A/N: So sorry about the delay! This was supposed to be up much earlier, but I had certain things that took up my time, sadly. Also, pardon the Romeo and Juliet references. I love Shakespeare.

Chapter 15 - Did My Heart Love Till Now?

When Spencer got home, it was evening and the sky had already darkened to the colour of an old bruise. She shut the door behind her with a resounding thud, and lethargically let the keys drop from her hand into the bowl by the door. She sighed and leaned her head back against the solid oak, letting her body slump against the door. She felt vaguely fatigued. Her mind was in a state of befuddlement, and her thoughts were crawling by at the slow-moving pace of a snail.

The house sounded, and felt empty, and Spencer inclined her head in wonder, and more confusion. Toby was usually back much before she was, and in fact, she was later today than usual. Before her mind could wander down that particular avenue, it was cleverly distracted by a fleeting thought about Emily.

Emily. Why had she suddenly made an unannounced appearance in her head? It was almost like she lived her now; or rather, the ghost of her did. Her thoughts about Emily were like half-remembered shadows of Emily. If even a fraction of the real thing ever made its way inside Spencer's mind, she was sure that she would explode.

Now, she was trying to purge her mind of the slowly replaying scenes of the kisses they had shared. (Or rather, the kisses that had come and conquered them both, making them feel utterly powerless.) She'd been able to keep these thoughts at bay when she'd be driving, but barely. Now, there was nothing to stop them, and Spencer found her mental barriers crumbling, letting in the heady rush of images, refreshed sensations, and overwhelming emotions.

She hadn't gone to visit Emily with a plan of kissing her. No, Spencer had promised herself that her momentary lapse of judgement on that glorious moonlit night would be the only one. She had even managed to control herself around Emily, and she thought that she could allow herself some bit of satisfaction for having the will to resist a towel-clad Emily Fields.

But she hadn't been able to, for long. Emily, surprisingly, had kissed her, and it seemed like that was the invitation Spencer had been waiting for. She felt ashamed, and a bit sick, that she hadn't even tried to stop herself, no, the thought of stopping hadn't even come to her mind. All that she'd been thinking in those perfect moments could summed up in a single word : more. She'd wanted more, she'd needed more, she would've nearly begged for more. But she was sure that neither of them was ready (or immoral enough) for that. Yet.

Spencer started walking towards the living room, tugging on her tie to loosen the knot, so that she could breathe more easily. The simple gesture, something that she did almost unconsciously, reminded her of yet another kind of pulling, on that same tie, but by a different set of hands, in a different kind of way. The thought made Spencer teeter unsteadily on her legs, made her crash into the doorway (in a house that she could navigate even in the dark!), then stumble into the living room. The room was cold, as the usual fire that Toby kindled every evening wasn't burning merrily, and Spencer was once again reminded of his absence. She set down her bag and folders on the couch, and wandered like a lost person around her own living room, her hands reaching out to straighten objects that didn't need to be kept straight. There was a dark cabinet in the corner of the room, holding a few, sombre books that Spencer thought reflected her maturity as a reader. It was kept there to impress any distinguished visitors to the house (although they usually had none). This, she opened with shaking hands, and she started organizing the already alphabetized titles.

After she had pulled apart and put back the living room together, she moved on to the kitchen. The kitchen was strange; there was no sign of cooking done, there was no anything. Toby usually had a meal ready for them when Spencer came home. Now, she found the counters clean, and no pans or pots waiting to be filled with food. It made her frown, then, she wondered whether she should start cooking. It had been so long since she'd cooked a proper meal, that she felt like she'd never cooked in her life. She stood in the middle of the kitchen, feeling a little disoriented and very lonely.

That was when she heard the distant sound of the front door unlocking, and loud steps echoing in the hallway. Toby was home.

He must've noticed her keys in the bowl, and the tie that she had discarded on her journey to the kitchen, because she heard his voice call out, "Spencer? Are you home?"

She didn't reply, and let him come to the kitchen looking for her. When he entered, he looked...different. Perhaps it was because Spencer was really looking at him, for a change. But she couldn't help but notice the lines around his eyes, and the funny set of his mouth. He looked nothing like the boyish Toby she'd known and loved. Suddenly, she found herself staring at a man who looked older than his years, and who was now looking at her with a completely indecipherable expression. The whole experience made Spencer feel even more disoriented, almost like she was living inside someone else's dream. It was like she'd gone to the library, opened the first page from her favourite childhood novel, and found lines and lines of a foreign language staring back at her.

"You weren't answering."

"Yeah, I guess I didn't hear you." It was a lame excuse, but Toby seemed to think nothing of it. He smiled uncomfortably at her, and pushed his way past her to the kitchen cabinets, opening them to peer inside and shake his head gravely. He took out several pots and pans. "How come you're late today?"

Perhaps it was Spencer's imagination, but she could swear that Toby froze at her question, for the smallest amount of time, before he moved to the fridge, avoiding Spencer's eyes. "You know that gazebo I told you about? Well, the guy held me back today and made me go over each and every detail for a hundred times before I left. Sorry." He said all of it really fast, all the while trying to look really busy as he took out boxes and opened them, then put them back inside.

Spencer frowned, trying to remember if Toby had ever told her anything of that sort. She honestly couldn't remember, and it made her feel guilty, so she smiled cheerfully at him and played along. "Yeah, I remember you telling me about that. Well, at least you've kept busy."

Toby turned his head at her words, a frown twisting his face. He felt awful, lying to Spencer, but he knew if he told her what he'd actually been keeping busy with, she'd fight with him. He didn't want to fight. He just wanted to make things better, for everyone. So he had created a fictional gazebo with a fictional employer, but Spencer pretending like she knew exactly what he was talking about made something in his stomach clench and burn.

