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it's not about your scars (it's all about your heart)
oh, I've loved you from the start
in every single way
and more each passing day
you are brighter than the stars
believe me when I say
it's not about your scars
it's all about your heart
- ‘All About Your Heart’ by Mindy Gledhill
Alice groans, a grumpy and strangled sort of sound not dissimilar to the cries of a dying Tauntaun.
And damn it, Jeremy, it isn’t necessary to watch every single Star Wars movie ever made whenever a new one is released. Especially since there’s over twenty of them now. Especially .
“Goddamn, Tauntauns,” Belle mutters, thumping the back of her head against the hard bench that she’s sprawled across. Even with her eyes closed, she can still see the crappy fluorescent lights glaring overhead.
Alice tries to kick at her with her stupid steel-toed boots, thankfully still drunk enough to be sorely lacking in the coordination actually necessary to shove Belle off the bench.
“Screw you, too,” she growls, throwing out a foot with much better aim. Her sneaker connects with what feels like Alice’s thigh and she hears a ‘ fuck ’ in return. “Why did we think a bar fight outside of Shorty’s was a good idea?” She cracks an eye open — the one that isn’t swollen shut — to peer at her cousin who has decided that lying down on the cold concrete with an arm thrown dramatically over her face is the best position to be in after they got their asses handed to them by a bunch of homophobic pricks.
(Oh, right. The bar fight seemed like a good idea because Purgatory still has its share of homophobic jackasses.)
“Isn’t Bellona supposed to be a goddess of war or something?” Alice snarks, her voice gravelly and not without a hint of petulance.
Belle nudges Alice again with the toe of her shoe. “Doesn’t Alice mean noble and kind ? Which one of those are you?”
“Bitch.”
“Asshat.”
Alice grouses once more. “I’m too old for this shit.”
“You’re only twenty, hoser,” Belle points out.
She ignores the counterpoint and instead whines, “Your moms are going to kill us.”
As if on cue, the metal door that leads to the jail cells opens and the sound of PSD-issued duty boots hitting the unfinished floor echoes in the tiny space. Belle forces herself to sit up just as Nicole comes into view. She just barely manages to catch a bag of frozen berries before it hits her in the face.
“A cop shop without ice packs?” Belle quips, but she lifts the frozen fruit to her battered face anyways.
“You wanna tell me what the hell you two were thinking before Earp hell rains down on your heads? Because I figure you have fifteen minutes before they get here if Waverly is driving. Twelve if it’s Wynonna.” Nicole folds her arms over her chest and levels them with her most withering sheriff’s stare. Belle’s only been on the receiving end of it once before and it sucked .
“Shit,” the younger girl swears. She sets the bag beside her on the bench before reaching down and grabbing hold of Alice by the lapels of her leather jacket. “Sit up, dumbass,” she grumbles as she manhandles her cousin onto the bench beside her.
“It’s not our fault that Chump’s spawn is a shithead,” Alice mutters under her breath.
Because Bradley James is as much of a misogynistic, womanizing bastard as his father. And because he’s captain of the hockey team, he gets a pass from most of the teachers and too many of the folks in town. Despite the fact that the team didn’t win a game all season.
Nicole just quirks an eyebrow at the both of them. “And? That doesn’t excuse for throwing the first punch.” She swipes at her face with her hand and sighs. “Belle, put the damn fruit on your face so it doesn’t keep swelling.”
Belle reaches for the bag at her side and presses it against the left side of her face. Lot of good it’ll do at this point, she thinks miserably. The two of them are no doubt a sight to behold. Alice’s jaw is already purpling, muddled with yellow and green splotches. Her hands are scraped to hell from when she tried to catch herself from eating pavement, and her knuckles are torn on both hands after landing a couple good punches. Belle’s worse for wear, though. Half of her face is black and blue, and she can’t even open her left eye, right now. Her lip is split and she’s sure that her torso is painted with bruises, too. Not to mention that the knuckles of her right hand are shredded from when she decked Bradley in the face and caught his teeth in the follow through.
It was worth it. So worth it and she’d do it again.
“I’d do it again,” Belle says and it isn’t a whisper or a mumble; it’s a fierce declaration that rips from her throat like an angry growl because Bradley James and his shit-eating friends can eat shit.
“Belle,” Nicole admonishes, her tone low and serious.
But Belle shakes her head. “No, mom. I’d do it again,” she repeats just as firmly. “I’d do it again because that goddamn blunderbuss was talking about you and mama. Saying shit that he said his dad told him. So I’m not sorry that I punched him.”
