Sara Shepard - Pretty Little Liars

She wasn’t the kind of girl who could fake things. But did that mean she wanted to break up? It was hard to make up your mind about a boy when he was right in your swimming lane, four feet away.

Her sister Carolyn, who was practicing in the lane next to her, tapped Emily on the shoulder. ‘Everything all right?’

‘Yeah,’ Emily mumbled, grabbing a blue kickboard.

‘Okay.’ Carolyn looked as if she wanted to say more. After her trip with Maya to the creek yesterday, Emily had skidded the Volvo into the parking lot just in time to see Carolyn exiting the natatorium’s double doors. When Carolyn asked where Emily had been, Emily had told her she had to tutor for Spanish. It seemed like Carolyn believed her, despite Emily’s damp hair and the funny ticky noise the car was making – something it did only when it was cooling down from a drive.

Even though the sisters looked alike – both had broad freckles over their noses, chlorine-bleached reddish brown hair, and had to wear a lot of Maybelline Great Lash to lengthen their stubby lashes – and even though they shared a room, they weren’t close. Carolyn was a quiet, demure, and obedient girl, and although Emily was all those things too, Carolyn seemed really satisfied to be that way.

Coach Lauren blew the whistle. ‘Kicking time! Line up!’

The swimmers lined up from fastest to slowest, kick-boards in front of them. Ben was in front of Emily. He looked at her and raised an eyebrow.

‘I can’t come over tonight,’ she said quietly, so the other boy swimmers – who were crowded around behind her and laughing at Gemma Curran’s fake tan gone wrong – couldn’t hear. ‘Sorry.’

Ben’s mouth flattened into a straight line. ‘Yeah. As if that’s a surprise.’ Then, as Lauren blew the whistle, he pushed off the wall and began dolphin-kicking. Uneasy, Emily waited until Lauren blew the whistle again, and pushed off behind him.

As she swam, Emily stared at Ben’s pumping legs. It was so dorky how he wore a cap over his already-short hair. He got so OCD before races, too, shaving off every hair on his body, including the ones on his arms and legs. Now, his feet made exaggeratedly huge splashes, which sprayed right into Emily’s face. She glared at his head bobbing in front of her and pumped her legs harder.

Even though she’d left five seconds behind him, Emily reached the opposite wall at almost the same time Ben did. He turned to her, pissed. Swim team etiquette dictated that no matter how big a swimming star you were, if someone caught your feet on a set, you let them go ahead of you. But Ben just pushed back off the wall.

‘Ben!’ Emily called, the irritation in her voice showing.

He stood up in the shallow end and turned around. ‘What?’

‘Let me go in front of you.’

Ben rolled his eyes and ducked back underwater.

Emily shoved off the wall and kicked crazily until she caught up to him. He reached the wall and turned to face her.

‘Would you stay off my ass?’ he practically yelled.

Emily burst out laughing. ‘You’re supposed to let me go!’

‘Maybe if you didn’t leave right on top of me you would-n’t be on top of me.’

She snorted. ‘I can’t help it if I’m faster than you.’

Ben’s mouth fell open. Oops.

Emily licked her lips. ‘Ben . . .’

‘No.’ He held up his hand. ‘Just go swim really fast, okay?’ He tossed his goggles onto the deck. They bounced awkwardly and landed back in the water, narrowly missing Gemma’s fake-tanned shoulder.

‘Ben . . .’

He glared at her, then turned and got out of the pool. ‘Whatever.’

Emily watched him angrily push open the boys’ locker room door.

She shook her head, watching the door slowly swing back and forth. Then she remembered the thing Maya said yesterday.

‘Fuck a moose,’ she tried out quietly, and smiled.

‘So are you coming over tonight?’ Hanna switched her BlackBerry to her other ear and waited for Sean’s answer.

It was Thursday after school. She and Mona had just met for a quick cappuccino on campus, but Mona had to leave early to practice her drive for the mother/daughter golf tournament she was competing in this weekend. Now, Hanna sat on her front porch, talking to Sean and watching the six-year-old twins next door draw surprisingly anatomically correct naked boys in chalk all over their driveway.

‘I can’t,’ Sean answered. ‘I’m really sorry.’

‘But Thursday is Nerve night; you know that!’

Hanna and Sean were hooked on this reality show Nerve, which documented the lives of four couples who’d met online. Tonight’s episode was extremely important, because their favorite two characters, Nate and Fiona, were about to do it. Hanna thought it might at least start a conversation.

‘I . . . I have a meeting tonight.’

