"Well?"

"She's fine, Em." AJ sighed and Emily slapped him on the arm. AJ winced and Emily gave a grunt of satisfaction. It's what he deserved for being so flippant about the whole thing. He acted like it was no big deal, but it was a very, very big deal. Elizabeth and Lucky were… Well, they were supposed to be Luke and Laura all over again, a crazy awesome couple that had adventures, and when you said their names together, people just nodded and automatically knew that you were referring to awesome.

But… there was no more Liz and Lucky. How could there be no more Liz and Lucky?

"What was that for?" AJ asked as he rubbed his arm.

"For being so… so… calm! She's not fine, AJ," Emily said. "There's no way that she's fine."

AJ sighed and said, "Okay, so maybe she's not fine in the normal sense, but she's not dead and she's not completely smashed. As far as I'm concerned, Elizabeth is—"

"Liz," Emily corrected him, jumping in before he could finish talking. AJ rose an eyebrow and Emily said, "Nikolas calls her Elizabeth, because Nikolas is a prince, and he's a Cassadine, and he's still so formal. I call her Liz. Lucky calls her…" Emily sighed. "Lucky used to call her Liz. Or, sometimes Lizzie. I should have known something was wrong when he started calling her Elizabeth all the time. I should have known when they went from being Liz and Lucky to Elizabeth and Lucky. I should have known long before now that it was getting really wrong with them."

"Em? Sweetie, you're babbling."

"I know that!" Emily knew she was acting like a child. Her arms were folded over her stomach. She was pouting. She had even just stomped. If she wanted people to take her seriously, she had to be more adult. She had to stop having tantrums, because then they just patted her on the head and dismissed her.

She had gotten really good at it for a while. Emily had to be the mature one when the rest of her family wanted to act like little babies. They fought all the time, and they didn't see what they had. They didn't understand that they had their family, that they should have been glad to have each other alive. Ned and Grandfather searched for faults so they could pounce on someone and bring them down, but they should have been bringing them up. So, when she faced off with Ned or Grandfather, she made sure that she was firm and there wasn't a hint of childishness in her. That was the only way to make them take her seriously.

But, with AJ, Emily couldn't always keep the childishness back. He was her big brother. Sure, she had stood up for him and had to be the adult when he started fighting with Ned or Grandfather, but she knew that if she was the one that needed someone to stand up for her, AJ would do it. Jason would do it, too, but Jason… There was a gap she knew she'd never be able to cross with him. Jason loved her and she was the only Quartermaine other than AJ that he would willingly have anything to do with, but there was still a distance with them sometimes. She couldn't have her childish moments with Jason. She had could have her cute moments and he would give in, but if she started whining, she knew that he would just go away until she stopped. Jason didn't remember living with the Quartermaines, so he didn't remember how important it was to be able to have those childish moments because Quartermaine children had to grow up so soon. AJ remembered, though, he knew, and so when Emily was feeling childish, she knew that AJ would let her have that time.

And, well, Emily was feeling childish. Her dreams were shattered! Liz and Lucky were the greatest thing ever, and after spending years listening to Monica threaten to throw the entire family, Alan included, out of her house, Emily looked to Liz and Lucky as a loving forever couple. Liz would never threaten to throw Lucky out. They wouldn't yell and each other and fight and… Emily had even overheard Bobbie and Luke talking about the days when Alan and Monica used to try to kill each other on a regular basis. Liz and Lucky would never do that!

Emily felt like her family was being torn apart all over again, and hadn't that happened enough? First, she lost her mom, then she lost Jason, and then Lucky… Now, she was losing Lucky all over again, and… No, she wasn't losing Lucky. She was losing Liz and Lucky, her perfect ideal of a couple in love, and that was just as hard as losing Lucky. So yeah, she was going to be childish, because she had done her best to be strong when her mom died. She had been strong when Jason got hurt. She had been strong when Lucky "died." As far as Emily was concerned, it was her turn to freak out.

Emily took in a deep breath and tried to calm herself down. Yeah, it was her turn to freak out, but at the same time, no one would listen to her if she freaked out too much. AJ would start to patronize her, maybe even accuse her of being on drugs, again, which she totally wasn't, but… She didn't even want to go there. She had to be mostly calm, and keep the freaking out to a minimum.

"I'm just worried about her," Emily said, forcing her voice to a normal, steady level. "I don't want her to go out and get herself hurt or anything. You said when you found her last night, she was drinking."

"And, I stopped her from drinking any more."

