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I deserve this. I deserve this.
He finally understood what he meant.
This pain was almost too great to breathe through. Jesse felt he was only alive simply because he didn't know any other way to be. But this pain - this ache - it was all wrapped up around his heart, coiled like a serpent, squeezing treacherously and breathing felt like dying a slow death. But he deserved it. Because she wasn’t around anymore to feel anything. She could never cry these tears, or feel this hurt. She could never laugh or smile or breathe ever again. He had taken that away from her. He had killed her. Wasn’t this a small price to pay?
There wasn’t any more heroin inside of his house. It had all been taken, along with the meth. There was nothing, just bare walls, rattled bones, a death bed inside of his bedroom littered with drying stains of vomit and empty beer bottles. There was nothing full-stop, nothing to be found, nothing to be had. His fingers squeezed around nothingness, tingling with pin-pricks and needles. His breathing was much too-loud against the space in his duplex and he felt reckless. He was burdened by emptiness and needed to do something to feel again. To prove to himself that he could.
Which is how, after a silent taxi ride with the driver making concerned eyes at him in the rearview mirror, he found himself outside of Mr. White’s house.
Why? Jesse didn't know.
No, he did. And that hurt most of all.
He wanted drugs. And he knew where he could go to find more, that wasn’t the problem. The problem was he was afraid it wouldn’t be enough. He could get absolutely wasted but he didn’t know if he could escape this nightmare even lost in the haze of a delirious blackout. He’d always found a quick fix for life’s cruelties before but this was different. There was nothing left after this. He was on the precipice of death, one push would send him falling and yet he couldn’t bear to take another step forward one way or another. He wanted an easy-fix. A solution. He wanted to be okay.
So he rang the doorbell.
“Jesse?” Mr. White’s shocked face came into view, eyes squeezing in scrutiny behind his glasses. Jesse could have sobbed in relief but he had nothing left to spill, there were no more tears to fall.
He must have been a sight to be seen, he knew that. He’d talked to Mr. White this morning, sniffling, voice slashed through with sobs over the phone he held in shaky fingers, begging for life, a pardon, a second chance. Begging for his ex-chemistry teacher to fix this, to make everything okay, because somehow Mr. White always managed to. Despite the fact he was the overwhelming detriment more often than not.
But Jesse knew, Mr. White had the uncanny ability to always make everything better, so if he called him, he would make everything okay. And he did.
In the sense that Jane’s body had been taken away and Jesse had not gone to prison, on top of his fervid heartache that felt like it was crushing his body like a worn out old accordion. It was a measly spit-droplet in the fathomless bucket of his grief.
“I don’t know what to do, Mr. White.” Jesse said shakily, eyes darting around. His wife’s car wasn’t in the driveway and he supposed he had taken a chance, given his son could be home, but Mr. White hadn’t pushed him away and gotten all angry, demanding discretion, so he supposed they were fine. For now. He’d let Mr. White worry about that. He couldn't be bothered.
Mr. White ushered him inside, because apparently they were all alone. He regarded Jesse with grim, narrowed eyes and a tight-lipped frown, apparently not knowing what to do with the situation, now that its ugly consequences had landed on his doorstep. He knew what this was.
Mr. White created the poison, never consumed it.
This was the ugly reality of their empire.
“Do you need anything?” Mr. White questioned stiffly, sounding out of place inside of his own home, and Jesse could have laughed - if he felt like he had any air left inside of him. He needed a lot of things. “Food? Have you eaten-”
“I need to get high.” Jesse muttered, better to be blunt he thought, and watched as Mr. White full-body cringed.
“No. You don’t.” Mr. White said with some kind of frightening authority, as if the mere suggestion was ludicrous. “Is that what this is - I don’t keep what we make in the house. God. Do…Do you want me to take you to rehab? Is that what this is?”
