ASHES AFTER THE BLAZE

The day An Khuynh, the legendary “White Moonlight” of Tan Dich, returned to the country, the whole city buzzed as if welcoming a princess. Meanwhile, I stood alone in the bridal chamber that had once been decorated like a fairy tale, now nothing more than a cold, gilded cage.

I am Tham Van, the legal wife of Tan Dich, and the “blind woman” ridiculed by the entire city.

Years ago, to save him from a horrific fire, the toxic smoke and searing heat had blinded me. My world collapsed into darkness in an instant. Yet, in Tan Dich’s eyes, that sacrifice was merely a cheap performance. He believed I had blinded myself to extort sympathy from the Tan family, using my ruined eyes to drive a wedge between him and An Khuynh.

But what he didn’t know was that I had secretly undergone surgery. Light began to carve a thin line through the heavy veil of night before my eyes. And that was when I realized it was time to vanish from his world forever.

The children had grown; they now understood the weight of longing for a father’s love. Tan Dich hesitated for a long time. Finally, under the tearful pleas of the twins, Ninh Ninh and Du Du, he reluctantly agreed to celebrate their birthday.

That evening, I prepared a feast: roasted chicken, salads, pasta, and the cake the children had picked out themselves. The candles were lit, the cream lettering had begun to melt, and the food grew cold, but Tan Dich never appeared. The two little ones clung to the cake, their eyes red, whispering, “Mom, Dad will come, won’t he?”

I took the guiding cane I had used for years and trembled as I walked toward the private club where he usually spent his nights. Although my sight had partially returned, the habit of groping through the dark remained. I stumbled repeatedly, my knees and calves covered in fresh bruises. When I finally stood before the thick door of his private suite, the laughter from within pierced my heart.

“Tan, An Khuynh is back. What do you plan to do with that blind girl and the twins?” a friend asked. “Divorce,” Tan Dich replied, his voice as calm and indifferent as a breeze over a still lake.

They mocked me, calling me a calculating interloper. They spoke of our wedding as the city’s greatest joke—how the groom vanished, leaving a blind bride to complete the ceremony alone. Tan Dich raised his glass, adding coldly, “Talking about a blind person is truly a mood killer.”

I remembered the first time I met him—when I was the pampered heiress of the Tham family. He had stood before my painting of a golden rice field and told me I was as beautiful as a work of art. As it turned out, my six years of unrequited devotion had bought me nothing but his contempt.

That night, when Tan Dich returned home drunk and mistook me for An Khuynh, he took me by force. The humiliation reached its peak. I pushed him away, screaming in despair. In the struggle, he shoved me hard, and my head struck the cold stone floor.

The impact shattered the darkness in my eyes. The milky haze receded, and the outlines of the room became sharp. I could see again. But the first thing I saw was not love; it was the cold back of my husband as he walked away with a sneer.

The next morning, Tan Dich sent his secretary with birthday gifts as if they were alms. Ninh Ninh threw the boxes out the door: “Yesterday wasn’t my birthday. What’s the point now?” Du Du looked at me with eyes far too mature for his age: “Mom, we can go anywhere, as long as we have you.”

I decided to call Tan Dich one last time to give the children a final chance to see their father. But on the other end, An Khuynh’s sugary voice intervened: “Canh, I just got back and you’re not with me?” Tan Dich hung up immediately.

The last thread had snapped.

I struck a flame. The blue fire licked the edges of that old painting of the rice field, then spread to the curtains and the bedsheets, swallowing the bridal chamber. Our marriage began in a fire meant to save a life; let it end in a fire that turns everything to ash.

I led the two children out in the middle of the night, leaving behind the Tan villa as it was consumed by a towering orange glow. We boarded a bus to my grandmother’s village—a poor but peaceful place.

News reports soon followed: “The wife and twins of CEO Tan Dich are suspected to have perished in a fire while he was with his former lover.” I watched the flickering screen and smiled faintly. The Tham Van of the past was dead.

On the other side of the city, Tan Dich spiraled into madness. When his mother placed a charred wedding ring and two half-burnt birthday gifts on his desk, the silence was deafening. He rushed to the cooling ruins, digging through the debris with his bare hands until they bled, but found only dust. Dreams began to haunt him—dreams of a happy dinner where I smiled at the table. In his sleep, he would cry out, “Van, don’t go…” only to wake up to the chilling void of his reality.

Two years passed.

I lived a quiet life as a kindergarten teacher in the village. Ninh Ninh and Du Du grew up surrounded by nature, free from the suffocating tension of the Tan household.

One afternoon, returning with the children after catching shrimp in the stream, my clothes stained with mud, I froze at the garden gate. Under the shade of a tree stood a man. He was gaunt, with a disheveled beard—a far cry from the polished CEO on television. A thick pile of cigarette butts lay at his feet.

Tan Dich looked up, his sharp eyes scanning my weary appearance, a mocking, broken smile tugging at his lips as he spoke in a voice raspy with regret and bitterness:

“Mrs. Tan… your life is indeed quite resilient.”

I looked at him, feeling no hatred and no fear. I simply squeezed my children’s hands and looked at him as if he were a stranger passing by.

Our story had truly turned to ash in that fire two years ago. What remained here were simply lives that were never meant to be intertwined.