Many thanks to Postcard Shorts for publishing my piece of flash fiction inspired by the anniversary of the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami: http://www.postcardshorts.com/read-2048.html

His death made all of the front pages, the headlines dripping with hyperbole regardless of the paper’s supposed quality. I arranged for copies of the morning’s papers to be gathered for review over breakfast and read the stories with barely concealed pleasure. Of course, they all differed in the telling, some had managed to glean additional information from the investigating officers or members of the family, others speculated wildly about potential motives. But whatever the angle, they all got one key fact wrong. It wasn’t a bungled burglary: our father was always meant to die that night.

My name is Charles Alexander Kindersley, son of the late, great Sir Rupert Kindersley, and, with my twin sister Rebecca, joint heir to his fortune. Prior to recent well-publicised events, you wouldn’t have heard of me or my sister, you’d even be forgiven for not knowing that Sir Rupert had any children. In public he scarcely acted like he had any family at all.

For those of you privileged not to know my father, I offer a few details of his life and innumerable accomplishments. Son of the British ambassador to France and his American wife, Rupert Kindersley was born in Paris in 1950. After attending prep school at a prestigious international academy, Rupert boarded at Marlborough College where he excelled academically and, amongst other impressive extracurricular triumphs, captained the first eight (a feat I could never hope to emulate). Like his father before him, Rupert went up to Caius, Cambridge, and took a First in Classics. After four fruitful years at university, my father joined a leading merchant bank in London and climbed the corporate ladder with easy success. He later obtained an MBA from Princeton and went on to establish his own, eponymous, hedge fund, drawing on financial support from the right sort of contacts across the City, and within a few short years made his first billion. Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire followed. Most impressive.

Business leader, government adviser and committed philanthropist: all worthy epithets used to describe my father during his life and after his death. To the list, I’d add the following: serial philanderer, borderline alcoholic and absent father, although you won’t find such labels in The Times obituary. My father, the man credited with saving the lives of a generation of Ugandan children following an endowment of the Kindersley Africa Foundation, worked every Christmas Day for the first ten years of our lives. My father, special envoy to the UN on entrepreneurship and fiscal policy, refused to eat at the same table as my sister after she told him that she’d fallen in love with a woman. My father the man who, after launching an apprenticeship scheme at his company for underprivileged children from inner London, got so drunk that when he got home and tumbled into bed his flailing fist broke my sleeping mother’s nose. It was her birthday and he’d missed dinner.

I wish I was making this shit up.

My sister Rebecca and I were always close, despite our parents’ various attempts to keep us distanced. We had different nannies, were sent separate boarding schools, even holidays in Europe taken apart. I still don’t fully understand why they sought to drive a wedge between us. Despite this, or perhaps because of it, we took every opportunity to feed and strengthen our relationship. We wrote every day during the school term; long, agonisingly detailed letters recounting the banal events of our tiny days. Over the years, letters were replaced with texts and emails, making our task easier. We learned to conceal this closeness from our parents, giving them no reason to think we were other than sibling acquaintances. Satisfied that their goal had been achieved, their attention to this task waned and we grew ever closer. After school, we went off to university. Against my father’s wishes, I read English Literature at York (he barely spoke with me after I made this choice), whilst my sister went to London to study Social Policy. We took turns visiting each other almost every weekend.

If you caught any of the news coverage, you will know that Rebecca and I are uncommonly similar in appearance, even though we are, of course, non-identical. We are tall, lean and strong-jawed like our father, but with our mother’s warm-toned skin and auburn hair. Our father’s pallor and bristled black hair made for quite a contrast in the few family portraits that were taken during our childhood as his corner of the picture looked to have been taken using black and white film. Aside from our looks and love for each other, as siblings we shared very little in common. When we were about eight years old and home at the same time, we snatched a rare moment of play and found an injured field mouse by the lichen-spotted stone sink in a darkened corner of the garden. I was frightened and wanted to kill the mouse, but Rebecca stopped me and nursed the creature back to health with nuts and milk taken from the pantry. When we were young, she always had an innate sense of justice and couldn’t help but intervene when she saw a wrong to be righted. I used to envy her those traits, but later I saw it for what it really was: weakness. I always thought that I was chosen for our father’s attention because I was stronger, somehow more able to cope.

