The rain came at stop twenty-one, just as Mrs. Lan had predicted. The windshield wipers moved to a rhythm he had forgotten—a stutter, a squeak, a stutter. In the rearview mirror, his father appeared in the last row, wheelchair and all, though in 2014 his father could still walk. The old man waved. Minh wanted to stop, to run to him, but the route demanded precision. He was a bus driver. He could not abandon his passengers.

It was 3:00 AM in Ho Chi Minh City when Minh’s phone buzzed with a notification from a forum he’d long forgotten. The title read: “Bus Simulator Vietnam – Free Download – Version 5.1.7 – No Ads – Unlocked All Maps.”

No splash screen. No permissions request. Just a black void and then—the smell of jasmine incense. Minh blinked. His convenience store vanished. He was sitting in a worn vinyl driver’s seat, hands gripping a steering wheel wrapped in frayed bamboo tape. Outside the windshield: the Da Nang train station, 2014. The sky was exactly as he remembered it—hazy gold, motorbikes swarming like metallic fish, and the distant clang of a railroad crossing.

She tilted her head. “Vì cái gì?” (For what?)

The bus fell through the code. He felt his phone heat up until it burned his palm. Then a click. A reboot. His convenience store returned—fluorescent lights, expired sandwiches, the hum of a refrigerator.