Sara Shepard - Pretty Little Liars

‘Shhh,’ Hanna hissed.

Their salads came. Hanna pushed the Styrofoam container of sweet potato fries to the side and took a bite of an undressed grape tomato.

Mona leaned closer. ‘I bet you could hook up with him.’

‘Who?’

‘Mr. April! Who else?’

Hanna snorted. ‘Right.’

‘Totally. You should bring him to the Kahn party. I heard some cops came to the party last year. That’s how they never get busted.’

Hanna sat back. The Kahn party was a legendary Rosewood tradition. The Kahns lived on twenty-some acres of land, and the Kahn boys – Noel was the youngest – held a back-to-school party every year. The kids raided their parents’ extremely well-stocked liquor supply in the basement, and there was always a scandal. Last year, Noel shot his best friend James in the bare ass with his BB gun because James had tried to make out with Noel’s then-girlfriend, Alyssa Pennypacker. They were both so drunk they laughed the whole way to the ER and couldn’t remember how or why it happened. The year before that, a bunch of stoners smoked too much and tried to get Mr. Kahn’s Appaloosas to take hits from a bong.

‘Nah.’ Hanna bit into another tomato. ‘I think I’m going with Sean.’

Mona scrunched up her face. ‘Why waste a perfectly good party night on Sean? He took a virginity pledge! He probably won’t even go.’

‘Just because you sign a virginity pledge doesn’t mean you stop partying, too.’ Hanna took a big bite of her salad, crunching the dry, unappetizing vegetables in her mouth.

‘Well, if you’re not gonna ask Mr. April to Noel’s, I will.’ Mona stood up.

Hanna grabbed her arm. ‘No!’

‘Why not? C’mon. It’d be fun.’

Hanna dug her fingernails into Mona’s arm. ‘I said no.’

Mona sat back down and stuck out her lip. ‘Why not?’

Hanna’s heart galloped. ‘All right. You can’t tell anyone, though.’ She took a deep breath. ‘I met him at the police station, not the trail. I was called in for questioning for the Tiffany’s thing. But it’s not a big deal. I’m not busted.’

‘Oh my God!’ Mona yelled. Wilden looked up at them again.

‘Shhh!’ Hanna hissed.

‘Are you all right? What happened? Tell me everything,’ Mona whispered back.

‘There isn’t much to tell.’ Hanna threw her napkin over her plate. ‘They brought me to the station, my mom came with me, and we sat for a while. They let me off with a warning. Whatever. The whole thing took like twenty minutes.’

‘Yikes.’ Mona gave Hanna an indeterminate look; Hanna wondered for a second if it was a look of pity.

‘It wasn’t, like, dramatic or anything,’ Hanna said defensively, her throat dry. ‘Not much happened. Most of the cops were on the phone. I text-messaged the whole time.’ She paused, considering whether she should tell Mona about that ‘not it’ text message she’d received from A, whoever A was.

But why waste her breath? It couldn’t have actually meant anything, right?

Mona took a sip of her Perrier. ‘I thought you’d never get caught.’

Hanna swallowed hard. ‘Yeah, well . . .’

‘Did your mom totally kill you?’

Hanna looked away. On the drive home, her mom had asked Hanna if she’d meant to steal the bracelet and earrings. When Hanna said no, Ms. Marin answered, ‘Good. It’s settled then.’ Then she flipped open her cell to make a call.

Hanna shrugged and stood up. ‘I just remembered – I gotta go walk Dot.’

‘Are you sure you’re okay?’ Mona asked. ‘Your face looks kind of splotchy.’

‘No biggie.’ She smacked her lips glamorously at Mona and turned for the door.

Hanna sauntered coolly out of the restaurant, but once she got to the parking lot, she broke into a run. She climbed inside her Toyota Prius – a car her mom had bought for herself last year but had recently handed off to Hanna because she’d grown tired of it – and checked her face in the rearview mirror. There were hideous bright red patches on her cheeks and forehead.

After her transformation, Hanna had been neurotically careful about not only looking cool and perfect at all times, but being cool and perfect, too. Terrified that the tiniest mistake would send her spiraling back to dorkdom, she labored over every last detail, from little things like the perfect IM screen name and the right mix for her car’s built-in iPod, to bigger stuff like the right combo of people to invite over before someone’s party and choosing the perfect it boy to date – who, luckily, was the same boy she’d loved since seventh grade. Had getting caught for shoplifting just tarnished the perfect, controlled, über-cool Hanna everyone had come to know? She hadn’t been able to read that look on Mona’s face when she said ‘yikes.’ Had the look meant, Yikes, but no big deal?Or, Yikes, what a loser?

