Chapter 5 — Between Two Runways

The psychological assessment room was located on the ground floor, separate from the operating area, with two gray fabric chairs placed diagonally across each other instead of directly facing each other — a detail Boi Thu noticed as soon as he entered, and immediately wondered if it was a deliberate calculation.

"The arrangement of chairs is not random," Banh Nghien Thao said, as if reading her thoughts, his voice was light, without any hint of a lecture. "Sitting straight across easily creates the feeling of interrogation. Sitting diagonally helps people feel more comfortable being silent for a while without feeling stared at."

"I don't intend to stay silent," Boi Thu said, sitting down, his back straight as usual.

"I know." Thao smiled and opened a notebook with no printed title, just blank paper. "Most controllers I meet say that within the first five minutes."

Boi Thu did not return the smile. She had read the protocol before arriving: three mandatory sessions, about fifty minutes each, assessed based on the critical incident response scale, combined with a free-form interview. There was nothing in it that theoretically worried her. But sitting in this room, facing — or rather, diagonally — from someone whose job it was to read out what she didn't say, the feeling of anxiety was still present, silently, under the shell of calm she had put up since morning.

On the way here, she glanced at the information sheet attached to the appointment schedule, printed on A4 paper clipped in Vong's file: the regulations on mandatory psychological evaluation after a serious loss of separation incident were applied uniformly throughout the industry, regardless of the results of the investigation of the cause, not disciplinary action, the sole purpose was to ensure that the person returning to the duty position was qualified to handle similar pressure in the future. She had read that paragraph three times in the car, trying to remember not to treat this meeting like a trial, but as she sat down in the gray chair, every theory she had reminded herself felt much thinner than the actual feeling of being observed.

"Before getting into the main part," Thao said, pushing a small piece of paper towards her, "I need you to check the items that accurately describe your condition over the past seven days. There's no need to think too long about each item, the first answer that comes to mind is often more accurate than the answer you consider carefully."

Boi Thu held a pen and scrolled through the list: difficulty concentrating, easily startled by sudden sounds, erratic eating, avoiding talking about work, feeling like you need to control every detail even though it's not necessary. She checked off three items, pausing longer on the fourth item—avoiding talking about work—before leaving it blank, even though she knew, as soon as she put down her pen, that the honest answer was probably somewhere between the two options.

"We start with a simple question," Thao said. "Since the incident until now, how have you been sleeping?"

"Normal."

"What does normal mean to you? Six hours, seven hours, uninterrupted sleep or intermittent sleep?"

Boi Thu paused for half a second. This was exactly what Vong had warned about — seemingly simple questions that required specific answers, not allowing her to hide behind familiar vague words.

"About five hours," she said. "Interrupt."

"Interrupted for what?"

"I don't know. Maybe because my mind is still thinking about the incident."

"What do you think?"

Boi Thu looked down at her hands placed on her thighs. "I think back over every step I took. Check to see if there are any steps I could have done faster, more accurately."

"Is it a form of thinking aimed at professional improvement," Thao wrote something down, "or is it a form of uncontrollable repetitive thinking, like a movie that keeps playing automatically in your head even though you don't want it?"

That question kept Boi Thu silent longer than she intended. The difference between the two things Thao just mentioned seemed subtle, but when she was honest with herself, she knew which way the answer leaned.

“It could be both,” she said, trying to keep her voice even.

"Okay. We take note of that." Thao turned the page, not showing surprise or worry, simply taking notes as part of her daily work. "Do you see any specific recurring images? No need to describe them in detail right now if you're not ready, just let me know if they are or not."

Boi Thu thought about the light dot that deviated from the center line on the Bach Lung radar screen, thought about the small gap between the coordinate grid lines after Echo Tam Mot disappeared. She thought of Bach's face, his fingers hovering over the keyboard, waiting for her to confirm before believing in her own number.

“Yes,” she said, just like that.

Thao didn't ask any more questions right away. She let that silence last for a while, long enough for Boi Thu to feel uncomfortable, but not so long that it became noticeable pressure — a skill, Boi Thu realized, no less sophisticated than coordinating two streams flying at the same time on the same frequency.

“I won't ask you to describe that image right now,” Thao said finally. "We have two sessions left. I'd rather go slow and correct, than go fast and have you completely shut down."

"I didn't close the door," Boi Thu said, a little faster than necessary.

"I'm not saying you're doing it on purpose," Thao replied, her voice still calm. "I say that humans have a tendency to protect themselves from painful things, and sometimes the most effective protection is the one that makes it hardest for people to recover from it later. That's not a weakness, Controller Ky. It's a very human mechanism."

Thao moved in another direction, her voice still maintaining the familiar slow rhythm. "Your colleagues describe you as someone who rarely asks for assistance, even when the workload is more than one person can handle neatly. Do you recognize that in yourself?"

"I like to finish the work myself before handing it over," Boi Thu said. "It's not because I don't trust my colleagues."

"So what for?"

She was silent for a moment, her fingers gently twirling the pen on her lap. "Perhaps because if something goes wrong, I want it to be my mistake, not someone else's because I assigned tasks unclearly."

"Do you realize that statement puts the entire responsibility on your shoulders, even in situations where multiple people are involved?" Thao asked, not to retort, but as if placing a mirror in front of her. "Eight years ago, you were also in a situation where many people were involved, right?"

The question came unexpectedly, not in the vein she had just mentally prepared to deal with. Boi Thu gently squeezed her hand around the pen.

"I don't want to talk about it today," she said, her voice still outwardly calm, even though they could both hear the tension behind each word.

"Okay," Thao said, without further pressure, wrote a short line in the notebook and then folded the page as if closing a door gently instead of slamming it. "We'll save it for another session, when you're more ready."

Boi Thu looked out the small window behind Thao's shoulder, where one could see a corner of the courtyard of the administration building, a few potted plants being taken care of by someone regularly even though no one in the technical department had ever mentioned it.

"I need to ask you one more question before ending today's session," Thao said. "This question is not included in the standard assessment form, but I feel it is necessary based on what you just shared."

"Ask."

"If tomorrow you were allowed to return to duty immediately, without waiting for the conclusion of the investigation, without any further evaluation sessions—would you want to come back?"

That question is so simple it's almost cruel. Boi Thu opened her mouth, intending to immediately answer with an emphatic "yes", the way she has answered all work-related questions for the past ten years.

But this time, the word "yes" did not come out immediately. There was a pause, only half a second, but enough for both people in the room to realize it existed.

"Yes," she said, a beat slower than usual.

Thao did not write anything else in the notebook. She just closed the notebook, put down the pen, and looked at Boi Thu with non-judgmental eyes, just observation.

"We'll meet again next Thursday," she said. "Same time."

Boi Thu stood up, walked out of the room with two chairs placed diagonally across each other, and out in the hallway, the afternoon sunlight filtered through the large glass window at the end of the row, shining a long streak of light on the tile floor, where she stood for a moment, clearly feeling that half-second hesitation still hanging somewhere in her chest, refusing to disappear as she expected.

She took out her phone and was about to text Dieu Van to let her know that the first session was finished, but her finger stopped on the screen, not typing a word. Finally, she put her phone in her pocket and walked out to the parking lot, letting the late afternoon of a day off duty pass by in an empty and strange way that she was never used to, even after ten years of doing this job.