Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The quad was golden.

Not metaphorically. Golden, like someone had spilt sunlight through the autumn trees just to show off. Ginkgo leaves whirled like lazy confetti in the breeze, their fan-shaped edges catching the light just right. The air smelled like espresso, dying grass, and the kind of cinnamon that only appeared when marketing departments smelled blood in the water.

Students sprawled across the lawn in loose clusters, tangled in textbooks they weren’t reading and listening to playlists they’d never admit aloud. The world moved slowly, as if it were suspended in one long, glowing inhale.

Sam’s boots crunched across the walkway, brisk but not desperate. Not technically running.

She wasn’t searching. Obviously, just walking with purpose.

‘Sure.’

She passed the koi pond, side-eyeing a cluster of theatre majors doing yoga with suspicious serenity. Her reflection in the water wobbled like it wasn’t buying it either: red beanie, wind-mussed hair, that same expression she’d been sporting all week: halfway between hopeful puppy and worst lesbian poker face in recorded history.

She paused by the bike rack. Checked her phone. No new messages. She forced her phone back into her pocket and groaned. “Get a grip, Nishimura.”

She detoured toward the anthropology building, but it felt half-hearted. She’d already checked the usual haunts twice, the library mezzanine, the lab with all the weird bones, that shady corner behind the planetarium where Lara sometimes read like she was on the cover of a gothic novel.

A girl by the fountain looked up from her sketchpad. Sam hesitated, then asked, “You seen Lara today?”

The girl blinked, then shook her head. “Nope. Sorry.” Her pen kept moving.

Sam nodded and moved on, her pulse ticking faster than necessary, yet the Daily Lara Hunt continued.

She called it that, now, half in mockery, half in surrender.

Not that it was weird. People often looked for their friends on campus. Lara just happened to be Sam’s friend, who made her stomach feel like a shaken soda can and her brain like static. No big deal. Totally platonic. Except for the part where she could identify Lara’s laugh from across the quad, or once rewound a voicemail just to hear her call her “love” with that velvet-soft accent that did unholy things to Sam’s synapses.

She passed a poster on the bulletin board—'Archaeology Club Mixer: Come Dig With Us!' Lara’s handwriting was unmistakable in the margins. Tiny, neat, and unrepentantly smug:

'The Neolithic period began earlier. Fix your dates.’

Sam smiled despite herself and touched the corner of the flyer like it might buzz. Perhaps this was proof that Lara had been here just minutes ago. Or hours. Or just long enough to haunt the air.

Lara Croft, human anomaly, crush of the century, and world’s worst texter.

Still no reply on her phone.

Not that she expected one. Lara Croft texted like a Victorian ghost: vague, sporadic, occasionally present during full moons, and entirely incapable of using a smartphone like a normal 21st-century human.

Sam once joked that Lara had the social media presence of a haunted painting, and Lara had just nodded thoughtfully, as if agreeing and might list it on her CV.

She reached for the door, and it didn’t budge, so the anthropology department was closed for the day.

Which meant Lara had probably buried herself in some dusty corner again, nose-deep in bones or shipwreck maps or some arcane text in a dead language. Classic Croft. The girl treated ancient civilisations like Tinder profiles. Swipe right for ruins, left for normal human interaction.

Sam sighed, squinting toward the west side of campus. A breeze kicked up, scattering leaves like clues she was too tired to chase.

“She’s probably in a damn crypt,” Sam muttered. “Or a museum. Or fell into a pothole while reading about Roman aqueducts.” She paused and chuckled, “Honestly, it could go either way.”

She slowed her pace. Sat briefly on a low stone wall. Watched a couple giggling on the grass. One leaned in to kiss the other’s cheek, and Sam looked away too quickly, heart thudding like a reprimand.

‘Get a grip. You’re not in high school. You don’t get to swoon just because she called you “love” like some Regency heartthrob trying to ruin your life. You’ve seen her tired, muddy, and stress-eating chocolate raisins at 3 a.m. during finals. You should be over this.’

Okay, but to be fair, she did call her love. And Sam had replayed that cursed voicemail in her brain and on her phone for the last six days.

She slouched, arms crossed in defeat like the wind had finally been knocked out of her sails, or maybe her gay little pirate ship had just run aground on the rocky shores of denial. Either way, she was done.

Time of death: 3:42 p.m.

Cause: British crush with unreadable eyebrows and an emotional availability score of ‘see me after class’.

It shouldn’t be this hard to find the only sexy British student on campus. Not just British, a fucking Lady. As in actual aristocracy. That is, she has a coat of arms, a crumbling ancestral estate, and probably at least three secret passageways that all lead to the library.

Sam blew out a sigh, eyes scanning the central lawn like Lara might materialise out of a leaf pile, trench coat swirling and smirk sharp enough to power the campus grid.

Sam sighed again. She needed coffee.

If she couldn’t find Lara Croft, she could at least caffeinate aggressively enough to forget that she’d spent the better part of her afternoon doing the world's most humiliating scavenger hunt. God, she needed a coffee. A fancy one. With foam art. And at least two different forms of sugar.

She stood up with the kind of dramatic resolve usually reserved for battle scenes and breakups, time to drown her feelings in something overpriced and aggressively seasonal.

Her boots struck the sidewalk with purpose. Not speed-walking, not stomping. Just enough crunch to communicate: Yes, I’m spiralling, but I’m doing it stylishly. She passed a couple holding hands and pretending they weren’t the emotional equivalent of a sledgehammer to the gut. Sam looked away. Rude.

The student union came into view around the next bend, sleek glass, ivy-covered brick, and a suspiciously large crowd bottlenecked near the front entrance. Sam slowed, squinting. There were people gathered in groups. Some gawking. Others looked vaguely betrayed. A few held phones like they were documenting a crime scene.

Sam frowned and pushed gently through the cluster of confused caffeine-deprived souls, ignoring a girl taking a selfie in front of a poster that read ‘A Whole New Brew is Coming’.

The coffee shop had been closed for two weeks. Renovations. Rebranding. A new vibe, according to the passive-aggressive email blast that had somehow bypassed her inbox filters.

It was supposed to reopen today. Sam needed it. Deserved it. She had suffered.

The coffee shop loomed ahead like salvation wrapped in reclaimed wood and roasted beans. Or it should have until she turned the corner and stopped dead.

There was a crowd outside.

Not a line.

A crowd.

Some gawking. Some confused. At least two girls holding iced matchas and filming TikToks with the kind of unhinged delight usually reserved for haunted dolls or edible glitter. A trio of first-year students stood back, openly debating whether they were witnessing performance art or a grand reopening.

She weaved through the knot of underclassmen like a woman on a mission (or a warpath—it was thin ice at this point). She sidestepped past a guy with a skateboard, someone in a cape, and elbowed past someone doing a dramatic spin for their vlog.

Then she saw it.

The new sign.

