Intimidation

Trevor is pulled over while driving one of his stepdad’s junk cars which doesn’t have an ownership title and without an ownership title he has no way to prove the car is his and the police cannot verify who’s car it is. The police believe the car is stolen especially with all of the carjackings that were happening in South Africa at that time it was almost commonplace. This means that Trevor has to go to jail and await his bail hearing unless he called his parents, but he decided that it would be smarter not to and play it off like nothing had happened so that he wouldn’t get spanked by his mother. “I figured that if I was in jail people were going to assume I was the kind of colored person who ends up in jail, a violent criminal. So I played it up. I put on this character; I played the stereotype.” I can definitely relate to Trevor and his tough act, specifically playing sports, before the game everyone acts incredibly tough. Players of any sport can all say that they have done this at least once. Although Trevor is doing this in a much different situation, which he plays up as a major deal, but it doesn’t really seem like he is in major trouble with anyone. He seems to think he is, however. This is very much like previously in the book, when he refers to himself as a chameleon, but instead of changing color he is changing his personality. I can admit to making myself seem tougher or cooler than I really am before a basketball game. During warm ups, everyone wants to make themselves seem as good as they can possibly seem, it’s basically customary in the AAU basketball world, which is the travel basketball association, and to be completely honest it never really works but everyone still puffs out their chest and puts on their “cool jacket”. In fact, it’s almost made fun of by kids because it really is silly how useless doing something like that is, but it really is the nature of a teenager.