Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author's Note: Finally, right? Now, if there are any mistakes, please let me now, grammatical or otherwise because I didn't proof read this one.

Let no love fall victim to circumstance...

Circumstance

There they were, Spencer Hastings and Emily Fields on the kitchen floor of the Hastings home, Spencer having cried only moments before, kissing each other. Neither girl would have ever thought this would have been possible. It wasn't something that either had ever dreamed would become a reality. It was a new sensation, so different than anything either had felt before.

Kissing Spencer was so much different than kissing Alison had ever been. Of course, Alison never actually kissed Emily back whereas right now, Spencer had her hands in her hair and enjoying her lips making contact with Emily's.

It was cloud nine for both of them.

Neither girl could hear anything, all there was, was them and the other's lips. Spencer paused a moment, exhaled heavily, and took a handful of Emily's silky hair and practically squeezed it before attacking Emily's lips once again. Emily was slightly taken back but didn't mind her hair being pulled ever so slightly. In fact, it caused Emily to grab hold of Spencer's shirt and pull her closer as their mouths battled even harder. It wasn't long before their tongues began to dance with one another. Truthfully, neither girl could honestly say who was the first one to dart out their tongue, they just knew they loved the feeling.

"You mean the world to me, Emily."

Emily's eyes darted open and she pulled away from Spencer and turned her head, mortified at what she had just done. Her eyes went wide and there was a horrible sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach that almost made her want to vomit. She had cheated on Paige. "Oh god," she whispered and placed a shaky hand over her mouth.

Spencer slowly opened her eyes and was looking down at her hands. Had all this really happened? Had she really been making out with Emily? Her best friend? The object of- What exactly? Spencer closed her mouth, clenched her jaw, and sighed through her nose. She knew what had happened and what she was feeling. She had romantic feelings for Emily. "I'm sorry," Spencer whispered.

Looking up, as if surprised Spencer was next to her, Emily looked at her with her eyes wide and unbelieving, mouth hanging open in pure horrific shock. No words formed in her throat and all she could do was shake her head.

"I like you," Spencer hoarsely said, finally admitting out loud what she, and her Other Voice, already knew.

Emily's expression didn't change as her whole body tensed up. "No," she finally managed to get out. She backed up, away from Spencer and scrambled to her feet. "You can't," she said, "You can't like me."

Spencer elegantly rose to her feet. "I do."

"No," Emily said with finality, "You're confused with everything that's been going on with your family and with Toby."

Spencer closed her eyes and chuckled while shaking her head, "Em," she opened her eyes again and looked into Emily's, "I know exactly what's going on. I've been denying it for weeks now."

"For weeks?"

"Yes, for weeks." Spencer paused and looked around the kitchen before continuing, "I'm not even sure when it started but I finally admitted what I feel for you, it's more than what a friend should feel for another friend."

"You're straight."

"So were you, once."

Emily scrunched her eye brows, "No, I wasn't," she clarified, albeit a bit offended, "I always knew there was something off with me, especially when I was with Ben."

"Well, there's always been something off with me."

"Spencer, you're not gay."

Spencer closed her eyes and sighed in annoyance. Why was Emily being so difficult about this? "Maybe not, but what if it's something else? Feelings for someone don't just happen."

"No, they don't" Emily agreed, "But people don't just changed their sexuality either."

"Look, Em," Spencer took a step forward, "I'm not saying I'm gay all of a sudden, or even that I'm bi, maybe questioning, but I do know that I've been going through a lot these past few months and you're the only person on my mind, the only person I can depend on, and the only person I want to be around. I had that recurring dream of this perfect world and I started kissing Toby and he turned into you."

Placing an unsteady hand on the kitchen island, Emily felt a little overwhelmed. It was hard to deny that there was something different between them every since their movie night and Emily didn't want to believe what it could have been. Now she knows what it was, something that she secretly hoped for but why now? Why at all? Why did it have to come just as she was getting serious with Paige?

Paige!

Emily's eyes widened in shock, hurt, and anger as she looked up and locked eyes with Spencer. She took a strong step forward and said with an accusing tone, "This is about Paige, isn't it?"

"What?" Spencer was taken back. She was expecting something else, not Paige's name to be thrown at her. Why would Emily bring that up? "What do you mean?"

Emily laughed, "Oh, Spencer, don't play with me. You hate Paige."

"So?" Why should Spencer deny that?

"You hate Paige, so much, you're playing with me to get her away from me." It was silly, a part of Emily even knew it was silly. Spencer would never go through such lengths to prove a point, not this way. That wasn't Spencer, but Emily was so furious, she couldn't think straight and Logical Emily was locked up in a closet where Irrational Emily had the key.

"You really think I'd make this up just because I hate Paige McCullers?"

"Why not?"

"Oh my god, Emily!" Spencer nearly shouted and threw her arms up in frustration, "Where the hell did you come up with that ridiculous idea?!"

"You have never shown any interest in any girl!"

"So?!"

"So this makes sense!" No, it didn't and Logical Emily knew it. "You got me to kiss you meaning I just cheated on Paige." Emily stopped, her heart skipped a beat and she felt like she was just punched in the throat, "Oh god," she whispered, "I cheated on Paige." Emily stepped back and braced herself on the island, afraid she'd fall. "I cheated on Paige," she repeated.

The anger and frustration died down in Spencer when she saw Emily, seeing her body language told her just how Emily felt. She remembered how horrible she felt kissing both Ian and Wren when they were with Melissa, she'd hurt her sister- Even though, now, she didn't care about her much. She could only imagine how Emily must be feeling. She knew Emily felt strongly about Paige and suddenly, Spencer herself felt bad, not for Paige, but for how Emily was feeling. "Em, I'm sorry," she said as she moved forward and touched Emily's arm.

