Time Moves On but This Town Doesn't

I was numbingly locked into my phone screen when I heard the bell above the entrance door jingle, slightly startlingly me back to reality. For a moment I forgot I was even at work and that guests would be coming in for their daily caffeine charge and sweet little treat. I quickly set my phone to the side to greet the person walking in, trying to act like I wasn't bored out of my entire mind seconds before they stepped in. I was mid "hello" in my higher pitched customer service voice when I recognized who just walked in. It was Bella from my junior high and high school years. Though she had been one of my best friends in eighth grade, we grew distant when high school came, finding new friends and different paths. Quickly, my tone changed from a customer-service level octave and dropped into an excited but natural greeting.

"I didn't know you worked here!" Bella exclaimed as she got to the register.

We never had a falling out and never had any bad blood. We just didn't stay connected over the Summer going into high school and when that first day of the new school year came, we naturally found ourselves drawing to different friend groups. What once was my best friend was then a girl in my third and sixth period who then became a girl I graduated with to finally a friend on Facebook whose posts I pay attention to but for some reason never like or comment.

Bella was always nice and I truly don't think has even a single bad bone in her body. The only hate I have for this part time job is running into people in this town that I absolutely could not stand but seeing Bella actually was comforting for some reason, almost nostalgic.

"I've only been here a few months," I smiled as I typed in her order, "just something to get me out of the house the days my husband works his long shifts."

"That's right! You got married! How has it been?" she excitingly dove into our now deeper than small-talk conversation.

We went back and forth giving little updates about our life, almost talking over each other as if we were young girls on the first day of school catching up about our Summer vacation. As I made her iced vanilla latte with oat milk, I filled her in on how my sister was doing and she told me about how her brother had just moved back to town. The conversation held a lot of "oh yeah!"s and "that's right!"s as we both remembered details about each others family and lives. We both desperately agreed how we couldn't wait to take our new husbands and finally, once and for all, get out of this town.

I put the lid on her to-go cup and handed her her drink. The conversation was feeling like it could keep going and something in me stirred, almost hoping this was the start to us becoming good friends again.

She smiled a big smile at me as she grabbed her drink and after a bit of a pause she said, "it was so nice seeing you! I hope to see you around."

I smiled back and returned the sentiment. Maybe all this was meant to be was a moment of running into a classmate without it being a miserable encounter, and I think I was okay with that, actually.

Bella turned to walk out the door and then abruptly stopped, slowly turning back to me as her entire demeanor changed, dropping from happy and light to somber.

"Did you happen to hear about Madison?" Bella softly asked me as she walked back to the counter, her eyes now full of sadness as she met mine.

"Madison?" I asked, "No... What happened?" I already knew what she was going to say before she said it. No one from our graduating class had passed in the almost ten years we had been out of high school. We were the smallest high school in the town and so it was actually a bit of a shock. I feel like that is what everyone expects from small schools in small towns, though. Half the class dies or marries too young, some make it out of the small town, some are miserably alone in the town, and just a few become big named somethin's.

Madison was another momentary friend in my school years turned Facebook friend I observed through photos and statuses. I had heard from her sister the years after high school were rough but she was finally doing better. I never ran into her around town but whenever I saw her post, I silently was rooting for her.

"That's crazy," is all I could muster out to Bella. She silently nodded her head and made her way out, leaving me with a feeling I had yet to experience in this life.

I took my final ten minute break for the day and sat outside in the shared courtyard amongst all the businesses in the plaza. I allowed for the soft but hot breeze to graze my face as I soaked in the news. I remembered how at graduation I had made a horrible, yet true, statement. Humor was always my way of coping and graduation was a tough change for me. We were sitting in our rehearsal for the actual event, learning where our spots would be and the valedictorian was practicing her speech. I looked around at the classmates filling the seats on the stage as I soaked in the most consistent people in my life for the last four years. Faces I had known forever, even if I only ever shared two passing conversations with them, would suddenly no longer be in my daily life. My most formative years were spent with these people and though most of us had never spoken outside of a shared class, I think I would have considered them family. A dysfunctional family, sure, trauma bonded by teachers and the way of the school we went to, but we all grew up together and now it was time to grow without each other.

"Just think," I had said to the classmates sitting within earshot of me, "in ten years some of us may be dead! Tomorrow very well may be the last time we ever see each other again in this life."

