**Chapter 18**

***Aria's POV***

I shot off a quick text to Jason, canceling our plans tonight. The sun had gone down and we were heading back to Emily's to get our cars and head back to our homes. I gave a sigh when I didn't get a response back from him, hoping that he wasn't too upset. Though he might be consumed by his conversation with Ali, so maybe that was why he hadn't responded.

"Looks like Andrew got released." Spencer commented, drawing my attention from my phone to the steps of the police station.

I tossed my phone into my purse, heading straight for Andrew. I knew what the DNA results said, but I needed to be sure. I ignored the scowl on his face when he realized that I was coming up to him. Without asking, I grabbed his left hand, taking it between mine and looking at it. His hands were rougher from years of scouts, his fingers slightly longer than those which had wrapped around my throat. I felt tears fill my eyes as I realized that he had only tried to help me and I had tricked him. He had been imprisoned and interrogated for the last few days when he hadn't done anything wrong.

"The hands are wrong." I whispered as I stared at his hands. He pulled his hand from my grasp, surprising me with the force behind his movement. "I'm glad you're out."

"That's not what I heard." He snarled, glaring hatefully at me.

"Where are your parents? Are they inside?" I asked, trying to figure out why he was alone.

"They're not back yet. I wasn't about to sit around waiting for them in there." He returned with a glare.

"Andrew, you don't understand." I tried to get him to talk to me.

He whirled around angrily, eyes blaring with hatred. My body completely locked up as his eyes met mine. My breath froze like a knot in my throat, silencing any potential sound I could have made. He despised me. The hatred in his eyes could have easily been behind a mask in a dark room.

"No, you don't understand." He snapped back, hands curling into fists as though he was holding himself back from hitting me. I closed my eyes, bracing for the blow, but it didn't come. "Do you know where I was those weeks? I was trying to find you. I was going to be the hero. But no, instead I get arrested. Hauled in and interrogated for days on end. My parents harassed. My uncle's farm ransacked. And all because I wanted to help you."

"Andrew, please." I pleaded, but my mouth snapped shut when he glared at me.

"It's only a few weeks to graduation. You just have to stay out of my way." He ordered, threateningly.

"You'll graduate. That doesn't mean that we will." Hanna chimed in, causing him to turn back to look at her.

"Oh, you'll graduate all right. They want you gone just as bad as I do. You'll graduate with honors."

"Campbell, do you need a ride home." I heard from behind me, I turned my head seeing Toby standing there in his police uniform with another officer a few feet behind him.

"Like I'm getting into a car with you, no thank you." He said to Toby before turning to walk away. He took a few steps before turning back to look at me. "You know other towns have nice toxic dumps. We have you."

"Andrew." I called, taking a few steps to follow after him but he was going too fast. I stopped realizing that it was useless and he didn't want to talk to me anyway. It hurt that he had been my friend and now had turned his back on me, unable to even look at me without hatred burning in his eyes. As much as it hurt, I still understood where he was coming from. Knew that there was nothing I could do to undo the damage that had been done to him. In a small town like Rosewood, even being released didn't wipe clean his record. He would go away to college, but I doubt he would come back. And his family would face the judgment of the town or be forced to move away and restart their lives.

"Let me go check in and I'll give you girls a ride home." Toby was talking behind me, but I was focused on the fact that Andrew hated us all now, well more than he had before.

A tear slipped down my cheek as I stared after Andrew as he walked away, disappearing into the night. I brushed it aside, vaguely hearing a conversation happening behind my back. Maybe he was right, we were a poison in this town. We brought nothing but trouble. I took a deep breath before turning back to the others, trying to show a strong front even though guilt was gnawing away at my insides.

"He'll forgive you Aria. He's just upset right now." Emily tried to reassure, wrapping her arms around me in a show of comfort.

"No. He has every right to be mad. He was set up by A." I brushed aside the reassurance.

"We all were." Hanna said, brushing her hair behind her ear in frustration. "Worse than ever."

"Even though everyone knows the truth, they still don't believe us." Spencer added, crossing her arms across her chest.

"That's what A really wanted, to make us feel alone forever." Emily said.

"Well, it's working." I commented, putting my arms around Emily for a moment before pulling away.

"When we were down there, in the silo, Charles made me play a game. A game with switches. About hurting people." Hanna admitted slowly, looking between us to see our reactions.

I felt my eyes widen that she had been forced to play the game as well. It was slightly reassuring that it wasn't just me, that maybe the others didn't need to forgive me because they had been put in the same situation as me.

"I thought it was just me." I said, cautiously. "I was never shocked. Were any of you shocked?"

They all shook their heads and I felt the pressure and anxiety from the past few days leave me. I sighed as the relaxation came over me, the guilt that had been twisting my insides up and made me want to throw up just thinking about it eased. The fear of being close to the others and then being rejected for what I had done eased.

"He just wanted to make us think we hurt each other." Emily shifted uncomfortably as she looked at us.

"The point was that there was a point that we would hurt each other. That any of us would." Spencer said, before admitting. "That all of us would."

Toby came out of the police station, approaching our group so we stopped talking, not wanting him to know what we were talking about. Spencer hadn't said the words, hadn't directly asked that he not know what had happened down there. But she was as bottled up about it all as we all were. It didn't need to be said.

"You girls ready to go?" Toby questioned, coming up beside Spencer and pressing a kiss against the side of her head.

"Yeah, can you drive us back over to Emily's, we left our cars there." Hanna requested.

"Of course." Toby responded with a smile.

