Chapter 2 — Fire Behind the Line

Ms. Le Thi Van Khanh's fabric stall is located at the corner of Dong Kieu market, in the middle of a row of small shops that have existed since the time left by her grandparents. Every morning, she opens her stall at five o'clock, arranges rolls of calico, silk, and kate fabric neatly by color, and brews a pot of strong tea to treat regular customers. Thien Ly stopped by at noon, after the night shift, bringing with her two lunch boxes bought at a nearby restaurant.

"Are you staying up all night again?" Mrs. Van Khanh looked at her daughter with both pity and blame, her hands still quickly folding a piece of cloth that had just been returned by a customer. "Your eyes are so dark, who would dare take it?"

"I don't need anyone to take it, mom." Thien Ly smiled and placed the lunch box on the small wooden table next to the stall wall. "I have my job."

"The profession..." Ms. Van Khanh sighed, not finishing her sentence. It's an old story, repeated over and over again for six years since Thien Ly decided to take the fire prevention exam. She never forbade it outright - she knew it would be useless for a daughter who possessed her father's stubborn personality - but every time she mentioned it, her voice still couldn't hide her anxiety.

The mother and daughter ate in silence for a while, the noisy market sounds echoed from outside, the sounds of people bargaining, and the sound of motorbikes weaving through the small alley. Dong Kieu at noon is always bustling in its own way - not hustle and bustle like the new downtown area, but a familiar, slow bustle, where everyone knows everyone's name.

"Three days from now is Dad's death anniversary." Thien Ly spoke first, picked up a piece of braised meat and put it in her mother's rice bowl. "I asked for half a day off duty."

Ms. Van Khanh paused for a moment, her chopsticks stopped in mid-air. "Yes. Mom knows."

"Do you want me to invite Uncle Dinh and Uncle Thien to come?"

"It's up to you." She bowed her head, her voice quiet. "Uncle Thien comes every year, whether mom invites him or not."

Cao Van Thien is Thien Ly's father's best friend, the person who joined him in the profession from the early days, promoted together, and experienced countless large and small fires during twenty years of work. After her father passed away, Mr. Thien was promoted to deputy head of the City Fire and Rescue Police Department, but every year on the anniversary of his death, he personally brought a bouquet of white chrysanthemums, lit a stick of incense, and then sat quietly all afternoon with his family without saying a few words.

Thien Ly always felt something heavy in Mr. Thien's silence each time. Not the usual sadness of a friend losing a friend. There was something like a block of stone pressing on his chest, something he had never dared to say out loud.

"Hey mom." Thien Ly put down the rice bowl and looked straight into her mother's eyes. "I want to ask mom something again, about the night dad passed away."

"Is that happening again, Ly?" Ms. Van Khanh's voice suddenly tensed up, her hands clasped the edge of the table. "It's been eight years, why do you want to dig again?"

"Because I don't believe that conclusion, Mom." Thien Ly spoke slowly but firmly. "Dad has been doing this job longer than I've been alive. He would never return to a fire scene just because he's careless, for no reason. He always taught us that the best firefighter is the one who knows when to stand back."

Ms. Van Khanh was silent for a long time, looking out the stall door, where the noon sunlight cast shadows on the hanging rolls of fabric. Finally she said, her voice hoarse: "I don't believe it either, child. I've never believed it. But what's the use of believing? The file is closed, people have concluded, your father is... no longer here to speak for himself anymore."

It was the first time in many years that her mother openly expressed her doubts. Thien Ly felt a feeling of both warmth and sadness welling up in her heart - warmth because she was finally no longer alone in her belief, sadness because for the past eight years, this woman had to bear that doubt alone, silently raising her two children, silently keeping the small fabric stall so she wouldn't have to depend on the meager subsidy from the agency.

In the evening, when Thien Ly returned to the small house in the alley behind the market, her younger brother - Nguyen Viet Cuong - was studying in the living room, books covering the table. He is twenty years old, a second year university student majoring in construction engineering. He is tall and thin, and has something very similar to his father, especially his bushy eyebrows and the way he frowns when concentrating.

