Celebrity Killer

By Paul Wilkins

When a killer begins targeting Celebrities the whole of the Celebrity media world goes into meltdown. With every Celebrity refusing to do any media exposure that might attract the killer, ‘Spectacle’ magazine is struggling for survival. Jimmy Churchill their hot low-life journo-hack concerned for his fast diminishing career decides to attempt to do what the Police force are struggling to do, and find the killer himself. He dives head first into the murky world of Vanity, Ego and paranoia whilst the killer begins to step up his campaign.
This is a high octane comedy crime caper that explores the crazy world of celebrity and ultimately begs the question - what does a Celebrity killer do when he becomes a Celebrity?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Paul Wilkins
• Release date: Jun 13, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310263095

Paul Wilkins

Paul has been writing, producing and directing his own award winning shorts, commercials and feature films for over ten years.He has written commissioned work for TV and wrote, directed and co-produced his first feature film ‘7lives’ which has been sold throughout the world. His second feature film which he has co-written and will be directing is called ‘The Ghost Writer’ and is currently in pre-production.Celebrity Killer is his first novel and he is currently co-writing the screenplay for the feature film adaptation.

Book preview

CELEBRITY

KILLER

By Paul Wilkins

COPYRIGHT

Celebrity Killer

Authored by Paul Wilkins

Copyright © 2015 Starfish Films

A Smashwords Edition.

All rights reserved.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Paul has been writing, producing and directing his own award winning shorts, commercials and feature films for over ten years.

He has written commissioned work for TV and wrote, directed and co-produced his first feature film ‘7lives’ which has been sold throughout the world. His second feature film which he has co-written and will be directing is called ‘The Ghost Writer’ and is currently in pre-production.

Celebrity Killer is his first novel and he is currently co-writing the screenplay for the feature film adaptation with the writer Dieter Fuchs.

Contents

TITLE

COPYRIGHT

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

PROLOGUE

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

NINE

TEN

ELEVEN

TWELVE

THIRTEEN

FOURTEEN

FIFTEEN

SIXTEEN

EPILOGUE

PROLOGUE

Jimmy had given up on anything exciting happening in his life; that was for those far less ordinary than him. He had little experience of life’s propensity for serendipity. Surprises were things that happened to other people and the few that had ambushed him in the course of his life had not been of the welcome variety. Like most people, he was too busy just trying to get by and make it through the day, pay the rent and maybe have a holiday once in a while. A long weekend in the shed would be nice, he often thought. It was only occasionally that he considered what extraordinary lives he was exposed to almost everyday, but he never thought for a moment that, one day, he too could be like the people that led them.

He pushed the Dictaphone closer towards the man’s mouth and asked another inane question, not thinking twice whether it actually deserved an answer or not.

Moments later, a black limousine screeched to a halt and a celebrity magazine, known as Spectacle, was thrown out the door, closely followed by Jimmy, who yelled out in vain.

‘Wait until my mother hears about this!’

He raised his head from the pavement as the car screeched away and the shrill of a sniper’s bullet sailed past his left ear and ricocheted off the road, just behind the receding car. Jimmy slammed a hand to his ear muttering to himself, not realising how close he’d come to checking out of this world.

‘Damn flies.’

The bullet was not intended for him. Twenty minutes down the road, the limo pulled up at the traffic lights and a roadside window cleaner, pounced. The chauffeur remonstrated, indicating he didn’t require such services, but after winding down his window, he got sprayed in the face, and it wasn’t H20. Jake Vision, ex-city window cleaning magnate, turned TV soap star, was dragged from the back seat and beaten with the very instrument that sparked his rise to riches and fame. It was curtains for his windows.

