Chapter Text
Ema groans as her eyes glaze over her textbook, slowly starting to slide down her chair in frustration. Normally with forensic texts, Ema would be able to read them over and over again without ever losing a bit of interest. But that’s where the word ‘normally’ becomes relevant, as in this case, she can’t even bring herself to engage with the opening of the section.
Maybe it’s just because bloodstain pattern analysis was her favourite subject as a kid, and so already knowing all this stuff is making her bored. Perhaps a person with a disinterest in the subject had written it, and Ema can palpably feel that in the text. Or it could simply be that she hasn’t got to help solve a real case since she started university, and three years of unpractised study is beginning to burn her out.
Ema pushes herself back up in the chair and once more focuses her eyes on the paper, hoping if she goes at it intending to nail one of those causes down she’ll at least be able to read the words. She gets exactly zero words into the forwards before her attention gets dragged away once more, this time by the ring of the bell.
A girl walks in, probably the same age as Ema. Thick black hair flows down her shoulders and frames a face that instantly draws Ema’s attention. Vibrant green eyes and an oversized smile give off an aura of innocence and bliss, although her smattering of facial and ear piercings helps to give that purity a tiny bit of spice so that it doesn’t grow boring.
Whilst Ema can’t suppress her immediate thought of, ‘Oh wow, she’s gorgeous.’ she doesn’t let that inform the colour of her face or her body language. It’s not like pretty girls coming into the shop is a new concept to her.
“Hi!” The girl strolls up to the counter, seemingly unable to stand still as her fingers immediately begin tapping against it.
The girl’s voice is a few hairs too loud and bordering on repulsively sweet, which makes Ema’s attempt at being normal significantly easier. “Hi.”
“Hi. I, uh, I need one of those fancy wedding bracelets.” She frames her fingers as a circle as if it makes her statement any clearer.
Ema does attempt to solve that riddle but eventually just gives up, “What?”
“Y’know those flower bracelets people wear at weddings and proms and stuff. I’ve got a date tonight.”
“Oh.” For a fraction of a second sadness at her statement of a date overcomes Ema, but she gets over it just as fast, “The word is corsage.” Ema non-committally points with her offhand as she drains her interest in the girl and by proxy the conversation, “Fancy ones are over on that display.”
“Thank you!” She gives Ema a quick prayer gesture before skipping over to the display.
Ema looks back down and attempts to read her textbook to clear her mind, but the words are still refusing to work with her. Theory number four finally develops, she got so bored at work that she fell asleep. Although if all Ema’s brain can come up with for dreams is dealing with a pretty customer, then she’s severely disappointed in herself. She looks back up at the girl, who at this point has begun walking around the store aimlessly looking at flowers.
Ema stares for a few moments and concludes that she isn't dreaming, fairly confident that she would remember having seen this girl at some point in the real world. Her date comment pushes itself back to the top of Ema’s mind and unconsciously makes her bite her lip in frustration. Her brain proceeds to process a few different awful ideas in rapid succession, eventually landing on the absurd conclusion that had Ema met this girl in the past, she absolutely would’ve been the person she’s going on a date with.
Never mind that Ema’s never asked anyone out in her entire life, nor that the total extent of her knowledge of this girl is Ema’s subjective opinion that she’s really hot. Ema only knows one thing, after a busy school day and a near-full shift her brain is refusing to work. She’d seen it first with the textbook, and now with this girl.
However, as Ema wrangles her thoughts in, she isn’t paying any mind to her impulses which decide it’s the perfect time to fire off a stupid comment, “You know the boy is supposed to buy you the flowers, right?”
In the immediate aftermath, Ema’s teeth dig into her lip so hard it nearly starts bleeding. Ema hopes that she spoke quietly enough for the girl not to hear her across the store. When she hears the girl start to speak, Ema rapidly buries her head in the textbook as she desperately tries to get out of this situation.
“That’s a little reductive. A girl has as much right to initiate a relationship as a boy, and that includes giving flowers. Although I’m buying these because of a girl and all that’s not relevant in this case.”
“O-oh. Yeah, of course.” Ema has significantly more attention placed on gritting her teeth than listening to the girl.