"But, what if you hadn't been there? What if she'd kept drinking and then gotten in the car and…" Emily stopped, realizing what she was saying and who she was saying it to. Her hands went up quick, covering her mouth. She gave a muffled, "AJ, I'm so sorry…"

AJ just shook his head. "Ya know, Em, if you keep doing that any time something even remotely related to the accident comes up, it'll never go away, and you'll never stop feeling bad about saying something. I know what I did, and we're all moving past it."

Emily's hands lowered slowly to her sides. "I know, I know, I just… I feel like if we don't talk about it, then… I don't know. It just feels like something we're not supposed to talk about."

"That's because Ned made it something we shouldn't talk about. But, I'm not Ned, and so we can talk about it if you need to talk about it."

"Do you need to talk about it?"

AJ didn't even think about it. He shook his head and said, "No. I've talked about it to Jason, and that's the person that matters. We're fine with it. He forgave me a long time ago, and that's helping me forgive myself. So, see? No reason to apologize, because you're the reason that Jason and I are even on decent terms."

"Okay," she said, the word slow and elongated, but she wasn't so sure. It all just seemed… weird. Maybe she had just expected it all to be harder. Most of AJ's problems had been because of his feelings of inadequacy within the family, feeling that he was always letting someone down. When it came to the accident, Emily expected that all to be there. But, Jason had forgiven him, and because she hounded them enough, they were actually sort of friends, as close to being real brothers as she was going to get out of them. Emily was just always so surprised that it had happened so quickly, that she hadn't had to fight harder for it.

"And, by the way," AJ said, "Elizabeth…" He stopped as Emily started to scowl and corrected himself. "Liz," he said, "wasn't going to drive drunk. She would have called you to pick her up."

"That's good, at least." Emily sighed. "I wonder if I could get Jason to let the bartender at Jake's know not to serve her."

"Then, she would go to another bar if she really wanted a drink."

"You don't go to another bar."

"Because Jason went one step further and told every bartender in town not to serve to me."

Emily pursed her lips and thought about it. That was a pretty good idea. Jason had already done it once, he could do it again. She probably should have felt bad about interfering in AJ's life the way she had, especially since his voice held such an accusatory tone, but she couldn't feel bad about keeping him safe and sober. The Quartermaines just had a way of driving a person to drink, and she didn't want AJ to have outlets. He couldn't even buy liquor in the stores in town, thanks to Jason, and if he wanted a drink that bad, he'd have to go all the way out of town.

She probably would have felt bad if she thought AJ was really upset about it. He didn't want to drink. He wanted to stay sober. He just didn't want to have to admit that he couldn't do it on his own, that he needed that kind of extreme help, so he would never thank her or Jason for it. But, she knew he was better off with the interference, and she knew he appreciated it on some level. He was just mad that he couldn't do it himself.

"Em, you can't possibly be thinking…"

"It worked for you."

"I was also a lot worse than Liz…" He shook his head. "You know, it feels really weird calling her that, because I don't know her as intimately as you do. How about you just let me call her Elizabeth until I get to know her better."

Emily twisted her mouth until it started to make her nose itch. Letting AJ call her Elizabeth felt like she was giving in, like she was saying okay that Liz was changing into someone else, but… Well, maybe she could get past that by diverting the conversation.

"What do you mean, get to know her better?"

AJ's eyes narrowed for just a few seconds, but long enough for Emily to know that he was suspicious of her long before he actually said, "What are you up to?"

"I'm not up to anything," she told him. "I'm just figuring that since Liz doesn't seem comfortable talking to me or Nikolas about how things are with Lucky, maybe she needs a friend, and you were already a friend to her last night, so…"

"Uh huh." AJ shook his head. "I'm not about to play rebound for your friend."

"I didn't say anything about being a rebound. Besides, it seems like Lucky's already been his own rebound, except a rebound is supposed to make you feel better and Lucky just made her feel worse." Emily sighed and crossed her arms. "I don't understand why this has to be so hard and complicated."

"Because we're people, Em," AJ told her. "We're people with emotions and our hearts break. That's never going to be easy, Em. It's always going to be hard."

"I know, I just…" She sighed. "I had this fantasy in my head and it didn't just involve Liz and Lucky."

AJ smirked. "Do tell." He moved from the chair to the sofa. He patted the seat beside him. "This sounds interesting."

Fidgeting, Emily turned around and made sure the door was closed. The last thing she needed was for one of her parents or, God forbid, Grandfather or Ned, to come busting into the sitting room while she talked about something she wasn't ready to have them butt their noses into just yet. The door was still safely closed, and she hoped that, knowing she and AJ were in there talking, Reginald would give her some kind of heads up if someone was coming.

