Chapter 4 — The Test Has No Name

One Serving, Three People

Three weeks before the scholarship exam, the school decided to organize a separate review session for the three candidates, proposed by the principal to ensure fairness - all three will have access to the same set of documents, the same instructor, no one will have an advantage over the other from outside resources.

The small meeting room next to the library was set up as a study area, with three tables arranged in a U shape, with the full-time Math teacher standing in the middle. Nguyen arrived first, followed by Khanh Thu, and finally Vy, walking in with the tense expression that had become a constant over the past two weeks.

"From today until the exam day, the three of you will study this program together," the teacher said, giving each person a thick folder of documents. "I do not favor anyone. The final result depends entirely on each child's ability."

The first review session took place in an awkward atmosphere. Nguyen and Khanh Thu are used to working together since studying for inter-school exams, so the rhythm of communication between the two is quite natural - one person states the solution, the other criticizes or supplements, sometimes even joking about silly mistakes. Vy sat at the other corner of the table, taking notes diligently but rarely speaking, only occasionally asking a brief question to the teacher, avoiding direct communication with the other two.

"Don't you try Nguyen's method?" Khanh Thu turned to ask Vy when she saw him struggling with a spatial geometry lesson. "Much faster than the way in the documentation."

"I'm used to doing things my own way," Vy replied, his voice a bit rough, then realized he had spoken a bit harshly, so he added. "Thanks, but let me try it myself first."

Khanh Thu didn't mind, just nodded and returned to her lesson. But Nguyen recognized the look in Vy's eyes when he thought no one was paying attention - a look that was both probing, as if he was tormenting himself for the refusal and letting it out a little impolitely. Nguyen used to think Vy was just a quiet, unsociable classmate, but the more he observed, the more he felt a tension hidden beneath Vy's calm demeanor, like an over-tuned string.

The exam structure was carefully explained by the teacher in the second review session: fifty multiple-choice questions on background knowledge, followed by three advanced essays, and finally a short essay in English explaining the reasons for deserving the scholarship. The exam time lasts for three consecutive hours. The exam invigilator will be sent by the provincial training department, not the school teacher, to ensure absolute objectivity.

"The advanced essay section accounts for sixty percent of the score," the teacher emphasized, tapping his pen on the board where the score structure had just been written. "Whoever solves this part quickly, presents it concisely, and makes few mistakes will have the biggest advantage."

Nguyen took careful notes in a notebook with frayed corners, while Khanh Thu marked with colored pens according to her own system she has been using for the past two years. Vy just stared at the board, clenched the pen so tightly that his knuckles turned white, and didn't write anything else - perhaps because the test structure had been memorized from previous sleepless nights, or perhaps because his mind was stuck in another place, farther away from this review room.

During break time, Nguyen went to the hallway to get water and happened to see Vy standing alone by the window, looking down at the schoolyard.

"Are you okay?" Nguyen asked, partly out of politeness, partly out of genuine curiosity.

"Fine," Vy replied curtly, then perhaps realizing the answer was too cold, he added. "Just a little tired. You and Khanh Thu study so well together, I can't keep up."

"We just studied together from the inter-school exam, nothing special." Nguyen shrugged. "You're good too. Ranking third in your grade is no joke."

"Tuesday doesn't mean anything when there's only one spot," Vy said, his voice small but decisive, his eyes still looking out to the schoolyard, not turning back to Nguyen. "For you, failing the exam means being sad for a few days and then finding another way. For me..."

He left the sentence unfinished, as if suddenly realizing he was about to say something he shouldn't say to his direct opponent. Nguyen waited, but Vy just shook his head, took a sip of water and then returned to the classroom to continue, leaving his unfinished sentence hanging in the air.

In the following days, the study schedule of all three became more and more dense. In the morning, we study the main course, in the afternoon we study privately for the scholarship exam, and in the evening we each study by ourselves at home until late. Nguyen noticed that Khanh Thu began to have dark circles under his eyes, and Vy was visibly thinner, sometimes answering the teacher's questions much slower than a few weeks ago, as if his mind was occupied by thoughts other than schoolwork.

