So I was thinking about this after the last episode and the whole Ali coming to them in dreams and that kind of thing. While I liked the exchange between her and Aria, I always liked it when she visits Emily and so I came up with this idea that puts everyone several years into the future. The girls are all grown up, A team isn't around anymore, because we still don't know who killed Ali in the show I'm just going to write this like we never found out who killed her. Sorry about the length, it kind of got away from me.
Emily was up early that morning moving around the kitchen trying to make both breakfast and lunch at the same time and she had to give herself credit; she was handling it well so far. She packed up Paige's lunch and put it in her briefcase so that she wouldn't forget it on the table as she rushed out the door on her way to work. After putting away all the lunch makings she turned her attention back to putting some breakfast on the table for her and Paige. She had managed to finally get the toaster to not burn the toast and that victory motivated Emily to try her hand at making omelets which, to her great surprise turned out well. As she put the food on the table and started eating Paige come downstairs trying to get her hair to cooperate.
"Something smells good." Paige leaned over and kissed Emily as she walked into the kitchen to make her coffee.
"Well I figured since you had a busy day you would end up skipping lunch and our reservations aren't until 7 so I couldn't have my wife starving now could I?" Emily flashed Paige a smile as the red head sat down at the table and started eating her food.
"Did everyone confirm that they were coming?" Emily nodded, "they are all coming."
"You don't sound very excited. You haven't gotten to see much of the girls since we moved, at least not beyond Skype, I thought you'd be over the moon to see them."
"I am, it's just, I'm nervous about telling them." Emily took one last bite of her food before pick up her plate and bringing it back into the kitchen. Paige followed close behind her, "Em, this is good news, happy news and they are going to be so happy for you. With all the bad things you all have been through, this is going to be a welcome change of pace." Paige wrapped her arms around Emily's waist, resting her hands on Emily's extended stomach. Emily was barely three months pregnant and it wasn't obvious unless she wore something tight or you were really looking for a baby bump. Emily and Paige had agreed that they would keep it to themselves until they had made it through the first trimester, which had past the previous week. They had invited their parents to dinner at their place and had told them then. Of course everyone was thrilled and already started talking about how spoiled this baby was going to be by both sets of grandparents. Emily wanted to tell the girls face to face before they started sending pictures to everyone or throwing it out on Facebook.
"I know they'll be happy, but you know me, I'm terrible with revealing this kind of thing. When we got engaged I practically yelled it over the phone to them because I was so excited." Paige laughed at the memory, "well I did a pretty good job proposing, so really, who could blame you."
"Paige, I'm serious, I don't want to sit down and just blurt it out."
"Emily, sweetheart, love of my life. You need to relax; this is supposed to be the fun part. Besides we planned it all out and you know exactly what you are going to say and how this is going to play out. Just stick with your plan and enjoy it." Paige kissed the side of Emily's head and went back into the dinning room. She ate a few more bites of food before handing the plate to Emily. "I have to go brush my teeth and bounce or I'll catch traffic into the city." Paige disappeared upstairs for a few minutes before returning to the kitchen full dressed for work.
"I will meet you all at the restaurant, just text me when you are seated and I'll leave the office." Paige grabbed her briefcase and gave Emily one more kiss. "Have a good day at work, try and rest when you can, please."
"I will, go build things, see you tonight." Paige had surprised everyone by becoming a architect in school and when they all graduated she was offered a starting position in a well-established firm in Philly so they made the move to the city official and they had been living there for about three years. Emily had graduated with a degree in sports medicine and when they moved she found work at a physical therapy facility in the city, about 10 blocks from Paige's office building.
Her workday was uneventful and her workload on Fridays was usually pretty lite so it allowed for her to rest whenever she didn't have a client to work with. Emily loved her job, but her mind was all over the place with her thinking about meeting up with her friends that night. Her last client left around 4:30 and Emily was on her way home by 5. She spent the next hour taking a shower, doing her hair and make up and getting dressed for her 'girls night out'. Around 6 she got a text message from Spencer that they were all on their way to pick her up form her house. Emily gathered up the few things she knew she was going to need and with some effort shoved most of them into her purse. After checking herself in the mirror for the thousandth time she heard the doorbell ring and Emily knew that she was the only one who could tell that there was a baby bump hiding under her dress. She walked down the stairs and heard Hanna through the door, complaining about how cold it was outside.
"You move to California and all of a sudden you can't deal with a little East Coast cold weather. Shame on you Hanna." Emily opened the door with a smile and all three of the girls on the other side of the door squealed in delight. They all hugged Emily and stepped into the house to escape the unforgiving wind cold weather outside.
"You guys really put a lot of work into the house. Looks great Em." Spencer walked around the living room admiring the work that had been done over the last few years.
