She’s Behind You!

the dress rehearsal, she’d discovered that her costume for her big number had a large tear in it and the zip was broken. The person in charge of wardrobe had scurried around and found another dress, though it wasn’t nearly as pretty as the one that Colette had been due to wear.

Colette was now wondering what else would go wrong. The fact that they’d be performing in front of a live audience made her jitters even worse.

Nervously she applied her pancake make-up. The rest of the cast were laughing and joking as they handed out good luck cards.

‘You’ll be great,’ said Sophie encouragingly.

‘I hope so,’ said Colette. ‘I feel as though I should never have accepted the role.’

‘Oh yes you should!’ Colette’s mouth twitched, before the girls separated, and Sophie hurried off to finish getting the stage ready.

It was as Colette was standing in the wings awaiting her cue that she spotted a familiar figure talking to Pete — Louisa!

As Colette continued to watch, she saw Louisa surreptitiously hobble on to the stage before she disappeared behind the façade of the Fitzwarren home.

What was she planning on doing? Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good.

Colette quickly grabbed Sophie, and whispered to her. She couldn’t let Louisa ruin the show after everyone’s hard work. She just couldn’t.

As she walked on stage, Colette felt a surge of confidence wash over her. She also knew what she had to do.

Later, as everyone was congratulating themselves on a fabulous performance — despite the terrible attempts at trying to sabotage the show by a former leading lady, and trusted member of the backstage crew — Colette and Sophie grinned.

Colette had improvised while on stage, and told the audience that she thought someone evil was hiding in her home — perhaps King Rat — and she needed their help to defeat them. If they all shouted out loud, ‘She’s behind you!’, then maybe they’d be able to reveal who the person was and send them back to whence they’d come.

The audience had dutifully done their bit and Colette turned to see that Sophie had wound back the backdrop — to reveal a very embarrassed looking Louisa attempting to cut the rope that held the scenery in place. She quickly hobbled off as the whole theatre booed!

As Colette took her bow to the cheering audience, she couldn’t have felt happier. She’d taken on the lead role, and conquered her fear. She’d also got her man, no, not Dick Whittington, but a handsome director named Richard who’d confessed he’d always liked her.

It was nice to see that there could be happy ever afters in real life as well as in panto land!

Colette felt a surge of confidence wash over her. She knew what she had to do