And there's more...

The Friends ringtone started trilling in Faith’s cavernous handbag as she bundled into the River Island changing room.

Shoving her soon-to-be-bought purple dress up on to a hook, she fished out the tinny mobile.  Its flashing little screen displayed her agent’s name.

‘Hiya Kev.’  She pressed the mobile to her ear to mask the din of a fellow dress-trier hollering at her toddler in the adjoining changing room.

‘All right, sweetheart.  Free to talk?  Not interrupting a lecture, am I?’

‘No, you’re OK, I’m shopping.’

‘At eleven o’clock on a Thursday?  Not skiving uni, are we, Miss Jephcott?’

‘I’m on study leave!’  She didn’t even try to make it sound a convincing protest.

In his leather-decked Birmingham office, Kevin Light, director of the Light & Sound entertainment agency, lolled in his huge swivel chair and chuckled.

‘Come on, Faith, this is me you’re talking to!’

Faith plonked her handbag on the floor and lounged against the cubicle wall with a terribly world-weary air.

‘Oh, you know how I feel about it, Kev.  I’m not an academic, never will be, and I can’t stand Marketing.  Besides, what I’m doing right now is much more important!  I always need new stage clothes, don’t I; have to keep updating my image?  And since I am a poor student, where better to purchase them than the January sales?  I reckon I’ve got a real knack for hunting out bargains.’

‘You could buy your frocks from Gucci if you gave up being a poor student and started making your living from music, I’m sure of it.  I could make you a star.  You could count on me to book you gigs every night of the week if you wanted.’

‘I know I could, but it’s not that simple.’  This was an oft-repeated topic.  Faith rolled her gorgeous eyes in the mirror, then did it again, admiring the cute yet droll faces she could pull.  Jennifer Aniston, eat your heart out!  ‘My parents would never forgive me if I abandoned my education.  I’ve told you how they feel about my singing; that it’s “just a hobby” and I should get a career, something to fall back on.’

Kev hoisted his feet on to the desk and took a jaded swig of black coffee.  He hated hearing her talk like this.

‘Well, with respect, I think your mom and dad are wrong.  This ain’t their life, kid, it’s yours.  You gotta follow your heart.  You were born to sing, not be bored to sleep by farty old professors in stuffy classrooms.’

Faith shrugged, too laid-back by nature to feel any sense of waste.  ‘I’ve only got another year and a bit to go.  Let’s get that out the way, then see what happens once I’ve graduated.’

Kev shook his balding head sadly, but knew better than to labour the point.

‘Anyway, talking about bookings – I’ve got another wedding for you.  Not ’til June, but the bride-to-be sounded delighted by the sound of you.  I offered her either you or Colonel K, and Zoe – that’s the wench’s name – went into raptures when I told her one of your specialities was Madonna’s Crazy for You.’

‘Great, I love doing that one.’

‘Yeah, well her and her chap, Karl, want it for their first dance.  Apparently it’s “their song,” or some such crap,’ grunted Kev, who was happily divorced.  ‘I told her I was sure you’d oblige, but that I’d confirm it with you, just in case.’

‘I’ll be there.’  Faith crouched and delved through the bag with her free hand, this time for her pen and diary.  ‘What’s the date?’  She eased the pen top off with her teeth and spat it across the little cubicle.

‘It’s June the fifth, at the Fairlawns, big hotel in Aldridge.  D’you know it?  Zoe said she’ll want to start the dancing round about nine, once they’ve greeted their guests and got the buffet out the way.  If you can do Crazy for You first, then some dancier numbers and finish with a few more ballads for the smoochies.’

‘That sounds ace,’ she jotted it on the empty diary page, ‘I’ve been working on a few new ones as well, so I’ll be well experienced at singing them by then.  June seems ages away yet, though, doesn’t it?’

‘It’ll soon be here, believe me.’  Kev, who would never see fifty again, couldn’t help a fond chortle at her sighing nonchalance.  There was something special about this girl.  He meant it when he said he could make her a star.  ‘I’m sure it don’t seem like ages away for that Zoe, planning her wedding.  I bet she’s all of a tiswas, trying to get everything organised.’

‘I’m never getting married,’ Faith sniffed at the very idea people actually did that sort of thing.  ‘By the time I’m as old as Zoe probably is, I shall be rich and famous and married to my music.’

‘Bet you wouldn’t say no if that Enrique Iglesias proposed to you?’ Kev ribbed.  He knew her weak spots.

Faith gazed at the mirror, as though she could see through it and into the fanciful scenario.  ‘Ah, well in Enrique’s case I might be forced to make an exception.’

‘How about Spencer?’  This was a rib too far.  Spencer was a third-year Media student whom Faith had been, to quote her, ‘kind of seeing’ for the last three months.  Typically of Faith’s conquests, the poor lad’s existence seemed to revolve around carrying her bags, having dates cancelled, and being generally besotted, slighted and eclipsed by his glamorous partner.

‘I don’t think so!’ she snorted, cruelly brusquely.  ‘I’m supposed to be meeting him tonight actually.  I might cry off, though.  I think he’s getting a bit serious.  To tell you the truth, I’d rather stay in with my feet up in front of Footballers Wives.’

Kev grinned involuntarily at Faith’s publicity shot, lined on the office wall with all his other artistes.  She was such a little poser: peeping through her wavy long hair in that ‘adore me’ fashion.

‘Oh Faith, you do love to leave a trail of broken hearts behind you!’

‘I’ll have to get used to it if I’m gunna be a star, eh?’

The silk purple dress looked sensational, as Faith knew it would.  Its bodice accentuated her slim torso, then flared into a skirt that rippled with every step of her rangy legs.  Its rich colour was so elegant against her hair – and would match to a tee her favourite amethyst nose stud.  It would be a stunning look for the stage.

