With Ali's remains dug up, we were forced to rebury her. This time however, my parents decided on a section inside the mausoleum, that way she couldn't be dug up again. The service was solemn, and Jason and I stayed longer for the little private service for my friends.

"Are you okay?" he asked. I nodded.

"I just wish this would just end…maybe I shouldn't have come back to Rosewood after all-" I thought of Toby and what I had seen during the storm.

"I'm sorry Madeline." Jason cut me off and I snapped my head up to stare at him.

"No, I didn't mean it that way Jason. You didn't do anything. I'm just-" I didn't get to finish as the girls entered…well, except for my half-sister.

We waited for a while before deciding to get on with it, but it seemed like bad luck, as Spencer stormed in with a look of hurt on her face, and told Jason our sister had been pregnant when she'd died. I nearly stumbled back in shock, while Jason stormed out in anger, finding out it had been that Detective Wilden at the station.

Spencer ran off, avoiding confrontation, and I debated chasing Jason or her, but I needed answers and ran after her.

I passed by Toby's mother's grave and noticed his name scratched onto the marble and my eyes welled up with tears. I knew his mom…she used to bake cookies for Toby and me…

We'd been friends for a long time after all, then distant friends, then best friends…and now…I'd tried calling a thousand times, but he hadn't picked up.

Thinking of that sweet woman's grave being vandalized cut me as deep as the marble had been, but I continued out the door after Spencer.

"Spencer!" I called her a dozen times before she finally turned around and gave me an exasperated, annoyed look. "I know. I know about him and what's he done to us." Her eyes widened. "I saw him run out from your house during the storm…I thought I was seeing things, hallucinating after that episode at Aria's place but…I've had a lot of time to think about it, and he hasn't answered my calls. Seeing him like that, in that black hoodie…his expression…it looked deadly."

Spencer gulped. "You can't tell anybody."

"So it is true. You just confirmed my worst fears. God, I'd hoped you would say I'm crazy."

"So you're not going after Jason?" she asked, eager to change the subject, folding her arms across her chest.

I shook my head. "I needed to talk to you first."

"Well, now you have, so bye." She smiled fakely, and stormed off, leaving me by myself in the cemetery.

The next morning I was getting ready for school when my phone beeped with a message. It said that if anyone else found out about Toby's betrayal, Mike or Jason would get hurt, maybe even fatally.

I wanted to break down and cry. My best friend wasn't giving me any answers that I could use to clear his name, and Spencer was lashing out, which left me, all alone, unable to release any of these secrets because if I'd lost one of the three most important boys in my life, I wouldn't let anything happen to the other two.

I walked downstairs into the kitchen where Jason was speaking with 'Dad' on the phone, telling him what Spencer had said last night. Judging by how much Jay was talking, obviously our 'father' wasn't able to say much due to shock or anger.

I quickly ate and Jason was still on the phone by the time I'd come back downstairs from brushing my teeth. I waved him goodbye, and rushed to school.

I was entering the school grounds when I overheard Spencer being kicked off her decathlon team and telling off Mona for taking away everything from her. I looked around and spotted Mike inside, walking through the hall, and eager to get away from the drama, I ran after him, wanting to kiss him so I could momentarily forget all this apparent treachery coming from the person I thought I knew more than any other on the face of the planet.

The person who could detect my lies, the person I could see through his lies as well…I guess he'd just become too good of a liar, even by our standards.

I spent as much time as possible with Mike that day. He had a therapy session that day, and I went with him, agreeing to grab a quick dinner on the way home at Taco Bell or something.

By the time I got home though, there were bottles of beer all over the front of the house, and Emily was with Jason, throwing the bottles away.

I realized this was some sick joke on A's part and I wanted to kill Mona for doing this to my family. All of this. And if she'd dragged my best friend into this…did he know Mona sent me texts as well? Was he the one to send them? Everything was so unclear and my mind was overflowing with questions regarding Toby.

"What happened here?" I asked aloud, alerting the two that I was there.