They weren’t looking for trouble for once. It’s just that they had stumbled out of Shorty’s just after midnight and Bradley and his hockey pals were sitting in the bed of a truck in the parking lot, drinking beers in public like the underage dumbasses that they were. And what Belle omits from the story is the reason why Alice had marched over to that truck first and started yelling at them. Because that’s what prompted Bradley James to start spewing his bigoted drivel, which then led to Belle jumping into the truck and slamming her fist into his face.
It all went downhill from there, of course. And, well, Shorty’s wasn’t particularly far from the sheriff’s station and Price broke up the scuffle as soon as she saw it. Bradley and his cronies took off, which wouldn’t actually help them since Price knew all their faces and names. But she’d hauled Belle and Alice back down to the station and threw them in the drunk tank after having a paramedic look them over to make sure neither of them had a concussion or any other serious injuries.
Now the two of them are facing Nicole’s I’m very disappointed in you face, which is the absolute worst.
Alice realizes what Belle is doing. That Belle is trying to take the fall for this mess. Trying to accept the blame for Alice getting hurt and Alice getting in trouble. Because even after all these years, people still see her as the daughter of Wynonna Earp, who will always be a bit of a misfit in the eyes of Purgatory’s citizens. Sometimes they look at Alice and whisper. They speculate why she disappeared for three years, suggesting all sorts of unsavory theories that continue to cast her mother in a bad light. And Belle? She doesn’t take too kindly to assholes messing with her family.
(Case in point: the wicked shiner she’s going to have come dawnlight.)
She’s a lot like her moms that way.
But Alice won’t let Belle fall on her own sword. Not this time. And so she stands from the bench, still a little drunk and still a little wobbly from the fight, and stumbles toward the bars.
“Alice,” Belle warns because she, too, knows what her cousin is doing.
But the words spill from her mouth before Belle can stop her, and they make Nicole’s blood run cold because she thought they were past all this sort of narrow-minded crap for fuck’s sake. Because what Alice tells her is that, “Tommy Hopper told Belle that she was lucky that her dyke moms took her in because nobody else wanted a kid that drove her ma to shoot her dad in the face.”
Nicole’s jaw clenches. She closes her eyes and even with only one good eye, Belle can see her mother’s nostrils flare as she breathes in and out, in and out, trying to keep herself calm.
“I see,” she finally says, opening her eyes and Belle can see the fire and fury behind them as much as she tries to hide it.
Nicole is a good cop. She’s a good sheriff because she believes in justice and goodness and standing up for the little guy. She remembers what Nedley told her all those years ago about protecting the ordinary, non-werewolf citizens of Purgatory. She cares .
First and foremost, however, Nicole is a good mom .
“You know your mama and I don’t condone solving problems with fists,” she says calmly. “And I’m going to leave you in the drunk tank until the morning shift comes in. Then we’re going to the hospital to have you looked over again and after that, I’m going to buy both of you breakfast at the diner.”
Alice and Belle know better than to argue with Nicole, especially if she’s letting something like this slide.
All three of them wince when they hear Waverly’s shouting from the main desk. Where are they? What happened? Why the hell didn’t somebody call them sooner?
Nicole rubs at the back of her neck and sighs. “I’m gonna go… handle that. I’ll see you two in a few hours, okay?”
Before Nicole can leave to calm down her wife and sister-in-law, Belle calls out, “Mom?” She stops at the door and turns back around, giving her daughter a curious look. “I love you, you know. You and mama.”
And Nicole’s head bobs, an affectionate smile on her face. “I know you do, Belle. Both of us do. And we love you so much. We wanted you Belle. We wanted you in your lives and you are such a gift. The best gift any of us could have ever asked for. Tommy Hopper can go to hell, okay?”
Belle nods. “Yeah,” she says softly. “Okay.”
“I love you, monkey. You, too, Alice. Thanks for being there for my girl.”
“Any time, Nic,” Alice murmurs before hobbling back to the bench.
As soon as Nicole leaves, Belle sinks into Alice’s side, emotionally and physically exhausted. “No more fights,” she mumbles.
Alice rests her head against Belle’s. “No more fights,” she agrees.
A comfortable silence settles in the jail cell that lasts for a whole five minutes. Belle pulls away, just enough so Alice can see the seriousness on her face. “No more fights. Unless Tommy Hopper or Bradley James open their stupid mouths again.”
“Agreed.”
They lean on each other, supporting one another. They keep each other from falling over, from falling apart. It’s what they’ve done since they were children, since that first time that Belle met Alice and they spent a Sunday afternoon drawing on the floor of Alice’s childhood bedroom. That’s what you do for your family. You protect them. And if you can’t protect them, you fight beside them. But always — always, you love them.
…
“Tommy Hopper said what?” Wynonna’s voice is loud and clear, even from where they sit in the cells at the back of the station. “Baby girl, go get your shotgun. I’ve got Peacemaker. That boy’s got some ‘splainin’ to do.”
fin.