“Script Money” The Novel

Chapter Nine

It was them who needed Kareem

Gwinnett Civic Center, 9:15 am.

My reason for running late.

I brought the Cadillac out because it was a motorcar. The Sky Captain edition, with the blocky sunroof and presidential tints, felt like you surrounded yourself by military strength. The car sat eight of all the little starlets from this five-person girl posse: Parker Jay was my closest joy.

And the biggest star on "Throned."

Her dance team dressed in yellow and grey Ivy Park hoodies and striped leggings, and they all had their hair braided in ponytails and sported headbands. Parker sat beside me, her leg sprawled on my lap while I tied her Yeezy's. She was chatting with Naomi, her best friend who, too, wore Yeezy's, while the rest of the little girl group were yelling to each other who remembered what steps. "So, who knows how many moves this routine even has? Seven, eight at the most?" I ask since I've been working and missed almost all her recitals except today.

"Forty-eight." grins Parker.

"Forty-eight. Mama, what are they feeding these kids on the set to help them remember that many moves?" I yelled to Tiny, who was Snapchatting.

Tiny sat across from me as my "girl group analyst." We were co-parenting, which felt like getting tattoos together. A strange prickly "uh."

"The worst cupcakes, brownies, all the food you'll hate on the way back," says Tiny. "Kareem, they have catered because there are so many teams here. The energy in these girls is like watching Dancing with the Stars. Say--go, Money Minions." Tiny aims her phone in her hand and dances.

"Go, Money Minions!" Suddenly the girls are chanting, and I'm looking for a bill with a sponsor's name other than mine. I was confused.

"The producers said we had to name our team, so Imani named it after me." cheeses Parker as she looks up from the cult around me.

Money Minions? I mouth in my head. "Hmm."

"They've changed a lot of parts you wrote to make it suitable for the kids. Like the bullying part where someone gets a black eye." scoffs Tiny.

"I was being straight up, mama...you know I got picked on as a little kid for having a disposable truck lip." Suddenly the girls are laughing at me, yanking on my bottom. "I'm for real...every time Bug-eyed Sam wanted to throw something in the trash, it went in my mouth. One time that fool tried to make me eat a dirty wet wipe."

"Ugh! Then he punched you in the eye," says Naomi.

"No...yeah...no, no. Yeah, I got off first, then the teachers broke it up because it was the first riot at John Foster elementary school. That's in the country, so activists came in--"

"You and 'Bug-eyed Sam' did not start the first riot," Tiny jumped in, smacking her teeth. "girls get this; Kareem didn't throw the first punch either. Bug-eyed Sam was his girlfriend in the third grade." she murmurs.

"She was a girl the whole time!" Parker turns to her girlfriends and laughs.

"I appreciate you sharing my business. Anyways, y'all are looking good with your little fresh Ivy Park fits. Uh, y'all ain't come to play." I hype it up, grinning.

"We came to slay." a girl named Poon-Poon snaps.

"Alright then. Keep that attitude when it's time to go to high school." I say. Although I scripted this movie for Parker, I pledged a distribution percentage to her team's tuition. I just wanted this day to be about one thing. "Hey look, I want y'all to go out there and make me look good 'cause I wrote this, and I want to go with y'all on the world tour if you win the deal?" I nod.

"Okay," says Parker, who gives me a pound.

"What Kareem wants is for everyone to have fun." Tiny throws a towel at me.

"Yeah, Yeah...what I do...let you guys be stars, but look...if y'all get three-sixty deal afterward, I'm entitled to thirty percent."

"Kareem... you're making us forget how many steps we got." coos Parker. So, I finished the ride, letting them run almost everything I owned.

Who runs the world? Girls. And apparently, Money's Minions.

The shoot is designed to make the civic center resemble a cheerleader competition—a national dance-off where judges picked Parker and her girls to represent their city. Inside the civic center was a gym matted with springy blue carpet, a judge's booth where four personalities sat, and a pair of DJs who rose above near the main floor.

Moments into the shoot, the fans swarmed me. I was all light about the: peace signs in the air and quick looks at whatever phone a fan aimed at me.

There were eighteen teams in this gym. Most start with at least five and go deep as a couple of dozen in one group. It sounded like a concert, and along with Tiny and me, I brought two of my drivers to keep my eyes on my girls. "I'm gonna get them checked in with producers, see where they need to be," says Tiny as she herds the group toward a unit director.

"Okay, you guys stay close. I will see if the director has enough clout to give me a cameo like Stan Lee."

"Hey Kareem," Parker hugs me. "just in case you have to go back to work," she says, tilting her head back.

