This is a true story about a couple I knew, who passed away a few months apart. He was a family doctor who practised in the locality for most of his life. A small man, well kept, warm dark friendly eyes and an appetite for listening. He was so good and kind and generous. They named a new ward after him in the local hospital after he died. She was the local village headmistress and she was also generous and kind. Her eyes were gentle, playful and crinkled at the edges from a lifetime of smiling. They had no children, luck conspired against them in that regard. I used to see them twice a year, in a medical capacity and they sought my services too.
They seemed to have a zest for all things around family and children. They gave to the community but had no family of their own. They were interested in the goodwill of everyone. They gave and never took.
They were people of gentle habit. She got home earlier than he did, watered the garden, did some other chores, then awaited his phone call. He would ring just before leaving the hospital, or the surgery or from a phone box on the edge of a village after doing his rounds. This was a few years before the first mobile phones were available. She would lighten up, put a record on and prepare a drink. They only ever had one weak gin and tonic, no more. After supper they would dance, then sit in the garden and talk about their people. They did this every day into old age. If a meteorite whisked across the sky, or the first cuckoo could be heard, he would rush to find her to share the moment. Time seemed to stand still from the outside, but on the inside of their relationship the fire still burned with the intensity of a sun.
When he died he was buried in the churchyard just the other side of the low stone wall that ran the long edge of their garden. Halfway down was a gate through where she would go at sunset every summer's eve to take some cut flowers from the garden and sit with him.