Jimmy walked along aimlessly, unaware of the fate that had befallen his recent interviewee. He turned to his Dictaphone, still held fast in his hand, and clicked rewind as he staggered off following the magazine, which blew back across the road ahead of him. His mind wandered, he realised his life had been full of things that he had chased and never caught. His life was passing him by, floating away in the wind and that was why he was still a low-life celebrity hack at the gutter rag Spectacle, he told himself. He had a PhD in Social Sciences, but those particular grey cells were rarely called upon these days. He was an overachiever, who had become adept at under achieving and somehow his mind had become slowly retuned and was now only fit for the gathering of the dainty titbits of the rich and famous. He felt like he had a permanent headache. The job was only supposed to pay his way through university but he had kept falling deeper into it, until he couldn’t remember how to get back to whatever it was he was really supposed to do. There had also been student debts to pay off and ten years later he was still paying. The money kept getting better, the parties kept on calling and his chance of actually meeting a girl seemed, at least in principle, to be increasing. Lately though, he’d had terrible flashbacks of a boy he used to know, with a brain and a determination to bring some value to his life. ‘One day, I’m going to help make the world a better place’, he mused. His name was Churchill. Jimmy Churchill.

His head throbbed as he listened to his recorded voice crackling from his hand whilst his eyes tracked the magazine, which continued to fly away from him.

‘Have you ever wondered what it might be like, to be a window cleaner again? You know, to be normal again?’

A voice screamed back through the Dictaphone, ‘I am freaking normal!’

Jimmy clicked off the machine and chased the wind that propelled the Spectacle magazine down a dark cul-de-sac. He watched as a cat sailed high, almost crossing paths with the magazine in mid-air.

Hesitating, and by force of habit, he quickly polished a badge pinned to his jacket, with his wet forefinger. It read: ‘My mum is dead.’

He raced to the cat’s rescue but recoiled in horror as he witnessed the source of the feline’s woes. A group of five teenage boys reached for the plummeting cat, and tossed it once more into the clouds.

Jimmy glanced at his badge again, bringing his lips to meet it, then advanced with trepidation towards the feral boys, stabbing his finger towards them as though hailing a taxi.

‘Hey, stop, you’ll hurt it.’

A boy, twelveish going on twenty, swivelled around and stopped Jimmy dead in his tracks with his red laser-beam eyes. He demanded to know who Jimmy was, in a tone that indicated that the answer would be irrelevant, much like a murderer might ask his victim, as a reference for a later diary entry.

His friend a ten-year-old social terrorist joined the chorus, snarling like a cornered snake,

‘Yeah, who are you?’

More cubs materialised, like your most embarrassing moment forming right before your eyes. Jimmy started to back off.

‘Listen, you’ve got to respect the animals, kids, I mean, just think if it was you?’

The first kid barked back, ‘Just think if it was YOU!’ and the rest of the gang descended on him like ants around an ice-cream cone. Jimmy fell back, shielding his face from the impending blows

‘Come on, kids, no one wants to get hurt right?’

The kids gathered around him and Jimmy could only think of the worst punch line imaginable and the joke was falling on him. Grabbing his arms and legs they tossed him high into the air.

‘I’m flying,’ he thought, ‘and there’s no one to catch me…’

ONE

A rock star swaggered out of a trendy hotel as paparazzi shot him with flash bulbs. He yelled at nobody in particular, the venom in his voice trailing like spit:

‘He hasn’t got the balls! I’m the hardest celebrity going!’ He then stabbed one finger in the air before escaping in a long black limousine.

Same time, in another swanky part of the city, a beautiful model in a garish yellow tracksuit jogged towards flashing cameras before hesitating. Pulling on her shades, she spun around and long-legged it in the other direction only to be cornered by another pack of flash bulbs. Shielding her eyes with one hand, she shovelled the ‘V’ sign up her nose with the other.

Dwight Bond, super cool and unhinged host of the celebrity show Helter Skelter, commented on the aforementioned footage flickering from the in-house TV screen, as the studio audience whistled and cheered.

‘There we have it folks, we’ve reached a new peak in celebrityville and it looks like only those with the biggest balls are gonna carry on bouncing!’

