Page 23 of Scar

Maeve sighs, covering her face with her hands. But that won't do, I uncover her face, taking her hands into mine. "Help me. Tell me what's wrong." I ask again. My girl is red as a tomato, it's kind of cute. But it's worrying that she's white as a sheet aside from her blush. "You didn't bring me any tampons or anything…" She says quietly.

Ah, so my girl isn't pregnant yet. Quite the opposite, actually. I hadn't bought any products because I expected she'd be carrying my baby by now and we wouldn't need them. Clearly an oversight on my end. "I'm sorry, fleur. I'll go buy you some. How about you lay down on the couch until I get back?" I offer. I want her to be comfortable if she's cramping. But she shakes her head no, her blush staining her cheeks a darker shade of red. "I can't. Mine are really… heavy." She almost whispers as if it's embarrassing.

Nothing about my love could ever be embarrassing. But it does worry me that she's just been sitting here suffering all day. "Fleur, have you been sitting here all day?" I ask. My heart breaks when my girl looks down at her lap and nods. Fuck, I somehow fucked up again. How the fuck am I the guy that's always prepared, but I didn't prepare for my girl to have her fucking period? I made her sit on the Goddamn toilet, miserable, all day!

I end up getting Maeve situated on the couch. She didn't like it, she fought me on it. But I won. I laid her down on several towels, gave her the remote and put a heating pad on her lower stomach. I can't imagine it was comfortable sitting on the toilet all day. In fact, her legs were asleep when I tried to get her off. I ended up carrying my girl to the couch with a towel folded up under her. She protested, insisting she'd ruin my towels and maybe my couch. But I don't give a fuck about the furniture, I care about her and her comfort! So, I headed out before she had the chance to argue with me about it. And I hope she's still curled up on the couch when I get back.

Thankfully, when I got home Maeve was still on the couch. I bought everything I could think of. Pads, tampons, those little reusable cup things, period underwear… didn't know that was a thing. I even got her some chocolate, some ice cream, and some salty snacks. All safe for her diet, of course.

She smiles when she sees me walk in the door with grocery bags, melting my fucking heart that she wanted to see me. I hurry to put away all the snacks and start to fill the bathtub before coming back for Maeve. "Come on, fleur." I insist. I'm pampering my girl. I scoop her up, holding a towel under that gorgeous ass while I carry her into our bathroom. "I can do it." She insists. Stubborn girl. "Of course you can, but I'm going to help you anyway." I insist.

I'm making Maeve take a nice, long bath. I know it will help with cramps, and it gives me the chance to sit with her. I'm not going to ask how her day went. I'm not sure she left the bathroom all day, and I don't want to rub it in that I screwed up yet again. But she sighs happily as soon as she's in the warm water, closing her eyes to relax. I'm loving that she's not covering herself up for me or worried that I'm seeing her naked. "How was your day?" She asks me quietly. It throws me off that she asked. I didn't think she cared about how my days went.

I end up sitting on the floor in front of the tub while telling Maeve all about my day. I can't go into too much detail about my patients, but I vaguely talk about seeing a new patient this week. She's having trouble regulating her emotions, it stems from childhood trauma that her mother put on her. I don't want to tell Maeve that I worry she has the same problems. Sometimes she cries too easily, sometimes she doesn't respond to situations that should infuriate her. It's as if she's scared to show her true feelings because nobody has ever actually cared or considered hers. It's hurtful to think about my girl being neglected, she's too beautiful and too wonderful to have been treated as poorly as she has her whole life. But never again. I will never let someone disrespect my girl again.

It surprises me that Maeve listens to every word I say, even making small comments as I speak, just so I know she's listening. I let her stay in the tub until the water starts to chill and my girl starts to prune. Only then do I help her out of the tub and immediately into a pair of those weird period panties. She says she prefers those because they're better for the environment and they're reusable so they're cheaper. She told me all about how she's tried the cup, but it made her cramps worse. I gotta make a mental note to buy more of the panties and throw away the cup.

