More car-related drama:
A couple of years ago, a landscape gardener we'd took on to sort the back garden and patio told Anita about his hitherto successful business being ruined by a company he'd done a big job for going bust, owing him thousands. On top of his diagnosed Crohn's disease. Also his house was two weeks from repossession, so Anita went to court with him to plead his case, and got a stay of execution, and some benefits he didn't know he was entitled to.
We had a spare van doing nothing, so we put him on the insurance and lent it to him while he got back on his feet. That was over two years ago.
Then last week he sent a message on his family group chat saying he loved them, then disappeared. Later that day the van was found on Tesco's car park locked up. His brother could see through the window three empty boxes of paracetamol, so then someone (we haven't been able to find out who) smashed the window, then took a crow bar to the sliding door to check he wasn't in the back. He wasn't.
The police could see from Tesco's CCTV that he had left the van and headed towards the train station. Further enquiries revealed he had taken a train to Preston, and from there the trail went cold. Until they found he had taken himself to Royal Preston hospital feeling unwell.
He's recovered now, but his head isn't in a good place. And there's still the Crohn's.
We got the van back to our house, and sorting through all the papers in there, found countless final demands and a repossession notice from his mortgage lender. While we feel sorry for him, it's his family (wife and kiddies) who have our sympathy. They had no idea, he'd kept it from them.
Meantime we have a claim going through with the van insurers, no idea how that will go. But small potatoes compared to what that bloke and his family have ahead of them.
