Her Final Confession

Chapter Fifty-Three

She felt the vibration of her cell phone in her pocket as she maneuvered through Penn Station, but she waited until she was seated on the train to Philadelphia to pull up Noah’s message and read Omar’s text messages. There were several pages of them. Some were between him and his family, mostly having to do with who was getting what for his mother’s birthday, and whether or not he had the time or money to fly home for the weekend to see her. There were several between him and unknown numbers, but they had to do with class assignments and study-group meetings. Then there were the messages between Omar and his roommate, Ethan Robinson. Josie saw immediately what Noah meant. The two seemed to have their own shorthand. Some of them were innocuous, like an exchange where Omar told Ethan not to forget the “guac” when he picked up the Mexican food, and another where Ethan texted Omar to say he’d left a textbook behind.

Then there were several whose meaning Josie couldn’t divine, like an exchange nearly two weeks earlier:

Ethan: did u talk 2 him

Omar: yes

Ethan: what did he say

Omar: we’ll talk later

A few days later, there was another:

Omar: where are you?

Ethan: getting food why

Omar: I talked to her. She doesn’t believe me. It didn’t go well. When will you be home?

Ethan: what did she say? Did you ask if she’ll do it?

Omar: talk when you get home

Josie took her notepad out and flipped through it, looking for the information she had jotted after she and Noah reviewed Omar’s phone records. Omar had called Gretchen on the same day as the text exchange with Ethan. Josie was certain that Gretchen was the “she” the two referred to in their exchange.

There was nothing after that besides mundane, everyday exchanges until the day of Omar’s shooting.

Omar: this wasn’t a good idea

Ethan: what’s happening

Omar: we shouldn’t have lied.

Ethan: you should abort. Turn around.

Omar: too late

Several minutes elapsed, and then Ethan texted:

u there, bro?

Then a few hours after that, around the time that Josie and Noah were arriving at Gretchen’s house to find Omar dead in Gretchen’s driveway, Ethan texted once more:

dude, u there????

Two minutes later, there was a text from Omar’s phone in response:

You fucked up.