That's a tone she recognizes, though she doesn't think she'd heard it from him in a long time. He was definitely in a bad mood. There was a little flare up of frustration at the fact that he was trying to send her away, when she'd battled with herself to come be nice in the first place. It's on the tip of her tongue to lash out with some biting remark and huff off. Her potential tantrum was interrupted by the glass being set in front of her. She looks up at the bartender. "Oh just leave the bottle, put it on my tab." He nodded behind the counter, before setting off.
She calms her knee jerk reaction by downing the first glass and pouring another, before leaning over to refill his. "What? Like you've never ignored me before?" She mutters the words bluntly, but not nearly as harshly as she had initially wanted to. Being ignored was one of those things that truly got under her skin, so she was kind of hoping he wouldn't. She swallowed roughly and pulled out her pack of cigarettes for something to do. "Don't gotta talk to me, just gotta put up with me sittin' here." From the edgy way she tucked the cigarette into her lips and lit it, it wasn't hard to see the whole trying thing made her nervous. She was rusty on how to comfort him even if she could still remember how.
Jesse huffs at the jab, even though he can't really argue. He’d done that to her a few times when they were younger--ignored her, knowingly--either because he’d truly wanted to be alone or because he was feeling spiteful during one of their fights. It’s not like he wants to get her angry at him now. He just wants to get sloshed in peace.
She’s being nice, though. That’s not lost on him. She could be digging at him already, but she’s not. And she did just pay for a whole bottle.
“Fine.” He empties his glass because he can, then half turns to her, holding out a hand. “But you’re not smokin’ near me without offerin’ me any.”
At the resignation she feels a small bubble of satisfaction at the win. She's quick though to grab her pack of cigarettes and lays it down into his hand, lingering for a brief moment as she studies his face, before pulling back and leaving it in his hand. "Help yourself." She flicks her lighter to life once again, offering it out to him whenever he's ready. It's little things like this that feel so familiar, sharing a drink and a cigarette.
She can tell that he's well into inebriation at this point, so she's going to have to catch up a bit. Looked like it would be one of those nights though. "So, how many you in at this point?" She could hold her own in a drinking competition, but she still didn't quite have his tolerance.
Jesse half wonders what she sees when she looks at him right now, then decides that he’d really rather not know. He busies himself taking out a cigarette instead. He slips it between his lips before leaning in to light it off the offered lighter. Really is like old times. She didn’t even try to set him on fire or anything.
“Can’t say.” He takes a deep drag on the cigarette, then tilts his head back and exhales a stream of smoke to the ceiling. “Stopped countin’. Not one of those nights.” Not the fun kind of drinking night, he means. His plan had just been to keep going until he can’t anymore, then maybe pass out in the employee’s only room in the back. There’s a cot there for a reason.
At least Ashe has B.O.B. to get her home in one piece, however drunk she gets. Except—
“Where’s B.O.B. at?” He looks around then, only just realizing Ashe is totally alone.
It hadn't been hard to see that he wasn't sitting there getting drunk for the sheer joy of it. She had been pretty sure when she'd seen him that he was trying to mold himself into the counter so no one would even give him a second thought. The trouble was that she didn't know what to think outside of that. Whatever it was, it lacked judgement of him. He always seemed so cocky and self assured when she was around him, it had been forever since she'd seen him like that and it made her curious to what hurt he was carrying that night.
She glances back towards the door, as if B.O.B. would still be there. "Oh. Sent him home." She wasn't exactly at her best defense without him, but she could take care of herself when push came to shove. It didn't worry her, and at worst he could come get her or she'd sleep on the sofa in the office she'd claimed for herself in the warehouse.
Setting down her cigarette briefly in the ash tray, she reaches over to pour another round of drinks, taking her own into her hand and swirling it. An old quote popped into her mind; To which f are we drinking? Fuck, forget, or fun. "So, clearly you ain't drinkin' for fun and I am gonna go out on a limb and guess you ain't lookin' to fuck. So that leaves, forgettin'." She held her glass up to his for a toast. "So, here's to forgettin'."
The small frown on Jesse’s face has an air of confusion about it, as if he’s puzzled by the idea that Ashe would send B.O.B. home without her. She should be more worried about her safety with this new criminal enterprise of hers. Not that she isn’t one of the most dangerous people he knows, but still. He’d have thought she’d be more careful. Had she wanted the privacy for some reason?
It takes him a second to come out of his own thoughts and catch up, but he gets it just in time. He raises his glass right after her, his frown leveling out as he taps his glass against hers.
“To forgettin’.”
At least for one night, if he’s lucky. He knocks back another healthy swig of alcohol before setting the glass back down.
“Angie got sent back home, we think. She’s gone now anyway.”
Easier to forget later if he gets it out now. Otherwise he’ll just be sitting here anticipating a question about it, turning it over and over in his own head until it’d be impossible to shake off.
It would have been careless if she'd been planning on making the walk home alone, however one look at Jesse had taken her back to the old days and she'd had a sixth sense that it was going to be one of those nights. B.O.B. had been in need of a recharge and she didn't want to hold him up, but it may have also had something to do with the way the omnic looked at her when she spent time with Jesse. Like he was happy about it or something.
After tapping his glass she takes a sip from her own. She'd been right, he was trying to forget. Angie was that Overwatch doctor, the one who was dating Moira. When she puts that together, she takes another gulp. It took all she had not to says something that was cruel. Not because she hated the doctor, but because she was resentful, distrustful, and probably if she was being honest a little envious. It left a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach, but at least the liquor replaced its bitterness. Those were the people that he was getting close to while she was back in Arizona feeling lonelier than she'd ever been in her life, which was saying something.
The mental struggle it brought up for her was only evident in the way her fingers tensed around the glass, before busying themselves with the cigarette again. All of it made her wonder why it was she had even sat down. It wasn't like she was great at comfort. She was pretty sure he could still remember that about her.
