After a perfect barbeque, Khánh watches Kai leave with a glass container filled with leftovers of bún. On the front stoop, he turns back and promises, “I’ll be back in a few days to power wash and stain your deck. I ended up putting off a lot of work for my job so I could get everything done here, so it might take a bit longer for me to get over here than usual.”

“Oh, but you don’t have to…” Khánh trails off. “Wait a minute, you said you had to put off your work just to fix up my back garden for me?”

Kai winks at them. “No accounting between friends, remember? I wanted to do all this for you.” He starts walking off, box in hand, and gives a very cool backwards wave. “I’ll see you soon, Khanh.”

Which leaves Khánh all kinds of flustered, and they have no idea why. Was it just the backwards wave move? They had watched a lot of anime in their younger years, so maybe it was just their brain reacting instinctively to a classic shoujo love interest move. Or, more likely, the heat of the grill had gotten to them, and they need to drink some water.

They put aside whatever strange feeling had come over them and go inside to do just that.

Two weeks and four days later, Kai comes tromping up the path to the back garden.

Khánh hurriedly opens one of the kitchen windows and calls out, “Kai! Come look! It’s the most wonderful thing!” They gesture to the back garden, then hurriedly throw on some shoes to make their way outside.

Kai is standing in the backyard, gazing at the miraculous garden and source of Khánh’s excitement. “Isn’t it wonderful?” they exclaim. “Thank you so much for doing this for me!”

Kai’s mouth tilts upward. “No thank yous, remember?”

Khánh smiles back. “I’ll just have to make you a filling meal with leftovers every time, then.”

The two spend an endless moment smiling at each other. Kai is the one who breaks it off first, turning to the side with a cough. “So, why don’t you show me what exactly has you all excited?”

“Oh yes!” Khánh takes off to the herb garden that seems to have doubled in height in the two weeks Kai hasn’t been here. “The basil section is getting along quite nicely, though Ms. Sweet Basil here has been quite naughty and keeps trying to put out flowers even though it is not the time for that. Thaisil, on the other hand, is very polite, though she’s still much smaller than Ms. Sweet Basil over here. At least she’s making more leaves, though. And I’m not sure what’s going on with Cinnamonil, but she’s very excited to be on this side of the garden now, as you can see… why are you looking at me like that?”

“Did you… name all your plants?”

“Well, of course! It’s only polite, don’t you think?” Khánh gestures broadly at the plants. “They are guests of my garden!”

“Naturally,” Kai agrees, and his mouth is tilted upwards at the corners. “What were you saying about Thaisil?”

Khánh continues down the rows, pointing out the new growth they’ve been monitoring ever since Kai replanted their garden. The pepper plants have been most robust, closely followed by the tomato and lettuce plants. The beans and cucumbers are just starting to wind their way out of the ground, but Khánh knows they’ll soon outgrow the others in the next few weeks. The eggplant and squash plants haven’t shown the same explosive growth as the others, but they don’t look miserable either, so there’s that.

Besides the vegetable plot is the herb plot, which is filled with all sorts of tasty leaves that are just about ready to eat… hmm.

“Kai.”

“Yes?”

“How do you feel about making your own food today?”

Kai’s smile freezes in place. “Uh, y-yeah, of course! Do… do you want me to go home now, then? I can come back another day…”

What? That wasn’t what they meant at all! Kai can’t leave! Panickedly, Khánh assures, “No, no, not like that! I meant, how do you feel about us making food together. The dish I have in mind is more of a hands-on experience. Please, stay and share a meal with me!”

Kai protests as usual that he doesn’t need food, but there’s no real heart behind his refusal. He’s clearly relieved at not having been sent away, and guilt gnaws at Khánh’s insides. “Let’s go ahead and get started now, hm?”

“Er, what about the power washing and staining?”

“Oh, right.” Khánh had totally forgotten that Kai isn’t here solely to visit them.

Kai grants them a small smile, and it feels like the sun has come out after a long month of overcast skies. “I look forward to making food with you after I finish.”

Which sends Khánh’s heart all kinds of thumping. They sit down until their body calms down, and Kai starts setting up the power washer Khánh didn’t even know they owned.

