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"Just go see a damn masseuse", Sam had said. "I'll even pay." I scoffed at her. She knew I wouldn't accept that.

"Yes, that's very dear of you, but I'm not incapable."

"No, you're just working yourself to death and scraping by because you're too proud to do anything else." I shot her a glare. She just shrugged. "C'mon sweetie, can't I just be nice to you?" I was going to tell her "no", and sternly, but when I opened my mouth she leaned forward and kissed me. It was brief but sweet, calming me immediately. "Yes, yes I can", she said and began thumbing through her phone. "Will it make you feel better if I do a little bargain hunting?" I sighed into her hair, kissed the side of her head, and nodded. I wanted to resent her for winning, again. Wanted to.

"I still wish you wouldn't squander every dime you possibly can on my behalf. The pain is hardly unbearable." I felt her hands grip my shirt at my sides.

"But it is pain, and you're my Lara, so that's a no-no. Stop being so serious."

"If I'm not serious then neither of us will be." That earned me a light slap on the shoulder and a smile.

"That's better", she said.

"I'll make it up to you, I promise", I told her without thinking. When her smile spread into a grin I rolled my eyes.

"Oh, I kn-"

"Yes, well. Don't spend too much." I remembered with a shudder the last time Sam spent an exorbitant sum of money on me that I had "made up" to her. I haven't been able to look at the black leather boots in my closet the same way since. The skirt "got lost in the wash". She'd torn the fishnets herself, so I needn't have made an excuse to throw them away. She seemed to remember as well because she gave me a wink.

"All right, all right", she said, and gave me another peck on my cheek. She looked down at her phone and continued to flip through it for a moment before pausing. She looked me in the eye and said, entirely seriously, "I could try it myself, you know? Massage seems like it'd be fun to learn." I was not in the mood. It wasn't that I disagreed or that it sounded unpleasant. It was a lovely idea, but a broken spring board can do a real number on one's back, and a sore back has a way of ruining good fun.

"Another time", I sat down, wincing at the painful spasm my lower back muscles gave. Sam gave me a sympathetic pout before looking at something she appeared to have found on her search.

I sat in silence while Sam dialed a number and struck up a discussion with the clerk at whatever office she'd called. Her voice raised just a bit in tone as she seemed to accept an appointment with someone named Mary. A telltale sign things were going well. I began to worry. She pulled the phone from her ear, and pressed her thumb to the little red icon to end the call.

"There's an opening in an hour, and now you're booked for it." I blinked at her. "Come on, I'll drive you."

"That won't be necessary, love. I can drive myself I promise." I tried to stand up but my back screamed in protest. I froze in mid-air, unable to move without further agitating my stiff muscles.

"Oh, really?" She took a knee in front of me and guided my arm across her shoulder with sympathy in her eyes. "Here…" I accepted her help and she guided me to the couch, lying me face-down before standing back up beside me, "Where do you keep your heating pad?"

"Top drawer of my dresser…" I replied, my voice muffled by a pillow. I heard her footsteps retreat before returning just moments later. I felt her lift the back of my shirt and set a towel down on the afflicted area of my back. She set the heating pad down on top and plugged it in. Within minutes I felt the soothing heat emanate from it. I felt a familiar weight settle down beside me while I willed myself to relax.

It was then that Sam stuck her damned finger in my ear. "Sam, stobbit…" I groaned, clumsily swatting her hand away before she promptly resumed probing the inner rim of my ear. "You are insufferable sometimes, you know that?" I turned my head sideways to glare up at her. She just smiled down at me, and traced the rim of my ear more gently. It was actually kind of nice.

"So do you wanna tell me now how the seemingly indestructible Lara Croft got hurt?" I smirked up at her.

"The indestructible woman of steel went flying. I honestly feel worse for the floor." Sam's finger stopped in place as she stared at me wide-eyed and open-mouthed.

"...How?!" The gesture she made with her other hand was one of finger splayed, palm up confusion. As if I could neatly place the answer in her hand.

"Springboard malfunction."

"Malfunction?"

"The mechanism was worn out, and when I hit the board the spring failed. Catastrophically." I felt the tip of her finger resume its slow path around my ear, spiralling inward and then sliding down my lobe to begin anew. She looked pensive.

"I'm definitely driving."

"Sam…"

"Nope, everything you touch explodes, I'm not letting you drive." I sighed.

"There's no way I'm going to talk you out of this, is there?"

"Nope. And if you keep trying I'm going to give you a wet willy." Well, I certainly did not want that. A drive with Sam would be less lonely, anyway. And I was sure she'd let me control the stereo. It would only take a frown and a pained groan, and I knew she'd melt and hand over the aux cord.

"I accept your terms, but we're listening to my music", I told her, closing my eyes as her finger continued to make laps of my ear.

"Do we really have to-"

"Saaam…" I whined. She relented immediately. The way her eyes rolled suggested she knew exactly what I was doing, but she caved in to me anyway.

"Fine. Only because I'd feel awful picking on a cripple."

"That's definitely why…" I remarked sarcastically, "Definitely not because you may actually possess a kind bone somewhere in your body." Her face scrunched.

