Alright Liars. Here's another chapter for you all.
I do not take credit for Pretty Little Liars.
Owned by Sara Shepard and Freeform.
Please review!
Time passes and somehow life starts to go crazy. Or is becoming more crazy than usual. Now that A is sucked back into their lives they are on edge again. It turns out that A had warned them before, that's why the note seemed to have been a second warning. Did me or the boys tell them that A had sent signs of still being around before they got any? Not a chance. Don't need them knowing I was still being targeted or snooping around without them. Which is why I didn't give them a lecture on not telling me that A had reached out from when they went to the Busy Bee Inn.
Aria is still not giving the Mike dating Mona thing a chance, so every time he invites her over she makes some type of excuse on why she leaves the room they are in or she goes out. Sometimes dragging me with her and other times on her own. Then it turns into all together her avoiding being in the house and going to the store with me if she doesn't hang with the girls.
On top of that Spencer is acting so weird lately. She looks like she hasn't been sleeping. Her eyes have circles under them, she even looks sick. When I see her at school it worries me and I have no idea what to make of it. Is it A, or is it school.
It's night now when I get a random call from Hanna while at the store for me to close up early and meet her outside. So without question I do. When I walk out there she is standing with her arms crossed, seeming agitated.
"What's up?" I lock the door behind me and walk closer.
"Have you seen Spencer?"
I raise my eyebrow, "No, why?"
"She's going crazy, Jessie. She's acting all weird."
"I've noticed. But it's not anything new. She's always having her crazy moments."
"Not like this. The last time she was acting this weird was when Toby "died" and ended up working with Mona for the A team."
"So what are you saying?" I slant my eyebrows in confusion. "You think that she is having another A moment?"
She shakes her head, "Not that type of A moment."
I slip my hands into my sweatpants pockets, "I don't get it."
She turns towards Ezra's building next door to my store. "She has something against Ezra."
I wait for her to continue, but she doesn't. "Meaning what?"
She takes a breath, "She thinks Ezra is A."
My heart sinks, my mouth slowly starts to drop and my eyes widen in shock. There is no way, and I mean NO WAY she just said that. I mean, it's Ezra. The guy who saved my life from the accident. The guy who is always there to protect me like my big brother. He has become one of my closest friends. There is just absolutely no way Spencer found out something to make him a suspect. For him of all people to take over the A game after Mona? No, he wouldn't hurt Aria like that.
I shake my head, "That's crazy."
"It's what she thinks, Jessie. She's been researching him online."
I look behind her as I see a figure walk over to Ezra's building. This person stops in front of the door, as if ringing the bell. "Then let's ask her ourselves." I point over there, "I think that's Spencer now."
Hanna turns around, then back to me. She nods, "Come on."
We ambush her just as she found someone to unlock the door for her. Hanna has a bit of a yelling fit that she is out of her mind to think that he has anything to do with this. Me of course agreeing because I can't wrap my mind around him being apart of something like this. Then Spencer begs us to come inside, just to check.
"If Ezra comes home and finds us here…" Hanna starts.
"He's not." I tell her when we get to his floor. "He went on one of his weekend trips to get his mind cleared for story ideas."
"I figured he wasn't around." Spencer says as she puts her hand up above his door to check it for something, "I've been watching his place all day."
I shake my head, "You really need to stop doing stuff like that."
She turns to me, "Well I think he rented the apartment in Ravenswood. So if we can find something that puts him there we'll have proof."
"And you want that proof to tell Aria."
She nods, "Exactly."
"What are we even looking for?" Hanna asks when Spencer bends down to the mat in front of his door.
"Primarily a key. Move." She tells her, having Hanna lift her feet up.
"Spence."
She looks up at me just as she finds it, "You know I have keys to his house right?" I rattle my keys in my pocket to make a point.
She looks at the spare key in her hand, then back to me. "Why?"
"Because I'm here often and he thought I should?"
"Then why didn't you say something before I started looking?"
"Maybe 'cause you didn't ask?"
She just gives me a bit of a look as she puts the spare into the lock. I'm not sure if she's upset because I got smart with her or because she knows that I was right.
"You're really serious about this aren't you?" Hanna asks her.
Spencer watches her for a second with her very serious Yes face and then opens the door.
"Wait." Hanna grabs onto her before she can walk inside. "Let's just say that you're right. If there's anything tying him to Ravenswood he's not keeping it here."
She watches her for a few seconds, staring at me and then glancing down. I go to turn to where she's looking when she says, "Yea you're right." she closes the door and locks it back up.
Hanna gives me a suspicious yet confused look. "That was easy." she turns back to Spencer.
"I think we are being watched." Spence whispers to us.
"What?" I whisper back, Hanna looking around.
"Don't look." Spencer says, bending down to put the key away. "Look, just follow my lead." she stands back up, inhales deeply as if she is sighing and says, "Yea. I have not been sleeping well lately. All this stuff about Ezra in my head? I don't even know what I was thinking."
I give her a very weird look, but play along. "Yea. Well school has been a bit much."
She shakes her head a few times, "No excuse. I mean, trying to convince you of all people that he's part of something sketchy? That was stupid of me."
She is completely confusing me now, "Um.."
But she doesn't give me much time to say more than that as she walks away and down the hall. Me and Hanna give each other a look and then follow behind her.
"What the hell was that?" Hanna whispers to me.
I shake my head, shrugging, "I don't know. Either she's completely losing it or someone really is watching us." I tell her. "And I honestly don't think it's him."
Spencer's crazy mood doesn't stop after this. She is convinced that Ezra is A, not only because she is sure that he rented that apartment but because of a surveillance camera she says she saw in a vent while we were at his place. She doesn't want Aria to know until we get solid evidence on him, but I still think she's out of her mind.