"Yeah. Moira was tellin' me about that. Sounded like she wanted to forget too. Guess she was well liked to be so missed." She didn't think for a second he'd be drinking his sorrows away if it had been her who had left, but the thought stings so she clears her throat and looked down at her empty glass, tapping a manicured nail against it. "It's catchin' up to you, huh? This place, everythin' that's happened. I can see it in your eyes."
Jesse is ready for the verbal blow to come. Expecting it. The understanding he gets instead throws him for a loop, and it shows on his face as he stares back at her. His poker face isn’t quite so strong tonight, either from the drinking or Ashe’s presence. More likely the latter, as he’s good enough at keeping his thoughts to himself when dealing with acquaintances.
Her mentioning his eyes seems to bring the fact that he’s projecting too much to his attention, and he pointedly looks down at the counter instead. His body stays slightly turned toward hers, though, whether he fully realizes it or not.
“Just been a while since I had anythin’ to lose. Then this place drags me in, and…” He laughs, a sound without any real amusement to it as he takes a drag of his cigarette before resting it in a nearby ashtray. Angela had never liked him smoking. He’d always laughed and pointed out that, in his line of work, it wouldn’t be the smokes that got him in the end. He’s been right so far.
“Moira’s takin’ it hard, but who can blame her? It’s not like we know where people go when they stop bein’ here.” Back home, perhaps. That’s the best-case scenario.
Moira was taking it hard. She took it hard the way that Ashe had taken such grief hard. "Moira'll fine." The woman was a rock and had dealt with a lot of adversity in her own ways, they had somehow bonded over that loathing a world that hadn't ever treated them right. "She's tough and she'll get through." She smiled wryly. "I would however, keep an eye on those experimentations of hers. I am guessing the person keeping her grounded was Angela and without her, who knows where she'll go." Jesse had kept her grounded and she'd launched herself into a full on war against the gangs until they conceded. Then she'd climbed the ladder and filled the emptiness of her losses with the money that came in. Who knew what Moira would do, and she was talking about doing it directly to others.
Though she tries not to focus so heavily on the other thing he'd said it kept nagging at her. "since I had anythin' to lose." Finally she can't keep the burning question she has to herself, so reaches for the cigarette takes a long drag to lets the smoke soothe her nerves. "You mean, since you left Blackwatch." She taps the ash into the ashtray as she quietly says that. She'd always assumed since his kidnapping that Deadlock was a forgotten family and Blackwatch was where he had wanted to be. Her tone isn't accusatory, just sad.
“Yeah. That was the first time I went out on my own.”
He can’t think of a reason not to admit it, even if he could think of several while sober. He frowns down at the glowing ember of his own cigarette where it sits, slowly burning itself down. What’d she have to be sad about? She hadn’t liked Blackwatch anyway. Would’ve thought she’d be happy being reminded of its demise and him no longer being a part of it.
“Lost Deadlock. Left Blackwatch, and then that went-” He holds up a hand and flicks his fingers out, as if to mimic an explosion with the single gesture. “Seemed simpler bein’ a rogue agent, and y’know what? It was. It was real damn simple.”
And lonely. Incredibly lonely, but which was worse—being alone, or losing the people you cared about over and over again? He’d thought about that a lot when the Recall happened. It was part of the reason he hadn’t answered it for as long as he had. That, and the lack of oversight and rules that make up a vigilante lifestyle.
“Then this place comes, and it gives you a house. A goddamn house, and you’re stuck in one town seein’ the same faces over and over again, and it’s- it’s bullshit, Ashe.”
He’s definitely drunk, his tone almost petulant as he knocks his glass against the counter for emphasis.
Ashe could never have done what he had done. She would have been too scared to. Though she approached keeping people with her from a backwards point of view, the idea of being alone scared her on a visceral level. Yanked her right back to her earliest memories of crying by the front door of a house that was too large and held too much emptiness. Being rogue never would have worked for her. She needed Deadlock like she needed air, because with them she was never alone.
He'd listed Deadlock in there, and it's reassuring in its own way. She gives voice to his own thoughts. "Sure, bein' without people is simpler, but sittin' in a bar knowin' no one in a town you are only passin' through isn't a life. Not unless you're a tumbleweed." She may not let people in very deep, but she was never happier than when she was counting the bills from a successful score and everyone was celebrating the success together; no matter how drunk and stupid they got.
She picks up her head as his drunken rant gets a little more escalated and he's talking to her, really talking and she's just listening, really listening. This town was brutal, it gave you a house and it had forced her to see him day after day, with little change. And when he'd been dead, it had been his ghost that she'd seen every night.
"...You got comfortable again." She poured a new glass, swallowing it quick and starting to feel the buzz hit her. When he slams his glass down, she stares at her own. A new line of thinking has been slowly growing inside of her over the last nearly half a year and with the alcohol taking effect and his own openness she dares to try and word it. "...I used to think..." She starts carefully but avoids his eyes as she tries to figure out how to communicate with him. "That you were like a tumbleweed, blowin' from place to place. That you'd touch down but be gone as fast, leavin' dust in your wake."
She swallows and some of her hair falls to curtain her face, to make her expression unreadable. "I believed that nothin' was enough for you." That she and Deadlock weren't enough. "And I hated you for that. And I hated myself for thinkin' I could catch you and keep you. Thinkin' you'd been makin' a fool out of me." And he had, but there is a small part of her starting to realize that maybe, just maybe, it was on both of them the damage that had been done to their relationship. "...Maybe, instead of that...maybe it's not that you were lookin' for greener grass, it's that life kept takin' you into yards only just long enough to adjust before forcin' you to move on, and you were strong enough to try and do that."
She takes another deep breath, unsure if anything she'd said was worthwhile and her fingers are shaking slightly as they hold the glass. "You've just done what you always do. You kept on livin', and hopin' for the better outcome to it all. And yet again, the world won't stay still for you. It's not bullshit, Jesse. It's your life, you're a tumbleweed lookin' for somethin' to stop you." She often talked a lot, but she really needed to get it out. "Before comin' here I didn't understand how you could ever get used to or care about people in a place that stole your entire life away. I think...I might be seein' it a little different now." Because now, she was making a home out of something that had seemed like a prison, because she had to survive and she had to not be alone.
