Chapter Two

As Ezra and Aria sat on her couch watching some Hitchcock movie, Aria's mind raced. She knew she had just asked him a bunch of questions, but she had so many more. She regretted kissing him and admitting her love for him with each passing second. She couldn't – shouldn't – give in that easily. Not after all that's happened.

Aria felt her heart pulsating inside of her chest. Her brain was running a mile a minute. No, she had to be wrong. She had to be dreaming. Aria shut her eyes tight, then opened them once again. No, this wasn't a dream. This was a nightmare. A real life, true nightmare.

She felt her mouth go dry and stood shock still. She turned her head from side to side, taking in the substantial amount of pictures. Pictures of Alison, all her friends, her family members, and herself. She looked at the board once more. It was everyone she knew, plus some others.

She took a deep breath and slowly crept out of the basement. Aria was in the cabin, Ezra's cabin, and the power had gone out. As she felt around for flashlights, she felt a handle on the floorboard. Figuring it was the door to the basement, she opened it and crawled down. She found a lot more than flashlights.

When she stepped out, she slammed the door back to the ground. Part of her was thinking about how sick it was for A to come in and invade Ezra's cabin, their new, special place, but Aria knew what this meant. A didn't have to invade if A had a key.

That damn diary. The girls, mainly Hanna and Spencer, had been ranting and raving over a diary of Alison's. The two started suspecting Ezra after reading an entry. At first, Emily said they were unreasonable, but slowly started coming around. Finally, they all went to Aria with evidence. Aria read the diary pages, and tried to deny it as much as possible.

But now, the diary pages were catching up to her. They became very realistic and truthful and scared the crap out of Aria. This was really happening. He was really the bad guy.

Staring down at the floorboards, she suddenly realized that she was not alone. Her head snapped up and her breathing became unstable. Ezra stood a few feet away, taking in the scene. He quickly put together what she had found as Aria spun around, trying to plan an escape. She never thought she'd try to escape from Ezra – her soul mate.

"Aria," Ezra said calmly, but was clearly worried.

Lightning struck and illuminated the cabin briefly. Aria's tears spilled over as the lightning bolt brightened Ezra's face. His eyes looked like they were about to pop out of his head and his mouth hung open.

Aria remembered passing a little mom and pop gas station about a mile away driving up. Now, having a tentative plan and route, she ran to the door of the cabin. To get to it, she had to pass Ezra. He turned with her and grabbed her arm. She panicked and kicked him in the shin hard. He let go and she ran out the door, snatching up her purse quickly.

Despite the thunder and rainstorm's roars, she could still hear Ezra calling after her. Instantly, her hair was matted to her face and she was soaked. Ezra's shouts grew closer and she looked over her shoulder. Ezra was following her now and she sobbed harder.

"Leave me alone!" she choked out.

Turning her head back around, she slipped into a puddle of mud. Things couldn't get much worse.

As Aria munched on her eggroll, she could still feel the icky mud all over her body. She tried hard to shake the memory away, but to no avail. That memory would never leave her and that was a fact.

She reached for the remote and paused the TV. "Can I ask you more questions?"

Ezra placed his fork down and turned to her, "Anything."

Aria felt tears prick her eyes as she tried to decide where to start. Finally, she sighed and rested her head in her hand. "Did you love Alison?"

Ezra bit his lip and looked down, giving a clear answer.

Aria whimpered and nodded, "Did you ever think of her when we kissed or hung out or anything?"

"No," he stated certainly. "Aria, I may have loved her, but I never loved her half as much as I love you."

"What's your biggest regret?"

"Hurting you," he replied, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Aria shook her head a little. "What else?"

"I haven't really ranked my regrets, Aria…"

As she chewed her lip, she let that sink in. He had made so many mistakes. "Did you kill anyone?"

Ezra ran his fingers through his hair and sighed.

"Wow," Aria stated before covering her face. She was sitting with a killer.

"I shouldn't tell you, no one knows, but yes."

"Ian?"

"Well, the push didn't kill him. The bullet to his head did, and that was Wren."

"So who?"

Ezra looked at her and wished she could make the connections by herself. She already asked him about the Halloween train and he already made the remark about killing the NAT members. The puzzle wasn't very hard.

"Garrett Reynolds."

Aria thought about it for a second before raising her eyebrows. "But, you said you had nothing to do with me in the box?"

"I didn't! I stashed his body in one of the – "

"Stop," Aria yelled, louder than intended. Was Ezra really talking about stashing bodies and killing people? This was too much. "I can't listen to you talk about this. I really, I can't."

"I understand," he told her, reaching for her hand. He laced his fingers with hers and felt happy for one of the first times in years. That happiness was shattered, though, when Aria pulled her hand away.

"Who'd you pin that on?" she whispered, crossing her arms over her chest.

"When Mona confessed to killing Wilden, for Hanna's mom, she told them Wilden killed Garrett. During all of our trials, Garrett was just a kind of don't ask, don't tell thing."

"You got away with so much," she murmured. "Don't you feel… don't you feel bad?"

"I do, but I couldn't ship myself of to prison, Aria. I wouldn't." Silence settled in again, and before it got too comfortable, Ezra broke it. "What are you the most upset about?"

Aria let out a laugh and rubbed her temples, "There's a lot of things. Number one, though, was you lying about never knowing Alison and never knowing half the people you really did know. You being with Alison also really hurts. And, because of you, I didn't… never mind, it's silly."

"What?" Ezra asked, intrigued. "I doubt it's silly."

"Because of you I never got a senior prom! Or a graduation!"

Ezra had to take a step back and recognize their age gap. She was still so young and things like that, prom and graduation, did matter. Those were memories that she could never have. Great, he thought, another thing to feel guilty about.

Ezra shrugged, "You could have stayed."

"No, I really couldn't have. I would've run into you and I would've just… no, there was no way I could have stayed."

"The other girls stayed."

"The other girls," she mocked, "weren't in love with you!" Neither of them spoke and Aria decided to continue, "What did you even say to them?"

Ezra sighed, remembering that day. The girls agreed to meet him at a restaurant, a public place, a few towns over to discuss everything. That day was one of the hardest days of Ezra's life and he hated thinking about it, but he knew, right now, he had to relive it. He had to for Aria, whether he liked it or not.