Unbelievable

She was completely weirded out that this had happened to her. She kept wondering if, after falling asleep again, she’d wake up in her own bed with its six-hundred thread-count pima cotton sheets, beautiful as before, ready for a day of shopping with Mona. Who gets hit by a car? She wasn’t even in the hospital for something cool, like a high-stakes kidnapping or Petra Nemcova’s tsunami tragedy.



But something that scared her far more—and something that she didn’t want to think about—was that the whole night was a huge, gaping hole in Hanna’s memory. She couldn’t even remember Mona’s party.



Just then, two figures in familiar blue blazers appeared at the door. When they saw Hanna was awake and decent, Aria and Spencer rushed in quickly, their faces pinched with worry. “We tried to see you last night,” Spencer said, “but the nurses wouldn’t let us in.”



Hanna noticed that Aria was sneaking a peek at Hanna’s greenish bruises, a grossed-out look on her face. “What?” Hanna snapped, smoothing out her long, auburn hair, which she’d just spritzed with Bumble & Bumble Surf Spray. “You should try to be a little more Florence Nightingale, Aria. Sean’s really into that.”



It still rankled Hanna that her ex, Sean Ackard, had broken up with her to be with Aria. Today, Aria’s hair hung in chunks around her face, and she wore a red-and-white-checkered tent dress under her Rosewood Day blazer. She looked like a cross between that freaky drummer girl in the White Stripes and a tablecloth. Besides, didn’t she know that if she got caught without the plaid pleated skirt part of the school’s uniform, Appleton would just send her home and make her change?



“Sean and I broke up,” Aria mumbled.



Hanna raised a curious eyebrow. “Oh really? And why is that?”



Aria sat down in the little orange plastic chair next to Hanna’s bed. “That doesn’t matter right now. What matters is…this. You.” Her eyes welled with tears. “I wish we would’ve gotten to the playground sooner. I keep thinking about it. We could’ve stopped that car, somehow. We could’ve pulled you out of the way.”



Hanna stared at her, her throat constricting. “You were there?”



Aria nodded, then glanced at Spencer. “We were all there. Emily too. You wanted to meet us.”



Hanna’s heart quickened. “I did?”



Aria leaned closer. Her breath smelled like Orbit Mint Mojito gum, a flavor Hanna hated. “You said you knew who A was.”



“What?” Hanna whispered.



“You don’t remember?” Spencer shrieked. “Hanna, that’s who hit you!” She whipped out her Sidekick and brought up a text. “Look!”



Hanna stared at the screen. She knew too much.—A



“A sent us this right after you were hit by the car,” Spencer whispered.



Hanna blinked hard, stunned. Her mind was like a big, deep Gucci purse, and when Hanna rooted around in the bottom, she couldn’t come up with the memory she needed. “A tried to kill me?” Her stomach began to churn. All day, she’d had this awful feeling, deep down, that this hadn’t been an accident. But she’d tried to quell it, telling herself that was nonsense.



“Maybe A had spoken to you?” Spencer tried. “Or maybe you saw A doing something. Can you think? We’re afraid that if you don’t remember who A is, A might…” She trailed off, gulping.



“…strike again,” Aria whispered.



Hanna shivered spastically, breaking out in a cold, horrified sweat. “Th-the last thing I remember was the night before Mona’s party,” she stammered. “The next thing I know, we’re all sitting in Ali’s backyard. We’re in seventh grade again. It’s the day before Ali disappeared, and we’re talking about how we’re going to have the sleepover in the barn. Remember that?”



Spencer squinted. “Uh…sure. I guess.”



“I kept trying to warn Ali that she was going to die the next day,” Hanna explained, her voice rising. “But Ali wouldn’t pay attention to me. And then she looked at me and said I should stop making a big deal out of it. She said she was fine.”



Spencer and Aria exchanged a glance. “Hanna, it was a dream,” Aria said softly.



“Well, yeah, obviously.” Hanna rolled her eyes. “I’m just saying. It was like Ali was right there.” She pointed at a pink GET WELL SOON balloon at the end of the bed. It had a round face and accordion-style arms and legs, and it could walk on its own.



Before either of Hanna’s old friends could respond, a loud voice interrupted them. “Where’s the sexiest patient in this hospital?”



Mona stood in the doorway, her arms outstretched. She, too, wore her Rosewood Day blazer and skirt along with an amazing pair of Marc Jacobs boots Hanna had never seen. Mona glanced at Aria and Spencer suspiciously, then dumped a pile of Vogue, Elle, Lucky, and Us Weekly magazines on the nightstand. “Pour vous, Hanna. A lot has happened to Lindsay Lohan that you and I need to discuss.”



“I so love you,” Hanna cried, quickly trying to switch gears. She couldn’t dwell on this A thing. She just couldn’t. She was relieved that she hadn’t been hallucinating yesterday when she woke up and saw Mona standing over her bed. Things with Mona had been rocky last week, but Hanna’s last memory was receiving a court dress for Mona’s birthday party in the mail. It was obviously an olive branch, but it was weird that she couldn’t remember their makeup conversation—usually, when Hanna and Mona made up, they gave each other gifts, like a new iPod case or a pair of Coach kidskin gloves.



