Disclaimer: I do not own Vampire Academy and neither of its characters. That is all the work of the marvelous author Richelle Mead. I just own the plot of this story.

Hi guys! I am back and ready to write a lot. I mean I have all these ideas and I can feel that this story is going to be loooong, so prepare yourselves.

I am going to upload 4 chapters now, just to catch your interest. The first of them are some kind of introduction and place the story into a context.

But take my word when I say that after the two of them meet, sparks are going to ignite.

Enjoy! :)

It all started when Lissa, my best friend in the entire world, and I, both decided to move to the big city, Manhattan, after graduating college. We are both 23 years old now and we are looking for a better life far away from home. We follow that new year, new beginning shit, you know?

But first, let me give you some context.

We have done everything together since we were three years old and met at the kindergarten. The first thing we shared was the dislike for our teacher, Miss Anderson, a frustrated fifty years old unmarried woman that liked to make little kids cry; and then came our dolls.

And we were practically inseparable ever since the day we met, being always next to each other, no matter what. We went to the same schools and were into the same classes too. We even followed the same University, but with different specializations. Lissa was going to become a nurse (this was her dream since she was like five years old and she broke her arm and had to be hospitalized; there she met the nicest nurse alive and she fell in love with this job) and I studied Economics (not because I really liked it, but I have always been good with numbers and I supposedly had many good ideas when it came to business; so my high school teachers guided me to take this road; and I don't regret it till this day).

Lissa's parents and her bigger brother died when she was twenty into a terribly tragic car accident (some drunk guy was driving on the wrong way and unfortunately they were at the wrong place at the wrong time and got hit frontally at full speed, dying almost instantly). And she still seems affected by that incident until this day.

My parents are still alive, but they are a major pain in the ass lately. For the last three years or so, my father was always working, coming home late and leaving early in the morning, doing God knows what, because I surely didn't have a clue. What was so time consuming about being an art dealer? And my sweet mother is a respected English teacher at a local university, who was never pleased with anything I did, no matter how much I tried. It's not easy to have such successful parents with high standards and be a constant disappointment for them. Well, mostly for my mother, because sometimes, when he would bother to be home, my father was my partner in crime. He was the fun parent. But the constant disapproval was one of the reasons I decided to leave my home and move along with Lissa to Manhattan. She had nobody to care for her besides me, and neither did I, somehow.

We weren't really the same, but we were completing each other just fine.

Lissa is the cute girl next door, who is ready to help you anytime. I am more the kind of girl you would call when you need to punch someone. I would get triggered pretty fast by almost anything. Just give me a reason, please.

She is the calm, rational one, who was always thinking before doing anything, and I am the one who takes action first and asks the questions later, no matter the consequences. It works better for me this way. I sometimes would think things in my head, but that happens really fast and it is like I didn't think anything at all, in fact. But I am really trying to get a hold of myself lately. Let's see how that goes.

Lissa is always dressing up with nice girly clothes and she always looks pretty, no matter the occasion. She is just like a doll. I am more the casual type, wearing jeans or sweats along with a baggy T-shirt and some sneakers, not even bothering with make up or with doing my hair, no matter how many times Lissa would encourage me to do so. I am more of a tomboy and I like myself this way. Honestly, the only things that differentiate me from a boy are my boobs and my long hair, even though I rarely bother to keep it untied.

Lissa is the type of girl who has a mannequin body, being tall and slender, with a pale complexion, golden hair and jade green eyes, making her resemble a little angel. That made you like her in an instant. And boys seem to dig that too. Well, one guy in particular, because Lissa is already engaged with a sarcastic, knows-it-all pain in the ass (for me) guy, named Christian Ozera. But he really loves her, and no matter how much him and I would bicker and tease each other, we were getting along fine at the end of the day, all of us.

I, on the other hand, I am a little more blessed by Mother Nature, having some curves and bigger breasts, a tanned complexion, dark brown hair and deep dark brown eyes, thanks to my Turkish paternal origins. People would often describe me as having some exotic air. At this chapter, I am the one with the advantages, but I rarely did bother to accentuate any of them. I sometimes liked to doll up, I won't lie, but I usually didn't have the time, and I didn't really care. I am not really interested yet in having a long term relationship, even though I had some boyfriends throughout my existence. Am I lonely sometimes? Yes, of course, but not too often. Am I ready to give up on being myself in order to seduce a guy or to make someone notice me? Hell no. If someone would want to know me, the real me, I am already showing myself to them. I am not going to cover myself with makeup and wear revealing clothes just to prove something. If they don't like me, that is strictly their problem, not mine.

'Have you finished packing yet?' Lissa asked from the other side of the phone.

'Nah, I still have a box or two to stuff with things and seal them. You?' in fact I was way behind with packing, but the last thing I needed now was to hear Lissa panic over my possible delay.

