Chapter 5: Uncle’s First Love

After the wedding reception, I launched a full-scale investigation into my uncle’s romantic history. Asking him directly was a guaranteed dead end, so I shifted my target to Auntie Wang next door. As the undisputed commander-in-chief of neighborhood intelligence, Auntie Wang knew everything.

The second I opened my mouth, she opened the floodgates. Every painful detail of Uncle’s past poured right out.

As it turned out, his leg wasn’t ruined in some random accident—he got hurt saving his very first girlfriend. One day, a knife-wielding lunatic had gone berserk on the street, slashing at anyone in sight. But the attacker had a sick kind of “rule”: women were his primary targets. Naturally, Uncle’s girlfriend became his first mark.

Bystanders scattered in every direction, not a single soul daring to turn back. Uncle was the only one who charged forward. He saved her life, but took three stab wounds to the leg, severing a key nerve. He’d walked with a limp ever since.

And the girlfriend? She dumped him not long after, turning around to marry a healthy, fully abled man.

Auntie Wang was practically fuming on his behalf as she told the story, while I sat there, frozen like a statue.

When I turned around, I saw Uncle standing in the doorway of the dumpling shop.

“Bui Chi. Dinner’s ready.”

Auntie Wang looked at him as if he were a knight in shining armor. “Thanh Thuong! Come comfort your girl! She’s about to cry herself out of breath!”

On the walk back, Uncle wiped away my tears, letting out a long sigh as we walked. “What are you crying for? I told you kids shouldn’t go poking around in adult business.”

Sobbing, I wrapped my arms tightly around his waist. “Uncle… why don’t you just be my dad forever? I’ll take care of you when you’re old. I’ll find the best doctors in the world for you!”

He paused for a second, then let out a soft laugh. “Well, look at that—progress. At least you’re not trying to call me ‘Mom’ anymore.”

Over dinner, he finished telling me the rest of the story.

After his first girlfriend got married, her life turned out to be anything but happy. She gave birth to three daughters and was despised by her in-laws for not producing a son. Trapped in a endless nightmare of endless chores, she was routinely beaten and verbally abused by her husband. Uncle had caught a glimpse of her from afar once. The girl he had once protected with his life was now being drained dry by a miserable marriage.

“Uncle,” I asked, curiosity getting the better of me, “does she regret it?”

He tapped my forehead lightly. “Stop letting your mind wander.”

Then, his voice turned firm. “Other people’s lives aren’t a drama for us to speculate on. And I’m not a recycling bin for broken hearts.”

I shut my mouth instantly.

Uncle added, his tone softening just a fraction: “Just think of it like… I had a wife once. But she loved someone else.”

Hearing that, I quietly scrubbed all my secret plans to set him up on blind dates right out of my head. Fine then. My uncle… seemed to have truly put the past behind him.

I patted his shoulder. “So what happens if the aunts and uncles start talking trash again?”

Uncle pouted, raising his voice to call my name: “Bui Chi! Did everything I just say go completely in one ear and out the other?”

I blinked, confused. “Huh?”

“Why do you care so much about what other people think? The only thing that matters is living your own little life well! A few careless words never killed anyone. We’re here to live comfortably—why suffer over other people’s loose tongues?”

He lightly pinched the back of my neck, a half-smile playing on his lips. “Bui Little Chi, you need to realize one thing: the life I have right now is something most people can only dream of.”

I knitted my brows. “Why?”

He let go of my neck, letting out an exaggerated sigh as if my lack of intellect was exhausting him. “Because I’m handsome, young, own a profitable diner, cook amazing food, and have a good, obedient daughter. Zero drama, zero family infighting. It’s absolute perfection.”

Me: “…”

Ah. Now I finally understood where my narcissism came from. Turns out it was a lethal combination of genetics and environment.

…

On the day I registered for high school boarding, Uncle announced that he was taking me to the city center to buy new clothes. The school only mandated uniforms on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays; the rest of the time, we could wear whatever we wanted, provided it wasn’t anti-social.

Starting high school meant spending way less time at home—sometimes I’d only get two days off a month. The words Ms. Lee had said back when I graduated elementary school echoed in my mind again: *“You have to learn to step out of your comfort zone.”* Hearing that, I felt like I was doing just fine. Probably.

Uncle held my hand as we stepped into the biggest shopping mall in the city. I asked timidly, “Uncle… do we have enough money for this?”

*(I mean, we’re just buying clothes. If we went to the night market, we could fill an entire suitcase for a fraction of the price.)*

He shot me a look. “Are you planning to buy the whole mall?”

“No,” I mumbled.

But after that shopping spree, I realized something: my uncle’s battle readiness was terrifying. I was going to high school, not entering a war zone, yet he bought supplies like we were prepping for an emergency evacuation. Roasted chestnuts, cartons of milk, bags of fruit, cookies, chocolates…

He patted my head approvingly. “Good girl. Ms. Lee said high school drains the absolute soul out of you, so you need to keep your strength up. Otherwise, by graduation, you’re going to look like an alien.”

Me: “…”

When school started, I was placed in a standard track class. Every time I passed by the advanced honors classrooms, I couldn’t resist sneaking a glance inside. That was fine. When they reshuffled the classes next semester, I’d fight my way up there. Absolutely.

High school was nothing like middle school. The pressure was suffocating, the competition brutal, and the stream selection hung over our heads. Without a second thought, I chose the STEM track—Physics, Chemistry, and Biology.

I remained a regular in the teachers’ office. But unlike middle school, the “regulars” here were lined up like a buffet line. Every single student had a crystal-clear goal.

Two weeks later, the school granted us a weekend break. Clutching my monthly exam report card, I sprinted home in pure excitement. But when I arrived, the diner was completely empty. A stranger was living in our old rented apartment upstairs.

Panic seized me, and I ran around the block in circles. Only after asking around did I discover that Uncle had transferred the lease on the old diner and moved near my high school to open a brand-new shop.

I let out a massive sigh of relief. Borrowing Auntie Wang’s phone to call him, he sounded completely baffled: “Didn’t you say you only get to come home once a month?”

I squeaked out softly, “I’m sorry… the school’s notification system had a glitch.”

It wasn’t long before Uncle pulled up on his motorcycle to fetch me. The second he saw me, he immediately bought me a cup of boba milk tea to soothe my frayed nerves. “This one’s on me. Next week, we’re canceling your boarding status. From now on, you’re coming home every single day to eat my cooking.”

On the way back, he pulled off a “magic trick,” pulling out a brand-new smartphone and handing it to me. “My little Chi Chi gave me quite a scare today. From now on, if anything comes up, you call me immediately.”

Sitting on the back of his bike, holding the new phone as the familiar scenery melted away behind us, a wave of warmth washed over me. Everything was heading toward a very cozy place.

The new shop was a two-story building. The ground floor was the diner, while the upper floor served as our home. True to form, Uncle still gave me the largest bedroom.

Being in the city, business boomed like never before. With a prime location, mouthwatering dishes, and the word-of-mouth reputation that “Uncle can cook literally anything,” the diner was packed from morning till night. He even expanded into food delivery, hiring an extra cook and a couple of line servers to handle the rush.

Looking at him now… my uncle was finally starting to look like a real boss.