No one told you life was gonna be this way
By Shannon Clarke

In the dining room of a house, four friends are considering going out for coffee. Two dogs are present as well.
All four people are talking, but each of them is having a different conversation.
River, who's been staring vacantly into space, suddenly exclaims, 'Oh, I almost forgot... You'll never believe what happened at work today. Carol...' Her voice trails off as she notices Duke. He's walking into the dining room, wearing the lid of the garbage can around his neck. Again. His nonchalant manner declares it to be the most normal think in the world. She jumps up and runs into the kitchen to clean up the mess.
Ron is sitting in front of the computer, staring at the BBC's website, muttering unintelligibly about some sort of sporting event and time differences and West Pork United, or something like that.
River returns to the dining room and sits down on the couch. 'Oh, right... So, Carol said that...' Coco springs onto her lap. She pushes him off and starts eating the chocolate mini eggs on the table.
Catherine is sitting next to Ron, monologuing about Professor David K. Thornbush and how he's really not a professor at all, just a PhD student teaching Classics at the university, whilst speaking of spanking his TAs. For reasons unknown, the word 'phallus' comes out of her mouth periodically.
River returns to planet earth for no reason discernible to anybody else. 'Oh, right... So she said that her computer... Oh, right, computer...' She jumps up and runs out of the room.
Dara is lying face down on the couch moaning that she's probably going to die before they even manage to leave the house and that it takes Ron 20 minutes to put on his shoes. She sneaks a sidelong glance at River and whispers something about 12-year-olds. Then she passes out. She proceeds to cough up three lungs in her sleep.
River returns to the dining room and proclaims that they're all heading out to Tequila Bookworm. 'That's a stupid name. They should have called it something else. But at least they have comfy seats.'
Ron looks Catherine in the eye and says, 'Four nothing! I mean, it was just Northern Ireland, but still...'
Catherine meets his gaze as she responds, 'He doesn't make any sense! This assignment just isn't possible. How can I write about what the common people thought, when the common people didn't leave records?'
'Hargreaves... Canadian... plays in Germany...'
Dara has another coughing fit.
River responds by sneezing 12 times in quick succession.
'Okay', she shouts. 'That's it! Everybody get up and go put shoes on.' Everybody else scatters to find their respective shoes.
She sits down and puts her slippered feet up on the coffee table. 'Oh right. Carol said her computer wouldn't work, so she shouted at me to... Hey, where'd everybody go?'