It was a warm September day in 2022. Expectation hung heavy in the air and around the green and verdant lawns. I was attending a remedial writing course when the phone rang. It was the call I had long feared. I immediately donned my black polyester suit.
“Is that you, Omid?” said a frail yet familiar voice. One that I recognised immediately.
“It is indeed, your majesty,” I replied, throwing myself prostrate.
“I have some very important news for you,” the queen continued. “I’m afraid I haven’t been feeling at all well recently. Seeing that halfwit Liz Truss on Tuesday was the final straw. The country has gone to the dogs. So, I have decided that I am going to die at three o’clock this afternoon. You are the first person I’ve told and I would like you to keep the news to yourself until I can get hold of Charles. Goodbye and good luck with your terribly important book.”
My head literally reeled, unable to grasp the momentousness of this momentous occasion. The world was rocked on its axis. It was the end of a historic era. Cliche after cliche tumbled into my head. And on to the page.
Later that day, as I sat beside the late queen’s bed in Balmoral, Charles entered the room. The Diana killer himself. I thought of the country I loved so much. We all knew Charles would be a crap king. Merely keeping the throne warm. But for whom?
The monarchy was in great peril, rocked by accusations of bullying, misogyny and racism. But not by me. It’s not my fault the Dutch edition named those with unconscious bias.
***
Two days earlier, among the heathered valleys – how much more of this do you want? – Paul Burns had played a lonely lament on his bagpipes. Now, there was just the bustle of the royal family paying their respects. Tim Laurence. The finest vice‑admiral of his generation.
But where was Harry? Left to hire a private jet on his own. No one even thought to book one for him. This, sadly, was indicative of the constant bullying of him and Meghan by the royals. Even at the funeral, they cut lonely figures as the king and I led the country in mourning.
Within days, Charles had launched a countrywide PR campaign. He was a new monarch for a new era. The sun was very bright. The king was all smiles as he did a royal walkabout. “About bloody time,” he told a group of well-wishers. “At last, I am the king.” Yet the mood couldn’t hold. Charles’s legendary petulance was evident when he cursed his pen with a torrent of abuse.
More was to follow. Soon, Buckingham Palace was riven with scandal when a 112-year-old courtier asked a black woman where she came from. Soon, the only question on everyone’s mind was: who were the royals who ruined Harry and Meghan’s lives by asking what their baby might look like? Now, as the Dutch version has been published, I can tell you that it was Charles and that cow Kate. Horrible, horrible attitudes that have no place in a modern society, said sources very close to Harry and Meghan.
It was raining outside and the grounds were very wet, so William tried to stay indoors as he went into crisis mode. The house of Windsor was in more danger than ever. The Caribbean tour, which I had been covering for NBC Useful Idiot Hour, had been a disappointment. Worse still, it was becoming increasingly apparent that I had no insights and could only recycle old rubbish for this book. But needs must. I was what the country expected.
“Do you want to see your grandchildren?” sobbed Harry.
“Not really,” said Charles. “I’m a bit busy this afternoon, opening a fridge.”
Typically unconscious racist behaviour.
***
It had been one of those days when it had been neither sunny nor raining. It was the day of the queen’s platinum jubilee. A day those of us in the royal press corp will never forget, as we were sworn to silence after Kate deliberately tipped a nine-year-old page girl over the balcony, sending her headlong to her death. And just because she was hogging all the cameras. Typical Kate. Luckily, Elton John saved the day with a magnificent rendition of I’m Still Just About Standing. The same Elton John who refused to play for Charles’s coronation.
Inside the palace, no one was aware of what the weather was as I began another dreary chapter repeating every royal story that had ever been printed in the Sun and the Daily Mail. And I can exclusively reveal that all the royals spend every morning on the phone to quarter-witted royal correspondents such as me to brief against their royal rivals. Charles dithers as Michael Fawcett squeezes out an inch of toothpaste on to his brush while he sits on the lavatory, or something.
