Chapter 14- I Hate To Inform You
"We need to call everyone and get them to meet us at the apartment. If this is the start of a whole new battle then we need to pull together." Toby could see the fear in Spencer's deep brown eyes as she said this. "I'll call Jason and Aria you call Caleb."
"And what exactly should I be telling him?" He was still confused about what had just happened but he could see how scared his girlfriend was.
"Tell him that he needs to get Hanna and to meet us at our apartment. It's important." About 2 minutes later Spencer was on the phone to her older brother. Ever since he found out about Mona threatening Spencer and he friends he had gone into over protective brother mode; when Melissa posed as –A he didn't want to let Spencer out of his sight but things called him away.
"Hi, Jason. No please just let me talk; you need to get to Toby's apartment as soon as possible. It's important." The beep that sounded at the end of the phone confirmed that the alarm in Jason's head had gone off and he would be by his sister's side as soon as possible.
"Caleb said that he's with Hanna and Emily so they're all on their way over. We best get back so that we're there to meet them."
In the truck on the way back from the town Spencer had gotten hold of Aria and after debating whether or not Mike should be involved in this situation they decided that he had every right to know. By the time they had arrived back at their apartment it was about 5pm and people were still in the coffee shop below. Hanna, Caleb and Emily were all huddled at the top of the stairs waiting for Toby and Spencer to arrive.
"Dude, you could have got here a bit quicker. I swear if that guy looked at Hanna one more time I would have gone crazy." Caleb glanced down at the older guy that was sat at a table in the corner. "No one looks at her like that."
The other four looked at Caleb with smirks on their faces. After all the time they had known the sketchy brunette they had never once seen him get this protective over Hanna.
"Aw baby, I love it when you get jealous." Hanna was the first one to break the silence that had quickly become unbearably awkward. Before their conversation could continue about how "hot" the couple thought each other were; Aria burst through the door with Ezra, Mike and Jason in tow.
"What the hell is going on Spencer?" Aria shouted as she entered the apartment "It's either someone just died or you found out your pregnant."
Spencer and Toby shifted awkward glances at each other which they hoped would go unnoticed. After their discussion before Spencer received the –A text it seemed like everyone was talking about babies. Jason shouting in Toby's direction proved that their looks towards each other hadn't slipped under the radar.
"What the hell man, did you get my sister pregnant?" Jason had barged past Ezra to square up to Toby. Despite the boy with the blue eyes being considerably taller than Jason, they both matched up strength wise. Jason pushed Toby hard in the chest to prove that he was willing to kick his ass.
"No, what? no! I swear I didn't get your sister pregnant! But you might want to hear her out. It's not me you should be angry at..." Everyone looked at Spencer like she had just killed someone right in front of them; all of them were scared about what was about to leave her mouth. It took her a few seconds to think about how to word the news but after stringing a sentence together to make it sound perfectly normal.
"-A's back and he/she/it is going to make our lives hell" She blurted out before thinking about how she bad she had made it sound. Well it was bad there was no way to make it any better but she could have at least said it nicely so that they could ease into it.
"W-What? How do you know?" Emily was the first one to speak up; she knew they despite them all wanting to wish it wasn't true something had to be done about it.
"Well, w-when we were in town going to get food I got the text. At first I thought it could just be a joke but who else would know about what Toby said to Meredith?" Spencer's voice shook as she tried to force the tears back. There were only a few people in the room that had seen Spencer cry before and they had all become aware of the signs. Toby rushed over from where he was standing next to Jason, to his girlfriend's side to offer her comfort while she figured out what else to say. Mike and Aria pulled together at the sight of Spencer's eyes watering. They both knew they had to distract everyone while she composed herself.
"Right, before everyone gets too deep into whatever this is, we're going to get food and have tea or coffee or whatever. You can't work all this out on an empty stomach." Aria was the voice of reason for the group because amongst all the stress of what Spencer had just told them they had all forgotten just how hungry they were. "Mike, go put the kettle on and bring a menu; I'm thinking pizza." Everyone nodded at her decision because none of them had the strength to put what they were thinking aside for even a minute.
Once the food was decided on and ordered Spencer ran off into the bathroom knowing that she needed to be away from the group for a few minutes before the tension became too much.
"Knock knock?" Aria was stood at the door with a huge mug of coffee that Toby had bought her as a joke. "Thought you might like a swimming pool of coffee?" The small smile that her best friend was holding proved to be a comfort for her. After everything that –A had done to her, to Toby and to all of her friends they had all stayed stronger than ever. After the mug had been placed on the bathroom counter she was pulled into a hug; regardless of the fact that she had to crouch down quite a bit, it was the most comfortable she had felt since the text came.
