He had a good job in the city, from which in four and a half years time he would retire to receive a healthy pension. Recently, he set up life insurance for himself and his wife, so that his nineteen year old daughter, whom he adored, would be looked after if the worst happened to either of them. After all, he did work for an insurance company and thus knew the importance of life insurance – besides, his wife had urged him that at the mature age of sixty-one, it was the right thing to do. And he agreed. They lived in a beautiful bungalow in the Cotswolds, and he wished to ensure that his daughter could afford to live there once he was gone. His wife also had a substantial inheritance, so he had insured her too. In part her inheritance had been used as the deposit on the bungalow. In a few months, they were planning to use the surplus to buy the sports car he had always dreamed of owning.
Their life in that bungalow had been happy. But of late, things had changed. His daughter, having decided to study in Edinburgh, had moved out of the house. This sudden change affected both parents significantly. Build up tension to this event —– His wife would regularly come home late from work frustrated and angry. Arguments, which were non-existent previously, now held a dominant role in their lives.
One issue which sparked such a quarrel stuck in his mind quite distinctly. His wife had come home one day to announce that with the opening of a new supermarket down the road, there was no longer a need to pay for the milkman to deliver their milk. He objected, saying that he wished to support the local dairy farm. This led to a row and in her anger she declared that, as he was allowing his principles to come in the way of common sense, she was removing his rights to access her bank account.
Since he was a child growing up in East London, it had been his dream to own a Ferrari. This was now cut short and, while he knew the feeling was mutual, he began to detest his wife. Drinking problems set in, and a gambling addiction slowly ate into the family savings. He loathed change and longed for his daughter’s company. It was his wife who had persuaded him to let her move so far away to study, and so he despised her all the more for it.
Two years after his daughter had left home, he awoke to a knocking sound one Saturday morning, after a night out at the casino. As was commonplace now, he had drunk far too much. The point at which the back of his head met his neck throbbed with an intense, agonising pain. It seemed to go through the thickness of his skull and reach the pillow on which his head lay. He opened his eyes before hurriedly closing them again to a squint, while turning his head away from the window to the left of his bed, through which a harsh beam of August sunlight burned onto his face. He noted that this was odd, as his wife would normally close the curtains before going to bed, and would not open them again till she returned from work at half past five.
As their bedroom faced the driveway to the bungalow, she did not want the neighbours peeking in. His vision was blurred as his eyes scanned across the room, past the gleaming scale model of a Ferrari F430 he so dearly dreamt of owning. He must have knocked it off its shelf, for it lay upside down on the floor in the corner of the room, by the door. On the wall opposite his bed, he noticed the signed, Princess Diana photograph which his wife cherished so dearly. His eyes rested upon this for a moment, for he noticed something different about it. Through his blurred eyes however, he could not distinguish what it was with any conviction. On the teak dressing table, the frame which once held the family portrait was empty. He continued to turn his neck till he faced the glowing window.
At this point, a ball of vomit burned the back of his throat as he remembered the terrors of the night before. His eyes had adjusted to the light now, and he nearly fainted as he saw the crimson smear which dripped down the bottom left window pane beside his head; causing the empty driveway to the bungalow to be tinted an eerie red. He stared at this for what seemed like an hour as the events of the night before flooded into his mind in grotesque detail.
Like a video being played back to him, he saw the hand clasping the model Ferrari smashing downwards with intense ferocity. He heard the metallic thud as the car’s nose pierced through skin and hit bone. Blood spurted out of the skull and trickled onto his wife’s white blouse. The mutual hatred the couple had for one another had reached a breaking point, in a fiery argument. This act was intended to end the relationship completely, in the most satisfying way possible – death would bring relief. Superb description….. needs to be like this in 1st para
At last, he turned his head back to the Ferrari in the corner, and noticed its body had been stained a darker shade of red. In his mind’s eye he saw, as if removed from the action, the victim being dragged across the room, the blood soaked hair of the drooped head sweeping across the picture on the wall, as the victim was dropped onto the bed. He looked at the photograph of Diana now to see a puce stain across her cheek. How amusing that someone who believed all of the conspiracy theories about her death was to be part of a conspiracy themselves. His wife was long gone. As far as he was concerned, as it was the weekend, nobody would report him missing for at least two days; enough time for it to all to be over. The attack had been planned carefully, and the choice of day was perfect.