By the way, I can also exclusively reveal that Pervy Prince Andrew is a real problem for the family. I can distinctly remember the crackle as he walked across the frosty gravel to be stripped of his titles by the queen. Sources haven’t yet been able to confirm whether he is a fully fledged racist or not. But since he has been accused of sexual assault and then paid to silence witnesses, there is no reason to suppose he isn’t.
The weather was quite weathery as Charles lurched in indecision. A man who can’t make up his mind whether he is indecisive or not.
William, meanwhile, was plotting his own ascension. William is actually a complete bastard. Just in it for himself. Hates Harry, who only wants to serve. And I am not usually one for tittle-tattle, but we shouldn’t forget his friendship with the Marquess and Marchioness of Cholmondeley. Worse, he couldn’t even bring himself to talk to Meghan when she interrupted him. That is the measure of his bigotry. Plus, he is really lazy. If only Harry were next in line to the throne, said a source close to Harry.
***
The sun rose in the west over the Pacific. Inside the Sussexes’ idyll in Montecito, the Sussexes were leading an idyllic life. Meghan was spending time with the children, reading them nursery rhymes rewritten for the modern generation before going off to do pilates. The rest of the day she spent perfecting her image and complaining to the media that no one was breaking her self-imposed media blackout.
In the meantime, Harry was doing his daily two hours of unconscious bias training. Later, he didn’t say to me, because I can categorically state that he and Meghan didn’t help me in any way with this book: “It’s all so unfair, Omid. I’m only a jobbing millionaire. It’s terrible that, after I left the royals, I’ve had to do things for myself. Charles has even taken away one of my houses. All I want to do is protect my family by invading their privacy. Have you read Spare? I haven’t. It’s a bit long. And it hasn’t got enough pictures.”
But let’s leave our much maligned prince there for a while. Happy loading the dishwasher as he and Meghan try to ignore the bigotry that is all around them. As they try to come to terms with the gross injustice that most people couldn’t really give a toss about them one way or the other.
So, as the California apples ripen on the trees and Meghan and Oprah feed the multicultural chickens, let us turn our attention to Kate. What a cow! Imagine having her as queen. It’s unthinkable. The monarchy will never survive Waity Katey, as sources close to everyone once called her. Let’s get real. Her parents are dead common and her mum, Carole, practically pushed her on William. Sent her to St Andrews to bag the prince.
Well, good luck to her. You did it, gal. But her lack of grace shines through. Not only has she killed countless minor royals who have tried to upstage her, she once stepped out of a car several seconds ahead of Meghan. And then deliberately stood in a puddle to soak her rival. Yet the country lets her get away with it. Thank God for sources not close to Meghan for speaking their truth to me. Yet all the while Meghan says nothing, not wanting to rock the boat, her only desire to do her duty towards a country she once called home.
A moment’s pause as dusk falls and we remember Diana. How well I remember her not saying to me, as I wasn’t even born: “Oh, Omid, I do wish Charles had loved me as I loved him. All I wanted was for him to rule over an undivided country. And for my two sons not to fall out. Although if they do, it will be William’s fault, as I’ve always suspected he’s a wrong ’un.”
It was a windy spring day as Camilla shagged her way through the home counties during her teens and early 20s. There was no country seat where she didn’t leave a pair of knickers. But she was happy to bide her time and now she is queen. And what a malign influence she is, chain-smoking her way through idle afternoons that are only interrupted by a game of draughts. Her one pleasure is to leak unfavourable stories about Harry and Meghan to her stooge at the Daily Mail.
So, as night falls and the stars twinkle over Buckingham Palace, there we must leave our dysfunctional royal family. A weak king, a plotting Prince of Wales and a saviour on the other side of the Atlantic. Barring a miracle, this is the endgame for the house of Windsor. Harry has even been snubbed by the Duke of Westminster, with no invitation to his wedding forthcoming. Hold the front pages. However will we cope?
Digested read, digested: endless.
• Depraved New World by John Crace (Guardian Faber, £16.99) is out now. To support the Guardian and the Observer, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply
