De temps en temps

They’ve been lighting up my days lately.

Seeing them happy on stage again at the 10-year reunion makes me smile without realizing it.

I came back to Huế again. I think it’s been a year.

The last time was in 2025. It already felt a bit off back then, but I didn’t think too much about it.

Huế used to be that place for me. Whenever I felt broken or needed to reset, I would just go there. It always gave me something - a bit of light, a bit of hope. I loved the food, the scenery, the whole atmosphere. Even the long monsoon rain, I used to enjoy it.

I’ve loved Huế for almost 30 years. I don’t even remember how many times I’ve been there anymore, for all kinds of reasons.

But this time, it’s not the same.

I don’t really enjoy the food like before. The scenery feels normal. Nothing hits the same. I don’t feel calm there anymore.

It feels strange to even say that.

I don’t know what changed.

Maybe Huế just holds too many memories for me. Too many times I went there when I was heartbroken. It just kept piling up over the years, and maybe now it’s too much.

Or maybe it’s just me. Maybe I’m older now, and I see things differently.

I don’t know.

It feels a bit like losing a place that used to understand me. Like Huế was this quiet space that could hold all the fragile parts of me without asking anything back.

And now it doesn’t anymore.

Maybe it’s time to let it go.

Or at least stop going there for the same reasons.

I don’t know where the next place would be. Huế used to feel like my “safe place” for so long, it’s hard to imagine something else taking that role.

I hate how something can look completely normal and still feel off.

We were talking. It wasn’t cold. It wasn’t distant. Just… fine.

So I asked.

Nothing heavy. Just simple.

The message sat there for a bit. Then the conversation turned. Like the question didn’t quite fit the mood.

I asked again.

“Didn’t ignore.”

But it still felt like I was the only one waiting for that part.

And that’s the thing that makes my chest tight.

Not a no.

Not even a rejection.

Just me leaning a little more than I should.

I keep replaying it in my head like maybe I imagined it. Maybe I pushed. Maybe I read too much.

But deep down I know.

When someone wants to step forward, they do.

And when they don’t, the conversation just… glides away from it.

No drama. No explosion.

It’s mùng 9 already, but Tết still lingers like smoke that won’t clear. The smell of leftover bánh tét, the sound of distant fireworks, the green calendar on the table still showing February with its red marked days. Everything feels like it’s moving on, but I’m stuck somewhere in between.

I sent the box to V today. Not a big dramatic gift, just some small things: lipbalm, a little roll-on aromatherapy he loves, keychains and a firework postcard I wrote by hand “have a fab 2026, see you xoxo”. I sealed it, dropped it at the post office, and walked away feeling stupid. What was the point? To let him know I still remember? To make myself believe I’ve done everything I could? Or just because I couldn’t stand the silence anymore?

Now the box is gone, and so is the last bit of something I was holding onto. I keep thinking about the postcard. “See you xoxo”. Why did I write that? I know there won’t be a “see you”. He’s in relationship, he posted the fireworks story for the world to see, and I’m here staring at a green calendar that says Tết is almost over.

I bought gifts for everyone else too, friends, nieces and nephews, coworkers. Everyone said thank you, smiled, seemed happy. But I felt nothing. Just emptiness. Even when I tried to fill the quiet nights with someone, it didn’t feel good anymore. Just weird. Like my body knew it wasn’t real, and pushed back.

The old book on the table “Tử Vi Nghiệm Lý Toàn Thư” is still open at the introduction. It says fate isn’t fixed. It’s not punishment from a past life. It’s lessons. Challenges to grow. I read that line and almost laughed. Lessons? I’m lying awake every night, eyes burning, mind spinning, and all I learn is how empty everything feels.

Maybe this is the part where I’m supposed to “adjust” like the book says. Stop chasing illusions. Stop buying feelings. Stop hoping for replies that never come.

Tết is ending. The calendar will flip to March soon. I don’t know what 2026 will bring, but I know one thing: I don’t want to keep doing the same things and expecting different results.

So tonight I’ll try to sleep. Not force it, just let it come. If it doesn’t, I’ll sit with the emptiness instead of running from it.

It was raining while I was writing this.

Not loud rain. Just that soft, endless kind. Blue rain.

I had Rainy Blue playing in the background. I didn’t even plan it. It just stayed on, like the feeling I couldn’t turn off.

I bought gifts. Too many, probably. I gave them to friends, colleagues, people I once felt close to. Small things. Nothing fancy. Maybe I was trying to prove to myself that I still cared. Or that I could still feel something warm.

