“This little mind of mine,” my daughter is singing, as we stand in her mom’s front yard. “This little mind of mine,” she sings. I’m kneeling down, and this we are almost at the same level, but she doesn’t look at me while she sings. The engine fan of my car, idling at the curb, kicks on and makes it a little harder to hear. “I’m gonna let it shine, let it shine,” she’s smiles, waiting for my approval.
“Yay Katie!” I clap. “That’s so pretty.” She’s three and this is the first song she’s learned to sing, and it makes my heart swell. Her mom called me and asked if I could come by to hear it.
“Daddy, do you have to go to work?” she asks.
“Baby, I’m already at work, I came over to hear you sing, it was so beautiful, I love it!” Her eyes shine. I pick her up and support her on my left hip. She still smells like a baby, my baby, and it’s as intoxicating as all the naps she took on my chest.
“Bravo Four, with Bravo Three for cover,” says the dispatcher.
“Bravo Four, go,” Travis answers.
I sigh, never a moment’s peace. “Bravo Three, go ahead,” I key up and speak into the radio mic clipped to my shirt. After six years as a cop the seconds of suspense between replying to dispatch’s call and them giving the information hasn’t lost its edge.
“Bravo Four and Bravo Three for cover, 12200 Industry Avenue for an unknown disturbance; caller is advising a man and woman screaming in apartment 226 or 228,” the voice broadcasts.
The courtesy is to allow the primary officer, the one assigned the call, to answer first. “Ten four,” Travis answers. Travis loves his job,the way I used to a few years ago. I hear it in his voice when he calls out on a traffic stop or even acknowledges his radio calls, he’s excited to be going somewhere, that something is happening and he gets to be part of it. With the little radio ear piece I wear, broadcasting all this right into my ear canal, I hear his engine revving up when he acknowledges. He can’t get anywhere fast enough.
“En route,” I answer. I’m eight blocks up and one block over, no rush. Katie is touching my badge, the light of a low summer sun reflecting off of it and onto her face, into her bright green eyes.
“You’re so beautiful, daddy.”
“Thanks, little baby.” I laugh, it’s the only way she knows to compliment. Probably because that’s what I tell her most of the time. I should get some new material. “Okay, Daddy’s gotta go to work, now. Gimme a kiss!”
She puckers theatrically, “Mmmmmwaa!”
“Guess what! You get to come to my house this weekend!”
“Yay, Daddy’s house!”
I hand her off to her mom, “I ‘preciate it.”
“Yep,” mom says, looking at the ground, at Katie, at anything but me.
I walk away, toward my cruiser. It’s August in south Texas and only thing hotter than the weather is my cruiser’s engine from running the air conditioner all day. Even at 8 PM, the daylight has about 45 minutes left and all I want to do was sit in the cool air inside my car and listen to my “good times” radio until the sun stops shining. Now I have to go tell a couple of adults how to act like adults and educate them on the concepts of compromise and temperance.

Travis pulls in just ahead of me. These apartments are old, built over fifty years ago. Until recently they would rent by the hour and advertised that with a wooden sign in the window. Real classy place. I tell all the the rookies I train, if you want to find bad guys start jacking the people coming in and out of here. Within an hour they’ll have an arrest, never fails.
Three apartment buildings are built as either a square or half square around the building’s respective parking lot. I never drive into the parking lots, it’s a perfect choke point to set up an ambush. I park in the street or in the few street-side parking spaces. Never park inside. Ever. The apartments we are looking for are at the end of the two building. The bottom apartment, 226, has a big window on the front door and is empty inside. It doesn’t matter, the yelling is in 228. It’s dark in the stairwell, and narrow, too narrow to even stand next to Travis. I stand below him while he knocks on the door and speaks with someone I can’t see.
“It’s the cops,” a girl’s voice yells from inside the apartment. “It’s okay, they were just arguing,” she tells Travis.