The deck is pretty extensive, wrapping all the way around the back of the house, so Kai has a lot of work to do. He won’t let Khánh help, of course, insisting that they just keep him company as he systematically blasts dirt and grime off old wood. At one point Khánh goes inside to prep the ingredients they’ll need. They definitely don’t spend a confusing amount of time peeking out the window, watching the mesmerizing sight of Kai’s methodical work.

Eventually, Kai opens the door to the house and swipes the back of his hand across his forehead. “Khanh! I think that’s it.” He pulls at the collar of his shirt, but it evidently brings no relief because he announces, “Now I’m going to go inside, open the freezer, and stand in front of it for about four hours.”

“Would you be up for making spring rolls now?” Khánh asks, trying not let their eagerness seep into their voice. Don’t pressure him, you don’t want to drive him away!

“Yeah, of course” Kai grins crookedly. “How do you think I’ve stayed so motivated this whole time? I’ve been suffering in suspense this whole time trying to think of what culinary monstrosity you’re going to have me create.”

“Oh, it won’t be so bad as all that,” Khánh laughs, waving him off. “Go inside and wash up, then come to the kitchen table.”

While Kai heads into the house, Khánh crosses the yard to harvest the largest leaves of lettuce and several handfuls of Vietnamese mint, perilla, cilantro, and garlic chives. In the kitchen, they wash and dry the leaves. They are just setting the last ingredients on the table when Kai emerges from the bathroom.

“Alright, what have we got then?”

Khánh looks up at him and smiles. “Today we are making gỏi cuốn, or spring rolls, also known as rice paper rolls. They’re one of the most popular Vietnamese foods out there, so naturally, you will be graded on your performance.” They cackle at Kai’s deer-in-the-headlights expression. “Just kidding. Come closer and let me show you what I have.”

They point out the bowls of thin rice noodles, boiled shrimp, thin slices of pork belly, strips of fried tofu, slim slivers of wood ear mushroom, and all the fresh leaves just collected from the garden. Next, they show him the thin sheets of dry rice paper.

“I’ll make the first one for you to see. What would you like inside yours?”

Kai reddens and replies, “Um, what do you recommend? I’m up for anything.”

“Let’s try a classic one first: shrimp and pork. So you begin by wetting the sheet of bánh tráng, that’s the rice paper here, just a quick dip in and out, then lay it on your plate. Next, you want to arrange your lettuce and herbs nicely, because this part will be visible from the outside. Add the shrimp and pork on this side… a few noodles over top of the leaves… then roll it up! And that’s it!” Khánh holds the plate up for Kai’s inspection.

Kai gives some appropriately awed responses, then Khánh concludes, “To eat, dip it in some of the peanut sauce here, then just bite into it.”

“I could probably do that…” Kai trails off. He looks nervous, but determined. “Hand me a plate and one of those sheets. What is it called in Vietnamese again?”

Six minutes later, Kai gazes upon his plate in devastation. The roll isn’t bad, Khánh reflects critically, but Kai is almost certainly comparing his lumpy, uneven roll to Khánh’s practiced, symmetric one. “It’s still edible!” they try to comfort him.

Kai looks up. Ferociously, he picks up his roll and swipes it in the peanut sauce. The structurally compromised roll comes partially undone, spilling its guts into the sauce bowl, but he pays that no mind and aggressively chomps the gỏi cuốn. “It’s delicious!” he declares emphatically. “And I’m going to keep making them until I get a perfect one! Hand me the tofu, I want to try that next.”

Oh dear, Khánh thinks. I see a lot of leftovers in our future.

*

Bonus scene:

Coworker: What’s gotten into you tonight? You seem a bit snippier than usual.

Kai: Ugh, nothing.

Coworker: Thaaaat sounds like something :^)

Kai: Do you ever get frustrated because you can’t do something that someone else makes look so easy?

Coworker: ...we literally tutor kids online for money. That exact experience is what keeps the cash coming in. Of course I know that feeling.

Kai: Oh right…

Coworker: Well come on then, what’s your problem? Was it a physics thing? It was always physics for me.

Kai: What? No, it was rice paper spring rolls. It looks so easy to roll them neatly but then when I try they just fall apart

Kai: Now that I think about it, yes, it is a physics problem!

Coworker: … that’s not what I meant but okay…