Drink This. You'll Feel Better--Sparia
Aria knocked on the door of the barn, frowning when Spencer didn't answer. Both her car and Veronica’s were in the driveway, and there was no way she’d walked somewhere in this storm. Aria supposed Spencer could be in the main house, but it seemed more likely she’d be in here. After rummaging around her purse for a few seconds, she used her extra key to let herself in.
"Spence?" she called, poking her head in. The barn was lit by candles, reminding Aria of the proposal she’d rejected only days before.
"Spencer?" she called again, shaking the memory of that night away. She walked into the kitchen and found Spencer huddled in the corner.
"Aria?" Spencer whimpered, holding a knife in front of her. Aria rushed over to her friend, grabbing the knife away from her.
"Spence, what happened?" she asked worriedly. Spencer looked at her, her eyes wild with fear.
"I thought there was someone in here," she mumbled, ashamed of being caught like this. Still frowning in concern, Aria led her to the couch.
“The door was locked when I got here,” Aria said, wrapping a blanket around Spencer. The brunette nodded, however instead of being reassured she just felt sillier.
“I’ll be back in a second,” Aria promised, kissing Spencer’s forehead. Spencer nodded again. When Aria returned, she handed Spencer a mug.
"Here, drink this, you'll feel better," she said, sitting down next to her. Spencer took a sip, then made a face.
"This is decaf," she complained. Aria rolled her eyes. Of course Spencer would taste the difference between decaf and regular.
"You don't need to be more hyped up than you already are. Besides, why do you even have decaf in here?" she asked.
“My dad stayed here a while back. I guess he left it,” Spencer explained, taking another sip and wrinkling her nose at the lack of caffeine. Still, she drank it without complaining. She wouldn’t admit it, but Aria had a point about her not needing any extra stimulation.
"What are you doing here anyway?" Spencer asked. Aria’s eyes drifted over to the laptop sitting out on the table. Spencer hastily snapped it shut, but not before Aria recognized what it was.
"Are you still watching those dollhouse videos?" she asked, the image of Spencer covered in blood making her queasy, even though she knew it wasn’t Spencer’s blood.
"Only mine," Spencer said defensively, not wanting her friend to think she was invading her privacy. Aria sighed, not wanting Spencer to take what she was about to say the wrong way.
"That's why I'm here actually," she admitted. Spencer raised an eyebrow.
"I thought you didn't want to see them," she said, starting to open up her laptop. Aria shook her head, and put her hand on top of Spencer’s.
"I don't. I wanted to check on you."
Spencer frowned, removing her hand from the laptop.
"Check on me? Why?" she asked, perplexed. She started to pick at her cuticles, an action Aria knew from experience to be a nervous tic. She reached out and gently laced their fingers together before Spencer could draw blood.
"We've been so preoccupied with figuring out what Hanna's up to none of us have asked how you're doing," she explained. Spencer's frown deepened.
"I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be? Hanna’s the one we need to be worrying about," she said, a hard edge to her voice. Aria wasn’t sure if it was directed toward Hanna or her.
"Spence..." she said softly. Spencer closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
"I really thought I hurt somebody in there. Killed someone, even," she whispered. Aria nodded, rubbing Spencer's back. She remembered when Spencer had first shared this incident with her. It hadn’t been until after Charlotte had been caught. Spencer had begged Charlotte to tell her what she had done in the Dollhouse, and Charlotte had laughed in her face. She’d taken that as confirmation that she’d hurt someone, and Aria knew it was something she'd been dealing with everyday for over five years.
"But you didn't," Aria pointed out gently, trying to make Spencer accept what she herself had believed from the beginning, that Spencer would never hurt someone.
"But I could have," Spencer argued.
"But you didn't," Aria insisted. Spencer nodded.
"I didn't. I can’t stop watching this, expecting for something to change. Every time I hit play, I'm afraid that I'm going to be hurting someone," she whispered, putting her head on Aria's shoulder. Aria put an arm around her in a sideways hug.
"Noel is going to go to jail for what he did," Aria said seriously. Spencer nodded, her mind elsewhere.
"Do you... Do you think we should go though the Hanna videos to see if there's anything that shows him kidnapping her?" Aria asked. Spencer shook her head vehemently. She was furious that Hanna had disappeared when they needed her most, and she was worried that she might be in trouble, but she wasn’t going to use her absence as a way to excuse invading her privacy.
"No. Not without her permission. If she doesn't want to tell us about it, I doubt she wants us to see it," she said. Both girls were quiet, thinking about when they'd both seen what Noel did to Hanna—Spencer, that first night when they got Hanna back; Aria two mornings later. Aria shuddered, remembering the angry red burns littering Hanna. It had been bad enough to see the evidence; she didn’t want to see it happening. Still, she thought they should know exactly what was on the tape before they turned it in.
"Do you want to stay the night?" Spencer asked, pulling Aria out of her thoughts. "I mean, it's storming so badly and--"
"I was already planning on it. It’s way too weird to stay at Lucas’s loft when Hanna’s not there,” Aria cut her off. Spencer gave her a grateful smile. She didn’t know if Aria was making up an excuse or if she was being honest, and she didn’t care.
"I'm going to go try to call Hanna again, okay?" Aria asked. Spencer nodded, but grabbed Aria's wrist when she tried to stand.
"Stay here?" She asked. Aria nodded, rubbing Spencer’s hand reassuringly.
"I'm right here."