Chapter 7 — Anonymous Drawing

During the summer break between eleventh and twelfth grades, instead of having a leisurely time like most friends her age, Dieu Linh took on a job helping her mother sell sticky rice in the morning and working as a Math tutor for two kids in the neighborhood in the afternoon, earning a little extra money to save for her senior year. Khoi Nguyen, for reasons he still kept secret, could not attend many class gatherings during the summer, only taking advantage of free evenings to meet her, carrying a sketchbook that had doubled in thickness compared to the beginning of the school year.

One evening at the end of July, the two of them sat on the steps in front of Aunt Bay Nha's house, under the streetlight shining through the leaves. Khoi Nguyen opened the notebook and showed her the latest drawing - a project much larger than the small houses he had drawn before, a community center with a library, free classrooms and common living space, located right on the riverside land near Cay Gon alley.

"What is this for?" Dieu Linh asked, flipping through each page, admiring the detail of the drawing.

"Just a daydream," Khoi Nguyen smiled, a bit embarrassed. "I think, if I have the chance in the future, I want to build something real for this area, not just drawn on paper. A place where the kids in the alley have a quiet place to study, not having to sit and study under street lights like you and I are doing now."

"Sounds good," Dieu Linh said, her eyes shining with excitement. "If you really do it, I'll be the first person to read there."

"You should also study architecture," Khoi Nguyen said, closing the notebook and looking at her seriously. "You have a very good eye for space. Last time you suggested the placement of the stairs in the song 'Tree House', I realized I placed the sun in the wrong direction."

"Me?" Dieu Linh laughed, a bit shy. "I'm just making a random comment. Studying architecture must be very difficult, and the tuition is probably very high. Where will my family find the money to follow?"

"There are scholarships," he said. "The University of Architecture has many scholarships for good students in difficult circumstances. If you have such good academic ability, you will definitely get it."

"Easy to say." She shrugged, but her eyes still sparkled with a bit of hope that she tried to hide. "And if I really studied architecture, it would be fun for us both to work in the same company later. You design, I supervise the project, that kind of thing."

"Let's make a deal," Khoi Nguyen held out his hand, half joking and half serious. "Ten years from now, we'll meet again, let's build this community center, really with bricks and cement, not just on paper."

Dieu Linh shook his hand, smiling brightly under the yellow streetlight. "Deal. Ten more years."

Little did the two know, that seemingly playful agreement on a hot summer evening would become one of the very few things that connected them together, throughout the turbulent years that were about to come, when everything they had right now - the trust, the closeness, the sketchbook full of shared dreams - seemed to be broken without a trace.

They don't know, the "opportunity" that Khoi Nguyen mentioned, for his family, has never been a distant thing, but is coming closer every day, at a faster pace than either of them can predict.

In early August, a call from aunt Bay Nha called Khoi Nguyen home earlier than usual. There was something strange in her voice, both relieved and reserved. When he returned, he saw his father - Mr. Ngo Bach Son - sitting in his aunt's small living room, with a rare leisurely look, a cup of hot tea placed in front of him.

"Father," Khoi Nguyen was surprised and stopped at the door. "Why did you come here without warning?"

"I want to personally come and tell you the news," Mr. Bach Son said, standing up, his face no longer filled with tension for the first time in nearly a year. "The court issued the final verdict last week. We won. The group of shareholders behind the threat was handled according to the law, control of the corporation was confirmed to belong to our family as before. Everything seems to be settled."

Khoi Nguyen stood still, the emotions in his heart were more complicated than he thought - both relief because he knew his family was finally safe, and a vague confusion creeping in, because he knew, "everything is okay" meant that his time in Cay Gon alley was about to end.

"So... will I go home now?" he asked, his voice quiet.

"Not yet," Mr. Bach Son replied, sat down again, and motioned for him to sit next to him. "There are still a few months left until the end of the school year. I think I will let you finish the first semester of your twelfth grade year here to stabilize and avoid chaos in the middle. When you change schools, I will make suitable arrangements, maybe an international school, and prepare your application to study abroad in the future."

Hearing that, a part of Khoi Nguyen's heart was relieved, because he still had a few more months with Dieu Linh and his friends in Tan Viet. But the other part of him felt even heavier, because he knew, "a few more months" was just postponing, not erasing, the day he had to leave, and the longer that time lasted, the harder it became for the truth he was hiding to be told.

"Can I... tell a few close friends the truth?" he asked, cautiously, immediately thinking of Dieu Linh.

Mr. Bach Son looked at his son for a long time, as if considering something. "How much do you trust that person?"

"I trust her more than anyone I've ever met," Khoi Nguyen said, without hesitation.

"Okay then," Mr. Bach Son nodded after thinking for a while. "But you have to say it in your own way, at the time you see fit, not for others to accidentally find out first. Do you understand what I mean? Such a big truth, if it is revealed suddenly, without anyone being mentally prepared, the consequences will be much worse than if you took the initiative to say it yourself."

Khoi Nguyen nodded, remembering his father's words, telling himself he would find the right time to tell Dieu Linh the whole truth - not through a fake piece of paper, not through a clumsy lie about "her aunt's acquaintance", but with his own words, properly, kindly, so that she would have time to receive it the way she deserved to be received.

But he didn't know, that careful plan would soon be completely disrupted by his father's impatience - who always wanted to protect his son as quickly as possible, sometimes even without consulting him first - in a way that neither father nor son could foresee.

After his father left, Khoi Nguyen sat alone in his room, opened his sketchbook, and looked back at the drawing of the community center he had just shown Dieu Linh the night before. He took the pen and added a small line in the bottom corner of the drawing: "Dedicated to D.L, when the time comes." He doesn't know exactly when that "coming time" will be, he just hopes that when it comes, he will be brave enough and skillful enough to keep the most precious friendship in his life, instead of losing it.

That night, Aunt Bay Nha knocked on his door, brought in a plate of fruit, sat down on the edge of the bed and looked at him with gentle eyes mixed with regret.

"I heard everything," she said softly. "I'm happy for you because our family is okay. But I'm also sad, because I know that in a few months I will have to leave you."

"I will miss you too," Khoi Nguyen said, holding her hand tightly. "Thank you for taking care of me for nearly two years, even more than my mother took care of me when I was a child."

"There's nothing to thank you for. You're my biological nephew. Not only that, I've been happy for the past two years because I've had you as my friend. The house has become less lonely." Aunt Bay Nha patted his head, then looked out the window, her voice lowered. "I just hope that when you tell the truth to Dieu Linh, you will choose the right time and the right way. That girl, although I rarely see her, I know when I see her, her self-esteem is very high. For people like that, the way they tell the truth is as important as the truth itself."

Khoi Nguyen nodded, engraving his aunt's advice in his heart, not knowing that just a few months later, he would no longer have the right to choose "when" or "how to say" - everything would be decided by a convoy of motorcades suddenly appearing in front of the school gate, on the day he least expected it.

That night, before falling asleep, he took out his sketchbook again, turned to the page with the drawing of the community center, and looked for a long time at the small text he had just added in the corner of the page. He thought of Dieu Linh's bright smile when shaking hands in the contract, of the look of absolute trust she had always given him for nearly two years, and told himself that no matter what happened, he would find a way to keep that promise, even though at that time he still could not imagine how bumpy the road ahead would be.