How I went to jail

Billy the parrot started going crazy when I walked through the back door at six thirty pm from my job as a welder. He climbed around his cage, did spins around his perch, and whistled at me.
“Bobby, let me out! Bobby, let me out,” he squawked.
I opened the cage and Billy flew out and headed straight to the cats bowl, took a few biscuits and settled on the arm of the old black leather settee to eat. 
My wife Karin came in, gave me a peck on the cheek, and looked at Billy with disgust. She was gorgeous. Curly blonde hair, bright blue eyes, and a smile that could melt your heart. 

 She and her parents were from a more upper class family than mine, whereas I grew up on council estates, and so her parents weren’t too happy when we started dating and even less so when we got married. They tolerated me for their daughters sake even though I’d never given them reason to dislike me. I’ve never been in trouble with the law, always worked, always had money, and always looked after her. 
“How was your first day?” I asked. 
Karin had started her new job as a receptionist at a Solicitors in town. She looked real good in her business suit. I loved the way her trousers clung to her body and accentuated every curve, I could barely take my eyes off her.
“Fine. It was great, in fact. I met some lovely people and I finally came up with the identity of the person that I always said you reminded me off but could never remember,” she replied with much enthusiasm. 
“Oh yeah. Who’s that then?”
“Actually, it was Grace who said it. I put our wedding photo on my desk when I was unpacking, and she remarked at your uncanny resemblance to Peter Sutcliffe.”
“The Yorkshire Ripper?” I snorted. “Bloody cheek!”
The those of you who don’t know who that is, well he was a serial killer of women, mostly prostitutes up in Yorkshire in the north of England in the mid seventies to early eighties. He was likened to the famous Jack the Ripper of London for the way he killed, and the similarity of his victim’s chosen professions. His hair was a dark brown mass of wild curls, chocolate brown eyes, and a dark complexion, very much Arabian looking. Topped off with a full beard and moustache, he was another version of the wild man of Borneo. Admittedly there was no denying it, we could have been separated at birth.
I made a grab for her waist to pull her towards me for a kiss and a cuddle. 
“Get your grubby hands off me,” she laughed brushing me off.
“Oh c’mon. I’ve missed you today,” I said attempting to grab her again.
“You’re not coming anywhere near me until you’ve had a bath, so forget trying to sweet talk me,” she replied.
“Spoil sport,” I chuckled back at her with a wink.
“There’s some food in the oven and I’ve ran the bath for you. I’m going upstairs to put a mud pack on and paint my nails.” 
“Thanks darling, I think I’ll have a bath first. I feel filthy as hell.” I replied. 
“Well, maybe after that bath you can show me how filthy you feel,” she teased walking past me to the stairs, purposely walking in a way her ass swayed seductively from side to side. I playfully smacked her pert bottom and she screamed, and tried to race up them as quick as she could, which wasn’t very fast as the stairs were so steep we had to install a rope bannister to pull yourself up with. She shouted obscenities at me all the way up. 
We lived in a huge house on the platform of a train station. The house was very much like the one in the film The Addams Family. All five of the en-suite bedrooms were huge and every room had high ceilings. Family and friends often commented that we had the decor to match. 

I was a hoarder, a collector of strange artefacts, ornaments, rugs, anything that caught my eye when we were on our travels. We decided long ago that we wouldn’t start a family. It’s not that we couldn’t, we just thought about the expense of it all, and thought we’d use the money to see as many wonders of the world as possible in our lifetime. We’d been together for fifteen years now and had been to every continent more than once, sometimes even taking three holidays a year. My favourite place to visit was Africa. I loved the people, the whole culture, but most of all the tribal masks and spears which adorned most of the walls throughout the house. 
I ambled to the fridge for a beer. Today had been a long day and I was shattered. The thought of a long soak in the tub with a cold bottle spurred me up the stairs and into the bathroom where I stripped off and climbed into the almost overflowing bath of bubbles. I let my body relax and lay back with a sigh. Karin flicked the stereo on in the bedroom and the soothing sounds of Marvin Gaye wafted across the landing. I laughed to myself as I heard Karin warbling along to the music, making up her own words as she forgot some of them. I really loved that woman but she had a terrible singing voice. Billy flew into the bathroom and sat on the cold tap, he’d learnt over the three years we’d had him which one didn’t burn his tiny feet. 
“Who’s a clever boy then?” I said to him. 
He turned his back on me, then a couple of anal raisins plopped into the bath.
“Eww! You dirty little bugger!” I laughed.
I didn’t mind though. After all, it wasn’t going to kill me was it?

