“Morning Candace,” said Sean to his agent in a chipper fashion as he entered the estate agency. They exchanged pleasantries. “So today’s the day!” he continued. “All the best with the viewings. I’m sure it’ll be over by the end of the day. The markets are in absolutely prime position to make a great sale.”

“Yes, absolutely,” replied Candace. “You’ve chosen such a great moment to sell. The area is very much up-and-coming, and London is starting to get the idea, though it’s been a bit slow off the mark. But we’ll start to see the urban renewal made possible when the markets take off, and from there, we’ll see positive outcome after positive outcome. I’m sure you’ve got great judgement on this – you’ll make a quick sale and a full profit.”

Sean wondered if she really agreed with him or was trying to massage his ego. Which actually he rather liked either way. He realised that according to social convention, now was the moment when he should say something that made it seem that he was, in turn, paying attention to something about her.

“So when are you due?” he said, referring to the large lump of her belly.

“September,” she replied, smiling, and Sean was certain that she was most touched that he’d thought to ask. He couldn’t think of what the next thing was that you were supposed to say, so he went for, “Ah, September, a great month.” Her face went blank as there was no particular pleasantry she could come back with. He quickly cut in before the small talk started to go flat. “Shall we get down to business then? It won’t take long to go through the paperwork.” They sat down at a coffee table to start signing various bits of legal this and that.

At that moment, the door to the agency flew open. A woman stormed in. To Sean’s mind, she was rather scruffy-looking; hair somewhat dishevelled, wearing a shapeless, ugly hoody, tracksuit bottoms that were baggy at the knees, and a pair of over-worn trainers. She didn’t look quite right for an area that was up-and-coming.

The scruffy woman did not hold back. “You bloody cow!” she yelled at Candace. “I had a call late yesterday from your little minion-creep, Fraser. What makes you think you can have fourteen viewings in my house in a single day? I’m not going to have a minute’s peace! I’m still living there, you know!”

Candace kept her calm. “It’s just what the markets are doing right now,” was her cool retort. “But I can reduce the viewings to ten or eleven if that suits you better.”

Sean wondered if that was going to do the job of appeasing this bad-mannered madwoman. It did not. She glared at Candace, pointed straight at her belly, and said menacingly, “What kind of a world do you want that child to grow up to live in?”

The question seemed bizarre and rather rhetorical. Candace did not appear to see the need to reply. She and Sean just sat there blankly. The woman flounced out, and the door slammed behind her.

“Jesus, what was all that about?” Sean asked, as the room returned to civility.

“Oh, nothing,” said Candace with a quick flick of her wrist. “That’s just one of your tenants. A bit peeved that she’ll be served her notice once you’ve made the sale, that’s all.”

“Well, there’s no need for her to behave like that. I mean, it’s probably for the best if she needs to move on. You won’t get anywhere in this world if you talk to people like that. Just makes you sound entitled and arrogant. I mean, calling it her house when she’s only renting! You provide housing for people, and they expect everything to revolve around them. And they don’t even care enough to look after the place. I hope you don’t have to put up with that sort of nonsense all the time, Candace.”

“Well, you know renters – what do you expect?” she replied. “Chip on the shoulder that the world’s changing around them, and they aren’t being given the handouts to be a part of it. Not enough get-up-and-go to make it onto the property ladder.”

“Seems her get up and go got up and left!” said Sean. The joke was neither funny nor original, and didn’t particularly make sense in the context. But they both laughed anyway, if only to dislodge some of the discomfort the incident had created that neither of them wanted to admit to.

.

By the end of that day, the sale had indeed been made, with a very healthy profit. Sean felt great. And he was out on a date that evening, so he could adorn himself in his plumped-up pride to impress his new lady friend.

Sean was pretty good at the dating scene. No real interest in deeper relationships (he was a bit of a cat that walked by himself), and he’d mastered the art of alluring his date into bed on the first encounter, after which he’d formed a dedicated practice of ignoring all attempts at contact with him until they got the idea and stopped trying to get through. What a bastard he was, he thought to himself as he got ready for his date that evening, and he loved the feeling of power that it gave him.

Essentially, he’d come up with a successful three-part dating formula. Firstly, the right combination of preening and grooming. Then, when he met his date, he had to find a way to angle the conversation so that he could tell an attractive story about his life. And finally, taking an intent interest in the date in question was a key ingredient of the magic mix.

Part one – being well groomed – was essential. Fresh breath and flossed teeth, hair plucked from anywhere it could act as a distraction. A subtle scent should be worn – nothing too overpowering. Clothing should show he cared for his appearance, but not too much. He usually wore a polo shirt just tight enough for his biceps to bulge slightly from the sleeves, so that his date could imagine a strong pair of arms around her.

His story about his life revealed how he’d had it tough when he was growing up with his single mum and half-sister, and he’d hardly ever seen his dad. But he’d persevered; he’d worked hard and transformed himself into a success. Okay, so he’d inherited his first property from his loser of a father, it was true, though he didn’t make too fine a point of it. He’d worked hard to do that property up so he could rent it out, even while putting himself through financial advice training. How had he managed to do all that? Well, it really was tough at the time. He’d pretty much lost a year of his life working to get it all off the ground, but he’d then managed to purchase a second property, a buy-to-let.

And as time went on, he’d gone from success to success, developing a full acquisition portfolio. Things were going so well that by now he’d more or less ended his financial advice work and was living in his own fantastic place on a passive income. He had a great agent who could handle anything, so he could spend his time doing the things important to him – like going to the gym and looking after his body. He was in control; a guy on top of his game who could foot the bill. He played sports and had a motorbike and ripped abs – not that he was showing them off. The story would only work if he still managed to appear modest; bragging was a universal turn-off, so he had to be skilled in how he talked about his positive aspects. By now, he’d got the story down to a tee, and they appeared to love it every time.

Crucially, part three of the formula turned all attention to his date; “…Anyway, that’s enough about me. What I’m really interested in is hearing all about you. What kind of life do you like to lead?”

“Oh well, nothing that’s quite as impressive,” his date would typically say; “You know, I’m just trying to get going with some things really…” And he’d encourage them, tell them they were on the right track, and give a few golden nuggets of advice. It was enough to take the evening where he wanted it to go.

His date on this particular evening was Michelle. Sean knew little about her from the dating app he was on, but she was pretty damn hot. They sat picking at Tapas and sipping Rioja at a fancy Spanish bar in a shopping complex on the city’s outskirts. He’d just got through the first half of the storytelling part of his formula, and things seemed to be going smoothly. He sensed they were going to develop a sparky connection. What was next came from out of nowhere.

“What the hell’s an acquisition portfolio?” asked Michelle with a slight smirk. Damn, that wasn’t a question that was supposed to be asked; they were meant to just be impressed by the fact that he had one.

“It’s a portfolio of my acquisitions…just joking, it’s – you know, I’ve worked hard to build up my properties over time to allow me a passive income…”

“So you make your money from not really doing anything?” Michelle interjected.

Crap, this wasn’t quite working out. It was time to change tack to part 3. “So enough about me. Tell me about you, Michelle. What do you enjoy doing with your time?”

Michelle didn’t answer his question. Instead she said, “I’ll be back in a sec,” and slipped off to the WC. Several awkward minutes ensued while Michelle was away from the table. What on earth was she doing in there? When she returned, she said simply, “Well, thanks so much for this evening, Sean,” (it had only really just begun) and, “I’ll call you,” before she swished out of the bar.

What the hell just happened? thought Sean to himself. Maybe he was losing his touch. Maybe he hadn’t plucked his nose hairs properly and had some distracting protruders. He felt his self-esteem dribble away with the humiliation of being ditched so soon into the evening. He might be a cat that walked by himself, but right now, he felt like a cat that had fallen head-first off the table and had to recover his dignity by proving to himself and the world that this wasn’t a thing that happened to cats.

Most of the pricey bottle of wine that he’d ordered to drink with Michelle still sat on the table. In an attempt to suppress a range of rotten emotions, he poured himself a large glass and knocked it back as fast as he could, before topping his glass up several times more. When the bottle was gone, he ordered a couple of double Jack Daniels, one after the other, before deciding it was high time to get out of there.

Sean did not feel drunk – he held his alcohol well, but as he revved up his motorbike and rode into the night, he knew he was risking it a bit if he should get stopped by the police. This was the last reasonably clear thought that Sean would have for a very long time. As he pulled off a slip road and onto the dual carriageway, a van hurtled into him. He was hurled from his bike and sent careering down into the tarmac.

.

Sean finally opened his eyes. He was in a hospital bed and had no idea how much time had passed. Everything was a blur. He lay there for a while, trying to make sense of things. Finally, a nurse came in and started writing down information from a monitor before he realised that Sean was awake.

“Hi, Sean,” the nurse said gently. “How are you doing?”

“I don’t know,” he mumbled. “What’s going on?”

“You’ve been in a coma. And you’ve been showing signs of consciousness for some time now. It’s great to see you get to this point. This is the first time you’ve spoken in all that time.”

“How much time?”

“The full coma lasted about 8 weeks,” said the nurse. “And following that, there have been around 12 weeks when you’ve been in a minimally conscious state.” This was crazy. He’d been here for months. And he couldn’t remember a thing about coming in and out of consciousness. Then he started to realise that something else was wrong. What was it? He could move his hands, but not his lower body.

“What’s wrong with my legs?”

“I’m sorry to tell you this, Sean, but you’ve had a spinal cord injury, amongst other complications. You know – when you had the motorbike accident. At this stage, it’s impossible to say how it’s going to heal.” Sean’s mind became a nauseating whirl, but the nurse didn’t seem to notice and continued, “Your sister has been visiting you. We’ll give her a call and let her know you’re fully awake. She’ll be so relieved.”

His sister. Georgia. Hmm, she must care after all. They’d never had a very warm relationship. They were only half-siblings with different fathers, but they’d grown up together, and things hadn’t been easy. They were too similar and too different at the same time. Still, at least she’d come. His body and mind were shattered, and he ached for human comfort.

Though when Georgia came to visit, the comfort was short-lived. God, why did she have to be so brusque? Hadn’t he been through enough? She told him that she was glad he was awake, and she hoped he’d keep getting better, but there was something he had to know.

“You see, the week after your accident, there was a huge financial crash. The economy plummeted, and since then inflation and interest rates have gone berserk. All sorts of companies have gone bust. The economy’s still in chaos and there’s all sorts of corruption going on. I tried to look into what it all means for your business, but I didn’t have much information to go on. It seems like that agent you used to manage your properties – well, it looks like they’ve skipped the country, cos the shop front’s boarded up, and I can’t find any other trace of them. Something weird’s happened and it looks like they’ve somehow managed to swindle a load of money out of you. And I know this isn’t what you want to hear Sean, but everything’s such a mess in the economy and what with your accident and all…your properties are on the way to being repossessed. Including your own house.”

Sean couldn’t believe his ears. His whole life – everything he’d worked for – had been put in a blender and turned to mush. There were no words for the state his life was in and a deep groan erupted from within him. He closed his eyes and waited for Georgia to go away.

.

Another three months later, Sean was finally ready to leave the hospital. His condition had been so serious that they hadn’t even booted him out for bed blocking. But by that time, he had a small amount of strength and movement in his legs, and he could do things like shift himself from a wheelchair onto a toilet. It was a world of difference from when he’d been hospitalised, but the word cripple hung heavy over him.

As he edged towards recovery, he’d started to spend time trying to sort out his financial affairs, mostly by shouting into his smartphone from his hospital bed. Things had not gone well. He really had lost his entire acquisition portfolio and he hadn’t found how to get to the bottom of what had gone on. He’d tried to start a court case against his agent but, as Georgia had said, it wasn’t possible to find a record of the company. It was completely bizarre.

Even the money he’d made on the house sale just before the accident had mysteriously disappeared. And all the ways he’d been careful and sought to cover himself with insurance policies had come to nothing, as so many insurance companies had gone bust. Without an income to pay the mortgage from his other properties, and without the income insurance that should have been covering him after the accident, he had lost his home too.

The final twist in the decimation of Sean’s life was that he wasn’t even due a decent compensation payout from the van driver who’d caused the accident. Not because the insurance company had gone bust, as things turned out, but because the van driver had been found to be at such minimal fault. The alcohol found in Sean’s bloodstream on the night of the accident put him well over the legal limit. In his drunken state, he hadn’t even switched his lights on. He was virtually invisible on the road, and then misjudged when he pulled out from the slip road onto the dual carriageway. Sean endlessly reeled in disbelief at what had happened to his life. There had been no mercy.

Except he still had one thing left: the house he’d originally inherited from his dead father. It had no mortgage and belonged to nobody else. Sean felt no warmth for the house, but he served the tenants an eviction notice so that he’d have somewhere to go. This was the first time he’d ever had a shade of conscience about how he affected the lives of his tenants. The crash had deepened the housing crisis, so what would they do? But it wasn’t the time for moral twinges.

The day that Sean left hospital, Georgia came to accompany him back to his house. It was kind of her, though he felt the smart of being patronized by her help. She’d booked an accessible taxi, which she complained had taken ages to figure out. When it finally came, the driver was a smiling Somali guy who slid Sean and his wheelchair into the cab without a shade of flap or fluster.

“How are you doing?” said the driver as they left.

“Don’t ask,” Sean replied, glowering.

“Ah, don’t worry!” said the driver. “This is early days. You not used to it yet. My wife’s in a wheelchair most of the time these days. She lucky I got this taxi! But it’s okay. You just got to keep all your family and friends around you, and your life will be good!”

Family. There was Georgia. A bit of a pain in the arse. Their mum had pissed off years ago after she’d deemed him and Georgia old enough to look after themselves. They weren’t even sure where she was, most of the time. Taken off in a truck with some guy who wore creepy cowboy boots, and no looking back.

Friends. He’d had friends in the past. Hadn’t seen them much for a long time. Too busy with business. How would he ever call them up now? Hi, Sean here. Just thought I’d get in touch. Yes, mate, everything’s going…just great. Yep, business. Oh, and by the way, I’m a cripple. What would they see in him now that this had happened? Why would they want to be his friend? Unless it was because they pitied him. The thought of being pitied crushed him.

They arrived at the house at last. He and Georgia started to squabble about how he was going to get out of the taxi. It all seemed so awkward.

“Easy, easy,” said the taxi driver, soothingly. “Just do it like this,” and he showed them how to manoeuvre Sean down the ramp.

The awkwardness continued when getting into the house. There were a couple of steps that Sean had never really thought about before. “Still waiting for the Council to come and make the adaptations,” said Georgia. “And they’re taking their sweet time…”

Finally, they got in through the front door. The first thing that struck Sean was a strong smell of damp. He’d forgotten all about that, but now it came back to him; he recalled painting over the black mould when he was doing the place up. A vague recollection of the tenants complaining about it came back to him. He’d done his best to ignore them. What was he supposed to do about it? Then he’d got a managing agent to do the job of ignoring them instead. Still, the air quality was so bad that it made him cough and splutter.

Georgia had done a lot of the practical stuff so that he had the basics covered for when he moved in. Sean suspected that this was to avoid the burden of having him stay with her. He still couldn’t access the upstairs of the house, as no stairlift had been fitted. Luckily, the bathroom was downstairs. She’d got bars fitted to the walls so he could hoist himself on and off the toilet. How it would work with the shower had yet to be figured out. She’d got a bed he could use in the living room and some basic furniture. She’d sorted out getting him a couple of Personal Assistants so that there were people in every day to help. Sean had never heard of a PA apart from the kind that made the boss coffee and typed up notes. Unless these PA people were going to come and assist him in getting his business back off the ground, he really wasn’t up for having them in his private affairs. But he didn’t refuse them, in spite of his pride.

.

The season changed, and winter set in, as much outdoors as inside Sean himself. There were raging storms within him. He was wild with fury and frustration. He was vile to his PAs until, one after another, they quit, and Georgia had to work on recruiting more. He was foul to her too, and in the end she left him to it. When alone, he drank too much and threw whiskey glasses at the wall. When his PAs came, he swore, threw tantrums, and ensured they could do no right. He didn’t want to see anyone. He wanted everyone to leave him alone. But when he was on his own, he felt only howling rage at the injustice of what had happened to his life. He’d never deserved this. He’d worked hard; he’d done everything right. He’d made one mistake, and everything had spiralled. Why had this all happened? Why?

Then came a late morning in mid-March when Sean woke up and felt something different. A ribbon of sunlight was beaming past the curtains. A flutter of joy crossed his heart. He hauled himself out of bed into his wheelchair and manoeuvred himself into the kitchen. Something in the air felt different. It was still cold, but he felt the urge to open the back door and let in the enlivening springtime air. The sound of birdsong, ushering in the change of season, drifted over him. It was so beautiful that he felt tears well up in his eyes. He was surprised at the effect it had on him.

For a long time, he just sat, looking out of the back door at the spring beginning to sprout. The cold was intense, but he didn’t care. He felt then that the storms within him had passed and could sense something else in their place. What was it that swirled within him now? Ghosts. But strange ghosts – how could he put it? They were the ghosts of his beliefs. That was what was still haunting him. And in that moment, he could listen to what they’d been saying for all these years; he could sense how they’d been controlling him.

Sean found that the ghosts had many messages. You are the only thing in your own way. You can manifest whatever you want. You can achieve anything if you try hard enough. You can choose to succeed, or you can choose to fail, but it’s your choice. You’re the entrepreneur of your own destiny. You’ll live the life you deserve. And the wealth you generate will be good for everyone. You’ll create jobs by being successful. Provide housing. Open up opportunities. Others would love to live the life you’re living if only they had the strength to.