Slick black font on matte white wood. Minimalist. Pretentious. ‘Brewed Awakening.’

Because, of course. Of course, the one place on campus where she could hide from her own feelings and quietly spiral into a latte had to be reborn with a pun about clarity and caffeine and getting over it.

Brewed Awakening. As if the universe had looked directly at her heartbreak and decided to turn it into a brand strategy.

As in: wake up, sweetie. Time to realise your crush might actually like you back, and now you have to deal with it like a real adult. Sam rolled her eyes so hard she might’ve sprained something.

She pushed through the door like it had insulted her personally. The inside looked… different.

Warm lights. Hipster seating. Plants in places plants didn’t belong. Macramé trailing like cobwebs. The air smelled incredible, with notes of coffee, cinnamon, and a horrifyingly on-brand blend that was probably called Pumpkin Afterlife or Witch’s Oath. Her eyes found the special board, and it was worse, Spiced Equinox.

Whatever. She didn’t care. As she looked around, she sighed, same general layout, but everything was a little too curated now, less cosy. The tables were mismatched in a way that suggested they had matching backstories, but the chalkboard was the worst part. Every drink name was a pun designed to hurt.

Deja-Brew.
Espresso Patronum.
Bean Me Up, Scotty.
Perky Blinders.
Latté Da.

Sam stared, dead inside. “This is a hate crime,” she muttered.

She looked around for something normal. Something human. Someone who could just hand her caffeine and not force her to engage with irony. That’s when she spotted the barista.

Mid-20s. That specific brand of barista expression that said I know your secrets, and I still won’t spell your name right on the cup. He raised an eyebrow. “Rough day?”

Sam blinked. Then gave him the deadest, most haunted look she could muster without openly sobbing. “You have no idea,” she said, stepping up to the counter like she was approaching an altar.

The barista, septum ring, t-shirt that read ‘Death Before Decaf’, forearms inked with vague cosmic symbolism, just nodded with the infinite patience of someone who had seen three crying freshmen and one live ukulele breakup before noon.

“You want something comforting,” he said, already reaching for a cup, “or something that tastes like vengeance and questionable decisions?”

Sam didn’t hesitate. “Triple-shot vanilla latte. Oat milk. And if you have anything that’ll make me forget someone called me ‘love’ in a vaguely aristocratic accent and ruined my entire week, I’ll take that too.”

He didn’t even pause. Just jotted it down like she’d ordered a scone.

“You want that iced?”

“Yes,” she said. “Cold. Like her emotional availability.”

He made a quiet, approving noise. “Damn. That’s the good kind of unrequited.”

Sam gave him a look. “Is there a good kind?”

The barista didn’t answer. Just turned to start the order, moving with the practised rhythm of someone whose soul had long since fused with an espresso machine. After a beat, he said, “You know, you’re not the first tragic lesbian to walk in here looking haunted.”

Sam squinted. “Excuse me?”

He shrugged. “We had a soft launch last week. A couple of days. Invite-only vibe. Still low-key.” He tapped the side of the machine like it had personally survived the trial. “A girl came in. Leather jacket. British Accent. Disaster aura. Left a trail of emotional damage in her wake.”

Sam froze. “…No.”

He shrugged, already moving toward the espresso machine, as if this was just another Thursday, and continued casually. “Honestly, I should start a punch card.”

Sam blinked. “Start a what?”

“Y’know. Fifth hopeless crush gets a free espresso. Or a therapist referral. Depends on the vibe.”

Sam blinked at him, then slowly leaned forward like she was being pulled by the gravitational force of shame and desperate hope. “Tall? Brown hair? Looks like she reads Latin for fun and hasn’t slept since the Bronze Age?”

“That’s the one.” He glanced at her. “Yours?”

Sam sputtered. “She’s not, she’s just…”

The barista laughed. Not mean, just delighted. Like a person who'd seen this kind of chaos one too many times and still couldn't help but find it entertaining. “Name’s Lara, right?” he said casually.

Sam gripped the counter like it might float her to safety. “Oh my god. She came in here?”

“She glided in,” he corrected. “Took one look at the menu and asked for black coffee ‘with no nonsense.’ I think she was judging the plant wall.” Sam made a noise somewhere between a whimper and a laugh. The barista leaned in, voice lowering conspiratorially. “One of my coworkers tried to flirt. Offered her a loyalty card and said something dumb like, ‘You strike me as an espresso girl.’”

Sam clapped a hand over her mouth. “She didn’t.”

“She panicked,” he said, eyes wide, like he was still processing it. “Went pink. Mumbled something about needing to read. Left so fast she almost knocked over the tip jar.”

Sam made a sound like a dying Victorian poet. “Why would you tell me that?”

He handed her the drink, lips twitching. “You looked like you needed hope.”

Hope. Hope? Sam wanted to lie down on the tile floor and become a ghost that haunted exactly one woman for the rest of eternity. She took the cup with trembling hands. The foam had a heart in it… She glared at him; he just smiled as she paid.

The barista gave her a pitying once-over and said, “Good luck,” like she was heading into battle and not back out into a campus littered with fall leaves and unresolved sexual tension.

She nodded, stunned. “Thanks,” she muttered, stepping back like she'd just been knighted, or hexed. Hard to say.

Sam staggered to a table like she’d just survived a romantic ambush, which, honestly, she kind of had. Her coffee trembled slightly in her grip, either from adrenaline or raw lesbian panic, again hard to say.

She slumped into the seat and let out a long, put-upon sigh, the kind that probably startled at least one nearby econ major. The table was small and circular, and was trying very hard to be rustic. It wobbled slightly, like it couldn’t commit to the aesthetic.

Across from her was the plant wall.

It took her a second to realise what she was looking at.

Lush. Green. Cascading vines that framed a soft-glow neon sign reading ‘You’ve Bean Missed’ in cursive so twee it gave her actual chest pain.

She squinted at the foliage.

Something was off.

Sam leaned in slightly, narrowed her eyes, and then, oh.

They were fake—all of them.

Plastic vines. Fabric monstera leaves, little silk ferns tucked into rows like lies.

“Oh my god,” she muttered. “Of course.”

She could see it now. Lara stood right where she was, her eyebrows raised, that tight-lipped expression of academic disdain she usually reserved for historically inaccurate museum exhibits and British tabloids, judging the hell out of the aesthetic, probably whispering inauthentic under her breath like a curse.

Sam huffed a laugh into her drink, then went still.

Because suddenly, she wasn’t looking at the fake plant wall anymore.

She was two years in the past, sitting in a different room, a colder room with fluorescent lights and an actual chalkboard, in her freshman year, the very first week, actually. When Lara, fresh off the plane from Wherever-the-Hellshire, had walked into World History 101 wearing a frayed navy sweater two sizes too big, a lopsided ponytail, and the most innocent expression Sam had ever seen on a nineteen-year-old who looked like she could win a bar fight with one hand tied behind her back. She’d hugged her notebook to her chest like it might try to escape.

