My college roommate had an obsession—with my discarded possessions.
She’d patch up my ripped clothes and wear them, dilute my near-empty serums with water to squeeze out a few more drops -- all under the flimsy banner of “waste not, want not.”
I thought it was just extreme frugality. That delusion shattered the day I saw her tongue swipe the melting ice cream from my boyfriend’s half-eaten cone.

Oh hell no. Thievery disguised as thrift?
Well, in this second life I’ve been handed, she won’t get a single drop of indulgence from me.
Blinding sunlight seared my eyelids. When I forced them open, the scene stunned me.
My university campus pulsed with life—orientation signs waved, banners screamed ‘Welcome Freshmen, Class of 2025!’...
Wait. Hadn’t I died in the dead of winter?
Before the cognitive whiplash could settle, a voice summoned me to sign in for dorm check-in.

And that’s when the impossible truth hit me: I’d been reborn, back to my first day of freshman year.
My signature felt automatic on the form. Hauling my suitcase upstairs, the weight felt heavier than before.
As I reached the dorm room, a soft, hesitant voice piped up behind me.
“Hi... I’m Lily Parker...”

That voice. Instinct screamed. I flinched violently.
An awkward silence hung thick. Lily visibly shrank back, stammering, “You okay? I didn’t mean to startle you…”
I glared, my vision momentarily blurring, seeing her past life’s face—the real one, twisted with vicious triumph the moment she killed me—superimposed over this facade of timidity.
A shuddering breath fought down the bile of rage rising in my throat.
“Hi,” I managed, trying to make my voice calm. “I’m Sarah Mitchell.”
She relaxed, but her eyes, wary now, tracked my expression as she shuffled towards the room, clearly intending to follow me in.
This time, though, I kept my face a frozen mask as she spoke.
Because I knew. Knew the venom coiled beneath this plain, unassuming surface.
In my first life, moving into this dorm on orientation day, Lily stood out starkly.
Among a sea of bright, fashion-conscious students, she’d carried a frayed duffel bag, her sneakers worn thin, radiating an aura of painful displacement.
During introductions between the three roommates, her eyes darted nervously between us before she mumbled, “I’m from a really small village. Hope you won’t... you know... look down on me.”
Then she offered homemade snacks from her hometown.
Claire Bennett, a sophisticated city girl born into wealth, and I —well, my family owned a quarry, comfortable but low-key—we exchanged a swift, understanding glance. Our clothes, our watches, the effortless confidence spoke volumes across the social spectrum.
Instinctively polite, Claire and I welcomed Lily warmly, promising friendship for the next four years.
But Lily harbored a disturbing habit.
She scavenged. Relentlessly. Anything anyone cast off became her treasure.
One day, my favorite shirt snagged on a fence and tore irreparably. I tossed it. The very next day, Lily wore it—meticulously patched.
“Is that my shirt?” Shock made my voice sharp.
Her head bowed. “It was such good fabric. Only needed a few stitches. Good as new. If you didn’t want it…” Her eyes brimmed with tears as she looked up, accusation hidden beneath hurt.
“I looked it up! This brand costs thousands! That’s half a year’s income for my family back home! How could you just throw it away? You’re not... mad, are you?”
Our voices, raised in the hallway, drew curious glances from passing classmates.
Before I could formulate a coherent response, Claire smoothly interjected, “Easy there! She’s just being practical! Waste not, want not, right? It’s just a shirt—no big deal!”
A knot of unease tightened in my stomach, but societal pressure kicked in. I forced a smile. “It’s fine. Just.. maybe ask me next time?”
Lily beamed through drying tears. The ‘crisis’ passed.
But that was just the start of my nightmare.
Finding my empty toner bottle, refilled with murky water? Lily did it.
A broken hair tie tossed in the bin? Miraculously repaired and circling her wrist the next day.
Leftover pizza crusts I hadn’t finished? Eaten cold from the shared fridge by her, citing the sin of wasting edible food.
For a while, I chalked it up to rural hardship making her overly thrifty.
But it escalated. Insidiously.
Until the day I saw her hand close around a pair of my well-worn, elastic-frayed underwear pulled from the trash.
Revulsion choked me. That was the final line.
“Lily,” I said, trying to keep my voice level but failing, “don’t you think that’s... incredibly unhygienic?”
Her head snapped up. “Unhygienic?” Her whisper was laced with something ugly. “You rich girls throw away $50 underwear without blinking. That’s what’s shameful!” Her voice rose, cracking into loud, theatrical sobs right there in the hallway.
Neighbors peered out, their expressions hardening instantly. Lily, the picture of persecuted poverty.
Even Claire turned on me. “Sarah, come on! Stop picking on her! Can’t you be more understanding?”
Frustration warred with the ingrained need for peace. In a moment of misguided generosity (or sheer desperation), I offered, “Look, if there’s something you really need, just ask. I can buy it for you.”
Little did I know, that seemingly kind offer was the worst mistake I could have made.
Someone recorded it, and Lily twisted it, claiming I looked down on her, making me a campus outcast -- the spoiled rich girl who flaunted her wealth and patronized the ‘poor scholarship kid’.
I poured it all out to my boyfriend, Noah Davis.
And the day he came to comfort me? That’s when I witnessed the spectacle that defined our downfall.
Lily sidled up to him. Leaned in. And flicked her tongue against the melting ice cream in the cone he was holding, half-eaten.
Noah recoiled like he’d been shocked. The ice cream dropped, splattering on the ground.
Lily instantly dropped to her knees beside the mess, tears welling up. “No! Such a waste! Perfectly good food! If you weren’t going to finish it, I would have!”
That pathetic display became the definitive image. The narrative solidified: Noah and I, heartless bullies, tormenting the innocent thrift icon. Campus solidarity rallied behind Lily.
She masterfully poisoned Claire against me too. My own dorm turned hostile, whispers turning to open hostility until they pushed me out entirely.
The drama exploded online. Noah and I were relentlessly doxxed and harassed offline and on.
Lily? She soared to internet fame—praised as the “Frugality Queen”. Her sob story made herself an influencer on the Internet.
The university expelled us both. Noah’s devastated parents shipped him overseas to start over.
Drowning in despair, I finally confronted Lily. I demanded to know why.
Her only answer was a hard shove. I tumbled backwards down a flight of concrete stairs.
As darkness swallowed me on that cold floor, her hate-filled face swam above me, the sneer finally unrestrained: “Rich girls like you get everything? Good riddance. Just die.”
My soul detached, a chilling spectator. I hovered beside my body, watching her pick through my abandoned bags. Days later, online, I saw it—Lily posing in my discarded designer clothes, pretending affluence for her streaming audience, luring lonely men into her fabricated world.
Only in death did the chilling depth of her calculated malice truly unveil itself.
That memory snapped me back to the present—this second chance.
Standing in the dorm doorway, I stared down at the girl blinking up at me with manufactured innocence: Lily Parker.
The rage still simmered, deep and cold. But I breathed it down. This time, I would protect myself and have her repay for what she did onto me.