as soon as he moves in, gavin starts causing problems for shirley, by playing his music extremely loudly at all hours of the day and night. after a while, shirley pleads with him to stop being so inconsiderate, but this only makes him play his music louder. eventually, shirley reports him to the landlord, and then to council. after gavin is visited from a council representative, he vows to make shirley's life a misery. days later, shirley's cat, boots, goes missing, and she fears that gavin may be responsible. after several weeks, the cat is found dead in a plastic bin bag on shirley's doorstep. a distraught shirley turns to her friends, the ferreira family, for help, but gavin claims that he found the cat dead in the road and returned it to shirley as an act of kindness. shirley is not convinced.