She Was Emma

Always, she was Emma and I was Amy. We met in preschool and hit it off immediately. I reasoned that we needed to be friends because we were both 4 years old and our names sounded the same. She understood what I meant: the names Emma and Amy feel the same in your mouth. We were inseparable. Parents, teachers and friends referred to the two of us all at once: Emma'n'Amy. Emmanamy. Emma-and-Amy.

I never minded that her name came first. Emma was loud and pretty and smelled like chocolate. She was bold, decisive and passionate. She deserved to be first. I didn't live in her shadow; I bathed in it.

We loved each other to death, but we butted heads often. It always turned out fine -- we made up, forgave and forgot -- but the adults didn't understand it. Every new school year a teacher would try to mediate for a while, usually giving up before the winter holidays. In the fourth grade, our teacher, an exasperated old woman, asked us why. How hard could it be for two best friends to get along? Why couldn't Emma'n'Amy be more like the other girls?

Well, what can I say? We just weren't like other girls.

One day when we were 11, we had a particularly bad fight. I can't remember what it was about, who started it, or who cried. What mattered was the aftermath, the reconciliation. We promised to be Emma and Amy forever. No matter where life would steer us, we would go together. Every milestone, every triumph, every pitfall, we would experience together 'til death do us part.

Emma grew up, and so did I. She went to college, and so did I. She married a man, and so did I. Birthdays, graduations, weddings, mortgages, I was always by her side. "Together forever" was easy, was beautiful, was effortless, was perfect. Until it wasn't.

I realized Emma was pregnant before she did. When you're so close to someone for so many years, you notice every little thing. I'm sure I know Emma better than she knows herself. Upon this discovery, my first reaction was to feel hurt. She never told me she planned to have kids. She should have told me! She would have told me. So then I thought, what if it was unexpected? That made sense. She wasn't trying, and she didn't know. I decided to keep it to myself, let her find out on her own. She would like that better.

In the meantime, I had work to do. For Emma'n'Amy. My husband is a loveable pushover and he was more than happy to start a family. Six weeks later, there was no luck on my end and still no news from Emma. She had to know by now, right? Maybe she was waiting for the right moment. Maybe she was giving me the chance to catch up. If she knew that I knew, that might be the kindest thing to do.

More weeks. Nothing. I was starting to get nervous. More weeks. More silence. I was falling behind. We were breaking the promise. We needed to talk.

I just wanted to talk.

I dropped by Emma's house unannounced. It was something I'd done countless times before without issue, so why did she seem nervous now? What made this time different? I just wanted to talk.

For a second I thought I saw Emma try to conceal her abdomen, but I may have misinterpreted her movement. The next moment we hugged and were all smiles. I congratulated her. She thanked me. I asked why she didn't tell me. She said she hadn't told anyone yet. "Too soon." I asked if the nursery was ready. She hesitated. "Not yet."

Then Amy asked Emma why half of her house was packed in moving boxes. And then...

I'm sorry, Detective, I think that's all I want to say without a lawyer present.

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Author's note: This piece was originally written for the Vocal + Assist on Facebook Unreliable Narrator Challenge. It has been edited for the Vocal Unreliable Challenge.