I help her into a comfortable pair of sweatpants that are loose on her stomach and one of my t-shirts. I know she has her own, but fuck it's sexy as Hell to see her in my clothes. "We can spend the evening on the couch, okay fleur? What food do you like when you're not feeling well?" I ask her as I carry her out into our living room. I love that she's letting me. As adorable as it is when she calls me a butthead or a jerk face, I love when she lets me help her. "I don't know, I can never afford luxuries, so I just eat what the dining hall has." She answers. Her voice is muffled with her face buried in my neck, fuck I love that. But I hate that she's so used to accepting no help that she doesn't even know what she likes and what she needs. I intend to pamper her for the rest of her life.

I carry my girl to the couch, getting her situated on the chase while I head into the kitchen. She even lets me kiss her on the temple before heading in.

I've read that women on their period want carbs, they want sweets. So, that's what I'll do. I made her crustless apple pie filling to put over her vegan ice cream, I made her some gluten-free vegan brownies with some of her pretzels in them and some peanut butter, and I made her gluten-free pasta with vegan bolognese because I know she needs the protein. I don't know if she'll trust the last part, but I also made some garlic bread with gluten-free bread I picked up at the store. I want her to be comfortable and happy right now. I don't even want her having to leave the couch if she's cramping.

I curl up behind her, situating her between my legs while resting her back against my chest. I'm surprised she lets me, honestly. But she doesn't fight, she just settles in against me. I put the tray of food on the couch next to us, leaving the apples and ice cream separate for now. The ice cream is in an insulated cup so it won't melt while she eats some real food.

"Everything is safe to eat, please trust me." I beg of her. I know it's a lot to ask, and I won't be offended if she doesn't. But I need her trust at some point. I need her to let me take care of her. She'll need to rely on me more than she wants to when she's finally pregnant. I'd like for this to be a little display of how she will be treated then, she'll be waited on hand and foot. Anything she could need, I will make sure she has it. Any craving, any need. I'll be there. Just like I will be right now.

My girl settles for the ice cream, the only thing I offer her that is still packaged and sealed. So I see I haven't earned her trust yet. That's okay, I'll work on it. I'll earn it someday. I just enjoy her laying against me while snacking on her ice cream and watching some documentary about the rainforest and deforestation. I don't see how she enjoys it, but I enjoy her against me, so I wouldn't change a thing.

I keep my arms around her, my hands laying on top of the heating pad to keep it secure against her lower belly. I know that will help her feel better. Occasionally I rub her, hoping to ease any discomfort she has. But she politely declines anytime I offer her medicine, so she's either stubborn, doesn't want me to move, or is feeling okay. I'd say she's stubborn. A few times while we've laid together, she's groaned and kind of curled into herself. That's when I massage her stomach until she settles again.

I should have prepared for this. I've read up on celiac. I've read that it can cause more severe periods in women, so I should've been ready. But I was arrogant and thought she would've been pregnant by now. I'm also kind of confused as to why Maeve is letting me lay with her, she hasn't hardly let me touch her since our night on the couch almost two weeks ago.

"You okay, ma petite fleur?" I ask her quietly. I kiss her neck lightly, resting my chin on her shoulder while I wait for her to reply. It takes several minutes, I feel my girl shifting as if she's uncomfortable or nervous. It makes me want to ask what she could possibly be nervous about. But then she answers. "Are you going to kill me since I'm not pregnant?" She asks so quietly that I almost don't hear her. Is this why she's so close to me? She thinks I'm going to kill her?

Fuck. I don't know how I fucked this up so badly that she's scared for her life around me. I kiss her neck again, tightening my arms around her. "No, ma fleur. I will never hurt you. You have nothing to be scared of, I promise." I say genuinely. I need her to believe me. I don't care if I have to pray to whatever fucking God exists, I need her to believe that she's safer with me than anyone else.

