Well, there's only one review so far on chapter one, which is pretty disappointing, but since I have so much of this written out already I figured I'd go ahead and update. Thanks for the story favorites and followers, but some more feedback would be appreciated!

Chapter 2

"A new development in the case of missing teenager Alison DiLaurentis occurred last night. A body, assumed to be Alison's, was found by workers during construction in the backyard of the house previously owned by the DiLaurentises. The house's new owners, who prefer to remain unnamed at this time, have no comment. But with this new discovery, it is likely that the Alison DiLaurentis case will change from a missing person investigation to a murder investigation."

My eyes are glued to the television. I'm so absorbed in the news report that when I raise my bite of cereal, the spoon nearly misses my mouth. The rumors of Alison running off to France or going to live a new life as a criminal can finally be put to rest.

Alison is dead.

"Turn that off," Mona snaps, walking into the kitchen and taking a handful of nuts from the bowl on the counter, the only thing she ever seems to eat anymore. "Please."

I scowl but grab the remote, and the screen goes black. I'm getting a little sick of this. Sometime during her transformation from loser to queen bee, Mona turned into what I would call a Pretty Major Bitch. As far as I know, she has not yet caused anyone to use words like "professional help," so at least that's something. But sometimes I do miss the glasses and dorky clothes.

"Can you believe she's really dead?" I ask, slurping the rest of the milk out of my cereal bowl and carrying it over to the sink. "I mean, we all kind of already knew that she was, but it's so…official, now."

"You're right," she says, but then raises an eyebrow at me. "We did all already know."

I lean my elbows against the counter and try to ignore that. "Are you going to the funeral?" Now that there's a body, there can be a funeral, which is happening tomorrow afternoon. Apparently the DiLaurentis family wants to get it over with as soon as possible.

"Of course not," Mona scoffs. "Maybe you've forgotten that she spent years trying to ruin my life?"

"No," I say defensively, fidgeting in my seat a little. "I just thought…I don't know, closure, I guess."

"I got over Alison DiLaurentis a long time ago," she snaps, flipping her hair back and stomping off. It doesn't really sound like it to me, but then again, I'm not in her brain and I am thankful every day for that.

I'm not going to the funeral either, I decide later that day as I do my first geometry homework of the year. I never really knew Alison. And Mona may be a Pretty Major Bitch now, but she's still my sister so I have to have some amount of sympathy, and anyway, Alison was worse.

There will be plenty of people at the funeral, I'm sure. Alison was popular, even in death. Some people will probably show up just to make sure that her ghost doesn't come after them or something.

Good thing I don't believe in ghosts.

…

I'm walking to lunch the Monday after the funeral when I hear my name over the announcements. "Viola Vanderwaal, please report to the main office."

I like my first name, and I like my last name, but I've realized over the years that they sound pretty stupid together. I'm not sure why my parents decided to give me a first name that starts with the same letter as my last. Maybe it was trendy at the time or something, but I don't like being one of those matchy people. It sounds even stupider when it's announced to the whole school.

Apparently the reason I was called to the office is for something more serious than a question about my transcript or a note from my mom, because as soon as I walk through the door the secretary ushers me into Vice Principal Hackett's office.

I'm not really alarmed until I walk in and see what appears to be two FBI agents waiting for me. "Miss Vanderwaal?" one asks, reaching to shake my hand. When I nod, she says, "Take a seat."

"What's going on?" I ask shakily, dropping my bag on the ground and sitting down on the old, dusty couch. Hackett is nowhere in sight.

"Nothing to be worried about," the same agent says. "We just need to ask you a few questions."

"What? Do I need to call my mother?" I don't know a lot about anything legal, but I do know that generally FBI agents cannot burst in and start asking you questions without your parents being there.

"That's not necessary," the male officer tells me sharply, reaching back to push the door to the office closed. "We're investigating the death of Alison DiLaurentis and we just have a few questions."

I am both glad that this has nothing to do with me directly and confused that out of all of the people in this school, I'm the one that they choose to talk to. "I didn't even know Alison," I protest, noticing that as I speak, the male agent writes on a legal pad.

"Don't worry. We're talking to anyone who might have had any sort of connection to the DiLaurentis family," the woman drones, clearly bored with my questions and ready to get to some of her own.

But I'm not sure I'm ready for that. "But that's what I'm saying. I never knew Alison. I spoke to her maybe once or twice back when we were in middle school, but she went missing before I started high school."

"You may not have had direct contact with Alison DiLaurentis, but we have reason to believe that your sister did. Is that correct?"

This makes me feel a little better – my family had this conversation with the Rosewood police after Alison went missing – but I still squirm in my seat. I hope I have enough time to eat lunch once this is over. "Uh, yeah. I mean, Alison kind of bullied her for a couple years."

