Summer in tenth grade began with the buzz of cicadas.
In the last days of May, the schoolyard was always flooded with sunlight. The flamboyant trees in front of Building B blazed red, their blossoms scattered all over the walkway. Every afternoon after school, Ha would deliberately walk a little more slowly.
Not because she liked staying at school.
She just didn't want to go home too early.
Ha's house wasn't always filled with laughter.
Her father often came home late from work.
Her mother was busy with the little shop at the end of the lane.
They both loved her dearly, but during those years, Ha began to realize that adults had so many things to worry about.
The electric bill.
Tuition.
Living expenses.
All the small costs she'd never paid attention to before.
Ha didn't ask.
She simply tried her hardest to study.
Because she knew Mom and Dad always hoped she could go to college and find a stable job instead of struggling the way they did.
But there was one thing she didn't know yet.
One day, her own family would become the reason she had to grow up earlier than the friends her age.
Monday morning.
Ha arrived in class earlier than usual.
She set her backpack down, then took out her books.
The seat beside her was still empty.
She looked at the clock.
6:48 a.m.
There were still more than ten minutes before class started.
Ha propped her chin on her hand and gazed out the window.
A little while later, An Lam came running into the classroom.
"Ha!"
Ha turned around.
"What?"
"You're here early."
"Yeah."
"Where's Khoi?"
Ha paused slightly.
"How would I know?"
An Lam pulled out her chair and sat down.
"He's your deskmate."
"He'll probably be here soon."
An Lam looked at her.
Then she smiled.
"You've looked at the door five times already."
Ha immediately protested:
"I have not."
"You have."
"No."
"Yes."
Ha said nothing more.
An Lam laughed so hard she collapsed onto her desk.
"You're hopeless."
"Shut up."
"Fine."
An Lam sat up straight.
"But I still think it's hilarious."
Ha turned her face toward the window.
She didn't want to admit that she was really waiting for Khoi.
She didn't know when it had happened, but his presence had become a familiar part of her day.
The moment she saw him walk through the classroom door, she felt like an ordinary day had begun.
Seven o'clock sharp.
The bell rang.
Khoi still hadn't arrived.
The teacher walked in.
Ha looked at the classroom door one last time.
It was empty.
She told herself:
*He must be taking the day off.*
But first period passed.
Then second.
Then third.
The seat beside her was still empty.
By recess, Ha couldn't hold back anymore.
She asked Gia Bao:
"Is Khoi absent today?"
Gia Bao was drinking water.
"Yeah."
"What's wrong with him?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know?"
"No. His mom called the teacher this morning to ask for the day off."
Ha fell silent.
"It's nothing serious, right?"
Gia Bao shrugged.
"Probably not."
Ha nodded.
"Yeah."
But she couldn't concentrate for the rest of the morning.
She looked over at the empty chair.
One of Khoi's books was still on the desk.
The pen he used all the time lay right beside it.
Everything was normal.
There was just one person missing.
Ha suddenly felt as if the room were bigger than usual.
That afternoon, Ha went home.
She opened the door.
"Mom?"
There was no answer.
Ha went into the kitchen.
A note lay on the table.
**I'm going to Aunt's for a little while. Go ahead and eat dinner first.**
She set her backpack down.
Then she opened the refrigerator.
There were only a few eggs left inside.
Ha took one out.
She cooked dinner by herself.
It was a very simple meal.
A bowl of rice.
One fried egg.
A little bit of vegetables.
Ha ate while checking her phone.
There were no messages.
She hesitated for a long time.
Finally, she opened her chat with Khoi.
His name was at the top of the list.
The last message was from New Year's Eve.
**Let's keep working hard together this year.**
Ha stared at the words.
Her finger hovered over the keyboard.
She typed:
**What's wrong?**
Then deleted it.
She typed again:
**Are you absent today?**
Deleted it.
In the end, she sent only:
**Are you okay?**
The message was sent.
Ha set her phone down.
Five minutes.
Ten minutes.
Twenty minutes.
There was no reply.
She laughed at herself.
*Maybe he's busy.*
Ha put her phone away.
But when she went to bed, she still hadn't received an answer.
The next morning, Khoi came to school.
The moment Ha walked into the classroom, she saw him sitting in his seat.
He was reading a book.
Ha stood in the doorway for a few seconds.
For some reason, she felt relieved.
Khoi looked up.
