At sixteen, Travis became more confident and self-assured, according to friends. They attributed the change to his involvement in the Mormon church, and as Travis became an active member of Jurupa Stake, he started to gain praise for his insightful ideas and his desire to help others.
Travis graduated from high school in 1995 and worked a string of jobs to save money for a church mission. The following year, he was called to serve in the Colorado Denver South Mission. Part of his two-year undertaking was volunteering to help the homeless in and around Denver. As someone who had spent a good deal of his life without essentials, Travis knew firsthand the plight of the people his mission was serving. He spent countless days handing out care packages to the less fortunate that contained food items and essential hygiene products. On each bag, Travis wrote a personalized note.
It was during his time in Colorado that Travis learned of the death of his father, who had perished in a motorcycle crash at the age of forty-nine on Travis’s twentieth birthday. Travis’s friends have said that Gary Alexander had been clean for more than a year when he died in 1997. By then Travis’s mother had also stopped doing drugs and had been trying to get her life together. But her long history of drug abuse had taken its toll, physically and emotionally, leaving her morbidly obese with a number of health problems. Travis’s friends complained that she was manipulative when it came to Travis, trying to make him feel guilty for not visiting more often or taking on the role of her caregiver. However, people around Travis were amazed that, despite everything his mother had done to him, he had found it in his heart to forgive her.
In 1998, around the age of twenty-one, Travis returned from his Denver mission and settled back in California, sharing a home with some other single Mormon guys. He joined the Riverside Singles Ward of the LDS, where everyone called him by his self-proclaimed nickname, T-Dogg. In the Mormon church, a ward is a local congregation presided over by a bishop, much like a pastor in other Christian denominations. Depending on the neighborhood, a ward can have anywhere between twenty-five to five hundred active members who live within a specified distance of a meetinghouse. Singles wards such as the one that Travis joined are found in areas where there is a high population of single adults. Also known as YSAs, or Young Single Adult Wards, they are created to serve unmarried members between the ages of eighteen and thirty. SAs, or Single Adult Wards, are for single members over the age of thirty. Family Wards are for married members or single members who are thirty plus. Either way, once a member is over thirty, the Young Singles Adult Ward is no longer an option. Members of the wards are taught the principles of the gospel, but a primary purpose of a singles ward is to give members the chance to mix with other Mormon singles with the goal of marriage. Travis was already keenly aware that in the Mormon religion, dating was for the sole purpose of finding a marriage partner.
At the Young Singles Ward, Travis made lots of friends, among them a young Mormon woman named Deanna Reid. They met in 1998 when Travis was on a date with her roommate. The girls in Deanna’s house would hang out with the guys in Travis’s house, and they all became friends. Travis and Deanna had already known each other for more than a year when they began dating in the spring of 2000. There was definitely a strong chemistry between them. In fact, friends said Travis wanted to marry her. Deanna wasn’t ready, though, and at twenty-one she really wanted to pursue a religious mission in Costa Rica. After only a few months of dating, she left California for Central America. The two stayed in contact via mail, as phone calls and email were not permitted. The church had strict communication policies for members on a mission. They could only call family twice a year, on Christmas and Mother’s Day, and they were forbidden to have telephone contact with boyfriends or girlfriends. There was no limit, however, to how many letters Deanna could write, but she was very busy and didn’t have a lot of free time.
Deanna had been away for more than one year when she received a letter from Travis in the summer of 2001, telling her that he was seeing someone else. “I was sad at first, really sad,” she recalled. “But I kind of expected it. I actually thought it would come a lot sooner. I kind of expected him to say that all along that he wanted to date other people. I even told him before I left that I didn’t expect him to wait around for a year and a half. I’ve seen that happen. All of my friends went on missions. I know what it’s like when the person you were dating starts dating someone else. It just happens all the time.”
In June 2001, Travis had fallen in love with a young woman he had met at the Young Singles Ward in Riverside. Linda Ballard was nineteen and a student at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. Travis and Linda had met once before while Linda was still in high school. He had even flirted with her, but her sister scolded him that she was still in high school and too young for him. When Linda came home for the summer after her freshman year, Travis reconnected with her, and the pair quickly became a couple. Their first date and first kiss were on June 4, 2001, exactly seven years to the day before he was murdered. Travis picked her up at her sister’s house, where she was staying. On his car’s dashboard was a picture of a young woman. “Who’s that?” Linda asked.
“Oh, that’s Deanna,” Travis replied. “She’s my missionary. She’s in Costa Rica on her mission.” Later, Linda learned that Travis had broken up with Deanna while she was in Costa Rica around the time they had begun dating.
From the start, Travis adored Linda. She was pretty, smart, and there was definitely an intense spark. She was quite beautiful, with full lips, and a radiant toothy smile. He was particularly attracted to her slender, petite frame. Linda, in turn, was taken in by Travis’s charisma and his easy way with people. Travis was just a few years older than she. At that point, he was selling day planners at Franklin Covey, a retail store in Riverside that sells organizers and offers time management training for companies and individuals. According to Linda, he was very into organization. He didn’t want to stay there long, as he had bigger plans for himself. Linda learned that he had been raised in poverty and she admired his determination to make something of himself. However, she was against his decision to forgo college in favor of finding a quick way to earn big money.
