Whatever Happened to Vicky Hope's Back Up Man?

by Laura Kemp

  ‘It’s better to be single than in a shit relationship.’

  ‘You say that but what about Sundays? The worst day of the week. Everyone else is coupled up and you’re in your pyjamas in front of Hollyoaks with no one to talk to.’

  ‘What? So you’d rather be like my mam and dad, would you? Fighting over how much he spends in the pub and the bookies? Bringing out the worst in each other?’

  Vicky shuddered and, with it, blades of grass poked her where they touched her skin, emphasizing Mikey’s point.

  ‘Course not. But imagine getting really old, like thirty, and being on the scrapheap.’

  She could see it now: having a meal out at the Harvester with just her biological clock for company while happy paired-up strangers gave her pitying looks.

  ‘Fucking hell, Vicky. You’re being irrational now. You want to be in love, that’s all this is. We’ve got years ahead of us.’

  Vicky hummed a concession into his armpit – this was the trouble with someone knowing you back to front, they always called you out on dramatics. But still she felt the grip of fear.

  Sensing it, he added softly, ‘Look, believe me, there is no way you’ll end up on your tod. You’re too amazing for that. If anyone’s going to be all alone, it’ll be me, all right?’

  His compliment bounced off her: her natural reaction was to big him up instead.

  ‘Oh hardly! You get asked out, which is more than can be said for me!’

  This was true. Not that he bothered with most girls, which pleased Vicky - none of them were good enough for him. His clouded eyes and jagged cheekbones were more tortured than boy band, he loved gaming rather than Match of the Day and he drank Guinness not premium wife-beating lager – but he got away with it because girls read him as brooding and mysterious.

  But Vicky’s equivalent wonkiness of ‘interesting’ clothes, wishing she’d gone to Hogwarts, lusting after David Tennant as Doctor Who and preferring Stop The War marches to Saturday shopping trips just wasn’t sexy.

  ‘Alone by choice, I meant. Girlfriends are too high-maintenance. Whatever mood I’m in, you’re about the only person I can hang out with. I couldn’t be bothered to have to explain myself to someone.’

  This time, his words hugged her.

  ‘Aw, me too. At least we’ve got each other.’

  ‘Yeah, defo. Although don’t think you can get away with making me listen to Coldplay when we’re in the old people’s home together, sipping hot cocoa.’

  ‘I do NOT like Coldplay! That CD was Pete’s, not mine.’ Then she realized what he’d said and a ping went off in her head. ‘But it’s a good call, that.’

  ‘What is, like?’

  ‘Well, why don’t we make a pact? You know, if both of us are still single by the time we’re thirty and ancient, we get together.’ This could be the solution, she thought, suddenly feeling sober, the security she needed to get on with the rest of her life.

  ‘You must be joking! I am never getting married. Not to you nor anyone. Not even Lara Croft.’

  Oh, he was so infuriating.

  ‘Can’t you just say yes, because I’m really worrying about this,’ she said, heaving herself onto an elbow so he could see how much this meant to her.

  ‘We’re mates. Being girlfriend-boyfriend would be… odd.’

  ‘Right,’ Vicky said, whispering now as she lay back down. All of the breath inside her had been punched out by his definitive refusal. She hadn’t meant it. Not really. Not much. It was just a bit of insurance; to know if it all went tits up, they’d at least have each other.

  ‘Tidy. Glad we’ve cleared that up,’ he said, putting an arm behind his neck. ‘Sometimes, Vicky, you are mental.’

  But she was stewing now: it wasn’t such a bad offer, was it? She began to feel offended then, that he considered the idea of her as his partner so ridiculous.

  ‘Fine,’ she said, sternly, inching away from his body, defensively pulling down the hem of her slightly too-tight Barbie T-shirt, on which she’d written in fabric sharpies ‘Screw you, Ken’.

  ‘Vicky?’ Mikey shifted his head to work out what was going on inside hers.

  ‘What?’ she said, prickling from his rejection.

  ‘Are you in a strop?’ he said. Vicky could hear his eyebrows shifting like tectonic plates.

  ‘No,’ she said, bristling, looking away from him.