“Rehab?” Jesse mused, the word tasting like bitter, dried ash on his tongue. Jane’s father had suggested rehab. Ordered it, really. She’d suggested meetings, before it all went down. He’d told her it wouldn't help, which it wouldn't, it wouldn't, and it would never help - it wouldn't fix what was fundamentally broken inside of him. It wouldn't change the fact that he was a killer, in more ways than one. “No. No man I’m not - I can’t. Don’t make me. I-I can’t.”
Not ever. Not now, especially, but not ever.
He could never be clean ever again. Not when the rot was him. It was all he was, decaying inside of his lungs, his chest, festering steadily inside of him.
“I….don’t think rehab is the worst decision you could make.” Mr. White said carefully, like he was dealing with an unruly child. In his patented teacher voice which Jesse had always scoffed at and ignored, he was coming to for solace now. “You’re not well.”
“Yeah, and who’s fault is that?" Jesse spat defiantly, beginning to pace. It was an accusation, not fully aimed at Mr. White, but intended for himself as well. It was all his fault. He could’ve just flushed it. He could have turned Jane away, knowing she was a recovering addict. Fucking hell - he never should have mentioned he even had the fucking crystal, knowing the temptation would be too much to take. He never even should have allowed her to get involved with him in the first place-
“Let’s not do this.” Mr. White sighed tiredly. “I’m not going to argue with you when you’re like this. Grieving. You should go home, get some rest. Now, I can drive you if-”
“I can’t sleep. Not in my bed. Where she fucking died, Jesus! Jane died in my room - you know that, don't you?" Jesse paused, pretending to cough because like hell was he going to suggest to Mr. White that he was crying. "You know what? She's probably, like, still there. Probably gonna haunt my ass now."
He laughed, like that was at all funny. Like the idea wasn't the slightest bit comforting.
Jesse thought he might like that as much as he’d torture himself with it, but he had always been somewhat of a masochist. Jane was probably in a better place now. Heaven, maybe, though Jesse had never believed in an afterlife one way or another, never having any drug-fueled visions of a golden place filled with singing angels and glittering skies. If she was up there, she was probably looking down at Jesse, pacing in his partner’s living room, cried-out and miserable with a sneer. I never should have gotten involved with him. She’d think, and she’d be right to.
“Then what do you need?” Mr. White asked, and Jesse stopped, looking up at the man as if he’d just now noticed him.
“Jane.” He said simply. “I need Jane, man.” And that was all there was to it. Mr. White flinched like he’d been hit, his eyes filling with a watery sympathy people usually reserved for starved strays on their last legs.
“I’m sorry.” He finally said. “God knows I wish I could give that to you. I can’t imagine what you’re going through.” Jesse scoffed. “It’s horrible, what’s happened, and I can’t imagine how you’re feeling-”
“Nah man, you can’t. Save the fucking empty platitudes for someone who gives a shit. Who needs them. I don’t need to be read a fucking hallmark card.”
Mr. White nodded, seemingly chewing that and swallowing it, testing the taste. Testing out how he felt about that. Figuring out what he could do. Jesse could imagine Mr. White had signed himself up for a lazy Sunday afternoon, watching football or the news or whatever dumbshit burn-out teachers did on their days off. He was probably trying to figure out how the hell to get his junkie partner out of his living room. He would probably be willing to say anything if it meant Jesse would leave. He’d probably be willing to do anything, and that made something dark and vicious deep inside of Jesse purr.
He was a burden. He’d always known that. Whether his parents had turned their back on him, teachers had sighed and shook their heads as they marked his failed tests with red pen, or possible employers had fixed him with a wan smile and empty excuses for why they weren’t hiring, Jesse wasn’t wanted anywhere by anyone.
Mr. White needed him. Sometimes. Said he did. He’d specifically sought Jesse out because of the life he’d made for himself which, he supposed, wasn’t exactly complimentary to his character. Mr. White needed him because he knew how to sell meth. Because he had known the ins and outs of how to move product on the street, more or less.
And that had gotten Combo killed too.
