Everyone in Newark had a Muslim attribute that they went by, except for me, Khalil Khalil (so nice you had to name him twice) Wilson, and Caesar Lord Baltimore Jenkins. We played the dozens like we were twelve years old still. That was our thing and we cracked on one another every chance we would get.
Khalil was always the warm-up, being a much easier target and not possessing the skills to be a championship level cracker (not a white person).
“Khalil, your momma is so stupid that when she finished filling out her job application and it said SIGN HERE, she wrote Pisces,” Caesar started.
“I didn’t know hos had to fill out job applications.” I said.
“Caesar, your mama is so stupid that at the end of the job application where it says DO NOT WRITE BELOW THE LINE, she wrote Okay!”
“Your girl is so ugly that she looks like she fell out the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down!”
“Caesar’s girl is so fat that when she wears heels, she strikes oil!” Khalil said.
“That isn’t a diss. Caesar likes them fat now.” I chimed in.
“Since when?”
“Not fat, just healthy. Those salad-eating bitches are out. It’s about some weight nowadays.”
“You? Shallow Hal? Elaborate.”
“Gladly. I was with this bigger girl the other night…”
“How big?” Khalil asked.
“Size ten or twelve.”
“That’s big?” I questioned.
“Compared to your ex-wife, yeah. Anyway, this chick was big enough that I could just lie out across her. Like a sofa. That’s where I came up with my new rating system.”
We all were intrigued so everyone stopped what they were doing in order to give this fool our full attention.
"Furniture," he said.
Khalil and I both had a lot of trouble wrapping our heads around that one, but we knew he would expound. I've always maintained that Caesar had a unique point of view and as usual he didn't disappoint. He had an incredible sensibility about him that was so simplistic. It worked for him and the way he lived his life.
"You see, if she's a sofa, she's the perfect size, eight to ten. A loveseat is a six to eight. I'll even do a futon once in a while, although they’re starting to get a little small. But recliners and ottomans are a little too tiny and they get thrown back."
"Well, what's too big?"
"Anything over a twelve is a sectional, and that's too big!"
We laughed it off as we had become accustomed to; however, Caesar was about to bless us with some more of his barbershop wisdom until Khalil brazenly shifted the attention over to my dating predicament and me.
"So, I heard you've gone over to the white side!"
"Don't start!"
"Black women deserve a Black man," Khalil said. You could just see Caesar's bushy eyebrows furrow and his lips twist. I knew what he was going to say, and so did Khalil I'm sure.
"Fuck them stuck-up, angry bitches. They don't deserve a strong Black man. At least the white girls acknowledge that we are the true strength, power, and beauty of what a man represents."
"I admit, some of us are. But some of us ain't shit either."
"Of all the Black men that are gay..." Caesar paused and cut his eyes at Khalil. He always did that whenever the subject of homosexuality came up, for some reason. That in turn elicits the response from Khalil asking Caesar why he looks at him whenever he says that.
“I’m not gay.”
"We know," Caesar said.
He always said "we know" tongue in cheek. I could tell he really wanted to say, "Yeah, right."
“Like I started to say, with all of the Black men that are gay, in jail, on drugs, or dead, you’d think they'd give us some respect. As children the Black male was raised primarily by a single female, so he was brought up to be submissive in a white society. She thinks she is protecting her son from his white counterpart, but she is actually emasculating him.” You could hear a pin drop as Caesar dropped pearls of wisdom on the shop. The barbers even stopped cutting in order to give him their full attention.
“Preach.” Big Mohammed belched with his baritone voice. He was a man of few words and even fewer syllables.
“She raised her daughter to be strong, independent and not take any shit. Subconsciously the Black female feels the need to challenge or continually change the Black male to fit her standards, thus protecting us from ourselves.
Now the difference with other races, especially white women, is they feel no need to change us. They recognize right off the bat that there are clearly defined differences and any attempt otherwise would be futile. So the statement, ‘It's a Black thing, you wouldn't understand’ actually holds true. All they want is our companionship and some of this jungle dick.”