For all our father’s money, we lived quite modestly. Although I can’t remember going without anything, and I’d seen much of the world by the time I was fifteen, I don’t believe we were spoiled. Rebecca, however, couldn’t understand why our father was so willing to compromise his family life if we didn’t see the pickings of his hard work. I couldn’t reconcile this sense of entitlement with my vision of Rebecca the do-gooder. Whatever the project, building an orphanage or helping a strapped-for-cash friend, she always expected our father to act the banker and time after time my father indulged her. I don’t know what made him respond to her that way, what she did for him that I didn’t.

When Rebecca met her girlfriend Miranda everything changed. For months I had been avoiding both of my parents scrupulously, leaving calls unreturned and ignoring callously my mother’s plaintive texts. My father had been away for much of the year on business, although his more expansive definition of the term included time with his mistress in New York, and the helpless woman was lonely. However, my sister summoned us for dinner at the family home under the pretence of celebrating her birthday, just the four of us. My first reaction had been to turn down the invitation, but Rebecca pleaded with me to attend and I relented. I hadn’t been to my parents’ house in several years. In fact, my last visit had been to take our dying grey tabby to the vet and I scarcely put a foot over the threshold when I collected the pitiable creature. The detached Georgian townhouse had been the family home, the place where we grew up and would return to during the school holidays, but my memory of the house never quite matched its reality.

My father was running late so Rebecca and I took turns mixing cocktails and exchanging pleasantries with our mother who seemed a little overwhelmed by our combined presence. The food was delivered before father got home (none of us had the slightest interest in cooking), so we kept the carefully wrapped parcels of food warm in the oven. Sir Rupert arrived a little after 9 p.m. and after a couple of quick, large tumblers of whisky in the seclusion of his study, he was ready to face dinner with his wife and children. We ate at the long dining table, one of us at each point of the compass, all of us picking at our food while we took turns at keeping the threadbare conversation ticking along. I’d been suspicious of Rebecca’s reasons for gathering us together and as dinner tailed on I realised that she was building up to something. And then my father, rather uncharacteristically, asked about Rebecca’s work.

‘So how are the depressed and down-trodden of London, Rebecca?’

‘Well, they’re usually more than just a little down-trodden, father. They tend to be homeless and most of them face issues daily that we around this table could barely understand. But, work at the shelter is going very well. Thank you for asking. Actually, my work is sort of the reason I wanted you all to be here tonight…’

He didn’t wait for her to finish.

‘As I’ve told you many times, if the charity needs more funding please speak with Charlotte at the foundation. I might by your personal bank, but I am not the charity’s. There is a procedure in place for dealing with such requests, Rebecca. You of all people should know that.’

‘I am more than aware of that, thank you. And I am not looking for money. I wanted to talk to you, to all of you, about someone I’ve met. Someone who has become very dear to me recently. I want to tell you about Miranda.’

So my sister told us how Miranda had joined the charity just under a year earlier, that they’d become great friends and had, in time, fallen in love. To me, the news didn’t come as much of a shock: my sister had never expressed more than a passing interest in boys and had never had a serious relationship. In our early twenties, I thought she was asexual and would simply end up an old maid. I was pleased for her when she made her announcement. Our mother had, up until that point in the evening, been a passive presence at the dinner table, her eyes constantly wandering into empty space just beyond the edge of my vision. But she was listening now, her dark eyes glittering and trained on Rebecca, her face grey. My father squirmed in his high-backed chair, his face red and contorted.

‘And what do you expect me to do with that information? Just sit here and accept it? Accept that you are a homosexual?’

My sister was visibly crestfallen and there no sign of the animation that had, just a minute or two earlier, lit up her eager face. I don’t really know why she had expected anything different. My mother started a series of questions beginning with the words why, what, when, but failed to complete any of them. We then sat in heavy silence broken only by the sound of rapid, heavy breathing. I didn’t know where to look and I certainly didn’t know what to say. I gave my sister a wry smile that I intended as a show of support. Approximately 10 minutes passed before my father issued his ultimatum.

