“YOU WHAT?” Mo yelled, and punched him in the shoulder as hard as she could. “You son of a bitch! I thought we were about to die! What’s wrong with you? How could you do that to someone?”
“Doesn’t seem like it would have mattered that much if I wasn’t,” Cash said. “Clearly I would have just saved you from a life you don’t want. Why the hell are you going to Stanford if it’s not where you want to go?”
“I would never have said that if I didn’t think I was about to die!” she said. “Please don’t tell the others about this—I don’t want them to know.”
“Why not?” Cash asked. “They’d only encourage you to follow your passion.”
“I know—and that would make it worse!” Mo said. “It’s hard enough knowing I’ll be stuck going to a school I don’t want to go to and forced to study a subject I have no interest in. Having my friends encouraging me and making me feel like I have a say in the matter would only make it more painful.”
Cash sighed and shook his head. “What is wrong with you kids?” he said. “Of course you have a say in the matter! The only reason you’re letting your parents control you is because you’re too scared to take responsibility for yourself.”
“Says the rich and famous actor,” Mo said. “No offense, but I don’t think you’re exactly the voice of reason on this matter. I don’t have a bottomless bank account like you—my dad is in control of my college fund. He thinks writing isn’t a real profession and won’t pay for me to pursue it. I don’t want to be paying off student loans my whole life so I’ve got no choice!”
“Oh, boo fucking hoo,” Cash said. “Is that really worse than being miserable for the rest of your life?”
Mo looked away and crossed her arms. There wasn’t a single thing he could say that she hadn’t thought of a million times.
“Look, you’re right, I don’t know what it’s like to be in your shoes,” he said. “I’ve had people telling me what to do my whole life, too, so I sympathize with you. But you aren’t under a studio contract! You don’t have legal obligations to a network! No one is going to sue you for everything you have if you don’t follow their orders! Your world is as open and free as this road—you just don’t see it!”
It was a convenient perspective given their location, but Mo didn’t know what he expected from her.
“So what should I do?”
“You need to claim the driver’s seat,” Cash said. “Never take a backseat to your own life! You gotta take that bitch by the steering wheel with all your might—even if the road is bumpy, even if there’s blood under your fingernails, even if you lose passengers along the way. Only you can steer your life in the direction that’s best for you.”
“That’s a nice metaphor—but real life isn’t always that simple.”
“You want something real?” Cash asked. “Fine, I’ll give you something real. Your lesson starts right now—come on, Chinese fire drill!”
“I’m Japanese!”
“That means we’re switching places!”
Cash ran around the car, slid into the passenger seat, and pushed Mo in front of the steering wheel.
“Drive us back to the junkyard,” he instructed. “And if this car doesn’t prove it’s better to live life in the driver’s seat, then nothing will.”
“I don’t have my driver’s license,” she said.
“I don’t have my driver’s license,” Cash mocked her. “I don’t have a college fund! I don’t have a daddy who understands me! I don’t want to be inconvenienced in exchange for happiness! Do you know how many people would slap you in the face right now? Shut up and drive!”
Once again, Cash knew the exact button to push. Mo looked at the open highway in an entirely new light. She wrapped her fingers around the steering wheel and stepped on the gas, and the sports car roared down the road. It was fun to be a passenger in the Porsche, but it was a completely different experience behind the wheel. Cash controlled the stick shift, but knowing she was in complete control of the speed and the direction gave Mo a sensation she had never felt before: she was in charge—and it was addictive!
“This is awesome!” Mo said.
“I told you!” Cash said. “This is how your life should feel!”
“Fuck you, Stanford!” Mo yelled toward the open sky.
“Yeah, that’s it!” Cash said.
They raced down the road until it became another highway altogether. Mo turned back around and only slowed when she saw her friends and the junkyard in the distance.
“Wow!” she said. “This is exhilarating! No wonder everyone in Hollywood loves James Dean so much—I can only imagine the freedom a car like this gave him.”
Cash knew very well that the icon was actually killed in 1955 after crashing his Porsche 550 Spyder, but he didn’t have the heart to tell her.
“Dream as if you’ll live forever. Live as if you’ll die today. That was his motto.”
Chapter Sixteen
THE JAILHOUSE