Chapter 33 — Summer After the Rain

The old dike records were opened in the provincial warehouse, an old building hidden behind a row of administrative offices, where the smell of moldy paper and the dust of time covers every drawer. Linh, her mother and the lawyer came together to see, each bringing a pair of thin gloves so as not to further damage the already fragile pages. There were moldy pieces of equipment, the writing had almost disappeared, but the data still matched the recording they had in hand. Gate number three had been repaired with substandard materials before the flood, a fact now officially confirmed in black and white.

Linh's father's name is in the operator section, clearly printed among dozens of other names. Next to it is a handwritten note: "Danger reported." The writer is a retired engineer, his handwriting is neat but full of haste as if he was trying to write down something before being stopped.

That engineer, Mr. Tan, lives in a house full of bridge models he made himself during his retirement years, stacked on bookshelves like a miniature museum. He said he sent a risk warning report to Mr. Hai as soon as he discovered the problem, but was asked to revise the data to make it less serious. He did not follow that request, and was then transferred to a remote province, isolated from all projects related to the dyke system for many years.

“Why do you keep the copy?” Linh asked, her fingers lightly gliding over the yellowed page.

“Because I don't want my children to ask why I'm quiet one day.”

Mr. Tan handed over the copy to the lawyer on the spot, without hesitation. The court has more solid grounds to expand the investigation. Linh's mother burst into tears in the car on the way home, the tears that had been pent up for many years finally found a way out. She said that if she had known that Mr. Tan was still alive and kept these precious documents, she would have found him much sooner, perhaps saving the whole family eighteen years of living in injustice.

Linh said it is impossible to know all the living people who carry a part of the truth within them. The important thing is that when they appear, no matter how late, be ready to listen fully.

On the way home, Minh called to ask about the situation. Linh said there is more important evidence. He told her to remember to buy him a new screw, because he dropped the last one down the drain this morning. She laughed amid the heavy files piled up on her lap, feeling relieved thanks to that trivial story.

Journalist Thu An, during her own investigation, found a person who worked at the radio station the night of the flood. She remembers receiving a call asking to postpone the warning broadcast on the ward loudspeaker. The caller claimed to be a superior, but his voice was distorted and unclear. She did not have a recording of that call, only the duty calendar with a line hastily crossed out right after.

Linh said it is impossible to know all the living people who carry a piece of truth in their hearts. Thu An asked if she was afraid that inconsistent accounts would ruin the entire file. Linh replied that if they only kept stories that were fit, neat, and without any contradictions, they would be repeating exactly what was done to her father eighteen years ago: twisting the truth to fit a more acceptable story.

Thu An wrote the second article in the series of reports, this time without a sensational title to attract views. The article opens with the story of Aunt Tam's old ladle used to cook ginger water for people to avoid floods, then slowly leads through technical data and points of debate that have not yet been resolved. The article was shared more widely than the first time. Some people from out of town sent old photos they happened to keep, some just sent a short question expressing sincere interest.

When she returned to the theater, Linh saw that Minh had marked a new path in the projection room for easier movement. He wanted to place the firebox in the easiest place to get to it, but that position accidentally blocked an old photo hanging on the wall. Linh said to hang the photo to the side, no need to keep the original position at all costs. Minh was surprised because she didn't stubbornly keep everything intact like before.

“The theater is not a frozen museum,” she said. “It must live to retain its true meaning.”

Together, they moved the photo to a new location, repainted a peeling wall and placed a sign below the photo clearly stating its origin. Linh's mother looked at her father's photo and quietly told him that he would not like this new paint color at all. Linh replied that he never liked the fact that she left dirty dishes in the sink overnight, but life had to continue the way people were living.

That night, the whole group sat and watched the new article on the theater's big screen. People commented enthusiastically below, some were angry, some were skeptical. No one calls Linh's father by a single, simple label like before. She didn't know if that was complete justice or not, but at least his name was back with more depth and more faces, no longer framed in a single accusation.

Linh set a rule for herself to not read online comments after midnight anymore, to avoid negative emotions that keep her up at night. She left it to Mai and Thu An to handle, only receiving verified information from reliable sources. Minh said she is learning not to let strangers on the internet control her emotions. She replied that he still needed to learn not to drop the real remote, referring to the TV remote he had just broken last week.

Thu An's article prompted a woman from a neighboring district to call the theater. She said she once took shelter in a theater when she was seventeen years old during the night of the flood, but never told her story because she thought the memories of a young girl at that time were not worth recording in official records. She still kept a ticket with the words blurred by water, with Mr. Khai's signature on it. Linh invited her to the theater, but made it clear that she had every right not to be photographed and could withdraw her statement at any time if she felt uncomfortable.

The woman arrived on a windy afternoon, her hair fluttering in front of the theater gate. She stood in front of chair number 13 for a long time, her hands trembling as she touched the edge of the chair, then told the story of the flood night: Mr. Khai gave up his last raincoat to a child who was shivering from the cold, then immediately turned back to find an old man stuck in the alley behind. She did not know whether he would be able to return home safely that night, because she was evacuated before dawn. Linh asked how she wanted her story recorded in the records. She replied: "Write down the fact that he was afraid. A courageous person is not someone who is not afraid."

Thu An turned off the recorder before leaving, not recording the last part of the conversation when the woman began to cry. Linh understands that is the most important part of the interview, the part that should not be turned into public documents. That night, they placed the smudged ticket in the main storage box, with the giver's name and the conditions of use that she clearly requested. Minh said that such a small piece of paper should be treated with respect like a true witness. Linh nodded, for the first time realizing that she was no longer trying to find a perfect version of her father, just trying to give him back the very human things he inherently had, including fear and courage intertwined in the same rainy night.

A few days after meeting that woman, Linh realized that their records were growing to the point where it was difficult to control without a more scientific arrangement system. She spent an entire evening with Mai reclassifying all the documents into three main groups: evidence that was completely authenticated, accounts that needed further comparison, and pieces of information that only had emotional value but did not have enough legal significance. Mai emphasized that even though the third group cannot be used as evidence in court, they still deserve to be kept carefully, because they are the soul of the story that dry numbers can never touch.

Mr. Tan, after submitting a copy of his report, offered to help further by contacting a few former colleagues who worked in the irrigation industry at that time, people who may have retired but were still lucid to recall the details. He said his old age now has a new purpose, instead of just sitting and assembling lifeless bridge models in a deserted house. Linh thanked him and carefully told him to only contact those who were truly willing, not to force anyone to speak up if they were not ready to face the past.

Late that night, while Linh was rearranging a new stack of files, her mother walked into the room and silently sat down next to her to help. Mother and daughter did not say much, just labeled each file together, occasionally exchanging a short sentence about which item should come first. Linh realized that, in the midst of quiet working nights like this, the relationship between mother and daughter was being healed in a way that did not require fancy words, just a persistent presence together every day.