Wai Lan was intrigued by the fact that he added nothing more to his offer. He didn’t try to convince her she had promising talent, or that it would help her failing grades. He didn’t say that now that he had finished his post at the school he had more time on his hands and wanted to help out some of his less advantaged students. Whatever his reasons might have been, it seemed almost impolite to ask. And what could he really say?

So every Wednesday afternoon, she would go to his house and sit at his piano for an hour. He lived in a small apartment about a ten-minute walk from the school. The route took her past a treelined riverbank where her mother used to swim as a girl. Kwan Lau Ming would welcome her in, walk directly to the front room, and gesture to the upright piano against the wall. Wai Lan liked this room. It was modest and clean, full of neatly stacked paperbacks. The last fifteen minutes of the hour were her favorite; the windows would pull in the pinkish gold light of the evening sun, and she would now and again look up and see him standing over her, his suited shoulders at an angle, his eyes darkly shining in the dimming light.

One afternoon in June, Kwan Lau Ming told her they would have to stop the lessons. He had accepted a full-time teaching post in another district and would need the next few weeks to prepare for his move.

“You mean you’ll have to give up this apartment?” said Wai Lan.

“Well yes, of course.”

“I know it’s a funny thing to say. It’s just that I’ll miss coming here. I never even got to see all of it.”

“Oh?”

“Yes, I’m always just playing piano here in the front room. I’ve used the bathroom perhaps three times.”

Kwan Lau Ming shrugged. “All right. Since it’s your last lesson, I’ll give you a guided tour.”

He got up and opened a door to the right of the windows.

“Here’s the kitchen. One stove ring, one pan—one of everything.”

“Not even an extra set of chopsticks?” asked Wai Lan, peering round the doorframe at the pokey little room.

“No. There’s the front room, which you’re well acquainted with. And over there is the bathroom, which you’re less well acquainted with, having used it only three times.”

Wai Lan giggled.

“Well, I’m afraid this concludes our tour,” he said, sitting down on the couch.

“Where do you sleep?” asked Wai Lan.

“Right here.” He patted the arm of the couch as if it were a faithful dog. “The life of a poor teacher. It pulls out. That’s where I lay awake at night, thinking…” He laughed a little, trailing off.