'Same. I can't believe that we are actually doing this, Rose. We are actually getting out of this hopeless town. Just like we dreamt since we were little.' you could hear the excitement in her voice, because she always spoke in a pitched voice when she was feeling this way.

We have always made plans to move somewhere together, into a place that was going to be only ours. Our little sanctuary, away from this dump of a town. And finally, that time has come.

'It is such a pity that Christian can't stay with us. I wish he wouldn't have taken up that job on the other side of the town.'

'Hey, it is not the end of the world, you know? It's not like you won't see each other ever again. Or like, you don't live into the same town. You know, this is the reason the subway was invented. To cover long distances. And it doesn't take that much time either to get from one place to another. So you'll be just fine, trust me.'

'Yeah, but I'll miss him.' She argued, sounding like a little kid.

'There is nothing I can do about that. Unless you want me to become your substitute boyfriend. I am already dressing like a guy somehow, so you will not feel the difference. Buuuut maybe he will find a job nearby us in the future. What do you think about that?'

'Yeah, that sounds good. I hope he will. I want to have him close to me.'

'Of course you do. The two of you lovebirds can't seem take your hands off each other, if you know what I mean.'

'Oh, Rose.'

'What? Am I not right? I have seen you on multiple occasions. The things get heat-'

'So, I'll see you around seven?' she asked changing the subject. I laughed.

'Yeah, see you. Now go take care of your lover boy. Tell him I said hi.'

I finished packing just in time and took all of my boxes on the porch so that the moving team would pick them up. It was about six thirty and I was so close to my leaving. Finally this moment has come. And I think that I am going to miss this place very much.

I remember when my father taught me to roller skate. I was only seven and this happened while I was on my summer holiday. The school just ended and as a present for my good behavior in the last month, I got a pair of roller skates. It was more some kind of a bribe to stop terrorizing my teachers, but it was totally worth it. I was very excited to wear my new pair of white skates and what I loved most about them was that they had rainbow colored laces. I was so afraid not to fall when we got outside that I couldn't let go of my father's hand. But he didn't mind and was very patient with me. At last, after a whole day spent outside in the hot air, I was able to follow my father along the street in front of our house, as he was running ahead me and telling me to come and catch him if I can. When I finally caught up with him, he picked me up into a piggyback ride inside to take dinner, where I narrated to my mother about my day.

And about my mother, I remember that I would sit with her on the kitchen counter as she would bake some brownies or cupcakes for the weekend. I would try to read her the instructions from the recipe notebook she always used. I just began to learn how to read and she would correct me when needed and sometimes she would scoop some of the sweet mixture and hand it to me as some kind of prize. She used to call me her little personal taster and promised to teach me every recipe in that notebook of hers. But the only thing I got to learn from her is how to make an excellent coffee, just like the ones that baristas do, but without the sophisticated machinery.

I really miss those simpler times. Now everything is complicated and I don't know how we got to this point. But I guess it is all of our faults, at least at some point.

It is somehow hilarious. I have wished for my entire life to leave, and now I am remembering all my happy moments spent here.

I was waiting for the time to pass, sitting on the stairs from my porch. The weather started to turn warmer as the days were passing. Maybe this winter won't be so long after all. My mother came and sat beside me.

'So, you are really leaving.'

'Yeah. I've told you that like two weeks ago. Don't you remember?' she had the habit of pretending to listen to me, when in fact she wasn't. And then she would ask me why I wasn't telling her anything about myself.

'I know. But I thought that that was just some plan of yours. Something you wanted to do some day. But I guess it wasn't.' she said putting some of the short auburn curls behind her ear.

Silence.

'When will you be coming back? You are going to come back, right?'

'I honestly have no idea. Maybe on holidays or something.'

'But why Manhattan? Why do you want to go so far away from home?' it's not that far. You just have to drive for six hours on a good day. Eight or nine tops if it's traffic, so I heard.

'I don't know. I guess that any other city would have done the trick. We just found something for Lissa there.'

'But for you? What about you?'

'I'll find something to do. It's a big city, mum. I'll manage to survive, don't worry. '

'Take care, will you?'

'Yeah, mum. I always am.'

When the moving team came, she hugged me. I was surprised, because she wasn't doing that very often. In fact, loving gestures weren't really in my mother's nature for the last couple of years.

And with that I left home for the first time in my entire life, for real this time, not only in my wildest dreams. Was I scared? Hell yeah, big time. But at the same time I was very excited. We were finally going the city of our dreams, to live the lives we have always talked about. And at least I had Lissa by my side. And with her with me, I knew that things were going to be fine, no matter what. We would always find a way to pull things through somehow.

P.S.: I am going to upload every Monday and Thursday. I promise I won't miss a single day :)

Oh, and please feel free to review. I am looking forward to hear your opinions. Good or not that good, I don't mind. I just want to improve my writing and your reviews are helping me a lot.

XOXO