: Re: What tense to use for events that are still happening? The question is similar to this but the answers does not answer me. In my general fiction novel, which is told in first person singular

@Rivera824

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If this is a personal account of something that happened with people who still exist and still have the same roles in the company, it would actually be more natural to use present tense for the description of their roles.
Example:

"It was crazy what happened at the meeting last week", Paul said with a shocked look on his face. "I arrived shortly after our CEO, Simone. Matt and Richard arrived just a few minutes later. Do you know them? Matt is the software architect and Richard is the Creative Director who heads our team. Anyway, we arrived, and then [...]"

So it matters whether this is a personal account, or a narration of a story. For the narration of a story, you want to keep the same tense, and the question whether Matt and Richard are still in those roles as they were back then is irrelevant to the story. However, if it's a personal account, and the person that is being addressed has a chance of getting to know these people later, then the present tense is the right choice.
For novels etc., this will probably only be important for dialogue. There could be exceptions, for example if the narrator is talking about something he/she believes to be true at all times:

They were all getting scared, but God was watching over them. God does not abandon his flock.
The black hole destroyed the ship. The universe does not care about the lives of its inhabitants.

At this point the narrator breaks out of a pure story narration and speaks directly to the reader. The examples would work equally well with past tense, but there's a slight shift in meaning. "God did not abandon his flock" is much more personal, more focused on the people in the story. It's not a general statement.

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