His busty chat show guest, Kelly Rivers, belly laughed, squelching out her words, ‘As if being a celebrity isn’t bad enough?’ before she tumbled backwards over her chair onto the floor, doubling up in laughter.

Jimmy Churchill was slumped on the sofa at home, which was slowly ingesting him like a boa constrictor. He sat solemnly watching Dwight’s TV show, sporting a black eye and a plaster on his nose. His very large mother, Beverley, was parked by his side, laughing at the television like a rabid dog. She was a proud mother but would have been prouder, if Jimmy had been a celebrity himself rather than a bottom feeder of the stars. She wasn’t a fan of bottom feeders. She prayed that her little boy would be a star himself one day. It only took a little bit of talent, she thought, and sometimes not even that. If celebrity was a meal, she gorged on it day and night until the blood ran down her face. Her ample figure was fed on celebrity chef Wayne King’s microwave munchies and when she wasn’t scouring the latest edition of Spectacle magazine, her mind was satisfying its penchant for gory horror movies. This imposing package was topped off with a pair of unusually large and dangerous hands.

‘I don’t know, Jimmy, why don’t you ever stick up for yourself?’

‘Mum… there were hundreds of them, they came out of nowhere, some like fully grown men, I’d like to see what you would have done!’

He looked hard at her very large hands and wondered. He wanted to please his mum, but, where his relationship with celebrity was ambivalent, she adored it. He respected its ability to enable him to earn a living, but detested the often sugar coated shallowness of the subject matter, which she licked clean, like cream off her spoon. It helps her relax, he reminded himself, and what’s wrong with that? He didn’t want anyone killed though, not like the killer, who was intent on mowing down any celebrity that took his fancy. That is what killers do though, he thought to himself, as he glanced at his mother again, turning his nose up, which sent a thunderbolt of pain down his whole body. He often misconstrued Beverly’s ambition for him as blatant disappointment and he was desperate for her to be proud of him, but he had resigned himself long ago to the simple fact that they just saw the world differently. He also had much smaller hands.

‘I mean, kids? Don’t you have any self-respect?’

Beverly became distracted, once again, by the flickering light in the corner.

‘ Oh, he’s so funny don’t you think?’

‘Probably the funniest man alive,’ snapped Jimmy, sarcastically.

He felt embarrassed about his mother’s ridiculous crushes.

‘That’s the fifth boob job she’s had, no wonder she keeps toppling over.’

Jimmy pulled his bum out of the crease in the sofa – he was certain it had bitten him.

‘Why do you watch this crap, Mum?’

She snapped back at him, ungrateful for the intrusion.

‘It’s educational Jimmy, don’t you want to know who’s doing the killings?’

‘Mum, this is not Crimewatch! It’s a show about bouncing boobs.’

He was too late; Beverly had already been sucked back into the television set as a roaming reporter interviewed a goatee-bearded trendy:

‘Do you buy Spectacle magazine?’

The wannabe bohemian looked around nervously as though he’d just been found guilty of a heinous crime. He explained that he didn’t and then backtracked, adding that he might occasionally, only if his girlfriend bought it.

The microphone was shoved under his nose. The reporter admonished him again, trying to infer that he was somehow implicated in the murders by the act of purchasing the magazine and increasing its sales. He backed away, his hands aloft in defence.

‘What’s it got to do with me?’

He turned and ran for his life and the image dissolved into a teenage girl shopper struggling to push a trolley full of shopping bags – Spectacle magazine was shoved in her face and the accusatory voice of the reporter once again bellowed:

‘Do you read this magazine?’

She pulled her shopping trolley back, using it as a shield to hide behind, and shouted out that it wasn’t her fault.

The screen dissolved again and Jimmy found himself hypnotised by what he was seeing, as though some unseen conjurer were pulling him further and further inside the TV box. The insinuation that the magazine he worked for was partly responsible for the murders was ridiculous, but he thought they were doing a pretty good job of proving otherwise. Maybe we will all go to jail, he mused, that would be one way of changing career direction. He glanced at his mother’s eyes and observed how the images from the TV screen flickered over them, like an alien invasion.

