After the Dance: My Life With Marvin Gaye (21 page)

I couldn’t.

A
void war at all cost.

Do anything to protect my children and myself from the fallout of a romance turned rancid.

Stay away from any encounter with a man seething with anger.

When Marvin called me, though, I didn’t hear his anger. I felt his hunger for reconciliation. To resist reconciliation was to risk a chance to finally make things right.

“I need to go back to him,” I told my mother.

“Don’t,” said Mom. “He’s playing you. Let go.”

I couldn’t. I had to hold on to hope. I had to see Marvin again and allow visitations with our children.

Once we agreed to visitations, Marvin showed up in Hermosa at a time when I wasn’t home. He greeted Mom, who was caring for the children, with great contempt. He played with the kids for a short time and then took little Frankie with him.

“What are you doing?” asked Mom.

“I’m taking my son.”

Before Mom could object, Marvin and Frankie were gone. Mom was alarmed, but there was nothing she could do. Nona was devastated. Her dad had taken her brother and left her behind. A half hour later he returned for Nona and whisked her away, too. When I returned home, my children were gone.

Now the game had suddenly changed. Now the children were in play.

Marvin was using the children to wound me, just as my affairs had wounded Marvin.

More than feeling wounded, I was feeling frightened—even terrified. I didn’t fear that Marvin would harm his children, but I worried that he’d never return them to me.

Marvin took Nona and Frankie to the home he had bought his parents on Gramercy Place in an old neighborhood in Mid-City LA. The house was huge. The kids had their own bedrooms and a large yard to play in. Marvin’s mom was a doting grandmother. Nona and Frankie were made to feel safe there.

After a couple of days, Marvin called me to say, “I have an out-of-town gig. Please come and get your children.”

His voice was calm. When I arrived, the kids were happy to see me but disappointed that they wouldn’t be going on the road with their dad, where his entourage spoiled them to no end.

“Thank you for letting me care for our babies,” Marvin told me with seeming sincerity. “They missed you something terribly. They need their mom.”

I was comforted by Marvin’s words. I was convinced that, when he was right—and today he seemed very right—I had been right not to throw a fit when he took the kids. I was right to keep cool.

“When I get back to LA,” Marvin said with his customary cool, “I’ll come down to Hermosa and we’ll have that talk I’ve been wanting to have. Is that okay with you, dear?”

“I’d like that,” I said. “There’s no reason not to be civilized—especially when the children are involved.”

“Civilization is based on mutual respect,” Marvin added. “And the great civilizations are built on love. I’m always going to follow the path of love.”

A week later Marvin followed
the path to Hermosa Beach. I was careful to make sure Mom left before he arrived. The animosity between my mother and husband would have only harmed the chances of a harmonious meeting.

In the first minute of the meeting, though, I realized harmony wasn’t happening. Marvin was coked up. I was too.

“I can’t talk to you in this house,” he said. “It’s filled with your mother’s evil spirit. If we’re going to talk, it’s going to have to be outside.”

I suggested that we take a walk to the beach. We had no choice but to bring Nona and Bubby with us.

Eager to get to the beach, the kids ran ahead.

“It’s over, Jan,” Marvin blurted out. “It’s been over for months. I’m no longer fooling myself about who you are and what you want to do to me. I have no choice but to save my own soul. I’m out. I want a divorce. And I want it quickly. We can go to Vegas.”

Feeling Marvin’s manic mood, I didn’t want to provoke him.

“Can’t we talk about cooperating—”

“There is no cooperating with you.”

“I don’t want to argue with you, Marvin.”

“Then don’t.”

“I’ll agree to a divorce, but not before we work out the financial details—”

“What details!” Marvin screamed. “There are no details! You deserve nothing! You’ll get nothing!”

I started to cry. “And how will the children live?” I asked.

“They’ll live with me. The courts will see to that. You’re an unfit mother. The courts will see you as the slut that you are, and that mother of yours—”

“Shut up! The kids can hear you!”

“I’m going to have my children, no matter what!” Marvin insisted.

