Ball Out (n.)
Rodeo term. A horse that comes straight up on hind legs when coming out of the chute and then begins bucking.
For the love of god, woman...
For likely the first time in her life, Officer Nicole Haught finds herself wishing she was a Jedi. Uncharacteristically, it's not an altruistic wish. She's not wishing for extra abilities in order to save the galaxy from the forces of evil. Not even a little bit.
No, Jedi Haught would be using the Force to convince Linda, the department's elderly secretary, to vacate her desk and head for the exit. Narrowing her eyes in concentration, she focuses her energy: You need to go home. Your husband is thinking about cooking supper.
Honestly, with as often as the woman laments her husband's misguided and frankly dangerous attempts in the kitchen, Nicole figures this is the kind of suggestion has the highest chance of yielding a return.
It's not that she actually expects any level of success, but when Linda remains at her desk, unmoving, filing her nails like she hasn't a care in the world (or any work, for that matter), it's hard for Nicole not to feel like the deck is stacked against her. Gritting her teeth, she cuts her eyes to the left, seeking out Waverly, apology and frustration etched on her face in equal measure.
What she finds when her eyes land on Waverly, though, transforms the frustration into bemusement, the corner of her mouth hitching up in an uncontrollable smirk. Waverly Earp, town sweetheart, Waverly "It's all in the smile and wave" Earp, looks madder than a wet hen, staring daggers at a little old lady in her golden years.
Absently, Nicole wonders if Waverly's working on her own Jedi mind trick attempt, albeit clearly a more intense version than the one she herself had attempted - more Skywalker Sr. than Jr. Perhaps even more impressive, the aging admin is completely oblivious to the glare, continuing instead to sit quietly at her desk, her eyes downcast, nail file maintaining a holding pattern in mid-air, still as a statue.
Very still.
Too still.
Nicole's eyes narrow in focus.
Oh shit...Waverly killed Linda.
With a slight jerk, Linda snaps out of whatever fugue state she was in and picks up where she left off, running the emery board across her nails (not sure that's the kind of filing in the job description, but whatever). Nicole sits across from her, mouth agape. When the deputy manages to tear her eyes away from whatever biological train wreck is happening at the secretary's desk in the corner, she seeks out the room's only other occupant, only to find Waverly's gaze is now solely on her.
Across the room - a slow eyeroll. An exaggerated sigh. Waverly lifts her notepad to her face.
An answering grin. Hunching low over her desk, keeping their conversation as private as can be expected with a gargoyle standing watch in the corner, Nicole mouths silently, "I know, right!"
When neither breaks eye contact, it takes roughly three seconds for the smirks to slide from their respective faces, their gazes growing serious, frank. Unsurprisingly, it's Waverly who cracks first, her eyes straying, drifting down to red lips before climbing back, eye to eye. Nicole can feel the blush bloom hard and fast on her cheeks, the blood in her veins simmering suddenly, like the deliciously warm buzz of a glass of wine. Out of habit, she bites her bottom lip and looks away briefly, and across the room, Waverly unconsciously mimics the movements, unable to stop the urge to wet her lips.
Lord have mercy...
At the sight - pink tongue, wet lips - it's like that glass of wine became a bottle, the simmering warmth dialed up to a rolling boil. There was this school concert Nicole had been in as a kid, one of those compulsory rites of passage. She'd been required to gussy up and wear a ridiculous poofy dress - although she still got to wear her boots, a hard fought victory. Singing songs with non-sensical lyrics, crammed onto a riser on stage with thirty other kids, the heat had been unbearable - and she distinctly remembers pulling crassly at her dress where it pinched to try and cool off, remembers discreetly reaching for her ears during the performance, trying to make sure she didn't have smoke coming out of them. This is no different. The heavy cotton of her uniform shirt is suddenly too close, too constricting. With heat rolling off her skin in waves, there's no escape route, leaving her blistering. Stifling. Pulling at the collar of her uniform, she looks down, her fingers scrabbling to undo the second button on her shirt, an emergency release valve of sorts. With her face still angled down, Nicole's eyes dart upward from under her lashes, looking across at Waverly.
Waverly's still watching, but her eyes are unfocused, her mouth open. Without warning, the notepad in her hand slips, beginning its descent toward the table beneath. Scrambling, she reaches for it, but rather than snatching it out of midair outright, she only manages to get a finger on it, just enough to bounce it up and allow a second attempt. A second attempt quickly turns into a third and fourth, the notepad traitorously bouncing out of her grip each time - it's like watching a newborn horse trying to juggle. Although a valiant effort, she can't stop the fall, and the notepad hits the table with a light thud.
A laugh on her lips, a sarcastic quip on the tip of her tongue, Nicole opens her mouth to comment on the spectacle, but in the corner there's a sound of squeaking vinyl - the chaperone moves. Swallowing her laughter, Nicole snaps her face back to her computer monitor and sits up a little straighter in her chair, hitting keys on her keyboard at random, the picture of a diligent deputy.
God, Linda, go back to sleep. Just over here doing...cop stuff. Obviously. Nothing to see here.
