Whatever Happened to Vicky Hope's Back Up Man?

by Laura Kemp

  Jack didn’t deserve to be a victim. Today, she would liberate him. Honesty was kindness. He wouldn’t see it like that at first, but in years to come when he was married and happy, he might believe he had had a lucky escape, barely a month before they would make their vows. That his love had saved a damaged woman. But he would have time, aged twenty-seven, to have another life.

  She didn’t believe there would be anything more for her after him. She would focus on her son, no doubt he would remain her nephew, he wasn’t hers to take away. She couldn’t scoop him up only for Charlie’s heart to break. The person who needed stability was Griff. Kate’s version of the future was to be as close to him as she was now: he would be the man in her life, upon whom she would dote. The rest of her time would be spent working and pursuing her interests. It wouldn’t be adventurous or fulfilling but it would be honest.

  She stopped to breathe in the earthy scents of moss and bark, to listen to the snapping of leaves and twigs as Boris bounded towards her, to watch insects fly in the dusty early summery morning air. To take in this one last moment of perfection before it all came tumbling down.

  Jack came up behind her and put his arms around her waist. She shut her eyes and savoured their final act of intimacy. His warmth, the comforter of his embrace, his fingers smoothing her stomach: his innocence which she was about to destroy.

  ‘There’s something I need to tell you,’ she said, speaking the words which had been waiting for the last seven years. Twisting so her face looked up to his, she saw him frown slightly in concern, that one look crucifying her because it showed how much she was going to hurt this lovely decent man. She pulled away to hold his hands between them before she dropped them and took a seat on the trunk of an old fallen tree.

  ‘It’s going to be difficult for you to hear it.’

  He squeezed his eyes and rubbed his chest, as if he was bracing himself.

  Jack took to a tree stump to support himself, barely a footstep from her but what felt like a chasm. The light was hazy behind his head. He had been her angel, he would remain so forever.

  ‘I’ve kept something from you and if it had no bearing on us now, I would never speak of it. But it does and this is not a way of reliving any guilt: how could it be?’ She could not wish away her own flesh and blood. ‘Only regret that I have kept it from you.’

  He nodded in a contained manner, but she could see his breath heaving with dread. She didn’t want to put him through any more.

  ‘Griff,’ she said, softly. ‘He’s my son, Jack. He’s the baby I gave up.’

  She swallowed and saw Jack through blurred eyes dip his head. There was only birdsong and the ripple of wind for a long time, a soundtrack incongruous with her annihilating announcement.

  Her hands trembled as she awaited his reaction: she felt relieved of her burden but it was replaced by anxiety at the transfer of its weight to his shoulders.

  His foot scrunched at the earth, his hands went up to his mess of baby curls and then he looked up at her, his chin quivering.

  ‘Of course he is… his eyes. They’re yours. His nails, they’re exactly the same shape too. His running around, his energy…’ He was gulping now. ‘How didn’t I guess? Why have you never told me?’ he said, hurt bleeding from every pore. ‘Why wait until now?’

  ‘I was afraid. That you’d leave me.’ She sobbed because the irony was plain to see.

  ‘How do you know I would’ve? What am I? The judge and the jury? Casting judgement, unable to understand?’

  ‘You’re the greatest thing that's ever happened to me,' she said. ‘Wonderful and true. I’ve made it dirty.’

  ‘This is absurd,’ he said, ‘What you've done is put me on a pedestal and assumed I couldn't handle something complex.’

  It made her feel cruel, as if she had underestimated him.

  ‘I intended to say, before you met Griff, but I was in too deep already. Knowing I’d found the love of my life.’

  ‘The panic attacks… that’s why you had them again, when you’d seemed to have put them behind you.’

  ‘Yes. Seeing Vee again brought that time of my life up again. But when you said I had to deal with whatever it was that was troubling me, that you could live with it but you were afraid I couldn’t, that’s when I knew I needed to say something. Before the wedding so that you wouldn’t feel tricked or deceived. I’m telling you now so that you can start again. But please know that I never wanted to keep anything from you: I wanted to protect him, we all did. You’ve made me happier than I’ve ever been. And I don’t want you to go…’ A sob burst from her, ‘…but I know you will want to. You won’t be able to trust me again.’

