This Is My America(49)
“You could have been killed. And you keeping it is messing with evidence.” Steve shakes his head.
I show Steve the texts and videos. As Dean looks over Steve’s shoulder, a confused look is on his face. I know I should give up the micro SD card, but then I’d have to admit I broke in to Herron Media.
I wait patiently for Steve to give me direction about how to get Angela’s phone in the hands of the police. Maybe take it back to the South Seafood Packing building and give Beverly a tip. Something that keeps me out of it.
Steve gets up, then passes over today’s newspaper.
I look at today’s headline: MANHUNT.
I skim the story for updates, but there’s nothing new. Until I see it. They say they’ve located her cell phone. A lie! I gasp and quickly finish the article.
Maybe they’ve stopped looking for Angela’s killer and settled on Jamal? There will be no justice for how she was left injured, attacked, and thrown away. Now it’s not just about freeing Jamal, but giving Angela justice.
AT A CROSSROADS
Dean gives me the silent treatment as we leave Steve’s new office. He was the first person to show up to the police station when everything went down with Jamal, but I’ve kept him out of the loop. I know it’s not fair, but he’d want to stop me from looking into things. And now I know I can’t tell him I’ve been communicating with Jamal.
“I’m sorry I haven’t shared everything,” I finally say.
“That was dangerous to go out to the Pike alone. You should’ve called me.” Dean’s eyebrows knit together. We feel distant and I didn’t realize how much I’ve missed him.
“It was the day of Angela’s memorial—you know I couldn’t stay. I felt like I needed to do something, so I went to the Pike. Only found her phone on accident.”
“You go with Quincy?” Jealousy flashes in his eyes. They’ve never really been cool. Only Jamal tied them together, but even then, it was estranged.
“Why would you think that?” I flick my eyes forward. Hope he didn’t catch me leaving Quincy’s car after Herron Media last night. My chest goes tight, thinking about the kiss that Quincy and I shared. It wasn’t a real one, just a cover to keep us from getting busted. But it put a shock in me, forced me to think about Quincy and me in that way.
“What if Chris doesn’t show?” Dean changes the subject, and I’m thankful.
“He’ll have to show up at school sometime. And if he doesn’t, I’ll go to his work.”
At the station Chris was visibly injured, shaking under the arm of some guy. Each time the image of his face runs through my mind, I can’t help but be more convinced that Chris killed Angela. I run through the approach I need to take with him, and the questions to ask. Thinking in procedures helps silence my fear of confronting him.
I look over at Dean, who gives me a half smile like he’s over it. He thinks it covers his thoughts, but it doesn’t. Not to me. I see the disappointment—and sadness?—lurking beneath.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
“This thing with Angela. It’s got my mom all riled up.”
His mom always knows how to get under his skin. Mrs. Evans thinks Dean’s on the wrong path. She’s ultra-conservative, praising Christian values while voting in ways that seem to contradict that. I try not to let him see it bothers me.
“She doesn’t want me spending time with you anymore. It started with the office loft, then she just went off…Tracy, it was…” Dean’s eyes look glazed. “She said so many things about us…Why it never mattered if your dad was arrested…or if Angela was still alive and Jamal home. Our lives are too different.”
I’m frozen. Dean’s using softer language, thinking he’s protecting me, but I’ve long decoded this meaning. She doesn’t want us to be close because I’m Black and he’s white. That’s what he’s been hiding from me, and this wasn’t their first conversation about this.
“What happens now? Is this it? I talk to Chris, and then we can’t be friends any longer?”
“You’re my best friend,” Dean says. “She can’t stop that.”
“You’re mine, too,” I say, and I mean it. Dean is closer to me even than Tasha.
I don’t care what his mom says. I’m glad he doesn’t follow everything she believes. We’ve always pushed the boundaries that were set before we had a chance.
“What if I’m as bad as her?” Dean chokes up. “That everything she’s raised me around is so ingrained in me I won’t even know, and then I do something to mess us up?”
“Why would you think that?” I touch Dean’s arm. He slowly turns to face me, his arms resting on the wheel.
“When Jamal’s story came out…my first thought wasn’t he’s innocent. It was wondering, how could he do that? At the table, my mom was going off on how rampant Black crime is, it was only time before something like this would happen again…I didn’t respond. I was still trying to understand, sort through Angela being dead. I went to the police station because I was worried what Jamal being guilty would do to you. Not…not because I thought Jamal was innocent.” Dean looks away.