Archive of Our Own ^beta

Yevgeny was 12 years old. He had a good childhood. Sure, they didn’t have a lot of money, but his dad, Ian, was always there for him.

When he was 10, things changed. Ian met a guy and got together with him. Yevgeny was glad his dad was happy, sure, but he didn’t really like Caleb. Or Caleb didn’t like him, no matter what Yevgeny did. The new man always made Yevgeny feel like he was in the way.

Of course, Ian had asked him what he thought of Caleb, asked him if it was okay for him if Caleb moved in with them. Yevgeny always said that he didn’t have any problems with the man, because he didn’t want Ian to be lonely again because of him.

Caleb and Ian were together for two years, they were all living together in a small apartment and for weeks the two men had just been fighting.

Yevgeny wasn’t sure what their fighting was about the entire time, but sometimes he heard Caleb dropping his name. Ian always asked him to “not fight in front of the child” but Caleb didn’t give a fuck if Yevgeny heard their fighting or not.

Yevgeny came home from school, he unlocked the front door and put his bag down, when he heard screaming from Ian’s room. He and Caleb were fighting again.

“What the fuck is wrong with you Caleb? He is my son! You knew about him since the beginning!”
“I don’t give a fuck about what you call him, Ian! I don’t want to have my own family with you, and I want him out of here!”
“How dare you to say something like that?! He’s my son! I’m not gonna throw him out, are you mad?”

Yevgeny swallowed hard.

He knew Caleb didn’t really like him, but that he wanted him gone? That was new.

“He isn’t even your son! That’s the whole fucking problem! He is not your son, you just raise him because your fucking ex-boyfriend didn’t want him!” 

Yevgeny couldn’t believe what he just heard.
He wasn’t Ian’s son?
He heard a punch landing in someone’s face.

“Get the fuck out of here!”, Ian yelled at Caleb.
“Fine! But don’t expect me to come back to you and your bastard freeloader!”, the door was ripped open and both men appeared in the living room where Yevgeny was standing.

Caleb just growled and went past him to the front door, Ian looked at Yevgeny shocked.
“Yev”, he whispered and cursed under his breath.
“I’m not your son?”, Yevgeny asked perplexed.  

Yevgeny had always kind of suspected this. He never wanted it to be true. But it was a fact, that he had insanely blue eyes, while neither his mom nor the rest of Ian’s family had them, and he was very small in contrast to his cousin Franny.

Yevgeny’s mother had died when he was very young and then he was given to his father, Ian. He didn’t want to loose him too, so he never addressed the blue eyes or anything to his dad.

Ian went up to him, Yevgeny took a step back.
“What did he mean with that?”
“Yevgeny don’t listen to him, he is an asshole”
“Am I your son?”, Yevgeny demanded him to answer the question.
“Wha- of course you are my son, Yevgeny. I raised you”
“But I’m not your real child! Not biologically!”

“Yevgeny, please, why does that matter?”
“It matters! If I have another father, I have to know that!”
“Yev…”
“Tell me!”

Ian sighed, “Okay… okay… I’ll tell you, but please calm down. Sit down.”

Yevgeny sat down on the couch, while Ian went to his room. He came back after a few minutes with a photo. He looked at it for a long moment – Yevgeny had never seen his dad like this, he looked sad, he looked at the photo longingly. Ian bit sighed and gave Yevgeny the photo.

“That’s your biological dad.”
Yevgeny looked at the photo, it showed two men, actually they were just boys, teenagers. It was a photo of a couple, looked like it was taken almost secretly. The two boys were sitting in what clearly was the Gallaghers’ garden, the one with the slicked back, dark red hair, clearly Ian, had his arm around the other one and was kissing his cheek, while the other man had his arms crossed in front of his chest, the grumpy look on his face splitting into a smile right when the photo was taken.

Yevgeny recognized Ian immediately, but he didn’t know the other man, who appeared to be his dad. He had black hair, slicked back, he had pale skin and defined biceps, his shirt’s sleeves were cut off. It must have been taken in the summer on the wooden staircase leading to the backyard of the Gallagher house, Ian’s childhood home.

“His name is Mickey Milkovich. He had you with your mom, not me… But Yevgeny, I’m still your dad, I raised you, not him-“
“Where is he?”, Yevgeny asked.
Ian sighed, “I don’t know, okay? I lost track of him a long time ago. Last time I saw him he was in prison, Yevgeny. I was the only one who could take care of you after your mom passed away, and I- I even been around you before that, I took care of you since you were a baby”

But Yevgeny didn’t want to hear Ian’s excuses. He had kept this a secret from him! He had kept a part of his family, of his identity secret from him!

“Why did you never tell me?”
Ian sighed, “I would have told you some day, Yevgeny. But you’re only twelve right now, what do you want with those news? Your biological dad is my criminal ex-boyfriend, congratulations. It doesn’t matter”
“It does matter!”, Yevgeny got up, “How can you say it doesn’t matter? This man is my dad and you never told me he exists!”

“Yev, I’m your dad!”
“But so is he! How could you keep this a secret from me!”, the boy yelled at Ian and then ran to his room, he threw the door shut loudly.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Yevgeny didn’t talk to Ian all evening yesterday and also not this morning before going to school.

He sat next to his cousin Franny, who apparently wasn’t even his cousin, at lunch.

“Can you believe that? He lied to me for 12 years!”
“Be fair, it was only 9 or 10 years.”, Franny said and ate her lunch.
“That’s not the point! I have a father he never told me about!”
“What do you need two fathers for anyway? You have Uncle Ian, that’s enough isn’t it?”
“So, you wouldn’t want to get to know your actual dad if you had the chance?”

Franny rolled her eyes, “That’s different. My dad is dead, and I only have my mom. You already have a dad.”
“Still, that guy is my biological parent, I have to meet him!”
“Okay, ask Ian to find him so you can talk to him”
Yevgeny sighed, “Who are you kidding, Fran? He would never let me do that. He said he’s just a criminal ex-boyfriend who doesn’t matter.”

“Well, leave it at that”, Franny suggested, “Seriously, why would you go look for some criminal just because he happened to be the one who had sex with your mom?”
“You don’t understand that Fran… you know your real family, I don’t. Ian will always be my dad and you will always be my cousin… but I need to know where I come from.”

Franny looked at him confused, “From the south side”
“From who I come from”, Yevgeny rolled his eyes, “Franny you have to help me.”
“With what?”
“Finding my dad.”
“No, definitely not! My mom’s gonna rip my head off.”
“Fran please… for me.”
“That maybe works with my uncle not with me.”

Yevgeny rolled his eyes. And crossed his arms in front of his chest, pouting.
Franny sighed, “Okay, for heaven’s sake. How am I supposed to help you?”

Yevgeny grinned at his cousin.
“My dad must have lived somewhere close to the Gallagher house.” 
“So, what do you want to do? Look at every house and look for the name? We’re gonna get shot. Besides, you don’t know if he even still lives here or if he’s in prison or something.”