"Well we knew it was going to be a labor of love when we bought it, but we spent the first two years fixing and building and it finally looks the way we always dreamt it would. Paige did most of the woodwork; she insisted that someone else would screw it up. It also saved us a ton of money with her doing most of the bigger projects." Spencer laughed, "of course she did it herself, speaking of which, where is Butch Cassidy?"
Emily rolled her eyes at the nickname, "she'll meet us there, her office is two blocks away from where we are going so it was just easier to do it this way." Emily grabbed her purse and jacket and pointed to the door, "everyone ready?" The ride to the restaurant was like listening to four teenagers catching up after spending a summer away from each other. They all talked about work, their husbands/boyfriends and commented about how they needed to put in more of an effort to see each other in person more often.
"Skype just doesn't cut it you guys, at least not for me." Aria threw in her two cents.
"Agreed, besides once we start having kids I will want full access to any and all spawn of my best friends." Emily gripped the steering wheel tighter at the mention of children, but tried to ide her reaction.
"We will work out something, some timeline of us visiting each other. I mean Hanna is the only one who moved real far away. The rest of us are all semi-near by." Emily threw them off talking about babies and they all started pulling out day planners trying to find another weekend they could all hang out with each other again. They pulled into the parking lot of the restaurant and Emily handed over her keys to the valet and all four of them walked inside quickly. Emily texted Paige to tell her that they had just gotten there and that she should head over to meet up with them. She told the hostess that they had reservations for five under the last name McCullers. They were seated almost immediately and as they got settled Hanna looked to Emily.
"So where are you hiding your wife?" Emily was about to answer when she saw Paige out of the corner of her eye. "Turn around and see for yourself." Paige made her way over to the table and leaned down to kiss Emily before greeting the girls with individual hugs.
"Sorry for not meeting you here, I was trying to finish a drawing or I would have made it here before you guys got seated."
"A likely story." Spencer winked at the red head, causing Paige to roll her eyes.
"You doubt my story counselor? I'm shocked the great Spencer Hastings would think so little of her best friend's wife." Emily had to smile. Spencer and Paige had always had a very strange way of talking to each other, like neither of them could be loving or affectionate toward the other; their relationship was based on insults and sarcasm and strange as it was it worked for them.
The waiter came around and took their drink order and told them to take their time on deciding what they wanted to order for entrees. As he walked away Emily told the girls that dinner was on her and Paige and to order whatever they wanted.
"What, no Emily, you guys don't have to do that. We are all grown up we can pay for our own dinners." Aria tried to protest, but Paige jumped in, "we don't have to, we want to, so please enjoy yourselves."
"I don't need to be told twice." Hanna turned back to her menu with a renewed sense of purpose and everyone giggled, some things never change and one of those things is Hanna Marin loving the word free. They made small talk and eventually put in their orders before settling back into their conversations again. Paige was talking to Spencer about the work she had done in the living room and kitchen, mostly because Spencer was interested in redoing her living room as well and wanted to get Paige's opinion on design ideas. Emily saw her opening and she took it.
"Actually one of the reasons Paige and I wanted to meet up with you guys was to get your opinion on another room we are going to be working on."
"I thought you redid most of the house already?" Hanna questioned as she sipped her water.
"We did almost every room. We had been using one of the upstairs rooms as an office for Paige, but the other room is still just empty and we have been making plans to change that, but it seems to be the one room that we can't agree on so we were hoping that you guys would be the tie breakers, maybe offer us some design ideas."
"I'm all about designs, let's do it." Hanna was literally all about designs seeing as that was her job in California, but Emily was looking for more cute and less couture.
"Babe, why don't we show them the color choices that we narrowed it down to?" Paige was trying so hard to hold in how excited she was as Emily dug in her purse before pulling out a small booklet of paint samples and putting it in the middle of the table. She flipped the book open to the middle and pushed it towards her friends.
"Paige likes the one on the right, but I prefer the purple to the green." Emily forced herself to speak in an even and controlled tone which was hard because well this was as Paige said, the fun part. All three of their friends seemed to be thinking the same thing and they all shared confused glances before Spencer finally bit the bullet and asked.
"Em, these are both really nice colors, but I'm a little lost, what would you actually be using the room for because neither of these really go with your color scheme throughout the rest of the house?"
"Well the rest of the house is deeper, richer colors and while we really like those we really want the nursery to be lighter." Paige held Emily's hand under the table as they watched the reality of the station hit their friends one by one.
"Nursery? Like a nursery for a baby, that kind of nursery?" Spencer was trying to contain herself, but they all seemed to be about ready to burst. Paige reached into her suit jacket pocket and pulled out the sonogram picture from their last appointment and placed it on top of the paint samples with a huge smile plastered across her face.
