"Dad's Cooking Breakfast"
Dated: Sometime last year.
Title: Dad's Cooking Breakfast
Rating: G
Summary: The unfilmed scene from season two episode four, "Down"
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Breakfast is a surreal event.
While the teacher watches the student make slow, relishing work of the food he has been provided with, he reflects that this is the first time he has seen the student eat anything that hadn't come from a vending machine.
Walt listened politely while Jesse quietly explained his whole housing situation to him between intermittent bites of toast and egg. As the boy talked, Walt knew that harsh indifference had been the entirely wrong approach to Jesse's problems, but considering what he'd been dealing with in regards to his own family, he probably couldn't have been paid to give a shit. Besides, he could only ignore Jesse for so long, before the boy did something ridiculous like show up at his house driving their mobile laboratory.
"... you know, I really didn't wanna have to come here," Jesse says, probably in closing. But his breakfast is still far from finished. "But I had nowhere to sleep except in the RV, and when the guy that was storing it found me, he booted me out because I couldn't even pay the damn repair bills. I sort of kind of actually had to steal the RV to get it here..."
Walt just stares at him blankly. God forbid that the storage guy should call the police and track him here.
"But it's not stealing if it's yours, right?" Jesse goes on. "Anyway, I don't think that dude was too eager to mix in with our, you know, dealings. If he called the cops or anything they'd know he stashed a meth lab."
Jesse sits with some expectancy. He barely believes the words that come out of his mouth, and Walter finds himself agreeing absently, with a minute nodding of his head.
Reassured, Jesse's hands return to their present task. They at least are clean; it suddenly reoccurs to Walt that Jesse is blue. "Is that what I think it is?" Walt asks, referring to the foul-smelling matter that soaks Jesse from the waist down.
Jesse examines himself like he's forgotten that he's covered in something. He looks back up quickly, instantly embarrassed. "Uh... Probably."
"How did that happen?" Walt scorns himself for sounding genuinely interested in the answer.
Jesse finishes chewing, quite unhurriedly, before he replies. "... I found a really creative way to smash a toilet."
Walt shakes his head, although he isn't as disgusted as he makes himself look at that moment. "I suppose it belonged to the storage guy?"
Jesse stares at him uncomfortably, twirling his fork between his fingers. "I'll pay him back," Jesse asserts, and Walt feels a touch of respect for him. At the same time, he is angered by Jesse's honesty. He pictures that final bundle of cash sitting behind the vent with the rest of Walt's 'half'. The money has not been divided evenly. Already their 50/50 partnership business model is broken. But he doesn't need it, Walt rationalizes. What's it to him if he doesn't get an extra couple hundred dollars?
The teacher tries to imagine that the student would do the same thing, that if their roles were reversed he would skimp the teacher just as readily. Looking at Jesse sitting across from him at the table, gazing mourningly at an almost empty breakfast plate, Walt knows this is not true. Jesse will always be honest with him about the money, although he's not sure why.
A silence passes over the table while Jesse works on his cup of coffee. He drinks it with a lot of cream and sugar, something even Walt Jr. doesn't do for fear of 'looking like a kid'. Walt gets the feeling that Jesse never worries about looking like a kid.
A smile touches the teacher's deeply-lined face at this thought. It would take a lot for the student to stop looking like a kid, especially in the eyes of the teacher, who only knows him as a child and will probably always see him that way. The student wears clothes that must be trendy in some universe, and they only add to that air of youth. Walt amuses himself by thinking that Jesse wears those huge sweaters and pants to distract from the fact that he probably stopped growing when he was fourteen.
Jesse notices Walt's face and he smiles confusedly. "What are you grinning about?"
"I was just thinking," Walt says, and does not elaborate on what he was thinking about. He considers adding about how small you are, because the look on Jesse's face would probably be funny. But Walt has been rude enough to him for the week, and he doesn't need to pick on the boy's stature above everything else. Walt almost grins again in spite of himself; he has partnered up with the least threatening person imaginable. The boy does flare up when provoked, but he couldn't even blacken Walt's eyes out in the RV just now, even though every part of him probably wanted to, and Walt is grateful for that. Now he doesn't have to think of a lie to explain a bruised face.