Ema might not be able to process the girl’s tone, but when she speaks a second later, it carries no offence. “Hey, can you make a custom corsage?”
Ema freezes at the sudden crossroads that is a question, as those require responses and that is something she doesn’t trust herself to do. On the one hand, she could say no and the girl will probably leave, freeing Ema from this situation. On the other hand, saying no means she doesn’t get the chance to amend her perceived faux pas.
As much as it’s the brain fog talking, she’d rather not leave things as they are. “I’m not a florist, but I can throw together something simple.”
“Okay cool!” The girl plucks a few purple flowers from a display and brings them up to the counter, “I don’t need anything complicated, just these on a simple band.”
Ema takes the stem, cuts it and begins assembling the bouquet while trying to process the conversation and looking for a useful start. As she begins dragging wire through the bulbs she tentatively starts speaking, “So a girl, huh?”
The girl fervidly nods her head, “Yeah, seeing Rosie Ringer—I say like you know who she is.”
“It’s cool. That’s cool. I’m bi.” Ema physically ducks underneath the counter to retrieve flower preservation spray, and emotionally as she realizes just how big of a mistake she made.
The girl leans over the counter to look at Ema, “Neat, never played the coming-out game with a florist. I’m a lesbian.”
Ema stands back up and begins treating the bouquet, and responds with a quiet voice. “Cool. But, uh, I’m not a florist.”
The girl rests her head on the counter and stares up at Ema, “Then what are you?”
“I am a college student who has to help her family pay bills.” For the first time, Ema manages to drag her attention away from the corsage and to the girl.
“Ah.”
Ema bites on her cheek just to give her lips a break and tentatively attempts to start up a conversation for the third time, “Can you give me your wrist?”
“Sure.”
The girl extends out a hand and Ema grabs onto her fingers with one hand, wrapping a simple black ribbon around her wrist to measure the size. She cuts it with a bit of slack, attaches the mini bouquet to the ribbon, and then ties it onto her wrist. When Ema finishes she turns her attention up to the girl, who is moving her wrist around to look at the corsage in as limited a capacity as she can with Ema still holding her hand.
The girl has nothing to say, giving Ema ample time to spend committing her face to memory. “There you go…?”
“Oh, I’m Kay. Kay Faraday.” The girl’s—Kay’s attention remains on the corsage as she speaks.
“Ema, Ema Skye.” She mounts just a tiny bit of courage in her voice.
“Well thank you, Ema Skye, this is beautiful!” Kay beams at Ema, and she realizes that her previous assessment of her smile as ‘oversized’ was an understatement.
A smile spreads across Ema’s face in response, “It’s nothing, please come again.”
“Yeah, I will!”
Kay backpedals her way out of the shop, waving the entire way with the decorated hand. As Kay makes her exit she bumps into someone else coming in, who gently tells her ‘It’s fine’ and lets her leave. Even if she can’t see her from the counter, Ema knows that voice well enough to recognize her.
“Hey Lana.” Ema is just a little too giddy and begins patting that down before her sister notices.
“Hello, who was that?” Lana moves through the door frame but keeps her eyes focused out at the street.
“Just a customer.”
Lana’s eyes quickly flash over to look at Ema and a smirk forms on her face, “Just a customer? I can’t recall interacting with a customer ever leaving a smile on your face.”
Ema feels her back instinctively tense up from nerves but doesn’t let her face betray her emotions, “Yeah well most customers suck, she was nice.”
“I suppose.” Lana strolls toward the counter and begins picking up the scraps left behind by Ema’s impromptu corsage making, “What did she get?”
“Wanted a corsage for her girlfriend.”
“That’s sweet, you could learn a thing from her.” Lana makes her way toward the closest garbage bin to dispose of the scraps.
“I’m plenty sweet.” Ema doesn’t intend to coat her words in venom, but Lana’s prodding is getting to her.
Lana adopts a soft grin and plays a tiny laugh through her throat, “Quite convincing Ema.”
“Leave me alone.” Ema slightly turns in her chair to avoid looking at her sister.
“Why?”
“I know your games Lana, and I’m not letting you trick me into saying something embarrassing.”
