Disclaimer: Still don't own it
Sorry for the extremely late update but the holiday was quite chaotic for me and I am glad that it's over so expect some normalcy for now on. Once again, a special thanks to Paraddicted for the pre-read.
Well this was unexpected.
I was hoping to either finding Alison or her sister stalking about outside; not my former boyfriend hiding in the trees.
At this point, I was once again in a conundrum; do I go back inside and tell Caleb that Mike is out here or just leave it be? Given what was said about me earlier, the temptation to let Mike do what he wanted was really great since it would allow me a bit of revenge. Let Mike form a more negative opinion of his sister; especially with the dead body not far from here.
Then again, that might cause problems for him down the line. My mother had always taught me that family was important, and Mike needed to be close to his. This meant that any animosity that he had with Aria needed to be resolved so that he wouldn't go down my path. Having him join me in death because of what I had done in life was not on the agenda.
Since he seemed to be just hiding in the woods and watching, I made my way over to him to make sure that he was alone. Luckily for me, there was no one else next to him and I was curious to how he got here; making wonder if he had followed the others here. He was dressed in a similar fashion as the incident at Alison's place a few days ago; allowing him to blend into the environment quite well.
Making sure that he was sticking around, I decided to go and get Caleb before Mike could escape.
For the fun of it, I entered the cabin the same way I had left just a minute earlier; with a bang of the door. The sudden noise from the door as well as the icy wind seemed to have startled the girls except for Hanna while Caleb just gave me a glare. The lights flickered and everyone physically shivered as my presence chilled the air around me. I stood there for a minute, kind of enjoying the scene; though I did get bored after a while.
"We have a problem," I said and Caleb glanced in my direction to show that he was listening to me.
"Mike is here," I stated and he looked at me in both confusion and surprise. Unfortunately, that caught Ezra's attention as well as everyone else.
"What is it?" Aria asked, curious to Caleb's sudden reaction while Hanna looked slightly nervous.
"You idiot," I said, shaking my head and sighing.
"I thought I heard something outside," Caleb said and he slowly moved to the window to glance outside.
Ezra did the same with the other window while the girls looked around for some sort of weapon; which I hope that they wouldn't use. He subtly glanced in my direction and I pointed to where Mike had been stationed. He nodded and focused his gaze, looking towards where I had pointed while trying to keep out of sight himself. Motioning at Ezra, the older man looked to the back door.
"Do you see someone?" Emily asked, and I could hear the concern in her voice.
"It might be A; I say we go out there and take the b*** down," Hanna said and she looked quite driven.
"And if she has a gun?" Spencer inquired, trying to make Hanna listen to reason. There was a time for bravery, and this was not it in my opinion.
"A never carries a gun," Hanna answered and I just rolled my eyes since she seemed to have forgotten about Shana or me for that matter.
"Well this A could; maybe Mona fighting back taught this A a lesson," Spencer argued and I recognized the lawyer tone from her parents.
"Which is why it might be best that you girls stay here while I go and sneak up on our intruder," Ezra said, pulling out what looked like a gun.
"Since when are you packing?" Hanna asked, startled by the weapon.
"It's a stun gun and I started carrying it after Mona died," Ezra answered, and I was surprised it took this long for him to carry a weapon given what happened with Shana.
"Just be careful; we don't know if it is A and I don't want someone hurt," Caleb stated and Ezra nodded as he moved out the back door that was in the lone bedroom.
"If Mike gets hurt, you taking him to the hospital will be the least of your worries," I growled, issuing a threat of sorts. Caleb was startled by my statement and once again, the temperature of the room went down.
"Why is it so cold in here suddenly?" Aria asked as she shivered and her breath be seen.
"Have you guys noticed that has been happening a lot lately? My room was freezing the night of Mona's funeral," Spencer informed the group and Caleb gave me a look.
"I don't remember getting mad at Spencer's," I stated and was perplexed.
Then again, it was my first night back as a ghost and therefore my emotions had to have been running pretty high that night.
