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All landlords are bastards. Before you give me ‘I’m a landlord and I’m nice’ or ‘My mate is one and they’re lovely’, I’m going to have to stop you right there. You are not a good person, and that pal is a parasite. Profiteering from the human right to adequate housing automatically makes you a scumbag. Housing is a right, not a commodity. This is the truth and I hope, in time, you come to accept it.

Now I have always,always, hated landlords, but I’ll admit my bad feeling towards them has intensified recently. You see, my landlord also happened to be the landlord of my childhood best friend, Amara, until he gave her notice to vacate her flat so his cretin son could have it instead. Amara was single. Her job as the assistant manager of the fruit and veg section in ASDA pays OK but it was a struggle to find anywhere decent she could afford in time. Me, her very best friend in the world, offered up my sofa, saying it was hers for as long as she needed it. Nicol, my boyfriend, was not best pleased. He and Amara had never really formed much of a relationship, mainly because she found his belief that he could save the world with a perfectly prepared recycling bin and an online presence dedicated to shaming people who didn’t care as much as him tedious. I understood it was less than ideal, what with there not being a defined end date to the arrangement, but Nicol agreed to it on the basis of loving me and wanting to make me happy. This was a rare display of Nicol prioritising my needs and, I’m embarrassed to admit, it moved me to tears.

Anyway, Amara found a new flat within a month, so it wasn’t a huge imposition like Nicol had fretted it would be. Plus, during the time she lived with us, she warmed to him loads. It was delightful to watch my best friend finally realise how wonderful Nicol could be, and for him to find an issue he could actually assist with rather than bang on about helping online. He educated himself so he could help Amara navigate the legal recourse for being illegally evicted. Understanding how grim our housing system really is led to him and Amara forming their own renters union so what happened to her could be prevented from happening to anyone else ever again. Nicol finally had a cause where he could make a real difference at the local level. Not just in South Lanarkshire, but also at the micro-local level of our home, when he and Amara left it together, flitting in secret one Saturday afternoon while I was getting my hair cut and they said they were off protesting for rent controls. This was not something I had foreseen, and it was not an event that would have been possible if landlords were not cunts.

So here I am, sitting on the same pink velvet sofa Amara slept on – and, let’s be honest, definitely fucked Nicol on – in a flat I cannot afford on my salary of zero pounds and zero pence, having been made redundant two days after I was abandoned. My role of receptionist at a law firm deemed unnecessary, an unattended iPad was deemed to be as efficient as me. It goes without saying, then, that making money to keep a roof over my head is vital in my current circumstances. Which is why I am this second painting my toenails, a task I usually complete once a year when I go to a foreign beach, after which I let it flake off to nothing during the winter months. This exception is being made as I’m preparing to take pictures of my feet to sell to a pervert I met on Reddit who has already bank transferred me £50 and is promising more if he likes what he sees. After that it’s just a measly £650 I need to scramble together for the rent.

The television is on in an attempt to dull my intrusive thoughts, which include, but are not limited to, having to move back in with my parents at the age of thirty-two; not meeting someone to be the father of the children I want before my eggs all perish; and accidentally choking to death and my body not being found for days.

As I wipe a smear of nail polish from the cuticle of my pinky toe, the theme music forFixer Uppers Go Under the Hammer starts. It sounds like a middling pop hit from the mid-90s and features a lot of saxophone, which is weird because I don’t think the programme first aired until the new millennium. The premise of it is that the presenter shows us a house or flat which is in a sorry state and about to be sold at auction. We then meet the person who has bought it and hear their plans for the renovation they are about to undertake, before an estate agent tells us how much they think the place is worth in its current condition. There are usually three such reno