  ‘Oh dear God,’ he said, amused. ‘You are in a strop. You. Are. A. Nutter.’

  ‘Well. For feck’s sake…’ she huffed.

  ‘What?’ he said, his voice arcing.

  ‘I thought we were best friends. We’d do anything for each other.’

  ‘Are you Meatloaf?’ he said, flicking his fingers against her arm, singing ‘I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That)’.

  ‘Go on then, have a laugh, take the piss. I’m off tomorrow, you better make the most of it.’

  She felt his chest rise then as he took a breath. He held it as though he was weighing it up. Finally, he blew out of his cheeks and squeezed her tight.

  ‘All right,’ he surrendered, ‘all right. Have it your way, you ludicrous person, you. If we’re both single when we’re thirty, I’ll be your back-up man. Okay?’

  At first, she was annoyed because he’d practically yawned it. But then, that was his way: he was guarded with his emotions because it was always a risk to him, to show he cared. Hadn’t he always been like this? Reserved and self-sufficient because no one had really looked after him. This was the closest she was going to get to an agreement. Bite his hand off, she told herself.

  ‘Really?’ she said, staying very still to make sure she’d hear his confirmation.

  ‘Really. I swear on Jarvis Cocker’s life.’ Again he delivered it in a fatigued voice.

  Vicky had a little wiggle to celebrate, not even caring about the wobble it set off down her body.

  ‘You’re mad, you know that don’t you?’ he said.

  Vicky giggled: he was bound to be rolling his eyes at her. ‘But don’t you feel better knowing that whatever happens now, we’ve got a plan B? I know I do. I feel all secure now.’

  ‘Good, good. You looney.’

  ‘See, this is why I love you, Michael Patrick Murphy. You know what it means to me.’

  ‘I do, Victoria Anwen Hope, I do,’ he said wearily, but she could tell he’d spoken with a grin. Her snow globe of worries began to settle: having Mikey in reserve steadied her.

  ‘You’ve just got to pray I meet someone now!’ she laughed.

  ‘Our Father, who art in heaven…’ he began.

  ‘Cheeky git,’ she said, letting him pull her in, which moved her towards his neck. She smiled as she anticipated breathing in the boyish salty smell she’d known forever. But in its place, and to her surprise, there was a musky manly scent.

  Just then, Vicky had a moment. A shivery split-second thing which seized her and made her reach out and place her hand on his chest. Beneath his ripped Pulp T-shirt, she felt his heart thumping as fast as her own. She had actual butterflies.

  A question appeared in her head… but it was one which she dismissed before it had even fully formed.

  Because Vicky had her plan B. If it all went wrong, then this time in nine years if neither her nor Mikey were in a relationship, he would be there for her.

  Right now though, I’m twenty-one and the world is waiting, she told herself as she tried to imagine a place where the sky hadn't been fake-tanned by the lights from the M4.

  Eight-and-a-bit years later…

  Chapter One

  V

  Brighton, February

  This was it, Vee thought waking up on her thirtieth birthday, the day that Jez would propose.

  This was the moment she’d been waiting for and had not just hinted heavily and repeatedly at but explicitly spelled out over the last few years.

  Jez knew what was expected of him: to ask for her hand in marriage.

  This was the one concession to their avant-garde
living: after all, hadn’t she always supported his art and gone along with his lifestyle in this freezing rattily windowed warehouse flat in Brighton and the dismantled bicycles in the hallway and veganism? Indeed, she’d even thrown herself into it because she found it all quite entertaining. Apart from the secret cheese she had behind his back. By doing what he did, it gave her some purpose and concealed her own jellyfish act of floating here and there, unable to find any sort of calling in her work life or hobbies or anything.

  Once, he’d tried to argue against marriage: we are all masters of our own fate and no one was forcing anyone to do anything, he’d said. Besides, he’d disagreed with it on the grounds that property was theft. But as far as this matter was concerned, she had refused point blank to even address his view. For this was the one and only condition she had placed on their relationship – and she was putting her foot down. It was non-negotiable. End of. And anyway, who said a proposal had to be predictable or naff? You’re an artist, Jez, she’d said, think outside the paintbox!