“That’s fine but I have to talk to your parents,” Travis says, and “I’m not leaving until I do.” Whoever he’s talking to tries to shut the door on him, but like any good cop, he has one foot in the threshold to block the it from closing. Like this bitch is the first person who ever thought to just shut the door in a cop’s face. The door opens all the way and he steps inside the apartment, leaving enough room for me to stand on the landing, with my one foot now across the threshold, blocking the door. Two teenage girls stand in the living room, averting their eyes, looking at the floor, at the counter tops, scratching their arms. An adult woman comes in from the right, from somewhere else, shouting at the girls,
“What the hell did you open the door for? I told you not to let them in!”
“Ma’am, she didn’t have a choice, we got a report of a disturbance, we have to investigate. We’re not here to give you a hard time, we have to make sure everyone’s okay, and once we do that we’ll be happy to get out of here,” says Travis.
“We’re fine, so you can go now,” says the woman.
“Who were you arguing with?”
“My husband.”
“Right, and what’s his name?”
“His name is Jerry, I don’t see what difference that makes.”
“Okay, well, where is he? I wanna talk to him.”
I hear her muttering something and her voice trails off, as she’s walking away. The teenagers return to their respective Ipods and cell phones, probably updating their Facebooks or Tweeters or whatever. I am ready to leave. My dinner hasn’t settled, I have reports to do and I don’t feel like dealing with this. I look to him to express my readiness to leave, to let him know I’m not interested in being here one minute longer than I have to, to express-
Travis’ eyes go wide, eyebrows into his hairline. His pupils pinpoint. He is a cool customer, doesn’t get worked up easily and I like working with him, despite the fact he’s fucking my most recent ex, which I think bothers him more than it does me since he never looks me in the eye. We are both waiting on transfers out of this division.
Travis grips his pistol, but leaves it seated in the holster. He points with his other hand at something I can’t see and yells, “HEY!” He releases the security features on his holster, his gun clears the leather and he’s pointing it at someone. “GUN!” he says, as I’m moving behind him. I need to see what he sees. I turn and stand on his left side.
A man. The husband, Jerry I’m guessing, is standing in a bedroom about twenty feet away. He has the thousand yard stare and he’s pointing his finger at us. He’s in a fighting stance. In his right hand he holds a two-tone automatic pistol, black frame and silver slide, “Charlie’s Angels” style, high ready, muzzle up.
Time slows. His finger is on the trigger. The sun shining off the stainless steel slide of his piece. His hair too black and too dull for the age of his face, styled in a mullet, because stereotypes exist for a reason. I stop hearing. The world is muted. His lips are moving, his yellow teeth framed by a mustache and beard dyed the same color as his hair. My vision narrows. He’s back lit, a perfect target.
Without thinking about the motions I release my Glock from my triple retention security holster and it’s in hand and trained on the threat.
“Bravo Three, he’s got a gun get us some units,” is all I say on the radio, but I can’t hear myself say it. “DROP THE GUN, DROP IT, “ I yell, or think that I do. My mind tells me there’s a flurry of traffic on the radio, and if I could hear it the Lieutenant is saying,
“Close the channel,” the way Clint Eastwood sounds. Sirens would be wailing in the background of other officers transmissions of,
“Bravo Five on the way,” and
“Bravo One, where did they check out?” and accidental key-ups with the Police Interceptor’s distinct engine revving up and shifting gears.
I know Travis is yelling at Jerry. I see his mouth moving. I don’t hear him giving Jerry the same tirade of commands that I did, though I know he is. But Jerry’s isn’t listening. Jerry is not doing what we’re telling him to do, even though we’re pointing guns at him. Jerry is non-compliant in the face of armed police officers issuing commands.
I’m afraid now that I’m going to see my partner shot. I’m worried that my wife will get a call from my Lieutenant because I’m in the hospital, or a visit from the Chief in the middle of dinner because I didn’t make it. That my latest ex, working dispatch, will have to hear my radio call of “Officer Down” and know that it’s her fiance who needs help. I’m concerned I’ve let this go on. That I’ve exposed Travis to this threat for too long. That I haven’t done anything about it. My training, both lecture and force on force, dictates that Jerry will be able to level and fire his gun at Travis and I at about the time our minds perceive that action and scream at us to react. I think he may be trying to pull a suicide by cop. I’m never going to get my transfer.
