CTRL A // PRETTY LITTLE LIARS FANFICTION <3

Chapter 3: How to be a Murderer

There is a method to our madness.

Hanna is the one who chooses the victim.

Emily is the one who makes the kill.

Spencer is the one who alters the evidence away from us.

Aria is the one who forms the lies.

And I am the one who designs it all. I design where the knife goes, where the light from the window falls and the sound of our footsteps when they enter and leave the building.

It is just the way it has always gone.

Five kills. Five different towns. Five words in Alison’s diary.

No one suspects us.

“Where to next?” Aria says as we sit in the apartment Spencer had rented for us a couple of months back.

“There are still three more locations in Alison’s diary and we are nowhere close to figuring out who A is,” Hanna says. “I mean the clues we have are useless. I don’t know how much longer we can hide from the police.”

“What are we supposed to do, Hanna?” Emily says, “If we go back to Rosewood, we can’t help ourselves looking through prison bars.”

“Emily’s right,” Spencer says, “We have to keep moving forward. Alison wouldn’t have left us these clues if we couldn’t eventually figure out who A is.”

“Are you sure? Because Alison was hella confusing when she was alive and I think that gets more complicated now that she is dead,” Hanna says, crossing arms and sending daggers at Spencer.

“I thought we weren’t going to mention Alison’s death.”

The voice is so tiny that I barely hear it until Aria finally steps out from hiding in the doorway to come stand in the circle of destruction.

“Well we can’t avoid the fact that she manipulated us, Aria! She was a horrible terrible friend and that doesn’t stop once someone’s dead. God, she was alive when she wrote all those clues. She could be giving us to A rather than giving A to us,” Hanna roars. “Does no one realise that?”

The world is on ice.

Everyone is staring at Hanna with open mouths and I just remain in my chair and slowly shake my head back and forth, back and forth.

“You think that matters?” It’s me who says it. “One key flaw in your argument is that you believe that Alison is smarter than us. Well, look at us. Look what we’ve done these past couple of weeks. Everything we do leads back to either Alison, who is dead so it doesn’t matter, or A, which does matter. We are no longer those girls sitting like ducks around a cafeteria table. We’ve murdered and we have gotten away with it.”

My voice breaks on the last bit.

The murdered bit.

Because it reminds me of everything that I didn’t want to happen. Murder is horrible and I wonder if that makes us horrible people but then again, we are trying to survive. But does it matter?

“Amelia’s right Hanna. We need to stay positive about this. We’ve done and gotten away with so much. We’ve left enough evidence to point away from us while simultaneously linking to Bethany’s murder. They can’t possibly think that a bunch of teenage girls have done this. We’ve made it look like a serial killer who has everything planned out,” Spencer says. Always the reassuring one.

Hanna sighs and moves towards her room in the little apartment that we have rented. I pull my coat around me tighter and move towards the kitchen to turn on the kettle.

Everyone else moves out of the minuscule lounge room and into their respectful shared rooms.

I guess that’s why no one sees my hand tremble violently as I grab onto the kettle handle to steady it.

The murders are too much.

They are too violent and horrible and the worst thing is that the rest of the girls don’t care anymore. Their humanity has been abandoned and they do it like they were born to do it. Sometimes I catch them asking each other if they are fine afterwards. They do it with empty eyes and they never seem to ask me.

I guess it is because they think I’m better than this.

I’ve lived my life in forensics labs, researching murders, watching cop shows and seeing about 100 dead bodies from my interest in the area of crime.

Murder shouldn’t terrify me, apparently.

 I should be used to seeing my friends gut out helpless victims just to save our necks.

But it does worry me.

Because people don’t change that quick. How did they change so quick and why am I still the same old Amelia who is horribly worried about the safety of my friends enough to convince them to leave Rosewood? To ask them to leave the people that they love.

Oh god.

I quickly make myself a cup of tea, chug it and then walk to the bedroom that I share with Spencer.

It’s my turn to finally share a room with my childhood enemy.