baby's black balloon makes her fly (i almost fell into that hole in your life)
.
summary: You think it's worse when anybody knows. You didn't even like knowing. soulmate au, fem!Jesse
.
note. I made Jessie kind of depressed. She's horrifically unhappy, and a little bit misunderstood. Walt doesn't seem to have an interest in her, and she doesn't know how to cope with anything. This kind of follows the series, but goes off on it's own. It's not terribly long or happy, but I do hope you enjoy it!
.
You like to think that even if you were a better person your mom still wouldn't love you. It makes it easier to forgive yourself, when you impulsively cut class to smoke behind the bleachers and sell weed to Badger—it makes you feel better when she gives you a disappointed glare and you know she's thinking about your future, about how you'll never be anything but her fucked up junkie daughter.
It's your junior year when you finally get around to chemistry, and unsurprisingly, five minutes into the first class, you find yourself hating it. Mr. White talks like you are supposed to be interested in science, like you'll need it. You spend the rest of the class doodling crass pictures of Mr. White in your notebook after he calls you out for not paying attention.
It's in sharpie, a simple black because you don't have colors yet. If you are truthful, you weren't sure you bought into it completely. A soulmate seemed fake, like a cop out from any of the work of a real relationship. You've only met one person your age who's met their soulmate, a girl in your art class that doesn't make a lot of eye contact and says you look good in buttercream. It doesn't mean anything to you, but whenever you wear the frilly yellow sundress (only after your laundry is festering and growing a new species of bacteria) she gives you a small smile and tells you that you look nice.
You remain unconvinced.
It's later in the year, because of course it is, and you are wearing that stupid yellow dress because your mom is on a rampage and she's spent that past few days raging about your clothes and comparing you to perfect Jake and why can't you be more like your brother, Jessie? so you slop on the frilly dress and your dirty sneakers, because your mom isn't changing who you are, but you do love her enough to at least try. It earns you half a smile from your dad, even when you slip on a sweatshirt and a beanie.
You sit in the inside of the row, close to the front beside some bubbly blonde and a geek, because if you don't you apparently have a tendency to talk and Mr. White seems to think you're better then that, and you should 'apply yourself'. You think he's full of shit.
The papers are passed towards you, because you are in the front row and closest, and it's a second, really, and not even a touch so much as the smallest of grazes, and if it'd been anyone else you would've been convinced you hadn't touched at all, or completely forgotten about it altogether.
Your world illuminates itself in color, and you froze. Mr. White shows no outward expression, and for a wild moment, you aren't completely sure anything's changed for him. Then the bell rings and he asks you to stay after. You don't move, and when you look up, and lock eyes with him, you realize you should look up the color when you get home.
"Ms. Pink—" he cuts himself off, and briefly, you wonder what he was planning on saying.
You can see the minute he changes his mind, and because it's you, and you are 18 years old and convinced that it's you against everyone else, you cut him off. "You're married, right?"
He is. You plow through, wanting to save yourself from the sting of rejection. "Just because we make each other see color doesn't mean we gotta have a relationship, Mr. White."
You try and sound uncaring, and maybe it works too well, or maybe it's relief—you can't tell, you never spent much time observing him prior, but his expression changes. He says nothing, and you stand, muttering some bullshit about being late for class as you get the hell out of dodge.
You try meth for the first time that night.
Two months later, you drop out of school and move in with your aunt. You watch her die, and any motivation you had to get clean is buried with her.
Fast forward 6 years, and you've mostly kicked drugs aside, but then Emilio is there, and you need the money really bad, and you can't let the house go. It takes approximately two months (the magic fucking number) for it to fall to shit. You climb out the window as Emilio is arrested, falling on your ass, and horrifically, when you push yourself to your feet, you lock eyes with Walter fucking White—who unquestionably recognises you, mouthing your name in bewilderment.
You had believed, perhaps naively, that you would never see him again.
Desperately, as you flung yourself into your car and floored the gas, you wished this would be the last time.
And then he's at your house and you find yourself hating him.
"Pinkman? It's me." he says, and he doesn't say his name or anything, because he knows you know him. How could you not? "I'm alone."
"How'd you find me?" you can't help it.
"You're still in our filing system." he says, and bitterly, you wonder if he searched for you before. "So your aunt owns this place, right?"
"I own it." You can't help it, he pisses you off. Years of no contact, and this is what he does? Shows up at your place unexpectedly to give you some bullshit for how you live. You bite back the urge to tell him it's partially his fault you ended up so fucked.
"No one's looking for you." he says, as if he really thinks you believe he'd say something. And maybe if you weren't his soulmate you would've. But it's Mr. White, and you aren't completely convinced he's not terrified of your existence. You wonder if he's told his wife that the girl who makes him see color is a junkie high school dropout.
"Why are you here?" you ask instead.
"I was curious. Honestly, I never expected you to amount to much, but methamphetamine? I didn't picture that. There's a lot of money in it, huh?"
"Fuck off." it slips out before you can stop it. You grit your teeth. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"No?" he mocks. It's mocking. You can tell by the stupid look on his face.
"Not a clue."
"Cap'n Cook? That's not you? Like I said, no one is looking for you."
"Look, I don't know what you think you're doing here, Mr. White. I mean, if you're planning on giving me some bowl winder about getting right with Jesus by turning myself in—"
"Not really."
"—High school was a long time ago. You ain't Welcome Back Kotter, so step off. No speeches."
"Short speech. You lost your partner today. What's his name? Emilio? Emilio is going to prison. The DEA took all your money, your lab. You got nothing. Square 1. But you know the business. And I know the chemistry. I'm thinking maybe you and I could partner up."
"You want to cook crystal meth? You? You and, uh and me?" Your stomach twists.
"That's right. Either that or I turn you in."
You hate him.
.
There's a moment, after the mess with Krazy8 showing up with Emilio and pulling a gun on you, after you wake up in the RV with a gas mask on your face that you think Mr. White might be genuinely pleased to see that you're okay. He winces at the black eye, and when you inevitably fuck up with disposing Emilio's body and end up destroying the bathtub and floor under it—he wordlessly helps you clean up. You sob the whole time, feeling dirty and gross and it's been months, but you want drugs more then you've ever wanted them. You're scared you won't stop.
You try and hide it, smoking in the bathroom while Mr. White deals with Kraze and the moral dilemma of killing him. You feel like your house is rotting from the inside out, and you find yourself crashing at friend's houses more often then not and you feel like it's haunted. With the spirit of your aunt, of Emilio, of Kraze when Mr. White finally kills him.
Not for the first time, you hope you'll die in your sleep.
.
You are moving the body when Mr. White's wife shows up. Her stomach is round, and the look on her face poisonous. For a terrible minute, you think he's told her the truth.
You couldn't say why it surprises you.
.
The colors are dull, dim. Vacant. Lackluster. You find yourself staring after Mr. White. You'd noticed it before, months before, but it'd been slower, more gradual, but now, maybe it was being around him that you really noticed how dull everything looked. And then Tuco puts you in the hospital and Mr. White knows before you are even awake.
"The world went…" he paused, searching for a word.
"Grey?" you offered bitterly, secretly enjoying his wince. He felt bad. Good. "You're talking to one of the only people who understands what that's like."
He swallowed, and stayed on the topic of business.
.
In the end, when it's just you and Mr. White and he's killed Fring and Tuco and let everyone you loved die, he's looking at you while you point a gun at him, and he says, "You would've been nothing without me."
You walk away and don't look back.
.
You only regret it once.