Chapter 1

1

Since I became pregnant, my eyesight had been getting worse.

I could be walking down the street and still fail to avoid an electric scooter coming the wrong way.

The man who hit me panicked when he saw that I was pregnant. I told him I was all right, but he insisted on taking me to hospital.

He was kind.

He ran back and forth registering me, arranging blood tests and collecting results until sweat covered his forehead.

Even the other pregnant women teased me.

“Your husband takes such good care of you.”

I hurried to explain.

“He’s not my husband. He accidentally knocked me down and brought me in for a checkup.”

“What about the baby’s father?” one woman asked, surprised. “Your husband should be with you at a time like this. What if something happens?”

The mention of the baby’s father made my heart sink.

Tieu Tri.

I hadn’t seen him since our breakup.

We had always belonged to different worlds. Perhaps going our separate ways was for the best.

But sometimes the world was smaller than I wanted it to be.

I collected my test results and turned.

There he was.

My vision came and went, but at that moment everything was cruelly clear.

His tailored suit emphasized his tall, lean figure. Apart from looking a little drawn, he was as handsome as ever.

Beside him stood a gentle-looking woman, elegant and immaculate from her hair to the hem of her dress.

My loose maternity dress was stained. The fall had left my hair in disarray.

I had read about their business marriage online.

She was Tham Tri Y, daughter of the family behind Tham Group.

She and I could hardly have been further apart.

Following Tieu Tri’s gaze, she noticed me too. She looked me over with a slight frown, then tugged his sleeve.

“Tieu Tri, who is she? Someone you know?”

I stood rooted to the spot.

I wanted to smile, greet them casually, tell them how well suited they were.

But something bitter lodged in my throat.

Tieu Tri said nothing either.

His eyes passed coolly over me, then stopped on the man behind me holding the billing papers.

I wished I could disappear.

I was afraid he would say something that would humiliate me even more.

Instead, he said only, “No.”

He put his arm around Tham Tri Y’s waist and walked past.

Two strangers.

Nobody would have guessed how fiercely we had once loved each other.

2

Tieu Tri and I had been classmates in high school. We even shared a desk.

He came from a prominent family and was exceptionally good-looking. Girls pursued him in an endless stream, with love letters and confessions, one after another.

Annoyed by the attention, he hired me to pretend to be his girlfriend.

The pay was generous. I needed money.

We reached an agreement quickly.

All I had to do was go on pretend dates with him after school.

He liked a cake shop near campus. Every time we went, he ordered two small cakes.

He never ate them. They were both for me.

He sat beside me with a book.

That arrangement gave me something to eat every evening and somewhere quiet to study.

We worked well together.

He got some peace. I earned enough to pay my university tuition.

As it happened, we were admitted to the same university.

Our majors were different, but our teaching buildings were close. Girls still liked him.

And now someone was pursuing me too.

When Tieu Tri proposed renewing our arrangement, I turned him down.

I wanted to know what a real relationship felt like.

I understood my circumstances. After graduation, dating wouldn’t be so simple. Family, work, income—people would weigh all of it.

Even after hearing my reason, he tried to persuade me.

He could give me the experience of a real relationship, he said.

And I would still get paid.

It sounded perfect.

So we agreed again.

We started dating like any other university couple: holding hands, eating together, going to the cinema.

At first, I felt nothing particularly different.

To me, it was much the same as pretending in high school.

Then came Christmas in our second year.

Our dorm rooms held a party together. We played Truth or Dare.

Tieu Tri drew a dare: kiss someone of the opposite sex in the room.

As far as our friends knew, we were a couple.

Everyone started cheering.

He leaned close and asked quietly, “Is this all right? If you’re uncomfortable, I can take the penalty.”

His warm breath brushed my ear.

A strange tingling ran through me.

I tightened my grip on my clothes and nodded.

When his lips touched mine, my heart seemed to miss a beat.

The cheering receded.

His hand settled behind my head, gentle but sure, drawing me closer. The kiss deepened, and heat rushed through me.