She’d sat two rows ahead of Sam.

Sam remembered that. She remembered everything. The way Lara's head tilted slightly as she listened, the soft accent, so gentle and careful, like she was afraid of interrupting the room. And then, when the professor had confidently rattled off some date about Mesopotamian irrigation systems, Lara had raised her hand, quietly, and corrected him.

Just a small thing. A century off. Not even a big moment. But she’d done it with this soft-spoken certainty that didn’t feel like arrogance; it felt like a gift. Like, “Here’s something true. I’d like to share it.”

Sam had sat there and immediately fallen face-first into a crush so intense that it should have come with a health advisory and a complimentary emotional support animal. Heart pounding. Brain static. Some part of her muttered, ‘Oh no. This is going to be a problem.’

And it had been. A beautiful, soul-ruining problem. One that only got worse the more she learned.

Like how Lara kept granola bars in her bag in case someone else forgot to eat. Or how she took photos of weird little bugs on her hikes and sometimes shared them on her barely-used Instagram with captions like ‘Ten legs. Fourteen eyes. Very polite.’

Or how, when she laughed, really laughed, she had snorted. Once.

The woman was a walking rom-com hazard. And now Sam had to live with the knowledge that not only was Lara possibly into girls, but that she glitched when those girls liked her back.

Which… gave her a shot?

A very small, terrifying, real shot.

Chapter Text

The rain started like the universe was trying to rinse the feelings off her.

One drop. Then two. Then the kind of moody autumn drizzle that felt less like weather and more like pathetic fallacy got drunk on pumpkin spice and decided to freelance. She sighed, suddenly hating her English Lit Professor.

Sam hunched deeper into her jacket, cradling her second coffee of the afternoon like it was some kind of holy relic. The cup was still warm, steam curling at the edges, the lid hissing every time she sipped, as if it disapproved of her emotional state.

The first coffee had been for comfort. This one was for survival.

She hadn’t planned on ordering a second, but after the barista handed her that heartbreak-in-a-cup with the pity foam heart and said, “You’re not the first tragic lesbian to walk in here looking haunted,” it was either caffeine or cry in the street.

So here she was. Soggy. Spiralling. And slightly over-caffeinated, in a quad no longer golden.

It had gone from ‘sunlit postcard’ to ‘prestigious liberal arts campus featured in a murder mystery.’ Wet leaves clung to her boots. Trees stood around like disgruntled extras in a Shakespearean tragedy.

Coffee first. Emotions later.

The warmth seeped into her fingers as she sipped again, oat milk, vanilla, and a not-so-subtle aftertaste of ‘you’re in love with your best friend and everyone knows but her’.

She didn’t even care anymore. She was too damp, too gay, and too emotionally winded to keep lying to herself. Lara Croft had become an actual point of conversation among baristas.

She passed the statue in front of the humanities building, the one that looked vaguely like a man trying to remember his PIN. A group of upperclassmen passed by under a single umbrella, laughing about something that sounded like existential dread and midterms.

Up ahead, her dorm loomed like a beacon of salvation. It was ugly in that way; all the campus buildings are ugly, with concrete bricks pretending to be architecture. The entryway buzzed at her as she swiped her ID, and for one glorious second, she imagined what it might be like if Lara were waiting inside.

Just casually. As if it weren’t a crime against logic and emotional equilibrium.

She pictured her on the common room couch, legs tucked up, hoodie sleeves pushed past her elbows, hair up in that barely-contained bun she only ever did when she was reading for fun and not for credit. A book cracked open on one knee. A mug of tea balanced precariously on the armrest. Head tilted, soft eyes catching Sam’s entrance with a small, warm smile. Something about it is both domestic and dangerous. Like a home she wasn’t allowed to live in.

But when Sam opened the door. No Lara.

Just Amanda.

Amanda Fucking Evert.

Draped across the communal couch like a magazine spread nobody asked for, bare feet propped up, crimson toenails gleaming like warning signs, her phone held above her like she was checking her Facebook, or maybe just updating her fans on what leather jacket to thirst after next.

Blonde. Tanned. Effortlessly smug. Tattoos curled up her forearms like whispered dares. A septum ring caught the light just enough to look like a threat. Her tank top was the sort of thing that technically covered her; Sam couldn’t decide if it was a shirt or a loophole.

Amanda didn’t look up. Didn’t need to. She probably knew it was Sam, and her judgment was already locked and loaded. Sam tried not to sigh out loud. It would’ve given too much away: her exhaustion, her heartbreak, the fact that she was, at this point, being emotionally haunted by the absence of a certain Brit.

She closed the door behind her with unnecessary care, like noise might shatter her already fragile gay composure. Gave Amanda a curt nod, barely civil—roommate diplomacy—Sam thought of it as the Cold War protocol. It wouldn’t be long before mutually assured emotional destruction.

Amanda turned her head with glacial slowness, gaze sweeping over Sam like she was a painting that hadn’t quite earned a frame. Her eyes sparkled with disdain. “Well, well,” she purred, all venom-dipped velvet. “Back from your caffeine crusade?”

Sam kicked a wet leaf off her boot with more force than necessary. “Back from hell, actually. They miss you.” Amanda gasped, mockingly, of course. Then stretched.

Stretched like she knew what she was doing. Like her bones were art, and she was bored of being worshipped for it. Arms over her head, tank top rising just enough to flash ink and abs and sin. Her tattoos curved along the edge of her stomach like secret messages Sam had absolutely no business decoding. Her spine arched, her ribs shifted, and the entire room briefly turned into a cathedral of sexual menace.

Sam looked away so hard she almost gave herself whiplash because Amanda was hot.

God, she was hot.

Objectively. Categorically. Hot in a way that felt illegal on a Tuesday afternoon. The kind of hot that made professors stutter and inspired girls in soft sweaters to write slam poetry. The kind of hot that deserved a government-issued warning label and possibly an exorcism.

And Sam? Sam was trying very hard not to combust.

She focused on her coffee. She focused on the weird stain on the ceiling shaped like a rabbit with anger issues. She focused on not thinking about how Amanda’s voice dropped an octave when she was toying with someone.

But it was too late.

Because her brain had entered the Gay Danger Zone and was already replaying the stretch. In slow motion. With musical accompaniment. Possibly saxophone.

She took a huge gulp of her latte, burned her tongue, and welcomed the pain as penance. She wouldn’t look. Couldn’t look. Looking was treason. Treason against Lara.

Sweet, brilliant, emotionally unavailable Lara. Lara, who smelled like old books and the kind of rain that ruins all your plans but somehow makes everything feel more poetic. Lara, who could debate post-colonial theory and call Sam “love” in the same sentence, leaving Sam to disintegrate behind a vending machine emotionally.

Lara, who wasn’t even here, who hadn’t replied to her texts, who was probably holed up in some forgotten corner of the campus cross-referencing obscure Mesopotamian trade routes or handwriting footnotes in Latin just for the fun of it. Ghosting via academia.

