Ok, saw a post by @hernameslucy, and it activated alll the Kipps brainworms. Turns out that I have a loooot of thoughts about the idea that Kipps had a relationship with the Lockwoods/Jessica and at least in part blamed Lockwood for Jessica's death. I find it compelling, but also when you draw out all of the implications it is so incredibly, utterly devastating. Anyway here's my very long analysis of how the Lockwood and Kipps rivalry might have come about (in addition to the cannon poke to the bum with a fencing foil...). After Jessica's death, I could see Kipps in the moment as a grieving teenager blaming Lockwood, and that would be painful for Lockwood on multiple levels. He’s losing out on whatever support Kipps might have offered him otherwise, and it reinforces Lockwood’s own shame around his culpability in Jessica's death. That brings this really complicated edge to Lockwood’s feelings towards Kipps because you have both a very real and very deep grievance (he would be very rightfully angry at Kipps for blaming him for something that really wasn't in his control) and also a reminder of his biggest regret (not being present when Jessica broke the vase).
This second point is where you have Lockwood projecting some of his own emotions onto Kipps. At the beginning of the series Lockwood does blame himself, and he's also very much running away from that feeling. When he finally shows Jessica's room to Lucy and George he lies about where exactly he was at the time because he's not ready to confront that shame, and there's likely a small part of him that is convinced that they will blame him as well (since there's a part of him that believes they rightfully should). Before Lockwood tells Lucy his full account of the day and in part acknowledges his own feelings of culpability, he's still very much trying to bury and push away those emotions. If Kipps really did blame him, that would make Kipps a very difficult person to be around because his very presence reminds Lockwood of the shame he's been avoiding.
On top of that, I think at that point in Lockwood's emotional arc there's likely a part of him that sees Kipps as the person that has the most clear-eyed view of him. The fact that Lockwood blames himself for Jessica's death and has acknowledged that fact to no-one would likely leave him with this feeling that he's actually lying to the important people in his life (among other things, this is supported in the show by Lockwood's line to Lucy that "there are things that I haven't told you about myself that are probably for your own good").
With Kipps being the only person who knows what Lockwood believes to be a terrible truth about himself, he could very easily become a place for Lockwood to externalize his own shame. Any attempts to prove Kipps wrong could be read as just as much an attempt to prove wrong his own worst judgments of himself. As for Kipps, I think an initial response of anger towards Lockwood is difficult to take but understandable. What's harder for me to reconcile is that over the years Kipps would continue to hold onto the belief that Lockwood really was at fault for Jessica's death. He's enough older that I think after the initial intensity of the grief passed, he would likely feel a bit ashamed for having blamed a child for something so clearly out of their control. As for why he would continue to antagonize Lockwood years later, I can think of a few possibilities.
The saddest of them is that he simply allowed his shame to curdle. Instead of acknowledging his fault, he doubled down on externalizing his emotions onto Lockwood. Clearly Lockwood had to be at fault because otherwise Kipps would need to fully acknowledge what he had done in placing the weight of blame onto a grieving child. I don't like this explanation as much because 1. I think Kipps is more compassionate than that even from the beginning (we stan one (1) Quill Kipps in this house) and 2. I don't think that this is a kind of hurt that could just be gradually smoothed over without some kind of reckoning between the two of them.
I think what's more likely is that sometime before the events of the series, Kipps did try to repair his wrong and Lockwood lashed out at him. Again, I think that Kipps would still be in the wrong in this situation both as the older of the two and as the party that added insult to injury. However, Kipps is also still a grieving teenager too, and in this instance he's coming to Lockwood with some vulnerability, admitting wrong and also likely seeking out company and commiseration in his grief. He's doing a difficult thing while also nursing his own grief, and he's met with coldness and anger. That would be hard to take.
This kind of hurt I could see slowly fading over time as they develop a relationship, since it places them on something closer to level footing. I still think they would have to acknowledge it at some point, but it also seems possible that that's just something Lucy was never privy to.
