dear_mun | Too Good For This World Too Pure.

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Too Good For This World Too Pure.

[He pauses to bite his lower lip. He's ill at ease, but resigned to feeling that way.] Yeah, I noticed.

[He's somewhat taciturn, but still is more emotive than Mike was at his best. He's trying to smile, it's just escaping him at the moment beyond a vague upturn of the mouth.] Too Goodman, maybe. Pure. Pure I could never manage, so I guess it's... ironic?

[He is just. Tired.] Why me? Why now? I mean. Look at your icons, kid. Three. And not like a smile or a twinkle in any of them. Exactly what are you expecting me to do here? Put on a white polo neck and turn blue? [Inside Out reference!]

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Somehow you've always been able to pull out of the shit you've been through. I don't know how you do it, but I know you can do it again.

[He's just quietly shattering, no big deal.]

Yeah, maybe.

[It's not a matter of whether or not he can anymore. It's more whether or not he wants to. And that has been a struggle all on its own.]

[It hurts, seeing her friend like this, so run down and broken.]

What happened to you?

[He laughs, sort of. It's not out of happiness.]

A lot.

I've got time. You want to sit somewhere? Get some food? Maybe somewhere not in a mall?

[Of course she does. He doesn't exactly not want her to either. It's just... hard.]

Ah. Yeah. [Pause.] Yeah, there's a Mexican down the street, if you want to have... Mexican.

Mexican is fine, absolutely.

[She's hoping he'll be more comfortable somewhere else, able to relax a little and better tell her what's going on.]

[He nodded and honestly feeling a little self-conscious in his uniform, he headed in the direction of the restaurant.] So what brings you here?

To Omaha? I'm meeting with an expert witness on Tuesday.

[She's noticed the uniform, but figures it's better that she doesn't call attention to it. She doesn't want Jimmy feeling any more self-conscious than he already is.]

[To Omaha, sure.] Good case?

[Her instinct's probably right, though maybe not it being addressed is worse. Eh. Something this stupid isn't worth the amount of thought he's putting in. .]

The usual. Trying to prove that it was physiologically impossible for our client to blow above the legal limit at the time he was stopped.

I'd ask you what brings you here, but I'm guessing that's probably part of the 'a lot'.

Ah, I remember that kind of thing.

[He smiles a little.] Yeah. Nobody's supposed to be able to find me. [Looks at her.] Think I could get my money back?

[He's not only dropped off the grid, he's actively hiding. She's seen a couple clients in that situation, and it's not a good sign.]

Probably not. Predictable risk. Or act of god.

[She gives him a small smile in return.]

Yeah, I figured. [He pulls open the door of the restaurant. It's a nice place, not too garish, perhaps surprisingly. It's got the Mexican flags, the matching uniforms but the colours of the walls are muted and the background music has a simple Spanish guitar strumming.

The waitress comes to them and smiles, recognising him. He holds up two fingers as she asks. She seems happy and takes them to the table.

She asks if they want something to drink and once she has their orders moved away.

That was tiring.]

I come here sometimes.

Yeah, I'm getting that.

[The place is nice, comfortable, not a dive bar or another place that might gather a shady crowd. Then again, depending on what Jimmy is hiding from, a shady crowd is probably exactly what he wants to avoid.

Kim leaves the menu closed for now, concentrating on her friend.]

All of the lot of things considered, are you doing okay? I mean, generally?

[He meets her eyes, in truth not ashamed. Anxious sure, not especially proud of himself, pretty definitely, but this is not a time where he's grappling with his conscience.]

Eh, you know. I could have been a lot worse. So yeah, I guess, I'm doing ok.

[It's more a testament of how badly he should be doing than how well he's doing now.]

[Due to her job, Kim has been lied to repeatedly, for years, by clients, by police, by witnesses. She knows a little bit of Jimmy's history with grift, but she also knows Jimmy. She wouldn't have faulted him if he had lied to her, but she's pretty sure he's telling her the truth. She holds his gaze, letting his words sink in.]

Worse. You mean, like...

[She can't finish the sentence, but it's all over her face. She knows bad things can happen to people who find themselves at odds with bad people. She doesn't have direct experience with the depths of bad that her friend has experienced, but what she does know of is sufficient to make her afraid for him.]

[He's not going to spell it out in detail. Not right now, anyway. Part of that is maybe the fear that it might still happen, but also because it didn't happen and probably, excepting maybe Kim's accidental presence, won't.

Kim isn't a known associate of Saul Goodman, just like Chuck McGill isn't, so the odds aren't really all that much higher now, certainly not to the point where he might be worried about their spending the time in a Mexican restaurant.]

Like I've got all my limbs, Kim. [And he's alive.]

[She pauses, again analyzing whether he's lying to her, this time sincerely hoping he is. But he's not.]

Jesus. What...

[...happened, that sentence would have concluded, except the waitress returns with their drinks, and then pulls out an order pad and looks expectant. Kim quickly scans the menu, orders a taco salad, and hands the menu to the woman.]

[If she's going to keep saying that...

The arrival of the waitress was a welcome break and he almost looked at his menu to prolong the moment. But she knew him and 'Gene' wasn't the type of guy that changed his order, so when she predicted it, he agreed.

He did reach for the drink.]

It was one of those 'for want of a horse' things, Kim. [Who knew that a Chemistry teacher would turn into a one-man wrecking crew.]

[It wasn't strange to Kim that Jimmy had a favorite restaurant where he ordered the same thing and obviously was liked by the staff. It was actually sort of reassuring, that he had something of a comfort zone in spite of the massive amounts of bad that had to have happened to get him here in the first place.]

So things spiraled out of control?

[Things, yeah. People, more like.]

Yeah. Bailing out turned... difficult. [Walter White turned into that monster you warn kids are under the bed about.]

Bailing out turned into this.

[She doesn't think he would have gone to this sort of extreme unless it was seriously necessary. She sighed, thinking for a moment.]

Are you in legal trouble, too?

[He's honestly not bitter enough about Kim to make a joke about her representing him, though it crosses his mind.]

Just this side of shifty. [He shrugged.] There's no... warrant out. [So he's... ok. They'd probably have things to ask him, but with Walt and the Nazis dead and Jesse out of the picture, the shady lawyer who was careful to keep out of the criminal limelight is no priority to anyone except anyone who might want to write a book about Heisenberg.]

[Actually, joke or not, she had something like representation in mind.]

Still, if it makes it easier to talk, we could do client attorney privilege. Say the word and you can retain me as counsel.

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Hello, Kim! \o/

Hi! \o/ Sorry I'm late to the party!

I was just early! ;D

:D

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