Stolen Innocence - Lisa Pulitzer [39]
As Uncle Rulon’s stroke placed Warren more firmly in the seat of power, these irrational directives started becoming even harsher and more far-reaching in their implications. Now FLDS men had to worry about any misstep in their household—even those that did not impact the marriage. Warren effectively began to encourage some women to spy on their husbands in the name of the Lord, wanting them to come forward with any infraction, no matter how small. He probed everything from the possession of worldly music to more serious infractions such as religious doubt or disloyalty.
No violation was too small, as far as Uncle Warren was concerned, and this was bad news for our family. It was no secret in our house that Warren had long had it in for many of the Walls. Now, with our problems, it was only a matter of time before he used this information to serve his purpose.
When Justin and Jacob returned from Canada, they had a hard time adjusting to family life. It had been rough for them in the closed FLDS community, a far cry from our routine in Salt Lake. There were fewer outside forces to entice them, no big stores or shopping malls or video arcades packed with children. If they had made any progress in their faith while in Canada, it evaporated shortly after their return.
The fact that Travis was again around only made the twins more restless. Travis had developed an interest in techno music and went to parties known as raves. The music had a strong beat and vocals like nothing he had heard before, and he would tell the twins about it whenever he came by our house. Even to me, just a child, I could see his effect on them was apparent, as both the twins wanted to do what their older brother was doing. At the time, I didn’t have a full grasp on the situation, but I did understand that Travis wanted to share his new world with my brothers.
Then in July of 1999 came the day that changed our family forever. Travis had excited Justin and Jacob about the raves to the point where they badly wanted to go to one. Since Travis wasn’t living with us, he was planning to go separately, and the twins had no ride. Desperate to get to the party, they begged my mom to drop them off there. Dad warned her not to do it. He was fed up with what had been going on at home, and if the twins went to that party, he would be upset.
Membership in the FLDS didn’t stop Dad from facing the kinds of concerns that plague all parents of teenagers at one time or another. His twin sons were not yet eighteen, and as far as he was concerned, it was still his duty to protect them when he felt that they were placing themselves in harm’s way. We’d all heard about the worldly music and dancing that went on at these rave parties, and it didn’t seem out of the ordinary for Dad to be worried. Besides, if Uncle Warren were to find out that Justin and Jacob had gone to a party even though they didn’t have Dad’s consent, he might use that as an excuse to further damage my father’s standing in the priesthood, and Dad might risk losing his family again.
The Saturday of the party came around and, in keeping with family tradition, that day my mother wanted us to wash the family’s Suburban so it would be clean and shiny for church the following afternoon. Most times, we would scrub the truck right in our driveway with sponges and buckets we had around the house. Mom tried to make this chore fun for us, and on this occasion she decided to take us to the car wash up the hill from our house.
The beginnings of summer dusk were spreading across the sky as we pulled up to the car wash and began to feed quarters into the machine. We had finished spraying the soapy lather over the truck and were applying the final rinse when we noticed a figure running up the road toward us. I felt a chill rush