Heaven's Harlots: My Fifteen Years in a Sex Cult Read Online Free PDF

and, turned on more by his mind than his body, I walked home with him to listen to music in the privacy of his bedroom. I was seventeen years old, but since sex had never been a top priority for me, I really didn’t know much about how to do it. I was surprised by the pain.
    “Shit, I didn’t know you were a virgin,” Jay said almost contemptuously.
    “This isn’t free love,” I thought,“it’s free sex.” I remember standing by the window in his attic room, and looking out on the darkened road.
    I suddenly recognized it as the same street where my sister had been born years ago—Ruby Street. Wiping the tears from my eyes, I left him silent on the bed and walked home alone through the empty, rain-drenched streets. As usual, my mom and sisters were in bed. It didn’t matter. I couldn’t talk to them anyway. Sex was a taboo subject in my house. I could picture my mom screaming and calling the pastor if I told her. I had no curfew and my mother thought I was mature enough to do what I wanted, so I walked the streets all night with a mixture of happiness to have had the experience and sadness to be alone again.
    Feeling alienated from the drug and music scene, I looked around for something to feel close to and thought I would return to the familiar pews of the churches. I remember riding my bike one day to a church that advertised a special youth meeting with an internationally known missionary speaker. I was hopeful that perhaps my old love for religion would be reignited. After all, I wanted to be a missionary when I was a child, and I had asked Jesus into my heart when I was a twelve-year-old at a Bible camp. As I held hands with a dozen other campers around a campfire, a feeling of euphoria came over me. I felt I had been chosen by God for “His Ministry,” but I was not sure what that meant. Having gone to Sunday school and church camps until I was a teen, I’m sure it was a Christian concept I had internalized. I never thought it would be easy to be a Christian, in fact, I felt that perhaps I had left the church because it was too hard to obey all their rules. Maybe now I would be like the prodigal son/daughter. I imagined the missionary welcoming me with open arms. Ah, how wonderful it would be if someone pure hugged me. “What a friend we have in Jesus.” In my state of hopeful anticipation, it never occurred to me to dress up for church. I wore my jeans, the ones I had carefully embroidered to fill up the holes, and a lacy, oldfashioned blouse covered with a tapestry vest. My long blond hair was hanging free, barely brushed, and I wore no makeup or jewelry. My unkempt appearance became brutally obvious the minute I walked into the church, which was only a few blocks from where I lived.
    Once inside, I walked hesitantly up to one of the front rows and took a vacant seat beside a group of girls about my age. They were all dressed nicely, with nylons on their legs and shiny shoes. I looked not only ragged next to these polished specimens of American youth, I looked dirty. My beautiful embroidery, which I had always admired for its colorful appearance, now looked dull and shabby.
    A young boy with buzz cut turned around to whisper something to the girl next to me. She giggled and inched away from me. Was she making more room for me, or was my presence repulsive? I realized that most of these young people went to my high school, but I did not recognize anyone. Did anyone know me?
    I focused my attention on the missionary. He was regaling us with his stories about his work in Africa. He launched into a diatribe about the sins of the youth in America, and how we were so lucky to have good parents who raised us differently. I kept my eyes on him the entire time, hoping he would look my way and notice the deep desire I had to serve the Lord. He glanced at me once briefly and never looked my way again. In fact, I felt that he avoided turning his eyes to the section I was sitting in altogether.
    The missionary