Chapter 1

In Rosewood, appearance is everything.

Everything revolves around who has the best job, who has the biggest purse, who has the most expensive car. It's not like there's an official competition or anything. But everyone knows that if you want to get anywhere in this town, you'd better play the game.

That's why everything, including valedictorian of the senior class and manager position of every business, can be bought. That's why girls are willing to spend four hundred dollars for one hair appointment, and some of the boys are, too.

That's why I am doing my makeup at five thirty in the morning.

But I guess I can't complain. I mean, I've known how this town works pretty much since I was in kindergarten and half the class showed up with Louis Vuitton backpacks. I could choose not to participate in the ridiculousness.

And yet, here I am. Five thirty. Doing my makeup.

It's kind of strange, actually, because my parents are possibly some of the only people in Rosewood who don't really care about appearance. Sure, we're relatively rich, like everyone else, and we have expensive clothes and furniture and everything you're supposed to have. But when I was in fourth grade they let me get bright pink braces instead of clear, almost invisible ones, like all the other kids had. And they let my older sister wear glasses and pigtails and be labeled the biggest loser in school for years before she finally wised up on her own the summer before this one.

I probably would have been a loser, too, if I hadn't gotten lucky. Somehow I ended up with twenty-twenty vision (lucky), braces that were only necessary for six months (lucky), and a sense of fashion that is certainly not genetic (lucky). So far in my short high school life, I haven't seemed to stick out.

Anywhere else that might seem pretty depressing. But in Rosewood, that's really all you can ask for.

I stick the cap back on my tube of eyeliner and evaluate my reflection. Out of all days, the first day of school is probably one of the most important. After all, you have to prove to everyone that you didn't either become poor or nerdy over the summer.

I turn my head from side to side, trying to decide if my eye makeup is even but getting distracted by the glint of my earrings in the process.

"Hey." There is a knock on my bedroom door and I spot my sister through the mirror. Her name is Mona. I think my parents should have named me Lisa, but I guess they have more common sense than I do because they named me Viola instead. "What do you think?" She holds out her arms so I can get a look at her outfit.

I swivel around and stare for a moment. "You look fine. I'm pretty sure that's my necklace, but whatever." Apparently older sisters have free reign of their younger sisters' closets. But God forbid I try to exercise the same right.

I turn back to the mirror and plug in my hair straightener. I already straightened it last night, but it got a little messy overnight. Having even slightly imperfect hair is unacceptable at Rosewood High School.

It's probably obvious that I'm a little bitter about all of this.

"So what's sophomore year like?" I ask, grabbing a section of my hair and narrowly avoiding burning my finger. "Is it hard?"

"Oh, it depends. It was for me, but probably not for, like, Spencer Hastings." I roll my eyes. Mona likes to pretend that she is not a genius with an IQ that is higher than mine. It probably has something to do with the fact that "Loser Mona" was smart so now she can't be.

But I'll still take pride in my straight A's, thank you.

"It's been a year, you know," my sister says abruptly, her voice a little lower but still pretty casual.

I spit a bobby pin out of my mouth and let my stick straight hair fall back around my shoulders. "A year since…" I begin to question, but the realization hits me halfway through the sentence so the last word of "when" turns into "Alison."

Alison DiLaurentis. Even just her name sends a chill up my spine, for various reasons. One reason is that she was the queen bee of Rosewood High School before I was even a student there. Heck, she was probably queen bee of Rosewood before she was a student there. With long, blond hair, light blue eyes, and the strange ability to make any article of clothing look amazing on her, Alison had the potential to be a real bitch.

And oh, did she live up to that potential. I knew the myths about Alison DiLaurentis way before I had ever seen her in person: She had three fake IDs. She had an older college boyfriend…in Europe. She could make anyone popular. Anyone.

She could also ruin the life of anyone she chose. And she chose Mona.

For all of middle school and the start of high school, Alison made my sister's life basically a living hell. Starting nasty rumors, creating nicknames, and turning the whole school against her were some of the highlights. She spent the majority of three years crying in her room. My mom used words like "depression" and "professional help" and even, once, "police report," though I'm not too sure what that was all about because I was eavesdropping.

It was horrible. It was also the reason why I made it my personal goal to be perfect. There's nothing to make fun of about girls who are perfect, and there was no way that I was going to be Alison's next target.

The second reason that even the sound of her name gives me a chill is because not only was Alison a major bitch, she was such a major bitch that apparently some one had enough and killed her.

