American Outlaw

by James, Jesse

  I thought for a second. “I was always scared of hospitals after that. I told everyone I hated them. But the truth is, I was totally frightened of being in them. They always reminded me of that night.”

  I laughed softly, relieved to speak the truth to a group of people. So many emotions were running over me, from grief to giddiness to this strange sense of solace. They merged and mixed, and somehow, they all felt like something I wanted to let in.

  ——

  As the days wore on, things got better—a little easier. I kept going to my therapy sessions, and even tried some new ones just for the hell of it. EMDR spooked me, but I did it. Equine therapy was a blast—those horses are wise, there’s no way to hide from them. Hell, I even went to AA meetings, even though I had never been into them before. At the end of the day, I felt exhausted and wrung out. But my insides were becoming more spacious. Instead of a bunch of rage and pushed-down feelings, it was like there was suddenly more room for things to circulate.

  One day Fay, the older woman who’d greeted me on my first morning at Sierra Tucson, motioned for me to come over to her.

  “Jesse,” she whispered. “Let me talk to you for a second.”

  “What’s up, Fay?” I asked, smiling. I liked nearly everybody at Sierra Tucson, but she was definitely one of my favorites, partly because I’d met her first, and partly because, looking at her, you could tell that she’d been a real crazy chick when she was younger. She kind of had that strut to her.

  “Every morning I listen to Howard Stern on the way to work,” she said softly, looking over her shoulder to make sure no one was listening in on us. “They’re talking about you, every single day!”

  I grinned. “Hey, it’s news, I guess. What all does Howard have to say?”

  “Oh, they just say that you’re in rehab, I guess for sex addiction.”

  “Sounds like Howard,” I said, laughing. For some reason, being safe inside these walls, the idea of my name being batted around on a national scale didn’t bother me at all. It had a tinge of unreality to it even. “We’ll set ’em straight when I get out, I guess.”

  “I’ll keep you informed on all breaking news,” Fay said, winking at me. “Hang in there, Jesse, I can tell you’re doing real good.”

  Fay wasn’t my only cheerleader. I guess the word had gotten out where I was: maybe those cops really had sold their story, the fuckers. As a result, I started to get mail on an almost daily basis. Receiving letters from friends who pledged their support meant a lot to me, but it was the letters from the random chicks in jail that made me laugh the most.

  Hey there, soldier, what’s good with you?

  I know you don’t know me but my name is Callie and as you can see I am in penitentiary right now . . . I am 31 years old and I have black hair, brown eyes, I am covered in tattoos. I have big titties. I am obsessed with choppers, especially yours. I have your name tattooed on my lips, and when I stroke it I am always stroking “Jesse James.” As you can see, I got mad love and respect for you. Please respond.

  I heard from Sandy, too. But it wasn’t good news. She would be divorcing me. I was devastated, of course, especially since I felt that I was making so much progress. But in spite of it hurting, I stayed focused on getting better. I had to persevere and fix what was broken.

  Somewhere around the midpoint of my time at Sierra Tucson, I assumed a kind of informal leadership role. It wasn’t anything that I’d planned on doing, but as I grew more comfortable, I just naturally started to step up. Our general lodge meetings after dinner were often pretty chaotic and disorganized, so I decided to take control of them, reading the minutes, organizing the agenda, telling funny stories to get the ball rolling.

  “Okay, you guys, I don’t have the crazy drug stories that most of you do, but damn, I want to tell you about something even worse: it’s called working for Donald Trump . . .”

  My whole life, I’d been a leader, from captaining football teams to running a business with more than a hundred employees. I just couldn’t not step up and take charge.

  It was great, too. People really appreciated my go-to attitude, and the more I saw I could help people out a little bit by cheering them up, the more I wanted to do that. There were people there who were so wadded up, it looked like they hadn’t smiled in about five years. My heart went out to them. I considered it a personal challenge and responsibility to get them out of their shell a little bit.

  “Hey, how’s it going?” That was all it took, sometimes. “Hey, can I give you a hug?” There was one woman there who’d seen all her kids die in a car accident. She’d done every kind of self-medicating known to man, and she just looked crushed, wrinkled. The day I got her to grin, to finally engage in a real conversation with me, that felt as good to me as winning a race. Better.

  I was figuring out that I had the power to help people. Not just to hire them, or sell bikes to them, but to really be part of their healing. And on the other side of that coin, I was seeing that I needed people, too. It might sound kind of contrived or whatever, but for the first time in my life, I was beginning to see that, sometimes, I needed to ask for what I wanted.

