I liked Mary and I understood her dilemma, but I wasn’t ready to physically return to the church, at least not yet. I continued to consider myself a Scientologist and to make large donations, knowing it would ease some of the pressure to return. The alternative wasn’t feasible. If I agreed to go to Ethics, I would be hooked up to the E-meter and “outed.” At that point, my beautiful Charley would be declared a PTS (Potential Trouble Source), which meant that if I wanted to stay in good standing with the church, I would be forced to “disconnect” from her. If I challenged church rule, I myself would be labeled an SP (Suppressive Person). The consequences would be dire.
L. Ron Hubbard wrote extensively about misfortunes befalling SPs after leaving the church. I’d read his stories of people stricken with terrible illnesses, or going insane, even dying. The threat of expulsion both saddened and frightened me. How could it not? In Introduction to Scientology Ethics, Hubbard wrote, “You are threatening somebody with oblivion for eternity by expulsion from Scientology.” I had lived in the Scientology world for so long that it was hard to imagine what my life would look like outside of it. I risked losing everything and everyone I’d known for twenty years. It was too big a sacrifice to take lightly. I knew I had to keep my new relationship under wraps, at least for the time being—until Charley moved out of her house and I could figure out something to pacify the church when we came out as a couple—but I was bursting to share my good news with someone.
I decided to take a chance with Dror and Virginia. They had proven to be good and loyal friends and had never reported me for all the times I complained about my marriage. I thought they could be trusted with my secret. Besides, Dror certainly wasn’t going to betray his rainmaker. He had a brand-new production company and movies he wanted to make.
I told Charley that I was going to invite Dror and Virginia to dinner to tell them about us. She knew Dror from brief dealings with him on Twist, but she didn’t know him very well. His company was receiving producer credit for the play, but I was the one who attended most of the auditions and rehearsals with Charley.
Charley was relieved I was “coming out,” but she worried that it was too soon because she and Maria were not yet officially separated. She also questioned the wisdom of telling Dror and Virginia, who were both so heavily involved in Scientology.
From hanging out with me, Charley had seen enough to have serious doubts about the church, particularly the fact that so much of the religion seemed to revolve around money. She knew I was the money person in my partnership with Dror and, by extension, Virginia, and she’d been with me when Charmaine called, under the guise of checking in on the kids and me, to ask for yet another donation. I made excuses for them, telling Charley that Dror was only following the teachings of the church about how to succeed in business, as I had. And Charmaine was raising money to save the planet, so who could argue with that? I could tell she wasn’t convinced, but she was reticent to criticize, and I was grateful for that. It was still my church.
Dinner was at Ago, an Italian restaurant off Melrose that was co-owned by Robert De Niro and popular with an A-list clientele. Dror and Virginia were all about the “in” LA restaurants. Spring was on the horizon and the night was warm. Dror and I arrived first and took a table in the crowded dining room. Earlier that day, I’d had a meeting with him at his Paramount Studios office and gave him the CliffsNotes version of the story. His reaction was guarded.
“Oh! Really? Charley?” Well”—he seemed to be choosing his words carefully—“I’m glad that you’re happy, Michelle.”
Dror was a businessman before anything. He wasn’t about to preach the word of Scientology to me when I had the potential to bring investments to his future film projects. I knew he lived for the acclaim and he wasn’t about to jeopardize his business by alienating me; he would just look the other way. I didn’t expect more than tepid acceptance from Dror—at least not at that point—but I was certain I could count on Virginia to be happy for me.
Virginia came in and the three of us settled into a conversation of small talk. I waited for the wine to be poured before I broke the news.
“The reason I invited you to dinner is that I really want to tell you something,” I said. Virginia’s eyes lit up.
“Oh my God!” she said. “You have a guy.”
I looked at Dror, who nodded to urge me on.
“Well, not exactly,” I said. Virginia didn’t even hear me. She was as excited as I was.
“I knew something was up!” she said. “I just knew you were in love.”
I didn’t know if I had the courage to continue. Virginia looked at me, puzzled.
“I am in love,” I said. “I have found the greatest love I have ever known. This person is not a Scientologist, but it doesn’t matter to me.”
Virginia narrowed her eyes and waited.
“It’s Charley,” I said plaintively.
Her mouth dropped and her eyes widened. “Charley?” she echoed.
The conversation wasn’t going as planned. I could tell that Virginia was disappointed. She had heard about Charley and the play, but she’d never met her. She looked back and forth between Dror and me. Virginia was never at a loss for words, but she seemed unable to speak. My reaction was to fill in the awkward silence.
“Wait until you get to know her!” I cried. “Charley is the greatest person. She’s kind and smart and very successful. You’ll love her!”
“Charley,” she said again. “I never would have expected this in a million years.”
Scientology considers love a weakness and passion a “body thing” discussed only by people who were low on the Bridge. It had taken all my courage to break that code with Dror and Virginia.
Now, all hope of acceptance dashed, I tried to justify my feelings.
“Think of it this way,” I said. “It’s not that I’m in love with a woman. I am in love with this being. It has nothing to do with gender. It was her soul that attracted me, and souls have no gender. The church taught us that.”
