The Beginning

I was generally a pretty good child.  Up until the age of about 14.  I'd argue that at 14 it wasn't that I became "bad" (that comes later), but was the beginning of my rebellion against my parents.  I was naive, I clearly did not know what I was getting into here.  His name: Jason.  It all started with Jason.  He was older, and in retrospect a bit of a low life.  I did things like start sneaking over to his house when I was supposed to be other places, saying that I was at the mall when he'd actually come pick me up.  It started so innocently.  My parents adamently did not like Jason and expressed their viewpoints on why I should not be associated with him.  None of that mattered though.

The beginning of when things got bad... it was another time that I had been dropped off at the mall by my parents with a friend and Jason came to pick me up.  That day he was in a red truck, I think it was his dad's.  He had 2 of his friends with him, at this time they were all about 17.  One of his friends was very nice, looked preppy, and was personable- his name was John.  We were driving around a neighborhood (to this day I don't remember why), and the boys had the 'bright' idea that the 2 friends should sit on the hood of the car while Jason drove to 'surf in the air'.  I remember, very specifically, saying to Jason, "this is really dangerous, you need to stop driving." He didn't listen, but then again, I didn't press the issue.  What happened next, happened so quickly that I can not describe it.  But, somehow, John was thrown from the hood of the car and hit his head of the curb.  While he lay there bleeding, the other friend called 911.  I immediately freaked out and told Jason to drive us back to the mall so we could be picked up by my parents. 

Unfortunately, despite being life flighted, John died that day.  It wasn't long afterwards that the local detective called my house and spoke with my parents.  Jason had worked out a story that we were all supposed to feed to the police.  Being young, and scared, I lied to the police and did what Jason said.  I was obviously under punishment by my parents at this point.  It was a Friday nite, I walked downstairs where my parents were sitting and said, "I lied to the police and I don't know what to do."  My dad called the detective on his cell phone and was able to reach him.  I went back into the station the next morning and gave my real statement. The parents were only pressing charges against Jason, but everyone was under investigation and looking to get some type of legal punishment.  Because I was the first to confess, they let me off.

That wasn't the last time I'd be in the police station that year regarding Jason though.