Don't Stop Me Now: The perfect laugh out loud romantic comedy

by Colleen Coleman

  I can’t see Mum and Frank’s faces in the crowd but I can see their outstretched hands holding up their phones, filming the whole thing. I spot Harriet in the front row clapping wildly, but Gregory is still staring ahead, his face unmoved.

  The taste of port on my teeth is sweet and sickly. I can’t say I’m a natural when it comes to being the centre of attention. Standing up and speaking in front of big groups of people fills me with bowel-emptying dread. When I was younger, I begged my mum NOT to throw a birthday party for me; all those people, swarming and expectant and impossible to predict. Painfully shy was written on every one of my reports through primary school. Painfully accurate, I’d say.

  Dr Winters approaches the podium. Everyone returns to their seats and settles to hear her speak.

  ‘Exceptional. This is our Vice Chancellor’s choice of words. And it is quite fitting, as I am about to make an exception to a tradition we have respected in this faculty for a very long time.’ She shifts her glasses to the top of her head.

  ‘In the past, it has been traditional to award the highest-achieving doctoral graduate a place on our academic team as an esteemed fellow. They are appointed as a professor; they may live in the grounds of the university and undertake research and lecturing duties. It is a much-coveted and respected route into academic life.’

  She turns from the crowd to look me straight in the eye. She is not smiling.

  ‘However, this year we have the chance to cast off old traditions and create new ones. These new traditions reflect my vision for the future of this great institution. Therefore, I shall not be extending the invitation to become a Banbridge fellow to the highest academic achiever. Instead, I have decided to take a holistic approach, selecting not on academic ability alone but also with considerations of personality, social acumen and emotional intelligence.’

  Sorry? Could you say that again in normal English?

  ‘This may seem jarring initially, Poppy, but I’m sure in time you’ll come to understand my rationale.’

  At first I think I’ve misheard her, but the whispers and nudges from the crowd tell me that is not the case. Not extending an invitation? Not selecting on academic ability? I’ll come to understand?

  ‘This is a personal and professional judgement. Dr Bloom, your thesis has been the subject of tremendous debate amongst colleagues across the globe. Some believe that it is an example of academic genius, “a work of brilliance; full of hope, ambition and boundless possibility”, to quote my colleague Dr Burley. But we are divided.’ Dr Winters pauses a moment and then leans in to her microphone, as if unable to help herself.

  ‘My selection has been based on a myriad of factors, not exclusively academic. To be a fellow at Banbridge, or indeed, a truly exceptional psychologist at any level, requires self-awareness, restraint. It requires maturity. It requires a deep appreciation of humanity that moves beyond the page, beyond the theory, beyond the university walls. This deep appreciation can only come when one is open to real life, real people, an understanding of the real world. Experience of life beyond the bookshelf.’

  White noise, pins and needles in my face. I look to Dr Burley. His hands are cupped around his eyes, as if shielding himself from some horrible road accident. I find Frank’s face in the crowd and try to focus on it. Frank knows best. He always knows best. I want to shout, scream, punch, run, rip that microphone from her hand and … and what? Tell her she’s wrong? She’s the dean of the university. She’s got free rein to say what she likes, even if that does mean sabotaging my life’s work, my future career and my reputation. I bite the inside of my cheek.

  Frank holds my gaze from the crowd and gives me a gentle smile, as if to say, Stay cool, stay calm. Do not react, just fade her out.

  But Dr Winters continues. ‘However, whenever a door shuts, a window opens. Or in this case, two windows. Due to my recent promotion to Dean, and the expansion of the faculty as a whole, for the first time we are in a position to offer two fellowships.’

  There is a shuffling in the seated crowd, nudges, whispers and sharp intakes of breath. Especially in the front rows. This could be anyone; this fellowship is now open game.

  Dr Winters clears her throat. ‘So without further ado, Dr Gregory Stubbs and Dr Harriet Law, it is my privilege and pleasure to invite you to join us as fellows of the University of Banbridge.’

  The crowd erupts in applause. Everyone leaps to their feet. Gregory has deep colour in his cheeks now and is smiling broadly, bounding up the steps two at a time. Harriet’s hands fly to her chest and she twirls around, bouncing in excitement as she sidles through our row of classmates to reach the stage.