Mr. White rubbed his neck, looking Jesse up and down, presumably navigating through the trials and errors of worthless junkies and how best to get them to leave you alone. Jesse wasn’t an idiot, despite what everyone might’ve thought of him. Mr. White didn’t need him. He said he was his partner but hell, he just said that to keep Jesse on his good side. To keep him coming back. He’d say whatever Jesse needed him to, so long as he got his end in. Because he needed him, to make money, and Mr. White knew exactly the right things to say to keep whoever he needed at his disposal. He was good at that, spinning niceties for Jesse’s pathetic need to be needed. He knew just what to say to keep Jesse coming back, Jesse could cuss him out, turn his cheek and demand to never speak to him again, and Mr. White would simply turn up in that damned RV the next day, saying whatever he needed to in order to get his way.
It was pathetic. And inexorable.
Jesse was a pawn in the chess board of life. Except this game was not one he was meant to win. It was rigged against him, and hey, maybe he’d had a hand in that. Maybe this was all unavoidable. It was definitely all his fault.
He knew Mr. White would pat him on the shoulder, look him in the eye and say some bullshit phrase that all adults said in the face of one of life’s unimaginable, random cruelties. This too shall pass. It will hurt now, it will always hurt, but like a broken bone it will heal, and the ache will only throb on rainy days.
Or he could be cruel, but honest. This was bound to happen. It could have been you. How did you expect for this to end? You have no one to blame but yourself, Jesse, so don’t make this my problem. I warned you.
And oh hadn’t he? Maybe that’s what hurt most of all. Because Mr. White knew, with that infuriating all-knowing infinite wisdom all adults seemed to possess over him, he’d known how this would go and Jesse had ignored him like an idiot. Just for one more day. One more hit. One more moment of bliss, cut away from the rest of the world, warm and strung out in the safety of his bed, with Jane holding him in her arms. If Jesse hadn't been so selfish and just pushed her away-
“You can’t let this break you, son.” Mr. White was speaking again, his tone soft and parental. Jesse could have rolled his eyes but they felt frozen, paradoxically they were filled with hot tears burning into his corneas, forcing him to blink furiously. “You need to grieve, but you need to do it properly. No drugs. No alcohol. You loved her and I understand-”
“Shut up.” Jesse sneered instantly, it was a hair trigger reaction, but those words sliced through his thin, scarred skin. Cut him up like nothing had, beat him down in a way Tuco’s fists had failed to do. “You don’t know what I fucking felt about her. You didn’t know her. You didn’t want to - she was just another junkie to you, huh? M-My…My junkie girlfriend, that’s what, that’s what you called her? You called her a fucking stripper too. A junkie, a stripper, a slut….fuck! She was a distraction to you, but she was everything to me.” His words were coming out stuttered and jumbled, wisps of breath, thick on his tongue, nonsensical and wailing. He was spitting them out like he’d die if he stopped speaking. He sounded crazed. So unlike himself he blinked, taking a step back, instantly feeling wetness hitting his cheeks. “You didn’t know her.”
Mr. White held his hands up placatingly, pushing down on air. “I didn’t know her.” He agreed, his face much too gentle and kind. Again, saying whatever he needed to. He was going through the motions. Calming Jesse down to calm his own toxic heart, pumping through the injected chemicals of chemotherapy. Oddly, then, Jesse felt guilty. Mr. White was the worst, a complete asshole, but he still had cancer. He was dying too. He forgot, sometimes, mostly because Mr. White somehow seemed larger than life. Even when he wasn’t playing up Heisenberg. Maybe he had a soft-spot because of his aunt but suddenly he felt all of the anger blow through him like a torrential wind and he was left with a burning nothing, the wick of his fury all but ash. “I was probably unfair to her, and I am sorry for that now.”
Now. Jesse briefly lamented over Mr. White’s word choice bitterly. Mr. White wouldn’t have cared what he said or thought of Jane if she was still alive. Never speak ill of the dead. Whatever. “I loved her.”
Mr. White nodded. “I know.”
Jesse blew out a shaky breath, hand sweeping over his tear-stained cheeks. “Do you…do you have the money?” He asked in a small voice, peaking through damp lashes only to instantly find Mr. White’s frown.
