Chapter 2
It's been another month, ten weeks total since she 'died' and went on the run.
She's learnt which of the inexpensive pre-packaged foods are cheapest and how to weave enough of a story that she can do some petty cash-in-hand tasks when she starts to run low on money. Stays active enough that she doesn't think people recognize her, moves through the shadows with a dull grey hood drawn over her head.
(She doesn't like black anymore, it's way too anonymous and anyway, she can't afford the expense)
In every mirror she passes, every store-front window and reflective surface, she sees herself and doesn't recognize the girl with ashy hair that's halfway blonde and halfway black – the colour is washing out, fading, taking deep black colour to a dulled sort of dark. In the end she buys a costume wig, says it's for a theatre role. It's heavy on her head, itches and the fit isn't as good as it could be but it's the best she can do.
It means another week of toast and peanut butter in a motel room, but that's okay.
0o0o0o0
Her nomadic habit begins to have its drawbacks: every motel room looks just the same, one bed sloppily made with cheap linens, a functional set of furniture and a few kitchen appliances. Déjà vu kicks in, and she spends – loses – days convinced that she's been in this room, this motel before. It doesn't matter that she keeps with her a map of the United States, and maps of every state and marks in circles the cities in which she stays, the paranoia and familiarity creep into her bones.
(these are the times where she curls up in the most advantageous corner she can find, body ready to leap up and fight if she has to)
She learns how to wash clothes in the shower and bathroom sink, using the free soaps provided, and hangs them on the communal clothesline to dry when it's sunny. If the weather is bad, she cracks windows open and hangs the clothes in the bathroom.
So much for looking decent: her clothes end up crumpled and creased because of wringing them out, and they don't feel soft. A shirt gets snagged on her fingernail, so she rips out the hem and slashes it an inch shorter, calls it DIY trendy. It's okay though, it saves the money of laundromats. Saves her having to engage with others and risk saying the wrong thing.
It's cheap and drab, and she misses dearly being able to have things properly laundered, the way clothes feel when they're fresh from the laundry and fully intact.
There are more advantages than disadvantages though so she grits her teeth and gets along with it.
0o0o0o0
She develops a system: when she gets to a new town she makes a beeline for the local bureau and finds out free things to do. Then she finds a café, someone new to buy her lunch and makes her way to the nearest motel.
Each of the next three days is allocated to museum and art gallery and library, staring at exhibits she doesn't care to learn about and books she doesn't want to read. Sometimes she picks up a thick fiction and camps out in the back of the library until closing time, tries desperately not to miss closing.
One evening she discovers a little hidden room in the library, hunkered over some dead author's doorstop of a novel, and so she takes her book there, buys vending machine snacks to tide her over.
At some point she falls asleep, knees drawn up to her chest and head drooping with the effort of keeping awake over such a wordy book. No-one comes to shake her awake during the night,
(because there's no-one to care, she remembers when she awakes the next morning with stiff knees that crack when she stretches out her legs and a sore neck from being hunched over the book)
and it occurs to her that she's just found a free new place to sleep.
After the three days she roams aimlessly, hopping on and off buses to see where they will take her. There are free concerts, city-sponsored events in the parks and it's always a case of food in exchange for a small cost, so small in fact that she can hand over a palmful of coins and the people running the tables will smile and ask what drink she wants, wish her a pleasant day.
It breaks up the monotony of hunting through her loose change for another vending-machine meal, and the first time she gets a burger she ignores the fact that it's generic and made to cater to a dozen other people, devours it because it's hot and substantial and has at least some taste to it.
Behind her face-masking sunglasses, she's just another girl with an awkward dye-job taking in the last of the good weather.
0o0o0o0
City-hopping takes a lot of time, she realizes. Whenever she'd thought about running off, travelling cross-country she'd never quite taken into account how much time would be spend on travel. Taking planes as needed, or sitting in the backseat while her parents alternated driving never taught her just how much time she'd need to allocate to going from one place to the next. She never knew just how long you might have to wait for the next bus if you missed one, never really gave much thought to how long a train might take travelling between states.
It works out though because she brings her thrift-store novels to the depots and stations, reads and writes, tries her hand at sketching.
It's a way to kill time.
0o0o0o0
Movies and theatre.
They're two things she has overlooked a bit until now, but she has a better grasp on how to travel and knows the best ways to bluff her way around. She learns that if a theatre isn't sold out, then she can get a discounted ticket – only if she has the money – and that sometimes people hang out in the lobby alone hoping to find company for the evening's entertainment. Even better, she learns that if she plays dumb she can convince someone she's actually smart and then they're paying her way in because they're happy to have the company.
Sometimes she works the pre-show lobby as if she's the one on stage, pretends to have lost her wallet or ticket or money and someone will take pity on her, buy her a new ticket.
They never see her again, or the money, but she's learnt the art of survival.
On other times, she works things so well that she gets invited to dinner, lunch or offered a place to stay.
She flashes her Vivian Darkbloom smile and agrees readily.
(free food, free comfortable place to stay, what's not to like?)
She's gone before dawn, stealing a sandwich and bottle of water for the road and leaving the trail of her perfume as proof that she was ever there.
0o0o0o0
So she knows how to kill a week, knows how to get someone to buy her food and entertainment.
