My throat feels thick. It hits the nail on the head, in so few words—I can’t really hate Ethan any more than I could hate myself.

Today 7:27 PM

Yeah. Even if I want to scream at him sometimes

Hey, that’s the whole point of having siblings, isn’t it?

Do you and your sister fight?

Physically. In cage matches.

I snort. She’s still typing.

Today 7:28 PM

No, not really. But I’m mad at her sometimes. You know, sister stuff.

Like—the divorce happened, and everyone else found a way to get used to it. She’s the only one who won’t

Stubbornness must be another Evans virtue

Then breaking the rules of Twitter wars must be a Campbell one

I’ve stopped fidgeting, at least, but I only realize this because I’ve started chewing a hole into my cheek. The truth is, I haven’t even opened Twitter since I saw the picture of Ethan on the Hub’s timeline. I know we’re winning, and I wish we weren’t. It sucks all the fun out of it.

And for a little while, it was fun. Waking up in the morning to see what Pepper had cooked up the night before. Waiting to see the indignant look on her face when she opened up a response, and waiting to see the sly one that replaced it when she came up with something else. At some point, it stopped being a war and started being a game.

Today 7:35 PM

Are we maybe going too far with the Twitter thing now?

TBH, BLB has been going too far since the beginning. Thank god you guys got more followers or we’d really look like assholes

Eh, you don’t need our help to do that

But I mean more with the … phones and the hacking and stuff

Well, that was super shitty. And my mom was not pleased

But you know what’s weird is that Pooja and I are kind of friends now because of it?

Wait, what? Did I stumble into a parallel universe?

I’m part of her study groups now. We’re getting lunch tomorrow afterward

WOW. From frenemies to study buddies

This is going to turn the whole school upside down. Like, full on dancing in the cafeteria, “stick to the status quo” upside down

Yeah, it’s nice.

If you think you got away with making a High School Musical reference without me mercilessly mocking you for it, you’re wrong. I’m saving it for later

Noted. And I guess Paul had fun with the whole espionage thing

Just how pissed is your mom, though?

Eh. She’s mostly annoyed

I may have made a colossal mess stress-baking in the kitchen though, and have been banned from baking in the apartment for the rest of the week

Oh, shit. That sucks

Yeah, for you. No more random baked goods

I start to type and then stop. This could be a mistake. Like, the kind of mistake with a consequence as small as Pepper laughing in my face or as large as my parents tearing me a new one.

But I can’t imagine my parents not liking Pepper. Even Ethan remains somewhat endeared to her, despite disrespecting our Twitter rules.

So I send the text.

Today 7:47 PM

You could always come use our ovens

And step foot in the enemy camp?

It’s not a no.

Today 7:48 PM

We’d only poison you a little bit!

Seriously, though … you think after this we should just call it quits?

On the Twitter thing?

It occurs to me she thinks I might mean something else—namely, the whole friendship thing that seems to have inadvertently bloomed out of the Twitter thing.

Yeah. I think it’s run its course, probably

It takes Pepper a bit longer to respond.

Today 7:55 PM

Agreed

After the Hub thing is over?

It was my idea, but suddenly I’m reluctant to agree. No more tweeting means a whole lot less of Pepper, something I didn’t even know meant anything to me until right now—right now, when I’m every bit as annoyed about the Ethan thing on her behalf as I am on mine. Right now, when I’m actually upset over something as dumb as her getting grounded from baking.

Right now, when I realize I’m going to miss these barbs after it’s all over.

But we still have swim and dive, for another month and a half. And homeroom. It’s not as though we’re moving to other planets.

Yeah. After that we lay down our keyboards

Which means this will all be over by the end of this week.

I put my phone back down on my mattress, assuming that’s the end of our texting for tonight. It’s weird enough I texted her in the first place. Like nudging some kind of boundary, turning us into that kind of friend.

But then her next text pushes it further than I did.

Today 8:02 PM

It’s weird to me that it took four years and a Twitter war for us to be friends

Aw. So you do admit it?

Begrudgingly

But really. I know you have this thing about Ethan, but you shouldn’t. I feel like you’ve kind of been hiding because of it