We Got You

She Slipped Away

The room was quiet for a moment and Melissa thought she had gotten through to Spencer, but when her little sister scoffed and crossed her arms over her chest Melissa knew different.

"My relationship is over. My friends aren't real. And my family is a mess of secrets and lies swept under a rug. What would I be throwing away?"

Melissa took a step forward. "Spencer, maybe our family isn't as ideal as we once thought, but we are still a family." She glanced at Jason. "All of us." Then she looked back at Spencer's friends. "Even your friends are your family and they are real. One thing I've always been jealous of was your friendship with them, not Alison, but them. How you all chose to be friends again and put Alison's manipulation behind you. How you stuck by each other no matter what life threw at you. I have always envied that." She admitted.

Spencer blinked and once again Melissa thought she was getting through to her, but then she took a moment to remember that her younger sister had a stubbornness to rival her own and this would not be easy.

"Everything I went through with them was because of Alison. She chose us to be her posse and we went along with it. We hurt people for fun. We did horrible things and this person who wants us to suffer is right. We deserve to die!"

Melissa and Jason shared a look then they looked from Spencer to the other girls. "What person?" Melissa asked in concern.

"Is someone threatening you?" Jason asked all the girls, but he was looking right at Aria. "Well?"

"No." They shook their heads. "Spencer is just- She's not thinking clearly." Aria explained.

"It's Mona again, she might even have help." Paige told them. The girls attention snapped to her.

"Paige-"

"No, Em, this has gone on long enough and it is destorying one of your best friends. It's time to tell someone about it."

"Yeah, but someone we can trust. Melissa might be-" Aria and Emily's glares cut Hanna off. "I mean- I-I just meant-"

Melissa turned and glared at Hanna. "You think I would help Mona? Help someone hurting my little sister? Why?!" She demanded to know.

Hanna gulped. "Y-You hated Ali and might have, ya know, killed her. Mona could have found out so she blackmailed you."

Melissa sighed. "Mona blackmailed me one time. I did what she wanted and that was the end of it." They looked shocked and she knew she would have to explain. "Mona found out that I did something, to protect Spencer, and she told me she would tell everyone unless I-" She sighed again. "I put on this black swan dress and spied on my sister and her friends. I didn't do anything, but watch you, and when I saw you coming I ran away to distract you from whatever Mona was doing. Now I know what she was doing was making you suspect me of helping her, but I would never hurt my sister. I have been protecting her since this started, since before this started!" She was starting to get upset and Jason realized maybe Melissa wasn't as strong as he thought and maybe she did need her big brother as much as Spencer seemed to.

He reached out to offer her comfort, just a hand on her shoulder, but the motion was enough for her to turn around and throw her arms around him in a moment of weakness that caught not only him, but everyone off guard as she cried in his strong embrace.

Spencer looked around her at everyone's tear stricken faces and felt her heart swell, but it wasn't enough to change her mind. She was done. She didn't want to cause any pain or suffering anymore. So she slipped out the back door and got into her van to leave and this time she wouldn't ever come back.