I had been driving up and down empty roads for two hours and thought I’d head back to the station. As Nick Cave says, “This is a mistake I sometimes make.” I walk into the harshly lit lobby with its dull yellow walls and walk up to the desk.

“What’s going on, Riley?” Marion asks as he hits the hidden switch, opening the door into the desk area. He’s sitting behind the desk, looking out a large Plexiglas window into the lobby. I walk past him and take a seat in a metal folding chair.

Marion is short—five-five, if he stretches—bald, and has a gut that strains against his uniform like a raging river against an unfortunate dam. And he’s lazy. The radio—the radio that he’s suppose to be answering—is calling out for him, has been calling for him since I was in the parking lot, but he just picks up the remote and turns the channel on the TV. I hate him.

“Nothing,” I say tersely and turn towards the TV. “I haven’t seen a car all fucking night.”

“Yeah, Sundays suck,” he replies sarcastically. He was once a patrol officer, but an incident involving a married woman, the caged backseat of a patrol car, and some questionable ideas of justice had put a stop to that and he found himself banished behind a radio taking phone calls—which he hated and would often just let the phone ring and ring and ring until someone finally yelled at him to answer the fucking thing—and dispatching patrols.

“Hey,” he says, suddenly. “I just got this 911 hang-up out on Eric street. Can you go check it out?”

“Just got it?” I ask. “I’ve been sitting here for five minutes,” I say as I swivel around to look at him.

“Yeah whatever,” he replies flippantly. “Can you go check it out?” he asks as he gets up and walks towards the radio console.

“Why don’t you send one of the patrols?” I ask. “I may be bored, but I’m not that fucking bored.”

“Come on, traffic,” Marion whines. “It’s almost shift change and I don’t want to send any of them out on this.” He likes calling me traffic in a derogatory way because I work the traffic patrol—traffic patrol being one who deals with traffic, not 911 hang-ups—and he wanted to be a traffic patrol, too, but due to the afore mentioned incident, knew that that wasn’t possible.

“Why not?” I ask. “What the fuck have they done all night?”

“Because I don’t want to listen to them bitching about getting a call at the end of shift.”

“You fucking pussy,” I snarl, knowing that I’ll go on this call. “Okay, fine. Where’s this big emergency?”

Marion turns and faces a wall-sized map of the installation hanging on the wall behind him and looks for the house. “It’s right here man,” he says, pointing at the house.

“There?” I ask. “That place is usually quiet, isn’t it?” The call came from a neighborhood with single family homes. A neighborhood where fights and arguments and anything else that would require the police to show up seldom, if ever, happen.

“Yeah, it is,” he responds. “Just go out there real quick, get the FI and come back.”

Of course, the fucking FI. An FI is basically a piece of paperwork used to conduct and record field interviews—name, date of birth, mother’s maiden name—and the higher-ups seemed to have a fetish for them. Fire alarm, get an FI; walk down the street, get an FI; go to a fight, get an FI on everyone in the building and no it doesn’t matter if they saw anything or not. It wouldn’t surprise me if we go through an entire rain forest every six months.

“Yeah, FI, right,” I say and walk out the door.

“Seriously Riley, get the FI,” I hear Marion calling out helplessly through the bullet-proof window as I walk away.

As I’m leaving, Bayard, my roommate, comes through the back door on his way to work. “Hey now,” he says—Howard Stern is his religion. “What’s up?”

“Nothing much, man,” I answer, walking out to the parking lot. “What are you up to?”

“Work,” he says, following me. “As always.”

“Fun.”

“Yeah, thrilling. You going to be around later?”

“I should be. I’m on my way out to a 911 hang-up right now, but I’ll be back in about ten minutes.”

“911 hang-up? Why?”

“I guess it’s too close to shift-change to send anyone else.”

“Fuck that,” he says without masking his contempt. “Lazy motherfuckers. Where at?”

“Out on Eric street.”

“Eric street? Where the fuck is that?”