“Mike has it. He’ll keep it safe for you.”
“It’s mine.” Jesse said, whiny and petulant.
“I’m aware of that. It's still yours. But can you honestly tell me that if I gave you that money now, it wouldn’t be up your veins in an hour? You'd be dead by tomorrow.” Mr. White lectured and Jesse sneered, like they always did. Jesse wanted to cause a scene, fuss and stomp and shout, maybe throttle Mr. White just a little bit, but he knew it was true. The pain was a sharp weight nestled just under his breastbone, and Jesse knew of only one way to soothe it, if only temporarily. Mr. White stood up slowly and Jesse watched him, his heart somersaulting in his chest. “How much sleep have you gotten? Not a lot, I’m guessing? This is hard for you and I understand that. What can I do? I can drive you back to your house, get you something to eat, I can-”
Before he was consciously aware of what he was doing, Jesse had fallen forward, too tired to support his own tremulous weight. But he hadn’t hit the floor, he’d fallen straight into Mr. White’s chest, and his arms had instinctively wrapped around Jesse to hold him up. Jesse let him.
“I loved her.” Jesse whispered, feeling tears rise for the nth time. He didn’t know what he was doing, fuck, but had he ever?
Mr. White was stiff against him, cold. Like Jane’s corpse under his hands-
He hesitantly hugged him, slowly smoothing circles over his back. Like Jane had done the first time he’d let her shoot him up, his gentlest drug, his most beautiful mistake.
“I’m sorry.” Mr. White said, sounding at a loss. Jesse’s arms tightened around him when he hadn’t even realized he’d brought them up.
“Did you know?” He slurred shakily, shivering like it was winter and he’d never be warm again. He felt the arms around him tighten. “We-we… fuck man, we were gonna do it. Get clean, we were, yeah, that was gonna be us. We were gonna flush it all away but…it was so fucking expensive.” A sob crunched through his windpipe. “We didn’t want to waste it. One more time. One more time. That’s what we said.”
“Jesse. Jesse.” He heard Mr. White saying, attempting to soothe him. “I’m sorry. I’m so-”
“Don’t.”
Mr. White stopped, and Jesse squeezed his eyes so tightly shut his head throbbed, and he saw stars. Shooting stars, blazing stars, burning up against the perfect blackness blanketed over a horizon that led to nowhere. Jesse knew where that nowhere led. He was standing in it now - but he wasn't alone. He had Mr. White. “It’s always one more time.” He repeated, numbly. Or maybe he hadn’t at all. Maybe the words echoed aimlessly inside of his mind. Would it even matter?
He breathed out unsteadily. It was almost as if he could physically feel himself pulling away from his body, tearing out of his own treacherously heavy skin. Then rough, calloused, too-large hands were cupping his cheeks and pulling up his head. “Jesse. Look at me, son.”
He couldn’t.
He couldn’t.
He wasn’t Jane.
No one was Jane. No one could ever be Jane again.
She was gone.
So Jesse leaned forward and broke the distance between them, capturing Mr. White’s lips and kissing him roughly. A thrill shot up his spine and Jesse couldn't help but make a sharp, pleased sound against Mr. White's lips. Instant gratification. The kind he was used to, as he nipped on Mr. White’s bottom lip with a ferocity that let him forget all matters past these suburban walls. It was all secondary to the way Mr. White’s hands tightened in the fabric of his sweatshirt, pulling him closer.
Mr. White would do whatever, say whatever, to soothe Jesse. To calm him down. Placate him into easy compliance before he sent him away. After the many times Mr. White had taken advantage of him, couldn’t he indulge, just this once?
But then Mr. White was pulling away, harsh hands planted against his shoulders.
“Don’t do this.” He said, sternly, his voice surprisingly level. Jesse’s eyes tiredly opened and stared past Mr. White’s glasses, into his pupils that were dilated from arousal, tingedwith a darkness that ran even deeper than that, fear, maybe. “This isn’t what you want.”
