As the shock of sudden wealth began to sink into the two sisters and their still-incredulous parents, priorities were discussed with friends and other families who had known the clan for generations. The conclusion was drawn, somewhat wistfully, that no matter what the future plans had once been for the twin girls, individually or together, fifty million dollars each meant neither would have to ever work during their entire lifetimes. There was absolutely no more necessity that they would have to put in efforts to procure an income. They were simply both now assured of an effortless, opulent life.

Conventional wisdom would say that the girls would immediately be thinking of investments and a more or less humane sharing of some of their fortunes with their parents and close friends. This, however, was not in the heart or mind of either girl, perhaps as a function of their lack of maturity. But more likely it was that neither wanted to part with any of the windfall in such a manner that, in their eyes, it would then compare less sizable to her twin. Yet on the contrary, when it came to spending on themselves—and gradually more ostentatiously, there again the girls' competitive nature to outdo each other at any expense, eclipsed all wisdom and generosity.

While Caia and Mireille still lived temporarily under one roof—their parents' spacious house on the vineyard estate above the Santa Ynez valley, they had become even more conscious of each other's new possessions and even their movements. Their father early on in their childhood had realized that both girls would have to have their own rooms with attached bathrooms. And this was to curb the sisterly arguments he expected would occur as they grew. But even with their own 'separate-but-equal' accommodations, arguments would grow into fights in those early years, which were steadily sustained and amplified throughout their later school years.

During the early days of their extreme wealth, it became particularly high drama when the two would return each evening following a full day's shopping. Their arms would be laden with colorful shopping bags from the trendiest shops in Santa Barbara or high-end boutiques from the neighboring Montecito. Also tense and edgy was the answering of the service gate of their property. For what usually followed was one or more delivery trucks gaining access onto the driveway, leading up to the backdoor of the home. These vehicles would usually be carrying an array of luxurious equipment and products ranging from wall-sized liquid TVs to computerized exercise treadmills. Each girl would stand during these occasions with her arms crossed in spite and jealousy at the doorway of her sister's room. And there she would angrily watch as the new acquisitions would be carried in and installed into the now grossly overburdened living quarters of her identical rival. Before any of these acquisitions was ever used or switched on, the other girl was already conjuring up what she would buy or order the following day just to outdo her sibling's growing material inventory.

This became a daily grind for Caia and Mireille, beginning early in the mornings to spend the entire day exhaustively shopping on the Internet or taking a taxi into the centers which provided them with this ever-growing collection of material things. Daily they would set out in separate directions to rapidly purchase items large and small, of high and low tech—but all with the exclusive attempt to even the score of this quantity/quality game they had obsessively adopted since the mountain of cash became available to them. As time passed their efforts became single-minded and cruel, with but one goal—to surpass the other in this new preoccupation with rivalry. Like the myth of  Sisyphus, who attempted to roll a heavy stone up a hill to end his labor, the stone would always roll back down and like the poor cursed Sisyphus, the two would begin again  trying to one-up the other.

It was when this game at their single residence became grossly excessive that it was decided by the girls' parents that the time had come, as "adults" for the two to leave the nest and exist on their own. This decision was hard for Marinos and Maria, but absolutely necessary as they their  house, as spacious as it was, could no longer accommodate the material goods each girl was obsessively collecting.

And the choices of purchases were also morphing from things any eighteen-year-old female would want to surround herself with—to more diabolical choices that at the heart of their selection were intended to insult or debase the other. This was exemplified following a typical shouting match the two had had one evening resulting in Caia calling Mireille a "pig." By the afternoon of the following day, the insulting Caia discovered that her sister had ordered thirty-two live piglets from a pig breading farm in the valley to be delivered by four employees into Caia's room!

There, amid her sisters new and still boxed possessions, the hysterical little creatures had remained all day—running and frantically rolling in their own urine and excrement, all in their desperate efforts to escape the locked door and windows. Amid the squealing and scurrying of the little pigs, which had sadly been traumatized by their premature abduction from their mothers, the livid and violently angry Caia stood that evening in tears and totally defeated by Mireilla's cruel and deranged act of revenge.

For it was following this watershed event in their efforts toward some hollow victory over the other, that both girls were encouraged at the suggestion of a psychologist their parents had enlisted, to go out into the healthier world of sibling detachment and find, with their endless amount of funds, their own separate homes.

Over the next months, though the girls did not see much of each other, their new competition would be to find and purchase with the help of realtors and designers, their own individual properties. And though these homes were intended to be comfortable and practical in every way, they would also need to have that impressive element showiness to them—to specifically rise above the other's in unique and impressive ways.

Hearing only from mutual friends and of course their parents, which luxurious home and location the girls had finally settled for, became cherished news for each sister to learn. For it was the exact location and which phenomenal attributes each lavish home offered that was but another element in their obsession to prolong and escalate their private battles.

Once each had moved into their more spacious, and ostentatious residence, the girl's old familiar conflict did not subside but only became more of a living hell. For following the lavish houses and several exclusive cars to accent their identities and mask their fixation, it would soon be with new people that their money could influence. And it would be the likes of these individuals whom they would charm and befriend, only to use as weapons in this newest unholiest of wars.

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