And yet, looking at Amanda felt like cheating. Which, by any reasonable standard, was unhinged.

Because Lara wasn’t her girlfriend, they weren’t dating. They hadn’t even kissed or flirted, unless you counted that time Lara hadn’t had coffee and sleep-mumbled ‘love’ during a study session and Sam had immediately experienced a full-body gay reboot like someone had poured a whole bottle of pinot noir directly into her nervous system, but still.

Glancing at Amanda, with her smug tank top and emotionally weaponised collarbones, felt like infidelity, like Sam had accidentally broken a sacred queer pact with the universe. And the realisation hit like a U-Haul full of catastrophic yearning.

She blinked down at her latte. It stared back at her. Judging her with its sad little foam swirl. She was being emotionally outmanoeuvred by milk.

‘Okay. Okay, no. You’re not cheating,’ she thought, ‘You’re just… aggressively loyal to a girl who doesn’t know you’re in love with her. That’s fine. That’s very normal. People do that. All the time. It’s like classic literature. Shakespeare. Sad Tumblr posts. Entire French films.’

She took a massive gulp of her latte, hoping the oat milk could clear her spiralling brain.

‘You love her. Like, real love. Not just the casual, ‘my best friend is cute and emotionally repressed’ kind. This is the already-chosen-wedding-song, you-researched-visa-options, tell-the-grandparents kind. This is catastrophic.’

She clutched the cup like it could anchor her to reality. It did not. “Oh god,” she whispered. “Am I mentally engaged to Lara Croft?”

Her brain, traitor that it was, immediately conjured the image: Lara in a ridiculous black velvet suit, hair braided with silver pins, standing in the library of some cursed ancestral estate. At the same time, Sam vowed eternal love and tried not to pass out from the sheer murderous intensity of her eye contact, saying “I do” with that unbearable British softness that made vowels sound like secrets.

Sam closed her eyes. Wanted to scream. Or cry. Or combust.

‘She’s got a coat of arms, ’ her brain whispered. ‘You could be Lady Samantha Nishimura-Croft. ’

Sam made a strangled sound, somewhere between a whimper and a horror-movie violin stab. Then she thunked her head gently, rhythmically, against the nearest doorframe like she could knock the thought loose.

Stop it. Focus.

She yanked her gaze back to the ceiling. That weird stain shaped like the vaguely aggressive rabbit. That would do. Think about the rabbit. Not about how Lara once bandaged a cut on her hand like it was the most important thing in the world, or how she always carried granola bars ‘just in case,’ and once tucked one into Sam’s hoodie pocket during finals like she was slipping her a love note. Not how her laugh was so rare and perfect that Sam had started logging them in her mental diary like a gremlin hoarding treasure.

Nope.

Nope, nope, nope.

This was Amanda’s fault—all of it.

With her perfect teeth and her arms like sculpted sin and that infuriating ‘I might steal your girl and set something on fire just to make a point’ energy. She was a walking bisexual crisis. A siren in sweatpants.

She didn’t just exist; she weaponised her hotness. With precision. With intent. With a strategic awareness that suggested she’d minored in Chaos Theory and majored in Smirking. She was basically a Bond villain. If Bond villains had cheekbones that could cut glass.

Sam wasn’t looking at her. She wasn’t. Absolutely not.

But she knew Amanda was leaning on something. Probably a doorframe. Or the sheer gravitational pull of her own ego. A glance, no, just the sat on the couch, yet she had that posture, the lazy kind of confidence that said ‘I know I’m being watched, and I’ve already decided how this ends.’

Sam was not okay with it because her thoughts were turning against her. “You’re not supposed to notice her arms,” she hissed internally. “That’s betrayal. That’s betrayal with biceps.”

But her brain, traitorous, as always, supplied the image anyway: Amanda at last semester’s pool party. Water sliding off her inked shoulders. Bikini strap clinging to dear life. Laughing like sin incarnate as Lara splashed her, smirking like they shared a secret.

A private moment. One Sam hadn’t been invited into. Just… witnessed like a third-wheel ghost at her own emotional haunting. She had spent the rest of that party internally screaming and eating exactly eight ice creams in rapid succession, trying to convince herself she wasn’t having an attraction-based stroke.

And now?

Now she was here again. Same girl. Same smirk. Same internal crisis, only soggier and more academically doomed. Trapped in a dorm room with her most dangerous temptation and her own spiralling imagination.

“Okay,” she whispered to herself. “We’ve been here before. You are strong. You are rational. You are a lesbian with boundaries.”

Amanda shifted. Just slightly. A flick of her ankle. The slow, predatory uncrossing of legs. It shouldn’t have had the audacity to look that intentional.

Sam made the tactical error of glancing.

Her gaze collided directly with the curve of Amanda’s hip, where the hem of her godforsaken demon tank top had ridden up.

Sin. Just, pure, unfiltered sin.

And her face. God, her face must have been doing something.

Something tragic. Something embarrassing. Something that screamed, ‘I am currently in the middle of an emotional meltdown’.

Because Amanda looked over, her brows arched. She didn’t smirk. Not right away. Amanda was too good at this. She let the silence stretch just enough to get awkward. Let it crackle. Let Sam stew in it, right before the moment the heat finally turned lethal.

Then Amanda moved.

Shifted her weight, leaned casually against the back of the couch like it was a throne, and she was the crowned queen of emotional ruin—one-toned arm draped along the cushion. Chin tilted, like she was about to offer a lazy compliment or a loaded challenge.

Her voice dropped, casual and cruel, velvet dipped in acid. “You know she sleeps in my shirts sometimes, right?”

Sam blinked. Once. Twice. Her ears rang like someone had snapped a rubber band against her soul. Amanda didn’t wait. Oh no, she leaned in, just a little, just enough to feel too close, like she was about to whisper a spell or a warning.

“Not that she means anything by it,” she added, soft as sin. “Lara’s like that. Doesn’t realise how intimate it is. She borrows things. Leaves them rumpled. Doesn’t think twice. It’s… endearing, isn’t it?”

The word wrapped itself around Sam’s throat. Endearing. Her grip on the coffee cup tightened so hard the lid gave a faint crack. Her stomach hollowed out like it was prepping for an emotional implosion.

Amanda smiled slowly and razor-sharply. “She wears the black one with the faded Queen logo,” Amanda said, voice light, like she was reminiscing. “That old thing. She gets this sleepy look when she pulls it on. All soft eyes and quiet sighs as she reads her books. Like she feels—” A pause. Intentional. Surgical. “Safe.”

She let it hover. Let it land.

‘Safe.’

Amanda didn’t need to say the rest.

‘With me.’

It was implied. Held behind her teeth and pressed between the syllables like a knife hidden in silk. Sam didn’t breathe. Couldn’t. Because her lungs were too busy knotting themselves into rage and grief and that awful, quiet kind of jealousy that you’re not allowed to say out loud, not when it’s technically not your girl.

