1
I immediately turned off the radio. The news report hadn’t even finished before it was cut off. The man in the passenger seat seemed terrified, his face deathly pale.
“How can that be a coincidence? The car that was chasing us earlier was red, too!”
His wife and their two children in the back also shrank back, exchanging frightened glances.
“Wait a minute. That was the accident from three years ago.”
I took out a cigarette and offered it to the man beside me.
Hearing that, he finally let out a breath of relief. He accepted the cigarette and asked gratefully, “My friend, what’s your full name? My surname is Mu. Just call me Old Mu. This is my wife, La Anh.”
“My surname is Long. Long Truong Dong.”
I glanced in the rearview mirror and gave La Anh a slight nod.
La Anh was holding her daughter in her arms, with her son beside her. Both of them managed a smile in response.
“We were lucky to have you help us this time, Brother Long.”
Old Mu sighed. “We were only picking up our daughter from school to take her home. Who could’ve known something like this would happen…”
La Anh chimed in, “It still gives me chills when I think about it. When we get home, we’ll have to find a temple and make offerings, just to be safe.”
“Is your daughter in college?”
I glanced at the girl in La Anh’s arms. She wasn’t a child anymore—probably around twenty.
La Anh gently stroked her daughter’s hair, her face full of tenderness. “Yes, she’s in college now.”
“If it’s not a school break, why is she coming home?” I asked curiously.
La Anh suddenly froze for a moment, while the boy beside her started coughing violently.
But it wasn’t an ordinary cough. It was dry, hoarse, and heavy, like the sound of lungs being crushed.
Strangely, Old Mu didn’t turn around to check on his son. Instead, he snapped coldly, “Mu Xu, hold it in. Don’t make those weird sounds!”
The boy seemed frightened and immediately held his breath, not daring to cough again.
I frowned. “There’s no need for that. If the kid’s sick, let him rest. Why make him hold it in?”
Old Mu forced a smile, looking awkward.
2
Suddenly, the roar of an engine sounded in the distance, growing closer by the second.
Old Mu immediately tensed. He looked out the car window, his voice trembling. “It’s that red sports car again! It’s following us!”
Blinding headlights shone from behind as a red shape hurtled straight toward us.
I gripped the steering wheel tightly. On the narrow mountain road, the engine’s roar sounded just like a wild beast slowly closing in on us.
La Anh spread her arms and hugged both children close. Old Mu sat in the front passenger seat, clutching his head and trembling.
I looked in the rearview mirror. The sports car had pulled right up behind us, its roof wide open.
The driver of the red car was gripping the steering wheel, his head almost all the way out through the windshield, his mouth a black cavern as if he were screaming something.
A street racer?
I frowned and held my lane.
This mountain road was one-way, whether going up or down. It was completely unsuitable for racing.
A piercing horn echoed along the deserted mountain road, mingling with wild screams in the icy mountain wind.
The sports car’s driver seemed to have truly gone mad, repeatedly and recklessly trying to squeeze into the narrow gap between my car and the cliff.
I refused to give way, and he went on a frenzied honking spree.
The engine grew louder and louder, as if the Grim Reaper were swinging his scythe right above our heads.
At that moment, Old Mu was curled up in the passenger seat, looking as though he’d been driven mad with fear, muttering nonstop.
There was a turn coming up. I reassured the whole family, “Don’t worry.”
As we entered the turn, I wrenched the steering wheel to the left. The large vehicle swayed violently on the road. The red shape was immediately forced back, and its driver had to slam on the brakes. Sparks seemed to fly from the road, leaving long, patchy skid marks.
Once we’d cleared the bend, the “red beast” tailing us fell silent and made no further sound.
3
It took the whole family a long time to calm down.
Old Mu took the cigarette I offered him, took two deep drags, then turned to me. “Thanks a lot, Brother Long.”
“Why does it keep following us?”
The girl huddled against La Anh and clutched her own arm, her voice trembling. “We didn’t do anything to it.”
La Anh gently soothed her daughter. Her gaze slid from the rearview mirror to my face, and her voice grew quieter. “Could it be… trying to find someone to take its place?”
“Didn’t we just hear it on the radio? There was an accident on this stretch of road. The driver of that red car died at the scene.”
La Anh looked at me again. “Brother Long, do you know what happened after that? In that accident… how many people died?”
