The pandemic has jumped species again. One by one, ghosts are dying. You don’t realise that the reason you suddenly cross the road is because there’s a pile of their corpses ahead. When it rains, you avoid sheltering in the shop-fronts where they collapsed before they could get help. But what use will that sixth sense of yours be if they all die? You’ll never know why they preferred looking out from bedrooms, what tragedy stopped them leaving.

You wonder if the virus going one way means that their grief goes the other. Is that why you lie awake crying? You want it all to be over. If streets look empty, are they safe? Will you still cross the road without knowing why, without looking? Will you always think you’re being watched? Maybe a few hermit ghosts still survive. For their sake, you never get too close to windows or old fireplaces. You wait until the sun is at its brightest, go to a public place, a happy place – the seaside maybe, a playground. But where is everybody? Can you get home in time?