07
Let me tell you the story from the beginning.
For the first twenty-plus years of her life, my daughter, Tô Tinh Tinh, truly was a spoiled, rebellious young lady.
She threw my money around and did whatever she pleased. Her classmates were afraid of her and too intimidated to cross her; whenever they saw her, they quietly kept their distance.
So from childhood on, she truly had no real friends. There was only one exception: Lý Huệ.
Lý Huệ had been Tô Tinh Tinh’s classmate since elementary school. When no one else wanted to sit with Tô Tinh Tinh, Lý Huệ took the seat beside her. They walked home together after school, and Lý Huệ even stayed to help her with her homework.
Once, when Lý Huệ came over to my house, I asked her, “Why do you want to be friends with Tinh Tinh?”
She answered me, “Everyone says Tinh Tinh is awful, but I don’t think she’s that bad.”
“After all, even a bad kid deserves a chance to change.”
Lý Huệ said she wanted to be a good friend and help a bad kid become better. And so the two of them made it through middle school and high school together, but Tô Tinh Tinh still didn’t change.
The one thing that never changed was that Lý Huệ remained her only friend. When Lý Huệ received an exchange scholarship to study abroad, Tô Tinh Tinh pestered me for money so she could follow her friend overseas.
But they went to different schools, and each had her own circle of friends. When final exams came around, Tô Tinh Tinh refused to study, but she knew Lý Huệ needed to, so she didn’t contact her much.
That was what Tô Tinh Tinh regretted most.
Late one night, after I’d worked overtime, I got a call from Tô Tinh Tinh overseas. She was silent for a long time, then burst into sobs.
“Mom,” she sobbed, “Lý Huệ is gone.”
Lý Huệ was the girl James had driven to jump from a building and kill herself.
James had made himself out to be a “rich, handsome guy” to get close to Lý Huệ. But Lý Huệ hadn’t been with him for his money—if she’d really been after money, she could have taken advantage of Tô Tinh Tinh at any point over the past ten-plus years. She never did.
She was simply a good girl who had spent her whole childhood studying and taking exams, with no one to teach her how to deal with the world.
So when James took her out to eat, gave her gifts, drove her in a convertible to the countryside to look at the stars, and then confessed under that starry sky that he wanted to spend his whole life with her…
That naïve girl thought this was true love.
So when James told her he was bankrupt, Lý Huệ maxed out her credit cards and borrowed money from everyone she could.
Tô Tinh Tinh lent her a great deal of money, too. But after a while, she sensed something was wrong and asked Lý Huệ what the money was for.
Lý Huệ wouldn’t say. Since she wouldn’t explain, Tô Tinh Tinh stopped lending her money.
Tô Tinh Tinh wanted to meet and talk, but Lý Huệ wouldn’t answer her calls. Only later did Tô Tinh Tinh learn that Lý Huệ had turned to online loans.
The interest kept climbing, piling up day after day.
She stopped going to school because the creditors were waiting there for her. With no money for rent, she slept in hallways among rats and cockroaches, still wondering whether the man she loved had managed to get out of trouble.
Then one day, so hungry she could hardly bear it, Lý Huệ went to search for food in the trash outside an upscale restaurant. And there she saw James walking out hand in hand with another woman.
She had sacrificed her dignity to borrow that money, just to save the man she loved from the mire. But he had used it to buy designer suits, diamonds, and champagne so he could deceive another woman.
Lý Huệ never told anyone what had happened.
She simply wrote in her diary in silence. Then, on a long, lightless night, she went to the rooftop of an abandoned building and jumped.
08
When Tô Tinh Tinh went to collect Lý Huệ’s belongings, she found a diary Lý Huệ had left behind.
While Lý Huệ was alive, Tô Tinh Tinh was always a rebellious young lady. She always thought she had plenty of time and could do whatever she wanted for a few more years.
When they were little, Lý Huệ once said, “Tô Tinh Tinh will grow up to be a good kid.”
But even when Lý Huệ died, Tô Tinh Tinh still hadn’t truly changed.
