Chapter 18 — Climbing Through the Storm

The article was published on a Monday morning, on the front page of the electronic version of Duyên Hải newspaper, with the headline reading in large letters: "Electric Pole No. 42 And The Budget Problem After The Super Storm — A Story About A System Repairing Itself".

Thắng read it for the first time on his phone, sitting at the breakfast table, Thắm standing behind him reading over his shoulder, both of them silent for nearly fifteen minutes as the nearly three thousand word long article gradually appeared on the screen.

The article opens with the image of column 42 broken in half on the sand, recounting the erosion process measured over three consecutive years, the proposed documents being shelved, but immediately after that, instead of stopping there to create drama, the article moves to the second part: the dialogue between Thắng and Lượng, the specific numbers on cost reduction targets imposed by the corporation, and finally the proposal for an emergency maintenance fund and a new risk assessment process that both of them have created. build together.

In the middle of the article, an excerpt from Khánh Thi's account of the moment she climbed up pillar 49 in the midst of gusts of wind was placed prominently, accompanied by a photo of her standing next to the newly erected pillar 42, her eyes looking straight into the camera, not with a bright smile like an advertisement, but with a serious, tired but steady expression.

"She's in the news," Thắm said, her voice was a bit surprised and proud for the student she had only met a few times but had heard her husband tell many stories.

Thắng's phone vibrated continuously all morning, messages from colleagues, from acquaintances, even from strange numbers, most of them carried a surprisingly positive spirit, not the outrage he once feared when thinking about the day the article was published.

At the branch office, Lượng was having a similar morning, although with a bit more trepidation because he was the one with more to lose in the way the public perceived this story.

The landline phone on his desk rang. The number that appeared was an internal number from the corporation's office, much higher than the branch level he usually contacted.

"Hello, I'm Lượng," he answered, his voice trying to stay calm even though his heart was beating faster than usual.

"Mr. Lượng, I'm calling about this morning's article." The voice of a woman on the other end of the line, from the corporation's communications and risk management department, was professional, making it difficult to guess the true emotions behind it. "The board of directors has read, and wants to hold a meeting this week to discuss the emergency maintenance fund proposal that you and Mr. Thắng put forward in the article."

Lượng held his breath for a second, not sure if this was good news or bad news.

"How did they react?" He asked directly, without beating around the bush.

"To be honest with you, initially there were some concerns about inside information being made public in this way," she replied, honestly. "But the majority of opinions, especially from the technical side, think that your proposal is reasonable, and that proactively admitting the problem before a more serious incident occurs at another branch is the right thing to do, not something that should be punished."

The amount of breath he exhaled, a feeling of relief spread throughout his body, even though he knew the upcoming meeting still had a lot to convince.

"Thank you for the advance notice," he said.

"One more thing," she added before hanging up. "The general director mentioned that he wanted to meet directly with Mr. Thắng and the student named Khánh Thi, if they agreed, to hear the story directly from the scene. He said, budget decisions should be made after listening to the people who actually climbed the pole, not just reading the report on paper."

The call ended, Lượng sat quietly for a moment, then dialed Thắng's number to share the news. His voice on this call was lighter than any call between them since the day the storm landed.

That evening, when he returned home, Lượng saw his daughter, a twelve-year-old girl who had just undergone a tiring period of dialysis, sitting at her desk with her tablet open to the e-newspaper page containing this morning's article.

"Dad, is this article about you?" She asked, looking up at him with undisguised curiosity.

Lượng sat down next to his son, his heart tightening a bit at the question he had been dreading for many days.

"That's right," he replied, choosing to be honest instead of avoiding it. "Dad made a wrong decision about allocating money to repair electric poles, and it contributed to a pole falling during the last storm." The girl silently continued reading the paragraph about the emergency maintenance fund proposal, her eyes moving slowly through each line.

"But dad was also the one who suggested fixing it, right?" He asked, looking up at him.

"That's right," he replied, not daring to hope too much for his son's next reaction.

"So you think dad is not a bad person," she said, simply as if it were an obvious thing that needed no debate. "Bad people don't admit their mistakes in the newspaper, dad."

Lượng felt his throat tighten, he hugged his daughter, holding him a little tighter than usual, and in that moment, all worries about reputation, about job position, about the eyes of colleagues, became much smaller than the simple words of a twelve-year-old child.

In the days that followed, the reaction from the Hải Lộng community also gradually became clear through comments on the electronic newsletter and conversations at the alley's cafe, where people discussed the article with a mixture of resentment about the budget cut and appreciation for what the electricity team did to save the hospital.

"I heard that they saved the hospital before coming to our house. And our house got electricity so early thanks to them working all night without stopping." A woman selling groceries near the district market spoke to customers, her voice filled with sympathy rather than criticism. "If we let them sit and argue about right and wrong, our people will still suffer for a long time."

Not all comments were positive, there were people who were still angry because column 42 should not have fallen in the first place if it had been reinforced at the right time, and that anger was not wrong, but the majority of public opinion, upon reading the article, realized that the story was more complicated than a simple accusation, and that, for Thắng and Lượng, was a much better result than what they had feared.

In the afternoon, at home, Khánh Thi received a call from Thắng, recounting the entire incident, and when she heard that the general director wanted to meet her in person, she stood still in the middle of the kitchen, still holding the ladle stirring the pot of soup for baby Bin.

"Child?" She asked again, not believing her ears.

"That's right," Thắng replied, his voice unable to hide his joy. "They want to hear from someone who has actually lived in that situation, not just from desk-bound people like us."

Khánh Thi hung up the phone, stood silently for a moment in the small kitchen, the fragrant smell of boiling soup, the sound of baby Bin playing echoed from the living room, and she felt a big change taking place in her life, a change that just a few months ago, when she was standing frozen on the eighth step of the exercise pole, she would never have dared to imagine.

Her mother-in-law, sitting in a wheelchair in the corner of the living room, called into the kitchen when she heard the story through the speaker phone.

"Can I meet the general manager?" She asked, her voice filled with an excitement she had rarely seen since the stroke. "Remember to wear ao dai when going, don't wear protective gear."

Khánh Thi burst out laughing, walked out to the living room, picked up little Bin, and spun him around, making the child laugh.

"I'll wear something appropriate, mom. I probably won't need a long dress," she said, put her child down, sat down next to her mother-in-law, held her hand, her hand was still a bit stiff from the aftereffects but was much more flexible than in the first months after the stroke. "I just hope they really listen, not just a meeting for the sake of it."

"They will listen," Her mother-in-law said, her voice unusually firm. "If anyone doesn't listen to someone who dares to climb a power pole in the middle of a storm to save people, that's their fault, not yours."

Khánh Thi remained silent, squeezing her mother-in-law's hand tighter, touched by the absolute trust that this woman, despite the limitations of her illness, has always given her since the day she became the daughter-in-law in the family, and even more so since the day her husband died, when both women had to rely on each other to overcome it.

Outside the window, the street lights that had just been completely restored across the small street where they lived turned on simultaneously, a line of yellow light running far and wide, marking a small but meaningful milestone in the comprehensive recovery journey of the entire Hải Lộng district after storm No. 11.