#pll x reader

ᕚ---ᕘ

Spencer Hastings was undoubtedly your best friend. Not that you had many friends, although there were plenty of people you got along with, you trusted nobody as much like Spencer. You had no siblings but a sister could hardly have been closer to you- you knew that.

It was odd. After all, you did only known each other a few years, but you assumed that time played less of a role in friendship than the experiences shared. And fighting side by side against a common enemy was certainly something that could bond two young girls together.

Yes, Spencer Hasting was a great woman; smart, kindhearted, brave, super loyal and absolutely reliable. And that is exactly what started growing butterflies in your stomach. However, there was one flaw that let you know you will never get to call her your girlfriend- when she could not stop babbling about her boyfriend.

"Oh, come on, Y/n!" she wailed in a tone that made you want to squeeze your hands into fists and dig your fingernails into your skin. Just a little, it would hardly hurt. "Do you not want to know what he got me for our anniversary?"

"No, I do not want to" you hissed as you dropped the fork with a clatter into the bowl.

Spencer seemed taken aback for a moment, but then her face lit up and she waved the necklace in front of your face again while you stared grimly at the piece of tomato that jumped out of the bowl. "Ha! You are only saying that because you do not know how great he is!"

Then your patience, which is quite thin by nature, snapped. "Damn it, Spencer!" you lifted your eyes to your best friend, who had moved intrusively close to you. The brunette was not exactly known for keeping a distance of discretion. "I do not care how great your fucking Toby is, okay?"

She slowly slipped her hands off the chain around her neck and the wide grin faded from her face as if the harshness you displayed tonight had wiped it away. However, she did not seem offended. On the contrary, she seemed extremely worried. "What is going on, shorty?"

"Nothing is wrong," with shaky fingers, you tried to lift the mushy tomato between your nails and shove it into the sink. "Just because I do not want to take a closer look at that gold chain around your neck that you bother me with all the time does not mean something is wrong"

Inside, you were despairing. You would most likely to want her to yell at you. Would love to hear her say how bad of a person you were, not enjoying their happiness. Maybe then you would feel less like a monster than you already did.

"There must be a reason for my best friend´s grumpy face though. You are never usually like that"

This almost made you laugh out loud. You were in the midst of a terrible war of emotions and feelings that were raging inside of you. Love and hate were close together and fought flawlessly in your soul for the rightness of them. On one hand, you were happy that the brunette had found someone who loved her with all her faults and flaws. However, you had hoped that you were the one who could offer all of those things to her.

You sighed deeply and got up to dump your dinner into the trash; your appetite was completely gone. Spencer´s face changed from a deep confusion to a frighteningly serious one that sent a chill down your spine. "It is about Toby, is it not?" In your stance, you flinched slightly and did not let a word escape your mouth, but she instantly knew that her guess was correct. "Ever since I told you it was serious between the two of us, you seemed completely lost in thought and distanced"

You still retreated in silence, but your hands were shaking so much that you dropped the empty bowl into the sink. And the youngest Hastings had noticed that too. Quickly, she jumped out of her chair and put her arm comfortingly around your shoulders while you clutched the marble, knuckles already turning white.

"I love you.." you began to speak in a low voice, looking down at your fingers scraping the stainless steel. Emily had previously advised you to stay away from the subject and try to shut off your feelings. She had warned you urgently, yet you had ignored every word and walked into a circular saw with open arms.

And worst of all, you did probably jeopardized the friendship with your stupid revelation.

"I did not mean to develop feelings for you but I did not stop them the first time I felt it and-" Spencer could clearly hear the uncertainty in your restless voice and stopped you to catch your breath. She pulled you closer and if you did not know her better, you would have assumes that she would want to kill you for ruining her relationship with the boy she fell in love with. "You have to stop,"

"With what?"

"Wanting to explain yourself," she paused for a moment, biting her lip as the front of her body gently pressed against your back and her head hovered over your shoulder. A clearing of her throat escaped her before she continued to speak. "Y/n, look at me"

You turned your face to her and saw a strange sight, two adult friends standing close together, one pulling the other into a tight and loving embrace. You, aware of how close Spencer was to you and how your heart started pounding violently in your chest, could not help but smile. "If Toby would see us like this.."