"I'm home." Cuong looked up, then bent down again with the thick textbook. "Are you on night duty again? I heard on the radio that there was a big fire in the wood factory."

"Yeah, luckily we saved you two."

"You know what I hate the most is hearing that kind of news?" Cuong put down his pen, his voice suddenly harsh. "Every time there's a big fire news on the radio, I have to turn on my phone to check to see if you texted me to say it's safe. Do you know how that feels, Ms. Ly?"

Thien Ly sat down next to her and didn't answer right away. She understood that fear better than anyone else, because she herself had experienced the same feeling — except that she stood on the opposite side, the side of the person rushing into the fire instead of the side of the person at home waiting.

"I'm sorry." She said softly. "But you know I can't quit this job, right?"

"For dad." Cuong sighed, his voice softened. "I know. Always for dad."

"Not just because of dad." Thien Ly shook her head. "I do this job because I really want to save people. But it's true that I also want to... prove that what they say about dad is wrong."

Cuong was silent for a moment, then stood up, went into the inner room, and returned a moment later with an old, dusty paper box. "I found this while cleaning out last month. Mom and dad's stuff was kept in the corner of the closet, she must have forgotten it was there."

Thien Ly opened the box. Inside were her father's personal belongings — a stopped watch, several award medals, and a black leather work notebook, different from Thien Ly's personal notebook. She flipped each page, her father's familiar handwriting appeared, notes on the fires he had handled, technical assessments, numbers on water flow, response time.

Towards the last pages, the handwriting became more hurried, as if written in a nervous mood. A note made Thien Ly's heart beat faster: "Vinh Thinh Warehouse - inventory does not match the books for the last three months. Need to ask the insurance company about the newly signed contract. There is something wrong with the way the parent company manages assets."

That line was written just four days before her father died.

"Cuong, do you remember what dad said strangely before he passed away?" Thien Ly looked up, her voice trembling.

Cuong shook his head. "I was only twelve years old at that time, Ms. Ly. I only remember Dad coming home later than usual the last few days, and one night Dad and Uncle Thien sat and talked for a long time in the yard, their voices were low, I couldn't hear anything."

Thien Ly closed the notebook and held it tightly in her hands like a newly found treasure. This was the piece of the puzzle she had been searching for eight years — evidence that her father, shortly before his death, had discovered something unusual regarding the very warehouse in which he died. Not an accidental electrical short circuit. There was something bigger, and her father was investigating it.

That night, Thien Ly couldn't sleep. She sat at her old desk in her room, placing her father's workbook next to her own notebook, comparing every detail. Vinh Thinh Warehouse is owned by a certain parent company — she has never found out the exact name over the years because the business registration documents at that time were no longer fully archived locally. But now, with this note, she has a new starting point: the insurance policy her father mentioned.

She thought about the bent iron latch at the Thanh Loi wood factory this morning, and the vague feeling of insecurity as she watched the fire swallow the corrugated iron roof. The two events were eight years apart, seemingly unrelated, but in her heart, an invisible string was starting to stretch, connecting the past with the present.

She opened her phone and typed into the search box the only company name she remembered from old investigation files - the company that owned the Vinh Thinh warehouse at that time. There aren't many search results that appear, most of them are old articles that have been removed or poorly archived. But there was a line of information that caught her attention: that company, after the fire, merged into a larger corporation, specializing in real estate, currently expanding operations throughout Hoa Trach city.

Thien Ly sat blankly in front of the phone screen for a long time, a cold feeling running down her spine. She didn't have enough evidence to confirm anything yet, but a professional hunch—a hunch that had saved countless lives in fires—was telling her that her father's story was far from over.

She closed her father's workbook, placed her hand on the worn leather cover, and whispered in the dark: "I will find the truth, Dad. No matter how long it takes."

Outside the window, the crescent moonlight shines down on the tiled roofs of the ancient Dong Kieu houses, quiet as if nothing had ever happened. But somewhere in this city, a plan has been laid for a long time, and the next fire is waiting for its moment.