Saigon at night is magic. One step in the past, one in the future. The past so heavy with war, imperialism, internal strife. But the future so bright with hope and growth. It’s a young city, and even approaching middle age, it still feels like a dream of new beginnings.

Sang Tao park straddles between the two — old Saigon on one side, new Thu Duc on the other. Young and old, couples and friends, tea or beer and snacks on the lawn. Gossiping, sharing, laughing. This is my favorite in-between moment in the city. Just after the stresses of work, before the rest of sleep. A pocket universe made to observe the craziness of the city, not to partake.

This is where we go, before she splits. Maybe after a day of coldness, or a week of manic praise. This is the in-between we share over a beer, old on one side and new on the other. We are rational, calm, loving. Reflective, planning. I don’t think about the whirlwind to come, and I believe she is calming her own urges — to love bomb, or to scorch the earth. Here, nothing else is allowed to seep in.

It’s in these in-between moments I learn about love, loss, futures, daydreams. What’s real, what’s performative. What we want to see, what we refuse to see. In between the cycles of cold and warm, never ending.

The view of Bitexco’s tower display shows an LED image of the Vietnam flag, so large it reflects off the river. I was once told the flag represents dating in Vietnam — a red flag, with a one-star rating. There are times I agree. This is not one of them.

Love is often measured by profound moments — cycles of emotion landing at confirmation, affirmation, resolution. The moment after the joy, the care, the fear, the confusion, when all of it resolves and you are heard, felt, cared for. Some people, like me, confuse that end feeling for love. I think it’s really relief, masking itself as something more romantic.

But love is easy, once you strip away the past, the insecurities, the digital footprints, the family judgment, the friends’ advice, the miscommunications, the gaslighting, the misunderstandings. Just two people, stripped emotionally naked, holding up a fragile construct on their own. You build safety nets — around yourself, around her — and steer clear of the land mines, so if you do fall, there’s no collateral damage to friends, family, colleagues. Too bad the net is made of wet spaghetti. What a design.

You do all the effort — the patience, the notes, the cooking. And it splits. Not one clean fracture, but in cycles, a bit at a time. The insecurity, the gaslighting, the hot and cold, the grand gestures followed by villainous depictions — you could draw a line down the middle and plot every moment cleanly on one side or the other. You hold onto the good side because it’s so good — the cuddling, the morning coffee, dipping your toes in the ocean together. That’s why the low hurts so much. The undermining, the false accusations, the cold delivery of you don’t matter. The low is like ten feet of concrete pressing down, slowly suffocating you.

Then she pulls you out. With more warmth than you’ve ever felt. A cake for no reason but that you’re her boyfriend. A three-word text that carries the weight of every love note ever written. A surprise happy hour with her and her sister. And we start again.

At first the cycle runs in weeks, and the cold is short. But as we get closer, it shortens to days, then hours, and the cold stretches longer. It stops feeling rational. What you could manage before becomes unpredictable now. It’s entangled in everything — life, work, friendship. There’s nowhere to turn. Tell friends, and you’re starting rumors. Tell colleagues, and you’re hurting her reputation. Tell family, and you’re blocked out. Reach for someone from your past, and the fabricated stories become true.

You’ve moved from concrete to ice — cold on every side. A quick death by suffocation starts to feel kinder than a slow one by hypothermia and loneliness. You could break the ice. But you know the blowback would be nuclear. So you take the slow death instead.

Then, like always, she thaws it. The warmth returns. And we meet again in our spot in the in-between of Saigon.