The older one seemed confused for a moment, then laughed out loud until her body shook with yours. Gently, she wrapped both arms tightly around your body and her face moved dangerously close to yours, your lips almost meeting. "I do not care"

With a mixture of curiosity and nervousness, you looked into her large and brown eyes, the color of which had darkened and was almost unrecognizable through the enlarged pupils staring at you.

"May I..?" Her gaze dropped to your lips with the warmest, friendliest smile you had ever seen and you nodded as your heart started leaping with excitement in your chest. As her soft lips brushed yours and kissed them gently, you felt the almost unnatural warmth that spread through every single fiber of your body.

As Spencer unintentionally pulled away from you, there was silence for a long moment before she began to whisper barely audible. "I have been waiting for this moment for so long, I did not think it would ever happen" her lips slammed back onto yours, slowly kissing their way down to your chin and shoulder before nibbling at the tender skin of your neck.

The sensation you felt overwhelmed your senses, letting you moan briefly before you laid your head back and thus allowed her to dive further with rough bites. Your hands settled on her hips, gently pulling her closer to you. They roamed her whole body until they caught on the buttons of her expensive blouse, that you were feverishly trying to open.

---

Two months. Your friends and you had struggled to survive for two whole months.

A had played games with you, tortured, despised and treated you as puppets. Asking so much mentally that you all didn't even know what you should feel after your, almost failed, escape. At least not you.

You didn't know how you could ever be around your best friends again after A urged you to shock them, choose who was next to play his sick game and who wasn't allowed to get water for the next few days. But apparently they had taken out their desperation on you too; you didn't get anything to drink or eat for days. A even managed to bring Spencer to hurt you.

And now you were out of the underground hell and had no idea what to do next and how you should behave towards Spencer. She apparently had no idea about the night when you woke up on her bedroom floor, your best friend attacking you like a fury and hurting you; A had probably put her on some kind of drug.

But you escaped the chaos thanks to Alison and were now in the hospital for observation according to the circumstances and the lack of nutrients. Mentally you had suffered a lot and it was not easy for all of you to return to a regular life but you knew that somehow, the girls would get through it.

While the others had probably gathered to talk about what had happened, you were bound to your bed and frankly you were glad for it. Standing across from Spencer would be too uncomfortable for you at the moment.

You looked at the ceiling with your lackluster eyes while you gave the doctor the time to sew up the last few inches of your abdominal wound, not really listening to him or the words that came out of his mouth- Your thoughts completely wandering off.

They were repeatedly disturbed by a gentle drop of the liquid flowing to your vein and it was unbearable for you to hear this noise, it brought you back to the place where you didn't hear anything else except the ticking clock in your supposedly own room.

With a violent pull, the door to your room opened with a loud squeak and you jumped up before you let yourself fall back onto the couch with a wrinkled nose, a pained face and tightly closed eyes.

"I´m sorry. I did not know-eh." the short brunette stuttered as she stood in the doorway and looked at you in shock. Staring eyes and an open mouth embraced the long cut on your stomach, which stretched sideways to your navel.

A little embarrassed, you pulled the piece of cloth you were wearing over the doctor´s hands to uselessly hide the cut - she´d already seen it anyway. The old man in front of you stopped in his movements and put the instruments he had a hold of in his hands aside before turning to Aria. "I am asking you to leave. We´re in the middle of a treatment."

She nodded quickly apologized before she took a few steps back, still confused without further speaking, and the door clicked shut with a soft click.

You actually intended to keep it a secret from your friends, but you knew that as soon as Aria entered the other girls room, she would tell them what she had seen and you had no chance to talk your way out of it.

And then the whole truth would come out.

---

Confused by the imagine she had of her best friend and the huge gap on her abdomen a few seconds ago, the little brunette walked quickly down the hospital corridor to get to Spencer´s room where they all wanted to meet up.

