Author's intro:

OK you guys I'm going to admit it, when Paige first came into the show in season one I was like 'who is this whiny, be-fringed, closeted, auto-aggressive perpetually unlikeable character with her hands all over Emily Fields?' and then I scowled at the screen and crossed my arms and didn't make eye contact and huffed myself into a near asthmatic fit every time she appeared. But then the 'If I say I'm gay ...' episode happened and my ice-queen heart just melted into a pool of empathy and repentance. And then when she returned in season two with the fastest-firing quip-revolver in the west and an amazing air of optimism and gayness and strength and self-assurance I was like 'who is this super-human queen of awesome and why doesn't she have her hands all over Emily Fields?'. So, in short, this a mostly AU (as in 'A'-less) story about how Paige McCullers won the heart of Emily Fields, by just being herself :)

Chapter 1

The screeching whir of the wood plane drowned out only the quietest of Paige's thoughts. The hot, heady smell of singed wood filled the workshop, the billowing wood-dust catching in the bright sunlight and making the air feel incredibly thick. Paige pushed the heavy contraption one last time along the length of pine she was working before turning it off and resting it back on the bench. The base of her hand tingled slightly from the vibration after it had stopped. She puffed out a heavy breath and wiped her palm across her forehead, sweeping back her sweaty fringe from her eyes. It had grown too long, and was on its way to becoming a visual impairment.

Voices returned, now, in the quiet, drifting in through the windows and from the corridor. Paige found herself listening out for Emily's voice again, freezing with an almost super-human stillness when she thought she heard it, relaxing and shaking her head in admonishment when she realised the intonations weren't quite right. It was Emily's free-period right now; Paige tried to picture what she'd be doing with it, then quickly tried to not picture it, as not picturing Emily was something she'd been trying to train herself to do. She was doing OK with that, most days, but unseeing things she had actually seen - that was a lot harder. Things like beads of water dripping down the back of Emily's exposed neck as she pulled herself out of the pool on those strong arms; the dark lashes of Emily's slowly closing eyes as she inexplicably leaned in closer to Paige as if to kiss her, the elation that swelled up inside Paige's chest as she realised she had indeed been about to kiss her, as proved by the warm breath against her lips and reinforced by the soft brush of her tongue through the warmth and wetness of her mouth, the tightening of her fingers where they rested upon Paige's thigh -

Paige snapped herself out of it, blowing out a frustrated breath, irritated to have caught thinking about her again. She glared at the various objects on her workbench with directionless scorn, reminding herself of her own self-disparaging brand of therapy that mostly involved torturing herself with rapid-firing vignettes of less pleasant memories. Memories like that vacuous blonde Samara pushing the hair back behind Emily's perfect ears and the nauseating sight of Emily's enchanting smile and her bright eyes shining in earnest as she gazed back at her, followed quickly by the harsh words with which Emily efficiently ejected Paige from her life. And like therapy, the method had mixed results. It was painful and blunt and realistic, and left Paige feeling small and worthless, but was slowly allowing her to acknowledge the fact that she would feel that way forever unless she did something pretty drastic to change it. Paige considered it progress.

She began to work again with renewed concentration, so engrossed in her task that she didn't notice the bell ringing to signal the end of the school day. She worked on through, grateful for the distraction that the manual task provided, for the focused mindset that granted her those few precious minutes she could get to herself that weren't permeated with thoughts of Emily.

'McCullers, what the hell are you still doing here?'

Paige jumped at the interruption, the metal setsquare she had been holding clattering against the bench and the pencil mark she had been carefully making against a piece of word slipping into an exaggerated arc across the surface. Recovering from the intrusion she glanced at her watch before turning on the spot. She grimaced sheepishly. 'We had plans huh?' she asked, knowing the answer.

'We had plans,' Pru agreed, folding her arms, 'big plans,' she elaborated, 'plans that involved making me look fabulous for the only date I've been asked out on all year.'

'You're projecting your tragedy to the whole school you know,' Paige observed, noting that Pru hadn't fully stepped into the room yet and voices still echoed ominously in the corridor.

Pru glanced behind her before stepping forwards, turning briefly to shut the workshop door.

Paige opened her mouth to speak again but was silenced by a raised flat-palmed gesture from her best friend. 'Big plans that you promised you'd not forget about to make up for the fact that you cancelled last minute two Thursdays ago and I was stuck watching that substandard Sandra Bullock romcom on my own.'

Paige cringed, screwing up her face in apologetic remorse, the guilt swirling in her stomach as she recalled her reason for cancelling on Pru was just to earn a mere extra half an hour with Emily after swim practice in which they'd made out twice, only for Paige to bolt when she'd thought she'd heard someone coming, garbling some ludicrous excuse about a sick aunt and a missing cat.

