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Mickey rummaged through the various shoes and jackets that clogged up the floor of the closet, tossing yet another faded, ripped drawstring bag to the floor behind him.
“Ay, Gallagher!” he called over his shoulder, shifting slightly on his knees, an ache spreading through his joints at the motion. Shit, he was getting old. “You gonna come help me with this fuckin’ treasure hunt or not?”
There was a clash from somewhere down the hall, followed swiftly by a low thud. A stalled beat later, Ian’s strangled voice floated to him, Franny cackling in the background the way only a five-year-old could. “ One sec!”
Mickey puffed out a breath, annoyed. Fucking husband, pulling the fucking husband card and making him sort through every fucking closet in the Gallagher house for one, stupid, fucking piece of paper.
Okay, one stupid, fucking, important piece of paper, but still. The deed to the house. Apparently it got filed away somewhere over the years and Fiona, in Florida, needed a copy in order to qualify for some property loan or something. They didn’t owe anything on the house — dirty money from Carl, apparently, had settled that issue — but her name was still on the deed as homeowner. Mickey kind of tuned out after the words “organize the closets” tumbled out of Ian’s mouth, eager to seize any opportunity to de-clutter, and Mickey had crossed his fingers in the hope that his husband would forget that portion of the plan.
Didn’t work, clearly, as his sore back and creaking knees were adamantly reminding him, nearly four hours and five closets later.
Mickey had finally worn him down on the moving-out front, convinced him of all the perks of staying put — mainly being around to help with the little ones, who Ian adored, and the virtually nonexistent expenses. But with that win came a vitalized push for home improvement that Mickey, honestly, should’ve seen coming. Ian’s always been a busybody, always looking for a new project to take on, and it was naive of Mickey not to expect a revived wave of that dragging him along in the undertow when they finally agreed to stick around for the foreseeable future. Decided to turn the Gallagher house into Ian and Mickey’s house.
If they weren’t married, if they didn’t exist in each other’s space so closely, so constantly, the increased motivation to organize everything and paint the fuckin’ walls and revamp the entire plumbing system might have tripped a few alarms in his head. But they were married, and they existed closely all the time, and Mickey knew Ian was taking his meds like clockwork and going to his court-mandated therapy appointments and getting a good amount of sleep each night. He was healthy, healthier than he’s maybe ever been while they were together, and stable. It wasn’t some disordered, disorganized behavior borne of excess energy and racing thoughts — no, it was just Ian. Just his husband, being an obnoxious, self-motivated dork like he always has been at his core. And as annoying as it was to be dragged into a whole-ass HGTV special, Mickey couldn’t find it in him to be all that angry about it, when it made Ian so happy.
He huffed another breath, trying to keep himself irritated despite the fond warmth spreading under his skin, and he leaned forward again. He pulled out shoe after shoe after coat after shoe, worn and weathered and full of holes. The sneakers without any treads, the winter jackets with homemade patches sewn in, the ratty old sweaters riddled with pulls — each article a testament to the traditional hand-me-downs that every Gallagher complained about, but still seemed to cherish a bit, too. Much like himself, they’d grown up piss poor in the Southside — neither the Milkoviches nor the Gallaghers ever owned much, but what they did own, they got their fucking money out of. It was a point of pride, almost: their ability to sustain something’s usefulness as long as they possibly could.
He tossed a stained button-down aside to reveal a small stack of shoeboxes in the far back corner just as Ian crossed back into the room, a pile of books under one arm and Franny hanging off the other like a koala.
“Hey,” Ian greeted, distractedly navigating the minefield their room had become, and Mickey worked to stifle a small smile at the sight as he pulled the boxes out. The little monster had rubbed off on him more than he’d care to admit, and seeing them together always made him feel weirdly warm — probably the hair. He always was a sucker for the ginger, freckly, alien-looking ones. “Finished the hallway closet. Found some of Lip’s old textbooks from college, figured maybe we can put ‘em online?”
Mickey waved a hand, directing him to one of the slowly growing piles behind him. “Glad you finally decided to join me. Shit to sell is on your side.”
There was a slight thump as Ian dropped the books to the bed, and then a bubble of five-year-old laughter as he flipped Franny around and over his head. Mickey appreciated, in times like these, the freedom to openly ogle his husband, who was so stupidly good-looking already, without the added appeal of the fucking smile and the strong arms swinging their niece around and that goddamn twinkle in his eye as he did it.
