“Tommy,” he replied.
“Thanks so much for helping me out, Tommy. I know I probably come across as small-minded, but I just didn’t feel comfortable out there. Things just felt—unsafe.”
“Trust me, I get it,” he said, not taking the bait as aggressively as she might have hoped.
“Could I please have a glass of water?” she asked.
“Sure.”
As he moved to the tiny kitchen, she looked around the apartment. It appeared to actually be two converted motel rooms. Through a door connecting the two, she could see that the other looked like a traditional motel bedroom. But this side had been reconfigured to include a small living space and a kitchen nook. The second bathroom was now a closet with a washer and dryer.
She studied his walls, which were covered in posters. One had a photo of a little blond boy and girl holding hands and read:white and proud of it!Another had a blown-up newspaper headline that looked to be about the 1921 Tulsa race riots. A third was a movie one-sheet for the infamously racist silent film,The Birth of a Nation. Thomas Bradford had basically decoratedhis living room in bigoted tropes. Jessie felt slightly sick to her stomach but did her best to ignore it.
“Here you go,” he said, handing her the water. “I see you’re checking out the décor.”
“Yeah,” she said, pretending not to be disgusted. “You’ve definitely got a vibe going on. I was worried that I might have offended you when I said I was uncomfortable in this neighborhood. But I guess I shouldn’t have been so concerned. Do you collect stuff like this for a living?”
“No. Finding racial pride imagery is just a hobby. My day job doesn’t allow me to go crazy buying too many expensive pieces so I have to limit myself.”
“Oh, whatisyour day job?”
“I’m a medical claims examiner for a health insurance company,” he said. “Basically, my job is to make people jump through hoops before getting access to services.”
“Do you like that?” she asked.
“It’s a living,” he told her, though she suspected that he probably got off on rejecting the medical pleas of people in need. He seemed like the type.
“We all have to get paid, right?” she said sympathetically.
“Right,” he agreed. “What do you do, Jessica?”
“Oh, I work for the city. Boring stuff, really. I certainly don’t have the resources to collect posters or other memorabilia.”
“Yeah, well, it’s part of my true passion,” he said, finally seeming comfortable enough to peel back the metaphorical white hood.
“What’s that?”
“I run a civic organization in my spare time,” he said with real enthusiasm.
“Oh, cool. What kind of organization?”
"We point out instances of our traditional culture being degraded. We operate a website that tracks instances ofCaucasians being victimized, either by other groups or by the authorities."
"Wow, that sounds like it should be a full-time job!" She did her best to feign being impressed.
“I wish it was.”
“Of course, some people don’t just point unfair stuff out,” she said leadingly.
He looked at her quizzically. “What do you mean?”
“Didn’t you see that story on the news today about the two women who were recently killed? They were both from foreign countries and there were green cards found on plates at their tables. Sounds like whoever did it wasn’t a big fan of immigrants.”
Bradford’s eyes narrowed. Jessie realized she’d been way too clumsy about broaching the crimes.
“I must have missed that story,” he said.
She didn’t believe that for a second. Even if he wasn’t involved, Thomas Bradford struck her as extremely online. The notion that he’d missed a story as juicy as this was laughable.
