By Nikki Knight

Good DJ’s know their audience. I know the listeners in my little Vermont town want cheery uptempo music to get them moving in the morning and gooey love songs at night. I know the Marley Dude needs to hear “I Shot the Sheriff” a couple times a week, and that the town clerk loves her Sinatra.

And I know when something’s wrong. Really wrong.

I should. I’ve been a DJ since I was a big, awkward teenager with a huge silky voice that was the only graceful thing about me, working overnights in my scruffy Western PA hometown. I was even born with a “radio name,” Jaye (short for Jacqueline) Jordan.

These days, I’m life-stress scrawny but I’m still the tallest woman in most rooms. And I’ve still got the voice. That, thankfully, only gets better with age.

Once upon a time, I was a midday jock in New York City, but then my husband survived cancer and wanted different things, most of them small and blonde. And my big corporate employer decided the “Bully Ballers Sports Lunch” was a better moneymaker than light rock at work.

I took my severance, bought the Vermont station where I’d had my first real job and started over. I still know my audience.

That turned out to be a very good thing one chilly April evening. My tween daughter Ryan had finished her homework and headed upstairs to the little apartment we share over the radio station, while I finished a few tasks before my all-request evening show.

I’m not the only busy person around; small towns are full of multitaskers doing work that would be covered by three or four full-timers in the City. So I didn’t mind a bit that the director of the Domestic Violence Help Center needed to tape her interview on the upcoming spring fundraiser a little before showtime.

I was pretty sure Linda Gould’s day was a lot harder than anything a jock – or even a radio station manager, as I now unwillingly was – ever had to deal with, and I could move my tasks around a little.

At a quarter to seven, I set up the former newsroom, and dialed her through the phone interface. It’s old equipment but it works decently enough, especially now that Ryan and her best friend had wired in a digital recorder.

The first time I dialed, it rang ten times, and nobody picked up. It didn’t concern me, because most of the world isn’t as precise about time as broadcasters are. The second time, though, Linda picked up, and she just sounded…strange.

“Hi, Jaye. Thanks for calling.”

We’d met back in the fall when I bought WSV and took it live and local again. The old owner gave me a break on the price because he felt guilty about firing everyone and putting angry satellite talk on a beloved community institution.

One of the first things I did as the new owner was go around town and acquaint myself with the current business, government, and social service leaders. Unlike a lot of folks who were suspicious of the New York jock, Linda, a no-nonsense Western Massachusetts native, welcomed me with friendly curiosity.

And more. When I gave her the short version on how we ended up here, Linda offered sympathy and connections to good counselors…if we decided we needed them. Smart, nice lady.

I wouldn’t say we were friends, but we were good acquaintances, with a lot in common as busy women with demanding work and family lives – and a fondness for jeans and good boots. By now, I’d interviewed her, either on the phone or in person, for several events and appeals, so I knew her well enough to hear something in her voice. But I didn’t know her well enough to ask what it was.

One of the key rules of Northern New England life is minding your own business.

The interview was boilerplate, a few quick professional bites about the event and how people can get involved – and always, the reminder of the resources at the Center, and the hotline for anyone who fears for their safety.

Usually, when I interview someone I know, I end by asking if they have a request. It’s a nice thing to do, and a way to leave the conversation on a warm note. This time was different.

“So what do you want me to spin you tonight?”

 “How about ‘How Am I Supposed to Live Without You?’”

 Pretty florid, but to each her own. “Which one, Laura Branigan or Michael Bolton?”

 “Jaye, make it Michael Bolton. You know me and him.”

 Her voice had gone a little higher, and brittle. And I knew.

 “Got that,” I said, keeping my own tone even. “I’ll get it right on.”

 “Thanks. Talk later.”

  “Take care.”

  I was out of the newsroom with my cellphone in hand before I finished the second word.

   The police chief picked up on the first ring. “George Orr.”

    Simpson’s police chief is a friend, and the husband of a closer friend. Chief George ended his 25 years at the NYPD as a lieutenant, and then came up here for a new challenge…and to bring some professionalism and diversity to the force.

     He’s probably not the only Black police chief in a small Vermont town, but he does stand out a little.

     “Chief, it’s Jaye.” Unless his wife Alicia is hosting girls’ brunch, I call him Chief. Respect’s a good thing. “I think something’s wrong at the Domestic Violence Center.”

     “Tell me.” His voice was cool, but very serious.

