Tay was my brother. We weren’t related by blood, but Tay was truly like family to me. He was a devoted father, son, brother, hustler, and a certified mack. You’d rarely ever catch him stepping out to a club or bar and not looking fly—even if he was just popping in for a split second. He grew up down the street, near both of my grandmothers on the nutty north side of town. I met him so early in life that I really can’t remember any formal introduction. His aura reminded me of that of legendary boxing champion Floyd Mayweather, with his slight stutter and bright smile. Tay could light up any room.
I had a lot of love for that dude, and whenever we stepped out together I was guaranteed to have a fun time. But on the night of the comedy show I was chilling at my mom’s house because my body had shut down from excessive alcohol consumption throughout the week. I’ll leave it at that. I needed to get my black ass mentally prepared for work the next morning and I couldn’t take a chance at partying too hard with Tay that night.
Duke and Tay had flown in a comedian from Washington, DC, as the headline act, and even with a modest crowd, the show still had to go on.
Unfortunately, the bulk of the folks—looking to drink and party—didn’t arrive until after the comedian’s set had already ended. But Tay and Duke still showed the comedian love and blessed him with a portion of their earnings from the door. Tay kept the jokester’s cup filled with vodka shots, too. Shit was all good.
By 2:00 A.M. the countless Cîroc shots and Bud Ice started to kick in.
Everybody at Arlene’s was feeling a good buzz as they headed for the door. Tay and Duke even lined up a few chicks to come home with them, but there was one problem: the liquor store was closed.
As the owners shut down Arlene’s, Tay and Duke were among the last ones to leave.
Tay skirted off recklessly. He punched at least sixty miles per hour on the dashboard down North Saginaw Street in his white 2007 Dodge Charger. Tay was headed to an after-hours spot to grab another fifth of Cîroc. Duke took off in the opposite direction in his green truck to get gas before entertaining the women.
Wandering closely near the door of the after-hours spot were a couple of strange-looking black dudes, according to an eyewitness whom I promised would stay anonymous. One was tall and light-skinned and the other was a muscular, dark-skinned guy with a thick beard.
Tay knocked on the door then gave the guys dap as he waited to get in.
“Wassup, my nigga!” Tay greeted them.
“Are they charging in there, my nigga?” one asked.
“Probably a couple of dollars, if that,” Tay said. “You just gotta buy some drinks.”
“Man, I ain’t buying no drinks,” the other guy said. “Is they searching?”
“Yeah, they’re gonna pat you down or something,” Tay explained as they walked back toward the door.
As he banged on the door again, the light-skinned guy exposed a handgun.
“You know what man run that shit,” he told Tay.
“Y’all niggas are gonna try to rob me?” Tay asked.
“Run that motherfucking shit before I kill you,” he repeated.
Tay placed his hands on the door with a gun pointed toward his head as the dark-skinned guy ran his pockets.
“That’s fucked up that y’all niggas robbing me like this.” Tay shook his head in disbelief.
“Shut the fuck up before I pop you,” the tall guy yelled.
Tay beat on the door again before it finally flew open. He ran in, explained the situation, and raced back out to spot the thieves. The duo was still in the same spot. As soon as the robbers saw Tay coming back out, they fired.
Tay’s body collapsed on the hard concrete as soon as the bullet entered his left temple. A stream of blood flowed from his head onto the street as paramedics arrived on the scene. His clothes were soaked in blood.
“Oh my God, Tay!” a woman screamed. “Talk to me!”
He never recovered. Two days later, on October 22, 2013, at Hurley Medical Center, Tay took his last breath. He was thirty-two years old. The news hit me like a shock wave.
I’ll never forget that day. I was lying in bed, chilling with my pregnant girlfriend, when my mother barged in the room to deliver the news.
“Tay just died!” she yelled.
I jumped out of bed in disbelief. Tay and I had been hanging out that entire week in celebration of my twenty-fifth birthday. In fact, I was right at that same after-hours spot that he got shot in front of just four days before the incident.
What if I had decided to attend that comedy show with him that Sunday night? I would’ve likely trailed him to get a bottle of liquor. Would those guys have shot me, too? Maybe I wouldn’t be here, either. That’s a scary thought but a truthful one. To make matters worse, Tay’s girlfriend was also pregnant with his daughter. He couldn’t wait to father his third child. We discussed fatherhood that entire week.
“Can you believe that this gonna be my first baby that I’ll be out of the joint to raise from day one?” Tay kept saying, smiling. “That shit crazy.”
“It’s gonna be wild,” I said, as we passed around a bottle of Cîroc. “Our babies will be tight since they’re so close in age.”
“I know,” he told me. “If it’s a boy, I’m gonna name him after me, but if it’s a girl her name will be Dessiah.”
Tay never got a chance to even learn the baby’s gender. Maybe someday I can tell Dessiah how cool her daddy was.
Moving on the streets of Flint in the late night can be deadly. It took my losing Tay to really grasp this. In the daytime, many people identify me