Landing slung over Ian’s shoulder upside down, Franny giggled, kicking her feet futilely. “Uncle Mickey, make him stop,” she begged, dramatic and so much like Ian that Mickey once again found himself suppressing a smile.
“Outta luck there, kid. He don’t listen to me.”
He could practically hear Ian roll his eyes as he scoffed. “I listen to you.”
“Alright, then, dickhead — put the rugrat down and fuckin’ help me. This is your project, remember?”
Ian sighed, but flipped Franny right side up and set her on her feet. “Would it kill you to not swear so much around our niece?”
Franny giggled again, exchanging a meaningful look with Mickey. “Nah, s’okay,” he assured, giving her a wink. “Little Red knows she ain’t allowed to say the grown-up words, yet. Don’t ya?”
Obligingly, like she’s in on some inside, secret knowledge, Franny nodded. “Not until I’m at least ten,” she agreed, very seriously.
“Or…?”
“Or someone’s being an ass-hole.”
Mickey grinned, triumphantly extending a fist out which Franny happily bumped with her own, while Ian huffed. He’ll put on a show of disapproval, but Mickey could see the urge to laugh in his eyes, that glint of endearment he was suppressing in favor of playing the role of Responsible Adult. “Okay, okay,” Ian eased, bending down to plant a kiss to her hair before turning her squarely away, giving her a nudge toward the door. “That’s enough of that. Why don’t you find Uncle Liam, huh? I think he’s downstairs watching TV.”
Without needing more prompting, Franny scurried away, waving over her head. “Okay, Uncle Ian!”
“And nothing too violent!” Ian called after her, but she was long gone. With her retreat, Ian turned back to Mickey, leveling him with a flat, unimpressed glare. “Seriously? Debs is gonna kill you if she hears Franny talking like that.”
Taking up the top shoebox, labeled ‘CARL’ in large green marker, Mickey scoffed. “Please — I’m not the only one around here saying it. Besides, she knows not to around her mom. I’m teachin’ her manners.”
Ian rolled his eyes again, settling down to his knees beside him. “What a role model,” he deadpanned, as Mickey passed over the CARL box.
“I try,” Mickey agreed, knowing full-well Ian was giving him shit. He lifted the next box, labeled ‘LIP’, and shook it slightly, the contents rattling inside as he pressed his ear to it. “Now are you gonna help me? Found the deed hours ago — all the rest of this is just your compulsive, neat-freak ass being needy. Least you can do is break your back with me.”
“Pretty sure my ass isn’t the needy one, Mickey,” Ian returned without a beat, that cocky little half-smirk playing on his lips like it always did when he was feeling particularly flirty. “And I can think of at least five more exciting ways to break our backs.”
“What, only five?”
“Well I don’t wanna wear you down too much.”
Mickey scoffed. “Oh, right, because I’m gonna be the one gettin' worn out first, out of the two of us. Please.” With a teasing grin, Mickey gestured to the boxes. “What’re these, anyway?” he asked, because he liked the direction this was headed, and the sooner they finished the sooner he could have Ian’s on him. “I’m not gonna open ‘em and find fuckin’ lady porn or something, right?”
Flipping Carl’s box open next to him, Ian laughed. “No promises,” he warned. “Just boxes of shit from when we were evicted that one time.” He promptly frowned, then, as he pulled out not two, but three different switchblades, followed closely by a half-melted action figure and a couple shuriken throwing stars. “Jeez, Carl.”
Mickey snatched one of the knives up, turning it over in his hands. “Huh. Nice quality. Little bro’s got some good taste.”
Ian rolled his eyes, plucking the blade out of Mickey’s hands and returning it to the box. “That’s just what we need,” he commented lightly. “Our POs to show up and find military-grade weapons in the house.”
Mickey huffed a breath, dropping his attention to the box in his own hands and flipping it open. “You’re no fun. Not like it’s a fuckin’ gun. You’re so boring.”
“And yet you married me anyways.”
As Mickey half-expected, half-dreaded, the first thing he saw in the box were magazines full of scantily clad women, curled and clearly well-loved. He snorted, pushing them aside as Ian reached across him for the last remaining box, one labeled with his own name. Under the magazines were a couple of old lighters, some papers, a bowl and a grinder that looked like they hadn’t been cleaned in years.
“You think Lip wants these back?” Mickey joked, lifting one of the zines for Ian to see and wagging his eyebrows, an image of a busty, bra-less woman washing a car stretched over the centerfold.
