Lil Wayne

Six weeks later, Wayne is on another island, guarded by another gate.

This island is called La Gorce ”“ “a hidden oasis in the middle of Miami Beach,” in the words of the realtors. Wayne lives here, down the road from Billy Joel, in a $14 million modernist mansion he’s pretty sure he bought sometime in 2009. (He’s bad with dates.) In the garage are a Rolls-Royce, a Bugatti Veyron and a different Maybach ”“ the one his label bought him when his 2008 album Tha Carter III went platinum in a week. His black-gloved chauffeur, Mr G, stands at attention next to the Prius he drives when he’s not on duty. Docked out back, under the palm trees, there’s also a speedboat. “I don’t know how to drive it yet,” says Wayne. “But I do have it.”

You know the line on his No Ceilings mixtape where Wayne says he has an elevator in his crib? That’s because he has an elevator in his crib. Other things he has in his crib: a sprawling roof deck with South Beach ocean views; an Escher-like staircase leading up to his two-story master suite; a marble-topped island in the foyer to display his dozens of awards, including the Grammy for Best Rap Album he sometimes uses as an ashtray; a five-foot-tall painting of himself; a grand piano; and a telescope. “Got 10 bathrooms, I could shit all day,” he once boasted on a different song, and that too is not an exaggeration.

At the moment, Wayne is in the guest wing, on the other side of the bamboo-forested, koi-ponded courtyard. This is where two of his boys stay: his videographer, DJ Scoob Doo, and Marley, who carries his luggage and makes sure he never runs out of Coke. Wayne is sitting between them, watching the Ravens play the Texans on Monday Night Football. He’s in his new uniform ”“ white Polo tee, shredded acid-washed jeans. Before him, on an egg-shaped coffee table, are a half-dozen cellphones, six tins of Don Lino Africa cigars, four lighters, a litre of Sprite and a four-pound bag of Jolly Ranchers.

“To be honest, I still haven’t exhaled,” he says, sparking a Don Lino. The day after he got out, he flew to Arizona to settle a different case (drug possession; three years probation). Then it was to New Orleans for a Hornets game, back west to play a show in Vegas with his protégé Drake, and finally home to Miami for a red-carpet bash with his whole Young Money/Cash Money family ”“ Drake, Nicki Minaj, his partner Mack Maine, label chief Bryan “Baby” Williams, aka Wayne’s surrogate father. He liked seeing everybody, Wayne says. But it was also a lot to handle on his third day out. “I can’t front ”“ I was out of place, mentally. I didn’t talk too much. I had my hood on the whole night, my shades. I played the corner ”“ you wouldn’t have even known it was my party. We went to the strip club afterward, but I didn’t really get to enjoy myself. It was too much of a shock.”

Wayne’s troubles started back in 2007, when, after a concert in Manhattan, NYPD officers ”“ claiming they smelled marijuana ”“ boarded his bus and found a loaded .40-caliber pistol. His manager, Cortez Bryant, says the gun was his, but the cops charged Wayne.

“It was all bullshit,” Wayne says. “They found [the gun] inside a bag, and in that bag I had a prescription. So they were like, ”˜This is your bag.’ But it is what it is. I dropped my nuts and took it.” He pleaded guilty to attempted criminal possession of a weapon and was sentenced to a year in Rikers. With good behaviour, he’d be out in eight months.

Wayne was housed in Rikers’ Eric M Taylor Unit, section 3-Upper. He was in PC ”“ protective custody (Wayne calls it “Punk City”) ”“ where they put anyone who might have trouble in the general population: celebrities, informants, child-molesters, ex-cops. He had his own 10-foot-by-six-foot cell ”“ number 23 ”“ with a bed, a sink, a toilet, a desk and a window. (What was outside the window? “The jail.”) He also had a so-called “day room” he shared with eight or nine other inmates, where he could watch TV or play games for about eight hours a day.

Wayne skipped the mess hall, preferring to buy food from the commissary ”“ lasagna, chicken, tortillas, cheesy rice, Pop-Tarts. 3-Upper had a communal kitchen, so most days the PC-ers cooked together, like the prison scene in Goodfellas. Other days, Wayne says, “I chef’d up myself.”

He read a lot. Mostly biographies: Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, Marvin Gaye, Joan Jett, Vince Lombardi. He really liked Anthony Kiedis’ Scar Tissue ”“ “That one was really good.” And deeper stuff, too: “I read a book about 2012 and the Mayan apocalypse. I read Confucius’ Odes, the Tao Te Ching or Chung or however you say it, the whole Bible. That was my first time reading the Bible ever.”

What’d you think?

“It was deep! I liked the parts where some character was once this, but he ended up being that. Like he’d be dissing Jesus, and then he ends up being a saint. That was cool.”

For music, he had a little transistor radio, also from the commissary. He listened to mostly oldies ”“ Anita Baker, Prince ”“ except for Fridays and Saturdays, when the DJs on the hip-hop stations could spin whatever they wanted. “What we’d do, since we gotta lock in at 10:45, everybody would turn their radios to the same station, and we’d just be jamming,” he says. “It was basically like being in the club.”

