Chapter 5 — The Thirteenth Desk Drawer

Lam Quang Vinh's name appears in old notebooks, a list of old teachers and a search page with no photos. Vinh used to be the school's equipment manager, then quit suddenly at the end of the year Mai was suspended. The records say he transferred jobs. Teacher Quang told him to go back to his hometown. The homeroom teacher said she hadn't contacted me for a long time.

Khoi found an address in the table and chair repair invoice: Vinh carpentry shop at the end of the alley near the old wharf. On Wednesday afternoon, An Khe and Khoi cycled there, after asking their mother's permission by explaining that they were going to ask about a history assignment. She didn't like lying, so her mother asked more. An Khe said there was something about the school, but there wasn't enough information to tell. Mom didn't stop me, just told me to go with my friends and return before dark.

The small carpentry shop is located between two high-rise buildings, with a low corrugated iron roof and the smell of pine wood permeating all the way to the gate. An old man was smoothing the surface of a chair, his back was slightly hunched but his arms were still strong. Khoi recognized him from his grandmother's key box.

“Are you Khoi?” he asked.

Khoi nodded. “Your grandmother told me to keep the school key.”

Mr. Vinh stopped planning. “Does your grandmother still remember that story?”

“She doesn't talk much.”

“So you still talk.”

An Khe presented photos and inventory. Mr. Vinh didn't read it right away, just poured them two glasses of water. He said Mai had come to the store once after leaving school, carrying a small drawer that had been removed from table number 13. Mai asked him to hold a key for her and promised to come back. She didn't come back.

“Where is the key?” An Khe asked.

Mr. Vinh looked towards the end of the shop, where there was a wooden cabinet locked with an iron wire. “Where people don't want to look.”

Khoi frowned. “Everyone says that.”

Mr. Vinh smiled sadly. “Because every secret has the same characteristic: it's right in front of our eyes but people don't want to see it.”

He opened the cupboard and took out a tin box. Inside was a brass key engraved with the image of a book, a small notebook and a faded bus ticket. He gave the key to An Khe, not Khoi.

“Why you?”

"You're new. New people often haven't learned to see a mistake as normal."

The small book lists the money donated to the scholarship fund. Receipts are marked with the payer's signature. Expenses are written in black ink, but there is a line of blue ink scraped off. Next to it is the number 13.

"Money is not lost in the fund box," Mr. Vinh said. "She died when she transferred it to the school's temporary account. Mai saw that the numbers didn't match and asked. They said she faked the book to frame someone else."

“Who keeps the account?”

"At that time, it was the parents' representative board. The person in charge was Mr. Lam Quang Vinh."

Khoi looked at him. “Is that you?”

"It's me. But I only signed according to the approved list. When I learned the money was withdrawn, I asked Mr. Phuc. He said he would handle it. A week later, Mai was suspended."

Mr. Vinh pulled an unsent envelope from the box. On it is the name of Mai's address, but there is no stamp. "I was going to write her. I wanted to say I didn't know who took the money, but I knew I was silent. I didn't send it."

An Khe holds an envelope. She didn't open it, just asked where Mai was. Mr. Vinh said Mai was working at a printing factory in another city, but he was not sure the address was still correct. Before leaving school, Mai sent back a sentence: "If anyone asks in the future, please say I didn't leave because I was embarrassed. I left because I couldn't stand people calling the truth a small matter."

Outside the gate, it was pouring rain. Khoi parked the car, An Khe put the envelope in a waterproof bag. Mr. Vinh called out: "The key can open the table of contents, but it cannot open the place where the real books are stored. If you want to find the books, you must ask the person who wrote the final inventory report."

“Is it Mr. Phuc?”

“No. A student.”

On the way home, Khoi pedaled slowly because of the slippery rain. An Khe asked if he was afraid. Khoi said he was afraid of being expelled from school, afraid that his grandmother would know that he was talking about old things, afraid that people would see them as two kids who wanted to be heroes. But he was most afraid that the table would be taken away before they knew what Mai had really lost.

“You can stop,” An Khe said.

“What about you?”

“I can stop too.”

“So why are you still going?”

An Khe looked at the water flowing along the alley. "Because I was blamed just because someone else spoke faster. I don't want someone else to have to hear that for twelve years."