As she strode out of River Island with it folded into a smooth bag (oh, how she loved the jazzy, cool feel of a new carrier – almost as much as the outfit, and promise, that lay within it), Faith considered putting in an appearance at her next lecture.

And then she spotted the ‘HALF PRICE’ poster in Top Shop’s window and thought better of it.

Faith adored January sales.  And, as she’d explained to Kevin, she did not adore Marketing – which was unfortunately the subject in which she was halfway through a degree at Wolverhampton University.  She harboured no scholastic ambitions at all, having entered higher education entirely at her parents’ behest.

Ron and Pam Jephcott were a well-meaning, working-class couple who wanted their only child denied none of the opportunities that eluded their younger selves.  They were demonstratively proud of Faith’s intelligence and feisty spirit – qualities they wished to see her maximise into adult life.

Ron and Pam didn’t quite understand, though, that being endowed in the brain department didn’t necessarily make you want to become a rocket scientist.  Faith’s sole aspiration was to sing.

She was a born exhibitionist, who loved the stage even more than she loved mirrors and clothes.  At three, when chosen for Mary in the nursery Nativity play, she’d toddled into the spotlight and found a home there.

At junior school, Faith’s bold treble had pealed out from a choir of shrill kids whose sound was insufferable to all but their mothers.  The music teachers keenly capitalised on her innate talent, pushing Faith forward as a soloist at open days and fetes where there were dignitaries to beguile.  Her squeakier friends were reduced to miming at the back.

Faith basked in the attention; the wows and gasps at her ‘big’ voice.  There was none of the child-star cutesiness about her; she had a confident sheen to her performance even then, and true passion for all things theatrical.

During Christmas concerts and plays, the classroom adjourning the school hall would be transformed into ‘backstage.’  To other kids, theme parks and sweet shops were havens of magic.  For young Faith, however, this was the benchmark by which she would measure future euphoria.  Incongruously surrounded by sequins, leotards, chalk dust and desks, awaiting her cue to go ‘out front’ and entertain people; knowing her parents were in the hall, on little wooden chairs, but not being able to peek out at them.  She never ever wanted to dip below this level of excitement.  To maintain it, then, she must spend the rest of her life either back- or on-stage.

Lead role after lead role followed, in high school productions.  Again, her friends watched dejectedly from the chorus line, while Faith drew all the ovations as Maria in West Side Story or Tallulah in Bugsy Malone, snogged the fifth-form hunks who played lead male, and got to preen over her picture in the Express & Star every year. 

For all that, the girl was impossible to hate.  A few crabby parents carped about ‘that Faith Jephcott’s name being all over the programme again’ – but they were only jealous that their kids weren’t as gifted.  At school, she was the most popular member of her year.  A giddy flirt, so aware of her own good looks and talents, ought in the catty classroom climate to have been resented, but she possessed an irresistible nature that charmed audiences and friends alike.  An engaging performer, a generous mate and fun company, she was too matter-of-fact to be insufferable about her many assets.

When GCSE time came, it was universally assumed that Faith would leave school, to either establish a singing career ‘in the clubs’ or study her craft at some illustrious London drama college.  Faith assumed this herself too – until her parents persuaded her to stop on into the sixth form.

Many school concert divas were the offspring of pushy, fame-minded parents.  Not so Faith.  Rom and Pam may have bought front row seats for all the school concerts, and kept a drawer crammed with their daughter’s press cuttings, but they believed there to be no money or security in music.

‘Try telling that to Mariah Carey,’ Faith had protested.

‘Yeah, but for every Mariah Carey, there’s a thousand more who never make it,’ Pam sagely pointed out.  ‘You shouldn’t put all your eggs in one basket, bab.  You need qualifications behind you, and a career, in case nothing comes of your dreams.’

‘Do your singing as an ’obby, by all means,’ Ron added, ‘but you shouldn’t waste what’s in yer yed either.  You’ve got a perfectly good brain, our Faith.  You could be anything if you tried.’

Faith agreed, with remarkably little sulking, to stay on and take A-levels.  She had a plan, though.  Her parents hoped she would outgrow her ambitions in the ensuing two years.  Faith knew she would prove them wrong, and that if – when – she got to eighteen and still wanted to sing for a living, something would have to give.  Mom and Dad would have to agree to her turning at least semi-professional, if they didn’t want her to lead a dreary, unfulfilled existence.  And if they didn’t agree – well, tough!  She’d be an adult by then anyway.

Faith’s teachers were less eager at the idea of educating her for a further two years.  The girl was definitely clever, and capable of achieving more than she did, but she had a lazy attitude to homework and a total lack of aptitude for study.  They privately agreed with her that she was wasting her skills in the classroom.

So she astounded all by sailing through her A-levels.  While some of her more diligent peers scraped Ds, Faith proved herself one of those sickening people who pass exams without appearing to ever open a textbook.

At this point, Ron and Pam, predictably, talked her into applying for university – though dissuaded her from taking a Performing Arts degree, which would have been her first choice.  A more practical subject would stand her in better stead, they said.

Faith opted for Marketing because she had once – for about an hour, after an episode of Absolutely Fabulous – contemplated working in public relations.  Marketing, PR, they were the same things, weren’t they?

She was presently halfway through her second year.  When asked to what use she planned to put her degree, she talked half-heartedly about ‘becoming a press officer for a hotel chain, or something.’  This was really only because she’d sung at functions in a few local hotels, and they seemed such pleasant working environments.

Faith was actually far less averse to the student lifestyle, though, than she would have people believe.  Aspects of it suited her – even though she maintained that the only thing she loved about the uni was its city centre proximity to clothes shops.  She had ample free periods (though still shirked lectures with shameless frequency), new mates to enthral, and freedom from the petty rules she’d found so binding at school.

