I'm going to tell you a quick story. 1998, all right? Here's the deal. Me and my homey's, it's like four of us in the car. There was a car back in the day called a Nissan Stanza; none of you all know what it is because they don't make them anymore. You know, it was a Nissan Stanza. What did it look like? >> Like a little car. Like a little car. It's like -- it's sort of like a car. >> Jason Reynolds: It's like a car. The Nissan Stanza was basically like this strange little car that they made back in the day, but it was also sort of like a van, sort of like a truck, like a weird little vehicle, right? And it had a sliding door on one side, but it was only like -- it was tiny little car with a sliding door, right? Very strange. Four of us are in the car. We're riding down 23rd and Parkway. You all know where 23rd and Parkway is? Around there right? All right. So I'm from here. I'm from your neighborhood. I'm from Wheeler Road, all right, right? All right, so we riding down 23rd and Parkway. It's the middle of the day. I'm thinking like maybe 3:30, the music is blasting. We playing something crazy. I can't think of what the song was now, but it's like the equivalent like in today's time which I would be playing, like Drake and Future, or whatever. Like something just wild, right? We blasting it. And we get to a yellow light, as the light turns yellow as we're approaching it. And my homey who is driving drives through the yellow light, right and makes the left turn. Technically he didn't break no law, right? He makes the left turn, we see the sirens. Woot, woot. Now everybody in my neighborhood, everybody in my neighborhood already knows what time it is. We were all raised to believe like listen, "You ever get pulled over by the cops, yes sir, no sir, hands up", right? My hands on the wheel, everybody doing what they're supposed to do. The cop walks over to the car. Remember there's four of us in the car. He walks over to the car and he says "Let me get your license and registration". My buddy is like "You why we being pulled over"? The cop is like "Well you ran a red light". My ma is like "It wasn't a red light. The light was yellow". He's like "Doesn't matter; give me your license and registration". My friend can't find the registration to his car. Now remember there's four of us. There's two people in the front and two people in the back. Now the guy in the back seat, behind the passenger side is one of your homey's who is like kind of stupid, right? You know everybody has the one friend you're like "Dog", like -- it's like that guy, right? [ Laughter ] >> Jason Reynolds: You all know this guy, right? So, so here's what happened. So here's what happens. So here's what happens, right? We look -- we turn around to our homey and say "Listen check behind the seat in the pocket behind the seat and see if the registration is there. If it is, don't open the door. Just pass it to me and I'll pass it to the cop". The cop has walked back to his vehicle at this point to run the license and do all this, that and give him the time to find the registration. So we're all digging through the car, digging through the car. Finally, the dumb one, right? He reaches in the back pocket, he pulls out, he's like "Yo, I found the registration". Remember it's a sliding door; this car has a sliding door. I don't know -- minivans are really quiet these days, right? But like back in the day when you opened a sliding door it was like hearing a lion's roar, right? You opened the door there was so much noise. So, he opens the door and literally a second into opening the door the cop is like with his gun out, like gun in the car in our faces. Now here's the thing, let's be clear. I'm not necessarily upset about the fact the cop drew his gun because my home boy opened the door and that was a ridiculous thing to do, and so the cop obviously went on the defense. But what happens next is ridiculous, true story. What happens after my friend opens the door, the cop tells him to close the door after we're all scared to death because the gun is in our faces. We sit in the car for five more minutes. The next thing you know there are four cops, right. Four cop cars pulling up behind us. They all come over to us. They say, "Do you have any guns? Do you have any drugs"? We say "No, we're coming from high school. We're coming from our school. We have no guns, we have no drugs. This is our neighborhood. We're just trying to get home; we've done nothing but run a yellow light". The officers say "I don't believe you, everybody out of the car". Five minutes later we're all out -- there's four of us, all out of the car with face down, we're handcuffed and they tear his car apart. I'm talking like everything, tear the seats out, looking for -- looking for something that's not there. Right, they took everything out of his glove compartment, they look under everything, they empty out his trunk, put everything on the street. They pull everything out of the car and put it all on the street while we laid there on our stomachs in our neighborhood with our friends walking by, "Yo what, what's good? What's happening", this that and the third. And finally after like 10 minutes of this, 20 minutes of this they don't find anything of course because we're innocent. They uncuff us and tell us to be on our way, leaving all of our stuff on the street. They all get back in their cars and they drive away, right? True story. It shook me because it was the first time that I realized that oh man, it's real out here. My older brother had gone through it. A lot of my other friends had gone through it. But it was the first time that I -- it could have been much worse, right? Anything could have happened. Some of its home boys fault for opening the door, right? But the rest of it was totally unnecessary. We hadn't done anything but run a yellow light, right? I've got other friends who have had their teeth kicked out, I've had -- I mean I have tons of stories, some of which I'll share with you guys another point. But that's what brought me to this book. That was sort of my own interaction as a young person. In this neighborhood, from D.C. as a young person in my experience with the police officers when I was your age. And so when I sat down to write this book that's sort of what I was brining to the table, right? I remember what it felt like. I remember what it was like to have your parents -- how many of you all had the talk with your parents about what to do if you ever have an interaction with the cops? And most of you all aint' even -- some of you all in high school, some of you all aren't. That's a lot of people. So, young age to have that talk. And I was around your age when my mom gave me that talk.