Morning crept into Samuel's room like a slow tide, soft gold pressing against the blinds.
He stirred under the covers, a low groan slipping out as faint music buzzed from his nightstand — the soft glow of his iPhone screen playing a quiet playlist he'd queued up the night before.
For a few minutes, he just lay there, letting the music soak in, yesterday drifting back in pieces.
The cafeteria — crowded and loud, stares prickling at his skin.Haley's smug grin flashing through the noise.The long ride to the beach afterward, wind snapping against his face, the ocean stretching out forever.
It all felt jumbled now.Like it had happened to someone else.
When the song ended, he reached over, thumbed the iPhone screen dark, and slipped it into the drawer without hesitation.
Couldn't risk carrying it around today.
Not yet.
From the same drawer, he pulled out his old BlackBerry — the worn plastic and tiny buttons grounding him better than he cared to admit.
He stuffed it into his pocket.
For a second, he just stood there on the cold floorboards, feeling the chill on his bare feet, before glancing at the mirror on the back of the door.
No hoodie hanging off his shoulders.No sleeves to disappear into.
Just himself — sharper somehow, clearer in the morning light.Broad shoulders starting to fill out.Jawline beginning to cut clean.Green eyes catching the soft gold of the sun.Blond hair a little messy, but in a way that didn't need fixing.
Tall already — and still growing into it.
Maybe today wasn't about hiding.
Maybe it was about showing up.
He straightened his collar slightly, rolled his sleeves higher, and headed downstairs — the BlackBerry tucked securely in his pocket, the morning stretching wide and clean ahead of him.
The smell of bacon, pancakes, and fresh coffee hit him like a wall — warm and heavy and safe.
The kitchen buzzed with small, easy sounds — the clink of silverware, the low murmur of the radio from the corner.
Michael sat at the island, a coffee mug loose in his hand, BlackBerry facedown on the counter.
He tapped his fingers absently, gaze flicking toward the stairs every few seconds.
Phil had stopped by after his shift last night.
Told him everything — about the cafeteria, about Alex being worried, about Samuel storming out.
Michael hadn't said much at the time.
But it stuck.
Maybe it was too soon for all of this.Maybe Samuel needed more time before being shoved into a world full of new faces and old wounds.
The stairs creaked.
Michael looked up sharply, mug pausing halfway to his mouth.
Samuel stepped into the kitchen — gray shirt, dark jeans, sleeves rolled to his elbows, shoulders squared.
Not hidden under a hoodie.Not hunched in on himself.
Just standing there — steady, present, like the storm from yesterday hadn't broken him at all.
Michael exhaled without thinking, something tight inside his chest finally letting go
"You alright?" he asked, voice steady.
Samuel nodded once."Yeah."
Michael smiled faintly."Good. Sit down. Eat."
Samuel crossed the room and dropped into the chair across from him, reaching for a piece of bacon without much thought.
Michael watched him for a beat longer before speaking.
"Phil came by last night. After I got home."
Samuel didn't flinch, but his hand slowed slightly.
"Said you had a rough day. That Alex was worried."
Samuel shrugged, low and guarded.
"I wasn't gonna hit anybody," he muttered."I just... needed air."
Michael nodded, as if that was all the explanation anyone could ever need.
"Next time — text me," he said calmly."You don't have to handle it alone."
Samuel finally looked up — not long, not dramatic — but long enough for something real to pass between them.
"Okay," he said.
Michael smiled again, easier this time, tapping his mug once against the counter.
"Glad to see you up. And looking like you belong on the cover of GQ."
Samuel snorted, low and amused.
"Almost makes you look old," he said, dry as dust.
Michael barked a laugh, shaking his head.
They fell into an easy quiet, the kind that didn't need filling.
Samuel picked at his food, feeling something small and solid settle under his ribs — a quiet kind of thankfulness.
Not everyone would've handled it like this.
Most wouldn't have.
He was grateful — even if he didn't know how to say it out loud yet.
Michael leaned back, shifting the mood lighter.
"You know," he said, "my first day could've been a hell of a lot worse."
Samuel tilted his head slightly, curious.
Michael grinned into his coffee.
"Could've gotten Bradford. Guy thinks he's running a boot camp."
Samuel smirked.
"Or Bishop," Michael added."But she's already got her hands full with Nolan. Rookie pushing forty."
Samuel chuckled under his breath.
"So who'd you get?"
"Valdez," Michael said with a grin."Smart. Cool. Didn't treat me like a moron."
He leaned in slightly, voice dropping.
"Biggest case we had? Some genius fell out of a tree sneaking out his girlfriend's window."
Samuel laughed — a full, honest sound that shook off more dust than he realized he was carrying.
Michael chuckled too.
"Said he was saving a cat," Michael added, grinning."Left with a broken ankle and a trespassing ticket."
