Beyond Belief (14 page)

“Hi, sir,” he said enthusiastically.

“Hi, Bruce,” my mom replied before entering her apartment.

Inside, a teenage girl greeted us. She was wearing a blue uniform, the kind my mom and dad usually wore at the Int Base: dark blue pants, light blue long-sleeved shirt, a stiff collar, a tie, and a name tag.

“Hi, sirs!” she said to both Mom and Tom. She bent down a little to talk to me. “You must be Jenna! I have heard so much about you!” I smiled shyly back at her. She turned to my mom. “I just put the laundry away, snacks are on the table, and I will be right next door in L2 if you need anything.”

My mother took all this attention in stride, but I was duly impressed. I couldn’t believe the level of personal service she commanded. She was a senior executive in the Commodore’s Messenger Organization International.

The Commodore’s Messenger Organization, or CMO, was an important part of management. It was once comprised of L. Ron Hubbard’s most trusted personal messengers. To this day, it is a very prestigious unit within the Sea Org and members are discouraged from fraternizing with regular Sea Org members. My mother was one of the highest-ranking execs in the CMO. She was also a member of the Watchdog Committee, the seniormost management body in the Church housed in CMO International. She was clearly an important person with an important position, which made me swell with pride.

“Great, thanks, Sharni,” my mom told her. Sharni was a messenger in the CMO in Clearwater, and one of her duties was to take care of my mother’s needs as well as those of other senior executives.

After I put down my suitcase, Mom gave me a tour of her apartment. Not only was it much bigger and more luxurious than the apartment she and Dad shared with the Rinders at Int, but she didn’t have to share it with anybody. Back at Int, their shared apartment had two bedrooms, but this place had three, all for my mom and the occasional guest; the bathroom had a Jacuzzi tub.

As if the extra space weren’t enough, it was also gorgeous, with Spanish tiles everywhere. All the furniture was elegant, even the ornate mirror that hung in the entryway, beneath which was a bowl of delicious candy. The embroidered curtains on all the windows had sheer panels underneath them. The living room even had a television, hidden inside a large wooden armoire. We walked into the dining/kitchen area, where an elaborate snack platter, holding French cheeses and fruit, was waiting for us. There were tall drinks of fresh-squeezed watermelon juice, too, with straws. I opened the fridge to find everything from pâté, which sounded disgusting, to peach juice to English muffins. I was in awe that so much great food was so readily available.

I couldn’t contain my excitement. The bedroom she had chosen for me had a queen-sized bed with a large, fluffy comforter in a floral pattern. I jumped on it, enjoying how delicious it smelled, how soft it was, and how I could sink into it, so unlike my linens at the Ranch. My room also had two closets and a big dresser, even though I hardly had any clothes. If I had brought my entire wardrobe, I still wouldn’t have been able to fill more than a drawer or two, since I usually wore a uniform. There was even a phone in my room, so that I could call my dad any time I wanted.

I carefully laid out the CDs I had packed on top of the dresser. I brought music with me wherever I went. Mom said she needed to go to the office to get stuff done, but she wanted me to come with her to meet everyone, which I was excited about. Twenty minutes later, we parked next to a tall concrete building on N. Fort Harrison. It was referred to as the WB, the West Coast Building, because it housed the management that was technically an extension of Int Management, which was on the West Coast.

As we walked through the building, Mom was greeted many times with “Hi, sir.” We took an old mechanical elevator to her office on the third floor, where messengers were running around.

Mom shared an office with her secretary Alison, Tom, and his wife, Jenny. Tom was the Commanding Officer of CMO Clearwater and Jenny was an executive within the CMO. The offices were very nice, with wood furniture, a tan carpet, and bamboo blinds. Uncle Dave’s huge office was at the end of the hall, attached to Aunt Shelly’s smaller one. The whole office suite had other rooms for Uncle Dave’s staff. He and Aunt Shelly weren’t there at the time, but the offices were theirs to use whenever they were in town. There was a kitchenette in the back, where another snack platter sat on the counter. The cupboards of the kitchenette and the fridge were stocked with all sorts of treats. We didn’t have access to extra snacks at the Ranch; we were forbidden to take food from the kitchen between meals. A friend of mine had even been assigned lower conditions for stealing food.