"Why are you standing there?"
"Nothing."
Ha walked over.
She set her backpack down.
"Are you feeling better?"
Khoi paused.
"Yeah."
"Really?"
"Really."
"Something happen?"
"No."
Ha looked at him.
He seemed normal.
But his eyes were slightly red.
She didn't ask anything else.
A little while later, Khoi spoke:
"You texted me yesterday?"
"Yeah."
"Sorry."
"It's okay."
"I was asleep."
"Yeah."
The two of them fell silent.
Ha opened her book.
Khoi opened his too.
But before class began, he said very quietly:
"Thanks."
Ha turned to him.
"For what?"
"For asking."
She smiled.
"I'm your deskmate."
Khoi looked at her.
Then he turned away.
Neither of them said anything else.
But from that day on, something between them changed.
Nothing big.
Nothing obvious.
They simply began caring more about each other.
A month later, the school held its annual sports meet.
The class had to choose participants.
An Lam signed up for the relay race.
Ha was dragged onto the cheering squad.
And Khoi was chosen to play soccer.
That afternoon, the sports field was packed.
Ha sat on the concrete bleachers with An Lam.
An Lam handed her a bottle of water.
"Give it to Khoi later, okay?"
Ha glared at her.
"You give it to him."
"It's not like I like him."
"Then why don't you give it to him?"
"Because I like watching the drama."
Ha had no response.
The game began.
Khoi wore a white gym shirt.
He ran across the field.
He wasn't the type to show off.
But the longer Ha watched, the more she realized how good he was at soccer.
Gia Bao passed the ball.
Khoi received it.
One shot.
The ball went into the net.
The whole field erupted.
An Lam immediately shouted:
"Khoi, you're amazing!"
Ha smiled too.
But right then, she saw a girl from the other side of the field run over and hand Khoi a towel.
The girl was very pretty.
She had long hair.
Fair skin.
Her uniform was perfectly neat.
Ha didn't know who she was.
The girl handed Khoi a bottle of water.
The two of them said something to each other.
Khoi smiled.
Ha fell silent.
That smile...
She had never seen him smile at her that way.
An unpleasant feeling crept into her heart.
An Lam followed her gaze.
"That's Uyen Tong."
"Who?"
"She's in Class 10A2."
"His friend?"
"Yeah."
"Are they close?"
An Lam looked at Ha.
"I heard their families know each other."
Ha didn't ask anything else.
She lowered her head and stared at her shoes.
The game continued.
But from that moment on, Ha didn't feel as happy as before.
After school, Ha deliberately walked slowly.
She didn't want to run into Khoi.
She didn't understand why she was avoiding him, either.
Maybe she was jealous.
It was a feeling she'd never experienced before.
And she hated it.
"Ha."
Khoi's voice came from behind her.
She stopped.
"What is it?"
"Wait for me."
"You don't have to."
"I'll walk you home."
"You don't have to."
He looked at her.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing."
"Then why won't you look at me?"
Ha said nothing.
Khoi stepped in front of her.
"Ha Nguyen."
"What?"
"Are you mad at me?"
"No."
"Really?"
"Yeah."
He looked at her for several seconds.
Then he asked:
"Because of Uyen Tong?"
Ha looked up.
He knew?
"It's not that."
"Okay."
"It really isn't."
"Then that's good."
Ha grew a little annoyed.
"What's good about it?"
"At least I didn't do anything wrong."
She looked at him.
"So you and her..."
"Our families are friends."
"Oh."
"Our parents know each other."
"Yeah."
Ha lowered her head.
Khoi looked at her.
After a while, the corner of his mouth lifted slightly.
"Are you jealous?"
Ha's face immediately turned red.
"I'm not!"
"Okay."
"I mean it."
"Okay."
He turned away.
Ha followed him.
They walked a few steps.
Then Khoi said:
"If you want to know something, just ask."
Ha was silent.
"Don't make things up in your head."
"Yeah."
"You overthink."
"I know."
"Then fix it."
"It's hard."
He laughed.
"Yeah. It really is."
That was the first time Ha heard Khoi laugh because of her.
She laughed too.
That childish jealousy disappeared as quickly as it had appeared.
But Uyen Tong had entered their story.
And many years later, that would become one of the names Ha least wanted to hear.
At the end of June, Ha began studying for her final exams.
She and Khoi often stayed in the library after school.
They sat beside each other.
