"Hey! Hey! Hey! You better let them have their way."

"Hey! Hey! Hey!
You better get out of the way."

Things I saw at the grocery store this afternoon:

Adolescent girls in a displaced standoff.

The Forest Hill Market is an entirely different place at noon on a weekday than it is when I am usually there, which is after work or on the weekends, with all the other grown-ups. In the eerie stillness of midday, teenagers roam the aisles of the grocery as if they were high school hallways, with all inherent politics and social codes intact.

Two pretty and well-dressed girls stand in front of the ice cream freezer, surveying various pints of Häagen-Dazs and Ben & Jerry's. Three rougher-looking girls walk by, slowly; one of these other girls makes a remark, either to or about the ice cream girls. Two of the tough girls rush quickly up the aisle, away from the ice cream girls, leaving the third still walking slowly, looking slightly perplexed. The two supposed badasses now peer around the corner, down the frozen food aisle, their hands gripping a Ritter Sport display.

"Come on, Angela!" one of them yells at the third girl. "Make a break for it!" The two girls then erupt into peals of laughter. Angela is laughing as well, sort of, as she nears them; she's walking a little faster but still looks confused. She shrugs her shoulders with the palms of her hands facing up, like, What do you want me to do?

The ice cream girls glare up the aisle, their eyes trained on the other three girls with laser-like precision, their facial expressions a mixture of mild shock, brittle amusement and imagined superiority. The other three girls scurry off, possibly into the dairy aisle, and the ice cream girls walk away empty-handed. I realize that I don't need anything from the freezer, and that I don't miss high school at all.

TRACK LISTING: MC5, "High School"