Lana shakes her head, “I don’t need to trick you into something embarrassing Ema, you’ve already done it.”
Ema spends a lot of energy stopping herself from just instantly dropping her head in defeat, “Really?”
“Yes. When I bumped into her, I noticed she was missing something. Would you like to guess as to what it was Ms Forensic Investigator?”
Ema stops and replays her interaction with Kay in her head over and over before, “Mother fucker…”
“No swearing young lady! But I take it you figured it out?”
“Mmm huh. Yeah, I did.” Ema finally lowers her head in defeat, “I forgot to charge her.”
Lana nods her head, “And you forgot to charge her because…”
“Because she was pretty, and I was embarrassed, and when I was tying the corsage around her wrist I got distracted thinking I was giving it to her. Don’t make fun of me.”
“I won’t, I've done my fair share of dumb things for pretty girls. Part of life is interacting with beautiful people who can shut off your brain with a look.” Lana snaps on ‘look’ for emphasis.
Ema sighs as Kay’s smile flashed through her head and a blush warms her cheeks, “That doesn’t make me feel better, and you making fun of me in your head isn’t helping.”
Lana waves her off and pulls out her wallet, “I’m not but think what you want, how much was that?”
“I wasn’t paying much attention to the flowers, but I’m guessing twenty-five, maybe thirty dollars.”
Lana slowly blinks at her and puts her wallet away, “Okay never mind, I forgot how expensive flowers are.”
“Yeah, it’s fine. I only want Rosie Ringer’s money anyway.”
Lana slightly tilts her head, “Ringer? Was that her name?”
Ema shakes her head, “No that was Kay, Ringer is her girlfriend's name.”
“Hmm.” Lana idly taps on her cheek.
Ema raises her head and an eyebrow at her sister, “What is it?”
“Nothing. I just happen to have met a defence attorney named Rosie Ringer once. She’s a widow in her late thirties, however, so I severely doubt there’d be any relation. I’ll help you close up.”
“Huh, alright…”
Three weeks have passed, Ema aced her bloodstain analysis exam without ever reading the book, and for some reason, Kay is still in her thoughts. Not that Ema expressly wants to forget about her, but normally a day or two after last encountering someone she thinks is cute they completely leave her mind. Kay isn’t even a real exception to that rule, just that her smile will randomly flash through Ema’s head and stick there for hours.
Ema is sitting at the counter in the flower boutique, writing up a fingerprinting lab as it approaches closing time, and when the bell rings Kay’s smile flashes through Ema’s head.
“Hi!”
Ema’s eyes nearly bug out of her head when she hears that voice, “Kay?”
“No doy.”
Ema wouldn’t be able to tell it was Kay if not for her voice. Her hair is now up in an extremely high ponytail, although the large key attached to her hair tie draws more attention. The soft-pink suit switched out for a gaudy pink and red ensemble, and except for some studs in her earlobes her extensive series of piercings are now gone.
This time her immediate thought is, ‘Goddammit she’s still beautiful.’
“You look… different.” Ema’s tone would fall somewhere between dismissive and angry. After three weeks of that look haunting Ema’s mind, she is rather upset to see a change in appearance, even if she doesn’t take particular offence at this new look.
Kay just nods along seeming unaware of Ema’s feelings, “Yeah. I was dressing that way for Rosie, so we’re back to normal Kay now.”
“Sorry you two didn’t work out?” Ema attempts to sound appropriately interested in a customer's love life, which is rather difficult.
Kay looks confused for a second and then shrugs her shoulders, “I got what I wanted from her, and it’s not like I expected us to be friends afterwards.”
Ema recoils slightly at that and responds with a murmur, “Oh, one of those ‘dates’.”
Kay blankly stares at Ema for a long time before a thought noticeably crosses her eyes, “Oh! You thought I was using the word date romantically!”
“Y-you weren’t?” Ema briefly wonders if she’s ever going to get through a conversation with Kay without embarrassing herself.
“No.” Kay shakes her head, “Purely a platonic exchange of information.”
“Then why did you buy her a corsage?”
