You know that boy who lives a few doors down from you who's just the creepiest person alive? When you're on your front porch, about to kiss yourboyfriend good night, you might glimpse him across the street, just standing there. He'll randomly appear when you're gossiping with your bestfriends—except maybe it's not so random at all. He's the black cat who seems to know your route. If he rides by your house, you think, I'm going tofail my bio exam. If he looks at you funny, watch your back.Every town has a black-cat boy. In Rosewood, his name was Toby Cavanaugh. "I think she needs more blush." Spencer Hastings leaned back and examined one of her best friends, Emily Fields."I can still see her freckles.""I've got some Clinique concealer." Alison DiLaurentis sprang up and ran to her blue corduroy makeup bag.Emily looked at herself in the mirror propped up on Alison's living room coffee table. She tilted her face one way, then another, andpuckered her pink lips. "My mom would kill me if she saw me with all this stuff on.""Yeah, but we'll kill you if you take it off," warned Aria Montgomery, who was, for her own Aria reasons, prancing around the room in a pinkmohair bra she'd recently knitted."Yeah, Em, you look awesome," Hanna Marin agreed. Hanna sat cross-legged on the floor and kept swiveling around to check that hercrack wasn't sticking out of her low-rise, slightly-too-small Blue Cult jeans.It was a Friday night in April, and Ali, Aria, Emily, Spencer, and Hanna were having one of their typical sixth-grade sleepovers: putting waytoo much makeup on one another, chowing on salt-and-vinegar kettle chips, and half-watching MTV Cribs on Ali's flat-screen TV. Tonight there wasthe added clutter of everyone's clothes spread out on the carpet, since they'd decided to swap clothes for the rest of their sixth-grade school year.Spencer held up a lemon-yellow cashmere cardigan to her slender torso."Take it," Ali told her. "It'll look cute on you."Hanna pulled an olive corduroy skirt of Ali's around her hips, turned to Ali, and struck a pose. "What do you think? Would Sean like it?"Ali groaned and smacked Hanna with a pillow. Ever since they'd become friends in September, all Hanna could talk about was how muchshe looooved Sean Ackard, a boy in their class at the Rosewood Day School, where they'd all been going since kindergarten. In fifth grade, Seanhad been just another short, freckled guy in their class, but over the summer, he'd grown a couple inches and lost his baby fat. Now, pretty muchevery girl wanted to kiss him.It was amazing how much could change in a year.The girls—everyone but Ali—knew that all too well.
Last year, they were just...there. Spencer was the überanal girl who sat at the front of theclass and raised her hand at every question. Aria was the slightly freaky girl who made up dance routines instead of playing soccer like everyoneelse. Emily was the shy, state-ranked swimmer who had a lot going on under the surface—if you just got to know her. And Hanna might've beenklutzy and bumbling, but she studied Vogue and Teen Vogue, and every once in a while she'd blurt out something totally random about fashion thatno one else knew.
There was something special about all of them, sure, but they lived in Rosewood, Pennsylvania, a suburb twenty miles outside Philadelphia,and everything was special in Rosewood. Flowers smelled sweeter, water tasted better, houses were just plain bigger. People joked that thesquirrels spent their nights cleaning up litter and weeding errant dandelions from the cobblestone sidewalks so Rosewood would look perfect for itsdemanding residents. In a place where everything looked so flawless, it was hard to stand out.But somehow Ali did. With her long blond hair, heart-shaped face, and huge blue eyes, she was the most stunning girl around. After Aliunited them in friendship—sometimes it felt like she'd discovered them—the girls were definitely more than just there. Suddenly, they had an all-access pass to do things they'd never dared to before. Like changing into short skirts in the Rosewood Day girls' bathroom after they got off thebus in the morning. Or passing boys ChapStick-kissed notes in class. Or walking down the Rosewood Day hallway in an intimidating line, ignoringall the losers.Ali grabbed a tube of shimmery purple lipstick and smeared it all over her lips. "Who am I?"
