Sideswiped

As Emily drives off, a strange feeling starts to come over Sonny. He wished he could have said something, anything to make her stay. Didn't she know how much he wanted her here? Didn't she know that the house wasn't quite so dark when she was here? Didn't she know that he was going to miss her?

Sonny closed the door and began walking back to the couch. Didn't she know that he was falling in love with her too? That question made him stop in his tracks. Where in the world did THAT come from?

"Get it together Sonny. How can you even think that you're falling in love with Emily?"

Sonny pours himself a drink and sits down on the couch.

"I'll tell you how you can think that, but you're not going to like it."

Sonny takes a big sip of his drink and lets his subconscious mind continue.

"Emily has been here for you when you needed somebody steady and reliable. She's gracious, kind, and strong. She also happens to be a beautiful young woman which any man would have to be blind not to see. Face it, you simply can't help but fall in love with her. She reminds you of Lilly. And somewhere deep inside, you think that Emily could make you into a better man like Lilly might have done, had she lived."

Sonny closes his eyes, feeling totally sideswiped by this new discovery.

"I have to forget what I feel for Emily. Jason has asked me to stay away from her and I have to honor that."

As Emily drove, she fought back the tears. The further away from Sonny's house she got, the more her heart broke, and the weaker she felt inside. There was something about Sonny that had made her feel safe. It was something Nikolas had never been able to give to her, no matter how hard he had tried. It wasn't really his fault that he looked like Connor, the man who had raped her. And now, with Sonny, she was finally able to feel as though the rape was truly behind her. She didn't cringe when he held her or touched her. He was so gentle with her.

"Maybe that's what's wrong. Sonny can't fall in love with me because he thinks I'm too needy and fragile."

"So what are you going to do now? Go to school and become a doctor just to show Sonny that you can be a strong woman? That's a silly reason, if ever I heard one."

Emily's inner voice was wrong! She was going to become a doctor to be able to help people like she was unable to help her mom survive cancer! How dare her subconscious suggest otherwise?

"How dare I? I dare because I'm willing to say the things that you're not. Face it Em, at this point, as much as you say that you can't be with Sonny, you're going to do everything in your power to try and make that man fall in love with you. You'll do it in spite of yourself. There's something about Sonny that gives you an adrenaline rush. You've never felt like this for a man. Nikolas and Xander were just silly girl fantasies. Sonny is more of a man than they ever were. You're a woman now, and you want a man who can treat you like one."

Emily groaned and slumped into her seat just a bit. She knew that there was no way to deny the truth. She closes her eyes, just for a second, to try and clear her mind. When she opens her eyes, there is a deer standing in the middle of the road. She swerves the car to try and avoid the deer, but she ends up sideswiping it, and driving off the road into a ditch. Her airbag inflates, but not before she hits her head on the steering wheel and is knocked unconscious.