Sliding Out Of That Topic

(I work for the Biology prep staff at my university, making sure that classes and labs have all the equipment they need, etc. One day my manager and I are prepping for next week when a boy comes in from the Anatomy and Physiology dissection next door. He seems a little dazed.)

Boy: “Do you have any plastic baggies?”

Manager: “Yeah, right here. What’s it for?”

Boy: “Dirty… something. Dirty… pictures? Of dead bodies. Dirty body pictures…” *he seems to realize what he’s saying* “Oh, god. Slides! I meant it’s for contaminated slides of tissue samples we took from the cadaver! Not dirty pictures!”

(My manager and I were laughing too hard to reassure him. The professor later told he came back to class with the plastic bag and a blush like a ripe tomato.)