I take a bus from the office across the Westlink, the six lanes of traffic cutting west Belfast off from the rest of the city. I remember the shock, as a child, of learning that the Westlink hadn’t always been there, that people were responsible for it, for making my bus journeys to almost any point in the city so long. Which must have been partly the point, a bit of social engineering. Keep the millionaires’ houses and restaurants on one side, and us on the other.
Once, as a teenager, I walked from our estate over the Westlink footbridge and all the way to the Malone Road. It was a damp Sunday morning in spring, and the huge houses were covered in thick wisteria, the blossoms dripping above their front doors. The houses on my estate all had gravel in their front gardens. I walked past the mansions with my headphones on, smoking a roll-up. If someone like Seamus had approached me that afternoon and said, “Do you want things to change?” I would have said yes.
At a supermarket on the Falls Road, I lift down two jugs of kerosene, feeling the weight of the liquid sloshing against the plastic. Tonight this kerosene will be used to set a stolen car on fire. It will be splashed onto the seats and in the boot, and touched with a lighter. The windows will burst from the heat and flames will tear out of their empty spaces, enveloping the wreck.
Niall answers the door of the safe house in a polo shirt and tracksuit bottoms. “Grand, thanks very much,” he says, like I’m dropping the kerosene off for a barbeque.
He and Damian are robbing a taxi office in Banbridge tonight, and need the kerosene to destroy any traces of themselves. By the time the fire is put out, the car will have melted and curled in on itself. The kerosene is about the size of a jug of laundry detergent. It doesn’t look like much, like something with the power to melt an entire car. Neither does Niall, for that matter.
He’d been playing Fifa when I arrived. We could be in his student flat. He sets down the kerosene, clearing a space on the kitchen counter among old takeaways and empty tins of Harp.
“Is Marian here?” I ask.
“No,” he says, “they went out.”
“Does Marian not give out to you about this?” I ask, nodding at the dirty surfaces, the overflowing sink, the sticky floor, the cold, congealed trays of chicken tikka and lamb vindaloo.
“Oh,” he says, “no, she does. We made a rota.”
The rota is taped to the fridge. This week Seamus has to take out the bins, and I file this away to remember the next time he frightens me.
“You’re on washing up,” I say, and Niall nods, looking defeated. “Here, let me help.”
I scrape out the foil trays, and Niall squirts some dish soap onto the dirty plates in the sink. I already know that when the robbery is read out on the news tonight, it will be difficult for me to connect it to this moment. Surveillance footage might be shown of two masked figures holding guns. You’d never picture one of them, hours earlier, in his kitchen doing the washing up. They always seem to have appeared from nowhere.
“Do you want a cup of tea?” he asks abruptly, as if someone, maybe Marian, once told him you’re meant to offer.
“That would be lovely.”
We keep cleaning the kitchen, talking about football and the weather. We discuss the different takeaway options in the area, and Niall complains that Seamus would have them order from the same chip shop every single night if he could. He and Marian are excited about the new Korean place in Ballymurphy.
“I thought Damian liked to cook. Doesn’t he cook for you?” I ask.
“He’s been too busy,” says Niall. I sprinkle some Dettol over the kitchen surface and wipe it with a cloth, pretending not to be curious about what has been occupying Damian’s time.
“Do you get nervous before a robbery?” I ask.
“Yes. I didn’t used to,” he says.
“Why is that?”
“Just getting older, probably,” he says thoughtfully, and my heart breaks at how young he seems. I want to know how they recruited him, what promises they made. He was raised in foster care. I wonder if that made them target him.
We continue with our tidying. I lean over the sink, rinsing old chips and vinegar from plates.
“Do you know what Marian wants for Christmas?” he asks. He’s planning ahead, it’s only November.
“You could do a nice tin of hot chocolate,” I say. “Or scotch.”
“What kind?”
“Oh, um, Oban. Talisker.”
He takes out his phone and carefully types the names into his notes. I turn away, drying a plate with a towel, trying to control my emotion before it makes me either cry or tell him the truth. He thinks these people are his family. Soon we’ve finished the dishes and the surfaces, and he walks me to the door.