The student nods like he understands, but it's known between them that the student can't understand the teacher. He can try, and he will, of course he will, but the odds that he will succeed are slim. So for now the student stirs what's left of his omelet around on his plate. He wants to eat it, but he's saving it until a little later. He's pretty sure that as soon as all of the food is off his plate, the teacher will tell him to leave.
"So what the hell were you doing before I showed up?" Jesse ventures with some degree of braveness. He had watched the display between Walt and his wife with curiosity, but by the end of it he'd wanted to just drive off instead of face his partner. The man was already pissed off, and Jesse thought that his arrival wasn't going to do much to help that. He had been very much correct.
"Having one of my now frequent fights with Skyler," Walt surprises him by answering. "She's found an interesting way of letting me know she doesn't believe a word I say. I'm sure she knows I was lying to her about the phone."
"She found out about the phone?" Jesse raises his eyebrows and, momentarily forgetting his position, he pops the last of his omelet into his mouth.
"Yes..." Walt pauses and takes a pretty deliberate look at Jesse's empty plate, and the boy finds his own eyes straying to the dish, greasy from the skillet potatoes and crusty with flecks of egg.
When both pairs of eyes rise from the plate and lock across the table, the student realizes that the teacher is aware he doesn't want to go just yet. And it's fair to assume that he probably wants more breakfast, too. The student is frustrated with himself for expecting anything. The teacher has reconciled for that episode out in the RV already. Neither of them mentioned it after it was over. There was an unspoken compensation that came when the teacher offered breakfast. He knew that the student would appreciate home-cooked food over any vocal apology.
Walt takes a sip of his own coffee (black, naturally) and debates with himself whether to share any more details about his family with Jesse. But these are details that are meaningless to anyone besides himself, and when he feels a rumble in his own stomach, he decides he will be nice. There is no danger for him in being nice right now. Considering everything that went down in the past couple of weeks, Walt figures Jesse has earned it. Walt suddenly begins to realize just how miraculous it is that they are both sitting here, alive and not horribly maimed. It is a revelation that momentarily makes him feel unashamedly protective of the boy sitting across from him.
"Skyler won't be home any time soon," Walt says, and nearly clenches his fist in aggravation at the fact. "If you want some more breakfast," He adds quickly.
Jesse doesn't try to hide his gratitude, and he nods a little too eagerly. Walt feels that same jealousy over the boy's honesty when he gets up from the table to return to the stove. His stomach has not been good to him today, but he will make himself an omelet this time, and maybe when he has coffee, he'll put some cream and sugar in it.
The student watches the teacher heat the stove up again and he almost thanks him for being able to read him so easily. But such comments have always felt cheap in the student's mouth, he expresses himself so much better without words. So he finds some solace in the quiet that is interrupted only by the cracking of eggs and the sizzling of oil. Glancing over his shoulder, the student smirks, observing the man's meticulous and precise movements. It figures the teacher would handle food the same way he would handle chemicals.
As they sit down to eat again, Walt marvels at how Jesse treats the second plate the same way he did the first. He must have really wanted it. For the first time in months, Walter feels some respect for himself, for not collecting the first empty plate and sending Jesse away, like he probably should have done. And when Walt takes a bite of his own omelet, he finally feels a fervent desire for food, a desire that has been foreign for far too long. He feels the other's eyes stray to him occasionally while he eats like a starving man, and being watched does not cause him to slow, because it is only Jesse, a person completely incapable of judgement. Walter has thinned rapidly, he wants to eat, and his pace gradually encourages Jesse to stop eating like his food is made of dust and will vanish if he's not careful with it.
Halfway through the omelet Walter at last slows down a bit, enough to talk and tell Jesse about how Skyler found out about the phone. At first they discuss possible excuses. When Walt mentions his 'cell-phone alarm' defense, Jesse laughs and it is his turn not to elaborate. He knows the man sitting across from him is smart. A genius, even. But for all that intelligence, he can be so damn dumb sometimes.
The teacher and the student give up on alibis quickly, they've been creating fabrications for much too long now. And as the food relaxes them, they gradually forget that they're supposed to hate each other. They continue to talk and hold conversation like normal people, or as normal as they can realistically be, alternating between consuming their food and exchanging words that stop having anything to do with their devious enterprise into the drug world, each secretly fascinated with and occasionally flummoxed by what the other says. They cannot possibly understand each other, no, but during that bizarre interlude, the student and the teacher unwittingly agreed on a conclusion: that they don't have to.