"Like a nursery for a baby." Paige answered the question, but truthfully all three of the girls were already too far gone to hear it. Once they saw the picture they all looked to Emily with huge smiles and some tears in their eyes. Emily stood up and pulled the fabric of her dress back to show that there was in fact a small bump hidden underneath the flowing fabric. Aria was the closest to her and she quickly wrapped her arms around her friend and hugged her.
"You're having a baby, that is so exciting Emily. Congratulations guys." Spencer picked up the sonogram picture and held it up to Paige, "so you finally knocked her up, I should've known you were going to cause trouble." Paige laughed, but Spencer offered the red head a hug and she accepted it.
"Congratulations, you guys will be awesome parents and I graciously accept the position of favorite aunt." Spencer pulled away from Paige laughing at her own joke. She handed the picture back to Paige who passed it around so Hanna and Aria could get a good look at it.
"Well that tears it, I will have to design a first class nursery for my precious niece or nephew, because I certainly won't have them dealing with sea form green as a color scheme for the walls." Hanna hugged both Emily and Paige, offered them tearful congratulations and grabbed the paint book thus proving to Emily that she wasn't kidding about the design plans. They all settled down into their seats, but the table was now very active with all of them talking about the baby and how Emily was feeling at this point in the pregnancy. They spent dinner talking about how they were going to spoil the baby and who would be the child's favorite "aunt". Emily drew the line at them discussing names though.
"We don't even know if we are having a boy or a girl yet. Besides the name is one thing not up for group vote, that one is all us." She gave Paige a quick kiss to drive home her point.
"Can we still make a baby betting pool for the baby shower?" Spencer was already running through ideas for Emily's baby shower that she was now throwing for her friend. Emily never understood why anyone would want to bet money on someone else's pregnancy, but she knew she was fighting a losing battle.
"Feel free." Dinner seemed to go by in a flash and eventually the group headed back to Emily and Paige's house. They settled into the living room and had changed from talking about the baby to catching up on the other things going on in everyone's lives. With Emily wrapped up in her conversation, Paige slipped into her office and started working on something on her computer. Paige had promised that they would announce the pregnancy on Facebook after they told their families and their friends. Emily had uploaded the sonogram picture to their computer and Paige was currently posting it on her page on the social networking site. Once she read through the post she smiled and clicked the button that would attach the photo to her page. She returned to the living room where the girls were still wrapped up in their conversations and she was about to join them when the house phone started ringing.
"Baby can you get that?" Emily asked from the living room and Paige quickly went over to the phone and picked up the hand held device. "McCullers residence."
"Paige, it's Ashley Marin."
"Ashley what do I owe the pleasure of this call?"
"You know full well what I am calling about. I open my email, nothing really exciting there, but I click on my Facebook page and I see a sonogram picture with your and Emily's name attached. When were we going to find out about this news?" Ashley could try all day to pretend to be upset, but she was just as excited as the girls were.
"Emily and I wanted to wait until the first three months were behind us. Her second trimesters started last week and we told our folks then and just told your daughter about it tonight. You were all next on the list, which is why I tagged you in the picture so that you, Ella and Veronica could all see it."
"Boy or girl?"
"Haven't found that out yet, but my money is on boy." Paige smiled at the thought of holding her son, or her daughter she honestly didn't care what they had, she was just overjoyed at the idea of being a mother.
"Well, either way, congratulations this is such exciting news: the first baby of the group. Is your lovely wife available to talk to me or has my daughter stolen her away to talk about deigning the nursery?"
"Let me see if I can't break her away form the group." Paige walked over and handed the phone to Emily without saying who it was, but as soon as Emily said hello Ashley launched into tearful congratulations and asking a dozen questions. The rest of the evening went like that. As soon as Emily hung up the phone it rang again. Eventually everyone's mother had called to gush over Emily being the first of the girls to become a mother and by the end of the night Emily was exhausted. Paige helped the group get comfortable in the spare bedrooms and on the couch in the living room as they were going to be staying the night. Once they were all set she and Emily said goodnight and went back upstairs to their bedroom. Emily didn't even really bother getting into PJ's she just took of her dress and quickly removed her make up before collapsing into their bed. Paige climbed in beside her wife and poked her shoulder.
"Em, baby, aren't you going to be cold sleeping in your bra and underwear?"
"Emily isn't here right now, please leave a message after the beep…beep." Emily was too tired to doing anything and Paige laughed as she wrapped the sheets and blankets around her and Emily who was already half asleep.