But. She was.

Lara wore Amanda’s shirt. And she felt safe. Sam blinked again. Tried to reboot her brain. Her voice, when it came, cracked. “…What?”

Amanda tilted her head, all faux innocence, like she hadn’t just carpet-bombed the emotional landscape. “What?” she echoed, blinking slowly.

Sam swallowed. “You said—she… she sleeps in your shirt?”

Amanda gave a half-shrug, as if the whole thing were barely worth clarifying. “Sometimes. When she sleeps in my room. If she’s tired or forgets her own night clothes. It’s not a big deal.”

Not a big deal. Each room has two bunks, yet a single assignment, which made studying easier, or so the faculty said. Sam often stayed in Miras' room, once in Lara's. Not a big deal.

Yet, Sam wanted to scream. Or laugh. Or throw her latte across the room and watch it splatter like her last shreds of composure. “But,” she said, clinging to the word like a life raft. “You’re not like...”

Amanda’s mouth twitched. Just enough to register as a smile. “Oh, Sam.” The way she said her name was like a soft little tragedy. “We’re not anything,” she said breezily. “Not officially. She’s… complicated.”

The pause that followed was deliberate. Measured.

“Besides,” Amanda added, gaze drifting lazily back to her phone, “you know how she is. Lara doesn’t need labels. She needs comfort. Familiarity. Someone who gets her silences.” Then she looked back at Sam. Met her eyes. “Someone who’s there.”

It landed like a slap. Not loud, but sharp. True enough to hurt.

Sam stood frozen, coffee cup clenched, throat closed, heart spiralling into that low, awful ache that comes with knowing you're not the person someone turns to, even if you’d give anything to be.

Because she knew that shirt, she’d seen it once. In the laundry basket. Folded with care and smelling faintly like sandalwood, jasmine and rain. She’d assumed it was Lara’s, of course, she had. That soft black Queen shirt with the cracked print and worn collar? It felt so her. A little vintage. A little tragic. A quiet statement of rebellion.

Her brain rejected it like a virus. It couldn’t be Amanda’s shirt.

Lara chose it. She reached for it when she was tired, when she needed something to cling to in the quiet. Wore it in that too-small twin bed across the hall, where she disappeared for days, into silence and unread messages, the emotional bunker she retreated to when the world felt too loud.

Was she wearing it now?

That thought hit, sharp—a clean strike to the ribs.

Safe. Amanda had said it like a mercy. Soft. Measured. Weaponized. Not just twisting the knife, but petting it. It was as if she were soothing the wound while deepening it.

Sam’s stomach flipped. Coiled in on itself.

Because she could see it. Too easily. Lara in that faded black shirt, limbs folded beneath her, bare legs tangled in old blankets, hair pulled up in that messy twist she only wore when she was too tired to do anything with those beautiful brunette locks. Book in her lap. That sleepy, vulnerable look Amanda had described so casually, so cruelly.

And in her hand. The mug. Sam’s mug.

The chipped white one with the faded compass printed on the side, the one that looked like it had sailed through a dozen thrift stores before ending up next to a Garfield thermos and a shot glass shaped like a cowboy boot.

Sam had seen it. Picked it up without thinking. Cheap ceramic. Weathered. Slightly nautical. It had felt… right. Like Lara. Like sea-salt mysteries and pages torn from forgotten journals. Like quiet strength disguised as chaos.

She hadn’t meant to give it to her. Not really.

It had just… shown up in the kitchen one day. Part of the shared mug shelf. Unspoken.

Lara started using it. Sam never said a word.

Because claiming it would’ve ruined it. Turned something soft into something loud. Something that exposed how Sam had stood there in that thrift store, holding a dumb, chipped mug and thinking: ‘She’d like this. I want her to have something she’d like. I want to be the reason she has it.’

So she let it go.

Let Lara adopt it. Let her warm her hands on it during late nights and foggy mornings, let her drink peppermint tea out of it barefoot and bleary-eyed and beautiful. Let her leave it half-full on the counter, with that faint waxy imprint from her chapstick—peppermint, always peppermint.

That mug had been Sam’s love letter.

Unwritten. Unacknowledged. And now, even that felt stolen. Amanda had the shirt. The smirks. The goddamn battlefield posture. And now it felt like she had the mug, too.

Amanda probably didn’t even know about the mug. Didn’t need to. She didn’t operate in gestures. Didn’t speak in subtleties. Amanda was all heat and momentum and boundary-pushing glances. She wasn’t the type to leave tokens behind and hope they meant something. She didn’t buy thrifted mugs and pray someone noticed. Amanda would just pour herself a glass of wine, lean against a doorframe like a femme fatale with tenure, and say, ‘You’re staying in my bed tonight or not?’

And somehow, Lara hadn’t run from that. Hadn’t stiffened. Hadn’t given one of her clipped, dignified ‘that’s not appropriate’ speeches. Hadn’t closed the door.

That part looped in Sam’s brain like a skipped record. She didn’t close the door. She let Amanda in, of all people. She wanted to believe there was a reason—a context. Something was buried beneath all of Lara’s layered restraint and studied silences.

Because—because the shirt didn’t smell like Amanda, and that mattered.

It smelled like Lara. That impossibly intoxicating blend: sandalwood, jasmine and rain and—God help her—peppermint. That damn Chapstick. Her shampoo. Her. Not Amanda’s dizzying perfume, all sex and chemical warfare.

So maybe the shirt wasn’t a trophy. Maybe it wasn’t a claim.

Maybe it was just something Lara kept, like the mug. Like the pencil Sam had lent her last semester that never came back. Like the playlist she made once, ‘by accident’, that Lara still listened to during late-night study sessions.

Little things. Quiet things. Things Sam had given her—on purpose or by accident or by quiet, lovesick default.

Maybe the shirt wasn’t a declaration. Maybe it was just… comfort. A soft thing that made her feel safe. An orphaned piece of cotton folded into a drawer the same way Sam had folded herself into Lara’s orbit, gently, constantly, never asking to be noticed, just hoping to be held.

That had to mean something. That had to count.

She just had to hold onto that. To the scent. The memory. The mug. The maybe.

She just— “You’re spiralling,” Amanda said. Flat. Observational. Not unkind. Just accurate.

Sam flinched, a truth she wasn’t ready to hear. “I’m not,” she said too quickly.

Amanda arched a brow. “You’re definitely spiralling.”

“I’m fine,” Sam lied, voice cracking like ice.

Amanda gave her a once-over. Sipped from her water bottle like she had all the time in the world. Then: “You always get this look.”

“What look?” Sam snapped, too defensive to be convincing.

Amanda’s lips twitched. “Like you’re trying to win a relationship no one knows you’re in.”

Sam felt her face heat. “I’m not, there wasn’t even a…”

“Exactly,” Amanda said, voice soft, smug. Like a cat finding a mouse. “But you still lost.”

