14
The Westfield Plot
My week at C.H.I.S was pretty uneventful and I returned home for my weekend leave on the following Friday evening. It was a very quiet Saturday, so I went to bed early. I woke up the following morning at about 7o’clock and turned on my TV to watch morning cartoons when my mobile phone started quivering on my desk. I obviously hadn’t turned it off last night. I glanced over at its screen, it indicated that I had received a message but I decided to ignore it. I spent most of my morning relaxing on my bed watching cartoons and it was about 11o’clock before I was ready for the day. I decided that I would ride the bike that Pat my Physio had lent me for the weekend. It was a three wheeler called a ‘Tricycle’ so I couldn’t fall off it, well that was the theory, but I had my doubts. With a deep breath I rode down our road, and then down Kings Way into the Folders Lane Estate. I couldn’t remember how to get to S.P.O.P.R’s base. I rode on for about another twenty minutes hoping that my wanderings would help me recognise something distinctive. I retraced my journey to the post box, then to the bus stop. I looked at my watch and thought I’d better go home even if it was only to let my Mum know that I was still alive! I would have to try and find the base another day, maybe next weekend to continue my training.
The next day I was back at C.H.I.S and returned the tricycle. I gave it back to Pat; I was in the foyer when Mario called down the corridor –
“Chris!”
Angie pushed me to the Occupational Therapy room where Mario was due to have a session with me.
Angie left me by saying “I hope you don’t mind, Patrick’s decided to have Chilli Con Carne tonight, we were wondering if you would like to join Patrick and have the same?” asked Angie.
“As long as it’s not McDonald’s I’ll be alright!” I replied, as previous attempts of eating McDonald’s had resulted in me being violently sick.
I was quite nervous of Mario now as I roughly knew what he was up to outside C.H.I.S. Even though I was reluctant I knew that I had to confront him and get answers. So later during our computer session I started to ask him some awkward questions.
“What do you do with your spare time Mario?” I asked.
“I either go to Russia to meet up with my family or at weekends I run a youth group in Bolney.”
“I saw your name on a door at Westfield.”
“You don’t know, there could be another Mario. Is that the time already I’m afraid we’re going to have to stop there” Mario said uncomfortably as he phoned upstairs for Angie to pick me up from the session.
“How was your session Chris? We’d better get a move on as its rest time now.” Angie said as she pushed me into my room.
She left me on my own but reminded me to push the alarm button if I needed any assistance. I wheeled myself over to the window of my room to see if there was anything interesting going on outside. There wasn’t much outside – across the drive there was Chailey Heritage. I decided to count Chailey Heritage’s windows to pass the time. I counted up to 19, when my attention was drawn to some skips which were at the back of the car park. As I looked closer to my surprise Mario was putting something into them and then he pulled out a mobile phone to answer it. At that very moment Chris P came through the door.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“I’m looking at Chailey Common.” I replied.
After my rest session my day continued full of therapy sessions. Later whilst I was sitting on one of the dining room chairs waiting for my dinner I saw some lights in the field opposite C.H.I.S. Suddenly I could just make out a faint muffled voice coming from the field opposite.
“Could we have clearing for Alfa Juliet Papa Alfa to take off from Alpha Bravo 21 please?”
When the voice stopped talking I went and found Angie.
“Where’s Mario?”
“He’s probably at home by now” Angie suggested.
As I was pushing myself away from Angie back towards my room there suddenly was an almighty bang. I pushed myself up towards the window facing Westfield, from where I could hear a fire alarm from across the road blaring out. It was a constant deafening note that was coming from Westfield. I was wondering what could have happened and if it was something serious like a bomb and whether anybody was injured. Then there was a blast of light as a Belfast freight plane flew over C.H.I.S above our heads. Angie went into the office to try and contact Westfield. She managed to contact one of the nurses who was upstairs in Westfield who told her that the stairs were blocked by debris and the lifts had automatically been sealed off in accordance with the usual emergency procedures. The people in Westfield could not get out or phone externally from the Westfield site. Immediately Angie phoned the emergency services explaining that there had been some mysterious explosion at Westfield, Angie showed another side to her personality of vulnerability. She also tried to phone my parents to let them know I was alright but the phone was dead when trying to make external calls for C.H.I.S as well, the explosion must have cut the phones off.
Just as Angie replaced the handset, three fire engines had just arrived in front of Westfield. I glanced out of the window intrigued about what was happening. Angie told us to remain calm and not to vacate the building, as it was safer for us to stay inside. In all the commotion another aircraft landed behind Westfield, it looked from Dad’s description when we were chatting about planes last weekend as if it was an Argosy, which wasn’t as big as the Belfast. We continued to look through the window as Westfield burned and the firemen started their rescue. We all chatted amongst ourselves surmising what had caused the explosion. Most of us suggested that it was an innocent fire and the explosion could have been caused by the oxygen canisters that are stored in the cellars of Westfield for patients that required support breathing. But I knew better, I was sure that it was another terrorist attack by the assassins. Angie tried to divert our attention by asking what we all fancied to eat. Angie switched on the oven, five minutes later she said
“Fish & Chip’s alright with everybody!”