There was a whole different vibe in the cafeteria the next day. Spencer, Hanna, and Aria all seemed to have their own bigger problems going on, and had apparently decided, for the moment at least, that they didn't really care if Emily wanted to hook up with Alison. It was a nice reprieve, though the cost of it made Emily's insides hurt.

She hated that Spencer had to go through her parent's splitting up, hated that Hanna was apparently going through an identity crisis thanks to Ali's return, and Caleb showing up out of nowhere was clearly not helping.

She wasn't as sympathetic to Aria's whole situation with Ezra, but she also knew that she was probably the one that should understand better than anyone what it's like to love someone with a bad history and a lifetime's worth of secrets. And regardless of whether she agreed with Aria's continued relationship with him, she was always going to be in her friend's corner, hurting when she was.

Even Ali seemed subdued. Not on edge, not starting in with anyone, not even trying to charm all their classmates and teachers. She seemed content just sitting by Emily's side, touching her arm every time she spoke, enjoying the quiet.

She was still easily put on edge though, still adjusting back to just dealing with regular mean girl warfare rather than a mysterious killer intent on hunting her down and torturing her friends. Truth be told, all of them were still adjusting.

Emily eased into Ali's touch as Ali leaned closer, letting her whole right side press against Emily's left, and absentmindedly rested a hand on Ali's thigh.

"I just don't understand how this could happen? I know my parents have their issues, but seriously, splitting up? I can't believe I'm living in a hotel right now," Spencer whispered, glancing over her shoulder.

Emily caught Alison slightly raising her eyebrows, as though she wasn't the least bit surprised by the situation, and was glad that Spencer was still too busy looking for any eavesdroppers to notice the reaction.

Emily squeezed Ali's thigh, trying to warn her to be more sympathetic regardless of what she might have thought about Mr. Hastings.

Ali seemed to understand, dropping her gaze to the table demurely.

It was things like that that concerned Emily the most about getting into a relationship with Alison. That she had to remind her to have a little empathy.

Though, there was a bright side to it. It showed that Alison wasn't trying to fake them at the moment. When Ali was in-character, she rarely broke it. If she was truly trying to manipulate them, she'd have been the first one to pipe up with something comforting to say.

And there was the fact that her own mother had just died. As horrible as this was for Spencer, Emily acknowledged that it possibly seemed kind of trivial to Ali to worry about a divorce when your parents were both still alive and well.

Not that either of them should express that thought now. It definitely wasn't the time to start telling Spencer that it could be worse.

Emily soothingly stroked little circles on Ali's leg, while keeping her eyes on Spencer.

"Spence, maybe it's a good thing. My parents split up, and, yeah, it was really hard, sometimes it still is, but they're both doing okay," Aria answered, reaching over to rub Spencer's arm.

"My parents getting a divorce is not a good thing, Aria."

"Okay, I didn't mean it like that exactly. I'm just saying, you'll be okay, okay? We're all here for you, and your dad still cares about you too, that's not gonna change just because things didn't work out with your mom," Aria explained.

Spencer shook her head and left the table, only stopping briefly to pat Aria's arm reassuringly.

Aria sighed, and seeming anxious to keep the harmony in the group and the conversation flowing, turned to Hanna.

"So, Caleb came with you to Emily's last night."

"Yeah."

Emily exchanged a glance with Aria, and felt Ali tense up.

She always did that when the other girls acted particularly close with each other, rather than with her, and when they talked about things that she didn't know as much about.

"You guys are hanging out again?"

Hanna pushed her food around on her plate, before looking at Emily.

"What are we gonna do about Mona? You know she's still trying to assassinate your girlfriend, right?"

"Mona doesn't matter. I'll handle her," Alison interjected.

"That's my problem, actually. I don't want you doing anything to her, Alison. I know how you deal with people. She was my friend, I'm gonna try to talk to her. And, I was thinking that maybe Emily, Spencer, and Aria could try to be a little nicer to her, y'know, not glare every time she walks by."

Emily raised an eyebrow. "In what universe would I feel compelled to be nice to Mona?"

"The one where you care about your best-friend," Hanna asserted defensively.

"She was horrible to us, she ran you over with a car, Hanna, and now she's out to drive Alison, one of my other best-friends, in case you forgot, out of town."