“I bought it because of her, not for her. We’d only communicated by mail, and agreed to wear purple flowers to recognize eachother.” Kay looks at Ema like she’s stupid for not assuming that.
“Oh.”
“Sorry to confuse you.”
Ema shakes her head and tries to suppress her faint blush, “Whatever, it’s my mistake. What did you need?”
“She had something of mine. I had something she wanted.”
Ema is desperate to get away from that entire conversation, “No, not with Rosie. What did you need from here?”
“Oh! Well… nothing. I was just walking by and remembered I promised to come and see you again, so I came in.”
Ema looks down at her lab report for a second and notes an easy way to get back in her element, “Well if you're here, could you help me with an assignment?”
“Yeah sure, what do you need?” Kay throws on her largest smile before leaning onto the counter and into Ema’s space.
“We’re building and analysing a fingerprint database. The more clean prints I file, the better I do. So if you don’t mind me taking yours?” Ema grabs her printing kit from under the counter and presents it to her.
Kay’s face doesn’t betray any emotion, but she does pull back ever so slightly, “Yeah I guess. I don’t see why not.”
“Okay, just give me your hand. This won’t take five minutes.”
Kay nods and presents her right hand to Ema, who uses her offhand to hold her wrist stable. As one hand rubs the ink pad against Kay’s thumb, the other presses down on her wrist to feel her pulse. Kay can peacefully smile all she wants, Ema knows her heart is beating a mile a minute.
Now if only she could figure out why.
“So what do you study?”
Ema turns her focus to Kay’s face, “Forensic science, going to become an investigator for the LAPD.”
“Oh wow, awesome! What brought you down that path?”
“My older sister bought me a book on the subject as a kid, and it just stuck from there. Not much else you can do with forensic science beyond investigating crime.”
Kay shrugs, “You could turn those skills around and get away with the perfect crime instead.”
Ema snickers at that, “Technically I suppose you could, but I would rather stay on the right side of the law.”
“Sometimes the law is wrong, what then?” Kay begins bouncing in place, though it’s so slight that if Ema wasn’t touching her she doubts she’d be able to tell.
“Forensic investigators just look at the science of the case, and all of that is black and white. I’m not qualified or interested in navigating the grey area that is how to enforce the law, that’s the prosecutor's duty.”
“Mmm.”
“Press your thumb down on this square and I will roll it around to get the edges of the print.”
“Okay.”
Ema briefly lets go of Kay’s hand as she follows instructions, “So are you in university?”
“Nope.” Kay begins shaking her head but quickly pauses, “Well not exactly nope. I have a private study with a mentor, but no formal enrolment in anything.”
That piques Ema’s interest enough that she stops rolling Kay’s thumb, “Private study? Of what?”
Kay sheepishly scratches the back of her head with her free hand, “Uhh, law study. Specifically as a prosecutor…”
“Are you fucking serious?”
“He-he… yeah.”
Ema rapidly blinks as her brain resets, “Wow. A future prosecutor and forensic investigator walk into the same flower boutique. The coincidence of the century.”
“Well the world is a small place, maybe we’ll work a case together someday.”
“Yeah, maybe.” Ema returns her attention to pressing out the fingerprint, “So what do you think about the law being wrong.”
Kay doesn’t lose a moment thinking, “What matters is-.” Kay’s phone rings and she pulls it out, “This is the boss man, can I?”
“Yeah of course.”
Kay gives Ema a thumbs up before turning around and stepping away to answer the call, “Hey what’s up? What! Okay, I’ll be right there!”
“What was that about?”
Kay steps back up to the counter and clasps her hands around Ema’s, “Someone was just murdered, and I have to go help. I hate to dash mid-fingerprint but…”
Ema is used to the concept of murder at this point, but the real thing still makes her a little shaky, “Yeah, yeah. No, of course, go solve that murder.”
“I swear to it.” Kay begins a dash out of the store but leaves a few parting words, “I’ll be back Ema, don’t worry.”
“Okay…”
It only takes Ema a few seconds to shake off her heightened state, but if she’s going to make it as an investigator then she will need to stop flinching at bodies and blood. Maybe in the future, she can ask a coroner to tour her around a mortuary to get acquainted, but for the moment she’ll settle for stretching the stress out of her body.
