It was the sound of someone cocking a gun. Not the sound you
expect to hear from a locked cubicle in a gents toilet, but it was
unmistakable. I mean I’ve never actually heard it in the flesh before, but how
many episodes of CSI have I watched? Just about all of them, so I know the
sound of a gun cocking when I hear it and make no mistake that was what I’d
just heard. I stood stock still listening in the silence; water dripping from
my hands, my heart beating loudly. I didn’t want to use the drier in case I
missed the sound of the person coming out of the loo ready to start his or her
mass shooting. I listened for further clues but there was nothing to hear; just
the sound of someone breathing heavily in the cubicle and the occasional drip
of water from the tap.
I’d only come into the toilets to wash my hands. I hadn’t
even needed a wee. I wouldn’t have been in here at all if my idiot colleague
had cleaned up properly after herself. But she never does, does she? Oh no, she
lives in a world where others clean up your mess for you. She’d spilt coke all
over the meeting room table and had only half-heartedly wiped it up. So it was
left to me to put my laptop and hands into the gooey mess. After cleaning the
laptop with wet wipes, I’d come in here to try to get the gunk off my hands. Now
thanks to her this was the second sticky situation I’d found myself in in a few
minutes.
My mind was ticking; what was I going to do? What was going
on? Was a terrorist going to spring from that locked door any second and start
to shoot indiscriminately, killing anyone and everyone who got in his or her
way? Was a jilted lover planning a revenge attack? Or was that jilted lover
planning to end his or her own life sitting on the toilet on the second floor
or an anonymous office building. I needed to stop theorising and get moving. As
I tiptoed out of the toilet I set of the hand dryer causing me to jump about
three foot in the air. Once I’d regained my composure, I got my phone out and
punched in 999.
“There’s a person with a gun… No, I haven’t seen it but I
heard it… No, not being fired, being cocked… yes of course I am sure, I’ve seen
Criminal Minds.” Once I’d convince the operator I was telling the truth, I told
her the address and waited.
There were no sirens, no noise, but within minutes there were
police everywhere. The Armed Response Unit looked more like military than
police and were obviously taking no precautions. I bit my fingernails and
waited at a safe distance as the police stormed the toilet.
“Put your hands on your head and come out quietly.”
I waited for the sound of gunfire. Would the quarry come out
firing? Would a trigger-happy police officer put a bullet in his or her chest?
Or if it was a suicide would the victim kill him or herself first? There was
nothing. I held my phone up making sure nothing was getting in the way of the
recording.
“Put your hands on your head and come out quietly.” I
counted to three and then there was a bang, not gunshots but the sound of a
door being kicked in.
“What the fuck? I was just having a dump?” I couldn’t see
him, but I could imagine Bob from Marketing just pulling his trousers up, a
confused look on his face.
Realising that this wasn’t going how I thought it would, I
clicked my iPhone off. That’s funny I thought, I’d never noticed that before but the
sound of turning off an iPhone 6 sounds just like a gun being cocked.
About a month later my colleague had peeled an orange on the
meeting room table and not cleared up the mess. I accidently put my fingers in
the sticky goo and then had to pop into the toilet to wash my hands. Just as I
was about to dry them, I heard the sound of someone cocking a gun; it was
unmistakable.
Ha ha :-)
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