She had not learned anything from just now and threw herself against the heavy door to open it, also without knocking first, and now stood in the entrance of the bare room. Three tired and lost pairs of eyes settled on her and surveyed the enraged statue, which stood in front of them with a wide open mouth.

Completely isolated in her thoughts, Aria sat down on one of the chairs that Emily had already placed in front of Spencer´s bed and fumbled around with her fingers. She bit her lip bloody from sheer worry and not knowing when the deep and long cut on your stomach was made and who was responsible for it, but one thing was clear; if she found out who A was, she would kill him for the pain that person had caused you and the others.

"Earth to Aria.. are you okay?" Hanna tore her out of her thoughts and gently nudged the smallest of the pack. Now Spencer and Emily, who were talking wildly earlier, had stopped and looked eagerly at the brunette. "Yes.. no. I´m okay but Y/n is not."

"What about her? Have you seen her?" Spencer abruptly intervened in the conversation, sitting up from her laying position. Her voice had lost it´s tone, was hoarse and low, even though she had just sounded perfectly normal not too long ago. "What happened?"

"I went to check on her because I was worried and then I saw how she was being treated." Aria quietly informed her friends as she cleared her throat and started playing with her fingernails. "She has a huge cut on her stomach. Something happened to her down there and she has not told us anything."

Shocked looks turned to the youngest of the group and she pushed back in the chair. Crossing her legs and arms, Aria looked back and forth between the girls and caught on to Spencer. She could clearly see the brunettes pulse in the main artery of her neck, the trembling of her dilated pupils surrounded by nervousness.

---

The situation between Spencer and you lay like a stone on the brunettes heart. Through therapy sessions with Sullivan, she had managed to partially bring her memories back to the fore.

The person she did this to was still fuzzy but it must have been you; the wound Aria had told her about matching where the blade in her hand pierced through the body beneath her. She had felt it was you. Of that she was sure.

But you remained silent about this situation as if this event had not happened in your reality. A week had passed in which you were discharged from the hospital with a whole medicine cabinet. Since then, you had been holed up in your room at your family home with no communication to Spencer.

Calls and messages flooded your phone, even literally exploding it with requests about getting in touch with her; at least let her know how you are doing. But she never got a single answer and your chat remained empty from your side.

The paths to your front door were softly lit as she walked through them. Flares were placed to the right and left of the pacing stone and illuminated the entire flower-planet front yard. The sprinkler system whirred next to her as she took one step after the other.

On the way here, she had given herself a motivational speech, but it disappeared with ever step she took.

Reaching the mahogany-like doors, she stood motionless and still on the patio. Her heart raced as she exhaled shakily and began pounding on them. It was a cooler evening, one of the firsts when she thought about it, and it had been too cold to wear a loose shirt. Spencer would have preferred a sweater, but that was of secondary importance.

As she waited, her mind filled with a bitter emptiness. She was terrified of a confrontation with you, but it would help her understand how you were feeling and how she could make amends. If anything. The brunette wanted to be pragmatic- the most efficient way to get a satisfactory answer.

Slow footsteps sounded on the other side of the door and she thumped heavily when she heard your faint voice in the distance. She huffed and ran a hand over her long brown hair before the door opened abruptly, revealing your pale and tired features under the hood of your white hoodie.

"Y/n.." she spoke cautiously and did not dare to look at you any further. She could see the pain you were in and Spencer felt even more guilty than before. She cleared her throat, nervously pulling her hands to strap of her bag that slung over her shoulder. "Before you slam the door in my face, listen to me. Please,"

You remained silent, disbelieving who you had in front of you.

Spencer could judge by your body language that you were more than just uncomfortable. All muscles tensed in your thighs through the dark blue ripped jeans you were wearing, your hands were tucked deep in the kangaroo pocket of your hoodie and yet she could tell you were fiddling with your fingernails nervously.

Without saying a word, you moved to the side and let her into the house. As she passed thankfully with pleading eyes, she breathed in deeply the floral perfume you were wearing. Spencer missed your closeness and your warmth towards her so much that she clung to every breadcrumb that was given to her in that moment.

