Vaulting Ambition
”What are you doing here,” a slim, tall man in his mid-twenties said as he examined the young woman in front of him over the bridge of his nose.
The woman in question was Dr Jessica Blair, the daughter of David Blair, Britain’s incumbent Prime Minister.
She sneered at him with her back straight and her chin held high. “I am here to support my husband, a class member reuniting tonight.”
Her husband, Robin Goodfellow, slouched at the back of the room, catching up with the friends he’d known since he was five.
They were here because the class of 2015 were reuniting at the notorious public school Sandylook Bay Academy, situated near the picturesque seaside resort of Sandylook Bay in East Sussex.
If you were lucky enough to attend the school, you had made it. The students who strode through its doors were known to go on to become the crème de la crème of British society.
The tall, slim man in his mid-twenties, an up-and-coming poet named Wilfred Wordsworth who was predicted to become a future Poet Laureate, took a sideways glance at Robin and then returned his gaze to Jessica.
“I see,” the poet said. “My father believes your father’s dragging this country into the ground,”
Jessica grimaced at Wilfred. “Oh really, is that so?”
Wilfred leered at Jessica. “Yes, the sooner his government is out of power, the better.”
Jessica crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow. “So you’re a Trad, I see. Now it all makes sense.”
Wilfred took a sip of the Prosecco in his hand. “I used to be. I understand that Lord Flooding is the only man who can return this country to its former glory.”
Jessica clenched her teeth behind tight lips. “Turning to fascism, interesting.”
Robin bounded up to his wife and bent his head close to her ear.
”Babe, I’m hungry,” Robin said.
Jessica tilted her head and squinted at Robin. “Go and help yourself to the Vol-au-vents then.”
She gestured towards the extensive buffet available at one side of the room.
Robin rubbed his hands. “I can’t, babe. There’s none left.”
Jessica’s forehead wrinkled. “Are you sure? They can’t all be gone, surely?”
Robin nodded his head. “Yeah. Well, at least the ones I like.”
Jessica sighed and rolled her eyes.
He spotted Wilfred in his peripheral vision and turned to get a better view of him.
The stranger smiled, his teeth on show like a psychotic Cheshire Cat.
Wilfred cackled and slowly applauded Jessica.
“My, what an admirable choice of husband; I’m sure the Prime Minister must be proud.”
Jessica stood in front of her husband and scowled at Wilfred.
”He may have a brain the size of a tiny atom, but I’d pick him over you any day.”
Robin lowered his head, his trembling chin appearing to shrink.
Wilfred narrowed his eyes, leering at the couple in front of him.
The Goodfellows watched as Wilfred slowly dissolved into the crowd.
Robin’s expression became blank. ”Who the hell was he?”
Jessica gazed at her husband, her mouth wide open.
”You mean to say he’s not Sandylook Bay Academy alum?”
Robin shrugged. “No. I would remember him if he was. He must be someone’s spouse.”
Jessica glared at Wilfred, who was laughing with other people in the distance.
“And he had the cheek to ask me what I was doing here.”
Robin nodded his head in agreement, not sure what else to do.
Jessica removed the red backpack from her back and whipped a cereal bar from its depths.
She handed it to Robin. “Have that to tide you over for the time being.”
Robin stared at the bar wide-eyed. “Wicked, thanks, babe.”
He gave her a peck on the cheek before skipping to another part of the room, munching on his bar.
Jessica simpered at him before making her way to the buffet.
The sound of chatter was interrupted by a wine glass clinking.
The whole room turned towards Guy Houseman, the man who taught many of the people present when they were at the school.
He smiled at his former pupils with outstretched arms.
“My children,” he said. “How tall you have all grown.”
His former students emitted a few subdued laughs.
Guy exhaled a shallow sigh. “I remember watching you run around in the sports field during playtime.”
Jessica chewed on a Vol-au-vent as she listened to the teacher recount memories that meant nothing to her.