The broadcaster introduced the next song and a put my head back and shut my eyes. How long I’d been asleep for I don’t know but Karin was shaking me awake.
“I can hear noises downstairs, it sounds like there’s someone down there,” she whispered.
The area we lived wasn’t too bad but recently they’d been a lot of break ins by heroin addicts looking for things to sell for their next fix. It was unlikely though, the police station was only in the next street. Sometimes friends or family would turn up unannounced and just let themselves in through the backdoor, it was probably them.
“I’ll go check it out. Go back in the bedroom,” I whispered back.
“Be careful,” she said disappearing as she closed the bedroom door.
I got out the bath and grabbed a small towel off the radiator and wrapped it around the bottom half of my body. I walked out of the bathroom and across the landing to the top of the stairs. 
“What the fuck are you doing in my house!” I yelled at the two hooded figures who were halfway up the stairs. They looked at each other in total shock, then fell over each other as they tried to retreat back down.
“Karin, ring the police!” I shouted as loud as I could.
I grabbed a spear of the wall and continued shouting at them to get out. Karin appeared with the phone held to her ear waiting for them to pick up. I was so mad that these little shits had walked into our house to take our things that we’d worked hard to pay for. The two burglars picked themselves up from the bottom of the stairs where they landed in a heap and one turned, and threw a miniature baseball bat which struck me on the shin. 
“You little bastard!” I screamed at them and shot down the stairs. 
They went for the backdoor, I bounded down the stairs and picked up the bat as they ran into the garden. I followed them out and launched the bat and hit one of them in the small of his back. My towel slipped off as he dropped to the floor in agony, and I was on him like a flash. I kicked him several times in the face and stomach with my bare feet, not realising at the time because of my anger and fury that I’d broken three of my toes. His mate was panicked, he couldn’t find the gate to get out of the six foot fence surrounding the house. 
“I’m gonna teach you a lesson you little shit,” I told him.
He too had a baseball bat and was now swinging it from one hand to the other.
“Bring it on you old bastard,” he yelled back. 
His hood had dropped off and I could see he wasn’t very old, eighteen or so. Even in the fading light I could see his front teeth were missing and his eyes were sunk and dark and his skin looked grey. Definitely a heroin addict. He swung the bat at me and I jabbed at him with the spear. I didn’t want to stab him just scare him off, but fair play he wasn’t gonna leave his mate behind or back down. I spun the spear around and hit him cross the legs and his back with the wooden pole keeping him at a distance. His mate started groaning and moaning as he regained consciousness so I gave him a couple of whacks across his legs and back as he was getting up. 
I saw the blue lights first, then the whoop of the sirens as the police pulled up outside. The young lad ran to the far side of the garden where the train tracks were, and threw his bat as far as he could into the overgrown hedges up alongside it. Two policemen and one woman burst threw the back gate and saw a naked Peter Sutcliffe lookalike in an aggressive mood wielding a six foot spear. Two young lads were cowering in the corner of the garden crying and screaming that I was a madman, and that they’d only come into the garden to retrieve their football, which incidentally they never found. 
The policeman produced their batons and CS spray and ordered me to drop my weapon, turnaround, and kneel on the floor with my hands behind my head. I obliged. Karin had now come out into the garden and was going crazy at the police. She was half trying to tell them what happened and half trying to fight the police to get them to release me. She didn’t help, and promptly got herself arrested for assaulting a policeman. The police radioed for back up and another car arrived and took the two young lads away for questioning. I was released from my handcuffs to get some clothes after promising not to cause any trouble, then my wife and I were taken around the corner to find out what the hell had gone on. 
The two lads were known to the police, they were seventeen but looked older. They got away with a caution, due to the fact that they didn’t break into my house as it was unlocked already and didn’t actually steal anything. They totally dismissed the fact that they were both armed with baseball bats as they could only find one and said it was mine. We ended up in court despite us telling the truth of what happened that night. My wife was bound over to keep the police and fined three hundred and fifty pounds for giving a policeman a black eye and a fat lip. I however wasn’t so lucky. I was sent to jail for two years for assault with a weapon, indecent exposure, assaulting a minor, and a few other bullshit charges. I was lucky that’s all I got. They wanted to put me on the sex offenders register because of my nakedness, what a bloody joke, but that got thrown out. 
Anyway, that was a few years ago now and I’ve done my time, and I’ve been back to Africa. Next time someone comes to my house and attempts to take my things, the first thing I’ll do is ring the police. The second thing is, I’ll get my new collection of voodoo dolls and make sure the little shits will suffer for the rest of their days.