Aria closed her eyes and breathed heavily. Once, the simple beep of her phone was something she anticipated; a message from her friends asking her to hang out or a message sharing a juicy gossip about someone or something. But now that beep always made Aria's heart skip a beat… and not in a good way.
Aria sat up and took the phone from her purse. Her heart beating fast, she pushed the light on to the phone. Message from a locked number. Right away Aria realized that can only mean a one thing. "You kiss, I tell. –A". Aria knew this was coming, she knew that 'A' already knows about Ezra, but she did not want to acknowledge it. Not until now.
"Guys, I need to tell you something.", Aria said as she met her friends Spencer, Hannah and Emily at the Rosewood High library. The library had become a hang out point for them, a place where they were able to be un-noticed, especially before the first period class. Spencer handed Aria one of the to-go coffee cups she was holding and told Aria to go on. "So, don't freak out. This has been going on for a while now, but I did not want to tell you guys before I knew that it is actually the real deal. The only ones who know are me, him, and unfortunately A", Aria said, looking at the girls seriously. "Oh my god, you are pregnant", Hannah said, a bit too loudly because the librarian looked sternly at the girls and shushed. "Hannah, god no. But this has something to do with a guy though. I am in love", Aria said and blushed a bit. She had no idea how to lead the girls to the point in which she would reveal that it was , Ezra, their English teacher she was in love with. And that he was in love with her.
Since the day Mr. Fitz started at Rosewood High, girls had been drooling over him; those eyes and the slightly girly brown hair made the girls crazy. Suddenly girls who only read Cosmopolitan before were into classics and poetry; and of course in their eyes Mr. Fitz was the perfect person to discuss those books with. The first day of the new school year, in the first English class, both Spencer and Hannah had admitted that Mr. Fitz truly was nice to look at. Aria just nodded and stayed silent; already at that point she had shared something with Ezra which probably would not make him the teacher of the year if people were to know.
"Well, what is so bad about that?", Emily said, "Isn't that a good thing?". Aria took a sip from her coffee and placed it down on a table next to her. "The thing is, I am in love with someone I probably should not be in love with". "Oh my god, you are in love with like a prisoner or something", Hannah said, her mouth hanging open.
"Oh Hannah, just stay quiet", Spencer said and told Aria to continue. She was intrigued and wanted to know more. There had to be something in this because A had acknowledged it. "I am in love with Mr. Fitz", Aria said. Spencer, Emily and Hannah all became silent. And then Hannah and Emily started to laugh. Spencer looked at Aria, waiting for her to declare it as a joke. But Aria just kept looking at Hannah and Emily, understanding why they were laughing. Probably every other girl in Rosewood High was in love with Ezra. But Ezra was only in love with her.
"You cannot be serious", Hannah said and leaned on Emily, who was still laughing. Spencer had remained quiet the whole time, and Aria saw from the way she was looking at her that she understood that this love for Mr. Fitz was not just a one-sided thing.
"I met him before the school started; we made out and saw a couple of times. I knew that he was older than me, and worked as a teacher, but I had no idea that he would be teaching us here. Neither did he." Aria saw that Spencer was tracking her brain, trying to come out with questions. "So, does Ezra know about A? And what does A exactly know about Ezra? ", Spencer asked and shushed at Hannah and Emily.
"Ezra knows nothing about A", Aria said and looked at the girls, "but A knows everything about Ezra".