A second opinion

A celebrity criminal appearing in pantomine is about to recieve a piece of Barbara's mind, yet she's never met him before.

I can't believe the cheek of him, bold as anything, staring out at me with his stupid face. Well, there's no way I'm putting up with this. No way. I've never liked him, never trusted him. He's smarmy and sly, and now here he is, a face on a poster outside the small Shaftsbury theatre, in the town where I live. He's appearing in a pantomime in a kids play for God's sake. This man killed an old woman in a drunken hit and run recently, and now he comes swanning into town as if nothing happened.

Unsurprisingly, he got away with it. Bleeding law and order, what a joke. Well, when I say got away with it, a hundred pounds fine and fifty hours community service. That, to me, is getting away with it. It's probably because he admitted everything in court, and the judge must have felt sorry for him. Well now he's going to face my judgement. I certainly won't let him off. He'll get what for. I may be a 65 year old pensioner, but I can still pack a punch. It doesn't matter that he, Jeff Duncan, is a 37 year old mechanic, and, it pains me to say it, quite a dish. The fact is, it says a lot about the justice system when they let criminals of the hook with barely a tap on the wrist. What use is the law if they only add to the victims pain by letting the guilty walk free, laughing from court?

Now he’ll be swanning around the stage without a care in the world, knowing the police can’t touch him unless he commits another crime. Yet, I don’t suppose he has much of a conscience. The woman’s barely in her grave and he’s gonna be laughing and joking with kids. Well he won’t be joking with me. Certainly not. I’m gonna wait at the stage door, and I’m going to throw flour at him. Maybe that’s immature for me, Harriet Montague, pillar of the community, and I should know better, but sometimes, talking can take a back seat, and violence can settle things quicker and easier, so I feel I’m justified, and what he did, hit and run and being drunk at the wheel, well, I think that might be quite lenient. So maybe I’ll mix it with eggs and pour the lot over him, and then give him a piece of my mind.

Either way, I’ll not let him get away with what he did. He’s always been a bit of a rogue, but it’s time someone taught him a lesson. I ought to go to this play, and stand up halfway through, maybe during a quiet part when he’s on stage and shout at him then. ‘Bleedin’ murderer,’ I would shout, but I won’t do that. I can’t spoil the kids fun, that wouldn’t be fair, so I’ll wait.

Normally I wouldn’t be out on a cold dark night, down a side street, waiting for somebody, but he’s got me so incensed, I couldn’t waste this opportunity to tell him what I really think. Thing is though, there are a couple of other people waiting at the door. Autograph hunters I think. Although why they would want his autograph I don’t know. If I waited there, then I know I’d give him a belt, so when he walks away, I’ll get him then.

I didn’t go with eggs and flour, instead, my walking stick, which I don’t really use that often, will be getting cracked over his head. After a while, he came out, and suddenly I felt all nervous. I don’t know why, but then I thought of what he’d done. I’m willing to forget some of the other things he’s done, but not this. After he’d signed his autographs and chatted with whoever they were, he walked away along the side street, I’m guessing, towards the cheap hotel just behind the theatre. This’ll be my only chance to get him alone, so I rush along the pavement after him, and catch him halfway across the road.

"Oy, you Jeff!" I shout, smacking the back of his head with my stick. He cried aloud and spun around.

"Ow, what the…? What was that for?"

"You know bloody well what that was for. Bleedin’ murderer, getting’ away with it like that". I went to hit him again, but he quickly stepped back.

"Bloody Jeff" the man said. "I’m never going to get rid of him, am I? You’re not the first to attack me, you know, you bloody idiot. I don’t know how many times I’ve got to say it, but Jeff, that’s right, Jeff, understand? Is a character I play in a soap opera. The court case isn’t real. I didn’t kill anyone. Why do people think they know me? My real name is Keith Perry, do you understand?"

"Don’t you speak to me like a child," I said, watching as he turned to walk away. I walked after him and grabbed his arm.

"Don’t you walk away from me". He turned, grabbed me, his face red with anger, and pushed me back into the road where I collapsed to the floor, and see a vehicle rushing at me.

Well then, that’s that. I’ve done it now. I’ve done it for real. I’ve killed an old woman. The bus has screeched to a halt, and I see the remains of her streaked across the road, bits of her blood on my trousers, and three gawping witnesses. I turned, and walked across into my hotel, and am soon closing the door behind me. I walked straight into the bathroom and switched on the light. I picked up a razor and break the small plastic casing of a blade. I stared at myself in the mirror.

"Well, I’m never gonna get rid of you, Jeff, am I?" I said, drawing the blade across my throat.