After Lý Huệ was gone, Tô Tinh Tinh stopped going out to have fun. She began taking her classes seriously, paying close attention and taking notes, and sitting every major and minor exam. Her grades gradually improved.
At night, in her dreams, she saw Lý Huệ smile at her and say, “Tô Tinh Tinh, I told you—you can become a good kid.”
With her death, Lý Huệ had turned Tô Tinh Tinh into a good person.
Tô Tinh Tinh called me. She wasn’t crying anymore. I listened to the voice of the daughter who used to shirk responsibility and think only of herself.
Her voice now was both resolute and calm.
“Mom, could you help me one last time?”
“We can’t just let this go.”
09
Tô Tinh Tinh had laid out the entire plan, step by step: from luring James back to the country to making sure he was punished in the end.
Public opinion had to be whipped into a frenzy, spreading James’s deeds all over social media and stirring public outrage. Even if he managed to escape punishment in the end, the people he’d swindled would hound him with accusations for the rest of his life.
That was why the time she brought James to the shareholders’ meeting, her visit to the coffee shop to demand money from me, her scuffle with Tiểu Nhã at the restaurant, and finally her tearful kneeling at the company gates had all been “accidentally” recorded and spread online, causing quite a stir.
The final “kidnapping” of Tiểu Nhã was actually bait to make James gather all his accomplices. He needed a large group to back him up, and the police could use the opportunity to arrest the whole gang.
The plan was extremely dangerous. James had a shadowy network, and if he suspected Tô Tinh Tinh, she would be in grave danger.
So Tinh Tinh always carried recording and tracking devices to stay in touch with us. The recording Tiểu Nhã received wasn’t from a planted bug; it had synced automatically from Tinh Tinh’s own device.
To make everything seem plausible, Tô Tinh Tinh had crafted an image for herself—that of a hopelessly lovesick woman, completely infatuated with James and too foolish to be saved.
She succeeded. Partly because Tinh Tinh’s performance was flawless, and partly because James was far too confident.
He had blind faith in his ability to manipulate women. But that very overconfidence became the dagger that turned against him.
As the police escorted him away, James still couldn’t accept the truth. He struggled and asked Tinh Tinh, “Did you never love me?”
Tinh Tinh answered him with an icy stare.
“Get lost, you piece of trash.”
Afterward, I drove Tinh Tinh and Tiểu Nhã to the outskirts. Lý Huệ’s ashes had been brought back to the country and buried here.
Tinh Tinh laid a bouquet of flowers in front of Lý Huệ’s grave. In the photograph on the headstone, Lý Huệ was still smiling gently, just as we remembered her.
On the way back, Tinh Tinh sat with Tiểu Nhã in the back seat. She clasped Tiểu Nhã’s hand and said, “Thanks for this time.”
Tiểu Nhã smiled and squeezed Tinh Tinh’s hand lightly. “What are you thanking me for? We’re sisters.”
I kept driving as sunlight streamed through the car windows, spreading warmth along the road.
10
James and his accomplices eventually went to prison.
For helping the police dismantle the fraud ring, Tô Tinh Tinh was named an Honorary Citizen. What she had done was also made public, and became a legendary story online.
Tiểu Nhã helped me manage the company. She once suggested that her older sister come learn the ropes, but Tô Tinh Tinh refused.
She set off for school again, saying she had to graduate before deciding what to do next.
Getting an education wasn’t something she could do well overnight. Tô Tinh Tinh ran into plenty of difficulties and had to extend her studies by another two years. Finally, in her third year, she overcame them all, completed all her credits, and attended her graduation ceremony.
On graduation day, she posted two photos on social media.
One was a scan of the photograph in a frame at my house. In it, Tô Tinh Tinh, graduating from elementary school, was hugging Lý Huệ and smiling brightly.
The other was a photo Tinh Tinh took on her college graduation day. She was wearing a cap and holding another graduation cap in her hands.
[From elementary school to college. We graduated together.]
[THE END]