The kids were further down the beach, oblivious to what was happening.

Marvin’s fury had unleashed my own rage.

“Just leave us alone!” I screamed. “Just get the hell out of our lives—and stay out!”

Marvin snapped. He pushed me, and I fell onto the sand. Marvin was all over me, straddling my chest, talking about how we could both die right here on this beach.

Hearing the commotion, the kids ran to us. They were hysterical. Marvin grabbed Bubby’s right hand, I grabbed his left, and we started pulling the poor boy in opposite directions. A neighbor called the police. A squad car was in close proximity. Within a minute or two, four cops were forcing Marvin off of me. He resisted but was quickly restrained. He cursed them wildly. One of the policemen punched Marvin in the eye.

“All I want is my son!” Marvin screamed. “This woman won’t let me have my son!”

Nona heard this. Nona couldn’t stop crying.

Marvin was hauled off, thrown in the squad car, taken to jail.

I remained dazed, devastated.

Within hours Marvin was bailed out. The next day I learned that he and his mother were driven to Las Vegas, where a fighter in whom Marvin had invested heavily, Andy “the Hawk” Price, was facing Sugar Ray Leonard. Before the bout, Marvin and Mother Gay attended Diana Ross’s big show at Caesar’s Palace, where they ran into Berry Gordy. Marvin had a huge shiner.

Word had it that if Price could beat Leonard, Marvin’s financial problems would be dramatically lessened.

But his problems—emotional as well as financial—were dramatically
increased when Sugar Ray knocked out Andy Price in the first three minutes of the first round.

Marvin was down and out.

A week later,
Marvin was frantically calling me again.

“You sent your daddy Earl out to kill me,” he said.

“Earl’s not trying to kill you,” I said.

“But he’s looking for me, isn’t he?”

“He doesn’t have to look. He knows where you are. But I’d never let him hurt the father of my children.”

“I don’t believe that,” said Marvin.

“Believe what you want. But stay away. There’s a restraining order. If you come back to Hermosa, you’ll be arrested.”

“If Earl isn’t looking for me, someone else is. You’ve got gangbanger friends. You’ve got gangbanger lovers. You’ve got gangbangers hunting me down.”

“You’re paranoid. You’re paranoid out of your goddamn mind. You gotta get help!”

It was clear that Marvin was sinking into spells of insanity. And yet how could I call it insanity when Marvin sent me songs that he was recording, beautiful new songs filled with remorse and pleas for reconciliation?

“I hate that
Love Man
album,” he told me. “I’m keeping some of the tracks but none of the lyrics. They meant nothing. Instead I’m writing about the state of the world, the state of my soul, and the state of our relationship. My point is to repair the relationship. Listen to the music and you will hear my heart.”

I was unable to listen to Marvin’s music without falling in love all over again. One song called “Praise” was just that—an open invitation to praise the God of love every day in every way. It was among Marvin’s most uplifting anthems. “Heavy Love Affair” was a synopsis
of everything that had been right and wrong about his relationship with me. He sang about “loving the pleasure sweetly” but also “loving the pain as deeply.” He sang about how he thought of me “every day” and in “all kinds of ways”—hating me, loving me, obsessing over me.

But the obsession was more than personal or romantic. The obsession concerned the apocalypse. It was clear that his early religious upbringing, first learned at the feet of his father, had come back to haunt him. He told me that these were the end days. The world was on the brink of destruction. “In Our Lifetime?” was the key song in this suite, a question that referred to the annihilation of the planet—
Will it happen in our lifetime?
If it was going to happen—as Marvin increasingly believed—then all we could do was “live and play and laugh and be happy.” All we could do was make love every day. Since the end of the world was just around the corner—“Revelation’s prophecy nearly fulfilled,” he sang in a song called “Love Party”—all we could do is celebrate the here and now.

As much as he tried, Marvin could not reconcile the two sides of his nature or, for that matter, mankind’s nature. The spirit and the flesh were at war. God and the devil were at war. War raged within Marvin’s heart and soul. In a song he would eventually call “Life Is for Learning,” he saw himself in the role of the suffering artist. “The artist pays the price,” he sang, “so you don’t have to pay.” We just have to listen to what the artist has to say.

