Chapter 14 — Climbing Through the Storm

The emergency room of a neighboring district hospital, where an ambulance took Thắng because Hải Lộng Medical Center was overloaded with serious cases after the storm, had the familiar smell of antiseptic alcohol and cold white fluorescent lights shining down on the bed he was lying on.

The doctor had just finished looking at the X-ray film and walked in, holding the still wet film.

"Fracture of the ulna of the right forearm, not displaced much, luckily no surgery needed." The doctor said, his voice was professional but not lacking in kindness. "Put on a cast for six weeks, then do rehabilitation. During this time, absolutely do not use force with your right hand."

"Six weeks," Thắng repeated, his voice heavier than the pain that was being somewhat controlled by painkillers.

"You're lucky." The doctor said, checking the cast again. "With that kind of impact force, if only the bones are broken, not broken, that's still very good."

The door to the emergency room opened before the doctor could leave. Thắm walked in, her hair disheveled from haste, her eyes red but trying not to cry in front of her husband.

"What's wrong with you?" She asked, her voice trembling, running to the bed, her hand raised to touch his arm in a cast, then pulled back for fear of hurting him.

"It's just a fracture, it's not dangerous," Thắng reassured, trying to smile even though he was tired. "Who told you to come here?"

"Mr. Xúyên called," she replied, pulling a chair to sit next to the bed, her hand holding his left hand tightly as if to make sure he was still there, still intact. "He said he was hit by a flying piece of corrugated iron while he was on the pole, and he almost fell down. My heart almost stopped when I heard it."

"But it's okay in the end," he said, trying to make light of the situation even though he himself knew the severity of what had just happened.

"Okay at the cost of a broken arm, six weeks in a cast, do you think that's okay?" Thắm spoke, her voice was both reproachful and sorrowful, a familiar mixture of a wife who had been accustomed to her husband's dangerous profession for more than twenty years. "How many times have I told you, this age is no longer the same as when you were thirty, you have to know when to stop."

"You're right," Thắng replied, his voice low, a rare admission. "But at that time, I couldn't stop. The hospital was waiting, my student was right next to me, I couldn't leave halfway."

Thắm remained silent, squeezing his hand tighter, and in her eyes, although there was still fear, an understanding began to appear that she had probably had for a long time but had never put into words: that the man she married was not the type of person who could stand by and watch when someone needed help, even though that always came with a price.

"Next time, you have to let the young people do more," she said, her voice softened, her eyes still watering. "You don't have to be the one to climb the highest forever, Mr. Thắng."

"I know, I know," Thắng replied, and in that moment, he realized that his wife's words touched exactly what he had vaguely felt all day, from the moment he witnessed Khánh Thi climb up to save him, and Vọng completed the final task without him pointing out each move anymore.

Thắng's phone, taken out by the nurse from the pocket of his protective pants and placed on the bedside table, vibrated continuously. He reached out to pick it up with his left hand and saw a series of missed calls and text messages from Thắm, from the dispatcher's internal number, and the latest message from Lượng.

"Heard you had trouble. Are you okay? Call me when you can," Thắng called back immediately, clumsily used his left hand to dial the number, and put it on speakerphone because his right hand couldn't hold the phone to his ear.

"Brother Lượng, it's me," he said when the other end of the line picked up the phone at the first ring.

"Are you okay?" In Lượng's voice, there was a genuine concern that Thắng rarely heard in normal business conversations.

"Right arm fracture, six weeks in cast. Not life-threatening," Thắng replied. "The last part, connecting to the hospital low voltage station, Khánh Thi and Vọng are finishing it."

"I know, I just received the report," Lượng said. "There's about an hour left for the hospital. They're on schedule."

A short silence passed between the two, both sensing that this call was not simply to inquire about their health.

"Mr. Thắng, I need to tell you something," Lượng said, his tone became more serious. "Vu Gia Thịnh, a reporter for Duyên Hải newspaper, just called me again. He said a series of articles about the causes of damage to the electrical infrastructure will be published in the next few days, as soon as the situation is stabilized. He has enough documents, even without us needing further confirmation."

"So what does that mean?"

"Which means this is going to be made public, whether we like it or not," Lượng replied, his voice carrying a deep fatigue. "The question now is no longer whether to say it, but how we will say it, and whether we have some control over that narrative."

Thắng lay still on the hospital bed, looking up at the ceiling, the pain in his arm now becoming more distant compared to the weight of the story going on in his head.

"What are you most afraid of?" He asked directly.

There was a longer silence than before.

"I'm afraid of being seen as the person who signed the paper that caused column 42 to fall, causing you to almost lose your life on column 49," Lượng replied, his voice trembling slightly, a rare sincerity that he had never shown before in any official meeting. "I'm afraid my daughter will read that article and ask me if her father is a bad person. She's twelve years old, on dialysis, and I don't want her to have to carry that extra burden."

Those words made Thắng silent for a long time. He had heard vaguely about Lượng's family situation through a few colleagues, but had never heard him say it out loud, and now, when he heard it, something in him changed, not complete forgiveness, but a deeper understanding of the person standing on the other side of the decisions he once strongly opposed.

"I don't think you're a bad person, Mr. Lượng," Thắng said, choosing each word carefully. "I think you're the one put in a situation where there are no good options, only less bad options. But that doesn't mean the consequences aren't real. Column 42 falling is real. I almost fell off column 49 is also real."

"I know," Lượng replied, his voice choked.

"So now the question is, what do we do with that truth?" Thắng continued, his voice gradually becoming clearer, as if talking helped him organize his thoughts. "If we just let the press publish one critical article, then everything calms down after a few weeks, with nothing really changing, then the next column 42, in another district, will still fall in the next storm. But if we proactively, together, come up with a different way of doing things..."

"What are you thinking about?" Lượng asked, his voice had a faint ray of hope.

"I don't know exactly yet," Thắng answered honestly. "But I know I don't want that article to just be a story about who's right and who's wrong. I want it to be a story about correction. Would you agree to meet with me and talk with that journalist, not to fight each other, but to suggest a specific direction?"

Lượng was silent for a moment, and in that silence, Thắng could imagine him sitting somewhere, perhaps still in an office cluttered with papers, holding his head in his hands like he always did when he needed to think seriously.

"Agree," He finally said. "But first, let's take care of the hospital. The rest will be left until everything is okay."

"Agree," Thắng replied, and hung up the phone, lying back on the hospital bed, looking out the window where the afternoon sky was gradually turning dark purple, wondering if the decision he had just made was the right one, but at least, for the first time since receiving Thịnh's call, he felt like he was in control, instead of just being swept along with the flow of events.

The phone vibrated again, this time it was a text message from Khánh Thi, accompanied by a hastily taken photo of the low voltage station with the short words: "Almost done. Please rest."

Thắng looked at the photo for a long time, a light, tired but warm smile appeared on his face, and for the first time during the past two stressful days, he allowed himself to close his eyes, even if only for a few minutes, before the sound of the walkie-talkie on the bedside table rang out again, calling him back to work.

Thắm sat quietly beside the bed, watching her husband sleep, her hand still not leaving his hand, and outside the emergency room window, the sky in the neighboring district had turned completely dark, the first stars after the storm began to peek out among the fading clouds, signaling a rare peaceful night after two consecutive stormy days.