#vailei

When Lei woke up that particular morning she was not expecting to wake up to her uterus’ bloody revenge. Her cramps were almost never this bad, and her cycles were regular, so she didn’t know why she suddenly had to suffer. Unfortunately, she had a date that day planned that she supposed she would have to cancel. She was not in the mood for running around with such heavy flow.

-

LEI (10:08 AM): Sorry I can’t hang out today. I’m not feeling well. 

VAIL(10:15 AM): are you okay? what happened?

-

Lei hesitated, her fingers hovering over the keyboard. From her experience, some men could be rather squeamish when it came to menstruation. But well, what else could she tell him but the truth? Honesty was the best policy when it came to relationships. 

-

LEI (10:16 AM): It’s nothing serious. I’m just on my period and the cramps are really bad this time. 

-

Limping over to the medicine cabinet, she took some naproxen with some hot water and after setting her hot water bottle on her nightstand, she lay down on her bed to wait for the painkiller to kick in. Throughout the aches and tremors of her entire midsection and upper thighs, her phone rang with text notifications, so she picked it up and held it above her face. 

-

VAIL (10:18 AM): I see 

VAIL(10:18 AM): can i come over? 

LEI (10:19AM): I can’t do much though. Right now, I can only lie in bed.  

VAIL (10:20AM): that’s ok

VAIL (10:20AM): I want to see you. 

-

Well, Lei certainly couldn’t say no to that. It was really sweet of him and if her stomach wasn’t feeling bloated, she was certain she would be feeling butterflies instead. 

-

LEI (10:21AM): Alright, then. Come over whenever. 

VAIL (10:25AM): Can i get you anything? 

LEI (10:26AM): If it’s not too much of a bother, I like dark chocolate kisses. 

VAIL (10:27AM): omw

-

It was maybe fifteen minutes later when there was a knock on the door. 

“Come in.” She said, raising her head a little to see Vail at the open door. Although he was a lovely view to look at, her pain-fevered gaze made him look blurry around the edges.

“Ceres let me in.” Vail said, as he entered the room. He was holding his jacket in one hand and a bag of chocolate kisses in the other. He appeared a little sweaty, as if he had just finished some light exercise. “How are you feeling?”

Lei sighed. “Not great. But that’s what happens.” She patted the empty space beside her on the bed. “Come and sit down.”

He placed his jacket on her desk chair and the chocolate on her desk before sitting down where she had requested. When she reached out for his hand to hold, he wordlessly let her take it. 

“Did you run here?” She asked him as she gently ran her thumb across his fingers. She squeezed his hand tightly when a particularly painful wave of cramps hit her. 

“Of course. I wanted to come here as soon as I could." 

“That’s sweet, but I’m not dying or anything.”

“Yunyi makes it sound like she’s dying every time she brings it up.” 

“It’s different for everyone.” Lei paused, thinking about it. “If it’s really hurting her, she should see a gynecologist. I could recommend one to her if she would like.” She could not help the doctor-in-training concern that was instilled into her as a med school student.

“I’ll let her know.” 

Lei wondered how that sort of conversation would go. “It’s alright, I imagine that would be a little awkward. I’ll talk to her about it myself.” 

“You’ve been talking to her recently?” He looked at her curiously, tilting his head much like a cat would. 

Lei nodded, smiling. “Yes~ She’s such a cutie, I can’t help but want to tease her and talk to her more.” 

Vail said nothing but Lei felt like she needed to add, “But you’re my favourite cutie~”

Vail looked at her skeptically this time. “I feel like you call everyone a cutie.” 

“Not everyone! But it is true that there are many things I find cute in this world.” She replied honestly. “But only you are my cutie of a boyfriend, right?” 

He chuckled. “I guess that’s true.” 

Lei winced as yet another wave of cramps bulldozed through her uterus. Usually lying down would alleviate the pressure but it wasn’t enough this time. “There’s a hot water bottle on the left lower shelf in my closet. Can you go and fill it with some hot water?” She asked. 

“Like those metal ones?” Vail pointed to the one sitting on her nightstand. 

Lei shook her head. “No, they're made out of rubber or silicon so they’re flexible, and they’re flatter and more rectangular-shaped. You cover it with a towel or sometimes they come with a covering and place it on your abdomen. Heat can help ease the cramping.” 

The bed creaked a little when he got up from it and went to her closet. Her closet was almost overflowing with the amount of clothes she had hanging inside so she almost never closed it and he stared at it for some time before crouching down to find the lower shelf. 

“Mine has a fuzzy grey covering over it with a cat design.” She tried to explain as she watched him struggle to push aside the some long dresses blocking the opening of the shelf. 

“This one?” He held up a floppy fuzzy-covered silicone blob awkwardly between his two hands.

“Yes, exactly.” Lei sighed in relief. 

He left the room to do as she had asked and Lei was left alone, staring at her ceiling. I’m so fortunate, she thought to herself, to have him care for me like this. 

He returned a few moments later and handed the filled hot water bottle to her. She placed it on her lower stomach and sighed in relief as the heat gradually seeped in, relaxing her abdominal muscles.

“Anything else?” He asked, still standing. 

