Family Tree

"So your mom, I mean Veronica, uh Mrs. Hastings, God this is confusing, confirmed that Mary Drake is your biological mother, Spence?" asked a flustered Emily. Her, Spencer, Hanna, Aria and Alison were all currently situated in Spencer's barn. Spencer sent the girls an S.O.S., and told the girls to meet her there so she could brief them on the truth of her birth that she just learned from her (adoptive) mom.

Spencer nodded. "Mary pretended to be Jessica and slept with my dad, and I was the result of that," she said stoically. "My mom adopted me the day I was born, and I've been living a lie ever since."

"This is crazy," Hanna paused when she realized, that with Spencer's whole situation, maybe crazy wasn't the right word to use. "Sorry, Spence."

"It's okay, Han. Crazy runs in my family. Or should I say our family?" Spencer paused. "You're right, this is crazy."

"Right?! I mean Ali and I are twins, and you're our what? Cousin?" asked Hanna.

"I think so. We should make a family tree," added Ali. "Spencer, do you have a whiteboard or something to draw on?"

"Yeah, I'll be right back," Spencer said as she got up and left the room.

A few minutes later, Spencer returned, not only with a whiteboard and a marker, but with an easel too. She set it up and turned to face the girls.

"Okay. Let's start with you Aria: Your dad is Byron Montgomery, your mom is Ella and Mike is your younger brother," said Spencer as she started the family tree. Aria absent-mindedly nodded her head in response.

"Emily, you're next: Your dad's Wayne Fields, your mom's Pam, and you're an only child." Emily nodded sadly. She'd never tell the others this, but she didn't think it was fair that out of all their fathers, Emily's was the least shitty one and he was the one that was dead. Emily no way considered Ted to be a shitty father, but she couldn't include him with the other dads because he didn't even know he had kids until they were nearly adults.

"You and Aria probably have the least complicated family trees," said Spencer to Emily.

"I think we should do you next, Spence," chipped in Aria.

Spencer nodded and began drawing her messed up family tree on the whiteboard. She connected Peter Hastings to Veronica and from them came Melissa. Then she added in Mary Drake, joined her to Peter and from them came Spencer.

As everyone watched Spencer mapping out her family tree, Hanna suddenly remembered something important she forgot to tell the others. "Guys! I just remembered something huge! Ted, I mean my dad, told me that Mary recently told him that Charles, I mean Charlotte, was his daughter!" exclaimed Hanna.

Spencer stopped writing and turned to face Hanna. Simultaneous "What?"s came flying at Hanna in response.

"Hanna, how could you forget to mention something like that?" asked a dumbfounded Emily.

"I don't know. There's just been so much going on lately. That's why we need to make this family tree", she added, pointing to the whiteboard. She didn't want to tell them (yet) that she also learned that Lucas went to the same camp as Charles and that the two of them were friends. She would tell them after she processed everything for herself, and after she found out more information. She didn't want the others to jump on the "Lucas is AD" bandwagon just yet.

"Anyway... I guess we'll put Ted next to Mary then," said Spencer as she turned back facing the whiteboard. She connected Mary to Ted, and from them came Charlotte.

"I guess our family's next," said Ali to Hanna. Hanna nodded.

Spencer wrote Jessica next to Ted and connected them. "Okay, Ali and Hanna, your mother is Jessica DiLaurentis, and your father is Ted Wilson. And you guys are twins." Hanna and Ali smiled at that last part. When Ashley first told the girls they were twins five years ago, Hanna was in denial. Ali, on the other hand, didn't seem too surprised. She appeared happy even. It took Hanna about a week to take everything in and accept it. Finding out Ali, one of her best friends, was her long lost twin sister, secretly made Hanna feel relieved. She finally understood why people were always confusing the two of them for one another. Hanna now knew it was because they were twins, and not because Mona transformed her into Ali's replacement after she went missing.

Hanna was also thrilled to know that Ted was her biological father and that Tom wasn't. She now knew the reason why Tom always treated her poorly, and preferred her (ex) step-sister Kate over her. The only thing sad about finding out Tom wasn't her birth father was learning that Regina wasn't really her grandmother either. Nonetheless, the two still spend time together now and then. Tom, on the other hand, is a different story. Once Ashley broke the news to Hanna, and Tom found out Hanna knew, he vanished entirely out of Hanna's (and Ashley's) life.

Learning all this back then helped Hanna to get out of the funk she was in at that time. She stopped drinking, stopped shoplifting, went back to wearing her old clothes, washed the black out of her hair, and let it grow long. She also fixed things up with Caleb, and they are currently engaged. Having a twin made Hanna feel like she would always have at least one person by her side no matter what happened in her life. She and Ali had this bond that no one could break or ever understand.

"Now I'm going to connect Jessica and my dad and from them came Jason." I'm going to add Mr. DiLaurentis near Jessica since he thinks he's the father of both you and Jason," said Spencer to Ali. "And I'm going to add Mr. Marin and Mrs. Marin near Hanna because they adopted you," she said to Hanna. "I'm not even going to bother adding your ex-step family Hanna. There's not enough room on the board anyway."

"Fine by me," replied Hanna.

Spencer stepped back from the whiteboard, capped the marker, and took her seat back down on the couch. All five girls stared at the mess of writing that was their families displayed out in front of them.

"Okay, let's figure out what everyone's relationship is to one another," said Aria.

"This is so weird. It's like the whole town slept together," added Hanna bluntly.

"Aria, Emily, I hate to break it to you two, but I don't think you guys are related to one another or the three of us," said Spencer sadly, referring to herself, Hanna and Ali.

"Not necessarily. If Hanna ditched Caleb and married Mike, then she would be my sister-in-law," Aria said jokingly.

"Yeah, Aria. That's not going to happen. Caleb and I are meant to be. No offense to Mike" replied Hanna.

"Hanna, relax. I was just joking. Even though I'm sure, my brother still has the hots for you."

Hanna blushed.

"If I married Ali, then Hanna would be my sister-in-law," added Emily.

"That could very well happen," Ali said sheepishly. This time Emily was the one to blush.

"And Aria, if you ditched Ezra and married Jason, you could be Ali's, Spencer's and I's sister-in-law... I think," said Hanna.

"Aww. Can you guys imagine all of us being related somehow? That would be so cute and weird at the same time," said Emily.

"Let's figure this out: Hanna and Ali are twins, that's easy enough. Because you two have the same father as Charlotte, meaning Ted, you guys are paternal half-sisters with her. But she's also your maternal cousin because your moms are sisters. Charlotte is also my half-sister, but we both share the same mother, not the same father. The three of us are also cousins on our moms' side. Jason is my maternal cousin and my paternal half-brother, and you two's maternal half-brother. Charlotte and Jason are also maternal cousins. And Melissa is my paternal half-sister," Spencer said slowly.

"Jesus. I feel like we belong on 'The Maury Show'," replied Ali.

"I think I'm more confused now then I was before," added Hanna.

"Let's just say that we're all one big dysfunctional family," said Spencer.

"I think that's one thing we can all agree on," said Emily.

"For sure," added Aria with a smile.