"Night baby." Paige tucked Emily in and before she could turn off the bedside lamp she could hear Emily breathing heavier and she knew she was already fast asleep. Several hours later Emily opened her eyes and shifted underneath the sheets. She had heard something that had woken her up, but she was hoping to ignore it and return to sleeping but she kept hearing it. It sounded like someone was talking to her, but it was a voice she hadn't heard in years. She sat up in her bed and saw something she never thought she would see again, or rather someone she never thought she would see again. Emily was sure she was hallucinating or at least dreaming because when her eyes adjusted to the dark she saw Ali standing in her doorway, leaning against the doorframe like she had been waiting for a while.
"God it's like waking the dead with you." Ali laughed as Emily sat up straighter in her bed, looking over to Paige to see if she was really going insane or if this was just her dreaming.
"She can't hear me, this is all you Killer." Emily flinched at the old nickname. "Still hate it when I call you that I see. You can calm down, you aren't losing your mind, I'm just dropping in on your unconscious."
"Why?"
"Like you have to ask. I've always kept my eye on all of you, but I stopped visiting you all years ago."
"So then why come back now?"
"It's not everyday my little Emily announces that she is having a baby."
"How did you know about that?"
"I can see everything, remember. I check in on you all from time to time. Saw your graduations, your weddings, which by the way you looked stunning in that dress, even if I don't agree with you choice of brides." Ali nodded in Paige's direction and Emily looked pissed.
"Do you have any idea what you did to her, what you pushed her to do? She could have died, I could have never met her because of you."
"Oh please I put the rest of you through hell too, none of you tried to escape me by dying and besides she looks pretty alive to me." Emily frowned harder and Ali tilted her head and looked at her friend.
"I know how much you love her, even back then I knew how much she loved you and I took advantage of her, I'll admit that."
"She almost died because of you."
"Poor Emily, holding on to anger for a ghost." Ali crossed to the other side of the room. "Being angry at me isn't going to undo what she did and I don't do apologies, you know that. But for you, I'll say this much, I may still hate her, but she loves you and she was always the one you were meant to end up with, so for what its worth she survived for a reason."
"How do you…"
"Know that." Ali finished for her, "being dead has a few advantages; I get to see how the past is going to play into the future. She lived because she was meant to be with you in the end, I believe you refer to them as soul mates." Emily looked over at where Paige was still asleep and couldn't help but smile.
"And I must have been wrong about her on some level, she loved you enough to marry you, give you this great life and now you get to add a baby to that." Emily was uncomfortable with Ali mentioning her child and her hand flew to her stomach like she was going to protect her bump.
"Relax Killer, no one is going to hurt him, least of all me."
"Him?"
"Told you I can see things you can't." Ali stood up and headed for the door again. "You should get some sleep, growing boys need their rest." Ali started to walk away, but Emily called her back.
"Ali wait, why is it that I only see you and never?" The blonde smiled, "you mean out of all your deceased girlfriends why is it that you keep seeing me and not the one who totally stole your heart, easy, you made peace with her death. You let her go, you got the answers you were looking for with her death. You know who killed her, hell you killed her killer, but the point is that even though her death broke your heart you had the answers to your questions. You never go that with me."
"You're telling me it's my own fault that you come back in my dreams?"
"I know weird stuff, but true. You call me back because I never actually left your mind. You loved her, but you knew that she would have wanted you to move on and live the life she was robbed of and you feel like forgetting me would make you a bad friend." Emily took a deep breath, she knew what she was hearing was the truth.
"Look Emily, I'll make it easy on you. I'm telling you right, let me go. Live your life and stop worrying about me. Leave me in the cemetery in Rosewood and move on. I'll always be your friend, but I don't need to be your obsession anymore." Emily never saw her feelings after Ali's death in that way before, but she knew that once again it was the truth. Ali walked over to the door as if she was going to finally disappear, but she turned around and pointed to Emily's stomach.
"I always knew it would be you. You were always going to be the one to have a baby first. Just try to restrain yourself when he's born and don't name him after me." Ali winked and went over to Emily's side of the bed and brushed her hand over Emily's belly.
"No one will ever hurt him, I'll make sure of it. Wouldn't want his pit bull momma to have to come to his rescue." Emily felt Ali press a kiss to her forehead and that was what caused her to jolt upright in her bed. This time she knew she was awake, that what she saw was no longer real and that Ali was gone for good this time. She looked over at Paige who had moved only slightly in her sleep and she reached down and started rubbing her swollen belly. She leaned back against her pillows still running her hand over her bump and instead of being freaked out like she usually is after she sees Ali in a dream, she was happy, content even. She turned over so that she was facing Paige and she smile as she drifted back to sleep.
"We're having a boy." Was the last thing she whispered to herself before she fell back asleep.