‘You are confused. This Miranda character has misled you. I want you to abandon this foolishness.’

‘I can’t do that, father; it’s not possible for me to just fall in line because you order it.’

‘You’ll do it, my girl.’

‘I’m not your girl, Dad. I have a job, a life, a partner: everything that you encouraged me, us, to achieve. I cannot live any other life.’

‘Well, if you’re so convinced that you can stand alone, then so be it. You’re on your own. No allowance, no donations, nothing. You understand that? And I can’t be in the same room as you if this is the choice you are making.’

He made to get up from the table. Rebecca’s response was characteristically instinctive and naïve. She folded her napkin and told him, calmly, that her choice was made and that he could keep his money. Then she left. I followed shortly after, hoping to catch up with her on the platform at Highgate, but she was nowhere to be seen.

I went back to my flat and slept. Over coffee the next day, I thought about the night before. I admired her stance, and understood that my father’s reaction was bigoted, irrational even, but I also knew that she was almost completely reliant on our father’s money and, despite her declaration, hadn’t yet figured out how to make her own or exist without it.

Initially she appeared to cope well, a budget was drawn up and she embarked upon her first hunt for a real job, one that would pay the bills and not just satisfy her childish quest for a just world. I knew something was wrong when, a few months later, I hadn’t heard from her in over two weeks. Not even a text. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d gone for so long without speaking. I was, of course, worried and clogged every conceivable inbox with increasingly panicked messages. Eventually she surfaced, arriving at my door just after 11:00 pm on a Sunday evening.

Over tea stirred with honey, Rebecca broke the news about her latest good cause. Until that night I knew very little about Miranda. We hadn’t spent any time together and I, for some reason, hadn’t questioned my sister’s reticence to share any details. I had also believed the version of events that Rebecca fed our parents over that ill-fated dinner. However, whilst it was true that Rebecca met her girlfriend through her charity work, the actual circumstances of their courtship had been concealed from us all. Miranda was, in fact, a recently recovered addict who had been staying at the shelter. They’d met over 20p toast. How quaint. I listened carefully as she explained what Miranda had done to feed her habit and nearly choked on a piece of dry shortbread when the extent of her financial indebtedness was finally revealed. Of course, Rebecca was adamant that those days were now behind her and all they needed was one hundred grand to move on with their lives.

This was an expensive field mouse.

I studied my sister’s face as she talked under the lamplight of my living room: I’d never seen her look so tired. She was utterly defenceless. It was at that very moment that the idea came to me. Now don’t get me wrong, I had often fantasised about the ultimate result of my plan, but a real world answer had, until then, never arisen. The plan appeared with absolute clarity. After a short pause, I explained that, unfortunately, I didn’t have the money to help (which was technically correct), but there was a way that she could get the money. And so I told her how.

As she was aware, our father kept cash at his office, locked in a personal safe: he’d drunkenly gloated in the dark that the figure was over a million pounds sterling. He’d whispered the password to me once, late at night when I must have been fourteen and home from school for the holidays. I remember the numbers being traced with a finger on the inside of my arm. I suggested that my sister arrange a final meeting with my father, at his office, a chance for them both to clear the air, after which she would leave him alone forever. I knew that my father wouldn’t be able to turn her down.

I also knew that he’d be drinking when she arrived. When she was much younger he had allowed her to pour his whisky when he returned home from work. She was fascinated by the heavy crystal glass and emitted whimpers of joy at the sound of the thick ice cubes chiming as they were churned by the pouring whisky. After she arrived at his office, she would offer to refill his inevitably empty glass, for old times’ sake. He’d indulge her request and at this moment she would add a sleeping tonic, which I would supply, to his drink. Within five minutes, he’d be drowsy and malleable: she’d be able to say what she pleased. Within twenty, he’d be asleep. The money would then be hers for the taking.

I remember her excited gratitude as she sat in my arm chair, lost in an ill-fitting and oversized sweater. I’d saved her, saved them both. She didn’t know how to thank me. I smiled. Later that night, I congratulated myself on coming up with a fully realised plan and so quickly.

