Before she could answer, his brother D turned around and said to the waitress, who was bringing more bottles, “Ayo, let’s do shots.”
Rap took another shot of his 1738, hit his glass on the table hard, and then said, “Double shots for everyone.”
Everyone was happy, following his lead. The three waitresses filled the glasses with the double shots of 1738, but Rap had a triple shot.
“You not doing no shot?”
“Naw, baby, I’m good. You g’on and do mines for me.” Bianca slid it over to the side.
“What, you don’t drink at all? You gotta live a little,” Rap said.
“Yeah, I drink, but just not feeling it tonight for some reason.”
Diamond heard him. “That’s why I brought her out, so she could loosen up.”
“Well, we ain’t doing no good job,” he said in slurs.
Bianca was glad she wasn’t drinking. She could really see how people who seemed witty when she was drinking, now seemed inebriated and silly. This was her first turning point. She said she would not drink around people she was watching and getting to know.
“Don’t worry. I’m going to do hers for her,” Diamond said.
“Thanks, boo.”
“You know I got you.” As Diamond went to reach for Bianca’s shot, Rap took it and drank it.
He smiled at her and imitated the people from an “oldies but goodies” commercial. “Naw, playgirl, you gotta get your own.”
Diamond, who was also kind of juiced up along with the fellas, burst out into laughter.
“You are so funny,” Bianca said.
When the fight was well into the eleventh round, Rap handed Bianca his cell phone. “Put your number in my phone so I can take you out tomorrow.”
“Okay,” she obliged, “but you gotta take your pass code off the phone so I can put my number in it.”
He took one more shot, and as he took the phone out of her hand, she moved the bottle of 1738 out of his reach. “No more for you. You’ve had enough. We’re done with this.” She put her foot down as he struggled to put the passcode in. It took him twice as long to log the right numbers in it, because his equilibrium was totally off. He finally handed it back to her.
Bianca logged her number in the phone and saved it for Rap, while he snuck and took another shot when he thought she wasn’t watching. “Come on, Rap. I said no more. You’ve had enough,” she said firmly, giving him a look, letting him know she wasn’t at all happy with him.
“All right, party pooper,” he said, trying to make light of the situation. “No more for me, because you can be the boss of me. But only you can boss me around, though.”
“A’ight, I won’t abuse the privilege,” she said with a smile.
“Did you put your number in the phone?” He stuttered a bit. “I mean the right number?”
“Of course I did,” she assured him. “I’m actually looking forward to our date.”
“Let me see it.” He dug into his pocket to get his cell, which seemed like such a chore for him to retrieve it out of his jeans pocket. “Show me.”
“You don’t believe me.”
“Not that. Just wanna make sure,” he said then, by mistake, to keep from knocking the bottle over, he knocked her purse off the table, causing things to fall out.
“Take the lock off it,” she said as she proceeded to gather her contents that had fell out of her pocketbook.
Diamond got up and went to the bathroom. “Girl, too much drinking. I’ll be right back.”
He struggled to punch in the passcode and kept putting the wrong numbers in. It was official, he was drunk! After trying three times, the phone locked him out and shut off completely. He shot her a look of daggers.
“Why you do that? Why you do that to my phone?”
“What?” Bianca said to him. “I didn’t do anything to your phone.” Realizing that there was one more thing she had left by mistake on the floor, she bent down and picked it up.
“I know who you are, and it ain’t shit you can do to me anyway,” he said.
“What?” She was dumbfounded. “I don’t wanna do nothing to you.”
“I’m so glad I ain’t in the streets no more.” He shook his head. “I swear, if I was still in the streets, do you know what I would do to your kind?”
“Boy . . . ” she said, looking at him as if he were crazy.
“Ayo, D, man, dey the po-po.”
D laughed. By now, he and Diamond were friendly.
“Look, nigga!” Bianca said in her boldest tone. “You are officially fucked up, and you really drunk as shit.” She stood up. “I’m ’bout to get the hell out of here.”
He grabbed her hand and pushed her down. “You ain’t going nowhere.”
“Nigga, let my motherfucking hand go.” She tried to jerk away from him.
He leaned in and got right in her face, and she could smell the 1738 reeking on his breath.
“Nigga, you are crazy, I’m not nobody’s fucking police,” she said, staring him back in the eyes. “And let me the fuck go!”
He squeezed tighter. “You think I’m stupid? Nobody knows you, you not drinking, no family, no friends, then you do something to my phone so you can tap it.”
She tried to push him off with her other arm, but it wasn’t working. She looked around at all the guys who were sitting with them and searched their faces to see who could help her, but she knew none of them could or would. “So you niggas call yo’selves men, and you gon’ let him hold me against my fucking will?”
“Bitch,” Rap said, his hand still squeezing her. The guys around stood up and surrounded her.
Before anyone knew it, with her free hand, she had a knife at Rap’s throat.
“Ohhhhhhh, shit!” the guys echoed, unable to believe their eyes.
“Muthafucka, now I asked you nicely to let me fucking go, but you wouldn’t. You want to torment me because I don’t wanna get drunk tonight? This