Education, though a yawn, was vastly preferable to nine-to-five employment – and, best of all, Faith could still do her beloved singing.  For her parents had, by way of ‘compromise,’ allowed her to sign up, at eighteen, with the Birmingham-based Light & Sound agency.  (Her local gig base was part of the reason she’d opted for a uni so close to home – the other part being that she wasn’t interested enough in tertiary studies to bother researching more distant academies.)

Light & Sound was a respected agency, the gigs paid relatively well and Faith enjoyed a cordial working relationship with dry, cynical Kev.  He threw almost weekly bookings her way: predominantly private parties, where her Madonna, Anastacia and Shania Twain-orientated repertoire never failed.

She lived for these, usually Saturday, nights when merry crowds would by turns bop and snog to the rhythm of her rich, smoky vocals.  She looked amazing too, sending men home dreaming of her statuesque body, tumbling mahogany hair and porcelain complexion.

She was cutting quite a figure right now, stalking through pedestrianised Dudley Street, with her sophisticatedly studenty clothes and piercings.  Unlike many tall people, Faith didn’t hunch up to hide her height.  She oozed confidence.  Her every step was careful and conscious.  She enjoyed walking; she liked the clack of her long boots on the icy concrete, the rhythmic swish of her dark hair and coat.  The street was her catwalk

Two hours later, in Beatties café, leafing through Heat magazine for the third time, she looked more bored than bold.  She was desperately prolonging her lunch, eking out the last cold splash of cappuccino and final rhombus of sandwich.

Faith frowned yet again at her watch.  How early could she feasibly go home and convince Mom her lectures had finished for the day?  She was cold, bored, had spent practically her grant on outfits, and now desired nothing more than to be home, playing music in her lovely warm bedroom.

Hell, I’m not at school anymore, she thought defiantly.  I’m an adult.  I don’t need sick notes.  It’s not as though I’m going to have teachers phoning home checking up on why I wasn’t there today.  I’ll just tell her I had a free, or the lecturer was off sick, or something.

She determinedly swallowed the crust and coffee, and got up.

How, though, might she explain away the shopping bags?

She sat down again.

Ah, bugger it – I’ll hide them in my boot until the coast’s clear, then sneak them in the house when Mom and Dad aren’t looking!

She gathered up her bags – of which she’d amassed a mountain since River Island – and made her way down through the vast department store. 

Beatties had been a magical place when she was little; Mom used to bring her in on the bus for treats, particularly at Christmas.  When she was five, pretty little Faith had wriggled on to Santa’s knee here and asked for Movie Star Barbie; at six, she’d asked him for ballet shoes; by seven, she’d been far too sophisticated to believe in soppy old Santa Claus.

Stepping out into the sharp cold, Faith tightened her scarf, and began a brisk hike to her car.  The battered red Corsa, purchased with gig earnings, was one of her proudest possessions.  She drove to Wolverhampton each morning from her home, four miles away in Dudley, so grateful not to be at the mercy of a temperamental bus service like virtually all her classmates.

She now wished, though, that she’d parked the car over this side of town rather than by the bus station, which was a good walk from where she had ended up.  Then again, when she arrived this morning she hadn’t known she would fancy popping into Beatties for her lunch.

Back in Dudley Street, the stench of Olbas Oil and sound of singing hit her simultaneously.  She followed the wafts towards McDonald’s, outside which a surreally attired girl was holding court to a rapt crowd of lunchtime shoppers.

This area was a popular patch with buskers, and usually Faith would walk by, ignoring them, but this doll-sized creature was not of the easy-to-ignore type.

For one thing, she was wearing a floor-length leopardskin coat over a strappy Union Jack top and red tracksuit trousers.  She teetered on platform trainers (without which she’d have been very petite indeed), had hoicked her streaky amber hair into two schoolgirl pigtails, and was belting out the Spice Girls hit Wannabe with what Faith’s connoisseur ear recognised as an untrained yet huskily melodic voice.  Down by her elevated feet, an upturned baseball cap collected a heartening shower of pennies and pounds.

She finished the song with a little karate kick, à la Mel C.  Her makeshift audience applauded keenly – which made a change from the demoralising silence that greeted most city buskers.

‘I thank you,’ she pattered, at a pitch that needed no microphone, ‘you’re most kind.  Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen of Wolverhampton.  I am the world’s only One-Girl Spice Girls Tribute – or I think I am anyway – your entertainment on this lovely icy winter afternoon!’

To Faith’s amazement, the tiny busker was whipping off the coat and tracky bottoms during this raspy spiel.  Even Faith, cosseted in woollies, shivered just looking at her.

The girl’s little strip revealed not only that the ‘top’ she wore was in fact a mini dress she’d tucked into the trousers, but also that her right arm was branded with a garishly massive tattoo of David Beckham.  That was the ‘Posh’ part of her composite costume, Faith surmised, having recognised already the homages to Scary, Baby, Sporty and Ginger.

‘I’d like to perform for you now the number – no pun intended – that became the girls’ first Christmas number one, way back in 1996.  I’m sure you all remember that long ago – I know I do.  Ooh, I was so excited, fighting me brother for the remote control, waiting for Crimbo Top of the Pops to come on!  Anyway, this is 2 Become 1…’

I’ve seen it all now, thought Faith.  She liked eccentrics, though, and this Spice hybrid was a true entertainer.  Raw, certainly, compared with Faith’s own slick style, but she had a gutsy voice, infectious personality and natural command over an audience.

Not to mention originality.

Faith reached for her purse.  Crazy Busker Girl deserved a few coins for withstanding this cold, as much as anything else.  That Union Jack barely shielded her bum, and goosepimples stood to attention all over her exposed skin (and David Beckham’s face).