"Several, thanks." She tugged on my ear rather firmly, and it smarted. "And if you'd stop hurting yourself you might have the time to jump them." She let go of my ear and sighed. "Let's go, before I think too much about what I'm missing out on."

"Who says I'd be in the mood?"

"Lara Croft not in the mood? Repent, the apocalypse is nigh." My mouth fell open and I gawked openly at her.

"Sam!"

"What? You always start it. And finish it, come to think of it." She shot me a cheeky grin, and I began bashing my forehead into the pillow she'd laid out for me, willing it to be made of cement.

"That's not the point!"

"I know, hon. I just think it's cute how you can be so aggressive one moment and so bashful the next, y'know?" The pillow continued to not be cement.

"Not. The. Point." I could feel the blood rushing to my cheeks.

"Awww, look at how adorably red you are!" Sam babbled, engaging me with babytalk of all things. To add insult to my injured pride, she pinched one of my reddened cheeks, and I couldn't help but think about how lucky she was that I was incapable of moving.

"Mark my words, Nishimura...as soon as my back is healed you're in for it." She just shrugged and smiled at me.

"Hot", she said. I buried my face into the pillow and screamed as loudly as I could. She seemed to finally be done pushing my buttons, not that it wasn't too late; I was equal parts embarrassed and ready to pin her across the couch. But she couldn't know that, pride dictated as much. She mussed my hair.

"We should get going, it's a bit of a drive. Have fun explaining your problem, by the way."

"You mean my mental girlfriend?" I took another lovetap on the shoulder.

"Quite", she said, mocking my speech. It took our combined efforts to shift my legs off the couch and get me first to my knees before she could help me to stand properly. I took the opportunity to give her an appreciative peck on the cheek. When she looked at me I shrugged, pretending as though I'd done nothing.

"What? I'm still mad at you. It wasn't me", I said. She accepted my blatant lie with a perked brow.

"Of course", she said while helping me into my boots and out the door. I hissed through my teeth in pain and put a hand on my back as we made our way out to the car. The heating pad had done nothing to help my pain. I slid into the passenger's side of the car while Sam adjusted the driver's seat and mirrors to her specifications and turned the vehicle on. I stuck my palm out when I saw her grab for the auxiliary cable. She pursed her lips but handed it over without argument. I rewarded her compliance with The xx.

She drove slowly and carefully for the sake of my injury, for which I was grateful, but it ended up taking half an hour to get there as opposed to the calculated twenty on the GPS. We ended up cutting it closer to my appointment than we intended to as a result. Sam quickly parked the car and ushered me out with her assistance. Once we'd crested the stairs I could walk on my own, and we headed into the building to check in.

We were greeted at the desk by a man with a ginger ponytail and neatly trimmed beard. I had expected him to hand us some paperwork, but he only waved politely.

"You're here to see Mary?"

"Yes", Sam said.

"Will there be massages for both of you, then?" he asked, eyebrows up.

"No", Sam told him. "I'll probably just wait." That seemed to strike him as unusual but he nodded professionally and returned his eyebrows to their places. Sam walked over to the chairs that sat around a table covered in what appeared to be summer fashion magazines. With her gone, the man took down my name to match it to the appointment Sam had made.

"Head through the doors there and have a seat, Mary will see you soon", he told me, gesturing to a pair of swinging double wooden doors. I pushed through them, mindful of my injury. When I spotted the cushioned wooden bench I simply stood by it, however. I wasn't sure I'd be able to get back up on my own, and leaning on others was something I hated. Sam was probably the only person in the world I was comfortable with seeing me in that state.

Sure enough, Mary arrived not long after. She turned out to be a spot taller than I am, with wavy shoulder length hair. It struck me as odd that she was wearing what appeared to be a dressing gown.

"You're my four o' clock?", she asked. I nodded. I didn't have much to say, the whole place made me a bit uncomfortable. I'd never gone to a spa or masseuse or anything of the sort before. She led me to one of the rooms that lined the short corridor and held the door open for me, gesturing with an arm across her waist for me to enter. "Take off your clothes and lie face down on the table, I'll be in momentarily", she said casually. When the door closed I looked around the room. It'd been prepared with scentless candles and incense, and the massage table had fresh looking towels laid out beside it. With a reluctant look back at the closed door to assure myself I was not in fact being watched, I began to disrobe.

I wrapped a towel over my middle, just in case and folded my things neatly before placing them in a chair, small clothes on bottom. That was when I first gave thought to the inherent difficulty of getting on to the massage table with my back out of sorts as it was.

I ended up having to crawl onto the table from a chair. Just keeping my towel on so that I could lay it across my backside was enough effort to send stiff pains shooting through me. I did manage, though, and once I was lying down it wasn't so bad. As promised, Mary returned shortly after. I did my best to turn my head to greet her, and saw she was still in her dressing gown.

She instructed me to place my face through the hole in the massage table. It was comfortable enough, but from my view of the floor I could see her bare feet and painted toenails. I closed my eyes for my own comfort, and then I heard a sort of "whoosh" noise. When I opened them again the white tangle of her robe was visible at her feet. If nothing else had been off, that might've sounded alarm bells. Instead the persistent incongruencies of the place had desensitized me to weirdness, I suppose. I closed my eyes again, if just a bit more tightly.

