Page 51 of Top Shelf

I look at her on the steps, wide-eyed in a pair of pajama pants and one of my sweatshirts. I fucking love how even though her clothes are here, she still wears my stuff. I smile at her.

“It’s all gonna be okay,” I tell her with a wink.

Then I walk to the door and open it, holding Odie back from licking their faces off.

“Good morning, sir,” the first officer says. “I’m looking for Tyson Calway.”

“That’s me,” I say.

“We’d like to ask you some questions about an incident that occurred last night.”

“Ask away, sir,” I say.

“Can you tell me what happened last night at Bennett Mill Hockey Rink?” the second officer asks.

“I was playing in a charity hockey game. It was a fundraiser for a new youth hockey league that my brother-in-law is putting together,” I say. The first officer writes some things down.

“Can you tell me what else happened?” the second officer says.

“Between the second and third period, I walked out into the hallway to find my girlfriend,” I say. Just then, she appears at the door next to me, slipping her hand into mine. “She had been confronted by her ex-husband who was formerly abusive prior to her leaving. He put his hand on her, and I gave him a warning.”

“You gave him a warning?” the first officer asks. I nod.

“Yes, sir, I did,” I say. “I told him if he put his hand on her again, I was going to lay a hand on him.”

“So what happened next?” the second officer says, her eyes going from me, to Sadie, back to me.

“He reached to touch her again,” I say, my voice calm and collected. I’m not afraid or ashamed to tell this story. “So I hit him in the face.”

The first officer writes furiously in his pad.

“I presume you’re the girlfriend?” the second officer says. She nods.

“Yes, ma’am,” Sadie says.

“Can you confirm that Mr. Cowl put his hands on you?”

“Yes, ma’am, I can,” she says.

“Did he threaten you in any way?”

She pauses for a minute.

“Uh, no, not last night, but—”

“Have you ever filed a police report about the alleged abuse?” the first officer asks.

She swallows, her eyes big and full of worry again. She looks up at me, then back to them.

“No,” she says. “I, uh…I just left.”

The second officer nods.

They ask us a few more questions and give us their cards. They tell us they have a “few more witnesses” to interview, and I wonder who else they have to talk to. They tell us that they’ll be bringing all the information they have to the district attorney who will decide if charges will be filed or not.

As they turn to leave, I stop them.

“My sister was actually present in the hallway,” I say. “She witnessed the entire altercation.”

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