Read Heaven's Harlots: My Fifteen Years in a Sex Cult for Free Online Page A

England states, and I met the members of the same blues band that I used to listen to in the “AT.” Although it was nice to be accepted by this group, who were not only “cool” but wealthy also, I knew it wasn’t due to my merit as an individual but only because of my close friendship with Sonny. That troubled me, whereas I should have been basking in my newfound fellowship with the privileged.
    I admired Sonny’s intelligence, but more than anything I appreciated his gentleness. He never pushed me to do anything, and never belittled any of my viewpoints. Instead, he told me his own views without getting patronizing or offensive. He challenged me to think about what I was saying, but he did not criticize my youthful nonsense. And at seventeen, one can be very stupid.
    Even though I came to Sonny’s every time I was free, I did not consider him my boyfriend. I did not tell anyone at school that I was seeing him, and he never gave me a ring or necklace, or anything that signified we were “going out.” I was too inhibited to ask why this was, but I eventually assumed that he realized I was too young to make our relationship public, or perhaps he thought that since I was seven years younger than he, I still had a lot to experience. I thought I did too.
    “I want to go to the Moratorium against the war in Washington,” I told him one spring day.
    “You know I can’t come,” he said.
    “I know, but I thought I would ask.”
    “Even if I did not teach, I would not go to the Moratorium. I have different ways to express my discontent with government policy.”
    “And so do I. But I want to go for the experience. I want to be part of the movement to stop the war.”
    “You are part of it right here. Go if you want to, of course. But how will you get there? Who is going with you?”
    “I’m taking my sister, and we’ll hitchhike.”
    “I can’t tell you what to do,” he said with a sigh.
    I knew he did not approve of me hitchhiking, but he would never say it.
    The Moratorium, held in April 1971, was a huge peace march against the war in Vietnam. I went to Washington to participate, slept on the Quaker church floor with hundreds of other dreamers, and was detained in a park by the National Guard. While there, I met an intense boy who read Chairman Mao religiously. I never saw him smile. Of the thousands of young people who came to Washington for those days, I met no one else.
    I was too busy observing this profoundly concentrated boy. He left for California when the Moratorium was over, and I don’t even remember his name. But I remember the determined look on his face. I admired his dedication to a cause, and I thought to myself that I wanted to be as serious about an ideal as he was. Now, with a standard to measure up to, I just had to find the right ideal for me.
    Sonny was there for me when I returned, but he didn’t press for conversation. He just held me in his arms like an ever-present father.
    Sex was nothing for me to give in exchange for his masculine kindness.
    After graduation from high school in June 1971, I went to Wildwood, a New Jersey beach town frequented mainly by young people, to look for a job in order to earn money for college. I found work in a restaurant as a waitress, all of the waitresses had to wear hot pants and I hated the idea. While in Wildwood, I met a boy from Pittsburgh who told me he had been born again. He witnessed to me about being a good Christian, saying that I should not give love freely, drink or smoke, or even listen to rock music. I should read my Bible every day and that would give me strength to resist evil. My roots were still in Christianity, however, Christians were always so close-minded and usually boring. But this boy was exciting, and he hung around with me, an obvious hippie. Why? Maybe there was still hope in this Jesus stuff he talked about. Since he did not say anything about going to church, I decided to follow his counsel. It wasn’t hard for me to