"Yeah. I'm sorry, but I don't think there's anything I can cook now. How about a frozen pizza?" Toby absently asked, opening the freezer to take out a big, rectangular cardboard box. He looked at Spencer for her approval, like he was used to.

"How about we order for Thai? I'm in the mood tonight." Spencer smiled, then her eyes widened when she noticed the look on Toby's face. Oh, damn those accursed double-entendres. He was looking at her as if she had suggested something completely inappropriate—or rather, completely appropriate, seeing that they were engaged, for heaven's sake—and that blush which had creeped its way onto Spencer's cheeks shouldn't even be there.

"Are you, now?" Toby smiled, and raised an eyebrow, holding her gaze for even longer once he had noticed the tell-tale flush of scarlet painting her face. Reluctantly, he tore his eyes away from the love of his life, and put the frozen pizza back in the freezer. "Why don't you order and I'll put those pots away?"

Spencer nodded, grateful for an excuse to turn away. She fished in her pockets for her Blackberry; she took it out and began scrolling through her list of contacts for the number of her favourite Thai takeout place. The air was still thick with the insinuations that Spencer had read all too clearly in Toby's eyes, so she started talking just to push the silence away. "Oh, guess what? I met Emily." She said it breezily, as if she were merely commenting on the weather or sharing an irrelevant fact about her day at work.

A pot noisily clattered to the floor, and Spencer looked up, her eyebrows raised. Toby met her eyes with a startled expression and a sheepish grin. "Sorry. What did you say?" His voice was a little shaky, Spencer noted, and it made her a little suspicious. Why was he acting so strange? Was it because she had mentioned Emily? Was he still harbouring those strange thoughts he had about them? Had he not believed her when she had said that they had fought and had ceased all communication?

"I said that I met Emily. Outside, actually, right when I got home. I...I think we're okay now."

Toby raised his eyebrows, and his smile drooped, as if something was slowly weighing down the corners of his lips. "How did things get fixed so suddenly?" he asked, one hand moving to rub his chin. Spencer's words made him feel wretched inside and he wondered whether this was divine intervention. Just when he had decided to take matters into his own hands, they had somehow once again slipped from his grasp. Perhaps it was a sign. Perhaps this meant that his efforts, when it came to Spencer, were wasted.

Spencer's grip tightened on her phone, and the material let out an inaudible groan in protest. Was that strange inflection in Toby's voice suspicion? Or was she just being paranoid?

"It wasn't sudden. I guess we both thought that it was time to let the past go. You were right." Spencer spoke in even, measured tones, hoping that she was being clear yet vague enough. It wasn't an easy balance to strike. "I have you to thank for that."

Toby flinched, but it was so slight that Spencer missed it completely. "What do you mean? I didn't do anything."

"You know that's not true, babe. I probably wouldn't have had the courage to face her that first time if you hadn't been with me." Spencer was aware that she was laying it on too thick, but she couldn't help herself. Her relationship with Toby - the only constant in her life—had changed so much when she hadn't been paying attention that it took way too much effort to go back to the way things used to be. It used to be anything but hard—it had been as effortless as waking up every day—but now everything felt awkward and uncomfortable. So, as was her nature, she shouldered the blame—it belonged with her—and tried too hard to make things as natural as possible.

Little did she know that her efforts were having the opposite effect. The more Spencer tried to show her gratefulness, the guiltier Toby felt for going to Arianna. "You know I'd do anything to make you happy, right?" His voice was a silent, unspoken, unnoticed plea. Spencer, of course, did not, could not understand what he was really saying, but he said it with such a sincere force, he was sure that it would be imprinted on her brain, a carbon copy of concealed emotions for future perusal.

Spencer blushed again and bent her head, feeling exactly like she had when she had won the Golden Orchid for an essay that she'd plagiarized from Melissa. The turmoil of emotions inside her were the same—the shameful, inevitable pride and the sly, poisonous guilt vying for first place in her heart.

She began fiddling with her phone to distract herself from her feelings, ignoring the intensity of Toby's gaze. When she'd finally found the number, she pressed the call button, sighing with relief as she finally had an excuse to turn away.

"Hello? This is Spencer Hastings. I'd like to place an order."

It took her ten minutes to place the order and an even shorter time to forget about Toby's presence. So, she jumped with shock when she felt warm lips on her neck as soon as she'd gotten off the phone. Taking her gasp of surprise as one of pleasure, Toby chuckled and snaked his arms around her slender waist, pulling her so that her back was pressed firmly against his chest.

"Toby! What are you—" she inhaled sharply as the lips moved up, his hands mirroring their action, his fingers reacquainting themselves with her body. Soon, she could feel his breath tickling her ear.

"I missed you, baby." The longing in his voice was naked now, and it made Spencer feel a dreadful mix of automatic desire and a strange, new repulsion.

"Toby." Spencer warned, shifting in his arms uncomfortably. "The delivery guy will be here any minute."

His grip didn't slacken, his breath continued to stir the locks of hair near her ear. For the first time, Toby wasn't reacting to the stern tone in Spencer's voice. "Spencer." There was that teasing purr again in the way he rolled the syllables of her name on his tongue.

Spencer spun around in the tight circle of Toby's arms, her eyes wide. Her hands moved to rest on his shoulders and she pushed slightly. He obviously took her resistance as some kind of foreplay and his lips put on a smirk before they were suddenly meeting Spencer's.

It was nothing like kissing Emily. As soon as the kiss began, her senses got tangled in an inevitable confusion. She'd still been savouring (unconsciously, of course) the lingering vestiges of Emily's kiss, she'd been trying to hold onto that addictive taste. Kissing Toby unbalanced everything. It had been so long that it felt like she was kissing a stranger, and when her hands automatically shifted upwards, instead of meeting long, silky locks, her fingers met with confusion dressed as short, gelled hair.