Then again, Faith reasoned, nobody had exactly forced her to dress like that.

Faith, that’s the kind of thing your mother would say!  Just give the wench some cash!

She’d spent her last dregs of change on that coffee and egg mayo sandwich, though.  Not even a stray pound coin rattled in her purse now; the smallest denomination she had was a fiver.  Faith rubbed the note between her fingers, debating whether to part with it.

Bugger it, she thought.  She was in a good mood, she’d got another booking, she liked helping fellow singers, and anyway one day she hoped to be famous and wealthy enough to dole out twenties and fifties to buskers without turning a hair.  It’s my money, I sang for it myself.  She sent the turquoise note fluttering down into the hat.

It was worth being generous to see the chuffed-to-bits expression on the girl’s face.

‘Thank you, love,’ she called out in astonishment.  She’d never had such a generous donation.

Pam wasn’t even home when Faith let herself into the cosy Jephcott semi in Dudley.

She’s probably off bargain-hunting herself.  So much for me fretting about trying to sneak these bags past her, thought Faith as she gleefully sprawled their contents across her bed. 

She brewed herself another coffee and thawed her hands round the lovely warm mug as she carried it back to her room.  She then spent a happy little afternoon trying on every dress again, modelling them in her narcissistically full-length mirror, co-ordinating accessories with them – these earrings, that belt – and singing along to her new backing tape on the hi-fi.  Like so many performers, Faith had never quite grown out of her ‘little girl in the dressing-up box’ phase.

The purple was definitely the best, she decided.  She’d known it would be, even though she’d bought it before all the others.  It had screamed ‘BUY ME, I’M SPECIAL’ from the reduced-to-clear rail.  Faith loved purple.  It wasn’t a hue that flattered every girl, but with her dramatic beauty and height she could carry it off. 

Faith twirled like a flamenco dancer across her small bedroom, visualising herself wearing a designer replica, in concert at Symphony Hall.

It was Justine Oliver’s skin, rather than dress, which was purple as she went home to her family, at four that afternoon.

She shivered in her long coat, took a lungful of the Olbas Oil to which she was addicted, and clomped across to the bar of the Hare & Tortoise where Joe was engrossed in the Express & Star.

‘Give us a Tia Maria, our Joseph, I’m froze.’  She wriggled up on to a stool, manically rubbing her leopardskin-clad arms.

Joe glanced up from the paper, amused as ever at Justine’s wacky apparel.  While he looked every inch the sleek barman, with his ponytail, black jeans and Ralph Lauren polo-neck, she was kitted out courtesy of charity shops and Wolverhampton Market.  Despite these superficial differences, though, the astute observer could tell by their identical green eyes, banana-wide smiles and soft bone structure, that they were in fact twins.

‘You got a cold?’ Joe asked, indicating the Olbas Oil.  He poured Justine a liberal slug of the dark liqueur she loved so much.  His sister’s capacity for alcohol defied science, in his opinion.  She was barely taller than some of the bottles she was able to drain in minutes.  ‘I’m not surprised, mind, dressed like that in midwinter.’

Justine downed the Tia Maria as though it were water, and shook her head, making her Baby Spice pigtails wag about like propellers.  ‘Not yet anyway.  I bought this when I had me last cold.  I found the bottle out today again, in me room, and now I’m kind of addicted to the stuff.’

‘Well it stinks the pub out.’  He wafted his hand about with exaggerated disgust.  ‘You’ll put the punters off.’

‘What punters?’  Justine wryly gestured to the vacant lounge.  ‘OK then, if you feel that strongly about it I s’pose I’d best have a fag to take the stink away.’

Smiling angelically, she dug her Silk Cuts from the voluminous leopardskin pocket and sparked one up.  Joe rolled his eyes. 

‘I thought you’d given up.’

‘I had – sort of.  But after freezing me tits off in that market place, I need some warmth and comfort.  Talking of which,’ she pushed her glass to him, ‘any chance of a top-up; bit of extra central heating?  Why not have yourself a lager at the same time, Joe?  My shout.’

‘Put the flags out!’  Joe gave a mock gasp at this rarity.  ‘Am I to take it that the One-Girl Spice Girls Tribute has had a successful day?’

‘I did make a fair bit actually.  Quite a few pound coins mixed in with the usual coppers – and then this nice girl gave me a fiver.  Five pounds, Joe!  You don’t pay that much to get into some gigs!’

‘Oh, I don’t know – I reckon she had herself a good deal there, one pound per Spice Girl!’

‘Don’t take the piss.’  She jabbed her fag towards him like a rebuking finger.  ‘My public love me!  I mean, they must do.  I don’t make them pay to hear to me, do I?  I’m not robbing people.’

Joe frowned with concern.  ‘I do worry about you, though, sis.  What if someone robs you, with all that money in your hat?  And out in this cold all day too.  You’ll catch your death.’

Justine drained her second glass as though competing in a Tia Maria-guzzling race and sighed petulantly, though she secretly loved his caring attitude.  ‘Quit mythering, Joe, you sound like our nan!  If I’m gunna be famous I’ve got to get out there amongst my public.  If anyone does try to mug me, I’ll just give ’em one of Mel C’s high kicks in the nadgers.  Anyway, I wouldn’t have to busk if Dad…’

‘If Dad what?’  Maurice Oliver materialised behind his son in the bar, his big face beaming and crimson as ever.

‘You know what,’ Justine pouted impatiently.  ‘If you let me sing in here occasionally.  Well, not just me – other singers, bands too.  Look at the place, Dad, it’s dead.  You need to move with the times.  This place hasn’t moved anywhere since the 80s.’  She made a sweeping hand gesture, which sardonically took in the horse brasses, chalked menus and discoloured padded seats.  ‘Live music would get people in – young people, I mean, not old farts who just come in to moan about the weather and their greyhounds.’