All I know is that the next day all three of them are on the "Ezra is A" train as they snuck into school to look through his office and I wanted nothing to do with it. I'm not going to help them figure out whether the guy who saved my life is A. Because if he is, that won't just destroy Aria, it will crush me too.
Then during the night the three girls planned on telling Aria when she gets back from her weekend with her dad over in New York at Syracuse University. But since I want nothing to do with it I stay home. It turns out though that they never get ahold of her, because I'm watching TV downstairs when she walks through the back door with Ezra.
"Jessie." her face drops a little, "You're home."
I give her a weird look, "I do live here."
She half smiles, "I just thought you'd be out. It's kind of early."
"I needed some chill time." I look at Ezra and smile. All this craziness with the girls thinking he has something to do with A not even in my mind. "You two are back together, aren't you?"
They both look at each other, then turn back to me. A smile comes across both their faces. "Yea."
"About time." I laugh and get up, "Well, I'll be upstairs. Making no noise and pretending I don't exist."
Aria starts laughing, getting my reference from Harry Potter. "That was perfect."
Ezra on the other hand looks a little confused. "I don't get it."
I shake my head a few times, "You need to get the old man into Harry Potter ASAP."
"Hey, I know Harry Potter. I just don't go to the obsession you do."
I laugh, "True."
"And I am not old."
I smile, "Keep tellin yourself that."
"Goodnight, Jessie." Aria says in a It's time to go now voice.
I start to walk away, "Yea, yea. I'm goin."
"Love you!" Aria yells behind me.
"Love you too."
"What about me?" Ezra asks in a fake sad tone.
I turn around and smile, "I guess I love you too."
"Yay." he says in a babyish voice.
We all laugh and I head out of the family room.
When they finally do find the time to talk to Aria the following night I don't find out details till Aria gets home. I'm expecting her to be devastated about the news, but instead she tells me that they had a major argument with Spencer. Apparently she found out from Ezra that Spencer has been using drugs, so her, Em and Hanna decided to talk to her about it. That's when Spencer got a little pissed and spilled her thoughts about Ezra being A. Aria thinks the drugs are making her paranoid about things, including that. They are all pretty upset with her, but Ria is pissed that she even accused Ezra of something like this.
The next day sometime after school I'm surprised when Spencer shows up at the store. I think she's desperate to get someone to listen to her. Because she rarely ever passes by.
"I need to talk to you." She says in a tired voice as she shuffles her feet through the front door and walks to where I'm sticking prices onto baseball bats.
I watch her for a second, "Hello to you too?"
She takes a deep breath, "This isn't a joke. You need to believe me about Ezra, Jessie. Don't shove what I said aside."
I sigh, getting a little annoyed with her obsession with Ezra as I put the bat I have in my hand down and have her follow me to my office. "Spence..." I sit on the end of my desk. "Why are you taking drugs?"
Her face drops, "They...they told you?"
"Duh."
She shakes her head, "Jessie. Ezra is A. It has nothing to do with the drugs."
"Stop saying that."
"I know it's hard to grasp…"
"No, it's insane to even say, Spencer."
She shakes her head, "It's really not. There's so much evidence that points to him, Jessie. I promise it has nothing to do with the drugs. I only took them to focus on this."
I shake my head, "First of all. Using drugs to focus isn't healthy."
"I know, but..."
"And two…" I don't let her finish, "It can't be him. He saved my life. What kind of person would have a heart to save someone and then have the heart to be able to torture and almost kill people?"
"A psychopath?" she asks in confusion. "Jessie, you know better than anyone that someone can switch a personality when unstable. Mona showed you both sides in the flesh. You can't think he may not be the same just because you think you know him. Because Hanna thought she knew Mona well too."
I open my mouth a few times, lost for words. "What do you want me to say about this, Spence?"
"That you believe me. That you can convince Aria that I'm not crazy, that this is happening."
I shrug, shaking my head and trying to take deep breaths. "How can I do that? I don't even know if I can believe it."
"But, Jessie..."
"Spence, you've gone through so many theories of who A can be that I can't even catch up anymore. And the fact that you are accusing someone who is so close to me doesn't make it any better."
"I know. I get it. But you have to keep an open mind incase I am right. Em and Hanna still believe me even if you and Aria don't. We have a plan to find out if he's A or not."
"Great, let me know how that goes when it backfires." I say this a little meaner than I meant to.
She gives me a sad look, "Is there more to this than just being mad that I think he's A?"
"You mean being upset with you about abusing drugs isn't enough?"
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry, just stop doing it."
She nods, "Promise."
Aria calls me a few minutes after Spencer leaves, asking me to meet her at home.
"Why? What's going on?"
"Ezra has been watching a friends cabin while he's been away and we've been going up there."
"Okay?"
"Well….okay, I'm kind of believing Spencer's randomness to him being A and I want to see if there's anything over there."
"What? Are you insane?"
"No...there was just something he said today that he shouldn't have even known about. It had to do when Spencer got sent to Radley after she thought she saw Toby dead. Something that only A would know, because I never told him."
"Okay...so why am I coming home?"
"You're coming with me to the cabin."
"What?"
"Please?"
I sigh, getting up from the stool I sit at behind the counter and start to make sure that everything is okay before closing up. "Fine. I'll be there in a bit."
Now, it turns out that Spencer isn't stopping her little drug spree, because I get a call from Andrew telling me that she just asked him for whatever it is he takes. Apparently she's asked before, and it's kind of his fault that she got hooked. He was hiding it from me before because he didn't want me to hate him, but now it's really getting bad. His stuff is proscribed by a doctor to help him focus for medical purposes. Spencer is just doing it because she's addicted now. Really? All this just to figure out if Ezra is A? Give me a break.
