My roommate and I trudged to the CVS check-out counter for the third time that day, both of us operating in a hazy, need-to-nap kind of state. We were worn-out mentally and emotionally from caring for her sick boyfriend, ready to purchase these two final items, go back to our dorm, and crash.
The cashier made small talk with us. I wasn't really paying attention.
When she asked us how old we were, I remember I was blankly watching the red laser of her scanner pass over the barcode of the thermometer box.
Looking up for the first time, I took in the short, stout woman with hair pulled back and face devoid of any make-up, waiting intently for Emily's answer.
"18," she said.
The woman turned and looked at me.
"18," I remembered to say.
And then the woman threw back her head and cackled in delight. "Looky here, Marcy," she said, turning to her co-worker, "A pair of 18-year-olds!"
She looked at us again. "What a great age to be! Why, I remember when I was 18: it was nothin' but a big ball of good times."
I wanted to say something about how driving repeatedly to the pharmacy and trying to sanitize a dorm room aren't exactly what make my big ball of good times bounce. But I figured that was probably unnecessary negativity just spouting out of my tired haze, and I'd keep it to myself. So I said nothing, as did Emily. I think we were both wondering what kind of a life this woman had that made her miss the cusp of adulthood so much, when the cusp of adulthood for us that weekend meant waiting in the ER without anyone to hug us or take our place.
"Marcy, wouldn't you be 18 again if you had the chance?" the cashier asked. "I sure would."
I wondered if this woman considered high school the best part of her life, which was an attitude I'd always considered a little sad. Here she was, working at CVS at 10 p.m. on a Saturday night, getting so excited over two tired little college girls who couldn't have stood out that much from any of the other college kids that wander in and spend their money on overpriced cereal and condoms and stuff to fix hangovers. Why should she care about us, want to be us? Didn't she have children of her own?
And then she answered our questions, more or less.
"Of course, I was married at 18," she explained to us and Marcy. "On Christmas Eve, to my good ole' Chance."
Some sort of response stumbled out of both mine and Emily's mouths, some kind of verbal recognition and awe of what she said. The image I had in my head: a girl our age, thin and beautiful, outside under a candlelit awning, facing an honest figure in a dark suit, with snowflakes entangling themselves in the lace of her veil. It was so different from how I'd pictured her before, leaning on the hood of some redneck's car in her high school parking lot, snapping gum, blowing off grades, and laughing about the upcoming dance.
She spoke again, and this time we really listened.
"We were married a good 31 years," she said, serious now, "until I lost him, this year past."
We exclaimed our condolences and again the image in my head of this woman changed. I saw her house, a modest ranch in a neighborhood not too far away, with stepping stones leading to the front door, white venetian blinds on the windows, a little terrier dog that barks when the grandkids come over, dragging their plastic tricycles through the yard.
All of a sudden we weren't making small talk anymore. All of a sudden, I loved this woman. Shattering my haze of yawns and self-absorption came this real and piercing yearning to be close to her, to know her, to tell her story. For the first time all day, and to this 51-year-old stranger with a scanner behind some check-out desk, I felt the pangs of empathy and love. I was reminded of how it is to be connected to another person.
At the same time, I knew there was no way to let this woman know the change that had occured - that the silent, stoic student who'd avoided eye contact moments before was a person again, interested and reluctant to leave.
But what else do you do but leave, when you are a kid and they are grown up and you have nothing in common except that you live and love cherish family? We talked a moment more; we smiled and said goodbye. Then we walked out the automatic doors, into the night, into 18, into alone again.
