Work Text:
The house was quiet in a way that still feels unfamiliar.
Alaska’s quiet was different. There’s no sounds of traffic, no buzz from the streetlights, no city-hum. The snow swallowed every small sounds that came from the forest right outside his house. It was the kind of silence that made you realize that you were breathing too loud.
Jesse liked it.
Most of the time.
He was sitting at the small wooden table by the window, sketchbook open and pencil rolling between his finger. He had always liked drawing, but recently it had become one of the main activities he did to maintain his mind and hands busy, it was relaxing, and sketching in general was fun.
His hand started moving without him even realizing. It was such a mechanic movement that he only realized he was doing it because the shape of a bald head appeared over the paper.
Jesse didn’t mean to draw him.
It just... happened.
Jesse freezes.
“Oh... shit”
He stares down at the paper, blue eyes wide as the pencil glides around the paper.
Mr. White.
Walter... Or at least someone who resembled him.
Jesse swallowed hard. His chest felt tight in an old, embarrassing way he hadn’t felt in a very long time. Years had passed since the RV, since the compound, since the lab, since that last look they shared after the Nazis died. Since Walter died.
Jesse swallowed again and leaned forward, elbows on the table. “Okay” He mumbles to himself. “I fucking got this.”
He starts with the glasses. Glasses were easy, thin wire frame with the slight reflection of light on the lenses. That part was right, Walt’s metal glasses weren’t hard to copy.
He moves to the eyes. Jesse freezes, the pencil hovers over the paper like a plane waiting to land. What did they look like?
Jesse frowns. Brown, they were... Brown? Hazel...? Maybe they were blue? Green? That doesn’t really matter, he sketches two small ovals beneath the glasses.
They look wrong immediately.
Too soft. Walter’s eyes weren’t soft... Or at least not that soft, but they weren’t rough either.
Jesse erases them.
The rubber scrapers harshly across the paper, leaving behind a faint gray smear.
“C’mon, man,” He mutters. “You’ve got this.”
Jesse closes his eyes trying to remember him. The sun of Albuquerque’s desert, the smell of chemicals, the way his voice said his name, the faint aroma of Coffee that clung to Walter’s skin, how his hands trembled slightly when trying to measure things with precision. But the face doesn’t appears on his mind.
He opens his eyes again, annoyed.
He tries the mouth. Thin lips, slightly downturn.
Jesse draws them, but they doesn’t look like him...
His grip on the pencil tightens, pressing the pencil harder against the paper this time, frustration building against his skin. Why can’t he remember?
The man exhales sharply and flips the page.
Fine... Fine. If he can’t get Walter, he’ll draw something else. Let his brain rest for a moment.
Jane comes so easy that it’s almost unfair.
The thin line of her bangs, the plumpness of her lower lip, her pointy nose, that look on her eyes and how her eyes where always a little lidded.
His hand moved without hesitation, and she is there.
Clear, alive on the page.
Jesse stares at her and his chest aches. She’s there... And he smiles at her in the same way you would smile to a person that was important to you once but you haven’t seen each other in years.
“Hey...” He mumbles softly to the drawing.
Jesse swallows and flips the page again.
Andrea, she comes easily too.
He draws her more carefully. Lines stronger this time as he tried to capture her warm aura. The steadiness in her smile and the gentleness in her eyes that always made him felt at home.
Jesse remembered the exact shape of her hair and how it fell over her shoulders.
He remembers her and his hand didn’t falter once.
Now is Skinny Pete who looks at him from the paper.
His face is long. The beanie covers most of his forehead. The lopsided grin is also there.
And without even noticing, Badger is smiling at him now.
Round face, goofy smile, messy hair under the beanie... And Jesse couldn’t help but to laugh a little as he looks at his friends on the paper, he shakes his head as he turns back to Walter.
Crystal clear.
All of them.
Every single one, except him.
The unfinished face stares back at him and his stomach twists again. That warmth that once was on his chest now disappeared, replaced by that sense of frustration and anger that he knew too well at this point.
“This can’t be so difficult, yo.” He mutters.
Jesse leans closer, squinting at the sketch like it could finish itself if he stared hard enough. He closes his eyes and tries to remember him.
Jesse remembers how it felt to watch him, how his chest felt when words of approval came his way, he remembers liking the sound of his voice and how he pronounced his name, letting the ss hiss slightly between his teeth... But the face...
The face won’t come.
“Are you fucking kidding me, man?!” Jesse’s voice cracks in disbelief, grabbing the eraser again and scrubs the paper harder. The graphite smears and the surface begins to thin with each scrubs.
Nose! The nose must be easy to draw!
Wrong.
Jesse goes with the mouth again, too wide.
Jesse tries again with the eyes, too thin.
Jane’s face is perfect. Andrea’s is perfect. Pete and Badger practically jumped onto the page.
But Walter? Nothing.
Just a bald head and glasses and a hat. But not the full picture. His chest burns.
“So you’re not going to give me this either?” He says, frustration edged on his tone. Drawing the others had been so easy... why was he the difficult one? Why was he always the difficult one?
It was insanely tiring, that whole situation was tiring. Even dead, Walter was as stubborn as he was alive, Jesse just wanted to paint him, was it really that much to ask?
With trembling hands, he ripped the page. Rage surged through his body as he crumbled the small piece of paper between his hands. He was tired of trying, trying to remember him, trying to get something from Walter... But he was just more tired of Walter, of how he managed to take the worse out of him even when he was dead, he had been for years now and still he managed to piss Jesse off like no one could do.
Defeated, he threw the crumbled piece of paper inside of the chimney, watching it burn slowly between wood logs and ashes. His hands traveled to his face and rubbed it with force, leaving light red marks all over it, a sigh left his lips as he let himself fall onto an armchair.
“Fuck you, Mr. White...”