  “With Sandy, or Janine, or Karla,” I told Dr. Thomas, “I’d want to be touched, or taken care of sometimes, but I’d never say it out loud.”

  “And? What would happen?”

  “I’d get all pissed,” I said. “I’d resent them for not being able to read my mind, and that’d lead me to go off and do whatever.”

  Finally, I was starting to get it: fuck, if you want affection, you gotta tell her. I vowed that the next time I had a relationship, I’d do better at asking for what I needed.

  I didn’t feel fixed. I don’t think letting go of your past can really happen in a month. I’d gained valuable insight, that was for sure. But none of it was going to alter the fact that I had run my life like an abused kid for so long. My entire adult life, my attitude had been, hey, if you’ve wronged me, then I’m gonna break your jaw. You can sue me, but you’re going to do it with a broken jaw . . .

  Everything was going to have to change when I got out. I knew that. And the fact was, I was going to have to deal with the paparazzi circus all over again. On my morning walks, I gradually began to see more and more cars parked on the road outside the gates. They had found me, and they would be waiting for me when I got out.

  And as my release date loomed closer and closer, I started to get a little frightened of the future.

  “I feel safe here,” I said. “I like everyone. They like me. I feel valued.”

  “Well, your real challenge, Jesse,” Dr. Thomas said, “is to take that feeling out into the world. You’re going to have to keep in mind just why the people here seem to like you so much.”

  “I’m . . . scared to do that,” I admitted. “I’ve always kind of pushed everyone away from me. Letting them in seems like the hardest thing in the world.”

  She smiled at me. “You’ve done so well. I have faith in you.”

  Right toward the end of the month, I had a dual celebration: my forty-first birthday and my ten years of sobriety. The residents got together and threw a big party for me, with cake and coffee and everything.

  “We’re going to miss you, Jesse!”

  “Don’t go!” Phil laughed. “Stay here, man!”

  “I would, if I could,” I said, grinning. “This place is the most fun I’ve had since juvie. But I gotta see my kids, man. I’m starting to miss them pretty bad.”

  It was true. Celebrating my birthday without my family around me felt lonely. I wanted to be with Chandler and Jesse and Sunny again. They gave my life purpose and joy. They made it make sense.

  The following morning, I rose early to take my last walk on the horse trail. As I strode along through the cold desert morning, I scrolled through all the emotions that had been heaping down on me ever since I’d come here: guilt and shame for ending my marriage. Anger and sadness, courtesy of my rough childhood. Guarded optimism, for the hope of a new beginnin
g.

  I was scared to leave, for sure. But I’d gained so much understanding here. I felt like I had the tools I needed to get through the rest of my life—or at the very least, the next couple of months, which were gonna be trying.

  I hadn’t always been the best guy, or the best husband. That much was obvious. But now that I knew more about what made me happy, that meant I knew more about how to make others happy, too.

  I walked faster, my feet pounding the hardpack, my hands stuffed into the pockets of my jeans.

  When I make a gas tank out of aluminum, when I weld, I thought, I make sure my hands are spotless. I make sure the table’s clean. I scrub all my tools, make sure the metal is immaculate, so no grease or moisture sucks into my weld and leaves a blemish. It takes a lot of work, a half day’s worth of work, just to prepare.

  In the end, my goal is to make a tank that doesn’t leak. I’ve gotten really good at it over the years. I’ve had bikes that have rolled end over end, smashed the tank up like a wad of foil. Not a drop leaks.

  I gazed up at the mountains above me. A red sun was starting to rise on the far horizon. Day was coming in.

  I’m going to figure out a way, I thought, to put that kind of dedication and detail into building a life.

  If I do that, I don’t think it’ll ever leak.

  AFTERWORD

  I press down on the gas pedal, feeding the engine. I am leaving Sierra Tucson, gunning up 77 North. Wind flies in the lowered windows of the car, cold and clean.

  I fumble for the radio, watching the road, searching for the dial with my hand. I turn on the power: static.

  I merge onto Highway 79 and open her up. The needle on the speedometer climbs to seventy miles an hour. Then eighty. Then ninety.

  My speed keeps climbing. I see it in the dust that hangs in the air above me. One hundred. One hundred five. One ten.

  The desert sun is getting low in the sky as I head west.

