AFTER IAN'S death,the days went by very slowly, and everyone had a lot of questions. However,Ian's explanation for his actions was quite clear in the end. Following dayBrooklyn's sneakers squeaked against the freshly waxed floor as she bolted through the school corridor. The whispers of the other students grew faint as she approached.
"Ian didn't commit suicide," she murmured urgently, her eyes searching for Spencer's familiar face. The weight of the words hung heavy in the air, as if each syllable was a secret too large for the hallway to contain.
Spencer's hand froze mid-air, the paper fluttering to the desk. Her eyes widened, a mix of shock and confusion. "What?" she said, her voice barely above a whisper,the classroom buzzed around them.
Aria leaned in closer, her eyebrows raising in curiosity. "How did you find out?" she hissed, her voice urgent, the question a tightly wound coil of suspicion.
Brooklyn took a deep breath, her chest rising and falling with the weight of her revelation. She pulled out her phone, the screen glowing a soft blue in the muted classroom light. "When I read it again, a couple of words stuck out to me," she began, her voice low and steady. "So I checked my old text messages."
The four of them huddled closer, their eyes glued to the screen as Brooklyn scrolled through a thread of messages between her and A. The room felt suddenly smaller, the walls closing in around them as they pieced together a puzzle they never wanted to solve. Spencer's heart raced, the whispers of their classmates fading into the background.
"I killed Alison," Brooklyn read, her voice a hollow echo in the stillness. The words on the screen seemed to pulse with malice. "I lost my temper. She knew too much. There's only so much you can bury. It won't be that easy, but you know how to get rid of pain." The message ended with a taunting dare: "Can't run from the law. Come find me."
Hanna's eyes narrowed, her grip tightening around the phone. "So these are parts from the texts," she murmured, piecing the words together in her mind. "This means A wrote that suicide note."
Spencer's voice was shaky, disbelief lacing her words. "How did you figure this out?" she asked, looking up at Brooklyn.
Brooklyn shrugged, a hint of a smile playing on her lips. "I watch Criminal Minds every night with my mom," she said casually, as if solving a murder was as easy as piecing together a TV plot.
Emily leaned back in her chair, arms crossed, skeptical. "For the plot ?"
Brooklyn nodded, a mischievous glint in her eye. "Yeah. Sure- if you take Matthew Gubler as plot"
Spencer felt a flicker of hope, her mind racing with the implications. "If A wrote this," she said, her voice barely above a murmur, "that means Ian never actually confessed to killing Ali." The revelation was like a key turning in a lock, unlocking a door to a reality they hadn't dared to consider.