  I don’t know what to do.

  So I clap. I paint a smile on my face for Harriet and then I slope off the side of the stage. It’s not that I’m not happy for her. Or Gregory. I’m just … sad and angry and confused. For Dr Burley and Mum and Frank and everyone I’ve let down. Including myself.

  I push through the metal fire-exit doors. Nobody stops me. Nobody even notices. They clatter shut behind me and I stand in the car park, taking deep breaths of fresh air. I throw my cap to the gravel and strip out of my graduation gown; everything feels heavy and hot and tight. I jump as I feel a hand on my right elbow. It’s Frank.

  ‘It’s okay, love, no need to be frightened. It’s all behind you now.’

  I press my palms into my eyes and slide down the wall onto the gravel. ‘Did that just happen?’

  Frank crouches down beside me and gently tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. ‘We couldn’t be more proud of you, Poppy love, okay? You’ve done better than we could ever have dreamed of. Amazing achievement. You should be proud of yourself and all.’

  ‘Not so amazing, though, is it? I didn’t get the fellowship.’

  ‘Let’s go home now, eh?’ says Frank, his knees cracking as he gets up from the ground beside me.

  ‘Home? I can’t go home! It’s my graduation!’ I tell him. ‘I can’t just leave; I’ve waited for this for years.’

  ‘It’s up to you, love, you can stay if you like, of course you can. Stay here with all your friends, enjoy the night.’

  All my friends: well, that’s going to be awkward, seeing as I spend most of my time with either Harriet or Gregory. A night with the two people I love the most as they excitedly discuss their plans to do the job I wanted so badly in the place I never wanted to leave. Plans that do not involve me.

  They will stay, but I will leave.

  I hear a surge of applause coming from the other side of the metal doors. Mum’s Ford Escort rolls up beside us. She keeps the engine running, either because she’s afraid it won’t restart or because she wants to make a very fast getaway.

  A peal of laughter comes from inside; I can hear Gregory making his acceptance speech. Breathless and earnest and charming and utterly unscripted. An impromptu speech in front of hundreds of people wouldn’t faze him at all. No need for Gregory to rehearse in front of the mirror; he can read a crowd of strangers, build a rapport, rise to the occasion without his tongue swelling thick in his mouth.

  I don’t want to go, but how can I stay? It’s over. Just like that. I have no business being here now.

  And suddenly I do want to get out of here. I can’t face a night of pitying looks and booze-fuelled commiserations. I haven’t the energy to pretend that it’s no big deal that my entire life plan has caved in and that I have no plan B.

  Home, family, Banbridge, bright, future – it’s gone. It’s not happening. Stop there Charlie Bucket, your ticket is invalid; no entry beyond this point, there’ll be no factory tour for you today, or tomorrow, or ever. And waiting by the gates catching glimpses of the others won’t do you any good. In fact it may make things a whole lot worse.

  I nod my agreement. Frank helps me to my feet and we climb into the back seat.

  We drive down the tree-lined avenue, past the redbrick dormitories and bespectacled cyclists. Past Ivy Court and the library and the chapel. Past the manicured gardens
and neatly trimmed hedges. As we reach the junction, I spot my ex-dad’s car speeding past us. Just as well really. I couldn’t shoulder his disappointment along with everyone else’s right now.

  Once I lose the final view of Banbridge from the back window, I turn around in my seat and gaze at the long, grey motorway ahead. Mum turns the dial on the radio and taps her restless fingers on the steering wheel. She’s not good with silence. Especially raw, stunned silences like this one. She’s not sure what to say. Or how to say it. I should be cracking open the champagne with Harriet at the student bar. I should be kissing my gorgeous Gregory on his perfect bow lips and rebuffing his drunken attempts to carry me off to bed. I should be choosing curtains for my lodgings and ordering new bookshelves for my office.