One afternoon, when the three were solving practice problems according to the official test structure, Vy made two consecutive mistakes in the types of problems he was already proficient at. The teacher reminded him gently, but Vy tightened his grip on the pen so tightly that the tip of the pen cracked, and broken pieces of plastic flew onto the table.

"Sorry teacher," he mumbled, bending down to pick up the broken piece of pen, his hands shaking slightly.

"It's okay, take the test to find out your mistakes," the teacher said, his voice reassuring. "Three weeks left, fix it in time."

Three weeks. For Nguyen and Khanh Thu, that is enough time to further refine their established skills. But to Vy, when Nguyen glanced at his face as he bent to pick up the broken piece of pen, those three weeks looked more like a hanging sentence than an opportunity.

After the review session, Khanh Thu went with Nguyen to the parking lot. The two were silent for a while before she spoke up.

"Have you noticed that Vy is different these days?"

"Have." Nguyen nodded. "The stress is beyond normal. But who wouldn't be stressed before a big exam like this."

"I don't know," Khanh Thu said, looking far away toward the school building with lights on. "There's something about him that makes me a little worried. Like he's carrying something heavier than we thought."

Nguyen did not respond immediately. He thought about Vy's unfinished sentence the other day — "to me..." — and wondered what the rest of that sentence was, but then pushed that thought aside, thinking that everyone has their own pressure, and shouldn't second-guess other people's things.

"Maybe he just needs more time to regain his form," he said, trying to keep his voice light. "Anyway, we'll know the results in three weeks."

Khanh Thu nodded, but her eyes still held a bit of concern that wouldn't go away. She didn't know, and Nguyen didn't know either, that her vague premonition, if pursued more closely now, might have prevented what was about to happen. But eighteen year olds don't have the habit of looking too deeply into other people's insecurities, especially when each person is also struggling with their own pressure.

That night, Vy sat in front of his desk for a long time, not opening his book, just staring at a piece of paper filled with debt numbers that he had calculated himself many weeks ago. He folded the paper and stuffed it into a drawer with a stack of old photocopied documents—pages of recipe notes he'd prepared "just in case," telling himself that they were just a backup, something he would never actually use.

But the closer the exam date gets, the more the line between "just in case" and a real decision in Vy's mind blurs, thinning like a thread about to break.

He turned off the light and lay down on the bed, but his mind kept spinning with different scenarios. He imagined the whole family gathering at a party to celebrate him winning the scholarship, his father's laughter echoing throughout the neighborhood; Then immediately that image disappeared, replaced by the scene of his father bowing his head before the creditor, and his mother quietly took off the last remaining wedding ring. Those two scenarios kept alternating in his mind all night, not giving him a single moment of real peace.

He thought of Nguyen, who may have lost his scholarship but still had a whole life ahead of him to study and rebuild himself from scratch with the strength he had trained since childhood. He thought of Khanh Thu, who even if she failed this exam, her family would still be able to send her to study abroad in another way, without having to suffer any financial consequences. As for him, if he fails, there was no second path waiting for him - only debt, only his father's disappointed eyes, only the burden that he had been used to carrying on his shoulders since the tenth grade, the day he accidentally let the whole family bet their honor on the academic achievement of a fifteen-year-old child.

In the middle of the night, Vy got up, opened the drawer, took out a stack of photocopied documents and looked again under the dim light of the study lamp. Those are just a few pages of formulas, some difficult types of exercises that he compiled himself - nothing illegal if just used to review at home. But as he held them in his hands, another thought, sharper and clearer than the previous nights, began to form: what if these pages had somehow appeared not in his briefcase but in someone else's briefcase...

Vy quickly stuffed the stack of papers back into the drawer, slamming it shut as if trying to trap that very thought in the darkness. He told himself he would never do such a thing, that it was just a moment of weakness from a head too tired from lack of sleep. But he also knew that just the fact that thought had formed so clearly in his mind was something he could no longer pretend had never happened.