Ian scrunched his nose, expression pinching in a way that shouldn’t be stupidly endearing, but was anyways. “No way. Tami’d have an aneurysm is she found him hiding shit like that. Besides, those are from like, high school. He’s more into diapers and baby bottles than nudie mags, these days.”
Snorting, Mickey shoved the magazine back into the box, flipping it closed and setting it to the side. “Sounds great,” he joked lightly, though the idea of having a kid of their own someday has been growing on him, just from watching Ian with Franny and Fred, and even Liam sometimes. Not that he’s told this to Ian explicitly, or was even remotely ready to start that conversation. A dog, maybe, he could deal with. He could see himself having that conversation. The rest... well, baby steps.
Besides, he only just won the moving debate — he wanted to ride that high a little longer before giving Ian the satisfaction of a win.
Ian just hummed, distracted, as he looked down at the contents of his own box. There was a shift in his posture, in his demeanor, that Mickey had missed — almost more subdued, a little heavier, shoulders a little tighter and mouth pressed into thin lines as he pulled a composition notebook out of the box, and then another.
Uncertain and suddenly nervous, Mickey asked, “The fuck’re those?”
Ian sighed, tossing one of many journals to him like a frisbee. Mickey caught it, glimpses of ink-filled pages flapping through the air. “Notebooks.”
Mickey rolled his eyes, fanning through the pages quickly before opening to a random spot in the middle. “Yes I can see they’re fucking notebooks, thank you, Mr. Informative.” He let his eyes scan down the page, glazing over the hastily scribbled bullet list, half illegible, disjointed and rushed and not even sitting properly on the ruled lines of the paper.
- Start online store?
- learn how to knit? getting cold, debs needs a sweater
- How to code in python
- get laptop to learn how to code in python
- GET MICK NEW JEANS!!!
- register for chicago marathon
- train for chicago marathon??
- Rebuild rooftop obstacle course
- buy Liam a new play set? swings for the backyard?
- Figure out how to make a video game — ask Lip
GTA, but fantasyFirst person shooter, choose-your-own storyline- Time travel
Something twisted in Mickey’s chest, and he flipped to a new page. “Are these...?” he trailed off, glancing down at the stream of consciousness that filled his hands before flicking his eyes to the other two notebooks in Ian’s lap, and the one he had flipped open himself. In his own hands, the new page wasn’t a list, instead a giant block of text with entire lines scribbled out, mapping arrows etched into the margins, edits and addendums between the lines that were too small and messy to read even while squinting. Mickey narrowed his eyes and tilted his head, trying to make sense of it without much success.
“The Ian Gallagher bipolar chronicles, yeah,” Ian murmured, a pinch to his expression. “Started writing shit down when I was working at the club, just to get it out, but I stuck with it for a while afterward too. Once things calmed down.”
Something uncertain coiled under Mickey’s skin. “Like a... diary, or somethin’?”
Ian shrugged with one shoulder, head tilted down to scan through the book. “Doctor told me it’d help track my moods. Keeping a running journal, or whatever. Jesus. Forgot these were in there.”
Mickey, despite the weight in his chest and the undeniable curiosity that tugged at him, flipped the notebook shut, waving it slightly to catch Ian’s attention. “You, uh — are you sure you want me to see ‘em? Kinda personal, right?”
Ian cautioned a glance up, shifting in his seat with another small shrug while he settled back on his heels. “Dunno,” he admitted. “I mean, do I feel like reliving my greatest hits? Fuck no. But I wanna share all the ugly personal stuff with you — seems like as good a place as any to start, right?”
And Ian had a talent for doing that, for looking at him like that and saying words as if they were easy, as if they weren’t penetrating and profound, like they wouldn’t sit in Mickey’s head on repeat for weeks on end.
I wanna share all the ugly personal stuff with you. Like it was that simple.
It made a heat creep up his neck, uncertainty growing in him and making him flustered, because what the hell was he supposed to say to that?
Reading his silence, Ian pressed on. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to, though. A lot of it’s just... crazy, kinda scary rambling that doesn’t make a lot of sense.” His gaze flicked back down to the open journal he held, and he leafed through a few pages. Quietly, without much humor, he huffed a sort of half-laugh. “Like this. Five pages here about Mr. Santoro’s algebra class from freshman year. What the fuck.”
