! The Couple In The Evening Class

As the new year’s evening class filed in, in varying displays of enthusiasm or cool, discreetly summing up their tutor you couldn’t help but notice them despite their modest manner – of equal height, and that a little under average couples attending class together always catch my too premature thoughts – has he brought her? has she brought him? is this just a stage in careful courtship, attending a class together? where will they sit? couples tend to choose the front row or the back, I’ve noticed; often arrive at ease, as if they’ve met up after work, taken a coffee or a light snack… which will ask a question first? and when they do, will some slight frisson of emotional thought-wave pass between them? suppose after the first term, one leaves, one stays – will the one who stays, feel freer to ask more questions? or will I sense that invisible tug of apron-strings…? over the weeks, although they gave no overt sign of it, they became a sweet, still place in the class, a perfect balance between individuality and togetherness; when he or she asked a question or gave an answer, the other radiated almost imperceptibly a quiet pride so pure that it was more, delight, as one might do with a son or daughter. At the end of the year, our paths went their separate ways; and yet, after so many years, so many classes, so many students, they’ve left a quiet place in my memory; of humble simplicity, strength clothed as modesty, boundless possibility – they, the silent tutor; I, the observing student.