She wondered if maybe she shouldn’t have told Mona at all. But then . . . someone else already knew. A.

Know what Sean’s going to say? Not it!

Hanna’s field of vision went blurry. She squeezed the steering wheel for a few seconds, then jammed the key into the ignition and rolled out of the country club parking lot to a gravelly, dead-end turn-off a few yards down the road. She could hear her heart pounding at her temples as she turned off the engine and took deep breaths. The wind smelled like hay and just-mown grass.

Hanna shut her eyes tight. When she opened them, she stared at the container of sweet potato fries. Don’t, she thought. A car swished by on the main road.

Hanna wiped her hands on her jeans. She snuck another peek at the container. The fries smelled delicious. Don’t, don’t, don’t.

She reached over for them and opened the lid. Their sweet, warm smell wafted into her face. Before she could stop herself, Hanna shoved handful after handful of fries into her mouth. The fries were still so hot that they burned her tongue, but she didn’t care. It was such a relief; this was the only thing that made her feel better. She didn’t stop until she’d eaten them all and even licked the sides of the container for the salt that had gathered at the bottom.

At first she felt much, much calmer. But by the time she pulled into her driveway, the old, familiar feelings of panic and shame had welled up inside her. Hanna was amazed how, even though it had been years since she’d done this, everything felt exactly the same. Her stomach ached, her pants felt tight, and all she wanted was to be rid of what was inside of her.

Ignoring Dot’s excited cries from her bedroom, Hanna bolted to the upstairs bathroom, slammed the door, and collapsed onto the tiled floor. Thank God her mom wasn’t home from work yet. At least she wouldn’t hear what Hanna was about to do.

Okay. Spencer had to calm down.

Wednesday night, she pulled her black Mercedes C-Class hatchback – her sister’s castoff car, since she got the new, ‘practical’ Mercedes SUV – into the circular driveway of her house. Her student council meeting had gone extra late and she’d been on edge driving through Rosewood’s dark streets. All day, she’d felt like someone was watching her, like whoever had written that ‘covet’ e-mail could jump out at her at any second.

Spencer kept thinking uneasily about that familiar ponytail in Alison’s bedroom window. Her mind kept going back to Ali – all the things she knew about Spencer. But no, that was crazy. Alison had been gone – and most likely dead – for three years. Plus, a new family lived in her house now, right?

Spencer ran to the mailbox and pulled out a pile, tossing everything back that wasn’t hers. Suddenly, she saw it. It was a long envelope, not too thick, not too thin, with Spencer’s name typed neatly in the windowpane. The return address said, The College Board. It was here.

Spencer ripped open the envelope and scanned the page. She read the PSAT results six times before it sunk in.

She’d gotten a 2350 out of 2400.

‘Yessssss!’ she screamed, clutching the papers so tightly they wrinkled.

‘Whoa! Someone’s happy!’ called a voice from the road.

Spencer looked up. Hanging out the driver’s-side window of a black Mini Cooper was Andrew Campbell, the tall, freckly, long-haired boy that beat out Spencer for class president. They were number-one and number-two in the class in practically every subject. But before Spencer could brag about her score – telling Andrew about her PSATs would feel so good – he peeled away. Freak. Spencer turned back to her house.

As she excitedly scampered inside, something stopped her: she remembered her sister’s near-perfect score and quickly converted it from the 1600-scale they used to use into the 2400-scale the College Board used nowadays. It was a full 100 points lower than Spencer’s. And weren’t they supposed to be harder these days, too?

Well, now who’s the genius?

An hour later, Spencer sat at the kitchen table reading Middlemarch – a book on the English AP ‘suggested reading’ list – when she began to sneeze.

‘Melissa and Wren are here,’ Mrs. Hastings said to Spencer as she bustled into the kitchen, carrying in the mail Spencer had left in the box. ‘They’ve brought all of their luggage to move in!’ She opened the oven a crack, checking on the rotisserie chicken and seven-grain rolls, and then bustled into the living room.

Spencer sneezed again. A cloud of Chanel No. 5 always preceded her mom – even though she spent the whole day working around horses – and Spencer was certain she was allergic. She considered announcing her PSAT news, but a twinkly voice from the foyer stopped her.

‘Mom?’ Melissa called. She and Wren strolled into the kitchen. Spencer pretended to study Middlemarch’s boring back cover.