Mom said we were going to have lunch with everybody in the conference room. I waited there until lunchtime, sometimes watching a young messenger in her mid-teens making the preparations. She introduced herself as Valeska. “I just ordered you a hamburger, as I wasn’t sure what you wanted,” she said, smiling.

A few minutes later, an older man wearing a tuxedo entered the conference room and started speaking in a thick French accent. The only thing I could understand was that his name was Steve, but I might have only known that because Valeska had already told me. French-speaking waiters in tuxedos were certainly out of the realm of my experience. I watched in awe as Steve thoughtfully set out the plate with my hamburger, as well as the rest of the food that had been ordered. Valeska told me the meals had been prepared at Hibiscus, the most expensive and the most epicurean of the three restaurants in the Fort Harrison Hotel, which was owned by Scientology. The Fort Harrison was where the public Scientologists stayed when they came to town to take services at the base. It had excellent facilities with three restaurants and more than two hundred guest rooms, outstanding course offerings, and a high concentration of Scientologists. Steve, a Sea Org member, worked at the Hibiscus and our selections had been made to order. I loved the idea that we could all order exactly what we wanted and how we wanted it prepared.

As soon as Valeska was done setting the table, the adults came in. They were talking among themselves, but I was so overjoyed with my hamburger that I hardly paid attention. It had to have been the best food I had ever tasted. Tom seemed to like his meal, too. My mom had fish, which was woven in a puff pastry, with a sprig of parsley garnishing the plate.

In the evening, Mom asked Tom to drive me home. I was disappointed that she couldn’t come with us, but at least I felt comfortable around Tom. He was funny and charming, and I was completely at ease with him. When we got back to the apartment, I was delighted to find that someone had unpacked my suitcase for me. Even better, Mom had put some of her special floral shampoo in my bathroom.

As I was settling in, Sharni came in and gently told me some news of how my week would go.

“Jenna, you know your mom is really busy,” she began. “She’s going to be working long hours, so while she’s at work I’m going to be taking care of you.”

At first, I was a little down about not seeing my mom as much as I’d hoped. It was still far more than I was accustomed to. I was easily distracted by the novelty of everything around me. Sharni took me down to the pool, and we both swam for a while. I was not used to idle time like this, and I loved it. After drying off, she even took me to the canteen for a Popsicle. While we were enjoying our Popsicles, Sharni pointed out Spencer, a guy she liked. He looked kind of goofy, but the idea of liking boys was entirely unknown to me. At the Ranch, girls were not allowed to have boyfriends. Dating was only for those who were old enough to get married, and we were too young, so what was the point, or so the argument went. Even flirting was something that could get us in trouble and cause us to be assigned to Lower Conditions.

Late in the afternoon, Sharni and I went back upstairs to the apartment. I called my mom at the office and told her I was going to sleep soon, hoping she was on her way home. Not only did I want to be with her, but the truth was I was afraid of sleeping in the room by myself. There might not have been coyotes in Florida, but I was still scared. I was used to having lots of people around at night like in my dorm, which I usually shared with seven girls. Mom was still going to be at the office for a while, but Sharni agreed to stay with me until she got home. Whatever time she did get in, I didn’t see her until I got up the next day.

That morning Sharni woke me up. I liked her approach, though. She softly shook my shoulder and whispered, “Rise and shine,” so different from the shriek of “Wake up time!” at the Ranch. Plus, I had been allowed to sleep in; it was already eight o’clock.

I went to the kitchen, and I found my mom in her robe watching television. I was a little surprised that she was comfortably watching broadcast television, when it was against Sea Org rules, or at least at Int it was. She was watching some sort of video countdown on VH1. She told me that she loved the program and watched it every morning with breakfast. For me, watching television was the biggest treat of all. While I’d watch movies on weekends, I hadn’t watched television since I left L.A.