"Are you home alone?" she asked in irritation as she was enveloped in the silence of the walls and saw only the flickering TV in the living room. You nodded firmly, your hands mostly tucked into your sleeves and positioned in front of your body. "My parents flew to Paris"

"And left you alone after you went through hell?!"

"What do you want, Spencer?" you shouted angrily and turned your head to her with a rigid expression. Your sudden explosion let her loosen from her rigidity before she stared at you with wide eyes and you thought you saw fear flicker in her eyes for a brief moment. "I do not think you came here to judge my parents."

The mood was strange. Cold, distant and restless. The unspoken swelled between the two of you. Sadness and fear burned in your chest while your best friend had a tiny spark of hope that she was trying to weave into normal conversation.

Motionless, the addressed person sat in front of you, looked deep into your pain-piercing eyes while tears stung hers. Spencer's heart was pounding deep in her chest and it had probably reached it´s highest point now. It pounded in her head, throat, abdomen and paralyzed her. It was indescribable.

The brunette swallowed hard and took a deep breath. She rested her elbows on the marble area and buried her head in her hands before rubbing across her nose. Very sheepishly with a shaky voice, she continued. "I know what I did. I remember."

Beside her you gasped and bit your lip, she could not quite identify the emotion she saw in your eyes. Where before there had been a coldness and severity, she now found something else. "W-what?" you said cautiously in a cracked voice.

Spencer kept shifting nervously on the bar stool, her hands alternately clawing at her pants, the counter in front of her or the disappeared back to the shoulder bag. "Just go now, Spencer. Please-I," you spoke suddenly, breaking her train of thought.

You ran a hand through your tousled hair nervously. "Y/n," she cut you off sharpy and your chest tightened. You found it difficult to breathe.

Spencer took another breath, ready to either explain or,what you thought was, more likely an apology. But she did not get around to it; you continued in a loud raging voice. "Do you actually know what I had to go through when you fucking came at me like a madman?"

You practically yelled at her, your voice already hoarse. You saw in your veil of tears how the older one flinched and her shoulders wandered to her ears. Nevertheless, she did not break her deep gaze, but got caught in your teary eyes. They had darkened. "Or how it felt to look into my best friend´s eyes, begging her not to do it while the knife was already penetrating my skin?"

The brunette felt like she was a little kid again. When she smashed the window with the hockey ball and was getting the lecture of the century from her parents. However, she would not end up in your comforting arms after she shed the first tears. You would not reassuringly run your fingers through her hair or insist that it was just glass and could easily be replaced.

No, this situation went much deeper.

Spencer opened her mouth that suddenly dried out. Tears streamed down her face in unison with yours and she let her eyes roam over you again. "I am so sorry.." she could not pronounce it, her throat tightening with every word. "I could never hurt you. A did something to me and that monster was not me. It is not me. I love you."

The leadership she took at the moment, trying to explain her actions, distracted from your troubled insides. You could not completely turn off your heart and the thoughts of the past hours and days.

Still, you knew her words were serious and she was genuinely sorry. It broke your heart to see her so upset. She too was under the influence of drugs that A had given her to commit the crime. You exhaled loudly and just looked at her, could not keep your mind from racing.

Slowly, you circled the counter and stepped carefully to her side. Your fingertips gently touched her cold, trembling and bare forearm. Spencer reacted to the touch she thought was impossible immediately and looked at you. A positive feeling flowed through her and she laid her head at the level of your belly button. You flinched at the pain, but swallowed it to keep her close.

You cupped her sticky, sweaty fingers and intertwined them with yours. Indescribable affection went through the brunette and she drew herself closer to the person who understood her so well. Who went through this hard time with her and who would master recovery together.

Relief flowed through the eldest, you could see it in her face which showed the corners of her mouth far raised. She knew that she still had a rough road with you ahead and that she had to help you to trust her completely again. Above all, you needed someone to overcome the nightmare and the anxiety.