My heartbeat lost its rhythm.

It lasted longer than I had expected.

And it felt nothing like pretending.

From that moment, something between us seemed to have changed.

3

The boundary between Tieu Tri and me disappeared.

He began kissing me whenever he felt like it—while we talked, while we read, while we walked hand in hand.

After only a few classes apart, he would pull me into a quiet corner and kiss my forehead, the tip of my nose, my lips.

Soft as a breeze.

Tender, and a little possessive.

I pushed him away, breathless.

“Tieu Tri, are we…?”

Whenever I gathered my thoughts enough to ask what we were, another kiss scattered them.

Between those kisses, he finally told me.

He had wanted to kiss me for a long time.

Since the first day we met.

He had held himself back for four years.

In high school, he had meant to confess. But I kept everyone at a distance. He was afraid that if I rejected him, he would lose even the chance to be my friend.

So he had hidden his real feelings behind a pretend relationship.

At university, he had intended to tell me properly.

Yet I still treated him like a stranger.

Three years as classmates, and I remained so distant that he lost his nerve.

He was afraid of failing.

Afraid of losing me.

But how could I not like him?

He was moonlight above the clouds—bright, distant, so beautiful that I hardly dared reach for him.

I had simply never believed that anyone, or anything, so lovely could belong to me.

Once we understood each other’s feelings, our relationship became an all-consuming thing.

No more hesitation. No more testing the ground.

We gave each other the truest, most passionate parts of ourselves.

4

After graduation, Tieu Tri joined his family’s company as an intern.

I found a job nearby.

Eventually, his parents discovered our relationship.

He was the Tieu family’s only son, born into wealth and status.

I was ordinary.

The distance between us might as well have been the distance between earth and sky.

They refused to accept me.

Tieu Tri was prepared to give up everything and defy them.

His father forced him out of Tieu Group, then made sure he couldn’t find a decent job elsewhere.

I kept losing jobs too, without explanation.

Still, he wouldn’t give in.

The man who had grown up in luxury began delivering food in the sun and rain.

Those days were hard.

They were also the happiest days of my life.

For the first time, I understood what a home could be.

No shouting. No cold indifference.

Just the warmth of two people trying together.

Tieu Tri went out to work every day. I cleaned and cooked.

Even when it was only a bowl of noodles, I made sure it was still steaming when I put it in his hands.

At night, we lay in bed, talking, holding each other, kissing.

In his arms, the difficulties seemed to melt away.

But that happiness didn’t last.

As the days passed, I watched the light fade from his once brilliant eyes.

Exhaustion took its place.

We would be talking in bed, our fingers entwined, and he would fall asleep after a few sentences.

I stroked his palm.

His hands had once been smoother than mine. Now they were rough with work.

So when his mother came to our tiny rented home, I no longer hid as he had told me to.

I found a few scraps of tea and made her a cup.

It was the tea he drank to stay awake.

His mother showed no disdain.

She accepted it and thanked me gently.

She was wealthy, but nothing like the haughty women in films. She was graceful and soft-spoken, each quiet word finding its mark.

“Ky Hoa, you’re a good girl. You keep this little room so clean and comfortable.

“I can see that you and A Tri truly love each other. If it were up to me, I would certainly let you be together.”

She paused and sighed.

“Tieu Tri may be my only son, but his father has any number of children outside our marriage.

“Once his father gives up on him, he won’t simply lose his privileged position. People will trample on him.”

Her gaze softened.

Her voice remained gentle as she struck at the heart of me.

“I can see how much A Tri loves you.

“But what about you, Ky Hoa?

“Do you truly love him?”

I couldn’t answer.

I felt terribly selfish.

It was February, still cold. There was no heating in our room. Yet inside my padded coat, I felt hot, sweat prickling over my skin.

I had thought love could carry us through anything.

Now it seemed that all my love had done was drag that pure moonlight into the mud.

So I let go.

I gave the moon back to the night sky.