Tabitha Clark (Book Character)

Tabitha Clark was first introduced in the 9th Pretty Little Liars Book "Twisted". When the girls were vacationing in Jamaica, they saw Tabitha, who resembles Ali very strongly. She has burn scars all over her bodies; her arms have puckered skin, her neck shows signs of lacerations, and her legs have withered flesh - all the signs of a girl who has survived a fire.

Biography
One day, while hanging out at the tropical rooftop restaurant of their hotel, where plenty of underage drinking is going on, Emily spots Tabitha and freaks out as the girl looks just like Ali. Tabitha has honey blonde hair and cerulean blue eyes, just like Ali, and even with her burn scars, she radiates beauty and confidence.

When Spencer goes to the restroom, she sees this girl there, and the girl mentions that she was supposed to stay at the "Royal Plantain," however, months later, Spencer looks the place up and discovers that no such resort exists in Jamaica!

Tabitha spends time with each girl individually, giving each the sensation that she knows their darkest secrets and that she is very similar to Alison:


 * She tells Spencer that she feels like they may resemble each other, like long lost sisters! (Ali and Spencer were half siblings)
 * She also alludes to a "guy problem," then creepily tells Spencer, "You know something about that right." (All Spencer and Ali ever did was fight about guys, not to mention Ali knew that Spencer was cheating with guys behind Melissa's back)
 * Emily feels that she has the "I'm-Ali-and-I'm fabulous-smile."
 * Tabitha asks Emily to dance, and as Emily reminisces, "everything had suddenly felt right, just like the moment when real Ali kissed her." This may be a nod to Emily's crush on Alison, who had always mercilessly teased Emily, but never sincerely reciprocated.
 * Emily also notices that Tabitha is wearing an old string bracelet, tattered and the same shade of lake blue as the friendship bracelet Ali used to wear. Hanna concurs with Emily's observation.
 * Tabitha seems to be alluding to Emily's secret of not shutting the door to the building Ali tried to burn the girls in, so that Ali could escape; when questioned by the girls whether she is Ali, Tabitha mentions the fact that everyone accepts that Ali didn't survive the fire: "But I escaped? Any ideas how that could have happened, Em?" According to Emily, she then pointedly glances at Emily's pocket "as though she had X-ray vision and could see the orange tassel Emily had carried everywhere," the same tassel that had been on the door Emily left open when the fire was raging.
 * Tabitha alludes to Hanna's chubby days, when Ali used to mercilessly tease Hanna for being overweight: "You're gorgeous you know...But I bet you weren't always gorgeous, were you?" Hanna replies, "What's that supposed to mean?" Tabitha counters, "I think you know, don't you?"
 * Hanna then notices that Tabitha's "Cupid-bow lips looked just like Ali's. It was as though Ali's ghost shone through Tabitha's marred skin."
 * Tabitha seems to be alluding to the secret Aria kept about her father's infidelity, a secret only Alison was privy to as far as she knew. The girl mentions Noel saying, "Don't worry, he's a good boy. Not like the rest of us cheaters." (In addition, Aria had cheated on Sean Ackard with Ezra Fitz. Aria was sure neither of these stories had made it to the press.)
 * In addition, Aria had always felt threatened by Alison around Noel, knowing that Alison was flirting, and Noel was into it. That same jealous instinct kicks in when Aria sees Tabitha talking to Noel at the bar. Even Noel murmurs something about Tabitha seeming familiar after she walks away.

Then, Tabitha summons the girls to the rooftop deck/crow's nest at the resort later that night, slipping a note under their door. The girls are spooked, but go all the same. At this time, Aria is the least convinced of all the PLL's that Tabitha is really Alison. While up there, the girls confront Tabitha, who has clearly heard about Alison DiLaurentis on the news, and they accuse her of being her. Tabitha denies it, but in doing so, incriminates herself more in the eyes of the girls.


 * Tabitha tells all the girls, "I feel like I've known you girls forever!"
 * She uses Ali's signature line in declaring her "true" identity: "I'm Tabitha, and I'm fabulous!" The girls gasp, and now even Aria, who had been the most skeptical about the Tabitha-Ali connection is convinced that the two identities are one and the same.

Tabitha claims that she wants to show the girls the view, but she corners Hanna dangerously close to the edge. Aria screams at her, warning her to back away, but Tabitha acts offended and confused about what she considers an overreaction. She then corners Aria, and the girls are terrified that she is trying to kill them. In a moment of instinctual self-preservation, Aria pushes the girl over the ledge.

They hear her body fall to the sand below the deck. They then search everywhere for the body, wondering where it is. They surmise that she either walked, which seems unlikely in her condition or was washed away to sea; they have no idea if she survived. They expect her body to be washed to shore soon if that is the case, but it is not until almost a year later, exactly the anniversary day of Ali's attempt to kill them in a fire, when her body is discovered by a fisherman off the coast of Jamaica, and the girl's body is indeed identified as that of Tabitha Clark, a young woman from New Jersey, exactly what Tabitha had claimed. They also learn from the news story that Tabitha had survived a structural fire some years back.

The whole time the body was missing, the girls feared being cast as murderers. Their fears are slightly alleviated when the news anchor reports that it is believed that Tabitha's death was an accident. The place was notorious for underage drinking, just like they saw the day she died. Therefore, it seems logical that she was drunk and swam out to sea, drowning under the influence. However, "A" lets them know that she knows their secret...

In ["Stunning"], it is revealed that the late Gayle is her stepmother. At the end of Stunning, Tabitha's father reveals that investigators have discovered that Tabitha didn't die of alcohol poisoning: she was murdered.