Jason's first experiment is in flight.
He is six years old and fearless: he climbs to the top of an orange tree and launches himself into the air. The result is a broken arm and an ass-kicking, but he flies for one glorious second. Later he realizes how foolish he was to do it without wings, so he builds himself a pair so he can go back and try it again. It becomes a pattern for him, this reckless pursuit of the unattainable. He always wants what he can't have. Lord have mercy, his mother says—you'll get yourself killed one day. She isn't wrong.
His big launch from the orange groves to the city doesn't go smoothly. He's perpetually broke and on the edge of eviction despite working three jobs to put himself through school. But the difficult part is getting used to the loneliness. Back home, between his parents and siblings and relatives and neighbors he was always surrounded by other people, and it was a blessing to have a moment to himself. Now he's here in the city like he always wanted and finally he's taking classes that challenge him, but he eats lunch by himself and never gets invited out for drinks. Even if he aces all his exams and works twice as hard as his classmates, they still look at him like they don't know what he's doing here. The dean slips up and mistakes him for the janitor, calls him boy—and that's after he's been a student there for two years. It wears on him, but he tries to keep it in perspective; to remind himself that yes, he deserves to be there, yes, he's worthy.
He's usually alone during his night shift at the Observatory, but he doesn't mind that as much. Sometimes, he'll take a break and gaze out at the city below him. The city lights are so bright, but the stars are dimmer here.
After a fifteen failed interviews—fifteen times where the interviewer shakes Jason's hand reluctantly before telling him they don't think he's suited for the position—he lands the job at Isodyne, and it feels like his hard work is paying off at last. He comes home for the first time in months, wearing the new suit he just bought with his first paycheck. His younger siblings and cousins are shy around him, and his littlest sister hides nervously behind their mother. It takes candy and a lot of coaxing to bring her around. Finally, by the time dinner comes around, she's comfortable enough to sit in his lap, and Jason starts to feel less like a stranger.
It's after dinner that he discovers that his sixteen-year-old sister, Dinah, has dropped out of school. He can't disguise his disappointment. Dinah is the brightest of his siblings; she's wasted here. You should be thinking about college—are you really going to spend the rest of your life picking oranges? he asks her. She just shrugs. His mother keeps scrubbing away at the dishes without a word.
Later, after Dinah's gone, his mother wipes her hands and turns around to face him. You really think you're somebody now, huh?
He doesn't come home after that, not for a long time.
His pursuit of Peggy Carter is completely bold and foolish. This is the sort of thing that would give his mother a heart attack if she knew. Black folks get killed for less, she would tell him. She would be right, too. But Jason just can't help himself. He's totally charmed by Peggy, so he charms her right back and she seems to enjoy it. They share half a dance at the Dunbar Hotel; he takes her up to the Observatory so she can see the city. He knows this is a serious matter and he's about to put his career and even his life on the line based on the word of a woman he's only just met—so why not make a night of it?
And it turns out to be a hell of a night, between getting shot at, kissing Peggy in the phone booth, and driving a stolen car back to Isodyne to retrieve the zero matter sample. He ought to be frightened, but really it's the most exciting thing that's ever happened to him and he's beginning to think he wouldn't be half bad at being an agent. But then he sees Whitney Frost; sees the hunger in her eyes as she trains the gun on him. The canister shatters and the world goes dark and silent.
There are no words to describe how it feels to be stuck between death and not-death, except that it hurts. Jason can't feel, can't touch, can't taste, can't smell—but somehow he can still hurt. Peggy's hand passes right through his shoulder and she looks horrified. He wants to take her hand and reassure her, though he's the one desperately in need of assurance at the moment. Still, he's glad that Peggy and the others found him and are willing to help him out, since he doubts anybody else would. (He does wish he could have met the Howard Stark under better circumstances, however.)
At some point he notices Sousa watching him, his expression unreadable. Even with the crutch and the Hawaiian shirt, the man carries himself like a soldier. The chief is wary of Jason; doesn't like him much. Jason doesn't take it personally, though. He sees the way Sousa looks at Peggy and he knows this isn't really about him.
Jason's slipping away, bit by bit, and it starts becoming terrifying. He's doing his best to hold it together, to be patient and keep working with Peggy and Howard towards a solution, but something in him is starting to snap. Something desperate and ugly is surfacing inside him and he can't stop it. It's not him; he's not that kind of person, except he must be or he wouldn't be having these thoughts. He'd vomit if he could. But he has no mass anymore, only his sanity, and even that is going…
He doesn't trust Whitney Frost at all and doesn't believe her when she claims she wants to help him. She had no problem with kidnapping him or shooting Ana Jarvis. She's only in it for her own personal gain. But at least she seems to be making more progress than he has, and frankly at this point his options are running out. If he doesn't take matters into his own hands now, soon nothing will matter anymore.
In the truck, Sousa sets down the gun. Jason takes it.
He's immediately wracked with guilt, even as he's getting back into the car with his kidnappers, even as they drive out into the desert, even as they open up the rift. His regret grows with every passing moment, but he's come too far to turn back now. Peggy, the Jarvises, Howard Stark, Chief Sousa—they've done nothing but try to help him, and this is how he repays them? He can't stop thinking about the hurt on Peggy's face. As he's drawn into the rift, he starts to think that maybe this is for the best. Maybe it would be better if he just disappeared completely. Maybe no one would miss him.
But the rift spits him back out. He has mass again, but he feels a thousand times worse, a thousand times heavier. And the zero matter inside him is trying to get out. Before it was a low murmur in the back of his mind and he could at least tune it out to an extent, but now it's nonstop and insistent. Now he can start to make out words and phrases. The voice changes, too: sometimes it speaks to him and it sounds like the professor that told him he would never amount to anything, or his supervisor at Isodyne who threatened him with charges of treason. Sometimes it sounds like Whitney Frost—give it to me, give it to me. But the worst is when it speaks in Peggy's voice, or his sister Dinah's, or his mother's. At first they plead with him. Then their tone changes: you're worthless, you're nobody, you deserve nothing. In the end, it's their combined voices that finally cause him to break; to let go.
Peggy forgives Jason. She insists that it was the zero matter that made him act the way he did. He's not sure if she really believes that or if she just wants to make him feel better, but either way, she's wrong. It was him all along and he has no excuse for that. You're a good man, Jason, she says. And no, he isn't. But he's trying to be better.
He never does get to finish his dance with Peggy, which is a shame. But that's okay. Sometimes that's the way it goes.
When the dust has settled and it seems like everything will be all right after all, Jason makes a call from Howard Stark's mansion.
His mother answers. Jason—is that—we thought you were—
I'm good, Ma. I'm okay.
There's no response on the other end for a long time. Jason realizes his mother is crying.
Come home, baby. Come home.
That's all he needs. Jason makes the long drive through the city and over the hills, until the landscape changes to acre upon acre of orange, grapefruit, and lemon trees. He can't quite hold back the tears as he finds the turnoff and pulls up to the same little green house and sees his entire family out on the porch waiting for him, overflowing with joy.
There's food and stories and dancing late into the night. Finally, once everybody else has gone to bed, Jason steps out into the orchard. All is silent except for the rustling of the leaves. He climbs to the top of a tree and looks up at the sky, listening for the heartbeat of the universe. The stars go on for forever.