Night Meal - Short story contest by Gia Han

In this area, which is surrounded by fields and wasteland, there are only a few scattered clusters of houses, and the roads are not properly lit, so people have long been in the habit of going home early and not going out after this time. Along both sides of the road at this time, only the sound of crickets chirping in the night can be heard. The yellow color of the old street lamps adds to the unsettling scene.

In that silence, only Mr. Thien's house was still lit. His nephew, who usually helped him at the restaurant, had to work a late shift today, and would return home after midnight at the earliest. So tonight, only Mr. Thien was busy cleaning the tables for his broken rice restaurant. Since his retirement, he had little work to do, and his hands and feet were itchy and unaccustomed. So he came up with the idea of opening a late-night restaurant for people who often worked late at night on the provincial road, which connected the province's main bus station to the communes and villages. Mr. Thien's children and grandchildren, although they did not understand why he wanted to get involved, but seeing him nagging them all the time, they had to give in and help him build that small restaurant to make him happy.

From the restaurant, which is only over 40 square ^meters wide, the pure white LED light shines brightly on a corner of the street, attracting flies and moths to gather there. The crackling sound of burning charcoal gradually replaces, even though it is only very small, the shuddering silence in the night and the fragrant smell mixed with the smell of smoke seems to want to soothe the mood of those who have to wander on this road at night. Mr. Thien stands in front of the charcoal stove, leisurely grilling the first batch of meat, humming along to a few old songs. In such a late night scene, it seems like he is the only one still awake.

Around midnight, when the last customer had just left, it suddenly started to rain. The rain came suddenly, it had been drizzling a moment ago and then pouring heavily a few minutes later. The rain was so heavy that it splashed into the shop, Mr. Thien had to quickly carry all the things that were on the porch inside and quickly close the door to block the wind. His shirt was half wet, his hair was also soaked. Unable to call his nephew, he could not rest assured to close the shop and go to sleep, so he had to lie down on a plastic chair near the door, light a cigarette, and look out at the white scene, watching the shop and waiting for his nephew to come home...

From within the rain, Mr. Thien heard the sound of water splashing from the motorbike wheels getting closer and closer. He quickly returned to the door and looked outside. Indeed, there was a motorbike driving towards his house. The wind and rain hit his face again, blurring his vision and making him unable to see anything clearly. Mr. Thien couldn't see who was driving. He was sure it was his nephew. He turned towards that direction, eyes half-closed and half-open, and shouted, his voice lost in the sound of pouring rain:

- What are you doing home in this rain? Come inside quickly, you're sick!

Hearing his shout, the car owner was a bit startled but still drove into the restaurant, saying thank you. Mr. Thien also quickly opened the door wide for the boy to drive his car inside. Just after opening the door for a moment, the rain had soaked the entire restaurant floor. From the car, a wet briefcase fell to the floor with a "thud", the documents inside were all wet and scattered, sticking to the marble tiles, making the floor look even more miserable.

Cơm đêm - Truyện ngắn dự thi của Gia Hân - Ảnh 1.

Mr. Thien quickly closed the door, wiped his face a few times, then took a closer look at the person who had just run into his shop. Only then did he realize that the person who had just pulled into his shop was not the nephew he was waiting for. It was a young man who worked as a technology driver, probably around his nephew's age. His figure looked thin, his skin burned black from being exposed to the rain and sun for a long time. He was shivering non-stop because he had been soaked by the wind and rain since before entering the house. His raincoat looked very old and torn in several places, and the clothes he was wearing inside were also wet in large patches that stuck to his body. His teeth occasionally chattered because of the cold. As soon as he had parked his bike, the young man turned to Mr. Thien and smiled at him, his voice unable to hide his gratitude while he was hurriedly carrying his briefcase and a pile of papers:

- Thank you so much! Luckily you let me stay, otherwise I would have been swept away by the rain! I don't know how it was that at night, I was driving in the middle of the road, it was pouring rain, I didn't have time to stop the car to put on a raincoat! Without you, I would have been ruined tonight!

Hearing those words, Mr. Thien also felt happy inside, responding to the boy with a loud laugh that almost drowned out the sound of the rain outside. He said:

- No, no, no! No need to thank me! It's not safe to drive this late at night anyway, and it's raining and windy too! You should stay at my shop for a while and wait until the rain stops before going.

