The episode starts with the Liars huddled around the ‘Liar’s Lament’ game. Aria defends Spencer, but Hanna is still pissed at Spencer for taking A.D.’s bait and playing the game when they all agreed not to.
They worry that A.D. will punish them for Hanna trying to attack the game with a steak knife. The Liars argue over who is behind the game. If it was Jenna, who is helping her? Sydney? Jenna is a vindictive blind girl, but she probably couldn’t have built the ‘Liar’s Lament’ game by herself.
Emily isn’t interested in debating who is helping Jenna. She doesn’t care that A.D. is blackmailing them with evidence that they caused Elliot Rollins/Archer Dunhill’s death. She’s willing to tell the police what they did, especially since she doesn’t feel bad about it. Emily thinks he deserved way worse. Emily storms off without listening to her friends.
Hanna, who has the most to lose, says Emily can’t just decide to walk out. Hanna may have been driving the car that hit Archer Dunhill/Elliot Rollins, but they are all in this together. Spencer assures Hanna that they are.
Aria gets a shock when she meets a reporter looking for Ezra. He’s working on a human interest story about Ezra being reunited with his long lost fiancé. Aria tells him that Nicole Gordon was never Ezra’s fiancé, she is. “Didn’t realize there were two of them,” he tells Aria.
In the locker room at Rosewood High, Paige and Emily talk about Alison. Emily knows Paige and Alison have intense history. Emily remembers the time Paige told her about Alison’s relentless torture in ninth grade and how she wanted to disappear. Emily fell in love with Paige that night. She’s wanted to protect Paige ever since.
Paige and Emily don’t realize a girl on the swim team, Addison Derringer, is in the locker room listening to them. Emily finally notices her and asks why she wasn’t at practice yesterday. Addison claims that she had a headache and went home early.
Spencer is furious at her dad, but he won’t be home until Thursday. Spencer has been ignoring his calls. Veronica says both she and Spencer’s dad are hurting. Neither of them wanted Spencer to find out the truth this way.
Veronica tells Spencer that Melissa didn’t know about Mary Drake. “So only you and dad could appreciate the bitter irony of me checking into the same mental hospital where I was born” Spencer says. She feels like a part of her will be living in Radley for the rest of her life.
Mona is still helping Hanna with her fashion business. The senator’s daughter, Katherine Daly, loves a particular dress Mona showed her from Hanna’s closet. When Hanna sees the black tutu dress, she flips out. She refuses to let Katherine wear that dress, but she won’t tell Mona why. Mona assumes Hanna is insecure about her design and tells her that no masterpiece is ever complete.
Addison Derringer is also in Alison’s English class. After class, Emily tells Addison that there is no record of her leaving school early. Since Addison didn’t have a legit excuse to skip practice, Emily takes Addison off the lineup for Saturday’s meet. Addison is a high school mean girl, so she isn’t intimidated by Emily. “Are you sure you want to do that?” she threatens Emily before leaving.
Addison acts like Alison did in high school, but Alison thinks Addison is worse. At least when Alison threatened adults, she looked up from her phone. Alison is worried about her own baby ending up like Addison.
Emily offers to bring dinner to Alison. She doesn’t want Alison to be alone now. Emily brushes back Alison’s hair and hugs her. They don’t see Addison eavesdropping and snapping photos of them.
Spencer calls Detective Marco Furey, so he rushes over. He’s ready to protect Spencer from Alison’s ex-husband, but that's not why she called him over. Spencer asks Marco to make the Mary Drake search a top priority. Spencer shows him the letter Mary Drake wrote to Spencer before she was born at Radley.
Caleb is usually the last one to side with Mona, but he agrees with her this time. He loves Hanna’s dress design. Hanna finally opens up about the dress. Hanna’s old boss, Claudia, hated the dress. She gave 20 suggestions and Hanna took most of them. So Hanna can’t really take credit for the design. Claudia suggested the belt on the dress and now Hanna can’t remove it. Without the belt it is just a hippie ballet costume.
Hanna may not believe in herself, but Caleb definitely believes in her talent. He tells her to take this moment and run with it.