She wonders if maybe that had been no different for him all those years ago when Blackwatch had taken him away from her and the gang. While admitting her wrongs didn't come anymore naturally than comfort, this was her trying to really hear him.
There’s no way she could know that Reyes had called him the same thing once. It twists in his chest, a sharp pain but an old one. But rather than curl back in on himself and turn away, the more Ashe talks, the more Jesse straightens up. He’s outright staring at her by the end, the whole thing less painful now but… unnamable. He doesn’t know what this bittersweet feeling is, only that it’s all-encompassing, like it’s gotten into his blood.
A tumbleweed lookin’ for somethin’ to stop you.
“… Never been that things aren’t enough for me,” he admits finally, breaking the weight of silence that had fallen over them when she’d finished. “Especially not you. Not Deadlock, I mean, not… all of that, any of it.”
He’d wanted to go back so badly. She’d been his family. It’d been his home. But by the time he had, they’d both changed too much. He couldn’t go back any more than Ashe could leave.
But it feels like, for the first time in a long time, she’s not blaming him for it. It’s a surprise how much that actually means to him. For her to understand. For her to look at him like that and see something good in what he’s been through. More good perhaps than he’s ever really seen in any of it.
"But I never hated you."
Why he feels the need to make that clear, only his drunken mind knows.
"I can't ever go back, but... wasn't ever 'cuz of you."
Ashe hadn't been the reason he'd lost Deadlock any more than Reyes had been the reason he'd lost Blackwatch. It'd only ever been him, making bad plays and putting down the wrong cards. Over, over, and over again.
He really wasn't so different from her, it just expressed itself differently in her. Her own life had been a series of bad decisions and wrong choices. For a time they'd made them side by and side and when happiness is scarce she'd latched onto it like a safety raft in a storm.
I can't ever go back. His own words sink in hard, not that she doesn't take in the fact that he had gone on to say that it wasn't about her, but it's the first part that catches up to her. When she'd first seen him after Blackwatch, that had been what she'd wanted. For him to be the prodigal soul returning home to them, so they could pick up where they'd left off. It had been a foolish and childish notion. He'd changed and so had she. In filling the gaps of his absence with anger, violence, and revenge she'd destroyed the home he'd had to come back to.
Of course they hadn't been able to go back, because the past was gone. Maybe they were robbed of it, maybe it wasn't what had been intended, but fighting against the reality had made her bitter. As usual she'd created a war where there hadn't needed to be one. Just another bad play on her part. At the time she hadn't been able to move forward either, so they were stuck in a stand off where every once in awhile the guns came out and made everything worse. The kids they were were gone and she clung to a photograph of what ifs, without ever thinking that maybe just because they couldn't go back didn't mean they couldn't go forward.
The issue then became how to move forward and was there anyway to build new positive memories, or had her lust for control and money destroyed everything she actually wanted? In the middle of becoming Calamity Ashe, she'd forgotten that she was still Elizabeth Ashe and she wasn't really sure what Elizabeth Ashe wanted, because she'd tried to destroy that part of herself to be stronger. Deerington seemed intent on trying to drag up forgotten wants and desires and forcing her to question herself. It was too hard.
"You don't gotta sugar coat it. It was 'cause of me. I changed the family, I..." She swallowed roughly, it was getting hard to not break down over things that had been slowly creeping to the surface finally daring to breach her consciousness. "I...forgot how to have fun. I..." She had become just like her Mama and Daddy and she was swimming in the only thing they had ever loved; wealth. She wants to not believe it, but a nagging feeling says she's an Ashe through and through. And like her parents, she destroyed everything that could possibly love her.
It's too raw and it hurts too much to even begin processing too deeply. Even if she wants to figure out if they could let go of the past and move in sync into the future, she's too afraid. She'll lose him like he lost Angela and she'll be trapped here alone and fighting to survive just like always and it'll only hurt more if she lets him in. She looks up at him, her eyes are wide and nervous. "I...I can't...I gotta go..." She stands up from her chair, clearing her throat because she feels ready to start crying and quickly grabs her jacket before heading towards the door. Whatever is out there in the dark streets of Deerington surely can't hurt her more than the truth coming to light in the bar.
Jesse had just wanted to sit and drink and peace, in a little microcosm of the life he’s lead thus far: living dangerously, on his own and on his own terms. So no one is more surprised than him when, after Ashe rushes out, he stumbles up to his feet.
“Goddamn it, god… damn it, Ashe-”
He about falls over the stool, and he definitely runs into a patron or several on the way out; but not a one of those obstacles will stop him when he’s got it in his mind to be somewhere. The night air, when it hits him, is pleasantly cool. It’s not autumn yet, but the promise of it is there.
“Ashe!” he shouts her name, not really sure if she’s far enough away yet to warrant how loud his voice is. Important thing is that she hears him.
She had been hoping that the night air and getting a little bit of distance, might bring her back to the comfortable territory of her unhealthy coping devices. At least being angry was something that she was used to. She had a rigid mindset, but it was what she knew. Starting to take into consideration that maybe there were other ways of thinking was downright threatening in some ways because it challenged years of her own reality. Despite Deerington cracking constantly at those edges, it didn't make her any ready for it.
She stops in her tracks when she hears him call her name, and she's surprised. He'd come after her and she hadn't been expecting it. After all, she'd assumed that he'd just return to drinking, he'd wanted to be alone in the first place after all. She wasn't sure she'd been good company. But slowly she turns around, it's not hard to see she's still a bit defensive, but she hasn't had the time to build the wall back up again.
"C'mon Jesse, I don't know what else to say... You didn't even want me there in the first place tonight, and I'm no good at reassuring anyone that it will be alright. I don't know how to help you...or make it better." No one had ever taken the time to teach her how.
He’s too drunk for this. Jesse never has the right words even when he’s really trying to (and no, easy smiles and vague advice about the inherent unfairness of the universe don’t count). But seeing Ashe look back at him, defensive as if he’s done something to hurt her somehow—it’s enough to make him want to try.
