1.28 - The Countdown

"So how's it going, Lockwood?" Mona said, through a tiny yet sincere smile on her face. As she walked up behind Tyler in the school hallway, she wasn't armed with her usual snide remarks that she would normally have made to Tyler. She knew too much about him now to poke fun at his painful werewolf transformation.

"Not bad, Vanderwaal," Tyler replied with his usual sneering expression, as he turned around to face Mona. "What's with the nice act?"

"Don't get used to it," Mona said with a small laugh. "We do need to talk about the dance coming up, though."

Looking around the crowded hallway, Tyler put his hand on Mona's arm and guided her into a nearby empty classroom so that no one would accidentally hear their secret plans, "So is this like a date then?" he whispered to Mona, their faces were now inches apart from each other but this time Mona couldn't make herself push him away, could she be falling for this pretentious rich boy?

"If you want to call it that." Mona murmured back to Tyler, "but don't get any ideas, Tyler. Were doing this for Hanna and the rest of the girls. Save all that romantic dating stuff until after we're done with this plan."

"Hm, then why haven't you moved since we walked in here?" Tyler said, maintaining his same grin. He finally had Mona exactly where he always wanted her to be, yet, he couldn't shake this feeling that she meant more to him than any other girl that he had tried to date. Looking down at his feet nervously, he spoke up in a normal volume, "So what time should I come pick you up then?"

Mona looked down shyly and looked back directly into Tyler's eyes, matching his grin,"7?" she replied as she began to turn around on her brightly colored stiletto heels.

Before she could exit the door, Tyler grabbed Mona's hand and looked into her eyes with an intense, yet almost kind expression that Mona had neither scene nor ever expected to see from Tyler. "So it's definitely a date then?" Tyler spoke up, in an anxious yet defiant tone.

As Mona turned her head, then, without any words, she nodded. "Don't forget, 7 PM. And my corsage better be no less than 80 to 100 dollars." There was the Old Mona.

Reluctantly letting go of Mona's hand, Tyler let out a small chuckle, "Of course," he spoke back. As he watched Mona walk out the classroom door, he couldn't believe this was happening. Former rich play boy Tyler Lockwood was falling for resident geek-turned-popular girl, Mona Vanderwaal. Ever since he had started helping Mona with her '-A plans,' he couldn't help but feel like he had finally found his equal and most importantly, someone that he could share the burden of his werewolf secrets with. As he prepared himself to ditch this school for the rest of the day, his thoughts were consumed with his future date with Mona. Even though this was all part of a bigger plan, Tyler had decided that his eyes, and maybe even heart, were going to be set on winning Mona over, once and for all.


Sitting on her window sill with her journal in her lap, Aria stared at her window in a deep contemplative state. With all that had happened in her life, thus far, this was the first moment that she had to herself alone, away from all of the crazy -A drama and vampires that had decided to enter her life. However, with the sudden alarming sound of the door bell, Aria was thrown back into this reality.

As Aria opened the door, she gave a gleeful smile, "Stefan," she spoke in a cheerful tone. Although she had kept her promise to -A and had tried to keep her distance from Stefan, she couldn't resist the temptation of running up and flinging her arms around her vampire sort-of-boyfriend. With all this -A drama, she wasn't sure what to call Stefan at this point.

"Hey, I hope it's okay that I came by," Stefan replied, popping his face from under the bouquet of flowers that he was holding, "Also I brought you these."

As Aria extended her hand towards the enormous arrangement of brightly colored flowers, she couldn't wipe off the enormous smile on her face, "You got me flowers? Thanks," she said as she lead Stefan into her house and they continued to walk into her kitchen to search for a vase to put them into.

"Well, I thought it was the least I could do. Plus, I also wanted to ask you something." Stefan responded, as his voice trailed off towards the end of his sentence. Then, before Aria could turn around from filling the vase up with water, in a flash, Stefan was facing her, "Now I know I don't want to mess up this whole -A dance plan up, but since we're both going, would you want to be my date?" Stefan continued, through his sincere yet pleading stare.

Pursing her lips to the side of her mouth, Aria looked back up at Stefan, "Are you sure it's okay?" she muttered, "I mean, you told me that you got that same text from -A. I don't want anything bad to happen to you."

At the sight of Aria's distressed expression, Stefan put both of his hands on Aria's petite shoulders, "It won't."

Aria put down the vase and gave Stefan a serious look, "How can you be sure?"

"Because I love you, and no crazy -A person is going to stop me from being with my girlfriend, because remember what I said to you, I will always protect you, Aria, always."

Aria smiled at Stefan, without any words, she put her hands on Stefan's face and kissed him. After weeks of fighting with herself and trying to stay away from Stefan, she had finally given into her temptations. Reciprocating her actions, Stefan held Aria's porcelain face, and at this moment, they both had someone to rely on, someone to depend upon, they didn't feel so alone anymore.

As Stefan slowly pulled his face away, he pulled out a secondary gift from his bag. "Plus, if you're still afraid to go out with -A on the loose, I thought that we could just stay in tonight, since we have a lot of catching up to do," he whispered, showing Aria a series of all of her favorite, classic movies.

Looking back at Stefan, Aria couldn't contain her happiness. Even though things were about to change because of the -A dance plan, she just wanted to live within this one, blissful moment of normalcy between her and her now, definite, boyfriend, "I love that idea," she spoke back, giving Stefan one last quick kiss, "and yes, I'll go to the dance with you."


"So everyone understands the plan, right?" Spencer spoke, in a serious and urgent tone.

"Yeah, we get it, Spence." Hanna sniped, "It's not that hard to follow."

"Han, this is serious. If this plan doesn't work then we all lose to -A," Spencer sniped right back, "And then who knows what will happen to us? We'll probably all be dead."

A silence fell over the room as all of the girls, plus Stefan and Damon, stood within the Salvatore mansion living room. As the day of the dance was fast approaching, all of them were becoming increasingly anxious about the result of their '-A plan.'

"Easy, Hanna," Damon smirked, "Just listen to Spencer and hope she knows what she's talking about."

Spencer rolled her eyes, "Anyway, Stefan. Damon. I'm putting you both on Klaus and Katherine duty. If they show up, which they probably will, and go after Alison or any one of us, just have our backs, okay?"

Aria's widened her eyes fearfully. Stefan gently squeezed her hand and looked back at Spencer, "Got it," he said.

"Alison and Emily," Spencer continued, turning her head to face her friend, "You stay hidden in the crowds for as long as possible. Also, Em, make sure Jeremy is safe." Spencer whispered, her voice trailing off at that last part. Emily nodded at Spencer and then looked downwards in slight embarrassment.

"Are you sure that this is even going to work?" Alison whispered in a forceful tone.

"No." Spencer answered back, "But let's just hope it does."

"Well that's hopeful," Aria muttered as she crossed her arms, "I don't know how much longer I can take all of this, you guys,"

With nervous glances, everyone looked back at the tiny Aria and then back to Spencer. Although everyone understood the carefully thought out details of the -A plan, there was still a sense of hesitation that loomed over all of their minds. Suddenly, their plaguing thoughts were interrupted by a familiar, ringing sound. Without thinking, everyone removed their phones from their pockets and stared at the message. Spencer read it aloud:

"What fun. All of my favorite people in one space.

This should be a night to remember." - A