A Dance With the Devil: A True Story of Marriage to a Psychopath (10 page)

The Clays were a warm, gracious couple from England and Malta. I was pleased with John’s choice and amazed that he had done it again. I was caught up in the moment, enjoying the excitement of the day: my pretty dress, great new friends, a wedding present, champagne, and best of all, my admiral who loved me, only me! I crammed the disparaging phone calls to my mother and Pam into my “I don’t want to think about it” sack. I refused to let their reactions spoil my happiness.

“Folks, look at the time,” John said. “We’d better get going. Don’t want to be late for the chief of police. He might throw us in the hoosegow.”

Twenty minutes later, J.R. drove us through the border check and we entered another world: Tijuana. As we crossed over the dry riverbed, I cringed at the sight of hundreds of shanties made from corrugated steel, plastic, cardboard, and whatever could be found to try to keep out the summer heat and the winter cold.

I tried not to stare as we made our way through the outskirts of town, but couldn’t help myself. Men in torn, dirty T-shirts stood outside cluttered automobile upholstery shops, drank beer, and puffed on cigarettes. Music blared from crackling radios. Colorful signs plastered on the dusty windows of the local bars advertised MARGARITA GRANDE. Everyone waited for the gringos. Were they waiting for me? Why was I here?

I moved to the edge of my seat, ready to call the whole thing off, to say we’d do it later, somewhere else. Out the window I could see we were entering a more affluent area. There were attractive shops, banks, restaurants, pharmacies, trees and benches, and strolling shoppers. I slumped back into my seat.

“Where’s the chapel?” I asked, scrutinizing each street we passed.

“I don’t know,” John said. “The police chief set everything up.”

John had used his Mexican friend in Los Angeles to facilitate getting a minister and a marriage license. The police chief was the go-between.

J.R. pulled into a parking place between two police cars and John hopped out. “Stay here while I go in,” he said. He disappeared up the steps, past guards armed with machine guns. Within minutes he was back in the car. “We missed the chief. He had an emergency and left his apologies.” John waved a tattered piece of paper. “But he did make the arrangements. Here’s where we need to go, J.R. Fast. He closes in ten minutes.”

John turned toward me. “It’s not the chapel like we thought. It’s the office of a justice of the peace.” He looked at the paper again. “Señor Pepe Sanchez.”

“What about the ring? And flowers?” I cried. “We were supposed to stop and get them before the ceremony.”

“Don’t have time. We’ll get them afterward.”

I cringed, and fought back the disappointment. Then, as if these developments weren’t enough, the car edged back into the industrial part of the city, and I grimaced at the poverty and blight that appeared once more out my window. My head began to swirl, my heart pounded, I felt queasy, and when the car stopped in front of a dilapidated former store, I just about passed out. John leaned over and whispered in my ear.

“Come on, Barbara. We love each other. That’s all that matters.” I bit my lip to hold back the tears. Thankfully, J.R. and Carrie kept looking away.
Is it all that matters?
I thought.
Is love enough?
If he loved me, why would he expect me to continually accept less than we had originally planned for our wedding? Looking back, I now see these words as a powerful tool of verbal abusers.

“No ring, no flowers, no nice chapel, no family, no friends, no police chief?” I moaned.

John took my hands in his. “I love you and soon we’ll be married, if that’s what you want.”

“Of course it’s what I want. But here? Like this? It takes away from everything I thought would be beautiful.”

“We can call it off,” John interjected sharply, sitting up straight in his best military way. “Real easy. But, you know, we’ll have put a lot of people out.”

“Okay, okay,” I relented. That responsible part of me reared up, ready to protect everyone’s feelings but my own. “Let’s do it.”

I climbed out of the backseat. A middle-aged man appeared in the store’s doorway, adjusting the collar of his multicolored, open-neck shirt. “Señor Perry?”

“
S
í.” John extended his hand as he walked around the back of the car. “Señor Sanchez?”