  I loop Frank’s arm and feel his body clench tight and then soften to release a huge, trumpeting fart. I can feel it bubbling under my seat. At least he didn’t do that mid-ceremony. Or in front of Gregory’s parents. Oh my God, that would’ve been so awful. Despite myself, I half laugh. It’s the only thing I can imagine right now that could actually make this situation even worse. Because one thing is for sure, today is nothing like I ever imagined.

  I should not be in the back of the car enveloped in the thick fug of Frank’s IBS. I should not feel as shit and ashamed and exhausted as I do. I hold my face. Something is going to crack.

  Frank shuffles in his seat as he releases another massively loud fart. Mum darts us a confused look in the rear-view mirror.

  ‘I’m sorry, love, I’ve just been holding it in for ages. It’s not my fault; it’s just the way my body works – when these things have got to come out, then they’ve just got to come out.’

  As Mum tuts, turns up the radio and winds down the windows, I just give in. I stop fighting it and I start to laugh, right from the pit of my stomach. But then I realise I’m not laughing at all. I’m crying, great big breathless sobs. Mum tries to rub my knee from the front seat; Frank puts his arm around me and cuddles me.

  ‘It’s okay now, Poppy, just let it all out. Everything will make more sense once we get you back home. Onwards and upwards.’

  Downwards and backwards, more like.

  I slouch back in my seat and close my eyes. Resigned, defeated and absolutely bloody exhausted. And on my way back home. Because after all, I’ve got nowhere else to go.

  Chapter Two

  This is officially my first day as a doctor. Yet I wake shivering in my vampire-themed teenage single bed. My mum’s house is set at its customary erect-nipple temperature even though it is late October.

  Objective reality: I am breathing. I am safe. I am warm … no, I’m not warm, they only ever heat this box room up for Christmas. Okay, anyway, I’m healthy …

  Subjective reality: I AM FAILING AT EVERY CONCEIVABLE LEVEL.

  The catastrophe of this whole thing has rendered me immobile. I can’t move a muscle in my body, so I’m just going to lie here. Forever. Flat on my back, staring at the ceiling of my yesteryear bedroom, rubbing my eyes as I study the Destiny’s Child Survivor Tour poster still suspended with Blu-Tack so old that it’s turned green.

  Beyoncé, can you handle this? Kelly, can you handle this? Michelle, can you handle this? Poppy … Oh no, not me, not today. I definitely don’t think … in fact, no, I can’t, it is my professional opinion that I cannot handle this.

  Look away, Bey Knowles, look away, this isn’t pretty or empowering in any way.

  I turn my head into the corner of my pillow. My black graduation gown is dumped in a crumpled heap at the base of the bed. I vaguely recall throwing it there last night before collapsing into a pit of codeine-induced oblivion. I don’t remember much else of last night. There’s a hazy memory of me lying on the couch in my pyjamas, flicking through TV channels and drinking hot chocolate while Mum talked on and on about fate and destiny and new paths and embracing change and curves in the road and stuff at the end of the rainbow and how nice it was going to be for us to spend time together and eventually something would come up and all sorts of irrational fluffy fluff that people tend to print on souvenir fridge magnets or cross-stitch on to cushions. Nice, well-meaning, but little more than frothy platitudes to keep the air moving between the rambling comforter and the person whose life is falling apart. Then the questions and helpful suggestions started, which were just as well-meaning but downright annoying.

  Why didn’t I give some old friends a call?

  What did I want to eat?

  What time should we eat?

  Why didn’t I join her at aqua aerobics?

  Maybe I should take a bath? Or go for a walk?

  Why was I being so quiet?

  In the end I had no energy for anything, so I nodded, apologised – just generally, for anything and everything – dragged my duvet back up the stairs, nicked a sleeping tablet from Frank’s emergency cabinet, shut my door and sank into the darkness, sobbing so hard that my jaw still aches.

  And now it’s morning. And I have not dreamt this. I am here, back in my parents’ house, fighting the cold shafts of light that stream in through the gaps in my blinds and muttering curses at the people setting up their stalls on the street below, banging and clanging, hitching and hoisting and getting on with their lives. The south London dawn chorus of strident voices selling fish and fruit and flowers mixed with snatches of music and radio chat and cars and sirens and pneumatic drills. The musical of my life set to Beyoncé anthems would probably be called Self-Destructilicious. Or Crazy in Debt would also work. However, I already know that she won’t be up for collaborating on this gig; nope, not her style. There are no redeeming features to this misery.

