Pretty Little Liars

Chapter 25: Let's Talk About Sex

Neah packs her school lunch at the kitchen island while Sage is calling out from the front door that he's heading to school early to finish a paper that is due in less than an hour. Neah glances over her shoulder when Tony walks through the doorway, nodding his head at his stepsister.

"Morning," he says to her, reaching for his own brown paper lunch bag from one of the cupboards.

"Hi," Neah responds distractedly, filling a water bottle up with juice.

"I saw that Dakota was here the other night," he recalls over the crinkling of his bag. "It was like walking back in time."

"Yeah, it was nice," Neah says honestly.

She isn't sure she would ever admit this out loud to her old friends, but she's internally terrified of what is happening in her life right now. With A lurking in the shadows of Rosewood, she feels like all of her dirty laundry is about to be aired out at any given second. The feeling is uneasy and it leaves a pit the size of a watermelon in her stomach. She can tell Dakota is scared out of her wits, and Sabrina looks like a lost puppy all the time, while Bree seems more angry than scared. One of them has to hold it together so it might as well be Neah.

Tony drops an apple into his bag before reaching on top of the fridge for a small bag of Fritos. "You going to Tyler Firestone's party tomorrow night? Supposed to be a good one."

"They're all supposed to be good ones," Neah mumbles.

Tyler Firestone is known for throwing parties. He's been doing it since the sixth grade when his parents upgraded their huge backyard with an in-ground swimming pool and a hot tub that can fit twenty people. Being friends with Ali, of course Neah has been to a couple of them, and of course she left them with a deep fear of getting older. Kids would drown themselves in booze or vomit their brains out or play weird stripping games in the basement that usually resulted in one or two people getting assaulted.

"But nope," she tells him, folding up the top of her paper bag. "Not my kind of thing."

He raises his eyebrows at her, as though he's shocked. Perhaps he doesn't even know her that well at all. "You're not down to party out in that big Firestone mansion?"

Neah looks at him. "Spending my night with a bunch of self absorbed teenagers, drinking, and watching girls fawn over my little brother doesn't sound like the best night on earth to me. I'll pass."

"You know what your problem is?" he challenges playfully. "You don't know how to let loose. With a few drops of beer in your bloodstream, you might know how to have a good time."

Neah stuffs her lunch into her navy blue messenger bag. "Yeah, well, the last time I got drunk we--"

She stops, the image of the two of them crushing their lips together playing through her mind. She swallows, looking at him and somehow feeling like a deer in headlights.

"Uh, yeah." He clears his throat, zipping up his own bag and slinging it over his shoulder. "Good call."

Neah can't quite explain it but the fact that he's trying to rush out of here like the kitchen is on fire is almost insulting. So they can hook up like their parents aren't married but he can't even stand to talk about it? This makes Neah feel bold.

"We're never going to talk about that night, are we?" she blurts.

Tony blinks on her on his way to the doorway leading into the foyer. "Is there something in particular you would like to talk about?"

That night rips through her mind again. "Maybe acknowledging the fact that it actually happened. I know that I was tipsy but I don't think you were. Like, at all."

"No, I wasn't," he admits, eyes trained on hers. "But you know what they say: drunk actions are sober thoughts."

Neah glares. He might have a point. "If you have something to say, then say it."

"I could say the same to you." He smirks, unbothered by this whole exchange. "I'm not all to blame here. It takes a two-person deal for sex to work, you know."

"I'm not blaming you," she insists honestly, feeling silly having this conversation before school. But, no one's even home so they might as well make the most of it in the most innocent way possible. She tilts her head, another thought coming to mind. "Is that what you think? That I might believe you took advantage of me that night?"

Tony shyly shrugs his shoulders and finally looks away from her, not saying anything.

Neah scoffs. "God, Tony. I don't think you raped me."

"Well how am I supposed to know that?" Tony shoots back. "We don't talk about this."

"And maybe it's time that we did."

"Okay."

"Okay." Neah juts her chin into the air. "I know damn well that if I would have told you to stop, that you would have. And I also know that it wasn't something I didn't want. And that you weren't exactly wrong about that thing with drunk actions and sober thoughts."

Tony studies her. He opens his mouth to respond but a honk outside cuts him off. He glances out the window over the sink. "Mason. I gotta go."

And with that, he's gone.