When Ema unclasped her hands to begin stretching, however, she is greeted by the rather curious sight of two bills and a dozen coins suddenly appearing between them. She begins counting out the money and it comes out to fifty dollars exactly. The second time through the bundle Ema looks for markings left over by the ink, but only finds ink stains on her hands.
“Huh. Mysteries upon mysteries.” Ema wanders out from behind the counter and to the fancy corsage display. They’re not all the same price, but the vast majority are fifty dollars, “So she remembered.”
Ema walks into her and Lana’s flat with dinner, only to find her sister scumming through various pieces of paperwork and occasionally glancing at her phone in the dark.
“Are you okay?”
Lana flinches and whips around at her voice, apparently having not heard Ema enter, “I’m fine, an old friend from the prosecutor’s office asked me to weigh in on a case is all.”
“Who?” Ema moves to set the fast-food bag down on the coffee table.
“Miles Edgeworth. You should remember, he was the flamboyant gay man you had a crush on as a kid.”
“Shut. Up.” Ema practically growls at her sister and defensively crosses her arms over her body.
Lana quickly moves her papers to the side, so she can eat safely, “I suppose by that gaudy thing on your wrist your mind is focused on someone else.”
Ema looks down and a blush overtakes her face. She’d needed a way to get Kay’s fifty dollars into the system and had decided to simply charge her for one of their fancy corsages. An artificial pink rose sitting on a golden mesh with gold and red beads strewn about it, all on a black ribbon.
Now, as to why Ema had decided to wear it home? Well, she wasn’t particularly interested in answering that question.
“I don’t wanna hear it.”
“I have no interest in mocking you, just a piece of advice. Ask them out next time you see them.”
Ema groans, “No. That’d be creepy and weird.”
“Why?”
“Because it'd be weird! Imagine if the checkout girl at our grocery store asked you out the third time she rang you up. That'd be really creepy wouldn’t it?”
Lana stares off slightly as she eats her veggie burger, “One of them actually did that recently.“
“What?” Ema’s face slightly drops at that.
“A girl at the grocery store asked me out.”
“What did you say?“
“No, obviously, it was weird.”
“My point exactly!”
“There’s a difference. I’ve never talked to that woman before, so it was weird. You have talked to them, so it’ll be fine. It may seem a little weird at first, but it opens a dialogue and communication is the basis of a relationship.”
“Little weird is still weird…” Ema pouts as she speaks.
Lana shrugs her shoulders, “It’s your choice, Ema. But the thing you’ll regret is never reaching out to her…”
The room goes quiet as they’re no longer talking about Ema and Kay. There are a few things they don’t talk about; like what Lana did for Damon Gant, what her five years in prison were like, and relevantly everything that is the relationship between Lana and Mia Fey.
Ema goes to reroute the conversation, “So not that I will take your stupid advice and ask Kay out, but if I did… what should I say?”
Lana seems lost in thought for a moment but eventually returns to their conversation, “Um. Honestly, I don’t know. I’ve never been the one to initiate a relationship before, girls always come to me.”
“Of course they do.”
Two weeks have passed and Kay is still taking up space in Ema’s head, although this time it's intentional. She still thinks that Lana’s idea to just ask Kay out is an absurdist one, but not for whatever vaguely remembered excuse she’d used at the time. It comes down to the simple fact that Ema doesn’t know all that much about Kay.
She knows Kay is pretty, that’s what started all of this after all. She knows Kay plans to work in the same industry as her, so she can make some inferences about her sense of justice and interest in helping people. And at that point, she runs out of information as she’s only spoken to Kay for maybe five minutes in the month since they met.
If they went on a date that could be rectified, but that also implies a level of commitment that Ema doesn’t think she’s prepared for. Some days she leans harder on biting the bullet and asking her out, some days she leans harder on fishing for information until she makes up her mind. Ultimately, none of that matters because she can’t do either until Kay decides to visit again.
Kay speaks loud enough that Ema can hear her before she even opens the door, “C’mon this is the best flower shop in all of Los Angeles, I swear.”
