For all of two years, things were well again.
The first summer without their mother passed by in a blur. Vicente spent nearly every morning in the kitchen, trying out recipe after recipe. Some of his attempts went successfully, some not so much — his first time making coconut buns had ended in both Leon and Ling getting food poisoning and a refusal to touch his cooking for the rest of July. But everything was fine apart from that.
He and Yao took turns cooking, and though it was still tiring, it was nothing near the amount of stress they'd had cooking before. Sometimes, when their father couldn't make it home in time for dinner, Vicente would turn to their mother's recipes and the four of them would have dessert for dinner.
Middle school started for him, and it wasn't all that bad, or at least not as bad as Yao had made it out to be. He still couldn't pluck up the courage to talk to his classmates, but his English began to improve, and though French was still a particularly annoying challenge for him, he was getting better at it.
With Yao in high school and occupied even more than before with schoolwork and revision, Vicente took on the role of helping Leon with his homework. This usually meant him shouting out tips as Leon glared at his math homework and he tried to saute vegetables, steam eggs and keep the rice from overcooking at the same time.
And Ling grew, sometimes bringing friends home and chattering away in one small cluster in the living room while her brothers worked. Sometimes she'd never talk with them unless absolutely necessary, instead too consumed with messaging her friends on the family computer their father had brought one day. Sometimes Vicente passed her while she was using the computer, and caught glimpses of the drawings she made, miles better than the ones in her sketchbook.
In his second-to-last year of middle school, on the first day of school, Vicente received his first cell phone. It was a small touchscreen phone, unlike the one Yao had. He didn't have anyone to call or send messages to, but he managed to download some games on it and had something else to kill time with apart from reading and cooking.
Things were different, but it wasn't enough to shake him, not yet. His siblings were a constant in his life, something he was sure would never, ever change. That was until 2017, when, two years after their parents had divorced, their father remarried.
At first, the siblings were all ecstatic — there'd be someone to cook for them again, someone who could help with their homework and bring them out to the park and care about them. But the moment their stepmother walked through the door, it was made clear that their dreams of a complete family couldn't ever come true.
Their father told them that she'd moved from Kyoto three years ago, and, like him, had divorced two years ago. Along with their stepmother, their father also welcomed their stepmother's son to their family.
Their new stepbrother Kiku, who was fourteen and two years older than Vicente, was aloof and quiet from the start. He was given his own room, one that the siblings were always told was off-limits for them to enter before he moved in, and barely ever talked. When he did talk, it was to his mother, in quiet, rushed Japanese that none of them understood.
It was clear what their stepmother thought of them, with the way she eyed them in distaste every time she passed them, though she was careful never to voice her disdain out loud. Vicente once saw her pass by Ling while his little sister was drawing something on the computer, only for her expression to turn sour. She muttered something under her breath as she walked away, and though he had absolutely no idea what she said, he was sure it couldn't have been something nice.
Once, before his test the next day, Leon asked their stepmother to help him figure out some questions that he didn't get. What was meant to be a harmless study session ended up quite the painful ordeal, with remarks dripping with condescension and insults slung left and right and quiet insults that rose to shouts until Vicente, who was studying next to him, began to flinch at words that weren't targeted at him. Even after their stepmother left, leaving Leon to continue struggling with his work. It took Vicente fifteen minutes to stop his hands from shaking.
Not even Yao was free from their stepmother. The day the results for his midterm exams were released, their stepmother decided to talk to him in his room, apparently wanting to discuss his grades and, subsequently, his choice of university. Vicente couldn't catch the rest of their conversation, but he could tell from how Yao left his room a few minutes after their stepmother did, eyes rimmed red and fists clenched, that it probably hadn't gone so well.
Their father turned a blind eye to everything their stepmother did. Vicente never had his unfortunate run-in with her, and instead she'd simply ignore him completely. She probably didn't even know his name. Somehow, even though he was free of the horrible comments and degradation that his siblings were forced to endure, part of him wanted to be yelled at, or be subjected to the harsh words of their stepmother. As much as he was used to getting ignored, that might hurt less.
