Street Certified Heavyweight

Beginning

Four Years Earlier

I had a long drive ahead of me and the last thing I needed was to be running on empty so I pulled into the Shell gas station in the hood, on MLK before hitting the highway. I grabbed my card out my wallet, and got out to pump my gas.

It was early. Not even ten in the morning yet and the hood was just starting to wake up.

The corner store across the street was open, somebody’s music was already blasting from somewhere down the block, and the gas station lot had the usual mix of people moving in and out grabbing breakfast and coffee before the start of the day.

I had my hoodie up and my mind already on the road, thinking about the three hour drive and what I needed to handle when I got back because I had moves to make and not a lot of time to make them.

I was minding my business.

That shit lasted about ninety seconds.

There was a dark blue Camry parked two pumps over and I peeped the movement inside it before I heard anything.

It was just the kind of feeling that made you look over without fully knowing why yet.

Then the voices in the car started coming through loud as hell and clear.

The woman’s voice is what caught my attention and made me lose focus on the gas I was pumping.

High and strained in a way that told you this wasn’t a regular argument.

This was somebody who was scared on top of being angry.

The nigga was matching her energy and getting loud too.

It was too early for muthafuckas to be arguing.

I kept my eyes forward and focused on my pump while I shook my head at the usual hood shit.

Then I heard the first hit. That muthafucka sounded off loud, even through the cars and traffic passing by.

That sound was unmistakable. Wasn’t a slap. Wasn’t somebody bumping into something. That was a closed fist connecting with somebody’s face. Then, the sharp cry that came right after it told me everything else I needed to know.

I pulled the pump out of my tank before it finished and walked over to them fast as hell.

Nah, I wasn’t captain save-a-hoe, but I wasn’t gone stand around and watch a nigga beat on a woman.

I don’t care how pressed for time I was or in a hurry.

This some shit that I was willing to get behind schedule for.

No woman deserves to be hit by a man, I don’t care what she said to him.

The passenger window was down and I could see her now.

She was a young girl, couldn’t have been older than me.

I’d say she was around twenty two, twenty three, pressed against the door with her hand up trying to block whatever was coming next and blood already coming from her lip.

The man in the driver seat was still going, grabbing at her, and she was trying to get away from him in a space that didn’t give her nowhere to go.

I knocked on the driver window twice. Hard.

He stopped, looked over at me and the look on his face was the kind that men got when they felt like whatever they were doing behind closed doors was being interrupted by somebody who had no business being there.

He rolled the window down further. “The fuck you want?”

“Step out the car real quick my guy,” I said. I didn’t know if I was going to talk to him, or beat his ass. I just knew I needed to get him off of her. I couldn’t watch this happen right in front of me and not say anything.

“Nigga this ain’t got nothing to do with you. Mind your business.”

“You putting your hands on a woman at a gas station pump at this time in the morning. It’s everybody’s business now. Step out.”

He looked at me for a second like he was deciding something and then he opened the door and got out and he was bigger than he looked sitting down.

Taller. Wide through the shoulders. He got in my face without any hesitation which told me he had done this before, not just with her but in general.

This nigga thought he was bad or somethin.

He was the kind of man who had gotten away with being physical his whole life because of his size. Today was his lucky day though.

“I said mind your muthafuckin business homie. This is between me and my girl. You need to walk back over to your car before you get the same shit she getting for not knowing her fuckin place.” he spat, and I couldn’t help but laugh. Did I really look like a bitch to him?

“Nah. That ain’t gone happen. I’ll never let a bitch ass nigga handle me like that, but I am gone make sure you don’t lift yo hands to nobody else. You must not know who the fuck I am?”

He grabbed me by the throat before I finished speaking.

He reached out and grabbed me with one hand, squeezed and got in my face. This nigga grip was strong and meant to be intimidating. On somebody else it probably would have worked.

I wasn’t somebody else though.