I think Jerry is going to drill me or Travis. I think he’s trying to lure us into a dialogue and then shoot us or himself. I see Katie, I hear “This little mind of mine,” and I’ll be damned if my baby girl will know daddy as a folded flag and framed badge. The thought of this makes me mad I’m infuriated. Fine, fuck this motherfucker for pulling a gun on me, on us. Time to let the air out of him.
The department issue handgun is a Glock model 22 pistol chambered in .40 caliber. Each pistol is identical with Trijicon brand night sights and a 4.5 lb trigger pull on the factory, “safe action” two stage trigger. This means that 4.5 lbs of pressure must be applied to the trigger, in a rearward motion of course, to activate the firing sequence. The trigger only has to travel .49 of an inch, less than half an inch, to initiate and complete the discharge of one bullet.
I begin applying pressure, and four-point-five pounds has never been so heavy. The trigger pull is smooth and easy, but point-four-ninths of an inch has never been so far. I see in razor sharp focus the little green dot, the radioactive glow of the tritium insert in my front sight and the white ring around it, directed at Jerry’s center of mass. Why has my gun not fired yet, I’m thinking. Should I try for the head shot? This is just like all my dreams where I pull and pull the trigger but nothing happens. I need to kill this guy before he kills me or Travis. And when I think the trigger can’t possibly take any more weight, right when I grip a little tighter with my left hand to manage the recoil and squint my eyes slightly to brace for the muzzle flash, right when I can’t believe I haven’t shot him yet,
“NOOOO,” the wife is screaming as she jumps on Jerry and grabs the gun. Oh shit, I forgot about her, where the hell did she come from anyway? The two of them jockey for control of the piece. I realize I can hear again. She reaches behind her and slams the bedroom door.
Now I’m thinking murder-suicide, and the cops who didn’t stop it, tonight at ten. I’m thinking I’ll be doing paperwork until I retire or die, whichever comes first. I’m thinking this big ass dude is going to toss that little bitch like a rag doll, and now he’s got the element of surprise on his side. I think I should do something about that, before Jerry decides to go in a blaze of glory, a hail of bullets. I think we still have speed and violence of action on our side, and two out of three Pillars of Close Quarters Battle ain’t bad.
A Meatloaf song pops into my head.
I’m not getting ambushed today. I double tap Travis on the back and move forward to a position of cover, except there isn’t one. There is only a hallway with the door at the end and Jerry beyond. The fatal funnel, they call it in the Academy, it’s practically guaranteed I’d catch a bullet if he starts shooting through that door. If my instructors could see me now they would kick my ass until I wished I had been shot. I move across the hallway to where it opens into the living room, concealing about half of my very thin body. Travis moves up and kicks the door. After a third kick it opens, Jerry and his wife still struggling for the gun. Any second I expect to hear a shot, to see her go down.
The gun, still black and still silver, goes flying onto the bed. The wife throws the magazine onto a shelf. Jerry’s hands go up in surrender. We holster our guns and rush in. The pig pile commences. I get Jerry’s left hand while Travis twists his right up behind his back, putting him face down on the bed. Travis gets the cuffs out and they snap-ratchet onto Jerry’s wrists.
Jerry’s wife starts yelling at us. “He didn’t do nothing wrong, you can’t take him to jail!”
I tell her to back up, leave the room. She moves in towards us, toward Travis and I trying to secure and search Jerry, the gun still lying on the bed, she’s still yelling, still moving towards the gun. I tell her again while I draw my Taser and paint the little red laser dot right on her chest, optimal target area. I wonder if when I pull the trigger the Taser will actually discharge this time, or if I’d be better off just throwing it at her like the last two fights I was in. She’s still griping, still coming toward us.