  ‘I don’t have the right, but may I, er, ask who the father was, is?’ Jack said, with apologetic dignity, looking first at her then away so that he wasn’t observing her discomfort, which made her jaw clench.

  ‘I… I… it’s too…’ Kate tasted blood as she wrestled with herself whether to go forward. She didn’t want to admit who because he was dead to her and if he was named then he would be present, reborn, haunting her all over again. Yet if she didn’t, or couldn’t, it might be seen as another cover-up or worse, that she was claiming to be dealing with this but failing. What she needed to get across to him was that it didn’t matter who he was because she’d never once seen him again. ‘It was a mistake, it’s water under the bridge, it’s not important…’

  ‘No, no, of course.’ So reasonable, so decent. It was killing her to even think of the father in this moment – he’d caused enough trouble and she didn’t want him anywhere near them now. Jack was wonderful, she didn’t want him tainted.

  ‘I’ll tell my mother and father that it’s off. The wedding. I’ll move out. Or you can. It’s up to you. But Jack,’ and her voice caught, ‘I will always love you.’

  He stood and began pacing. Then quietly, he spoke.

  ‘Your mother,’ Jack said, stopping to double over. ‘Your bloody mother,’ he shouted, hitting the floor.

  ‘I know…’ she wept.

  ‘No, that’s just it,’ he said, strangled, ‘you have only realized half the problem. It’s not Griff, Jesus. I love him like blood, it must be because, Christ, he was yours. Is yours. He isn’t the issue here. You didn’t tell me because your mother has controlled every inch of your life and you have let her. You were brainwashed by her, so afraid. That is what you need to address, Kate. Her. That’s what I can’t understand. The wedding, how you’ve let her get her own way. It was my day too, but nobody ever thought to consider my wishes. I wanted the happiest day of my life to be about us. Not her.’

  ‘I’ll tell her now,’ she said, desperately, her heart rising that there still may be a chance. ‘I’ll go there now. It’s Sunday, she’ll be home. I can be back by lunchtime. I promise. If we can stay together, I’ll do it now.’

  ‘But do you feel it, Kate?’ he implored, then shaking his head because clearly he didn’t believe she did. ‘That’s what I need to know. Do you see that you are still enslaved to her? Do you see that your happiness hasn’t ever depended on me or Griff but on her? You cannot keep bowing to her for the rest of your life.’

  ‘I won’t. I’ll sort it,’ she said, stepping towards him, her fingers in a clawed spasm of excruciating self-hatred.

  ‘I need some time to think,’ he said, turning his back on her. His shoulders jerked up and down as he let it all out.

  ‘Of course,’ she said, wanting to touch him, groping the air with her hands but backing off, frightened she would break him. ‘I’ll go to Charlie’s,’ she said. ‘I’ll go back to the cottage now, pack a bag. However long you need, if there’s a chance…’

  And then she ran as fast as she could, because out in the clearing, she could begin to be free again.

  Chapter Eighteen

  M

  Cardiff City Centre

  ‘I’m going out, Dad,’ Murphy said, crouching down to check he’d understood. It was hard to tell because his eyes were vague. At this
time of day, even though he’d only been up since 11 a.m., the tiredness would come like a rising tide.

  ‘Melanie’s here. I’ll be back about midnight. She’s going to stay in my room. Okay?’

  Dad stared at him vacantly. ‘Have you told your mother?’

  Murphy rubbed his temples and counted to ten because it would be so easy to shout. His dad was a pathetic sight, with tufts of hair sticking up where he’d missed with the Brylcreem and there was a stain of curry on his shirt, which Murphy had made worse by rubbing at it.

  ‘The football’s on tonight. The Champions League thing,’ he said, hoping he’d said it right because he knew fuck all about it. He checked his watch. Shit, he was already late.

  ‘1971. When Cardiff City beat Real Madrid one-nil. At home. You weren’t born yet. Your mam and I had just met. I turned down a ticket to go courting with her. Twenty-one I was, she was sweet sixteen, fresh off the boat from Ireland. That family of hers, well, I’d have sorted them out if she’d let me. But she never saw them again.’

