relationship, and was raised Catholic as well. 

“I can remember multiple pinnacle moments of my life where change could have come to me and I very easily could have lived openly and out. And something bad would happen and I would just shut myself even harder back in the closet.”

Stephenson had overcome the struggles of opening a new building and coming out. Then, in July of last year, she was set back by a hospital visit three days after her 40th birthday. 

Two days later, it was confirmed she had leukemia. 

“I was walking around at my birthday probably dying,” Stephenson commented. 

She then fought for nine months against her cancer. That was until Sunday, March 31, when she took her last chemo pills. She finished her treatment and returned back to work Tuesday morning. 

“I have a lot to make up for. I have nine months of missed work to make up for.”

Alongside work to make up for, there were rumors online that had to be snuffed out. While out of work, Stephenson had to fight rumors of her own death, and the death of the shop.

Stephenson said that before cancer, sales were doing amazing and the shop was running the best it had ever been. “Everything was going great. And cancer just kind of wrecked everything. So I just have a lot of work ahead to kind of get things back on track.”

Stephenson says her being public about her situation is why she thinks people like the shop so much. “I have to operate with full transparency. I think that’s part of why people like this place so much. Because, you know, I show people that it’s not all polished and it’s not all perfect.”

Stephenson is currently in remission, meaning no signs of cancer can be found. The shop is continuing on with Stephenson’s and Wendell’s work, and is currently undergoing minor construction for a new area in the shop. 

Note – This article has been modified since its initial publishing to better reflect the views of the subject.