Khoi did not reply. He raised his hand to signal An Khe to come closer to the sidewalk. A truck passed by, splashing water on both of them. An Khe shouted majestically, Khoi laughed out loud for the first time.

That night, An Khe opened Mr. Vinh's envelope in the presence of her mother. In the letter there was only a short paragraph: "Mai, if you still believe that there are good people at that school, come back when you're ready. If not, don't think you're wrong for what you said." After reading An Khe's mother, she told her not to send it right away. “The recipient must have the right to choose whether they want to listen or not.”

An Khe understands. She took a photo of the envelope, saved the original, and sent a message to Khoi that they needed to find the student who wrote the inventory report. Khoi replied: **The final report has the typist's name. I'll ask the administrative office.**

The next morning, in desk drawer number 13, there was a new piece of paper.

**The key holder was half telling the truth. The bus ticket does not take you to Mai. It leads to the day when money disappears.**

The back of the ticket had the date September 18 printed on it, the exact day the class held a fundraiser that no one remembered happened.

That night, An Khe put up a time table on the bedroom wall. She marked the 18th, 19th and Mai's day off from school. The space between the three days is only two panels long, but it contains enough silence for twelve years. Khoi texted that tomorrow he would find the club account code. An Khe put down the phone, realizing that for the first time she had someone walking next to her in this story.

Reconstruct the fundraiser using fragmentary pieces of information. That day there was a basketball game, a cooking competition and a stall selling second-hand goods. The campaign committee receives cash, while students transfer money to the school account. There are no uniform receipts. Bill collectors change every hour.

Tuong Vy asked for a schedule of activities from the union room. The calendar is laminated with plastic, but one corner is peeling off. Below are the hours of the "special booth" run by Hoang Lam. Do not write the content, just write the location: warehouse block C.

“No one remembers this stall,” Tuong Vy said. “If there was, people would have told it.”

An Khe asked teacher Dung. I remember there was a used book stall near the warehouse, but then it was closed because of the rain. An old teacher named Lan used to be in charge. Ms. Lan now runs a tailor shop, and she still keeps a box of receipts because she's sorry for the paper.

They went to the tailor shop on Saturday. Ms. Lan recognized the name Mai, but did not remember An Khe's face. She searched the paper box, took out a receipt for the amount of two hundred thousand, the payer wrote "M". The serial number on the receipt is not consecutive to other sheets.

“I gave this to Mai,” Ms. Lan said. "She brought the money, she didn't have to accept it. She said she wanted to contribute before knowing if she would get a scholarship or not."

That story surprised An Khe. Rumors said Mai took the money, but Ms. Lan remembered that Mai was the one who contributed the money. Khoi asked if there was anything else in the box. Ms. Lan found a piece of list, which had Hoang Lam's signature in the tally column and Mr. Phuc's signature in the confirmation column. The actual amount received is lower than the amount recorded on the summary sheet.

An Khe did not immediately conclude. She asked Ms. Lan if she would allow the photo be taken. Ms. Lan agreed, then told them to ask Mai if possible. “Twelve years later, I'm still embarrassed that I didn't keep this more carefully.”

On the way home, Khoi bought two loaves of bread. He gave An Khe a sandwich, saying that the investigator also needed to eat. An Khe took a bite and discovered that there was an extra packet of chili sauce in the bag. He mistakenly took two portions.

“Are you always this calm?”

“No. I just chew slowly so others will think so.”

The two laughed, but the laughter soon ended when An Khe's phone vibrated. Some strangers sent photos of cloth notebooks, along with the line: "Don't turn this into a game. The loser has lost too much."

Khoi wanted to inform Ms. Hanh immediately. An Khe agreed, but before that she looked back at the photo. In the lower corner of the book page there is a symbol that resembles the letter C. Ms. Lan also used that symbol on receipts. It could be the club's abbreviation, or it could also be the tally's mark.

Ms. Hanh asked us to hand over all the copies. She said from now on, don't go to the warehouse by yourself or contact strange numbers. An Khe felt pulled out of the story, but Ms. Hanh reminded that the children's safety was not a secondary detail.

That night, the new piece of paper was in the desk drawer. Not a question, just a warning. An Khe kept it with a photo of the receipt, then wrote on the first page of her notebook: "Evidence does not make anyone stronger. It only helps people not have to rely on the memory of someone who wants them to forget."