“Don’t need you to say anythin’.” He’s the one who has things to say, but the amount of whiskey he’s already had is really making it a struggle.
“You said it was ‘cuz of you. It wasn’t, and I just… I can’t let you go runnin’ off in the middle of a… a murdertown in the middle of the night with B.O.B. because you think you messed up, and…”
He’s losing steam, losing coherence, but there’s one thing he can still focus on well enough.
She's quiet for a long moment as she watches him. A large part of her brain wants to turn tail and get on that bike and drive away from there, away from the risk of letting herself care about him again. Another voice tells her, it's really too late for that anyway, and it was too late from the moment she'd held him dying in her arms. Whether she figures out how to outwardly address that is another story.
The battle inside her head over what to do wages, but ultimately she realizes she's screwed at this point. She lets out a sigh and her shoulders ease. She moves towards him and back towards the bar.
"Alright." She tries to keep her head high, but it's an effort to stay poised and strong in the moment. "Guess I could go for one more drink."
Just one is better than nothing. Jesse will gladly take it. This doesn’t solve anything, doesn’t change a thing either, and Jesse will feel extremely embarrassed about it in the morning. Right now though, all he feels is relief that Ashe won’t be off in the night, feeling all that weight pressing down on her shoulders while making her way home alone.
“You still got a bottle to finish,” he reminds her as he follows her back in. The other bargoers give him a wide berth this time.
“Don’t got to talk about anythin’ if you don’t want. Can go back to the original plan. Just drinkin’.”
Because if anything is clear now, it’s that Ashe has just as many demons as he does. More than he’d thought.
While Ashe may have said one, she knew that when he'd gotten her to agree, it would be more than that. The emotional exhaustion had caught up to her. Between all the situations Deerington had thrown at her, the demons were having a hay day with her. In the middle of that storm Jesse somehow still feels like a beacon of safety and while confusing, it also means she keeps finding ways to stay in his line of vision.
She takes her seat again at the counter, and the barkeep nods his head to her. Tucking the longer pieces of hair behind her ear so that she's not hiding behind it, she dares to glance up at him. This was the boy whom she had deeply cared for all grown up. The reasons that became friends is starting to come into clarity again and she wonders as she looks into his eyes if what had drawn them together as friends all those years ago was stronger than what had torn them apart. It's hard for her to say yet, but he'd run after her and she figured that meant she needed to brave sitting in the muck of it all a little longer.
After a minute of staring into his eyes as if trying to figure him out, her eyes drift to his mouth and she feels a slight warmth grace her cheeks. Hadn't been that long ago since she'd left her lipstick all over them. She turns her attention to the bottle, and pours them both another drink. "Well, I can't say as this place is borin', never can figure what it'll throw at you." One day it was making a joke out of you in outrageous outfits and leading you to make out in closets. The next, you are stuck facing your fears with that same person who you who can't figure out is friend or foe. "I don't...fully hate it. It's got some good people in it. Sure, we might lose them, but...that ain't different than home. And I'd say we are better equipped to deal with the horror than most." She runs her thumb along the rim of her glass. "Just another battle in a different place."
She really wanted to ask him why he couldn't ever return if it wasn't because of her, but she was too afraid of the answer, so she lets that question hang back in her mind. It's in good company with unasked questions like why hadn't he even tried to get her out or why he couldn't come back but he still came to them when he needed something. She needed so many answers and as usual she wasn't as good at getting what she needed as what she wanted.
Jesse is a little amazed that she’d agreed to come back to the bar. He wonders now and again how far the bounds of Ashe’s seeming tolerance of him goes. At times, it’s almost as if there’s something like friendship between them again. But then the past—reality, really—always rears its head.
And making it even more complicated are things like the way her eyes dart down to his lips. It’s impossible not to remember that heated moment in the closet, and then after, both of them acting right up until they weren’t.
Again, it’s all very complicated. He’s too drunk to even try for a well-timed flirtation, so he just props his shoulder on the counter and his head in his hand, his eyes on Ashe the whole while.
“It’s not the people I mind either. It’s the everythin’ else.” Oof, and what she’s saying really hits home.“It is different though. It’s… it’s like this place takes ‘em away. Like it’s playin’ games.” He frowns out at the crowd, his free hand idly going to the chain around his neck. It had been mostly hidden behind his flannel before. At the end of it is what had been left behind for him of Rei: a little silver camera, and a man’s silver ring. It’s not something he always wears. When he does, he tends to keep it hidden.
“But you’re right. We are better equipped.” His frown deepens, as does his grip on the necklace. “Lot of good that does when we can’t land a hit on whatever is playin’ with us here.”
She was almost surprised herself, it would have been so much smarter to just get on her bike and leave. However, Jesse had come out of that bar after her, and that hadn't happened in years. It would have been easier for him to let her go too, but she supposed they were in whatever went down tonight together. There had been a lot of 'togethers' lately though and it was definitely a challenge to her perception of things. But without Deadlock or Overwatch, it felt in a way like they were back to just being Jesse and Ashe. Perhaps without Overwatch or Deadlock there to divide them, they had a chance to remember each other.
"Jesse McCree admittin' he's missin' the target. Never thought I'd see the day." She teased to try and lighten it up. "I'm tryin' to figure some of that out in my work. Ain't just about the product."
It's hard to not think about what had happened at the party, she'd been thinking about it since then. Hadn't been willing to talk about it. She had questioned whether she'd gone too far, and she knew it had gone farther than necessary. Luckily she is distracted by the necklace that he pulls out when he starts talking about the people. It doesn't take much to figure out that the necklace represented someone important. Likely someone he was missing greatly. She can see the little silver ring and something in her twist uncomfortably.
She lifts her head motioning towards it. "What's that? You go and get married in the time we've been apart?" She can't quite understand why she isn't sure she wants the answer, but her tone doesn't give any of her trepidation away.
