Alison + Emily = 4Eva

And the Alison plot thickens — apparently in the form of a love triangle. According to Shay Mitchell and Sasha Pieterse, two of the stars of ABC Family's Pretty Little Liars, Alison actually does love her friend Emily Fields. And there's more — there might be a future relationship in the cards for them now that Ali's revealed that she's been alive this entire time. But what about Emily's current love interest, Paige, with whom she shared an implied-sex scene with during the show's noir episode on Tuesday night? We're not so sure that Alison would be Emily's best match — but then again, we're not sure Paige is, either.

Emily Fields is constantly getting the short end of the stick when it comes to A's hijinks. (Even though Hanna's trip to the dentist two weeks ago might take the cake as the worst we've ever seen.) She had a car crash through her living room, she messed up her shoulder and had to quit the swim team/lose her chance for a college scholarship, her parents both moved away (even though her dad is back now, yay!) and left her to live in Alison's old room with crazy Mrs. DeLaurentis, she got trapped and psychologically tormented in the high school last week, and there was that time she got locked in a box and almost sawed in half. Emily has really taken the brunt of A's psychological and physical torment over the past five seasons — so does she really deserve to be manipulated by Alison?

Mitchell and Pieterse spoke to E! about where they see their characters' relationships going based on their past and now that they've been reunited. Mitchell said:

I think Ali was playing. I know that Emily had deep-rooted feelings for Alison, and she was like her first real love. And I think she also opened her eyes to be like, OK, I have feelings for another person who is a girl and obviously that opened up another door. But for Emily, 100 percent it's real, and I don't think it ever went away, even when she was supposed to be dead for a little while.

We all know, at this point, how Alison's brain works so we also know that she's latched onto the easiest target of the group for a reason. She definitely can't manipulate Spencer or Hanna anymore (Aria's kind of a wildcard) but she can definitely get under Emily's skin. And even though Emily seems like she's so cool, she's got a terribly large flaw in the fact that she's desperate to hold onto being Ali's favorite. But according to Pieterse, easy-manipulation might not be Ali's actual motive. The actress told E!:

I think Alison is desperate for someone that she can trust, and so she's kind of grabbing at straws at the moment, but I think she really does love Emily and feels close to her and still feels that connection. And I honestly do feel that Alison had real feelings for her.

If that's true and Ali's not just looking for someone she can trust to help her continue to run, we're left with a huge question. Who will Emily choose and will that relationship be the best for her? (Let me acknowledge in advance that I don't necessarily support either of these relationships as a fan of PLL.)

ALISON

Yes, she's Emily's first love and sure, her feelings might be from the heart. But that still doesn't change the fact that she's been in hiding for years making everyone believe that she's dead. It also doesn't change the fact that Ali pseudo-blackmailed Emily about her sexual orientation when she first came out to her. So how can Emily justify trusting her now?

There's also the obvious fact that she's targeting Emily because she knows how easy she is to manipulate and how her feelings force her to pledge loyalty. (Look at how easy it was for Ali to turn her against Spencer.) It just wouldn't work with these two — Sorry, "Emison" 'shippers unless you don't care about Emily getting taken advantage of and ultimately hurt. Emily has a good heart and Ali hasn't exactly proven herself to be the greatest person. So there's that.

Paige

Paige and Emily have had a decently good run since she was basically Emily's rebound girl following Maya's death. The swam together, made plans to go to college together (until Emily wrecked her shoulder and had to quit), and now they're kind of "just seeing where things go". They also just shared their first implied-sex scene during this week's "Shadow Play". It'd appear that they do pretty well together, right?

But there's also the shady element that Paige is always hiding something. First, she got SO defensive and sketchy when Emily asked her about her relationship with Shana and second, she just gets really strange sometimes for no good reason. She's also always so reluctant to share what she knows, so how can Emily really trust her either? She's a great girlfriend but she's not the most trustworthy character.

So, in conclusion, neither of these two are the best match for Emily. She really should look for someone more stable and less likely to try to manipulate her — because she's absolutely prone and attracted to these types of people. But even though they're both the pretty bad romantic interests, Alison is the actual worst. Emily knows nothing about her — she's just blindly in love with someone she thought she knew and that's a recipe for disaster.

Images: ABC Family