Maurice and his wife Audrey had been licensees of this snug Wolverhampton pub since the twins were tiny.  Joseph and Justine – born twenty minutes apart, twenty-two years ago – had known no other life.  Their social lives had always been largely Hare-&-Tortoise-centred, and they began willingly assisting in the family business the minute they could legally serve drinks.  They both enjoyed it; the regulars liked them, and their natural people skills suited them to the work.

That didn’t stop them, however, trying to put these skills to uses outside the pub.

Joe had recently set up in business as a mobile DJ, and was amassing a gradual trickle of party bookings for the nights when he wasn’t pulling pints.  He was very good at it.  Partygoers enjoyed his warm banter, and he liked being flirted with by the packs of girls who would fall over each other to request ABBA numbers and angle brazenly for dances and drinks.

Joe hoped, though, that his future would see him ‘spinning discs’ on the radio and at roadshows rather than just to conga-ing wedding guests.

Justine simply yearned to be famous, full stop.  Since infancy, she’d loved attention.  Aspiring for household name status just seemed a natural progression from that.

Though she was without a way of knowing it, she had a remarkable amount in common with that ‘nice girl’ who’d rewarded her busking talents with a fiver today.  They were both shameless show-offs – but while Faith’s roots were in school musicals, Justine’s were a tad more rough and ready. 

When she was a child, this bar had seemed an exciting grotto, with its ranks of colourful bottles – made all the more intriguing by Mom and Dad’s dire orders not to touch them because their contents were ‘very dangerous.’  Justine learned to read by memorising the bottle logos and forming the letters imprinted around them into words.  ‘Tia-Mar-i-a’ (that had always been her favourite), ‘Ma-li-bu,’ ‘Bac-ar-di.’

But, as with any hostelry, it was the people who really made it.  This one was a microcosm of life: luring courting couples, middle-aged greyhound-breeders and domino-playing pensioners alike.  And since life and people in general fascinated Justine, so she became fascinated by her parents’ patrons, their traits and conversations. 

Frequent were the nights when she sneaked down, pyjama-clad, most aggrieved at being packed off to bed with her Care Bear while all these grown-ups were laughing and drinking pretty liquids in her family home.

More frequently, though, she would stay up late, not a bit shy or tired, singing and chatting to the punters, who were enchanted by her.  Occasionally she dragged Joe up for duets, but he preferred playing with his mates, or listening to endless music on his Sony Walkman, so mostly she entertained them as a pint-sized soloist.

Her favourite regular at the time was Bobby, a dimply-faced eighty-year-old who smoked a pipe and gave her Wine Gums.

‘Not making a nuisance of herself is she, Bob?’ Audrey once enquired of him, interrupting a booming Whitney Houston medley by the seven-year-old Justine.

‘Nah,’ Bobby chomped toothlessly, ‘I’m enjoying meself.  This little wench is gunna go far with a personality like that, mark my words!  Her’s got the gift o’ the gab and no mistake.  We’ll be hearin’ her on the wireless one of these days.’

Justine loved and never forgot those words – though she’d had to ask what a wireless was.  Bobby was long dead now, but she would not give up vowing to make his prediction come true – if only to honour this twinkly, sweet-dispensing grandpa figure she had so hero worshipped.

But a Black Country boozer offered precious few star-making opportunities for a lass.  Especially a boozer as staid as she now believed this one to be.

On her days off, Justine went for auditions.  In the last twelve months alone, she’d applied to compete on Stars In Their Eyes, Big Brother, Blind Date, Mastermind (specialist subject: the life and career of Geri Halliwell) and a new live ITV ‘search for a star’-style show called Talent Scout – anything that might propel a Wolverhampton publican’s daughter into the public consciousness.

But TV producers had thus far remained mysteriously immune to her idiosyncratic appeal (or possibly they just disliked the smell of Olbas Oil), and she still had no occupation to list on her CV other than ‘barmaid.’

Justine privately thought her eccentric dress sense, fizzy persona, David Beckham tattoo and, er, unique musical style made her a gift for television, and was perplexed by the torrent of rejection letters she had accrued.

‘If they’d only given me a chance,’ she’d moaned to Joe the day she learned she wasn’t to feature in the first series of Talent Scout, ‘I’m sure they’d see the viewers would respond to me.  I’d be liked by the public – if the people who stand and applaud me in the market place are anything to go by.’

Justine busked only because she could find no other stage for her novelty act – but her brother was right, it was a risky activity.  She was none too sure it was legal either.

It frustrated her beyond belief that her parents owned a pub with ample band space but no entertainments licence.  Justine was a little old now to tour the bar tables charming old people with her gap-toothed trilling.  She wanted to perform there properly, with a synthesiser (or, failing that, backing tapes) and a microphone and lighting.

‘Loads of places round here have live music now,’ she would gripe daily to her dad.  But Maurice was obstinate.

‘This ain’t the bloody ’Ard Rock Café, bab,’ he chuckled, in a way that managed to sound good-natured yet also make it quite clear he had never heard such a ludicrous idea in his life.

It was to Maurice’s credit that he’d resisted the trend for converting a traditional local into a soulless ‘theme pub.’  But Justine knew contemporary punters wanted more than pie and chips and horse brasses.  The Hare & Tortoise needed a personality transplant.

‘It’s not as simple as that, love, as you well know,’ Maurice was explaining with saintly patience.  ‘I need a public entertainment licence.  I have to apply for one, it takes weeks to process, me premises have to be inspected, to see if I’ve got enough fire exits and all that palaver, and then only when those nice men at Wolverhampton City Council give me the big thumbs up can I can start getting these scruffy herbert rock bands in.’

