Chapter 2 — Shrimp Street Without Name

Nam Can market opens from dawn until noon, then gradually dwindles, leaving only a few dry goods stalls selling to customers who missed their flights. Hai Yen parked the car some distance from the market, walked in to inquire about the accommodation, still carrying the bag of inspection tools in her hand that had not left her body since leaving the port. She read the strange message from earlier three times, then turned off the screen and stuffed the phone into the innermost pocket of her backpack. It's not that she isn't afraid. It's just that she has learned to put her fear aside, to make room for what needs to be done at hand.

The row of dry goods stalls is at the end of the market, where the smell of dried shrimp, dried fish and fish sauce mix together into a unique smell that anyone who grew up in this estuary can recognize even with their eyes closed. She walked slowly, her eyes scanning each stall, not really looking for anything specific, just the habit of someone who has been here for too long to not be curious.

Then she saw her.

The woman sat behind the dried shrimp tray, her hair tied in a high bun with an old horn comb, her hands quickly arranging each layer of shrimp neatly under the sunshade. That sitting posture, that way of tilting her head, Hai Yen can recognize among hundreds of other people. Her foot stopped in the middle of the aisle, letting a street vendor lightly bump her shoulder without even having time to apologize.

Mrs. Sau — Tran Thi Nga, her mother — looked up at that moment. Her hand was holding a handful of dried shrimp when it suddenly dropped to the ground, spilling a few onto the wet cement floor.

“Yen?” Her voice was hoarse, so small that only two people could hear. “You came back... when did you come back?”

“I just arrived today.” Hai Yen walked closer, sat down next to the row, and helped her mother pick up some fallen shrimp. Her hands shook slightly, but she tried to keep her voice calm. "I'm on a business trip. Just stopping by."

“What business do you come here for?” Mrs. Sau's eyes quickly glanced down at the tool bag on her daughter's shoulder, then stopped at the small badge hanging on the front of her shirt - a card with the words Food Safety Certification Center printed on it. Her face turned white in an instant. “Do you... do you work at a place that often inspects shrimp factories?”

Hai Yen did not answer immediately. She knew her mother understood, she just didn't want to believe it yet.

“I'm an inspector,” she said, choosing every word. “This time I was assigned to audit a shipment of Dai Duong.”

Mrs. Sau's hands tightened on the hem of her shirt, the wrinkles around her eyes were much deeper than the last time Hai Yen saw her, two years ago, when she came home to mourn a distant relative and only stayed for exactly one day. Around them, the sounds of buyers and sellers were still noisy as usual, no one paid attention to the meeting that made both mother and daughter stand in a private silence.

“Stop that,” Mrs. Sau said, her voice urgent, her eyes darting around as if afraid someone would hear. "Ocean is not a place you should touch. People are very big, you know everywhere. You have to be careful in everything you do, not to mention..."

“What's more, you're my daughter,” Hai Yen continued, her voice colder than she intended. “Is that what you meant to say?”

Mrs. Sau remained silent, bent down, and continued to fold the dried shrimp as if her hands needed something to hold on to. After a while, she continued, her voice calmed down but still shaking.

"It's been ten years, Yen. I thought you had left everything behind, doing business peacefully in the city. Why did you suddenly crash into this place?"

"I did not choose the shipment to audit, mother. It was assigned by superiors." That's true, but Hai Yen knew she could have asked to change jobs as soon as she saw the company name, and she didn't. So. She didn't say that part. “I just happened to come to this place.”

“It doesn't matter whether it's accidental or not,” Ms. Sau sighed, her voice dropping like someone who had just let go of a burden she had carried for too long. "Please, be kind, finish the examination and then leave. Don't ask anything more about the past. I beg you."

Hai Yen looked at her mother for a long time. There was a question she had carried with her for seven years since she left this land, a question she had never dared to ask directly for fear that the answer would break something fragile that remained between mother and daughter. But standing in the middle of the market, amidst the smell of dried shrimp and the sounds of people passing by, she felt that question could not wait any longer.

“Do you believe my father is innocent?”

Mrs. Sau suddenly looked up, her eyes suddenly filled with tears but did not fall, as if she had trained herself in the habit of not crying in crowded places. She opened her mouth, then closed it, then opened it again.

“That's for later,” she said, her voice choked. "Have you found a place to stay? It's almost noon, the sun is very hot."

That evasive answer told Hai Yen more than any affirmation. She stood up, brushed her hands, looked around the market to hide the feeling of disappointment rising in her chest. "I haven't. Do you know where it is?"