“Right… and we can’t ask uncle Lip because Ian will forbid him to say anything… what about Kevin? We could trick him into telling us where my dad is.”
“Okay”, Franny sighed, “But I still think it’s a stupid idea.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tricking Kevin into telling him the address of the Milkoviches was quite easy. He asked if he ever heard of the name around here, because he heard some kid talking about a Milkovich and Kevin immediately said “Yeah, the Milkoviches, course I know them, the old one is finally dead as far as I know, a funny lot, they lived to a street over”

And before Kevin could realise what he just did Yevgeny was on his way to the house.
Franny still thought it was a bad idea, so she went home and told him to do the same.

Yevgeny straightened his back and got the picture he still had out of his pocket.

He knocked on the door and looked back to his cousin, who watched him concerned.

The door was opened after a minute, but a woman stood in front of him instead of his dad. She had piercings and freckles, she was pretty in her own way and she looked like a bad-ass gangster chick.
“Who are you?”
“I-uhm, I’m looking for Mickey Milkovich… does he still live here?”
“Who wants to know?”, she asked.
“I’m Yevgeny… I need to talk to him.”
She shrugged and turned around, “Mickey? It’s for you!”, she looked at the child again, “Come in”, she said with an eyeroll and lead him inside.

A man came out of the kitchen into the living room where Yevgeny and the woman stood.
Yevgeny swallowed when he saw him, he looked like the man on the photo, ten years older, but it was him. Pale skin, black hair, he wore a dark shirt and a blue vest.

“What is it? Who is that?”
The girl shrugged and went left the room to go into another room. Yevgeny was alone with the man who was probably his dad.

Mickey looked after the girl and shook his head, then he looked at the boy, “Who are you? What do you want here?”
“I…”, he cleared his throat, “Well, I… I’m your… son.”

Mickey stared down at him perplexed.
“Sorry, you’re my what?”
“Son”, Yevgeny repeated, “I’m Yevgeny.”

Mickey’s eyebrows wandered up into his hairline.
“Oh”, he said eventually and then looked concerned behind him like he was looking for someone, “You didn’t bring your mom with you, right?”
“No”, Yevgeny mumbled, “She’s not alive anymore.”

Mickey sighed relieved and then quickly cleared his throat, he told him to sit down on the couch, he sat next to him a bit further away then necessary.

“So… what brings you here? Child support? Because kid, I don’t have money.”
“No, I don’t care about money”, Yevgeny shook his head, “I just wanted to meet you.”
“Why?”, Mickey asked, he sounded genuinely surprised.
“Because you’re my dad”, he shrugged.

“Huh”, Mickey bit his bottom lip, “So… if your mother isn’t alive anymore… do you like live in a orphanage or something?”
“No, I live with my dad… I mean, my adoptive dad. I just found out that he’s not my real dad yesterday. He never told me that I have another dad.”
Mickey nodded, “Well, that must have been a shock”

Yevgeny shrugged, “Yes, kind of. I’m mad at him for not telling me”
“Then I guess, he doesn’t know you’re here?”
Yevgeny shook his head.
“Well, if he is any good as father, I’m sure he’ll be worried about you if you’re not home in time.”
“I don’t care. He should have told me the truth if he wanted me to tell him where I go.”

Mickey smiled at him, “How old are you now, kid?”
“Twelve.”
“Twelve, right. The last time I saw you, you were just over a year old. I actually was already in prison when you had your first birthday. That other dad, for how long did he take care of you?”
“Ten years”
“And is he a good dad to you?”
“Yes”
“Then be fair to him. Maybe he would have told you at some point. But if he had been a good dad for ten years, you shouldn’t punish him by just randomly looking for me and coming here without talking to him first.”

Yevgeny looked at his hands and nodded, he was right, he wasn’t fair to Ian.

“How did you find me anyways?”
“Well, he told me your name and he gave me a picture.”, he said and took the picture out of his pocket to give it to Mickey.

Mickey looked at the picture with an open mouth, the colour vanished from his face.

“See, this is you and this is my adoptive dad”, he pointed at Ian.

“Ian is… Ian adopted you?”
Yevgeny nodded, “He said, he’s your ex-boyfriend, is that true?”  
Mickey cleared his throat, “Yeah… yeah that’s true”, he gave the picture back to Yevgeny, “You should go home, I have no interest in him showing up at my house, alright kid?”
Mickey got up from the couch.

“No, I don’t want to yet, I want to get to know you. You’re my dad!”

Mickey looked at him conflicted.
“Yevgeny, I’m sorry but you have a dad. And he’s probably better at it than me.”, Mickey turned around, he needed to drink something, and if it was just water.

“My dad’s boyfriend wants to kick me out”
Mickey stopped, he cursed himself for it. He slowly turned around to him. He didn’t want to think about Ian having another boyfriend.

“I only know that I’m adopted because yesterday my dad and Caleb were fighting, and he said that I’m not really my dad’s son. He doesn’t want me there. And dad and he are fighting the whole time because of it. I don’t want to go home yet. I want to get to know my real dad.”

“You shouldn’t worry all too much”, Mickey said, he clenched his jaw, “Ian never cared about his boyfriends’ wishes and problems whatsoever.”

Yevgeny was surprised about the bitter tone in his dad’s voice.
“Has my dad been very mean to you?”, he asked shily.
Mickey rolled his eyes, “I’m not gonna discuss that with you, you’re a child.”
“No one ever discusses anything with me, that’s why I also didn’t know you were my real dad.”
Mickey sighed and ran his hand through his hair.

A knock on the door saved him from answering. He quickly left the room and went to the front door.
He ripped it open and froze immediately.

Ian stood in front of him. Ian stared at Mickey, he wasn’t ready to see him, both stood in the door to the house, looking at each other – looking for signs of change and little feature which remained the same. Both were unprepared for this reencounter after 11 years.

Yevgeny came to the door as well. Ian was finally able to stop looking at Mickey and looked at his son instead.
“Yevgeny, thank god, you can’t just run around here without telling me, I was worried!”
“I’m sorry”, Yevgeny mumbled, he went to hug Ian, Ian hugged him back, “Go to the car, we talk about this at home.”

Yevgeny nodded he turned around to Mickey, “Bye”
Mickey nodded, “It was nice meeting you, Yevgeny.”
Yevgeny smiled at that and went to the car.

Ian and Mickey were alone again, Mickey didn’t understand why Ian would still be here to continue the uncomfortable staring.

“You look good”, was the first thing Ian could say.
Mickey just scoffed, shook his head, threw the door shut and left, but Ian stopped the door from closing and followed Mickey into the house.

“Mick”
“Leave my fucking house Gallagher”
“I just want to-“
“You just want to what?”, Mickey looked at him, “Talk? It’s been eleven fucking years without a word from you, I don’t need one now. Congratulations on fatherhood, now leave!”

Ian bit his bottom lip, suddenly at a loss of words, but he didn’t want to go just now either.
Mickey shook his head and went into the kitchen, Ian followed him.

“Mickey, I’m sorry”
“Shut your mouth, you’re not fucking sorry. You don’t give a fuck. Now go to your car, to your kid and go home to your boyfriend.”
“How do you know about the boyfriend?”
“Yevgeny told me, and he hates him.”
“Well, I broke up with him and threw him out today.”
“Good for you.”

They stood in the kitchen across from each other. There was silence between them again.