Spencer looked at Mona. “Well, now that Hanna’s awake, I guess we don’t have to do that thing on Friday.”



Hanna perked up. “What thing?”



Mona perched on Hanna’s bed. “We were going to have a little vigil for you at the Rosewood Country Club,” she admitted. “Everyone at school was invited.”



Hanna put her IV-rigged hand to her mouth, touched. “You guys were going to do that…for me?” She caught Mona’s eye. It seemed unusual that Mona would be planning a party with Spencer—Mona had a lot of issues with Hanna’s old friends—but Mona actually looked excited. Hanna’s heart lifted.



“Since the club’s already booked…maybe we could have a welcome-back party instead?” Hanna suggested in a small, tentative voice. She crossed her other hand’s fingers under her sheets for luck, hoping Mona wouldn’t think it was a stupid idea.



Mona pursed her perfectly lined lips. “I can’t say no to a party. Especially a party for you, Han.”



Hanna’s insides sparkled. This was the best news she’d gotten all day—even better than when the nurses had permitted her to use the bathroom unattended. She wanted to leap up and give Mona an enormous, thankful, I’m-so-happy-we’re-friends-again hug, but she was attached to too many tubes. “Especially since I can’t remember your birthday party,” Hanna pointed out, pouting. “Was it awesome?”



Mona lowered her eyes, picking a fuzz ball off her sweater.



“It’s cool,” Hanna said quickly. “You can tell me it rocked. I can handle it.” She thought for a moment. “And I have a fantastic idea. Since it’s kind of close to Halloween, and since I don’t look my absolute best right now…” She waved her hands around her face. “Let’s make it a masquerade!”



“Perfect,” Mona gushed. “Oh, Han, it’ll be amazing!”



She grabbed Mona’s hands and they started squealing together. Aria and Spencer stood there awkwardly, left out. But Hanna wasn’t about to squeal with them, too. This was something only BFFs did, and there was only one of those in Hanna’s world.



14



INTERROGATION, WITH A SIDE OF SPYING



Tuesday afternoon, after a quick yearbook meeting and an hour of field hockey drills, Spencer pulled up to her blue slate circular driveway. There was a Rosewood PD squad car sitting in her driveway next to her mother’s battleship gray Range Rover.



Spencer’s heart catapulted into her throat, as it had been doing a lot the past few days. Had it been a huge mistake to confess her guilt about Ali to Melissa? What if Melissa only said that Spencer didn’t have the killer instinct to throw her off track? What if she’d called up Wilden and told him that Spencer had done it?



Spencer thought of that night again. Her sister had had such an eerie smile on her face when she said Spencer couldn’t have murdered Ali. The words she’d chosen were odd, too—she’d said it took a very unique person to kill. Why hadn’t she said crazy or heartless? Unique made it sound special. Spencer had been so freaked out, she’d avoided Melissa ever since, feeling awkward and uncertain in her presence.



As Spencer slipped inside her front door and hung her Burberry trench coat in the hall closet, she noticed that Melissa and Ian were sitting very rigidly on the Hastingses’ living room couch, as if they were being berated in the principal’s office. Officer Wilden sat across from them, on the leather club chair. “H-hi,” Spencer sputtered, surprised.



“Oh, Spencer.” Wilden gave Spencer a nod. “I’m just talking to your sister and Ian for a moment, if you’ll excuse us.”



Spencer took a big step back. “W-what are you talking about?”



“Just a few questions about the night Alison DiLaurentis went missing,” Wilden said, his eyes on his notepad. “I’m trying to get everyone’s perspective.”



The room was silent except for the sound of the ionizer Spencer’s mother had bought after her allergist told her that dust mites gave women wrinkles. Spencer backed out of the room slowly.



“There’s a letter for you on the hall table,” Melissa called out just as Spencer rounded the corner. “Mom left it for you.”



There was indeed a stack of mail on the hall table, next to a hive-shaped terra-cotta vase that had allegedly been a gift to Spencer’s great-grandmother from Howard Hughes. Spencer’s letter was right on top, in an already-opened creamy envelope with her name handwritten across the front. Inside was an invitation on heavy cream card stock. Gold, scrolling script read, The Golden Orchid committee invites you to a finalists’ breakfast and interview at Daniel Restaurant in New York City on Friday, October 15.



There was a pink Post-it note affixed to the corner. Her mother had written, Spencer, we already cleared this with your teachers. We have rooms reserved at the W for Thursday night.



Spencer pressed the paper to her face. It smelled a little like Polo cologne, or maybe that was Wilden. Her parents were actually encouraging her to compete, knowing what they knew? It seemed so surreal. And wrong.



Or…was it? She ran her finger along the invite’s embossed letters. Spencer had longed to win a Golden Orchid since third grade, and perhaps her parents recognized that. And if she hadn’t been so freaked out about Ali and A, she definitely would have been able to write her own Golden Orchid–worthy essay. So why not really go for it? She thought about what Melissa had said—her parents would reward her handsomely for winning. She needed a reward right now.