Sharni had set out a bowl of hot cereal and a plate with two poached eggs and toast on the dining room table. At the Ranch, only the adults were allowed to have toast, because there was only one toaster, so this was an unexpected and welcome treat. When I finished my breakfast, I found Mom in her room getting ready for work. I watched her blow-dry and curl her hair at the vanity table. She was so stylish and pretty, and I admired everything about her, like she was some sort of movie star with a glamorous life in Florida that I had never known about. Her life was her work and her friends, she was waited on and served, she pampered herself, all while working hard for the greater good.

When she was done with her hair, she put on her uniform. She wore the special Egyptian cotton shirts exclusive to executives, while the rest of the crew had to wear cotton-poly blends. Her CMO Int jacket not only had her name embroidered on the front, it also had prominent shoulder boards, showing everyone that she was an officer. Seeing her like this was so inspiring. Her earned rank was Lieutenant, Junior Grade, the third-highest rank in the Sea Org.

I got ready, too, because Mom told me I was going with her to the WB. In the parking lot, staffers in crisply ironed shirts and dark slacks were piling into the Sea Org buses that took them to the base in downtown Clearwater. The Hacienda Gardens was three miles east of downtown; the Sea Org staff took the buses in, since they didn’t have cars. Ten blue-and-white buses, all with the word “Flag” written in black script along the side, shuttled people between the buildings that belonged to the church. Everyone in the parking lot was dressed in some type of uniform, white or light blue dress shirts and navy pants, or a tan shirt with brown pants.

Scientology’s presence in Clearwater was enormous. The church owned many buildings and was in the process of accumulating more. The Fort Harrison Hotel was one of the most recognizable landmarks in Clearwater, with its magnificent Mediterranean-revival architecture and whitewashed walls. The hotel had a gorgeous marble lobby, eleven floors, three restaurants—the Hibiscus, the Garden, and the Lemon Tree—a swimming pool, a ballroom, a ton of offices, and auditing rooms. This was where the public received auditing.

Down the street from the Fort Harrison was the Coachman Building, where all the training courses were delivered. There was a five-story glass atrium with an arched barrel roof that ran through the entire building, separating it into two halves. Most of the Scientology buildings were within walking distance of each other, and the whole stretch was a stark contrast to what I’d known at the Ranch, both in terms of opulence and upkeep.

The drive to Mom’s office took only about ten minutes, but I loved being in the car and seeing the normal world with other cars and freeways, something I rarely saw. Florida, with its palm trees, strip malls, and crowds of people going about their business, was much more exciting than Hemet.

This car ride with Mom was going to be one of the few times I was going to see of her on any given day during my visit. For the rest of my stay, I saw her at lunchtime, some dinners, and late in the evening depending on when she got home, but that was it. It wasn’t surprising that she had so much work to do; after all, this is how it had been my entire life. She and Dad had different jobs and different responsibilities, but their dedication to the cause was very much the same. I might have traveled a long way, but that wasn’t about to change the nature of her work or her commitment to it.

Looking back, I struggle to reconcile the life my mom was living at Flag to the one I was living at the Ranch. The experiences were so different it feels hard to believe that they both grew out of the same cause, and that, as a parent, she was comfortable living in conditions that were so much better than what I faced. More than just the physical conditions, though, there was a freedom to her life in Clearwater that didn’t exist at the Ranch. She didn’t have to do manual labor, subject herself to daily meter checks, or get yelled at every day. She didn’t have to ask for permission every time she went to the bathroom, something I still do out of habit to this very day.

I am sure she didn’t see it that way. This wasn’t about neglect or about her being better off than her children. She had committed herself to a cause bigger than herself or her family, and she was following through with it. She truly assumed that I was well taken care of at the Ranch, although she also never went out of her way to understand what life for me there was actually like or, if she did know, she must have been okay with it.

When I saw her way of life at Flag, I wasn’t resentful or even jealous. More than anything, I was motivated to figure out how I could leave the Ranch and live like my mother. To me, that trip confirmed that there was a totally different way of life in the Sea Org. When I was back at the Ranch, what I would remember from this trip was the luxury. At the Int base, my father was allowed to have his own comforter or cookies whenever he wanted them—little extras that were prohibited at the Ranch. At my mom’s apartment, she had all that and much, much more.