Now There's A Coincidence

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It was one of those unexpected occurrences, out of the blue so to speak. A crime writer would have hesitated to use such a string of coincidences in such a plot, I mean, how likely is it that so many random events would come together?

      But they did!

First my wife's older sister had fallen and broken her arm. Well, not quite first because two days earlier her husband had been sent on a sales trip for a few days in Holland because two days earlier than that, his boss had gone down with a slipped disk.

      See what I mean?

      So my wife took it on herself to stay with her sister until her husband returned. Well, she couldn't be left on her own now could she?

      Well, there I was on my own quite content at the prospect of spending some time in front of the box watching sport, and as I usually kept a few cans of ale in the fridge I did not consider myself to be at risk of anything untoward spoiling my few days of being an armchair sportsman. I've always been keen on sport; in my young I played most of the popular sports at one time or another. At school it had been rugby or soccer. Later on tennis and badminton tempted me away from the turf. Later still as I entered that part of my life when one was supposed to act seriously, at least as far as the future was concerned, I found myself somewhat attracted to the golf course.

      So sport of any kind was something that interested me and I even found those that I had never played good TV fodder!. Athletics and field sports are a case in point, as are those on the ice and snow. Swimming, snooker and darts; they're all the same and boxing or the gee gees is grist to the mill. If it's sport I love it. Doesn't matter if Id played it or not, or if I had played it whether I‘d been any good or not. Mostly it was not, but sport was sport and I loved it all.

      Well now, this is where it starts to get interesting for not in any real sense had I ever contemplated the curious nature of coincidence. How It came about that I was anticipating a weekend of booze and bats (to coin a phrase) for instance. Well I mean, The idea of coincidence had never crossed my mind. Just one of those things I guess.

      Well here’s the thing; before she left on her errand of mercy my wife had stocked up the fridge and freezer, enough for my needs while she was away. Except, I decided, she had seriously underestimated the anticipated beer consumption levels during her absence (bless her, I'm sure it was unintended) so I took myself off to the supermarket.

      Well there I was with my trolley now carrying a quantity of cans much more suited to the serious sporting weekend I envisaged and I turned towards the checkout just in time to see a bottle of whisky disappearing into the inside pocket of a large ragged coat worn by a young man standing close to me. Clearly taken aback by our sudden 'face to face' and my apparent interest in his activities; more perceived than real I should add; he turned, intending no doubt to swiftly increase the distance between us in the direction of the door. Unfortunately in his haste he lost his equilibrium and fell against the display of bottles identical to the one (I later found out that it was two) in his inside pockets. Whereupon he fell to the ground accompanied by several more bottles from the display. This was not without considerable commotion and it transpired, some degree of pain for the noise was a combination of breaking bottles and a sort of stifled scream emanating from the mouth of the lad. Members of staff appeared quickly and when it was noticed that the resulting flood of whisky was starting to take on a redness not natural to the blend an ambulance was called to take him away.

      Well I didn't know what to do so I just hung about. Shortly after the sound effects changed when the police arrived just about the same time the ambulance was leaving, each announcing their presence simultaneously in their own ear splitting styles.

      In all this commotion I had not uttered a word, save something akin to "bloody ell mate, watch what you're doin." when the young lad had collided with the bottles of Bells. Nevertheless I felt obliged to remain in case my testament proved to be pertinent.

      In the event he had been carted away and I (and so too the other customers) was allowed to continue my shopping, somewhat miffed that despite my being the only witness to the crime, no one asked me a single question.

      Well you can imagine, In all this I had lost some of my enthusiasm for the task in hand, but as I had just about ticked all the items on my list I made for the checkout. Despite the ever growing crowd of customers four of the six tills were unmanned and most of the people in the queue before me seemed to be pushing impossibly full trolleys. 

      Well you can see for yourself it had been an unusual episode and with all those people before me there was going to be a longish wait. Now, as previously mentioned it had never occurred to me to ponder the question of coincidence in general, or of major incidents at supermarkets. Well you wouldn’t would you? So there I was with plenty of time for pondering! So I pondered. Minor shoplifting I would have thought, would be about it but anything more than that would be relatively few and far between.

      How naive of me! Try twice in an hour that's what. For even as the sounds of the competing police and ambulance vehicles were still ringing in my ears, (though by now both vehicles were gone), this chap with a big hat and most of his face covered in a scarf rushed in waving a gun, and demanded all the cash from the tills. Not only that but he was shouting and pointing to those of us in the queues 'requesting' that we should throw our wallets to him. The woman behind me backed away and I followed suit cowering behind my trolley as best I could until I was far enough away to feel that I was out of immediate danger. Only then did I realise that I was near the door, and following the lead of the unknown lady we continued to retreat from the mayhem until she and I were outside the shop. She it seemed was more savvy than I for without a moments delay she was off, disappearing amongst row upon row of parked car. It took only a few moments of additional pondering before I too headed for the safety of my car.

      Well as you know I'm not by nature a dishonest man though I’ll admit to the occasional moments when my standards had slipped slightly. But if anyone had asked at the time I would have told them straight that I’d go back to pay for my 'purchases' when the panic was over. Well, wouldn’t you do the same? In the event nature intervened, for despite my normal regularity the excitement and the panic had worked some kind of magic on my bowels and suddenly I needed to get home in a hurry.

      Well there you go, my sporting week-end turned out to be a bit different to what I had planned. So it came about that late on Sunday evening I heard the sound of the key in the lock as my wife returned from her stint of Florence Nightingaling, and I, as she knew I would, stood up to welcome her home with a fond but asexual kiss.

      "Everything OK?" she asked as she removed her coat.

      "Everything’s fine!" I replied from the kitchen, my voice perhaps slightly blurred by the sound of water filling the kettle.

      "Manage OK? she said, in a questioning way that suggested that perhaps I hadn't, or to express surprise that I had.

      "I certainly did," I told her "well I did once I discovered where you had hidden the tin opener!"

      She laughed a soft laugh, and soon she was enjoying a nice cup of tea.     "Did you have a good journey back?" I enquired.

      "I did. Got a nice seat so I was OK. OH, and I saw on my smart phone that there was an attempted robbery at the super market."

      "Yes, I heard about that too." I replied. "Man with a gun they say."

"Seems it was a toy. Anyway he got carried off when the police turned up unexpectedly. Apparently someone had been taken to the hospital earlier and the police wanted to speak to the manager. So he was caught red handed."

      "Well well, what a coincidence." was all I could say.

      "Oh, and by the way, I'm sorry I didn't top up on beers and stuff. I was well on the way before I remembered."

      "Not to worry," I said "I nipped down and got a few."

      "Good job you didn't get caught up with that other business."

      "Isn't it just," I replied as I took another drink of larger. "That really would have been a coincidence."