'"RAT me out, your blood's next. A' I mumbled aloud whilst holding Spencer's phone. Whilst the girls had been apart of the school play, they'd found a trophy in the prop box that was awarded to Ian, with dried blood plastered on the bottom.
It was a setup from A because the girls took the trophy to the police station for evidence, when the examiner had tested what the blood was, it was rats blood.
"It was a setup." Spencer huffed, taking her phone back from me and slumping down onto my bed. Aria paced around my bedroom with her hands clasped together at the back of her neck.
"Aria, please stop pacing you're making me feel nauseous." Emily sighed, resting back against the bean bag in the corner of the room. Han was perched at the end of my bed, I stood in the middle of the room as they each informed me what I'd missed.
"We think that Ali made us go to that frat party just to see Ian..." Hanna said, I glanced out the window and stared down at the quiet street.
"I was at that party too, how did I not see you guys?" I asked quietly, I remember the party like it was yesterday, Matt was stuck to my hip all evening because I was introducing him to Jason, this was way back to when I believed Jason and I were the perfect couple and he wasn't actually playing me.
"We didn't even realise Jason was there too." Spencer hummed, I clicked my tongue against the roof of my mouth and hugged my arms around myself.
"He was with me for half of the night, then he told me he had to 'go and see some friends from basketball' and disappeared upstairs, probably to do coke or something." I shrugged.
"I still can't wrap my head around you and Jason..." Aria sighed, leaning her side up against the door and folding her arms.
"Yeah well...I was your age and he was hot so.." I looked away from them to try to change the topic, the other night had been running loops in my mind, I could still feel his fingers slowly moving my hair over my shoulder if I closed my eyes.
"I'm driving Toby over to a motel tomorrow, he doesn't want to be home alone with Jenna so it's just until his parents get back..." Spencer said as she pulled her hair back and tied it into a low-ponytail.
"Did you ever figure out what the braille meant?" I asked her.
"Yeah, Toby told me that I was reading it wrong and it turns out that it's actually 214, whatever the hell that means." Spencer laid back against my heaps of pillows and rested her hands on her stomach.
"214? Does that number mean anything to anyone?" I asked, looking around the room as each of the girls collectively shook their heads.
༄
It was Saturday afternoon, the girls had stayed over last night and left this morning. I knuckled down with some work whilst my parents did some housework around me.
"Quinn when are you next seeing Ledger?" Dad asked, a dusty cloth slung over his shoulder as he'd just cleaned all of the cabinets in the kitchen.
"Monday, I'm heading to his to look after Diem whilst he's at work." I mumbled, keeping my eyes transfixed on my paperwork.
"Oh that sounds nice, you need to invite him over for dinner soon, there's a football game on next Thursday night and I'd love to watch it with him." My dad suggested, lightly patting the top of my head before leaving the room.
"Yeah sure, I'll ask him if he's free when I see him." I smiled softly.
My phone pinged not long after my dad had left the kitchen, I reached over the island and grabbed it.
'S.O.S'
-From Spencer Hastings,
Sent at 7:38pm
I scrambled from my seat soon as my eyes panned over the text, grabbing my jacket from the rack and slinging it on. "Mum! Dad! I'm going over to Spencer's I'll see you soon!" I called out as I stumbled to tug my boots on.
The front door slammed behind me as I made a beeline towards my car parked on the front drive. I slammed hard on the accelerator as I headed down the road towards Spencer's house, pulling up on a side road once I saw Emily, Hanna and Aria waving me over.
They were on the opposite side of the road to Spencer's house, I tightened my jacket around me and looked both ways before crossing the road.
"What the hell is going on?" I asked, standing beside Em and gazing over at the police car parked on Spencer's driveway.
"Did she send anything else?" Aria asked, I hummed a 'no' in response, "It was just the SOS" Hanna mumbled. Two policemen stood outside talking, we could hear their walkie-talkies muffled from where we were stood.
Hanna's phone pinged first, then Emily's, then Aria's, and then mine. I pulled my phone down at the pocket and a pang of fear hit me.
"Breaking news bitches," Aria read out, "Spencer Hastings now a person of interest," Emily went on; "In my death." Hanna finished.
"-A." I mumbled. Glancing up and sharing an equal look of fear and confusion with the other girls.
༄
"Today is going to drag I know it is." I groaned, following behind Emily and Spencer in front as we headed into her house. Each of us planting our bags onto her island countertop.
"I feel like whole parts of my brain have shut down." Spencer rambled on, moving straight over toward the fridge. "I used to love algebra, or at least I understood it, now it's a mess."
I hated algebra, her bringing it up genuinely made me shiver at the thought of it.
"Well, it can get really abstract." Emily retorted, Spencer grabbed us each a yogurt and slid mine over to me, turning on her heel to the cutlery drawer to grab a spoon each for us.
"Yeah but that's what I liked about it y'know? Xs, Ys, Zs, none ever real, I could deal with that." Spencer continued on with her rant as I cracked open my yogurt lid and dunked the spoon into it.
"Just isolate the X-Factor, and now I feel like I'm the x-factor." She sighed heavily.
Mrs Hastings soon came gliding down the stairs, "Honey where were you?" She asked, speeding over to us, that's when I immediately knew something was up.
"We stopped along the way at Quinn's-" Spencer starter but was interrupted by her mother brushing her off. "Don't worry I was expecting this." She said pitifully, "it's mostly about intimidation so I just want you to stay calm."
Spencer urged upright, "Stay calm about what?" She asked. My eyes cast towards the shadows moving up stairs before an officer headed down them holding a box.
"They served a search warrant." Mrs Hastings placed a piece of folded paper onto the countertop.
Spencer scooped it up and begun to scan her eyes over it. "A search warrant? For where? For what?" She asked frantically.
