American Outlaw - Jesse James [29]
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I had an extensive record and a probation officer. I’d already used up all my chances. Now they were ready to do me in.
“Do you realize the severity of your crime, Jesse?” Ms. Torres asked. I suppose she felt kind of vindicated—I’d been proven to be a real-life criminal, after all.
“Yep,” I said curtly.
“You can’t just go around burglarizing places. Do you understand that?”
“Are you done yet?”
“You have absolutely no remorse, do you?” she snapped at me. “Well, listen to me, you better change that attitude before you see the judge. You are going to serve time for this, Jesse. Do you realize that?”
What she said scared me. But I was so furious, her words barely cut through. My father, Bobby, the cops: none of them gave a damn about me. Just like it had been for my entire life, the people closest to me had fucked me over the hardest. So the state wanted to send me to jail, huh? Well, then great. Maybe that was the best place for me.
At my hearing, several of my coaches showed up and spoke on my behalf. They said I was a good leader and a credit to our town. They pled with the judge to give me another chance, or, barring that, to reduce my sentence.
He frowned. “How much of the football season do you have left, gentlemen?”
“Two more weeks.”
The judge looked me over sternly. “Given the gravity of your crime, Mr. James, and your past criminal record, I’m inclined not to hear any pleas on your behalf. But these men seem to believe in you.”
I looked up at the judge, who held my future in his hands.
“I will reluctantly agree to suspend your sentence, Mr. James, until you have completed the final football game of this season. Immediately after, you will enter the California Youth Authority, where you will serve ninety days of rehabilitative therapy.” He banged his gavel. “That is all.”
I exhaled, relieved. I’d have a chance to finish out the season. But I’d miss the following three months of classes. If I wanted to graduate, I’d have to go to summer school for sure. Awesome. I was well on my way to being a loser.
“Hey, man, let me explain,” Bobby said, when I saw him at practice the next day.
“No,” I said coldly.
“Aw, James, you don’t get it, man. If Dave got nabbed for this, he’d do real time. You’re just going to juvie, man.”
“Beat it,” I snapped. “I don’t want to talk to you.”
He nodded. “I wouldn’t talk to me either, James. I get it, man,” he said. “I really do.” And Bobby loped away.
I walked around for my last two weeks of freedom in a depressed stupor. The football field was my only refuge. More recruitment letters arrived at my house each day. Clemson, Michigan State, Wisconsin: everybody was talking scholarship. They all wanted to come down and meet my parents “when the time was right.” I laughed drily, picturing Nina serving up a martini to a Big Ten coach, my dad trying to sell him a case of reclaimed tuna, found at auction.
Our last game was against Norte Vista. I played with a fury that surprised even me. I knew a few of the kids on the team personally, and I decided to go for each of them, one by one. I ignored the quarterback and the direction of the play, focusing instead on taking each opponent out at the knees for one last time, simply because it felt so good to smash them down to the ground.
We were down by three in the last quarter, and it looked like I might just lose the last game of my high school career. With three minutes remaining, we made our final drive down field. We drove the ball inside the twenty, and our quarterback grimaced in the huddle, trying to decide what the hell to do.
“What do you think, Jesse?” he finally said. He looked shaken.
I shrugged. “Let’s run it,” I said. “Come on, guys! This is it. Our last time. Let’s make it count.”
We ran a play for Bryson Young, our speedy halfback. The quarterback shoved it into Bryson’s chest, and he slipped around the end. Norte Vista’s defensive back came rushing in to grab him, but I leveled him with a block that put both of us on our asses.
Bryson made it to the three. We were just a play away