Mickey glanced back down at the notebook between his hand, covers worn and warped. He remembered those racing nights that stretched into mornings, falling asleep with Ian scribbling something beside him in bed and waking to nearly the exact same sight, like some kind of fucked up spot-the-difference puzzle. So absorbed in the pages and the words and the ideas that he probably hadn’t torn his gaze free at all until Mickey stirred awake next to him.
“The fuck you doin’ up so early?” he’d ask, and Ian would blink, hand stalling over the pages, lifting his head to look at him with eyes that were a little too bright, a little too wide. He could recognize it now for what it was, but at the time, he'd just seemed happy.
“Early?” he’d parrot and glance down at his phone, then quickly through the closed blinds, as if gauging his surroundings. Settling back into the time stream with a laugh. “Shit, must’ve gotten a little carried away. Started writing, guess I lost track of time.”
And a weird, unfamiliar worry would pool in Mickey’s gut, in that instinctual part of him that he’s always relied on to survive, but before he could say anything more Ian would be crowding in on him and pressing their lips together and grinding his hips down on Mickey’s groin, and all rational thought would fade away.
“You want breakfast? I can make us some pancakes,” Ian would ask between kisses, and Mickey would be breathless beneath him.
“Breakfast?” he’d ask, as Ian’s hands wandered low, played under the band of his boxers. “’S like, six AM. What I want is to go back to fuckin’ sleep.”
“Banana pancakes, though, Mick,” Ian would insist. “Your favorite. With bacon? I can swing by that new cafe on my run and get some coffees, too. Oh — maybe those little pastries that you like? The crumbly ones?”
“Or, here’s an idea — we go back to goddamn bed.”
And Ian would just hum at him and lower himself until he was lined up with Mickey’s eagerly awaiting morning wood, and by the time they were done and Ian was hopping out of bed to go start on breakfast, Mickey would be so blissed out and still a little groggy from sleep that he would forget to be worried about Ian running around like the fucking Energizer Bunny.
Here, now, glancing down at the notebooks brought back a similar kind of weight in his stomach, but it wasn’t as unfamiliar nor as insistent. More like a dull ache, because they had a name for it now, for those bright eyes and the too-wide smiles and the insatiable sex drive that had left Mickey feeling raw for months, and having a name took some of that urgency away. Having a name Ian accepted took even more. The worry would always be there, always feel heavy and a bit like grief, but it was older, now, and dulled. The edges that were once so sharp have since been rounded, even though the tragedy of a scared teenage boy wrestling for control would never be easy to carry, no matter how much time has passed. And looking at these notebooks — at tangible evidence of that time — knocked the wind out of him.
Still, Ian had handed it to him. He’d tossed the notebook to Mickey with the knowledge of what it contained, and Mickey could appreciate the progress in that. Ian, who was once so fucking resistant to opening up about this part of his life, handing it to Mickey on a silver platter. Inviting him into the ring with him.
He tapped his fingers along the cover, still, before diving into it. “You sure, man? Feels — I dunno. Kinda feels like an invasion of privacy, or some shit.”
Beside him, Ian looked up, the slight draw to his brow softening as he did. He clearly didn't enjoy looking through them, with that achingly familiar, dark look behind his eyes, but he offered Mickey a small smile and lifted his hand to brush a thumb over his cheek. “It’s not an invasion of privacy if I literally handed it to you,” he pointed out. “But it’s sweet of you to worry about that.”
Mickey swatted his hand away, scoffing. “‘M not fuckin’ sweet, ” he complained, dropping his gaze to the journal again.
“You’re the sweetest, Mick.”
“Shut the fuck up.”
“You’re gonna give me cavities, you’re so sweet.”
“I hate you.”
“I’m getting diabetes just from sitting near you.”
Mickey flipped him off and was rewarded with a soft laugh, and a small amount of that tightness in his chest began to release. “Don’t need to read ‘em to understand, y’know,” he reminded Ian after a beat, like an offer. One last assurance, to make sure, to really make sure, he was okay with it. “If that’s what this is about. I was there, remember? For a bunch of if, anyways. I get it.”
“Yeah,” Ian exhaled, and nodded. The small smile slipped from his face and he glanced down again, thumbing through pages quickly. Some of them had drawings, some had more lists, some just a few words in large, bolder writing. Others were filled edge to edge, corner to corner with words, repetitive patterns, fancy script. No sense of consistency in sight. “I know you do. Just... if you want to. It’s one thing to live through it, another to see how fucked everything was in hindsight. Plus, I wasn’t—” Breaking off, Ian hesitated. His brows pinched a little tighter. “I wasn’t thinking straight, I know, but it’s still real. Still happened, right?”
