Title: In The Aftermath
Summary: After Spencer's arrest and Mona's death, the girls realize that the only way to end it all is to jump in headfirst and do the one thing they've been unable to for so long: tell the truth, and hope that something goes right. How hard will it be to deal with the aftermath? Spencer/spoby centric, but includes all main characters/couples.
Author's note: Hello again! Sorry for the long wait, classes have started up again. Updates may be slow, but I promise I'm still working on this story. This chapter is the longest, as I couldn't find a space to break it up, so hopefully that makes up for the wait! Thank you all so much for your amazing reviews. The response to this story is amazing and I am glad so many people enjoy it! Please let me know what you think, and if you have any ideas! I'm always open! Enjoy! -Jen
PS: Not now, but in the future, parts of some chapters could be on the M side of things. Would you guys want that, or would you rather I kept it on the T side?
Chapter Two
Fifteen minutes pass before Spencer moves away from Toby, and even then she wished she could stay. But Hanna is hurting, and she needs to be there for her friend. In the time that she'd been caught up in Toby, face hidden against his chest, Mike had appeared. He was sitting beside Aria, looking grief stricken, and it's then that Spencer remembers they were dating, him and Mona. Hanna is still sitting in Caleb's arms, but when Spencer approaches he lets her go. Sitting down beside Hanna, Spencer wraps her arms around her, and the blonde leans into her.
She's not crying, but she had been, Spencer can see the red around her eyes. "I'm so sorry," Spencer whispers. She wants to say something else, say something to make her feel better, but what was there to say? Sure, Hanna had been distant with Mona considering everything she'd done, but she had still been her best friend once upon a time, she was still important. And Mona was murdered, probably violently, for no reason. All because of this whole thing. All because of them. "We're going to end this," Spencer finally says, and feels Hanna nodding against her shoulder.
"We have to," Hanna whispers. It's a relief, for all four of them to finally be on the same page, for all of them to be in agreement. No matter what happened as a result of telling the truth, they had to do it.
The parents were all in the kitchen, making dinner and talking, though all of them would occasionally look over at them from time to time. Finally, once a headway is made on dinner, they all come towards the living room.
"Ok," Veronica sighs, "I think it's time we all play catch up. Full catch up, the truth."
"Shouldn't Alison and her father be here, too, then?" Pam Fields asks, and Emily shakes her head.
"No, mom," Emily sighs. "We...we were wrong about Ali, about a lot."
"Everyone should sit down," Spencer says, standing up, allowing Hanna to go back to Caleb. "This is going to take a while."
They sit on the couches and chair, pull in chairs from the dining room, and take up spots on the floor. It's Toby that reaches out for Spencer, bringing her to sit down in his lap once again, and she doesn't have any complaints. With him in a wheelchair it worked, because she wanted to be close to him, needed to be close to him. Toby was the one person that could keep her calm, keep her out of the dark place that so often seemed like it was going to swallow her up. And when she did feel like it was swallowing her, he was always there, helping her through it. Getting to know and subsequently falling in love with Toby, and reconnecting with her friends were the only good things about the past four years. Once they're all seated, there's a moment of silence, and they all look at each other before Spencer finally opens her mouth, and starts to talk.
"Alison was the one to bring us all together," Spencer remembers. "The summer between sixth and seventh grade. We'd all known of each other, we all knew each other, but we weren't friends, and we weren't friends with her, until one day we were." Spencer didn't really know how to put it other than that. One day they weren't friends, they were all just girls in the same grade, at the same school, who lived in the same town; and then the next they'd all been brought together by the popular girl. "There was never any transition period, really. I know I always wondered why she picked me," Spencer says, the other girls nodding in agreement. "But that wasn't something we ever voiced out loud, to her, or to each other. You didn't question Allison wanting to bestow her friendship on you, you just thanked your lucky stars because she did."
"We were all different, or missing something, or we had some quality that she liked," Aria chimes in quietly. "I was the weird girl, I didn't have many friends. I felt everything too much, too deeply."
"I was loyal, but I was quiet and shy," Emily murmurs. "And I had a crush on her, even though I didn't know it at the time. I was easily manipulated."