For her part, Waverly looks just this side of mortified, if the slightly manic look to her eyes is any indicator. She's diligently scribbling on the notepad in her hands, again, but Nicole doubts there's anything of substance being written, glancing back at her monitor to the open report on her screen, which now reads "Mr. Williams discharged a weapon into the air at approximately sgoinasef oasidnfsald aeiinllaie ! NFdfaoi;a aernkaea;n..."
Glancing discreetly at the clock on the wall, Nicole does a double-take. Three minutes. It's only been three minutes since Waverly walked through the door and started hovering near the Sheriff's office, pretending (terribly) she had some Black Badge business to tend to here.
When Wynonna and then Waverly first started to clock some serious hours at the station as their connection to Deputy Marshall Dolls and the Black Badge division deepened, sure, some heads turned. Tongues wagged. Questions were asked - not that there were any answers in return. Over the months, though, they've managed to weave themselves into the fabric of the station, almost indistinguishable from the ones on payroll. Almost. The gun attached to Wynonna's hip isn't quite department issue, though. That aside, their presence these days is a non-event. Waverly Earp, attempting to stand casually in the bullpen at the end of the day, writing notes with no Purgatory Sheriff's Department employee accompanying her or even remotely involved is routine enough that, outside of a polite "good afternoon," the office continues on as if she wasn't even here.
And that has made this latest turn of events far easier than it has any right to be.
Tonight is not the first time. Ever since she busted into the station a couple of days ago, five feet of focus and fire, Waverly's been treating the bullpen like her second home. After she quit her job at Shorty's, she has a lot more time to devote to...other pursuits. The thing with Shorty's - Nicole knows there's far more to the story than Waverly's letting on. Her training tells her to push, to probe, to ask questions that elicit substantive answers. But when the topic comes up, Waverly hedges, steering the conversation elsewhere like a linguistic sleight of hand. Every damn time. So...Nicole doesn't push.
That's not to say she can't suss out information elsewhere. After all, she's still a cop. On her way home late last night after a grueling shift, not five minutes after officially going off duty, a call came through the radio of a scuffle in the street in the vicinity of the bar. Part of her wanted to bust a u-ie right in the middle of Allen St. and ride code all the way downtown, a golden opportunity to check things out in her capacity as local law enforcement while also feel out the new owner and getting the lay of the land on a more personal level. Instead, with a deep breath, she continued home, her stetson remaining stowed in the passenger seat, its duty done for the day. That doesn't mean that she's hands off completely. On the contrary, when she clocked in this morning, the first thing she did was read her coworker's write-up of the call in question. Who doesn't like a little light reading with their coffee? The scuffle itself read as routine, a few drunks with too much liquid courage and not enough brain cells decided the results of their dart game required sloppy punches and stumbling in the street. The report contained a statement from the bartender and a few choice patrons, but no one else. Mr. del Ray, proprietor, and his - followers? Entourage? She's not sure what to call them. Something about them makes her skin tingle, the hair on her neck stand up. Yeah, there's way more there than anyone is letting on, and it's something she's going to have to keep a close eye on.
The good news is that she's not the only one. Even with the management change, Nedley still takes his happy hour supper break there. Hell, maybe he's still able to pick up bits and pieces from the...changing clientele, but she can't imagine he feels terribly welcome there anymore.
It's a miracle that the shake-up at Shorty's hasn't changed Nedley's routine. Like clockwork, when Nedley walks out the door, it's only a matter of time before Waverly breezes in. On reflection, Nicole decides it's kind of amazing how quickly a routine is set, how quickly schedules are rewritten. After only a few days - hell, not even 72 hours - her internal clock has been reset. It doesn't even matter if she's around a clock, if she's consciously aware of the time. That's remarkably irrelevant. When happy hour rolls around, it's like the alarm goes off. Her heart beats harder, the blood pumps through her veins, her breaths are deeper. She's awake. Inevitably she ends up practically bouncing in her seat like a goddamn puppy, checking the doorway every time she notices someone walk by, heart fluttering and hopeful.
Yesterday - yesterday, she thought they were busted. When they left Nedley's office, each going their separate ways, they were too distracted to notice they'd forgotten to flip the shades back open. Nedley had come in a little while later; Nicole was once again working diligently at her desk. As he approached his office, he stopped in his tracks, narrowed his eyes, and then slowly cut his gaze to her. No words. Nothing else. Just the look, before stepping across the threshold and, one by one, flipping his blinds back open. When he opened the set near her desk, he paused to stare a second longer at her before continuing around the room. The rest of that shift had been...interminable.
But still totally worth it.
Nicole looks up, peeking slowly around the side of her monitor to see Linda still studiously filing her nails. Well, she's nothing if not dedicated.
Deciding to chance it, her eyes slide to Waverly once more, a grin pulling at her mouth. Waverly is looking right back at her, a self-satisfied smirk forming on her face, before feigning interest in that damned notebook again.
Sighing and turning back to her monitor, she skims the open report on her screen, finding the gibberish she had typed a minute ago and quickly deleting it. Re-reading what she's typed so far, well, this isn't exactly her best work. And sadly, this one's already late. The going turnaround time on her police reports? Suddenly abysmal. It took a whole extra day to finish the ones from that first happy hour with Waverly. Let's be real - there was no way she could have possibly thought about anything else for the rest of her shift, even long after Waverly had left the station sporting a dopey smile, her whole countenance alight, solidly tipsy without a drop of alcohol.
