#SingleForever🥲

[wordsmithwhumpsandfluff]

Can you do a spirit with a bad period with Aiden maybe on a date 👉👈💕

Other ask:

love the amberlynn period fic. would also love to see eliana or spirit’s period fics sometime 👀

More focus on the romance than the actual period in this one, but I still love it😘 I hope you love it, too!!

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After sending a pic of her face and a text that said ‘#SkateboardFails’, Spirit witnessed the group chat with her friend fill rapidly with concerned responses.

Doc. Kei🩺: WHAT THE HELL?! WHAT HAPPENED!!!!!

Jor: Holy shit. . .

Oliver {lil bro}: Spirit!!?

Amber: Omg, Spirit! What happened to you?!

Eliana: Jeesus, your eye!

Spirit quickly texted back, ‘I am fine, guys. I just had an accident at the skate park’.

Isaac texted, ‘Y’all should’ve seen it🤣!!!! Complete wipeout!!!’ in order to feed the lie, and Spirit was grateful for him.

But suddenly, Birdie texted Spirit outside of the group chat, and Spirit frowned.

Nico_from_Rio: Did you get in a fight?

Her best friend knew her too well.

Spirit texted ‘No’ and gave a detailed (fake) story about how she nearly collided with someone at the skate park when she was hanging out there with Isaac, and wound up turning too sharply and skidding onto the concrete, faceplanting.

Birdie interrogated her via texts for a while before she gave up, and Spirit let out a sigh of relief.

Now she only had one more person to show her face to.

It had been a few days since she and Aiden had saw each other. Because of their regular texts, Spirit knew he was out of the hospital now and fine, but his mentor forced several extra sick days on him just to be sure.

Spirit was more anxious about showing Aiden her face than she was to show it to her friends. After all, they were her friends, but this was. . . Aiden. The guy she liked. She didn’t want to scare him off.

She took a deep breath as she pressed the FaceTime button, her camera facing her ceiling so that her face wasn’t visible yet.

Aiden answered after just a few seconds, smiling widely with his glasses slightly crooked on his nose and his hair all messy. “Hey!” he said. “I bought and started reading the book you recommended; ‘The Initial Insult’. So far, it is absolutely amazing. Very dark and depressing, but amazi- Why am I staring at your ceiling?”

Spirit sighed. “Aiden,” she said hesitantly. “Please just. . .” She sighed again, not exactly knowing what to ask him not to do. Then she lowered the phone.

Aiden’s smile vanished, his eyes widening and his mouth opening and closing in shock.

“Spirit. . . your face.” He shook his head, looking dumbstruck. “What the—? What happened?! Oh my God, are you okay?!” He looked closer at the phone, looking so concerned and Spirit forced herself to smile a bit to calm him down.

“I’m fine,” she said. “I just—” she hesitated, simultaneously wanting to tell him the truth and shield him from it at the same time. “I had a little incident,” she settled for saying.

He frowned deeply, eyes still wide and concerned.

“Seriously, I’m fine, Aiden. Stop worrying.”

Aiden nodded. “Well. . . okay then.”

They remained silent for a second before Aiden said, “I’ve been wanting to ask you something.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“I was going to tell you that day, but then. . .” he shrugged, “all hell broke loose.”

Spirit was nodding, waiting for his question.

“Feel totally free to say no if you don’t want to do this. I’m really hoping that you will want to do this, just so you know, but it’ll totally be fine if you say no to—”

“Are you asking me out again?”

Spirit could see him startle and blush through the screen, looking just a bit sheepish. “How’d you tell?”

Spirit grinned and shrugged. “Your rambling sounded just a bit familiar.”

“Yeah, well. . . So, yes or no?”

Spirit then frowned. “You’re really asking me out when I look like this?” she asked.

Aiden stayed quiet for a second. Then shrugged. “Umm. . . yeah?”

“Yes,” Spirit said. “But, something small? And maybe we should schedule something a few weeks from now? Just so I don’t go out on a date looking like this.” Spirit gestured to her face.

Aiden’s brows furrowed ever so slightly since he was still concerned and curious about how Spirit’s face wound up so beaten and why her answer was so vague.

If he was being honest, he didn’t want to wait super long for a second date. Suddenly, he had an idea: “What if you just come to my place? We can do Netflix and chill.”

