…”he keeps a rifle in the trunk of his car. It’s parked right outside our door. If your officers come with lights, he’ll see them from the window and go to the car first. Tell them to come quiet. Tell them to park around back.”
My hands were shaking, but my voice wasn’t. That’s the training. I typed every word into the call notes. Rifle in trunk. Vehicle at front door. Approach from rear, no lights, no sirens. I radioed it to the responding unit myself.
“Okay,” I said, in my dispatcher voice. “Your order will be there in about eight minutes. Is anyone else in the home with you?”
“No kids,” she said. Pizza voice again. “Just the two of us. He’s watching TV.”
I stayed on the line. She ordered garlic knots. She asked about the soda. I’ve never listened to anyone order food so carefully.
At 3:17, the officers came in quietly through the back of the complex, on foot. One of them stood between the front door and the car. When my sister’s husband heard the knock and got up to look out the window, there was already a police officer standing by his trunk.
He was arrested for domestic assault. The rifle was in the trunk, exactly where she said.
My shift ended at 7. I drove straight to the hospital. Jenna was sitting on a bed with a bandage on her cheek and a blanket around her shoulders. Four years. I didn’t know what to say. So I said, “You forgot to tell me what size soda.”
She laughed and cried at the same time. Then she said, “I called that number six times this year. I hung up every time. Tonight I prayed it would be you.” It wasn’t even supposed to be my shift. I’d swapped with a coworker.
Jenna lives with me now. On Fridays we order a large pepperoni, extra cheese, thin crust. From an actual pizza place.
