Writing for Fun
April 2016
Vengeance - Diane Silverston
[Part 1 - to be continued in May]
'Vengeance will be mine,' said Jon in such a sinister voice and with an angry look on his face, that the group of people with him felt a sudden chill go down their spines. They had never seen him like this before. 'I'll get them back. They won't know what's hit them,' he continued, 'they can't be allowed to get away with this.'
There was a strange silence as he finished. Everyone was looking down, not daring to make eye contact with him or any of the others. They had nothing to say. What could they say? Nothing would appease him. He had made up his mind and nothing would make him change it.
This much they did know about him. Once you had irritated him nothing could rectify it, and this time he was not just irritated, he was furious.
'How dare they?! What right had they? It's unbelievable that they thought there wouldn't be any comeback, no retribution.' His rant continued.
Still no comments, no eye contact, no movements from the others.
'You say nothing! You must agree, you must feel it too? It has affected you as well. Our lives have been changed for ever because of them. You must feel something?'
Still no answers, no movement.
'I don't believe you are just going to sit there and accept what has happened without making any comment about this situation and what should be done.' Jon walked to the French doors, opened them, moved onto the balcony and stood looking at the neighbouring gardens.
Now the others started to fidget nervously, glimpsing at each other and occasionally towards the doors, where the figure of Jon was being surrounded by the darkening sky as evening fell.
Quite early the next morning the group of five were sitting there once again, nervously waiting for Jon to join them. It seemed strange, there had always been seven. Patrick's chair by the fireside seemed to be accusing them. Why was it empty? Where was Patrick? He wasn't there, and would never be there again. That was the nub of the situation. Patrick would never be there again. He was lost forever.
The door slammed and heavy footsteps were heading towards the room.
'Well?' shouted Jon, 'have you decided? Are you going to join me? Or are you just going to sit there and mope?'
'What are you thinking of doing?' Kit asked almost in a whisper. The others leant forward to hear Jon's reply.
'Do? Do? I'm going to do to them what they have done to us. I'm going to change their lives forever.'
'How?' muttered Kit.
'They took Patrick. I'm going to take one of theirs. They started the fight, I'm going to finish it. They knifed Patrick and left him dying, so the same will happen to one of them.'
'But I don't see that will help, it won't bring Pat back, nothing will bring him back.' Peter almost cried as he spluttered it out.
'And won't it just escalate? We knife one of them and they will retaliate, and so on,' David, the youngest of the group, managed to say.
Charlie butted in, 'Patrick had been spoiling for a fight for weeks. He'd been pushing and pushing with his comments.'
'Are you saying that what they did was right?' shouted Jon. 'That we do nothing. Let them think they have got away with it. That we're scared! No way!'
'I'm not saying that,' Charlie went on, ' but I don't see how this will solve the situation.'
'It won't,' the quiet voice of Don, the eldest, came across. 'Calm down all of you. The best way to get retribution is to do it the legal way. We know who did it. We report it to the police. Let them deal with it.'
'The police?!' Jon couldn't believe what he was hearing. 'Us go to the police? What will everyone think and say?'
'That we have done things correctly. Perhaps that we are thinking straight and growing up at last,' suggested Don. 'It will be the last thing that gang will expect. We'll get them back. Vengeance will be ours.'