As Ian spoke, he flipped the notebook closed again, and Mickey wondered why Ian would hold onto them for such a long time if they sat as heavily inside of him as they seemed. Ian’s always been one to get stuck in his head, long before any diagnosis was given, and in some ways, he was tragically predictable for it.
Mentions of his mother would make him sad and angry and a little scared, because she was dead and she had abandoned them and Ian was the only one of her children that still seemed to love her despite it all. And that was scary, because what did that mean for him?
Mentions of Mickey in prison, or of their patchy history, would cast him into an ocean of self-doubt and guilt and he’d start to retreat into himself while also pushing Mickey away. Because he didn’t trust himself with his own life, and Mickey knew he trusted himself with Mickey’s even less because Mickey — for whatever fucking reason — was precious to him.
Mentions of his illness, of the things he’s done during his manic or thankfully more sparse psychotic episodes, would make his eyes get all cloudy and dark and ashamed, because he used to be a quiet, steady presence in his family, one of Fiona’s rocks, and he’d abruptly become something else. Something unreliable and unpredictable, a loose cannon that needed to be monitored and medicated, thrust into center stage for the worst possible fucking reasons.
So the fact that Ian held onto these journals — these tangible, crystal clear reminders of those episodes he worked so hard to put behind him — didn’t make sense. It didn’t add up in Mickey’s head, he couldn’t connect the dots. And there was a crease between his husband’s brows and a hunch to his shoulders with that shadow of shame in his eyes, and Mickey didn’t like it, didn’t like the quiet, didn’t like the uncertainty.
“Why’d you keep these?” he found himself asking, before he could stop himself. Ian lifted his head again, moving his gaze to match Mickey’s with a frown, green eyes curious, if a bit disarmed. Exposed and vulnerable, no shield in sight. Mickey waved the notebook he still held vaguely. “You hate this shit, Ian. Thinkin’ about it. Don’t see why you’re keeping fuckin’ souvenirs of something you hate so much.”
The question seemed to throw Ian, and briefly, Mickey felt bad for pressing it. But then Ian was shifting closer, running a hand through his hair as he thought. Surprised, maybe, because Mickey’s never been one to pry, has never been a big talker and therefore not one to open these cans of worms, and he hadn’t expected the question. Fuck, Mickey was surprised too, but has also long since accepted the fact that he would always do things that were out of his comfort zone for Ian’s sake, for better or for worse.
After a long moment Ian sighed again, shaking his head slightly. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I’ve only ever read through ‘em once, before shipping off to prison, and even then I could only skim them. Made me feel kinda sick, honestly.”
Mickey pushed out a breath, because that wasn’t helpful at all. “Then why the fuck you holdin’ onto them? You trying to... punish yourself, or something?”
“No,” Ian responded quickly, almost defensively, but then he paused. Tilted his head slightly, as if honestly considering it. “Maybe a little.”
“That’s fucked up, man,” Mickey chided, though his heart felt heavy in his chest with the implication. “What’s that TV lady say? Chuck shit out that don’t bring you joy?”
And Ian surprised him a bit by laughing, small and quiet, before turning the notebooks over in his lap. It was a comfort, to hear the laugh, because it meant Ian wasn’t getting too bogged down by it all. “I don’t know, Mick,” he confessed after a moment, and flipped another one open. “I look at ‘em and it feels like they belong to someone else, y’know? But they don’t. They’re mine. All this,” he fanned through the pages, each one filled with something different, “it’s all just... me. Kinda nice to have the reminder, I guess. Important. Even if it feels really shitty, too.”
And that... that could make sense, Mickey supposed, because there was nothing more surreal than being here, now, married and stable with Ian the healthiest he’s been in a long time, and seeing how unsteady things were back then. Like every moment was held together by tissue paper, ripping apart at every corner. The hours Mickey spent in the club far past midnight, keeping an eye on his coked-out, underage love, neither of them having a clue what was going on. The humiliation that clung to Ian like a rancid stench while he looked back at Mickey, searching for reassurance, for comfort, as he admitted himself to the hospital. A seventeen-year-old kid scared out of his fucking mind.
Mickey could see how it might be nice, to have a reminder of how unsteady things were. How unsteady things could get again, if they weren’t careful. He could see how it could be nice, and important, and shitty, all at the same time.
