Lovers Must Always Prove a Point/West Seattle/Fri Oct 26/11:35 pm: A West Seattle man called 911 and said that the heated argument he was having with his lover required police intervention. When Officer Pitts arrived, this is what he/she observed: "Four fingers of the complainant's hand were bleeding, and three were bandaged. I saw droplets of blood on the floor of the hallway, the kitchen, and bathroom." Officer Pitts requested an explanation, and the West Seattle man said he got into an argument with his lover that achieved a new level of intensity when his lover coldly stated, "I wish you were dead."

Being the sort of man who doesn't play with words, he grabbed a knife from the kitchen, cupped its blade with his right hand, pointed the handle toward his lover, and said, "Go ahead, kill me." His lover was astonished, and refused to take the knife and make her words come true. So "to prove a point," he "squeezed the sharp blade and drew it across his fingers."

Officer Pitts then asked the woman what happened, and she said, "He cut his fingers with the knife because I kicked his ass at pool." Officer Pitts then asked where the knife was, and the lover said it was in the garbage can under the kitchen sink. Officer Pitts then looked in the garbage can and found the bloody implement. But this piece of evidence had no value, because the crime never materialized; the deed, the death, never left the realm of a lover's curse.

Besieged/Capitol Hill/Mon Oct 29/6:57 pm: A Capitol Hill man called and asked the police to intervene in an argument he was having with his lover. When Officer Slaughter arrived, he/she made contact with the Capitol Hill man, who was standing outside his house. He told Officer Slaughter that he and his lover had been drinking at a bar with three other men on the previous night. She was enjoying herself; he was not. He wanted to leave; she did not. "Fine," he said, after asking her to leave for the last time. "You're not welcome at my place, then." When he got home, he threw a sleeping bag out on the porch and a put a toothpick in the door lock. "You see," he explained to all-ears Officer Slaughter, "I was tired of her coming home late and staying out with other guys. This is why I put the toothpick into the lock. I wanted her to stay out [of my life]." She never came home that night.

The next day he and his lover were supposed to meet at 3:00 p.m. at a pet shop to get some fish for an aquarium they recently bought. She never showed up. He got very angry with her and went to where she worked to ask her about last night (where did she go?), and about the missed appointment at the pet store. She explained that after he left the bar, the three guys kidnapped her. As for the pet store, she simply forgot. The Capitol Hill man imploded; he was besieged by her army of indifference, her bullets of deceit (did she have sex with the men at the bar?). He ordered her to leave the ruins of his life at once.

Later at the apartment, as she was packing her possessions, the Capitol Hill man asked her if she was going to report the "kidnapping" to the police, and she said, "No. I'm not." At this point, he left the apartment and called the police himself.

Officer Slaughter then talked with the lover. "He is verbally abusive," she said wearily. "He's always accusing me of sleeping around, going out with other guys. He is on some power trip. He calls me lots of names, and he has a little penis. Short men [usually] have that problem." Officer Slaughter handed the lover a business card, and returned to the precinct to write up this police report.