Pedro exhales. “I wasn’t going to say anything, but speaking of scenes, care to explain why you crashed into me the other night?” he says, leaning in to be heard above all the cheering behind us. Just the sound of his voice makes my skin crawl.

“You mean when I accidentally ran into you?” I give him a pointed look.

“Was it really an accident?” He squints at me.

I hate that I can smell the scent of guava frosting from his family’s bakery on his clothes because we’re standing so close, sandwiched together between our classmates at the whiteboard.

“Leave me alone.” I give him a little shove with my shoulder to get more space between us, but I end up knocking the marker out of his hand.

Our classmates begin accusing me of cheating.

“I swear I’m not—” I begin to say, but Pimentel shakes her head at me.

“No fighting,” she warns.

My cheeks warm up with embarrassment. Great. Now even Pimentel is siding with Pedro.

Pedro grabs another marker, giving me a death glare from behind his bangs.

“Was that an accident, too?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“Then why didn’t I hear an apology?”

He doesn’t deserve one. But I know he’ll just use this against me if I refuse.

“Sorry,” I say in a low voice, the words coming out like pulling teeth. “For the cake, too.”

Pedro scoffs. “No, you aren’t.”

The blood in my veins feels like liquid fire.

“I know how to take responsibility. Unlike you, who refuses to admit to sabotaging my family. I know your family started those lies about rats in Salt’s kitchen so you could steal the wedding gig from us!”

Pedro looks like he’s about to retort, but our classmates get even rowdier behind us. Now they’re rooting for Diego, who seems to finally be on the right track answering the equation. He’s so happy he does a dramatic lap around the classroom to hype himself up.

“So that’s why you crashed into me,” he says, not a question. “I knew you could get petty, but I never thought you—Never mind.” He scoffs. “We didn’t steal the client. She contacted us. She was always going to need a second caterer for the cakes and pastries. We were just doing our job.”

“But I saw your bakers loading empadinhas into the back of the van. Don’t deny it.”

“You know what? Salt has no patent on empadinhas. Any bakery can—”

Diego is now doing celebratory cartwheels and he crashes into the first line of desks. There’s a big commotion behind us to rescue him.

“Salt and Sugar have always had a deal, and you know it,” I say. “It’s such a Molina thing to backstab people when they’re the most vulnerable. Like Grandma always said, trust neither thin-bottomed frying pans nor Molinas...”