The tune bobbed along. She didn’t have to think, not while the song played it’s merry, morbid, way out.

The voice was familiar, she remembered it weaving out songs from an old cd player, but not this one. Like he’d been saving it just for now. An odd thought, though one of such theatrical gesture that made it seemed all too true. At least for those who knew him, had known him.

She remembered days after school where in the garden, he’d be humming one of his old memory songs, inviting them in. He use to be a teacher, before an early, active retirement, teaching different things to those who tumbled round his house.

How to play violin; vocal lessons, making lions out of mice; how to grow things in a garden; herbs on a window ledge.

And they had flourished under his tutelage, bringing home their treasures and accomplishments. Until age had made them leave his house for late, hot summers; ordinary thrills and drama replacing the soft magic he gave.

Then age took him, and back they flocked for one last time.