"We have on file that what went on between the two was a little more than your standard case of bullying," the man pipes up, still writing furiously on his pad. I'm waiting for him to go on, but both agents look up and stare right at me.

"Oh. Well, um, I guess. I don't know, my sister didn't really…tell me much. But I think it was just, you know, name calling, rumors, stuff like that."

The woman sits back against Hackett's desk and crosses her arms, looking at me with greater interest than I think I deserve. She taps her pen against the desk for a moment, sighs, then says, "You don't think she would have…done anything to Alison, do you? As revenge?"

"What?" I gasp. Mona is five feet tall on the dot. The image of her whacking Alison over the head is so funny to me that I have to hold back a laugh. "No! No, absolutely not. No." I sneak a look at the clock and see that the lunch period is nearly over. My stomach grumbles and I stand, grabbing my purse. "Look, if you have any more questions, you'll need to ask my sister. I really don't know anything more." Before they can stop me, I push out the door and back into the main office.

I stop in my tracks. The four seats outside the vice principal's office are filled. Aria, Spencer, Hanna, and Emily sit in a row, clearly the next victims of the FBI agents' questioning. "Hey guys," I say, giving them a smile.

Spencer doesn't beat around the bush. "Viola, what's going on? There's a cop car outside."

I glance behind me to make sure the secretary isn't listening, then step closer to them and say quietly, "Two FBI agents are here. They said they're questioning everyone who might know anything about Alison's death."

"What?" Aria leans forward in her chair. "We already talked to the police when Ali went missing."

"Yeah, but now they know that someone killed her," I whisper. The door behind me opens, and I jump and rush out of the office before I'm called back.

…

I've been taking gymnastics lessons since I was four years old. It's not that I love it or have dreams to win an Olympic medal or anything. But it's not completely horrible and I'm pretty good at it by now, so why stop going?

Every week, I go to a two hour group class. We always start out with a half hour of stretching. For the past three years, my partner for this has been a blond girl named Elizabeth who is much better than I am. So it's a pretty big surprise when she's not in class.

"Viola," the instructor, a tall woman named Beth, calls, jogging across the large room to me. "Elizabeth broke her ankle over the weekend. She won't be in class for a good few months."

I stare at her, open-mouthed. If an incredible gymnast like Elizabeth can break an ankle, I don't even want to think about the injuries that I could possibly sustain. "Wait, if she's gone, who am I going to work with?"

"Justin's partner is out today, too. You can partner with him." Beth waves over one of the three guys in this class. I've never spoken to him, but I can't say that I haven't noticed him. It's hard not to notice a guy who is tall, muscular, and about three times more attractive than anyone else in the room.

He walks over, nodding at me, and I suddenly become aware that what little gymnastic skills I previously had are all going to go out the window today. "Hey," he says as Beth jogs to the front of the room to start class.

"Hey." I smile, working hard to keep my eyes on his.

"So…" He pauses, and I wonder for an insane moment if he's actually going to ask me out after a mere two words. "You want to go first?"

It takes a second to dawn on me that he is talking about sit-ups. I hope my face isn't as red as it feels. "Oh. Uh, sure. That's fine."

I lay on my back on one of the blue mats spread around the edges of the room, folding my arms across my chest, and Justin kneels in front of me, pressing his hands down on my feet to keep them in place. "You're not from around here, are you?" he asks.

"Brookhaven?" I ask, pulling myself up to my knees and dropping down again. After years and years of this, I barely even get out of breath anymore. "Uh, no. I live, like, ten minutes away. In Rosewood."

"Rosewood?" He pulls away and I fall back, grimacing when my head hits the mat. "Crap, sorry. But isn't that the town where some girl's body was found a few days ago?"

I finish my fifty sit-ups and slide back. We switch positions and he starts the exercise, about twice as fast as I had been and not out of breath one bit. "Yeah," I confirm. "Alison. She was a year older than me."

"I saw a news report on it," Justin explains, finally having to huff a bit to get the words out. "Pretty crazy stuff. Do you think someone actually killed her?"

"I mean, I guess so. How else could she have ended up in a hole in the ground?" I ask, sitting back as he finishes his sit-ups. I sit cross-legged on the mat beside him and glance around. We appear to be the only people who are done.

Justin wipes his brow on his arm. I try not to stare. "I wonder if they'll ever figure out who did it. The reporter said she went missing a year ago?"

"Yep." I am ready to be finished with this conversation. Practically the whole reason I came to class today is because it seems like all anyone in Rosewood can talk about is Ali's murder. I was hoping that the news hadn't yet spread to the neighboring towns, but obviously I was wrong. "They found her body right when things were starting to quiet down again."

By this point, most of the other groups have finished stretching, and Beth calls out for us to roll up the mats. "Well, I'll tell you one thing," Justin mutters to me, grabbing a corner of our mat. "Rosewood sounds like a pretty interesting place."

I roll my eyes and grab the other side. "You have no idea."