"And half, after they divorce our monkey asses!" Khalil reiterated while reminding Caesar of all the problems O.J. Simpson and Tiger Woods had faced while dealing with white women.
"Don't hate the player, hate the game. I just can't deal with the nasty attitude anymore."
"And I can't deal with one more woman telling me she needs to find herself. She gonna find herself all right. Right at the bottom of the East River," I chimed in for good measure.
"I told you what you got to do," Caesar said.
"Don't listen to him. You know that stuff don't work for anyone else but him."
"My father, a church pastor, I might add, gave me a piece of advice that I will take to the grave and now I shall pass it unto you like the Holy Grail. My daddy said, ‘You can never go wrong if you treat the hos like queens, and treat the queens like hos!’ For instance, if you got a girl who’s doing things for you, being nice to you, fucking you...treat her like royalty. But if you got one of them stuck-up, selfish bitches who think it’s all about them, treat her like shit."
I was stunned. One, because a man of the cloth thought of this, but mostly because it was simple but true. Every girl I ever really cared about treated me like shit. Jamila Brown in eleventh grade, Misty Lemond when I moved back from L.A., and, of course, Eva the Eata.
"That shit works?" I belted out.
"Of course. That's Caesar's number one rule."
"But what happens when you meet the right girl?" I played devil's advocate. It was an annoying habit I had, but you had to challenge Caesar once in a while on his various philosophies.
"That's the only snag. The right girl won't go for that bullshit." Caesar submissively threw his hands in the air.
Khalil and I sat astonished as we got the final edge ups on our dark Caesar-cut for me and schoolboy-cut for Khalil. Caesar actually wore his hair bald but liked to come to the barbershop for the company. Maintaining a bald haircut is actually more work than if you had hair.
“You know you really should write a book. Sadly, that bullshit you come up with would probably sell,” I said.
“I’m way ahead of you,” Caesar responded. “Got a title and everything. Let a Pimp be a Pimp and Let a Ho be a Ho!”
“Very imaginative.”
“My second choice was Forget Them Hos!”
Khalil paced back and forth like a caged lion, fidgeting anxiously. Then he blew. Rarely did Khalil lose self control; however, he was one of those people that stuffed his emotions until it was too late and he turned into Superfly TNT. "I can’t take this anymore. You are so full of shit! You never used to be like this. You were one of the nicest guys until..."
I knew what was coming. We all did, including Rahim the barber. You know how everyone has his or her own personal “don't go there” thing? Khalil was about to drop Caesar's and there was nothing I could do about it. I actually interviewed for the Secret Service when I got out of college. It seemed glamorous, but you couldn't get me to take a bullet for $27k a year, and Caesar desperately needed someone to take a bullet for him right now.
"Don't go there!" Caesar threatened.
"He's right, K, don't go there!" I begged, knowing what would happen inevitably.
"You'r
e the one who always wants to keep it real, right? Well, let’s keep it real. You were a nice guy until Carmen left you for that ball player and you've been a misogynistic asshole ever since!"
"Fuck you!” Caesar emphatically rose from the chair, stormed toward the door, and then wheeled around showing a millisecond of vulnerability. "I was in love with her." He handed the barber a fifty-dollar bill, then whisked through the glass door onto Elizabeth Avenue.
He said it. He never says it.
Carmen was the first hot chick to ever check for Caesar and he was nuts over her.
Caesar and I both went to the same high school and played on the basketball team together. He wasn’t very good, but he played defense and rebounded like a demon. He used the same Rodman-like tenacity in the financial world to shoot up through the ranks of Dunham Michael & Associates. We remained tight all through college since Princeton was only a twenty-five minute ride down Route 1 from Rutgers’ main campus in New Brunswick.
