Chapter Text
“Again Ali, we’re so sorry.” Spencer repeats after explaining everything about how Mike had found Mona in the midst of setting up this whole fake murder plan only to receive no response. Alison looked like a shadow of herself stuck in this awful place, the place they’d put her in. Her hair seemed less golden, her eyes more grey than blue, her usually perfect skin washed out. The Ali they knew would never have allowed herself to look so ..defeated, even in prison.
“..Ali?” Aria tried softly, lowering her head in attempt to draw Alison’s gaze from the table.
“I’m sorry, was I meant to say something?” The blonde asked, lifting her head, though she seemed to be looking beyond them rather than at them. Her voice held none of the venom it usually did when she was angry or upset, though the three girls sitting opposite her couldn’t bring themselves to be relieved. Her tone was hollow, empty. As if there was no emotion attached to it at all.
Emily and Aria both turned to Spencer hoping she’d know what to say and the overachiever turned to glance at each of them before taking a breath, trying to reanalyse the situation and find the words that might get through to the blonde, but Alison beat her to it.
“Something to assuage your guilt for turning on me I guess.” She mused, the tiniest of smiles curling her lips. “I’m supposed to forgive you or act like a raging bitch so you don’t feel so bad. Sorry, I’m not really in the mood for either today.” The blonde elaborated, though once again they detected no malice in her words, only exhaustion as she leaned back into her chair and lifted her arms to tuck her hair behind her ears, revealing for the first time that her skin was littered with bruises.
The three friends gasped in unison at the sight but it was Emily who asked the question
“Ali, did someone do that to you?!” Her words were laced with a protective rage that used to make the blonde feel safe, but as the memory of the brunette’s betrayal that night in her backyard played in her mind for the thousandth time, Alison couldn’t even bring herself to look at her.
“I’ve been through worse. This isn’t anything I can’t handle.” She answered, barely batting an eyelash as she placed her hands back under the table and out of sight.
“When have you been through worse, how many fights have you been in?!” Aria scoffed, her guilt rising so high in her throat at the sight of her friends marked flesh, she thought she might choke on it.
“Now you care?” She asked, her head cocked to one side, a flicker of amusement playing through otherwise distant eyes. “It’s not like any of you asked when I came back. You might have talked me into staying like you gave a damn about me, but let’s be honest you all liked me better when I was dead.”
“Alison! Don’t—-“ Spencer tried but was quickly cut off.
“Why not? It’s true.” The blonde shrugged, the ghost of a smile painting her face though her eyes remained sad and empty. “You can remember a ghost however you want. Pick and choose which memories you wanna keep, tell whatever story you want without having to deal with anyone getting any inconvenient facts in the way of your narrative. Dead girls don’t talk. You could paint me as a fallen angel when you were feeling sentimental and blame me for everything that ever went wrong in your lives every other day of the week.”
The girls across from her remained silent, their eyes wide and their hearts hurting. Because as much as they wanted to yell that she was crazy, that it was all some fantasy she’d created in her head, there was truth to it. An ugly shameful truth none of them ever thought they’d have to admit even to themselves. But Ali always did have a special talent for finding out everyone’s deepest darkest secrets.
“It’s a little harder when you have to see me walking around, trying to make up for the awful things I did rather than acting like the monster you think I am.” Alison added after a moment, sounding almost sympathetic.
It was Spencer again who was the first to recover. “Ali, we don’t —“
“Yes, you do.” She interrupted once more, the certainty in her tone making all their hearts drop. “It’s why I’m here. You can pretend all you want if it makes you feel better, but it doesn’t change the fact that you hate me so much you didn’t even consider that Mona might not be dead.” The blonde shrugged, tired of lying and skirting around what they all already knew.
“Mona, who tortured you all for over a year. Mona who ran me out of town. Mona who ran hanna over with a car. Mona who’s been in and out of Radley for years.” Ali reminded, her each sentence making the others want to sink back in their seats. “One would think the possibility that this was another one of her games would’ve entered your mind at some point, especially for brainiac over here.” She continued, her eyes shifting to Spencer who suddenly felt small. Because the blonde was right. She should’ve thought of it sooner, but she’d managed to entirely convince herself Alison was guilty to the point she never even considered the alternatives.
“And if you really thought about it, you would’ve thought about the fact that a girl who was able to convince everyone she was dead and stay hidden for two years without slipping up, someone who’s saved your asses more than once without leaving a trace of evidence, someone who’s been wearing disguises since this whole game started.” She went on, none daring to meet her eyes as she reminded them, not in an angry chastising way as they’d come to expect from her but with a quiet nonchalance. As if none of it mattered at all, as if nothing really did. “Probably wouldn’t walk into the house of a known psychotic stalker notorious for getting our every move caught on tape and paint the walls red with their blood. But you didn’t wanna think about it.”