“Mom…”
Before I could answer, the girl clung fearfully to La Anh’s waist.
Old Mu turned and glared at La Anh. “Don’t talk nonsense! What does it matter how many people died? It’s the middle of the night. Don’t scare the kids!”
I glanced in the rearview mirror and saw La Anh slowly lower her head, while the girl’s eyes were red with fear.
As for the boy, Mu Xu, he was leaning his head against the car window. With every sway of the vehicle, his forehead kept knocking against the glass, as if he couldn’t feel any pain.
“I don’t remember exactly how many people died,” I replied to La Anh.
“But I think there was a girl riding with the driver in the red car. After the accident, she fell into a coma and never regained consciousness.”
4
Silence fell inside the car.
The mountain road was pitch-black. Now ours was the only car on it.
Beside the downhill road was a sheer drop. Here and there, cypress trees leaned out from the cliff, their tangled branches reaching over the road.
In the darkness, the tree shadows fell across the road like lurking claws, making my skin crawl.
“Miss, what’s your name?”
I broke the silence and glanced at the girl huddled in La Anh’s arms.
She seemed surprised that I’d asked her. She sat up, about to answer, then frowned and went blank.
“Your little brother’s name is Mu Xu. What about yours? What’s your name, miss?” I asked again.
The girl slowly parted her lips as if to answer, but La Anh pulled her into a tight embrace.
“Her name is Mu Giai. ‘Giai’ as in ‘giai yen my vi’—a feast of delicacies. Her grandfather chose it for her,” La Anh said with a smile.
The girl stared blankly, then nodded slightly. But instead of snuggling back into her mother’s arms, she sat by herself, leaning against the window.
5
It was now past midnight, and the moon had gone down.
The remote mountain road was deserted, with almost nothing but our headlights to light the way ahead.
Suddenly…
“There’s someone!” the girl screamed.
La AnhOld Mu immediately looked out the window, but there was no one in sight.
La Anh stroked her daughter’s head. “It’s the middle of the night. Why would anyone be out there? You must’ve seen wrong.”
“No!” the girl insisted.
“I saw her very clearly. She was a girl in a floral dress, standing by the road and watching us!”
6
“Don’t tell me it was the girl from that red sports car?”
Mu Xu blurted out, and Old Mu’s face turned deathly pale.
“Stop talking nonsense!”
Old Mu shouted at his two children, then turned to me with an embarrassed look. “Sorry you had to see that, Brother Long.”
“It’s all right. Seeing something like that in the middle of the night is enough to make anyone’s imagination run wild,” I replied.
“Brother Long, what are you hauling on a run this late at night? Your truck seems to be handling the road easily enough,” Old Mu asked, changing the subject.
“I’m not hauling anything. I’m heading into the mountains to look for someone.”
“Looking for someone?”
Old Mu looked a little surprised. “Then why drive such a big truck? Isn’t that inconvenient?”
“It is inconvenient, but it’s safer.”
I smiled. “I’ve been driving trucks for more than ten years. I’m more used to these than cars.”
“I can tell you’re a real pro behind the wheel, Brother Long.”
La Anh shot Old Mu a glare. “You’re much better than him!”
Old Mu said nothing. La Anh turned to me and asked, “Do you have relatives in the mountains, Brother Long?”
“I’m not looking for relatives. A client asked me to find a friend of hers.”
7
As we were talking, a white figure suddenly appeared in the middle of the road.
The headlights swept over it, and everyone in the car saw clearly: it really was a girl in a long white dress, with tiny red flowers embroidered on both sleeves.
I hit the brakes, but it was too late. The truck barreled straight toward her.
Luckily, she was only an apparition, like an image flashing across a TV screen: it appeared out of nowhere, then vanished.
“Was that her? Was it really her?”
Mu Xu cried out in alarm. “Has she come back?”
“Shut up!” Old Mu shouted again.
La Anh held her daughter tightly. The girl, however, was perfectly calm, only looking confused. “Mom, I think I just heard someone calling me.”
La Anh instinctively covered her daughter’s ears. “Don’t listen. It can’t be anything good.”
“Don’t get so worked up. It might just be an image naturally recorded by the environment here.” I tried to reassure everyone.
Old Mu nodded quickly. “Right, right. Brother Long’s been driving for years. He must know more than we do.”