  It was only when Vee had spied her slippers that she darted out of bed, which was a mattress on a floor of concrete. Carpets and floorboards were out of the question – ‘too bourgeois’ – so for warmth she relied on a pair of grey alpaca wool booties which dated from her travels in Peru. Sometimes, when she put them on, she’d wonder whatever had happened to Kat, but today her past was far from her mind: it was all about the future.

  Sticking on one of Jez’s holey jumpers, Vee dashed in to the loo then nipped down the spiral metal staircase to their open-plan lounge-kitchen-diner which was bathed in sun during the spring and summer but murky as a mine now in winter, even at 11am.

  ‘Hello?’ she shouted, her voice echoing off naked brick walls, hoping he’d have taken the day off because it was important to her. Surely, he knew? She swallowed her disappointment at the silence, telling herself that he had had to go to the studio as soon as the sun was up to make the most of the daylight. With his exhibition coming up, he’d been working really long hours. Instead, yes, instead, he’d have left her something, a teaser of his intention.

  Weaving her way through sculptures and tyres, casts and tools, she looked around the room for a sign of her surprise. What form would it take, her proposal? Perhaps there’d be a treasure hunt of clues? Or maybe he’d have made her something like he usually did, which wasn’t because he’d forgotten her birthday – no, it was a heartfelt and unique personal expression of his adoration.

  Lost in thought, she banged backwards into a six-foot iron tor, a piece entitled ‘The Angst of Man’, which on the quiet she thought resembled a penis, and it tottered dangerously from one edge to another.

  ‘You clumsy cow,’ she said aloud, holding out her arms to catch it should it fall. Oh Christ, she thought, imagine being cheated out of a proposal because she’d been squashed to death by a metal cock.

  Thankfully, the structure settled down and Vee continued past the brown cord retro sofa and the beach driftwood coffee table towards the table, which was an old door balanced on four metal beer kegs – her present had to be there! Because he wouldn’t have forgotten. Would he?

  Could there be a little sparkly box on it? she wondered before berating herself for being so dull and uninspired. As if Jez would go to H Samuel! As if she’d want a rock from H Samuel! Well, she wouldn’t refuse it if there was one.

  But Jez was far too imaginative for that. A diamond nose stud would be much more up his street! Now that would be both edgy and romantic. Bugger, she thought, why hadn’t she asked for that? Not that Jez liked her suggestions a great deal. God knows how she was going to get him to agree to all the bits and pieces that she wanted for their wedding.

  But she had it all planned: it’d be traditional with a twist. The sort of wedding the artist Banksy would approve of, that’s how she’d sell it to Jez. Their ushers would tell people to sit wherever the hell they fancied, the photos would be Victorian-style with no smiling, they’d ride to the reception on a tandem, guests would pick their favours out of lucky dip boxes and the centrepieces on the tables wouldn’t be flowers but collection boxes for their favourite charities. She’d just have to present it to him as an installation, that’s all.

  Just then, in amongst the detritus of his breakfast, she saw an envelope marked ‘V’.

  Here it was! She hugged herself, wanting to savour the moment because within an hour she’d be slaving away at work. If she had a wedding to plan it would distract her from that awful bloody place.

  She was sick of Hello Daaling, the budget veggie bistro where she was supposed to be a member of the waiting staff but had been the de facto manager for two years, ten hours a day, five days a week on shit money. It was damp and cramped and the student waiters and waitresses were completely unreliable. How had she ever thought that slogging it in that cafe was The Answer? It was just the latest in a long line of dubious ‘career’ choices she’d made since returning to the UK with Jez from Thailand seven years ago. Her six months of travelling had turned into eighteen when life - and love - got in the way. She’d come back with a nose piercing, an empty bank account and a 6ft blond dreadlocked artist boyfriend, but no clearer sense of direction.

  There’d been the yogi course which she’d had to quit because she couldn’t get her leg behind her neck. She’d tried jewellery making, but she was too heavy-handed with the pliers. Having a stab at training to be a counsellor, she’d realized it wasn’t for her when she kept drifting off during the classes, too busy thinking about her destiny or whether she was going to cook falafels or puy lentil parsnip risotto for tea. If only she’d become a teacher as she’d wanted to when they moved back. But it was too late.