“I said mind yo business bitch ass, police ass nigga. You can’t save the world today if I put yo bitch ass in a body bag for getting in my shit.” he spat.

I was more in shock that this nigga ain’t know that I wasn’t the nigga to play with. I mean, the whole hood knew that. All I wanted was some gas, and was about to possibly catch a body round this bitch.

I broke his grip, grabbed him by the back of his head and slammed his face to the hood of his own car.

I felt something crunch under the impact.

He stumbled back and I was already on him, two body shots that folded his bitch ass forward and then a right hook that straightened him back up.

Then another one that put him on his ass.

I kicked that bitch ass nigga like I was playing soccer with his head.

He tried to get up but I got down and put my knee in his back, then pressed him flat and got close to his ear.

“My name is Street, hoe ass nigga. You should have stopped when you had the chance. You wanted to be tough today, knowing you a pussy.”

He wasn’t moving.

I stood up, stepped back and looked at him on the ground and then looked over at the girl who had gotten out of the passenger side during all of it and was standing by the rear of the car watching.

I expected her to be relieved.

She was not relieved or even appreciative.

“WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?” She came around the car fast and got in my face and her whole energy had changed into something I wasn’t expecting. “WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT TO HIM? ARE YOU CRAZY?”

I looked at her. “He was beating yo ass a second ago. I was just coming to get the nigga to stop.”

“THAT IS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!” She was already pulling her phone out. “I’m calling the police! You just jumped on my nigga for no reason! I got the whole thing on camera from inside the car!”

I looked at her standing there with her phone pointed at me, lip still bleeding from what he had done to her not three minutes ago.

This hoe must had a concussion or some shit, she defending the same man who had just put his hands on her face.

I felt something that wasn’t anger, but it wasn’t really disbelief either, it was somewhere in the middle of both.

I didn’t say anything else to her. I just looked at this muthafucka like she’s lost her mind. And my eye contact put visible fear in her.

I walked back to my car, got in, and pulled out of that gas station lot while she was still screaming behind me.

Her nigga was still getting himself up off the concrete.

I ain’t have time for this dumb ass shit today.

She was recording, still yelling, and showing her ass as I merged onto the street and kept moving.

My phone rang not even a minute later.

It was my lil brother Melo.

I cleared my throat and let out a long breath before answering. I needed it to sound normal, because today was all about my baby brothers. Not the weird ass couple at the gas station.

“What’s good bro.”

“Nigga where you at? We been ready. Mazi been outside for twenty minutes already acting like we gone miss something. You gone follow us there still, right?”

“Tell him to sit his impatient ass down. I’m on my way.” I checked my mirrors out of habit and switched lanes. “Y’all eat already?”

“Yeah we ate. You good? You sound like something happened.”

“I’m good. Just traffic. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

I hung up, drove and let the morning move past my windows and didn’t think about what just happened because thinking about it wasn’t going to change shit. I would do it again tomorrow under the same circumstances.

Some things you just couldn’t walk past.

I wasn’t built that way and never had been. Even if that dumb ass hoe was ungrateful, she still ain’t deserve to be beat on by no nigga.

Before I made it to my brothers, I got a call from my uncle, Legal.

My adrenaline was still rushing and I didn’t want it to be shown in this call.

Legal was my father’s best friend. His real name is Jermaine, but he went on to be a big attorney and the streets named him Legal.

All he cared about was muthafuckas doing the right thing.

Legal really did make a difference in this community.

He was a good guy and made sure to keep my father memory alive.

He loved us and looked out for us like his own and was around for all our milestones.

“Aye Unc, what’s good?” I answered, trying to sound calm.

“Today the big day. Are y’all on the road yet?

I called Mazi and he ain’t answer. Melo phone on DND like his lil ass the president or something.

I’m trying to remind them to keep me updated.

What’s wrong with you? Why you answering like that?

” He asked, he already knew that I was trying to cover some shit up.