There were two things that Sean learned from listening to the ghosts. Firstly, that he had profoundly failed and that maybe, on some level, in his empty little life, he’d chosen to fail. He’d been shallow and reckless, out only for himself, and he’d taken an action which led to his life falling apart. Second, he learned that his philosophy had failed. There were conditions in which he’d been able to be successful, and those conditions were no more. His personal catastrophe had collided with a structural disaster. The economic crash was beyond anything to do with his own success or failure. He’d believed himself to be in control, but he could see now that this had always been a lie. The old Sean had died, but there was no new Sean in that place. Only ghosts.

Later that day, there was a knock at the door. When Sean made it to the door to open it, a woman was standing there with a bundle of leaflets.

“Hi!” she said in an unnecessarily friendly tone. “Sorry to bother you. My name’s Judy, and I’m from your local community union. I’m out today asking people around the neighbourhood if there’s anything concerning you about how things are being done in your local area. Is there anything you’d like to bring up?”

Sean slanted his eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. What kinds of things?”

“Well, a lot of the residents here have brought up issues with their landlords – you know, the way their rents have been pushed sky high since the crash. But also maintenance issues; not fixing broken boilers, not dealing with damp, leaving holes in the walls, evicting tenants for no reason, all that stuff. As a union, we bring people together and apply pressure so that we can get what we’re owed. If we do it together, it works.”

He stared at her squarely, unsure if what he was about to say was to spite her or because he needed some kind of confessional to unburden himself.

“There’s something you need to know about me. Don’t be fooled by the wheelchair. Before this…” he nodded down at his legs, “I was a landlord. I had nine houses, as well as my own. I didn’t even do any work any more, I had so much money coming in. And I was the landlord that you lot are all up in arms about. I didn’t give a shit about the rising damp or a broken boiler. In fact, I didn’t even understand why the tenants were making a fuss. All I thought about was the money. To be brutally honest, I thought that renters were losers. If they really cared about their lives, they’d find a way not to rent any more. And I hated unions. Thought they were the scourge of the economy. Honestly, that’s what I thought!”

Judy’s expression remained steady. “And what do you think now?”

“I don’t know what I think! Everything’s been crazy in my head since this all happened. All I know is that there’s this feeling that I’ve never really allowed myself to have before. It must be empathy. I don’t know what else to call it. A bit of empathy for the world. That’s what I have now.”

She handed him a leaflet. “If you come and help us, we won’t hold your past against you,” she said. And with that, she left.

A few days later, Sean asked his PA to take him out to do the shopping. As they went down a supermarket aisle, they suddenly bumped into the guy who had driven the taxi back from the hospital, pushing a woman in a wheelchair. Sean guessed it must be his wife. It had been months ago, but the taxi driver still recognised him.

“Hi, friend, good to see you!” he said. “How you doing these days?”

“Better thanks mate,” Sean said, feeling the slight curve of a smile on his face. “Things are starting to go a bit better.”

They chatted a little, and the taxi driver introduced him to his wife, Leila. Before they moved on, Leila said to him, “I go to the Disability Equality Forum. I learn a lot there. You should come if you’ve got any problems with the Council not doing its job. We’re starting a campaign.”

Sean thought about all the things that needed doing in his house that the Council should have done months ago and all the problems he had getting round the city in a wheel chair. Maybe he’d go.

“And come and see us for some food,” said the taxi driver, handing Sean a card with his number. “In my house we have lovely Sambusa.”

.

Sean sat at home in the quiet of the evening. He was caught between loneliness and an attempt to swallow his pride. Finally, he managed to send a text message to Georgia…I’m sorry I’ve been so difficult. I’d like to see you…

Then he scrolled through the names in his phone. His eye landed on Jason, a friend he’d known since primary school but hadn’t seen in years. All the fun they’d had through all that time. The climbing trees, building crazy big fires, bunking school, clowning around. Jason was a live-wire who couldn’t keep still. Smart as they come, but he’d failed all his exams. Why had they lost touch? Sean couldn’t say. They’d just gone their separate ways, living such different lives. At that moment, he loved and missed Jason with a welling sadness.

He pressed Jason’s number, and the phone started to ring. After not long, Jason picked up. Sean could barely believe it.

“Mate, is that really you?!” Jason sounded as excitable as ever.

“The one and only,” replied Sean, bracing himself against his own tears. “I just wanted to get in touch. I – I’ve missed you, you see, and I’m – I’m really sorry it’s been so long.”

“Well, it’s great to hear from you! How the hell are you doing?”

“I’m good. Yeah, good.” He inhaled with a breath that was sharp and shallow. You can do this. “Mate, I want to hear how everything’s going for you, I really do, but first, I want to tell you something. It’s about something that’s happened…”