Back at Rosewood High, Addison schemes up a plan to get Emily fired from her position as varsity swim coach. Addison goes to Paige and tells her that Emily makes her uncomfortable. She accuses Emily of inappropriately staring at her while she changed and getting to close and touchy. She even claims that Emily inappropriately touched another swimmer on the team.
Addison says that Emily is also inappropriate with other teachers. She shows Paige a photo of Emily touching Alison’s hair and hugging her. Paige asks Addison to email her the photos.
Aria meets up with Holden to discuss her wedding menu, but he’s swamped with work. A bride changed her mind at the last minute. Now he has to cook for 40 people instead of 20. Aria offers to help, so she’s assigned with chopping tomatoes.
Aria tells Holden that Ezra is still in New York. Nicole’s family found him a small apartment near the clinic. Aria wonders if Ezra really was engaged to Nicole. Holden puts things into perspective for Aria. Aria has been with other guys who have loved her, but she didn’t share all those details with Ezra. So it makes sense if Ezra didn’t share every detail with Aria. Everyone has history.
Back at Rosewood High, Paige tells Emily about Addison’s accusations. Emily is ready to kick Addison off the swim team and confront her, but Paige warns her not to go near Addison. It’s Addison’s word against Emily. And Addison might convince her teammates to file a formal complaint against Emily.
Paige offers to supervise swim practice instead of Emily. Paige will talk to the other swimmers and handle the situation.
Spencer goes to the police department to talk to Detective Marco Furey about Mary Drake. The police think Mary Drake checked into a motel under a fake name. While they are talking, Jenna Marshall comes in. Jenna claims that she has been hiding. “I need to tell somebody the truth,” Jenna says.
Jenna starts her sob story, claiming that Noel wanted to kill her just like he killed Sara Harvey. She says it was all about Charlotte’s money. Charlotte had promised to pay for a surgery for Jenna’s eyes, so Noel wanted Jenna’s help to find the money. Hard to believe since Noel’s family is rich, but Jenna says Noel’s parents cut him off.
Jenna says she brought the gun to defend herself. Jenna starts to cry, but Spencer isn’t buying it. Spencer tells Marco to arrest Jenna, but Marco can’t charge her with anything. The bullet that hit Spencer didn’t match Jenna’s gun.
Spencer goes to talk to Aria, who is still busy cooking. Spencer eats Holden’s mushrooms while she tells Aria about Jenna. Spencer says Jenna has balls the size of church bells, which isn’t an image Aria wanted in her head.
Spencer wanted to tell Marco about A.D.’s ‘Liar’s Lament’ game. Spencer also confesses that she wants to find Mary Drake. She thinks she’ll be able to forgive Mary and not fear her anymore.
Spencer isn’t ready to forgive her parents, though. When Spencer gets home, she tells Veronica that she isn’t going to work with her anymore. She’s going to find another job. And when Veronica says that they are selling the house, Spencer isn’t broken up about it. It doesn’t feel like her home anymore.
Veronica tells her that their house was a home because they were a family. Veronica and Spencer might not have the same blood flowing through their veins, but they are still family. Veronica made sure Spencer grew up feeling safe, nurtured and loved. Spencer cries, but she doesn’t respond to Veronica’s moving speech.
At the Brew, Emily sees Jenna with two other blind people. She sees Jenna send a text to someone. Emily also notices Addison suspiciously receive a text at the same time. Emily starts wondering if Jenna and Addison are working together.
Holden returns and notices the missing mushrooms. He was going to pay Aria cash for helping, but he’s fine paying her with fungi. Aria doesn’t respond to his jokes because she sees a heart wrenching news article on her phone. The journalist wrote about Nicole and Ezra’s reunion. The article has photos of Ezra and Nicole looking happy together. Aria takes off in a hurry, but not before Holden notices the photos on her phone.
Hanna and Mona meet at the Radley bar to talk business. Mona’s been busy. She found an amazing accessory for Katherine Daly to wear with Hanna’s dress. And Hanna’s going to let Katherine borrow her shoes, which are being fixed at the cobbler shop.
Their business meeting is interrupted when they see Jenna enter. And Jenna is wearing Hanna’s dress design! The only difference is Jenna’s dress is white instead of black. Mona storms up to Jenna and demands to know where she got the dress.