At that moment, I realized she needed this drive. "Okay, go on." I crumble.

I have Ronnie walk with me toward the dollies, where a production team is panning close-ups of the stage. The cameras get filled with a cluster of groups. Day players and backup actors panic when they realize I've ambushed their set to see them perform. "Ah, bro," I say, noticing one of the directors behind the screening monitors. "You Samirah's cousin, ain't you?"

"Yeah, Rashard Ballard. What's going on, Kareem?" he says, shaking my hand.

"Just chilling, watching my girls kill the show. Mine are the ones with matching Yeezy's; do you feel me? Make sure you remember the crew. Their little routine gone be crazy."

"Okay," grins Ballard. "Funny thing is they don't win in the end."

"And why the hell not?"

"Nope. Money Minions lose in the finals." Ballard scans his script. "I guess producers didn't want them winning over the foreign exchange ensemble from Sri Lanka. The strongest message is--"

"You 'bout say acceptance."

He grins widely. "Acceptance!"

I shake my head as I gaze at the stage. "Y'all making my girls go up against an entire country. Those boys look like break-dancing ninjas."

"You know what they say; you only lose when you don't compete. Hey, I saw your fiancée at the studio earlier. I've got to tell you, the media's calling Imani' the roughest beauty in entertainment.' They say she's the perfect match for the brothers' rough around the edges like yourself."

"How'd Sam and her get along down at the studio? That had to feel weird."

"It was like a Rossey-Holms weigh-in, those two hated being there, but the silver lining was we're all here for the Money. You know Sam can fake anything but go into labor."

I wondered how much Samirah faked with me, then went on to tell Ballard how vital his insight had been when I pitched ADVANCE to the producers. "I came to tell you, good looking out. The other day you pushed Nick into putting my story in the ranks." I say.

"C'mon man, studio's calling you Tarantino Cashmere. Your shit's a swish."

"I appreciate it, for real. I know how much of an asshole your uncle can be, but you helped get my first TV show on primetime, you dig?"

"Since Raleigh's been back, Nick's been on his ass. He's hazing my ass hard, so he sends me to do things like this for him." sighs Raleigh.

"I think him making me rich has made me an asset."

"That man's shaky to be around. You do what Nick says and get credits, but if you become a problem to Nick, you may never walk on a set again. That's why I do whatever the hell I gotta do. Before rumor has it, I'm disposable."

"You're right about that. Check this out. Do you know where Raleigh is chilling? I got something I want him to hear. Might keep your uncle's boys off his head---you know what I'm saying."

Ballard checks his watch as he shakes his head. "He's creating some distance to keep Nick's foot off his neck, but if he's anywhere, it's near a studio." He tells me, then returns to his dolly getting shots broken down in reels, and Parker was stepping into formation to my latest work. However, my career never ended with me when things always came up.

And I had to be on the go.

* * * * *

Cromartie Studios, 10:03am.

Amongst them, Lotto fell into the faculty of sweating all several thousand participants like a talent scout. "I want you to watch them, especially my women. Anything you see them do that doesn't look or sound like a good fit; you let me know." Imani had said when she escorted him inside the room.

He sat in a chair in the distance, observing them as they came intermittently in crowds of twenty, twitching every time an attractive woman entered and scaling a male actor as if he could spot a personable hero just by watching his gait.

Lotto drank in the role of living as the surveyor. "Hey, I'm Lotto Cashmere. I'll be your survey personnel today," He says, wearing a mic and passing out questionnaires. "take these and fill them out. To be honest, you better say yeah, make 'em think you down for whatever you feel me?" He gave everyone tips. People knew him from "Throned," so he acted seasoned like relatives in the Wayans family could do. He made them laugh even if he knew that person didn't have it. "Remember...anyone can be a star, you start...go up there and own the moment," he says, finally sitting on standby, studying them.

The moment a guy was lame, Lotto wagged his script like a white flag in a talent show.

He lusted over the women's two-minute introduction like a private dance. In a bar, he didn't have to tip. Each woman having sex appeal, he gazed at her personality pouring into the sides she read and listened to the judges make their prowess bloom with scintillating questions.

"What'd you think about the script? You like it?" Imani asks one of the sixty questions she's inquired as she sits at her table with Samirah and Shaquea.

"It's got drip. I never thought being a mule was so amazing." a woman replies.

"Have you ever performed in a movie before?" asks Samirah.

"Nope, my first one, so I'm willing to do what it takes."

Samirah glances at the other women. After two hours of casting, "whatever it takes" meant half the battle was won.

"Would you commit to a nude scene then?"

"Hell yeah," she says.