Spencer pulled back, her heart clenching painfully in her chest, as if she was doing something terribly wrong. Shouldn't this be what she should have been feeling when she'd been kissing Emily? Shouldn't her heart be rising up in her chest right now, like the way it had when Emily had simply glanced at her? Blue eyes were all she could see, but it was the wrong colour. It was the wrong arms around her shoulders, the wrong body pressed to hers. It all felt so wrong when only a short time back, it had felt so...right.

"Spence? What's wrong?" There was confusion and that same, double-edged concern in Toby's eyes now, the kind that tore at Spencer's heart. He looked like a puppy that had just been kicked by its master. "Is this...do you not want me?"

Spencer gulped, and chewed on the inside of her cheek, hoping that the wrong (or the right) answer did not accidentally slip out. She smiled, and willed herself to feel the same desire that she could see so clearly in those clear, cyan eyes. "I'll always want you." Her words wiped the worry away, and the ache in her heart, instead of decreasing, only intensified. Her words felt hollow and weak.

But she should want him. It was the right thing.

Wanting her was the wrong thing. Right?

Nothing made sense anymore, but Spencer knew that perhaps, if she tried hard enough, her body (her so-far heterosexual body) would begin to reassert itself and sort her emotions out for her. So she tried to drown out her thoughts and nearly jumped on Toby, kissing him roughly, sloppily.

The kiss wasn't the soft one he'd been expecting, and their teeth clanged together, and something hit the bridge of Spencer's nose. It didn't stop the determined girl, who now was using her momentum to carry her forward till she had Toby against the fridge, his reticence slipping away.

This couldn't be that bad, Spencer thought, as she kissed and allowed herself to be kissed, as she displayed the kind of emotions that she couldn't feel. She was sure that at some point, she would start feeling like herself again. Perhaps Toby's kisses, and his frantic touch would erase the memory of Emily's. Perhaps the imprint of those black, burning eyes would be burnt away from beneath her eyelids.

Perhaps she could convince herself to fall in love with Toby again.

Emily had taken her time getting dressed at school, allowing herself to soak in the full impact of everything that had happened. The locker room was now sacred ground, and she had wanted to spend some time there, by herself, to bask in the afterglow of her little encounter with Spencer.

Spencer. The girl who basically refused to leave her thoughts. Her best friend. Serious Spencer. Funny Spencer. Flirty Spencer. The Girl Who Made Everyone Turn Into Mush Spencer.

Now, Emily was regretting delaying her departure from school. She'd already stayed back later than usual, and then Spencer had come along and taken up more time (not that she'd minded, not at all), but Emily wondered if Arianna would be too mad.

Wait, why was she even worried? Emily shook her head, as she got out of her car, and ran her fingers through her jet-black locks. She had to keep reminding herself that she owed her girlfriend nothing, anymore. They barely spoke to each other these days. There was some sort of a Cold War between them. They exchanged customary words during breakfast, divided the household chores equally between them, and sometimes even watched television together. But there was always that space between them on the couch, and they always sat on the opposite ends of the dining table. They tried not to stay together in the same room for too long, and whenever they did, they made sure to have a laptop or a book with them to avoid conversation.

Emily didn't know who had started it. Perhaps, she had been the one to initiate the constant ignoring, the cold shoulder. Arianna had tried, she had tried very hard to bridge the gap between them. But Emily couldn't be helped for wanting to burn every one of these bridges. The fact was, her heart still hurt. But now, it was a completely new kind of ache. A guilty ache. An uncontrollable ache. A terrible ache.

When she got inside the house, she could already sense that something was not quite right. Her suspicions were affirmed when Arianna came out in the hallway as soon as the door had clicked shut. She had a menacing expression on her face, and her usually sharp features looked like they could slice the thick tension with ease.

"So, you've finally come home." No sort of a greeting whatsoever.

Emily scowled, shrugging her bag off and taking her jacket off without a word.

"Where were you?", Arianna continued, a sneer starting to twist her lips quite automatically. "With Spencer?" She spoke without thinking, but was rewarded with a sickly sweet satisfaction at the look on Emily's face.

Gotcha.

Emily had tensed and frozen in her actions, her mind whirling. How could Arianna know? Was she spying on me? she thought, biting her lip as her pulse rate started increasing. "I went swimming." She wouldn't deny or accept the fact. She didn't know whether she could go for an outright lie right now. Especially after what had happened. With Spencer.

"With Spencer?" Now Arianna was definitely taunting her. "Don't worry about trying to hide anything. I should've seen it from the first day. The way you two looked at each other."

Emily's heart dropped to her stomach, as if she'd skipped a step while coming downstairs. She turned to Arianna, her insides heaving. She had no idea how Arianna was suddenly reading her thoughts as if reading words printed on paper. "What are you talking about?", she managed to choke out, her voice trembling, her eyebrows furrowed.

"I said, don't worry now. I know everything." Arianna smiled, and some of that sharpness seemed to be gone now. However, her voice dropped when she said, "I know everything about you and Spencer."

Emily's knees weakened immediately, and she half-stumbled, half-fell forward, landing clumsily against a door handle near Arianna. The shorter girl immediately moved to support her girlfriend, a thoughtless action, an action that caused Emily to shrink back as if she'd been burnt.

"I-I can explain—" she started to say, her tongue working before her mind. All she knew was that suddenly, she was brimming with guilt, and a terrible realization of how wrong she'd been to cheat on Arianna. Not once. Not like Arianna had cheated on her. But Emily had gone back for more. And it was horrible. And it made her a horrible person.