“
S
í.” the man answered, vigorously shaking John’s hand as he put one arm around him. The two became engrossed in a conversation in Spanish and disappeared into the storefront. I caught Carrie’s eye as we walked in behind them. I shrugged my shoulders and flashed a halfhearted smile. She gently squeezed my hand, as if to say everything would be fine. But when I looked around inside, there was no way she could erase the dismal setting. I viewed with distaste the dark paneled walls, the avocado open-weave drapes, the worn linoleum, the gray metal desk, the street noise, and the justice—who, it appeared, did not speak English.

“We have to fill out these papers,” John said, walking over to a small Formica table next to the front window. I sat down gingerly on one of the orange plastic chairs. John handed me the legal-size pages and sat down opposite me.

“Where’s that camera of yours?” J.R. said.

I felt in my purse as I read the papers in front of me.

“This is all in Spanish!” I exclaimed, handing the retrieved camera to J.R.

“Don’t worry,” John said. “All you have to do is sign here . . . and here... and here.”

If there’s one thing I try to be careful about, it’s signing any kind of legal document. I make sure I read every word. In this case, with my one semester of Spanish, I knew that was impossible. I could make out that it was a certificate of matrimony and that it had my name and my mother’s name typed into the text. I would just have to trust John that everything was on the up-and-up. I signed where directed.

“Smile,” J.R. said as he posed us for our first photograph in that dismal setting. I responded with one of my happiest grins, reflecting that, after all, this was my wedding day.

Señor Sanchez positioned us in front of the gray desk, the groom to his right, bride to his left.
Well, at least something about today is traditional,
I thought. John stood in true military form—back erect, chest out, chin up, his naval aviator’s wings pinned to his lapel. I was proud to be standing next to him, about to become his wife.

Without flowers or rings, John and I intertwined our hands. Señor Sanchez read, in Spanish, from a small, worn book. Soon he came to a part where he paused and nodded at John, who looked over at me lovingly and firmly pronounced, “I do.”

The Justice continued a bit, then paused and looked up at me. Figuring this was my part, I gazed up into John’s eyes and smiled, saying “I do.”

After more words, Señor Sanchez closed his book. He grinned and motioned for us to kiss. We didn’t unclasp our hands, no groom embracing his bride, no longing kiss, just a quick grazing of lips with me tiptoeing up to meet John’s, as if this contributed to the seriousness of the step we had just taken. We released our hands and turned toward J.R. and Carrie.

“Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Perry,” they chimed.

Mrs. Perry.
The sound of that pleased me.
Mrs. Perry.

“Now let’s go get a ring, and some flowers,” my husband said.

We left the ugly office and climbed into the backseat. I snuggled into John’s embrace.
Mrs. Perry.
What a beautiful sound. Disappointing as the wedding ceremony had been, I was
Mrs. Perry.
I was at last the admiral’s wife.

But at what cost, I now ask myself. What led me to accept such a dismal situation that was awful in every way? I believe deep inside I felt unlovable, and out of desperation and fear of rejection, I accepted marriage at any price. I needed John. I needed him to rescue me from the stark loneliness that existed before he came into my life. I was an intelligent woman who was emotionally insecure, and John knew just how to manipulate me to get what he wanted—I was his golden goose who would provide him with the lifestyle he wanted to live, the consummate goal of any card-carrying psychopath. So although the wedding was far from what I had wanted, I put aside my fairy-tale wishes and deferred to John’s plans—all with a smile on my face.

 

At a small jewelry store back in town I chose a petite, dark blue sapphire set in a twisted knot of gold. It was one of the few rings in our price range—inexpensive. John paid for it and slipped it into his pocket. A clock on the wall rang out five chimes.

“We have reservations at La Escondido for five thirty,” John said. “Let’s go, Cinderella.” He ushered me out the door. “We’ll get flowers at the restaurant.”

Despite the friendly banter in the car, I couldn’t help feeling lost. The events of the day kept running through my mind. I tried to push away thoughts of the distasteful building and the little man speaking in Spanish, but when we drove into an empty parking lot of the restaurant, I couldn’t help myself. “If this place is so popular, where are all the cars?”

