eccedentesiast | jason dilaurentis

141 | chArlotte's web

"You know, the judge didn't see it that way," Aria said.

"If Sara really was brainwashed, she'd have a pretty strong motive to kill Charlotte. Revenge," Spencer told them, easily falling back to her old habits of jumping to conclusions – even if they did make sense.

Aria picked up her phone and checked the time, "Oh, I hate to break up this but I gotta get going."

"I'll walk you to your car," Hanna offered and after a few goodbye hugs Aria left Rosewood.

•*•*•*•

After spending the morning with her dads and Jaime, Isabella met up with the others at the Hastings barn. Alison had spoken with Lorenzo after the funeral and he'd given her the autopsy report that Isabella now read loudly from, "'The flower was placed in her hand to make it look like a suicide. Her fingernails were wiped clean. So were her hands."

"I'm so sorry, Ali," Hanna said sympathetically.

"Who would do something like this?" Alison asked, understandably still shaken by her sister's murder.

"Sara Harvey," Hanna responded easily.

"Well, the police can't see how she could push someone off a building when she can barely hold a fork," Alison snorted.

"Maybe she's lying about that," Hanna suggested.

"Or maybe she had help," Spencer added.

"Either way, they took her off the suspect list," Alison told them. Then she changed the subject and said, "Aria left town quickly."

"She had to go back to work," Spencer explained.

"Well, she was still angry with Charlotte," Alison pointed out, referring to the hearing.

"She wasn't angry. She was scared," Spencer tried to reason with her. "And she said everything that she needed to say up on that stand."

"I saw her dad this morning. He said that she left town one day earlier than planned," Alison told them, clearly not buying any of their excuses about Aria's departure. The other three had no idea how to respond. Luckily, she decided to change the subject, "I was hoping that you guys would come to dinner tonight. Emily, Caleb, Jaime. Jordan too. I could really use the company. It's been really lonely in that house.

"Sure," Isabella said, knowing her friend needed this. "We would be happy too."

Hanna didn't look thrilled by the thought – probably not looking forward to having Caleb and Jordan, who decided to show up from nowhere, in the same room – but she pushed it down and asked, "What should we bring?"

•*•*•*•

Later the same day, Isabella sat on the couch in the Hastings barn. Spencer was — of course — freaking out about them once again being a suspect in a murder. Isabella couldn't claim to be completely calm yet she tried to sooth her own paranoia by reasoning that she had nothing to do with it.

Caleb handed over a coffee mug to Isabella and then one to Spencer who sat with her computer by the dinner table slash desk. "The police thinks that the murders was premeditated. That's why they're looking at us,"

"Alright, let them look," Caleb told her. "They'll see that all of you put what happened behind you and you've moved on."

"You know it hasn't been that easy," Spencer pointed out, casting a quick glance at Isabella.

"Going to therapy isn't a strike against you," Caleb told both girls. "You had a lot to overcome."

"I think I am still overcoming it," Isabella said. It's been a long time since she had a full on panic attack but her mental health was far from perfect. She'd still wake up some nights and be stuck in the dollhouse, the box Charlotte put her in or sometimes the lighthouse.