Star City 2: Chapter 1

On an unseasonably warm October day, the Royal Mountebank Theater on
West 47th Street in New York City became a glittering mecca for
fashionistas and paparazzi. The annual Big Apple Fall Fashion Preview
was the most anticipated event of the year for the clothing industry
and, as usual, the Lopper twins were the stars of the show.

The 22-year-olds were blonde and thin and radiated the superficial
charm highly prized by Hollywood casting directors and the editors of
glossy magazines. Outsiders found it difficult to tell them apart, but
those who frequented the trendiest watering holes in New York and Los
Angeles knew that Laura was the wild one and Lisa was the smart
one.

Those stereotypes were accurate enough. The twins were a force of
nature, and the tabloids loved their casual promiscuity, their passion
for alcohol and their late-night brawls in the better nightclubs on
both coasts.

On a runway or in front of a camera, though, it was a different story.
Laura and Lisa were all business, and delivered in abundance the
charisma and style that separated world-class supermodels from lesser
clothes horses.

Hoping to gain their favor, designers flooded the twins with gifts
ranging from free fashions to customized Hummers, and Hollywood moguls
sent hand-written notes begging them to star in upcoming
features.

Laura and Lisa accepted all this as their due and were only moderately
jaded by their A-list lifestyle. After all, they had been born into it.
They were the daughters of the notorious Eloise "Cha-Cha" Hamilton, who
had married and divorced three European industrialists before hooking
up with Harold Lopper, a bottled-water magnate from Scranton, Pa.

Harold had made his considerable fortune by lacing his line of waters
with an obscure Asian herb that mimicked the effect of
amphetamines.

The impact of the product was as dramatic as it was beneficial.
Sipping Lopper's Bubbly, college students across America were
completing term papers on time, homemakers were happily cleaning their
ovens at midnight and long-distance truckers were setting records for
on-time deliveries.

For a brief period rumors circulated that officials of the federal
Food and Drug Administration were investigating the active ingredient
in Lopper's Bubbly, but a hefty donation to a certain congressman's
re-election campaign quickly ended such speculation.

Unfortunately, no sooner had Harold become a tycoon among water
peddlers than he dropped dead of a heart attack just short of his
fiftieth birthday, leaving his wife to preside over his corporate
empire and his daughters to continue their jet-setting antics.

Business magazines reported that Cha-Cha proved to be a talented
executive only in that she hired experts to run the company while she
spent her time lunching in Paris and seducing gondoliers in Venice. Her
enormous personal fortune, gained mainly through several divorce
settlements, combined with the huge windfall Harold had left her, had
established Cha-Cha as one of the world's wealthiest women, and her
lifestyle reflected her affluence.

With her daughters grown and pursuing careers of their own, Cha-Cha
was free to circle the globe in search of diversion and dalliances, and
she was passionate in doing both. To Laura and Lisa she was a mercurial
mother figure who showed up infrequently and kept in touch mainly
through perfunctory e-mails and late-night cell phone calls. And that
was fine with them. Even for her daughters, a little bit of Cha-Cha
Lopper went a long way.

So for Laura and Lisa life was good on that evening in early summer
when they pranced down the runway at the Royal Mountebank. Behind the
blinding camera flashes, champagne flutes were filled to the brim,
diamonds and emeralds sparkled in the candlelight and beautiful people
regarded each other with the veiled gazes of the rich and famous.

After the show, the twins were surprised to find their mother waiting
in their dressing room.

"Mom, you made it. I don't believe it," Laura said affectionately as
she gave her mother a peck on the cheek.

Lisa, more subdued, merely murmured hello.

"To what do we owe the honor?" Laura said as she slipped out of a
$20,000 party frock and kicked it into a corner.

Cha-Cha looked elegant in a simple black Dolce &; Gabbana number
that set off a string of opaque freshwater pearls.

"I came to recruit you two for a mission of mercy," she said. "I
received a note from a girl in Florida, the president of a children's
society there, and she's putting on a fashion show to save the group's
pet project, an old lighthouse."

Lisa was unmoved. "What do they need us for, to buy them a new light
bulb?," she muttered.

Cha-Cha pressed on.
"They need money for repairs or the state will close the lighthouse
and leave the group without a source of income for their kids," she
said. "So I'm going to tell her the three of us will show up for their
show a week from Friday. It's going to be at the lighthouse itself,
with nothing but tents to dress in and a wooden runway thrown up at the
last minute. Sounds exciting, doesn't it? I know it's late notice, but
the best things are done on a whim. What do you say? It will be
great!"

Both girls groaned. "Why don't you just write them a check?" Laura
said, removing her mink eyelashes. "It would save everyone a lot of
trouble."

"That would be no fun," Cha-Cha said. "This way we can do a good deed
and get some great press besides. You girls should know how to
recognize a PR opportunity by now -- I've taught you well enough. So
how about it?"

Laura and Lisa exchanged a disgusted look.

"We'll be there," Lisa said. "But we won't like it."

Cha-Cha clapped her hands with delight.
"Don't be so negative," she said. "We'll have a blast. My boat is
nearby in Palm Beach. I'll fly down bring it up to Star City. You two
can meet me there next week. We can lie on the beach and swill
margaritas like ordinary people. It's just what we need in this family,
a little time for togetherness."

She spread her arms and scooped up her daughters in a bear hug.

They grunted and pretended to smile.