“Since when are you out?”, Ian asked quietly.
“Two years”, Mickey growled, “That makes nine years that I was rotting in prison, alone!”
Ian flinched and took a step back.
“Nothing from you, not a word, not a visit, a phone call, not even a single fucking letter!”
“Mickey, we broke up”, Ian reminded him and looked at him again, tears were slowly coming to his eyes.

“No, you broke up. And then you let me rot in jail. But you fucking adopted Yevgeny?”
“It wasn’t my idea! Before Svetlana died, she made me his guardian.”, he swallowed, “I’m sorry that I didn’t communicate with you, but… one way or another we were broken up.”
“Yeah, we were, so why are you still here? You left me alone for 11 fucking years I don’t need you in my house or my life now, got it?”

Ian walked up to Mickey, “What did you expect of me? Should I have gone up to the prison every month to make you feel better? I have a job, I have a kid and I have a right to my own fucking life, Mick. That doesn’t mean it had been easy for me or that I didn’t think about you!”

“Oh, it wasn’t easy for you? It wasn’t easy to be free and out and fuck other men while I was rotting in jail? I find that hard to believe!”
Mickey wanted to turn away, but Ian grabbed his arm.
“Don’t touch me”
But Ian didn’t think about stopping to touch him, “Mickey, I get that you feel abandoned and hurt, but I didn’t want to hurt you” 

Mickey looked at Ian’s hand on his arm, he pushed him away, but Ian held both of his arms now, “Mickey look at me”
But Mickey had enough of him, he grabbed Ian and forcefully pushed him against the counter, “You think you know how I feel?”, he screamed at him, “You think you know how this went down for me? You don’t know shit! At first, I came out for you and took a beating from my dad for it, then you got sick and I did everything to help you! Then you ran away with your mom and you came back and broke up with me! And when I went to prison you didn’t contact me once in nine years! My fucking sister died and nothing from you! Nothing! I did so much shit for you over the years and when my little sister died you didn’t even have the decency to accept the only call, I made to you in nine years!”

Ian swallowed hard, Mickey’s face was incredibly close to him for the first time in 11 years. He had thought about him a lot – hell of course had he thought about him! He was his first Big Teenage Love and the father of his son. He had thought about him every time he had looked into Yevgeny’s blue eyes. And he had missed him, and he had kept the old photos and he had always compared the new boyfriends to Mickey. He even went so far to recreate certain memories he had with Mickey with the new boyfriends, just to see how they react, just to compare them to this ideal he held Mickey up to. But every time he had thought about him the guilt swapped in and washed over the memories.

And all this longing, the missing, the immense guilt it all manifested in this real-life nightmare of Mickey throwing all those things at his head – and no matter which argument Ian used to defend himself, he knew that he had let this man down in so many ways, the majority of them were inexcusable.

“And again, you have nothing to say”, Mickey said eventually, and he sounded so bitter and so disappointed in him, that Ian couldn’t help the tear rolling out of his eye.

They years of prison and loneliness had made him bitter and cold. If it wasn’t for the mention of his sister, Ian would have guessed his heart was completely frozen over the years. Just a cold stone – and Ian had turned him into that.

Ian had lived his life, a job, a kid, boyfriends, while he let Mickey rot in prison all by himself after the man tried his hardest to be good for Ian, good enough for Ian - and he ended up being better than Ian. And while Ian lived his life, Mickey still lived in the same house he did back then, which, essentially, was just another prison. A memory cell he would never get released from.

Mickey looked at him with those cold blue eyes, which used to be the most emotional and intense eyes he had ever seen. He had dreamed of seeing him again, looking him into the eyes again, feeling his skin underneath his fingertips again. Now he was so close… so close he could feel Mickey’s breath hitting his face.

Within a split second, before his brain could even agree to the idea, he put a hand at the back of Mickey’s neck and pulled him into a hard kiss.

It only lasted a second or two before Mickey pulled back and looked at him confused and angry. Ian looked back at him, staring at him, waiting for a reaction.

Mickey punched him and a sharp pain shot through the left half of his face. Ian held the side of his face for a moment and grimaced. It’s been a long time since he had been hit like that. He looked at Mickey again.

“I deserved that”, he said with a steady voice.
“Yeah”, Mickey panted, still confused, his cold façade cracking slowly, “You did.”

Ian nodded and then he kissed him again, just as quick, and hard as before, he pulled him in, wrapped both arms around him and held him. It was like Mickey was melting in his arms and Ian hoped the ice around his heart was melting too. Mickey didn’t respond for a few seconds, eh was just leaning against Ian, trying to keep up the façade, but he could never resist Ian.

Mickey kissed him back, he put his hand on the back of Ian’s neck and he kissed him hard and angrily. It was different kind of passion than it used to, it was aggressive and firm, but Ian could feel his emotions coming through though. Mickey pushed him closer against the counter, Ian wondered if it was his passion or his anger pushing him. Ian pushed back, he made Mickey tumble back until he hid the kitchen table. This house hadn’t changed a bit and Ian remembered all of their making-outs in this kitchen perfectly.

Ian pushed him up against the table, until Mickey was sitting on it and Ian stood between his legs and they were seventeen again. They were making out, Ian’s head was filled with hope and fear to let him go again and Mickey’s head was empty. Mickey’s brain was on stand-by, because otherwise he would stop this. Otherwise he would push him away and punch him again, he would scream at him and throw him out instead of kissing him. So, it was good, that his head was empty.

“Dad?”, Yevgeny’s voice interrupted them, and the two men were thrown back into the harsh reality and pulled back from each other. Ian looked at Mickey, panting, unsure what to do know and Mickey just pushed him away. Ian stumbled back, still looking at him, waiting for the eye-contact to come back but Mickey refused to look at him.

Ian sighed and looked at Yevgeny, who stood in the doorway to the kitchen.
“Are you coming?”, Yevgeny asked, while looking from Ian to Mickey and back.
Ian rubbed his hands over his face and looked at Mickey again, then nodded when he realised Mickey’s wouldn’t look at him, “Yeah, let’s go.”

Ian turned to leave the kitchen, but he couldn’t resist grazing his fingertips over Mickey’s hand once – Mickey pulled his hand back so violently, that, for a moment, Ian really thought he hurt him with the gesture.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Part 2

Mickey lay in his bed, staring at the ceiling. The kiss was playing in his mind over and over again.
Ian lips on his, his hands around his body, his hot breath, his fingertips grazing his skin gently.

He was angry.
He was angry at himself for letting Ian do this to him again. He was angry that he let him kiss him – that he kissed him back! He should have stopped it, he should have shoved him away, he should have punched him.

He had needed a long time to get over him. At least he thought he was over him. He was only over him as long as he didn’t see him, apparently. In prison he had been so angry and frustrated and so in love with Ian. He eventually needed to accept that Ian would never come to see him, that Ian was gone – that Ian just didn’t want him anymore

That Ian didn’t love him anymore.

That Ian didn’t care anymore.

That Ian never really cared.

Mickey refused to believe that Ian ever cared about him. He had a crush on him, Mickey knew that. It had been a damn teenage crush to Ian – it had been the world to Mickey.

As soon as Mickey was out of reach the slightest bit – be that juvie, married, prison or Ian running away – Ian had someone new.
The guy from the bleachers, the old dude Ned, people in the club, whoever he fucked when he was gone with his mom and probably a dozen other guys while he was in prison – that Caleb dude for example.