"I think it's just us; we have been running a marathon since Mona died," Hanna said and truth be told, what she said didn't make a whole lot of sense. But it was nice to hear her covering for me none the less.
"Running a marathon?" Emily asked and I could hear the slight mocking in her voice.
"Have any of us really taken a vacation ever in the last few years? It has been one thing or another since this whole thing started," Hanna said and I had to admit that she was right.
"You mean the thing that Mona started back when I returned," Aria accused and I glared at the shorter girl, taking a step towards her. Caleb saw this and moved to make an interception if it was needed.
"If we are going to start accusing people of starting things, then we have to point the finger at Alison; she was the one who made all of this happen," Emily declared, and I was once again amazed on how much she has grown since the end of her being a fan girl to Alison.
"You know, something occurred to me the other day; did Alison know that Mona was A all along?" Spencer asked and every one of us stopped to think about that.
"I don't think so; if Ali knew that Mona was A then she would have killed her and took her place a long time ago," Aria said and I nodded in agreement.
"Unless Alison and her partner used Mona just as she used us," Emily reasoned and that was something that never occurred to me.
Contrary to popular belief, all the deaths in Rosewood were not because of me. Sure, I might have been the catalyst behind those many demises, but I was not the direct cause. I had always believed that other people were killing each other because they had secrets to hide, but there was a chance that I had been wrong; it could be that someone alone was responsible for bumping off all those people.
Before we could all ponder further, Ezra appeared at the front door and looked a little worn and disheveled.
"He got away," Ezra said as he breathed heavily and Aria went to his side to give him a hug; the loving girlfriend that she was.
"He?" Spencer asked, her tone indicating that that she wanted to know more.
"I got a good look at his face when we fought; it was Mike," Ezra stated; everyone but me and Caleb looked shocked.
"Why would Mike be out there?" Aria asked with her voice full of shock and concern. I was equally alarmed that he had followed the girls here, and hoped that he wasn't seen by A if she knew about this visit.
"He must have followed us after we picked you up from your house," Emily said and it made sense given his recent activities.
"But why? And has he been doing this for a while?" Spencer inquired and everyone looked at Aria for an answer while Caleb glanced in my direction.
"Been back for only a few days; don't look at me for what my former boyfriend is doing," I said, kind of lying and shrugging my shoulders. I suppose I should have told Caleb about the trio, but I just couldn't since it might lead to trouble. He seemed to buy it and turned his head back to Aria.
"He has been acting weird for a while now, and I just thought it was because of the funeral and his visit to Mona's house. Especially when he brought back that book he has been reading," Aria informed and my curiosity peaked.
"What book?" I asked, more than interested.
"What book?" Caleb asked Aria, repeating my words.
"I haven't managed to get a closer look at it, but it was dark pink with a blue bookmark," Aria informed and my eyes widened since I knew full well what the book was.
"Uh oh," I said out loud and Caleb's head whipped towards my direction. The way he looked at me, I knew he was asking me on what was wrong.
"The book is my diary from when Alison was tormenting me back during freshman year. I used to write down all the bad things that she did to me so that I could use them to drive me to become A. I also wrote down all the times that the rest of the girls just stood by and did nothing; complaining that they did nothing to stop her," I informed him and I sighed while he looked grim.
"What is it?" Emily asked, seeing Caleb's sudden change in behavior; lucky for me, he was fast on his feet for excuses.
"Didn't you tell me once that Mona used to write down things in diaries and that she wrote a lot during the time before you guys became friends?" Caleb asked Hanna, giving her a look that he wanted her to say yes.
"Yeah; she had a lot of colorful ones," Hanna answered, taking Caleb's subtle hint.
"Wait, if Mike has Mona's diaries then he possibly has a gold mine of information," Spencer said and I sighed since she didn't seem to understand what was going on.
"Not if all they detail is what Alison did to Mona and that we just stood by, letting it happen," Aria objected and it looked like she understood the problem.
"So Mike might hold us responsible for what happened to Mona," Emily said and Hanna nodded.