It happened last summer, right before the start of her sophomore year and my official introduction to high school. According to facts, she was at a sleepover at the Hastings' barn with her four best friends, Spencer, Aria, Hanna, and Emily. Sometime during the night, when everyone was sleeping, she disappeared. No one has seen or heard from her since. Since no one ever found a body, they can't officially say that she's dead. But everyone knows.

There are about a million rumors about who killed her and why. But they all seem a little far-fetched to me. I don't know how she died, or if she even is dead, and I don't really care. After what she did to my sister and countless other people (nicknaming a boy in her class "Hermie" just might top the list), I'm just glad that I don't have to worry about bumping into her anymore.

I yank the cord to my straightener out of the wall and now actually do burn my finger. I grimace. "I don't want to talk about Alison. I'm just glad that I get to enjoy most of high school without her posse ruling the school."

Mona sighs and walks back out of my room. "Do you need a ride?" she calls over her shoulder. I know that the only reason she asked is because she got her license just a few weeks ago and she is very excited about it.

"No, Macy's mom is picking me up." Macy Littleton is my best friend. Well, I call her my best friend, but we're really not that close. Not many people in Rosewood are. We generally seek out the people most like ourselves and cling to them in hopes that we won't get shafted into the sea of outcasts and losers.

Ten minutes later, I toss my dark hair over my shoulders, grab my purse, and take a deep breath. A whole new year at Rosewood High School is about to begin.

…

Macy's mom talks nonstop the whole drive to school. Are you ready for school, what classes are you taking, do you girls have classes together, have you had a good summer? I'm not even really sure where to jump in because there are so many questions to start with.

We're pulling into the drop off area, already filled with parents' BMWs and Mercedes, when Macy hits me on the shoulder and points. "Hey, isn't that Aria Montgomery?"

I follow her gaze out the window. A girl with wavy, dark brown hair and big eyes is climbing out of a dark blue minivan. I squint and very vaguely recognize her. "Looks like it. They must be back from Iceland."

Aria Montgomery was one of Alison's best friends. Her family moved away to Iceland very soon after "that night." Last time I saw her, she had pink streaks in her hair and carried a pig puppet around in her backpack. She was what most students called "artsy," though that was probably only because she was Alison's friend.

Now the pink streaks and the pig puppet are both gone. Macy and I watch as Aria disappears through the front doors of the school. "Have a good day, girls," Mrs. Littleton calls to us as we scamper out of her mini Cooper.

I admire all of the new clothes and new hairstyles as we enter the main hallway and go looking for our new lockers. I'm suddenly glad that I decided to wear a leather miniskirt – it seems like half of the school is wearing the same one.

"Hey, Viola." Hanna Marin passes me, waggling her fingers in my direction.

"Hey," I call back to her, smiling. Hanna is Mona's best friend. She was part of Alison's clique back when she was chubby and only wore baggy t-shirts. Somehow the two of them bonded the summer Alison disappeared, and showed up the following school year as the new queen bees of the school. I was there to witness the whole transformation and even I was shocked.

Macy laughs and grabs my arm. "You are so lucky that your sister is, like, the most popular girl in school. Even the other popular juniors know you!"

I roll my eyes. Macy is way more concerned with popularity than I am. Her goal is to be at the top of the social hierarchy by the time we're seniors. My goal is to make good grades and not be on anyone's bullying radar. That's one reason why we're not that close. "Hanna's like family," I tell her. "She practically lived at my house over the summer."

"And you don't understand how lucky you are?" she demands, finding her locker and spinning the combination.

"No." I open my own locker, just a few down from hers, and begin piling in my new binders and notebooks. "Hey," I change the subject, "who do you have for study hall?"

Macy pulls out her crumpled class schedule and consults it. "Mrs. Carlino. Why?"

"I have Mr. Fitz. I've never even heard that name," I complain.

Her eyes light up and she slams her locker shut, glancing around conspiratorially. "Mr. Fitz? Oh my god, that's the new junior English teacher. I heard he's so hot." She shakes her head in mock disgust. "God, this must be, like, the best day of your life."

I wouldn't exactly go that far, but the idea that at least one of my teachers is cute does brighten things up a little. "Well, I'll tell you one thing." I sling my purse over my shoulder and link arms with her. "This is our second year with no Alison DiLaurentis and her reign of terror, so it's going to be great no matter what."

I'm wrong, but I don't know it yet.