Kiku stayed silent through it all. Sometimes, during dinner, their stepmother would loudly compare him and Yao, shooting their oldest brother venomous glances after every other sentence. While Yao would protest the behaviour, insisting that he was every inch the dutiful, well-performing son as their stepbrother, Kiku never spoke up. And once, after another explosive argument that ended in slammed doors and crumpled paper, Leon had curled up on the sofa, clutching the torn, ragged remains of some of his best stories and cried, so hard that his tears surely destroyed what was left of the paper. Vicente, who was helping Ling with her homework, had done his best to console him, but Kiku, who was sitting right next to Leon, had merely turned the other way.
One evening, Vicente heard Leon complain about how horrible Kiku was for never stepping in to defend them against their stepmother. "We're all like Cinderella in this house," he lamented, "and Kiku is that repulsive stepsibling who lets us be treated this way. He's just as bad as his mother!"
He hadn't said anything. Before their father had divorced, Vicente had been no different — acting as the quiet, unacting bystander whenever his siblings were lectured, using the neglect he was familiar with to his advantage. Kiku was doing the same thing as he had all those years, so wasn't he just as bad?
Leon opened his mouth to badger him for his answer, but then their stepmother shouted from the kitchen, announcing that it was time for dinner.
Yao was setting the table with one hand and holding a notebook with the other, muttering chemical equations under his breath as he set placemats and chopsticks down. On the other side of the dining table, Ling and their stepmother were sitting together. Ling's face was red, and she looked just about ready to burst into flames as she demanded, "why can't my friends come over?"
Their stepmother's gaze was emotionless. "You will disturb your brothers from their studying. I know how much noise you girls will make, and the ruckus is not something I will tolerate in this house."
"But — "
"I said no." Her expression hardened. "You spend enough time with your friends at school. Why do you need to see them more than that?"
Ling looked like she wanted to protest further, but she scowled and got up, marching to Leon's side. "Stepmother is such a jerk," she muttered, "Father would've said yes, I should've asked him."
"Father never says yes to us these days," Yao said. "He doesn't know anything we're doing, either." Vicente realised he'd switched to Mandarin, most likely to prevent their stepmother from hearing.
"Maybe he's forgotten that he has other children." Leon took his seat at the kitchen table. "I bet he thinks Kiku is his only son."
Vicente sat down next to Leon. He listened to his siblings rant as dinner was brought out, as bowls of rice were passed around, as their father came out of his office and smiled at their stepmother.
Halfway through dinner, as he was picking bones out of a chunk of grilled mackerel, their father asked, "so what have you children been up to?"
He hadn't forgotten about them after all. Before anyone could answer, Vicente set down his chopsticks and answered, "I got the highest score in the class for a science test."
Their father raised his eyebrows, impressed. "Really? That's great, Ka Long."
What little pride he'd had for his achievement dissolved. "Father, I'm Ka Lun." Vicente nudged Leon. "He's Ka Long."
"Oh, I'm sorry." Their father turned to Leon next. "Then how about you, Ka Long? Have you done anything similar?"
"My English teacher sent a note home last week." Leon sat up a little straighter. "She said I was doing really well."
Their stepmother added innocently, tossing a baleful glance at Leon, "if only we got nice notes from your math teacher, too. The only one we got was the one talking about how you failed your last quiz."
Leon recoiled like he'd been hit in the stomach. He stared down, struggling to compose himself.
Vicente watched Kiku through the exchange, nonchalantly reaching for a chunk of pickled daikon radish. He looked utterly bored and most likely wasn't listening to the conversation. Then he looked at Leon, who was flushed and blinking hard. He wanted to say something, to reassure his brother that one failing mark wasn't too bad, but nothing came out of his mouth.
When dinner was over, Kiku and Yao went straight to their rooms, Ling helped clear up the table and Leon sat down at the family computer. Vicente passed him and managed to catch a glance at the screen. He was on the notes app, and at the very top of the page he was beginning to type, "The Story".
Vicente turned away before he could see the rest of the title, but that was all he needed to know. It seemed that like Ling, Leon had found his own outlet for his emotions.
He said nothing and left his brother to his writing. He was no author; he couldn't think of any encouragement to spur him on, or any optimism that could raise him up from where their stepmother had put him down.