Stolen Innocence - Lisa Pulitzer [136]
Complicating matters was the fact that Grant frequently struggled to feed his growing family. He had been instructed by his father and the former prophet Leroy Johnson to work for his uncle in their sheet-metal shop, but he rarely received any compensation for his work. As a result the family barely had enough food to survive and Daleen was forced to watch her children go hungry, unable to do anything about it. Grant’s lack of care for his children created a rift in their marriage that deepened over time. The two were often at odds over the extent to which the church’s teachings would be upheld in their home, and their arguments were heated.
Finally Lamont’s father found the courage to go against the advice of the elders and find a job that provided an actual paycheck, but eventually new problems took root in the marriage. The Split in the church at the end of Uncle Roy’s days caused a division between Lamont’s parents, as many members of Daleen’s family decided to leave the FLDS. Lamont’s mother sided with her relatives, and it got to the point where Grant forbade his wife from associating with some of her sisters because of their apostate status.
But Daleen didn’t feel it was right to have to choose between her family and her church, and she had the courage to eventually leave the FLDS and take her kids with her.
On July 3, 1992, Daleen summoned her eight children to the front yard. She had told them they were going somewhere, but they had no idea where. Lamont told me that he and his siblings were at first excited at the prospect of an adventure but became a little bit apprehensive when one of their mother’s sisters pulled up in a van. The big Fourth of July celebration was to be the next day, and they worried they wouldn’t be back to partake in the fun.
“Get in,” his mother instructed. She’d directed the kids to pack as much stuff as they could fit in a suitcase, and she loaded up the car. Lamont hesitantly obeyed, but when he realized what his mother was doing, he was furious. Though he knew things were difficult at home, Lamont had never expected her to flee and he had no interest in leaving the community. When it became clear that his mother didn’t intend to return, Lamont worried about seeing his friends and family again.
As the eldest child, he tried to put on a brave face for his younger brothers and sisters who cried furiously as the van wound its way along Highway 59 to St. George. His mother took them to stay with one of her sisters, who’d left the FLDS many years before. But her trailer was hardly big enough to accommodate his mom and her eight children, which made things difficult for everyone. At school, Lamont fared little better, fighting to adjust to the new way of life. Back in Short Creek, he had been popular among his peers and loved the community, but public school in St. George was a different story. His classmates teased him mercilessly for being a member of the FLDS and for the way he dressed. The family was so poor that Lamont had just two pairs of pants, one that was too short and another that he couldn’t button around his waist.
Lamont did his best to keep his complaints to himself. Life on the outside had saved his mother, and he began to see a side of her he’d never encountered before. She went out in the evenings with her sisters. She smiled and laughed and even met a man whom she felt deeply in love with. Daleen lit up when he was around, and over the next few months Lamont and his siblings came to know and like him, too. But the romance ended abruptly when Daleen became pregnant