Spencer looked like she might try to speak but was quickly silenced once again. “You wanted me gone. You wanted me to pay. Or maybe I’m wrong. Maybe I just overestimated your intelligence.” Ali finished, her last words accompanied by a hollow chuckle that made it clear how much weight she gave the possibility.
The silence that filled the air in the moments after were heavy and thick with tension. Spencer was rendered speechless by the argument presented her and having no worthy rebuttal she left it to the two either side of her to take the lead.
Seeing Aria was also at a loss for words, Emily hesitantly took over, her heart pounding painfully in her chest as she looked at her first love. She’d never felt so guilty in her life and the fact that Ali hadn’t looked at her once since she got here hadn’t escaped her. She knew her betrayal had to have stung the most.
“..Ali, we-“
“Don’t.” The blonde replied softly, her eyes fixed on the wall straight ahead, still not daring to look at the brunette. She’d learned early on growing up in the Dilaurentis house how to seperate herself from her feelings when she had to, and in here that’s just what she’d done. All her feelings of betrayal and heartbreak weren’t going to help her survive in a prison full of hardened criminals, so she’d let the part of her that wanted to cry and scream with rage lie dormant. Locked away in a box in her mind until it was safe to let it out.
But as good as she was at sectioning off her emotions there were a few people that always managed to slip through the cracks and slither into her heart no matter how high she tried to build the walls around it. Emily Fields had been at the top of that list almost since the day they met, and just hearing her voice now Alison was starting to feel tears pricking at the back of her eyes and that was the last thing she needed.
“I don’t wanna hear you’re sorry. You aren’t. You’re just sorry I didn’t do it and now you have to feel guilty about it.” She added when she heard Em start to try again, willing herself to keep the emotion from entering her voice. “But I am sorry. I’m sorry I thought you were different.”
Those last words had felt like a bullet to the chest, tears filling the swimmers eyes almost instantly as she looked at the blonde silently begging her to take them back. To turn and look at her and see how sorry she was.
The others shifted uncomfortably, knowing this moment between their friends was a private one that they shouldn’t be baring witness to. Though Alison apparently didn’t seem to pay any mind to the fact they had an audience.
“Don’t give me that wounded look, we both know you’re not that innocent.” The blonde sighed, not having to turn to know her mermaid was crying. Her mask slipping for a moment, her voice hitched and all their eyes widened at the first display of emotion they’d seen from her all day, and an unfamiliar one at that. “You got what you wanted from me and then just like everyone else you turned your back.”
Narrowing her eyes, it took Emily a moment to pick up on her meaning and when she did she felt her heart shatter in her chest. Shaking her head vehemently, the swimmer reached out to try and grab her hand but the blonde recoiled.
Meeting each others eyes, Spencer and Aria both raised an eyebrow, realising there was something more to the scene before them than either was privy to.
“No. Ali, I —“
“Look, visiting hours are almost up so, hopefully you got what you came for, you can all go home with lighter consciences knowing you tried but I’m still the Queen Bitch, too cruel to accept a heartfelt apology and call it a day.” Alison announced quickly, doing what she could to shut down the situation before it got out of hand.
“It’s not like that.” Spencer insisted.
“Yeah, it is.” She replied with a frustrated sigh, growing tired of the back and forth. “We both know you’ll think about this for a couple days and then you’ll go back to your own lives and forget I’m even here. You won’t call and you won’t come back. There might be days where you’ll consider it but then you’ll remember how it made you feel like shit and you’ll change your mind, because feeling like you’re all good and righteous people being unfairly victimised by the big bad world is the only way you sleep at night.”
Again, they all looked at her in shock floundering for something to say. None being able to recall a time where the great Alison Dilaurentis had been so brutally honest.
“What? Too much? You guys should probably go before evil Ali hurts your feelings anymore.” The blonde snarked, a shadow of her trademark smirk adorning her features as she motioned to the guards that they were ready.
Emily wiped her tears and headed out the door after taking one last lingering look at the blonde who still refused to even turn in her direction. Spencer was quick to follow her out, worried about the other brunette and wanting to ask questions about what she and Aria had just seen between she and their incarcerated friend.
The smallest of them all was next to head toward the exit when she was called back.
“Aria, wait.” Walking back toward Alison hesitantly, she braced herself for whatever was about to be thrown her way. “Mike’s a good kid and I don’t wanna drag him into this unless I have to, but if I can’t get out of this on my own I’m going to have to tell my lawyers what he knows.” She warned.
“Ali, you can’t.” She begged, instantly panicked at the thought of what might become of her brother if anyone found out.
“I might not have a choice.” The blonde reminded regretfully.
“Just give us a few days, okay?” Aria pleaded, to which Alison agreed before watching her run out the door.