Chapter 14 — The Alley Is No Longer On The Map

The deeper she went into the alley, the faster Vy's heartbeat became. She passed by familiar houses, recognized a few faces of her old neighbors who were now much older, with white hair, more bent backs than before, but still sitting in the same familiar positions in front of the house as if time passed more slowly for them than the rest of the world.

When the alley opened into a larger yard, Vy paused. The communal well was still there in the same central position as ever; the cement ring was more chipped, moss grew in damp places, but the basic shape remained unchanged. Next to the well, the old tamarind tree with three propeller-shaped roots was now much larger, its spreading foliage shading an entire corner of the yard.

She stepped closer, raised her hand to touch the cold wall of the well, feeling every chip under her fingertips, just like the night she last stood here before leaving fifteen years ago. Tears suddenly welled up in her eyes. She quickly raised her hand to rub her eyes through the mask, trying to suppress the emotions that were surging much more intensely than she imagined.

Looking to the opposite side, not far away, was a row of small houses with a faded wooden sign that still clearly read: "Car Repair — Hai Moc". Vy's heart seemed to stop beating for a beat. The shop was still there and still operating, its rolling door half pulled up to reveal inside a familiar space with all kinds of tools hanging neatly on the wall, a partially disassembled motorbike lying in the middle of the workshop floor.

And then she saw him.

Khanh was crouching next to the car, quickly holding a wrench, his figure was much taller and more solid than the image of the teenager in her memory. A few strands of hair had turned gray prematurely on both temples, his face was tanned with more mature, resolute features, but there was still a vaguely familiar look of the boy who used to sit next to her at the edge of the well years ago.

Vy stood silently from afar, not daring to step closer, just watching him work, each movement mature and decisive, exactly like the way Uncle Hai Moc used to work in the past, as if a part of the father's soul had been completely transferred to the son. She felt a complex emotion rising in her heart - both warm because she saw that he was still healthy, still maintaining the family car repair shop, and painful because she realized that the gap between them was now not only fifteen years of time, but also a whole abyss of unsaid things, unresolved hurts.

She remembered what he said years ago, when the two of them were still drawing an alley map on the cement floor: "If you go anywhere else in the future, just look at this and you'll remember the way back." At that time, she did not expect that one day she would return, not as a child returning from home, but as a representative of the company that was about to erase this entire place from the city map.

That thought made her chest feel like someone was squeezing it. She looked around the well yard, trying to imagine the scenario in a few months, when excavators and bulldozers would move in, when the old tamarind tree with three propeller-shaped roots would be cut down, when this common well would be filled with concrete and rebar of a modern urban area. She was the one who held the pen and approved that drawing. The thought literally made her feel nauseous.

How long she stood there, she didn't know, until a childish voice rang out right behind her, causing her to turn around in surprise.

"Miss, who are you looking for? I feel strange standing here all this time."

A little girl about ten years old, her hair tied in two ponytails, her hand clutching a lesson book, was looking at her with undisguised curiosity. That was baby Lam, although Vy couldn't know her name right now.

"Ah, you... you were just passing by." Vy replied, trying to keep her voice calm, turning her face in another direction to avoid the child's too close look.

But little Lam, with the natural acumen of a child, continued to observe the strange woman standing next to the well with eyes full of confidence. "Are you crying? Your eyes are red."

"No, it's probably due to dust." Vy quickly defended, but her voice was a bit lost.

At that moment, Mrs. Nam Xoi's voice rang out from the side of the alley, calling her granddaughter to come home for dinner. Not seeing Lam's immediate response, she walked closer and narrowed her eyes to look at the strange woman standing next to the well with her grandson.

"Whoa, who is this, Lam?"

"I don't know, she's been standing here all this time, I saw her crying." Lam replied innocently.

Ms. Nam Xoi stepped closer, with the careful eyes of someone who had lived in this alley all her life, familiar with every face that came in and out, immediately realizing there was something strange, strangely familiar in the standing posture, in the eyes of the masked woman in front of her.

"I... I'm..." She hesitated, reaching out with a trembling hand to gently pull down Vy's mask, enough to clearly see the face underneath. A few seconds of silence passed, then Ms. Nam Xoi burst out, her voice both happy and choked. "Oh my god, Vy! Is it Vy? Oh my god, why did you come home without telling me in advance? I'm so happy!"

Her voice rang out loud enough to make several people around her turn their heads to look. Vy panicked, raised her hand to signal her to keep quiet, but it was too late - from the car repair shop across the yard, Khanh also raised her head, her eyes directed straight towards the source of that familiar call.

The distance between them was only a few dozen meters, close enough for Vy to clearly see the expression on Khanh's face gradually changing from surprise to something much more complicated - stunned, then shocked, then a moment of something cold suddenly passed before he could hide it.

Khanh's hand holding the wrench slowly lowered. He stood straight, not taking his eyes off Vy, not saying a word, just standing there, in the middle of the familiar yard that had witnessed so many of their memories, as if time was frozen in this unexpected moment.

Vy wanted to step forward, wanted to say something, but her legs turned to stone and she couldn't lift them. She just stood there, facing the eyes of her once best friend, feeling more clearly than ever that fifteen years of separation was not a void that could be filled with just a wave or a polite greeting.

"Does Miss Vy know Uncle Khanh?" Little Lam asked, innocently not understanding the tension that was covering the surrounding space.

Mrs. Nam Xoi didn't answer, just looked back and forth between the two of them, her face gradually changing from joy to a vague worry, as if she sensed that something was wrong that she couldn't name.

A few seconds passed in heavy silence, with only the sound of traffic echoing from the main road and the sound of someone turning on the radio to listen to Cai Luong in a nearby house. In the end, Khanh was the first to break the silence. He put the wrench down on the workbench, slowly walked out of the shop, across the yard, each step steady, without haste, as if he had learned to control his emotions through years of training.

He stopped about two steps away from Vy, close enough to clearly see the changes on her face after fifteen years, far enough so that neither of them had to touch each other.

"Long time no see." Khanh spoke first, his voice strangely calm, without any excessive emotion, as if he was greeting a first-time acquaintance, not the close friend who had sworn by the tamarind tree years ago.

"YES." Vy replied, her throat was dry, unable to utter a longer sentence.

Mrs. Nam Xoi, realizing the strange atmosphere between the two of them, quickly pulled Lam's hand, using the excuse of cooking rice to retreat inside, but her eyes still could not hide her curiosity and worry as she continuously looked back.

Only Khanh and Vy remained, standing opposite each other in the common well yard, where they had witnessed countless evenings sitting side by side sharing all the dreams and worries of their poor youth, now becoming the place to witness an awkward reunion, stranger than any meeting between two complete strangers.

"Visit home?" Khanh asked, his eyes quickly scanning her simple but clearly expensive office outfit, and the shiny car parked not far away that he had noticed earlier.

"I..." Vy hesitated, not knowing where to start, the explanations about the project stuck in her throat. "I just stopped by to see the old place."

"Really." Khanh nodded, his eyes glanced over the wall of the well, past the tamarind tree, then stopped at her face, as if trying to find some trace of her old best friend left in the successful woman standing in front of her. "After stopping by, are you planning on leaving, or are you planning on staying and talking for a bit?"

That seemingly casual question carried an indescribable weight, making Vy realize that this chance meeting could not just stop at a few polite greetings and end as smoothly as she had hoped.