Please read and review! It's a typical girl next door story, but maybe not so typical. AU. No A. I do not own PLL.

Aria Montgomery could remember exactly where she was when her new neighbor moved next door. She was sitting in her living room window seat writing in her journal and staring out the window. She still had the journal. It white and bedazzled and the pen that went with it had purple feathers on its cap. The entry in her journal mentioned Spencer and school, described a fight with her brother, Mike, listed a complaint about her parents thinking her too young to have a cell phone, and included a sentence that said someone had moved next door where the Springer's used to live. It was dated July 23, 2007. It was the summer before she turned thirteen.

She doesn't remember much else about the day except that her mother had probably asked her to set the table for dinner, her father most likely had been working in his office, and her brother had almost certainly been playing basketball with Gavin across the street. It was a typical summer day at the Montgomery house. Neither of her parents worked during the summer. Ella taught art history and appreciation at the high school, and Byron was an architecture professor at Hollis College.

But Aria does remember what happened the day after that, July 24, 2007. Her mother had taken a plate of cookies to their new neighbor and introduced herself. Aria's journal page was still smeared with chocolate from the chocolate-chip cookie she had swiped from the cookie plate.

"He's young," said Ella at dinner that night. "And lonely."

"How long does he plan on staying?" asked Byron. "After what happened to Elliot and Anne, I can't imagine that he wants to hang around."

"He says that he got a job at the high school, and that he wants to stay in the house for now," responded Ella.

"They left it to him, then?" asked Byron between mouthfuls of lasagna.

"I think he's the only family they had left," she answered. "Maybe we should invite him over for dinner sometime. I doubt he can even cook. A home-cooked meal might do him good."

"Can you make Grandma's ravioli?" chimed in Aria, her only contribution to the conversation.

"Maybe," responded Ella absently. "Mike, honey, eat your vegetables," she scolded her ten-year-old son.

"What's his name?" asked Byron.

"Ezra," said Ella as she took a sip of her iced tea. "Ezra Fitz."

It was the next day, July 25 when Aria met her new neighbor. She had a pink headband in her hair and pink tennis shoes on her feet. She rang the doorbell. He answered it. She saw that he had dark brown hair and and was wearing a t-shirt and shorts. He looked tired. Aria remembered her mother said he seemed lonely, but she had never said that he was sad.

"Yes?" he asked looking down at her.

"I'm Aria from next door. My mom brought you cookies yesterday."

He nodded. "I remember Mrs. Montgomery."

"Can I read in the tree house? Mr. and Mrs. Springer used to let me do it all the time." She stopped when she saw him wince at his grandparent's names. "Was I not supposed to mention them?" she asked in a small voice. She looked down at her feet.

"It's okay," he answered. "It's good to say their names." He looked down at the book she carried. "What book did you want to read?"

She looked up at him. "To Kill a Mockingbird."

"That's one of my favorite books," he said. She craned her neck so that she could look him in the eye. She noticed his eyes were blue and friendly. "How old are you?" he asked.

"I'll be thirteen in six weeks," she responded proudly.

"Are you sure you would rather read than play with your friends?"He asked her gently.

"Spencer and her family are at their lake house. Emily and her mom are visiting her dad on his base in Texas, and Hanna is with her parents visiting her grandma." This time she winced as she mentioned the word grandma.

"It's okay," he soothed her. He thought about it for a moment. "Go ahead." He leaned his head inside and towards the backdoor. "I'm guessing you already know the way."

"Thanks, Mr. Fitz," said Aria, smiling as she entered the house. She noticed it looked the same as if Mrs. Springer was cooking in the kitchen and Mr. Springer was watching TV in the living room. She half-expected to see them.

"It's Ezra," he called out after her. "I'm only twenty-two not forty-two."

She looked back at him as she reached the back door. "Thank you, Ezra," she flashed him a smile as she opened and closed the sliding door behind her. She got through half the book that afternoon, enjoying the solitude of the tree house. She never saw Ezra looking at her through the kitchen window, staring at her as she stared at the black and white pages of her book.

It was July 30, when she saw him again. This time he rang her doorbell, and she opened the front door.

"Hello, Aria," he smiled at her.

"Hi, Ezra," she smiled back. She noticed that he was wearing a button down shirt that matched his eyes and he smelled good like fresh paper and dried ink. She closed the door behind him and led him into the living room.

"This for you," he said, handing her a book. "For when you finish To Kill a Mockingbird. It's by Steinbeck. I think you'll like it."

"Really?" she asked, her eyes wide. "No one's given me a book before." She read that title. "Of Mice and Men. What's it about?"

He chuckled. "You'll have to read it and find out."

She sighed in frustration and noticed that her mother had come out of the kitchen and was ready to warmly greet her guest.