Lei smiled at him gratefully through the pain, which was luckily finally starting to subside a little from the heat and naproxen. “I wouldn’t say no to a Kiss right now.”

Much to her surprise, instead of going to fetch the chocolate kisses, he leaned over and gave her a gentle peck on the lips.

She blinked. Once, and then twice. He blinked back at her.  

“I meant the chocolate…” Lei said. 

“Ah, did you, now.” Although most people would think his expression was neutral, she had been with him long enough that she could see the redness of a telltale blush creep into his ears. He was embarrassed and very cutely so. 

“It’s okay,” She smiled, pulling him to sit down beside her on the bed. “What you gave me was better~"

-

When she awoke from her little nap, she was feeling much better. Vail was also curled up beside her, so he must have joined her in bed after she drifted off. He was still holding her hand, which she remembered they were doing when she was still conscious. 

She turned to her side to check her phone on the nightstand for the time. It was close to 2PM, so it seemed that her “little” nap had been three hours long. 

She sat up at the edge of her bed and as she was about to stand up to stretch and go to the kitchen, she felt strong arms wrap around her — Vail’s. He was a light sleeper and seemed to always wake as soon as she moved from his side. 

“I need to make lunch now. Aren’t you hungry at all?” She asked, gently stroking his hair.

His sleepy response was to simply nod his head a little. “A little.”

“Come on, let’s go to the kitchen then. We can have soup noodles. It’s the perfect day for that.” 

The promise of noodles seemed to be enough to rouse him because he sat up gradually after, rubbing at his eyes a little. “Sounds good.” He said. 

She put him to work chopping vegetables — carrots, daikon radish, green onion, onion, bok choy. He was good with a knife, after all. She simmered the soup in the meantime — chicken stock, dashi powder, soy sauce, onion, carrot, daikon — all the things she was making him chop. 

“Is it done yet?” He asked while she was boiling the noodles. He had come up from behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist and putting his chin over her shoulder. 

“Not yet, be patient!” She laughed. “Hungry, aren’t you? And you didn’t want to let me get out of bed.”

“That was because it was comfy in bed. But this is because I’m hungry. It’s different.” He justified.

She laughed again. She used the ladle to scoop some soup, blew on it to make it less hot, and then held it close to his mouth. “Ahh~” She said.

He bent his head a little and sipped at it. 

“How is it? Is it flavourful enough?” 

“Yeah, it’s fine.” 

She pouted at him. “You and Ceres are the same, you never have any feedback when I cook. You’re always like ‘it’s good’ or ‘it’s fine’.” 

“Well, if it’s good, what else can I say?” 

She nodded, “I guess it’s better for me if you’re not picky.” She tasted the remnants of the ladle herself. “Oh, this is good.” 

He looked at her as if to say, see? But he didn’t verbalize it. 

She sighed, “Alright, I get your point. How do you want your egg?”

“How you usually make it is good.”

“Okay, over-easy it is~” 

After they had eaten, they washed the dishes together — he washed them and she dried them — she wiped her hands on a hanging towel and fetched the bag of chocolate for their dessert. 

“Want a kiss?” She held up the bag of dark chocolate Kisses in her hand and shook it.

“Sure.” He held his hand out.

Instead of placing a candy there, she grabbed his hand, pulled him closer, and gave him a quick peck on the lips. 

“There.” She said, smirking. “Sweet revenge.” 

He stood there blankly for a moment, so she took the opportunity to place a chocolate in his still-opened hand as an apology for the surprise. 

“Ah.” He finally said, at least a minute later, when he seemingly had processed the information of what just happened. “You got me.” 

“But it was better than what you were expecting, right?” She said with a little teasing smile. 

“Yeah,” He smiled softly at her. “It was.” 

He carefully set the chocolate on the table before pushing her against the kitchen counter and propping her onto it. The marble countertop was a little cold against her skin, so she first squawked from the surprise, but she was soon distracted by his warm hands gripping her bare thighs. They exchanged many more kisses — not the chocolate kind.

AUTHOR'S NOTES

Shout out to my fellow uterus-havers -- period cramps suck

Apparently naproxen is the best for period cramps and since Lei is a pharmacy nerd she would definitely know

At this point in time Ceres + Lei share an apartment -- this will be explained in another Ceres&Lei fic I'm still writing (also a WIP from 2 years ago LOL) but I thought it was cute to have Vail + Lei do domestic things together 🥺🥺🥺

I feel like Vail would be pretty good about periods / menstruation since he works with a lot of female runners on his team (Lexi, Zoey, Keeper)

I'm very proud of that ending as a parallel to what Vail did hehe I THINK THEY'RE JUST SO CUTE (CLENCH FIST)

We will not discuss the thirst at the end 👁👄👁💧

LINKS

[main story = Sweet Something]

[bonus 1 = Soft like Mochi]

[bonus 2 = Whipped like Whip Cream ]

[bonus 3 = Chocolate Kisses = you are here!!!]

[bonus 4 = Brown Sugar Beach Days]

Another version without the text. And shoulder bitemark, for some reason? I think I removed it to avoid prevent the sus but y'know tumblr gets the full sus glory