That...was something else entirely. After the miscommunication the day before in the street and the trainwreck of a conversation in the squad car that morning, her headspace wasn't exactly fantastic when Waverly stormed into the station. The outlook was looking particularly grim. Hell, if someone had told her she'd end up on a couch underneath Waverly Earp before the end of the day, she'd call them a liar.
Well, she'd punch them first. Then call them a liar. And then maybe punch them once more for good measure.
She knew what "just friends" had meant, and she had meant what she said in return - that she'd never ask Waverly to be anything she wasn't. Really, that she'd wait. Even if those weren't the words that were said, they were the words that were meant. She just hadn't expected the wait to last approximately three hours.
To hear that Waverly was scared of her - of this thing between them - it was one thing to guess at but another thing entirely to hear spoken aloud. And it made it all the more important to her that Waverly be the one to set the pace, to decide what was acceptable, what was perhaps too scary. Nicole, for her part, was happy to be along for the ride.
Honestly, they're lucky they weren't caught red-handed the first time in Nedley's office; it's not like either one of them were watching the clock. Time was measured in breaths taken, in kisses shared, in long stretches of disbelieving staring, broken only by soft smiles and gentle strokes. Time was infinite.
Bruising kisses, swollen lips, low moans, legs tangled together, they alternated between heated, almost frantic moments, when one or the other (or both - jesus, both) of their hips would roll together unconsciously, seeking friction, and incredibly tender moments, where all movement stopped, all limbs stilled, and they'd lose a minute or two just staring. For someone who started off the day scared, it was a hell of a statement.
When they did finally agree that the need to vacate the office outweighed their need to eliminate all traces of personal space between them, for some reason Nicole had expected Waverly to revert to the shy, rambling version of herself, perhaps having gone through the reserves of courage she'd stored up for her trip to the station.
Instead, she was the exact opposite. While Nicole was trying to move them towards the door, Waverly took the whole route backwards, taking the opportunity to steal more kisses, her lips greedy, insisting that time was infinite. All of this - is the exact opposite of a problem, Nicole decides. When Waverly reaches a decision and decides to go for something, she makes it happen. No excuses. In the short time she's known her, the short time she's observed her, it's clear that Waverly doesn't make a lot of decision on the spur of the moment. That's more of Wynonna's calling card. But when that decision is made, there's not a force on this green earth that is going to keep one of the Earp girls from making it a reality, for better or for worse.
Well, after all, it's not like the Earps are the only ones who don't like to wait when they see something they want. Yeah...Nicole can totally work with that.
That first time, somewhere along the way Waverly's hands had dug into Nicole's braid, pulling and tugging, leaving it hanging in long messy strands around her face. In addition to the rumpled clothes and the dropped radio, it was just one more thing Nicole had to straighten before attempting to stand up from the couch. While she quickly worked to rebraid it, Waverly had sat beside her, watching raptly, occasionally reaching out to touch Nicole's arm, her face, her thigh, as if she was checking to make sure she was real. The added attention turned the deputy's routine movements into something...other - the steps slowed, the air heavy. The mundane turned intimate.
It took Nicole a long time after Waverly left to catch her breath.
The makeout sessions have left her feeling like a teenager again, the heady buzz of oxygen deprivation and hormones a potent cocktail with a killer one-two punch. But, to be honest, it's the moments in between - the ones filled with everything from soft smiles to inane small talk, moments where Waverly stands still, wrapped up in the circle of her arms - these are the most intoxicating of all.
Shit - maybe she really did die in the ditch that day, and this - all of this with Waverly is what heaven is like. It's pretty much just like she'd imagined it, anyway.
A clang, metal on metal, breaks the silence in the bullpen, and it's honest to god one of the most beautiful sounds in the world. It's the sound of Linda returning her damned nail file to her desk drawer, the sound of her work day coming to an end. It's the sound of an interminable wait, almost over. Within seconds, purse in hand, knit scarf wrapped haphazardly around her face, Linda makes her way around the desk, surprisingly speedy for someone who looked like she had one foot in the grave mere minutes ago.
Before stepping through the door, she calls out, "You girls have a good night."
"You, too! You tell that husband of yours to stay out of the kitchen, you hear?" Waverly responds, her voice saccharine. Nicole, a smile big as Texas plastered on her face, offers a small wave. Pleased, Linda leaves, her footsteps echoing down the hall.
The smiles drop the second her back clears their line of sight, when their eyes snap back to one another across the expanse of the bullpen. After five excruciating minutes, they're finally alone.
Nicole plans on giving it ten seconds. Ten measly little seconds. A buffer. A safe zone.
She makes it to six.
1...2...3...4...5...6...oh to hell with this.
Swiveling in her chair, Nicole stands, moves swift and sure, her plan in action. On the way, she grabs a folder, grabs a wrist, and pulling Waverly with her into their favorite room in the world, she leans into her own personal slice of heaven.