  I survey the dusty shrine of my teenage self: plastic shelves lined with netball trophies and swimming medals; the small desk that Frank found in a churchyard skip littered with chewed pencils and stacks of outdated school books. Dr Poppy Bloom, eh? What a joke. How the hell have things turned out this way? Why am I back here? Winters, Harriet, Gregory … the applause, the laughter, the heat creeping up my neck, the blast of cold air once I snapped open those metal doors. I remember it all with razor-sharp clarity.

  And I get it. I don’t like it, but I get it. I was close, but ultimately, I didn’t have what it takes. Not what they were looking for. Not up to scratch. I blow out my cheeks. I haven’t anything left. I’m here now, and I’m going to have to make the best of it.

  A dog barks fiercely outside, then a car alarm starts to sound. The room is too bright to fall back to sleep, so I sigh, kick off the duvet and think about facing the day.

  I shuffle downstairs, relieved that I’ve at least got the house to myself; a few hours without intense worried looks, very unsubtle nudges and – mainly – no questions. Though I will have to face my ex-dad at some point, and he’ll go in for the kill.

  What do I mean, I haven’t got the fellowship?

  What did I do wrong?

  What did I do to lose it?

  Why haven’t I applied anywhere else? Shouldn’t I really have been applying all year?

  Am I not aware of the competition? The demand? The race for jobs? For placements? For experience? For that crucial foot in the door?

  Isn’t it about time I stopped thinking and started doing?

  I stop dead on the stairs and try to hold my brain together: calm down, Poppy, breathe, breathe, just concentrate on now. I’ll get some breakfast and a nice cup of coffee and think about whatever I need to think about later. But it won’t be long. He’ll be on the phone soon enough, and what will I tell him? What will he think?

  My head starts swimming again. I scrunch my eyes shut as if it’s a proper strategy to shut down stressful thoughts.

  I know I’ve got at least six hours of peace, as both my parents are at work. Frank is the flower seller at the entrance to Brixton tube station, just around the corner, but my mum travels across London to work as a hairdresser in Holloway. The majority of her clients are well known to the women’s prison there; Mum essentially just bleaches, shav
es and spikes their hair in between sentences and when they are out on parole. She’s worked there since I was a baby, so even when she met Frank and we moved into his house here in Brixton, she kept her job despite the hour-long tube commute.

  I haven’t actually set foot through the doors of the salon since I was a toddler, around the time my mum and my ‘real’ dad split up. It’s weird to think that I’m edging thirty, the same age they were when everything went tits-up for them. I used to think that things could only go tits-up for grown-ups if you were incredibly reckless. Obviously I’m reassessing that viewpoint now as a twenty-nine-year-old standing in a onesie in my mum’s kitchen, my only ambition for the day being not to see or speak to anyone.

  I run my fingers through the knots in my hair, still full of kirby grips and sticky with the hairspray I used yesterday to secure my graduation hat against the wind. Twenty-four hours ago, that was my biggest concern. Oh, the naivety.

  Even though my mum’s a hairdresser, I’ve never even let her give me a shampoo and blow-dry, never mind a cut and restyle. I know that sounds bad, but her skill set very much reflects her clientele’s tastes, and I’ve always worried about ending up with a crispy yellow bob or a badly shorn mullet.

  Even though I tease her about the salon, she has never had a day off sick in her life, and when she effectively became a single parent with no money, it was that little salon that kept us afloat. She loves the other hairdressers in Holloway, loves the women who come in to pour their hearts out about fights they’ve been in and men they’ve threatened, and the way they tip her in SIM cards, semi-defrosted trays of meat and anything she wants from Superdrug. Maybe I should put an order in myself – is there such a thing as personality concealer? Mood contouring? I could totally reinvent myself and nobody would ever know it was me. I could return to Banbridge undetected, enrol as a new student and introduce myself as a more sociable, confident, charismatic version of myself. Dr Poppy Bloom take two.

  Downstairs, I hear the landline ring from the hallway.