Chapter 7 — Late Table Lady

An anonymous text message arrived on An's phone at eleven o'clock at night: "The last table is not for poor ladies."

An read three times. The sentence is short but has the weight of a stone thrown against a glass window. She did not answer. She took a screenshot, sent it to Huy because he was the only one who knew her secret, then put the phone down. Two minutes later, Huy called.

“Are you awake?”

"Still."

"Me too. I'm awake because I just ate two packets of noodles."

“This message…”

"I saw it. Don't reply. Anonymous messages live on angry recipients."

“What if the sender is a student in the class?”

"Then we'll still go to school tomorrow morning. He'll have to see your face."

An couldn't sleep. She lay listening to the sound of the fan spinning, thinking about the word "lady". It was both the truth and the label she tried to hide. She wondered who could know. Huy? Are not. Tomorrow? You can suspect it but you don't know it yet. Like? May have read the logo on the card. Khang? His eyes sometimes made her feel like she was being seen more than she wanted.

The next morning, no one in class mentioned it. Huy behaved so normally that it was intentional: he gave An a piece of paper, on which she was shown wearing a crown and sitting at the last table.

“I'm investigating through art,” he said.

An crumples the paper. “Do you want to be punished?”

“No. But if I disappear, tell my mother that I died a queen.”

Khang looked at An. “Is something wrong?”

"Are not."

“You say no in the voice of someone who is hiding at least three things.”

“I just can't sleep.”

“Let's have breakfast then.”

Khang placed an egg sandwich on her table. An looked at the food, then looked at him. “I can't take it forever.”

"This is the leftover cake my grandmother made. If you don't eat it, Huy will eat it all."

Huy raised his hand. “I would like to confirm that possibility.”

An received the cake. She did not mention the message. While standing in the backyard, she still felt her back tense every time anyone looked. Huy suggested turning on the loudspeaker to announce the project's rules, but Khang told him not to turn the yard into an investigation site.

Quynh Nhu arrived after second period, holding her phone. “There's a new account posting about my class.”

On the screen is a photo of An receiving a dress box in front of the school gate, taken from afar. Caption: “Some new student lives simply but has his own driver.”

Mai stood up. “Who took the photo?”

Like shaking your head. "I don't know. The post hasn't had many views yet."

An felt his ears burning. She didn't want the whole class to know this way. Huy looked at her, not smiling. Khang took the phone from Nhu, read the comments and then returned it.

“We tell the teacher,” he said.

“If reported, people will ask.”

“If you don't report it, people will tell it for you.”

An turned away. “I'm not ready.”

Khang does not force. He just told Nhu to save the photo and send it to teacher Hoang. Mai held An's hand and asked her if she wanted to go back to class. An shook his head and continued to paint the rule board. She painted every word: "If you see someone who needs a seat, give it up." Shaking hands distort the paint strokes.

Huy suddenly picked up the brush and added a line at the bottom: "Do not comment on other people's wallets."

Mai burst out laughing. “This line is not in the rules.”

“Yes now.”

An did not laugh. “Don't make everything a joke.”

Huy put down the brush. "I know. But if we don't laugh a little, others will scare us so much that we won't dare stand here."

An looked at him. Huy doesn't use humor to hide, he uses it like a small umbrella in the rain. Can't stop the rain, but help people move on.

Teacher Hoang called An to the teacher's room. The teacher did not ask if she was a lady or not. The teacher just asked: "In what way do you want the school to handle the post?"

"I don't know."

"So we have two jobs. One, protect you from having your personal information spread. Two, give you the right to decide what you want to say about yourself."

An looked at the door frame. “If I tell the truth, everyone will think I came here to test them.”

"Maybe. But you can't control every thought. You can only control how you behave after the truth is known."

“Do you think I should say it now?”

“I think you should speak when you are calm enough not to use money, achievements or tears as an explanation.”

The answer made An choke. Teacher Hoang gave her time until the end of the week. Meanwhile, the school will request the account to delete the photo and remind students not to spread private information.

Leaving the room, An saw Khang waiting in the hallway. “Since when have you been standing here?”

“Since you said you wanted me to have the right to decide.”

“Are you eavesdropping?”

“The door is open.”