“Custer housing area, if you can believe the map.”

“Oh,” he says like he’s just been told the square root of 34525 is 2. He stands there for a minute before his face lights up and says, “Oh yeah, Custer, off Jackson street, right?”

“Yeah,” I say while working myself into the blue unmarked car that I sometimes use to chase down ghosts and speeders and drunks.

“Do you want anyone to go with you?” Bayard asks.

“No, that’s okay,” I tell him. “It’s only a 911 hang-up, two people might be over-kill.”

“Yeah,” he laughs. “People might actually start to think we respond to things and do work.”

“We don’t want that,” I say through the open window and put the car in drive. “I’ll be back by shift-change, stop by the office later and we’ll play some Grand Theft Auto.”

“Grand Theft Auto?” he asks excitedly. “You guys got that?”

“Yup. It’s sitting in the office now.”

“Fuck yeah. Give me a call when you get back.”

“All right man. See you in a bit.”

Pulling out of the parking lot into the dark, empty streets of post on my way out to Eric street, I think about how Sunday nights on an army post always seem filled with an uneasy silence. People are locked in their houses, waiting for five in the morning in to roll around so they can slog through yet another week of tedious and meaningless bullshit with the upcoming weekend the only light at the end of the endless tunnel.

I drive down the main road to Custer housing area feeling pretty good, the sun is going down, the heat of the day is dissipating into the night, a cool breeze flows through the open windows. I find Eric street, turn, and drive slowly so I don’t drive right by the house. I’ve done that a couple of times before, and let me tell you, it’s fucking embarrassing. According to the map, the house should be tucked into a cul-da-sac on my left about halfway up the road. And sure enough, there it is.

I pull up in front of the house noticing the open door. A car is in the driveway and a man is busy rummaging through it.

“Excuse me sir,” I call out to him as I walk up the drive. I notice him jump at the sound of my voice and he looks around quickly. I look towards the house to find the name next to the door, a requirement on army posts. “Are you Sergeant Heppner?”

He climbs slowly out of the car looking as if he hasn’t eaten in months. Pale skin clings to his bones as if it were about to give up and abandon the whole project that liked to be called Sergeant Heppner. His face is hollow and his eyes dart around like a beaten dog’s. “Yes, who are you?” he answers in a high voice that sounded exactly as I imagined it would.

“I’m specialist Riley, Military Police. Do you live here?” I ask and point toward the house.

“Yes.”

“We got a 911 hang-up from your house…”

“Oh yeah, just the kids playing around,” he interrupted.

“How many kids do you have?”

“Two,” he answers and leads me up the walkway to the front door. “You know how kids are, they just knock things over while running around the house.”

“Yeah,” I respond. Fucking brats, I think.

“But come on in, you can talk to my wife. She’ll tell you that everything is okay here.”

“Okay, great,” I say excitedly.

We walk through the front door and into the cramped hall way. He walks straight ahead into the living room, calling out for his wife with every step. “Julie! Julie!”

“What?” a woman finally yells from upstairs.

“The MPs are here. Can you come down and tell them that nothing’s going on.”

There’s creaking from above and she comes down the stairs to my left. Sergeant Heppner goes to the base of the stairs and calls out again, “Every thing’s okay here, right?”

She comes slowly down the stairs, but when she sees me standing in the foyer she moves down the stairs quickly. “No everything is not okay here,” she says, her voice trembling.

She looks about the same as her husband, skinny with dirty stringy blond hair. But I don’t notice any of this right way. All I see are her hands—holding, what looks to me like, every knife in the house. Fuck, I think as her husband audibly scoffs and turns towards the living room.

“Ma’am, why don’t you put those knifes down?” I ask, my excitement replaced by adrenaline and dread. This is going to be a long night after all.

Sergeant Heppner turns back towards us and interrupts, “She’s full of shit officer. Nothing is going on here.”

