As always, comments and critiques make my day!
Waverly wasn't gay.
Or at least, she had never really had the opportunity to be gay.
There weren't really that many women in Purgatory that fit in her age range, and most of the ones who did were, well, for lack of a better word - bitches. Save for Chrissy Nedley, she didn't have many girls in town that wanted to be her friend, much less girlfriend. If they were older than her, then they knew Wynonna. and if they knew Wynonna, then they were convinced that the entire Earp family was crazy. Even if they were closer to Waverly's age, they had still heard about Wynonna, and considered Waverly crazy by association. Honestly, most of her life she had felt like she was under a microscope, the whole town watching to see when she would crack, when she would live up to her Earp name.
So she made it her goal to be the friendliest, nicest, person she could be. She endeared herself to the people of Purgatory. She was the success story. The lovable bar maid with the tragic past. Still, even if she had most people in town convinced that she wasn't going to suddenly go bonkers and turn out like Wynonna, kids her age still didn't exactly fall over themselves to be her friend. She was a geek, a nerd; the girl who spent her free time buried nose deep in books that most other kids couldn't even read.
So between Purgatory's minimal population, Waverly's family history, and her own penchant for the ancient and paranormal, her friend options were minimal. Boyfriend options were even more limited - it was well known around town that Champ was the only one stupid enough to date an Earp - and that meant girlfriend options were non- existent.
It wasn't that Waverly had sat down one day and thought about who she found attractive, she hadn't really had time. Maybe while watching television of movies, she had sometimes found other women attractive, but certainly never in real life.
Never had she ever had a girl standing in front of her and thought 'wow'.
At least not until two weeks ago when a gorgeous redhead had saved her from an unbearable Champ.
Nicole Haught - if that was even her real name - was definitely crush worthy.
Looks alone, she was gorgeous, but paired with the fact that she had gone out of her way to help save Waverly from unwanted attention?
Absolutely swoon-worthy.
And that's how Waverly found herself at 10AM on a Wednesday, distracted by a girl she had barely met. It had been two weeks since that night in the club, but she hadn't really had any time to process what had happened, not with Wynonna's quest for the Seven taking up most of her time.
She had gone through a lot of change in the past month - Curtis dying, Wynonna coming back to town, Black Badge getting involved with the Earp curse, and breaking up with Champ. Now she had to deal with the weird bubbly feeling that fluttered in her stomach when she thought about the mysterious redhead. Luckily, she had been able to avoid Champ and the subsequent conversation about what he had seen.
Thank god for that.
Because she didn't even really know what to tell herself, much less her ex-boyfriend.
She wiped down the bar top a little too vigorously, letting some of her frustration out on the wooden surface. The bar in general wasn't the cleanest place in the world, and Wynonna's run-in with the demon last night hadn't helped any. She moved on to the beer taps, wiping them clean when suddenly she found herself being sprayed in the face with Bud Light.
Shit.
Shorty really needed to fix that.
Like she wasn't already having a tough enough morning, now she got to add 'soaked with beer' to her list of troubles.
"I didn't know Shorty's had wet t-shirt competitions." A voice laughed from the doorway and she froze.
No fricken way.
That drawl was unmistakeable. Granted, she never thought she would hear it again; but still she knew exactly who it belonged to. Sure enough, she looked up to see the mystery redhead leaning against the door jab in a sheriff's deputy uniform, twirling a white Stetson in her hands.
Holy cow.
If she had thought the other girl looked good in skinny jeans, it didn't hold a candle to how she looked in uniform.
Damn.
She suddenly found it very difficult to keep air moving in and out of her lungs.
"You OK?"
Totally fine, just you know, thinking about how I might be gay for you, and how I'd probably never see you again.
"Yeah? Yeah! Just, uh a bit jumpy."
Because you showed up at my bar.
"Had a crazy night." She continued, scrambling to grab a towel off the bar and pat her shirt.
"Sorry I wasn't here to see it."
Dimples?! She didn't remember those from the other night.
The officer extended her hand across the bar.
"I've been, uh I've been meaning to stop by."
Waverly wasn't trying to be rude, she just physically couldn't speak. But the other girl's face still fell almost imperceptibly.
"I'm Nicole? Nicole Haught?"
Waverly's jaw went slack.
"That's your real name?"
The words tumbled up before she could stop them and she winced. To her utmost joy, Nicole laughed.
"Excuse me?"
"I thought - this is really stupid- but I thought maybe you gave my sister a fake name."
"A fake name . . ."
"I mean, she can be scary; I'd probably give her a fake name. And 'Haught'? What kind off last name is that? A hot girl saying her last name was 'Hot' just seems fake."
