Chapter 15 — I Can't Be Patient Anymore

“Minh Minh, when will she move out? I can't wait anymore. I want to move in with you.”

"Baby, it's almost here. Just wait a little longer, wait for her to sign the divorce papers, then that house will be ours."

"House, can she take it? I don't think she's the type to let go easily."

"If you don't accept it, you have to endure it. I have a way. Don't worry, I have everything figured out."

“What's the way, I'm so curious, tell me.”

“You will know then, believe me, everything is in my hands.”

“Well, love you, Minh Minh, I'm waiting for that day.”

“I love you too, baby.”

I put the phone down, wiped my tears, then picked it up and threw it hard on the floor, with a dry echo like the sound of something ending. The screen shattered like a spider web, but it wasn't enough. I picked it up, threw it, threw it again, until the screen turned off completely, until the cover came off, until the components were scattered everywhere like torn pieces of memory. I threw until my hand was cut and blood flowed but still felt no pain, as if all feeling had died with what had just collapsed. After that, I sat down on the floor, hugged my knees, cried, cried for my mother, cried for myself, cried for three years of marriage that now looks like a bitter joke. I cried for a long time, cried until there were no more tears, cried until my throat was hoarse, until everything in my heart was exhausted, leaving only a cold void. I stood up, went to the bathroom, turned on the faucet, washed my face, then looked in the mirror, where I reflected a woman with red, swollen eyes, pale face, dry and cracked lips, looking more like a shadow than a person. But those eyes were so cold and terrifying, cold as ice, so cold that there was no room for any emotions to enter. I went back to the room, picked up every piece of Chu Minh's phone, put it in a plastic bag, as if cleaning up the remnants of a life that I had just personally ended. Then I opened my laptop, logged in to WeChat, and started taking pictures of the entire chat, from the first line to the last, each message, without omission, without forgiveness. I save everything to the cloud, save it to the hard drive, save it to USB, three layers of protection, as if I were keeping evidence for a certain verdict. Next, I opened the phonebook and found a name I hadn't contacted for a long time, my senior, currently working at a famous private detective agency in Giang Thanh. I called him, his voice so calm that even I felt strange.

"You, it's me, Lam Uyen Thanh, I need you to help me investigate a person, named Thien Thien, female, about twenty-five years old, three months pregnant, having been in a relationship with my husband, Chu Minh, for at least a year."

"I need all of her information, address, job, social network accounts, rental history, and whether the child in her belly is Chu Minh's or not, the more detailed the better."

The other end of the line was silent for a moment, then his voice lowered, asking if I was sure, and I only answered with one word, sure, without hesitation.

“Any amount of money is fine, I need it the fastest.”

He replied three days later, I said thank you, then hung up without another redundant sentence. I looked back at the computer screen, where those sweet chats were still there, but now they were no longer love, but just something so dirty that it made people want to vomit. I remember the wedding day, when he knelt down first my face, saying he would love me for life, remembering when my mother was in the hospital, he held my hand and said he would take care of me for her, remember every argument, every reconciliation, every sentence "wife, I was wrong, let's live well". All of those things, looking back now, were all fake, so fake that I believed it was true for three years. Everything... is an act. And I, like a fool, believed for three years, believed in every look, every word, trusted to the point of forgetting that I could also be betrayed. I turned off the computer, walked to the window, outside the night was deep, the lights of thousands of houses lit up like different lives silently existing. Under every light there is a story, some people are happy, some people are broken, and my story... has finally come to the end that it should have come to a long time ago. I picked up the phone and called lawyer Truong, my voice was so calm that even I felt strange.

“Lawyer Truong, prepare a divorce petition for me.”

"One more condition, if Chu Minh commits adultery in marriage and transfers common property, I ask him to... leave empty-handed."