She felt a rustling in her backpack.
Her eyes inflated, her iris’ appearing like islands in a sea of white.
She kicked the person behind her to get them to move away.
”Ow,” Robin said, rubbing his leg.
Jessica froze. Her mouth dropped open as she covered it with her palm.
”I’m sorry, I didn’t know it was you,” Jessica said.
“Who else would it have been,” Robin said.
Jessica scanned the room, observing the other people with them.
Robin shook his head. “Doesn’t matter; where did you hide it?”
Jessica frowned at her significant other. “Hide what?”
Robin gestured to the backpack. “You know, the… the Heritage Bars.”
Jessica groaned, her eyes raised towards the heavens. “There’s plenty of food here to have.”
She indicated the buffet table next to them, which Robin gawped at.
“Yeah, I know,” Robin said. “But I’m hankering for another Heritage Bar.”
Nestled somewhere in the middle of the crowd, Wilfred espied Jessica and her husband.
A devilish grin appeared, and he wormed through the crowds towards them.
He approached the beggar and his wife, cackling with glee.
“Well, well, well, Miss Blair,” Wilfred said. “It appears your father’s got himself into trouble again.”
Jessica examined Wilfred’s smirk before watching the small radio bounce up and down in his hand like a ball.
“What’s this?” Robin said, having decided to eat an egg and cress sandwich.
”I assume you already know, Jessica,” Wilfred said. “Unless your father doesn’t disclose proposals with you before making them public.”
Jessica’s whole body sagged downwards; a frown appeared on her face.
Wilfred guffawed in her face. “I can read your mind; you know exactly what I’m talking about, don’t you?”
“What’s going on, babe,” Robin said.
Jessica sighed. “Rebecca was searching for a job; father decided to take matters into his own hands.”
Wilfred stared at Jessica before pushing between her and Robin and leaping onto the buffet table.
Robin gawped at him, then helped himself to another sandwich.
”Everyone, your attention, please!” Wilfred said.
The crowd turned towards Wilfred, whose red face and fiery eyes dug into them like daggers.
”Get down from there, sir,” Guy said. “You’ll squish the food.”
”Food preservation is less important than the announcement I have to make,” Wilfred said.
“Spit it out then,” Guy said. “Then get off the table.”
Wilfred swallowed some saliva, his head shaking violently.
”The government is corrupt,” Wilfred said. “David Blair most of all.”
The room gasped. Robin stared at his wife, his mouth agape.
Guy sighed, “is that all?”
Wilfred held up the radio still in his hands. “I’ve just heard the news on the radio. The Prime Minister has appointed his daughter to lead the Nepotism Extraction Parliamentary Organisation.”
Robin raised an eyebrow, still gazing at his wife.
Jessica observed the people around her as they shrugged and glanced at each other blankly.
She sighed. “My father has hired my sister to sniff out ministers and civil servants who are only in Whitehall due to familial connections and have them sacked.”
A wave of audible gasps filled the room. Some people staggered backwards while clutching their chests.
“Is your sister planning on sacking herself,” Guy asked Jessica.
“When Whitehall is free of nepotism, yes,” Jessica said. “But in the meantime, who better to sniff out nepo babies than a fellow nepo baby?”
Wilfred scowled at Jessica. “He’s probably going to fast-track your promotion to head of the NHS. Not on my watch!”
The poet whipped out a gun and pointed it at Jessica.
Various people screamed and ran towards the sides of the room. Guy gazed heavenwards and crossed himself.
Jessica glared directly into the gun barrel, crossed her arms, and tapped a foot.
Wilfred pulled the trigger.
“No!” Robin said, rushing over to his wife and pushing her over as the bullet ejected from the gun bounced off his arm and onto the floor.
”What on Earth are you doing?” Jessica said, moving herself away from her husband’s grasp. “It’s only a toy gun. The worst it could do is give me a small bruise.”
Robin chuckled; a flush crept across his cheeks.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “My bad.”