“There is Mrs. Tu's boarding house, two alleys away, affordable and clean.” Mrs. Sau pointed toward the end of the market, then hesitated one more sentence. "Or... I can stay at Mom's house temporarily. My old room is still there."

Hai Yen shook her head. Not because she didn't want to, but because she knew that if she lived in the same house, her mother would have even more reason to spy on her every move, and she needed enough distance to freely follow what she had just discovered at the port. "I'm staying at the inn for work convenience. I'll visit mom often."

Mrs. Sau nodded and did not press further. Before Hai Yen turned away, she reached out, grabbed her daughter's wrist, and squeezed gently. Her hands were calloused from years of making and drying fish sauce, the hard calluses rubbing against Hai Yen's skin were like a reminder she couldn't ignore.

"Hey Yen. I'm not stopping you from working. I only ask you for one thing: if you find out something, don't rush to do anything. Come ask me first. There are things... you won't understand everything from the papers."

That sentence made Hai Yen pause. It was not like a normal plea from a mother who feared her child was in danger. It sounded like the words of someone holding on to a portion of the truth, pondering how much to say.

“What won't I fully understand, Mom?” she asked, trying to keep her voice light even as her heart beat faster.

Mrs. Sau let go of her daughter's hand and turned back to the dried shrimp. Her voice was as sharp as a door that had just closed. "Nothing. Mom is old, talking nonsense. Go find a place to rest, so it won't be too hot."

Hai Yen knows she shouldn't pressure her further, at least not now. She greeted her mother, promised to come back for dinner that evening, then left the market with a more disorganized heart than when she arrived.

Mrs. Tu's boarding house is an old two-story house, the ground floor is for rent for groceries, the upper floor is divided into six small rooms for guests and a few seasonal workers. Mrs. Tu, a woman in her seventies with a bright voice, led Hai Yen to the room at the end of the row. As she walked, she told stories about the area as if she had known her for a long time.

“What are you doing here, carrying such heavy tools?” Mrs. Tu asked, glancing at the bag of inspection tools on Hai Yen's shoulder.

"Yes, I work to check the quality of seafood products, aunt. I plan to stay for a while week."

“Which side should I check? By the Ocean?” Mrs. Tu stopped in the middle of the stairs and turned to look at her more attentively. “If you touch that side, be careful. In the past, an environmental inspection team came down, the first week it was very aggressive, the next week it suddenly calmed down, then withdrew without seeing anything announced. People here say all kinds of things, I'm old and don't dare discuss it in depth, I only know that the big guys in this industrial park, you have to be careful when dealing with them."

"I'm just doing my part," Hai Yen replied, keeping her voice gentle, even though Mrs. Tu's words made her even more wary.

The room is small, containing a single bed, a rickety wooden table and a window overlooking the alley behind the market. Hai Yen paid the weekly rent, stowed her luggage, then sat on the edge of the bed for a while, letting the morning's fatigue subside before going out to find a place for lunch and continuing to navigate around the area.

On her way to the center of the market for lunch, she passed by an old wall covered in moss, where someone had scrawled an advertisement for a shrimp hatchery. She stopped, not because of the advertisement, but because behind the wall, in the distance, she recognized the familiar green corrugated iron roof of a row of warehouses - where in the past, the executive office of Kenh Ba cooperative used to be.

Now, on that corrugated iron roof, people have repainted a wave symbol embracing the letter D.

An old lady selling sugarcane juice set up her cart right at the corner of the wall. Seeing Hai Yen standing there looking for a long time, she let out a sentence as if speaking to herself rather than to a stranger. "Back then, people were coming and going here very bustlingly. Now they've built high walls and posted security guards, so no ordinary people dare to come near." Hai Yen bought a glass of sugarcane juice and asked a few more random questions about the warehouse area, but the old lady just shook her head and laughed, saying that she had just moved to sell here a few years ago and was not familiar with the old story. She finished the glass of water, thanked the old lady, then continued, carrying the feeling that even those living next to the vestiges of the Kenh Ba cooperative were accustomed to not asking, not mentioning, not being curious - a kind of collective silence that was deeply ingrained in the daily rhythm of the whole market.

She stood there for a long time, the wind blowing from the river mouth brought with it the familiar salty air, and at the same time the phone in her pocket vibrated. It wasn't a text message from an unknown number this morning. This time it was a call from the Certification Center's internal number, the name displayed was her direct superior.

She hesitated for a second before picking up the phone, wondering if her superiors had heard anything about the audit this morning, or if this was just a normal business call like the dozens of other calls she received every week. But there was a vague feeling that told her that, from the moment she stepped foot into the container yard this morning, no more calls would be normal.