  I slide the sunroof open, and I think about Jesse and Chandler and Sunny. How excited I am to see them. To be with them, as the new person I’ve discovered after the pain and triumph of this last month.

  Entering rehab had been like committing suicide. I’d been at the end of my rope in life—pushed to a limit, no end in sight. Some mornings at Sierra Tucson, I experienced a quiet euphoria that I would imagine the suicide jumper feels when he steps off that fateful ledge. Turmoil put him up there, willing to end it all, but when falling through the cool air to his demise? He has to feel some peace and quiet. I wonder if that feeling lasts forever. I hope so.

  One twenty, one thirty. My speed keeps going up until the scenery blurs. Cacti streak by my window.

  So much has happened in such a short amount of time. It makes you realize just how much of a razor’s edge we walk in life. In the blink of an eye, everything we have can be gone. If I’ve learned anything from the life I’ve lived, it’s that through adversity, something good always comes.

  My foot presses down on the gas pedal a little more. I blast through the desert, wind whipping at my face, toward home.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I would like to thank Judge Diesler from the Riverside Juvenile Court. I am sure that if he wasn’t as hard on me as he was, I wouldn’t be around today to write these words. He just gave me the maximum sentence every time without bothering to look up at me. I never actually saw his face all of those times I was in front of him. I wish he were still around, so I could shake his hand.

  Would also like to thank the following football coaches:

  Gil Lake

  Dave Perkins

  Coach Bradshaw

  Coach Reed

  These guys were not afraid to spit in my face and tell me I was wrong. They filled a huge gap in my life and gave me the discipline I needed to make it.

  I would also like to thank Jennifer Bergstrom for letting me do things my way.

  Also a heartfelt thanks to Jeremie Ruby-Strauss, because he told me, “Thank your editor, fucker!” And to Jen Robinson, for getting the word out.

  Last, would like to thank Sam Benjamin, for taking my lifetime of stories and making them into an actual book.

  INSERT PHOTOGRAPH CREDITS

  Page 1 (clockwise from top left): the author; the author; Carol James; the author

  Page 2 (clockwise from top left): Carol James; the author; Scott Patterson; Melody Groom

  Page 3 (clockwise from top left): the author; Carol James; the author; the author

  Page 4 (clockwise from top left): the author; Karla James; Karla James; Carol James

  Page 5 (from top to bottom): Karla James; Alain Saquet

  Page 6 (from top to bottom): Karla James; the author

  Page 7: the author

  Page 8 (clockwise from top left): the author; the author; Tyson Beckford

  Page 9 (from top to bottom): Rob Fortier; the author

  Page 10: the author

  Page 11: Hildie Katibah

  Page 12: the author

  Page 13: the author

  Page 14: the author

  Page 15: the author

  Page 16: Hildie Katibah

  My mom in 1964.

  My dad in 1976.

  Family portrait with my mom, dad, and sister, Julie.

  Building cars as a kid.

  Little badass in 1977, already dreaming about my first motorcycle.

  Young punk with a flattop, 1984.

  Me in junior high.

  Wearing #55 for La Sierra High School.

  Rhonda, on the day I surprised her with a customized Volkswagen Beetle.

  Laid up from the knee injury that ended my football career.

  In Scotland with Danzig’s Rick Dittamo in 1989.

  A little light reading on the tour bus.

  Getting my very first tattoo: Karla’s name on my leg.

  Dressed to impress with Karla, 1993.

  The early bike-building days, working in my garage.

  New dad with baby Chandler in 1994.

  In Long Beach with the 1976 Harley I built myself.

  With legendary hot-rodder Boyd Coddington.

  Getting Chandler and Jesse Jr. started early.

  From exes to best friends: Karla and me in 2004.

  Young love: Janine and me.

  Life with Janine was never boring.

  Janine and me on our honeymoon in Mexico, 2002.

  Going for a ride in Daytona Beach with Janine.

  Chandler keeping me company while I get inked.

  In Japan with Chandler in 2003.

  In Daytona with Tyson Beckford.

  Kid Rock and me in Afghanistan.

  Kid Rock, Pamela Anderson, and me.

  From welder to reality TV star.

  Sandy and Sunny in London.

  The happy family: Sandy, Sunny, and me.

  The loves of my life: Chandler, Sunny, and Jesse Jr. in 2007.

  Father and son in 2009.

  Self-portrait in rehab.

  Me in 2010, doing what I love.