“Yeah? You know all about what I want?” Jesse challenged, leaning forward again, but Mr. White jerked his head back.
“Jesse. You don’t do this.” He said firmly. Jesse’s eyes widened as he huffed an incredulous half-laugh. “You’re grieving. I understand that and I’m here for you, but not like this. I’m not going to – kiss you when thirty seconds ago you were crying your dead girlfriend’s name into my shoulder.”
“But you’ve done it before.” Jesse reminded him, and Mr. White’s flashed with tell-tale regret before he was forced to shut them. As if that would hide his true feelings. Jesse’s voice turned husky, sultry. “Remember? The first time we cooked? When I - when I told you what a god damn genius you were? An artist?”
“Stop.” Mr. White said, but his own voice was now a bit too breathy, a bit too shaky to convince Jesse he was entirely unaffected. He wanted this too despite the lengths he’d go to deny it. Jesse didn’t miss the way Mr. White’s eyes lingered on him when he’d thought Jesse turned his back. Hell, maybe he wasn’t even consciously aware he was doing it. Maybe he was, but like with all things, he made excuses, claimed plausible deniability.
“Then when we were out in the desert? After we killed those men?” Jesse continued, licking his lips. “When we were stuck in the RV after the battery broke down and you told me-”
“Those were mistakes.” Mr. White said faintly. Jesse leaned closer, their breaths mingling as he smiled against his frown. He pressed soft, chaste, whispers of kisses across his jaw, and he tasted like nothing. Nothing but skin and exhaustion.
“Then this can be another.”
Mr. White shook his head. “It would be taking advantage of you.”
Jesse did openly laugh at that. “Oh, what? Now you have a problem with that?”
Mr. White frowned, eyes turning sharp and steely. “You think I’ve taken advantage of you?” He asked, his tone defensive, and Jesse rolled his eyes. Now wasn’t the time of that. “When, hm? When, Jess? I don’t like to be accused of things I didn’t do…” His voice slowly trailed off, until Jesse fully dropped onto his knees. The ache was hardly felt over the heat collecting in his belly, the pain directed elsewhere temporarily, and then Mr. White’s hands grabbed his own just as his fingers latched around his belt. “Don’t. Don’t do this. Get up.”
“C’mon man, let me do this.” Jesse mumbled, his fingers fighting against Mr. White’s as he struggled to undo the latch. The cool metal burned against his overheated fingertips. “I mean - what dude doesn’t want his dick sucked? You can pretend it’s your wife or whatever if that makes it easier. I don’t care.”
“Skylar could be back soon.” Mr. White voice hitched, as his fingers loosened against Jesse’s, so now he was cradling the back of his hands.
“Yeah? You don’t seem all that concerned. Threesome could be hot.”
Mr. White blew out an aggravated puff of air. “You’re being ridiculous. Really, are you high? Get up Jesse, I won’t ask you again, and I don’t want to hurt you.”
But you do. Jesse lamented, pointedly keeping his eyes fixed on the growing bulge in Mr. White’s trousers. “I’m not high. That’s why I need this. I can go shoot up or I can suck your dick, whatever. Just let me know.”
“Jesus!” Mr. White exclaimed, after a strained, conflicted pause. “Are you threatening me? You’re telling me if I don’t allow you to perform a sex act on me you’re going to go get high? And you don’t see a problem with that?”
Had Jesse said he didn’t? Had he said this was a particularly good idea? “Look, man, you don’t get to decide when your morality suits you. Okay? We do this and chalk it up as a one time thing. Never happening again. Whatever, I got it, now just shut up and let me do what I need to do.”
“This…is a bad idea.” Mr. White breaths out, as Jesse undoes his trouser’s button and zipper, pants pooling around his ankles. Fingers clasp around his chin, then, tilting his head upwards so he’s forced to gaze up into Mr. White’s eyes. There’s no coming back from this, Mr. White’s eyes say.