That landed. Sam sucked in a breath and looked down at her drink. Her throat burned. She wanted to argue. Say something sharp. Anything. But her heart was loud in her ears, and all she could think was: It smelled like Lara, as if it were comfort.

“I’m fine,” she said, but it came out shaky, thin and splintering at the edges.

Amanda made a sound. Not quite a laugh, more like amusement dulled by pity. “You’re about as fine as a wet cat in a thunderstorm.”

Sam glanced at her slowly, coffee still clutched like a talisman. “What do you want, Amanda?”

Amanda didn’t look smug now. She looked dangerous, like a storm rolling in on stilettos. She crossed her arms, head tilting ever so slightly, just enough to look down on Sam without effort. “I want you to understand something,” she said, calm as a scalpel. “Lara’s mine.”

Sam blinked. “What?” It slipped out, startled and too soft.

Amanda didn’t flinch. Didn’t gloat. Didn’t soften. “I’m not playing anymore,” she said. “This isn’t cute. You keep fumbling around, but she's not going to realise she’s in love with you, she’s too oblivious for that.” She stepped closer. Sam didn’t back up, but her body locked. Her pulse jumped, trapped between her ribs and her throat. Amanda’s voice was even now. Clean. Deadly. “I’ve been here when she forgets to eat. When she disappears into herself. When she won’t talk and just needs someone to sit beside her, anyway. I show up. You don’t.”

Sam’s breath caught. “That doesn’t mean…” she tried, but Amanda cut her off with a single look. Sharp. Dismissive.

“You think love is about who wants it the most? Who sighs the loudest? Who can look the most tragically in love over a cup of overpriced coffee?”

Sam recoiled like the air itself had turned on her.

“I’ve shown her,” Amanda said, quieter now. “With actions. With presence. I didn’t wait for her to figure me out like one of her puzzles. I made it easy to stay.” She tilted her head, blonde hair sliding over her shoulder, tattoos gleaming like armour in the flickering overhead light. “And she didn’t stop me.”

Sam couldn’t speak. Couldn’t breathe right. Her chest felt too full and too hollow at once. Her brain flooded with static and all the wrong words: No. Please. You’re wrong. You’re right. She’s not yours.

Amanda turned. Like the conversation was over. Like the war had already been won.

She walked to her door. 404. Paused, hand on the knob. “Tell yourself whatever you need to sleep, Sam,” she said, not looking back. “But when she wakes up scared at 3 a.m., she doesn’t come to you.”

Click.

The door shut behind her with a finality that felt like a verdict.

And then Sam was alone.

Just her. A cold cup of coffee. And the unbearable gravity of every word she’d never said, every feeling she’d folded up and hidden in thrift store mugs, playlists and granola bars.

Every little thing she thought might one day matter.

Every soft, quiet maybe.

Dissolving into nothing.

Chapter Text

The hallway was too quiet in that specific way dorms get after midnight, like the walls were holding their breath. Sam padded softly along the linoleum, bunny slippers whispering against the floor, open robe flapping behind her like a defeated superhero cape. She wasn't sure what she was looking for.

Juice, maybe. Closure, possibly. A goddamn reason not to scream into a pillow? Definitely.

She rubbed at her eyes, smudged mascara coming away like the remnants of a bad decision. Sleep hadn’t come. Not really. Not after that conversation. Amanda’s words were still echoing in her skull like a cursed ringtone: ‘She’s mine.’ Like Lara was a trophy. Sam was just a background character in Amanda's origin story as a Bond villain.

“Shut up,” she whispered to herself again, for what felt like the eighth time that hour.

Her hand hovered over the common room door, closed on evenings she had no idea why, before pushing it open.

It creaked. Of course, it creaked.

Sam stepped inside, expecting empty couches and the soft hum of a vending machine. What she got instead was the smell of Earl Grey and potential drama.

Amanda stood at the kitchenette, bathed in the sickly fluorescent light, her back to Sam. She wore loose joggers and yet another designer tank top that probably cost more than Sam’s rent. Her hair was up in a casual bun that had no business being that stylish, and next to her were two mugs, one black as hell and the other so heartbreakingly familiar that Sam nearly tripped over her own damn feet.

The compass mug. Lara’s mug.

The one with the chipped handle and the stupid little faded cardinal points that always made Sam think of faraway places and Lara’s stupid, perfect mouth sipping tea in a way that wasn’t even seductive but melted Sam's heart all the same.

Sam didn’t speak. Just stared.

Amanda was… making tea.

Allegedly.

She’d filled the mugs with boiling water and now the teabags were floating on top like soggy corpses. There was no milk. Just the mechanical clink of a spoon as she stirred with the casual disdain of someone committing a war crime and calling it a cultural exchange.

Amanda didn’t look up. Didn’t acknowledge her audience. She simply hummed softly under her breath, some indie track Sam didn’t recognise but immediately hated.

She should say something. Anything. But instead, she just stood there, halfway to the fridge, watching this Tea Atrocity unfold with the horrified fascination of someone witnessing a slow-motion car crash destroying an entire monarchy’s worth of etiquette.

And then, because the universe had a sick sense of timing.

Lara walked in.

Barefoot. Sleepy-eyed. And wearing the shirt.

The one Sam had bought her for her birthday last year as a joke. It said: ‘Shhh... I’m plotting a fictional character’s demise. Probably yours.’ in curly font over a stack of books.

Sam had picked it out on impulse at a bookstore clearance rack. Lara had laughed when she opened it —like, actually laughed, snorted even —and swore it was too big but too soft not to sleep in. But Sam hadn’t seen her wear it since.

And fuck, she looked so good in it. The hem hit just above her knees; her hair was a messy halo of curls, half-tamed by sleep, and she blinked at the scene in front of her with a dazed confusion that quickly, tragically, turned into horror.

“Oh no,” Lara croaked, voice hoarse from sleep, staring at Amanda’s tea crimes like she’d just witnessed the burning of the Library of Alexandria.

Amanda turned with a smile too sweet to be real. “I made you tea, babe.”

Sam didn’t breathe as Lara stared into the mug like it might bite her. The room fell quiet as Sam watched everything unfold in what felt like slow motion.

Amanda’s smile. Lara’s grimace. The T-shirt. The goddamn mug.

It was a silent tableau of disaster. A still life titled: ‘This Is Fine Except Nothing Is Fine and Also I'm Dying Inside.’

Lara blinked blearily at the mugs, then at Amanda, then back down at what should have been a sacred ritual and was instead… a steeped travesty.

“Oh no,” she said again, stepping forward like a museum curator about to scold a tourist for touching the exhibits. “Amanda. What is this?”

Amanda raised an eyebrow, all nonchalance and smugness. “Tea,” she said, as if that weren’t objectively false.

