Well, the hardest thing was my own sister stabbing me in the back, but at least it was consistent with her personality. Claire turned so fast, I’d swear Sierra had something on her, if Claire had ever actually done anything interesting.

Anyway, talking about it again feels nerve-racking, but I’m sure talking about Molly isn’t one of Sabrina’s favorite pastimes either, so fair is fair. “The boy was sort of the least of it, but we definitely did break up. After I found out he was hooking up with my sister. And my best friend knew about it.”

Sabrina’s hand freezes in the bowl of warm popcorn. “Oh. Shit.”

“Yeah.”

“Dude, your sister sucks.”

“Yuuup. In so many ways, but that was just the final straw. I couldn’t imagine going back to school with all of them after that. So here I am.” I drop onto the couch next to Sabrina and dig my hand into the bowl for a fistful of popcorn.

“So what’s it like between you and your sister now?”

I think of the simultaneously satisfying and empty feeling of finally blocking her email address, partly because I didn’t want to give her a way to get in touch with me and partly because I didn’t want to feel worse if she never even tried. At least this way, I’ll never know. “It’s nothing. Nonexistent.”

She nods slowly, and I can tell she wants to choose her next words carefully. “That must be really hard. I mean, Salem sucks, but I also don’t know that I could be here without him.” She narrows her eyes. “Don’t you dare ever tell him I said that.”

I mime locking up my lips and tossing away the key, even though I have a feeling he feels the same way about her. Meanwhile, I can’t even imagine what Sierra would say if you asked her how she feels about me.

Probably something like “Evie who?”

Sabrina returns to flipping through channels, but turns out Friday-night pickings are exceedingly slim. “Cooking show?”

“Cooking show,” I affirm with a nod, because nothing says comfort TV like watching people make cupcakes flavored like chicken and waffles with maple buttercream.

As we lie back and demolish the popcorn while debating which sounds worse, avocado cream filling or honey barbecue frosting, I feel one of the thousand cracks in my heart seal itself shut.

Chapter Seven