"Look, we all know that Alison kind of deserves that," Hanna answered, shooting an apologetic grimace at Ali, but not making any move to retract her statement.

Emily resented the words, but couldn't refute the truth of them.

Alison was staring at Hanna impassively, not taking offense to the statement.

"You're right. I was not…kind to Mona, and I know that I've earned every ounce of anger that her flunkies have for me, but that doesn't mean I'm just going to lie back and take everything that they want to dish out."

"I'm not saying that you have to. I don't want anything bad to happen to you Ali, believe it or not, but I don't want anything bad happening to Mona either. So, please, at least give me a chance to take care of this before things get out of control," Hanna said, words pleading, but tone defiant.

Ali sighed. "Okay. Do what you have to do, but I'm not going to promise not to retaliate if she slaps me again or sends one of followers to do it for her."

The agreement stunned Emily, and could see that both Aria and Hanna were in the same boat.

"Em, walk me to Fourth period?"

"Sure, Ali."

Emily got up, and took the hand Ali offered her.


Emily sighed, staring at the door of the locker room for a long moment.

She was about to upset a lot of people. Alison, Mona, Hanna. Paige. But she also didn't feel like she had a choice. It was one thing to agree to let Hanna take the lead, or even to agree to play nice, but she couldn't just do nothing when Ali was in trouble and she had a way to stop it, or at least mitigate it.

She pushed the door open, holding it and slowly closing it to make sure that it didn't make a sound, and slid into the room. She knew Paige would be there, could hear her moving around, opening her locker, and braced herself for the confrontation.

When she rounded the corner, Paige jumped.

Emily leant against the locker, trying to stay calm.

The situation wasn't dire, both Alison and Hanna were already on it, and Mona hadn't done anything so far other than make an unflattering video of Alison. Still, it put her on edge to know that Mona was out to get Ali, and worse, that she had a team of anonymous minions who all had a bone to pick with Alison as well.

She was tired of jumping at shadows, tired of not knowing who was trying to hurt her and her friends, tired of being a sitting duck just waiting for the next blow to come. A was gone, and she had no intention of letting this keep happening for the rest of her life. She was done being a victim.

"Paige, you need to tell me who's helping Mona."

"No. Why would I do that?" Paige looked both as though she couldn't believe that Emily had the audacity to ask her to help Alison, and annoyed at herself for being surprised.

"Because it's important. You know what Mona is capable of."

"And I know what Alison is capable of. She's not even sorry for anything, we all heard her say it."

Emily sighed, not able to deny that, but-"Mona set her up, she knew what she was doing."

Paige shook her head and sat down on the bench, as though she couldn't meet Emily's eyes when Emily was asking her for something like this. Or as though to keep her resolve.

"Mona didn't force her to say anything, Emily. Alison was the one who made that choice. And she was able to do that because she's been playing everyone. Because she's the same person she's always been."

"Look, even if that is true, could you really live with yourself if something happened to her when you could have stopped it?" Emily asked.

Paige was one of the best people she knew, appealing to her better nature was the best tactic Emily could think of.

Well, without playing with her feelings. Suggesting that she'd be willing to get back together with the other girl if she told her. That idea had crossed her mind for a split second, and she wasn't sure if she could ever forgive herself for it. She couldn't believe that she'd become the kind of person who even had thoughts like that.

All the more reason to put an end to all of this.

"I mean, probably. I'm willing to find out."

"You don't mean that."

"Look, Mona's made it very clear that she's not interested in hurting Alison, she just wants her gone. And I can't blame her for that. Everyone, other than you and your friends, want her gone, Emily. I'm not going to stop her from trying to get Alison to leave town. If it was life or death it'd be a different story, but it's not. I'm sorry, I can't help you."

Emily moved to sit down on the bench next to Paige.

"Paige, I get what you're saying, but please. Mona is dangerous, and the amount of hate that some of those people have for Alison-things could very quickly get out of hand, even if Mona is telling the truth about her intentions. I need names."

Paige closed her eyes for a long moment.

"Hastings. That's all I'm gonna say."

Emily reached out and rested a hand on Paige's shoulder.

"Thank you."


Emily parked outside of Hanna's house, and tried to figure out how she was going to explain knowing that Melissa was working with Mona.