Right after graduating college he met Carmen, a law student at Seton Hall, who wanted to become a sports agent. Cez was just starting out at a local brokerage and he was working maniacal hours trying to help her through law school. He and Carmen lived together and they planned on getting married after she graduated but eventually her desire to succeed could no longer be contained.
While interning at a sports management company, she met this Knick-ass nigga and started “hanging out” and “working long hours.” It finally got to the point where she flat out said that Caesar didn’t make enough money for her and she left him.
He was devastated…at first. Then, he decided the best way to get his revenge was to be a success. He stepped up his game and got hired by the top brokerage firm on Wall St. and shot up through the ranks with mercurial quickness. By his third year, he had made partner and was pulling down about $400,000 annually. He now pulls down about $800,000 a year in salary and another $3 million in his year end bonus. He had arrived, and that meant bad news for every woman in his path. He was intent on making all of them pay for what Carmen had done to him.
Could I Have Some of Those Crunchy Things?
Once again I found myself with yet another aspiring model at a five-star restaurant in SoHo. I guess I hadn’t quite learned my lesson. A modelizer was the type of guy who only dated models. I didn’t think that was the case with me, but it seemed like it since it wasn’t hard to meet a model in New York City. Not to mention that’s who was showing me love.
Any young girl who was ever told that she was cute and should be a model flocked here showing up with a dollar and a dream. Most of them didn’t make it. Only the “freaks” did. Or should I say the freaks of nature? If you were unusually thin, looked doped out, had freckles and red hair, were African-American with freckles and red hair, or blue Black, your chances were much higher than the All-American-looking Suzy from the Iowa cornfields.
Dominique Dunbar was a bitch in every sense of the word, which turned me on. I had a thing for snotty, nasty, snobby, condescending, snooty, stuck-up, false sense of entitlement, look down on you types women. All of my exes were like that, including Kennedy.
By no coincidence, each was also a Scorpio and I was an Aries. The problem with that is Scorpio is a water sign and Aries is a fire sign, which doesn’t mix because water extinguishes fire. So my relationships with them were highly volatile. The sex was off the hook, which is what Scorpio is known for, but outside of the bedroom we didn’t get along at all. It was fight or fuck.
Dominique was a sista-looking sista, which meant she had to get a perm at least once a month. She wasn’t one of the curly-haired mixed breeds I was usually attracted to. She had rich, mahogany skin, gaining her the nickname Black Beauty while she was growing up. I’m not sure if that was a compliment or not because I knew a light skinned girl growing up, Dawn Jackson, that we nicknamed Red Dawn and she didn’t take to it very well.
It’s not that I’m color struck and only attracted to light skinned girls, but that seemed to be who was attracted to me. I guess we were able to identify with one another since I got teased so bad growing up. The kids used to call me “lil Indian boy” and it wasn’t until a few years ago that I figured out that they meant East Indian and not the Native Americans that I had always thought. I was also called names such as Chief, Gomez, and Sanchez for my resemblance to Hispanics.
Whenever we used to play the dozens in high school, that was the “go to” diss when it came to me and would end the session while classmates would howl with approval like a bunch of hyenas.
I wasn’t very enthused about this date to begin with and it sure didn’t help that Dominique was sitting across from me with a sour puss. The waitress walked past and Dominique flagged her down for the third time.
"Excuse me, darling, do you think that you can put some extras of those crunchy things that go on top of my salad?"
"You mean croutons?" she said condescendingly.
“Yes, croutons. And could you bring me a fresh glass of water? I asked for lemon, but no ice.” The waitress hustled off biting her bottom lip carefully not to say something that might cost her job.
“Can you believe these people?” Dominique continued to grumble.
These people? Dominique was uptight, to say the least, and she had a way of talking down to people, making them feel like the help even though she was only one generation out the projects herself. I was becoming turned off by the second as I shook my head visibly disgusted. I really needed a drink at this point and I’m not talking about a martini either. Wild Turkey would do the trick. Once again the waitress walked by but has no croutons.
“Missy, could I please have some fucking croutons? How many times do I have to ask?”
