Emily slowly opened her eyes. She sat up in the bed, looked around, and noticed the ruffled sheets beside her.

"Oh good, you're up," Spencer said as she walked in the room. She handed Emily a glass of something and then crawled into the bed beside her.

"Please tell me you haven't had any caffeine this morning because I don't think my head can handle you if you have."

"Don't worry. It's noon. I had my coffee a few hours ago. Just drink what's in your hand. It'll help."

Emily inspected the liquid. "Is it safe?"

"Probably."

Emily shrugged and took a sip. "Wow.. that's disgusting." She took another sip, then put it down on the nightstand.

"You can't keep turning to alcohol when things get rough with your girlfriends. Do I need to stage an intervention and to teach you to use words instead of destructive behavior?"

Emily looked down at Spencer's bruised fist. "Look whose talking, Ms. Perfect. I can't believe you punched Paige."

"Nice. Way to turn this around on me." They smiled at each other and then Spencer went on to say, "I told you I'd destroy her. She can't hurt you like that and not expect any consequences. Paige has had it coming for a long time and then what she said yesterday, it set me off."

"She was right though. I'm a horrible person."

It took everything within Spencer to keep from breaking down at the sight of the desolate expression on Emily's face. "Emily, no you are not. Look, I don't know everything that happened, but I do know that you are NOT a horrible person. You are the sweetest, kindest person I've ever known. It sounded to me like Paige was just jealous. She's insecure. Lashing out is the way she deals with that."

Spencer decided to try and lighten the mood to get that sad expression off of Emily's face. "So, who's the tall, hot blonde?"

"Samara. She's goes to Sheridon Prep. She's in the pride group there. That's how we met."

Spencer raised her eyebrows. "Do you like her?"

"Maybe. She's pretty and she's really comfortable with her sexuality, which is nice. I'm just not sure what I want anymore. I sort of feel like I don't deserve a girlfriend."

"You deserve to be happy. After all the crap that you've been through.. you deserve happiness Emily. Speaking of crap you've been through, I've been meaning to talk to you about Alison, especially after yesterday with her name being mentioned."

"What about Alison?"

"Well, obviously the mention of her still affects you. Remember when I said that you never stood up to her and you got upset? I shouldn't have said that, but regardless, it seems like you're harboring some feelings about her. You even still wear that stupid bracelet."

Emily pulled her arm out from under the covers. "No. I took it off."

Spencer looked down at Emily's naked wrist. "Oh. I hadn't noticed. You must have done that recently. What made you take it off?"

Spencer's phone started ringing on the nightstand. "Hold that thought," Spencer said and picked up her phone to look at the text message. "Aw crap. I told Toby I'd meet him for lunch today. I completely forgot."

She jumped out of the bed and walked over to her closet to get changed. While getting dressed, she said, "We'll keep talking tonight, ok? I'd cancel this thing with Toby, but I've been neglecting him the past few days because of Hanna and her grandiose party planning." Emily nodded.

Spencer grabbed her purse, walked out of the room, then stuck her head back in the door and said, "See? Wasn't it nice to talk and use words to express our feelings?"

Emily rolled her eyes.

Spencer smiled. "Just make yourself at home. I'll be back before dark."

Once Spencer was gone, Emily laid her head down and tried going back to sleep, but the thought of Alison kept her awake. "Why did Spencer have to bring her up?" she thought.

It wasn't that Emily was still in love with Alison, it was just that she hated to be reminded of her. Alison had changed Emily. After all that time of being in love with her, feeling like her heart was ready to burst when she was around her, crying herself to sleep every night because she knew they could never be together, believing that her feelings were sick and wrong, the pain of it all had hurt her so deeply. "I will never let myself go through that again," she thought.

Emily turned and looked at a photo of Spencer sitting on the nightstand. She felt a stabbing pain in her heart. Terrified of this feeling, she jumped out of bed. Before she could make her next move, she heard her phone ring in her bag. She went over to it, picked up her phone, and looked at the text. "Someone's been busy breaking hearts. You know the feeling, right Em? Get used to it. -A" She threw her phone back in her purse and walked downstairs.

She looked around for awhile, trying to figure out what to do. She decided to look in the fridge for something to wash the bitter taste of the concoction she drank earlier from her mouth. Opening the fridge door, her eyes were instantly drawn to the bottle of champagne in front of her. "Don't be so weak," she said to herself.

She forced her eyes away from the bottle and found a pitcher of orange juice. She picked it up, but didn't realize how heavy it was and did not have a substantial grip on the handle. It slipped through her fingers and dropped at her feet, shattering into several sharp shards.

Emily bent down to clean up the mess. She reached out her hand to grab one of the shards, but pulled it back suddenly after it sliced through her hand. She watched as the blood began to form in her palm. She stood up, grabbed a towel. and pressed it to the wound.

Looking around her, she breathed deeply to calm herself down. Her efforts produced no relief. The pain was overbearing. She opened the fridge and grabbed the bottle of champagne.

Spencer walked into her house and found Emily passed out on the couch with the empty champagne bottle lying on the floor. "You have got to be kidding me."

She walked over to the couch and started shaking Emily's shoulder. "Come on, wake up."

Emily's eyes opened. "Hey.. you're back," she said groggily.

Picking up the champagne bottle from the floor and placing it on the coffee table, Spencer said, "Dammit, I should never have left you."

Spencer sat down next to Emily and maneuvered her head onto her lap. She pushed a strand of hair out of Emily's face.

The touch of Spencer's hand across her face startled Emily. She looked up into Spencer's eyes and became confused. "Is she coming onto me?" Emily wondered. She felt that all-too-familiar pain begin to arise, but instead of succumbing to it, she took control. She lifted her head and kissed Spencer.

Spencer pulled away. "Emily. Stop. You're not thinking clearly."

Emily was hurt. "But I love you Spencer. I love you so much."

"I love you too Em. Now come on, let's go up to bed." Spencer stood and grabbed Emily's arm to help her up. As she did so, she noticed the deep gash in Emily's palm. "How the hell did this happen?"

"It was an accident."

"Well, it needs to be cleaned."

"No! I don't need you to save me Spencer. I can take care of myself."

"Obviously you can't. Look at yourself!"

Emily stood. "I'm going home."

"Oh yea, I'm sure your mom is going to be real pleased to see you like this."

"I'll go to Hanna's."

"How do you plan on getting there?"

"I'll walk!"

"And get yourself ran over or taken advantage of? I don't think so. You're staying here."

"Stop telling me what to do. You're not my mom."

"I'm not trying to be."

"Could have fooled me. You're always so patronizing!"

"It's only because I care about you."

Emily opened her mouth to snap back, but no words came out. She had nothing left to say.

"Emily, please. Just lay back down. I'll bandage your hand and you can go to sleep. We'll talk about this in the morning."