When she stepped the to the table I felt a rather unprofessional drizzling of oil across my bare back before she initiated small talk.

"You have lovely hair", she told me. I wasn't sure what to say to that, and shrugging my shoulders was out of the question, so I did my best to nod into the table and grunt a reply. I felt her lift my ponytail from where it lay on one side of my neck and tensed my scalp at the unwanted attention. Thankfully it ended quickly and she dropped my hair back into place where she'd found it.

Her hands dipped into the oil she'd dripped onto my back, spreading it around between the blades of my shoulders and up along the base of my neck. That, at least, felt pleasant, though she didn't seem to have any aim or technique beyond smearing oil about, and her hands were overly gentle. It was more a caress than a proper massage, and did nothing for my muscles. I was becoming impatient.

She moved down the table and began oiling my legs as well, starting with my ankles and calves.

"That's not what I'm here for", I told her. I felt bad, and immediately added my most polite "carry on, please". My back was hurting terribly. Her hands stopped, and I felt her tap her fingers against me momentarily in thought.

"Hold your horses, darling!" Her hands moved up from my calves to my thighs. It actually felt quite nice, my legs were pretty sore as well, though not nearly to the extreme my back was. She was treating the muscles firmly then and, I thought, rather professionally.

She slid back to my knee and wrapped her hands around my leg so that one of them strode along the inside edge. When she dragged her palms up my thigh again she did not stop at the towel, and I could feel it rising and exposing more of me. Realization finally set in concerning the nature of the parlour Sam had chosen, I panicked.

I slammed my hands onto the edges of the table and gripped them tightly, meaning to push myself up, but the pain in my back sent me stiff as a board and stole the air from my lungs. I had no breath left to protest with and instead was left half exposed with an arched back and an involuntary gasp. Her hands might've roamed higher had I not slammed my legs together as hard as I could, trapping her wrist.

"I'm sorry?" She seemed quite confused. In retrospect I can see why. "Was that not what you wanted?" I pinched the bridge of my nose and held myself up with my free arm.

"I'm so sorry...my girlfriend must have made a mistake when she scheduled this appointment." I cursed Sam mentally even though I knew she meant no harm and none of it was her fault. This wasn't the first time that an attempt to help went sour. "If it's not too much trouble...could you kindly remove your hand from between my thighs?" We'd been stuck in that position; both nude and her hand precariously close to me, for several very awkward seconds.

"I can't", was Mary's reply, and I could feel her tugging against my still-clenched thighs. I immediately let her go and buried my reddening face in my hands while Mary hurried to retrieve her robe. "If you could, ah...not mention any of this you don't owe me anything." I had absolutely no intention of doing so regardless but I nodded in agreement while still keeping my eyes averted from her. "I'll just, uh...leave this door closed while you gather your things."

With that, the door snapped shut with a sharp click. I felt like I was eighty years old with the way I hobbled to my previously abandoned clothes and put them on as quickly as possible. I couldn't bend forward long enough to tie my boots so I just simply tucked the laces in and left the room. When I emerged out into the lobby, Sam gave me a look of utter bemusement.

"Later…" I hissed through my teeth, "let's just go out to the car." She shot a confused look to the clerk. I didn't bother checking his expression; the less he saw of my face, the better. I took Sam's hand rather firmly, lacing our fingers together and leading her out through the door. On our way down the front steps the questions started.

"Lara? What happened?" I frowned at her sidelong just long enough to gauge her reaction. She didn't blush or look nervous, just a bit sad. I felt guilty and gave her hand a soft squeeze.

"They didn't offer the sort of massage I think I need", was what I told her. It dawned on her much more quickly than it had me. Her cheeks folded away as the corners of her mouth spread and her brilliant smile took over. She laughed, she snorted, and she was beautiful the entire time. It almost made up for the experience I'd just had. "Can we please go home?" I asked as she helped me settle into the passenger seat. She nodded, and circled to the driver's seat.

Sam was kind enough to not ask me about what exactly had happened for the entire drive. Instead she proposed, for the second time that day, that she fill in as my masseuse and "physical therapist". I happily accepted; albeit with an outward frown and crossed arms.

It wasn't until we'd gotten home, and I had once again been laid across the couch with the heating pad that she knelt beside me, put her hand in my hair, and asked me:

"So, did you get your happy ending?" I'll admit, I laughed.

"No, Sam, just a very, very awkward story." Her fingers followed the grain of my hair to the loose ponytail I wore and gently tugged the hair tie out. With my hair free she began to brush through it with the tips of her fingernails against my scalp.

"...There's still time", she said with an air of quiet mischief.

"Sometimes a happy ending isn't what it's about."

"I know", she said. "But those are more fun." I couldn't argue with that. By then her hand had drawn itself across my cheek and her thumb was stroking the sensitive space just under my eye. When she leaned in and kissed me it didn't seem like a bad ending to my day at all.