Jessica got up off the floor and scoffed. “Honestly.”
Guy ordered his assistant to grab Wilfred and escort him out of the building.
“What are you doing?” Wilfred said, trying to free himself from his restrainer as his captor took him into an abandoned outhouse on the school’s grounds. “Why have you taken me away? She’s the one reeking of corruption.”
”But she didn’t cause a scene at a school reunion and shoot someone with a toy gun, did she?” The assistant said.
Wilfred writhed in the assistant’s grip but eventually gave in.
”No,” he said.
The assistant lowered him into a corner of the room.
”You will stay here until your wife has finished catching up with her old classmates; then, she shall retrieve you,” the assistant said.
Wilfred growled as his captor breezed out of the building and closed the door, shrouding him in darkness.
The poet whisked his phone out of his pocket and lit it up, shining its torch around the room.
A faint glisten ahead of him caught his eye.
Wilfred crawled over to it for a closer examination.
It was a small sheet of glass with scratches on it.
On further inspection, Wilfred realised the scratches weren’t random but letters, appearing to form a message on the glass.
It was too dark for him to read it now, and the shine from his phone’s torch was too bright to use, so Wilfred pocketed the glass for when he could leave the building and sat in silence, staring into the darkness.
Meanwhile, in the main hall, Jessica chatted with Robin’s close friends, two of whom Jessica was close to, as they went to Oxford together.
”My niece is interested in becoming a hairdresser,” Jasmine Lopez, another close friend of Jessica’s from Oxford, said. “She’s already looking into university courses.”
Sophie Johnson, one of Robin’s closest friends who introduced him to Jessica, beamed at the news.
“Oh, wonderful,” Sophie said, clapping her hands. “It’s good to know I’m inspiring the next generation of hair stylists.”
Her husband, Chris, slowly leaned closer to her ear. “I don’t think you’re why she wants to be a hairdresser, Soph.”
”Oh, pish,” Sophie said. “Of course, it can’t be a coincidence that the niece of one of my oldest friends would want to pursue my profession!”
“I s’pose it’s not impossible, Soph,” Chris said, sipping from a plastic cup of beer.
Jessica grinned at the amusing scene before her, but then she noticed the weight on her back was slightly lighter.
She frowned as she patted her back, but her eyes bulged; her backpack was missing.
Jessica hyperventilated and spun around frantically, only to be met by her husband rifling through the back, searching for more Heritage Bars.
Robin glanced up momentarily and espied his wife, who glared at him with crossed arms.
She held out an arm towards the rucksack in his hands.
“Give me back the back,” Jessica said.
Robin turned red in the face, caved his chest in, and bent his spine.
”Sorry, babe,” Robin said, chuckling sheepishly and handing her the bag like a crane moving a pile of paving slabs.
Jessica grabbed the bag, rolled her eyes and scoffed, turning back towards the rest of the group.
Dante Lopez, Jasmine’s husband and Robin’s best friend, took out a letter from his bag.
The letter was from his father. He unfurled it and scanned its contents.
Our dad wants Bella and I to pay him and our mum a visit whilst we’re down here,” Dante said. “I think we’ll probably make a move if you don’t mind.”
”That’s fine,” Jessica said. “I’m sure you’re not the only ones who’ll drop in on their parents here.”
Dante, Jasmine, his boisterous sister Bella and her husband bid their friends goodbye and left the school.
Robin gazed out of the window towards the English Channel.
”How about we go for a walk along the South Downs, like we used to,” he said, turning back towards his friends.
The group clocked each other to gauge their reactions, then turned back to Robin.
”That’d be great, yeah,” Chris said. “I could do with some fresh air.”
”Cool,” Robin said, rubbing his hands. “Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s go now while the sun shines, shall we?”
So Robin, Jessica, and their friends vacated Sandylook Bay Academy and trundled along the seafront towards the Seven Sisters, following a route Robin discovered was a good shortcut.
The Robinsonverse 