Samuel shook his head, smiling properly now.
The world outside — the stares, the whispers — felt a little farther away.
The BlackBerry buzzed against the counter.
Samuel wiped his hand on his jeans and flipped it open.
Text from Turtle:
"Bro you're on TMZ already. You famous now lmao."
Samuel blinked once.
Tapped the link.
The photo loaded — grainy, blurred — but clear enough.
Him, in the hoodie.Standing behind Vinny Chase on the dock.
Headline: "Vincent Chase's Mystery Protégé: Who's the New Kid?"
For a second, he just stared.
Then a thought — sharp and cold — sliced through him.
Fuck.
If yesterday was bad...Today might be worse.
He snapped the BlackBerry shut and slid it deep into his pocket, his gaze flicking toward the morning sun slicing across the floor.
It was already starting.
Dunphys Pov
The Dunphy kitchen buzzed with the usual morning noise — forks scraping plates, the low hum of half-awake chatter, Claire moving between counter and table with practiced urgency.
Luke and Alex bickered lazily over the last waffle.
Phil sat at the head of the table, coffee mug clutched tight, trying — and failing — to act casual.
Haley barely looked up from her phone.
"So," Phil said, voice light but carrying an edge."About yesterday."
Claire froze mid-step.Luke looked up.Alex paused with her fork halfway to her mouth.
Haley kept scrolling.
"I get it," Phil said, working hard to keep upbeat."You thought it was funny. Maybe even harmless. But Haley — not everyone likes being filmed."
Haley sighed dramatically, thumbs still working the screen.
"I didn't do anything wrong," she said."I just showed people something awesome. It's not my fault if they overreacted."
"You didn't ask," Phil said, voice tightening."And because you didn't ask, Samuel — a kid who's already been through enough — got ambushed and walked out of school."
Haley rolled her eyes so hard it was a wonder she didn't strain something.
"I didn't make him leave," she muttered."Everyone was being so dramatic."
Alex shot her a sharp look across the table.
"He left before lunch ended," she said flatly."I went to find him after. He was already gone."
Phil set his coffee down harder than necessary.
"I found out when Alex told me in the car," he said, pinning Haley with a look."And we're lucky it didn't turn into something worse."
Claire nodded, crossing her arms."Who knows where he even went after that?"
Haley barely heard them anymore.
Her eyes snagged on something — a bright post flashing up between her mindless scrolling.
She blinked.Frowned.Tapped.
The feed shifted again — a flash of a yacht, Vinny Chase grinning wide, models flashing peace signs into the camera.
And tucked in the background, barely visible at first—
Haley leaned closer, heart kicking hard against her ribs.
No way.No freaking way.
"Haley," Phil barked, snapping her attention halfway back. "You listening?"
She waved him off blindly, fingers flying across the screen, scrolling faster now, pulse thudding in her ears.
Another shot —closer this time.
Clearer.
Her jaw dropped.
It was Samuel.
Standing on the deck next to Vinny Chase.Talking with Ari Gold like it was nothing.Wearing the exact hoodie he'd had on yesterday.
Not hiding.Not brooding.Laughing — like he belonged there.
"Uh — guys?" Haley blurted, voice cracking a little higher.
Everyone turned — Claire frowning, Phil stiff with frustration, Alex narrowing her eyes in curiosity.
Haley flipped her phone around and slammed it onto the table.
"Explain that," she demanded, jabbing a finger straight at the screen.
Everyone leaned in.
The headline blared across the screen:
"Vincent Chase's Mystery Protégé: Who's the New Kid?"
The photo showed Samuel, blurred but unmistakable, trailing behind Vinny on a sunlit yacht.
Luke squinted first, his face screwing up.
"Hey, that's the guy from Aquaman!" he said, jabbing the screen."We watched that movie, remember?"
Phil blinked, struggling to keep up.
"Yeah," he said slowly."Yeah... we did."
But his focus kept swinging back — not to Vinny, but to Samuel.
Claire clapped a hand over her mouth.
"He was at a party?" she gasped, half-horrified.
Phil just stared, mind spinning in empty circles.
"I—I talked to Michael last night," he said, dazed."He didn't say anything about..." he waved helplessly at the screen. "...this."
Haley leaned back, arms crossing triumphantly.
"So I guess I'm not the bad guy after all," she said smugly.
Phil shot her a look sharp enough to slice bread.
"You're still grounded for filming him."
Haley groaned like she was carrying the weight of the world.
Claire wasn't even listening anymore — she just kept staring at the photo, trying to make sense of it.
Alex leaned closer, studying Samuel's face carefully.
He didn't look furious.Or humiliated.Or even uncomfortable.
He just... stood there.
Steady.Solid.
Like he belonged on that yacht — like it was normal.
And somehow, that unsettled her more than anything else.