‘She’s a believer,’ he thought.

She flicked her head at him as though ticking him off for breaking her concentration and he turned again towards the action on the screen, considering just how much time he and his mother spent inside this ‘box’ as opposed to inside their own lives. It’s too late, he thought, we’ve been taken over.

A black, media trendy ran down the street with the Spectacle magazine tucked under his arm, chased by the intrepid reporter barking after him like a starved-crazy-Rottweiler.

‘ Excuse me, sir? Sir? Do you read Spectacle magazine?’

The picture returned to the studio and Dwight and his busty celebrity guest were once more called upon to add their comments:

‘There you have it, folks, the state of the nation. A celebrity killer racks them up and the sales of the number one rag-toed ‘news of the celebrities screwed’ sky rockets, but for how long?’

Kelly cradled her ample cleavage as she leant towards Dwight.

‘But aren’t you worried? I mean you’re the biggest celebrity going?’

Dwight turned, smiling, towards the camera.

‘Every celebrity is peeing their Prada knickers. Not me. I’d love him to waste me. Put me out of my misery! You can print that, Spectacle.’

The eruption of Kelly’s laughter was echoed by the studio audience, its sheer force propelled her once again over her chair and onto the floor, convulsed in hysterics.

Jimmy felt the full force of his mother’s body as she too lost control of her laughter and, inadvertently, crushed him like a sliver of cheese in a Beverly-sofa sandwich. The laughter continued to bellow from the TV in the corner.

‘Baby! Are you okay?’

She grabbed Jimmy’s arms and pulled him out of the sofa’s teeth to freedom, as he gasped for air. Jimmy threw his head in his hands for shelter and some much needed comfort.

‘I’ll be lucky to survive this week,’ he thought to himself.

Beverley’s hands descended down towards his head like humungous dark clouds before landing with a thud. The lights went out.

‘Jesus!’

‘Baby, baby. I’m sorry.’

He begged his mum to back off, to let him breath, and give him a chance to survive the evening. He felt like his life was one prolonged assault. She leant back and Jimmy felt a rush of oxygen return to his body and he lived, at least for the moment, once again.

She glanced at him like a snake might look at a rabbit, deciding if it could be swallowed whole. She accused him of resting on his laurels, of not grabbing the chances that were afforded him. Why couldn’t he be more like Dwight Bond, she asked? He was incredulous, but it transpired that her sermon was only just beginning. She demanded to know why he hadn’t taken the opportunity to grab some adulation for himself. If Dwight could do it, then why couldn’t her son? She grabbed him by the lapels and, for a moment, he was worried that she’d forgotten her own strength again, but he sighed with relief as she let him go. She flopped back into the sofa and Jimmy’s heart fell back with her as he recognised the look of defeat on her face.

Lately, he’d been having a recurring dream. He’d be running along a stream, desperate to reach the bridge but, somehow, as soon as he almost reached it, it would inexplicably appear to be in the distance once more, and this process would repeat ad-infinitum as the bridge continued to elude his grasp. There was something over the other side that compelled him and even though he didn’t know what it was, he suspected it would change his life forever.

He wanted to make a difference to the world but then, didn’t most people? Why else get out of bed in the morning? We just all need to find what it is, he mused, or else risk drowning in our own self-pity.

‘I want some respect, Mum, that’s all. Is that too much to ask?’

‘Yes, of course, of course.’

‘Anyway, I hate that guy.’

Beverley expelled a deep sigh.

‘Oh. That’s a shame. A real shame.’

‘A real shame? Why might it be a real shame?’

She switched the television off and the room became shrouded in the silence of life. Real life, without added interference. It was eerie.

Beverley folded her hands in front of her, like two large pets.

