Page 67 of The Psychopath Next Door

‘So boring,’ said Rose.

‘The cinema?’

‘Nothing on,’ Dylan protested.

‘Trampolining?’

‘I’mnota baby.’ Rose didn’t even crack a smile.

‘How about laser tag?’ Emma said eventually. ‘That might be fun. Ethan? What do you think?’

I had been distracted, hungover after polishing off a bottle of wine by myself and staying up to watch Netflix after everyone else had gone to bed, drunkenly falling asleep on the sofa. I had woken up in the morning to find that someone, presumably Emma, had draped a blanket over me.

‘Hmm?’ I said.

‘Laser tag? Do you fancy it?’

With my hangover, I couldn’t think of anything I’d like less than running around an indoor play area with laser-gun noisesringing in my ears. I would have preferred to lie on the couch all day and wallow.

Except that was pathetic, wasn’t it? Part of the reason for this trip was to remind Emma that we were a strong family unit, better together. And here she was, wanting us all to do something. Acting, I had to admit, as if her family was all she cared about.

Was she pretending? Thinking about it, I realised her prime motivation was likely trying to build bridges with Rose after all the tension of the past few days.

‘Maybe Keira would like to come,’ Emma suggested to Dylan, who immediately seemed excited about this idea.

‘Oh God,’ said Rose. ‘If she comes, her dumb little brother will have to come too.’

‘Has the real Rose been body-snatched?’ Dylan asked. ‘Or were you always this annoying?’

‘You’re the annoying one,’ Rose said, glaring at Dylan. ‘Keira isn’t even pretty. You’re just desperate.’

Dylan looked like he’d been slapped.

‘Oh my God.’ That was Emma. ‘Rose. Apologise to your brother.’

Rose narrowed her eyes, and I was certain she was going to swear at Emma. I was horrified but mesmerised – this behaviour was so unlike the Rose of old – and I braced myself for the fallout. But then Rose blinked and rubbed a hand across her face, and her expression completely changed. Became pleasant again.

‘I’m sorry, Dylan. I didn’t mean it.’

He stared at her for a second, shocked by the change, before finally saying, ‘Whatever.’

In the end, Theo and Angela decided they wanted to come along too. So here we were, the two families, pulling up outside what looked like a 1960s warehouse.

We went inside and the instructor, a broad-shouldered man called Dave who clearly loved his job, showed us how everything worked before handing out the guns and helmets, which he explained were necessary because the ceilings were low in places.

‘You’re lucky, you’ve got the whole place to yourselves,’ he said, taking us into the arena – a large space that had been turned into a kind of maze across two levels, with ramps and steps leading up to higher platforms, all decorated to look like something from a future war. There was a ‘control tower’ at the centre of the ground floor where Dave based himself, with a number of screens that would display our scores. The guns kept track of how many hits we achieved and received. At either end of the arena were two sheltered areas that Dave described as ‘camps’.

‘We’ll start with a team game. Family versus family. The Doves and the Gallaghers.’ He smiled at Theo and Angela. ‘Shame your surname isn’t Hawk, right?’ When they just nodded, he sighed and said to them, ‘If you go over to the camp at the other end of the arena, we can make a start.’

I crouched in the camp with Emma, Dylan and Rose. Emma looked weirdly sexy in her army helmet – did I have some kink I hadn’t previously known about? – and Dylan wore a look of rapt concentration. I’d observed him flirting with Keira in a way I’d never seen him do before, the two of them teasing each other about how they were going to get murdered. It was sweet. Dylan had never had a girlfriend before. He’d been on a couple of dates, but then we’d never heard about the girls again.

Rose seemed quite excited too, her filthy mood from earlier having evaporated, although I’d seen her bristling with irritation when Henry tried to talk to her. The poor kid gazed at her like she was the loveliest thing his eleven-year-old eyes had ever seen, but she just wasn’t interested, although I didn’t blame her for notfinding his chat about how he and his friends ‘slayed at Fortnite’ appealing.

‘We ready, team?’ I asked. ‘Are the Doves going to show we’re not all about peace?’

Dylan groaned. ‘Dad, that’s so cringe.’

‘The Deadly Doves, that’s what we should call ourselves.’

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