Agape house band of musicians, but there’s also the chance to meditate, spending time in soothing silence and quiet reflection, that particularly appealed to Doria and her embrace of yoga culture.
The centre was founded in 1986 by the Rev Dr Michael Beckwith, a charismatic advocate of the New Thought movement that promoted positive thinking as a modern way of dealing with the universal problems of today – feeding the homeless, preserving the environment and helping children whose lives have been shattered by war and disease. They are the virtues that Doria and Meghan already followed and ones that would become even more important to them in the years to come.
These were religious gatherings and God did not take a backseat, but they were a world away from a draughty Sunday service at Crathie Kirk, next to Balmoral. A celebrity or two might drift in, happy that they were not going to be photographed or disturbed. The Oscar-winning actress Hilary Swank was a particular devotee and would often be there when Doria and Meghan attended.
In the school holidays, when Meghan was thirteen going on fourteen, Agape started a summer drama camp for some of the members’ children. The camp, which met every day, was called Agape’s 38 Flavours, because that was the number of children who signed up for it. They were from different cultures, all encouraged to share their experiences of life.
Meghan was one of thirteen or fourteen young teenagers, alongside a pocket of pre-teens and a group of little children. Another girl was known as Meg so Meghan adopted her own special jingle: ‘Meghan Markle with a Sparkle’ and everyone called her that.
Generally, Doria would be the morning taxi, dropping her off at 8am, then Tom would pick her up at 4pm. Meghan’s domestic arrangements had changed. Tom and Doria had swapped roles to a certain extent. One of the popular myths about Meghan’s childhood and beyond is that her mum and dad remained great friends. That was not the case, but like many parents, they made the best of it for the sake of their child.
Meghan was faced with the tricky dilemma of keeping both parents happy and including both in her life. During the week she lived with her father. The Woodland Hills home had proved far too large for one person after both Yvonne and Tom Jr had moved out, so instead, he found a second-floor apartment in an unassuming West Hollywood street called Vista Del Mar, conveniently near his work and the school.
At weekends she was back with Mum. Doria was following in her own dad’s footsteps by setting up in business for herself and becoming a store owner. She found premises for two businesses in a modest shopping mall on La Brea Avenue, just a five-minute drive from home; one was a gift shop called Distant Treasures and the other, catchily named A Change of a Dress, included some of her own designs. Understandably, the stores required a lot of attention so there was little time for the school run, so Tom’s place seemed a sensible option for Meghan during the week.
Tom didn’t go to the Agape church but he was happy to do his share of parental chauffeuring for camp. This was the first time the teenage Meghan had come into contact with boys. She went to an all-girls school so the opportunities had been thin on the ground. That changed when she met Joshua Silverstein, a year older than her and just as keen on theatre.
Like her, Joshua was mixed race. His father David was Jewish and his mother, Beverly, African–American. His parents, who divorced when he was eleven, went to high school with Michael Beckwith. Some years later David bumped into Michael, who invited him to come along to Agape. He loved the sense of community there and would take his son to the services, often twice a week.
Joshua did not need to see which box Meghan might or might not have checked to understand her ethnicity: ‘When I saw Meghan, I saw a lighter-skinned brown person with curly hair and freckles and fuller lips. And I was like, that person is a person of colour.’
Meghan and Joshua got together in a time-honoured way. He recalled, ‘It was very typical of what kids do at that time. A friend told me Meghan thought I was cute and then I told my friend I thought she was cute. That was really the impetus we needed to become a couple. I took a day to think about it and figure out what to do. It was camp and we would be seeing each other every day so it was a big commitment to show up as a couple.
‘So the next day I made my move and we just fell into it. It was very innocent and very cute. And everyone took it that we were together. If she was doing anything acting-wise, I was very focused on it and very, very interested in what she was doing.’ Even though they were young, they talked about the black experience from the perspective of someone who had a white parent. They weren’t overly serious conversations but ones in which they discussed what it might be like to be a person of colour in the entertainment industry.
The new couple also had the more traditional teenage problem – how to find any privacy. They would sit together at lunch but the other campmates would always be around. Joshua explained, ‘It was this awkward and uncomfortable thing – like you are sitting with us and infringing on our space. But they were like – “Are you guys going to kiss? Kiss now.”’ They did kiss, making sure they practised a lot at every opportunity during camp.
Having been together most of the day, Meghan and Joshua would spend much of the evening on the phone to each other. He would be on the floor of his mother’s bedroom and she would be in a closet upstairs – both of them trying to keep the conversation away from parental ears.
Camp was an enjoyable way of spending the summer holidays. The Agape theatre programme was different in that it combined theatre games and practice with a sense of spirituality. There was nothing overtly serious but it just seemed natural to take a break with some guided meditation or ‘visioning’, where you think about your goals for the future, or to end a day of fun with a prayer.
Meghan celebrated her fourteenth birthday at the beginning of August and was given a rousing chorus of ‘Happy Birthday Meghan Markle with a Sparkle’ at the camp. Her memorable summer ended with a spectacular show in the Sanctuary, Agape’s main hall on Olympic Boulevard in Santa Monica. It was a culmination of all the various stories and presentations, improv games and sketches that they had worked on for six weeks. They each had to perform a monologue in which they created a new and totally original character. Meghan made sure her hair was at its wildest, smeared lipstick on her face and wore clothes that didn’t really fit. Joshua remembers it as being ‘quirky’. She loved the applause – the cheering, screaming and laughing that stays with you. The big finale was a huge, choreographed dance number entitled ‘Agape’s 38 Flavours’, in which every boy and girl took part.
After camp was over, the group got together and met up at the promenade next to Santa Monica beach. Everyone was relaxed, just hanging; Megan and Joshua held hands as they walked along before they all went into the local cinema to watch the film Clueless, a big summer hit in 1995.
The movie, set in Beverly Hills, is loosely based on Jane Austen’s classic novel Emma. The heroine, Cher Horowitz, played by Alicia Silverstone, is a high-school matchmaker who eventually falls in love with the Mr Knightley character (Paul Rudd), who in the film is rather coincidentally called Josh.
Unfortunately, the other, real-life Josh was unimpressed. He observed, ‘I wasn’t a fan. I was a young African–American boy watching a film about white women. It revolves around a shopaholic white woman and I was not relating to any of that.’ When his guy friends said they were leaving, he went too and told Meghan that he would see her outside. He left just before the tender kiss between the two lead characters: ‘I left my teenage, romance-driven beautiful girlfriend in a theatre while the kissing scene happened. What a dummy! I didn’t understand back then that you don’t do that. You don’t leave – that’s when you kiss the girl in the movie theater.’
That evening, Meghan let Joshua down gently during their long evening phone call. She explained to him why he shouldn’t have done that. She was, he acknowledges, a little ahead of him in understanding how a relationship works. He recalled, ‘I listened to her and I understood and I felt bad.’ Meghan also observed, sensibly, that they were both moving up from middle into high school next term and would inevitably see little of each other. She told him she wanted to enjoy the high school experience, the next stage of growing up. ‘So it was like “Oh heartbreak