Dror nodded, but Virginia was unmoved. “I’m worried,” she said. “Isn’t there a big age difference?”
Yes, I said. There was a nineteen-year age gap. “But Charley is a young soul and I am an old soul, so it kind of evens out,” I said.
I felt like I had when I was a teenager trying to convince my mother that my best friend wasn’t a bad influence on me, that she was a nice girl.
“I’m sorry, Michelle,” Virginia said, backpedaling a bit. “I just didn’t expect this. I’m worried. Look, I know Charley is successful, but I doubt she is as successful as you are. What does she want from you? Aren’t you funding her musical? I’m concerned about her influence over you.”
I laughed and assured her that Charley didn’t need my money; she was quite well-off.
“Well, not as well-off as you,” she said. “Wait a minute! Isn’t she married?”
Yes, I said. Charley was married but they were headed toward a divorce.
I had been so sure that Virginia would be happy for me and this would be a celebration; instead I felt judged and embarrassed.
“Virginia, I can’t help this,” I said, hating the desperation in my voice. “I swear to God we’re like magnets. I have never loved anyone more. This is just so right. There is nothing in the world I’m worried about or have concerns about.” I waited for the inevitable question.
“What about the church?” she asked. “How do you think they will handle this?”
There it was. The question I had hoped she wouldn’t ask. My face flushed, and despite my own misgivings on this score I was overcome with feelings of anger.
“I don’t give a fuck!” I lied. This was not the conversation I had hoped for. I was newly in love. I didn’t want to be reminded—especially by one of my closest friends—that at some point the church would have to know I was with a woman. I wasn’t prepared to de
al with the ramifications of that yet. I just wanted to be happy. “My Bridge is my Bridge,” I said. “My freedom is my freedom. No one is going to tell me who to love.”
Virginia looked taken aback. “Well,” she said, lifting her wineglass. “On that note, I guess we should toast. To love.” She tried to seem cheerful, but I could see through the act. I was the woman who was funding her husband’s career. What else could she do?
I left the restaurant feeling sad and dejected. I don’t know why I expected a different outcome, except that perhaps love had made me delusional. Virginia and Dror were Scientologists first—just as I had been for most of my life. They weren’t going to give me unconditional support for something the church—and therefore they—considered evil.
On the drive home, I thought back to the officiant’s warning at my wedding, about how couples were expected to uphold their commitment even after love faded. “Know that life is stark and often somewhat grim, and tiredness and fret and pain and sickness do beget a state of mind where spring romance is far away and dead,” he’d said. At the time, they were just words. Except that they weren’t.
For years, the church had expected me to work things out with Sean—even if it meant subjecting myself to abuse and violence. It took threatening to cut off the stream of money spilling from my bank account into church coffers to finally be allowed to end the marriage with the church’s blessing.
I knew the road to acceptance of my relationship with Charley would be long and difficult. In the eyes of the church, we were sexual deviants who threatened mankind by choosing a lifestyle that tended “toward the pollution and derangement of sex itself so as to make it as repulsive as possible to others and so to inhibit procreation.” By choosing to love a woman, I would be considered a threat to the “well-ordered system for the creation and upbringing of children, by families,” the master wrote.
But I had paid for ethics protection with large donations before. And I would do it again if it bought me a reprieve.
* * *
Charley and I consummated our relationship in May. We’d held off mostly because of our shared guilt over her unfinished marriage. I didn’t know what to expect. The only experience I’d had with a woman was my brief fling with my high school friend, Lacey, and this was an experienced, mature woman who had been “out” for most of her life. What if I didn’t please her? I worried.
We met in the afternoon at the Langham Hotel at the foot of the San Gabriel Mountains in Pasadena. The hotel is from bygone Hollywood, majestic and grand. I had picked out my clothes the night before. I wanted to look beautiful for Charley.
I arrived first. The hotel room, which overlooked the lush hotel gardens, was romantic, with billowing silk curtains and a matching gold bedspread. Charley had arranged for champagne to be waiting for us—Veuve Clicquot.
Sitting nervously on the edge of the bed, I heard the click of the room key in the door and Charley walked in. She looked so handsome in her tailored suit and boyish haircut. “You still have your coat on,” Charley said, laughing. Nervously, I pulled off my jacket while she popped the cork on the champagne. She filled two flutes and we held up our glasses to toast. “To our love,” she said. “May this gift never end.” We shared a kiss and talked for a while about trivial things. Charley poured us another glass of champagne. The second one did the trick. Any worries I’d had when I got there melted away. My cheeks flushed and my heart began to slow down. Charley took the empty glass from my hand and drew me close to her. She smelled heavenly. She unzipped my dress and pushed it to the floor, then pulled back and gazed at my body. “You are more beautiful than I could have ever imagined,” she said. It was the first time in my life I felt so desired. Kissing had never been so passionate. When Charley ran her hands over my body, I marveled at the sensation. I had never been touched so tenderly. How had I been missing this my whole life? I wondered.
When our lovemaking was over, we lay entwined for a long time. “Miche, you were perfect,” Charley said. “I could lie here with you forever. I’m in heaven.”