It seemed so easy for Ian to replace him, to just go on to the next ass, fuck the next one, forget about him. Mickey hated that it was so easy for Ian.

Everything was always easy for Ian!
Coming out, having boyfriends, seducing people, making them falling in love, moving on – he did it all not caring about who he left behind, because he always had support from other people.

And Mickey? The only support he ever had were his cousin, who was always in prison, and Ian, who really wasn’t as supportive as he was pushing and forcing him to conform to his fantasy of a boyfriend.

Mickey did everything for him even though it had never been easy, even though he paid with physical and emotional pain – and yet, it was never enough.

He was never enough.

Because no matter how hard he tried, no matter how much he changed, no matter how much he supported Ian – he was left.

He still wasn’t sure why Ian left him. He ran away with his mom, came back, and broke up with him – then he let him rot in prison for 9 years.

When Ian broke up with him and when he saw him being arrested, even that one time he visited him when Svetlana paid him to do so, he always seemed like he couldn’t care less. He seemed cold and distant and unemotional. He didn’t care about him, not one bit. He didn’t have one nice word for him, not a smile, no warmth and emotion.
Just coldness and jokes and hurtful statements.

Mickey had needed a long time to see this. To realize and accept that he had held Ian up to some kind of ideal that Ian had never lived up to. He had put him on a pedestal for being the best boyfriend in the world when he was never the best and hardly even a real boyfriend to begin with. So, he had kicked him down again - and that was hard work for him.

And now Ian dared to just be there again. Exist again. Kiss him again.

Mickey had worked so hard to see Ian for who he truly was and this kid just came back because it was easy for him, he just kissed him again, because it was easy for him to do that and then leave again. Because if you don’t care about someone else’s feelings, everything was a lot easier.

A soft knock came from the door and interrupted his circulating thoughts.

“Fuck off”, Mickey growled but he knew it was no use because his cousin never listened anyways, she just came in.

“Are you crying?”
“No”
“Good”, she said and closed the door, she came to the bed and sat down by his side.

“What do you want?”
Sandy sighed, “What was that with Ian all about?”
“Nothing”
“Nothing? You didn’t leave your room in five hours without a TV or your phone or alcohol in here. You’re just staring at the ceiling.”

“I was sleeping”, he mumbled.
“Mickey… did you talk it out with him?”
“Do I look like I talked it out with him?”, he asked, “Do I look like I want to talk it out with him? Or like I want to talk to him in general? I don’t want to see him, Sandy, I just want him to stay gone.”

“The last two years you were hoping he would come back to you”
“No I wasn’t”, Mickey sat up, “I don’t want to have anything to do with him anymore.”
“Oh please”, Sandy got up and opened her cousin’s nightstand drawer, she grabbed the photos next to the lube and threw them on the bed, “You’re still completely hung up on him, why are you even denying that?”

Mickey stared at the photos and swallowed. He didn’t look at them very often, he had tried to throw them away many times… but he never could. At least Ian had kept one photo of them too, right? He had kept a photo of the two of them for 11 years until he gave it to Yevgeny now. And the photo had been in a good condition.

“Because I shouldn’t be”, he answered his cousin and searched the photos together from the bed, neatly stacking them and putting them back into the drawer, then he shut it, “Because I worked hard to learn my lessons from how he treated me. I shouldn’t care about him anymore”, he took a deep breath and shook his head, “And I don’t”, he insisted, “He’s an asshole, he doesn’t matter, I hope he dies. That’s it.”

Mickey got up from the bed, past his cousin and left the room, Sandy followed him into the kitchen.

“You kissed him though”
“I didn’t, he kissed me”
“You didn’t push him away”
“I did, I pushed him away and I punched him across the face like he deserved!”

Sandy looked around the kitchen, “Mickey, I can see that you made out here”, she pointed at the things on the counter which where pushed to the back and the chairs by the table which were out of place because they had leaned against those furniture’s.

“I think you still love him”
“Oh fuck off! I don’t let you live here so you can throw that bullshit around! He treated me like shit, I will never go back to him!”

“Even if he apologizes?”
“He wouldn’t, it’s Ian, Ian doesn’t apologize! Ian doesn’t even acknowledge his mistakes, Sandy!”
“Maybe he changed, it’s been 11 years.”
“11 years without a word while he secretly raised a kid that could or not could not be mine. How do you even start apologizing for that? Why would I forgive him? And even if I would forgive him, which I wouldn’t, why would I want him back then?”

“Because I repeat, you still love him.”
“And?”, he yelled helplessly, he looked lost, “What good did that ever do me? Why is that supposed to be the only thing that counts? Tell me the big secret, Sandy! Why do I have to let him treat me like shit just because I love him? Who came up with that?”

Sandy bit her bottom lip.
“I’m not going back to him. Because he will never change”, he said calmer and he didn’t even try to hide the sadness in his voice, “He will never apologize, he will never acknowledge his mistakes, he will never… he will never care about me”, he shrugged, “I accepted that. And it doesn’t matter anyways, because Ian doesn’t even want me back. Okay? He kissed me because he could, because he didn’t have an answer to what I said.”
“Mickey, people don’t just kiss people for no reason.”
“Oh yeah? Then you don’t know Ian Gallagher. Kissing random people for no reason is easy for him, he does it because he can, like everything in his life.”

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Yevgeny and Ian were sitting at the dinner table, Yevgeny barely said a word since Ian got him from Mickey’ place.

“I was worried about you”, Ian mumbled, “You can’t just run away.”
“I didn’t run away, I visited my dad”
Yevgeny calling Mickey dad stung.
“You didn’t come home after school and wandered around the neighbourhood without telling me, it’s called running away. Do you even know what the chances were that Mickey actually lived in that house? What if you would have met his father instead?”

Yevgeny looked at him, “I have another grandpa too?”
“I hope he’s dead”, Ian mumbled, “And even if, he is even worse than Frank, much worse, okay? He would have done god knows what with you.”
“Well, I only met my dad and the girl that was living there.”
“What girl?”, Ian asked confused, he hadn’t seen a girl in the house. What kind of girl could live there with Mickey? Was he still playing straight-pretend?

Yevgeny shrugged, “I don’t know, maybe I’m related to her too, maybe she’s my aunt.”
“She’s not your aunt.”, Ian mumbled, his aunt was dead.

Mandy had died a few years ago, when Mickey was still in prison and Ian was busy raising the child.
Mickey’s words were echoing in his head “I did so much shit for you over the years and when my little sister died you didn’t even have the decency to accept the only call, I made to you in nine years!”

“Yevgeny listen, he’s not your dad, I’m your dad, okay? You don’t need him or his family, you’ve got me. He didn’t care about you the last years…”
“Maybe he just didn’t show that he cares because he didn’t know where I was.”, Yevgeny said, “He is my biological dad, and I want to get to know him.”

Ian hated having this conversation with his son.
He raised this child for 10 years! 11, if you count the first year of his life. Mickey hadn’t been able to look at the baby back then, it was Ian who did all the work. He fed him and raised him. And now, Yevgeny just wanted to go to that other man and call him dad, just like that?

Ian wouldn’t even be upset about it if Mickey wouldn’t hate him so much.
Seeing him today threw him off completely. He had tried so hard to stop thinking about him. And there he was again. In front of him, so close that he could touch him again, kiss him again, no ugly glass between them, no talking through telephones – but Mickey hated him.

