The writing gods have heard your pleas and bless you with a great bounty of fanfiction this month, my beloved readers! Enjoy :)

All feedback appreciated! Seriously, that stuff keeps me motivated to keep pumping away at this. I appreciate y'all


"Wait Lara, it's not-" Sam began as Lara quickly got to her feet.

"Not what?" Lara demanded, "Not the way it seems? You were just curious, right? Why can't people just mind their own damned business?!" Sam stepped in her way in an attempt to bar her exit.

"You don't understand, I-"

"I gotta go," Lara spat, "I have a shift at the Nine Bells." She pushed past both Sam and Steph and stormed out of the dorm. Sam stood there helplessly, watching her as she left and listening to the sounds of her retreating footsteps.

You don't understand, I know exactly how you must feel with all the scrutiny… she finished in her head. She shook her head to clear it and scowled over at Steph, "Steph, what the hell?!"

"I didn't realize it would cause such a big issue," Steph replied, raising her hands up in front of her defensively.

"Of course it would!" Sam exclaimed, throwing her hands up exasperatedly, "It's exactly the same as if-" she stopped mid-sentence, and her stomach sank as she suddenly realized her own hypocrisy.

"You wouldn't happen to be the same Nishimura as the owner of Nishimura Corporation?"

"Yup...that's my dad…"

"Jesus Christ…" She blurted out, slapping a hand to her forehead. "You know what? Nevermind, lemme just get your sunglasses for you," she said, making for her desk and pulling Steph's sunglasses out of one of the drawers.

"Wait, but-" Steph stammered as Sam handed her glasses to her.

"It's fine," Sam said in a monotone as she turned Steph around by the shoulders.

"I didn't mean to-" Steph continued as Sam guided her to the door and showed her the way out.

"I get it, but I'm really stoned and I need to fix this right now so let's talk about this later, 'kay?" She closed the door behind Steph before leaning back against it exhaustedly while she evaluated the current situation. If Lara had been angry at her before for getting too personal, Sam figured she might as well be dead to her roommate at that point. "...Fuck!" She shouted after a little while, and she kicked over a pile of books right beside her desk before crumpling to the floor and squeezing her eyes shut to think. What was she going to do? It wasn't like she could talk to Molly or anyone at UCL about the situation without further drawing Lara's ire. Steph had proven that.

Her eyes snapped open. There was one person she could talk to, but how did she know that the person in question would even respond to her? Regardless, she pulled her smartphone out of her pocket, opened up the Facebook app, and scrolled through her friends list until she found the name 'Jessica Burgess'. She hit the message icon and began typing.

Jess, I know what you said about distancing ourselves from each other until we're over the breakup, but I promise that this has nothing to do with that. I just need someone to talk to and I feel like you're the only one who understands me well enough to give me some good advice. She hit the 'send' button and waited, not that she really expected Jess to respond. Much to her surprise, however, she saw the typing indicator pop up for Jess in the message box shortly thereafter.

I'm here, what's up? Jess replied. In spite of her current level of distress, Sam couldn't help but feel a smile creep upon her face. That's right, even if they couldn't be together, her and Jess would always have each other's backs.

I seriously fucked up, Sam typed back.

In what way? Came Jess's query. Sam tapped her phone against her chin and thought of where to begin.

So, I know this is gonna sound crazy, but I became friends with an English noble and she's actually my roommate. Remember how pissed I'd always get when people would ask about my dad or bring up his company? Well, this chick is kind of in the same boat, long story short her dad is apparently a nutcase and I made the mistake of looking into who she is and now she's pissed at me. What do I do? The typing indicator for Jess popped up and disappeared several times before she finally seemed to settle on a response.

If she's in the same boat as you, just find her and apologize and let her know that you understand the way she feels. Isn't it obvious? Sam bit her bottom lip pensively before replying.

Do you mean find her right now? Shouldn't I give her some space or something first? She's REALLY pissed.

No, Jess responded before adding: the longer you wait, the more pissed she's probably gonna get. That's if she's anything like you get when people bring up Dickhead. Sam snorted at Jess's use of their favorite nickname for her father.

Fair point...thanks Jess. She locked her phone and pocketed it, deliberating over her next move. Lara had just said she had a shift at the Nine Bells, so perhaps if Sam was fast enough she could catch up to her roommate and get her to hear her out. Time was of the essence, in that case. She pulled her phone back out and searched for 'The Nine Bells' in her Google Maps app to find that it was about a twenty minute walk. Lara already had about a ten minute head start on her, so she had to run if she was going to have any hope of catching up.