We all headed over to his car and I was glad that we at least had one cop who was really on our side and didn't hate us like everyone else must. Toby pulled up to Emily's, where we all got out, promising to talk to Spencer tomorrow, as she got a ride home with Toby. I waved as they drove off, before heading over to my car. The engine turned over quickly and I drove home, trying to keep my tears at bay that Charles was still out there, that Andrew hated me, and that I still hadn't heard back from Jason. Tears ran down my cheeks as I drove, before finally pulling up outside of my house. I noted the cop car that was stationed across the street idly, before breaking down into silent sobs. After a few minutes of crying, I wiped at my eyes, brushing away the tracks left on my face. I took a few deep breaths to steady my nerves before turning off my car and heading inside.

"Where have you been? The police called hours ago saying that Andrew was released and that they were sending the squad cars back out." My mom said, cradling a mug of tea between her hands.

"I was with the girls. Don't worry, we had cops watching out for us when Andrew was released." I returned, heading for the stairs.

"Do you want me to stay upstairs with you tonight?" she questioned, to which I shook my head.

"No, don't worry about it. I'll be fine." I replied, walking up the stairs.

I heard her calling after me as I walked up the stairs but I didn't want to deal with it, not tonight. I grabbed my phone from my purse, checking again for a response from Jason. When there was nothing there, I sent a quick text seeing if he was okay before dropping the phone on my bed and taking my shower stuff to head to the bathroom. Only after the water was pouring over me and the steam filling the bathroom did I break down crying. All too soon the water began to cool off and I had to get out of the shower. Once dressed in my pajamas and with my fuzzy socks and slippers on, I headed downstairs to make myself some hot tea.

"Oh, there you are. Are you doing alright?" my dad asked when I walked into the kitchen.

"Yeah, I'm alright." I replied, looking around for my mom while putting the kettle on to boil. "Where's mom at?"

"She headed back over to her apartment, said she'd stop by tomorrow morning." He answered.

I nodded my head at his response, slightly hurt that she had just up and left without at least saying goodbye. Though I suppose I had been rude to her when I came in, I just didn't want to talk about Andrew, or Charles, or anything about my imprisonment for that matter.

"Didn't you have plans tonight?" he asked, reminding me that I'd had to cancel my night with Jason, that I'd lost my night away from all the Rosewood drama.

"Something came up, he needed to be with his family tonight." I told him, heading over to the pantry and grabbing out some chips.

It was one of the differences since my mom had moved out, my dad kept more junk food in the house than she had. And right now, I wanted the fatty comfort food. I opened up the bag and settled down at the breakfast bar. My dad pulled up the bar stool next to me, snagging a few chips from the bag as well.

"I'm sorry, maybe you'll do something another night." He reassured, before popping a chip into his mouth.

I gave a shrug as the kettle began to whistle. I grabbed it off the burner, then grabbed a mug and the tea basket before opening up the loose leaf tea mix box. "Do you want a cup?" I checked with him, only to receive a shake no. I cradled the warm mug between my hands and retook my seat at the bar.

"So any plans for tomorrow?" he questioned.

"I have some dark room time scheduled at Hollis. There's a bunch of pictures that I need to develop." I replied, giving him an excuse that would hopefully have him leave me alone about it.

"Do you want me to drive you?"

"No, it's fine I can drive myself." I told him, sipping at the still weak tea.

We sat in silence for a few minutes, each eating our chips before he moved over to the fridge and grabbed out a bottle of juice and a glass.

"Did you go to school today?"

"Uh, no. I wasn't really up to it today. So I stayed at the coffee shop for a little while before going to talk to Jason. Hanna had scheduled a therapy session today, so I was with the girls from then on."

"Aria, if you don't want to go to school, you don't have to. Mike can pick up the rest of your schoolwork and you can do it from home. Or from my office at Hollis if you like." He offered.

I smiled at him, grateful that he wasn't going to make me go back to school. The idea of being surrounded by the other students terrified me, especially if Andrew was going to be there. He said he wanted me to avoid him until after graduation, and I wanted to give it to him. I owed him that at least, after all he had been through because of me.

"Good night, honey." He said, moving over and pressing a kiss to the top of my head.

I managed to repress my flinch until after he had left the kitchen, shuddering once I was alone. My chest seemed to seize up as I controlled my reactions. Quickly I emptied out the tea basket and took the mug upstairs, throwing back my anti-anxiety pills. I curled up under the covers, shaking as panic began to overwhelm me. Silent sobs tore through my chest and tears ran down my face as I huddled on the bed. I wasn't even sure what it was that triggered the reaction, but I couldn't stop the memories of curling up in terror on the bed while I was kept in the silo. With the images fresh in my mind, I lurched out of bed, legs tangled in the sheets causing me to crash into the carpet.

I lay on the carpet, my cup of tea spilled on the carpet beside me, while I buried my face into the plush ground. Tears continued to stream down my face while I waited for the pills to kick in. It was probably about fifteen minutes later when I felt my body grow limp, the pills relaxing my tense muscles. My face felt raw from the tears and it took me a few moments to pull myself together enough to climb up from the floor. I cleaned the spilled tea up from the floor with a damp towel and filled the mug with water from the bathroom sink. My head was aching, probably from the crying. Though now that I thought about it, every time I took those anti-anxiety pills my head seemed to hurt. I curled up under the covers, deciding that I'd figure things out with the pills in the morning when I'd gotten some sleep.

I checked my phone, as I settled under the covers, relieved to see that I had finally gotten a response from Jason.

-Jason: Aria, sorry. I'm fine. Talk to you tomorrow.-

I sighed at how short the message was, but decided to just head to bed instead. I set it on the nightstand, plugging it in to charge before curling under the covers and trying to fall asleep.

**End Chapter**

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