“I’ll call if I come up with something,” Isaiah said, turning to go.
“You’re on a fool’s journey, Mr. Quintabe,” Bobby said.
“That’s okay. I’ve been a fool before.”
As soon as they got in the car Dodson said: “How’re you gonna find that dog? There’s a million of ’em out there and it could be from anywhere. Long Beach, Compton, Carson, Lawndale. Shit. East LA got more pit bulls than people.”
“The hit man isn’t from the hood,” Isaiah said.
“How do you know?”
“He wears Crocs, for one thing. And you saw the security footage. Remember his T-shirt? Do you know anybody from the hood that listens to the White Stripes?”
“What if the hit man ain’t from around here? What if he’s from Mexico or Miami? For all you know he could be back there right now.”
“You mean when the hit man found out Cal wasn’t leaving his house and he went back to Miami or Mexico to get his dog? No, he’s local.”
“What does local mean? His house is driving distance from Woodland Hills? Mexico is driving distance from Woodland Hills. You arguing just to argue now. Ain’t no way in hell to find that dog.”
It was eleven o’clock in the morning. Noelle was in bed wrapped in a silk kimono with pink and black birds on it and talking on the phone. “Say that again?” she said. “Cal hired a detective? When did this happen? Well, why didn’t you tell me sooner? Oh yes, it is a problem. I swear to God, that damn Calvin will plague me until the bitter end.”
Before she married Cal, Noelle was a singer in the Mary J. Blige mold. Bobby Grimes had her under contract but her career stalled out because she had the voice but not the soul. She met Cal singing backup on one of his albums. He was drawn to her elegant beauty and sophisticated style, way different from the Lil’ Kims he was used to. Noelle knew all the stories about rappers’ girlfriends but was seduced all the same. Calvin was sweet and charming when he wanted to be and he had that street swagger she’d vowed to stay away from but couldn’t. But what put her over the top was the lifestyle.
“Think of somethin’ and you can have it,” Cal said.
It was true. If she thought of something she wanted she bought it without even glancing at the price tag. The attention was mind-blowing. All she had to do was walk to her car wearing short-shorts and she’d be on the E! channel and TMZ the same night. But there were downsides. After she married Cal her mental development got put on hold. There was no need to read anything but tabloids and fashion magazines and no reason to challenge herself or create anything more worthwhile than a line of handbags to sell on HSN. There were six thousand of them in a warehouse somewhere. She thought about getting a job but Calvin was against it unless she found something hip to do. Nothing to sully up the brand. Their home life was nonexistent. If Calvin wasn’t recording, he was clubbing, hanging with the fellas or on tour for weeks at a time.
And Noelle discovered that even unlimited excess loses its charm, the thrill of getting anything she wanted wearing thinner and thinner. Wasn’t that the whole point? Wanting, waiting, struggling, and then getting it. Not wanting and getting in the same damn breath. She found herself thinking about the ordinary issues everybody else thought about. How can I feel good about myself? What am I passionate about? Can I succeed on my own? How do I get Charles and Bug out of my fucking house?
Calvin was unhappy with the marriage too. His blue-ribbon trophy wife who looked like a billion bucks on his arm and who told him she’d take a bullet for him and shaved his balls for him and wore thongs and stilettos to cook breakfast for him was bitchy and moped around and complained about everything from the size of her closet to their seats at the Image Awards. Not a word about the house in Coconut Grove right across the bay from LeBron’s place or her six hundred pairs of shoes or hanging with her friends at the Pasha Club drinking thousand-dollar bottles of Cristal or her personal hair and makeup artists or that beast of a bodyguard that followed her around, like she needed one to watch her eat lunch at the Ivy. And Noelle wasn’t interested in kids. Not that Calvin wanted them but having kids was in, a fashion statement. You didn’t have a baby and name it Zippy or Apple Pie you were off the blade.
In the beginning, Noelle went on tour with Cal to shoo away the hos and chicken heads but he cheated anyway. Her girlfriends said that was the price of being married to a rap star. Noelle lived with it for a while but the reports became so numerous and persistent it got to be humiliating. The straw that broke the camel’s self-respect was a tabloid photo of Cal with his tongue down Tierra’s throat. She was another singer at Bobby’s label and they’d never gotten along. Noelle retaliated. She locked Cal out of the house, slashed his suits with a box cutter, threw his Montecristos in the swimming pool, and had his Mercedes Black Series SL65 towed away. Cal retaliated for the retaliation by bringing Tierra back to the crib and doing her in the marriage bed. When Noelle found five used condoms on the bedroom floor she said: “Oh, the shit is on now.”
Even in the rap world their fights were legendary. Cal was performing at the Nokia to a sold-out house. He was doing the finale, “Up from Nothin’,” putting a little extra into it because Snoop and his entourage were supposed to be in the greenroom watching. He was midway through the second verse when Noelle came out of the wings and hit him with what people said was Bishop Don Juan’s pimp cup. He grabbed her by her weave and slung her into the audience. At a Thanksgiving dinner, Cal cooked Noelle’s Stella McCartney shoulder bag in the microwave and she slapped him with a turkey leg. She nearly bit his finger off when he pointed at the door and told her to get out and he mashed his waffles into her face at Roscoe’s. Noelle air-freighted Hella to Kwaylud, a rival rapper who lived in Atlanta, and Cal threw her hairdresser out of a second-floor window. On her Facebook page, she posted a picture of him masturbating. He hired a cement mixer to fossilize her shoe collection in concrete. After the divorce it didn’t stop. He cut a diss track, rhyming about her cottage-cheese ass and different-size titties, the nipples big as cupcakes. Noelle responded with a radio interview and described in graphic detail how Cal liked baby talk and how his dick was shaped like a knitting needle with an army helmet stuck on the end. Bobby Grimes said the tabloids should have gotten together and given them an award.
“We’ve got to do something about this,” Noelle said to her caller. “I don’t know but I know I don’t want somebody they call IQ sniffing around my business and in case you’ve forgotten, we’re in this together. I realize that but the story’s not over until it’s over. All right, call me later.”
Noelle went into her cathedral-like closet, more clothes in there than the Prada store on Rodeo Drive. She was making an appearance on The Shonda Simmons Show and wanted to look fresh, make a statement. Let the world know she was doing just fine without her scalawag husband. All she had to do now was decide what to wear when she went out shopping for something to wear.
Consuelo, the housekeeper, was dusting in the bedroom. “Consuelo?” Noelle said. “Could you tell Rodion I want to go shopping?”
“¿Quieres decir que el monstruo feo?” Consuelo said. “I don’t want to.”
Cal was curled up on the double-king Duxiana like a cooked shrimp. Above him was a poster-size black-and-white photo taken in an underground club somewhere in South Central. Cinder block walls, low ceiling, klieg lights reflecting off a field of captivated faces and holding clouds of weed smoke in the air. Cal was part of a trio back then and that was his debut as front man. He was stripped to the waist, his body like bundles of fibers jeweled with sweat, holding the mike like he was drinking the last drops of nectar from a golden goblet. Cal knew the song well. It was the one that put him on the map. He lay there mouthing the words: