SUZU, Ishikawa Prefecture—For 18-year-olds around Japan, spring generally represents high school graduations, farewells to hometowns and the start of new phases in life.

However, the situation is much different in Suzu, a city deeply wounded by the Jan. 1 Noto Peninsula earthquake.

At the prefectural Iida High School, Suzu’s only high school, 89 seniors are expected to graduate in March.

Many of them have struggled in the aftermath of the disaster and seen their dreams dashed. Some have lost loved ones.

But the earthquake has strengthened their love for the city.

Here are the stories of three teenagers who plan to move forward to help rebuild their hometown.

‘I’M STAYING HERE’

Soa Miyashita, 18, was born and raised in Suzu and has wanted to work in the city ever since he was in junior high school.

He studied hard and received a job offer from the Suzu city office last November. He is expected to start work there in spring.

His mother was pleased with his decision to stay in Suzu.

The Jan. 1 earthquake cracked the walls of their house, and Soa and his family took refuge at a relative’s home nearby.

The mother feared another devastating quake would hit the area. And after about a week, she asked Soa, “Do you want to go to Kanazawa?”

Soa’s 21-year-old sister already worked at a company in Kanazawa, the capital of Ishikawa Prefecture. And his 17-year-old sister had said she wanted to live in Kanazawa after graduating from high school.

His close friends on the high school basketball team planned to move to Tokyo and Kanazawa after graduation.

“I want you to reconsider your career path,” Soa’s mother said.

Her suggestion made Soa think about all sorts of things, including his family, friends and his future.

But after a short pause, Soa said, “I’m staying here.”

After the earthquake, he saw elderly people on the TV news saying that despite the damage, they wanted to stay on the Noto Peninsula, where they were born and raised.

“I understand their desire to cherish their hometowns,” he said.

Soa said that even if only a few people remain in Suzu, he wants to work at city hall as a planning officer to ensure Suzu is safe and secure for them.

When he expressed these thoughts to his mother, she nodded her head silently.

Of the 89 seniors at the high school, only about 10 will remain in Suzu after graduation.

Soa thinks he might cry when the time comes to say goodbye to his friends. But he is determined to send them off with a smile.

He said he wants to tell them: “Good luck to you all. I’ll stay here and do my best for the recovery.”

‘WE ARE ALL FAMILY’

On Jan. 9, Ayame Noka, 18, tearfully waved at a microbus until the vehicle was out of sight.

It had departed from Suzu city hall and was carrying the coffins of her three cousins and their mother to a crematorium.

On New Year’s Eve, Ayame met the cousins for the first time in a long time, and they talked about school life and romance.

The following day, the earthquake hit, and the cousins and their mother were caught in a landslide. Ayame saw their bruised and discolored bodies.

“Did we do something wrong? Please God, why?” Ayame mourned.

When Ayame was in junior high school, her family moved to Suzu, where her mother’s family lived.

Some of her classmates complained about living in the countryside.

“I want to get out of here as soon as possible,” they would say.

But Ayame was different. She was much more interested in the local summer and autumn festivals than posts on Instagram and South Korean idols.

“Even if we are not blood-related, we are all family,” she said felt about Suzu residents.

Her family has run a sake store since her great-grandfather’s time. Ayame had planned to learn about the business by working at a sake brewery in Suzu from spring after graduation.

But the quake severely damaged the brewery.

Ayame decided to stay in Suzu and help rebuild her family’s business as well as the brewery.

She said it makes her sad when she thinks that the name of Suzu is only known around Japan as the place where the disaster occurred.

“After all, my happy memories are also filled with this place,” she said.

Ayame said she has already decided how she will use her first salary. She wants to spend it on her grandmother, who escaped the tsunami with her, and to help revive the local festivals.

MIXED FEELINGS

“I’m not going to that school,” Ryosuke Umeki, 18, told his father at the Iida High School gymnasium, which had been turned into an evacuation center. “I’m going to work in Suzu.”

Ryosuke’s dream was to work in the auto industry. And after graduating from high school, he planned to attend an automobile-maintenance school in Nanao, about a 90-minute drive from Suzu.

His house in Suzu was destroyed by the earthquake and tsunami.

Wrapped in blankets at an evacuation center, Ryosuke spent sleepless nights thinking, “I don’t know if it’s right for me to leave at such a difficult time.”

Last year, Ryosuke reached the top 16 of an inter-high school sumo tournament.

Although he was solicited by sumo stables and university sumo clubs, he also received a job offer from a construction company in Suzu.

But Ryosuke turned them down because he planned to go to the Nanao auto-maintenance school.

Now, he had mixed feelings.

“What we need for reconstruction are young people working in the field, right?” he wondered.

At the shelter, he became friends with a volunteer worker from Kumamoto Prefecture.

When he confided his concerns about his career path, the volunteer explained what had happened in the aftermath of the deadly Kumamoto Earthquakes in April 2016.

“It takes time to recover,” the worker told Ryosuke. “It is not too late to (get involved in reconstruction work) even after you have studied and acquired qualifications.”

Ryosuke learned that if he understood how to maintain automobiles, he could use that skill to repair equipment for reconstruction work.

One week after he said he would stay in the city, Ryosuke again talked to his father. “I’m going to leave Suzu after all.”

When spring comes, Ryosuke will leave his parents and begin living in an apartment in Nanao. He will also be separated from his friends in Suzu.

“Even though I’m away, my feelings for the hometown remain the same,” he said.

As he sat beside a childhood friend at the shelter, Ryosuke smiled and said: “If we want to meet, we can always get together. Am I right?”