"No, don't. You don't need to," Arianna cut in, her hand reaching for Emily's arm. This time, Emily didn't move away. "Toby told me everything. He came this afternoon, actually. He was worried." At Emily's look of alarm, she added, "For Spencer and you."

Emily felt like she was going to throw up or faint or do both and honestly, she didn't feel like she had the energy left to do either. Toby knew too? The fact that he did was a hundred, no, a thousand times worse than Arianna knowing, and the fact that she thought that was a bad thing in itself. "Toby...what?" She felt so confused and terrible, that she felt like sinking to her knees and crying.

"Why did you hide it from me, Em?" Now, the sharp glint was back in Arianna's eyes, and her raspy voice was edged with the smoothness of steel. "I always knew there was a part of you I never had access to...I just didn't know it would be the whole of you." She shook her head, her hand slipping to Emily's wrist, her fingers against Emily's pulse.

"I'm sorry," Emily blurted out, unable to hold back any longer. "I'm so sorry and I was so stupid, and I'm a hypocrite because I did exactly what you did and I shouldn't hold a grudge against you and—" She was silenced by Arianna's look, and her fingers against her lips. She jumped back immediately, unable to stand the feel of her skin.

"Yeah." Arianna was looking down at her fingertips, a small smile playing at the corners of her lips. "We both hid things, and I don't think we should've done that. But...it's okay. I understand. I know what it's like to want to...escape." She sighed, her inky-black eyes moving up to meet Emily's shimmery gaze. "I wish you would've told me you had a painful past. And forgotten best friends. If Toby hadn't come today and told me about your fight with Spencer, I never would've guessed."

Emily's eyebrows shot up in confusion. What was Arianna talking about? How could her girlfriend even remain so calm about all of this? Emily would've expected Arianna to be out the door by now, out to get Spencer's skin as a living room rug or something of that sort. Arianna was probably the most possessive and the most competitive person she'd ever met, and none of this was fitting right. "What did Toby tell you?", she asked hesitantly, her heart lifting with hope.

"Only that you had...a complicated past. And that you and Spencer were best friends and something vague about external forces getting in the way of that." Arianna shrugged, now looking bored of the whole thing. "He was really worried about his fiancee. And you. Said that you used to be a close friend of his."

Emily nodded with every word Arianna said, her heart lifting higher and higher till it was back in its right place. So Arianna didn't know. Thank god. But this meant that she knew that her and Spencer were friends. And that Toby wanted to fix what he thought was still the problem between them.

Oh. Poor Toby. Emily's heart had hardly recovered from the shock, and now it back being tortured by short, irregular spasms of guilt. Toby had been a really good friend of hers. She was still a terrible person.

"I was. And yeah, whatever he said is true." Emily bent her head down, playing her favourite card. The I-Am-Sorry-But-Look-At-How-Cutely-Innocent-I-Am-How-Can-You-Stay-Mad-At-Me card. Her lips were upturned, her eyelashes were lowered, but she was looking at Arianna through them. "High school wasn't the best time for me, at all. And there's a reason I never told you about it. It's because I wanted to forget all about it myself."

Only, like the past had caught up with Arianna, her own past was catching up with her. It had more than caught up with her. It was conquering her in the form of Spencer Hastings. (And she was liking it a little too much.)

Arianna caved under the gentle, but irresistible duress of Emily's doe-like eyes, and smiled, the steel gone, the glint gone, all sharpness suddenly becoming blunt edges. "I know what you mean. I'm sorry you had to go through all that." She shifted her feet awkwardly. Now that she'd gotten the confrontation out of the way, it felt like there was nothing else that they could talk about. She felt her heart twist as she realized that it was her fault that they had gotten this way.

"It's not your fault."

And suddenly, it felt like they were hardly talking about Emily's past anymore.

"I'm still sorry. I can't help but feel that everything that makes you unhappy is my fault because I wasn't there to make it right." Arianna said it before she could help herself, but from the look on her face the instant the words left her mouth, it was obvious that she hadn't been planning on saying that.

Emily wasn't planning on hearing that too, and her eyes widened, and her heart melted just a little. She shook her head unhappily, all wide eyes and upside-down mouth now.

"You shouldn't feel like that, then. You're not...you're not responsible for my happiness."

Arianna flinched, but very slightly. "But I am." Her voice was thick, and her words dropped like stones in the miles and miles of ocean between them. "I always feel responsible for your happiness. Because it means mine too. I am selfish." She smiled, a lopsided one that looked frayed at the edges, rough and rusty with disuse.

Emily wanted to shut her ears. She didn't want to hear any of this. This wasn't what she needed. Not today. Not after what she had done. Not after what she had enjoyed and what she wanted to do again, and again, and again. She frowned automatically, and it made the smile slip off Arianna's face like someone had switched off a light.

"I think we all are." She breathed out softly, as if trying to hold a lot of things in. Emily was afraid that she would slip up and Arianna would see through her disguise, so she started walking towards the stairs, signalling an end to their conversation.

"I-eh, Em..Emily?" Arianna called out when Emily had reached the bottom of the stairs, her fingers knotted together. Emily turned, and raised her eyebrows in reply. "Could you...would you come back to our room?" Her voice was weak, and faint, and sounded so unlike Arianna, that it made Emily take notice. The once-strong girl was now diminishing in front of her. And it was all because of Emily. She ruined everything she touched.

"I'm sorry. I need some time."

Time. Her faithful excuse. It worked every time.

Arianna nodded, her eyes getting suspiciously bright and watery, and she started blinking rapidly. Emily felt every seam holding her chest together being ripped open, and right then, she just wanted to kill herself for being so cruel. Instead, she clamped her lips together and fled to the safety of the guest bedroom, where she could hate herself in private.