“She’s doing her best. Why are you so obsessed with these croutons?”
“I'm not obsessed. I really could care less. It was the principle. When I'm home I'll have a salad without croutons. But when I'm out, paying for it—actually, you're the one paying for it—I expect to have things the way that I want them.”
I guess I could see her point. Bitchy or not, I still wanted to hit that.
The waitress came back with a bowl sarcastically overflowing with croutons. Good for her. She and I cut a knowing glance of satisfaction to one another.
Dominique reached out to stop a good-looking brotha gliding past the table. “Hannibal?” He looked at her with a blank stare. “You don't remember me? Dominique Dunbar from Cleveland Heights?”
“Oh yeah. How are you doing?” He bent over to give her a weak European air kiss on the cheek, clearly not what she was expecting. He looked at me and extended his hand. “What’s up, man? Hannibal.”
“Dapper Carter,” I said as he gave me a strong handshake.
"How's the modeling coming?" he asked Dominique.
"Slowly but surely. I just got featured (extra) in a rap video. I see you're doing well. Saw your billboard on Broadway," she gushed.
He thanked the wannabe diva respectfully. Not a bad guy. And I recognized him from the billboard on Broadway in SoHo. He was riding a classic Harley soft tail with his shirt off and wearing a black leather motorcycle jacket with faded blue jeans and a pair of Cole Haan combat boots.
"I thought I recognized you," I said.
"I recognize you too. Saw you play in the NCAA Tournament against Kentucky back in ‘97. I made a lot of money off of you guys that year. Have a drink on me. Anyway, gotta run. My fiancée is waiting for me.”
"You're engaged?" she whined. I could see the disappointment in her eyes. A part of me felt badly for her, but another part of me really didn’t give a shit.
"Getting married next month. You take care of yourself. Ciao'."
The Billy Dee Williams wannabe vanished, leaving an uncomfortable silence between Dominique and me. She looked like someone stole her bike. Everybody is a ho to somebody. No matter how fine a chick is, there was some joker out there who treated her like shit and didn’t give a damn about her ass. Someone is running around tal
king about how many different ways he violated Halle Berry. Nobody’s safe.
Caesar also says that sooner or later everybody gets tired of fucking a pretty girl. Not me! I always liked pretty girls. It didn’t really matter very much to me what their body looked like, but it was a requirement to have an attractive face. I had to be able to look at you while we were having sex in my favorite position—plain old missionary. Dominique was conspicuously unhappy, quietly poking at her salad. I watched her unsympathetically. She looked so pitiful.
"What are you looking at?" she asked.
I know you're not really supposed to tell a beautiful woman how beautiful she is because she already knows this information and it will just go to her head. Dominique was a self-centered, narcissist already, but I couldn’t take her pitiful looking self any longer.
"Have I told you that you look amazing today?" Amazing is one of those adjectives that a female can’t get enough of hearing about herself. Just saying the word caused you to smile, corroborating the sincerity of the statement further. Girls don’t want to be told that they look “pretty.” They want to hear that they look “hot.” And they don’t want to hear that they look “nice.” They want to hear “amazing.”
"Not as much as you should. But I do, don’t I?" she said, modeling her True Religions, riding boots, and a black, leather Baby Phat top.
Stupid ass me. I knew I shouldn’t have said anything, but it did perk her up immediately. We continued our date with very little conversation and lots of uncomfortable silences until unexpectedly one of Dominique's girlfriends slipped into the booth we were sitting at. Charisma Halifax was extremely cute, thirty pounds overweight, but nonetheless attractive.
I noticed Dominique gave her a weak pat-pat on the back type of hug. You know, like she really didn’t like her all the time, but she tolerated her. Must be a girl thing. When guys don't like each other, they won't hang out together.
"Dap, I hope you don't mind if Charisma joins us? I told her we'd be here."
"Sure. Why not?" I answered condescendingly.
Dapper Carter's 8 Rules of Dating Page 9