“Bullshit!” she yells. “I was on the phone with my friend when he came into the room and started freaking out! He was throwing shit around and ripped the phone away from me.”

I really don’t want to be here by myself anymore and reach for the radio clipped to my shoulder and speak into it quickly, “Dispatch, 41. Hot 10-30 my last, 10-48, signal four.” Translation—Hey you bald head motherfucker, it’s me, fucking traffic, and I’m out here where you sent me and have found a husband and wife who want to kill each other and maybe me, too. Send back-up. Now.

“Hey sergeant, why don’t you go outside real quick while I talk to you wife here.”

“Why do I have to go outside?” he whines and I have to suppress the urge to pepper spray and pistol whip his punk ass.

“I always find it better to talk to people separately so I can get their stories without a lot of interruptions,” I try reasoning with him. He stares at me at me blankly so I continue, more sternly, “Because I told you to.”

He sulks out like a punished two year old, slamming the screen door closed. Nobody has answered my radio call, I ask Heppner’s wife to put down the knifes again and call in again.

“Dispatch, 41,” I speak into the radio slowly, hoping that will help.

“Go ahead, 41.”

“Um, yeah, dispatch. I’ve got a hot 10-30 out here at this 911 hang-up. Could you send a couple of patrols out here please.”

I glance out the front door to make sure Sergeant Heppner is still around, he sits on the hood of his car smoking, and walk into the living room where the wife is pacing back and forth.

“What’s your name ma’am?”

“It’s Julie.”

“Can you tell me what happened tonight, Julie?”

The radio is crackling, “41 have you all ready made contact with the people inside of the house?” That’s a stupid fucking question, I think and turn off my radio. Long ago, I learned that the quickest way to get help is to stop answering the radio. I knew that the station would soon empty out with people running for their cars and the night would erupt with blue light and sirens calling out.

Julie sits down on the oversized couch which fills the room and starts her story. It’s a story that’s been told many times in many ways. Her husband doesn’t trust her, she was only talking with a girlfriend of hers and they were making plans for that evening. When she got off the phone, her husband came raging into the room and started throwing things at her, calling her a slut, a whore, a no-good-dirty-bitch. She got fed up with this and dialed 911. This of course enraged her husband who then pulled the phone out of the wall. I wasn’t really listening. I just looked out the window waiting for the cavalry to show.

“And then he said he was going to kill me,” she says, her voice hitching up to a sob.

“Kill you?” I ask, my attention snapped back to the small, upturned room. Husbands and wives threaten to kill each other all the time, especially around an organization where killing has been taught as a logical response to problems. “What exactly did he say?” I ask, looking for specifics.

“He told me he was going out to the car for his gun,” she says.

“The car?” I ask, panic creeping up. “Does he have a gun out in the car?”

“I don’t know.”

“Does he have a gun? Have you ever seen a gun?”

“No,” she answers. “I’ve never seen a gun, but he hides a lot from me.”

I look out towards the sidewalk. He isn’t there. I look out the window hoping to see approaching blue lights and hear a screaming siren. They aren’t there either.

Fuck, Fuck, Fuck, my mind screams as I reach for my radio. How could I have been so fucking stupid? “Dispatch 41. Possible 10-38 golf. 10-48 code three.” Translation—There’s talk of a gun, send help as fast as you can with lights and sirens. Hell, with a helicopter if you’ve got one.

“I’ll be right back,” I tell her and move towards the front door. “Stay right there.” I should have put the guy in handcuffs, put him in my car. Done something. I hear shattering glass behind me as I reach the front door and time stands still.

“Fucking bitch,” an animal like voice breathes silently. I turn around and see him, she sits there on the couch all the color drained from her face. In his right hand is the biggest gun I’ve ever seen, it’s shiny and the light in the room dances off it.

I don’t even reach for my gun, forgot I even had one. “Hey there fucking piggy! Come get the mother fucking bacon!” he’s screaming, moving towards me, leveling the gun at me and the world explodes to the sound of approaching sirens.

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