Before long, the relationship between Travis and Linda became serious. They started talking about marriage almost immediately. In August, Linda had to move back to Provo for her second year at Brigham Young. Travis wanted to go to Provo, too, saying he would find an apartment, so the two could continue dating. But Linda told him not to come yet, preferring to wait a semester before Travis made such a leap. She didn’t want the pressure of having someone moving his whole life to another state for her. She wanted to date long-distance and visit each other as often as they could.
That fall, Travis was struggling financially. He wasn’t making much at Franklin Covey, and his financial picture was growing increasingly bleak. He shared a house with several other young men, but he still had rent and bills to pay. He confided to friends that he was down on his luck. Though he had saved three thousand dollars to put away for a rainy day, he had spent most of it, and there appeared to be many rainy days still ahead. From his futon, he prayed to God for an answer to his troubles. He had dreams of financial independence, world travel, and even a career in politics at some point in the future.
One morning, Travis awoke with a strong urge to connect with a fellow church member named Chris Hughes, a tall, strapping man with a cheerful yet commanding presence. Travis had heard of Chris, but the two had never really spoken. That Saturday, Travis followed his premonition and sought Chris out. He learned that Chris was a salesman for a firm called Pre-Paid Legal, and as luck would have it, Chris was searching for someone as well. Chris was looking for a key person to help him build his business in Southern California. Although PPL was a great opportunity, Chris was new to town and needed to make connections. It was a perfect fit. Except for his mission, Travis had lived in Riverside his whole life and knew tons of people. Chris had an established team and a secure career. Bot
h men liked to describe their initial meeting as “providence,” with each searching for what the other had to offer. In the days that followed, Chris hired Travis onto his sales team at PPL.
As a sales associate, Travis had a gift for closing the deal. He used the story of his own childhood struggles to motivate potential clients. The strategy quickly won him financial rewards, and he was convinced he had found his ticket to success. But his success at PPL came with a price all its own: Linda wasn’t comfortable with PPL’s multilevel marketing approach, where every sales associate recruited people under him, and each of those people was expected to recruit more people, who would be under that person. The concept did not sit well with her. She found it awkward when Travis tried to sell the company’s services to her friends. They’d be on a double date when Travis would turn the conversation to PPL and encourage the other couple to join. Linda began to feel uneasy when they were socializing with friends, but it wasn’t enough to end the relationship.
Travis and Linda spent that Christmas with both of their families; first in Las Vegas with Linda’s father and the rest of her family, then in Riverside for Christmas dinner with Travis’s grandparents, Mum Mum and Grandpa Jim. Grandma Norma was sweet, laid-back, and easy to talk to. Everyone involved had a great time, chatting, joking, and enjoying each other’s company.
Travis was enamored with Linda and enjoyed showing her off to all his friends—even introducing her to his barber. He also wanted her to meet his mother, Pamela. She was not in good health, and he was not sure how much longer she would be around. Linda knew about Travis’s horrible childhood. He had told her about his mother’s abuse and the powerful drug addiction she had ultimately conquered, explaining how he no longer harbored animosity or resentment toward his mother and earning Linda’s admiration in the process. Still, Linda didn’t know what to expect.
During the visit, Travis and his mother were polite and cordial to each other, although they were clearly not close. While she had kicked drugs, her small home was still quite messy. She seemed to be the polar opposite of her fastidious and motivated son. Linda and Travis didn’t stay long, just long enough for Linda to smile, shake Pam’s hand, and talk for a bit.
After Christmas break, the plan was for Travis to move to Provo. That January 2002, the two caravanned to Utah, using walkie-talkies to stay in touch for the long drive. Linda had found Travis a house to share with other single Mormon men and helped him move in. His place was not far from the house she shared with several other young Mormon women.
The momentum of their relationship was powerful. The two would kiss and cuddle together, but they never went further. Both were intent on adhering to the tenets of their shared religion, but it was hard for them to control their desires. Travis was anxious to enjoy a sexual relationship, but because sex out of wedlock was considered a sin by the Mormon church, Travis wanted to wait to have marital intimacy. Still, he was sure he had found his soul mate. Months earlier he had even gone out and bought her an engagement ring, and had gone so far as to ask Linda’s dad for his daughter’s hand in marriage.
Although Linda knew that Travis wanted to get married, she was having doubts about making him her life partner. She was very young and not sure that she was ready to make the ultimate commitment. She loved him, but she just wasn’t sure he was the one. She began praying over whether or not she should marry him, and the answer she got back was “no.” On February 5, she went to Travis’s apartment to end things. She told him she didn’t feel right about getting married. She wasn’t sure if it was because he wasn’t the right one, or it was simply bad timing. She said she was still very young, and marriage was a big step. When she said they needed to break up and move on with their lives, Travis was devastated. He began crying uncontrollably. “I just can’t picture my life without you,” he said, tears running down his cheeks. She had never seen him cry so intensely, and it broke her heart.