  Sixteen? Mam had got here at sixteen? She’d always said twenty-one. Murphy was torn between wanting to know more and having to go. Shit, Dad, why did you have to do this now? Why not earlier when I sat with you, when I got you a pork pie and tomato, just like you’d asked. But you didn’t say a word. Just ate and burped. This was becoming a thing, his talking of Mam. Little moments of what their life had been before it’d gone wrong. How did it happen? If he left now, he might miss it and he sensed this might be why his parents had fractured off into their own directions, leaving Orla and him in a wasteland of brittle love.

  ‘What had happened to Mam? Why was she here at sixteen then?’

  His dad wiped his damp eyes and stayed silent. Then just like that he snapped out of it.

  ‘I need a piss,’ he said, shuffling himself to the edge of his threadbare wing-back which Murphy had got a man with a van to bring over so he’d be comfy.

  ‘Tell me about Mam,’ Murphy said, grabbing his wallet off the side.

  ‘I can bloody manage, Michael,’ his dad shouted, waving him away, creaking to his legs and groaning without inhibition.

  The door had closed on his memory: Murphy felt it as if it had been slammed in his face. He popped his head round into the kitchen.

  ‘I’m off, Melanie,’ he said. ‘Help yourself to anything. Dad’ll ask for a nightcap, just give him a small one.’

  ‘Will do, love, have a good time,’ she said, tidying away the dishwasher stuff. ‘Expect I’ll be asleep when you get back. That dinner was lovely, thanks.’ She gave him a warm mumsy smile, which got him every time because it reminded him of his Mam on a good day.

  He didn’t know what he’d do without Melanie. She’d been a carer for years; you could tell by the way she never flapped. Over a cuppa, she’d make him see he was allowed to have feelings of exasperation and anger – ‘it was perfectly normal’ – but just think how confused his dad was too. She’d done the impossible, this supposedly unremarkable fifty-something woman with a stoop, and made him more patient with the old bastard. People like her were the bloody heroes, not his generation of entitled millennials who’d grown up thinking they were special. And if it wasn’t for Melanie, he wouldn’t be going out to meet Vee now.

  When she’d texted in the week to ask if he wanted to go to that gig, he’d thought no. Every time he had heard Vee say Kate’s name, it was like his brain had shut down. How could he get involved with Vee when there was classified information between them? Yet he felt doomed – because every time he backed off, the pulling towards her would return. He had no one else he could stand to be around when his days were filled with worrying about Dad and trying not to get cross at him for muddling up breakfast and dinner or feeling dreadful pity when he did his buttons up wrong.

  Vee was the only one. His efforts to block her out only worked partially, because she would feature in his dreams. Always her, laughing, taking him somewhere, her fingertips brushing his.

  Then when Melanie had caught him stirring salt into his tea, she’d told him he needed time away from Dad. If he didn’t, the resentment would creep in. So, yeah, he’d replied, he was up for seeing Jarvis Cocked-up, where he was heading now.

  It wasn’t far to the Tram Shed – he did a quick walk through the tired backstreets of Riverside and Grangetown, seeing not the litter and for sale signs but the stoic silhouettes of buildings beneath a vibrant orange sky. Thinking it was good enough to get outside, he hadn’t realized how housebound he’d felt in Cardiff compared to his ‘hardly home’ situation in Hackney.

  A few lookylikies wearing black-rimmed specs and tweed suit jackets hung around outside the venue but most of the people were just normal. It made him feel like he didn’t have to look cool, like he did in London.

  When he went inside, his spirits went tequila when he saw her. It was proof of how lonely he’d been. She looked like she was up for a good night: she’d dressed up a bit. Not for him, of course. But for the occasion: all rockabilly with her hair up and fifties bandana, a black and white polka dot shirt, turned-up jeans and a red pair of lips.

  ‘Hiya!’ she sang, her eyes wide, happy and vibrant. She held out a bottle of beer for him. ‘I’m off tomorrow, so cheers! Had a swift one before I came out!’

  Ah, so that was why she was so buzzing. He was shocked to feel a bit of a downer that it wasn’t about seeing him but the fact she could have a night of it without work in the morning.

  ‘Wicked,’ he said, as she clinked the neck of his drink on hers – it made him stop as if it was an act of intimacy.