‘A meeting for what?’

‘Um... V Club.’

Hanna’s mouth fell open. V Club? As in Virginity Club? ‘Can you skip it?’

He was quiet for a minute. ‘I can’t.’

‘Well, are you at least coming to Noel’s tomorrow?’

Another pause. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Sean! You have to!’ Her voice squeaked.

‘All right,’ he answered. ‘I guess Noel would be kinda pissed if I didn’t.’

‘I would be pissed too,’ Hanna added.

‘I know. See you tomorrow.’

‘Sean, wait—’ Hanna started. But he’d already hung up.

Hanna unlocked her house. Sean had to come to the party tomorrow. She’d hatched a foolproof, romantic plan: She’d take him to Noel’s woods, they’d confess their love for each other, and then they’d have sex. V Club couldn’t argue with having sex if you were in love, could it? Besides, the Kahn woods were legendary. They were known as the Manhood Woods, because so many guys at so many Kahn parties had lost their virginity there. It was rumored that the trees whispered sex secrets to new recruits.

She stopped at the mirror in the hallway and pulled up her shirt to examine her taut stomach muscles. She swiveled sideways to investigate her small, round butt. Then she bent forward to look at her skin. Yesterday’s blotchiness was gone. She bared her teeth. One bottom front tooth crossed over a canine. Had they always been that way?

She threw her thick-strapped, gold leather handbag onto the kitchen table and opened the freezer. Her mom didn’t buy Ben & Jerry’s, so Tofutti Cutie 50-percent-less sugar faux ice-cream sandwiches would have to do. She took out three and began to greedily unwrap the first one. As she took a bite, she felt that familiar tug to eat more.

‘Here, Hanna, have another profiterole,’ Ali had whispered to her that day they visited her dad in Annapolis. Then Ali turned to Kate, her dad’s girlfriend’s daughter, and said, ‘Hanna’s so lucky – she can eat anything and not gain an ounce!’

It wasn’t true, of course. That’s what made it so mean. Hanna was already chubby and seemed to be getting more so. Kate giggled, and Ali – who was supposed to be on Hanna’s side – laughed too.

‘I got you something.’

Hanna jumped. Her mom sat at the little telephone table in a hot pink Champion sports bra and black flared-leg yoga pants. ‘Oh,’ Hanna said quietly.

Ms. Marin appraised Hanna, her eyes settling on the ice-cream sandwiches in her hands. ‘Do you really need three?’

Hanna looked down. She’d chomped through one sandwich in less than ten seconds, hardly even tasting it, and had already unwrapped the next.

She smiled faintly at her mom and quickly stuffed the remaining Cuties back into the freezer. When she turned back around, her mother set a little blue Tiffany bag on the table. Hanna looked at it questioningly. ‘This?’

‘Open it.’

Inside was a little blue Tiffany box, and inside that was the complete Tiffany toggle set – the charm bracelet, round silver earrings, plus the necklace. The very same kind she’d had to hand over to the Tiffany’s woman at the police station. Hanna held them up, letting them sparkle in the overhead light. ‘Wow.’

Ms. Marin shrugged. ‘You’re welcome.’ Then, to signify that the conversation was finished, she retreated to the den, unrolled her purple yoga mat, and turned on her Power Yoga DVD.

Hanna slowly slid the earrings back in the bag, confused. Her mom was so weird. That was when she noticed a creamy, square card envelope sitting on the little telephone table. Hanna’s name and address were typewritten in all caps. She smiled. An invite to a sweet party was just the thing she needed to cheer up.

Breathe in through your nose, out through your mouth, the soothing yogi instructed from the TV in the den. Ms. Marin stood with her arms placidly by her sides. She didn’t even move when her BlackBerry started singing Flight of the Bumblebee, which meant she had an e-mail. This was her Me time.

Hanna grabbed the envelope and climbed upstairs to her room. She sat down on her four-poster bed, felt the edges of her billion-thread-count sheets, and smiled at Dot, sleeping peacefully on his doggie bed.

‘Come here, Dot,’ she whispered. He stretched and sleepily climbed into her arms. Hanna sighed. Maybe she just had PMS, and these jittery, uneasy, the-world-is-caving-in feelings would go away in a few days.

She sliced the envelope open with her fingernail and frowned. It wasn’t an invitation, and the note didn’t really make sense.

Hanna,

Even Daddy doesn’t love you best!

—A

What was that supposed to mean? But when she unfolded the accompanying page stuffed inside the envelope, she yelped.