“Except she didn’t stay inside,” Ali snapped. “She went out and talked to Jenna Cavanaugh. She practically exposed all of us.”
“We’ll watch her more carefully this time,” Mr. DiLaurentis insisted, setting down his mug. “We hope that you girls talk a little, too. We’ve scheduled a counselor to come out here and help us through the transition. We really need to start dealing with some of these issues instead of avoiding them.”
“But I don’t want to talk with her!” Ali screamed. She knew she sounded wild, but she couldn’t help it. Then she looked at Jason. There was a little smile on his face, like he was actually happy. “Did you know about this?”
Jason nodded. “They told me last night. I think it’s a good idea, too.”
“You would,” Ali snapped. She leapt up from the table and stormed out the door.
“Alison, where are you going?” Mrs. DiLaurentis cried.
“Out,” Ali snapped, her voice making an embarrassing crack.
“We’re not done talking!”
Ali just waved them away, but Mrs. DiLaurentis started after her, reaching out to grab the back of Ali’s shirt. Ali twisted away and broke free, but instead of continuing on, she whirled around and stared her mother down. Her eyes burned. Her nostrils flared. All of a sudden, Ali was filled with rage for the woman standing across from her. Her limbs literally contorted with hate.
“I know what you’re doing,” she spit out. “I’ve seen you with . . . him. I know the truth.”
At first, Mrs. DiLaurentis’s brow creased, but then her face went very pale. She looked nervously at her husband, then at Jason. Ali’s skin prickled. So it was true. Maybe all of it.
Ali whipped around and fled out the door. “Alison!” Mr. DiLaurentis called after her. “Damn it! Come back!”
But Ali was already halfway across the yard toward the trees in the back. Tears streamed down her face. Her throat felt clogged with screams. Suddenly, it felt like everything she was desperately trying to hold together was now a big ball of unraveled yarn. She pictured it lying in a tangled mess of impossible knots on the ground. No matter how much she tried to work out the kinks, it would never, ever be the same again.
What if they sent her to the Preserve? What if there was a bed waiting for her right now? She thought of the stack of Polaroids in her top drawer, all her mementos from the past year and a half. They would be all she had left of this life. Of any life. She would die before she had to go back. She would literally kill herself.
“Alison!” her mother called from the porch, but Ali kept going. Only when she came to the gazebo hole did she stop and glare into its dark abyss. It had to be a ten-foot drop. If her parents found out, if “Courtney” somehow masterminded sending Ali to the Preserve in her place, she would jump in the hole and never come out. What would her parents do? Would they try to save her? Would they miss her? Would they even care?
“Ali!” her mom called one more time, and Ali raised her middle finger up high. She kicked at a pile of dirt and watched little pebbles cascade down, down, down, filling up the empty bottom, and then continued on into the woods, where she could cry without anyone hearing.
21
AN OFFER SHE CAN’T REFUSE
Two afternoons later, Ali and Spencer sat at Spencer’s big dining room table, watching the rain stream down the windows. They’d cleared some of the china plates, napkins, and candlesticks off the table—Mrs. Hastings was the type who always had the table set so she could wine-and-dine a guest at a moment’s notice—to make way for Ali’s laptop and a stack of index cards. They were using Ali’s iTunes to pick a playlist for the impromptu end-of-school party Ali had put together for Friday. The flash cards contained vocabulary words for their English final tomorrow.
“Okay, megalomaniac,” Spencer said.
Ali tipped the chair back. “Is that a band or a vocab word?”
Spencer giggled. “Vocab, silly.”
Ali threw up her hands. “You got me.”
Spencer flipped the card over. “Someone who has delusional fantasies of power, relevance, and omnipotence.”
“Got it,” Ali said, turning away. That definition reminded her of someone: her psychotic sister. Wanting to be the only DiLaurentis girl. Pushing her out of the family by any means possible. And now they were bringing her back.
It was six days, one hour, and twenty-three minutes—roughly—until her sister returned, and Ali had no idea what to do about it. Worse, her family had thrown themselves into preparing for her twin’s return: getting a new quilt for the guest bedroom, buying her a laptop and a desk, inquiring about membership for her at the Rosewood Country Club, setting up an account at the Rosewood pharmacy so they could easily refill her meds. Mrs. DiLaurentis had even had the balls to ask Ali if she had any clothes that she wouldn’t mind giving up—“Courtney” probably needed a few things to start her off. As if Ali was really going to let her wear her jeans and T-shirts! It was incredible: Even though her parents believed the girl in the hospital was the real Courtney, they were still treating her better than they’d ever treated Ali when she was there.
She’d tossed and turned all night, having nightmares about the corridors of the Preserve and the moans she used to hear at the Radley. Could her sister prove, unequivocally, that Ali had lied for all these years—and forced her to take her place in the Preserve? And what could Ali do if she did? It was true, after all.
“Ali?”
Spencer was staring at her, a pencil hovering halfway between her mouth and the paper. Her blue eyes were wide, and strands of hair had come loose from her ponytail. “I asked if you thought Nas would work for the playlist.”