After all that had happened, Jesse felt that he had to leave. He couldn't say in Albuquerque anymore, probably couldn't even go back to visit. It was too much, too hard to drive through it and relive it all.
So Jesse took the little money that he'd stashed away, packed a few possessions into his car, and headed out of state, north west towards Alaska for a fresh start.
Five years later
00
Jesse had gotten to Alaska, but he hadn't stayed long. He knew it would be cold, but it was far worse than he expected. Without snow chains, his tires didn't make it past a week. Jobs had been hard to come by, too. He had little true, legal work experience to speak of. Ultimately, he had ended up at a little building near the docks, gutting fish. The smell of the place made the meth chemicals seem like a field of roses.
The job itself was miserable, too. The inside of the building was almost as cold as the outside, and most of the people working there were life-long residents and not open to outsiders. After getting into a fight with the boss about the heating situation, Jesse left and headed back down south.
In the years since, he'd traveled extensively, seeing much of the north west - little towns in Oregon, the mountains of Montana and Colorado. He'd been to California and had stayed there for a while, too.
Jesse's main problem, though, was that he never found stable employment. That was mostly his fault and he knew it.
Truth be told, most of the money that he'd made in Alaska had gone to drugs. Jesse wasn't sure exactly when, but at some point, the memories had gotten to be too much. They ate away at him, causing him sleepless nights and a knot in his stomach that never seemed to fade. The heroin took that away, at least somewhat. It made him calm, but at a cost. He'd resorted to living out of his car, doing odd jobs for money to buy more smack.
It wasn't a good life, but Jesse got by. The more dope that he did, the more the past fell away. He forgot about Jane, and about Drew Sharp. About Combo and the plane crash and his family - about his parents who didn't want him, his dead Aunt Jenny and the friends that he'd left behind. He did briefly wonder what had happened to the home that he'd abandoned - surely, he owed a ton of taxes on it, but without a fixed address, the town couldn't find him, so it wasn't really a concern.
00
It was a rainy Thursday when Jesse's car had broken down. He took it to a mechanic, but the thing was shot. It would have cost more money to repair then it would have to buy a new car, and Jesse didn't have enough to do either.
So, he had taken to living on the streets. He didn't have much of a choice. Still addicted to the smack, he looked for work, but again found nothing. No one wanted to hire some kid who lived under a bridge. So, he earned money the only way he felt he could – putting out.
Jesse's clients were both male and female. He took on men because of necessity more so than choice. The females tended to be nicer while the men seemed to enjoy abusing him.
On the plus side, Jesse often saw the same clients over and over. He had moved out east and settled in a small town in Missouri, for the time being, and there didn't seem to be that many people there. This afforded him the advanced knowledge of what he was going to be in for.
Weeks of life sleeping on sidewalks, under bridges and occasionally in fields took their toll, though. Jesse showered whenever he could, but sometimes he would go days without, and he often only made enough to afford either drugs or food, not both. More often than not, he chose the drugs.
He had become so thin that his clothes were practically falling off. He attempted to use an electric cord that he had pulled from the trash as a belt, but it only went so far. Scars also littered his arms, advertising his status as an addict.
The problem here was that, the worse his appearance became, the harder time he had getting and keeping customers.
Thus, when he was approached by a new person – an older man, tall, thin, with grey hair, a beard and glasses – Jesse jumped at the opportunity.
The man had found him in the parking lot behind the only supermarket in town. He was carrying bags of groceries, so Jesse assumed that the man hadn't been there actively looking for him.
At first, the man stood there for a few seconds, quietly looking Jesse over. Wanting to make a decent impression, or at least seem interested, Jesse forced himself to stand up.
The man just continued to stare.
"You're Jesse?" The man finally asked.
"Yeah, that's me," Jesse replied. "You know me?"
"I've heard of you. Not many people like you in town."
The words weren't spoken with anger, disgust or anything to that extent. Jesse wasn't sure how to take it.
"Okay…" He took a deep breath. "Do you, uh…Is there anything I can do for you?"
"I have some work you can help me with," the man replied. "If you're okay with coming back to my house."
Not feeling as if he were in any position to argue, Jesse agreed.
"Yeah, okay."
The man nodded, and led Jesse over to his truck.