I vaguely remember the guy sitting next to me, I actually can not remember his name for the life of me but I do think he transferred to our school sophomore year, gave a groan at my statement and when others gave me shocked looks, I think he ended up giving a bit of a chuckle.

A horrible yet true statement. That day was truly the last time I would ever see Madison.

Why did I have the audacity to say such a thing out loud? If I were to bring it up to my therapist I am sure she would say something about how I was finally grasping a huge reality of life and it felt too heavy to hold on my own so I, quite literally, had to share it with the class.

My gaze was locked in to the restaurant across the courtyard as I thought about the few memories I held of Madison. Most of them were faded away and almost non-existent, but I could clearly remember a fond one. It was freshman year and for some reason we were both after school late doing something. Somehow we began giggling about the boys and, in confidence, we shared to each other who we had the biggest crush on. Madison ended up dating that boy for a few years. I wonder if he had heard the news yet.

My thoughts were interrupted as a server from the restaurant came out to their patio and around into a back corner of the courtyard. Something about her seemed very familiar and as she pulled out a cigarette from her apron it clicked in my head. I watched as Andrea took a long drag of her cigarette and before she could look my way, I turned my gaze to my drink in front of me as I quickly checked how much time I had left on my break.

I don't think Andrea would even realize it was me. I hadn't seen her since eighth grade and she was not someone I wanted to keep up with on social media. She was someone who made junior high absolutely miserable for me, actually. We had some mutual friends early into high school, but I had lost contact of her livelihood before graduation even came. I don't even remember what high school she ended up going to but I do know she had gotten married shortly after and if I thought back to the last time I stalked her social media pages, I think I saw that she has a kid or two.

Yet here we are, working across the courtyard from each other. Some days I even grab a quick lunch from that place and most days they get in as I am unlocking the courtyard gate for the day. Did she just start working there or was this just my first time seeing her?

My break was done and I grabbed my drink and my phone off the table to headed back inside. I looked up to the sky and quickly pleaded that Andrea wouldn't feel the need to grab a coffee after her shift because she was someone I would not really care to play nice to.

What an odd day. What a strange series of interactions to have one right after the other. I stood behind the register just admiring the few people that scattered the shop. Some presumably studying, one man was reading a book, and there was a couple that looked to be on a date. I thought about Bella, Madison, and Andrea. All three very different impacts on me in very formative times of my life.

All I could remember of Bella was how nice she always was and all I could remember about Madison was who she dated in high school and my body still shuddered at the ice that would shoot from Andrea's voice every time she talked to me. I thought about how Bella and I had joked about everyone getting stuck in this town and how we are trying to break free and then it hit me...

Even if we get out and move away, we will still always be stuck here. Some of us will move away but those who stay will have their perception of us from the version we were growing up always stay the same. Some of us will come back for a few years as we plot to leave again. Some of us will only ever know this town as home and the world is only as big as the city limits. We never fully leave. Whether by existing as an opinion or fond memory in someone's mind or by being here until we die, we are all stuck.

Time moves on but memories don't. I had spent the last ten years exploring big cities and when I came back and settled down with a man I can't believe I found in this town, nothing changed. My memories of others still existed as they were and though we had all grown up, I think all we could see was the version of us at sixteen. Bella and Andrea are married and all I could think of is recess in eighth grade. Madison has passed on and all I remember is her holding hands with that boy at lunch.

Time moves on but this town doesn't. I'll go to the grocery store on my way home and see someone from junior year fourth period and quickly go to another aisle. Why? Because they were rude to me for the last semester of that class and that is all I see. Even though I see they have a newborn on their hip and their hair has changed, I won't dare try to see who they've become. Why?

Because time moves on but this town doesn't. If I make it to my high school reunion, I'll encounter everyone I once saw daily, with their spouses and kids, but all I'll be able to see is who they were at fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, or eighteen. It doesn't matter if they became nicer or an absolute devil. None of us will hear about the year their frontal lobe finally developed and honestly, with some I don't think we would even be able to tell. In this town, we will always exist as who we were. Whether we exist as a memory in someones mind because we finally got out or we exist as a memory because we simply didn't make it, much less make it out of this town.

We will always exist as we were to somebody because time moves on but this town doesn't.