The night was cold, already heralding what would be a harsh winter, and Emily Fields was wrapped up in several blankets on her bed. She was curled up on her side on the quite large bed, the conspicuously large space left behind symbolizing the loneliness that was beckoning her with open arms. Eerie sounds took over the night, with a background screaming and moaning as trees bent under the constant duress of a cruel wind. The sounds were atmospheric, in all the wrong ways, so Emily couldn't be blamed for jumping when she heard a scrape against the glass of the French windows leading to the balcony of the guest bedroom. She rose up in her bed, gathering the blankets up around her and pressing her hands against her chest. The scrape came again, followed by a muffled clatter. Emily could feel her heartbeat accelerating, and she rose up from the bed, padding bare-feet over to the French windows. She had always wondered why Arianna had chosen the room with an unimpressive view of the road for them, and left the one overlooking the back garden for guests, and now she found herself accounting for her girlfriend's actions with sinister reasons.

The glass was fogged up and frosty, and Emily could see nothing but blackness. She twisted the door handle, and opened it just a little, letting a sliver of moonlight seep in and wash the room with a pale glow. It brought a bitter wind with it that chilled Emily to the bone, and she shivered in her loose t-shirt and shorts. She thought she heard a voice, and it made her stomach swoop, but she decided to be brave and opened the door further. Just then, her phone started buzzing loudly, breaking the silence that had been reigning. Emily screamed softly and jumped, and her grip slackened on the handle, and the wind took the opportunity to fling the door wide open. She ran to her phone, and picked it up as fast as she could.

"Hello?" Her voice shook so badly that the syllables came out mangled. "Who is this?" she tried again.

"It's me." The voice unmistakably belonged to a certain person.

"Spencer?" Her pulse rate was coming down, and she could breathe more easily now. The whining of the trees, which had seemed spooky before, was laughably irritating now. "You're not asleep yet?"

"Uhm...no. I'm freezing."

Emily frowned, wondering if she was hearing it right. "Come again?"

"I said, I'm freezing. Did you not hear me? I swear I've waken up the entire neighbourhood by now."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm outside and you're going to have to defrost me by the time I get inside. I'm sure I aimed right."

Emily let out a small laugh. "You were throwing stones at my window?" She tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear. "Again?" She started walking towards the balcony.

"Yeah. The wrong one, at first."

Emily's eyes widened and she gasped. "Please don't tell me you woke Arianna up."

"No, no. Since I know how to look, I noticed that you weren't there, so I tried here. By the way, your girlfriend can sleep through a tsunami." The sound of Spencer's low laughter made Emily shiver again, albeit in a different way. "So, can you please let me in?"

Emily was now out on the balcony. The moon had been eroded away to a thin slice of silver, so the garden was cloaked in a darkness that made it impossible to see anything but vague shapes of the different plants and trees that Arianna had adorned the place with. "Where are you?", she called out, half to the phone, and half out into the night.

"I..ehm." There was a cough, then a pause. "Look left."

Emily turned her head, but all she could see were the ominous branches of a magnolia tree that looked quite pretty in normal daylight. "Are you gonna swoop in like Batman?"

"That was the plan, yes."

Emily chuckled. "What? You're kidding."

"I tried to climb and execute my perfect Spiderman moves but these branches are so unkind to creepers." Something rustled to Emily's left, and she moved to the corner of the balcony, her eyes wide. The tree looked like it was...moving. A pale something could be made out between its leaves, and Emily blinked her eyes, willing her vision to become sharper.

"You're not. Are you?" She was so going to start laughing. "Were you going to climb your way into my house?"

"Oh yes. The new-age Romeo." A branch that had reached quite close to the house started shaking violently, and Emily saw a dark form come out and start crawling down its length. It was Spencer!

Emily cut the call, her phone almost falling from her hand as she started shaking with quiet, but uncontrolled mirth. This was a sight that she couldn't see with a straight face. "Oh my god, Spence! I cannot believe you."

Spencer was grinning at her, and her teeth were reflecting the moonlight so well, it looked like a shining beam in her face. "What light through yonder window breaks! It is the east...and Emily is the sun." Her throaty laughter made the air around Emily thrum (or that's what it felt like to her), and she knew she was blushing like a schoolgirl and it made her mad. When Spencer had gotten a few feet near the edge of the balcony, she stopped. "What did I say? Creeper-resistant. You need to start growing vines." She reached out her hand, smiling at Emily. Irresistible.

Emily leaned over the balcony, and had to stretch to grasp Spencer's hands in hers. The branch was now swaying, and the wind made it rock even more, and the drop looked dangerous. "I don't think you can jump this far. You'll hurt yourself." The worry in her voice was marked, and for some reason, Spencer smiled even more manically.

"With love's light wings did I o'erperch these walls, for stony limits cannot hold love out." Spencer was exaggerating the words, and had assumed a high, dramatic voice and Emily had to seriously control herself or she'd burst out laughing and Spencer would seriously fall and hurt herself.

"Only you could be quoting Shakespeare in the dead of the night when you're trying to break into your neighbour's house. Classic Spencer." There was a teasing seriousness to Emily's voice, but more than anything, she looked fond. "Now, please, will you come inside?"

"If the lady doth insist." Spencer winked, and her fingers tightened around Emily's wrists. Their eyes met and they nodded, and Spencer pushed herself on her feet, crouching, ready to leap. Then, she leaned back, pushed with her feet and jumped, the branch groaning as it was bent downwards. Suddenly, she was airborne, and the pressure decrease on Emily's hands. Then Emily was pulling hard, and something landed on her, and she was knocked backwards.