She managed to come up with a couple half-baked explanations before dismissing them all. She couldn't get mad about everyone else keeping secrets and going rogue while doing the same thing. She'd already gone against what Hanna wanted, at least a little, she wasn't going to make things worse by lying about it.

Mrs. Marin let her in with a slightly strained smile, looking anxiously up in the general direction of Hanna's room.

"Hello, Emily. I'm glad you're here. You might want to head on upstairs."

"Is everything okay? They're not trying to kill each other, right?" Emily asked, only half-joking.

"Hey, I wouldn't send you up without reinforcements if that was the case. No, just, I actually haven't heard much of anything from them, which almost worries me more. Alison being back has been hard on Hanna.

"I thought she'd be thrilled about it, all you girls were always so close, and she's one of the people who helped get Alison back in the first place…but, I don't know. I guess it's just the shock of it. I'm glad that she has you and the other girls at least, I can't imagine what it's been like for all of you," Mrs. Marin admitted.

"It's been…interesting. And I'm glad you know that we're all here for Hanna. We always have each other's backs."

Mrs. Marin smiled slightly, and let Emily continue on up the stairs without another word.

She stopped right outside the door as she heard voices. She wasn't trying to eavesdrop on her friends, but it sounded like whatever they were talking about was intense, and she didn't want to interrupt if they were coming to an understanding.

"All we have to do is keep our story straight. Don't forget, I'm not the only one who's in trouble here. Aria killed someone, and all of you have been covering up for both of us."

"Yeah, I got that, we've been over it a million times."

"I'm just saying, don't slip up. If you must go the 'kill em with kindness' route, at least make sure that you don't say a single word about what's been going on that we haven't agreed on. Mona already knows a lot more about what's gone down than I'm comfortable with.

"She will notice any mistake, she'll figure out what it means, and then we're all screwed. She's smart, Hanna, she has good reason to hate me, and she's proven in the past that she'll do what she has to in order to carry out her sick little plans."

"Ali, knock it off. Mona's apologized, she's changed. She wouldn't hurt me. All she wants is you gone, not all of us in prison."

There was a pause, and Emily started to make her way into the room, when Ali responded.

"Fine. I guess I'm not the only one who needs a second chance."

Emily entered the room, and took in the scene in front of her.

From their tones, she'd thought that they'd be across the room from each other, trying to keep as much space between them as possible as they argued, and was surprised to find them sitting next to each other on Hanna's bed. To anyone who didn't know what they'd just been discussing, it would look like a pretty normal 'two friends hanging out' situation. They weren't even that tense, as though they'd come to an agreement, understood what they both wanted, and we're okay with each other.

No, it wasn't as affectionate as when any other pair in the group hung out, but it wasn't bad.

"Em." Ali smiled as she walked in the room.

Hanna rolled her eyes, but didn't seem as mad as she had been the last time she'd addressed what was going on between Emily and Alison. Mostly, just mildly annoyed and resigned.

"Hey." Emily breathed out, both nervous about what she was about to confess, and a little flustered by how happy Ali was to see her.

Ali moved over on the bed, obviously making space for Emily sit down.

Emily stayed standing.

"I talked to Paige, after school."

Suddenly, it was as though the temperature in the room had dropped 20 degrees.

Alison looked livid, but also as though she was trying to control it, and nodded her understanding. Hanna clearly knew why she'd been talking to Paige and looked ready to snap.

"Emily, what the hell? I thought we agreed, I'm gonna talk to Mona. She'll never trust me if she thinks I'm part of some plan to put a mole on her team."

"She says that Melissa is on Mona's team." Emily said, not responding to Hanna's points.

Ali refocused at that news, didn't seem as worried about Emily talking to her ex, a girl she'd hated since years before becoming her almost girlfriend's ex, when she had her weird rivalry with the older Hastings to think about.

Though, Emily wasn't naïve enough to believe that she would just forget it either.

"Honestly, for Spencer's sake, I wish I could say I was surprised," Ali bitterly noted.

Emily almost questioned that, but decided it was pointless. If Ali had any intention of expanding on that statement she would. Interrogating her over it wouldn't do anything.

Besides, honestly, Emily wasn't surprised either.