What did Marvin have to say?

Return to love. Return to God. Bring out the best in your character. Praise the power that can heal all wounds. Believe in that power.

When I heard those songs even in half-completed form, I realized what Marvin’s violent behavior had made me forget: that he was a genius. I felt his genius being expressed in not simply a single voice of indescribable sweetness, but in many voices—all of which were woven in a tapestry of enchanting harmony. Marvin’s musical
expression broke me down—broke down my animosity for all the ways he had hurt me, broke down my vow to protect our children from his presence, broke down my pledge to Mom and Earl that I would never again respond to his overtures for reconciliation.

In short, to hear Marvin sing was to forgive him. Any man who sang so soulfully must possess a loving soul. Any man who sang so lovingly must be incapable of living without love. Marvin required love. Every song he sang said so. Marvin required my love, Nona’s love, Frankie’s love.

“I’m going back to Hawaii,” Marvin told me during one of our midnight phone calls.

“When?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Why?”

“It’s all over for me here. The house, the studio, all my money. My family is gone. My spirit is depleted. Hawaii is the only place where I’ve ever been able to find peace. Hawaii will be salvation. When I get settled, I’ll send for you and the children. By then I know you will have forgiven me for all the suffering I caused. By then all will be well. God will be served. We will be together. I will see you in Hawaii, Jan. Until then, just remember—I love you, and I always will.”

I spoke the words that I had sworn never to say again:

“I love you, too, Marvin. Always.”

I
n the album eventually titled
In Our Lifetime?
Marvin wrote
a song he called “Love Me Now or Love Me Later.” I heard it as Marvin’s version of the creation myth. For the album cover, Marvin commissioned an artist to draw a twin version of himself—Good Marvin with angelic wings and a halo sits across from Evil Marvin, with horns on his head and a black cape around his body. They are engaged in a life-and-death chess game in the clouds. Beneath them the planet is being destroyed in a nuclear holocaust.

At the end of the seventies, as I watched him escape once again to Hawaii, this was Marvin’s vision of himself and the world in which he felt trapped. He was filled with love; he was filled with hate. He was filled with hope; he was filled with despair. He was filled with creative energy; he was filled with destructive energy. There was nothing he wanted more than reconciliation with me; there was nothing he wanted more than ongoing warfare with me. I wanted him to forgive me, but I kept up the ridiculous and destructive behavior. I kept making the same mistakes.

When Marvin called me to come to Hawaii with the kids, it was the loving Marvin that I heard, the Marvin who expressed his great need for us. But when I arrived, it was the angry Marvin who greeted me. He wanted details of my current affairs. There were no details to report. My relationships with Frankie Beverly and Teddy Pendergrass were mere diversions. They involved lust, not love, and had run their course.

“What about Rick James?”

“He’s my friend, not my lover,” I said truthfully.

“And you expect me to believe you?”

“The only thing I expect of you, Marvin, is to make good on your promise to try and bring us all back together.”

My words had an impact on him. He wanted peace. He and I walked on the beach, swam with the kids, watched the glorious sunsets. There were a few days of calm, a few nights when intimacy was restored. My sweet Marvin was back.

We rented a condo in Kihei and went for long drives around the island. We hung out at Longhi’s in Lahaina with John McVie of Fleetwood Mac and visited friends in the hills. We moved from Kihei to Kaanapali and went house hunting with George Benson, who already owned three properties on the island. He urged Marvin to move to Maui.

“I’d love to,” Marvin said. “I feel like it’s definitely in my future.”

Optimism returned. Our hearts filled with hope. But then, like the purple sun sinking into the ocean, hope vanished.

We couldn’t escape the darkness.

Was it the drugs?

Probably, because he and I kept getting high.

Was it Marvin’s ongoing battle with chronic depression? Was it my similar battle with acute depression?

Certainly. There were prolonged periods of darkness that separated us from everyone and everything.

