The Pembrokes

The Bad Blood Between Sasha And Fern

~The Bad Blood between Sasha and Fern~

The rivalry between Sasha and Fern started before the both of them even knew Jamie Carrington, since they were a few years older than her. Sasha Manning and Fern Pembroke were rivals for the Dean's List at Medical School as well as the provision of Private Medical Care. The Mannings owned the Mannington Mercy Private Hospitals and the Pembrokes headed the Xavier Pembroke Private Hospitals. Sasha described them as arch enemies because they could not stand one another nor see eye to eye with each other.

Both families once tendered for the provision of healthcare services to Pfizer Inc., the global pharmaceutical corporation based in New York City. Both private hospitals thought that they would become the exclusive provider but Pfizer decided to sign on three Private Hospital Groups, ie. Mannington Mercy, The Pembroke and Simon P. Stratton Memorial Hospitals to share the provision of private health services to the staff of Pfizer Inc. as part of their employees' benefits. That resulted in the start of the rivalry between the Mannings and the Pembrokes.

The Mannings and Pembrokes regularly hosted black tie charity events as well as other fundraising activities to raise funds for their respective hospitals. So, both families not only competed for the fundraising dollars, they also fought over which hospital came up on top. Furthermore, as wealthy families, they were also invited to social events planned by other non-profit organizations for the purpose of raising funds; it was known amongst the socialites that the Pembrokes and the Mannings would always want to be the largest donor between the two families for those events.  After all, the hospitals were helmed by affluent and powerful men with huge egos. 

The more Sasha hated Fern and couldn't stand the presence of each other, the more they ended up meeting each other in social functions, university functions and fraternity events. The Mannings met the Pembrokes when they were on separate family holidays in Australia. Sasha and Fern even bumped into each other twice again during their individual holidays. Once in Greece, another time in Eastern Europe. They always fought for attention in the group tours, trying to outsmart each other when being asked questions by the tour guides.

Due to the family feud and their own personal competitiveness, Sasha and Fern never got along. Apart from their academic and business rivalries, Sasha also found Fern to be whiny and spoilt. Not someone whom she would like to be associated with. However, according to their friends, they could have gotten along really well, perhaps the best of friends if they were not "poisoned" by their families when they were children. Scary as it may sound, both Sasha and Fern were rather alike in terms of their characters and likings, with just some minor differences.  

In truth, Fern and Sasha came from rather similar family backgrounds, both heiresses to their family wealth and private hospitals. They were beautiful, intelligent, competitive, responsible and driven. However, Fern was protective of the people she loved whereas Sasha was possessive. They were both their teachers' pets and popular girls pursued by many suitors of both sexes. Sasha was an out bisexual. On the other hand, Fern's sexual orientation was not known. It was unclear to the others if Fern was straight, bisexual or a lesbian since she kept her private life, private, from the prying eyes of her course mates.

The bad blood between Fern and Sasha went beyond character differences. Sasha went as far as disliking Fern's smile. She especially hated the way Fern spoke, she called her a Snob and also Ms. Whiny behind her back.  The rivalry worsen when the sexy and charming Desmond Goode, the resident lady-killer whom Sasha had developed a liking for, was actively trying to pursue Fern when they were all studying at Harvard Medical School.  This added the romantic rivalry dimension to their already fractured association. At several occasions, their circle of friends even had to step in to stop the cat-fights between them. Sasha Manning and Fern Pembroke brought out the worst in each other.