"They found your friend Alison's body."
The words still seemed surreal to her. She had peddled as fast as her toned, swimming legs could carry her down the street to the DiLaurentis house, where Maya now lived. She'd been going there anyway, but this was not why. How could this be true? No… no it wasn't! It couldn't be! Alison was alive, and she was coming back. Emily Fields had thought it a million times. She even had a system; if the boys wore red shorts on the bus, Ali was coming back. If Coach made them practice starts and kick-offs, then Alison was alive. And she'd been right more times than not. Alison was alive! Her beloved Alison was alive.
As Maya's words echoed around in her head Emily couldn't even stand. Her legs wobbled and she fell into a sitting position on the lawn as the paramedics brought the gurney out with the sheet draped remains of the first girl Emily had ever loved. In her hand she clutched the letter that she'd written Emily with her latest message from -A. How could this be? Who could have gotten that letter? That wasn't important, she didn't care. She wanted to run over to the gurney and kiss her, like sleeping beauty and wake her up. She wanted those beautiful blue eyes to drift open and for Emily's face to be the first thing they beheld since falling asleep three years ago.
Even though Emily had resigned herself to the fact that Alison was gone, there wasn't a day that had passed in three years that she didn't expect her beautiful blonde friend to be walking down the halls of Rosewood Day as though nothing had happened. Oh what rapture that day would bring. Emily would find herself on the highest clouds of nirvana knowing that she was alive. She loved her, fully, wholly and completely! She knew that now, she was the only one out of the four friends, who had split during eighth grade, that still believed Alison was alive, and still longed day after day for her return. None of them understood, none of them could, none of them loved her like Emily did.
The tears, that Emily had held in since first meeting Maya and re-entering the DiLaurentis house after 3 years of avoiding it to avoid the pain of Alison's disappearance, all came out at once. Maya sat with her, gently rubbing her back, but it did nothing to ease the pain. She wanted to scream, she wanted to go into complete hysterics, she didn't care who saw. She was already starting to hyperventilate. She could feel her heart and soul being torn out and entering the ambulance that had passed her while she'd been peddling her bike to get to Maya's house. She hadn't even believed it when Maya told her. Her heart actually leapt thinking Alison was finally home, but when Maya had clarified and told Emily that they had only found her body buried in the back yard, all of that came tumbling down. All the hope and prayers of three years were destroyed in the time it took Maya to say one sentence.
Suddenly Emily felt a surge within her. It wasn't energy, or power, or anger, no it was a physical surge. She scrambled off their lawn and over to the hedges on the other side of the street before bending over and feeling the Danish she'd eaten that morning rush back up her esophagus with a burning sensation as she started vomiting. The tears still streamed down her eyes and she still felt as though she'd just had part of her literally torn away. She felt as though she were going to die. She couldn't even breathe. Her air had been stolen. Her entire world had just been loaded into the back of an ambulance to be brought down to the medical examiner. Emily's life, as she knew it to that point, was over.
Days past and before Emily knew it, it was Monday. The day of Alison's memorial service. Her parents had backed off of her since learning of Alison's death. She didn't think they actually understood why Emily hadn't said a word to anyone since then. She walked around their house like a zombie. There was no life, no emotion, nothing. There was an empty shell of a girl behind those brown eyes. She came downstairs for meals and at the table and almost absentmindedly shoveled a little food into her mouth before saying that she was finished in a very monotone voice. Then she would drag herself back upstairs to lay in her bed and cry endlessly into her pillows. Just when she thought she couldn't cry anymore, she would find something else that would remind her of Alison and it would all come back. She honestly didn't think that she had anymore tears left, but she always found more.
A small black pleated GAP skirt with a matching black blouse was Emily's outfit as she stood with her parents on the marble floors of Rosewood Abbey. From somewhere, somber Organ music played in a hushed tone to set the mood, but Emily didn't need the mood to be set. She was miserable enough as it was. She was just existing, though a bit of life came to her eyes as she saw Mrs. DiLaurentis in a cowl-necked black dress with white pearls, walk up to her and speak to her parents, asking if it would be ok if Emily came and sat in the front with the rest of Alison's friends. Friends…. Emily was so much more than that. She loved her, didn't anyone understand that? Emily Fields loved Alison DiLaurentis!
Slowly she felt the tug on her arm and she started walking forward, focusing on the white tulips and the smell of incense that filled the place. The closer she got to the casket in the front, the harder it was for her to walk. Her breath was leaving her again, the tears were starting to fall, and she felt as though she were going to pass out. She couldn't take this, she wanted to crawl in with her. She wanted to just crawl into the casket with Alison and be buried with her. She wasn't living anymore anyway, she was merely existing. What no one understood was that the cold casket before them held more than the remains of a young girl; it held Emily's heart, her soul, her being. All of it died with Alison.
Emily sat down next to Aria Montgomery, and beside Aria sat Hanna Marin, no longer looking like "Hefty Hanna". A moment later, Spencer Hastings joined them. Emily was outwardly social, but inwardly she was dead. She longed to hear Alison's voice calling her 'Killer' just one more time. She had grown tired of it in the weeks before Alison's disappearance but now she wanted to hear it, to hear her say it one more time with such fondness. It was wonderful knowing that she had her own personal pet name by Alison.
The Organ music picked up with the Canzona for Queen Mary, from Henry Purcell's "Funeral Music for Queen Mary." It was regal, how like Alison. It was haunting, which was all Alison could to anymore. Emily was utterly heartbroken. She had nothing left. She felt the tears falling, more than any of her friends. From somewhere Aria presented her with some tissues and Emily dabbed her eyes, but her eye make-up was destroyed, but she couldn't care less.
The funeral was agony. Each of Alison's friends got up and said something. The only thing that had gotten her this far was the flask of whiskey that Hanna had produced. Emily couldn't, she just couldn't. Her mind wanted to. She wanted to get up and tell everyone in the place how much she loved Alison, how much she meant to her, and how dead she was without her, but her body refused to move. She felt like she was going to throw up again. Tears streamed down her cheeks as her brown hues wouldn't leave the picture of Alison that sat next to her casket.
On and on the funeral went, and with each passing moment Emily could feel herself dying a little more. Aria reached over and gently squeezed her hand. Having her friends there helped a little. It was obvious they knew something. Had Alison told them about the letter? Had Alison told them about the kiss? Was one of them the ones who sent her the -A messages? So many unanswered questions, but the only one she cared about now was why? Why was Alison gone? Why was she dead? Why had all the hope and optimism that Emily had felt for the past three years suddenly gone, locked in a black casket with a bunch of white tulips on it? Why wasn't she there?
The funeral ended and Emily composed herself, mostly because of Hanna's flask. Aria and Hanna went first down the aisle, and then Spencer, linked arm in arm with Emily. Thankfully, because otherwise Emily would have darted back and refused to leave the casket, longing to sleep with her love for eternity. They exited the church and the bright light of day jolted Emily back into reality as all of them were concerned with the messages they were getting from -A, but deep down Emily Fields didn't care, she loved Alison too much to care, and while her outward appearance was calm, and concerned, wrapped up in -A's game, inside she was a disaster and would be so for another two years.