My dove

Lean on me darling| fluff

*Authors note| this is such a beautiful prompt and I love that you are trusting me with such hard but important topics. It feels me with pride that I can shed light on these topics and raise awareness. Most of the what I write comes from experience but if I don't know I do research to ensure I get everything right*

Trigger warnings ~ Abusive ex, eating disorder (starving/skipping meals)

Prompt~ tumblr Anon~ Greetings! I've been loving all your Lady Lesso work and want to request something but romantic. Basically the reader's ex-girlfriend was abusive and made her develop an eating disorder, however she's really good at hiding it. Lesso eventually discovers how the reader sometimes starves herself and immediately confronts/comforts the reader saying she loves her no matter what. Thank uuuuuu 🙏

It was getting bad again. You knew that. Yet you still felt absolutely powerless to stop it. And before you knew one missed meal became two then three. It was a dangerous vicious cycle, unfortunately one that you had been in before. Sometimes you knew a relapse was coming, certain triggers were easily spotted and you could work hard to counteract them. But you couldn't stop this one. So you did what you always do. You buried yourself in your school work, avoiding everything like she had taught you.

Your ex girlfriend knew of your eating issues, and you thought she was helping. After all that's what she said she was doing. You allowed her to take control over your meals when you mentally couldn't cope with it. Little did you know you were being manipulated and abused under the pretence of love. She knew of your poor family relations and that made you an easy target. Only now you had finally escaped her clutches did you see just how toxic she was. Moving to the school for Good and Evil was a fresh start for you and that's what made this relapse ten times worse. The guilt. You were messing up your fresh start all by yourself. And that fact seemed to make you slip further and further into the dark thought space.

You were quite good at masking relapsing by now. You knew the appropriate amount of time to sit at the table pushing the food around the plate before you could get up and leave. You knew the best places to hide food if anyone had given it to you. You knew how to dump any food that was unable to hide. You knew how to disguise the dizziness and the fact weight was falling off you at an alarming rate. You knew if you drank enough that your stomach would remain silent. Filling up on water was something that allowed you to hide your relapse for so long. She had also taught you all of this.

That's how you managed to hide from the great Dean of Evil for so long, in fact it had been months now. You were definitely getting unhealthier as the days trickled by but you couldn't make yourself care. You knew you deserved this, to suffer, to hurt after all what's beauty without pain? Her words would circle through your mind on an unrelenting loop. So much so you had fully conceived yourself that she was right. You needed this. You needed to suffer. Then maybe you'd be beautiful. However your mask slipped the day you passed out in Curses and Death traps.

Lesso had her students sparing in an attempt to strengthen their abilities, your ability was physically and mentally demanding, you knew that but try as you might you were not getting away with not participating. You took deep breaths and attempted to survive the spar but your weak exhausted body couldn't put up with the exhaustion much longer, you passed out cold on the floor. Lady Lesso immediately called the spar off, her student could not kill before graduation and the very thought that she had just witnessed that honestly panicked her slightly. Crouched down by your head, ignoring the sharp pain in her right knee, she noticed your eyelids fluttering indicating life. You were coming back around. Thank the heavens above.

You were always disoriented when this would happen, memory hazy as you attempted to focus. The pain in your shoulder indicating that's where the impact of your fall was. You could've sworn your heart stopped beating when your gaze focused on the Dean. Shit! You scrambled to sit up only to find her hands gripping your shoulder preventing any rapid movements. "Slow down y/n, are you feeling okay?" She murmured to you hoping to keep the attention you received minimal. After the other students worked out you were in fact not dead their interest seemingly dwindled.  And you managed to bluff your way through using the sparring as a cover story. She bought it surprisingly, you couldn't help but be impressed that you had fooled the women.

The second time it happened you were not that lucky. No this time it had happened in the halls. You were making your way back to your dorm when it happened again. Your books tumbled from your hands slamming to the floor as you felt consciousness leave you. A blissful blackness enveloped you. Nothing to be seen or heard. Is this what death is like? Well unfortunately you weren't as lucky to find out. Consciousness began to flood throughout you once more, a disappointment lingering through your heart. Once again you were met with the worried irises of the Dean. Her hand slowly stroking at your clothed shoulder in a comforting repetitive moment.

You flinched away as though you were burned. You knew damn well that she would feel just how poignant they were. And by the look in her eyes you could tell, you were caught. And that is how you ended up in her office for a "discussion" about your adjustment to the school. At first you tried to deny everything, after all that's what she taught you. Say nothing. Hide it or they will stop you from becoming truly beautiful. To be worthy of love. But you could tell the Dean was seeing through your lies and becoming rather frustrated with the fact. That's what made you break.

You stood in her office, sobs wrecking through your weak body as you shook and eased yourself to the ground. Breaths coming out irregularly as your eyes were blurry due to the tears. You were curling up into yourself hugging your knees to your chest as you attempted to self soothe by rocking yourself gently. In that moment, Lesso was sure she'd never seen someone look so small and so broken. It shattered her heart. Which is why she found herself once again knelt in front of you despite the pain in her knee. "Little one?" She hummed out putting effort into making her tone seem more light and comforting than normal. When you moved your head up she was met with your tear soaked eyes. She had choose to keep her hands in your direct vision not knowing how you would respond to touch in this state.

It was then that you spilled everything. All the pain and hurt from the past. Every single thing she had done and said to you. It felt like a heavy weight being lifted off your chest. And she listened attentively to everything you disclosed, that automatically made telling her that much easier. You even told of her of the current relapse. When it started. What you do. What you feel and think. Just everything. And you could see you had shocked the Dean. She immediately put two and two together though as you knew she would.

"So that spar with Hester was this?" She questioned almost knowingly. When you nodded you heard her slight chuckle. "I did wonder, Y/n your more than capable of neutralising her gift. Why didn't you come to me little one? I could've tried to help" she mumbled picking up the courage to tilt your chin upwards with a slender finger. "Promise me, from now on to come to me, you're not broken my dove we will fix those beautiful wings of yours and you'll flourish" her tone of voice conveyed just how much faith she had in you and that honestly made your heart swell. "Now my little dove we are going to get you something to eat okay?" You eyes held the fear you were feeling which instantly had her adding "I will stay with you the whole time and even eat so you aren't eating alone little one, how does that sound?" You nodded knowing eating with someone always made you feel less self conscious about what's on your plate. Maybe just maybe you could be beautiful without this.  As if she read your thoughts Lesso took you by the hand and helped you up before catching your gaze and murmuring " you're beautiful dove no matter what or how much your eating beauty radiates from within."

Word count~ 1512

*Authors note~ so most of this is personal experience for me, I was diagnosed at 8 years old, after blacking out on a climbing frame and breaking both bones in my arm and even twisting them over eachother. I still relapse every now and then but I do have my tools and support system. So if this is something you struggle with please reach out to someone you trust. And remember that beauty truly is a concept and exterior beauty is different to the beauty of a kind soul*