"Spencer, listen to me. –A might be back and yes we're all scared but we are all here, we're together and we're going to get through this. I know that this is harder for you and Toby than it is for the rest of us because you two are always the targets. But I want you to know that every single one of us in this apartment will do everything in our power to keep you safe. Most of all, we're going to find out who the hell –A is and take the bitch down. I don't care how long it takes. But right now, we have to go back out there; have something to eat and I know for a fact that my little brother, well our little brother is out there completely in the dark. He loves you Spence, we all love you. We're the Hastings-Montgomery-Fitz-Cavanaugh-Marin-Fields-DeLaurentis-Rivers family; we get through everything" Aria's combination of their names to name their big family had lifted Spencer's spirits considerably because although Spencer's only blood relation out there was Jason she felt that every single one of them was family. Maybe not Toby though, because that would be weird. She let out a small chuckle at the last thought before picking up her bucket of coffee and walked back out into the living room feeling like she was ready to take on the world.
Everyone had found somewhere to sit in the living room of the small apartment so it was already pretty cramped but Toby and Ezra had got the two best seats on the sofa with Mike crammed between them; they waited for the two brunette beauties to finish their talk. As soon as Spencer was stood at the door Toby looked up at her lovingly and patted his knee inviting her to come sit on him. After she had followed his instructions and was sat comfortably with his arms wrapped around her protectively, she could feel Toby's warm breath on the back of her neck and it made the whole situation a lot easier to deal with.
"You okay?" Toby whispered in her ear while they were listening in on their friend's hectic conversations.
"mhmm, I will be. Aria made me realise something that I will never forget." She moved her hips so that she could slide into the small gap between her boy friend and the chair arm with her legs were resting over Toby's and her feet perched on Mike's knee.
"And what would that be?" His big blue eyes bore into the side of her head as he waited for her to answer.
"That I have the best family in the world" A smile broke onto Toby's face which she mimicked. "I love you Toby."
"I love you too Spencer." He kissed her delicately before they both realised that the room had gone increasingly quiet.
"Why the hell can't you be like that?" Hanna hit Caleb playfully before settling back down into the nook of his arm. Spencer and Toby both laughed as they tried to cover up their embarrassment but neither of them really cared.
After a few minutes of silence there was a knock on the door which caused everyone to dig into their pockets and pull out the money they had offered to chip in. Mike paid for the pizza and soon enough they were all sat back in their places ready to get down to business.
"Right, now that we all have food is someone going to tell me what the hell is going on here?" Mike questioned. "It would be pretty good if I knew who fuck this –A person is." He was greeted with a slap on his left arm from Aria. "What the hell was that for?"
"Language!" She exclaimed which caused everyone else in the group to laugh; Aria was the one that probably swore the most despite being one with the biggest vocabulary, after Ezra of course. "But yeah, we'll tell you; I have to warn you it's a long story and it might make you rethink how you feel about all of us. Well apart from me. You have to love me"
"Okay, just get on with it then."
"Spence why don't you start? You're probably the best at explaining whatever the hell is happening to us."
"Sure" She muttered as she lifted herself up into a more comfortable position on Toby's lap and began to recount exactly how it all had started. "Well, obviously you know about Ali going missing and that part of it. But the bit you don't know is that about 2 days before Ali's body was found we" She gestured towards herself, Aria, Emily and Hanna before she continued to explain. "All got texts off of some mysterious person that claimed to know all of our secrets. At first none of us knew that all of us were getting them because we weren't exactly close. It must have been at Ali's funeral when we finally spoke to each other about it, after that it all got worse. They started threatening to ruin everything we cared about; apart from in Aria's case it wasn't just a threat. –A told your mom about your dad's affair and outed Emily. Then when me and Toby got together they did everything in their power to break us up. We got these creepy chucky dolls and mine told me to keep Toby safe so I made Emily tell him that I had been cheating on him with Wren just so that he'd stay away from me. Oh and Dr. Sullivan figured out who –A was and got kidnapped and Toby had to go find her and bring her back once Mona was put into Radley and the last thing you should probably know is that we think –A killed Ian and made it look like he'd committed suicide. Basically, we're in one huge mess." Everyone else went from looking at Spencer as she explained it all to staring at Mike expecting him to say something.
"Wait, so how did Jason, Ezra, Toby and Caleb all find out?"
"Well when Mona revealed herself to me then got put into Radley. We all thought it was safe to tell them put apparently we weren't safe. Then we found out a few months ago that Toby was one of them, but we don't talk about that because it was to get answers. Since you've been plunged into our world we thought you had the right to know; just so you're aware."
"What? Toby? Well surely that means that you had direct access to this –A person? I mean you were working with them?" Toby cleared his through as Mike referred to him being part of the A team.
