-Hey, everybody. I'm Seth Meyers.
This week we've been turning the top of our show over to
"Late Night" writer Amber Ruffin.
Every evening, she has told us stories
of her encounters with the police.
Here once again is Amber.
-The last two days, I've told stories about
my run-ins with the cops.
Today I'm going to tell you a story about
a run-in with the cops.
Okay, I was living in Chicago, and my friend Anthony
had just left my house.
Now, he goes out the door, across the porch,
down the stairs, gets on his bike and rides away.
I shut the door, I go inside, I change into my pajamas.
And when I come out of my room,
I see that he has left his wallet.
So I call him. He comes back to get it.
I step out onto the porch with no shoes, in my pajamas.
And instead of walking to the end of the porch
and down the stairs, I just reach over the side of the porch
to give him his wallet back.
So, he rides up on his bicycle and just lets his bicycle fall
and then reaches up to get his wallet.
Now, at that moment, I'm reaching down
and he's reaching up, a cop car pulls up, flashes its lights.
The cop gets out, and she's like, "Hold it right there!
We gotcha!"
I'm like, "Okay."
Now, everything she says to us
she says with her hand on her gun.
Now, I'm terrified, because while I'm a black lady,
Anthony is a black man,
and this cop is a tiny, little white lady.
Now, I'm scared.
Anthony's scared.
I've had a lot of run-ins with the cops at this point.
And isn't it hilarious that
when people say "run-ins with the cops,"
they mean they got caught doing something?
But when I say it, I just mean being a person that they bother?
Okay, so, this cop says,
"Why were you guys running from the police?"
And we're like, "We're not.
I'm not running anywhere. I live here."
And she's like, "Okay."
Meanwhile, I'm like, bitch, I have no shoes on.
I don't say that.
I say, "I'm in my pajamas with no shoes on,"
and she goes, "Let me see both your I.D.'s."
I go, "Okay, but to get my I.D.,
I have to go in the house, okay?"
And she's like, "Fine."
So I go in the house, and the whole time I'm in the house,
she's asking Anthony a million questions.
So, I come up. I give her my I.D.
She says, "This address is from Nebraska."
And she's right.
I go, "Oh, yeah, I don't have a new Chicago I.D. yet."
And she goes, "Well, then I need proof you live here.
Go get some mail."
Now, this is where the story takes a turn,
and I can't describe it exactly except to say
now she has unsnapped that thing that holds your gun in place
and is holding on to her gun tighter.
So, I go inside and I'm freaking out
because she's going to shoot my friend Anthony
for just being bigger than her?
So I go in, and I tear up the house,
looking for a piece of mail with my name on it,
but I just moved there, so I don't really have any!
So, I go, I get the mail, I come out,
and for some reason, she has calmed down.
I give her the mail.
She looks at the mail, and she looks at us and she goes,
"Okay, from now on, when I tell you to stop, you stop."
Now, remember, she's never told us to stop anything.
And I look at Anthony like,
"Oh, my God, are you going to handle this cop lying on us?
And he looks at me and he looks at the cop and he goes, "Okay."
I look at him and I go, "Okay,"
and we live to get harassed another day!
Because that's the kind of thing you have to do
to stay alive when you're black.
You have to let the police lie to you at your own house.
That's it. That's my story.
We used to open this show with fun jokes,
but for the last three days,
we've opened this show with stories about me
getting mistreated by the cops.
And if you're tired of hearing these stories, do something!