This wasn't the Samuel she knew.The quiet one, the cautious one, the one who seemed almost allergic to attention.
Something was off.Something wasn't adding up.
Alex sat back slowly, arms crossing tight across her chest, heart ticking faster.
She had questions.
Way more than before.
Samuel Pov
The school doors swung open, and Samuel stepped inside, instinctively bracing.
He half-expected the world to tilt —a tidal wave of stares, whispers, phones pointing at him.
Instead... nothing.
Just the normal hum of lockers slamming, sneakers squeaking across the floors, lazy gossip rolling off half-shut lockers.
Samuel blinked once, caught off-guard.
Maybe nobody saw the TMZ article yet.
Maybe nobody recognized him in the photos.
Or — more likely — without Instagram or instant viral blasts, the world had simply moved on.
He exhaled slowly and kept walking.
First period passed without anything weird.
Dylan slouched into the seat next to him, looking about as awake as a hibernating bear.
When Samuel slid into his usual spot by the window, Dylan leaned over, flashing a crooked grin.
"Yo," Dylan whispered during roll call."You good, dude? You dipped out like someone lit your backpack on fire."
Samuel smirked faintly, shrugging one shoulder.
"Had to clear my head."
Not exactly a lie.Not exactly the truth either.
Dylan gave him a long, fake-suspicious look, but let it drop.
"Fair enough," Dylan said."Alex and Tori were, like, freaking out though," he added under his breath."They were seriously worried, man."
Samuel paused for half a beat, feeling a small, guilty twist under his ribs.
"I'll talk to them at lunch," he said simply.
Dylan grinned and nodded, wiggling his eyebrows.
"Good call. You owe 'em big time."
Samuel snorted under his breath, tapping his pencil idly against the desk, grateful Dylan wasn't digging deeper.
The biology teacher droned on at the front of the room, pacing back and forth about cellular respiration while half the class fought to keep their eyes open.
The classroom drifted into a slow, sleepy rhythm —the kind Samuel had already started recognizing after just a week here.
By the thirty-minute mark, he had half-turned toward the window, elbow propped on the sill, chin resting against his knuckles.
Outside, LA burned bright — endless blue sky, lazy breeze stirring the palm trees beyond the parking lot.
The sunlight was warm against his arm.The quiet hum of the school faded into the background.
Just quiet.Just peace.
And for a little while, it was enough.
He wished it could stay like this forever.
In the back of his mind, lunch was already forming like a checkpoint.
Tori had promised to save him a seat.
Alex too — or at least, she hadn't told him not to come.
He smiled faintly, the corners of his mouth tugging up without him realizing.
Maybe — just maybe — today wouldn't be so bad after all.
The cafeteria buzzed with its usual noise — trays clattering, chairs scraping, the low thrum of a hundred conversations bouncing off the walls.
Samuel stepped inside, tray loose in his hand, already regretting it.
He hadn't packed a lunch this morning — too much swirling in his head, too many half-formed worries.
Now he was stuck choosing between a row of sad, sweaty pizza slices and a lonely-looking fruit station near the exit.
After a grimace at the curling edges of the pizza, he grabbed an apple and a banana, figuring he could find real food later.
Balancing the sad excuse for a lunch, he spotted Tori waving him over at their usual table.
Alex sat beside her, a notebook half-open in front of her, tapping a pen against the table in quick, sharp beats.
Dylan was already there too, halfway through a bag of chips, crumbs decorating the front of his hoodie.
Samuel made his way over and dropped into the seat across from them.
"Hey," Tori said immediately, her voice lighter than yesterday but still carrying the weight of real concern."You okay?"
Samuel nodded once, setting his tray down.
"Better than yesterday," he said, aiming for casual.
Tori studied him a second longer, then let out a breath like she'd been holding it all morning.
Alex, though, wasn't letting it go so easily.
She leaned forward slightly, her pen freezing mid-tap.
"So... what did you do after you left?"
Samuel forced a shrug, keeping his voice easy.
"Went to the beach," he said."Cleared my head. Even spotted a turtle."
The words slid out smoother than they felt.
Dylan barked a laugh, almost choking on his chips.
"Man, livin' the dream."
Tori smiled, but her eyes stayed on Samuel a second longer — careful, measuring.
Alex narrowed her eyes, studying him like she was trying to fit two versions of him into the same frame.
The kid who stormed out of the cafeteria yesterday — angry, embarrassed.And the kid standing on a yacht behind Vinny Chase — calm, like he belonged there.
Samuel didn't say anything about the yacht.
Didn't even flinch.
Maybe... maybe it wasn't really him in the photos after all.
Alex leaned back slowly, folding her arms without a word — filing it away for later.
She wasn't sure yet.
They drifted into an easier rhythm — eating, joking about homework, trading lazy bets on who would survive Friday's football game.
For a little while, it almost felt normal.
