We're Going to Need More Wine - Gabrielle Union Page 0,78

North Bay, D at the wheel, me dialing them on speaker.

Zaire answered on the third ring.

“Where are you?!”

“Um . . .”

“That’s how I know you’re fooling around,” I yelled, the panic not quite yet unleashed but slowly working its way up my chest. “WHERE ARE YOU? Tell us specifically where you are.”

“I think we’re on Fifty-first Street. We’re walking back. The keys didn’t work.”

I periscoped my head straight toward D, like, “I told you so.”

As we drove our golf cart down the street, a cop car whooshed silently by. The thing about North Bay Road is that it’s the most exclusive street in South Florida. A siren or flash of police lights would denote trouble, and if you’re spending thirty million dollars on a mansion, you don’t want to know there’s trouble. That’s why, in this neighborhood, police officers just roll up on you silently, like ninjas.

Then another one magically appeared. The squad car slowed down as it reached us, and the officer rolled down the window. Instinct kicked in. Dwyane and I froze.

“Oh,” said the cop, genially. “Dwyane Wade.”

“Hi,” said D.

“Have a nice night,” the cop said.

As he drove off, I stared straight ahead and gritted my teeth into a smile. “If you think these cops were not called on our boys, you are fucking delusional,” I said.

These are privileged kids, I thought. Lord knows what they would say when the cops reached them. I would like to think they would be polite, but under duress, who knows. I realized it was completely possible they would say, “I live here, motherfucker.”

Soon we found them on the side of the road, walking toward us. Before we did, I turned to D. His eyes were on the road.

“What did you tell the kids to say when they’re stopped by police?” I asked him.

“Well, I told them what to say in case—”

“WHAT did you tell them?”

“I told them to say their full names and our address.”

“Wrong answer,” I say. “‘I’m Dwyane Wade’s kid.’ That’s what they say.”

AS WE ZOOMED DOWN THE ROAD IN OUR STUPID GOLF CART LOOKING for the kids, my mind flashed back to March the year before. Zaire was in seventh grade and he’d asked if he could take our Dalmatian–pit bull mix, Pink, out for a walk with Dada. It was a negotiation.

“Okay, walk down to the Boshes’,” we said. D’s old Heat teammate Chris Bosh lived eleven doors down the road. I figured they could walk out the door and I would have our security call the Boshes’ security to warn them.

As they bounded out, I stood at the door, ready to drop a Black Bomb. “Wrap the dog leash around your thumb,” I said to them. “That way, your fingers are free to spread.” This was an actual conversation I had. But this is what you did three years after Trayvon Martin and five months after Tamir Rice. I didn’t want the boys to have their hands in their pockets or for them to look as if they were concealing something dangerous.

Zaire started to open his mouth, and I shut him down.

“You’ve gotta walk Pink that way,” I said. “It’s not just the police. It’s the neighborhood security officers, too. Anyone who is armed can harm you.”

Sure enough, the first time they walked Pink, it was a disaster. That was the night someone swatted Lil Wayne’s house over on La Gorce Island, near us. Now, if you are a celebrity, swatting is a nightmare. Someone calls 911 as a prank, announces a hostage situation or shooting at a famous person’s house, and watches the news as a SWAT team storms the mansion. It’s happened to Justin Bieber, Miley Cyrus, Ashton Kutcher—any bored thirteen-year-old can make a call and then watch the show. It’s happened to poor Lil Wayne twice.

So there were two boys walking a huge dog as a dozen police cars flew past them. At our house, our security guards started to go crazy, talking about a shooting. Chris’s security then radioed in, practically yelling, “Abort mission!” about walking a dog. It was like an international incident.

As more and more cop cars raced by the kids, they froze on the side of the road. They assumed the cars were for them. “Oh my God,” I imagined them saying to each other. “This is what she is always talking about!”

The last cop car stopped and rolled down the window, just like they had done with D and me in the golf cart. He was looking at