Justine’s heart-shaped face sank like a child’s who had just been told she wouldn’t be able to have any ice cream until she’d finished her homework.

‘Which is why – ’ her dad paused dramatically, ‘I’ve applied for one!’

‘You have?’  Surprise transformed Justine into a cartoon character, with eyes on stalks and a grin that bared every tooth.

‘Ar, your old man has decided to give this “moving into the twenty-first century” lark a go.  I’ve been thinking about what you’ve said.  You’re right – perhaps we ought to have a few groups on here, and karaoke nights.  So I’ve sent off me application form to the council.  Let’s see what happens, eh?’

‘Oh Dad!’  Justine leaned ecstatically across the bar and kissed his florid cheek.

‘And you, me flower,’ he gave her snub nose a little tweak, ‘are going to be our first star turn the minute I get me licence.’

‘Yeah?  You mean I can do me own little show?  My Spice Girls one?  And we can advertise it – in the paper – and put my name on a sandwich board outside – and I’ll sing on a stage – with a proper microphone – and – ’

‘Calm down, calm down,’ Maurice chuckled at his daughter’s irrepressible style, ‘I haven’t got the licence yet.’

‘Oh, but you will!  Why would they refuse you?  This place is crying out for a bit of music.’

‘Well I sincerely hope the council see it that way too.  There’s no harm in you getting a bit of training in the meantime.  You’d best start doing some vocal exercises.’  He frowned at the cigarette ember in her hand.  ‘Giving up them bloody things might be a good idea.’

Without batting an eyelid, Justine squashed it into an ashtray, as though destroying incriminating evidence.  ‘Given up already,’ she said sweetly.  She gazed euphorically into space, visualising her star career at last unfolding before her.  Oh, she had plans for this place!

‘Hey, I could run talent contests!  We could get loads of singers in – and give prizes – and – ’

‘Does that mean I could run some discos here as well?’

‘You could do, Joe, but let’s just see, eh?  Now are you OK to do the evening shift with your mom and me, our Just?  Joe’s going out.’

‘Course I am.  I’d work every night for the next month without paying, I feel that happy!  Where is Mom, by the way?’

‘At the cash and carry.  She should be back in a bit.’

‘Right.’  Justine slid from the stool, jarring slightly at the impact of her huge trainers landing on the floor several seconds before the rest of her.  ‘I think I’ll go and have a nice hot bath before I start work, then get changed.  It’s chilly work, this busking lark.’

Faith Jephcott was a true escapist.  For all her popularity, she enjoyed solitude as much as company, and claimed she rarely felt lonely.  She could be so gregarious and dominant in groups, yet there also existed in her elements of the ‘typical only child.’

At uni, flocks of friends would surround and adore her – yet she had chosen to shop alone today, and this evening fictional footballers were preferable companions to her sort-of boyfriend Spencer.

Talking of which…‘I’d best ring him,’ she grimaced, furrowing for her phone again.  She contemplated calling off their date via a brisk text, but conscience conquered her.  Even Faith couldn’t be that callous a lover.  She owed Spence the courtesy of a proper call – disappointing though its content would be for him.

With a highly OTT sigh, she slumped back on her bed and scrolled through her mobile’s full address book, ferociously jabbing the ‘call’ key when she reached his number.

‘Hi Spence, it’s me.’

‘Faith!’  His voice was instantly shrill with irritating concern.  ‘Are you all right?  I was ever so worried when you didn’t show up for uni today.’

She gave the autopilot reply ‘I’m OK,’ then remembered just in time that she was supposed to be playacting, and thinned down her voice to a suitably pathetic pitch.  ‘Well actually, I’m not.  I’ve got a bit of tummy ache.  That’s why I didn’t make it in today.’

‘Oh dear.  Nothing you ate, I hope?’

Faith clenched her teeth.  Why did he have to be so bloody earnest and kindly?  Spencer would make someone a lovely husband one day – unfortunately, Faith just wasn’t the wifely type.

‘No, I’m just coming up to my time of the month,’ she replied heartlessly, knowing no subject shut boys up faster than menstrual cycles.  ‘But it means I’m going to have to take a rain check on the pictures tonight too, I’m afraid.  I really don’t feel up to it.’

‘Oh.  Well we don’t have to go out, not if you’re feeling poorly.  Do you want me to come over and see you instead?  We could listen to CDs, or watch – ’

‘No!’  She didn’t mean to snap, but the thought of him in her room, cooing and smothering like Florence bloody Nightingale, was too much.  She felt instantly guilty, though, and added in more benign tones: ‘Really, there’s no need.  I wouldn’t exactly be fun company right now.  I think the best thing for me is an early night and a mug of warm milk.’  As if!

‘OK, Faith.  Well, perhaps we could reschedule tonight then?  We could go to the flicks later this week?  When you’re feeling better?  Maybe?’

With each word, she could hear the hope ebbing out of his reedy voice.  She hated herself for insulting his intelligence; poor Spencer was astute enough to know ‘You’re dumped’ when he heard it.  But pity and conscience were not reasons to stay with someone, and Faith had had enough.  He was really nettling her now, with all his talk of ‘rescheduling.’  What kind of dork used words like that anyway?

‘Yeah, maybe.  Look Spence, I’ve got to go.  I really do feel like death warmed up right now.  I’ll see you at uni, yeah?’

Why can none of the decent, gentlemanly ones ever look like Enrique Iglesias? she wondered as she closed her eyes and slapped the mobile down on the duvet next to her.  They might sustain my interest for longer then.

But Faith knew blaming Spencer’s un-hunky looks for her own indifference was as unfair as it was convenient.  The fact was, she’d made the mistake – again – of going for a guy whose sole selling point was his fanatical crush on her.  Everyone wants a besotted partner after all.  Spencer’s crush was flattering and empowering; initially it had blinded her to his shortcomings and their general incompatibility.

