The first-person narrator, Eddie Harnovey, is a chemical engineer, married to Tanya, an aspiring but ultimately uncontracted political science academic.

Eddie is from middle class origins, his father being a clerk for a local council.

The next time is as fellow shoppers in a department store, as Eddie looks for formal wear for his marriage to Tanya.

Downsized, jobless, and with only three dollars in his bank account, Eddie skips an appointment with Amanda - now an employment consultant - and ends up beaten unconscious protecting a friend of a now indigent man Eddie befriended while still solvent.

Amanda identifies Eddie from the appointment card he had in his shirt pocket.