Elsewhere Lotto taps his finger like an "And One."

The following person had to answer. "What kind of situations makes you uncomfortable in this script?"

"I don't like portraying terrorism. I have two girls at home, and I like this story, but I don't want them seeing their father kill people." a man complains.

"Would you show your ass on camera? I know guys do that," asks Imani.

"No, nudity. No killing. I want a procedural part or a comedy."

"You do realize our brand is risqué, right? See, you not understanding what we are looking for here at Cromartie. Our writers give you exhilarating criteria that only come from things brutally shocked full of attention or people getting shot the fuck up."

"Or blown up," adds Shaquea.

"We make it sexy, so none of our stars should be afraid to get dirty. We produce hard twists 'til your ass pop drama 'cause we all make some shady mess in this game", she scoffs at Samirah, "but our viewers use it like drugs."

The man nods. "Yes, but I'm hoping for a lead in a generally watched drama. Your criteria do consist of more than hurting human beings, right?"

"We understand," Shaquea replies, then scans her tablet. "Um, Victoria Suggs! Is there somebody named Victoria out there? Sir, you can have a seat." She dismisses the man, who grimaces and stalks out of the room.

Then a curvaceous model approaches next.

Lotto slumps in his chair, melting as his eyes wave green lights at Imani from afar. "So, Victoria, you're from Albany, okay... tell us what kind of skills you got that'll make you perfect for this series?" Samirah studies her hard. He was spotting the woman, squeezing her hands behind her back.

"It's okay, sweetheart, you ain't gotta be nervous." coos Imani.

The short cocoa woman begins sniffing. And in light of her deathly tiny waist, slim neck, and round Saldanaesque chin, she's mortified.

Shaquea adds. "Ms. Suggs, do you need a minute to yourself?"

"Ugh...oh, my god, I just slayed my lines; now I'm feeling corny." The woman muttered as she began welling with tears. "I can't answer the question."

Imani stands, kneeling forward to grab her hands. "Well, stop tripping, okay? I remember how incredibly you ran through your lines. Women work every minute in this business looking for hope and acceptance, okay? But when you make that new story seem real, sweetie, they already believe in you. Now I want to see Victoria, the one who brought her fine ass from Albany, and what makes her the next leading lady on Script Money's newest drama." Imani rubs her damp hands and sighs for comfort.

Samirah and Shaquea glance at each other, their emotions a bit flushed.

"Thank you so much." Victoria Suggs hugs her sympathetically.

"Alright, step back and tell Money what you are working with." Imani stands proudly, holding her curvy hips and longing for some nourished confidence. In the back, Lotto beams eerily at Imani's effect on the judges.

The woman is in tight pants and black sandals and wears a sports bra beneath a flannel shirt. She narrows her lids, then mutes the crowd as she removes her clothes and sniffs, "I can be cold...because he said he loved me, then teaches me how to set up and kill his rivals with this body. When I'm naked, I'm a relentless flame beneath these chocolate hips I can fuck whenever I need to 'cause that's how I get shit done. I'm on fire now, in light of what lives dead inside me. I grind without counting days; each situation is a cliche to your Script Money brand. How I live is risqué it ain't warm where I come from. I finesse suckers to survive. I was in love, but he told me to be his infiltrator. Somewhere under all these flaws, I am this real woman whose smart, powerful, and raw because those are the ones men love, unlike the weak and damaged. So I love this Money, I want to win, and whatever it takes to get on this team---I put my heart into everything I'm worth." Victoria wipes her eyes and exhales deeply.

"Um, wow..okay--" Samirah babbles.

"You need to step over here." Lotto comes over and asks her to walk with him near a table filled with remaining headshots. "Here's your clothes, ma. I think she's answered enough questions, you know I'm saying?"

"What is he doing?" murmurs Shaquea stretching her hand out.

All at once, Imani claps her hands. "He's getting our first backup settled. Did you listen to her? All of you need to say hello to the realest seducer in our cast, girls. Victoria, you like a raw painting filled with emotion and color, baby." says Imani beaming, shuffling her résumés and sitting back.

"And that's a woman you want to manage. We don't have time for you to begin some ratchet cult where you trust all these anxious women," says Samirah with a conciliatory tone. Then all at once, her phone rings, and Samirah strips away from the selection process.

"That bitch does have a tight body." notes the assistant, staring on.

"She was afraid of us rejecting her femme-finessing lifestyle. You've been living in the right direction all your life Samirah, but this girl is a beautiful savage looking for a success story. She ain't come from no damn Mickey Mouse Club. She's running, and I'm going to help her." affirms Imani.