Thank you, sir!

The young man happily responded, then sat down at a table in the corner of the shop. Mr. Thien offered to lend him some clothes to change, fearing that he would get sick wearing wet clothes, but the boy cautiously refused, only borrowing a towel to dry his head, while his wet jacket was hung on the bike. The pile of books he brought with him was also placed in front of the standing fan to dry. Mr. Thien noticed that although the boy kept his eyes glued to his phone, he occasionally glanced at his food cart. The grilled ribs from earlier, although no longer hot, still had a lingering aroma. The boy's eyes lit up with obvious longing. He said:

- Son, do you want something to eat? I see you driving a motorbike taxi this late without eating anything, it's not good for your health. Whatever you want to eat, I'll get it for you, consider it my treat!

- Yes... yes, thank you very much. It's true that I haven't eaten anything since last night... - the young man was a bit startled as if he had been caught. When he heard him say that, he couldn't hide anything anymore, he just smiled fakely and replied in a low voice - then please let me order the regular portion, don't get the fried pork rinds, okay?

- Coming soon!

He happily replied, quickly took the plate and the dipping bowl, then quickly scooped the rice and picked up the ingredients to put on the plate. In just a few minutes, a hot broken rice dish was out of the oven with all the colors and aromas of rice, meat, eggs, cucumbers, pickles and a bowl of fish sauce with the trademark flavor of his restaurant.

When the plate was placed in front of the young man, just as he had expected, the boy looked at the plate with wide eyes in confusion, then turned to look at him, stammering and asking softly: "Yes, uncle...". Mr. Thien felt satisfied with his "joke", he smiled and patted the young man's shoulder a few times, saying and laughing:

- You told me to get the regular portion without fried pork rinds. That's what my regular portion looks like! This dish is my treat! Eat well to have energy to run, okay?

As if to prove that his words were not a joke, he even took a spoon and fork for him, wiped them clean, put them in his hand, placed the bowl of fish sauce near him and signaled him to eat quickly. Touched by Mr. Thien's generosity, the young man thanked him profusely, and ate his plate of rice like someone who had not had a full meal for a long time.

Looking at his appearance, Mr. Thien thought of his nephew, who had not called or contacted him again. He brought out another cup of iced tea for the young man, poured a glass for both of them and asked him a few questions. Gradually, the young man gradually followed his curious approach. Through his story, Mr. Thien knew that his house was on an island commune in the neighboring province. Because he was going to school, he moved here, went to school during the day, and came back at night to take on night jobs because, according to him, "it's easier to bargain for night jobs." There were nights when he drove until 2 or 3 a.m. before returning to his boarding house, then woke up around 6 a.m. to go to school.

He asked him if he was afraid of being exhausted living like that. The young man half-joked, half-complained: "It's still tiring, but I'm very happy that I can still go to school! Now I'm only going to college, but in the future I can transfer to university and become a skilled worker, which will be much better. Besides, if we don't study hard in today's society, it will never get better!"

The two of them kept chatting about this and that. The more Mr. Thien talked to him, the more he thought about his nephew. It seemed like children like him and his nephew shared some common suffering that perhaps he had never noticed before...

The rain gradually stopped and it was time for the young man to leave. When he was about to take his bike away, Mr. Thien hurriedly ran into the house, took out a new, intact raincoat, and put it in his hand, saying: "Here, I'll give you this coat, you should wear it. Yours is too old. If it rains again later, you won't get wet like before. Consider this a gift from me, if anything happens in the future, just stop by the shop and talk to me, okay?" The young man happily took the raincoat from his hand, and kept saying thank you until he got on his bike and left. Now, the rain had almost stopped, Mr. Thien struggled to carry the folded table and chairs out to the porch.

Suddenly, there was a notification from his phone, it was a message from his nephew. It turned out that it had been raining earlier, the place where he was unable to contact him had lost signal, and now his nephew had texted him to let him know that he was about to return. Reading his nephew's message, Mr. Thien was secretly happy, but suddenly thinking about the conversation with the young man earlier, he felt a few things stirring in his heart... After a moment of hesitation, he texted his nephew back: "Hey, do you want to go back to school?".