Oh yeah. Her work, which is now their work. They’re in this enterprise together, working towards a common goal for the first time since Deadlock. That reminds him of what she’d said before she’d run outside. She’d seemed… shaken. Sad. All these years, Jesse had assumed that Ashe was more than happy. She had it all. The gang continued to thrive, she had all the power and influence and money she could want or need, and surely she had other people these days she was close to. What else could she need?
He might’ve asked, had she not asked about the necklace first.
“Me, get married?” He huffs out something like a laugh, though it’s more sad than amused as he looks down at the ring and the charm. “Nah, this… this belonged to somebody special. She got here when I did. We were…” He trails off. They were together, sure, but… he’d never quite let her in the way he wanted to. He’d been too afraid, to be honest. Good things didn’t happen to people he let get close. But then look what happened—she was gone anyway.
“… She was special. These were hers. Got left by my front door the day I found out.”
No note. Nothing to indicate if it had been her choice, or some sick joke played the town.
Ashe was never satisfied. Her self assured attitude wasn't entirely show because she knew what she was good at and she constantly challenged herself to do better. There was no limit to what she would strive for, but really that boiled down to the fact that nothing was ever enough. There was no amount of money, products, or power that kept her happy. Ambition got her what she wanted, but not necessarily what she needed.
She'd always assumed he was pretty happy as well. Even right then, playing with the necklace around his neck, she had figured that whoever this had been about had been making him happy in a way hadn't. The idea of him marrying had seemed silly to her too. Did wandering rangers even settle down to marry?
Either way she feels an odd weight lift out of her stomach, despite that it's clear there was something going on. "Somebody special, huh? I know that look, you were taken with her."
It felt odd to feel anything like envy, but she couldn't help but feel replaced, like there was this space in his life that she had once filled as his best friend and now he had others to fill it. Though really, that was how she'd always felt. Replaced by Overawtch, replaced by justice, replaced by...whoever this girl was. Even her parents had replaced her spot in their family photo with the dog. She was replaceable, always had been, no matter how much she tightened the rope to make sure no one forgot her. As uncomfortable as she is, she presses on, with another shot of whiskey of course. "So...tell me about it."
Does Jesse even have a look when he’s taken with somebody? He must, for Ashe to notice. Still feels weird to think that she can read him that easily, even now. Equally strange to remember how he could read her just as well once.
Even in Overwatch, with the people he’d grown to consider his own family, he’d not met anyone he’d had that same tie to. He’d been closest with Reyes, but even then—especially near the end—there were things he didn’t know. Secrets the older man had kept close to his chest. There was no coming close to what he and Ashe had, growing up and then fighting their way through adolescence together. Despite what she thinks, he’s never found anything or anyone that could replace that. He likely never will.
“Yeah. I was.” He looks up, blinking until his eyes can focus on her properly. He hasn’t touched his glass for a few minutes, and judging by how blurry his vision is, maybe he shouldn’t if he wants to stay upright until she leaves. “What… d’you want to know?”
He’s surprised she cares, but what’s one more surprise on top of all the ones Ashe has already left him with?
She's starting to wish she was that drunk. Especially when he confirms that. Not that it matters, she's gone obviously. And not that it would have mattered anyway, she tells herself, because there isn't anything she wants from him. However, the confirmation makes her swallow and she reaches over to pour another glass, working her way to his level. They'd both pass out on the counter at this point.
Whether it's about caring or collecting information so she has the bigger picture, she isn't quite sure herself. She isn't so well adjusted as to want happiness for others when it could potentially be a wedge in her own happiness, but she doesn't fault him either. She'd had her own fair share of men in her life that had come and gone. Mostly because she couldn't ever give all of herself and she wasn't one to be controlled. But she doesn't not care, so it's a start.
"I dunno. She's obviously not here anymore, so that's got you upset. Who was she? When did she leave? She come from our world?" It's intense the way she feels, so she reaches for a little teasing to make herself more comfortable...if not him. "You used protection right? Tell me you used protection."
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She calms her knee jerk reaction by downing the first glass and pouring another, before leaning over to refill his. "What? Like you've never ignored me before?" She mutters the words bluntly, but not nearly as harshly as she had initially wanted to. Being ignored was one of those things that truly got under her skin, so she was kind of hoping he wouldn't. She swallowed roughly and pulled out her pack of cigarettes for something to do. "Don't gotta talk to me, just gotta put up with me sittin' here." From the edgy way she tucked the cigarette into her lips and lit it, it wasn't hard to see the whole trying thing made her nervous. She was rusty on how to comfort him even if she could still remember how.
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She’s being nice, though. That’s not lost on him. She could be digging at him already, but she’s not. And she did just pay for a whole bottle.
“Fine.” He empties his glass because he can, then half turns to her, holding out a hand. “But you’re not smokin’ near me without offerin’ me any.”
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She can tell that he's well into inebriation at this point, so she's going to have to catch up a bit. Looked like it would be one of those nights though. "So, how many you in at this point?" She could hold her own in a drinking competition, but she still didn't quite have his tolerance.
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“Can’t say.” He takes a deep drag on the cigarette, then tilts his head back and exhales a stream of smoke to the ceiling. “Stopped countin’. Not one of those nights.” Not the fun kind of drinking night, he means. His plan had just been to keep going until he can’t anymore, then maybe pass out in the employee’s only room in the back. There’s a cot there for a reason.
At least Ashe has B.O.B. to get her home in one piece, however drunk she gets. Except—
“Where’s B.O.B. at?” He looks around then, only just realizing Ashe is totally alone.
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She glances back towards the door, as if B.O.B. would still be there. "Oh. Sent him home." She wasn't exactly at her best defense without him, but she could take care of herself when push came to shove. It didn't worry her, and at worst he could come get her or she'd sleep on the sofa in the office she'd claimed for herself in the warehouse.
Setting down her cigarette briefly in the ash tray, she reaches over to pour another round of drinks, taking her own into her hand and swirling it. An old quote popped into her mind; To which f are we drinking? Fuck, forget, or fun. "So, clearly you ain't drinkin' for fun and I am gonna go out on a limb and guess you ain't lookin' to fuck. So that leaves, forgettin'." She held her glass up to his for a toast. "So, here's to forgettin'."