It was later at dinner when Ella mentioned Aria's name to her guest. "Aria requested ravioli. It's my grandmother's recipe, and her favorite dish."

"Is your grandmother Italian?" he asked politely.

"Yes," responded Ella. "She and my grandfather immigrated from a small village in Tuscany. One day I would like to go back there and see the house that she grew up in."

"I bet you and Aria get your beautiful hair from her," said Ezra. It was only after the words came out of his mouth that he realized they might be inappropriate. His face reddened.

"Actually, it is," answered Ella, kindly. "My mother's hair is the same shade of brown too."

"So what subject are you teaching, Ezra?" interjected Byron. "Ella told me that you got a teaching job down at the school."

"English. I'm teaching eleventh grade American literature and twelfth grade British fiction."

"Aria's getting ready to head into seventh grade. Maybe you'll have her in class in a few years."

"Maybe," said Ezra. "I'm not sure how long I plan to be in Rosewood."

"Any other plans?" asked Byron.

"Nothing specific," answered Ezra. "But I don't know if it's a good idea to stay here too long. That house has too many memories." The table suddenly seemed thick with awkward tension.

"We're so sorry about your grandparents," said Ella. "After that horrible car accident." She shook her head. "It wasn't right."

The table was silent as person at the table concentrated on eating their dinner, or in Mike's case, concentrated on eating anything that wasn't green.

"I remember you used to come over in the summer," offered Byron tentatively. "When Aria was younger. They built the tree house for you, didn't they?"

"I used to visit sometimes," responded Ezra. "Before college. I wish I had visited more. But," he paused, hesitant to bring up the painful topic, "they were my mom's parents, and she died of cancer when I was little. I didn't know her family really well, and my dad and I lived in California. It was a long ways away," he finished.

"What's your favorite book?" asked Aria between bites of ravioli. The adults looked at her as she stared at them innocently.

"I don't have one," he responded.

"Why not? You're an English teacher aren't you?"

He sighed. "There are so many beautiful things written, and so many things I haven't read, I don't think I can pick just one thing."

"Oh," said Aria her voice small. "I'd never thought of it that way." The rest of the meal was finished in polite conversation and silence. Before he left that night, Ezra told Byron and Ella that Aria was welcome to read in the tree house anytime she wanted, as long as it was alright with them.

Aria spent the rest of her summer sneaking over to Ezra's and finding a quiet place to read and hanging out with her friends. One day her parents even took her and Mike to Philadelphia as a treat. But it wasn't until August 18 that she really talked to him again. That night she wrote in her journal that Ezra seemed happy, happier than she had ever seen him.

When he let her in the house so she could go out the back door, she asked him, "Are you ready for school to start?" She looked at where he was sitting in the living room, eyes on a book.

He looked up at her. "Honestly?" She nodded. He sighed. "I'm terrified."

"Really?" she was bewildered, sitting next to him on the sofa. "Why? You're the teacher. You don't have to worry about Mona Vanderwaal following you around or Jenna Marshall hitting you with a volleyball during gym. You don't even have to worry about gym."

"But what if I do everything wrong?" he asked her. "What if nobody listens to me? This is my first real job. What if I mess it up?"

"I didn't know teachers thought that way." She looked at him hard.

"You're mom never says any of this?" he asked. "That makes me feel a whole lot better."

"I mean, she has said things sort of like that," amended Aria. "But she's my mom."

"Moms are people too," responded Ezra, "and so are teachers."

"You'll be fine," said Aria confidently. She looked up thoughtfully. "But watch out for Melissa Hastings. She's Spencer's sister. She likes to ask questions nobody can answer. And Jason DiLaurentis, he's my friend Alison's brother, he's a party boy. Don't believe him when he says he forgot his homework at home. And Ian Thomas, he's a jock. They're all in eleventh grade."

"Anybody else I should know about?" he asked. He was interested in seeing what she would say.

She thought hard for a moment. "Garrett Reynolds. He's broody and secretive. You never know what he's thinking."

"Thanks Aria," he said. "That makes me feel better."

"Really?" Her eyebrow flew up to her forehead and arched itself.

"Now at least I know what I'm expecting."

She impulsively hugged him, her childish body clinging to his. "Have a good first day of school on Monday," she said, getting up from the sofa.

"You have good first day too," he called back to her. When she looked behind her, he was smiling. It was the first genuine smile she had ever seen him give. It made him looked nice. He looked happy. She smiled back at him.

In this AU I picture Ezra as 9 years older than Aria. It makes sense later, and if you think about it 9 years isn't such a big age difference. My grandfather was thriteen years older than my grandmother when they got married. Any my mother is six years older than my father.