Conversation clusters.

In the supermarket where we buy our words*, I idly stroll wondering how much money I can afford to spend and what is the best value**. I mean I worked hard to be able to spend so I want to carefully select the words I am going to use for the next while. Making my way through the aisles alphabetically I notice a flashing sign proclaiming a new product 'Take part in any conversation' it reads. Intrigued I make my way into a new aisle where laid out before me is packages of words grouped together termed 'Conversation Clusters'. A shop assistant bursts out of nowhere. 

-Hello how are you?' she inquires 

-I'm not sure' I stammer in surprise. 

She breaks into a peal of laughter. 

- I have just the thing for you she replies and motions at a particular pile of 'Conversation clusters' with the titles 'Small talk', 'Idle chit chat' and 'Passing pleasantries and casual greetings'. 

Together they take up the most shelf space in the aisle. 

-Our new conversation clusters save money and time, instead of wasting time actually thinking about considering and choosing your words, you can select your words for the coming week in one or two neat packages, She replies while beaming at me. 

-What's the difference between these particular clusters? I ask.

She looks slightly flustered before composing herself.

-These clusters will all essentially say the same thing but with different words that depend on the context.

- If they all say the same thing, then how am I meant to choose between them?

- Well your not choosing at all, its not about what you want to say, its about what situation you may find yourself in, in the future, so you save loads of time browsing because instead you can predict to whom and how much you may run into certain types of people. We also have clusters based on common personality types so you can equip yourself with the words appropriate if you are prepared to run into such a person in the next week or so. 

- But what if I want to respond to something I didn't expect? 

- We have a high success rate and our clusters especially these types are selling extremely well, we find that people partaking in a cluster such as 'Small talk' are rarely faced with anything unexpected that they have to respond to. 

- Do you provide clusters for 'Perspective altering discussion' or 'Inspiring dialogue'? 

- We do not deal in this nature of conversation. You will have to spend more money and time selecting your words from the shelves if you wish to undertake this type of conversation. 

- But what if I'm extremely anxious about the nature of time because of my over-bearing awareness of my own mortality in combination with.... 

Interrupting me the shop assistant now visibly frustrated snapped 

- I don't know how to deal with this, I only buy clusters, I don't browse the aisles.   

*The supermarket is a metaphor for your mind. 

**Spending money is a metaphor for learning. 

Flash Fiction

The art closet is always locked at lunch but one day they find it open. They spill the glitter from tubs onto pages. It’s an avalanche, scree from magical mountains.  They blow it off the tops of their thumbs and watch it mushroom, suspended temporarily; it drifts through the air as if there was fairy warfare. They spread it out on the page and drag their fingers through it until it’s a whorl, the thumb print of a giant. Their teacher calls. Panicked, stumbling into the closet. So this is how it feels to be in a snow globe.

There’s not a lot of places to go in this town. There’s an industrial estate, warehouses blotting the horizon.  We went drinking there as teenagers, joked about climbing the cranes. During the day it held none of the same appeal. During the day it was just ugly, not dangerous. Dangerous. I can’t go back. Danger used to excite me, not frighten me, not remind me. We always drank too much. My mam wheels me by on the foot path, we can’t avoid going by that way as there’s not a lot of places to go in this town.

You sewed a button onto your coat, one which didn't match the others. I imagine you could have imagined a button falling off when it didn't. Maybe a button had fallen off another coat and you forgot which one. We laughed at first. It was funny, nothing to worry about. Then you tried to boil milk in the kettle, you picked up the remote control like the telephone, you went into the Garda station to buy your bread.  A soft grey round button among shiny black ones, you pull at it now as if it reminds you of something.