Spencer cleared her throat, and Ali whirled around, startled. “Guys, hi!” she cried. “What’s up?”
“Not much.” Hanna pointed at the notebook in Ali’s lap. “What’s that?”
Ali closed the notebook fast. “Oh. Nothing.”
The girls felt a presence behind them. Mrs. DiLaurentis pushed past, waltzing into Ali’s bedroom. “We need to talk,” she said to Ali, her voice clipped and taut.
“But, Mom…” Ali protested.
“Now.”
The girls glanced at one another. That was Mrs. DiLaurentis’s you’re-in-trouble voice. They didn’t hear it often.
Ali’s mother faced the girls. “Why don’t you girls wait on the deck?”
“It’ll just take a second,” Ali said quickly, shooting them an apologetic smile. “I’ll be right down.”
Hanna paused, confused. Spencer squinted, trying to see which notebook Ali was holding. Mrs. DiLaurentis raised an eyebrow. “C’mon, girls. Go.”
The four of them swallowed hard and filed back down the stairs. Once on Ali’s wraparound porch, they arranged themselves in their usual places around the family’s enormous square patio table—Spencer at one end, and Aria, Emily, and Hanna at the sides. Ali would sit at the table’s head, next to her father’s deck-mounted stone birdbath. For a moment, the four girls watched as a couple of cardinals frolicked in the bath’s cold, clear water. When a blue jay tried to join them, the cardinals squawked and quickly sent him away. Birds, it seemed, were just as cliquey as girls.
“That was weird upstairs,” Aria whispered.
“Do you think Ali’s in trouble?” Hanna whispered. “What if she’s grounded and can’t come to the sleepover?”
“Why would she be in trouble? She hasn’t done anything wrong,” whispered Emily, who always stuck up for Ali—the girls called her Killer, as in Ali’s personal pit bull.
“Not that we know of,” Spencer muttered under her breath.
Just then, Mrs. DiLaurentis burst out of the French patio doors and across the lawn. “I want to make sure you have the dimensions right,” she screamed to the workers who were perched lazily on an enormous bulldozer at the back of the property. The DiLaurentises were building a twenty-person gazebo for summer parties, and Ali had mentioned that her mom was being very type A about the whole process, even though they were only at the hole-digging stage. Mrs. DiLaurentis marched up to the workers and started chastising them. Her diamond wedding ring glinted in the sun as she waved her arms around frenetically. The girls exchanged glances—it looked like Ali’s lecture hadn’t taken very long.
“Guys?”
Ali stood at the edge of the porch. She had changed out of her halter into a faded navy blue Abercrombie tee. There was a baffled look on her face. “Uh…hi?”
Spencer stood up. “What did she bust you for?”
Ali blinked. Her eyes darted back and forth.
“Were you getting in trouble without us?” Aria cried, trying to make it sound like she was teasing. “And why’d you change? That halter you had on was so cute.”
Ali still looked flustered…and kind of upset. Emily stood up halfway. “Do you want us to…go?” Her voice dripped with uncertainty. All the others looked at Ali nervously—was that what she wanted?
Ali twisted her blue string bracelet around her wrist three full rotations. She stepped onto the patio and sat down in her rightful seat. “Of course I don’t want you to go. My mom was mad at me because I…I threw my hockey clothes in with her delicates again.” She gave them a sheepish shrug and rolled her eyes.
Emily stuck out her bottom lip. A small beat went by. “She got mad at you for that?”
Ali raised her eyebrows. “You know my mom, Em. She’s more anal than Spencer.” She snickered.
Spencer faux-glared at Ali while Emily ran her thumb along one of the grooves in the teak patio table.
“But don’t worry, girls, I’m not grounded or anything.” Ali pressed her palms together. “Our sleepover extravaganza can proceed as planned!”
The four of them sighed with relief, and the odd, uneasy mood began to evaporate. Only, each of them had a weird feeling Ali wasn’t telling them everything—it certainly wouldn’t be the first time. One minute, Ali would be their best friend, and the next, she’d drift away from them, making covert phone calls and sending secret texts. Weren’t they supposed to share everything? The other girls had certainly shared enough of themselves—they’d slipped secrets to Ali that no one, absolutely no one else, knew. And, of course, there was the big secret that they all shared about Jenna Cavanaugh—the one they’d sworn to take to the grave.
“Speaking of our sleepover extravaganza, I have huge news,” Spencer said, breaking them out of their thoughts. “Guess where we’re having it?”
“Where?” Ali leaned forward on her elbows, slowly morphing back into her old self.
“Melissa’s barn!” Spencer cried. Melissa was Spencer’s older sister, and Mr. and Mrs. Hastings had renovated the family’s backyard barn and allowed Melissa to use it as her own personal pied-à-terre during her junior and senior years of high school. Spencer would get the same privilege, once she was old enough.
“Sweet!” Ali whooped. “How?”
“She’s flying out to Prague tomorrow night after graduation,” Spencer answered. “My parents said we could use it, so long as we clean it up before she gets back.”
“Nice.” Ali leaned back and laced her hands together. Suddenly, her eyes focused on something a bit to the left of the workers. Melissa herself was traipsing through the Hastingses’ bordering yard, her posture rigid and proper. Her white graduation gown swung from a hanger in her hand, and she’d slung the school’s royal blue valedictorian mantle over her shoulders.
Spencer let out a groan. “She’s being so obnoxious about the whole valedictorian thing,” she whispered. “She even told me I should feel grateful that Andrew Campbell will probably be valedictorian instead of me when we’re all seniors—the honor is ‘such a huge responsibility.’” Spencer and her sister hated each other, and Spencer had a new story about Melissa’s bitchiness nearly every day.
Ali stood up. “Hey! Melissa!” She started waving.
Melissa stopped and turned around. “Oh. Hey, guys.” She smiled cautiously.
“Excited to go to Prague?” Ali singsonged, giving Melissa her brightest smile.
Melissa tilted her head slightly. “Of course.”
“Is Ian going?” Ian was Melissa’s gorgeous boyfriend. Just thinking about him made the girls swoon.
Spencer dug her nails into Ali’s arm. “Ali.” But Ali pulled her arm away.
Melissa shaded her eyes in the harsh sunlight. The royal blue mantle flapped in the wind. “No. He’s not.”
“Oh!” Ali simpered. “Are you sure that’s a good idea—leaving him alone for two weeks? He might get another girlfriend!”
“Alison,” Spencer said through her teeth. “Stop it. Now.”
“Spencer?” Emily whispered. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing,” Spencer said quickly. Aria, Emily, and Hanna looked at one another again. This had been happening lately—Ali would say something, one of them would freak, and the rest of them would have no clue what was going on.
But this clearly wasn’t nothing. Melissa straightened the mantle around her neck, squared her shoulders, and turned. She looked long and hard at the giant hole at the edge of the DiLaurentises’ yard, then walked into the barn, slamming the door behind her so hard that it made the twig-braided wreath on the back of the door thump up and down.