"Ouch." Spencer laughed, and then winced when she felt a sharp jab in her ribs. "Spence, you're kind of crushing me."

"You broke my fall."

"And you broke every bone in my body. How nice."

Spencer pulled back, bracing herself on her arms that were on either side of Emily. She was still grinning, the leap having done nothing to wipe that Chesire cat likeness off her face. "I'm so sorry. You're nice landing material though." Her eyes moved from Emily's, and looked downwards. "Soft." That teasing tone, again.

Emily pushed her, trying hard to keep a serious face. "You're mean. Get off me." For some reason, it was getting harder to breathe, and it wasn't because of Spencer's weight on her at all. Despite the chilly night air, she was feeling warm.

"You wound me with your harsh words!" Spencer was still talking in that dramatic tone, and her lips were now twisted in a smirk. She pushed herself off Emily, standing up and wrapping her arms around herself. "Here I was, thinking, hoping, wishing that I would get a warm welcome."

Emily bit her lip to smother a smile, and followed suit, getting up slowly. Now that Spencer was standing a few feet away from her, she could finally see what the brunette was wearing. Spencer was wrapped up in a long, over-sized coat that looked like it had been put on in a hurry. Her feet were naked, and her toes looked deathly pale. Emily's eyes widened, and she tugged on Spencer's arm, pushing her inside. "How did you forget shoes? Are you insane?"

Spencer shrugged, and looked down, as if noticing for the first time that she wasn't wearing shoes. "I was in a hurry. I didn't want to wake Toby up." Now that the surprise had worn off, and their mirth and laughter had faded, the seriousness had returned, making the mood sombre. "I just needed to see you."

Emily sighed. "Come here." She was still holding Spencer's hand, and now she led the skinny girl to the bed. Her hands moved to Spencer's coat, untying the belt at the waist and taking it off. Her eyebrows started rising when she saw what Spencer was wearing underneath. Nothing but a white man's shirt which reached the middle of her thighs, which obviously belonged to Toby, and the underwear that was peeking through the semi-transparent material. She must've been in a real hurry. "What are y-what are you wearing?" She gulped and pushed Spencer down on the bed and sat down next to her.

Spencer started blushing, the colour taking its time to dye her a dark shade of scarlet. "I...uh..I took the first thing I could find because...yeah. Toby." She was mumbling into the sleeve of her shirt, her hand near her mouth. "Sorry." She had no idea what she was apologizing for, but it felt like she should. Perhaps for indecency. Not that it mattered between them. Or, did it?

"Oh." Emily nodded, and took the overcoat off her, getting up and slinging it across the back of a chair carelessly. "You need to get something warm on your feet. I think the water's still hot."

"I'll go...er..clean up." Spencer rose and walked to the en-suite bathroom, a little unsteady on her feet.

Emily let out a breath and sat down on the bed, looking at the creased coat hanging from the chair. She could not believe it. Spencer was in her room. Her girlfriend was sleeping in the next room. It was as if the fact had just sunk it. Spencer was in her room! This was insane, and Spencer was insane, and she was insane, but she really couldn't have left her friend (hah) out there.

Spencer got back after a few minutes, and sat down on the opposite side of the bed. "It's cold." The statement sounded flat, and Emily could sense that Spencer too had just realized the situation they were in. And perhaps she too was wondering how on earth they had got there.

"Yeah." Emily turned her head and looked at the brunette's bent back. "Do you want to change into something else?"

"No." A pause, then, "Unless you're uncomfortable with me wearing...this." Spencer wouldn't turn around because she was afraid that she was blushing again, because her face and ears felt unbearably hot.

"N-no! It's no problem. I've seen you wearing less." Emily spoke without thinking, and again, she was reminded of how things lay between them currently. Was it even advisable for them to be in the same room together? She didn't know.

"Yeah." There was a slow, hesitant chuckle. "You have."

Emily moved on the bed, getting on her fours and crawling over to where Spencer was sitting. "You're on my side of the bed, by the way."

Spencer jumped up, surprised to suddenly have Emily so close, so soon. "I'm sorry." She started half-backing, half-dragging herself to the other side, and Emily grabbed her arm, stopping her. "W-what? You said..."

"I never asked you to move."

Something changed. Something shifted in the air. Spencer found herself staring too hard at Emily, her eyes hungrily drinking in the vision. It was so different from looking at Toby. It was so different from looking at everybody. All the emotions that she'd been struggling to feel when she'd been with Toby was crashing into her like waves, and she let the current carry her to an unknown destination.

"Oh."

"Yeah."

Emily was shifting now, and they were both in the center of the bed, and now, the space was accentuating how close they were.

"You're mad, Spence." Emily's fingers had interlaced with Spencer's somehow, and they both sat there contemplating the contrast of their skin, how beautifully they complemented each other.

"I am." There was so many unsaid words lying between those two, simple syllables that it made Emily shiver. "Your fault."

Emily started moving, and Spencer shifted too, perhaps unconsciously, perhaps willfully, unable to keep herself away from the other girl. Emily smiled, and Spencer shrank back against the headboard, looking slightly ashamed. Emily took the blankets and covered Spencer with them, then moved to the foot of the bed. She peeled back the layers, and sat looking at Spencer's feet. "They must be numb."

Spencer nodded, although Emily's head was turned away from her. "Yeah," she croaked, when she'd realized her mistake. "Like you said, I'm mad."

"Completely insane," Emily laughed, her warm breath hitting the cold skin and making Spencer sigh. Emily turned around and grinned. Then, she moved her hands till they were covering Spencer's feet. The skin felt like glossy, cold paper, and Emily began to rub softly, trying to revive the warmth, trying to transmit heat energy from her own body to Spencer's.

