Chapter 13: Birthfather – Summary and Analysis

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

⚠️ This page contains detailed plot information for Chapter 13 of Sleepwalk by Dan Chaon. If you haven't read this chapter yet, you may want to come back after finishing it.

Summary

The chapter opens with Will Bear sitting in the parking lot of the Red Hot Truck Stop, inside the camper of his vehicle, the Guiding Star. He receives a phone call from a woman who introduces herself as Cammie and claims to be his biological daughter. She explains that she tracked him down using an old alias he used years ago—Davis Dowty—and records from a fertility clinic in Evanston, Illinois.

Will recalls that he sold sperm under that alias in his younger days, when he was less careful about privacy. He had believed the donation was anonymous and had even found a way to make a living wage by traveling between clinics. He acknowledges that it's not impossible a child resulted.

As the conversation unfolds, Will's mind dissociates—he describes feeling like he's floating outside his body, slightly above and to the left. He writes notes on a napkin, cataloging observations about Cammie's voice: a female voice, approximately 18 to 25 years old, with a childlike affect, a slight lisp on s-sounds, and vocal fry. He scribbles the phrase