Lara made a noise. Not quite a sigh. Not quite a groan. It was the noise of a nation’s collective disappointment distilled into a single breath. Sam, still frozen near the fridge like a bunny-slippered ghost of gay heartbreak, covered her mouth.

Lara pinched the teabag from the compass mug, dangling it between two fingers like it offended her on a spiritual level. “You put the water in first?”

Amanda blinked. “Yeah?”

“No milk?” Lara asked, voice rising an octave.

Amanda shrugged. “Didn’t think you’d want any. It’s black tea.”

“It’s Earl Grey,” Lara said, scandalised, like Amanda had just used the Magna Carta to swat a fly. “It’s a bergamot blend. It needs balance. You’ve absolutely murdered it.”

Sam was having trouble breathing. Her brain short-circuited at ‘bergamot blend.’ She wasn’t sure if she wanted to kiss Lara or fall to her knees in awe. Probably both.

Amanda raised both eyebrows now, amused. “Didn’t realise I needed a degree in tea to make you a cup.”

“You don’t need a degree,” Lara huffed, already turning toward the sink. “You just need basic decency and the ability to follow centuries of well-established cultural practice. It's literally on the tin, Amanda.” Lara tapped the neatly handwritten note that she had supplied for the dorm.

Sam watched her pour both mugs down the drain with the precision of someone conducting a ritual cleansing.

“I mean, really,” Lara continued, putting the compass mug down like she was apologising to it. “You steep it after you add the bag, two to three minutes tops, and never squeeze the leaves. That’s how you get bitterness. Which…” she shot Amanda a glance “…might be thematic in your case, but is entirely unnecessary in the cup.”

Amanda’s smirk twitched. “Wow, okay. Didn’t know I was signing up for the Crown-approved tutorial.”

“Perhaps if more people paid attention in these tutorials, we wouldn’t be having this discussion every time someone tries to ‘brew’ something in this kitchen,” Lara muttered, reaching for the kettle like it had personally wronged her.

Sam Was Dying.

Because Lara’s voice was still hoarse from sleep, she had bedhead, and that shirt, that stupid shirt, was slipping off one shoulder in a way that had no business being legal. She looked like an extremely hot librarian who had just woken up from a nap and decided to annihilate someone verbally.

Sam had somehow moved to the fridge without being noticed and was gripping the handle as if it were the only thing tethering her to this mortal realm. Her thoughts were not safe for public consumption. ‘Why is this sexy? It’s tea. She’s making tea. This should not be arousing.’

Except it was. Because Lara was passionate, she was rarely authoritative. She was quietly indignant on behalf of leaves in hot water. And Sam had a type, apparently, and it was ‘sleepy British disaster women who get hot under the collar about beverage preparation.’

Lara poured the water, not into the compass mug, not even into a cup at all, but into the ceramic teapot she’d bought two days after moving in. The one with the tiny floral etching around the rim and the lid that always clicked just a little when she set it down.

Sam blinked at it like she was seeing it for the first time.

She’d watched Lara carry that teapot back from the student co-op, hadn’t she? Lara had clutched it like treasure, explaining that a proper teapot was essential because, and she’d said this without irony, ‘bags just aren’t the same.’

Now, Lara swirled the hot water inside, just a little, enough to warm the porcelain. She tilted it gently in a slow, careful circle, her wrist moving with a grace that should not have been this hypnotic, and then poured the water away into the sink.

Sam felt her soul leave her body again. Amanda just leaned back on the counter like she was watching a cooking show she didn’t care about.

“First,” Lara began, voice soft but clipped, like this was a lab demonstration and Amanda had just insulted the entire British Empire, “you preheat the teapot. Swirl the hot water inside to warm the ceramic. Then pour it out. Otherwise, the leaves are shocked by the temperature drop and the infusion is… compromised.”

Compromised. Like this was a hostage situation. Sam was sweating.

Lara reached for a tin that, Sam realised with a start, she’d given her for her birthday. Earl Grey loose leaf. Imported. Lara had smiled so softly when she opened it, saying, ‘You remembered my favourite.’

Of course, Sam had remembered. It had nearly killed her, that smile, and now Lara measured it into the pot with the kind of precision usually reserved for bomb defusal.

“You never use bags for this,” she added, glancing at Amanda with the kind of look one might use for someone who thinks Taco Bell is authentic Mexican cuisine. “They’re dust. Crumbs. You lose the oils, the nuance. It’s a shadow of the flavour you’re meant to get.” Sam smirked as Lara glared at the offending box of teabags next to the sugar.

Amanda didn’t respond, but her eyebrow raised half a millimetre, whether in challenge or boredom, Sam couldn’t tell. She wasn’t even looking at Amanda anymore. Her entire being was focused on Lara Croft’s tea tutorial, which was somehow the most erotic thing she'd ever witnessed.

Lara continued, unbothered. “You pour the hot water directly over the leaves,” she said, doing just that, her wrist tilting in a perfect, fluid arc. “Let them steep. Two to five minutes. I prefer closer to four… less bite, more depth.”

Sam made a tiny noise. She didn’t mean to. It escaped—just a little breathless gasp, like her soul had hiccupped. Lara didn’t seem to hear it. Amanda definitely did.

Lara placed the lid back on the pot with reverence and stepped back, arms crossing loosely as she waited.

“This pot has a built-in strainer,” she said casually. “So you can pour directly into the cup. No need to decant. It’s all clean. Efficient.”

Efficient.

Sam was going to die. She was going to drop dead in the common room, in her bunny slippers and dressing gown, her quest for juice forgotten, because Lara Croft was making tea with such gentle precision and with an authority that she rarely expressed, and it did things to Sam; she had to bite her lip to not whimper at her intrusive thoughts.

The worst part?

She'd done this before—a lot. The rhythm, the flow, the control, it wasn’t her first time, and God help Sam, she’d missed it, this domestic ritual of Lara’s, this slow, quiet intimacy she performed for herself and those she cared for.

“Jesus, Croft,” Amanda finally muttered. “It’s tea. Not a blood rite.”

Lara turned, face neutral, but her eyes… oh, her eyes flashed. “That’s where you’re mistaken,” she said softly.

And that was it. That was the moment Sam decided she needed to insert herself into the fridge to survive.

With all the grace of a woman trying very hard not to combust in front of two people who definitely wouldn’t let her live it down, she stepped backwards, opened the fridge door, and leaned into it like she was searching for juice but really just needed cold air to hit her face immediately.

The chill hit her skin, and her eyes fluttered shut. Fuck. What the hell was happening to her?

Lara Croft, nerdy, noble, obliviously dangerous, had just made a cup of tea so sensually competent it rewired Sam’s entire nervous system. Like, what was that? The whisper of her voice? The hand movements? The smug little comment about pre-heating the teapot like she was recounting ancient knowledge passed down in a secret coven?

Why was that sexy? No, scratch that. That was a stupid question.

Lara was sexy. Period.

