Chapter 3 — The Watch Repair Shop That Doesn't Sell Time

The alley leading to Ms. Mai's house was so narrow that motorbikes had to walk. Both sides of the walls were mottled with moss because of the rain falling from the corrugated iron roof of the house next door. Lan walked slowly, counting the house numbers with peeling paint chips, until a trellis of dark red bougainvillea appeared, covering a low iron gate. She stopped for a moment before knocking, not because she was shy, but because she realized she hadn't prepared a question that was light enough to not make a stranger remember something they'd been keeping hidden for fifteen years.

Lan found Ms. Mai's house behind a trellis of bougainvillea flowers covering the gate. She knocked three times, each time separated by exactly one breath. Inside there was the sound of a chair being pulled across the tile floor and the sound of a lock rattling. A woman in her sixties opened the door, her gray hair cut to her chin. She looked at the photo Lan was holding, then looked at the watch in her hand.

“You are Hòa's child.”

Lan nodded. “You know my father?”

"Know."

“The old lady selling water said I was the last person to talk to your father at the station.”

Mai opened the door wider but did not invite in. “The last one does not mean the one who understands him.”

Lan stood under the eaves, listening to the sound of the sewing machine at the neighbor's house running steadily. “I just want to know why dad didn't come home.”

“What did your mother tell you?”

“Tell him to leave.”

Mai looked up at the clock hanging on the wall. It shows 16:42, but there is no second hand. "Hòa did not leave. He voluntarily stayed in a place where no one could see him."

“What are you saying?”

Mai went back inside and took an iron box from the top of the cabinet. Inside was a stack of discolored train tickets, a copper key and a piece of paper with two lines of numbers. She put everything on the table, her fingers stopped on the key.

Afternoon sunlight penetrated through the crack in the door, shining straight into the iron box, causing the layer of dust on the lid to fly up into tiny floating particles. Lan sat down on the chair opposite, feeling the musty smell mixed with the smell of old oil emanating from Mrs. Mai's shirt. There was a short silence before Mai spoke, long enough for Lan to clearly hear the sound of the wall clock ticking, as if the house was also preparing itself for what was about to be told.

"That year, Bình An station had an overnight train that was not on the schedule. Hòa discovered a passenger forgotten in the cargo compartment. He had no documents, only a silver watch. Hòa planned to take that person to the hospital, but the train had to stop because of a power outage."

Lan felt her throat dry. “Who is that person?”

"A young girl. She said her name was Hà Ly."

The two letters on the watch cover popped up in Lan's memory. H.L.

“Is she dead?”

Mai shook her head. "She's alive. Hòa took her to town in Mr. Sáu's car. But then someone came to the station and asked about the watch. Hòa didn't want to hand it over. He said he would take the girl out of here after changing the message on the watch."

“What message?”

"I don't know. I only know that Hòa met his mother at the station at 4:42 p.m., before the last train left. The two argued. Her mother cried, Hòa said something that I couldn't understand. Then he followed the girl."

Lan looked at the stack of tickets. One ticket has a date that matches the day my father went missing. Seat 12, car 3, departure time 4:50 p.m. “If you followed her, why do people say you ran away from home?”

Mai smiled sadly. "Because I want you to live a normal life. Hòa left a letter for your mother. She burned it."

Lan stood up. “You saw the letter?”

"See."

“Do you remember the content?”

"Partly. He wrote: 'Don't wait for me at the train station.'"

Lan cannot speak. She still remembers her mother sitting by the window every afternoon, looking at the slope until it got dark. Mother never mentioned that she had received a letter; Just say dad is not worth the wait.

She tried to imagine that afternoon: mother standing in the middle of the station platform, her hands shaking, and father with his back turned toward the train about to leave. The image was only imaginary, but it clung to Lan more tightly than any real photo she had ever seen. She realized that for so many years, she had grown up with an abbreviated story — her father left, for no reason — and that abridged story had shaped the way she loved, the way she feared being left behind, the way she always left a place before it could leave her.

Mai pushed the key towards her. "This opens the secret compartment in Mr. Sáu's repair desk. Hòa gave it to me to keep. After Mr. Sáu passed away, I didn't know who to give it to."

“Why did you give it to me today?”

“Because the clock has started again.”

Lan looked down at her wrist. The second hand of the silver watch is vibrating slightly, even though Minh hasn't finished installing it yet. It stopped at 16:43, then retreated one notch, then continued forward. She remembered Minh's words: the clock doesn't give back people, it only gives back a moment.

“Miss Mai, is Hà Ly still alive?”

Mai looked out at the alley. "She changed her name. Someone in the city calls her Hạ. Every year she sends money to a scholarship fund named after Hòa."

Lan felt that the ground under her feet was no longer solid. “Your father saved her?”

"He tried to save one person and hurt two others. No one in this story is completely right."

Lan walked out of the alley, clutching the key so tightly that red lines appeared on her palm. She took a long walk before catching the bus back to the shop, not because the distance was short, but because she needed time for Mai's story to settle into something she could carry without causing her to collapse in the middle of the road. The sun had turned dark orange, the roofs of houses on both sides of the street cast long shadows on the sidewalk, and in Lan's head, the image of her mother standing in the middle of the station kept repeating over and over again like a stuck video.

Lan brought the key back to the shop. Minh was replacing the back cover of his watch. On the table there was a small drawing of the balance wheel. He wasn't surprised when he saw the key.

“Mr. Sáu once said there was a secret compartment,” Minh said. “I don't open it.”

“Do you know about Hà Ly?”

“Know the name.”

“And know my father didn't leave?”

Minh took off his magnifying glass and looked straight at her. “I know he got on the train at 4:50 p.m. I don't know where he got off.”

Lan tightened the key. “So why didn't you say it from the beginning?”

“Because you asked me to fix a watch, not ask me to tell a story.”

“It's in the watch.”

“No. It resides in the people who touched it.”

No one said more. Outside on the street, a truck carrying vegetables passed by, making the glass on the wall shake. A clock hanging high was misaligned, the minute hand fell down but then moved up on its own. Minh stepped onto the chair and adjusted the hanger. Lan watched him, noticing that every time he touched an old watch, his shoulders stiffened as if avoiding a memory.

Lan put away the photo. “My mother doesn't remember.”

“Maybe she remembers but doesn't want to tell.”

“Where is the difference?”

“It depends on whether the listener is willing to sit back after the answer or not.”

“I don't run well yet,” Lan said, then surprised herself with that sentence.

Lan sat down on the chair opposite the counter, watching Minh work in silence for a long time. She realized she had never asked why a quiet person like him chose a career where he had to listen to things all day. Perhaps it was the silence of his profession that made him bearable; No one forces a watch to explain why it breaks, people just need to know how to fix it. She wondered if he had chosen this job to avoid having to answer similar questions about himself.

“Is Ms. Mai still alive?”

Lan stood between two rails covered with weeds, trying to imagine the sound of the train whistle in the past, the sound of grinding iron wheels, and the sound of her mother crying. The afternoon wind blew across the punctured corrugated iron roof, bringing with it the smell of wet soil and sunburned grass. She thought of her father standing somewhere very close to where she was standing, on an afternoon fifteen years ago, when he had to choose between two people he loved in two different ways. No one taught Lan how to forgive a choice she didn't fully understand, and she knew she would have to stand in many places like this before finding the answer.

Lan turned back to look at the station one last time. On the wall there is an old electronic clock, the screen has been dead for a long time but still shows 16:42. At the same time, at the shop on the slope, Minh heard Mr. Sáu's pocket watch make a clear clicking sound.

He opened the drawer. Its second hand has moved to 16:43.