Sinner Takes All: A Memoir of Love and Porn

CHAPTER 3 The Party’s Over

When I wasn’t working, I would take a handful of Valium, pass out, not eat for two days, and aimlessly walk around Tokyo spending the majority of the money I was supposed to save for college. I was earning money hand over fist every week and would blow it on expensive designer clothes (and lots of boots) at ritzy boutiques in town. Looking back, maybe they shouldn’t have paid a young girl directly. Maybe it should’ve gone through my dad so he could put more away for college and just give me what I needed to live on.

I took Valium every day and I was full-on addicted. I took it mostly so that I could sleep, but I was always sleeping, up to twelve hours a day. And I wasn’t exactly Sleeping Beauty. I was looking pale and thin. My hair was falling out and my nails were getting brittle. I wasn’t going to castings because I’d oversleep. And when I did get up in time, I would look like such shit that I’d end up blowing off a job.

I was a not-so-beautiful mess. From ages fourteen to sixteen, I was living in Tokyo by myself with no structure, no family, no rules, and lots of money. It’s what I thought I wanted, but it was lonely. I was really missing home. Some days I was on top of the world and I was so happy to shoot and work. And other days, I couldn’t drag myself out of bed. I didn’t understand what was going on with me. I didn’t realize that I needed help, because no one was there to tell me. I was on my own.

I was calling my best friend back home, Ally, and my sister a lot. But my sister was younger than me and Ally was my age, so they didn’t exactly have any words of wisdom for me. Besides, they were wrapped up in their own lives. Life was going on without me, and it was starting to get to me.

My worst night was the night Ally told me she lost her virginity.

“Who did you do it with?” I anxiously asked her.

“Seth,” she replied.

Seth?! I was shocked.

Seth was a guy who’d had a crush on me before I left for Tokyo. We were actually kind of boyfriend/girlfriend. And when I left, he moved on to her. It hurt badly. I was jealous. Because she lost her virginity to a guy she really liked and my first time was shitty.

I didn’t have a mother or even a mother figure to help me deal with these new feelings and emotions. So, I did the only thing I knew would make me feel good: I took three Valium, went to bed, and cried and cried and cried. Sometimes I’d sleep for twenty-four hours straight.

The days were getting rougher. I was becoming more of a mess. I had no friends anymore. The models I had befriended now thought of me as this stupid little drug-addled slut. Mean, but true.

I knew my dream was crashing down on me, but I was ready to go home anyway. I was so tired of being sick all day from the pills and champagne. Work stopped coming my way. I wanted to get away from the guys I’d had sex with. I didn’t save nearly as much for college as I had planned or my father had hoped for. I was ready to leave, but not brave enough to do it. The decision ended up being my dad’s. He caught wind of what my life was like in Tokyo and called up my agency and warned, “She’s underage. She’s drinking. You’re going to get in trouble for this. And I know she’s having sex. She’s only sixteen.” I know I spilled to my sister Debby that I’d had sex and it was supposed to be our little secret, but then she went and told my dad. I felt so betrayed. Next thing I knew I was on a plane back to America, my dreams of becoming a famous supermodel gone forever.