The ice that had encased my heart for so many years was thawing. “Promise me this will never end,” I whispered.
“I promise,” she said.
* * *
The more time I spent with Charley, the less I had for Dror, and he wasn’t happy about it. He complained I wasn’t holding up my end of our business relationship. That I was always busy with my insurance company and Twist. My assistant, Monica, was overwhelmed and in over her head, and I needed to hire someone to coordinate the projects he and I were working on. “My bookkeeper has a friend who is available,” Dror said. “She is LRH trained and very savvy with tech. I’d love for you to meet her.” Eventually I got tired of Dror’s nagging and hired Celeste as my office manager.
Celeste was different than the other young women who worked for me. She was a tough New Yorker with large breasts she liked to show off. That spring, she whirled in and took over the office. She was willing to take on any task, and her IT skills really were a plus. But she was ambitious and hard-driving, and in short order got under everyone’s skin. I was too busy to notice, but even if I had been aware of the friction Celeste caused, I would have ignored it. That was my training as a Scientologist. All “nattering” was frowned upon. You were not to think ill of another Scientologist.
Celeste was always preaching about the benefits of Scientology and how much it had helped her to become the woman she was. She’d joined as a troubled teen, she said, and couldn’t imagine how her life would have turned out if she hadn’t kept up on the Bridge. She had met her husband in the church, and their twin daughters went to a Scientology school. “How long has it been since you’ve been on the Bridge?” she asked repeatedly.
I had tried to stay in the church’s good graces with newsy e-mails to Mary Mauser about my busy life and promises to return as soon as I had a break in my hectic schedule, meanwhile writing big checks as a way to buy time. When I finally scheduled an auditing appointment and then missed it, I e-mailed Mary my apology. “I tried very hard to make it, but between kids and packing for a trip, I couldn’t find the time to get down there,” I wrote.
Perhaps as a way to elicit her sympathy, I mentioned that my friend Charley was dealing with some medical issues and I was worried about her. I asked Mary for her “postulates” (good thoughts that manifest into a positive outcome). I had mentioned Charley to her previously, although strictly in the context of working together on Twist, so she knew the name.
Mary responded a few hours later, but not with the compassion I expected: “On your partner in business ONLY [smiley face icon]: She is PTS, no question about it [translation: If she’s sick, it’s because there is a “Potential Trouble Source” or “Suppressive Person” in her life]. Disseminate [translation: Tell her about Scientology] and get her working with someone. Discovery [translation: figuring out who the SP is] and handle or disconnect [translation: getting rid of them] keeps people alive. Science of Survival and PTS tech [translation: church policy for dealing with evil influences] are very clear by LRH.”
Charley’s health turned out to be fine, but, rereading Mary’s e-mail later, I was struck by the reference to her as my “partner in business ONLY.” What had she meant by the capitalized “ONLY” and the smiley face? Charley and I had been intimate for only a couple of weeks at the time, and I hadn’t told anyone except Virginia and Dror—and I was certain they wouldn’t tell. What had Mary been implying? And why? Did she know about us, then? And if she did, how? Did she know about the tryst at the Langham? Was I being watched?
* * *
Charley was scheduled to take a brief trip to New Orleans before we headed to New York for auditions for Twist. She suggested I meet her. We could spend time together and she would show me around her old stomping grounds. I was thrilled. I had never been to New Orleans, and the kids were scheduled to be with their father, so I was free to go.
&n
bsp; I met Charley at the historic Roosevelt Hotel. After unpacking, we dressed for a romantic dinner at a quaint restaurant in town. We headed down the elevator, holding hands. When the door slid open, we were facing the bar. A group of well-dressed businessmen turned to look at us, and I dropped Charley’s hand, suddenly embarrassed. I turned to Charley. “Honey,” I said, “I have an idea. Why don’t we order dinner in our room? Let’s just spend the time alone together.”
Charley looked confused at first, but then gave me a reassuring smile. “Maybe things are changing a little more slowly in the South. But let me ask you a question,” she said. “Do you think a white woman with a black little girl wouldn’t get stares if you walked into this hotel lobby?” Charley asked. “Would you look at your daughter, Savannah, and say, ‘Baby, let’s just have dinner back in the room tonight’?”
Tears stung my eyes. Of course she was right. If I couldn’t be proud of who I was, then what was I teaching my children? “Absolutely not!” I said. “I would pull her closer and hold my head high and take her out to dinner!”
Charley smiled. I grabbed her hand and we walked out of the hotel and down the street to the restaurant. After that, there was no turning back for me. I was a lesbian and I would have to figure out how to deal with the church. Perhaps, because of my position, I could talk them into allowing me to be the catalyst for positive change. I could reason that L. Ron Hubbard’s views about homosexuals and lesbians were archaic and the church could increase membership and donations by lifting its prohibition on homosexuality and coming into the present. I had always been good at making persuasive arguments about things I believed in. And I believed passionately in Charley and me. If I was able to convince the church to accept us as a couple, then others could live openly within our faith without fear of humiliation and punishment. Wasn’t that a win for everyone?
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