Flash, bang, miss ... Bloody Idiot

Below was my entry to the Flashbang writing challenge - 150 word or less crime story.  The long list was announced yesterday and I didn't make the last 25.  No great surprise - I got hung up on playing with the form (two sections, four paragraphs each, first and last lines echoing) rather than the story.  


Bloody Idiot

An idiot.  He’d been made to look an idiot. 

Well he’d have his revenge.  Rolly Thompson was a dead man walking.  Assuming he took the usual route home from the pub. 

His wiped his sweating palms on his jeans, felt his stomach knot and twist. 

A swaying figure came into view.  His fingers flexed on the knife handle, trying to get a comfortable grip as he prepared to launch himself out from behind the bushes.

***

Barry Halpin stared at the bathroom mirror.  The man staring back looked defeated; pasty skin, black bags under bloodshot eyes. 

Revenge had seemed a good idea with a skinful of beer and whisky chasers.  It had lost its appeal the second he tasted the blood spurting from Rolly’s neck.

There was a crash downstairs, the cry of ‘Police!’ and the thump of heavy boots on stairs. 

An idiot.  He’d been a bloody idiot.