Hounded by the ghost of Flat Past

Well, to be strictly correct, it's more Luke-the-not-landlord, not the flat. Once we texted him on the Friday to say we were moving out the next weekend, he phoned straight back - a first! - but we weren't prepared to talk to him until the weekend; and he didn't call back or come round at any stage during the week; until Saturday afternoon, when we were in a secondhand shop buying a supremely cheap (£40) tv, because the broadband people were coming round on Tuesday.

Did I mention he's so assiduous at the moment, because he hasn't been around for three months to collect the rent? Unsurprisingly we a) forgot about it, and b) spent it (on essentials, naturally).

Lara looked at her phone, and said "I'm not answering it - we've already moved out." She's such a bad influence; I didn't answer mine either, and he left a message saying "I'm in hospital" (sure you are), wanting to send his mother(!) round to pick up the keys and rent.

So then we were quite bad, and either didn't hear our phones (genuine, honestly), or were in meetings (also genuine), or at the gym (really! I know it sounds bad); but we also failed to call back. So this week we decided that we had to call him. Two bottles of wine later, we'd made a huge list of bargaining points, which I won't reproduce, but included: no contract, no receipts, toilet leaking into kitchen, the fact that he didn't have keys himself (I could go on), and psyched ourselves up to call him. It was engaged. For about 15 minutes. We texted him saying "We've been trying to get in touch with you (which we thought was a nice touch), but your phone is engaged. We're going to bed but will call you after work tomorrow." Twenty minutes later he texted Lara saying "My phone is on 24/7", which made us squeal in disgust (we had been drinking), and want to stay up to 3am to call him then. That was Tuesday. Wednesday we were at a bbq (fantastic weather, and so much food we ate ourselves sick). Tonight we must call him, because I'm off to France tomorrow, and Lara's going to Sweden to collect her cats. I just want this sorted. Gargh.