It turned out he wouldn't be bringing his mooncakes out to Madeline just yet. With the unexpected arrival of a group of high-school students, Yao was suddenly swamped with orders he couldn't fill on his own, and Vicente had to abandon his baking to help his brother out.

  Together they worked through the many dishes the hungry kids had ordered, then pushed them out to Kiku, who had decided to act as a temporary waitress. Leon ran up to the kitchen to take a plate of char siu, reporting, "those guys are a choir from a high school in the city centre. Apparently, they just won a competition, and one of them suggested they go here." He balanced a plate of shrimp-roe tofu on his other arm. "Since, you know, our stuff is cheap."

  "Oh, nice." Vicente propped up the plate of tofu before it could slip off Leon's arm. "Tell them congratulations for me."

  Leon and Kiku returned to the kitchen a few more times afterwards to pick up dishes that ranged from deep-fried chicken to egg tarts. They only stopped coming back when the sky had turned dark, and the students were finally gone. Vicente went out into the restaurant and saw Madeline helping Ling out at the register, sorting out coins and banknotes at lightning speed. He waited until she was finished to speak up, "hi again."

  "Hello." She pushed the drawer shut. "You look like you had a tough evening."

  "It was challenging. It's not every day forty hungry teenagers show up and order enough food to feed a small village," he joked. "But I'm alive."

  Madeline leaned against the register, glasses slightly crooked. Vicente had to stop himself from reaching out and straightening them. "I'm sorry for making you wait," he apologised. "I mean, I brought you over to celebrate Mid-Autumn's, but you just spent two hours helping Ling out."

  "I don't mind working at the register." She straightened her glasses. "And it was interesting, watching all the customers come and go."

  "Let's go have dinner now." He untied his apron, rolling his shoulders back. "It's getting pretty late."

  They went into the kitchen where Kiku, Leon and Ling were already sitting down, while Yao was rummaging through the fridge. "Dammit, we ran out of leftovers."

  "We what?" Leon asked incredulously.

  "Ran out of leftovers." Yao kicked the refrigerator door in frustration. "Give me a moment to make something."

  Kiku stood up. "You've been cooking all day. Let me do it."

  Yao pushed her back down. "And you've been on your feet all day. You're going to sit down and rest."

  "I can cook," Madeline offered.

  Everyone stared at her. Yao gasped in horror. "My goodness, you're our guest! I won't have you lifting a single finger while you're here."

  "You're all tired out, while I've been doing pretty much nothing," she continued. "I've been over so much, it's only fair I do something to return the favour."

  From the bench, Leon groaned. "Let her do it. I feel like I'm going to die if I don't eat soon."

  "All right," Yao sighed. "Thank you so much, Madeline. You can check the fridge and cupboards for ingredients."

  Vicente followed her to the fridge. "I'll help you."

  Ling snorted. "Of course you will."

  From the fridge, Madeline had already pulled out a bundle of leeks, as well as a bag of chard. She handed the chard to him and took out an onion and two eggs next. From the cupboard, she took flour, canned anchovies and a box of shredded parmesan. "I didn't expect you to have all this."

  He took the onion and leeks from her and set them down on the bench. Once all her ingredients were gathered, Madeline asked, "where do you keep your bowls?"

  She pulled out a saucepan, a frying pan and a mixing bowl. Vicente jumped when she slid him the mixing bowl as well as the bag of flour. "Pour out two hundred and fifty grams of that and mix it with a hundred millilitres of water. Then add a teaspoon of olive oil and some salt."

  Surprised by the sudden order, Vicente weighed out the flour, then ran to measure the water. He mixed everything together until it formed something resembling a dough, occasionally looking at what Madeline was doing. She was bringing the saucepan of water to a boil while separating the chard leaves from the stalks. The leaves only went into the water for a few seconds before she pulled them out and set them aside, chopping up the onion and leeks. Without looking up from her work, she commanded, "roll the dough out and cut it into triangles."

  The chopped onion and leeks were sweating away in a pan as Vicente rolled the dough out thinly. While Madeline put in the anchovies and chard she'd cut up, a rich, savoury smell filled the kitchen.

  Soon enough, she was finished with the filling she made and turned the heat off. She took a spoon and began scooping it onto the squares of dough he'd prepared. This time, she didn't have to say anything before Vicente began to crimp the dough closed, forming small dumpling-like fritters.

  While he finished crimping the last of the fritters, Madeline poured oil into the frying pan. She motioned for him to place them into the hot, bubbling oil. They sizzled at once, turning golden-brown and crispy-looking. The moment she took the cooked fritters out of the pan, he placed a batch of uncooked ones in. They continued doing so for twenty minutes, the two of them perfectly in sync, until all the fritters were fried and arranged on two plates.

  Ling eyed the plate of food ravenously.

  "Dig in," Vicente prompted.

  Leon wasted no time in taking a fritter with his bare hand and biting into it. "They're so good."

  The rest of his siblings did the same, and so did Madeline. He picked up one of them and tried it. The dough was crispy, crackling and making way for the chard-and-anchovy filling. The nuttiness of the parmesan cheese mellowed out the flavours of the other ingredients, keeping the fritter from tasting too strong.

  "These are called barbajuan," Madeline explained. "They were sold everywhere back in Nice, but I never got the chance to make them until now."

  He reached for another. "Leon's right, they're delicious."

  "We pulled it off all right," she agreed. "We make a pretty good team, don't we?"

  "I guess so." Vicente smiled. It was the first time they'd ever cooked together, and he had to say it went well. We'll get to do this again one day.

  The rest of the meal went in silence until the plates of barbajuan were finished. Yao cleared up the plates from the bench, remarking, "they were amazing, Madeline. Thank you for cooking for us."