Almost.
The scrape of footsteps near their table yanked Samuel out of that small peace.
He caught the movement out of the corner of his eye —Haley, cutting through the cafeteria like she owned it, with Maddie and Cassie flanking her.
Tori stiffened slightly beside him.Alex's pen froze mid-air.Dylan wiped his palms on his jeans like he was prepping for a fight.
Haley stopped at the edge of their table, her smile wide and full of teeth.
"Hey, Samuel," she said, voice dripping with fake sweetness."You okay after yesterday?"
Samuel gave a small nod, not bothering to fake a smile.
Haley's grin stretched wider, feeding off the tension.
"I mean, it must've been so hard," she said."Storming out like that... and then just disappearing."
Samuel stayed silent, picking at the sticker on his apple with slow, steady fingers, feeling the air thicken around him.
For a second, it looked like maybe — maybe — she would just leave it at that.
Of course she didn't.
Haley pulled out her phone, flipping it around dramatically for everyone to see.
"Except," she said, voice twisting sharper, "you weren't exactly hiding, were you?"
The screen blazed bright in the fluorescent cafeteria light.
Samuel.
On a yacht.
Standing behind Vinny Chase, hoodie slipping half-off his head, laughing with Turtle.
A quick swipe — a second picture.Samuel again, talking with Ari Gold near the rails.
Maddie's mouth fell open.Cassie leaned in closer, blinking fast.
Tori's fists tightened against the tabletop, knuckles whitening.
Dylan froze, chip halfway to his mouth.
"No freakin' way," he muttered. "That's Vinny Chase."
Alex sat back slowly, her mind visibly racing, eyes locked on Samuel.
Samuel stared at the screen, heat rising behind his eyes even as his chest tightened.
There was no shrugging this off.No easy lie to cover it.
The yacht.The flashing cameras.The wrong kind of attention, crashing straight into the middle of everything he was trying to hold together.
The small, fragile quiet he'd found this morning shattered like glass.
Samuel's first instinct — old and too familiar — twisted in his chest for a split second.
Not panic exactly.Not fear.
Just the bone-deep urge to get away before it all blew up again.
He breathed slow through his nose, grounding himself against the weight of stares pressing from every direction.
Not today.
Haley stood at the edge of the table, flipping her phone screen around for everyone to see —photos of Samuel on the yacht, caught in grainy frames with Vinny Chase, Turtle, Ari Gold.
Haley smiled wider, sharp and glinting.
"You got lucky one time, Samuel," she said, voice rising just enough for the nearby tables to hear."That doesn't make you special."
Samuel leaned back in his chair slightly, looking at her with a level gaze — not angry, not rattled.
Just... bored.
Haley pressed in harder, sensing she wasn't getting the meltdown she wanted.
"It must be exhausting," she said, voice dripping with fake sweetness, "pretending you're someone important."
Maddie tittered nervously.Cassie stayed quiet, her eyes locked sharply on Samuel.
Samuel sat still, feeling the weight of the table under his fingertips, the buzz of the cafeteria crowd pressing at the edges of his mind.
He wasn't looking for a fight.But he wasn't backing down either.
He drew a slow breath, ready to finally answer —when his BlackBerry buzzed against his pocket, sharp and insistent.
The sudden noise cut across the tension like a match sparking in dry air.
Haley flinched.
Everyone at their table looked toward him instinctively.
Samuel slid the BlackBerry from his pocket and flipped it open with one smooth motion.
His eyes caught on the caller ID.
Samuel flipped the BlackBerry open and froze for half a second.
Vinny Chase.
He blinked once, a small jolt running through him.
Honestly, he would've figured Turtle.Maybe Ari, throwing something wild his way.
But not Vinny.Not like this.
Samuel felt the corner of his mouth tug upward — a real, low smile. Half-surprised. Half-steady.
He glanced up once, catching the table's reactions.
Tori was staring, mouth slightly open.Maddie and Cassie sat stiff as mannequins.Haley looked stunned — phone dangling uselessly at her side, jealousy practically leaking off her.
Samuel slid the BlackBerry tighter into his hand, stepping back from the table.
"I gotta take this," he said quietly, voice calm and even.
The words didn't have to be loud — they cut clean through the cafeteria noise.
He swung his bag over one shoulder and turned toward the exit.
For a half-second, the room stayed frozen —then the buzz started.
Whispers.
Scraping chairs.People twisting around to see.Half the cafeteria craning to get a better look.
"Was that Vinny Chase?""No way, dude.""Bro, who is that kid?"
Samuel didn't look back.
He flipped the BlackBerry open as he pushed through the cafeteria doors, pressing it lightly to his ear.
The line clicked — a beat of static — and then he said, low and easy:
"Hey Vinny. What's up?"
And just like that, the noise of the cafeteria fell away behind him.