I knew Tank by now. I knew that he wasn’t a scary dude, and he got off on fuckin with people. He had me with him, and I didn’t want this situation to go left, so I paused, turned around in his arms, and I looked at him.
“Don’t say anything to them. Please. Let’s just get in the car, and go,” I told him, looking him in his eyes, and then my eyes looked passed him, paying attention to the police officers that were parked in front of the club building.
Because Miami clubs were so dangerous, and stuff was always happening, these days, officers would always post out front.
“I’m not going to say shit to them niggas. Come on,” he tapped me on my ass.
I kissed him, and then I finished leading the way. They were parked so close to Tank’s car. I knew he was itching to say something to him because from being around him, I knew that people parking close to him was one of his pet peeves, especially when it was so much room to not have parked so close.
He looked at me, looked at the small distance between his car, and theirs, looked at them, but he kept his word, and he didn’t say anything to them. He just shook his head, opened the passenger door for me, and as I was about to get in, I heard…
“Stay out your lil’ cousin business. You going to get him killed,” the bigger dude said, taking the blunt from his lips, and he had his eyes on Tank.
I saw the way Tank’s jaws flexed, and he was itching to say something to them. The fight that he had with himself to keep quiet had gone out the window. He kissed me on my forehead,and he tried to walk over to them, but I reached up, pulling his shirt, stopping him from moving.
“Smoke your blunt nigga, and don’t say shit to me. You been dying to get my attention for the past two hours. You been staring me down in the club, as if you were one of these hoes out here and wanted to ask me for my number. Then, you parked your whip right next to mine, barely leaving any space. You barking up the wrong tree, nigga. I’m not the nigga that you want to beef with. Smoke your blunt in silence, homie. I’m telling you this not the beef you want,” Tank spat, and the whole time, I had an arm on him because I didn’t want him to walk away.
I knew that the moment Tank walked over to them, that things were going to go left. Tank had a gun on him too. Him, June, and the rest of the dudes that were in our section, they all knew security, so they were able to slip him a few dollars, so that they could get the guns in the club. I didn’t know if these dudes had guns, either. I didn’t want to find out. I wanted to just go.
“Nigga, I don’t give a fuck who you is. I’ll beef with a motha fuckin dog. I never cared. I said what the fuck I said. Stay the fuck out of Rico’s business before you get your ass killed or him. Listen to your bitch and get the fuck in the car. We ain’t scared of no nigga that sell hookah’s for a living,” the man continued to talk.
I knew that Tank was itching to beat his ass, so I had no choice but to let go of him. I had to. The dude was being too disrespectful.
The second I let go of Tank’s arm; he charged at them like a raging pitbull. He came at them so fast, not really giving them any time to prepare for it. The dude that had been sitting on top of the car, doing all the talking, Tank went for his legs, pulling him off the car, making him hit his head on the concrete, and from there, he started beating the shit out of him. He was aheavy-set dude, so it was shocking to see Tank pull him down off the car like that.
He was with another guy, who was tall, and skinny. You could see it in his face that he wanted to react, jump in, and help his friend out, but there was this look on his face like he didn’t want to be involved in this brawl. The dude that Tank had on the floor, he was getting the shit beat out of him, and during that, he kept trying to reach for his waist, and I knew he was trying to get his gun.
“Tank. Tank, he has a gun!” I screamed for him.
Before Tank could even react, you could hear the police sirens going off, coming from the parking lot, and within seconds, the officers made their way over, and you would think that Tank would have stopped, and just throw the towel in, especially since the officers were over here, but he was still in that mode, where he was blacked out, beating his ass.
It felt like my body had gone numb, where I wasn’t really taking in the things that were happening, but when the officers came, and I watched as it took three of them to get Tank off the dude, and they aggressively tackled him to the floor, putting him down on his stomach, so they could restrain him, and put his hands behind his back, I lost my fuckin mind. I became erratic, rushing over to them, screaming for them to stop.
“Stop! Don’t hurt him! Don’t fuckin hurt him. He didn’t do anything!” I was screaming, tears falling down my face, losing my mind.
“Ma’am, go over by the car! Go over there, NOW!” one of the officers yelled at me, but I paid him no mind, as I continued to yell for them to stop.
“Dionne, go over to the car! Go to the fuckin car before they put cuffs on your ass too! GO!” Tank barked at me, as he was still down on the concrete, and they were able to put handcuffs on him.
I stepped away, even though I didn’t want to, and I went to Tank’s car, standing in front of it.
“Take the key, and go to the house, baby. Ima call you,” Tank said to me.
“No. I’m not leaving you! No!” I was out of my mind, and I was scared as hell.
I knew that black men were white officers favorite kind to target, so there was no way in hell that I was going to leave Tank with these officers by himself.
“Dionne, take the fuckin keys, and go to my house. I’ll call you when all this shit gets settled. Do that shit now!” he barked at me again, and the officers agreed with him, telling me to go because I was making the situation worse with all the screaming, and crying that I was doing.
I didn’t want to leave him. I wanted to stay right here, and watch the way things unfolded, but I got into the car, started it, and I hysterically cried the entire way to Tank’s house. I was so messed up right now that I was cool with the idea of getting booked with him, just so that I wouldn’t have to be without him.
I didn’t know what they were going to do to him, and that’s the part that scared me shitless.
Chapter 10
Tavion ‘Tank’ Briggs
Booked for the Night