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It takes him a second to come out of his own thoughts and catch up, but he gets it just in time. He raises his glass right after her, his frown leveling out as he taps his glass against hers.
“To forgettin’.”
At least for one night, if he’s lucky. He knocks back another healthy swig of alcohol before setting the glass back down.
“Angie got sent back home, we think. She’s gone now anyway.”
Easier to forget later if he gets it out now. Otherwise he’ll just be sitting here anticipating a question about it, turning it over and over in his own head until it’d be impossible to shake off.
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After tapping his glass she takes a sip from her own. She'd been right, he was trying to forget. Angie was that Overwatch doctor, the one who was dating Moira. When she puts that together, she takes another gulp. It took all she had not to says something that was cruel. Not because she hated the doctor, but because she was resentful, distrustful, and probably if she was being honest a little envious. It left a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach, but at least the liquor replaced its bitterness. Those were the people that he was getting close to while she was back in Arizona feeling lonelier than she'd ever been in her life, which was saying something.
The mental struggle it brought up for her was only evident in the way her fingers tensed around the glass, before busying themselves with the cigarette again. All of it made her wonder why it was she had even sat down. It wasn't like she was great at comfort. She was pretty sure he could still remember that about her.
"Yeah. Moira was tellin' me about that. Sounded like she wanted to forget too. Guess she was well liked to be so missed." She didn't think for a second he'd be drinking his sorrows away if it had been her who had left, but the thought stings so she clears her throat and looked down at her empty glass, tapping a manicured nail against it. "It's catchin' up to you, huh? This place, everythin' that's happened. I can see it in your eyes."
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Her mentioning his eyes seems to bring the fact that he’s projecting too much to his attention, and he pointedly looks down at the counter instead. His body stays slightly turned toward hers, though, whether he fully realizes it or not.
“Just been a while since I had anythin’ to lose. Then this place drags me in, and…” He laughs, a sound without any real amusement to it as he takes a drag of his cigarette before resting it in a nearby ashtray. Angela had never liked him smoking. He’d always laughed and pointed out that, in his line of work, it wouldn’t be the smokes that got him in the end. He’s been right so far.
“Moira’s takin’ it hard, but who can blame her? It’s not like we know where people go when they stop bein’ here.” Back home, perhaps. That’s the best-case scenario.
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Though she tries not to focus so heavily on the other thing he'd said it kept nagging at her. "since I had anythin' to lose." Finally she can't keep the burning question she has to herself, so reaches for the cigarette takes a long drag to lets the smoke soothe her nerves. "You mean, since you left Blackwatch." She taps the ash into the ashtray as she quietly says that. She'd always assumed since his kidnapping that Deadlock was a forgotten family and Blackwatch was where he had wanted to be. Her tone isn't accusatory, just sad.
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He can’t think of a reason not to admit it, even if he could think of several while sober. He frowns down at the glowing ember of his own cigarette where it sits, slowly burning itself down. What’d she have to be sad about? She hadn’t liked Blackwatch anyway. Would’ve thought she’d be happy being reminded of its demise and him no longer being a part of it.
“Lost Deadlock. Left Blackwatch, and then that went-” He holds up a hand and flicks his fingers out, as if to mimic an explosion with the single gesture. “Seemed simpler bein’ a rogue agent, and y’know what? It was. It was real damn simple.”
And lonely. Incredibly lonely, but which was worse—being alone, or losing the people you cared about over and over again? He’d thought about that a lot when the Recall happened. It was part of the reason he hadn’t answered it for as long as he had. That, and the lack of oversight and rules that make up a vigilante lifestyle.
“Then this place comes, and it gives you a house. A goddamn house, and you’re stuck in one town seein’ the same faces over and over again, and it’s- it’s bullshit, Ashe.”
He’s definitely drunk, his tone almost petulant as he knocks his glass against the counter for emphasis.
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He'd listed Deadlock in there, and it's reassuring in its own way. She gives voice to his own thoughts. "Sure, bein' without people is simpler, but sittin' in a bar knowin' no one in a town you are only passin' through isn't a life. Not unless you're a tumbleweed." She may not let people in very deep, but she was never happier than when she was counting the bills from a successful score and everyone was celebrating the success together; no matter how drunk and stupid they got.
She picks up her head as his drunken rant gets a little more escalated and he's talking to her, really talking and she's just listening, really listening. This town was brutal, it gave you a house and it had forced her to see him day after day, with little change. And when he'd been dead, it had been his ghost that she'd seen every night.
"...You got comfortable again." She poured a new glass, swallowing it quick and starting to feel the buzz hit her. When he slams his glass down, she stares at her own. A new line of thinking has been slowly growing inside of her over the last nearly half a year and with the alcohol taking effect and his own openness she dares to try and word it. "...I used to think..." She starts carefully but avoids his eyes as she tries to figure out how to communicate with him. "That you were like a tumbleweed, blowin' from place to place. That you'd touch down but be gone as fast, leavin' dust in your wake."
She swallows and some of her hair falls to curtain her face, to make her expression unreadable. "I believed that nothin' was enough for you." That she and Deadlock weren't enough. "And I hated you for that. And I hated myself for thinkin' I could catch you and keep you. Thinkin' you'd been makin' a fool out of me." And he had, but there is a small part of her starting to realize that maybe, just maybe, it was on both of them the damage that had been done to their relationship. "...Maybe, instead of that...maybe it's not that you were lookin' for greener grass, it's that life kept takin' you into yards only just long enough to adjust before forcin' you to move on, and you were strong enough to try and do that."
She takes another deep breath, unsure if anything she'd said was worthwhile and her fingers are shaking slightly as they hold the glass. "You've just done what you always do. You kept on livin', and hopin' for the better outcome to it all. And yet again, the world won't stay still for you. It's not bullshit, Jesse. It's your life, you're a tumbleweed lookin' for somethin' to stop you." She often talked a lot, but she really needed to get it out. "Before comin' here I didn't understand how you could ever get used to or care about people in a place that stole your entire life away. I think...I might be seein' it a little different now." Because now, she was making a home out of something that had seemed like a prison, because she had to survive and she had to not be alone.