After she hung up, Samirah finally returned to the table with a horrid look. "Nick's planning to announce dropping the Script Money brand." she spills.

* * * * *

Three Hours Later.

I left the civic center in a separate motorcar and rode to the HubExpress warehouse where my Sak Chasers worked. My driver pulled the Cadillac into the lot while I sat behind the partition, waiting to get Raleigh on the line. "Boss, your production crew got like seven girls with them," says Ronnie as the black window ahead falls.

"Tell Chill to follow us over in the Sprinter. Bring my boys in here." I tell him Ronnie isn't up for much more instructions. He anticipates these things. Then as the partition goes back up, I finally hear Raleigh on the end of my iPhone. "Yo, Raleigh!"

Raleigh says. "Kareem, I guess when Sam rolled over, she asked you to make peace with me too."

"That would've been a date, and I don't do them. Look, I'm trying to be at you in about thirty minutes. I ain't coming to make up with you 'cause between me and you, we good. I need you; where you at?"

He takes some time to think about where we stand.

It was then, he said. What's this about? I don't hit the pro tubes for Script Money."

"No, but you would produce a soundtrack for a Script Money series."

Raleigh pauses. Then eventually replies. "Cramac Estates, up on Duluth." He hangs up, and I realize the motorcar is still running, and I'm ready to pull up on Samirah's brother.

I'm leaning my elbow on an armrest and relaxing in my leather seat when my doors open. Some afternoon sun spills over the door frame as Ronnie presses his back to the rear door and murmurs, "Kareem, ain't having all of this. Boss?" Ronnie frowns at me.

I nod.

And in comes Trung, Ara, Brock, and Kelby, cramming into the cabin like football players on a charter bus.

"That number I had in my head when you told me painting pussy would get me swag," says Kelby first as he slaps my hand.

"What it do?" Boyishly, I grin as he sits and catches me up.

"I quit counting when I tripled that amount in my bed this morning." I laughed with my little white homie as the Sak Chasers found seats in separate rows before my reclined seat.

"Kareem, we ran out of room for them," Trung says, crouching near the door.

I pointed at the company of four more female day players, their stilettos spiking into the floor as they packed in like cheerleaders all the varsity football players fucked, smelling like the fragrant oil glistening between their breasts, along their stomachs and thighs, each woman came in bikinis and black fishnet catsuits and instantly wore panicked faux looks on their dolled faces when they spot me. "So, this the big homie we work for. Hey Daddy." a pale girl coos as she sashays to my leg rest, then presses her palms on my shins.

Already I feel myself rocking into a cinder.

"What up?" I spill in a stoic drawl. "Yo, Trung, I told y'all to put them in the van with Chill. I ain't trying to explain no rumors today."

My casting director peers up the block before shutting the door and sealing the cabin in impenetrable black windows. "I know, big dog, ain't no cameras out this bitch but ours. You good, relax," he says, then sits as a girl squats near his armrest and playfully massages him.

"All you need to do is chill, get your business out the way while I handle this." The mid-twenties woman strips down her netted suit, then pulls a string on her green bikini top before squatting near my crotch.

Somehow, I cosign.

Gazing at her creamy white breast, orange tan lines lacing her nipples. It instantly stirs movement in my jeans. "Oh," she moans and spots my bulge swishing, and all I do is sigh as I let her french-manicured fingers dip in my jeans and pull out my dick. "I'd probably come so hard with this thing in me." She giggles with medium-plump lips and a slanted chin that creases as she mouths me without hesitation.

Alright. I'm weaning myself from fucking off.

Just head from a gorgeous white chick who loves a sausage party.

"What they call you on tape?" I stare, brushing her brunette hair aside.

"Charity." What I liked about Charity instantly was her angelic voice.

"You sure don't mind giving away this head." I groan as I lean back. "Brock, open up that fridge right there. I got some bottles of Ace in there from last night. Y'all gives these ladies something to drink."

"Here's a master of what the girls just produced." Ara passes a tablet to Kelby, then Kelby hangs it over Charity's head. I grab the tablet and press play. "Your girl Ms. Fines hasn't come by in a few days. So we beefed up on girls to cover her gaps. I think that toy you gave her was way too much."

"She got what she wanted, I guess. Where's the back end you brought in?" I give Kelby back the tablet, feeling Charity tensing as she swallows hard. Then I spot Trung slinging a brown leather bag at me. He tells me he had these day players on call from an account online used for "sexual tourism." I open the bag and scan the cash. "Sexual tourism? Where you from?" I ask Charity.

She sheathes her teeth and replies. "I'm a Georgia girl, baby."