Carefully, Mickey picked up another notebook, flipping idly through the pages as he thought. This one was littered with post-it notes and dog-eared pages, the lines filled with bible verse after bible verse on an endless loop. He nudged his husband in the side. “Gay Jesus?”
Ian paused in his own browsing, looking over Mickey’s shoulder to scan quickly down the pages he held out. He nodded. “Gay Jesus,” he confirmed, almost easily, as if it hadn't derailed his entire life. “In my defense, Frank actually started coining that, not me. The kids from the youth center took it and spun it, and then I was… climbing pretty fast, which didn’t help anything. And eventually it kinda blew up, like it always fucking does.”
There was a potential joke sitting there, somewhere, in poor taste — pun intended? just like that van, maybe? — but Mickey voted against it. Instead he flipped back to the beginning and started to read the first page, where the writing was more legible, almost calm. Familiar, closer to Ian’s typical handwriting than the rushed, urgent chicken scratch of his deep mania. “Right. Frank.”
Ian bumped him a little bit in the shoulder, but when Mickey cast him a sideways glance, he was rolling his eyes. “I’m gonna go start getting dinner ready,” he deflected, and ducked in to press a kiss to the side of his head, sliding the other notebooks in front of Mickey as he did. He could feel Ian’s breath, warm through his hair, and he hummed, pleased. “Pasta ’nd shit okay? Liam sent me this cacciatore recipe he wanted to try, told him I’d help him out. Takes a few hours in the crockpot, so we gotta get it started early.”
Mickey wasn’t sure what the fuck cacciatore was, but Ian was rising already from his seat beside him, and he wasn’t about to protest a home-cooked meal. He looked around them, at their mess of a bedroom. “‘Bout the closets?”
“We made a dent. I’ll bring the junk we’re tossing down with me.”
“You don’t wanna read ‘em with me?” he finally vocalized, casting a glance up as Ian pandered around, picking up piles of long-neglected belongings. “You’re just gonna let me... have at it? Nothin’ you want me to skip over?” He wasn’t sure what these notebooks contained. Old boyfriends? Our breakup? You leavin’ me at the border?
And Ian just watched him for a moment, as if reading his mind, halting in place with an armful of junk. Kneeling down again, he emptied his arms and pulled Mickey in for an actual kiss. Giant-ass hands cupping either side of his face, fingers scratching through the hair at the nape of his neck, tongue parting his lips, drawing him in closer, deeper, and Mickey felt all the breath leave his lungs.
Without warning, Ian pulled away, and Mickey couldn’t help the strangled noise that rose from the back of his throat with it. “I love you,” Ian murmured, and it definitely wasn’t the first time he’s said it but it would always hit Mickey like a ton of bricks. Clear green eyes bore into his own. “And I trust you. Okay? Read whatever you want.”
Caught off guard and still a little breathless, Mickey swallowed. “Fucking… okay, Jesus,” he swore, little more than an exhale. “A simple yes or no coulda worked, you drama queen.”
Ian smiled, pressing another kiss to his lips quickly. “And who knows?” he continued as he pulled away, rising once again to his feet to retrieve the scattered junk. “Maybe there’s a million-dollar idea hiding in there, somewhere. We could end up rich.”
Still feeling a little dazed, Mickey huffed a breath. “You think your coked-out, seventeen-year-old manic ass came up with something to catapult us over the poverty line?”
Ian snorted, arms full as he straightened once more. “No, but it’d be pretty poetic, right? Profiting off my shitty mental health. Compensation from the universe for giving me a brain that doesn’t fucking work half the time.”
And while he was grateful they’d reached a point where they can talk about it, even sometimes joke about it, without Ian totally shutting down or getting angry, there were still moments that were a little too real, a little too sharp. Where all that hurt Ian was so good at internalizing shone through just a little too much. “Oi,” he protested, nonplussed, “you seem to be doing pretty fuckin’ good, from where I’m sitting.”
“Yeah, okay,” Ian returned, “let’s see how you feel after you read those.”
“Ian—“
“I’m kidding, ” he cut Mickey off, rolling his eyes. “God, let me have my shitty coping mechanisms, huh? You’re so fucking soft, sometimes.”
Never one to take a compliment well — and Mickey was ninety percent sure that that, under the scolding tone, was supposed to be a compliment — he found a heat creeping up his neck. Which was stupid, because they were married. He was allowed to be a little soft for his husband sometimes, goddamn it. Not that he’d admit it. “Shut the fuck up. I ain’t soft.”