Chapter 33

Leon's POV

It's been a few days since Maeve confided in me on the couch. Things seem a little better. She even fell asleep against me on the couch that night. I didn't have the heart, or the desire, to move her. So I simply pulled my leg off and slept with her on the couch. I woke up to her head tucked into my neck and her hand loosely clutching onto my shirt.

It ended up being a fucking mess, though. I woke up to melted ice cream and fucking pasta all over the floor, one of us knocked the tray off in our sleep. I don't even care who. There's a reason our floors are all hardwood and tile. I cleaned it up while I left Maeve to sleep, I even washed the towels I made her bleed on while I ran to the store. I didn't want her to think she was responsible for cleaning up her blood or the mess in the living room. She doesn't know that I'm far too comfortable with blood anyway.

I even stayed home the next day. She was still bleeding pretty heavily and dealing with pretty severe cramps. So I made us do exactly what we did the night before. I brought her pre-packaged food, laid her against me, gave her the remote, and was just there for her. She even had the confidence to ask me for some pretzels while we watched some goofy ass animated movie about a robot at the end of the world. I gotta admit, it was pretty cute. The movie and her needing me.

But today, Maeve and I are in my study doing her finals. She's being polite with the professor that is assigned to monitor her, she even surprises me when they ask her why she wasn't able to come into class to take her finals. She tells them that she was accidentally glutened and is still very sick. She confidently lies that her doctor is worried about the structure of her bones and is encouraging her not to go outside until they can do a bone density test.

I don't like that she said all of this so confidently, that tells me this is something she's already had happen to her. Now I'm worried that I may have caused permanent damage to her body from that meal we had two weeks ago. She seems fine now. But I've looked up the lasting effects of a celiac being fed gluten. I could have caused her infertility! I could have ruined our chances at children, I could have ruined her life. I will never let that mistake happen again. No wonder she was scared I was going to kill her if I couldn't get her pregnant.

I sit back and work on my phone while she uses my laptop for her finals, looking up at her periodically to make sure she's doing alright. But when the professor tells her that she has a five minute pause between exams, she gets up and heads to the restroom. I hop up and head to the kitchen to grab her a snack and a bottle of water. I know if she were in class right now, on campus. She would only be taking an exam or two a day. But this, now. She's having to take all nine exams in one day. I know she's tired, or at least she's going to be. And I know she's going to have a headache by the end of it. So I also take the precaution to grab those blue light glasses that she swears help with being on the computer for long periods of time.

When I head back into the study, Maeve is just sitting down from the restroom. I sit the water and the bowl of cut up fruit I'd grabbed for her down before pulling her glasses out of my shirt collar and handing them to her. She smiles up at me, really smiles. It makes me realize that I'd wage wars to see that smile. "Thanks." She says tome.I feel like an idiot that all I'm doing is smiling at her like a fucking fool. But she's so beautiful like this. She's wearing her pajamas, just a silky pair of shorts and a tank top, her gorgeous golden brown hair is piled up on her head in one of those messy buns that somehow looks flawless on her, and her face doesn't have a spec of makeup on it. Just how I like her, just being her. "Do you need anything else?" I ask, putting my hands on her shoulders to knead the knots out of her neck for the rest of her break.

Maeve cranes her neck to look up at me, shaking her head no. "I'm okay. Thank you." She says quietly. I know it's probably hard for her to thank me when she thinks I've stolen her life from her, so it doesn't go unnoticed that she is. "Anything for you, ma petite fleur." I promise her, leaning down to kiss the top of her head. When the professor gets back on the screen, she makes a faceat mypresence. "Sorry, I was just leaving." I promise. "Dr. Aldon?" The professor asks.

I quirk an eyebrow at this woman on the screen, I guess I'm used to getting recognized after that "Hottest 35 under 35 in Texas." Article came out, but it's still weird to me when it happens. "Yes, I'm sorry to interrupt, I was just making sure my girlfriend was doing alright."I explainto this woman.