Hanna shifts in her seat beside Caleb, looking at the floor as she speaks up next. "I wanted to be her," She finally says. "I had weight problems, and dad had just left...Ali always seemed so perfect. So beautiful, so put together, with her perfect family, her perfect life, and all her friends. I admired how easy everything always was for her. I wanted to be her," She repeats, her head falling to rest against Caleb's shoulder. He rubs her back gently, looking upset, like he wants to counter everything she's saying, tell her how everyone else sees her, but somehow knows it's not the time.
"I was the smart one," Spencer says. "That's why she picked me. But I wasn't just smart, I was so desperate to be accepted, to fit in. I was always in competition with Melissa, I felt like I was never good enough," she says quietly, her eyes on her lap. She doesn't add that she still feels that way, that she's never good enough. She tries so hard, has been trying to hard to figure everything out while still being the best in school, being the best at everything. Spencer feels Toby's arms tighten around her waist slightly, his thumb gently rubbing against the skin on her arm.
"Compassionate, loyal, admiring, smart...she saw those, and a bunch of other qualities in us that appealed to her," Spencer sighs, "And so we were picked."
"It started out normally enough," Aria says. "We were just friends, we got closer and closer. Ali had this way of making you feel like you could trust her with anything, and we did," Aria murmurs softly. "We told her everything, told each other everything, and never seemed to notice that she didn't give us the same. She was always listening, making snide comments, but she never told us her secrets. And oh, we knew she had them," Aria adds.
"Alison...she has this way of making you feel like complete crap about yourself," Hanna says. "But then saying something or doing something to make you feel better, even though she was the one to cause it." Her eyes drop down to her lap, as Caleb rubs her back. "She'd always make comments about how I was eating, or how I was too big...she made me hate myself, and then she...she taught me how to puke it all up and hide it," Hanna finally admits. The look on Ashley's face as she goes on is painful, and Pam takes her hand in a show of comfort. "She didn't put her fingers down my throat, but she planted it in my head, and then she...she just kept making comments. She said it was to help me."
"Hanna," Ashley whispers, shaking her head, eyes filled with pain. "Why, why would you believe her?" She asks. "There was nothing wrong with you, you were beautiful. My god, I was so clueless, you said you wanted to go to those camps, but it was all her, wasn't it?" Ashley exclaims. "Hanna, I'm so sorry," She shakes her head, burying her face in her hands. "I was so caught up in your father cheating and the divorce, I didn't even notice, I wasn't there for you!"
"No, mom," Hanna says quickly, moving off of Caleb, over to her mother. "It's not your fault," She shakes her head, kneeling in front of her. "It's not, don't-don't blame yourself, please."
"Your hair," Ashley says, looking at her, resting her hands against each side of her daughter's face. "Your hair, your clothes, you...was that all because she came back?"
Holding onto her mom's hands, Hannah looks down, shrugging a little. "I guess," She murmurs. "After she left, Mona and I became friends, and we said we weren't going to let anyone talk about us like they had been. We got in shape together-healthily-and we redesigned our wardrobes. I...I became Ali's clone," Hanna murmurs. "And I didn't want to be like her anymore."
"You never, ever had to be anyone but yourself," Ashley murmurs, wrapping her arms around Hanna, holding her tight.
There's a silence that follows for a bit, and they all give the mother and daughter their moment. After a minute, Hanna pulls away, and sits back down next to Caleb, and they go back in time again.
"For the most part it was all innocent enough. She'd get us to pull pranks on people, but then..." Spencer trails off, looking at Toby, shutting her eyes. "Ali got a lot of things wrong," She finally says, "And she thought..."
"She thought that I was a creep, just like the rest of this town," Toby says for her, his hand gently rubbing her back. "I was grieving. My mom had barely been buried when my father married Jenna's mother," He says, "And I was forced into this whole new life, expected to be accepting of this new family. Jenna was...inappropriate," Toby says quietly. Spencer takes his hand in hers, holding it tightly, wanting to give him strength, the strength he always gave her. "She wanted me to see her as a girlfriend and she...forced herself on me," Toby finally says. "Alison DiLaurentis was creeping through a window, and saw it the other way around."
Emily seems to get that Toby can't talk about it anymore, and that Spencer wouldn't want to, so she takes over. "Ali had us wrapped around her finger. We did whatever she said, eventually, and one day she wanted to prank Toby...to set off fireworks near his tree house," She says. "But he wasn't in there, Jenna was, and she...she got hurt."