Travis sent Linda an email later that night, telling her he didn’t know if he would ever find anyone else like her and apologizing for not being worthy. “I wish that I could show my best self. I feel like I have so much to offer, and I feel like you haven’t seen the best Travis that there is. I want to be better, and I want you to see my best self.”
Linda felt terrible for him. For some reason, she was no longer sure how she felt about seeing him. “It’s a timing thing,” she told him in a reply email. “We’ll keep dating.” The two got back together within the hour.
“I want to marry you, and I will wait for you to make up your mind,” Travis told her.
On February 10, Travis’s grandfather had a heart attack, and Travis immediately flew back to California to be with him and Mum Mum. He even moved in with Chris Hughes temporarily to be near his grandmother in case she needed him. Later that month, Linda traveled to Riverside to visit. While there, Travis brought her to a PPL meeting. He was enthusiastic for her to find out more about it, hoping it would turn her less negative. It was there that she saw Deanna Reid, the girl in the photo on Travis’s dashboard. Deanna had returned from Costa Rica, and apparently had been recruited into PPL as well. By now Linda knew about their past relationship, so she was curious about her.
After the meeting, Travis signed Linda up as a new recruit. She was uncomfortable with that, but he told her not to worry, he would do all the work. Although Linda accepted Travis’s choices, she continued to feel that a college degree would serve him better and open more doors in the future. The day after the meeting, Linda came to see Travis at Chris’s house, and the two had a long talk. They considered dating other people, but still while dating each other, too. Travis agreed, hoping that this meant there was still a chance that their relationship would work out.
On March 8, Travis flew back to Utah, and the two continued to date. Linda was still trying to decide how she felt about the relationship. For the next several months, Travis did all sorts of special things to woo her—cooking her dinners, baking her cookies, and taking her out on really nice dates. After all his effort, Linda felt torn. A part of her wanted to marry him, but some other part of her was still questioning a lifetime partnership.
That May, Linda and her friend Krista took a road trip from Provo to Riverside. While in Southern California, they went on a double date in Huntington Beach with Travis and his friend Mark. During the evening, Linda and Travis danced to Chris de Burgh’s “Lady in Red,” the same song the two had danced to on one of their first dates the previous June. Suddenly, as they slow-danced, Linda began to cry. All at once, reality hit her. This would probably be the last time the two would dance together.
Linda had decided to move on. Travis soon packed up his stuff in Provo and moved back to Riverside. After the breakup, Travis wrote Linda a poem, the gist of it being he only wanted the best for her, whether that meant staying with him or going their separate ways. He was heartbroken, but ready to move on with his life. Now Travis Alexander was going to put all of his considerable intelligence and drive into becoming a financial success.
The sweltering hundred-degree days of summer in Southern California did not slow Travis down. He was disappointed that his relationship with Linda had failed, but he found comfort in his work with PPL and in the arms of his old flame, Deanna Reid. In the spring of 2002, after Travis had returned from Provo to Riverside, the two began seeing each other at the Young Single Adult Ward functions, and they quickly found their romance back in full throttle. Deanna had even gone to visit him in Utah while he was still living there. She was Travis’s rock, always there for him as a loyal friend and, when the moment was right, happy to become his romantic partner once again.
For the next three years, Travis and Deanna dated exclusively. While they lived separately—Deanna with her parents and Travis in a rented house with other single Mormon men—they were a regular couple around town. They were very social together, taking in movies, hiking, and hanging out with friends. Everyone, including Linda Ballard, was convinced they would eventually be married.
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With Deanna back in his life, Travis felt a sense of security and stability. He could now focus on becoming his best possible self. He began each day with a motivational exercise. On a three-by-five-inch index card, he listed the six things he believed were essential to do every day: prayer; reading scripture; reading ten pages of a good book; listening to thirty minutes of personal development; working out; and making money. He wrote the same list on a new index card every morning, until the six items became a routine part of his day. As time went on, he added a seventh item to his list, and then an eighth, and so on. He also created other lists of things he wanted to do for fun or out of necessity. They could be anything from updating his calendar to thirty minutes of practicing Spanish. Once the lists were made, he studied them and asked himself, “If this was all to get done, would it be an amazing day?” Sometimes the answer was “yes,” other times it was “no.” Either way, he wouldn’t start his day unless he could say that it was going to be “one for the ages.” Travis claimed his morning index card ritual had increased his productivity fivefold. He was convinced it was because people tended to finish what they focused on. “Write down what you want life to bring you today, and chances are life will bring it to you on a silver platter,” he posted online in his blog.
As with Linda, Deanna’s involvement in PPL was mostly for him. She already had a full-time job, working in customer service for a security company in Irvine, California, where she was stuck in a cubicle all day. She wasn’t crazy about the work, but the money was good. Still, she went to the PPL meetings, helped with the setup, and manned the sign-in tables. She even did some sales. While she wasn’t as high in the ranks of the company as everyone else seemed to be, she did like the personal development aspect of it. More important, she liked what the company had done for Travis. He’d become more confident, and his public speaking skills had really improved. He’d always had a swagger, and running the meetings and speaking in front of large groups seemed to fit his personality. At last, he seemed to have found his niche.
Exposed: The Secret Life of Jodi Arias Page 8
