The Old Quarter Apartment – Part 1: Month Away

The apartment was above a noodle shop, up a stair so steep it counted as climbing.

"We are going to be so happy," said Mai, standing in the tiny kitchen, "or we are going to murder each other."

"It's a good test," said Chris, wedging their suitcase between the bed and the wall.

They were forty-one and forty-four, married nineteen years, with two teenagers at home, demanding jobs, and no spare minute. A year ago, in a hospital waiting room, a medical scare for Mai had turned out to be nothing. It had also turned out to be everything. They'd decided life was too short.

So: a month. Hanoi. Her mother's city, which she barely knew.

The mornings began at five, with the shop below clattering to life and the whole Old Quarter honking. They ate steaming bowls of pho on tiny plastic stools, elbows touching, while motorbikes streamed by. In the afternoons they rode rented bicycles through the lakeside streets. In the evenings they drank iced coffee on the balcony and watched the lights come on.

"You're different here," said Chris, one night.

"How?"

"You laugh more."

"So do you."

"I know," he said, surprised. "I think I forgot how."

She leaned on the balcony rail beside him. Below, a woman sold lotus tea from a basket. The warm air smelled of grilled meat and jasmine.

"Can I ask you something?" said Mai.

"Yes."

"Are you happy?"

"Right now? Very."

"Not just because it's a holiday?"

"No." He turned to her. "Because it's you. I'd forgotten that you were someone I wanted to be around."

Her throat ached. "Green?" she said, the old word.

"Green," said Chris, quietly. "Very green."

Continue the story: Part 2 – Rain on the Balcony.