But Ian was already retreating, sending a laugh over his shoulder as he crossed into the hallway. “It’s okay, Mick, I won’t tell anyone.”
Grateful Ian’s back was turned, blind to the heat creeping further along his skin, Mickey reached out and tossed a shoe at him through the open door. It struck him in the leg. “I fuckin’ hate you,” he called after him. “What the fuck even is catchy-toree?”
Ian just laughed again, making his way down the stairs, and Mickey — again — was left sitting alone in front of their open closet door.
He spent a moment just blinking down at the notebooks, feeling weirdly nervous and still a little flustered. But then he heard soft puttering from below him, Ian and Liam moving around in the kitchen. He heard them chatting, laughing, the clatter of pots and pans as they inevitably spilled out of the cabinet they’re always precariously shoved into. He heard the slight drone of the TV in the background, something running with loud, dramatic background music that was probably too violent for Franny to watch. He heard Franny laughing in glee at the distinct sound effect of gunshots. Heard the music switch, briefly, to something cheeky and childish, before a cry of protest from their niece brought the action movie theme back full-force.
Forcing a breath in and out, he gathered the notebooks in hand and rose from the floor, entire body creaking with the motion. After a day of being hunched over, all he wanted was to draw a hot bath and let the heat soothe his aches away — or maybe convince Ian to give him a back massage. Maybe take a bath together, and have Ian give him a massage there, all warm and wet and sudsy.
Instead of any of that, he shoved the pile of clothes off of his side of the bed, effectively clearing it while also ruining any semblance of organization that had been attempted. A beat later, having second thoughts, he did the same to the other side, knocking the textbooks and old alarm clocks and a few slightly-used backpacks to the floor.
He settled in on Ian’s side of the bed, propping a pillow up behind his back because he’s not, despite Ian’s insistence, a total Neanderthal, and took one last look at the notebooks before steeling his resolve.
Flipping open what appeared to be the earliest one, Mickey began to read.
A few hours, four notebooks, and a shit ton of feeling later, Mickey found himself descending the stairs towards the kitchen.
A delicious smell filled the air, mouth-watering, sweet and savory, wafting from the open crockpot Franny was diligently stirring. At the table, Liam was poured over what looked like math homework, Ian hovering at his shoulder with a crease between his brows and a wooden spoon in one hand. There was a pot of something simmering on the stove, probably pasta in another, and there was red sauce dripping down the handle. Something must’ve been in the oven, as there was a slight undercurrent smell of burning, confirmed seconds later by Ian’s eyes growing wide when he caught it, too.
“Fuck,” he swore, jumping back and hurrying around to the oven, dropping the spoon into the pot as he did with a slight splash of red sauce. “The garlic bread.”
Mickey fought a smile, because — Christ. He was so grateful they’ve gotten here.
Ian pulled a covered tray out of the oven quickly, hissing, with just a towel protecting his skin from the searing pan, and he plopped it quickly onto the empty burners to cool. “ Ouch, ow, shit, hot.”
God. Mickey loved him so much.
It wasn’t until Ian shook the pain out of his hand and reached to stir the pot again that he finally noticed Mickey’s presence. When he did, his expression relaxed, softened into something happy and at ease, as if just seeing Mickey standing there like an idiot at the bottom of the stairs made his whole damn night. “Mick, hey. You’re just in time, dinner’s almost ready.”
A normal person, in a normal situation, would probably respond with something gracious or flirty — something about having a doting husband in the kitchen, spoiling him with a home cooked meal. But they were never really normal, and this wasn’t a normal situation, and for whatever reason, Mickey couldn’t make any words form on his lips.
Ian noticed his struggle, because Ian always did. His expression wavered, ever-so-slightly. “You read them.”
It wasn’t a question. It had never been a question, whether or not he would. Ian had physically handed them to him, had invited him backstage to the most unstable period of his life, truly letting his guard down for the first time ever. It was never a question. “Yeah.”
“So?” Ian asked, stirring the pasta with a hopeful, nervous kind of look in his eyes. “Any million-dollar ideas?”
And there might have been, truly — but it was hard to keep track. Mickey’s mind was still reeling, a bit, from it all. So many thoughts, moving so quickly, perforated only by a few calmer, more lucid entries that sounded so fucking scared. Moments of clarity, waking up briefly to see the everything burning around him. Other entries, darker, heavy ones, once the meds came into play or low spells crept in, turning the edges of the world black.
