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Mrs. DiLaurentis folded her hands. The sun streamed across her face, lighting up one cheek and casting the other in shadow. “You really seem like something’s bothering you.”
Ali slammed down her lemonade glass hard, the ice clinking. Was her mom that much of an idiot? Of course something was bothering her. Several somethings. And her mother knew exactly what those various things were.
She looked at the half-dug hole instead. “When are they going to finish that thing?” she asked sharply. “They’re taking forever. By the time they’re done, the opportunity to have fabulous summer parties will be over.”
Mrs. DiLaurentis didn’t glance toward the hole, her eyes still on Ali. “Do you have anyone to talk to, honey? About . . . things?”
Ali stared down at her flip-flops. “If you mean her, we were keeping that a secret, remember? I can’t talk to anyone.”
“Well, if you’d like to talk to your friends about it, that’s okay with us.”
Ali sucked in her stomach. “No, thanks.”
Mrs. DiLaurentis brushed an invisible mess of leaves off the surface of the patio table. “Perhaps a counselor, then. They can help.”
Ali glowered at her. “You’ve got the wrong twin. I’m not the crazy one. I don’t need a shrink.”
Mrs. DiLaurentis shut her eyes. “That’s not what I meant. But the way you reacted the other day when I said Courtney was coming home—you seemed very disturbed.”
Ali shifted her chair around so that she wasn’t facing her mother. “What do you expect? You just dropped it on me! Even Jason knew before I did! And I don’t want her home, Mom. It’s a terrible idea.”
“She’s part of the family. And sometimes, in families, you have to do things you don’t want to do.”
“And what happens if she tries to hurt me again?”
A car grumbled on the street. A mourning dove cooed from the trees. Mrs. DiLaurentis pursed her lips. “That won’t happen.”
The incident in the bathroom at the Preserve flashed in Ali’s mind. “How do you know?”
“I just do, okay?” Then Ali’s mom stared at the half-dug hole, then at the shrubs that separated their yard from the Hastingses’. “We should talk, too, about what you said to me. About . . . him.”
Ali stood and headed for the sliding door. “No, thanks.”
Mrs. DiLaurentis caught her arm. “It’s not what you think, Alison.”
Ali yanked the door open. “Yes, it is.”
“It isn’t, and you shouldn’t have confronted me with it. Now your father is asking questions. I’m not having an affair with anyone, and it was rude of you to say so.”
Ali’s head whipped up. All sounds—the swishing of the wind, the neighbor’s Weedwacker, the steady hum of the heating unit—seemed to cease all at once. “Are you seriously going to sit here and deny it?”
Mrs. DiLaurentis’s eyes darted back and forth, searching her face. “What do you think you saw, exactly?”
“I saw some guy touching your cheek at the mall. And I heard you,” Ali hissed. “I heard you talking to someone in a sugary voice—someone who wasn’t dad. It sounded like whoever it was knew about Courtney.”
A muscle by Mrs. DiLaurentis’s mouth twitched. Her eyes had darkened to a deeper blue, which they always did when she became serious or enraged. “Yes, there is someone who knows about Courtney besides us. But it’s someone who has kept things an absolute secret, I promise. There are a lot of things you don’t understand, Alison. Things you don’t need to know.”
Ali ran her hand down the length of her face. Rage bubbled up inside her, then geysered out. “Things I don’t need to know?” she growled, her voice sounding feral. She yanked her hand away from her mother, her head spinning faster and faster. “When are you going to tell the truth, Mom? When are you going to tell me where I really come from?”
Mrs. DiLaurentis jerked her head back and frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“I heard you!” Ali screamed. “I heard you say, She’s your daughter, too! So this does concern me, Mom. Knowing who my real father is concerns me a lot.”
The color drained from Mrs. DiLaurentis’s cheeks. “Alison,” she hissed. And then she rose to her feet and slapped Ali across the face.
It came so fast, so out of nowhere, that Ali didn’t feel the sting until a few seconds after it was over. Tears welled up in her eyes. Her mouth dropped open, but she was too stunned to speak.
Mrs. DiLaurentis settled back into her chair. Calmly, evenly, she picked up the overturned glass. There was a long pause. Ali’s heart pounded; her cheek stung. It felt like everything hinged on what her mother would say next.
“There will be no more of that,” Mrs. DiLaurentis announced in a deep voice. And then her gaze shifted to the half-dug hole at the back of the yard. “The workers are set to pour the concrete for the gazebo the weekend your sister is home,” she said in the clipped, perfunctory voice Ali was used to, the voice that got things done. She squeezed Ali’s shoulder twice. “Just in time for your fabulous summer parties.”
And with that, she was gone.
24
HANNA LETS IT ALL GO
The following evening, Ali placed the last bowl of chips on the table and stood back for the effect. “Do people even eat Doritos anymore?” she asked aloud, then spun around and glanced at her friends. Too bad Hanna wasn’t among them; otherwise, she would have made a snarky comment.