They studied together.
Sometimes they argued over the smallest things.
"How do you do this problem?"
"Read the question."
"I did."
"Read it again."
"I don't understand."
Khoi sighed.
"Give it here."
Ha handed him her notebook.
He explained it.
She listened.
Some days, they studied until six in the evening.
The school was empty.
The afternoon sunlight streamed through the windows.
Ha was so tired that she fell asleep at her desk.
When she woke up, she found a jacket draped over her.
It was Khoi's.
He was sitting across from her.
"Sleep well?"
Ha sat up.
"How long was I out?"
"Twenty minutes."
"Why didn't you wake me?"
"You looked like you were sleeping well."
Ha looked at him.
"Weren't you cold?"
"No."
Ha handed back the jacket.
"Thanks."
He took it.
"Yeah."
They went back to studying.
Neither of them said anything.
But a very gentle feeling filled Ha's heart.
She thought—
*Maybe this is all youth needs to be.*
But Ha's life began to change one evening at the end of July.
That day, while she was doing homework, she heard her mother coughing in the next room.
Once.
Twice.
Then again and again.
Ha set down her pen.
"Mom?"
There was no answer.
She went inside.
Her mother was sitting on the bed with one hand over her mouth.
There was a tiny red streak on the tissue.
Ha froze.
"Mom..."
Her mother immediately hid the tissue.
"It's nothing."
"You were coughing up blood?"
"It probably just means I'm overheated."
"You need to see a doctor."
"I'll go tomorrow."
"No. I'll take you tomorrow."
Her mother smiled.
"You focus on studying."
Ha said nothing.
She stared at her mother for a long time.
For the first time in her life, she felt afraid.
A shapeless fear.
The next day, her mother went to the doctor.
Ha still went to school.
She sat in class, but her mind wasn't there.
Khoi noticed.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing."
"You don't look okay."
"My mom is sick."
His pen stopped.
"Someone in your family?"
"Yeah."
"Is it serious?"
"We don't know yet."
Khoi fell silent.
After a while, he said:
"If you need help with anything, tell me."
Ha looked at him.
"Yeah."
She tried to smile.
But her eyes were already red.
Khoi didn't ask anything else.
He simply pushed the carton of milk on the desk toward her.
"Drink it."
"I don't want it."
"Drink."
Ha took it.
She opened the carton.
She took a sip.
Tears fell onto the page of her notebook.
Khoi saw them.
He didn't say anything.
He simply took a tissue and placed it beside her hand.
Ha lowered her head.
She didn't want him to see her cry.
But she didn't know then that this was only the beginning.
A week later, Ha's mother had to be hospitalized for further tests.
The family began borrowing money.
Ha's father took on extra work.
Her mother still tried to smile every time she called.
"Just focus on your studies."
Ha stood in the hospital hallway.
She looked at her mother through the glass door.
The woman who had always been healthy now lay on a white bed, her face pale.
Ha turned away.
She didn't want to cry.
But in the end, she did.
Khoi called.
"Where are you?"
"At the hospital."
"Wait for me."
"You don't have to."
"I'm coming."
"Khoi..."
"I'm coming."
An hour later, he appeared.
He was carrying a bag.
"This is for you."
Ha looked inside.
A box of porridge.
A bottle of water.
Some pastries.
"Why did you buy all this?"
"Gia Bao said you hadn't eaten."
Ha fell silent.
"Thanks."
Khoi sat down beside her.
The two of them said nothing.
After a while, Ha asked:
"Khoi."
"Yeah?"
"If one day..."
She stopped.
She couldn't continue.
He looked at her.
"What if one day my mom isn't here anymore?"
Khoi fell silent.
The question was too big for two sixteen-year-olds.
He didn't know how to answer.
In the end, he could only say:
"Don't think like that."
"But what if..."
"I'll be here."
Ha looked up.
Khoi looked straight into her eyes.
"I don't know what to say."
"But if you need someone by your side, I'll be there."
Ha's tears fell again.
She turned her face away.
"Don't make promises you aren't sure you can keep."
Khoi was silent.
Then he said:
"I am sure."
But sixteen-year-olds were often too naive.
They thought a promise could stand against everything.
They didn't know that some things couldn't be kept simply because you wanted to keep them.
They didn't know that illness could drive a family to ruin.
They didn't know that money could make people who loved each other start fighting.