Satisfied that, for the moment, they were alone, Emily sat down beside AJ. "Nikolas," she said. Emily felt her eyes widen. There was no way that she was going to be able to hide just how excited the thought made her from AJ. He was already grinning at the sight of her eyes. He would only grin wider if he knew that her heart was beating so hard it felt like it would burst out of her chest.

"I'd know that look anywhere," AJ said, grinning. "The spark in your eyes… What does Nikolas have to say about the way you say his name?"

"Nikolas…" Emily sighed. She thought about when she kissed him in the park and ran away. Nikolas had told her that it wasn't right, that she was like his sister, but… Now, she didn't think so. She thought that, since that kiss, he had been looking at her differently, like he was wondering if there really was more there. She had been ready to never see him again, but Nikolas had been the one to seek her out after that, the one to tell her that she shouldn't apologize and that she didn't need to feel nervous around him.

"I don't know," Emily told AJ. "I mean, I think he's considering it." She wasn't going to tell AJ that she had kissed Nikolas and run like a fool, but she didn't have to get into that story with him. She didn't have to tell him why he was considering it.

"I think he's afraid," Emily said. "With what's going on between Liz and Lucky… I don't know," she said. "I think he sees them, the way they can't even look at each other and he's afraid that if something happened, we would lose our friendship. But, I can see it in his eyes, ya know? He's thinking about it. He's thinking and thinking's good, right?"

AJ nodded. "Thinking means you won't get into something that will destroy your friendship. It's good that he's thinking." But AJ was smiling, even though he was trying to be serious, which meant to Emily that he thought this was a good thing, that she should go for it. Of course, she could have been projecting. She was probably projecting. AJ probably just thought that it was cute. She'd probably think it was cute if it was happening to someone else. But, since it was happening to her, Emily just felt nervous and sometimes kind of pathetic.

"I wish everything would be the way it was, ya know?" Emily sighed. "I know it's not going to be like that, though, but if Nikolas and I… I love him, AJ, I really love him, and I think he loves me. He's just afraid to see what we could be together."

"Give it time, Em," AJ told her. "If it's meant to be, it'll be."

"Now, you're spouting clichés at me," Emily said with a sigh.

"Because sometimes, the clichés are true." AJ reached out and grabbed her hands. He squeezed tightly and said, "I love you, Em, and I'll do anything I can to help you, you know that. But with this, there really isn't that much I can do."

"I know," she said with a sigh. "You listened, though, and you didn't tell me how awful the Cassadines are, so that's plenty."

AJ chuckled. "With my record, I can't really talk too bad about anybody." AJ gave her hand one more squeeze, then pulled back. The pager on AJ's hip buzzed and he groaned as he looked down and saw the number. He looked up at Emily and said, "Sorry, Em, it's Jax."

"You're usually more excited about going to work," Emily said, pouting. AJ looked bothered and she hated to see him like that. She didn't just worry that he was going to go back to drinking or anything. She just hated to see him anything lesst han happy.

"Yeah," he said with a grunt. AJ pushed himself up off the sofa and said, "That was before most of my days became listening to Jax complain that his life is verging on hell ever since Jason's girlfriend developed some kind of vendetta against his wife."

Emily winced. "Still?" She sighed. "Have you asked Jason about it?"

"Yeah, and all he says is that it's between Sam and Alexis." AJ shrugged. "Whatever it is, I hope it's settled soon so I can get back to doing real work."

"I hope so, too, because until recently, you've been really happy working for Jax." Emily looked up at AJ and smiled. "I like it when you're happy."

"And I like it when you're happy," he told her. AJ bent over and pressed a kiss agaisnt Emily's cheek. "And I'm absolutely sure that you're going to get your happiness."

"How can you be so sure?" Emily asked.

AJ spoke as though it was completely obvious, like the question had no merit at all, and like he was surprised she had even asked it. "Because you're you, Em."

"And what does that mean?"

"It means," he said, "that I've never met another person who deserved happiness as much as you. Whether you believe it or not, you're the best person I know, Em. You're going to get everything you deserve and more, and to do it, all you have to be is yourself."

"So that means I'll get Nikolas?"

AJ laughed as he bent down to pick up his suit jacket off the back of the chair. "I said you'll get what you deserve, Em, not what you want."

"Well, I do deserve him." She folded her arms and didn't even care that she was pouting. "I do."

"Then, keep the faith, babe. You'll get him."