“GET THE FUCK BACK,” I say, and she does. Sometimes a little profanity goes a long way. Travis has Jerry searched and secure. I get the gun and rack the action. A hollow point round ejects. I retrieve the magazine and see it has three more rounds in it. They’re hollow point bullets, the same as what’s in my gun, the same as what the Police Department issues.
“Why would you pull a gun on two cops, Jerry?” I just have to ask.
“You know, for protection,” he says. “I got arrested once for some warrants while I was still in bed.”
“Well, you’re lucky you didn’t get shot you stupid fuck,” Travis says. “I said I didn’t want to fuck with you.”
Jerry turns his head away from us. Travis helps him up.
I radio a “Bravo Three, we’re ten four, secure,” letting everyone listening that nobody got dead, and we have things under control. “You good?” I ask Travis.
“Yeah, you?”
I nod. “You got him?”
Travis nods, as he walks Jerry out to his patrol car. The wife is sitting in the living room, crying. I stand her up and handcuff her for the time being. I explain she’s not under arrest, but until I have some more Officers, she’s being detained for my safety. The girls are huddled and crying and holding each other in the corner, almost exactly where they were when I forgot they existed. I’ve got Jerry’s gun shoved in my waistband, the magazine and loose round in my pocket, I’ve got to get people calmed down. Instead of just standing there, I take out my notepad to start gathering what I’m going to need for this report. My hands are shaking so badly I can’t write.
I’m embarrassed and I don't want anyone to see that. I put it away. My knees are bouncing and my legs are shaking and I’m pissed this adrenaline dump is going to wear off in front of everyone. My body is shaking it out, but my voice is steady. I shift my feet in a mockery of impatience and ask her what the hell Jerry was thinking.
The Lieutenant is the first to arrive after my call for help. He doesn’t ask what happened, he doesn’t ask what’s going on, he just says,
“What do you need?”
I ask the LT if he can watch her while I go secure the gun, which is really just an excuse to get out of there, to catch my breath, to let the shakes out and find some relief out of the public eye. I step out of the apartment and down the darkness of the stairs and I walk out into the shining sun. I sit in my patrol car and let the air conditioning wash over me. Hooking a finger down the front of my shirt, I pull the top of my armor away from my body and let some heat out. It feels the way a hot oven does when you crack the door just a little. My breathing starts to slow, the rhythm of my heart steadies, the shakes subside. I sit, holding the gun that could have killed me or Travis. I check the snaps on the holster that holds my gun that should have killed Jerry.
Steve walks up. We usually go everywhere together, he’s my rolling partner, since the PD doesn’t use two man cars. “Is that it, brother?”
“Yeah” I nod more than I speak.
“And it was loaded?”
“Yeah,” I hand him the magazine. He’s asking obvious questions not because he doesn’t know and not because he’s legitimately curious, but to get me talking before I can lock it up and stuff it down to eat away at me later on, to reassure me that anything that happened is okay.
“What a dumbass, you know, fuck that motherfucker.”
My head bobs up and down.
“Hey, you got evidence boxes right? Why don’t you secure the gun and I’ll go start getting statements and all that. Don’t worry about it, brother, I got it. I’ll be right back”
“Dude...I pulled the trigger on him.”
Steve stops, glances toward the apartment, “Shots fired?”
“No, bro, that’s what I’m saying, I pulled the trigger but the gun didn’t go off. That guy should be dead. How does that happen? Before the shot broke his wife jumped in front of him…you can’t measure how fast that had to have happened. I’m lucky I didn’t get the shot off and kill her.”
I sit a minute more, replaying the incident. I’d pulled my gun hundreds of times, believed I’d have to use it a dozen of those at least, but never actually pulled the trigger on a man. My heart starts beating harder, faster. I wonder if Jerry knows how close he was to being shot. The shaking comes back. I pull my cell phone out of my pocket, touch the last received call, and wait for it to connect.
“Hello,” she says, with a hint of bewilderment and apprehension.
“Hey, put Katie on the phone, ask her if she’ll sing her song for me.”