Him & Her

In the Series 3 final episode of the brilliant BBC3 sitcom “Him & Her”, Steve has planned an elaborate proposal to Becky, the culmination of the whole series. (Perhaps of all three series, since it has always been abundantly clear that couple, though they have absolutely nothing going for them, they are 100% in love.)

Of course everything goes wrong, as usual, mostly because of Becky’s dreadful sister Laura (easily the most appalling TV character since Jill in Nighty Night, though not quite as evil).

Eventually, as Becky is storming out “for a walk” Steve has to come clean and reveal his special “Will You Marry Me?” T shirt in the least romantic circumstances. Then she makes him go through his programme: the carefully written speech, the ring, the pre-made cardboard decision boxes, the helium balloons printed with their faces. In the most touching of scenes he says how proud it would make him to call her his wife and turns around to show the question “What d’you think?” on the back of his T-shirt. Becky, of course, says “Of course I’ll marry you, you silly prick”.

As the credits roll, C comments “See what you missed out on”.

And she’s right. She deserved the full romantic treatment rather than “I want to get married as soon as we get away from this place” (i.e. Norton, East Yorks).  I guess at that time I didn’t see the point of asking a question to which we both knew the answer already.

I was desperate to be with this wonderful person as soon as possible but of course had no money or job and came up with the idea of doing voluntary work as near to where C was studying as possible. Which was how we ended up getting married in Burton on Trent.

In every sense, meeting C was a turning point for me. Before her there wasn’t any direction beyond finishing my degree course. After, there was every reason to get a job so we’d have somewhere to live and be together. Because of C I learned to be a vaguely sociable, to pretend to be confident, to grow up. I owe everything to her friendship, support and love. (Well maybe not my filthy sense of humour.) My favourite time of the day is waking up next to her. I believe in her.

(I wonder if Steve and Becky will now get jobs so they can do stuff like holidays together? Probably not, as some of the humour would be gone.)