Kay enters performing a showman's gesture for the quaint little boutique, although she makes sure to throw in a little wave directly at Ema. Following Kay is a woman carrying herself with some actual dignity, sporting some extremely formal clothing, a blue-grey bob and this absolutely striking face with a mole under her eye.
Ema’s first unhelpful thought is, ‘Kay is prettier than her.’
Ema’s second unhelpful thought is, ‘Is that Franziska fucking von Karma!’
Kay bounds up to the counter and leans against it, “Hay Ema, my aunt needs to buy some flowers for a girl and I figured… what better place?”
Ema blankly stares at Kay for just a moment before wrapping Kay’s scarf up in her hand and dragging her ear directly next to her mouth, “Is that Franziska von Karma?”
“Yeah.”
“Your aunt is Franziska von Karma?”
“Yeah, why?”
“W-Why!’ Ema has to bite down on her lip to not scream in Kay’s ear, “Why do I ask? I don’t know, maybe because she’s one of the most famous prosecutors in the world.”
“Is she?”
“She’s the youngest international prosecutor of all time and she holds the title of the youngest person to ever run a trial in most countries in the developed world.”
“So?”
“So?” Ema violently flails her hands around in disbelief, which as she’s still holding Kay’s scarf means that she starts shaking the girl as well.
“I mean Ms von Karma’s accomplishments are impressive but, like, you are the first civilian I’ve ever met who recognized her. Or any lawyer I know for that matter. I just don’t see the famous thing.”
“You’re unbelievable Faraday.” Ema loosens her grip on Kay’s scarf and lightly pushes her back to the customer's side of the counter.
“Yeah, I get that a lot.”
Ema looks behind Kay to Franziska, who has taken to awkwardly standing in the middle of the shop seemingly without any idea of what she’s supposed to be doing.
Ema gulps and nervously directions her words to Franziska, “So what’s this about a girl.”
Franziska takes a few steps forwards as she carefully considers her words, “There is this woman who means quite a deal to me, and I would like to buy her flowers to show my appreciation.”
“And this connection is platonic or…”
“The intention of the flowers is to make it romantic.” Both of them side-eye Kay who lets out a squeal at Franziska’s words.
“Okay. Did you have anything in mind, some flowers she’s particularly fond of?”
“No, it’s not a subject we’ve ever discussed. Um, I suppose roses are the traditional choice.”
It brings Ema a bit of comfort seeing a woman so powerful be just as nervous with her heart as she is, “Eh. Rose blooming season doesn’t kick off for another month, and whilst we do have a year-round supply the quality ones are reserved for wedding displays.”
Franziska scoffs, “I have no interest in settling for anything less than perfection.”
“Understood. There are a few other love flowers, but I’d honestly just say walk around the store until you find something that you think she’d like or reminds you of her. Kay can you?”
“Yeah.” Kay dashes forwards and links her arm with Franziska’s, beginning to slowly drag her around the store as she has to point at everything she sees.
“Thank you.”
Ema bounces at the counter with what little time she’s bought herself to think. Even under the best circumstances, it’ll take them at most ten minutes to get through the entire store, which means Ema has absolutely no time to decide what to do about her little crush.
Three minutes and fifty-two seconds later Ema isn’t any more confident in what to do, but Franziska is holding a bouquet of pink, white and purple orchids. Ema puts on the best smile she can through her nerves and confusion, “Not to shoot you down, but that is a bridal bouquet.”
Franziska reflexively tenses her body and a small blush takes her face, “O-oh. Then I suppose this would be too forward.”
“It spoke to you, that’s all that matters.” Kay chimes in from her position leaning back against the counter.
Ema rolls her eyes, “Whilst it does sound absurd coming from her mouth—” Kay turns her head to look at Ema aghast. “—I agree with Kay. Your girl won’t be able to tell, hell if I hadn’t been working here for a while I wouldn’t be able to tell the intent either.”
“I will trust in your expertise in the subject then.”
“Okay cool. Do you need us to ship them or are you going to deliver them in person?”
“Preferably in person but I am unsure if our schedules will be aligned over the next few days, if you’ll excuse me I’ll phone her to confirm the details.”