She wonders if maybe that had been no different for him all those years ago when Blackwatch had taken him away from her and the gang. While admitting her wrongs didn't come anymore naturally than comfort, this was her trying to really hear him.
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There’s no way she could know that Reyes had called him the same thing once. It twists in his chest, a sharp pain but an old one. But rather than curl back in on himself and turn away, the more Ashe talks, the more Jesse straightens up. He’s outright staring at her by the end, the whole thing less painful now but… unnamable. He doesn’t know what this bittersweet feeling is, only that it’s all-encompassing, like it’s gotten into his blood.
A tumbleweed lookin’ for somethin’ to stop you.
“… Never been that things aren’t enough for me,” he admits finally, breaking the weight of silence that had fallen over them when she’d finished. “Especially not you. Not Deadlock, I mean, not… all of that, any of it.”
He’d wanted to go back so badly. She’d been his family. It’d been his home. But by the time he had, they’d both changed too much. He couldn’t go back any more than Ashe could leave.
But it feels like, for the first time in a long time, she’s not blaming him for it. It’s a surprise how much that actually means to him. For her to understand. For her to look at him like that and see something good in what he’s been through. More good perhaps than he’s ever really seen in any of it.
"But I never hated you."
Why he feels the need to make that clear, only his drunken mind knows.
"I can't ever go back, but... wasn't ever 'cuz of you."
Ashe hadn't been the reason he'd lost Deadlock any more than Reyes had been the reason he'd lost Blackwatch. It'd only ever been him, making bad plays and putting down the wrong cards. Over, over, and over again.
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I can't ever go back. His own words sink in hard, not that she doesn't take in the fact that he had gone on to say that it wasn't about her, but it's the first part that catches up to her. When she'd first seen him after Blackwatch, that had been what she'd wanted. For him to be the prodigal soul returning home to them, so they could pick up where they'd left off. It had been a foolish and childish notion. He'd changed and so had she. In filling the gaps of his absence with anger, violence, and revenge she'd destroyed the home he'd had to come back to.
Of course they hadn't been able to go back, because the past was gone. Maybe they were robbed of it, maybe it wasn't what had been intended, but fighting against the reality had made her bitter. As usual she'd created a war where there hadn't needed to be one. Just another bad play on her part. At the time she hadn't been able to move forward either, so they were stuck in a stand off where every once in awhile the guns came out and made everything worse. The kids they were were gone and she clung to a photograph of what ifs, without ever thinking that maybe just because they couldn't go back didn't mean they couldn't go forward.
The issue then became how to move forward and was there anyway to build new positive memories, or had her lust for control and money destroyed everything she actually wanted? In the middle of becoming Calamity Ashe, she'd forgotten that she was still Elizabeth Ashe and she wasn't really sure what Elizabeth Ashe wanted, because she'd tried to destroy that part of herself to be stronger. Deerington seemed intent on trying to drag up forgotten wants and desires and forcing her to question herself. It was too hard.
"You don't gotta sugar coat it. It was 'cause of me. I changed the family, I..." She swallowed roughly, it was getting hard to not break down over things that had been slowly creeping to the surface finally daring to breach her consciousness. "I...forgot how to have fun. I..." She had become just like her Mama and Daddy and she was swimming in the only thing they had ever loved; wealth. She wants to not believe it, but a nagging feeling says she's an Ashe through and through. And like her parents, she destroyed everything that could possibly love her.
It's too raw and it hurts too much to even begin processing too deeply. Even if she wants to figure out if they could let go of the past and move in sync into the future, she's too afraid. She'll lose him like he lost Angela and she'll be trapped here alone and fighting to survive just like always and it'll only hurt more if she lets him in. She looks up at him, her eyes are wide and nervous. "I...I can't...I gotta go..." She stands up from her chair, clearing her throat because she feels ready to start crying and quickly grabs her jacket before heading towards the door. Whatever is out there in the dark streets of Deerington surely can't hurt her more than the truth coming to light in the bar.
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“Goddamn it, god… damn it, Ashe-”
He about falls over the stool, and he definitely runs into a patron or several on the way out; but not a one of those obstacles will stop him when he’s got it in his mind to be somewhere. The night air, when it hits him, is pleasantly cool. It’s not autumn yet, but the promise of it is there.
“Ashe!” he shouts her name, not really sure if she’s far enough away yet to warrant how loud his voice is. Important thing is that she hears him.
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She stops in her tracks when she hears him call her name, and she's surprised. He'd come after her and she hadn't been expecting it. After all, she'd assumed that he'd just return to drinking, he'd wanted to be alone in the first place after all. She wasn't sure she'd been good company. But slowly she turns around, it's not hard to see she's still a bit defensive, but she hasn't had the time to build the wall back up again.
"C'mon Jesse, I don't know what else to say... You didn't even want me there in the first place tonight, and I'm no good at reassuring anyone that it will be alright. I don't know how to help you...or make it better." No one had ever taken the time to teach her how.
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“Don’t need you to say anythin’.” He’s the one who has things to say, but the amount of whiskey he’s already had is really making it a struggle.
“You said it was ‘cuz of you. It wasn’t, and I just… I can’t let you go runnin’ off in the middle of a… a murdertown in the middle of the night with B.O.B. because you think you messed up, and…”
He’s losing steam, losing coherence, but there’s one thing he can still focus on well enough.
“Just…”
Don’t go.
“Stay for one more drink.”
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The battle inside her head over what to do wages, but ultimately she realizes she's screwed at this point. She lets out a sigh and her shoulders ease. She moves towards him and back towards the bar.
"Alright." She tries to keep her head high, but it's an effort to stay poised and strong in the moment. "Guess I could go for one more drink."
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“You still got a bottle to finish,” he reminds her as he follows her back in. The other bargoers give him a wide berth this time.
“Don’t got to talk about anythin’ if you don’t want. Can go back to the original plan. Just drinkin’.”
Because if anything is clear now, it’s that Ashe has just as many demons as he does. More than he’d thought.