Faith yearned to meet a soul mate; a man of whom she would never grow bored, because he would be in love with the real Faith Catherine Jephcott and empathise entirely with her needs and motivations.  Particularly her needs and motivations of a showbiz nature.

It wasn’t just the lovers in Faith’s life that lacked empathy, though.  None of her friends shared or understood her affinity with the stage either.  While never short of supporters who would cheer her every gig, tell her she’d be a superstar one day, and be proud to count an artiste among their acquaintance, she had no buddies ‘in the industry,’ so to speak.  Well, there was Kevin – but, though encouraging and fair-minded, he was when all was said and done a businessman, profiting from her talent.

Faith thought back to the Spice busker, envying her free, joyous attitude; the unapologetic way she just plonked herself in a shopping area and sang her socks off.  She could kick herself for not talking to the girl; not waiting for an interval in her little street concert in which to initiate a conversation, maybe even invite her for a drink.

Now Faith would doubtless never see her again, and had squandered a chance of befriending a much-needed kindred spirit.  Someone to whom she could gush about how singing was her calling, something she simply had to do, and how she derived greater highs from making people watch and applaud and dance as she belted out some Anastacia song at a wedding, than from any drugs or sex she was ever likely to be offered. 

How, when she glided out of the wings in a sensational dress and seized that microphone, she knew this was it; this was her life – and studying, eating and socialising were just things that kept her awake between gigs.

How she absolutely adored the powerful, almost sexual feel of a microphone in her hand.  It wasn’t so much the amplification of her voice that she enjoyed, as the sensation of cupping its phallic steel shape in her slender fingers – it made her feel like a ‘real’ singer.

As a youngster, Faith was often found adopting the clichéd singing-into-a-brush posture in front of her mirror.  In high school concerts finally came the thrill of handling the real thing.

Currently, she preferred to keep such feelings to herself than share them with folks who would respond with a polite nod but could never identify with her.  Her parents were supportive, of course, but in an ‘Oh aren’t you clever, dear, what a lovely hobby you’ve got’ sort of way.

Faith thought an ally with similar goals might encourage and motivate her.  At present, she has little incentive to take her music seriously – as in seriously enough to leave university and try her luck ‘on the road.’  She’d have loved a touring career, but was too laid-back by nature to be a risk-taker.  She knew she lacked, for example, the balls to do as the One-Girl Spice Girls Tribute did: present a novelty act to an alien, potentially unwelcoming crowd.

Faith so admired quirk and pluck in a performer – yet she herself favoured innocuous audiences: sweet young couples and pissed aunties at parties.  She knew herself that it made no sense. 

Living at home, having no nine-to-five job, and studying only as hard as she could be bothered, Faith knew she was trapped by the ease of her lifestyle.  It scared her that without that incentive to break out of it, she might meander through the years, missing opportunities she ought to be nabbing now – while she was still young, footloose and marketable.

Justine lit a scented candle on the bathroom ledge and sank into the suds, squealing at the blissful tingle of scalding water on goosepimpled skin.

Her tiny arms protruded just enough from the forest of white musk lather to hold the Victoria Beckham autobiography she was rereading for the fifth time.  Flicking through to the dog-eared pages of pictures, Justine mused about the days when Posh and the group ruled the pop charts.

The Spice Girls were her first idols.  Her only ones, in fact.  The five (or four, as they became) may have parted company years ago, but Justine still lived and breathed them, and prayed – literally prayed – for a reunion tour.  She listened to virtually no other music, had worn out numerous copies of their CDs, and every morning arose early so she could watch a snatch of her Spice World – The Movie DVD pre-breakfast.

But her clothing was the most conclusive gauge of her devotion/barminess.  Justine actually garbed herself in the manner of a different Spice Girl every day, according to her mood, and teamed elements of their best-known costumes (Geri’s Union Jack mini, Mel C’s tracksuits, etc) for her busking act.  Sections of the pub clientele took regular bets on which member she was going to emulate on a given day. 

It was fortunate that she didn’t work in an office – for no items that even approached ‘sober’ hung in Justine’s wardrobe.

‘I don’t own one trouser suit or sensible skirt, and certainly nothing beige,’ she’d once declared proudly, ‘and I never will!  I’d lose my identity.  Why should I dress all dull and conventional like everybody else, when I’m known for my zany clothes?  They’re my trademark.’

Justine’s bedroom still looked like a fourteen-year-old’s den.  Spice Girl posters had papered the Olbas-scented boxroom above the bar since 1996.  The squares of wall behind these Blu-Tacked images were several shades darker than the bare gaps between them.  There were those who might say that at twenty-two she was too old for Smash Hits pull-outs, but Justine didn’t care.

‘If I took them down, my life would feel as bare as my walls,’ was her dramatic response when Audrey gently suggested that Baby, Scary et al might like to retire to folded comfort in a cupboard.  ‘My room would look all sanitised and empty.  This group brought so much joy to my life.  Their songs were the soundtrack of my adolescence.  I like to look at them and remember all that.’

What Justine liked remembering was the buzzing summer of 1996, when slithering out of bed in time for The Chart Show’s lunchtime edition was still a feature of her holidays.  One day she’d switched it on to see the feistiest school gang ever – or so they looked – tell you what you want, what you really, really want.  Her first thought – like many other people’s first thoughts – was Wow!  Who are they?  Where did they spring from?

And then – zoom!  They were everywhere.  On crisp packets, on magazine covers, in every other telly advert – and at Number One.  Nine times.  Justine knew this because she’d bought every single they released – on every single format they released it on.

