An orderly queue was forming to enter my bungalow. This was not the sort of thing I was accustomed to. Who were all of these people and why were they queuing at my door?

I peered through the blinds. Just a few moments prior, life had been quite normal – no queue and dinner was in the microwave. When the microwave pinged I was all set to eat my food and binge-watch noughties episodes of QVC on the YouTube. I liked my life to be simple and predictable and it generally was ever since I took the easy decision to excuse myself from society.

Did you know that partying has declined by 50% since 2004? I’m responsible for that.

Still peering through the blinds, trying to make sense of things, I watched as the queue to my bungalow grew longer and longer until I couldn’t make out the end of it. Someone had started selling cookies to those in line. I wanted a cookie, but I dared not venture out. What could all of these people want with me, Eco Umberton? I had spent many years and many calories avoiding people, and now they were queuing to meet me. Or were they queuing to kill me? Perhaps they wanted one of my air fryers. Is it possible that they wanted my pet Haggis?

In order to stall – and in the hope that they’d all simply leave as suddenly as they’d arrived – I decided that I’d go and sit in the back garden and eat my microwave meal. To my horror, a queue of people had also formed at the back door. People were clambering over the hedge to join it. A few of them were doing keepy-uppies with my football.

Despondent, I went to my bedroom and lay on the bed. I needed a new mattress but this wasn’t the time for that. I looked up at the ceiling. It needed a new lick of paint but this wasn’t the time for that. Granted, I hadn’t been paying enough attention to the little things, but this wasn’t the time for that. I started to hear a knocking at the door. The people were getting impatient. I opened my bedroom curtains to survey the queue and there was a man looking in at me. He was eyeing me curiously, as if I was a baby meerkat at Folly Farm. I shut the curtains and went downstairs to put the kettle on. Force of habit. 

The banging at the front and back door was starting to get louder and more constant. They were even banging on the windows. The microwave meal was cold and my appetite was starting to abandon me. I wanted to relax and watch QVC. They wanted to get in. The kettle was rattling as it reached its climax. It made me nervous. Then I heard a noise in the bathroom. With nervous gait, I approached and opened the door. A man was climbing out of the toilet. He was dripping wet and, yet, he seemed happy with his life.

“Eco!” He said jovially upon seeing me. I slammed the bathroom door shut and barricaded it with a chair. The collective sound of banging on the windows and the doors had gotten cavernous. I heard footsteps scurrying over the rooftop. I called the police. No answer. The operator was probably busy having a shit. Classic police incompetence.

Suddenly, a door was breached and they were in. All of them came rushing in. It was a deluge. I hid under the dining table, but they dragged me out by my feet and carried me into the street. They lobbed me into the boot of a Mini Cooper. My breath was heavy and I could see fuck all. Have you ever been in the boot of a Mini Cooper before? It’s small and it’s dark.

After something like fifteen minutes, the car stopped. They bundled me out. They were singing Coldplay songs. It was horrible. I looked at my surroundings. There was a hill with a man stood atop. They led me up to him. It was Steve Buscemi and he was eating a stick of candy rock from Blackpool. He looked deranged.

“Eco,” he said.

“What do you want with me?” I replied.

“You’ve been having too much of a good time.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“Everything.”

“Please, just take me home. I promise I’ll get a new mattress and re-paint the ceiling.”

“Do you promise?”

“Yes! I promise! For the love of God, let me go home.”

He slapped me on the back. Then he booted me in the arse and I tumbled down the hill. I’ll never forget it.

When I got home that night I was tired. It had been a strange day but I knew I needed to change my life. I got a paint brush and started to paint. Soon, I got sleepy.

When I woke up the next morning my arse was aching and I was covered in paint. I opened the curtains to take in sunlight but Willem Dafoe was staring back at me. He was bearing his teeth and holding a chainsaw above his head. Two steps behind him was Steve Buscemi. He was reading the bible, chewing on a stick of rock from Blackpool Pier and holding a dog leash which had David Beckham attached to the end.

Beckham looked up at me.

I looked down at him from behind the safety of my window.

He was looking rather glum and I think he mouthed the word ‘help’.

I shrugged sadly. Then I closed the curtains.