---

Everything around you began to hang up, almost to stand still, and you felt an oppressive warmth rising in you that was accompanied by dizziness. Your breath caught in your lungs, every way blocked the air entering it. The tension in you continuously rising.

You were afraid of situations with people that you did not know personally, which did not necessarily make your job any easier. Fear of strangers; it was not possible to assess them and they were all unpredictable. Eventually, each of them could be a monster that was after you once more.

Your hands gripped the sink with ravishing strength, the muscles in your arms tightening rapidly. White skin contoured your knuckles and revealed the fine veins as you felt your eyes burning.

The room in which the crowd gathered around Veronica Hastings felt like a pool full of piranhas ready to attack. Of course you understood that people did not care about you as an event manager who just had to look good standing in the lounge. Yet the unbelievable, cruel fear that something horribly was about to happen was kindled.

Slow, salty tears trickled down the sides of your nose and you narrowed your eyes. The black imagine in your mind´s eye instantly transforming into the memories back to the bunker in which you were imprisoned. The background noise of your girlfriends interviewers sounded audibly loud and disturbing to your ears; amplifying the monotonous ringing in your ears.

Your protective shield had crumbled under the looks of the people who seemed judgemental to you and made your existence questionable. Your strong walls had been broken down.

Frustrated with yourself and the embarrassing situation you did gotten yourself into, you smacked the white ceramic destructively. You tried to cover your ears, blocking out the voices as a deep, loud sob escaped your mouth.

You had to breathe. It was too hard to breathe. You could not. The panic in you grew steadily and tears ran unhindered down your cheeks, smearing the mascara completely. You could not stop the fear corrupting your head piece by piece; destroying your perspective of life.

You vision blurred in your reflection of the mirror. You could no longer see. No longer breathe or hear. All your senses left and all you could feel was the sharp and pricking pain in your chest, the memories that haunted you and the demons that caught up with you.

You were exposed to the panic attack and could not escape it.

---

"Attention, everyone!" an auditioner had risen from his seat and was crowding the front of the stage at the microphone. Amused, he waved to the audience of newscasters. He fell silent for a while, clearing his voice before continuing with a smile on his lips. "Let´s greet the Senator from Pennsylvania. Mrs. Veronica Hastings."

There was loud cheering from the crowded room; the photographers sneaking around unrecognized between the rows of seats. He had stepped aside, leaving room for the woman he had announced seconds ago. The addressed stood up from her place, renewed applause enveloped the walls and she thanked them heartily for being allowed to be here.

As the woman immediately began her preface, Spencer stood in a quiet corner of the room with some of the other lobbyists, engaged in an animated but low-key conversation. "Yes, your mother outdid herself today. It never ceases to amaze me how quickly she can host an event like this,"

The brunette sighed and finally searched around for you, the actual creator of this entire event. You were the event manager and in demand in your job as ever. You had often helped her mother and smiled on an an advertising poster for exclusive brands in every town in the are. She envied your freedom and your drive to make it this far. She was more then proud of you.

During her studies, Spencer focused on international relations. This was her dream and her chances of becoming the ambassador´s right-hand man in the near future were increased. Her career was within reach in the diplomatic field. She knew that this way she was always somehow close to her mother and you, the only people who mattered most to her besides the other girls. "Spencer?"

Her head snapped around to one of the girls in front of her and gave them an apologetic look. They responded with a friendly smile. "I am sorry, will you excuse me?" with that, she quickly downed the noble and outrageously expensive drink in the champagne glass, said goodbye to them and headed towards the bathroom to check her makeup.

A clean slate and perfection were the top priorities for this career, everything else was unacceptable.

Spencer followed the long and dimly lit room, barely making out each door in the pallid light. Gently, she ran her fingers over the individual panels that were stuck in the middle of the door and traced the lines of the writing. "Bingo,"

With a firm grip on the doorknob, she threw the door open and gave out a startled scream when she saw a darkened figure in front of her. Pondering why someone was sitting in the dark, she stepped a little into the room and waited for the automatic light to come on. Spencer blinked a few times to adjust to the brightness before she recognized you standing in front of her.