Title: Dad's Cooking Breakfast
Rating: G
Summary: The unfilmed scene from season two episode four, "Down"
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Breakfast is a surreal event.
While the teacher watches the student make slow, relishing work of the food he has been provided with, he reflects that this is the first time he has seen the student eat anything that hadn't come from a vending machine.
Walt listened politely while Jesse quietly explained his whole housing situation to him between intermittent bites of toast and egg. As the boy talked, Walt knew that harsh indifference had been the entirely wrong approach to Jesse's problems, but considering what he'd been dealing with in regards to his own family, he probably couldn't have been paid to give a shit. Besides, he could only ignore Jesse for so long, before the boy did something ridiculous like show up at his house driving their mobile laboratory.
"... you know, I really didn't wanna have to come here," Jesse says, probably in closing. But his breakfast is still far from finished. "But I had nowhere to sleep except in the RV, and when the guy that was storing it found me, he booted me out because I couldn't even pay the damn repair bills. I sort of kind of actually had to steal the RV to get it here..."
Walt just stares at him blankly. God forbid that the storage guy should call the police and track him here.
"But it's not stealing if it's yours, right?" Jesse goes on. "Anyway, I don't think that dude was too eager to mix in with our, you know, dealings. If he called the cops or anything they'd know he stashed a meth lab."
Jesse sits with some expectancy. He barely believes the words that come out of his mouth, and Walter finds himself agreeing absently, with a minute nodding of his head.
Reassured, Jesse's hands return to their present task. They at least are clean; it suddenly reoccurs to Walt that Jesse is blue. "Is that what I think it is?" Walt asks, referring to the foul-smelling matter that soaks Jesse from the waist down.
Jesse examines himself like he's forgotten that he's covered in something. He looks back up quickly, instantly embarrassed. "Uh... Probably."
"How did that happen?" Walt scorns himself for sounding genuinely interested in the answer.
Jesse finishes chewing, quite unhurriedly, before he replies. "... I found a really creative way to smash a toilet."
Walt shakes his head, although he isn't as disgusted as he makes himself look at that moment. "I suppose it belonged to the storage guy?"
Jesse stares at him uncomfortably, twirling his fork between his fingers. "I'll pay him back," Jesse asserts, and Walt feels a touch of respect for him. At the same time, he is angered by Jesse's honesty. He pictures that final bundle of cash sitting behind the vent with the rest of Walt's 'half'. The money has not been divided evenly. Already their 50/50 partnership business model is broken. But he doesn't need it, Walt rationalizes. What's it to him if he doesn't get an extra couple hundred dollars?
The teacher tries to imagine that the student would do the same thing, that if their roles were reversed he would skimp the teacher just as readily. Looking at Jesse sitting across from him at the table, gazing mourningly at an almost empty breakfast plate, Walt knows this is not true. Jesse will always be honest with him about the money, although he's not sure why.
A silence passes over the table while Jesse works on his cup of coffee. He drinks it with a lot of cream and sugar, something even Walt Jr. doesn't do for fear of 'looking like a kid'. Walt gets the feeling that Jesse never worries about looking like a kid.
A smile touches the teacher's deeply-lined face at this thought. It would take a lot for the student to stop looking like a kid, especially in the eyes of the teacher, who only knows him as a child and will probably always see him that way. The student wears clothes that must be trendy in some universe, and they only add to that air of youth. Walt amuses himself by thinking that Jesse wears those huge sweaters and pants to distract from the fact that he probably stopped growing when he was fourteen.
Jesse notices Walt's face and he smiles confusedly. "What are you grinning about?"
"I was just thinking," Walt says, and does not elaborate on what he was thinking about. He considers adding about how small you are, because the look on Jesse's face would probably be funny. But Walt has been rude enough to him for the week, and he doesn't need to pick on the boy's stature above everything else. Walt almost grins again in spite of himself; he has partnered up with the least threatening person imaginable. The boy does flare up when provoked, but he couldn't even blacken Walt's eyes out in the RV just now, even though every part of him probably wanted to, and Walt is grateful for that. Now he doesn't have to think of a lie to explain a bruised face.
