Sara Shepard - Wanted

No, Ali insisted. It’s got to be dark. That’s how it works.

It doesn’t always have to be the way you want it, you know, Ali? Spencer told her.

Close them, Ali answered, baring her teeth.

Spencer struggled to let light into the room. Ali let out a frustrated groan. But when Spencer glanced back at Ali, she realized that Ali wasn’t just angry. She’d frozen in place, her face drawn and ghost-pale, her eyes round. It was like she’d seen something awful.

Spencer turned back to the window, a shadow catching her eye. It was a tiny shard of a memory, barely anything. Spencer clung to the image now, desperate to remember whether it had really happened. And then…she saw. It was Ali’s reflection…except she wore a hood and carried a bulky camera. Her eyes were demonic and unblinking, out for murder. It was someone Spencer knew very well. She tried to say her name, but her lips wouldn’t work. She felt like she was choking.

The memory was rolling forward without her. Leave, she heard herself demand to Ali.

Fine, Ali answered.

“No!” Spencer told her old self. “Call Ali back! Keep her in the room! It’s…it’s her sister out there! And she wants to hurt Ali!”

But the memory careened on, out of Spencer’s grasp. Ali was at the door now. She turned around, giving Spencer a long look. Spencer let out a hoarse gasp. Suddenly, Ali didn’t quite look like the girl who was with them today.

Then Spencer’s gaze fell to the silver ring on the girl’s finger. Ali had said she hadn’t been wearing a ring that night, but there it was. Only, except instead of an A in the center, there was a C.

Why did Ali have on the wrong ring?

There was a tap on the window, and Spencer turned. The girl outside smiled sinisterly, running a hand along her eerily identical heart-shaped face. She held up the fourth finger on her right hand. She was wearing a ring, too—hers with the initial A. Spencer’s head felt like it was going to explode. Was Ali out there…and Courtney in here? How had that happened?

My memory’s playing tricks on me, she told herself. This didn’t happen. It’s just a dream.

The Ali at the door turned, her hand on the knob. Suddenly, her skin began to fade from pink to pale to white to ashen. “Ali?” Spencer called out cautiously. “Are you okay?”

Ali’s skin had begun to flake off in thick curls. “Does it look like I’m okay?” she snapped. She shook her head at Spencer. “I’ve been trying to tell you…”

“Trying to tell me?” Spencer echoed. “What do you mean?”

“All those dreams you’ve had about me? Don’t you remember?”

Spencer blinked. “I…”

Ali rolled her eyes. Her skin was peeling off faster now, revealing ropy muscles and bleached bones. Her teeth plunked to the floor like acorns. Her hair turned from golden blond to pale gray. Then it started to fall out in chunks. “You really are stupider than I thought, Spence,” she hissed. “You deserve this.”

“Deserve what?” Spencer screamed.

Ali didn’t answer. When she turned the knob, her hand flaked off at the elbow, as brittle as a dried flower. It landed on the wood floor and promptly dissolved into dust. Then the door slammed hard, the force resonating through Spencer’s body. It sounded close. Real. Memory and reality collided.

Spencer’s eyes sprang open. The bedroom was oppressively hot; sweat poured down her face. Her old friends sat cross-legged on the carpet, their faces docile and relaxed, their eyes sealed shut. They looked…dead.

“Guys?” Spencer called. No answer. She wanted to reach out and touch Hanna, but she was afraid.

The dream crackled in her brain. I’ve been trying to tell you, the girl in the vision said. The one who looked like the Ali she remembered…but the one who was wearing Courtney’s ring. All those dreams you’ve had about me. Don’t you remember?

Spencer did remember plenty of dreams about Ali. Sometimes, she even dreamed about two different Alis.

“No,” Spencer whispered perilously. She didn’t understand this. She blinked in the darkness, looking for her fourth friend.

“Ali?” she squeaked.

But Ali didn’t answer. Because Ali was gone.

Aria heard a slam and jerked awake. Half the candles had blown out. A putrid smell filled the air. Her three old best friends were sitting on the carpet, staring at her.

“What’s going on?” she asked. “Where’s Ali?”

“We don’t know.” Emily looked terrified. “She…disappeared.”

“Maybe this is part of the reenactment?” Hanna suggested groggily.

“I don’t think so, guys.” Spencer’s voice trembled. “I think something’s really wrong.”

“Of course something’s wrong!” Emily cried. “Ali’s gone!”

“No,” Spencer said. “I think…I think something’s wrong with Ali .”

Aria gaped at her. “Ali?” Emily sputtered.

“What do you mean?” Hanna demanded.

“I think the girl at the window of the barn was Ali’s sister,” Spencer whispered, her voice thick with sobs. “I think that’s who killed her.”

Hanna wrinkled her brow. “I thought you said it was Melissa.”

“And no one killed Ali,” Emily added, narrowing her eyes. “She’s here .”

But Aria stared at Spencer, a tiny kernel of an idea forming in her head. She thought of those Polaroids again. It could have been a DiLaurentis face reflected in the window.

“Oh my God,” Aria whispered, remembering what that creepy medium had said to her a few weeks ago, as she stood over the hole where Ali’s body had been found: Ali killed Ali.

A bang thundered from downstairs. Everyone jumped and scuttled back into the corner, hugging one another tight. “What was that ?” Hanna whispered.

There were a few more creaks and slams, then silence. Aria dared to look around the rest of the room. Someone must have opened the curtains, because moonlight spilled through the window onto the floor. That was when she noticed something she hadn’t seen before. Just inches from the door was a white envelope. It looked as though someone had recently slipped it through the crack.

“Um, guys?” she squeaked, pointing a shaky finger at it.

Everyone stared, too petrified to move. Finally, Spencer snatched it off the ground. Her fingers shook. She held the front of the envelope out for the rest of them to see.

To: Four Bitches. From: A.

Emily sank to her knees. “Oh my God. It’s Billy. He’s here.”

“It’s not Billy,” Spencer snapped.

“Then it’s Melissa,” Emily guessed frantically.

Spencer tore open the note. Lines and lines of type covered the page. As she read, her mouth twisted. “Oh my God.”

Hanna squinted. “This can’t be real.”

A cold, hard knot of certainty congealed in the pit of Aria’s stomach. There was something wrong. Taking a deep breath, she leaned in and read, too.

Once upon a time, there were two beautiful girls named Ali and Courtney—but one of them was crazy. And as you know, with a few magical twists of fate, Ali became Courtney for a while. But what you don’t know is that Courtney became Ali, too.

You heard me right, Pretty Little Losers…and it’s all because of you. Remember when you stalked me in my backyard for the Time Capsule flag? And remember that girl who trotted out to the lawn and talked to you? That wasn’t me. As you so astutely figured out, Courtney was home switching from the Radley to the Preserve that weekend. And oh, how poor widdle Courtney didn’t want to go. She had her neat, crazy little life at the Radley…and she didn’t want to start over in a new hospital.