Innocent

Chapter 1

 

I forced myself to block out the insults my brother Daniel was making of my friend James Waters as his face was being shown on the news. I knew my brother had a lot of hatred for him, but I couldn’t see why he had to hate him. James never did anything wrong. But only I knew what truly happened and I wasn’t comfortable talking about it yet. No one fully understands how I felt or what I had gone through, even if it was two years ago. I have kept everything to myself only because no one wanted to hear my side and wanted to make up their own story and believe a whole bunch of lies. I have tried to move on, but it was hard to. The nightmares haunted me all the time. What bothered me the most is that there’s an innocent man behind bars.

James was sent to Juvenile when he was seventeen. He spent three months there until he turned eighteen and was transferred to an adult jail. He is supposed to be in there for eight years. I have begged the judge so much not to send him to jail, but he wasn’t interested in hearing what I had to say. The judge and other people reckon I was trying to protect him by saying he was innocent. Of course he is. But everyone just wants to treat him like a criminal over a crime he never committed.

I have tried to visit him in prison so many times. No one would ever let me go. “Why would you want to see that bastard after what he did to you?” is what so many people ask me. I know I have a right to see him. I’m almost twenty years old. I can make up my own mind of who I wanted to see, can’t I?

Besides, James is my friend. I’m sticking by him no matter what.

James has always been the quiet one through high school. He never had friends or hardly ever talked to anyone. Sometimes you didn’t even know he was there since he never made a sound. It usually was just him and his iPod. He was obsessed with music and he is never seen without an iPod. I have never really spoken to James throughout my school years. Don’t even know why. He is such a nice person and one of the things I liked most about him was his eyes. He had these really nice hazel brown eyes. He also has this very nice smile, but doesn’t really show it. I was lucky enough to see it a couple of times.

I had gotten to know James when our Biology teacher assigned us as lab partners when we were in twelfth grade. I didn’t even expect a friendship to form between us. I mean, this is James Waters. He hardly has ever spoken a word to anyone since high school. Maybe longer than that. You might as well say since Kindergarten. That’s how long I have known him and it makes me feel horrible that I have never really spoken to him. No one really knows anything about him.

From what I have learn about him since I became is lab partner is that he uses music to escape reality where he doesn’t have to worry about his problems. He could sit in a room for hours just listening to music and not even get bored doing one thing. He is an only child and only lives with his father. His mother left when he was just two. I kind of understand why she left because James’ father is a complete asshole. Although the only thing I don’t understand is why she never took James with her and just abandon him with a father who doesn’t have respect for anyone, not even his own son. He is constantly smoking and drinking. It surprises me so much that Mr Waters is still alive.

I try not to think about what happened that day, but it’s hard to forget. It replays in my head over and over again, like an annoying song on repeat. But instead it’s a horrible nightmare I’m having and I can’t wake up from it.

James’ mug shot came up onto the screen as the news reader announced that he was being released on parole. It showed footage of him at his trail and when he was being handcuffed by the police, walking out of the court house and into the back seat of a police car.

I turned away from the television, unable to look at James’ face. It was tearing my heart to pieces.

“What are they doing?” Daniel said. “They can’t release that asshole!”