The student nods like he understands, but it's known between them that the student can't understand the teacher. He can try, and he will, of course he will, but the odds that he will succeed are slim. So for now the student stirs what's left of his omelet around on his plate. He wants to eat it, but he's saving it until a little later. He's pretty sure that as soon as all of the food is off his plate, the teacher will tell him to leave.
"So what the hell were you doing before I showed up?" Jesse ventures with some degree of braveness. He had watched the display between Walt and his wife with curiosity, but by the end of it he'd wanted to just drive off instead of face his partner. The man was already pissed off, and Jesse thought that his arrival wasn't going to do much to help that. He had been very much correct.
"Having one of my now frequent fights with Skyler," Walt surprises him by answering. "She's found an interesting way of letting me know she doesn't believe a word I say. I'm sure she knows I was lying to her about the phone."
"She found out about the phone?" Jesse raises his eyebrows and, momentarily forgetting his position, he pops the last of his omelet into his mouth.
"Yes..." Walt pauses and takes a pretty deliberate look at Jesse's empty plate, and the boy finds his own eyes straying to the dish, greasy from the skillet potatoes and crusty with flecks of egg.
When both pairs of eyes rise from the plate and lock across the table, the student realizes that the teacher is aware he doesn't want to go just yet. And it's fair to assume that he probably wants more breakfast, too. The student is frustrated with himself for expecting anything. The teacher has reconciled for that episode out in the RV already. Neither of them mentioned it after it was over. There was an unspoken compensation that came when the teacher offered breakfast. He knew that the student would appreciate home-cooked food over any vocal apology.
Walt takes a sip of his own coffee (black, naturally) and debates with himself whether to share any more details about his family with Jesse. But these are details that are meaningless to anyone besides himself, and when he feels a rumble in his own stomach, he decides he will be nice. There is no danger for him in being nice right now. Considering everything that went down in the past couple of weeks, Walt figures Jesse has earned it. Walt suddenly begins to realize just how miraculous it is that they are both sitting here, alive and not horribly maimed. It is a revelation that momentarily makes him feel unashamedly protective of the boy sitting across from him.
"Skyler won't be home any time soon," Walt says, and nearly clenches his fist in aggravation at the fact. "If you want some more breakfast," He adds quickly.
Jesse doesn't try to hide his gratitude, and he nods a little too eagerly. Walt feels that same jealousy over the boy's honesty when he gets up from the table to return to the stove. His stomach has not been good to him today, but he will make himself an omelet this time, and maybe when he has coffee, he'll put some cream and sugar in it.
The student watches the teacher heat the stove up again and he almost thanks him for being able to read him so easily. But such comments have always felt cheap in the student's mouth, he expresses himself so much better without words. So he finds some solace in the quiet that is interrupted only by the cracking of eggs and the sizzling of oil. Glancing over his shoulder, the student smirks, observing the man's meticulous and precise movements. It figures the teacher would handle food the same way he would handle chemicals.
As they sit down to eat again, Walt marvels at how Jesse treats the second plate the same way he did the first. He must have really wanted it. For the first time in months, Walter feels some respect for himself, for not collecting the first empty plate and sending Jesse away, like he probably should have done. And when Walt takes a bite of his own omelet, he finally feels a fervent desire for food, a desire that has been foreign for far too long. He feels the other's eyes stray to him occasionally while he eats like a starving man, and being watched does not cause him to slow, because it is only Jesse, a person completely incapable of judgement. Walter has thinned rapidly, he wants to eat, and his pace gradually encourages Jesse to stop eating like his food is made of dust and will vanish if he's not careful with it.
Halfway through the omelet Walter at last slows down a bit, enough to talk and tell Jesse about how Skyler found out about the phone. At first they discuss possible excuses. When Walt mentions his 'cell-phone alarm' defense, Jesse laughs and it is his turn not to elaborate. He knows the man sitting across from him is smart. A genius, even. But for all that intelligence, he can be so damn dumb sometimes.
The teacher and the student give up on alibis quickly, they've been creating fabrications for much too long now. And as the food relaxes them, they gradually forget that they're supposed to hate each other. They continue to talk and hold conversation like normal people, or as normal as they can realistically be, alternating between consuming their food and exchanging words that stop having anything to do with their devious enterprise into the drug world, each secretly fascinated with and occasionally flummoxed by what the other says. They cannot possibly understand each other, no, but during that bizarre interlude, the student and the teacher unwittingly agreed on a conclusion: that they don't have to.