He didn’t lift weights or play ball ”“ the prison-issue shoes were too thin ”“ but he did play a lot of cards: Crazy Eights, Spades and his favourite, Uno. “I’d bust a nigga’s ass at Uno,” he says. “We were gambling for commissary and phone time ”“ I was taking all a nigga’s shit. ”˜Lemme get them cookies, lemme get them chips, lemme get that soup.’ I would have a bed full of shit ”“ the CO would come through like, ”˜What are you, about to cook?’ ”˜Nope, just kicked ass at Uno, that’s all!’

“I swear to God, niggas used to be like, ”˜Sorry, baby, I can’t talk tonight ”“ Wayne got my phone call again,’” he says. “They would say, ”˜Come on, man, let me just call her tonight.’ ”˜Fuck no! What’s her number? I’ll have my people text her.’”

(Not surprisingly, the other inmates eventually stopped asking Wayne to play. “I would come to the day room and niggas were playing. I’d be like, ”˜Why y’all ain’t call me?’ ”˜Oh, we thought you were asleep.’ Right ”“ like you can’t look in my cell and see I’m right there. We ain’t got no doors, nigga!”)

One of his favourite pastimes was reading letters from fans. He got a lot of letters ”“ so many that he couldn’t keep them in his cell, because it was a fire hazard. He says of the 400-odd pieces of mail he got each day, he’d read 20 or 30, and answer about half. His team also set up a website so he could post shorter messages online. (He wrote them out by hand, and an assistant uploaded them once a month.)

The site ”“ WeezyThanxYou.com ”“ is maybe the sweetest public act a rapper has ever committed. He flirts with the girls, calls them “adorable,” “cutie,” “darling,” “baby doll.” (The guys he calls “bro.”) He sends birthday wishes, fantasy-football tips, relationship advice. He compliments fans’ artwork, their poetry, their photography, their raps. Most of all, he offers encouragement:

“I know you’ll be a wonderful teacher someday.”

“Earning your Masters in Library and Information Science is beautiful.”

“Nice Halloween outfit Allison!”

“I hope you kill ’em in the softball field. Go Tia!”

“I prayed for your grandpa and love your decision to become a radiologist. Jed you are amazing!”

Wayne also had a lot of visitors. His family, of course: his mom, Jacita, his four babies’ mothers, his 12-year-old daughter, Reginae, and his boys ”“ two-year-old Dwayne III, 17-month-old Kam and 14-month-old Neal, whom he calls his “littler meatball.” (Neal doesn’t speak yet, but Kam can say “da-da.”) A lot of friends, too: Diddy. Fat Joe. Drake and Nicki and everyone from Cash Money, of course. Kanye West came and rapped his whole album for Wayne, two months before it came out. T.I. wanted to come, but his probation officer wouldn’t let him. Wayne’s pal Brett Favre couldn’t make it either, but he did get on the phone to say, “Keep your head up.”

He also had a job. “I was an SPA,” Wayne says ”“ a suicide-prevention aide. (It’s the highest-paying gig in Rikers ”“ 50 cents an hour.) He walked the halls from 10 to six at night, keeping an eye out for people trying to kill themselves. At first he liked it, because it got him out of his cell and let him sleep in. But eventually, the hours got to him. “10 to six, niggas all be asleep,” he says. “That shit was for the birds.”

Wayne says he got along with most of his fellow inmates, as well as his COs. (“I’m a cool dude.”) He didn’t much care for the warden, though: “He had that white paint job,” he says, pointing to his face, “and you know how they feel about that black paint job. Especially when that black paint job got money.”

But all in all, he says, it wasn’t that bad. “Not to use the word ”˜easy’ ”“ but it wasn’t as difficult as people might think. There’s difficulty ”“ mentally, just waking up every damn day in that motherfucker. But once you get over that, it’s all good.”

It took him a while. “He ain’t used to living like that,” says Baby. “Getting orders. Taking orders. It was hard.” Cortez Bryant says that for the first two weeks, Wayne was pretty down. “Sometimes he’d call, and I’d be like, ”˜What are you doing?’ And he’d say, ”˜What do you think I’m doing? I’m in jail.’”

At the beginning, Wayne kept a journal, thinking he might publish it someday. But he quit after a couple of weeks. “It got boring,” he says. “Every day was the same.” In a radio interview last summer, he talked about how he’d call Drake three or four times a week, but Drake would only answer once. Wayne didn’t blame him. “Every time I dial somebody’s number,” he said, “I feel like I’m bothering them.”

His last month was the hardest. In May, he got caught with an iPod charger in his cell (it was found in his garbage can inside a bag of chips) and was punished with 30 days in solitary. (He also had a watch with an MP3 player on it, and another inmate tried to take the rap. “He was a solid nigga,” Wayne says. “Shout-out to my nigga Charles.”) Wayne was in the box from the beginning of October until the day he was released. “That was the worst,” he says. “No TV. No radio. No commissary. Basically you’re in there 23 hours a day.” The only upside was that he had a window onto the street, where he could watch cars go by, people come and go. “I used to sit at that motherfucker all day,” he says.