"Well, Waverly Earp, if you weren't such a popular girl around here, I might have thought you had given me a fake name too. I haven't heard the name 'Earp' since history class."
"That's me, queen of the smile and wave!" She raked her eyes over the taller woman, taking in the uniform and the Stetson that was now resting on the bar. "What's up with the . . . uniform?"
"I'm the new rookie Sheriff's deputy. I started a few days ago, mostly filling out paperwork and getting the grand tour so far."
"Yeah, I remember Sheriff talking about a new rookie."
They locked eyes for a long awkward moment.
"Can I get a cappuccino to go?"
What?
Nicole motioned to the espresso machine across the bar.
Oh!
"Oh, I'm really sorry. Um, we're not actually - open yet, so -"
Waverly twisted the towel in her hands nervously. Was Nicole just going to ignore what had happened two weeks ago?! I mean she'd had Waverly pressed up against a wall with her tongue in her mouth for pete's sake!
"Oh! Right! My bad!" The officer splayed her hands and shrugged. "To be honest, I found out you worked here and I didn't really wanna wait to see if it was really you. And you know, your door was open"
Nicole winked, and Waverly shivered - maybe because her shirt was still soaked, but probably because having Nicole so close was doing things to her.
"Oh, God, I'm sopping wet." She rambled to cover her nerves, but dropping the double entendre didn't exactly help. "You know, I keep telling Shorty he needs to fix the taps." She was pretty sure that she had never seen someone as interested in barkeep talk as Nicole was at this moment and she felt even more unnerved as she racked her brain for ways to get Nicole to stop staring at her with those big brown eyes.
"If you could just-" she twirled her finger at the other girl. "Sorry, do you mind just, uh-" She mimed covering her eyes with her hands and Nicole's face relaxed in understanding.
"Oh! Yeah! Yeah, sure!" Nicole graciously turned, offering Waverly relative privacy.
She took a moment to compose herself- not that it really helped, because her heart still pounded in her chest and her palms were ridiculously sweaty. She turned away from Nicole -out of sight, out of mind - and reached for the bottom of her tank top, pulling it over her head.
At least, she tried to pull it over her head.
Somehow, between her shaking fingers and the beer soaked material, the shirt stopped halfway over her head, effectively trapping her.
"Uh, umm, uh, officer? I'm stuck."
Geez talk about looking clumsy in front of your crush.
"Let me help you." She felt Nicole's presence close in, and soft fingers brushed her arm, tugging the material away. "I got you."
Her stomach fluttered as their eyes met, and she felt the word vomit coming up.
"Good thing you're not some stranger, right, or this would be really, really awkward."
There were those dimples again, severing any ties Waverly might have had with effable thoughts.
"Uh, Um I-I owe you one." Even though Nicole's eyes didn't wander, she felt the need to cover herself, and she wrapped her arms around her half naked torso.
"Alright, well, how about you buy me that cup of coffee?" Brown eyes sparkled. "How about tonight?"
Coffee?! Tonight?! With Nicole?! Who made her emotions a complete mess?!
"Oh, I can't."
"No?"
The officer looked disappointed and to be honest, Waverly felt disappointed, but she still didn't trust herself to say yes.
"No. I mean, I'd love to," - slow down, Waves - "Like, like to, uh but I have plans."
"Plans?"
"Yeah. I'm a planner." Really?! "I like to know what I'm doing at least two or three days in advance."
Nicole didn't seem discouraged at all.
"So Friday then?"
"I- I - I just got out of a relationship."
There, that said she needed some space without completely writing things off. Right? Maybe it seemed too eager.
"With a boy. A man. A boy-man"
That's way better, she thought sarcastically; make it seem like you're a hundred percent confident in your heterosexuality, like you're not interested in her at all. Ten minutes ago, you were ready to read every article on the internet about liking girls, but sure, talk about your ex-boy-man.
She needn't have worried, Nicole just laughed.
"Right, the club stalker. I've been there - it's the worst." Something told Waverly she wasn't referring to the situation with Champ specifically, but rather the conflicting emotions that were currently fighting for space in her very fragile psyche.
"Well, some other time then." Nicole smiled as she placed her business card on the bar top, and all hope was not lost. "I mean it."
The words were spoken with a promise, and Waverly felt the weight of them, the possibility.
Nicole turned, placing her Stetson back on her head, and winked. Effectively nailing the final nail in Waverly's coffin.
She watched the other woman leave before picking up the card and brushing the the worn paper thoughtfully with her fingers.
"Officer Haught. Of course."
Much more to come! We'll see where these two end up!