The suggestion surprised Spirit. “You want our date to be at your apartment?”

Aiden ran a hair through his longish messy hair. “I mean, only if you’re comfortable with it? We can wait if you really want to, but you could just come and hang out at my place. I basically have every microwavable unhealthy snack you can think of, and we can watch a horror movie like we did at the theater. What’dya think?”

Spirit didn’t have to think it over very long. “Yeah, sure. Can you text me your address? I don’t remember it.”

“Yeah, sure. This weekend? Saturday again?”

“It’s a date.”

— — —

Spirit whined as she woke up to the sound of her alarm.

She didn’t whine because it was extremely early—since she always had to get up really early and was used to it—but rather because of the tight pain in her lower abdomen that let her know what time of the month it was.

Great fucking timing.

She grumbled curse words as she climbed out of bed, cringing as she shuffled to the bathroom.

Spirit hated her periods, as any other girl would. But her periods always seemed to have it out for her, showing up at the worst times: exam days, birthdays, holidays, and more.

Now, on the day when she was supposed to go on her second date with Aiden.

Spirit quickly got ready for work, barely managing to make it out the door on time. Other than her job at the mall’s music store, she worked as a barista at Starbucks. It was honestly worse than her job at the mall, because while her music-store-boss was rude and grumpy, her boss at Starbucks was even worse. The woman gave Spirit a death glare when she showed up just thirty seconds too late and reprimanded her on punctuality. And then threw a fit about Spirit’s face and how she’d fire her if they weren’t so understaffed.

Spirit was not having a good day. One customer was some man in a suit and his spoiled-looking teen daughter, and both of them were incredibly rude. Spirit also dealt with a mother who brought her five little kids and a screaming baby into the coffee shop, and it took twenty whole minutes to just get her order down. And the annoying encounters just kept coming. Not to mention the fact that her boss refused to give her a break that day since there was only her and one other barista working that day, and that barista had to leave early for a doctors appointment. Spirit didn’t even have time to take two minutes to take some ibuprofen.

It was gonna be a long day.

— — —

Aiden looked at the time on his phone. It was almost 8:00, which was almost 30 minutes later than the time they planned.

He had no texts from Spirit, and he was debating on just eating the fifteen taquitos he heated by himself.

Suddenly, his phone rang.

As soon as he saw Spirit’s name, he picked it up eagerly. “Hey!” he said cheerfully. “You on your way?”

Silence. Then, “I am so sorry, Aiden. Can we reschedule?” She sounded exhausted.

Aiden’s face fell and a weight settled in his chest. “Oh. Um, yeah. Is everything okay? You sound down.”

“I’m fine,” she mumbled. “Just exhausted. Again, I’m so sorry. I promise we can reschedule.”

“That’s okay,” he assured her. “Are you sure you’re fine? You sound really tired.”

She sighed. “I just had a long day. That’s all. I’ll text you tomorrow.”

“Okay then. Goodb—”

She hung up.

Aiden frowned as he looked at the words ‘Call Ended’ on his phone screen. He wound up eating two of the taquitos, and putting the rest in the fridge, along with the other movie snacks he heated up.

More than disappointed, he felt worried. Between the fact that she gave no explanation bout why her face was all beaten and the fact that she sounded completely exhausted over the phone, he was very worried, and he couldn’t help it.

He knew there wasn’t much he could do. But what he could do, and did, was send a text saying: ‘Hey, if you need anything, just let me know. Anything at all, Spirit ;)‘.

— — —

Spirit grinded her teeth together so hard that they began to hurt.

She was sitting on her bathroom floor, in too much pain to sleep and too nauseous to not be worried about throwing up.

Upon getting home from work, she was painfully aware of three things: she had no ibuprofen, she had only 3 pads left, and she didn’t have enough cash in her wallet to afford gas, meds, and pads.

Also, she felt absolutely terrible for cancelling her date with Aiden, and part of her was even a bit panicked that she had ruined everything. She was scared that he wouldn’t want to reschedule, and that he’d decide to stop seeing her. That kind of fear was new to her, but it triggered the same kind of reaction that any fear did.

So, there she was, sitting on the floor of her tiny bathroom, in pain and having to remind herself every few minutes to remember to breathe since she wound up holding her breath whenever she thought about Aiden.