We waited in the car, under a large portico covered with bright red bougainvillea, while John went inside. Several minutes later he bounced back to the car, grinning from ear to ear. “They open in ten minutes. We’re early, but they said for the bride and groom to come in and have a drink.” He winked at me.

I always try to make the best of a situation. So far, today’s events made it a challenge. The event this evening was our wedding dinner. I was determined it would be okay.

On the way to our table, my positive attitude started paying off. We were in an upscale dinner club with burgundy leather-upholstered booths, flickering candles, white linen-covered tables, and fresh flowers. I needed this romantic ambience more than I realized.

“I asked to be near the band,” John grinned. “We want to have our wedding dance, don’t we? And I ordered us a bottle of champagne.”

The evening was looking up. Once we were settled with the champagne in our glasses, J.R. announced, “I believe it’s appropriate for the best man to give the first toast.”

“Oh, wait a minute,” I said, digging into my purse. Out came my camera and I set it on the table. “We must have our pictures.” We all chuckled and raised our glasses.
Click, click.

“Here’s to Barbara and John—for richer, for poorer, in sickness and health, until death do them part.”

John and I intertwined our right arms and sipped from our glasses. The camera flashed. “Well, let’s not talk about the death part,” I grimaced. “That’s a long way off.”

John set his glass down and fumbled around in his coat pocket.

“I think you’ve waited long enough for this,” he said. “It’s time for the ring ceremony.” He took my left hand. “It’s a little out of sequence but, what the heck, better late than never.” He chuckled, amused at himself. I hadn’t had enough champagne yet to laugh, but I did manage a smile.

John spoke at length of his love for me, and finished by saying, “With this ring I thee wed.” He slipped the ring on my finger, and the camera flashed once more. I glowed. This time it wasn’t the champagne. I felt deeply loved by this man . . . my husband.

The restaurant quickly filled with well-dressed patrons enjoying themselves for a Saturday night on the town. When the flower girl approached us with her wicker basket, John picked out the two largest orchid corsages.

“A white one for the bride and a purple one for the matron of honor,” he grinned, laying them on the table. Once he had pinned my corsage on me, we put our heads together, forehead to forehead, looking into each other’s eyes and smiling, as only two people in love can do. The camera flashed and captured that moment forever. J.R. was doing a great job recording our special day. The band started playing the “Wedding March.” How did they know? John gave me a quizzical look, shrugged his shoulders, and smiled.

“A little bird must have told them,” he said. We stood, at the insistence of the bandleader, who announced that the next song would be for our wedding dance. As we twirled around the dance floor, my spirits lifted. The audience applauded. All eyes were on us. The earlier experiences of the day evaporated. I was the fairy-tale princess at the ball, and I had just married my prince.

Later, back in the bridal suite, I put on the white negligee Debbie had given me at the wedding shower. I posed, looking into the mirror above the fireplace, to show off the low-cut back. The camera flashed for the last time that evening.

 

 

I have always been tenacious. If something gets stuck in my mind I will not rest until it is sorted out, no matter how long it takes. What I kept looking for in my relationship with John was some proof,
any
proof that would validate his stories about himself or his absentee family. On the way back to the Los Angeles Airport we stopped at the mission in San Juan Capistrano, and I saw an opportunity to shed some light on at least one of John’s stories, the one I thought of as the “Three Arch Bay House” story. By now I had begun to name his stories. He had many, and he told them often.

As we walked around the inner courtyard of the mission, past the ancient cacti, making our way to the old bell tower to see the swallows, I hatched my plan.

“Isn’t your house at Three Arch Bay near here?” I asked, even though I had already checked out the map in the gas station when we filled up before leaving San Diego. “I think it’s a direct hop to the ocean from here, only a couple of miles.”

“Yeah,” John said. “It’s Spanish, just like this mission.” Without any more prompting, he reminisced once more about how his father had bought the land in the 1930s for next to nothing and built a home on the point with an unobstructed view of the ocean. He had barely moved in when Uncle Sam transferred him, so he leased the home to the Hollywood couple Anne Jeffreys and Bob Sterling, who still lived there.

“I’d love to see the house, John. Do you think we could go by it for just a minute?”