The Crouch twins were considered to be a menace to the town they lived. Father Crouch had run off three years previously to be with his ‘soul mate’ leaving his long suffering spouse of twelve years with two sets of twins born a year apart. The prick had climbed on top of her as soon as she was cleared for sex again and had knocked her up first time. The poor girl now had 4 babies under 2 years old. The prick was proud of the fact, it proved he was a man. He was 16 when he made his girlfriend pregnant with the boys while she had turned 16 two months later.

His parents were well off and helped them both financially and made sure he completed his high school and then sent him through a community college after he joined his father’s firm. They couldn’t have cared less about his girlfriend, no help with her schooling. Her parents were dirt poor with 6 other kids to worry about. The only good thing was he married her and there was no pre- nuptial, when they divorced she received a fair deal.

Momma Crouch, known as Jayne was only thirty but looked older due to the worry of raising her children. Even though the settlement was okay, she still had to work as a cashier at the store, she was working in part time when she first fell pregnant. The owners felt sorry for her but never enough to offer regular raises, their charity was of the kind that believed charity started at home. The hurt of losing her husband was taking its’ toll on her, after all this was the late 1950s. People who divorced were frowned upon.

She had started to hit the booze on a regular basis, coming in from work, pouring the first of many drinks, resulting in her passing out on the sofa. The twins were left to look after themselves most nights.

Roger and Richard were nearly sixteen and the girls Marcie and Bonnie twelve months younger. The boys were fraternal twins but the girls were identical. Paul was dark haired while Richard had sandy coloured hair, both were stocky. Even at their age they were tall around 5’10”. The girls were brunettes with lovely brown eyes, with the promise of really nice bodies to come as they got a little older. Their figures were developing nicely, breasts and hips clearly defined.

The four of them ran amok, they were always in trouble for doing silly things. Bullying the younger kids at the school, taking their lunch money stuff like that. Taunting girls was another past time they enjoyed. The girls were just as bad, they too stole the younger girl’s lunch money and ruled the roost amongst their peers, none of them were liked in fact they were hated.

About a month later things had come to a head so Roger call a family talk for the twins, Jayne was passed out on the sofa again. He looked at her lying there with her work uniform up around her buttocks and showing her panties. Drool escaping the corner from her mouth and dribbling onto her blouse. Snores came in a series of grunts as she was dead to the world.

“What are we going to do? The Principal is going to expel us for good this time, Mom is useless, we have to do all the work around here. We have to do something, Mum can’t help us or herself, any ideas?”

Bonnie and Marcie both agreed they were tired of doing housework, never having any spare money to themselves because their mother kept buying bottles of alcohol. Richard, the quieter one of the boys muttered, “Might have to do yard work for the rich old ladies here in town. I bet Mrs. Richards could use our help.”

“Yeah, we could offer the whole house service, yard and house kept clean and tidy, we could pitch in and share the load, make us some money” Marcie responded.

Roger took charge, he and Richard would get their gardening tools, the girls to get the cleaning gear together. They gave them three days to get it ready. Bonnie was to make posters to put into shop windows. The week after the posters were put up, people started calling them for quotes. These four enterprising kids would only agree to a price after seeing the job.

Mrs. Richards was the first to call. A bit of background about her is in order, she was in her late forties and had been a widow for the last five years. She was full figured woman with dyed blonde hair but was stinking rich, her only son had married and moved to another state with his job but she refused to leave her house. She wanted both her yard and house kept up, her last cleaner left because it was too much work for one person.

The four of them saw her the next morning, playing truant that day, they looked, asked questions and when finally presented a figure, her expression showed she was thinking they would be cheaper. But team would be worth the money, at least give them a trial. She agreed.

It took just over two days of solid work until they were satisfied. Mrs.Richards was pleased with the result, paid them in cash and asked for them to come back in two weeks.

The business was doing so well the four of them barely had time to go to school and do their homework. Their own home inside and out was starting to look run down. Jayne did nothing but drink when she was home. They decided something would have to be done about their mother and her alcohol problem. The plan was: find her bottles and pour the contents down the sink. Then a way had to be found to get her money away from her on payday.

Like most drunks who still wanted to be seen as respectable she bought a bottle which she could hide in her bag on paydays and then would go to the bottle shop when the shop wasn’t busy for her week’s supply. After drinking her bottle and falling asleep most of the money was taken out of her purse, in the morning when she discovered it, they convinced her she had lost it.