Spencer sat up, pulling her knees up, and her feet away from Emily. "What are you doing?" She sounded breathless, and her eyes were wide.

A small smile tugged at the corners of Emily's lips, and she shrugged, slowly pulling Spencer's feet towards hers and enveloping them with her fingers again. "Warming you up?" She bent down and blew on her fingertips, and grinned when she saw them wriggle. The pads of her thumbs were slowly stroking small circles on the skin at the bottom of her feet. She started adding pressure with her fingertips, and soon it had become an all-out massage.

"You..really don't have to." Spencer was still staring at her, wide-eyed and mouth open, but she looked like she was thawing, just as Emily had intended.

"I don't want you complaining about a cold welcome." Emily's eyes were dancing, and it made Spencer go even more slack-jawed. With every word she uttered, warm breath hit Spencer's skin, a soothing, yet somehow titillating sensation. Emily had many talents, and it seemed that being good with her hands was one of them.

Before long, Spencer was reaching out and pulling Emily to her, and they were falling back till their heads hit the soft pillows. Their hair was a tangle of black and brown, and it was all over their faces, and they reached out and brushed the locks away, till they could finally see what they'd been dying to.

It was enough to take both their breaths away.

"Hi."

Spencer Hastings sounded unsure of herself, probably for the first time in her life,and Emily let out a small laugh, the atmosphere already lightening.

"Hi to you too, stranger."

Spencer grinned and moved closer to Emily, until they were dangerously close. "Didn't someone tell you about how dangerous strangers can be?"

"Maybe I want danger." Emily had an eyebrow arched, and a smile that was doing crazy things to Spencer's chest.

"Be careful what you wish for." Spencer leaned in, their noses touching, and she could feel the tanned girl freezing, she could feel everything slowing down. "You just might get it."

The kiss was supposed to come, but Spencer felt like being mean, and she felt guilty for what she had been doing earlier, and she leaned back, and the world started spinning again. She didn't miss the look of disappointment on Emily's face though, and it made a thrill rush through her veins.

"Don't make promises you can't keep." There was a touch of petulance in Emily's voice, a hint of that teasing tone that she seemed to use only with Spencer. "I hate getting disappointed."

Oh, god.

"I would hate to disappoint you."

And now they were kissing.

And rolling.

On top of each other.

It wasn't kissing, it was more like they were devouring each other. Somehow, Spencer had managed to magically transport herself on top of Emily, not unlike the way they had lain out on the balcony, only it was much more comfortable, and much more hot right now. She was kissing Emily so hard, she was afraid that she'd end up breaking her. Emily sighed into her mouth, relief personified. They both felt it; the relief, the almost palpable ceasing of tension, of the pain they had been in when they'd not been touching. Now, it felt like Spencer was breathing life into her, and she responded eagerly, her arms encircling Spencer's neck, pulling her down, so they could both sink in the sea of sensations. The night, they belonged to. The night emboldened them, and the night symbolized them, and they were the night. Therefore, it wasn't long before Emily's tongue was slowly, teasingly swiping over Spencer's upper lip, asking for entrance. The plea was accepted, and soon, they were engaged in a dance, a slow torching up of their insides till they melted into each other.

"Emily." It was just her name, but the way Spencer took the opportunity to slip it between their open mouths, the way the syllables seemed to roll from Spencer's tongue onto hers, drove her crazy. Passion, and something else poisoned her blood and she flipped them over so that she was on top, and Spencer let out a little gasp of surprise and suppressed indignation. Emily restarted the kiss, nipping at Spencer's bottom lip, and all resistances seemed to crumble and collapse in front of her determination.

Soon, her kisses were moving down, and later, she would blame the night, and the sparing moonlight for her reckless behaviour. Now, she couldn't care less, and Spencer's sighs and quiet, little sounds (that seemed to surprise Spencer herself), fueled her actions. Emily trailed small kisses down Spencer's long neck, marveling at the flawless lines that made her up. She paused at the hollow above her collarbone, and pulled back. Her hand moved up to trace a reddish mark that spread over her collarbone.

Spencer sprang up, like she had pressed a button, and moved her own hands to cover the mark. Her eyes found Emily's, and they were full of regret and silent apologies. "Toby." That one word was all the explanation that Emily needed. It explained Spencer's outfit, her urgent need to see Emily. It explained what they were and how wrong this was, but all she could think of in that moment was how angry she was and how unfair the world was. Toby got to mark her like that. She didn't. She saw Spencer moving in for a kiss, but she ducked her head, pushing the brunette down and resumed kissing, her lips moving over the hickey, and here, she grew daring, and cautiously tugged at the smooth, alabaster skin with her teeth.

The reaction was instant, and it was in the form of a broken moan that Spencer strangled by biting her fist. Satisfied with the response, Emily grinned, and began to drag the edge of her teeth along Spencer's collarbones, making the pale girl shiver. Here, and there, she nipped and bit at the skin, sometimes gently, sometimes not, and used Spencer's appreciative sounds as a guide as she went lower and lower, marking her territory. Spencer could always blame Toby for those in the morning. But they'd both know that it was Emily's signature all over her.

Emily's moves were slowly, but surely turning Spencer into liquid inside. All the fire that had been hiding from her, all the passion that she'd been looking for with Toby was here, right now. Her mind went back to Toby's touch, Toby's kisses, their hurried lovemaking and she felt disgusted. How could that match up to this? How could anything ever hope to compare with Emily's perfection? She couldn't think of a single day, a single time when she'd felt so full of emotions and sensations. She couldn't even think about Toby for long, because Emily's little bites, showing a side of her that Spencer hadn't even known existed, were doing wonders to her body, setting fire to her skin. Their legs were tangled together in the most amazing way, and it was so different to having Toby's legs rubbing against hers. This was the whisper of smooth skin against hers, warm toes rubbing against her ankles, knees brushing against her thighs in a way that made her legs feel alive.