He had deserved that punch that Mickey landed in his face when he kissed him. Ian knew, he deserved it, he deserved a few of those. He had hurt Mickey – he didn’t mean to – but he did, though. And he couldn’t deny it to himself.

If Ian could get back together with Mickey, Yevgeny wanting both of them as dads would be the best thing – but like this? Yevgeny wanted contact with Mickey and Mickey flinched away from Ian as if his touch was burning his skin.

“You can’t forbid me to meet my dad”, Yevgeny said sternly, “And anyways, I’ve seen you kiss! So, don’t act like you hate him!” 

“I don’t hate him”, Ian mumbled and sighed, he rubbed his hands over his face, “Look, Yevy, the thing with Mickey and me is very complicated, okay? I don’t want you to get in the middle.”
“I think you should get back together with him, he’s nicer than Caleb”
“I threw Caleb out”
“I know, now you should make up with my dad. You were boyfriends once, you can be again.”

This was getting too much for Ian.
“Yevgeny stop talking about this!”, Ian said loudly, “My relationship with Mickey is none of your business and you will neither speak nor think about it and you will definitely not visit him again! Did I make myself clear?”

Yevgeny bit his bottom lip and looked down at his plate, Ian rarely got loud with him. Yevgeny wordlessly got up from his chair and went to his room.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Yevgeny went back to Mickey’s house a few times, at least once per week, always secretly.

Mickey always lectured him, that he couldn’t just show up whenever he wanted without telling anyone, because Mickey might be not home sometimes, and Ian might be worried – but Yevgeny didn’t really care.

Hanging out with Mickey was fun, Yevgeny had started calling him “pops” to not confuse anyone by saying “dad” the whole time. They talked about Yevgeny’s childhood, about school, they went to the movies or to get ice cream – his cousin Sandy often came with them. It always ended the same way – Ian called him and demanded that he would come home immediately.

Yevgeny knocked on his pops’ door, it was a Friday. Mickey opened a few minutes later, “Yevgeny?”
“Hi pops”, the child grinned.
Mickey sighed, “I guess I don’t even have to ask if your dad knows you’re here, right?”
Yevgeny shook his head and entered the house.

“Can you help me with my homework, it’s like super tough math stuff.”
“Yevgeny, sorry, but I don’t have a lot of time today. I’m meeting someone in an hour.”

Yevgeny looked up at him confused, he noticed that his pops was wearing a button up shirt.
He swallowed and scratched the back of his head.

“Are you… are you having a date?”
Mickey shrugged, “Kind of, yeah”
“But… you can’t go on a date, pops”
Mickey sighed, “I can, and I will, today. I can help you with your homework but then I have to drive you back home, okay?”
“No! You can’t date anyone!”

“And why not?”, Mickey asked with raised eyebrows.
“Because… because you need to get back together with my dad…”, he mumbled quietly.

Mickey looked at him surprised.
“Your dad?”
Yevgeny nodded.
“Why would your dad and I get back together?”
“Because that would be great. You’re both my dads, you should be together.”
“Yevgeny, it’s… that’s very complicated. Actually, it’s not, your dad and I won’t get back together.”

“But I know that you want to!”, Yevgeny insisted, “Sandy told me”
“Sandy says a lot, okay? It doesn’t mean it’s true. In fact, don’t believe anything Sandy tells you.”

“But… But you can’t go out with someone else! You can’t!”
“Yevgeny, you can’t forbid me to meet someone.”
“Yes, I can! I’m your son”
“And? If you start weaponizing that against me, I’m gonna make an DNA test real quick with you. Did you forbid Ian to date people too?”
“No… because I wanted him to be happy, so I let him date whoever he wanted, but that was a mistake! All those guys were idiots! They were rude or they hurt dad! Caleb, Trevor, Eric, Tyler, Trevor again-“

“Yev, stop, stop”, Mickey raised his hands, “I really don’t want to hear the names of the guys my ex-boyfriend f- dated.”, he shook his head.
“And now he could date you and that would be good!”
“For you maybe, but it wouldn’t be good for me, okay? Yevgeny, what happened between your dad and I is really none of your business and you shouldn’t know about it. But here’s the thing… He didn’t treat me right, okay? I’m sure he’s a great dad to you, but he didn’t treat me right and that’s why I can’t be together with him anymore.”

Yevgeny sighed, he let his head hang low, “Not even if he apologizes?”
Mickey bit his bottom lip, he didn’t have an answer, he would like to say ‘no, not even then’ but he didn’t know if there wasn’t a way Ian could win him back… he didn’t know for how long he could resist him. He didn’t know what Ian had to say so he would forgive him… But why did he have to think about that anyway?

“Yevgeny, Ian doesn’t even want me back, okay? So, all this is pointless.”, Mickey said and turned around to get some water from the kitchen.
“Yes, he does!”, Yevgeny insisted.
Mickey quickly turned around again, “Did he say that?”

Yevgeny blinked at him, “So you do care!”, he said, “You care if dad wants you back!”
Mickey bit his tongue and cursed himself, “It’s complicated okay?”
“Why do the both of you keep saying that? What’s supposed to be so complicated? You want him back and he wants you back…”
“You’re still a kid, you can’t understand everything yet, okay? And I shouldn’t discuss this with you.”, Mickey sighed.

Yevgeny pouted, “Do you want to know what he said or not?”
Mickey looked down at his son, “No”, he said, and he couldn’t even convince himself with the tone of his voice.

“Are you sure? I heard him talking on the phone with Uncle Lip.”
“Lip never liked me”
“I didn’t say Lip wanted you to get back with dad, did I?”
Mickey sighed, “Okay, tell me what Ian said.”
“Do you promise not to go on the date if I tell you?”
“No”
“Then I won’t tell you what he said.”

“Then not”, Mickey shrugged, “But if you don’t, your chances of me believing that he would want me back and the chances of anyone getting back together with anyone stay at zero.” 
Yevgeny chewed on his bottom lip, mentally going through his options.

“Okay”, Yevgeny gave up, “He said, that he wants to get back together with you but that you hate him so there is no chance. And he said that he would apologize but you refuse to talk to him anyways. He said, he still loves you, but he is afraid that he hurt you too much to have a chance of being forgiven.”

Mickey closed his eyes for a minute and ran his hands through his hair, “Well”, he said and cleared his throat, “He’s right with all of that. So, get that idea out of your head. If you want to see me regularly that is one thing, okay? We can arrange that with Ian, but him and I are history… it’s been 11 years, Yevgeny. That’s 90% of your life and 40% of mine, okay? We’ve only been together for a year anyways.”
“You’re good with percentages”, Yevgeny crossed his arms in front of his cheat, “But you can’t count. Dad said you started dating when he was fifteen.”
“We didn’t start dating back then, we started… seeing each other. We’ve been in an actual relationship for less than a year before I went to prison, okay?... I’m sure Ian will find some good guy for him one day who is nice to you too. But it won’t be me again.”

Yevgeny sunk deeply into the couch and almost started crying.
“Yev… please don’t take it so hard… you don’t even remember how it was when Ian and I were together, you don’t know if you would like it… Come on, I help you with your homework and then I drive you home in twenty minutes okay?”