"The house, the barn, your room." Mrs Hastings replied shortly.
Spences eyes bulged out her head and I looked over at Em who looked as equally shocked as I. "My room?!" Spencer gasped.
"No! Spencer!" Mrs Hastings started but Spencer had already bounded towards the stairs, Mrs Hastings, Em and I trailing close behind her. "Honey, don't interfere!"
Multiple men all in suits were scattered around Spencer's room, each looking through her belongings and ransacking through her cupboards and drawers.
"Make them get out." Spence demanded to her Mother.
"I cant, you're a person of interest in a murder investigation, they're doing their job." Mrs Hastings shrugged.
"Well what are they looking for?" Spencer asked frantically, I scoffed at one of the agents as he barged past me and out the room.
"Things that connect you to Alison, and what happened to her..." Mrs Hastings sighed.
I heard a sniff behind me and turned round to only almost jump out of my skin as Ian walked past, glancing into the room with some sort of smug, secretive look on his face that I wanted to punch off so badly.
"Are you going to school?" I asked Em as we sauntered back downstairs, "I think so, it would be weird if we didn't turn up after...this." She mumbled. I nodded and picked up my bag from the counter.
"I'm going to head off now because I got a student coming to me in twenty minutes, I'll see you later okay?" I called as I headed towards the door. "Call me if anything else happens!"
༄
Hanna's head rested in my lap and the muffled sounds of her faint cries were covered up by one of my blankets she was clutching against her.
"Han..." I whispered, running a hand soothingly through her hair.
Caleb had betrayed her. Jenna had offered him a lot of cash to practically spy on Hanna and try to log Hanna's mobile data onto a flash drive for her. He'd done her dirty, right beneath our noses.
"Han, he's not worth it, okay?" She cried a little more before sitting up right and wiping her face.
I shuffled round on my bed and turned to face her, face knitting tight together in pity as I gazed at my Bestfriend.
"Out of all people, it had to be frickin' Jenna Marshall." She huffed.
"Do you think he was telling the truth?" I asked her softly, his response to her confronting him was that he genuinely thought it was just bitchiness between girls, but after Jenna began asking him weird questions and he'd started to develop feelings for Hanna, he backed out.
"I don't know." Hanna shrugged, gazing down at her hands as her fingers fiddled with her bracelets.
"Come on, let's get you a little more ready for school okay?" I suggested, standing up and gently pulling her up with me.
Once I'd done her hair in her classic curled style, brightened up her skin with moisturiser and applied a little bit of lipgloss on her lips. She looked back to her usual, gorgeous self.
I didn't have a tutee until 10am, so I had a chance to stay with the girls before their first period, normally I went to the staff room toilets but I wanted to be there for Hanna right now, so I was stood in the girls bathroom touching up my makeup as Emily and Aria rambled on about Caleb and Jenna.
Speak of the devil and they shall appear; because the bathroom door opened and in waltzed Jenna, my teeth seethed at the sight of her.
Aria tapped my wrist lightly and beckoned us towards the door. "Come on." She whispered. Hanna halted and stared Jenna down, whilst the rest of us moved towards the door.
I watched, just as confused as the other girls as Hanna sauntered over to Jenna, "hello?" Jenna asked timidly.
The sound of Hanna's palm clapping against Jenna's cheek and the clattering of her shades dropping to the floor echoed through the toilets. I clasped a hand over my mouth to stifle my gasp.
Hanna bent down and picked up Jenna's glasses, snatching her wrist and placing them in her hand. "This is Hanna...if you couldn't tell." She said sternly, before swiftly turning on her heel and ushering us out the door.
༄
I'd missed out on going to the founders festival because I was staying at Ledgers; the girls kept me posted on every little thing that happened throughout the evening.
"Diem told me she really enjoyed spending time with you the other night." Ledger mumbled as he gently played with strands of my hair, I was curled up on my side leaning against him, an old western film played on the TV.
"I loved looking after her, I'll happily do it more often for you." I glanced up at him and admired his side profile, lightly placing a kiss on his jaw and smiling to myself afterwards.
"How are things with Spencer now?" He asked, I'd informed him of most of the drama happening around our lives, I still hadn't plucked up the courage to tell him about A.
"Well I mean this town lives for gossip so everyone's feeding off her family like vultures..." I sighed, running my finger tips over his wrist that hung near my chest as his arm was thrown over my shoulder.
"Damn, it must be shitty for her, I wouldn't think this sort of shit would happen to girls like you all." He looked down at me briefly before panning his eyes back to the television.
"It's because we were friends of Alison's, not so much myself, but they were bestfriends with her and they're my bestfriends too, so we're all connected."
Ledger hummed in response and went back to fiddling with the ends of my hair, I relaxed into the comfort of his chest and let all my doubts and worries fade away for just a moment.
The girls had told me Emily found the key Jenna was so bothered about, it was for a storage unit in a holder near the outskirts of the town centre. So they were checking it out tonight and promised to keep me informed.
Aria had been dealing with problems with Ezra, she'd found pictures on his computer of him and some woman called Jackie. Whom apparently he was engaged too aswell; she said she was going to confront him about it and be honest. Whereas Hanna's advice didn't quite win any votes, her advice was: "Make a fake profile, friend Jackie, comb through that skanks page and nail his ass to the wall!"
I would've taken her advice in a heartbeat. It has to be done...
But Hanna is still healing after Caleb ditched town, he lost my trust after I saw that Jenna had the pendant Han thought was for her, but he seemed pretty truthful when he came clean about what it was all about. Still kind of sketchy though.
It's been a week since I helped Jason recover and I hadn't seen him around town, I didn't wanna ask the girls anything because I don't like talking about him to anyone. I thought about messaging him a few times just to check on him, but it's not my place to, so I refrained.