Ema is so used to asking to be excused being a simple turn of phrase that she’s briefly confused by Franziska standing there waiting, “Of course, Ms von Karma.”
“Danke.” Franziska retrieves a phone from her vest pocket as she makes her way out of the shop, leaving Ema and Kay all alone.
“Are you feeling okay?”
Ema’s attention and words snap to Kay, “What?”
“Are you feeling okay? Your face is all red and puffy.” Kay brings her hands up to her cheeks to do a nonsense gesture intending to make her point clearer.
“Yeah fine. Just a little starstruck I guess.”
“Okay cool, I just wanted to make sure.”
“That’s very nice of you Kay.”
Kay does her little beam smile that makes Ema’s heart flutter, “I’m here to serve. Oh, how did your fingerprint thing go?”
“Highest marks in the class, as usual.”
“Very impressive.”
“It is, and you’re not going to mock me out of that belief.”
“No mockery intended. I only work with the best, so if you’re ever going to be my assistant…”
“Oh, we’ve graduated from working a case together to being full-time investigative partners?”
“Well I said assistant, but I suppose you could be promoted to partner. Eventually.”
This is the kind of comfortable Ema craves, easy flowing words that even when not about her point of passion are still related. That it lets her escape from her romantic thoughts for a moment is just an added bonus.
Ema nods her head and takes on a slight smile, “I’ll try my hardest. Can I assume that Franziska is your prosecutorial mentor?”
“Nope, not that she doesn’t sometimes contribute, but her younger brother is my actual teacher. That’s why I annoy her by calling her aunt instead of mom.”
Ema stares at Kay with a curious look, “I feel like I would have heard of an even younger von Karma going around prosecuting people.”
“Well his last name isn’t von Karma silly, it’s Edgeworth.”
Ema’s brain takes a moment to reset, “As in Miles Edgeworth?”
“Wow, you really do know your lawyers huh.”
“Y-yeah, um, not just that. Me and Edgeworth have actually met before.”
“Really?” Kay’s eyes slightly bug and she leans in a little closer.
“Yep. I was a key player in a major case about five and a half years ago.”
“Oh damn, that’s neat. Do you mind if I ask him about it?”
“About the case?”
“Yeah, I’m curious, but I don’t want to just invade your privacy y’know…”
“Oh! Um, I guess… yeah no I suppose I don't mind.” Ema breaks eye contact to stare off into the corner.
“You don’t sound too sure.”
“It’s not that, I don’t really mind anything you might learn about fifteen-year-old me from Edgeworth. Just… my sister was on trial, so talking about it always makes me a little nervous.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry.”
Ema waves her off, “It’s fine. She’s fine. You met her, actually. Bumped into her on your way out the first night.
“Well then I’m glad to see everything there worked out.”
“Mm-hmm, speaking of what happened with your murder investigation?”
“That was a gigantic mess. Like five innocent people, me and Mr Edgeworth included, managed to get arrested for it during the night type of mess, but we caught and prosecuted the bad guy in the end.”
“Oh my god, that sounds awful. What was it like getting falsely accused of murder?”
Kay’s smile drops for a second, “I’ve had worse days. I’ve been working in this field for three years, so I’m just thinking of it as an overdue occupational hazard.”
“Well, hopefully, it’ll never happen again.”
“Here's hoping. Fran was actually telling me about this girl who managed to get falsely accused of murder three unrelated times in three consecutive years.”
“Christ! What do you have to piss off for that to happen?”
“No idea, worst string of luck I’ve ever heard of.”
“Well my condolences to her.” Ema stares at Kay for a moment and bites down on her lip, “So Kay I wanted to-.”
The bell rings as Franziska enters the store and Ema just shuts her mouth on the spot, “Our schedules have a small alignment. Long enough for me to deliver the flowers to my paramour, and have a first date if things go well.”
Whilst Kay resorts to applause Ema makes use of her words, “Good for you two, just give me a second to spray these down and put them in a box.”
When Ema begins working Kay leans over the counter and whispers to her, “What were you going to say?”
“Nothing, bookmark it for the next time you come in.”
“Okay…”