Blood on My Hands

cops said there was nothing they could do. They couldn’t track the texts and that was that.”
    “That’s all they said?”
    “Well, they said I shouldn’t tell anyone or spread any rumors, because there was no way to prove who really sent them and, you know, like, Dakota’s mother is a congresswoman and people might get the wrong idea.”
    “Would you tell me what they said?”
    He grimaces, as if reluctant to disobey police orders. I give him a pleading look, trying to remind him of what’s at stake.
    He nods. “Whoever sent the texts said they wanted to kill me. One even threatened to kill me and Katherine.”
    The news goes through me like an electric current. Maybe there’s no way to prove that the texts came from Dakota. But like Griffen said, who else would have sent them?
    “I don’t understand why the police didn’t do more to follow up on them,” I tell him.
    Griffen raises his eyebrows and gives me a look as if the answer is obvious. Then it hits me: Dakota’s uncle, Samuel Jenkins, is the chief of police. She’s his niece. Of course he wouldn’t want rumors spread about her.
    “Do you still have them?” I ask.
    “The text messages?” Griffen shakes his head. “I mean, the police probably have the copies I printed out. But I erased them from my phone.”
    That’s disappointing, but still, I’m pretty sure that if his parents went to the police, there’s a record of a complaint. And the copies Griffen gave them of the threats. It all has to be there somewhere.
    Griffen turns his head toward his house and straightens his leg again. “I better get going.”
    “Okay.” I get up.
    Griffen rises stiffly. I help him get the straps over his shoulder. For a moment we’re practically face-to-face. Again, I feel certain his is familiar.
    “Have we ever seen each other before?” I ask.
    He shakes his head and then walks off. But it’s still bothering me.
    As much as Mr. Lamont wanted Slade to work in his drywall business after high school, some kind of military service came first. It was a family tradition, a duty, going back to the First World War.
    After the initial two months of National Guard training, when we weren’t allowed to call each other, Slade and I would video chat a few times a week. He always tried to smile and be brave, but he wasn’t a good enough actor to get away with it. His sadness, homesickness, and fear of being sent overseas always came through.
    There was one exception, one night in the summer when he really did seem excited. It began with his waking me up with a phone call around one in the morning. “Get on the computer,” he said when I answered.
    “Why? Is something wrong? Are you okay?”
    “Just do it! I have to talk to you.”
    Still half asleep, I staggered to my computer and slumped into the chair. A few moments later Slade came on.
    “You look wide awake,” he said with a smirk.
    “You woke me up!” I tried to sound annoyed, but I was happy to see and speak to him, even if it was on the jumpy Internet connection.
    “I know what I want to do!” he announced excitedly. “I’m going to be a commercial fisherman.”
    “Are you high?”
    “No! I’m serious! I mean, I know I have to work with my dad when I get back, but someday that’s what I’m going to be.”
    Since Slade and his dad loved to fish, it wasn’t a totally off-the-wall idea. But it came pretty close. “Where did you come up with this?” I asked.
    He told me about a guy named Rick he’d met that night in a bar near Fort Benning. Rick was in another National Guard unit and his family ran a fishing trawler out of Montauk Point on Long Island. “It was amazing, Cal. He talked about what he and his family have been doing for generations, and showed me some pictures and it was like, ‘Hey! This is it! This is what I’ve been waiting for! It’s what I’ve always wanted to do!’ You know what I’m saying? Like after all this time of feeling like there was something else out there, but I didn’t know what it was. Well, now I know!”
    I thought of asking exactly how he intended to be a commercial fisherman in Soundview, or what would become of the drywall business, but it was such a joy to hear him sound excited that I couldn’t rain on his parade. So I said, “That’s great, Slade. And it sounds like you’ve found a friend, too.”
    I had no way of knowing that was the wrong thing to say. On the computer screen the smile left Slade’s face and his voice