She explained that being a fan of his show held special dispensations, especially if you were the recipient of the Helter Skelter fan of the year award for the last three years. She had connections and a certain sway with the right people.

‘Beat to it, Mum.’

‘Well,’ – she beamed, and her smile appeared to make the room glow, like one of those cheap, energy saving light bulbs.

‘They’ve agreed to interview you for a position on the team!’ Her hands inadvertently clapped together in excitement, sending a crescendo of noise that challenged the sound barrier. Jimmy made a break for his ears, but it was too late, his ear drums were already a-pounding and the sound waves ripped through his nerves and nostrils as he screamed for mercy.

‘Be-Jesus, Jimmy, you are sensitive my boy.’

He held the plaster on his nose as the snot oozed from his nostrils. My mother really is trying to kill me, he thought.

‘Mum, you seem to forget that it has been less than twenty-four hours since your dear son was attacked and, I think it’s fair to say, it’s far too early for him to be jumping back into the ring.’

‘So, what do you think?’

Jimmy had become tired of being pushed around at Spectacle. It had done more than most to relegate ‘taste’ and talent to the waste paper bin and he felt, increasingly, that he was being tightly screwed into a little ball. But he needed a job, especially if he was ever going to afford the deposit he needed to find his own place. Not everyone thought it was healthy to still be living with your mother at thirty. I can leave anytime I want, she knows that, doesn’t she, he mused, not entirely convincingly.

Pushed around at work, pushed around at home. It had its advantages though – his mother’s cooking for instance – how would he eat otherwise? Who would clean his clothes? He certainly couldn’t think of anyone else who’d go anywhere near his underpants. It wouldn’t be easy to leave, he thought, in more ways than one. His mother needed him. Who would pay the bills if he was gone? Who else was going to look after her? Perhaps the bridge across the stream was the bridge to a new life without her, but somehow he couldn’t, or didn’t want to find the way out. If he had his own place he wouldn’t be able to pay her bills as well as his own, so he had to dispatch his dreams to the waste paper basket.

Spectacle was the devil he knew and Helter Skelter the devil he didn’t but celebrity obsession had become a commodity and he had become an adept trader, so why not trade with it? In any case there was little escape, even when he came home. His mother’s obsession informed her every waking hour, and didn’t he just know it. If there was not a celebrity on the television, there would be a famous face slapped on the coffee pot, the knife and fork, or the toilet seat. The toilet seat he didn’t mind, sitting on them gave him a perverse sense of pleasure. His mother understood that celebrity came in many forms – some earned, some laid on a plate, some justified and others woven out of substance thinner than candyfloss, but she wanted it regardless. In truth, she would have been better at writing about it than Jimmy. He wanted something else, something far more difficult to obtain. He wanted his work to be taken seriously. He had written many articles concerning the current imbalance in society. All men were equal, was his mantra, and it was unethical to elevate, or prejudice one person over another. Of course, not one of these articles had made it into print. They were far too long, serious and boring. However, it seemed unlikely that Helter Skelter’s ethics would be any different from Spectacle’s.

‘Why would I want to work there?’

‘Jimmy, it’s not that difficult, it could make you a celebrity in pronto time.’

He had reiterated over and over again that he had no interest in becoming a celebrity himself. He challenged her to explain her ingenious plan that would make a lowlife journalist become a star. Not that he had ever wanted such a thing, of course. The words dried up and for a moment she seemed to be in a state of suspended animation. He assumed that he had killed the debate once and for all. Why she considered it such a noble ambition was a constant source of bemusement for Jimmy. She had once explained that it would enable her to see him at home and also at work – on the telly – but he was sure there was another agenda. Maybe she wanted his face plastered over the toilet seat too. He certainly felt he’d had his fair share of having his face rubbed in it already. Many people envied his job, rubbing shoulders with celebrities in the best bars, swanky houses and hotels, but it was often the very worst occupation: taking him so close and yet so far from any semblance of