"Well, everyone except her." Trung points to the brunette in my lap. "I found that broad at a Jason Aldeen party and said, 'Hey, you wanna get paid for looking like a doll on tape.' But these bitches ahh, I got from Boca Paradise, none of them speak enough English to go back to tabloids and say anything about your business boss."

"Boca Paradise?" I say again.

"Yeah, Boca Paradise. They help you get resorts and tickets to spots like San Domingo, Brazil, Venezuela, you know, all those third-world spots where the women do shit way more generously than American bitches." I gage the dirty blond curls, the mulatto skin hues, and voluptuous bodies on all the Hispaniola pornstars: exempting White girl Charity. "I'm the Foreign king baby, Kareem. They look at every hundred dollar bill I throw at them like a lottery ticket." Trung grins and palms a stack of cash as he flicks bills at her gyrating body. "They think we're Kareems."

I studied their Spanish accents as they cackled at each other.

I feel Charity purposely erupting me from my reverie. She moaned greedily with need, then gagged with a girlish chuckle. "Oh, come back to Charity, baby." Sucking harder and harder as she strokes her slim fingers up and down all at once, I feel like a glider running off a cliff and falling into quenching gravity. I palm her head and make her throat me faster and faster as I think of myself spilling into her mouth. A primal groan follows when White Girl Charity is still swallowing me hungrily and enjoying her tactile pleasure.

Suddenly I hear my phone ringing while I'm coming.

Mrs. Money!

"Ah shit, get the fuck up. Stop!"

I push the woman's shoulders back, take my dick out, and snap my fingers toward a bag. "Get me a towel," I add. Charity begins looking frantically for something to wipe away her pool of spit. "Brock cut the music. Hey, say something that'll make them shut they ass up. Now." I bark to Trung.

The noise frazzles into silence in a second as Charity pushes me back and kneels. "I got this. Get the phone," she whispers, washing my crotch like an EMT in an ambulance.

As I answer my phone, the motorcar freezes.

Dollar bills float silently to the floor.

"Moneybags, what up, ma?" I feign a nonchalant vibe. Charity grins.

"Kareem, you not gone believe all the shit at the studio right now," Imani growls into the phone, affecting how I shove the white girl away.

I scowl. "Whoa, calm down, babe. Talk to me."

"I'm outside by the damn sound cables so that nobody can hear me. Are you listening?" asks Imani.

"Yeah. I can hear you." And it had me tripping.

"Glendall's doing some fucked up shit to this company. I guessed when Samirah's brother decided to pull the lawsuit, Glendall told her to remove your script from the block and replace it with one of his punk ass clients."

"How the hell did Samirah let that happen?"

"I don't know; maybe he still has rights over some of her writers."

"Ones he can guarantee Raleigh credits on and a way back in the studio by putting him in sounds." I'm pissed, thinking this is bad karma for the fucking Samirah. Or maybe the white girl?

"They're pushing you back, and if Sam doesn't, which that bitch has, there's gonna be a war at Cromartie over Script Money," confirms Imani.

"That ain't making sense. Samirah promised me she'd direct and take an honor roll spot in it. We just talked about this."

"Just because she promised on your dick Kareem doesn't mean the trick gotta follow everything come out your damn mouth."

"What the hell you talking about? I ain't say she did anything on my dick."

"She must've passed along a lot of ideas to your sneaky ass for an hour." When I heard her snarling, I knew I'd fucked up, and my groin was currently the fall guy.

"We looked at diamonds! She ain't look at no dick. I told you---whatever. Look, we talked about this Money. Babe, what got you tripping?" I shake off the past

"Mmhmm. Samirah's in a trap, and she's acting like a damn tiger to get out. Kareem, she threatened me today."

"How?"

"She has a copy of the tape," says Imani sulkily.

"What tape? You mean our--"

"Yes, our sex tape, fool! Somehow her sick ass hid illegal cameras in our room, and now the bitch is blackmailing me so I can't walk out of Cromartie and get you another deal."

"Oh, god, no. Not a leak." I scrape all the naps in my hair as I eat this all.

"On top of that, Nick wants to change the name before Raleigh sues Cromartie." Imani groans loudly. "Babe, this company is fucked up. Where are you?"

I reply, staring Charity in her tired grey eyes. "I was just on my way to Raleigh's place. Babe, you need me to come get you."

Pssh, after I drop off this orgy first.

Imani teeth tremble whenever she wells with stress or frustration. "Uh-uh...Please go to Raleigh's and fix this. I need you to get them papers and bring him back to Script Money, okay?"

"Alright, I'm on it." I hung up and contemplated how I'd have to play Raleigh differently.