He’s applied that particular hair dye, the one that is supposed to get men’s natural hair color back but is in every case: rust-colored.

“These losers can’t even manage a proper death,” says the man with the rust-colored hair, sweating. Don looks at him; he looks wretched.

“You have on pimp shoes,” says Don.

“Yes, of course I have on pimp shoes,” says rusty.

On the giant screen now is an old man at a rubbish heap, in the background the body of a rat is turning on a stick over a fire.

“Loneliness is only tolerable with money,” says the sweating man. “If you have money, you can buy things, and parcels will arrive. Someone will want something. At least someone will take an interest in you, even if it is just an algorithm. Without money, all that’s left is the kitchen, the clock, and the yellow paint on the walls, a park that belongs to somebody, the parking lot in front of the supermarket where you can stand until the security detail shows up. Most people’s lives consist of waiting. For something to happen, which will jolt them out of their waiting, which will make them take stock and realize that they’ll regret not having enjoyed life. But how? How do you enjoy life if nothing is burning inside you? And how much TV can you watch? Especially if the electricity has been cut off. Especially if your bottom hurts from sitting and from being reamed out by all the bullshit you stuff yourself with, and that’s what we mean by freedom. The freedom of self-actualization and possibility that was bestowed upon us all by the free market in reality gives most people nothing more than the possibility to watch the rich being free. The poor are theoretically entitled to freedom, but they just have too little money to live it out, freedom.”

“You put that well,” says Don, who had stopped listening after barely a second.

The sweating man nods quickly and disappears into the unbelievably multicultural neighborhood. Don watches him go. She scratches her hand, scratches off the scab that had formed over the red splotches that look like disgusting little islands.

The first few dynamic, nonchalant young men are coming out of the café across the street. With the crumbs of chips in the corners of their mouths, they flow into the street, which had been filled with tourists enjoying the last great amusement. Take a flight for ten pounds from someplace or other, day ticket, and then wander the streets, hit McDonald’s at lunch. There you can get cheap meat in a kale wrap—back in the evening, or, if it is to be a really wild outing, to one of the box hotels for £19, where people sleep in something like lockers, stacked up in sheds next to motorway on-ramps.