Jay turned towards me and frowned. "Some prank…hey, I got to go to Dad's old apartment and look through some boxes for that apology photo frame Ali gave Dad as her bribe with Emily. Want to come?"

"Um, I'll meet you there. I want to just finish up my homework first and put my things away." I smiled and he nodded.

"Alright." He headed towards the garage with my friend. "We'll see you there." I saluted him as a send-off and headed inside to put my things away.

I trudged upstairs to my room and let my things fall off my shoulder and crash to the floor. I'd already completed all my homework; I'd really just wanted to be alone for a few minutes. I looked around the room at my countless photo frames, focusing on the pictures in each of them.

Some with Ali…the girls…one or two with the family, one with Jason, Ali, and me- right before we all grew apart and became…well, drunks, bitches, and followers respectively. Not really a follower…just innocent and eager to listen to Ali. If only I could go back to that time when the picture was taken, and really treasure it…if I could freeze it and preserve it…

I kept looking at the photos. Plenty of cutesy ones with Mike all over…and in one of those frames on the wall that allowed multiple pictures with the italic words 'best friends' to connect them all together.

I froze and my eyes welled up with tears. I swallowed and looked. All of the photos were of Toby and me. Throughout the years, at different events and hangouts…Both of us smiling, laughing…having innocent fun like kids should have. Why couldn't things still be like that?

I couldn't cry now though. I couldn't let the A team beat me like this. They had cracked Spencer, but they couldn't crack me. No way. I wouldn't snap. I absolutely refused.

I went down to the apartment complex Jason had gone to, and once I got out of the elevator they were in front of it, the photo frame in Emily's hands.

"Oh. You found it already." I blinked, feeling useless.

"Em did. C'mon, we'll discuss it on the ride down." We headed into the elevator and they quickly filled me in on this whole Cece-Wilden-Ali things from that summer.

Then the elevator screeched to a halt and shook. The lights blinked and went out, quickly replaced with emergency lights. Jason sounded the alarm for the emergency on the wall with all the buttons and we waited. We realized soon though we had to get out, because this elevator was going down, judging by how much the elevator was moving about.

Emily got out first, while I had a mini panic attack. A second one in less than a week, not a good sign.

"Mads, you need to climb out now. Em is right there. You'll be okay. Breathe. Breathe." He coached me from the door, not able to let the doors shut.

"But what about you?" Emily called from the shaft and I stood up shaking, knowing that this elevator was going down in less than a few minutes. So I managed to duck under Jason and get onto the same ladder rungs on the side of shat like Emily had.

I should never have come. I hadn't done anything anyway.

Plus, what happened to the elevator? It had been fine going up. Someone did something to sabotage it. Just as I was safely on the side though, the cables snapped, and the elevator plummeted down the shaft…with Jason still in it.

"JASON!" I screamed, wanting to let go of the side of the shaft and jump after him. Oh god, how could he survive that?

He did survive though, luckily, by some miracle. He was stuck in a neck brace and everything though in the hospital. Emily went to go get him some water and I sat there by his bedside, still crying like I had been ever since he'd been put into the ambulance.

"I'm alive Mads, you don't need to cry anymore."

I wondered if Spencer had told someone, and if that was why Jason had almost died. Because someone knew.

"But you could have died!" I cried out for the thousandth time.

"But I'm not." He argued back. I heard the four girls outside the room, and I needed to know if they knew about Toby or not. I needed to know if Spencer had told them. I couldn't let Jason or Mike die because of me and my friends' mistakes. I hastily wiped at my mascara, hoping it hadn't run much, and hurried out of the room, saying I'd be right back.

But it seemed only seconds after I'd left Jason, a nurse came up to us and said Jason was gone. We rushed into the room and pushed the curtain aside…with only an empty bed there to greet us.

Jason had either got up and left…or the people trying to kill him took him, probably to finish the job.

This time, I fell to the ground and broke into wracking sobs. For Jason, for Toby, for my friends, for Ali, and most of all, for myself.


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