Chapter 2 — CEO Phong, Stop Chasing Her—She Already Has a Marriage Certificate

The cafe is located on the second floor of an old house in the old neighborhood, where Nhã Kỳ and Tú Anh often met since they were students. The warm yellow light, gentle jazz music coming from the old speakers, all are so familiar that Nhã Kỳ feels like time here passes much slower than the fast pace of life in her husband's villa.

"You know, I'll see Mr. Khanh again in Milan," Tú Anh spoke while stirring a cup of iced milk coffee, his voice still as excited as when he was running a project deadline. "The teacher asked about you. He said your graduation collection is one of the three most impressive ones he has ever graded in twenty years of teaching."

Nhã Kỳ smiled lightly, twirling the small spoon in her hand. "It's an old story, why bother mentioning it?"

"What's old? You're only thirty-three years old, not sixty-three." Tú Anh looked straight into your eyes, sharp eyes that rarely appeared on an inherently carefree person like her. "I'm serious, do you remember the feeling of standing in front of a white canvas, not knowing what it will become, but knowing for sure it will be beautiful?"

Nhã Kỳ was silent for a long time. Yes, she remembers. She remembers every detail clearly — the feel of needle and thread across her fingertips, the smell of new cotton fabric, the late afternoon light streaming through the school's sewing studio windows. But that memory is now like an old film, the colors have faded, only faint lines remain.

"I have a different life, Tú Anh," she said, her voice was gentle but somewhat evasive. "I have Bảo Nhiên, I have a family. Not everyone is lucky enough to live out their passion."

"It's not lucky or unlucky. It's your choice," Tú Anh replied directly, without beating around the bush as usual. "You chose to stop because you thought it was the way to keep the family peaceful. But Nhã Kỳ, after seven years, have you ever wondered if Mr. Nguyen really needed you to stop like that, or was that just what you thought of yourself?"

That question was like a small stone thrown into the calm lake in Nhã Kỳ's heart, creating ripples that she had deliberately not seen for many years.

She remembered the first year after getting married, when she naively believed that if she was patient enough and gentle enough, she could gradually make Chính Nguyên open her heart. She learned how to cook his favorite dishes without asking, learned how to recognize his mood by the way he unbuttoned his vest first or last button when entering the house, learned how to be silent at the right time and speak up at the right time.

She considered it a form of love — a quiet, persistent love, like flowing water wearing away stones. She believes that with enough time, that cold man will realize her persistent presence, and that cold heart will gradually melt.

Seven years. She gave him seven years.

There are rare moments that make her believe she is on the right track. Like the time he suddenly brought home a silk scarf of the exact color she liked, without saying an explanation. Or the time she was sick with a high fever in the middle of the night, he personally took her to the emergency room instead of calling a driver, and sat next to the hospital bed until the morning even though he had an important meeting the next day at seven o'clock. Nhã Kỳ picked up and kept those small pieces as treasures, as proof that her love was not one-sided.

But she cannot deny that those pieces gradually become fewer and fewer over the years. In the first and second years, he sometimes asked her if she was tired after a long day. By the fifth or sixth year, those questions almost completely disappeared, replaced by neat work orders and schedules arranged without discussion.

She still remembers the third year of her marriage, when she was six months pregnant with Bảo Nhiên, she eagerly prepared an entire room for her child, hand-painted small patterns on the walls, and sewed each towel out of the softest cotton fabric. She expected him to go with her to regular prenatal checkups, to choose a name for the baby with her, and to dream with her about the shape of the baby about to be born. But Chính Nguyên at that time was in the process of taking over the group from his father, working sixteen hours a day. There were weeks when he came home when she was fast asleep and left when she had not yet woken up. She went to prenatal checkups alone most of the time, with only a private driver to pick her up, and told herself that it was because of his responsibility to the whole family, not because he didn't care about her and the child in her belly.

The day Bảo Nhiên was born, amid the agony that lasted nearly twenty hours, she held the nurse's hand tightly because her husband was still in the middle of an emergency meeting with the board of directors, only having time to rush to the hospital just in time for their daughter's first cry. She clearly remembered the moment he stood outside the glass door of the delivery room, his face pale, his eyes - the rare time she saw them - shining with something very close to a mixture of fear and gratitude. That was one of the three times he turned his head to look at her that she still remembered.

But after that moment, everything quickly returned to its old orbit. He loves his daughter in his own way — fully providing for her, taking care of her health and education, but rarely holding her, rarely sitting and playing with her for hours like other fathers do. Nhã Kỳ sometimes wonders if he himself is afraid of something in giving his full affection, as if there is some invisible wall stopping him, even from his own biological child.

"I'm not saying you have to leave your husband and children to follow your passion," Tú Anh continued, his voice softening. "I just think, you deserve both. You don't have to choose between being a good wife and being yourself."

"Mr. Nguyen is not a bad person." Nhã Kỳ defended, almost reflexively. "He's just... not used to expressing himself. From a young age he had to shoulder the responsibility of the entire family, and didn't have many opportunities to learn how to express his emotions like a normal person."

"I know. I didn't say he was ugly." Tú Anh took a sip of coffee. "But being kind and knowing how to love are two different things, Nhã Kỳ. You keep justifying people's indifference with the past, when will you allow yourself to be sad, angry, and ask for something for yourself?"

Nhã Kỳ did not answer immediately. She looked out the window at the street lights, people rushing home after a day of work. How many of them are returning to someone who is actually waiting for them, and how many, like her, are returning to a big but empty house?

"My birthday is coming up." She changed the subject, her voice softened, as if she wanted to escape too heavy questions. "Mr. Nguyen and Bảo Nhiên will go to Singapore for business on that occasion."

"Forgot again?" Tú Anh frowned.

"I guess so. Three years in a row." Nhã Kỳ smiled, the smile was a bit bitter but she tried to make it light. "But this year I think differently. I plan to fly there and surprise him. Maybe, standing in front of me on his birthday, he will be startled to realize he forgot something important?"

Tú Anh looked at her friend for a long time, her eyes were filled with both pity and a bit of worry that she couldn't put into words. "You always believe in small miracles like that, don't you?"

"I just believe that, if I'm patient enough..." Nhã Kỳ left her sentence unfinished, as if she herself was no longer completely sure of the mantra she had been telling herself for the past seven years.

"Well, let's go try it." Tú Anh gently patted her friend's hand, not wanting to completely extinguish that fragile hope, even though she had a not-so-good premonition in her heart. "But Nhã Kỳ, if this time he still doesn't change, can you promise me one thing?"

"What?"

"Promise you won't lie to yourself again. If it's not a miracle, but a different sign, then you must be brave enough to look it straight." Nhã Kỳ nodded, even though she still couldn't imagine how devastating the "different sign" her friend just mentioned would be.

That night, when returning to the villa, Nhã Kỳ stopped by Bảo Nhiên's bedroom before entering her own room. The girl was sleeping soundly, still holding the old teddy bear that Nhã Kỳ sewed back the torn ear last year. She sat down on the edge of the bed, gently stroking her child's hair, her heart filled with a love that was both warm and painful.

No matter how cold her husband is, Bảo Nhiên is always the warmest light in this house. And perhaps, because of her daughter, Nhã Kỳ has enough reason to continue to be patient, continue to believe, continue to wait for something that she does not dare to name clearly, only vaguely hopes that it will come on her birthday, in a strange city, under the Singapore sky.

Little did she know, in that same city, another woman was counting down to her own special day — and that day, ironically, coincided exactly with her birthday.