Rebecca contacted my father the next day and the meeting was scheduled for the following week. I told her come by the flat during the afternoon before the meeting to pick up the sleeping tonic as I didn’t have any left. I ordered the poison from one of the darker corners of the internet. It hadn’t been difficult to find and it was as easy as any other on-line transaction. When she arrived she looked happier than I had seen her in years.

‘Let’s get a drink at the Duke of Wellington. Pints of ale and salted peanuts, just like when we were at uni.’

‘Don’t you think it would be better to keep a clear head? You don’t want to cock it up.’

‘A couple of pints won’t hurt. And anyway, I’ll still be more sober than Daddy Dearest.’

We sat on a wooden picnic table outside the pub, sipping our drinks and watching people file past on the pavement. In the distance, several kids were playing on a climbing frame and a small white dog ran around them in a tight, repeating circle. She did almost all of the talking, overcompensating for her nerves. Then afternoon drew to a close and we said our goodbyes: she practically skipped down the street towards the station after receiving the ampoule. At that moment, I think I pitied her more than ever before.

I only heard what actually happened that evening during the trial (although the end result was clear). According to her testimony, the meeting went as we planned it and Rebecca took over £80,000 from the safe before heading back to the flat that she shared with Miranda. She also gave evidence that there had been an element of reconciliation during their meeting, but that could have been the guilt talking. I’m sure my sister was grateful for any crumbs of affection that my father tossed her way.

His body was discovered by night security shortly after 1:00 am. He’d been slumped over his desk for hours, but no one had dared wake him. I had stayed in that night. I couldn’t find any distraction in books or film and made countless cups of tea that went untouched and cold. I knew that if all went as I intended, my father would be dead by 8:00 pm, but there was an element of uncertainty, like Schodinger’s famous experiment. When the time came, I expected to feel something and had hoped for elation. But that evening, I felt nothing.

The news of his death broke in the morning. Initially it was being reported that he had suffered a heart attack, another cautionary tale for those contemplating working for an investment bank in the City. However, by the end of the day the nature of the story had shifted and there was talk of foul play. One news channel were informed that my sister had been seen in the company’s reception area at the end of the working day and, after a little digging, the fact of her estrangement from my parents was pulled into the open. Rebecca was arrested the next day and I followed her into custody a few hours later.

Many people have suggested that I hoped not to be caught. I suppose I did harbour an idea that the poison would not be detected during the autopsy, but I had done my research and knew that was highly unlikely. Others, not a single intelligent mind between them, even suggested that I had hoped that Rebecca would take the blame for me. Ridiculous. My sister only cares about her own survival. She didn’t give a first thought to me, why I did it, or why I used her as my instrument, rather than killing him myself. She knew what he did to me all those years. She held me when I couldn’t sleep in fear that he’d wake me up in the middle of the night. She knew, or at least, knew enough to speak out for me when I couldn’t find the strength.

Her tearful protestations of innocence at the trial were predictable, but I still cannot understand her expressions of love for a man who had so utterly rejected her. She didn’t feel his loss, she just felt sorry for herself as she was inescapably a thief. But what did she really have to be sorry about? At least he loved her enough to leave her alone.

My sister was a witness of fact at my own short trial. She was a picture of politesse: a smart, yet feminine, trouser suit, white blouse, sensible heals and matching haircut. At the end of her re-examination, prosecuting counsel asked her why she believed I had wanted to kill my own father.

‘I believe my brother was jealous of the relationship that I had with our father. He coveted our closeness. I also believe that he couldn’t stand to see me happy in my new relationship. When I came to him, he saw an opportunity to take his revenge on us both. I am sure the money was also a factor, although of course, he’ll have to wait for that now.’

‘Thank you, Ms Kindersley. We have also heard evidence during the course of these proceedings that your brother may have been subject to sexual abuse at the hands of your father. Now, your brother hasn’t yet corroborated these allegations, but did you ever witness any such conduct?’

She paused before answering.

‘No. That’s absurd. My father would never do such a thing.’

‘And, one final question, Ms Kindersley: did your brother, Mr Charles Alexander Kindersley, ever give you reason or cause to suspect that he was being abused?’

‘No, never.’

‘I have no further questions, Your Honour.’

I often think of her answers as I lie awake at night.