Anxiety plus insanely painful cramps made Spirit’s stomach a complete mess, though she refused to puke, which was why she was grinding her teeth so hard together.

Spirit involuntarily gagged dryly, one hand planting on her aching stomach, and the force caused her to leak. She groaned, realizing she’d be down to two pads now.

Spirit sighed, knowing that she had to ask for help.

With a sleepy yawn, Spirit forced herself up and walked out of the bathroom, into her room. She picked up her phone, half asleep, to call Birdie and say that she’s not feeling well and ask her for help.

“Hey Siri,” Spirit mumbled, too tired to even open her contacts. Yawning, she mumbled, “Call Birdie on speaker,” but the command was half-unintelligible.

Spirit flopped onto her bed, closing her eyes as the phone rang. When she heard the call get picked up, she said, “Hey, Bird. Sorry for the late call, but can you come over with some pads and ibuprofen? I swear, this is the worst period I’ve ever had. Kill me, please, and then burn my uterus because it deserves it.”

Silence.

Spirit frowned. “Birdie?”

“Um. . . Hi, Spirit?” a sheepish response came. Aiden.

Spirit all but shot up in bed, face burning and scrambling to grab her phone. In her flustered panic, she hung up.

Never had she ever felt more embarrassed. She had just said that. . . to Aiden.

Suddenly, his name appeared on her phone. She froze. Why the hell was he calling back?!??!

She picked up. “So, um. . . I’m so sorry about that. I asked Siri to call one of my friends, and then you got dialed by accident, and I’m so—”

She stopped. Because he was chuckling.

Spirit could hear him laughing, and she was so completely confused.

“Aiden? Why are you—?”

“N-nothing,” he laughed. “It’s fine, it’s fine. Just a bit funny, that’s all.”

Spirit wasn’t laughing. She felt humiliated.

When Aiden stopped laughing, he asked a question that shocked Spirit completely: “Would you be okay if I picked up some pads and ibuprofen for you?”

Spirit’s face was on fire. “Y-you don’t have to do that! I’m so sorry, that call wasn’t meant for you—and I don’t need you to get me anything. Please, just forget about this.”

“I don’t mind. Just text me your location, and I’ll be there as fast as I can.”

Spirit cringed, now even more mortified at the thought of Aiden—who lived in a decent and nice apartment—seeing the crap-shack where she lived. “No, Aiden, you don’t—”

“Text. Me.” Spirit could hear him leaving his apartment and the jingle of keys. She wanted to bang her head against a wall or something because of how embarrassed she felt.

Finally, she gave up. Without saying anything, she texted him her address. “Top floor, last room down the left hallway.” And she hung up before waiting for his response.

Now, along with the awful cramps and anxiety, a weight of mortification was settled in her stomach, and that seemed to be the final tipping point for her gut because she found herself running back into her bathroom to puke up the measly couple of granola bars she had for dinner.

— — —

Aiden pulled up to the building and frowned. He had not expected this.

Inside, the building smelled strongly of cheap beer and ramen. There was no elevator, but rather a lot of stairs.

He went to the top floor, went down the left hallway, and stopped at the last door. He knocked. “Spirit?”

It took a minute before the door opened. The girl looked miserable. And Aiden noticed than not only was her face beaten, but her knuckles were also more bruised than usually and she had some bruises on her arms. That, plus the fact that she looked really pale, made him super worried.

“I come bearing gifts,” he said with a forced smile, holding up a pharmacy bag.

Spirit’s face turned red with an embarrassed flush. “Thanks. Come in.”

She stepped aside so he could walk in. From looking at the building, he thought that her dorm would be small, but this was insane.

A thin mattress on a black metal frame took up most of the space in the room. There was a small table by the bed with a lamp and books piled onto it. More books were in stacks on the floor, and a skateboard was propped against the wall. There was a clothing rack with shirts, hoodies, and pants hung on it, and baskets with other clothing items were on the floor next to it. Aiden saw no closet, but he did see the open door of a tiny bathroom. There was even a minifridge and a microwave on the floor. The room was dark, cold, and way too tiny.

“I know you’re thinking that this place is absolute shit,” Spirit grumbled, leaning against the wall with a frown, hands in her pockets.