  Now, she realized, in terms of her working life she was no better off than years before when she’d paid for her simple and uncomplicated existence of food, bed and fun by handing out beach party flyers to backpackers on Koh Samui.

  Thank God then for Jez. Her relationship was the one thing she’d invested in.

  And this proposal would prove it: it’d be a signpost to the security of a soulmate, to move from the stinking North Laines to Hove where they’d get a dog, then have kids, loads of them. They’d start trying as soon as they were married for a child called Star - his choice but she'd work on that. He’d be such a great dad, she knew it, all hands on and playful: theirs would be one big beautiful scene of chaos and love. She’d home educate and never have to go back to honking of onions courtesy of Hello Daaling. And that future was waiting for her in this envelope.

  Her fingers trembled as she reached out to pick up the envelope, which stood against Jez’s bowl of chilli avocado porridge. Shaking drops of almond milk off it, she anticipated some act of ingenuity: he was all about making memories. Even though he was thirty-three, he never let life suck him dry. His inner child brimmed over: his big brown eyes were often hopping boyishly with excitement. In fact he looked a bit like a jester with his spongey dreads and colourful clothes! But then he could afford to be, thanks to mummy and daddy who, out of guilt for nobbing off to the South of France to be near his sister and their grandchildren, had bought him this place and signed over two of their London flats to him so he could live off the rent - justified by him as a sacrifice he had to make so he could create rather than work for The Man.

  At least it meant minimal contact with his plummy parents, who had neither a microwave nor telly in the kitchen.

  But Jez’s spirit, his joie de vivre, his refusal to let the details get him down were what attracted Vee to him in the first place on the night they met on a Cambodian beach. Kat had long gone – and this was Vee’s last hurrah before heading home. She couldn’t believe that the handsome topless double-barrelled public-schooled fire juggler liked her back. But by then she had buried her suburban self: Vicky had become Vee after she got in with a bohemian crowd. Her hair was long and bleached by the sun; she’d finally got a healthy colour; she had a fake tattoo of a Buddha on her lower back which she religiously had reapplied because
the real thing would be too painful; and she was skinny after a persistent bout of Thai tummy (which still troubled her, probably irritated by all the lentils they ate). Jez had been impressed with her voluntary work at a children’s home and taken with what he called her quirky Welsh ways. The way she spoke in reverse, like Yoda, ‘Coffee, I need’, and celebrated St David’s Day wherever she was. She had been his ‘sweet little rarebit’. Six years on, it had come down to this moment.

  Tearing open the envelope, she saw the card inside wasn’t birthday-related, which didn’t surprise Vee. A golden 3 and 0 was not his style. Instead, the card was one of the promos he’d got made up of his works of art to sell at the exhibition, which Vee did think was a little bit ‘me, me’, me’. But she was prepared to overlook it… until she read inside.

  Vee,

  I’m so, so sorry but it’s not working. We’ve had an amazing time, AMAZING, but recently I’ve felt there’s something missing. It’s not you, I just need to be free. I need some authenticity, to find meaning. Existence precedes essence – I’ve forgotten that I’m an individual and I need to throw off the labels that have defined me for too long.

  The absurdity of it all though is that my quest will not be done alone – there is someone else, a sort of soulmate, like I had no say in it. I never wanted to hurt you.

  Do not be sad, rarebit. Fly, like me, and embrace the beauty of the world.

  Jez

  The shock was like a blow to her head with a cast-iron Welsh cake-baking stone, robbing her of breath and balance.

  Vee followed her stomach and dropped to the floor, taking a spoon and a hammer with her. In slow motion, they somersaulted down and clanged and clattered at a deafening volume as they hit the dank concrete.

  Holding her ears, Vee’s head exploded and she began to fight for air. He was ending it, he’d met someone else. But no, it couldn’t be. She refused to believe it.

  The card had fallen from her hands and she scrabbled at it desperately, her fingers numb and clumsy. Reading and rereading it again, she raged at his crass employment of existentialism to justify his philandering – had he forgotten she’d done sociology at uni? That she was damn sure Sartre and Camus hadn’t wrestled with what it was to be human to assist spineless men dumping their girlfriends?