They didn't know that distance could turn messages that once arrived every day into calls no one dared to make.
And least of all, they didn't know that sometimes people left each other not because they had stopped loving one another.
But because they thought leaving would make the person they loved hurt less.
At the end of summer, Ha's mother was discharged from the hospital.
The doctor said she would need long-term treatment.
Her family began entering a difficult period.
Ha didn't tell Khoi much.
She was afraid he'd worry.
She also didn't want to become a burden.
She started attending fewer extra classes.
She stopped getting milk tea with An Lam.
She no longer stayed at the library until evening.
After school, she had to go home and help her mother.
Khoi noticed.
"You've changed."
Ha smiled.
"No, I haven't."
"You have."
"I'm just busy."
"Because of your mom?"
Ha fell silent.
"Yeah."
"Let me help."
"You don't have to."
"Ha Nguyen."
"I really don't need help."
He looked at her.
For a long time.
"Don't carry everything by yourself."
Ha lowered her head.
She wanted to say that she was scared.
Very scared.
But in the end, she only said:
"Yeah."
On the first day of eleventh grade, Ha stood in front of the mirror in her uniform.
She looked at herself.
A year had passed.
She was still herself.
But somehow, she was different.
Her eyes were no longer as carefree as before.
She now knew what it meant to worry.
What it meant to fear losing someone.
What it meant to stare at a hospital bill without knowing what to do.
She left the house.
On her way to school, her phone vibrated.
A message from Khoi.
**I'm at the gate.**
Ha looked at the screen.
She smiled.
When she reached school, she saw him standing beneath a flamboyant tree.
He was a little taller than the year before.
His face looked more mature.
When he saw her, he handed her a carton of milk.
"For you."
Ha took it.
"Strawberry milk again?"
"Yeah."
"You remembered?"
"I remember."
Just three words.
But they softened something inside Ha.
The two of them walked into the school together.
An Lam came running over.
"Finally, everyone's here!"
Gia Bao shouted from behind her:
"Class 10A1, gather up!"
The whole group laughed.
Ha looked at her friends.
At the schoolyard.
At the flamboyant tree.
At Khoi beside her.
She didn't know how long those peaceful days would last.
She only knew that at that moment, she was very happy.
Maybe the most beautiful thing about youth isn't that it's perfect.
It's that while we're living through it, we don't know it will end.
Ha was the same.
She used to think she had plenty of time left.
Two years.
One year.
Then college.
Then work.
Then a future she and Khoi could build together.
She believed that as long as she tried hard enough, everything would get better.
But life had never promised anyone that effort would earn them a happy ending.
One September afternoon, after school, Khoi stood outside the classroom.
"Ha."
"Yeah?"
"Do you want to go somewhere with me this weekend?"
"Where?"
"I don't know."
"Then why go?"
"Somewhere."
Ha burst out laughing.
"You're asking someone out without knowing where you're going?"
"Yeah."
"Then I'll think of something."
"Okay."
She looked at him.
"But we have to be home before six."
"Yeah."
They went down the stairs together.
The afternoon sunlight streamed through the windowpanes.
Their shadows stretched across the tiled floor.
Ha didn't know that years later, she would remember that afternoon.
She would remember the way Khoi stood beside her.
His voice.
The sunlight.
The lingering buzz of cicadas.
And she would remember that back then—
she had someone.
Someone who made her believe that there really was such a thing as "together."
That night, Ha wrote on the last page of her diary:
**September 12.**
**Today was very ordinary.**
**Mom is still undergoing treatment.**
**Dad is still working.**
**I'm still going to school.**
**Khoi is still sitting by the window.**
**I still like him.**
She stopped writing.
Then she added another line.
**I hope these ordinary days last a very long time.**
She closed the notebook.
Turned off the light.
Lay down in bed.
Outside the window, the wind moved through the treetops.
Ha closed her eyes.
She didn't know that just a few months later, her family would face a major upheaval.
She also didn't know that the boy she trusted most would have to face his first choice between family and love.
And least of all, she didn't know that the promise he'd made at sixteen—
**"I'll be here."**
would soon be tested by life.
Again and again.
And painfully.
But right now, they were still young.
Still loving each other in the most awkward way.
Still believing in tomorrow.
And still unaware that some summers can only be lived through once in a lifetime.
**That summer, we had each other.**
And it was the most beautiful summer before life began taking everything away, one thing at a time.