“So what do you think?”

“I think you should speak when the words are yours, not when rumors force you to speak.”

An leaned on the railing. “If you knew who I was, would you hate me?”

Khang looked down at the yard, where several students were picking up plastic bottles. “I don't know who you are enough to hate.”

“A very unpleasant answer.”

“I'm trying to be fair.”

In the afternoon, the other account posted another post. This time it's a photo of the group's estimate board, with the expense line crossed out. The caption reads: "Some people are used to using money to solve everything, but now they practice being poor."

Mai wanted to refute. Huy wants to post an explanation video. Khang told everyone to stop. An held the phone, his fingers shaking on the comment box. She could write, "I don't use the rent," but that's a disclaimer that's not entirely true. She used the money to buy tape, thought about paying for pallets, and still had her gym card in her wallet.

An turned off the screen. “I'll tell the group first tomorrow.”

Khang nodded. "Okay."

“Will you be there?”

“I'm always at the front desk.”

“I asked seriously.”

“I also answered seriously.”

An threw an eraser at him. Khang caught it. Huy breathed a sigh of relief as if he had just watched a movie scene with a temporary ending.

That night, An wrote a letter to the group but tore it up. The second letter looks too much like a notice. The third letter has many apologies. In the end, she just wrote in the book: "I am the daughter of Le Khai, the owner of Khai An Hotel. I did not come here to pretend to be poor, but to learn how to live without relying on my father's name. But I hid it from everyone, and you have the right to feel uncomfortable."

An re-read, did not edit. For the first time, she chose an explanation without a table of figures.

The next morning, An did not read the message immediately. She put her phone in the drawer, got on the bus and observed everyone. A worker fell asleep, a little girl held a school bag, and a woman divided a box of sticky rice in half for her children. No one knew who she was, and for those fifteen minutes, that made her breathe easier.

In class, Huy posted a piece of paper on the bottom desk drawer: "Rumors cannot be kept with books." Mai asked where he got the paper. Huy spoke from the teacher's room, then immediately went to ask permission. Teacher Hoang forced him to rewrite it with recycled paper.

When the group met, An read the written explanation. She didn't mention the people who sent the photos, just talked about her identity, resources and reasons for changing schools. Like the suggestion to remove the sentence "I ask everyone for forgiveness", because no one has the right to force her to lower herself.

“I want to accept responsibility,” An said.

“Accepting responsibility is not the same as apologizing for existing,” Nhu replied.

Khang listened, then added: "You can say you understand why other people are upset, but you don't need to make yourself at fault in every sentence."

An corrected it. She finds the text lighter, but more real. Huy read it one last time and said: "There is no sentence shocking enough to attract views."

“That's good,” An said.

A class 11A3 student came to ask the group for help checking his post. She once shared An's photo, now she wants to remove it but is afraid of being thought of as hiding. As instructed to contact the administrator, An said there was no need to apologize in front of the whole school.

“You just have to right what's wrong,” she said. “Don't turn fixing into another performance.”

She nodded, deleted the post and apologized privately. An didn't reply right away, then texted: "I received it. Hope you don't share anyone else's private photos anymore."

In the afternoon, the group set up a mailbox in the yard for those who wanted to give comments without writing their names. Huy proposed to further prevent "rumours", but Khang did not allow it. They only receive comments on the project, do not turn the yard into a place to collect curiosity.

At night, An called her mother. Mom asked her if she wanted to come home for the weekend. An said yes, but wanted to take the bus himself. Mom agreed, just told me to leave a message when she arrived. An feels that trust is different from his father locking his card; it doesn't push her into challenges, just gives her room to decide.

When he arrived at school the next morning, An turned on his phone. The anonymous message still had a new sentence, but she did not reply. She went to the yard, looked at the board, then placed a piece of paper below: "If you want to ask, ask using your name." Not a challenge, just a clear invitation.

Khang read the paper and said: "This sentence does not make the sender lose face."

An replied: "I want them to stop, I don't want them to get hurt."

Khang nodded, then opened the yard gate with her. A student walked in, asking if this place could really be quiet. An pointed to the time table and said today was reading time. The two spoke more quietly, as if respecting the silence was also a way of responding to rumors.