  "Any time." Madeline had bits of chard sticking to her jacket, her braid was half-undone and her cheeks were bright pink from working in a hot kitchen, but Vicente had never seen her more beautiful. "I'm glad you enjoyed my cooking."

  "I'm still hungry, though." Leon hid a burp. "Do we have dessert?"

  "We can split a mooncake," Vicente suggested.

  "There are six of us here, there's no way we can split just one." He stood up and went to the corner where the mooncakes were waiting on a baking tray, covered by clingfilm. Leon brought back two of them, carefully balancing a knife at the side of the plate.

  They each got a third of the mooncake. After taking hers, Ling piped up, "we should really have these while looking at the moon. It is the Mid-Autumn Festival, after all."

  "Oh, yeah." Yao nibbled on his slice. "We should go upstairs."

  Vicente was already on the way out of the kitchen, glancing back to see that all of his siblings were still at the bench. His oldest brother waved his hand dismissively. "Go upstairs first. We'll join you with seconds."

  Madeline followed him out, holding her plate of mooncake. "So it'll be just the two of us up there."

  "Yeah." For some reason, his hand started shaking, threatening to drop the plate he was holding. "We can get a good view of the sky from our living room window."

  The apartment door swung open to show their silent, empty apartment. Vicente stepped inside, footsteps echoing, and kicked his shoes off. "Here we are," he said. The sentence was pretty useless, but at least it filled the silence. He switched on the lights, illuminating the drab little living room.

  Nothing was said about the fact that there was only a small sofa in the living room right beneath the window. Madeline carried her plate for the sofa and asked, "may I sit down?"

  "Go ahead." He followed her there, sat down and took his first bite of the mooncake. The lotus paste was velvety and sweet, the dough so soft it melted in his mouth. It was a small slice, but its flavour was so remarkable and the treat so filling that any more would've been far too much.

  Next to him, Madeline did the same. Her eyes closed in bliss. She took another bite and said, "they're perfect." She smiled at him, sitting so close that their noses nearly touched. "But I think they'd taste even better with a view."

  "I... uh..." He forgot how to speak for a few seconds. "You're right."

  Madeline turned around and knelt on the sofa so that she could look out the window. "Look, the full moon is out."

  She was right — the full moon was shining, bright and silver among the blue-black of the night sky. Despite having seen the moon hundreds of times before, it looked even more spellbinding this time. Perhaps Madeline had lent some of her beauty to it, just for tonight.

  He found himself looking at her again, at her blue eyes that reflected the moon outside. Madeline looked peaceful, peony-pink lips smiling slightly and fingers drumming the sofa. If he listened hard enough, he could hear her humming a tune.

  "Why are you looking at me?" She asked teasingly. "Surely the sky is nicer to look at."

  She'd noticed. Vicente scrambled for a response, babbling, "not really. I prefer to look at you." He nearly kicked himself — he needed to work on not saying everything that came to mind.

  "Really?" She set her plate down, mooncake finished.

  "Uh..." His brain suddenly decided to shut down and forget every word in the English language. "Uh..."

  "Does that mean you think I'm pretty?" She tilted her head, those stunning eyes flicking back and forth between him and the window.

  "Yes," he said, surprised by his own boldness.

  She laughed. "That's sweet. I have to say, you're rather good-looking yourself."

  Vicente could feel himself turning giddy. "Thank you."

  "For someone who does so well in school, I'm surprised how oblivious you can be." Madeline leaned closer with a smirk. "Did you really think I wouldn't notice you gazing at me whenever we spent time together?"

  His brain was still refusing to function. He felt frozen in place, incapable of thinking anything other than an endless stream of she knows, she knows, oh my goodness she knows, what am I going to do now, I need to say something but what do I say, somebody help —

  "You didn't notice me looking at you, either." She blushed, the pink creeping across her cheeks visible even in the dark.

  "W-What?" That's not what I meant when I said "say something"!

  "Maybe I'm wrong, and I'm overthinking why you look at me all the time. I know why I stare all the time, though, and I'm sure you know too." Madeline took his hand. He could hardly breathe. "I like you."

  How did those three simple words manage to have such an effect on him? Through the sound of his rapid heartbeat, Vicente heard himself say, "I like you too."

  It wasn't exactly how he'd imagined telling Madeline how he felt about her, but that didn't matter. She knew, she felt the same way, and maybe that was all they'd need. He smiled back at her shakily, unsure of what to do next.

  She lifted up his hand, thumb stroking his, and kissed the back of it. If someone had seen them without knowing any context, the kiss could've been easily mistaken as friendly. But the two of them knew.

  Silence hung between them for a while. All Vicente was aware of was the spot on his hand where Madeline had pressed her lips. Those same lips parted to break the silence. "This is nice. Just the moon and the two of us."

  "And I wouldn't have it any other way," he agreed, ending his sentence with a yawn.

  Madeline stared at him, amused. "You're already tired?"

  "Hey, I had a long day. I had school, work and a confession."

  "Your siblings won't be here for a while." She turned back around and sat on the sofa. "You can take a power nap if you want."

  Vicente yawned again as he sank down next to Madeline. "That sounds good." He inched closer, resting his head on her shoulder. "Now, if you don't mind."

  "Goodnight for now, Sleeping Beauty." She took his hand once more, lacing their fingers together.

  The lights were dim, and the sky outside was mostly dark. It wasn't anything like the home he'd left all those years ago, but that meant nothing when he already had somebody who was as bright as the sun next to him. He closed his eyes, dwelling on that thought. Madeline's warmth was comforting, and it lulled him into sleep quickly. Her arms felt like home.

  As the moon watched over them, Trofilos dozed away, and so did Vicente.