Entertainment

Noel & Charlotte Had A Mysterious 'PLL' Connection

by Kaitlin Reilly

Rosewood is getting seriously crowded these days, thanks to the influx of former residents returning to their old stomping grounds. Jenna, Jason, and Paige have all returned to Pretty Little Liars in Season 7, but the person raising the most suspicion these days is Noel Kahn. Of course, when I say "raising suspicion," I really mean "has been accused of being the Liars' ultimate stalker." Hanna is so convinced that Noel is A.D. on Pretty Little Liars that she decided to kidnap him as payback in the Aug. 23 episode, "The Wrath Of Kahn." It all has to do with Noel's apparent — and possibly familial — connection to Charlotte. But did Noel really know Charlotte, and well enough for them to team up to take down the Liars? We've actually known about their connection for quite some time.

Noel and Charlotte's connection might seem random, especially when you consider that Noel's father was the one who dealt with Mary's adoption records of her second child and Charlotte's sibling. But while I'm not convinced that Noel really is that sibling — according to showrunner I. Marlene King's interview with Entertainment Weekly, we won't find out who Mary's second child is until Season 7B — that doesn't mean that we don't know anything about how Charlotte and Noel are connected. We saw one way Noel was connected to Charlotte — though, at the time, she went by a different name: CeCe Drake.

Back when Noel was in high school, he and his brother, Eric, used to throw parties at their parents' cabin. During the Season 3 episode "The Kahn Game," Charlotte brought Spencer and Aria to one of these parties, under the guise that Spencer would give a friend of Charlotte's her late University of Pennsylvania application.

Though we didn't see much interaction between Noel and Charlotte, she was a friend of Eric's and seemingly ran off with him for most of the party while Spencer, Aria, Jenna, and Noel played a very tense game of "Truth."

It wasn't the first time Noel and Charlotte were seen together. Noel helped Alison escape Rosewood multiple times, and was seen helping both Charlotte and Alison evade the police in New York. Clearly, Noel knew a lot of Charlotte's secrets — though whether he knew Charlotte's secrets or just CeCe Drake's is unclear. We don't know if Noel knew that CeCe Drake was really Charlotte DiLaurentis when he was in high school, or if he figured it out when the Liars did after the Big A reveal.

Though Pretty Little Liars is definitely implying a connection, we don't yet know if his sketchy behavior has anything to do with Mary Drake's second child, or if the Noel-is-A.D. theory is merely a red herring to distract us from the real Big Bad. I'm inclined to believe the latter, but with a fatal finale coming up on PLL , anything is possible. Whatever Noel and Charlotte's real connection is, let's hope that he starts spilling their secrets in the midseason finale.

Images: Byron Cohen/Freeform; Giphy