Melissa and Alison had never gotten along, even before her thing with Ian had started. And Melissa did also have a habit of meeting up with shady people and doing shady things, even if in the end it usually turned out that she wasn't doing whatever they had suspected her of doing. Something about her tended to keep the whole group on edge.

"Well, so what? Melissa's bad news, everyone knows that, this doesn't change anything. All you did was make things even harder for me with Mona, because we all know she's gonna find out about your little talk with Paige," Hanna burst out.

"Hanna, this actually was important. Knowing that Melissa is involved means that we have to watch everything we say, and stay aware of everything going on around us, at both Spencer's house and mine. Before, we might not have trusted Melissa, but we wouldn't know just how cautious we need to be." Ali stepped in.

Emily raised an eyebrow at the protective tone, as though it was making Ali's blood boil to watch her get berated.

Hanna sighed. "Okay, sorry, chill out. I get it. This is just frustrating. Every time we think we know something or come up with a plan, we find out something else. It feels like everyone is always ten steps ahead of us."

Both Emily and Ali softened. That at least was pretty relatable. It was how they all felt constantly over the past few years.

Ali hugged Hanna for a long moment, then stood up, stepping in close to Emily.

Emily wondered if Ali really hadn't noticed that Hanna had made no move to hug her back.


Emily stayed parked in the Dilaurentis driveway rather than just drive away after Alison got out of the car.

Maybe it was paranoid, and she did feel a little weird about watching Ali wander around her house turning on lamps, but she just needed a few more moments to make sure that everything was okay. It turned out that having multiple girlfriends die on you, even if one did come back, made you a little worrisome when it came time to part ways with said girlfriends, even if it was just for the night.

Emily shook her head at herself, and started to pull out of the driveway when she saw the light that Ali had just turned on go out. It was probably nothing, just Ali deciding to go upstairs instead, and turning out lights that she wasn't using. The thing about it, though, was that she'd never seen Ali do anything like that before. Ali didn't care about electric bills or the environment.

Now she knew she was being paranoid and completely ridiculous, but she couldn't stop herself from getting out of the car.

The moment she reached the door and found it unlocked she knew that something had to be wrong. She swung the door and started jogging down the hall.

"Ali? Is everything okay?"

The only response was the sound of shattered glass, a thud, and, unmistakably, Alison gasping and crying out in pain.

Emily rushed into the room and didn't even think before reacting, just threw herself at the hoodied figure choking Alison with her own scarf.

After that it was a blur, the next thing she knew she was on the ground, the only thought going through her mind being that she needed to make sure Ali was okay.

She crawled over to Ali and pulled her into her arms, a door slamming behind her as whoever it was made their escape.


"We're calling the police."

Ali coughed a few times before she could answer.

"You can't do that. I'm not getting the police anymore involved in my life than I have to, none of us need them looking at us too closely. Not with half of them convinced that we're the spawn of satan, snooping around trying to poke holes in our story. You can't call my dad either, because if he finds out he'll go to the police himself," Ali argued, throwing her scarf on the table, and moving a hand up to rub her throat.

"Ali, someone broke into your house and attacked you. They have to realize that you're the victim here."

"And what if they don't? People aren't very trusting of me lately, if you haven't noticed, Emily. Then I'm just inviting the police into my life, having them watch my every move, even as they're building a case against us, for nothing. I'm not relying on the kindness of strangers.

"The only people I trust are you and the girls."


"It wasn't A. I mean whoever it was could have killed me, and chose not to," Ali insisted.

Spencer was still throwing the idea that A might not really be gone out there. She had a point about how it seemed like a pretty 'A' thing to do, torturing one of them, but they hadn't heard anything from A since Shana died.

Emily really didn't want to even consider the thought of A still hanging around, and shifted uncomfortably at the 'Ali could have died tonight' talk.

"Who would want to scare you like that?" Spencer insisted.

This time Alison was the one fidgeting, glancing down at the floor, and then up at Emily, passing the ball over to her.

Emily sighed and shrugged, "An angry classmate working with Mona, or…Your sister."

"Melissa?" Spencer said. Sounding pretty incredulous about it considering the fact that Melissa was always hanging out with people who hated their whole group.

"She's part of Mona's gang."

"Look, we don't know who it is. It was too dark to see anything," Ali interrupted, oddly enough being the one trying to keep the peace, and comfort Spencer.

