I loved it.
We should just be friends.
She swept past the beautiful farmhouses, crumbling stone inns, and gardeners’ pickups parked on the road’s shoulder. She used to bike this exact route to Ali’s house; the last time, in fact, had been before the kiss. Emily hadn’t planned to kiss Ali before she came; something had come over her in the heat of the moment. She would never forget how soft Ali’s lips were or the stunned look on Ali’s face when she pulled back. “What did you do that for?” she’d asked.
Suddenly, a siren wailed behind her. Emily barely had time to move to the edge of the road again before a Rosewood ambulance screamed past. A gust of wind kicked up, blowing dust into her face. She wiped her eyes and stared as the ambulance got to the top of the hill and paused at Alison’s street.
Now it was turning onto Alison’s street. Fear seized Emily. Ali’s street was…Maya’s street. She gripped the rubber handles of her bike.
With all the craziness, she’d forgotten the secret Maya had told her last night. The cutting. The hospital. That huge, jagged scar. Sometimes I just feel like I need to, Maya had said.
“Oh my God,” Emily whispered.
She pedaled furiously and skidded around the corner. If the ambulance sirens stop by the time I get around the corner, she thought, Maya will be okay.
But then the ambulance pulled to a stop in front of Maya’s house. The sirens were still roaring. Police cars were everywhere.
“No,” Emily whispered. White-coated medics got out of the vehicle and ran for the house. A ton of people littered Maya’s yard, some with cameras. Emily threw her bike at the curb and ran crookedly toward the house.
“Emily!”
Maya burst through the crowd. Emily gasped, then ran into Maya’s arms, tears messily running down her face.
“You’re okay.” Emily sobbed. “I was afraid—”
“I’m fine,” Maya said.
But there was something in her voice that was clearly not fine. Emily stood back. Maya’s eyes were red and watery. Her mouth was drawn down nervously.
“What is it?” Emily asked. “What’s going on?”
Maya swallowed. “They found your friend.”
“What?” Emily stared at her, then at the scene on Maya’s lawn. It was all so eerily familiar: the ambulance, the cop cars, the crowds of people, the long-lensed cameras. A news helicopter hovered overhead. This was exactly the same scene as three years ago, when Ali went missing.
Emily stepped back out of Maya’s arms, grinning in disbelief. She had been right!
Alison was back at her house, like nothing had ever happened. “I knew it!” she whispered.
Maya took Emily’s hand. “They were digging for our tennis court. My mom was there. She…saw her. I heard her scream from my bedroom.”
Emily dropped her hand. “Wait. What?”
“I tried to call you,” Maya added.
Emily wrinkled her brow and stared back at Maya. Then she looked at the twenty-strong team of cops. At Mrs. St. Germain sobbing by the tire swing. At the POLICE LINE, DO NOT CROSS tape loops around the backyard. And then at the van parked in the driveway. It said, ROSEWOOD PD MORGUE. She had to read it six times for it to make sense. Her heart sped up and suddenly she couldn’t breathe.
“I don’t…understand,” Emily sputtered, taking another step back. “Who did they find?”
Maya looked at her sympathetically, her eyes shiny with tears. “Your friend Alison,” she whispered. “They just found her body.”
31
HELL IS OTHER PEOPLE
Byron Montgomery took a big sip of coffee and shakily lit his pipe. “They found her when they were excavating the concrete slab in the DiLaurentises’ old backyard to put in a tennis court.”
“She was under the concrete,” Ella jumped in. “They knew it was her from the ring she was wearing. But they’re doing DNA tests to make sure.”
It felt like a fist was pummeling Aria’s stomach. She remembered Ali’s white-gold initialed ring. Ali’s parents had gotten it for her at Tiffany’s when she was ten after she got her tonsils out. Ali liked to wear it on her pinkie.
“Why did they have to do DNA tests?” Mike asked. “Was she all decomposed?”
“Michelangelo!” Byron frowned. “That’s not a very sensitive thing to say in front of your sister.”
Mike shrugged and jammed a piece of sour green-apple Bubble Tape into his mouth. Aria sat opposite him, tears quietly running down her cheeks, absentmindedly unraveling the edge of a rattan place mat. It was 2 P.M., and they were sitting around the kitchen table.
“I can handle it.” Aria’s throat constricted. “Was she decomposed?”
Her parents looked at each other. “Well, yes,” her father said, scratching his chest through a little hole in his shirt. “Bodies break down pretty fast.”
“Sick,” Mike whispered.
Aria shut her eyes. Alison was dead. Her body was rotted. Someone had probably killed her.
“Sweetheart?” Ella asked quietly, cupping her hand over Aria’s. “Honey, are you all right?”
“I don’t know,” Aria murmured, trying not to start bawling all over again.
“Would you like a Xanax?” Byron asked.
Aria shook her head.
“I’ll take a Xanax,” Mike said quickly.
Aria nervously picked at the side of her thumb. Her body felt hot and then cold. She didn’t know what to do or think. The only person who she thought might make her feel better was Ezra; she thought she could explain all of her feelings to him. At the very least, he would let her curl up on his denim futon and cry.