'But you would clearly rather spend time with ...' Pru peered sceptically over the rims of her glasses, 'some ... irregular lengths of timber than with your best friend. Who, may I remind you, was the only girl who stuck by you during your 'Ghost World' phase; the girl who was almost ostracised by your entire family for taking the wrap for the ownership of the bottle of vodka that you had an 'allergic reaction' to and spent two days with your head in the toilet; the girl who queued up for half an hour at 2am for that dozy, selectively-deaf attendant at the 24 hour store to give me a bag of ice after you'd decided to pierce your own ears with a hat pin that you found; the girl who donated her own bikini top that time you lost yours coming up from a dive at the beach and wanted to go and get an ice cream ...'

'Alright, stop it, Jesus,' Paige said, alarmed at both how many occasions Pru could recall and the speed at which she was able to recount them. 'I'm a terrible friend. Hang me, quarter me, whip me naked through the street of London but just ... keep your voice down,' she peered nervously through the glazed panel in the door. She did not need anyone to be reminded of the questionable years of her early adolescence.

Pru looked thoughtful for a moment before relenting. 'I'll forgive you,' she began, 'if you let me borrow your green dress, the one with the lace.'

Paige frowned for a second before shrugging. 'Deal, I guess,' she muttered, rubbing an eraser against the wood to remove the mark she'd made. 'Though I don't know what good your friendship is if it's just a way to bully me into compliance with a ... quite frankly disconcertingly comprehensive list of my former embarrassments.'

'Ah but if we forget our past, how can we expect to learn from it?' Pru asked her.

Paige rolled her eyes. 'I'm growing tired of you.'

Pru's self-satisfied smirk was wiped from her face as Mona Vanderwaal burst importantly into the room with all of her usual regard for anyone's privacy or personal space.

'Hi Paige,' she announced in such an amicable way that it almost implied they were friends and interacted on a regular basis - a charade that went entirely counter to Mona's usual approach to Paige, which could only be described as an attitude of barely concealed contempt.

'Uh ... hi Mona,' Paige responded with a half-shrug and a bewildered glance in Pru's direction.

'You're just the person I wanted to see,' Mona continued, a hint of excitement in her voice.

'I ... I am?' Paige asked, her gaze catching the fan of fliers clutched in Mona's arms about half a second before Mona thrust them forwards practically into Paige's face.

'Fashion show,' Mona said, by way of an explanation. 'Two weeks from now.'

Paige frowned, tentatively plucking a flier from deck Mona had presented. '... right,' she began slowly, 'and this affects me how?'

Mona laughed, touching Paige lightly on the arm as if her question was absurd. 'Because you're building the stage, silly,' she admonished.

Paige blinked. 'I'm doing what now?'

'Well, you and the rest of the drop-outs, I mean ... 'workshop students',' Mona corrected herself with icy precision. 'It'll be a lovely team-building exercise.'

'This is an interesting tactic, Mona, if your goal is to actually get me onside.' Paige noted. 'Sociopathic denigration has always been such a great motivational tool.'

'I'm so glad,' Mona said, unruffled by Paige's stubbornness, 'because your Father was so pleased to learn that you'd be finally be earning some extra credit.'

Paige visibly baulked at the revelation. 'My father?'

'He was presented with a list of the people involved at the most recent PTA meeting of course,' Mona told her before softening slightly and rubbing Paige's arm encouragingly. 'Poor Paigey, the college offers haven't been exactly rolling in have they? And it's not like you're the swim team anchor anymore ...'

'It's bold to break this news to me in a room full of so many sharp objects Mona,' Paige said, through gritted teeth.

'Of course I've run it all past Mr Tamborelli, who's equally delighted that the varsity swim team is finally giving something back to the school community,' Mona continued, unflinchingly.

'You've been to my Father and the Principal about this already?' Paige asked, slightly dumb-founded by Mona's efficiency.

'Of course,' Mona answered, a trace of surprise slipping into her tone, 'didn't want you wriggling out of it did I? Goodness you are slow today aren't you. Maybe it's the fumes ...' she glanced theatrically around the room with mock concern, 'should I open a window?'

'Only if you're going to jump out of it,' Paige answered, folding her arms crossly.

'Of course your friend Emily will be one of the models,' Mona said, ignoring Paige's suggestion. 'You wouldn't want to disappoint her, would you?' she added, a smile flicking across her mouth with such remarkable insincerity that Paige's blood ran cold. Her brain fizzed with sudden activity. What did she know? What could she know? Had Emily told anyone? Had she seen them?

Paige clenched her jaw, determined not to react in any way that might incriminate her in front of either of the girls in the room. She resorted to glaring mutely in Mona's direction.

'Great then,' Mona said, taking Paige's silence as some sort of agreement, 'there's a formal meeting tomorrow at lunchtime. I'll see you there.'

Before Paige could properly organise her thoughts Mona had left the room. Paige's nervous gaze fell on Pru, who had witnessed the entire exchange with the expression of someone who didn't quite grasp the full extent of what was going on. 'Did you seriously just agree to that?' she asked, staring blankly at the space Mona had just vacated.