Jenna, cryptic as usual, says the dress was a gift. Jenna and her friends take off without giving any answers. Hanna is sure this is part of A.D.’s game. Mona wants to know what game Hanna is talking about, but Hanna doesn’t explain.
Hanna and Caleb follow Jenna to the cobbler shop. Hanna worries that Jenna is going to steal her shoes, too. They watch as Jenna’s friends go inside the shop. Jenna stays outside, though.
Caleb confronts Jenna. Jenna claims that she is there to rehearse for a concert in the studio above the shoe repair store, but she’s clearly lying. Jenna and her friends don’t even have instruments with them.
Jenna tells Caleb to back off, but Caleb doesn’t back down. He’s sure the police are poking holes in Jenna’s story. Jenna isn’t worried about that. The only person who can contradict her story is Noel and he’s dead.
While Caleb distracts Jenna, Hanna sneaks into the cobbler shop to get her shoes back. There is a caged area in the store and, of course, Hanna gets locked in the cage. A drill suddenly goes through the wall, almost piercing Hanna. And she almost gets hit in the head when equipment starts swinging. Hanna gets flashback of A.D. torturing her.
Hanna gets a taunting text from A.D. that reads “Wait your turn, Bitch. It’ll come. And you’ll be ready.” Caleb comes in and calls out for Hanna, but she’s too traumatized to answer. Luckily, Caleb sees her and is able to get her out.
Emily asks Alison for help sneaking into Spencer’s barn to get to the game. She’s afraid A.D. will expose more of her secrets, like how A.D. took the final exam that Emily missed.
So Emily and Alison sneak into Spencer’s barn. Emily takes her turn at the board game, pushing #BENCHME on the game’s phone. They see security footage from behind the Brew showing Addison smoking a bong with her boyfriend at the time she claimed she was sick.
Emily decides to blackmail Addison with the security footage. Back at school, Emily asks Addison how far she will go to protect a lie. Emily demands that Addison retract her allegations. Addison accuses Emily of stalking her. She tells Emily to find a lawyer.
Emily, losing control, tells Addison that someone should have smacked her a long time ago. Emily calls Addison a bully. As things get out of control, Paige comes in.
Emily really should have let Paige handle the situation. Turns out Emily didn’t need to blackmail Addison after all. Paige found an email from Addison bragging to her friend about getting Emily fired. Paige already shared the email with Principal Hackett. So Emily no longer has to worry about the false allegations. Addison gets sent to the principal’s office, where her dad is waiting.
Paige offers to give Emily a ride home. Before leaving, Emily finds an envelope from A.D. in her mailbox. It contains another puzzle piece and a message that says “Embrace your dark side, Em. I’ve had to. That’s how you win the game.”
Aria heads to the New York clinic where Nicole is being treated. And she brings her a bag of salt water taffy as a present. Aria is about to head in when Holden stops her. Guess he followed her when he realized what she was going to do.
Aria listens to Holden and the two of them go grab pizza. The road to every altar is paved with bad decisions, Holden tells her. Aria wonders if she should give the engagement ring back to Ezra. Holden gives her an emphatic ‘no’.
Holden tells Aria to stare at her diamond ring. Think about how long it took for a lump of carbon to become a diamond. He tells her to be patient. She shouldn’t expect Ezra to be on her timeline. Holden tells Aria give Ezra a couple more weeks. Ezra’s probably more torn up over the situation than she is.
Aria thanks Holden and rests her head against his shoulder. Loving this sweet friendship between childhood friends Aria and Holden!
Back in Rosewood, all the Liars gather around the ‘Liar’s Lament’ board game. They recap what A.D. did to them that day. Emily ended up blackmailing a tenth grader. And A.D. tried to grind Hanna’s hand into moccasins.
Emily puts her piece of the puzzle on the board. Spencer realizes the puzzle is a map. She can see the three roads leading out of Rosewood. So the question is, what does A.D. want them to find? Something or someone?
Totally get that Ezra wants to make sure Nicole is okay, but why did he move into the New York apartment Nicole’s parents found for him? And he really needs to tell Aria if he still wants to marry her. It isn’t fair to leave her wondering if he still wants to be engaged. And poor Hanna. A.D. keeps putting her life in danger. What did you think of Pretty Little Liars 7x12 “These Boots Were Made for Stalking”? Leave your comments/thoughts below!
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