Whatever it was, Marvin moved from mellow to manic, then
from manic to violent. His arguments with me got physical again. I feared for my life. I prepared to flee with my children.

“You’re not taking them anywhere,” he insisted. “They’re staying here with me.”

I was terrified, confused. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t leave without my children, but Marvin was adamant. Then he offered a compromise.

“Take Nona back with you,” said Marvin. “But Frankie stays with me.”

At first I rejected the offer. I also saw the pain that the compromise was inflicting on Nona: Marvin wanted his son but was willing to lose his daughter. I wanted both my children. But Marvin wouldn’t let me have them.

Lacking the resources to hire a lawyer, I reluctantly accepted the proposal. Openly weeping, I embraced my son. I could barely speak the words:

“Be a good boy, Bubby. Listen to your father.”

“Say good-bye to your mother,” said Marvin. “You won’t be seeing her for a long time.”

“Not too long,” I told Marvin.

“We can’t foresee the future,” said Marvin.

Back in LA,
living with my mom and Nona, I grew more fearful that my son was not safe. Word came down that Marvin was growing more despondent. His money had run out completely. He was down to begging old friends like Smokey Robinson for loans.

A week later, another report came back from Maui: unable to pay the rent, Marvin was evicted from his condo. He and Frankie were living in an abandoned Helms Bakery truck.

“I’ve got to go back over there,” I told my dad Earl. “I’ve got to go get Bubby.”

“I know Marvin,” said Earl. “He won’t give up his son voluntarily.
Your only chance is to go over there with a court order—and that’s going to take time.”

I started those proceedings, but they were slow going. For every step forward, there were two steps back. Because I was high a good deal of the time, I just couldn’t pull it together.

Another report from Maui: Jeffrey Kruger, a big-time promoter out of London, had traveled to Hawaii to convince Marvin to tour Europe. It was Kruger who called me with the news.

“Your son is safe,” said the Englishman, “and he is eating well. He looks fine. His father, however, looks terrible. Marvin is close to a complete breakdown. I suggested that we immediately fly you over here to care for Bubby. But Marvin has flat-out refused. So I’ve convinced him to allow me to send for his mother.”

I was both relieved and crushed—relieved that Frankie was all right, crushed that I could not come to claim him. I continued to work through my lawyer as Kruger prepared Marvin for his European tour.

When Mother Gay arrived from the mainland, she, Marvin, and Frankie moved into a condo in the town of Lahaina. Kruger also brought over Marvin’s band, led by Gordon Banks, a fine guitarist who had married Marvin’s sister Zeola.

Frantic phone calls from me, concerned about my son’s welfare, went unanswered. Marvin had instructed his mom not to speak to me. Only Kruger kept me in the loop.

The winter of 1980 had come and gone. Kruger returned to London. Realizing that Marvin required more time to build up his strength, he postponed the tour. In the spring Marvin went into a recording studio in Honolulu to work on what was once
Love Man
and was now
In Our Lifetime?
His philosophical-theological writings continued.

Money for production came from Motown, which was clamoring for the release of the record. It had been three years since the commercially unsuccessful
Here, My Dear.
Berry Gordy had done
nothing but pour money into Marvin. Marvin had squandered and mismanaged that money. He was on the verge of being indicted by the IRS.

I was on the verge of losing it. I had to see my son. I had to get him back. I had to find a way.

After months, good news. My lawyers persuaded the Superior Court of California to issue a writ of habeas corpus. In June, when Marvin was due to fly into Los Angeles to change planes for London, he would be served and forced to give up Bubby. I’d have my son back.

But someone tipped off Marvin’s mother about my plan—and Mother Gay tipped off Marvin. To avoid the writ, he avoided LA and instead flew into San Francisco. I was enraged, but there was nothing to do. Even though Marvin had lost his passport, Kruger managed to convince the authorities to allow him and Bubby to leave the country and make the transatlantic journey.

In June of 1980, Marvin and Bubby arrived in London along with an entourage that included Mother Gay.

Having failed to reclaim my son, I fell into despair, the deepest and scariest of my life.