When Mickey drove Yevgeny up to his and Ian’s apartment complex, they were met with the sight of Ian fighting with another man. Ian was shoving things into his hands and they were shouting at each other.

“Who is that?”, Mickey asked.
“Caleb”, Yevgeny mumbled, “He has been calling Ian all the time lately and stood in front of our door. I think he wants to get back together with him. I hope they don’t… Caleb was always rude to me”
“What did he do?”
“He was always annoyed with me, no matter what I did. He didn’t want me around when he met with Ian and he always told me to stay in my room and stuff… he never wanted to be alone with me, when Ian had to work… and when he thought  I didn’t listen, he called me waste of space and baggage.”
“Did he, huh?”, Mickey growled, “You want me to talk to him?”

Yevgeny looked at him, he wasn’t sure what his dad meant by that…
“Yes, please”, he said though.

Mickey stopped the car next to the two men. Ian looked at them surprised. Yevgeny and Mickey got out of the car.

“Yevy, were you at Mickey’s again?”
Yevgeny nodded.

“It’s getting better!”, Caleb exclaimed, “Now you’re not only having your ex’s kid around the whole time but also contact to your ex again? Are you fucking kidding me?”
“Then fucking leave! I threw you out, you’re coming back the whole time! If you would stay gone you wouldn’t have to get upset about this.”

Caleb looked from him to Mickey, “You! Can’t you take your broken condom kid and fucking leave?”
Mickey raised his eyebrows at him, and Ian bit his lip, the Milkovich walked over to the man, who was at least a head taller than him.

“What do you want to fight me? You’re so tiny you can’t even look into my face!”

Yevgeny just heard Ian mumble “Oh-oh”, and then Mickey had already kicked Caleb’s balls and when Caleb groaned in pain and doubled over, Mickey held him down by his neck and brought his knee up to kick him in the chest as well, then he dragged him a few feet away and shoved him against a fence.

“He shouldn’t have said that about his height”, Ian mumbled, “Don’t ever joke about your dad’s height, Yev.”
“He’s my pops, you’re my dad”, Yevgeny corrected him, and Ian smiled.

In the meantime, Mickey was busy with Caleb, “So you’re mean to my son, huh? You treat him like trash and call him a waste of space?”
Caleb started stuttering something, but Mickey punched him in the face to shut him up, and once more so he fell to the ground, he kicked him and then leaned down to him, “Listen very closely faggot, you’re gonna stay away from them, you’re gonna stay the hell away from Yevgeny, if I hear him complaining about you one more time, I’m gonna find you and I’m gonna show you how we deal with guys who mess with kids in prison, understood?”
Caleb nodded quickly, he just wanted to get away from him.
“Good”, He wiped his hands on Caleb’s shirt to not dirty his own and then went back to the car.

Yevgeny was grinning at him and Ian looked at him with a mix of admiration and worry.

“That was cool, pops”
Mickey shrugged, “Call me if he’s acting out again, yeah?”
Yevgeny nodded.

They said goodbye and Mickey drove off without Ian being able to get out one word.
Ian looked after the car and sighed deeply.

“It’s okay dad”, Yevgeny mumbled, “I know you still love him.”
Ian looked down at his son and ran his hand through his blond hair.
“I do”, he whispered.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Yevgeny and Ian had dinner together. Yevgeny was in a bad mood, he just punctured his food with his fork.
“Are you okay Yevy?”
Yevgeny just shrugged.
“Is something wrong in school?”
“No…”
“Your friends?”
“No”

Ian sighed, “Your… pops?”
Yevgeny sighed.
“Was that a yes? I thought him beating Caleb up was ‘cool’, don’t learn that from him, okay?”
“He has a date tonight”, Yevgeny mumbled.

Ian stopped his fork in the air, Mickey had a what?

Mickey never went on dates with him.

“Mickey doesn’t do dates”, Ian mumbled.
“He does now”, Yevgeny shrugged, “And I even told him what you said, and he went to the date though.”

Ian looked at him, “What did I say?”
“When you talked to Uncle Lip on the phone you talked about pops, I heard you.”
“For fuck’s sake Yevy, you can’t eavesdrop on people! Who raised you?”
“You”, Yevgeny shrugged, “And you said, that you want him back and that you’re afraid that you hurt him too much.”
Ian sighed, “Yevgeny, those are adult-conversations, you don’t understand what it’s all about.”
“Because you don’t tell me! What did you do to pops that is so horrible?”

“Yevgeny, I’m not talking about this with you, you’re a child, my former relationship with your father is nothing your have to stick your nose into, alright?”
Yevgeny crossed his arms in front of him, “You should grovel.”
“Excuse me?”
“If you hurt him and you want back you should apologize and beg him for forgiveness. You should grovel like you never grovelled before.”
“I don’t grovel, Yevgeny. It’s pathetic.”

“No, you’re pathetic! You say you want him back and that you love him but you’re too proud to say you’re sorry!”, Yevgeny yelled at him.
“You’re calling me pathetic? I’m your dad you can’t speak to me like that!”, Ian said with a louder voice.
“Fine! Then I’m not speaking to you at all! I’m not gonna speak with you until you and pops are back together!”, Yevgeny stated and sat back down to keep eating.

Ian shook his face, “I could ground you for this”
Yevgeny kept eating unimpressed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A week later.

Mickey was watching his TV show when someone started knocking obnoxiously on the front door. Mickey got up slowly, the person knocking sounded like they were panicking, which didn’t make Mickey move faster whatsoever.

He finally opened and said, “What the fuck?”, when he realised it was Ian standing in front of him and the scene was too real and the Deja-vu too hard right now.

“The fuck do you want here?”, Mickey asked and tried to shut the door at the same time, Ian pushed against it and let himself in, he went into the living room and waited for Mickey to follow him.

“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Yevgeny doesn’t talk to me anymore”, he stated, his voice shook slightly.
Mickey frowned at him.

“He didn’t talk to me in a week. He refuses to talk to me until we’re back together and I can’t take that Mickey, I can’t take my son not talking to me!”

Ian was close to a nervous breakdown, Mickey could hear it in his voice. His brain switched to caretaker within a second, he pinched the skin on his arm, he couldn’t give in.

“I didn’t tell him to do that”, Mickey said eventually, he felt like he was blamed.
“I know”, Ian ran his hands through his hair, “I know… he’s fucking stubborn, always were… he got that from you.”
“You’re more stubborn than me”
“No”, Ian shook his head, “I’m a loser, I give up, I run away… I ran away from you so many times, why? Because when I can’t deal with shit I just run! Because it was – it was easier than staying and fighting and fucking looking at you! I’m like my fucking mother, oh god!”, Ian let himself fall on the couch, he sat opposite from the couch on which Terry had beaten Mickey up in front of him years ago… on which Svetlana had come into their lives.

Mickey didn’t know what to do with himself. He sat down on the other couch, so he sat across from Ian, he looked down at his fingers.

Ian looked at him sadly, “I’m sorry”, he mumbled.
Mickey looked up at him, their eyes met.

“I’m sorry”, he repeated, “I’m so sorry, Mickey, for everything. I’m… I’m sorry for not respecting your fear, for running away when you needed me, for making you come out, for… being sick and, and cheating and running away again and breaking up, Mickey… I’m sorry.”

