The twins' growing years

When their parents both died in a tragic car accident on the way to Johannesburg, en-route from Cape Town, their aunt took care of them immediately. They were twelve years old at the time.

When they each were in grade nine, at the Roman Catholic Convent called Saint Mary's, their Aunt Bekka informed them that they would have to move from Pretoria to Johannesburg. They would be leaving her care to go and live with their grandmother Alice, for the remainder of their school years.

The girls were rather pleasantly surprised to learn that the grandmother whom they did not know, was considerably more "well-off" financially than they could ever have expected.

In fact; she was rather wealthy.

They had never before known that they had a grandmother, let alone the fact that she was rich. She was friendly, but also formal in her attitude towards them.

The girls were sad to be leaving their aunt, but they looked forward to their new lives.

Their aunt refused to explain why she had never told them about their grandmother before.

They could soon tell that their grandmother was proud of them. Alice was rather glamorous. She wore many rings on her fingers and she always wore a necklace.

She was not round, warm and cozy, as they had expected her to be.

She only spoke to them when they were formally sitting at the dining room table with her, during dinner. She then asked them what they wanted to be in the future and she told them about their family history. During the day they were in the company of the housekeeper, Lydia.

It took a while for them to get used to all the formality. Their aunt, who was their mother's younger sister, had made them all eat in front of the television.

She and her husband did not have children of their own. Their food used to be very simple, except on Sundays, when they had a good, formal lunch and sat at the table.

They saw very little of their grandmother over the next four years of their childhood, because she was often away on business trips on behalf of her cosmetics company. For the greater part of their days they were on their own with only the butler, Mr. James and the housekeeper, Miss Lydia, for company. 

Twice a week, a tutor named Mr. Karl came over to check on their progress in most of their school subjects. He reported back to their grandmother. After-school activities included ballet, piano and drama classes.

***

When their grandmother returned from her trips she would have tea with them in her luscious, beautiful garden. In the winter they would sit in front of the fireplace with her for tea. They had tea with their grandmother about once every six weeks.

Their grandmother Alice was sixty years old when they first met her. Since the girls were both beautiful and because she herself was involved in the beauty industry, she enrolled them both into modelling school.

She did this as soon as they completed their schooling. Afterwards she sent them to study towards their BA degrees in Psychology, which they completed well. Carminda refused to study Psychology further, so she dropped out after two months of having started on her honours degree.

They were both well-disciplined young ladies. Alice did not tolerate wild parties or friends; she felt that they had each other for company.

After graduating, the girls went on tour. Alice allowed them this indulgence. Shannon went to Europe and Carminda went to India with some friends.

These friends were alliances which the twins had made in secret. Alice assumed that they had both gone to Europe.

In India Carminda learned that she possessed mystical powers She returned there soon, on her own.

Carminda remained in India for five years, during which time she underwent training. Her grandmother disapproved and stopped her allowance. Carminda trained for relationship counselling under a mature, Hindu woman as her guide and teacher, for two interesting years.

Then Carminda went to England. She earned a living by singing backups for small bands and later by doing relationship counselling for a radio station.

Carminda also did some work as a model.

Through her agent she achieved a valuable advertising contract with the leading cosmetic house called Roset.

All of this after much frustration and many times being plagued by hunger pangs. She lived with other unsettled young people, sharing apartments. On some days she almost resorted to phoning her grandmother, to ask for help.

This was how Carminda eventually became streetwise as well as wealthy (having gone on to become a supermodel), during the same period in which her sister became qualified with a doctorate in Psychology.

Today, Carminda could not believe that she did it on her own after all. She did not need her grandmother's help and now she could actually help people like Blake and his family. She only hoped that no part of this new plan of hers was going to backfire.

***

Laura was happy that Ferdinand Marcel was going to perform an investigation on her behalf.

So, on this particular Thursday afternoon, she felt safe enough to visit the shopping mall in Menlyn. For the first time in weeks she felt free enough to go into a book-cum-coffee shop.

As she sat there, Laura paged through a fashion magazine, searching for pictures of herself. She found two which pleased her.

Afterwards she decided to finish her chocolate cake and leave immediately. She did indulge in cake on isolated occasions, when she felt that she deserved it. She never indulged in emotional eating, though.

Just before she could leave however, a complete stranger came around from behind her and sat himself down at her table, right opposite her. Immediately she felt like getting away from him, before he could explain himself.

He was tall, with dark hair and piercing, dark eyes.

Before Laura could speak, he himself started talking.