Chapter 3: Sidney Robert

Sidney was a beautiful woman with blue eyes and silver golden hair. She had a shape like a model with her five feet six inches height. When she passed, heads turned, the women with envy and the men with fascination and lust. She took her beauty for granted, not unaware of it but not making a big deal of it either.

'I wonder why those men will not keep their eyes to themselves!' she once said angrily to Sandra, her high school friend.

' Do you really blame them? You know you are a beautiful girl. Every man wants you and you should be flattered', she replied.

'Well, I am not and I do not appreciate being looked at like I am something to be eaten alive'.

Sandra had chuckled and shook her head. That was the endearing thing about Sydney. She did not crave attention, but she got it anyway.

Sydbey had a twin brother Stark Robert. They were close but while she had gone ahead to read medicine, Stark had read engineering and they both had excelled in their different fields.

Apart from ensuring that they were educated, before the misfortune that befell their father, he ensured that he got them trained in other skills that they took interest in like in music and dancing which he had passion in himself. They had trainers who came to the house to teach them to sing and dance.

Sidney and her brother had very great voices.

They were singing 'O Happy Day', once and while, Sydney added what the music instructor called attitude to her singing, Stark sand it flat though with a great voice.

'Sydney, you really are a great singer', the trainer complimented her. Sydney smiled and looked at her brother who poured.

'Mr. Laurel, you always compliment Sydney. Did I not sing well too?'

'You did but she sings with attitude but you do not', Mr. Laurel said, patting Stark comfortingly. 'It's not late for you to learn though. I believe she can put you through'.

'I shall be glad to do that', Sydney said, looking at her brother with mock sevrenity, 'but I doubt he will be interested. He also shows interest only when you are here, Mr. Laurel'. Then looking fondly at her brother, 'But you are better at dancing. You beatevall the time and I do not complain'.

'I am, aren't I?' Stark laughed. 'I remember how you fell once when we were supposed to be entertaining dad's guests'.

Sydney recalled that. She had been so embarrassed. She had wanted to add more 'flavour' to it like Stark called what he always does when dancing but she had ended up on the floor. Her brother had quickly picked her up and manuvered it to seem like it was part of the dancing style. They had bowed amidst applause.

'What a breathtaking dance style', she had heard some people mutter as Stark hurriedly led her away from the drawing room. 'The Robert twins will never cease to amaze us'.

They had entered their room and laughed their heads off and the trick they had just pulled off.

'Sidney of the golden voice', became the name her brother called her. And she referred to him as 'Stark, the twisting body dancer'.

Sidney was not really an incurable extrovert, that was her brother but she was not too much of an introvert either but after her father's demise, she withdrew into her shell. She had been very close to her father more than her mother, though her brother had loved their mother more.

Her father called her, 'My little angel' and their mother called Stark, 'My Charming Prince'.

Her social life or whatever she had as her social life died. She buried herself in her studies much like her father was buried under the ground. She was determined to make her father proud though he was no longer with them. She wanted him to look down from heaven and smile proudly at her and she also wanted to make life easier for her mother who had been through a lot to ensure that they got the education their father had wanted them to have.It might have been easier if she had remarried one of their father's friends who were eager to make her mother theirs or even became a mistress to any one of them but she refused.

Maybe it was just as well because her attention might have been diverted and she for one would not have forgiven her mother for betraying their father. She would have taken it as a betrayal of her father if her mother had remarried especially any one of her father's friends who rendered little or no help to them after his demise.

She secretly suspected that they might have been responsible for the downfall and bankruptcy her father suffered that had led to his death because of the envy they had for her father.

It was not surprising then that Sidney shunned all male advances. She had friends, male and female, that was true, but she drew the line when it came to dating and other intimate relationships.

When she met Carl, though he was not just handsome but beautiful, she had just registered his looks and nothing more.

She had not really been attracted to him. It was as though her sexuality had gone to sleep.

But her mother being so bothered that she might grow into an old maid started talking to her about going out on dates.

'You are old enough now, Sid', she said. 'you have to go out more. Your excuse about studies no longer hold. You are now a medical doctor doing well in her field, does it mean that you do not have anyone who has shown interest in you or like I fear are you the one not encouraging them?'

'Mum, I will go out more often now just to please you', she said with no intention of doing any such thing.

Sidney felt that she had not met the right person. When she met a person that knocks her off her feet like her father did her mother, then she would go with the person without persuasion.

'You have been telling me this for so long but have not yet fulfilled it. Now that you have accomplished your goal of being a doctor and an accomplished singer, the next thing is to get married and have your own family. I need to see my grand children running round me', Mira said.

'And you shall. Stark will get married soon and give you what you desire', Sidney assured her mother.

'And you? Stark is a man and can get married anytime but you have to do so now before you start getting along in age'.

'Mum, I am just twenty four. There is still time and moreover, I am yet to find that person who will make my heart flutter when I set eyes on him like yours did when you saw my dad. See the type of live you shared. I want that same thing too. I do not want to get into a relationship or marriage for the sake of it alone. I need to know that I shall be happy, you know', she said seriously.

'But sometimes it may not be love at first sight. I have seen sworn enemies turn to ardent lovers. You can just go out more with some men and go regular with anyone of them that you like the most and things might just pick up from there. Apart from instantaneous love, there is also love that is built and it lasts longer than the instant one does sometimes. Just give yourself a chance and open your heart for someone to get close'.

To make her mother happy, she went out on a date a few times with some men who asked her out and some of her doctor friends who were interested in being more than friends with her. Alot of whom had been asking her out for a long time and she had kept turning them down.

She tried but could not find any connection. She felt that she was not being fair to them or even to herself. It seemed like a waste of time.

Then she met Carl. His pursuit of her was relentless. He even sought the assistance of Dr. Matthews, her superior and mentor at the hospital.

With her mother's constant nagging, she decided to go out on a date with him.

Alot of things had been instrumental to making her accept his request for them to go out on a date.

First was her mother's constant nagging as observed as events unfold, then a strange dream she had and felt it was an indication that she should give Carl a chance.

And of course his persistent pursuit.

But what really prompted her to taking that giant step was what mother said, 'Your father would want you to be happily married anywhere he is. He has always wished it and you are aware of it. Would you deny him this little happiness?'

Her father had indeed spoken of how happy he would be when Sydney got married. They had always laughed about how her children would curl round his legs, restricting his movements and all. This brought her father's painful death to mind because that was the beginning of the turning point in her life.