Mickey looked away from him.

“Mickey, I love you”, Ian said, he had never said it before and Mickey didn’t know why he would say it now after 11 years, “I’ve always loved you and I missed you every day I- I compared every guy I’ve dated to you, I dated people who were completely different from you and who were just like you and none of them could reach you”

Mickey shook his head and leaned back in the couch, “You left me alone, Ian. If you missed me so much you could have just put your ass into a car and come and see me.”

“I couldn’t”, Ian whispered, “I couldn’t… see you like that. The first time I had to talk to you through glass it was thrilling and, and I waited for you to come back out, because I knew you’d be out soon and we’d be together again but this time… I couldn’t do that for years. I couldn’t look at you through glass for years on end, I couldn’t talk to you only through a telephone. I would have seen you being hurt and lonely and it would be my fault. It would have ripped me apart watching our relationship only through glass, Mickey. I wasn’t… I wasn’t strong enough. I was never strong enough…”, he exhaled deeply, “I wanted to call you and visit you a hundred times, I started writing damn letters… but I wasn’t strong enough.”

“A few weeks ago, that sounded different. You said you didn’t visit me because you had the right to your own life. Which explanation am I supposed to believe Ian?”
Ian shook his head, “Life? That wasn’t a life. That first year of you being in prison wasn’t life. I tried to get my shit together with the pills, I worked as a waiter, I was miserable, and I noticed… I noticed how much less miserable I had been with you. But you were in prison because you wanted to avenge me. And then there was Yevgeny suddenly. He looked just like you”, Ian smiled and looked at his fingers, “He was so small and so innocent and he was a part of you, he reminded me of a better time and a better life that I could have had if I wouldn’t have fucked it all up. I raised him and I started to work as EMT and only then I had a life again. But I still missed you.”

Mickey chewed on his bottom lip.
“Mickey… I know I wronged you so many times. I know I have no right whatsoever to hope for forgiveness, but please… I beg you… at least accept my apology. Maybe I can’t get you back, maybe I’m too late, maybe I’ve ruined too much for that. And I will have to live with that, because that’s the one thing I can’t run away from… but I can’t take my kid not talking to me Mickey, I can’t.”

“And what am I supposed to do about that? Am I supposed to just get back together with you after all this mess just so Yevgeny talks to you again? Are you serious?”
“And… and because I love you and you still love me… do you still love me, Mickey? At least a bit… please… Or do you just hate me now?”

Mickey sighed deeply, he didn’t know what to tell him, what to say, he didn’t even know what he felt exactly. When he looked at Ian he felt so much pain, all that pain that Ian had put him through since they met… but he had been his whole world once and… no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t get rid of that feeling he once had whenever he thought about Ian.

“Love is not enough Ian”, he said slowly, and he looked at him, “Love doesn’t fucking cut it, okay? I loved you and you ran away, I loved you and you broke up with me when I told you, I loved you and you let me rot in prison, so what good does love do me? Why is it supposed to cancel everything out? Why do I have to forgive you and let you treat me however you want just because I love you?”

Ian swallowed hard, Mickey shook his head and got up from the Couch. The Milkovich slowly rounded the couch and ran his hands through his hair.

“Do you know why I broke up with you?”, Ian asked, Mickey looked up at him and shrugged.
“Because of the bipolar and you being tired of me trying to help you?”

Ian shook his head, “Because I wasn’t good enough for you. Because… I asked you to change and you did, you became the perfect boyfriend while I just… continued to be this good-for-nothing quitter. And then I got sick which meant I got worse and you got even better at being my boyfriend. You were too good for me and I knew it… when you took care of me it was the only thing I could think of – you’re too good for me. I failed you in every single way until I couldn’t anymore, do you understand?”, Ian started crying now, “When I ran away with my mom, I realised I… I ran away again, I ran away from you, I failed you again, I was… turning into my mother more and more and I- I couldn’t keep failing you and dragging you down, I couldn’t keep doing this to you. I planned to… break up with you then and get my shit together and come back to you but… then you were in prison and I didn’t know what to do. It all turned to shit, and I didn’t know what to do. And the only person who could have helped me through it wasn’t there anymore because I pushed you away.”

Ian rubbed his tears from his face.
“You don’t get to decide who’s good enough for me”, Mickey mumbled.
It was a shock to him to hear the same words out of Ian’s mouth which were circling in his mind all the time.
“As your boyfriend I only wanted what was best for you and that wasn’t me”
“It wasn’t you leaving me either. Do you have any idea what that did to me? To try my hardest and be left though without an explanation?”
Ian bit his bottom lip and shook his head.
“Yeah, I didn’t think so. Do you see why this isn’t working anymore? I don’t know you anymore, I can’t trust you, I can’t rely on you, I can’t even believe you really cared about me. And that’s why simple love just isn’t enough”, he said sadly, and he hated himself for coming to that realisation and he hated Ian for making him realise it.

“But I’m willing to get that all back, Mick. I want you to trust me again and all that, I just need a chance. I want to be together with you again, not because of Yevgeny, but because of you and me, because I’m still in love with you. I will apologize for everything, I’ll fucking grovel for the rest of my life, I just want a chance to- to prove to you that I’m good enough now, we can make it now! I- I’m not the same man I was 11 years ago”

Mickey looked at him, and it wasn’t just sadness in his eyes, it was regret and misery, “But neither am I, Ian.”

Ian wiped his face again with his sleeve, since the tears kept spilling out of his face, he got up from his seat.
“So, there is… there is no way of us ever…”, the sentence got lost between them.
And Mickey honestly didn’t know the answer.

Ian nodded, he swallowed another love declaration down and slowly walked towards the door.

“Why didn’t you answer my call?”, Mickey suddenly spoke again.

Ian stopped and turned around to him.
“When Mandy died it was the only time, I’ve called you. You picked up the phone, you heard it was me and you… hung up again. I needed you that one time, Ian… just that once and you weren’t there… Why?”

Ian exhaled deeply, “Because I didn’t know she was dead yet.”, he leaned against the wall, “Yevgeny was sick around that time. He was really seriously sick, and it was just after we moved into our apartment, so I was all alone with him. I lived of… three or four hours of sleep, I slept next to Yevy’s bed to make sure he made it through the night. Carl was in prison too to that time. When I got the call I barely listened. I registered that it was prison, I didn’t acknowledge whose name was said, which voice I heard, I just knew I couldn’t talk to anyone in that moment. So, I didn’t accept the call and hung up. I brought Yevgeny to the hospital later that day and he had to stay there for a few days. Apparently Svetlana had him never vaccinated against anything… on day two in the hospital the police came to ask me a few question and only then I heard that Mandy had died… only then I remembered who had called me, I understood why you must have called me… and I knew in the same second that this had been the last straw for you. You reached out and I didn’t reply, I knew that day that I definitely ruined it all forever.”, he looked at Mickey, who now had some tears in his eyes too, “I’m sorry.”

When no further reaction came, Ian decided it was now definitely time to go. He turned around and walked the last feet to the door. He reached for it when Mickey finally spoke again.

“Wait”

It was the only thing he said, Ian turned back around to him and looked at him, waiting for more. There wasn’t more.