Aiden’s eyes widened. “No, I wasn’t! I was just thinking. . . um. . .”

“It’s fine,” Spirit sighed, looking at him. “All my friends think so, too. And I definitely know so.” She looked at the bag in his hand. “Could I have that?”

“Oh, yeah,” Aiden said, handing the bag to her.

She thanked him, taking the box out of the bag and putting it in her bathroom. She came out with just the ibuprofen and went to grab a water bottle from her fridge. She took two of the pills, chugged half of the bottle, and let out a sigh of relief.

“You okay?” Aiden asked, taking a single step towards her. It’s all he had to do to stand right next to her.

“I’m fine,” Spirit said, looking up at him. “Again, I’m so sorry about our plans. I ruined another date before it even started, and then this, and I just. . .” She shook her head. “I totally get it if you don’t wanna keep hanging out with me. I’m really sucking at this whole ‘dating-thing’, and I don’t—”

“Wait, hold up,” Aiden interrupted. “Spirit, of course I don’t want to stop hanging out. And I already told you, it’s fine that you cancelled. If you weren’t up for it tonight, then that’s fine.”

Spirit frowned. “Are you sure?”

He nodded, smiling softly. “Absolutely.”

Spirit sighed and sat on the edge of her bed. Aiden sat beside her.

“So, what really happened to you?” he asked. “Because you have bruises on your arms and hands, too. And I’ve seen my fair share of people coming into the station after a fight. There’s no way you didn’t get scars and bruises like that without getting in a fight or something.”

Spirit didn’t look at him, chewing on her bottom lip.

“You said something when I was in the hospital. . . you said that you wouldn’t come back if your face wasn’t as pretty. . . is this what you meant?”

Spirit have him a surprised look. “You were concussed and half-asleep. I thought you wouldn’t remember that.”

He shrugged. “Well, I did. Sooooo?”

Spirit sighed again, hands once again going inside her pockets. “I knew the guys who robbed the store,” she admitted. “They and I grew up in the same neighborhood. They’re all assholes.”

Aiden’s eyes widened, the shock feeling overwhelming as he began to put the pieces together.

“I just. . . I got so mad after what happened to you. That’s something you should take into consideration before you decide to keep hanging out with me: I have a short fuse and some serious issues with my temper. Basically, I went to their place, and I confronted them about what they did to you, and then. . . I left looking like this. They looked just as bad, though, so there’s that.”

Aiden frowned deeply, brows creased.

Spirit sighed, wrapping her arms around her stomach and looking at the floor. “Yeah, I bet you’re reconsidering wanting to keep hanging out now.”

He shook his head. And then, he put a hand on her knee, making her look at him.

“I’m not reconsidering,” he stated. Then he smiled a bit. “It’s honestly cool to think that you stuck up for me like that. It’s like having a hot guardian angel.”

Spirit blushed, eyes widening, and Aiden chuckled at her reaction. Then his eyes moved down to where her arms were wrapped tightly around her stomach. “Are you nauseous?”

She shrugged. “A little. Not as much as I was earlier, though. It just hurts now.” She yawned. “I’ll probably just sleep it off, though.”

He nodded. “Is there anything else you need?”

She shook her head, smiling thankfully. “No, you’ve done more than enough for me. Thanks.”

He nodded again. “So, movie night next Saturday?”

The look that appeared on Spirit’s face—shocked and glad—made Aiden’s smile widen.

She was about to agree, when she looked at her computer and said, “Y’know, we can watch a movie here if you want? I know it’s not like how we planned, and I don’t have any snacks or anything, but that way we don’t have to wait another whole week.”

Aiden somehow smiled wider. He didn’t hesitate to agree.

He and Spirit scooted back enough that their backs were against the wall and their legs were dangling off the side of the bed. Spirit had her computer on her lap and she put on a horror movie on Netflix.

Her shoulder was nearly touching Aiden’s. Eventually, she felt his head touch the side of hers. She startled a bit, but he just chuckled. After a hesitant second, Spirit slowly laid her head on his shoulder. She even found herself smiling, even as her eyes began to grow heavy.

Aiden noticed her starting to doze off, and he grinned. “Gonna be honest, this is a good date,” Aiden whispered, his hand grabbing hers.

She squeezed his hand softly in return. “Yeah. It really is.”

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@bellysoupset