  Jesus, Murphy, he thought, it’s not as though you’ve been in solitary, is it? Calm yourself.

  ‘Sorry I’m a bit late. Dad.’ That’s all he needed to say.

  ‘’S’all right. Only been here ten myself. Mum dropped me in but the traffic was awful. Jarvis is on in a sec. Fancy going up to the balcony? Get a good view then.’

  As they went up the stairs, she began to talk, looking back at him every other footstep, stopping every now and again to make a point, to throw her hand in the air or do a face. The chat came easy, she was filling him in on stuff, he didn’t hear all of it because of the music, but he felt his cares slipping away.

  They were in position just in time for the lights to fall. Vee grabbed his arm and his stomach flipped, but then the floor did look as if it was moving from up here: the crowd was jumping in a dizzying murmuration as the fairly spot-on Jarvis, waggling his finger and angling his legs in cords, launched into ‘Disco 2000’, the song of their youth.

  He stole a look at Vee, just to make sure she was enjoying herself, and his eyes rested on a lock of her hair which hung long down her cheekbone. He followed its path and saw how it touched the exposed skin on her chest.

  He took a shaky breath, something was happening. Maybe it was the release of stress. And his ribcage was thudding – was it from an echo of the past? That deep longing he’d felt when she was away? It was the most intense friendship he’d ever had – no wonder it was coming out, being here, now with the music transporting him back to the days before she went away. It had to be like a muscle memory, easy to recover after previous practice. Or was it from the bassline?

  The boys, they’d say it was because he hadn’t had any lately. Orla, she’d make out it was meaningful with a knowing look. Yet it wasn’t that kind of feeling.

  Throughout the night, not even a load of Pulp covers could stop him from being so aware that she was next to him. Perhaps it was just because it was a big thing to get used to, having her around. That was the complicated bit – everything else, how they communicated, was effortless.

  What did it mean? Did he need to worry?

  The trouble was, when the gig had ended and they’d had a few more beers, her arm seemed as if it was meant to be in the loop of his.

  ‘Murph, Smurf,’ she giggled, as they walked back into town, and his grin ran up and down his body. ‘I don’t want to go home yet! Vodka, I want. Shall we
get some from the shop and get drunker in Roath Park?’

  ‘What, like we’re seventeen again? You puke and I carry you home?’ It wouldn't be the worst ever ending to a night out, to be fair.

  ‘Yeah! Come on, town is full of wankers,’ she said, as he got elbowed by a pissed girl as they joined the swarm of Cardiff’s Saturday night revellers. It wasn’t even ten to eleven and there were casualties everywhere. ‘I don’t want to queue up for hours to get in somewhere shit and then sober up before I’ve even got to the bar.’

  She had a point. He couldn’t face that either.

  ‘I’ve got some voddy at mine. There’s a roof terrace. We won’t disturb Dad then. Fancy that?’ It’d just come out, saying that, so easy and he felt self-conscious as if he sounded desperate.

  ‘I don’t fancy it,’ she said, which made his stomach lurch until she added, ‘I bloody love it!’

  He swung her round the corner of Westgate Street and up to the flats which were in the shadow of the Millennium Stadium.

  ‘I didn’t realize you lived here!’ she said, gazing up at the huge Victorian four-storey building. ‘I thought only judges and MPs and lawyers owned these places.’

  ‘Yeah. A few do,’ he admitted, letting them in. ‘I’m on the second floor.’

  Inside his flat, it was all quiet with Dad long asleep and Melanie getting some shut eye, so he tiptoed in to get the booze, two glasses and a throw. It could get chilly up there after a while even on a nice June night like this.

  Vee hung back, thank God: she was on the right side of making loud drunk shhh noises. Then he took her along the hallway, through a door and up some metal stairs to one of the best views in Cardiff. He felt a mixture of embarrassment and pride at her extended ‘oh my God’ as she went to the edge to peep out over the heads and cars, buses and cabs across town, from the twinkling trendy office blocks and illuminated arch of the stadium to Cardiff Castle and City Hall’s dome which were lit up like Christmas trees. Like a kid, she waved down then span around and skipped through a few tables and chairs to a vast rattan day bed which the residents’ association had chipped in for.