But the warmth never really came back.

There’s still a box on my desk. I haven’t opened it. Tết sweets. A small Valentine thing. I chose it carefully, like I always do, for someone who never asked for it. Now it just sits there, reminding me of how much effort I put into things that never asked for me.

I scroll through their stories. Life keeps moving for them.

Mine feels stuck at that last “seen”.

What I thought was intimacy probably wasn’t real. It was paid for. Timed. Polite. Done with a kind of professional gentleness. And still, my heart holds onto it, like affection is something you can slowly buy your way into.

I know that’s not true.

But knowing doesn’t really help.

The rain keeps falling. Quiet. Indifferent.

Nothing gets washed away.

I sit there with the unopened gifts, the soft disappointment, the ache I don’t know how to name. And for once, I don’t try to escape it.

I don’t book another flight.

I don’t look for someone else.

I just let it be.

Blue. Rainy.

So after all the outrageous things I did just to meet V for the third time, here came the fourth.

This time was worse.

I was in Saigon. I don’t even know why, but I asked again if we could meet one last time. V were in Nha Trang. So I booked the next flight and flew there just to see them in person.

V work full time, so there wasn’t much time for me. We met late in the evening after they got off work, rode around the city by bike at night. Quiet streets, night air, nothing special. Then lunch the next day. Then dinner again. Again riding around, eating street food, talking nonsense that didn’t really matter.

In the afternoon, I even went to the supermarket and bought them a Tết gift set. I don’t know why I did that. I was hopeless.

I spent more than I ever thought I would on something so obviously hopeless - money, time, energy, even my health. And still, I kept going.

The feeling was there. The vibe was there. The chemistry, at least for me, was there.

Just one more day with them made me want another. And another.

I’m way past the age of throwing myself fully into this kind of pointless romance. I know that. And yet here I am. Doing it anyway. It feels pathetic, honestly. Watching myself run headfirst into something I already know won’t go anywhere.

I’m flying back to Melbourne next week.

But right now, I’m sitting on the last flight of the day, heading back to Saigon, already planning another one-day trip to see them again this Friday.

I know how bad that sounds.

I wish I could forget about this the way I ignored people I used to like. I tried meeting others. It didn’t work. Nothing stops me from going back to them.

It’s really bad. Can someone please stop me?

Sometimes I wonder if this is still God’s challenge for me, one last test before I can reach some kind of calm, my so-called final destination. If it is, I don’t understand what I’m supposed to learn anymore.

Maybe it’s because I’ve never really been in mutual love my whole life. So whenever someone shows me even a tiny bit of warmth, a bit of interest, I fall straight into it without thinking.

Or maybe I’m not in love at all. Maybe I’m just craving affection. Something cheap. Something temporary.

I don’t know. All I know is, while everything else stays quiet, this feeling keeps raining on me, slow, constant, impossible to ignore, soaking through everything. No forecast ever warned me it would last this long.

I met V twice.

And somehow, that was enough for a lingering feeling to grow. I don’t really know how.

I’ve always been drawn to people with a stable career path. Nothing fancy. No titles. No need for a high salary. Just someone who feels settled and content with their professional life. That kind of quiet stability matters to me.

After the second meeting, I found them interesting. More than I expected. I caught myself waiting for a third one.

But distance got in the way, and for a while, meeting again didn’t seem possible.

I did something a little extreme. After coming home, I booked the next ticket back there and tried to make another meeting happen. I even prepared a small, personal gift - nothing special, just some oils they once mentioned they needed.

Then I found out they were seeing someone else too.

That’s when something in me shifted.

Not long after, it became clear we weren’t really a match. There was a gap - psychologically, generationally, even in how we deal with mental health. We were simply not standing on the same ground.

It keeps happening like this. Every time I start to feel like someone might be the one, something feels off by the third meeting. I can’t tell if these are signs from God, or if I’m just getting older and more selective. Maybe both.

After we parted, I felt an unexpected sadness. Not because I wanted to continue, but because there was suddenly nothing left between us. No shared topics. No vibe. Just a quiet blank space.

That emptiness always shows up when dating doesn’t work out the way I hope. Even the things I usually adore couldn’t pull me out of it this time.

The other day, during a coffee date with a friend, “Dự báo thời tiết hôm nay mưa” by Grey D came on. It’s been on my Spotify forever, but I only truly heard it then. It felt like the song arrived exactly when it was meant to.

I guess it’s hard to have everything at once.