Chapter 13 — No Resentment, No Forgiveness

There was no longer a Chu Minh Hien. Nor was there a Lam Tu Vu. A message from To Dao lit up my screen:

"My brilliant events genius. You must live your life as happily as possible."

I replied with a simple smiley face, then rested the phone on my knees. I tilted my head back to look at the sky. In this sprawling city, the stars were a rare sight, merely a few faint, scattered specks clinging to the darkness above. Suddenly, my mind drifted to the sky over Western Sichuan. I remembered that night when a vast sea of stars blanketed the heavens, shimmering as if someone had spilled a bag of crushed diamonds across the velvet void. Back then, I sat in the courtyard of our guesthouse, sipping butter tea, my heart consumed by one man—Chu Minh Hien—and heavy with a suffocating, unbearable sorrow.

Reflecting on it now, I wondered when exactly I had let go. Perhaps it was on the summit of the Zheduo Pass, where the relentless, icy wind whipped against my face, clearing my mind with startling sharpness. It felt as though something had been scrubbed clean by that gale. It was not a matter of forgetting; it was a matter of releasing. Those two things are entirely different. To forget means the memory no longer exists, but to let go means the memory remains—yet it no longer possesses the power to bring you to your knees ever again.

18

After the Lunar New Year, General Director Ngo kept his word. I officially became a partner in the firm, holding a six percent stake. The day the contract was finalized, he looked at me and said, "Nhuoc Tinh, you have not wasted the last three years. But you will soon understand that today is only your true starting point."

I committed his words to memory. That evening, To Dao dragged me out to celebrate. We had a few drinks, and as the alcohol took effect, she grew more talkative than usual, revisiting the past. She reminisced about when I first joined the firm, bold enough to argue with clients during meetings; she spoke of the first time I took on a major project and stayed awake for three days and nights; and eventually, she touched upon the time I spent loving Chu Minh Hien.

"I knew it all along," To Dao said, slamming her glass onto the table. "He was never worthy of you. I didn’t want to say anything back then, but I always felt it. His vision was too small. He was never going to be enough to hold someone like you."

I sipped my wine, neither refuting nor confirming her words. To Dao watched me, her eyes bright and searching. "But do you know what I admire most about you? It’s not that you’ve become a partner today. It’s those eight days in Western Sichuan."

"Eight days?" I chuckled.

"Yes," she insisted. "Those eight days. If it had been me, I would have collapsed the very moment I found out. I wouldn't even have been able to walk out the front door. But you—you just drove off to look at the snow-capped mountains."

I looked down at my glass, offering a faint smile. "At that moment, I only thought of one thing: I could not let his actions ruin the scenery I had always dreamed of seeing."

To Dao tilted her head, blinking. "That was all?"

I nodded. "That was all." I paused, then added slowly, "He was not worth me suffering that much."

To Dao went still. A few seconds later, she hastily covered her mouth, her eyes turning red and her voice thick with emotion. "Tan Nhuoc Tinh, you... you are truly remarkable."

I smiled, finished my drink, and poured more into her glass. "Come now. To us. Let’s drink to that."

Our glasses clinked, the crisp, clear sound lingering in the air before fading into the small room. Outside the window, the city was draped in night. The lights remained bright, and the traffic flowed in an endless, pulsing stream. Everything was moving forward.

19

Whatever followed thereafter, if I were to recount it, would only be fragmented memories. The marriage between Lam Tu Vu and Chu Minh Hien crumbled in less than a year. One day, To Dao sent me a screenshot of a post from a mutual acquaintance’s social media feed. It contained only two lines:

"Finally, they have gone their separate ways. It’s what they deserved."