Chapter 40 — Shrimp Street Without Name

The next morning, Hai Yen went to her mother's house earlier than usual, carrying a photocopy of the old audit file and a heavy heart that had not slept all night. Mrs. Sau, seeing her daughter's expression, immediately put aside what she was doing, made her tea and invited her to sit down at the table, sensing that this would be an important conversation.

“Mom,” Hai Yen started, her voice trying to stay calm, “I need to ask you about something, a small shipment, about a year before the big poisoning incident.”

Mrs. Sau's face suddenly changed color, her hands that were pouring tea stopped halfway. “You... you already know that?”

"I just found out, through Ms. Tuyet," Hai Yen replied, placing the photocopy on the table. “Mom, you've known this for a long time, right?”

Mrs. Sau put down the teapot, her hands clasped together, her eyes looked far away as if returning to a memory that she had tried to bury deeply. “I know,” she admitted, her voice quiet. "Your father told me not long after it happened. He was very upset. Many nights I saw him unable to sleep, muttering to himself about what he had done."

“Why didn't you tell me?” Hai Yen asked, her voice could not hide the hurt.

“I'm scared,” Mrs. Sau replied, tears began to fall from her eyes. "I'm afraid that if you know about that, you will think your father is also guilty, and will lose the trust you have kept in him all these years. I want you to remember your father as a completely innocent person, unjustly harmed, because that is the only thing I can give you back after losing him."

Hai Yen held her mother's hand, her voice softened. "Mom, I understand why you hid it from me. But I think, Dad doesn't need me to remember him as a perfect saint. Dad just needs me to remember him as a real person, who has moments of weakness, but in the end is still brave enough to stand up and do what's right, even if it costs him his life."

Mrs. Sau looked at her daughter, her eyes were filled with tears but also shone with an indescribable relief, as if she had just been freed from a burden she had carried alone for ten years, afraid that this truth would destroy the image of a perfect father in her daughter's heart.

“What are you going to do with this information?” she asked, her voice still worried.

“I will put it in the file, along with all the other evidence,” Hai Yen replied, her voice steady. "I want the whole truth to come out, not just the part that benefits our family. I think that's the way to truly honor what he sacrificed — not by painting a false image of perfection, but by accepting the full, complex, human truth, as he lived it."

Mrs. Sau nodded and squeezed her daughter's hand. "I'm proud of you, Yen. I'm proud that you've become a stronger person than me, daring to face the things I've avoided all my life."

Mother and daughter sat together for a long time in silence, no words needed, just each other's presence was enough to ease the hurt and burden that had accumulated over the past ten years. Outside the window, the morning sunlight shines through the door frame, bringing with it a fragile but genuine feeling of serenity, as if after many storms, this small family is finally finding a more solid ground to stand on.

That afternoon, Hai Yen sat alone in her old room, writing down the entire story about her father — not just the glorious part. light, but also the weak part, the small mistake that was taken advantage of to build a wrongful verdict much larger than what he actually did. She understood that this would be the most important document in the entire file she was building, not because it proved her father's complete innocence, but because it proved something even more important: that his sentence had been engineered based on a crime he had not committed, by taking advantage of another small mistake for which he courageously accepted responsibility.

She put down her pen, looked out the familiar window of her childhood room, and felt a profound transformation in herself. The journey she began more than a month ago, with the sole goal of absolutely exonerating her father, has now become something much bigger and more complicated — a journey to find the complete truth, even if that truth shakes what she once believed absolutely, even if it forces her to learn to love her father not as a perfect symbol, but as a real person, with all his limitations and the nobility of his final choice.

That afternoon, she brought her handwritten note to lawyer Hoang, explaining her entire decision to include this information in the official records. Lawyer Hoang read each page carefully, her face clearly showing respect for Hai Yen's decision.

“This is a very courageous decision,” she said, setting the papers down on the table. "Many people, in your position, would choose to hide this information, only presenting the favorable part. But legally, I think you made the right choice. A transparent, complete dossier, including unfavorable details, is always much more convincing and trustworthy before any jury, than a carefully selected dossier just to create a favorable image."

“I think so too,” Hai Yen replied. “And I thought, this is also the only way I can face myself later, knowing that I pursued the whole truth, not a version that was edited to fit what I wanted to believe.”

Lawyer Hoang nodded and began instructing Hai Yen how to present this information in the file in a tactful legal manner — not to hide it, but to ensure it was properly understood in the full context, avoiding being used by the other side to distract the entire case into a completely different story.

Late that evening, after completing the additions to the file, Hai Yen sat alone in front of the small altar in her mother's house, where her father's portrait was placed. She lit a stick of incense and stood still, looking at the familiar face in the old photo, the face of a man who had taught her so many things about integrity, and now, she also knew more about his limitations.

“I don't blame you,” she whispered, her voice soft in the quiet space. "I understand, you are just a human being, facing difficult choices for which no one has perfect answers. I just hope that wherever you are, you feel relieved, because finally, the truth about you, complete and complete, is about to come to light."

She stood there for a long time, letting the thin incense smoke rise, blending into the quiet evening air, carrying with it the silent promise of a devoted child. to his father — not a promise to prove he was perfect, but a promise to let the world know who he really was: an ordinary man, with ordinary mistakes, but who ultimately chose an extraordinary path of courage and integrity.

Mrs. Sau, standing at the door of the room observing her daughter from afar, did not speak to disturb that private moment, just stood quietly watching, her eyes also filled with tears. When Hai Yen turned back, mother and daughter exchanged a wordless look, a deep understanding that had been built through everything they had just experienced together.

That night, before falling asleep, Hai Yen reopened the entire file that had accumulated over the past month, now with a new chapter, more complicated and painful but also more real than anything before. She understood that the most difficult part of the journey to find the truth about her father had ended. But ahead, there is still a long way to go to turn that truth into true justice — not only for her father, but for everyone who has and is still paying the price because of a system built by the greed of a few, on the pain of countless other small families.

She turned off the light, lay down, and in the moments before sleep overtook her, she felt a strange peace wash over her—not because it was over, but because she had learned to accept the full, complex truth, instead of trying to cling to a simplified version that was more pleasant but not entirely true. That, she thought, was really what her father had tried to teach her throughout her childhood years, even though she was too young to fully understand its profound meaning, and it took ten years, and many tears, for her to truly fully grasp that lesson.