Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Freshman Year:

Purgatory was still bullshit, but high school was a whole other level of hell for Wynonna. Frankly, the whole situation was balls.

Things had been going down for the Earp family long before Wynonna started at Purgatory High, but that’s where everything started to spiral. When she was 10 mama left, and though the rest of the family continued on with their lives they all realized that it changed their family dynamics. Ward became someone cold to the girls, a foreign figure. He didn’t even speak to Waverly, and when he would to Wynonna it was ‘get me a beer’ or ‘go fetch Willa for me’. Willa was the only daughter Ward ever truly loved, so when she disappeared he lost it.

It was Freshman year for Wynonna. She was never the best student, but she was averaging C’s for once. Everything seemed fine, Ward wasn’t the best father but she didn’t need him anyways. Even then Waverly was her support system, her little 7th grade angel. They always stuck together, Wynonna had never trusted anyone as much as her, even if she was her little sister. Waverly gave her hope.

She had almost made it through the year when it happened. It was a brisk February morning, Willa hadn’t come home last week. She was a senior when Wynonna was a freshman, a popular girl. She had been out at a house party..or at least that’s what she had told her daddy and sisters. When she didn’t come home Ward damn near set the house on fire. He had Wynonna take the truck up to the sheriff’s station and make Nedley put out a call while he scoured the streets leaving poor Waverly at home. Nedley didn’t like Ward, never did, but he told himself to do it for Wynonna and little Waverly. He knew Wynonna got in trouble every once in a while but deep down he saw the good in her. Nothing turned up for a week. It was a Monday morning when they found her. She was lying in a ditch just shy of the purgatory town line. Nedley said it looked like she had been there for a few days.

The funeral was small. Ward pulled Wynonna and Waverly out of school, and some of Willa’s closer friends joined them to mourn. Wynonna cried, Waverly just held her. Not that Waverly didn’t love her eldest sister, but Willa never cared for her. Quite the opposite actually. She used to throw her favorite stuffed animal out on thin ice, if it weren’t for Wynonna pulling her out when she fell in she’d have been the first Earp sister to meet her end.

Ward went completely off the handle. The first night back in the house after the funeral he cut his hand. Waverly said he did it on purpose, but Wynonna patches him up anyways. There was blood all over the kitchen. Wynonna cleaned it all up after putting Waverly to bed. Ward was of course different after Willa was gone. Wynonna knew it, Waverly knew it, and he definitely knew it. That’s really when Wynonna knew she had to be there for her sister, because Ward sure as hell wasn’t going to be.

Wynonna went back to school the next day like nothing had happened. They weren’t close, she was still her sister, but Wynonna never saw much of her anyway. She didn’t want pity. She never wanted to be known as the girl with the dead sister. She only had four months left of school to get through and then she could stalk away in her room for the rest of the summer. She didn’t really plan on doing anything different, just sticking to the back of the classroom and resisting the urge to go smoke in the bathroom until lunch. Meeting Henry really fucked that all up.

He was kind. Cocky, but kind. He walked up to her in their biology class and led with a swift ‘Hello darlin’. She thought he sounded like he was from the old west, but he was cute, and older, and took her mind off of things that were happening that she’d rather forget. They started officially dating about a month later. She wasn’t usually the one for labels, but this felt different. She figured he knew about Willa but they never really talked about it. She had him over to the homestead every once in a while and Waverly even started to take a liking to him. He fixed their mailbox and she thought his mustache was funny. She could tel Wynonna was happy though and that’s all that mattered.

She eventually made it through freshman year. It wasn’t easy and she came close to failing one of her classes but her teachers sort of let her slide on the account of the whole losing a sister and all. She wasn’t as much of a trouble maker back then, but it was wheee everything started. Where the seed was planted so to speak. Henry wasn’t much of an impact on her in school. She still got shitty grades, she still sat in the back corner, and she still only takes to three people..four now. But outside of school it was just like she had someone other then her sister to watch TV with. It’s almost like they weren’t even really dating, more of a friends with benefits, but Wynonna did like him, just not enough to go on dates neither of them wanted to be on.

Like her grades, her summer was average.

It was spent mostly making out with Henry, or teaching Waverly how to play poker. Wynonna didn’t take part in the whole “friends” aspect of high school. Henry only ever hung out with her or his friend from the trailer park her lived in. His name was Bobo, but her never spent time with the two together. They had an odd hatred for each other.

Henry got her more into drinking. Not that she wouldn’t have gotten there on her own especially with her family name, but he just acted as a catalyst. They had campfires, drank whisky, and told Waverly it was cranberry juice so she wouldn’t get mad and wouldn’t want to drink it. He wasn’t a bad influence on her, Ward had already hit every area of what one would consider bad before Henry even came along but it was clear that he also wasn’t helping the problem. Summer was coming to an end soon, and sophomore year was approaching. Wynonna had no desire to go back to Purgatory High, but at least she had someone to look out for her. It would be Henry’s senior year, and having him around would only turn out to bring Wynonna more pain. For now though, he was the only thing that made her ok with having to go back.