"So Alison used the blackmail she thought she had..." Veronica seems to understand. "And you took the blame for something you didn't do," She says, looking at Toby, who nodded his head once.
Seeming to go into lawyer mode, as if he ever left that, Peter finally spoke. "Did you throw the fireworks, Spencer?" He asks. "Because if so, if any of you did-"
"No, dad," Spencer cuts him off. "It was Alison. It was all Alison, that's what we're saying!" She exclaims. "Alison brought us together for some-some crazy game she wanted to play! We've been her dolls for years,
even when she was supposedly dead! Because you wanna know something? She wasn't dead, and she sure as hell wasn't kidnapped, either!" She shouts.
"Spence, calm down," Toby says softly, rubbing her back.
"I can't!" She exclaims. "I was just arrested for something I didn't do, and it's just what she wants! I might go to jail, I might go down for this and I- I don't even understand it all! The past five years have been just one thing after another, one game after another! I trusted her, we all trusted her, and all we were to her were dolls, pawns!" She cries. "I'm sick of it, I don't want to do it anymore, I don't want to do any of it anymore, I can't!"
"I know, baby, I know," Toby says gently, bringing her close against his chest. "But this is going to end it," He murmurs in her ear. "This will end it, it's going to be over soon."
She wants to believe him, wants to believe that the truth will be the end of this. They'll pay the price, whatever it is, and be done. She clings to him, to his words like it's a lifeline, but there's that part of her head, the realistic, smart part that tells her it could all just blow up in their face. Because like Aria said, who would believe a bunch of liars? But the truth is all that's left, and so she doesn't have a choice. Taking a moment, Spencer buries her face against the crook of Toby's neck. His skin, warm against her, is soft and smells like a combination of his cologne, his deodorant, and the faint antiseptic smell of the hospital. Minus the hospital, it smells like home, like safety. It calms her.
Pulling her head away, she finally opens her eyes, and nods to the girls, before she starts again, from that night, the night of the Jenna thing. It seems like it takes a whole day, the girls taking turns recounting the past years. Occasionally, Ezra, Caleb, Paige, or Toby would jump in. They told them everything, each of them detailing their lives. It's not always easy. Aria and Ezra having to recount their breakups, Ezra admitting to the parents about his book (Byron glaring at him in a way that was reminiscent of when he found out they were together). When Toby told them all about being a part of the A Team as a desperate attempt to protect Spencer, and the whole mess that followed that. Emily confessing that Ali had messed with her head most of all, tearing up as she apologized to Paige for everything. And Hanna, telling more about her thought process and experience with the bulimia and anorexia.
They all leave out the things their parents really don't need to know, though at this point that's only the occasions when they all had sex. It seems to be an unspoken agreement that none of their parents need to know about any of that.
"We thought we were going to end it," Aria murmurs at the point when they're talking about New York. "That we'd figured it out. Ezra had gotten shot, and we made a plan to draw A out, when he woke up and confirmed what we'd suspected. It was Shana...so I left the hospital to go to the theater," She says quietly, her throat feeling tight. "And when I got there...she had the gun on them. On Spencer, Emily, Hanna...and Ali. She said she was getting revenge, that she'd got us all to the lodge, she'd set the fire, and she was angry. She kept waving the gun around, talking about getting justice for Jenna, and she was about to shoot," Aria whispers. Her head is in her hands, tears in her voice as she talks. "I grabbed a prop rifle, and I snuck in there, and I called her name. She turned, and shot the gun...it hit the light, and I hit her. I only meant to knock the gun out of her hands, but she-she fell!" Aria says, her voice breaking. "She fell the wrong way, and it was too late, I couldn't save her, I couldn't help her," She cries. "I didn't mean to, I didn't mean to kill her," She shakes her head, a sense of relief in her voice as she finally tells someone. Ella gets out of her seat, moving towards her daughter, and Ezra vacates the spot next to Aria so she can take it, wrapping her daughter in her arms.
"It was self defense, Aria." Veronica says softly. "You did what you had to do, you thought that your lives were in danger, and they were. It was an accident."