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She takes her seat again at the counter, and the barkeep nods his head to her. Tucking the longer pieces of hair behind her ear so that she's not hiding behind it, she dares to glance up at him. This was the boy whom she had deeply cared for all grown up. The reasons that became friends is starting to come into clarity again and she wonders as she looks into his eyes if what had drawn them together as friends all those years ago was stronger than what had torn them apart. It's hard for her to say yet, but he'd run after her and she figured that meant she needed to brave sitting in the muck of it all a little longer.
After a minute of staring into his eyes as if trying to figure him out, her eyes drift to his mouth and she feels a slight warmth grace her cheeks. Hadn't been that long ago since she'd left her lipstick all over them. She turns her attention to the bottle, and pours them both another drink. "Well, I can't say as this place is borin', never can figure what it'll throw at you." One day it was making a joke out of you in outrageous outfits and leading you to make out in closets. The next, you are stuck facing your fears with that same person who you who can't figure out is friend or foe. "I don't...fully hate it. It's got some good people in it. Sure, we might lose them, but...that ain't different than home. And I'd say we are better equipped to deal with the horror than most." She runs her thumb along the rim of her glass. "Just another battle in a different place."
She really wanted to ask him why he couldn't ever return if it wasn't because of her, but she was too afraid of the answer, so she lets that question hang back in her mind. It's in good company with unasked questions like why hadn't he even tried to get her out or why he couldn't come back but he still came to them when he needed something. She needed so many answers and as usual she wasn't as good at getting what she needed as what she wanted.
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And making it even more complicated are things like the way her eyes dart down to his lips. It’s impossible not to remember that heated moment in the closet, and then after, both of them acting right up until they weren’t.
Again, it’s all very complicated. He’s too drunk to even try for a well-timed flirtation, so he just props his shoulder on the counter and his head in his hand, his eyes on Ashe the whole while.
“It’s not the people I mind either. It’s the everythin’ else.” Oof, and what she’s saying really hits home.“It is different though. It’s… it’s like this place takes ‘em away. Like it’s playin’ games.” He frowns out at the crowd, his free hand idly going to the chain around his neck. It had been mostly hidden behind his flannel before. At the end of it is what had been left behind for him of Rei: a little silver camera, and a man’s silver ring. It’s not something he always wears. When he does, he tends to keep it hidden.
“But you’re right. We are better equipped.” His frown deepens, as does his grip on the necklace. “Lot of good that does when we can’t land a hit on whatever is playin’ with us here.”
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"Jesse McCree admittin' he's missin' the target. Never thought I'd see the day." She teased to try and lighten it up. "I'm tryin' to figure some of that out in my work. Ain't just about the product."
It's hard to not think about what had happened at the party, she'd been thinking about it since then. Hadn't been willing to talk about it. She had questioned whether she'd gone too far, and she knew it had gone farther than necessary. Luckily she is distracted by the necklace that he pulls out when he starts talking about the people. It doesn't take much to figure out that the necklace represented someone important. Likely someone he was missing greatly. She can see the little silver ring and something in her twist uncomfortably.
She lifts her head motioning towards it. "What's that? You go and get married in the time we've been apart?" She can't quite understand why she isn't sure she wants the answer, but her tone doesn't give any of her trepidation away.
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He might’ve asked, had she not asked about the necklace first.
“Me, get married?” He huffs out something like a laugh, though it’s more sad than amused as he looks down at the ring and the charm. “Nah, this… this belonged to somebody special. She got here when I did. We were…” He trails off. They were together, sure, but… he’d never quite let her in the way he wanted to. He’d been too afraid, to be honest. Good things didn’t happen to people he let get close. But then look what happened—she was gone anyway.
“… She was special. These were hers. Got left by my front door the day I found out.”
No note. Nothing to indicate if it had been her choice, or some sick joke played the town.
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She'd always assumed he was pretty happy as well. Even right then, playing with the necklace around his neck, she had figured that whoever this had been about had been making him happy in a way hadn't. The idea of him marrying had seemed silly to her too. Did wandering rangers even settle down to marry?
Either way she feels an odd weight lift out of her stomach, despite that it's clear there was something going on. "Somebody special, huh? I know that look, you were taken with her."
It felt odd to feel anything like envy, but she couldn't help but feel replaced, like there was this space in his life that she had once filled as his best friend and now he had others to fill it. Though really, that was how she'd always felt. Replaced by Overawtch, replaced by justice, replaced by...whoever this girl was. Even her parents had replaced her spot in their family photo with the dog. She was replaceable, always had been, no matter how much she tightened the rope to make sure no one forgot her. As uncomfortable as she is, she presses on, with another shot of whiskey of course. "So...tell me about it."
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Even in Overwatch, with the people he’d grown to consider his own family, he’d not met anyone he’d had that same tie to. He’d been closest with Reyes, but even then—especially near the end—there were things he didn’t know. Secrets the older man had kept close to his chest. There was no coming close to what he and Ashe had, growing up and then fighting their way through adolescence together. Despite what she thinks, he’s never found anything or anyone that could replace that. He likely never will.
“Yeah. I was.” He looks up, blinking until his eyes can focus on her properly. He hasn’t touched his glass for a few minutes, and judging by how blurry his vision is, maybe he shouldn’t if he wants to stay upright until she leaves. “What… d’you want to know?”
He’s surprised she cares, but what’s one more surprise on top of all the ones Ashe has already left him with?
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Whether it's about caring or collecting information so she has the bigger picture, she isn't quite sure herself. She isn't so well adjusted as to want happiness for others when it could potentially be a wedge in her own happiness, but she doesn't fault him either. She'd had her own fair share of men in her life that had come and gone. Mostly because she couldn't ever give all of herself and she wasn't one to be controlled. But she doesn't not care, so it's a start.
"I dunno. She's obviously not here anymore, so that's got you upset. Who was she? When did she leave? She come from our world?" It's intense the way she feels, so she reaches for a little teasing to make herself more comfortable...if not him. "You used protection right? Tell me you used protection."
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