by Matt Coyle
“You’re just sorry it wasn’t you.”
“Next time ask for help. Asshole.” She hung up.
Friends.
* * *
I rented a safe deposit box once I was finally healed. In a bank near where I lived, not at Windsor Bank and Trust. Jules Windsor fled to Europe before the news came out that he’d laundered money for the mob three decades ago. His crime was well past the statute of limitations, but there wasn’t a statute of limitations for a soiled reputation. My father and I knew all about that.
The one item I stored in my new safe deposit box was a letter envelope. Inside was a flash drive with a copied file from the flash drive I gave back to the Russian mafia. Insurance for when I receive a certain phone call.
I donated the fifteen thousand dollars in the twenty-seven-year-old envelope to the Mount Soledad Veterans Memorial.
A plaque was scheduled to go up in my dad’s honor in the spring. Not because of the money, but for his service to our country. I offered to put up my aunt and my sister and her sons when they came down for the ceremony.
Sometimes when I’m sitting in front of the TV at night, I let my eyes drift up to the bookshelf above it and gaze at the shadow box holding my father’s LJPD badge.