"Mona wasn't exactly an innocent person in all this; she did do some pretty brutal things to all of us," Spencer argued, mimicking her parents in a sense; which I found hilarious since she tried to distance herself from them as much as possible.
"Neither are we; our parents taught us better and we didn't stand up to Alison when we were supposed to. Now because of that, we are trying to make sure that we at least make it to graduation," Hanna argued back and it was nice to see someone taking responsibility for their actions.
That was the thing that had always angered me about the girls; their lack of taking responsibility for the bad things they had done. Sure, I had made their lives a living Hell but it wasn't like I was working with nothing. They had chosen to do what they did and just looked the other way while other's suffered. So for Spencer to put all the blame on me just made her a hypocrite in my opinion.
"Hanna's right; we all have sins we are responsible for," Ezra said and I nearly snorted since some of us had far more sins than others. But he was making Hanna's case for her so I couldn't complain.
"So what are we going to do about Mike; if he's read Mona's diary then he probably blames us for what happened to her," Aria said and I shared her concern.
"Well we need to talk to him; let him know that we are trying to find Mona's killer," Emily said, which was better said than done. I had a stubborn boyfriend who never listened to others which was why he ignored everyone and continued to date me.
"How do you propose we do that?" Spencer asked, looking skeptical; which sort of made sense since she and Melissa never really acted like real siblings. I blamed both of them for that.
"Suggest that Hanna talks to Mike; I have a plan," I told Caleb and I hoped that he wouldn't argue with me about it.
"I think Hanna should talk to Mike alone at school," Caleb said simply, a little more forceful than I would have liked.
"Why her?" Aria asked, looking at Hanna in confusion.
"Because Mona was my friend and Mike knows that," Hanna said, understanding what Caleb was saying. Contrary to popular opinion, Hanna was just as smart as the rest of the girls.
"So what are we going to do about Cece? Should we call the cops?" Emily asked and everyone looked like they were pondering for an answer.
"And get blamed by the police; I don't think so," Spencer said, which made sense given her past stints with the law.
"I'll do it," said Ezra and we all looked at him in shock. He may have a history of self-sacrifice but this was a little much.
"No; you are already in trouble with the cops because of Shana; you can't be blamed for this too," Aria objected, her voice full of panic.
"What is she talking about?" I asked Caleb, a little annoyed that there was another thing I didn't know about. He motioned with his hand that I hoped meant that he was going to explain to me about it later.
From what I fully knew, Shana had been responsible for what happened to Ezra in New York; saving the girls from being shot. I had suspected that Jenna's deceased girlfriend had decided to go after Alison after what happened at Emily's birthday party last year; fully believing that it was the blond who tried to kill Jenna. Thinking about it, there was a good chance that Shana's belief was valid.
I couldn't understand though why Ezra was in trouble because of what happened to her though; especially since he was in the hospital when she was killed by one of the girls. I don't think I was able to find out which one it had been since I think I was busy with other things at the time; I think. With the hole in my memories, it was hard to know what I was missing and what not; which I prayed ended soon.
"It'll be okay; I will just tell Tanner that my interference with the investigation led me here," Ezra said and Aria looked unsure. From what he was saying, I concluded that the police found out about Ezra's little hobby; the one I hoped involved his book and not the one where he dated underage teens.
"It's risky," I said, not caring that no one but Caleb could hear me; he did nod his head in agreement though.
"You guys take off; I will take care of things here," Ezra stated and everyone reluctantly nodded; Aria gave her boyfriend one last sappy moment before we all left him there alone in the cabin.
While Emily drove Aria and Spencer home, I got into the backseat with Hanna and Caleb.
"Well this was a fun night," I said with fake glee and we drove Hanna home. Caleb just rolled his eyes while Hanna just looked at him in confusion.
"She's being snarky," Caleb simply said and Hanna snorted.
"She's like that," Hanna said and it almost seemed like she was happy to have me back.
"I think I am going to stay tonight with Hanna," I said and Caleb nearly drove us into another car.
Please R&R!