She was sexy waking up. Or when in cargo pants. When correcting professors about Sumerian burial rites. She was sexy when she was confused. When she tripped over her own boots, she was even sexy when she was half-asleep and full-named Sam, then immediately faceplanted into a pile of notes about ancient Roman sewage systems.

Sam clutched the juice carton as if it were the Holy Grail. What was this feeling? This slow, curling heat in her chest? Her stomach? Her spine?

It wasn’t just that Lara was hot.

It was that she was unapologetically competent. Unbothered. Graceful. Sharp. Like every time she moved, she knew exactly what she was doing, even if she didn’t always know what it meant to someone watching.

Someone like Sam, who was currently experiencing a queer awakening so intense it might qualify as a religious vision. She peeked back over the fridge door.

Lara stood with the compass mug in both hands, sipping it with a soft hum of satisfaction. Her eyes were closed. Her expression was relaxed. There was a smear of something on her cheek—probably sleep—or maybe powdered sugar from the cookie she’d nibbled earlier, and Sam wanted to die.

Not metaphorically. Not dramatically. Literally. Just drop dead. Right there on the common room floor, juice box still in hand, obituary reading: ‘Local queer disaster dies from hot British girl doing absolutely nothing.’ She sighed and grabbed a glass.

Lara opened her eyes and turned toward Amanda, gesturing subtly to the black mug still sitting on the counter. “Go on then,” she said, tone casual but distinctly expectant. “Try it. That’s how it’s meant to taste.”

Sam, meanwhile, was pouring her juice as if it were rocket fuel. Slowly. Carefully. Distractedly. Her brain was absolutely not on juice. Or cups. Or gravity. It was somewhere else entirely.

Somewhere very dark.

‘Go on then.’ The way Lara had said it, low, warm, faintly bossy, made Sam’s stomach do a somersault. Jesus. Was that her voice? Her real voice? Not the public one. Not the clipped, careful, library-approved version. This was the Lara that whispered commands at 2 a.m. while mapping ruins or reading inscriptions aloud to herself in her room with the door cracked open.

And for a split second, Sam had a thought. A terrible, glorious, earth-shattering thought.

What if Lara said that to her?

Go on then.
Take it off.
Touch me.
Lie back.
Let me.

Sam nearly dropped the juice. Would she be the top?

Oh God. Oh God. She would. She absolutely would. And Sam would let her. Would fall apart with just a word—probably something like “stay,” or “good girl,” or…

NOPE. SHUT IT DOWN.

Abort. Evacuate. Sound the alarms. Her brain was on fire; she gulped down some juice and immediately choked on it.

“Are you alright?” Lara asked, tilting her head in genuine concern.

Sam nodded violently, tears welling in her eyes as she coughed. “Yup. Fine. Just… vitamin C ambush. All good.”

Amanda snorted into her mug. And then, because the universe delights in cruelty, she sipped the tea. Took a whole, dramatic mouthful. Swallowed. Let the silence hang. Then said, dry as a bone, “Tastes like tea.”

Sam froze.

Lara… didn’t. She blinked once. Very slowly. Like her soul was rebooting.

Then she looked down into her mug, not at Amanda, not at Sam, just at the liquid inside, as if it had personally betrayed her. Her posture didn’t shift much, but something in her shoulders sank. Not visibly. Like a ship listing just slightly, unnoticed by anyone who didn’t know it well.

And Sam? Sam saw it. Felt it. Something cracked.

It wasn’t dramatic. Lara didn’t cry. She didn’t flinch. She just… absorbed it. Like someone had broken something delicate in her hands and she had to pretend it wasn’t important.

“Oh,” Lara said quietly—just that.

Sam gripped the edge of the counter. Her chest ached.

Because that tea, that effort, that ritual, that whole quiet display of care and heritage and personal meaning, it had mattered to Lara. She’d made it like a gift. Like a piece of herself in ceramic and steam. And Amanda had reduced it.

‘Tastes like tea.’

Like it was nothing, even if she didn’t like it, there were better ways to say it.

Sam wanted to scream. Or punch something. Or grab Lara’s hands and say ‘It’s not just tea, you absolute goddess, it’s you, it’s your history, your heart, your fucking fingerprints in every step…’

But Lara was already retreating.

Not dramatically. Not angrily. Just quietly. The way people leave when they’re used to being misunderstood. She rinsed her mug, carefully placed it upside down on the drying rack like it deserved better than the evening it had been subjected to, and murmured something so faint Sam couldn’t catch it.

No glance at Amanda. No glance at Sam.

Just bare footfalls across the floor, the soft rustle of her oversized sleep shirt, and then the quiet sound of door 413 clicking shut behind her.

Sam stood there, juice in hand, heart in throat. The air had gone thick. The fluorescent lights suddenly felt too bright. The moment hung between her and Amanda like secondhand smoke.

She turned slowly. Amanda was leaning against the counter again, arms crossed now, expression unreadable.

Sam stared at her, waiting. Say it. Apologise. Don’t deflect. Pretend it mattered. ‘Give me a reason not to hate you right now.’

Amanda looked right at her and, of course, smirked. “She takes it so seriously,” Amanda said, shrugging like she hadn’t just stomped on something sacred. “It’s just a drink.”

Sam blinked. Once. Twice. And then she turned fully, slowly, as if her bones were made of glass, trying not to shatter.

“It’s not just a drink,” she said. Quiet. Low. Dangerous.

Amanda tilted her head, playing innocent. “Come on. It’s tea. Leaves. Water. You steep it, you sip it, you move on.”

Sam stepped forward once. Her juice sloshed slightly in the glass, forgotten in her hand. “What you just reduced to ‘tastes like tea’? That’s her favourite. The one she drinks every time she actually lets herself unwind, which, by the way, is rare as hell. She doesn’t do casual comfort. She doesn’t have many soft rituals. But that? That’s one of them.”

Amanda’s expression flickered, just a little. The corner of her mouth twitched. Sam saw it. Pressed forward.

“The teapot? The loose leaf blend?” she said, practically hissing now, keeping her voice low like it would carry weight if she didn't have to shout. “She learned how to make it from her father, she told me once, it reminded her of when she was with him. It’s not tea, Amanda. It’s memory. It’s her. It’s the one piece of home she brings with her, no matter where she goes, and you just…”

She trailed off, breath hitching. Amanda’s gaze sharpened. “I didn’t know that.”

“Didn’t care enough to ask,” Sam snapped. Amanda’s jaw twitched. Sam took a step back. “She’s serious about things in quiet ways,” she said, voice softening, but no less sure. “You either learn to see that, or you don’t deserve to be near her.”

She didn’t wait for a reply.

Sam turned, bunny slippers brushing the tile, and walked down the hall. She stopped in front of her door. Then looked across the hall. 413, Lara’s door. Closed. Quiet. A soft line of light underneath.

Sam stood there a moment, caught between the weight of everything she didn’t say and everything Amanda never understood.

The light under Lara's door went out.