"Well shit…" Sam whispered to herself, getting to her feet and letting herself out of the dorm room. When she was a little younger, she'd gotten herself into a tight spot or two when the police had busted a party she was at. She couldn't remember another time where she had to demonstrate such prowess in terms of speed and parkour. At one point, she had to climb down from a third story balcony and run two miles to avoid getting an underage. Compared to that, she felt as though chasing Lara down would be a piece of cake.

The moment she set foot outside the dorm hall, she started sprinting at full speed with her phone held out in front of her so she could track where she was supposed to go. Admittedly, she was a tad less fit than she used to be as a freshman or sophomore in high school in the absence of her mom's mandated fitness program that comprised of yoga and cardio, as evidenced by the burning sensation she began to feel in her sides. Left, right, left, right, she kept pounding away on a mixture of grass and pavement regardless, desperate to head her roommate off and fix the mess she'd created before it was too late.

Why do I even care? Said a voice at the back of her head, and she felt herself slow down slightly. Why did she care? It wasn't like she'd known Lara for a while, and for all Sam knew she could turn out to be an awful person even if she managed to patch things up for the time being.

It's because she's like me, said another, more confident voice in her mind. She knew why Lara was so quiet and touchy about her personal life: isolation and secrecy were far preferable to living life in someone else's shadow. It's for that reason that Sam herself never made many friends in high school. She went out and partied a lot, and hosted a fair number of parties herself, sure, but none of those people were actually her friends. She thought they were at the time, but somewhere along the line she realized that the real reason they hung out with her was because they knew she was one of the richer girls in school.

Rich little Samantha Nishimura always had everything she wanted, or so everybody thought. But for all her material possessions, she never felt any less miserable. Her peers only saw her as an object to be exploited. Her father never viewed her as his daughter, only an heir. And her mother, while good intentioned, was irrevocably ditsy and absent-minded and never had the time for her. It was for all those reasons that she had decided to go to school out-of-country in the first place: she thought that maybe, just maybe, if she put a whole ocean between herself and her family, people would see her for who she was and not as Hisao Nishimura's daughter. Which is why she made sure that nobody knew she was Hisao Nishimura's daughter.

Much like how Lara made sure nobody knew she was a Croft. Sam's stomach churned guiltily, and she began pounding away on the city sidewalks with renewed vigor. She bobbed and weaved in and out between pedestrians who cried out in surprise as she came barreling by, keeping an eye out for Lara's long, flowing ponytail as she did.

"Hey! Croft!" She gasped out as loudly as she could when she finally saw Lara up ahead of her, "Stop!" Lara didn't stop, however. If anything, her pace quickened so as to get away from Sam. "Damnit, I said stop!" Sam shouted with the little breath she had left in her lungs, finally catching up to Lara and grabbing her by the shoulder to spin her around to talk.

"Get off of me," Lara snarled, batting Sam's hand away, but she had stopped moving for the time being. Sam doubled over to catch her breath, balling her hands up into fists.

"What the hell is your problem?!" She demanded in between breaths, feeling hot sweat trickle down her face and back.

"What's your problem?!" Lara fired back.

"Don't deflect from the question!" Sam spat, finally having taken in enough air to draw herself up to full height.

"I'm not deflecting!" Lara exclaimed angrily, "You're the one who can't mind her own damn business!"

"I'll admit that it was wrong of me to pry into your personal life like that," Sam conceded, wiping the sweat from her brow, "but I'm going to tell you again: it's not for the reason you think it is."

"Oh by all means, I'd love to hear what excuse a spoiled little rich girl like you can conjure up!" Lara snapped. That struck a nerve.

"Wow," Sam began, shaking her head angrily, "yeah, you know what? I may be a fucking spoiled rich girl, but do you know why that is, do you?!" Lara opened her mouth to respond, but Sam held a hand up to silence her, "No, you shut the hell up for a moment. Lemme tell you something, you may think you're all alone in this world, that nobody understands you, but that's not the case. Do you even know who I am?" Again, Lara opened her mouth again to try to reply but Sam stopped her, "No. Of course you don't. Because you're too busy sitting on your high horse and judging people to even have an open conversation with someone. God, you really are a fucking noble."

"How dare yo-!" Lara began.

"Good, you're pissed," Sam interjected, "now you know how it feels to be called a spoiled little rich girl by someone who doesn't even know me." She crossed her arms across her chest, "Lemme ask you something, are you familiar with Nishimura Corporation?"

"Everybody is," Lara retorted coolly, "they're one of the largest media conglomerates in the world."

"Yeah, well guess what? The CEO, Hisao Nishimura? That's my dad."


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