How to Kill Your Family(6)

From the compound, I travel to the casino, which is about a thirty-minute drive along a fairly hairy road. A cliff edge on one side heads down towards a … gorge? A ravine? I don’t know. As I said, I grew up on a main road and I’ve always had what I feel is a healthy suspicion of big open spaces. The countryside baffles me, and anywhere that takes thirty minutes by car isn’t somewhere I’d waste my time going if I was at home. Sometimes I get the urge to have a quick meeting with a man (I mean sex, lower your eyebrows), or just waste my time mindlessly scrolling on dating apps. I flick through chancers posing in front of BMWs, as if that’s a sign that they’ve ‘made it’ instead of a clear indication that they are stupid enough to think that hire purchase makes good financial sense. But a tacky car and a V-neck T-shirt aren’t necessarily complete no-nos. I’m not going to be spending my life with these men, after all. I don’t even care enough to commit their names to memory. But I do have a firm line in the sand. If you’re more than a couple of kilometres away, it’s not happening. My mood is fleeting, and I’m not waiting for you to change at King’s Cross, or text to say the Overground has been replaced by a fleet of buses because of essential repairs. So the Spanish countryside is an alien world to me, and fuck it, the cliff leads to a ravine. Whatever you’d call it, it’s a long drop and the cliffside is covered in gnarly-looking bushes. Plus there isn’t a soul to be seen on this route. Perfect. The sun is out, and the warm breeze hits my arm as I balance it on the door while I drive. I turn on the radio, and the local station is playing the Beach Boys. ‘God Only Knows’ fills the little rental car, as I slowly hug the road and make my way towards the casino. I don’t believe in God, obviously. We live in a time of science and the Kardashians, so I think I’m safely in the sane camp there. But also, any god with real clout wouldn’t have paired me with these people and given me such a calling. So no God. But I do feel like someone is smiling down on me today.

While I’m on God, there’s a story in the Bible (I mean, it’s not in the Bible, I heard it in a film and it involves modern technology), which goes something like this: A man lives in a little house very happily for years, until one day, the emergency services knock on his door and say, ‘Sir, there’s a storm coming, we need to evacuate.’ And the man says, ‘Thank you, gentlemen, but I’m religious, I have faith. God will save me.’ The men leave and the storm comes. The waters rise around his house, and a boat comes past. ‘Sir,’ says the captain, ‘come with us, the water will only rise.’ But the man says ‘Thank you, gentlemen, but I’m religious, I have faith. God will save me.’ Later on, the man has to climb to his roof as the house floods. A helicopter hovers overhead. ‘Sir, climb up this ladder, we can get you to safety.’ The man waves them away. ‘Thank you, gentlemen, but I’m religious, I have faith. God will save me.’ Later on, the man drowns. When he gets to heaven, he meets God, and says, ‘Father, I had faith, I believed in you, I stayed true. Why did you let me drown?’ And God looks exasperated (and why wouldn’t he, this man is an idiot), and says, ‘David, I sent you the emergency services, a boat, and a helicopter. Why are you here??’

Someone has sent me big, stupid Amir with his powerful cars, a definite date when my grandparents will be out late at night, and a windy dangerous road. And unlike that stupid man in the fable, I fully intend to take advantage of them all.

*

I have a little over thirty-six hours before I carry out my plans. I could spend the time following the couple around to learn more about them, but honestly, they’re just not interesting enough to make it worthwhile. So I go to the beach for the rest of the afternoon, splashing out on a sunbed at a private beach, and drinking rosé as I read a book about a woman who kills her husband after years of gas-lighting and emotional abuse. I couldn’t get on with The Count of Monte Cristo – too close to the bone, I expect. I did flick to the back though. A terrible habit for sure, but my cheating nature was nevertheless rewarded with this line: ‘All human wisdom is contained in these two words, “Wait and Hope”.’

Wait and hope. I’ve been living this line since I was a teenager now, and finally the waiting part is coming to an end. I put my hands on my hot chest, and try to feel if my heart is pounding faster than usual. But no, I’m breathing as normal, as if today is just another day and I’m not about to commit a terrible crime. How strange. My mind is going over and over the plan, and the anticipation is rising like steam ready to burst out of my ears and yet here I lie, shielded by dark glasses, heart refusing to betray me by bursting out of my chest. My body is ready, even if my mind is behaving like a teenager getting ready for a first date.

Later that evening, before I get into bed, I send Amir a text from my newly acquired burner phone. That’s what Edward Snowden called a phone that you buy to try and stay untraceable. A little grand in my case, given that I am not aware of any state secrets. But a good tip nonetheless, and a twenty-minute trip to a less salubrious part of London plus sixty quid in cash got me this rather quaint old flip phone, which I added credit to so that I could text. It won’t make its way back to England but it’s serving a useful purpose. I ask Amir if he’s around tomorrow and whether he could sort me a car for a couple of days. I’ve told him that I’m travelling further into the countryside for the night and would feel safer in a bigger car, which is sort of true, I suppose. The best lies have a kernel of truth, making it easier to stick to your story and less likely to get caught up in different versions. My friend Jimmy has a terrible lying face, the corners of his mouth automatically turn up in a smirk when he fibs. It’s sort of endearing, but it makes it impossible to trust him with anything, given his tendency to get caught out when confronted.