"Y/n, you scared me!"

When there was no answer form her best friend, she stood stock still and could not do anything but cast her gaze over you. The shock evaporated and she looked into dark, wide-open eyes. Fixed pupils radiating nothing but pain, fear and pure panic. "Are you okay?"

Your breathing was heavy and your heart was beating hard and fast against your chest. Trembling legs that barely kept you standing and a tremor in both hand made it impossible to move. "I think I am having a panic attack,"

Panic attack was an understatement. You felt like you were suffocating. No matter how many desperate breaths you took, there was not nearly enough oxygen in the air to fill your collapsing lungs. Your hand clutched your white blouse and it looked like you were going to throw up at any moment. "I will get my mother,"

You pounded your chest in desperation, trying to breathe life into it. The dizziness broke out, it felt like being on a sailing ship. "No, please" you only managed a pathetic snarl; you were sure you were going to choke. "She has more important things to do."

But Spencer did not care what you told her. She was intended to shout, even scream. After her mother. In the room full of other people and the Secretary of State, who had come along and embarrassing herself just to make you feel better. For her, it was important how you felt and that you needed help. "You are the most important thing in the world to her. I am gonna get her, no matter what you say."

Your best friend knew that you would only escape the swelling panic attack if you only had her mother by your side. And so she disappeared out of the door faster than she came and ran for her life onto the middle of the stage to get what you needed.

---

"Oh god, baby" she whispered softly before she lunged through the door at you, pulling your violent shaking body into her arms and hugging you tightly for a while. You cried, occasionally speaking things between sobs that she could not understand.

"Please stop crying, love. I am here." Veronica said softly and poured little kisses on your top hair. She pushed you a little bit away from her so she could look into your glassy and red-shot eyes.

The senator carefully wiped away some of the tears glistening on your cheeks with one of her thumbs before looking down at your hands, which you were playing with madly; scraping the corners of your skin until it bled.

Sighing, she took your hands in hers and held them tight to break your bad habit. The saintly tears behind your eyes burned as if you had washed them out with soapy water. Air. You needed her so badly but could not make it. Cold sweat formed on your forehead and your vision darkened. "Close your eyes, angel."

You did as you were told and more tears welled up in your eyes as your heart danced in your chest. "Well done, now try to breathe in as slowly as you can." You were drained, completely drained and your body barely obeyed. Everything rumbled inside you and it seemed so clear to you that there was no room to breathe. "Can not."

"Yes you can, I believe in you."

Your hands clenched in hers and you tried to swallow, desperately pushing the air into your lungs most possible. You pounded your chest again and whimpered in desperation. Warm hands pushed past your back and laid down on your shoulders; slowly massaging it.

"Do you remember our first Christmas together?" Veronica began, hoping some happy memories would bring you down. Her hands fell from your shoulders down your upper arms until they settled in your middle and hugged you tightly from behind. "After dinner we sat drunk on the two cuddly sofas with Spencer and laughed uproariously at the Grinch."

Like a toddler, she rocked you in front of the mirror and breathed tender warmth on your neck. Veronica elicited a quiet giggle from you and she started to grin mischievously into your soft hair. "You were curled up on my lap because you did not like his face and his mighty eyebrows."

"He is green and creepy," you began to squeeze out softly between your dry lips, feeling the air slowly enter back your lungs. The senator grumbled in amusement and looked up in the mirror. The last tears had left your eyes and the first lanes of those that had fallen earlier were already drying on your skin. Your lips were no longer pressed together but lay relaxed on each other and formed, in her eyes, into a beautiful grin. "His smile is like the smiley face from the horror movie."

She noticed how relaxed you suddenly leaned your head against her shoulder. She loosened her tight grip on you, yet not completely letting go of you and still ensconced in her embrace. Veronica gently brushed a strand of hair away from your face.

"Thanks, Ronnie. You are the only one who can calm me down during a.. well, panic attack. But you always pull it off and Iloveyousomuch," you said in one breath, watching her cheeks turn pink despite the words already said many times.