In the weeks leading up to the dreadful first day Wynonna tried not to think about it as much as possible. She went on with her life as normal, but there was not stoping time. As much as she knew she’d hate having to walk those halls again, nothing could have prepared her for how awful her sophomore year would be.

Chapter Text

She actually thought she had beat the dreaded bad luck the Earp’s had. It was like a curse. Things had started looking up last year...even after Willa. She always had Waverly to keep her afloat, and having Henry by her side for more romantic needs, she really began to think that life was looking up. The icing on top of the cake was meeting Dolls.

He had been in her PE class. He was just as cocky as Henry, but he was nice to her and slowed down so she had someone to run with. They became quick friends, bonding over their gun knowledge and fighting tips. Henry did not like Dolls. He never verbally expressed it but anyone in the same room as the two of them could tell. Dolls never made advances on Wynonna, he knew she was taken, sorta? They weren’t really calling it a thing? It...well it was complicated is what it was. Very complicated, because about three months into the school year Wynonna found Henry kissing a new transfer student named Rosita.

She told herself not to be mad. They never really used the term boyfriend/girlfriend, but they knew, or at least she thought they new that things were monogamous. Apparently not...Henry tried talking to her like nothing had happened, like he hadn’t just run after her because he saw how hurt she was. She told him she didn’t want to see him any more, that he was no longer allowed in her house and to act like she didn’t exist at school. It’s was really hard to do, as much as she hated it he had become a big part of her life. But a girl knows when to drop someone.

She was furious. She drank so much that night she was leaning over the toilet all through the morning. Waverly of course was there stroking her back and holding her hair. She hated seeing her like this. Wynonna disappeared for a few days, it worried Waverly sick, but she just needed some time alone. She took a bottle of whiskey and two packs of cigarettes and headed into the woods. It was hard not having someone to talk to, as much as she loved Waverly she didn’t want to burden her with her problems. She though about texting Dolls but she knew he was camping with his family that weekend.

She came back to school eventually. She saw Henry in the hall with Rosita and punched a locker so hard she had bloody fingers. Henry wasn’t everything, but he was something, and I’m Wynonna’s life something is a lot. When she got to PE there was Dolls waiting for just like he had every other day she hadn’t been there. She looked at him, her eyes still teary, that stupidly sweet smile of his. She hadn’t thought of him in a romantic way before now, but feeling his arms wrap around her when he saw her tears, to hear his assure her everything would be ok. It was exactly what she needed, he was exactly what she needed.

They never pursued each other. They knew, they both knew how much they had come to love one another. They just never got the chance. It was three months after Wynonnas little issue with Henry. Things weren’t great, but they were better. She drank with Dolls and they talked about the world, and what they were going to be. She felt like she actually had a friend. They were meant to be together, there for each other. Dolls didn’t have the best home life either. They’d escape into the woods and down a bottle only to wake up and have to go back to the real world...but at least they had each other...for a while.

Her world came crumbling down hard. She had walked into school feeling the same way she always did. It wasn’t until she’d get to see Dolls that she had a smile. Unfortunately her smile didn’t come that day, quite the opposite. In third period Principal Lucado came over the loud speaker. Wynonna didn’t listen until she said his name. Xavier Dolls. He’d been in a car accident on the way to school. There would be a funeral Friday.

She left the class in the middle of the announcement. She called him, texted, everything she could think of. It had to be a sick joke. He was the strongest person she knew, and he was gone. She was alone again. Of course Waverly was there for her, and held her as she cried all week. They went to the funeral together. Waverly never really got to know him, but she knew how much he meant to Wynonna. It was small, family and a few friends. They gave their respects and sunk back into the homestead. Wynonna wasn’t the same.

She decided then that this was the point she no longer let people in. She tried with Henry. She tried with Dolls. Everyone she connected with crumbled. The rest of Sophomore year was bland. She stuck to the back, her grades fell even more..when she bothered to show up. She kept herself contained around Waverly as not to crush her spirits, but when alone she allowed herself to cry for Dolls, and for the Earp curse. She prayed Waverly had a better time in High school then she was having. Junior year was fast approaching, and Waverly would be a Freshman. Wynonna would be there to look out for her. For now she had to finish the rest of the year.

Two months left of sophomore year. She passed..barely. She spent the summer shooting bottles after she’d drank their contents. Waverly was nervous for high school, but Wynonna tried to keep her excited. They walked her schedule and had the same lunch period. She had no doubt Waverly would be ok. It was herself she was worried about. Little did she know junior year would be exactly what she needed. Junior year would lift her spirits. She’d become her old self again, because Junior year was where she would meet Nicole Haught.