The Hands of Time

You see him in the pasta aisle. 

At first, you’re not quite sure. He is the right height and has a similar relaxed posture. The hair is the same black fuzz, buzzed close to the scalp. You inch closer for a better look but his head is bent down. You watch him study a can of marinara sauce. He gently places it back on the shelf, label out.

You pretend to look at a gluten-free box of bowtie noodles, but really you’re looking at him. You crane your neck just so, trying to catch a glimpse of his face. You need to know for sure. Then he looks up–looks right at you–and you know. It’s him.

“Oh my gosh,” he says. His eyes are wide. His eyebrows raise. You search his face for some sort of emotion, but you come up empty. He is unreadable. The thought strikes a chord of irony in your heart. Funny, this face you once knew so well now seems a mystery.          

He walks toward you. For a moment, you’re worried that he might hug you. But he doesn’t. He only looks at you. Somehow, that is worse. You move your weight from one foot to the other as he towers above–he was always so much taller than you. You have to tilt your head back to see him.

“Hi,” he says.

“Hey.”

Standing there in the pasta aisle, you suddenly remember how it felt all those years ago. You remember how you loved this boy who now stands inexplicably before you in the pasta aisle, a grown man. You remember the butterflies, the petty fights, the inside jokes, the weekend trips to the lake. You remember standing on your toes as he brushed your lips with his own. You remember that it was the first time you had ever felt truly alive.

The fluorescent lights above flicker and hum. A woman jostles you with her cart.

“I thought that was you,” he says.

“It’s me.”

“You caught me by surprise.”

“Ditto.”

“What are you doing here?”

You hold up your basket with bread, eggs, and milk.

"Shopping,” you say.

He holds up his basket.

“Ditto,” he says.

You stare up at him. The freckles splayed across his nose reek of the same boyish charm from your youth. He is handsome in a tired sort of way, with stubble darkening his jaw. You notice the thinly etched lines around his eyes that mark the years that have passed since you last saw him. You wonder what he sees when he looks at you. Does he see your sadness? Your grim acceptance?

You spot the birthmark on his neck and quickly avert your eyes. You feel heat rushing to your cheeks.

“How’ve you been?”

He is being nice. He’s always been so nice.

“Great,” you say, as if you would ever dare say anything else. “And you?”

"Can’t complain,” he says.

You smile. He smiles. You nod. He nods.

You want to shake him. To scream. You want to ask him if he, too, realizes that the two of you had become everything you swore to never be. A couple of regular people, stopping by the grocery store on their way home to make dinner. Buying food. Making small talk. Driving home then going to sleep and doing it all again tomorrow. You hate it, and you hate him for being part of it.

“I thought you were living out in California,” he says. You were waiting for that.

“I was,” you say. “I’m staying with my mom right now.”

You don’t elaborate. He doesn’t pry. You remember why you fell in love with him, all those lifetimes ago.

“How long has it been since I last saw you?” He scrunches up his face as he thinks, and you feel a gentle tug on your heart at the familiarity of the expression. Like a warm blanket, warm and inviting, to crawl beneath on a winter’s day. “It can’t be fifteen years now, can it?”

You pretend to run the numbers in your head, but you don’t need to. You already know.

“Yes. Fifteen years.”

You remember the day, down to the Freddie Mercury T-shirt he was wearing. You thought about it often over the years. The day you outgrew the first boy you ever loved, then tossed him aside like a shrunken shirt.

“You’ve got small-town dreams,” was what you said to him. He only stared. He was so lost for words. You almost felt bad for him, but you didn’t. You almost stopped talking, but you didn’t.

“I’m leaving here and I’m going to be something. I won’t have anything holding me back. That includes you.”

That’s what you said. That’s how you ended it.

It had seemed like the end of the world at the time. You suppose that in a way it was. The end of a world that you no longer wanted to be a part of. The end of cruising down familiar backroads with a simple boy who loved you for who you were, not for who you thought you would become.            

You look at him now and he looks so much older. His eyes are still dark brown but less warm somehow. His smile is less kind. Hardened by the years, or perhaps by you and the words you had thrown like knives. It had never been about him. You realize that now. You wonder if he realizes it as well. 

“I can’t say I ever thought I’d see you again,” he says. He looks at the pasta. His fingers dance on the rigatoni box.           

“I can’t say I ever thought I’d be back here.”           

“Well, welcome back,” he says. He means it, you can tell. You could always tell. You feel dizzy suddenly, overwhelmed by all that has already happened.           

He looks at you and knits his eyebrows. He can tell that something is wrong. He could always tell.           

“Is everything okay?”

You don’t answer. Part of you, the dormant part of you that once loved him, would like to tell him the truth. You’d like to say that you tried for fifteen long years to be something. To be extraordinary. Only to find out you weren’t so different after all. As it turns out, you were exactly like everyone else.           

“I’m fine,” you say. You don’t say that you quit your job. You don’t address the boozing, the eviction. You don’t mention that your visit has an indefinite question mark on its end date. You say that you are fine because that is what you are supposed to say to long-lost lovers you run into at the supermarket.           

He knows that you are lying, but it is not his place to comfort you. Not anymore.           

“Well, it was great seeing you,” he says.           

There it was. The classic dismissal. You had anticipated it, but still felt shaken by its implication. He was ready to get away from you, and you can’t blame him.           

“It was great seeing you as well,” you say. You feel as though you are reading a script. You know how the rest of the scene plays out. You know how the rest of your life plays out.             

When he hugs you goodbye, you feel like crying. His arms feel awkward, too heavy around your torso. You wonder how it was that his arms were once the safest place you could ever be. Your throat feels tight.           

He looks down at you one last time. You look back at him and you remember. Who you were. Who you dreamed you would become.           

He waves over his shoulder as he walks away. You watch him go, wondering how it is that time slips by so quickly.           

“Excuse me.”           

A woman stands before you. She huffs under her breath. You suppose she was once pretty–she has all the right features. Full lips, shining dark hair, bright blue eyes. However, standing here below the harsh fluorescent lights, you can see how her beauty is seeping away. There are dark circles below her eyes. Her cheeks are sunken. Her hair needs to be brushed.          

“You’re blocking the ravioli,” she says. You step aside. You watch her disappear among the throng queuing at the checkout line.

People mill about on all sides and you feel overwhelmed by the close proximity of these strangers. You decide it is time to leave and you, too, make your way to the checkout aisle like everyone else. One in a sea of a million.           

You disappear within the crowd.