Knows how to play to someone's ego, how to make intelligent remarks on a play she's seen and make her companion feel like they're the only person on her radar.
Not bad for a sheltered girl, and her teeth glow with the soft candlelight as she smiles prettily.
0o0o0o0
Thanksgiving is rapidly approaching and for the better part of a day she debates with herself about going home for a sneak visit. If she's very careful, maybe she can trick A and fly so low under the radar that only her parents and brother will see her, then slip out with fresh clothes and extra money.
It's getting colder, she can see her breath when she exhales and coffees don't stay hot for as long as they could.
In the end, she decides against it. Uses the money on a thrift-store winter coat and gloves, picks up a few hours house-cleaning to top up her stash. It means a couple of nights sleeping in the library's hidden room, but at least she'll be warm. Her hands shake from the cold and when she flirts her way into a meal she's always conscious to pick something hot.
(doesn't know when the next one will be, after all)
She struggles to figure out what she's going to do for Thanksgiving, there's a shelter a couple of streets over which is hosting a hot lunch. Turkey and vegetables, all the trimmings. It's mainly a matter of pride: she's Alison DiLaurentis.
Nostalgia wins out though because technically right now she isn't Alison, she's Vivian and it doesn't matter who she is because either way she wants a Thanksgiving dinner. If she can't be with her family and friends then she can at least have a tableful of the same foods she's grown up knowing every Thanksgiving.
No, she decides, she isn't too prideful for a lunch hosted by a shelter.
0o0o0o0
The day works out fine. The food is excellent, and she takes a bit of everything.
She doesn't recall ever appreciating volunteers so much, considers doing some of her own volunteer work at some point. Changes her mind by the time she's walking out the door to return to her latest motel room, because as always she can't risk connecting with someone, can't risk getting too settled into the one place and being recognized.
(once she's recovered from the food she buys hair dye and touches up her colour)
0o0o0o0
It's the end of the year and doubly painful because Christmas is coming up, and she wonders what Rosewood is doing, wonders if they are doing the same trees and street decorations as last year or if they have something else. Already there are decorations out on the street, popping up overnight and it's barely December. Tinsel decorates the inside of store windows, drooping at the ends, and various displays of lights sparkle, printing themselves on her eyelids when she blinks.
She remembers Emily and how much she loved Christmas, how Aria would always try to make unique gifts and how Spencer would be competitive even with decorating and gift-wrapping. Remembers how her parents made conscious efforts to put aside all arguments, how she'd steal extra candy and blame Jason.
Snow swirls lightly around her as she crosses the street, roaming through a more residential area. Here, there are snowmen on every street, every window lit up with either coloured or white lights, and a few stray pine needles on the pavement. There is tinsel coiled around each lamppost, and if she listens closely she's sure she can hear a combination of bells and Christmas carols being played inside.
It's not unlike Rosewood.
By comparison, the motel is even sadder when she returns: one small fake tree is in the foyer, done up as if it was simply brought out of storage, decorations still on, and the reception desk has a couple of small decorations. She wonders how long the decorations will last; they look as if they have been stored and brought out every year for the last decade, and they don't look as though they will survive this festive season.
Her room is cold and dull, the only signs of life are her supply of food and the remade bed.
It's the price of survival.
0o0o0o0
She isn't stupid, never has been.
This is why she finds herself buying a very cheap and basic burner phone and making notecards for the supermarket's advertising board, offering her housecleaning services. It's extra holiday money, something more to do and she can't hang around here forever. Other people will have holiday stress, the added concerns of visiting relatives and Christmas cooking and dealing with gifts.
She doesn't have anything to stress about beyond surviving one day to the next. To do that though, she needs money, so she picks a number, calls it a special 'holiday rate'. Call Holly, she prints on each of the cards, tacks them on various supermarket walls. Cash only.
She'll risk staying here a bit longer for the season, then go.
It's a big city and she was right, there are people who just don't have enough hours in the day. Some people let her in and leave her there with a bucket of cleaning supplies, others work around her. It's the most human interaction she's had in weeks, and watching other happy families go about their lives stings worse than ever.
She cleans silently, scrubs mirrors and vacuums floors until her ears ring.
(doesn't have a manicure to wreck, doesn't have an iPod to drown out the noise)
It becomes a habit to assess each house, eyeing the various jewellery on casual display. It'd be so easy to pocket a necklace from this house, diamond earrings from that one and pawn them a few cities later. The phone is going in the train stations' trash anyway, she'll never see these people again, it was their fault for not checking references…
No. It's too risky, she can't chance the thefts being reported. Even if her alias has another persona, she doesn't want to worry about being chased for theft as well as everything else.
Instead, she continues polishing furniture until she's sure she's about high from the fumes and collects her money. Some of the women – housewives, she guesses – give her small parcels of food, things that won't go off too quickly. Dinner, with the help of the microwave that she's always sure is about to blow up, works out best on the days she's spent cleaning.
The stash in her backpack grows steadily and she spends some time counting it all out, folding the notes discreetly into a couple of small boxes and tins in a secret pocket.
0o0o0o0
So she spends her first Christmas as a dead girl cleaning houses and eating microwaved handouts in a ratty motel. She can't go home for fear of being stalked, and she's going to be picking up and moving on soon. At least she has a decent stash of money with her, at least she's learning that she can rely upon herself.
It's survival.