Dinner for Vampires: Life on a Cult TV Show (While also in an Actual Cult!)

Shortly after returning to Idaho, Joy learned from Jasmine that Dontay had cheated on Jasmine shortly before their wedding and that Les had told Dontay to keep it a secret. Jasmine felt angry and betrayed. She vented to Joy about how Les had convinced her to give up opportunities to go to Stanford and Paris because she needed “to learn how to be part of a family” (251). Joy was stunned because this was the same language Les had used to convince her to give up the role in Beauty and the Beast. When Joy shared her concerns with QB, QB told Joy that Jasmine couldn’t be trusted because Les thought she was “bipolar.”

A few weeks later, Joy got an email from Harker explaining to everyone why he and Mina were leaving the Family to join the Orthodox Christian church. The Family, including Joy, encouraged them to stay instead of following their own path. The event inspired Joy to begin questioning her own relationship to the Family. Later, Abe, Harker’s brother, confronted Les about how he was spending their money on things like landscaping and HBO.

One night, at the weekly Family softball game, Dontay got into an argument with Kurt’s son. It spiraled and Abe intervened. Kurt pushed Abe to the ground. Jasmine was furious and began to attack Kurt. Les held Abe down to stop him from intervening. QB thought it wasn’t a big deal. Joy was shocked.

Joy began having recurring nightmares about natural disasters. She went to LA with QB and Rosie to audition for new roles and got into an argument with QB that she describes in the prologue. When QB threw a sweatshirt at her, she took Rosie and left. She called QB and told him she wanted a divorce. She stayed with her costar Daphne Zuniga and spent time with Paul Johansson. Joy repaired her relationships with her parents.

Joy was cut off from everyone in the Family except Danielle, the One Tree Hill superfan. Danielle told Joy that she thought Kurt and Les were stealing money from the restaurant. This prompted Joy to wonder how TRIAD had been handling her money.

Back in Idaho, Joy went to the bank where Juana, a woman who had formerly been a member of the Family, worked. They had never been close, but Joy realized she and Juana were the only women in the cult with a job outside the family. When they checked Joy’s bank account, Joy discovered approximately 2 million dollars missing. She began to worry about how she would pay for divorce attorneys. Joy transferred what was left, $190,000, to a personal account. Juana approved the transaction without QB’s signature, which was against bank policy, showing her solidarity with and support for Joy.

Pam and QB went to Joy’s house in Idaho. Pam served her with divorce papers. QB took everything out of the house, including their dog. Joy had trouble finding divorce attorneys who understood her situation and the extent of the abuse that had taken place in the cult. Finally, she found a female attorney to help with her case. While the divorce was making its way through the courts, Joy agreed QB could visit with Rosie periodically. Members of the Family, including Gretchen, attempted to intimidate Joy during these supervised visits. QB’s mother, Marti, attempted to force her way into Joy’s house and, when denied entry, pretended that Joy had assaulted her.

Eventually, Joy got the court’s permission to move back to LA with her daughter Rosie. Meanwhile, Danielle had been fired from the Bistro. She agreed to help Joy move back to LA. Then, the custody battle began.

Back in LA, Joy found it difficult to book work as a 30-something actor. She took up smoking to deal with the stress. One weekend, her father came over. He had with him a massive folder of research he had done over the past six years about Les and the Family. He had learned that Les had been accused of sexual misconduct and had defrauded other congregations. They planned to use the material to convince a judge that QB should not have custody of Rosie.

Joy began to contact other people who had been hurt by Les and the Family. She felt less alone when they shared their stories. One person Joy talked to, Alice Burke, told Joy that Kurt had been her foster father. One day, Kurt had taken her to a vacation home and given her a “cough syrup” that caused her to become unconscious. She had woken up in the bathtub, naked, with Kurt over her. Alice told Les about what had happened, but Les eventually sent Alice back to Kurt’s house. This confirmed Joy’s resolve to never let Rosie go back to the house in Idaho.

Three years later, Joy won custody of Rosie. QB had visitation rights. She learned over the course of preparing for the trial that the One Tree Hill cast and crew had been very worried for her, especially her costar Paul Johansson, but he hadn’t known how to intervene. After sessions with a cult expert, Joy came to understand that QB had been “groomed” by Les to be blindly obedient. During those three years, Joy wrestled with her faith in God. At one point, she heard God tell her that the reason she had received the message from him in the NYC diner when she was 19 was “so [she’d] know [God] was real now, when [she] needed [God] most” (286).

Joy considered suing TRIAD to attempt to recoup her missing funds. The forensic accountant advised her that it would be difficult to win, and she was better off cutting her losses and dropping the case. The accountant encouraged Joy to sign the mediated settlement offer to avoid further conflict with the Family, even though it meant she would have to pay QB more money. Joy was reluctant, but she agreed to sign, knowing she wanted to give her daughter a sense of “magic and peace,” similar to what she had found in the fictional Tree Hill.

Joy ran into Camille at an Entertainment Weekly party. Camille was initially cool with Joy until Joy told her that she had left the “cult.” Camille was happy for her friend and told Joy how much she had missed her.

Other people were less sympathetic to Joy. A woman at a party commented that she herself would not have been “stupid enough” to wind up in a cult. Joy challenged the woman by comparing being and staying in the cult to a woman who ends up in an abusive relationship. Women in abusive relationships aren’t stupid; they end up in a bad situation because of a variety of difficult pressures.

Joy notes that people are often disappointed when she tells them she was only in a small cult without radical practices like “branding” or “psychedelics.” However, she says that the subtle manipulation and small scale of the Family is part of what made Les so successful as a cult leader. He was able to fly under the radar and avoid prosecution for financial crimes because it involved fewer than 70 people. Joy states that the best way to identify a cult is “the notion that anyone who does not agree with the group’s beliefs or choices […] is deemed ‘unsafe’” (296).

The last time Joy saw Les was when he testified in court. He acted like he had no idea what the allegations were about. She lost touch with most of the Family and former Family members, except for Danielle. She learned from Danielle that the restaurant had been closed. The Van Hewitts sold the house to Danielle who renovated and sold it. Joy says that ultimately it was One Tree Hill and its fans that helped her leave the Family.