Page 30

Chapter Thirty

VIVI

I work up the courage, bile rising in my throat as I stare at Mom’s contact in my phone. I’ve had her number memorized since grade school, and dialing it always felt so comforting. Not anymore.

I hear her pick up. “A-l?? Vivi?”

I clear my throat, trying to steady my breathing. “Hi, Mom. Can I talk to you?”

“Yes, con. You can always talk to Mommy. What do you need?”

“Mom… about the photos you’ve been looking for—”

“Don’t worry about them,” she cuts me off. “I’ll be okay. I’m sure they’ll turn up soon.”

Guilt overwhelms me. I know she’s lying. I wonder how many times she’s had to lie to me like this before. “I know where the photos are. They’re with me.”

She inhales sharply. “What? Con, why do you have them?”

“Because… I’m in Vi ? t Nam, Mom.” I can feel the line going cold—can picture her face, a cross between anger and disappointment. “I haven’t been in Singapore this entire time. I’m in Sài Gòn. Your home. I wanted to come here because—”

She refuses to listen, her voice rising as she speaks. “How could you lie to me like this? Why did you go to Vi ? t Nam without telling me?”

“Mom—I—I can explain.”

“How could you!” she practically screams through the phone. “Vivi, I have told you many, many times that Sài Gòn is dangerous. Con, you are so reckless… you lied to me!”

“Mom, I’m fine!” I protest. There’s no point arguing back. I’ll just let her know I’m physically healthy and end the conversation. “I really am. I made friends in Sài Gòn. I promise, Mom, this city is so beautiful and you have nothing to worry about.”

“Do I know these friends?” she presses further.

“No, but that’s not the point—”

“I raised you better!” I can hear Dad’s voice in the background trying to calm her. “Now you’re running around in Vi ? t Nam by yourself. You know they can hurt you? What if Mommy won’t see you again?”

“Mom!” I sigh with all the teenage angst rising in my throat. “Stop it, please. Stop acting like I’ll get kidnapped and trafficked. I’m safe!”

“You lied to Mommy, con. I can’t believe this. You never listen to Mommy.”

I blink, tears falling down my cheeks. “Mom, I know about Aunt Hi ? n and Bà Ngo ? i.”

The line goes dead silent.

“What are you talking about?”

“Stop lying to me, Mom. We’ve had family here all this time and you never told me about it. You didn’t even tell them about me .”

“You lied to me.”

Frustration grips me. “Mom, can you please stop focusing on the fact that I lied to you about Vi ? t Nam and start focusing on the fact that you have been lying, too?”

“I didn’t lie. It’s better that con didn’t know.”

Great. Just great. “Well, I know now, Mom.” My voice cracks. “You never wanted to come back, because something happened, and you ran away. I know about your childhood home, about how you left Vi ? t Nam when you were my age, and the fruit stand that Aunt Hi ? n runs. I even know about the boy in the photo—”

“You don’t know anything about Mommy. You think you do, but you don’t.”

“Then tell me.”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Wouldn’t understand? How would I understand when you haven’t even tried telling me?” I want to give up, anger boiling within me. All the rage from my childhood, from being excluded from our family history, from seeing my aunt and grandma comes spilling out. It pours and pours out of me.

“All my life, you never wanted to talk about Vi ? t Nam, even when I asked. How could you have kept our family from me? How could you walk away from the people you love and pretend they don’t exist? Grandma is dying , Mom—did you know that? I wasn’t going to meet my own grandma if you had continued to lie to me. If you cared, you’d come. You’d be back here, too.”

She sucks in a breath, and I know I’ve crossed a line I can never turn back from.

Finally, Mom clears her throat, her voice shaky. “Some things cannot be said, and con, you know better than to ask.”

“You can’t expect that of me,” I say through clenched teeth.

“I can because you’re my daughter.” With that, she ends the phone call, leaving me in tears with an aching pain in my heart.

I stare at the blank screen, tempted to fling my phone on the concrete floor and scream. Scream about my mom, her expectations, and the unsaid words between us. But I don’t, and instead, I resign myself to sobbing on my mattress, arms cradling my own face as hot tears blur my vision and stain my shirt.

My phone buzzes again. A text from Lan.

The journalism results are in. They just emailed me. Can you please come over?