Mickey stood in the middle of his living room, which once held the scene of the biggest horror they have had to experience yet. Mickey looked so lost and small standing there.

He had asked him to wait, he didn’t want him to leave yet… he had asked him to wait when he was in prison too. And Ian was willing to wait an eternity for Mickey. He was willing to wait for however long Mickey needed him to wait.

But Mickey didn’t only need someone who waited, he needed support and he needed help sometimes, even if he didn’t show it as much.

Ian slowly went back into the living room and came towards Mickey, who looked at him longingly. Ian finally reached him and wrapped his arms around him, not to kiss him, just to hug him. Just to hold him and support him this once when he needed it. He wasn’t sure what he needed it for right now, for the story with his sister, for Ian apologizing, for Ian explaining why he did what he did, for all the pain of the last years – but Ian could tell he needed it. And he needed it from him.

Ian hugged him and Mickey wrapped his arms around his neck and leaned into the embrace. He hid his face in Ian’s shirt and Ian ran his hand over his back, “It’s gonna be alright Mickey… I’ve got you and I’m not letting go again… I’ve got you”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mickey and Ian lay on one of the couches, Mickey on top of Ian, Ian had his arms around him and smelled his hair.

“You still smell good”, Ian whispered.
“This is still creepy”
“Shut up.”

Mickey looked up at him, Ian kept running his hand through his hair, having Mickey this close again was like a dream came true, he really actually dreamed of this. But he didn’t know what this meant.

He had given Mickey a bit of support for the first time ever and he knew it wasn’t enough, it didn’t make up for the years he wasn’t there.

“Mick”
“Hmm?”
“I know I can’t apologize enough for what I’ve done… I can’t apologize my way out of it… but do you think there is a chance for us? Can you give me another chance?”

Mickey bit his bottom lip, still looking at him, “I don’t know”, he said honestly.
Ian swallowed hard, at least it wasn’t a no. “I don’t ask you to come back together with me right away… or to just forget everything that happened, but maybe we could start small? A new beginning for you and me, step by step… and if along the way you realise you can’t forgive me and you can’t be with me, I will accept it.”

Mickey lowered his eyes and started counting the squares on Ian’s flannel.
“One chance, huh?”
Ian nodded, “Dates… some things we do together with Yevgeny… I would do anything for you, Mickey. I think… there’s a chance for us to be a couple again, a happy one.”

Mickey bit his bottom lip, “Like it used to back then?”
“No”, Ian mumbled and threated his fingers through Mickey’s black hair, “Better. Because I can be better now.”

Mickey smiled lightly.
“Will you… give me a chance?”, Ian asked after a while, “I know it won’t be easy and I will let you alone if you ask me too, but I’m not running away unless you tell me. I promise you… I swear.”

Mickey bit his bottom lip. He wanted to trust him again, he wanted to love him and feel loved by him again, he wanted to be with him, and he wanted to… he wanted to have a life again.

Like Ian had told him that he didn’t have a life until he had Yevgeny again – Mickey had felt a similar way the last years. He didn’t have life. He had a job as security guy for a no name clothing shop in a mall and the rest was just habits. Spending time with Yevgeny gave him a sense of life and meaning again – and he knew that a relationship with Ian – a good relationship with a good Ian who showed that he cared – was the final piece he was missing.

Of course, he was afraid of being hurt again, being left again – but he at least had to try, didn’t he?

He needed answers, he had always just wanted answers from Ian, he was desperate for them – and today he had finally gotten answers.

But the question, if they could ever work again, if they could be a good couple, if he could trust him again – he had to figure out the answer himself and he could only do that by giving Ian a chance to answer.

“You get a chance”, Mickey whispered, “But slowly…”
Ian started smiling brightly, Mickey had missed this smile so much, Ian was smiling so happily, he almost cried of joy too, but he got himself together in the last moment.
“Will you punch me again if I kiss you now?”
“Even if, it wouldn’t stop you anyways”

Ian grinned, “That’s right”, he whispered and pulled him into a kiss.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A Year later

Mickey was woken up by someone poking his shoulder.

“Pops wake up”, Yevgeny said repeatedly.
Mickey just groaned and hit his face further in his pillow, so Yevgeny started poking Ian, who was lying behind Mickey, cuddling him, “Dad… Dad… Dad wake up! Pops… Pops”

“For fuck’s sake Yevgeny, did no one ever taught you to not wake up adults? Who raised you?”
“He did”, Yevgeny said shrugging and pointed at Ian.
“It’s all your fault”, Mickey mumbled.
“Don’t say fuck in front of the child, Mick”, Ian lectured him half-heartedly, “What’s up Yevgeny?”

“It’s time for breakfast”
“You’re thirteen years old, You can make your own breakfast, I believe in you”, Mickey mumbled.
“But we need to have breakfast together, today… it’s our anniversary.”

Mickey opened his eyes slowly and frowned at his son.
“Whose anniversary?”
“Ours. We are a family for a year now. Did you forget?”
Mickey sighed, “Yevgeny, your dad had to remind me everyday for a week and I still almost forgot our anniversary two weeks ago. I can’t also remember whatever nonsense dates you come up with”

“Don’t listen to him Yevy, you know pops is always grumpy in the morning”, Ian said behind him, “We’ll have breakfast with you, just give us ten minutes”
“Five”, Yevgeny insisted.
“Thirty”, Mickey countered.
“Ten”, Ian insisted, “Wait in the kitchen okay?”

Yevgeny sighed dramatically and left the room.
Mickey cuddled back into his pillow, ready to go back to sleep, but Ian turned away from him to get up.

“Where are you going?”, Mickey complained.
“I don’t know if you remember, but two seconds ago our son asked us to have breakfast with him.”, when Mickey only groaned again, Ian added, “Come on now, he’s already 13, this s gonna be one of the last times he’s gonna voluntarily spend time with us.”
“So, when you actually pay attention to your children, they end up liking you wanting to spend time with you… who knew?”

Ian grinned and went to the closet, “Yeah, imagine if someone would have told our parents that… fuck”
“What?”, Mickey asked and rolled on his back.
“I stained the last shirt I had at your place yesterday, I don’t have anything to wear anymore.”
“I don’t mind”, Mickey grinned, “But you can take one of my shirts.”
“Thanks”, Ian took one of Mickey’s shirts, it would probably be too small for him anyways, “I need to get more clothes here, then this wouldn’t happen anymore.”

Mickey nodded, “Yeah, if you moved in, it wouldn’t happen anymore either.”

Ian looked at the tired man in the bed, he started smiling, “Are you asking me to move in?”
“Well, you’re sleeping here as often as possible anyways, it’s better with Yevgeny and your work schedule, Yevgeny’s room is bigger. I mean, it’s closer to your siblings which is an disadvantage, but I think there are more pros than cons really.”

Ian grinned and jumped back on the bed, “And?”
“And what?”
“The main reason you want me to move in?”
Mickey looked up at him and sighed, Ian grinned down at him, waiting.
Mickey sighed and rolled his eyes, “Because I want you around.”

Ian nodded and grinned, “Yeah, you do. We together and Yevgeny, as a family?”
“No, the kid’s still only coming over for the weekends, Gallagher – of course and Yevgeny.”

Ian leaned down and kissed him.