Nightmare (PLL fanfiction)

Aria's mind.

!The next part of the story will be Aria's P.O.V!

Sometimes, I was afraid to change; make a change, when I remembered that we were constantly changing things because we found them ugly, and things were ugly because they were ordinary. And that beauty was more common and thus more ordinary, I was afraid that what I changed would become ugly. Sometimes, I thought that beauty and ugly were just like the two sides of a coin; no side really was ugly or beautiful. It was just a matter of 'which side are we used to' and 'which side do we want to see now' and after time, we would want to flip again. Make a change. But I did make a change, I let go of the others' hands. We drifted apart like waves, and from that moment on; it was just me. Nobody else was there to lend me a hand whenever I needed them. That's what I liked to tell myself. So I went to a place where nobody could reach me, in the back of my mind. Wandering off a pathway where the leaves would color dark red when I walked past them, I would see my favorite tree; a big, old willow with leaves in the colors of all seasons. I climbed it and I hid there, dreaming of what it would be like to be free. I'd fly on the back of an eagle, climb mountains on the back of a polar bear. Swim miles while clinging on to a dolphin. Jump into a volcano and feel the hot lave cooling down my soul. I would wander off in my dreams to a forest as bright as snow. I found blood heavier than tears, so it carried my sorrows and sins on the back of an eagle. But then I found ink heavier than blood so my eagle carried them both as I wrote it all down.

Alison called me Monday-morning. She told me I was her favorite. I nodded even though she couldn't see me. She had asked me who my favorite was. It wasn't a question though, she just wanted me to say I was her favorite so I felt like I owed her the world. But it was the other way around now, she owed me the world. I killed someone for her, and she wasn't even grateful. She was just nerve-wrecking, so I told her I didn't have any favorites, just people that I generally hate. I felt like crying all the time, all morning, all afternoon, all day. I gazed into mirrors and shop windows when I walked past them, and I never seemed to be able to recognize myself, I knew who I was, don't get confused here. And I knew it was me for sure. But it felt like I was a stranger to my own mirror reflection. I tried everything to fix it, but it just was broken forever. I got angry so I smashed my mirror with a book. It scattered into a thousand pieces and I felt like my body was doing the same thing. I closed my eyes and the memories came back, the way I threw a knife at someone, the way I buried someone's body. Someone who maybe didn't deserve it. I get that someone would've wanted to kill Ali, I had my days too. And he was under influence of some drugs. I found myself crying on my bedroom floor. My mascara running down my face, my hands trying to cover the mess that was me. I just wished I could go back to the moment it started, turn around, and walk the other way. I wished I could go back to the moment I had met Alison and turn around and walk the other way. I picked myself up from the ground, the way I always do. I got my ass to my desk and started writing in my diary. The one place my thoughts were safe from the rosewood community, or Alison for that matter. I knew I had to drag my ass to school that day too, and I did.