When Emily's lips had conquered her collarbones, they moved lower, but Spencer's voice startled her. "You don't get to have all the fun." And then she was being pushed, and Spencer was on top of her, and their lips were engaged in a passionate battle again. But it was a constantly interrupted one, as Spencer kept pulling away to murmur words to her. "You are really good at this." Spencer was using kisses as her punctuation; the brief one, a colon, the lingering, teasing one, a comma, and the one that took Emily's breath away and made her legs squirm under Spencer's was the full stop. She pulled away again, taking the time to gaze into Emily's eyes with unconcealed desire. "The absolute best."

Emily smirked, and something cold and steely entered her gaze. "Even better than Toby?"

Spencer rolled her eyes and kissed Emily, her tongue teasing its way inside and punishing Emily's for the insolence. When she was satisfied with the way Emily was softly sighing, breathing, melting into the kiss, she pulled away and winked. "Better than me. And that's saying something." It was enough to make Emily laugh, and the way her dark, glittering eyes lit up made something ache inside Spencer's chest.

"No one can be better than you." Emily's hands moved to Spencer's cheeks, and drew her face to hers. "No one."

"No one can be better than us," Spencer replied, mirroring Emily's smile, feeling the uncontrollable urge to kiss her again, but fearing that the world would shatter if she broke the gaze that had both their eyes locked firmly in place.

But they soon started kissing again, slowly, teasingly. They couldn't help it. It was impossible not to kiss. It was a torture for both of them, and their tongues slowly twisted and danced inside their mouths, and Spencer couldn't help but let her hands wander down, and this time, there was no confusion, no sense of wrongness at all. Her searching fingertips met with smooth, warm, feminine curves, and it felt so wonderfully right that soon her hands were overstepping their boundaries and they had slipped inside Emily's shirt to rest at her hips, her fingers sliding up and down. Emily moaned, and Spencer's heart nearly stopped, stuttered, and started again, changing gears so it could speed up to match Emily's. Her hands moved up, feeling the buttery softness moving under her fluttering fingers, and she could barely breathe because there was a sudden tight sensation in her chest.

"Spence."

Emily had broken the kiss, and she was staring at Spencer with eyes that were wide, eyes that Spencer was afraid she would drown into.

"Yeah?" Her own voice startled her because it sounded so rusty, so low and cracked at the edges. "Do you want me to stop?"

"I don't, and that's the point."

Spencer smirked, and her fingertips started dancing on skin, up and down Emily's sides and Emily flinched, her eyelids fluttering shut, her lips parting. Spencer bent down and captured her lips, taking advantage of the opening and conquering Emily's mouth with her tongue, taking her unawares. Emily's hands moved to her wrists and tugged them down, her fingers interlacing with Spencer's and pulling them out of her shirt, and up near their heads. Emily seemed to be playing a game of her own, because she was kissing Spencer so passionately that Spencer missed out the hand-pulling entirely until it was too late, and when she did, she groaned against Emily's lips.

"You can't distract me like that." Spencer was complaining, but she really didn't mind being distracted, as long as it meant being kissed by the goddess disguising herself as Emily Fields.

"Everything's fair in love and war."

Oh, this was war. A war of lust, a war of will, a war of self-control and a war of who was in control. This was a war, alright.

But was this love?

A/N: So, that was it! Love it/Hate it? Let me know. I really struggled with this chapter, and I didn't really proof-read it, so let me know if there are mistakes! Thanks a lot.

SpemilyForever: I think we all envy Spencer her strength! I certainly would've been far more inappropriate in her place. Thanks a lot for the kind comments!
PS: It is kinda hard for me to do that because every chapter is different, and so is every week. I never know when I can actually update, so it's mostly random.

pinkcrazyness: Thank you!

go-sullivan: Yeah, Idk I just feel like it's always like that with Spemily, even in the show.
I would love to read your fic! I need more Spemily, and this website really lacks some!

itsmetati: More kisses in this one. (;

LittleLiarLovesEmily: Thank you for your reviews, really. I wish it were that easy, but breaking up with someone after staying for so long with them is never easy, but we'll see what happens!

Craycrayforshay : Thank you so much! You flatter me. :)

spinoza-off : Thanks a lot! The drama has started, and there's obviously going to be more, as this fic centralizes on the adultery and stuff. Yes, when it comes to who's important, Toby wins hands down, because for both the girls, they've known him longer, while Arianna certainly wins no points when it comes to Spencer.

LaughLoveLiveXx: Haha, thanks. Your interpretations are amazing, and I feel like you really get the chapters so well! I think we all loved 3.01 and I wanted to have a scene like that, but it would be too soon, so I didn't veer in that direction. I'm glad you liked the closing paragraph because I really needed it to be emotional after their...well, ehm, physical-ness, let's say. And I really feel that they trust each other enough to be vulnerable around each other.

AxLax420: I didn't know straight guys watched PLL! Wow. :D Trust me, everyone thinks Spemily is hot, so you're not alone there. (; Thank you for being so nice!

Kxia: You really know how to feed my ego. Haha. I think the confusion will never fully go away because, not only are they cheating on their respective partners, but they are also transitioning from a beautiful platonic friendship to something more, and that is always a dangerous journey. I feel like, when it comes to this, the romance and the kissing, especially between girls, Emily would be the one to take charge because she's the one with more experience. But obviously, Spencer can never stand being left aside, or feel like she's not being active enough, and I just wanted to show that in their kisses. Thank you for the wonderful review. :D