Paige sighed and began clearing the work bench busily to avoid looking at her friend.

'Paige?' Pru prompted.

'Well you heard,' Paige said, unplugging the plane roughly and wrapping the flex tightly around the handle, 'I don't have any other choice. She's managed to go straight to my Dad via the Principal ... my hands are kinda tied.'

Pru observed her. 'You're lying. There's something else.'

Paige turned around to meet Pru's gaze, shifting uncomfortably under the scrutiny, noting soberly the drawbacks of having a best friend that still adored you despite seeing you wet yourself at the sudden appearance of a clown at two separate birthday parties. She had thought about telling Pru about Emily. There were even a few occasions when she had started to, but all her sentences had collapsed in on themselves before they were even halfway out of her mouth, and she had just sighed sadly and introduced a clumsy segue into a different subject. Lying to Pru felt even worse than lying to her parents, because, unlike her parents, she was almost certain that Pru wouldn't reject her, or renounce their friendship, or pray for her soul to be saved, and yet she was still too much of a coward to say it out-loud to anyone, even Pru, because saying it out loud meant changing the world. Just like all the times before it, now just wasn't the time. So she lied again, and tried to push down the nauseous feeling of guilt that it always inspired.

'No there isn't,' Paige insisted. 'Mona's just a bully. It's worse to stand in her way.'

'You know who else is a bully?' Pru asked.

'Don't start that again,' Paige said tiredly, not wishing to get into another debate about how Paige needed to learn how to stand up to her Dad.

Pru knew when not to push it, and she backed down. 'Alright,' she relented, although Paige suspected that it may have just been because the offer of the green dress would've been retracted had she managed to get Paige in a worse mood than the one she was in already.

Pru smoothed down the front of the dress and regarded her reflection with a small satisfied smile.

'He's going to go nuts for you Prune juice,' Paige told her, propping herself up on her elbows from her reclining position on the bed to get a better look.

Pru did a half-turn in front of the mirror, examining her back-view as much as the restrictions of her human skeleton allowed. 'This is such a nice dress Paige,' she said, 'maybe this fashion show isn't so opposed to your interests after all,' she noted.

'Please,' Paige said with an eye-roll, 'my Mom picked that dress out for me to wear to my Aunt Miranda's eightieth birthday because the last time I wore jeans and converse to a family event she asked my parents when they were going to let me move back home. I'm about as interested in fashion as I am in the plant life of the mesozoic era.'

Pru's reflection regarded her uncertainly.

Paige shook her head, 'Sorry, I fell asleep in front of the National Geographic channel last night.'

'I'm surprised your Dad allows that kind of blasphemy in his house.'

Paige flicked a playful hand-gesture in at the reflection. 'He's a church deacon, Pru, not an eighteenth century quaker.'

Pru held her hands up in apology, her smile still evident. 'So you were telling me how much you loved fashion.'

Paige sighed. 'I love fashion about as much as I love Mona,' she said glumly, jumping slightly at the vibration of the phone in her pocket. Extending her leg awkwardly in her position to fish it out, she almost dropped it immediately when she saw she had received a text from Emily.

'Someone you don't want to talk to?' Pru asked, noticing her sudden strangeness.

'... something like that,' she muttered, opening the message.

Hanna told me you're helping out with the show?

Paige re-read the message a few times, her eyes darting animatedly across the screen. She chewed absently at her thumbnail then looked up to ensure that Pru was still engrossed in her own reflection before deciding to answer.

Yeah, Mona can be very persuasive when she wants to be...

Emily's reply came after about twenty seconds, and Paige felt the familiar of mixture of Emily-related excitement and anxiety as she thumbed open the new text.

It'll be fun to work together, I'm looking forward to it :)

Paige's eyes widened slightly, her stomach clenching in that strange way it only ever did around Emily. She shook her head slightly, silently but sternly telling herself not to read too much into the message. Emily was just a friendly person. And moreover she'd made it abundantly clear that she only wanted to be friends with Paige. Besides, she was with Samara now; Paige was just someone that it was easier to be nice to than to bear a grudge against. Satisfied with her analysis, she chose not the reply to the text and stowed her phone back into her pocket.

Removing the phone from her immediate line of sight did not, however, stop Paige from thinking about the text all evening, distracting her to the point that Pru left with a pair of cream-coloured pumps that she didn't even ask for permission to take; nor did it stop Paige from reaching for the phone every few hours in the night, turning over restlessly in her bed, unable to sleep, the light from the screen lighting up her face as she reread the text over and over, allowing herself to smile the small smile of someone who just, for the briefest moment, was made to feel like they were worthwhile.

Sorry there was no Emily in this chapter, but I can assure you that she'll be all over the next one! I'd love to know what you think so leave me a review and tell me if you're so inclined :)