It was funny, the idea of a pop group seeping into every area of popular culture seemed now like a feature of another era.  But then there had never been anybody quite like the Spice Girls.  They’d captured the hearts and balls of a nation.  People used to moan about Spice overload, but Justine loved every minute.

‘It was the most exciting time of my life,’ she said now, with the air of an eighty-year-old who would never know excitement again.

In the stagnant, post-Take That pond of pop, they were so bubbly and different; glamorous, but in a ‘Friday night down the disco’ sort of way, lacking, say, Bananarama’s art-college snootiness, or Eternal’s magazine gloss.  This lot had a matey air about them, for which Justine herself strove today as an entertainer.  And their five looks, though distinct and diverse, were conveniently easy to replicate.

Other girls may have jammed the Samaritans switchboard when Take That split up, but Justine had survived puberty indifferent to their chest hair-free charms.  Whereas she didn’t leave her room for three days when Geri Halliwell quit the Spice Girls.  She’d even taken time off school, despite the proximity of her GCSEs (not that absence had done much harm – Justine being even less academic than Faith).

They were never quite the same after Geri left.  A nostalgic tear dribbled into the bubbles.  Justine was a girl of inconsistent emotions; who could be a stoic rock to family and friends after relatives’ deaths, yet become waterlogged with tears at a soppy film, or the chipping of a nail, or in this case the disintegration of a pop group.

My career, on the other hand, is just beginning, she thought, and her mood suddenly lightened as though controlled by a dimmer switch.  Her days as ‘just a barmaid’ were over – or they would be when Dad’s licence was granted.  She would be able to add ‘entertainments manager’ to her somewhat piteous CV – OK, so all she’d be ‘managing’ were a few karaoke contests in the family pub, but everyone exaggerated when they went for jobs, didn’t they?

She closed her eyes and lolled deeper into the sensuous water, visualising her pigtailed self on stage in the Hare & Tortoise.  It wasn’t the loftiest ambition, granted, but then it was only the start.  In a few years time, her stage would be Wembley.  Possibly.  Or maybe she’d have a TV career instead?

Yeah, she could become a Pop Idol judge, like Geri herself.  She’d be The Nice One.  The one who’d tell all the kids they were going to be megastars, even if they sang like mutilated parrots, and be cheered while Mr Sneery Big Trousers Simon Cowell was hissed like a panto baddie.

There was little of the diva in Justine.  ‘Wealth and celebrity will never make me arrogant,’ she would idealistically swear.  She had always been affable and popular, and wished to remain that way.

‘That was a truly bostin’ performance,’ she’d tell the would-be pop idols, in her broad Wolverhampton brogue – in itself such a rarity on TV as to automatically qualify her as a quirky media ‘character.’

The once gawky busker would be gowned in Gucci, attend premieres, and present awards at the Brits.  And be photographed slinking out of limos, then parading elegantly along red carpets, on the arm of a guy who looked just like the one tattooed on her arm.  The real thing was out of bounds, obviously – Justine would never muscle in on an idol’s man – though she hoped he might feel just a teeny bit flattered that bubbly little Justine Oliver admired him enough to have his likeness scored into her skin with a big buzzy needle.

She wanted to do I’m a Celebrity – Get Me Out of Here, and Celebrity Fame Academy in aid of Comic Relief.  She wanted to have her own column in OK magazine, and be one of those talking heads who get wheeled out for Channel 4’s plethora of 100 Greatest… shows.  She liked the idea of her opinions and memories being important enough to be sought for such a nostalgia marathon. 

And in years to come, wobbly camcorder footage of herself belting her little lungs out in school concerts would surface on Before They Were Famous.

And when Frank Skinner – that other Black Country kid made good – interviewed Justine on his chat show, she would beam all cutely and engage him with the tale of how her stellar career was born in her old man’s backstreet bar.

She’d use her celebrity to help the family too, though.

‘I hear you’re a twin?’ Frank would say.

‘Yeah – and my brother, Joe, is a fantastically talented DJ.  Please give him a job – someone!’  Radio 1 would be on the phone next morning, and Joe’s career would rocket too, thanks to his caring, sharing sister.

The world is my oyster, she thought, crossing one doll-length leg over the other and flopping bubbles off the end of her toe, in what she imagined to be an actressy way.

Talking of oysters, they were what she would dine on when she was famous.

No, hang on, she didn’t like oysters, did she?  That’s right, she’d tried them once, at a New Year’s Eve party, and they made her a bit squeamish, with their slimy, salty taste (not unlike some of the men she’d been with).

And in fact ‘squeamish’ was an understatement – it was more like violently, kaleidoscopically ill.  Yeuch, no!  Oysters were out then.  She couldn’t run the risk of decorating posh hotel toilets in hues of barf.  She’d just have to dine on – what was that other thing rich people ate? – caviar, that was it!  And sip Champagne of course.  Wonder if you could mix it with Tia Maria?

A knock and a holler intruded on her daydream.

‘Justine!’

‘Hi Mom!’

‘You gunna be much longer?  I need a shower ’fore I start the evening stint.’

‘OK.  Won’t be a minute.’

Justine lobbed her book across the floor, seized the soap for the first time and made a token effort at washing in the now tepid, skin-puckering water.  She wouldn’t always have her mother rapping on the bathroom door.  One day she would be blasted with Jacuzzi jets in her own lavish suite.  With a power shower, and fluffy ivory carpet, and an oiled-up hunk of a butler feeding her grapes, and – ’

‘Justine – come on!’

‘All right, Mom!’

She snuffed out the vanilla scented candle and testily heaved herself out of the water, back into reality.  Catching her glowing reflection in the cabinet mirror, she smiled wryly, proposing an imaginary toast to her future.

‘Today Wolverhampton – tomorrow the world!’