"It was never really that easy, Mona gave me all the orders so I never got to meet whoever it was that gave them out. As many times as I tried to gain their trust I was just greeted with more orders from Mona."
"Oh, the other day you said something about Melissa and –A and that being the reason why you're living here Spencer, what was that about?"
"A few weeks before you came to live with us we all went to the lake house after Caleb traced a text from –A there. When we got there Toby was having a standoff with Wren and Melissa was there too. She'd never forgiven me for kissing Wren and Ian so she was sending me death threats; we still have no idea if she would have gone through with them."
"Actually, I want to know what she was thinking other than being jealous when she sent those texts. Maybe you should go see her Spence?" Hanna offered out of curiosity. "I mean, don't you want to know if she would have acted on what she said? Because if she would then she needs help!"
"Fine, I'll go talk to her. She can't just come back here and expect everything to be fine again; she's been having it pretty easy since she got back."
"Spencer, you're not going by yourself. Even if your parents are there I'm not risking that. I'll come with you." Toby tightened his grasp protectively as he said that. "Plus I want to find out what Wren actually knows, not just some bullshit excuse"
"Fine we'll go see her tomorrow; then we'll all meet back here and talk about what happens from there." Spencer looked around the room that she hadn't noticed was nearly pitch black other than the small lamp that was on a timer next to the TV. "Jesus, what time is it? 10:30. I guess we should wrap this up for the night. I'm knackered." She pushed herself up off of Toby's lap and began to stretch; her actions were mimicked by Aria, Emily and Hanna.
"Well, I'll help you tidy up in here before me and Ezra go" Aria picked up all the mugs and walked them into the kitchen on a tray. "You guys go; we have some stuff to sort out here about living arrangements"
Jason came over to Spencer to hug her before he left.
"Have I ever told you how proud I am to call you my sister?" Jason whispered into the top of her hair "We're going to do everything possible to finish this for you, for all of us. I love you Spence"
"I love you too Jason. Now go before it gets too late and you end up passing out in bed with Mike." Spencer laughed as she pushed him playfully out of the door.
About 10 minutes later Spencer, Toby, Aria, Ezra and Mike had all discussed when it would be best for them to move and the couple had left. The three of them were now stood in the living still trying to gather what had happened this evening.
"Well, I'm going to bed. Night guys" Spencer padded off into hers and Toby's bedroom to get changed and climb into bed. Toby and Mike were now stood looking around the room to see if anything needed clearing away before Toby went to bed.
"Hey Toby, is it alright if I go stay with my mom at her hotel tonight? She text me earlier saying that she had a spare bed if I wanted it. I gathered you two could use to space tonight." Mike flicked through his text to find the one from his mom that he'd received earlier to prove that he wasn't lying.
"Sure, how you going to get there? Do you want a lift?"
"Are you sure you wouldn't mind? Mom doesn't exactly have a car since she got here so she can't exactly pick me up."
"Hey it's no problem; I think Spencer and Aria would kill me if anything happened to you."
It had just turned 11 when Toby got back to the apartment and he expected Spencer to be asleep by now. She'd had a long day so she would usually be passed out in their bed. To his surprise he opened the door to a piece of folded up paper on the counter; his heart leapt into his mouth as he remembered the last time this had happened. As he opened the piece of paper there was only a sentence taking up the entire sheet.
"Come get me." Toby was confused but he knew better than to ignore Spencer's request. He followed a path that had been made out of rose petals; he expected them to stop as he reached their bed but they carried on going to the door that led to the bathroom. There was quiet music playing in their bedroom that drowned out the dull sound of the shower but he had picked up on it. He flung the door open and there she was; only covered up with a short white towel that was reached the top of her thigh, her hair pulled back into a messy bun with a few strands dangling out of the hair tie. She knew that she was driving him crazy as she slowly removed her towel and stepped into the shower; she proceeded to hide her bare body with the shower curtain.
"Are you going to come get me then?" Her voice had lowered a few octaves as she said this before biting her lip teasingly. The clothes that he was wearing were the only barrier between him and the most beautiful girl in the world that was currently in his shower. There were items of clothing flying everywhere as he rushed to go join his girlfriend in the hot stream of water.
It ended up being a long night of the pair getting lost in each other's bodies as they enjoyed the time they were given to spend together. It was the most perfect night either of them had ever experienced. When they finally fell asleep at the small hours of the morning it seemed to be over too soon.
This one was a bit longer than usual and pretty hectic. I'm sorry if the beginning seemed a bit sketchy, I wasn't entirely sure how to start it. Please, please, pleaseeeee review guys. I want to know that you think! -Chloe :-)xx