Still unable to find his words, Mickey did the only thing he could think of — force his legs to cross the room, circle the island, and pull Ian close to him. He tucked his head down into Ian’s shoulder, and he felt Ian freeze only for a moment before melting into it.
“Whoa, hey, Mick,” he murmured, and Mickey felt his hands run up and down on his back. “What is this? What’s happening?”
“You’re so fucking stupid,” he muttered into Ian’s shirt, before pulling back slightly to look at him. “Your dumb ass wrote like ten pages about liking the way I smell.”
Why those were the words his mouth decided to say, Mickey might never know. But Ian seemed to relax, that edge of nervousness draining from his shoulders as he lifted a hand to cup Mickey’s cheek gently, and Mickey would take it. Ian ran his thumb along his cheek, like he always fucking has. “I do like the way you smell,” Ian pointed out, a small smile tugging at his lips again. “You smell very nice, Mick. Now that you’ve started showering regularly.”
Huffing a breath that felt like a laugh on the outside, something else on the inside, Mickey blinked at the infuriating heat in his eyes. “So stupid,” he said again, because nothing else would come.
Ian bent his head forward, foreheads touching as he searched his gaze, suddenly worried. “Mickey, don’t — were you — “
“Shut up,” he cut Ian off, because no, that wasn’t happening, not here, not now, with Liam and Franny right fucking there. “I was not.”
“Hey,” Ian eased, then, in that calm voice that always felt like a balm on all of Mickey’s emotional bruises, “I’m okay. You know? Really.”
And Mickey took in a breath, again, because — yeah. Ian was okay. They were married, in the kitchen they shared with their family, about to eat a nice dinner, and Ian was okay. Standing here, with him, wearing a stupid little apron and holding him.
“Yeah,” he agreed, and lifted his own hand to caress Ian’s face, too. Because they were married, and because he could. “I know. Really fuckin’ glad.”
“I love you,” Ian said again, so easily.
“I know,” Mickey repeated, because he did know. “I love you too.”
Ian’s smile grew into that dopey, bright grin that Mickey loved and hated at the same time. The grin that, so many years ago, made him question everything he thought was important. Ruined his life, before saving it. The one that, to this day, he would do just about anything to see.
Ian dipped his head a little, brushing their noses together before kissing him, soft, gentle, the opposite of everything they used to be. It used to be all speed and greed, always waiting for the other shoe to drop, urgent and hungry before everything was ruined. Having to get all of their passion out at once, all of their feelings — love, anger, grief, resentment, fear. It used to all come bursting out at the same time, hard and fast and desperate, and it would forever be a little bit of a thrill, to have that fire with Ian. But it didn’t always have to be like that, now. They didn’t have to rush their love. They weren’t waiting for a shoe to drop, anymore, or an anvil to fall. They were in their endgame. They could take their time.
And kissing Ian, all slow like this, would never cease to amaze him.
A quiet giggle, though, and a sort of choked-sounding cough brought him back to the present. To the eleven- and five-year-olds currently watching them, waiting for them to finish being dramatic so that they can finally eat their dinner.
Mickey made a small huff of acknowledgement, before pulling Ian down for one more, quick kiss. They could take their time, sure — but maybe not with a live studio audience. “Alright,” he murmured as he pulled away, and gave Ian’s cheek a light, playful smack. “Enough with the sappy shit, Mr. Milkovich. Time for some grub.”
Ian rolled his eyes but broke away obligingly, that happy little gleam in his eyes that would always send echoes of their vows looping through his head. The way Ian had said his name — Mickey — like he was everything. “As you wish, Mr. Gallagher.”
And Mickey tried — he really did — to think of some dirty, flirty thing to say to that, but all he could think is this. This is the only thing I want. And that was too much, so he simply reached for the plates and went to set them on the table while Liam cleared his homework and Franny dropped the silverware all over the floor.
Maybe he was soft, now. But maybe that was okay. The Gallaghers, for all their callouses, have always been soft. Soft, but strong together. He was part of that, now.
And if he held Ian’s hand all the way through dinner, through Lip and Tami bustling in with Freddie, through Debbie’s tirade about the disheveled state of the house and Carl’s enthusiastic reunion with his throwing stars, well — no one gave a singular fuck.
Just as well. Mickey didn’t plan on stopping anytime soon, anyways.
He never had to let Ian go again.