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"Good girl. Foreign," Jesse took a drag of his cigarette, fighting the urge to gag and cough, "better off wherever the hell she is."
He couldn't remember when exactly he first heard her voice, sweetly melodic, in his mind. Maybe 5? 6? He remembers being scared and thinking he was going to be like one of those people in far off places. The ones who saw the Virgin Mary and become saints or something. Even at that age, Jesse knew that wasn't a life for him.
But she was good.
Probably the type of girl who stayed in school. Ate her vegetables. Would turn her nose up at everything that scruffy punk had to do to survive. She didn't understand.
He took another drag, placing his palms on his opened knees. The other Deadlock boys didn't need to know the rest. Didn't need to know how his little Chinese voice of reason didn't deserve him. How she wouldn't accept settling down with some kid with blood on his hands.
Jesse was certain he'd never settle down anyway.
Deadlock came and went and when Reyes offered him a chance with Overwatch, he could hear his little sweetheart cheer. Maybe an opportunity to be the guy he knew he could be-- and she deserved.
Hardly.
He wasn't good enough for those flashy blue uniforms, he soon found out, and they shrouded him in black instead. Did the dirty work the real organization couldn't be seen doing. In reality, it wasn't much better than the gang he betrayed back in New Mexico.
Jesse's giggly soulmate got shoved to the side.
Desperately he wanted her to stop. Go away. Someone out there made a mistake pairing the two of them together and he was certain of that. Giving her hope of a happily ever after.
It wasn't until Overwatch was no more and he was some gun for hire that he got his wish.
He was certain it was the third whiskey that was softening his conscious, drifting his sweetheart further and further away and leaving her a whisper in his mind. It was what he thought he wanted until her absence was replaced with nothing.
That's when he realized.
Your soulmate was the little voice in your head. The voice that supported and accepted you. It was common knowledge that criminal gangs and big, international organizations could agree on. The theme of love songs and stories the world over.
But if one was to die before the two met, their voice would be lost to the other's memory.
A thoughtful gesture, in retrospect, had the gunslinger not taken her for granted. Wished her out of his existence.
Jesse was good at silencing her with alcohol anyway. He got better when he used it to counter that emptiness.
It was ten years later, some job that led him to a small town in Mexico and an even smaller bar that nobody in their right mind would step foot in. He liked those places.
The television off to the side was showing the news as Jesse nursed at whatever hard liquor they had available. Some breaking event that cut through a soccer game he was only idly watching. He took another sip at the watered down bourbon as he stared up at the screen, an old warmth returning to his chest.
Mei-Ling Zhou, former Overwatch climatologist, rescued after ten years in Antarctica. The only one of her team to survive. He took another sip, noting just how pale the poor girl looked slumped over a man's shoulder as the channel described her story. All her accolades and achievements. Things a momma would be proud of.
Jesse was tempted to ask the bartender what exactly he put in his glass, what made him feel so soothed when he heard her voice after a decade.
Quiet.
Weak.
A whisper that assured him that maybe mercenary work wasn't right for him, no matter how just his cause.
Plunking down a few coins and bills, he scooted his stool back and tipped his hat to the omnic, mumbling a bit of broken Spanish before waltzing out the door.
"So that's where ya been, sweetheart," he laughed, adjusting his serape in the midday sun.