      “Well, I just did a phone interview with Linda Gould and she requested Michael Bolton’s ‘How Am I Supposed to Live Without You.’”                

       “Jaye…” The chief’s voice went from concern to indulging his wife’s pal. “Michael Bolton?”

       “I know Linda. When I interviewed her back around Christmas, one of his holiday songs was on the satellite and she said she wouldn’t listen to him at gunpoint. We laughed about it.”

       “C’mon, Jaye.”

       “Her voice was stressed. Give me credit, Chief. I know voices.”

      “You do.” He was right on the fence.

     “Look. You can make fun of me for the rest of my life if I’m wrong, but please check it out.”

      “Oh, all right. It’s better than filling out the employee evaluations for the patrol guys.”

“Thank you. Really.”

  He made a growly noise and hung up.

###

The evening show was on, and I was doing the standard once-per-night spin of “You’re the Inspiration” for yet another anniversary couple, when the doorbell light flashed.

I wasn’t surprised to see the Chief on the porch, hands in the pockets of his black leather trench, the Indiana Jones fedora he wore on his bald head shadowing his eyes.

  “C’mon in,” I said. “The coffee’s fresh. Are you going to make fun of me for the rest of my life?”

   Chief George shook his head. “I’m never going to make fun of you again.”

    I already knew that.

   “Come downstairs. I’ll get you some coffee and we can talk.”

    “Good. I’m going to need your statement, Jaye.”“Then I need some coffee too.”

Once we were settled in the studio, with good dark roast in WSV swag mugs, and I’d racked up the next two songs (the Marley Dude’s “One Love,” and a Mariah Carey classic), the Chief gave me a wry smile.

      “You called it, Jaye.”

       “I’m just glad I could help. What happened?”

        “Well, Donny Winstead’s wife left him – it’s not talking out of school to say there’ve been years of calls to their place – and Linda helped her and their two kids get to the county shelter.”

         Simpson, like the other towns in our area, is too small for its own domestic-violence safe house. We share one with the rest of the county, and only a few people know where it is. For good reason.

          “And Donny wasn’t happy,” I said. Easy math there.

          “Got it in one.” The chief took a sip of coffee, and a long breath. “He showed up with a gun – you know, it’s Vermont, everybody has one – and demanded to know where his wife and kids were. Linda convinced him to let her pick up when you called back, saying it would cause more trouble if she didn’t.”

         “So she tried to send a message through me.”

          “Which she did, thanks to you knowing your listeners.”

           “What happened when you got there?”

           A small chuckle. Whistling past the graveyard. “What always happens with people who think they’re tough.”

           “Handed you the gun?”

            “Yup.” Chief George wasn’t normally monosyllabic. I suspected he’d be having a good long talk and an adult beverage with Alicia tonight to process this close call.

             “How’s Linda?”

             “Shaky but she’ll be okay. Tough lady.”

              “Maybe I call her tonight.”

              “Maybe…said she was going home to hug her kids, so…”

              “Maybe not til tomorrow.”

              A nod.

              “So what’s Donny get?”

              He scowled. “Depends on how I write it up, and what the D.A. can make stick. If I thought it would hold, I’d write it up as attempted murder and terroristic threats.”

              “Would this help?” I held out the CD of the interview, and more. I hadn’t realized Linda left the line open – and I’d left the tape running — until I hung up with the Chief and walked back into the newsroom to hear the last few minutes of it.

              She told him he could kill her but he wouldn’t get the information, and he told her he’d shoot her in the knee and see if that changed her mind.

             Linda had assured him it wouldn’t.

           It wasn’t a bluff.

            Donny was still trying to work up the nerve to test her when the Chief knocked on the door.

            Chief George took the disc. “Well, well. Miracle of modern technology.”

            “Something like that.” I took a breath, still in awe of Linda and her bravery. I was sure I could do anything I had to do to defend my kid…but not that I could do it for someone else’s.

            That’s a whole different order of guts.

            The Chief put the disc in his pocket and studied me for a moment. “Look, Jaye, you didn’t walk into the line of fire, but you definitely saved a life tonight.”

            “And Linda saved three.”

            “Yep.” He grinned “Alicia’s right. You don’t mess with the women up here.”

            “Nope.” The Marley song was fading, and I made the seg into the Mariah Carey.

“’Hero?’” asked the Chief.

“Hell, yeah.”      

“You could do a lot worse.”

I raised my coffee to him. “We almost did.”