TEENAGE TALES: HOSPITAL HIJINKS...

The long-vanished hospital shop of my childhood, teenage years
and young adulthood.  Demolished sometime back in the '90s

I've a nagging suspicion that I may've told this tale before.  Or perhaps I intended to tell it but then forgot.  Either way, I can't find it on the blog or remember which of these two possibilities is the right one, so I may as well tell it now - or again - whichever is the case.

When I was a teenager, me and my pals were quite adventurous in our, er, adventures.  We explored places we had no right to be, convinced in our fevered imaginations that we were agents of U.N.C.L.E., or The Three Investigators, or 007 - or any fictional characters with whom one associates 'living on the edge'.

We explored building sites, office blocks, the local Civic Centre - before, during and after working hours.  We investigated hotels, restaurants, churches - even the local hospital and surrounding out-buildings. You name it, any place we shouldn't have been, we were all over it like a rash.  For we were - The Adventurers! (Seriously, that's what we called ourselves.  Or maybe it was just what I called ourselves and the others merely humoured me, but hey - that still counts in my book.)

Let's just pause for a moment while I savour the thrill of what I deludedly (but willingly) like to believe was my exciting everyday life as a teenager, but (sadly) know I'm likely romanticising just a bit.  But we had our moments, and one such moment was this.

Sometimes there were three of us, but on this particular evening, there were only two - my good self and a friend who, for the purpose of this tale, we'll call Adam Cowie.  We'd just been into the local hospital shop so that I could check to see if it had any U.S. comics or black and white mags that, for some reason, weren't regularly or readily available from other newsagents.

There used to be more trees here, but they were felled to make
way for car parking areas.  Again, none of this exists today

The shop had nothing to offer, alas, so we then decided to investigate a ground-level out-building partially concealed by a wooded area.  It was one of several annexes once used as wards (I think), though at the time of this tale, used mainly for storing medical supplies and maybe also by administration staff.  We gained entry through the door, which yielded (undamaged) under the slightest pressure from our inquisitive selves.

We wandered the corridor, exploring the various rooms, and I happened to notice that all the windows were tightly secured with string, tied around the handles to prevent them from being opened.  My pal had just examined a bag containing a variety of medical implements and put it down again, when we were suddenly aware of what sounded like soft, slow footsteps, stealthily making their way along the corridor.

Discovery meant trouble, for who'd ever believe we were merely indulging our over-developed sense of curiosity by doing a bit of exploring without criminal intent?  My friend (as usual) sh*t a brick, but I was made of cooler stuff.  I'd noticed a pair of small surgical scissors in the bag my pal had been looking at, so I extracted them and quietly cut the string around the handle, replaced the scissors, then we both made a rapid escape through the open window frame and vanished in a cloud of dust over the horizon to freedom.

Phew!  It had been a near miss, but once again we had evaded capture by the combined agents of S.M.E.R.S.H., S.P.E.C.T.R.E., T.H.R.U.S.H., and HYDRA, and were free to fight yet another day.  Well, that's how it seemed to my fertile imagination, but then again, I always was a bit of a nutter.

Ah, those were the days.