Emily pulled away, quickly as if she'd just touched a hot pan. "Don't," she snapped, fire in her eyes, "I can't do this, Spencer." Emily took to her feet and started for the door. "This didn't happen," Emily said before looking at Spencer, hand on the door, "We're not talking about this." With that, Emily walked past the threshold and closed the door behind her.

Spencer stood in her kitchen, disbelieving, unable to accept what had just transpired between Emily and herself. She had admitted her feelings out loud, to herself and to Emily, even kissed her, then they fought and Emily accused her of doing this solely in the hopes of breaking her up with Paige. It was ridiculous to say the least, but partially, remotely, really, had the tiniest ounce of truth in it. She did want Paige out of the picture, but it wasn't solely because she hated Paige. She did have romantic feelings for Emily, but couldn't quite figure what she wanted to do with them, she only knew she had to kiss Emily, bbut did she want anything else? Spencer couldn't answer that yet, it was completely new and horrifying territory. She hadn't planned anything, not even the admittance or the kiss. Those had just happened on their own.

Her eyes stung badly and burned as she choked on a lump in her throat. One enormous sob escaped her and she clutched her chest. It all hurt so much, so very, very much that Spencer had to brace herself on the island but even that couldn't stop her as she pummeled to the floor. The bar stool getting knocked over as Spencer fell in a heap.

What had she done?

It was a disaster greater than she could ever have imagined. It was a horrible disaster, she'd ruined her friendship and confused herself even more.

Why? she thought to herself, Why couldn't I just ignore it?

Breathing was difficult, she didn't think she got one good breath of air into her lungs in the past few minutes as her head began to hurt and she fought the urge to vomit. It was such a disaster and really, she didn't know what to do from here. Usually she was Disaster-Prep-Spencer, first in action, first prepared for any emergency but this time, nothing came to her.

The entire world drained of color as her vision cleared and the sobs subsided. Everything was grey and lifeless and slow. Spencer turned her head, her vision following a few seconds too slow as the world blurred for a moment before catching up with her. She used the bar stools to get herself back to her feet, although she was shaky and uneven, she eventually managed. Spencer sniffed, realizing she could barely breathe from her nose, and rubbed it with her hand.

She was completely disoriented without even taking any drugs. She might as well have been on something. Why not? How much worse could it get? With that, Spencer turned ungracefully on her heels and wobbled toward her parent's liquor cabinet. Her parents, bless them, trusted Spencer to never take what she shouldn't, but now, here she was, grabbing a bottle of whiskey. Spencer slowly rose, cradling the bottle in her hands as if it were gold. With care, Spencer twisted the cap off and took a small, difficult whiff of the alcohol and nearly heaved. It was strong.

Kissing Emily replayed in her mind and with new resolve she took a swig from the bottle. Her mouth burned, her throat burned, everything burned. It was different than the tequila she had that night she ran into Wren. This was spicey, it was intense and the burning followed down her esophagus into the pit of her stomach. For a second, Spencer thought she was going to vomit, the alcohol was so strong. She waited a minute for the after taste to die down before taking another swig. Again, the liquid burned down her throat and again she held back the urge to vomit. Spencer repeated this several times before, finally, the alcohol kicked in, making the world slow down with her rapid eye movements.

Tonight was such a disaster, Spencer thought. She was haphazardly seated, partially laying, on the couch in her barn house. How'd I get in here? she thoughtfully asked herself, Doesn't matter. I messed up big time. She took another drink, now much easier to go down. Her head hung in despair as she wobbled her way toward and through the back door, across the yard, still taking bigger and bigger swigs from the bottle, making her way to the barn house.

Barn house.

Spencer stood in front of the barn house, wavering a bit, glaring at the house as if it were the epitome of all the horrors that's happened in the past year. In some wicked, twisted way, it was. It was here that all five of them had their last sleep over where Alison was center stage and decided to get away for a bit, never returning. That was the beginning of her nightmare and all Spencer could do was glare at it as she took an even bigger swig from the whiskey bottle.

Doesn't taste like anything now, she thought to herself, taking yet another swig. Nearly losing her balance, Spencer struggled to walk forward before finally reaching the door and nearly slamming her head against it. Somewhere far away she hear the sound of a car engine starting. Or was it in her own driveway? She struggled to concentrate as she swallowed the saliva that built up in her mouth. The car engine began to move away and as she turned and leaned her back and head against the door and caught a glimpse of the trunk of her mother's car as it left the property.

Spencer scoffed at the thought her father not being home, being in Philadelphia once again on "business," her mother would leave to wherever and not tell her anything.

Slowly Spencer's body began to slide down until she hit the ground with a thud and slouched and hung her head. New, fresh tears fell freely from her face in new sadness that now, she was truly alone. Her family was nothing more than hollow shells of people who live with her, Jason is still such a mystery yet, he was one person she could kind of, sort of trust, at least compared to her father and Melissa, but she couldn't always bother him. The relationship was new and he had already seen her drunk once, picked her up from Wren's building and let her crash at his house; she couldn't do that again, and her friends, that was a whole other deal.

Spencer chuckled an uneasy, humorless chuckle and took a longer drink from the bottle. Her friends all had their own demons to battle. Aria, bless her, was dealing with her parents, particularly her father being a hypocrite about her relationship with Ezra while Hanna dealt with whatever it was she was dealing with, Spencer couldn't remember, and of course she had just blown things up with Emily. Who did she have?

No one.

Haphazardly setting the bottle down, Spencer buried her face in her hands and began to cry, all alone on the steps of the Hastings barn house.

TBC...

Author's Note: Gahhh, it's getting harder and harder to write... But I have SOOO many ideas...