21 Jump Street (Tom Hanson)

Threatening Letters

"I'm here," I said. I thought I sounded pretty convincing but the little squint Tom gave me shook my confidence.

"All my passes are up," Captain Fuller said. He was the first one to bowl, and we were on our last frame. "I'll get us a seat in the restaurant."

The bar food of the bowling alley wasn't enough to satisfy us, so we all agreed to go to the neighboring restaurant for dinner when we were about halfway done with the game.

"I'll come with you," Doug said and joined him.

Ioki was bowling his last turn, and he got eight pins down in total. Judy got a spare, and Tom ended with a strike. I ended with a gutter ball, and Tom said that I'd do better next time. I didn't really care though, I was just having fun.

We walked up together to give the desk our bowling shoes, and I could feel his eyes on me. I could tell that he wanted to ask me again what was wrong, but ultimately decided against it.

We joined the crew over at the restaurant, where they had already gotten a table for us, and upbeat music started playing. Tom lifted his hand up to me from across the booth and asked, "wanna dance?"

I chuckled softly and nodded and took his hand. He led me away from the table and did some funny dance moves around me, such as wiggling his arms together and some basic disco movements before pulling me into him for a slow dance.

He was leaning in so far, our ears were practically touching. He held me close, and used his momentum to sway together to the music as we made our way around in a circle. He said in my ear, "I know that I haven't known you for very long... but something's got you vexed."

I haven't told anyone about the threatening phone calls and letters, because I know that there's nothing that anyone can do about it. I didn't want to worry my team for something that was my issue, but it was so hard to keep it bottled up inside. Since the sender hasn't actually acted upon any of their threats, there's nothing the cops can do. I found it better just to keep this issue to myself. I was afraid that if I mentioned anything about it, I would break open.

"I'm fine," I lied. I remembered that I placed the most recent letter on my coffee table in my apartment, not wanting to throw it away in case it could be used as evidence. The words on the page flashes in my mind, but I shook them out.

"It's me. Talk to me, Gregg."

"Don't worry about it."

I could tell that Tom didn't believe me, but he dropped it. We finished our meal, and Tom drove me home. He asked if he could have a glass of water, so I left him by the door and I walked into the kitchen. I welcomed him into my apartment, and he made his way into my living room.

I heard him ask, "what the hell is this?"

I poked my head out from the kitchen and set the glass of ice water down on the counter before I ran up to him and tried to rip the letter from his hands. He was livid. He lifted it up in the air, out of my reach.

"That's just..." I said, but I had no idea what to say. I finally revealed to him that I've been getting death threats.

"By who?" He asked. He let his hand come down and he finally gave me the letter. I could see the fire burning in his eyes.

"I don't know," I said and folded the letter so I didn't have to see it. "I think it's someone I've arrested in the past but who knows."

"Is it Brian?" Tom asked.

I shook my head. "No, I don't think so."

"How do you know?" He asked.

"I got the first letter before we had that case with Brian," I mumbled.