But that’s the best part about addictions - they’ll never leave, they’re always there. Hiding in the dark, and old friend's arms to fall into when you need them most. It’s permanent, how he’s about to scar himself. And he’ll do it with his eyes closed. It’ll taste so sweet, hurt so terribly. But will it feel so terrible while he's basking in this high?
So Jesse hooks ready, willing fingers into the waistband of his underwear and slides them down, and he lets all thoughts, no matter what kind, rush from his mind as he wraps his lips around Mr. White’s cock and fills his mouth up with him.
And fingers immediately come to tangle in his hair and tug.
This pain is something he can deal with. Something he can bear.
Mr. White tastes like….well, like a dick, there’s no way to romanticize that. Just salty, sweat and damp skin sliding over his tongue, the roof of his mouth. Jesse wouldn’t say he’s, like, an expert at giving blowjobs but he knows what he’s doing. There were times in the past he didn’t have money for meth, but he always had his mouth.
So he takes Mr. White to the hilt, swallowing over and over again, letting his eyes roll back into his head as drool drips down his chin. Better than tears, Jesse thought, hollowing his cheeks. He knew how to make it good. After a moment of deliberation Mr. White decides to give up his act of corpse as he roughly thrusts into the tight, wet heat of Jesse’s mouth and makes him gag. But he doesn’t mind. He wanted this, didn’t he?
Oh, yes, yes he did. Because now he’s not thinking of anything besides how bitter precum tastes smeared across his taste buds. It’s acidic, seems to be melting into him. Becoming him. There’s the urge to breathe and when he forgoes it, for a few painful, glorious moments his head feels light as a feather. Jesse luxuriates in the way it feels like phantom fingers are wrapped around his windpipe, squeezing tighter and tighter, until the need to breathe overtakes him and he inhales noisily through his nose. He’s thinking about how his fingernails are jaggedly torn into Mr. White’s thighs, if he’s drawing blood, if either he or Mr. White even care. He wonders if it’s a bad idea to leave marks, because of his wife. Then he wonders how often they do this. If they even do this at all or if Jesse’s the only one. The only one giving him this stolen, sordid delicacy, like he does all things. He’s the only one. The only one Mr. White comes to in dark times. And he needs him now.
Jesse feeds the darkness inside of Mr. White and Mr. White feeds the emptiness inside of him. Between the two of them, Jesse can’t say who’s more fucked up.
(He’d really like to say it’s not him, it could never be him, but then Jane’s frozen hazel eyes staring up at nothingness flash through his mind)
Mr. White’s moaning his name out above him like a litany, a prayer, like he’s singing along with the choir in church. He’s pushing his head down farther, farther like he doesn’t care whether or not he can’t breathe and Jesse likes that more than he should. It gives him something to fight for. Consciousness is at the knife’s edge of his mind so then, because he’s already abandoned all dignity at the door, shot all proprietary up his veins, he grinds down on Mr. White’s leg just to cry out around his cock.
“Fuck.” The result is instant, Mr. White’s shooting down his throat and squeezing his fingers so painfully tight around his head as if he wants to crush his skull. “Fuck Jess. Jesse. You like that? Hm? Good boy. Good boy-”
He wishes he could say the praise doesn’t go straight to his groin.
Oh, but it does. So sinfully hot, wickedly delicious, he’s not at a wake but he’s in hell, he's burning alive but at least that is a feeling at least Jesse can still feel something. He feels nothing, yet everything. It is the fall before he hits rock bottom.
“You wanted this.” Mr. White’s repeating, and he looks down at him with a certain glint in his eyes as Jesse’s tears roll down his face. Mr. White moans. “You wanted this.”
And he did, didn’t he? If it hurts in the morning then at least the physical pain can distract from the way his heart bruising itself against the bones meant to protect it. If it hurts, at least this is a pain Jesse can sink his teeth into. He’s alive and perhaps that's the worst part. Jesse turns himself inside out, lays himself bare, and Mr. White watches with ragged breaths as Jesse gets himself off against his leg, like this is the only thing he has left to live for.
Maybe, just maybe, it is.