"I know, I know that, but she's still dead," Aria sobs. "And we thought it was over then. We thought that Ali could come home, that we would be safe, and then it wasn't."
"It started all over again," Spencer said, taking it upon herself for the most part to detail what had happened since Ali's return to Rosewood, all leading up to now, including Melissa's video confession. By the end, she sighs, "We think it's Ali. We think it's been Ali this whole time."
"It is," Aria cuts in from where she is, still in Ella's arms. "Mona called, just before...that's why we went over," She tells them. "She said she had proof that Ali was A, and it makes sense. She picked us...smart, loyal, admirable, compassionate. All the things she couldn't be. She's a sociopath that used us all in this game."
"But why," Pam asks. "What is the point of all of this?"
"I have a theory." It just occurred to Spencer now, a summation of all her thinking from the past day. All eyes on her, she takes a breath. "We know that Jason is only Jessica's, not Ken's," she says, glancing at her dad. "She's got a history of being unfaithful. What if Ali's biological father is different, too? What if Bethany Young's father was also Ali's?"
"So they were half sisters, and Mrs. D was what? Trying to get on Bethany's good side?" Hanna asks. "So Ali got jealous and lured her out there? Why?"
"I don't know," Spencer sighs. "But Bethany Young was dressed just like Ali, and looked so much like her. Some of the DNA had to be the same for a test to be tricked."
"Is there anything you know about this, Peter?" Veronica asks coolly of her husband.
"No," He says quickly. "I meant what I said, Jessica and I never had a deeper relationship again after Jason was born. We didn't talk, she didn't tell me anything."
A silence falls over the room, interrupted by the timer of the stove. They all jump, as Veronica hurries over, turning it off. "I think this is all a lot to take in," She says finally. "Let's have dinner, and enjoy the rest of the holiday to the best of our ability. Everyone can stay here...I think it's best if we all stay together for the moment. Safest. And then tomorrow we can work on how to do this."
The parents all nod in agreement, all of them getting up to go in the kitchen again and finish dinner. Ella makes sure Aria's ok before joining them, and Ezra sits beside her once again. They're all quiet, sitting with their significant others, as dinner is put on the table and they all sit down.
The parents try to make it seem normal, making conversation, and the girls all join in when forced. No one eats much, though, their minds all reeling. It's a weird few hours after dinner, before they all finally decide to just go to bed, as everyone's exhausted.
The girls let Spencer voice all of their thoughts for them. "Someone can take my room...we'll all go in the den," She says, since none of them wanted to be separated. If any of the parents have an issue with the girls all having their boyfriends or girlfriends sleeping with them, none of them say it, and they're all grateful.
She's reluctant to leave Toby but does for a few minutes so she can go upstairs to her room, grabbing T-shirts and pajama pants for Emily, Aria, Hanna, and Paige to borrow, and gathering pillows and blankets from the hall closet. After they all change, in relative silence, they head downstairs and into the Hasting's den. It's a rather large room, housing a double bed in addition to a over sized sectional sofa and a large screen TV. Spencer produces and air mattress from the closet, and
It's an unspoken agreement to let Spencer and Toby sleep in the bed because he's still in pain and his leg would make the floor difficult, and Caleb helps him out of the wheelchair and onto the mattress before joining Hanna on one end of the large sofa. He wraps her in his arms, her head resting on his chest, whispering into her ear, and they give them their privacy. Emily and Paige volunteer to take the air mattress, and after getting it all set up, they too curl up together, leaving Ezra and Aria in a similar position on the opposite end of the sofa.
With the lights out and everyone comfortable, Spencer crawls into the bed with Toby. No words are exchanged as he pulls her in close. They exchange a kiss, long though chaste, before she lets her head fall against the crook of his neck, their bodies intertwined. "I love you," Toby murmurs softly, stroking his hand up and down her arm. "Always, Spencer. No matter what."
Spencer lets out a shaky breath, the reality of the day feeling like a weight on top of her, momentarily lifted by this small bubble of safety with Toby. "I love you, too," She whispers. Spencer is sure she won't sleep that night, and she probably wouldn't have, but Toby was there. Before long, she feels herself slowly giving into the nagging exhaustion, thinking briefly of what the next few weeks would bring, but finding momentary solace to let go for a while.