Emily grimaced inwardly at that. It wasn't fair of her to keep believing that any kind gesture Ali made was something to raise eyebrows at. While being friends with Alison hadn't always been easy, it also hadn't always been difficult.

In her own way, she'd looked out for all of them, had made all of them laugh, had even been a good friend to them sometimes. They'd loved her for a reason. And Emily knew that she was the one that had been shown that kindness more often than anyone else.

Ali had been proving lately that she really had grown up, that she meant it when she said that she was trying to be better. It was time for Emily let go of her old perceptions of Alison, and get to know the person that she had become.

Emily looked up as Aria and Hanna rushed in, Aria throwing herself at Ali for a hug.


"I never thanked you for what you did tonight."

Emily looked down at that, uncomfortable with the gratitude.

"I didn't do anything."

"You risked your life for me, Em. Most people see danger and they run in the other direction as fast as they can." Alison disagreed, and Emily was surprised with the level of admiration that she saw as Alison stared at her intently.

Emily held her gaze for a long moment, drinking in Ali's affection, but also feeling undeserving of it in that instance.

Emily didn't know about most people, but she did know that no matter how everyone was feeling about Ali lately, Spencer, Hanna, and Aria all would have done the same thing. Even Ali herself had saved all their lives at some point, pulling them out of burning buildings and barns, just to start with. They had each other's backs because they loved each other, it wasn't anything that anyone in the group usually expected praise for.

"It's getting late, do you want me to take you home?" Emily asked, standing up and turning to Alison, only to find that she wasn't making any move to get up.

"I don't want to be alone tonight. Can I stay here tonight?" Alison asked, tentatively, as though she was nervous about it, but also well aware that there was no chance of Emily telling her she had to leave.

"Yeah, yeah, of course." Emily answered softly, moving to pull the covers aside for Alison.

Alison slid into them and looked at Emily expectantly, surprised when Emily just sat down on top of the covers.

"I'm just going to stay up for a little while," Emily explained, shrugging, and leaned back against the headboard. She tried to look casual, as though she simply wasn't tired yet, not wanting to reveal to Alison that she was really preparing to play guard all night.

Emily had already been worried about what people would try to pull now that Alison was back, the attack was only making her anxieties worse. It almost made her wonder whether Ali being back in Rosewood really was the best thing for her, or if Emily was just being selfish.

Emily shrugged that thought off. Yeah, she did want Alison back, but Rosewood, where all of Ali's friends and family were, had to be better than being alone on the streets. Even with as many enemies as Ali had. Emily was confident that a number of Mona's followers would get bored with the game sooner rather than later, so long as Alison managed not to harass anyone, and others would probably even be won over by Ali's charm.

As messed up as Ali's confrontation with Mona had been, she hadn't been wrong when she'd said that everyone wanted to be her friend, or that she could easily become the Queen Bee of Rosewood once more, if she put her mind to it. There was something magnetic about Alison, irresistible, and if they could just hold out for a little longer Ali's number of enemies would probably go right back down to the likes of Mona, Jenna, Melissa, and, possibly, a few other kids that Ali had been especially merciless towards.

In the meantime, though, all bets were off.

Alison nodded, but instead of rolling over and going to sleep, as Emily had thought she would, she moved forward and pressed a lingering to Emily's lips. Emily allowed herself to enjoy it, just for a minute, and moved her lips down, kissing Ali's jaw, and then the ring of bruises around her neck.

Those bruises gave Emily the resolve that she needed to pull back. To not let herself get distracted by her want for Alison, to not let herself just fall in-between the sheets with her and forget about the rest of the world.

Someone had broken into her house and attacked her. Someone who wasn't even A, a random person in town, only hours before. Emily just couldn't get in the mood with that thought hanging over her, what it might cost her if she wasn't paying attention to her surroundings tonight.

Emily pulled back slowly, kissing Alison a few more times, and wrapped an arm around her as she curled up against her.

Alison's eyebrows were furrowed. Emily could tell that she was confused by her actions, but instead of forcing Emily to tell her, she allowed Emily to have her secret. Something that the old Alison never would have done, and seemed soothed by their proximity and the feeling of Emily running her fingers through her wavy blonde hair.