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"You're not coming with me, are you?"
He asks it so plainly, sounding exhausted, and as you look over at him, standing next to the car, looking-- you've never, not once thought he looked small. Never. But he seems shrunken in on himself, these last few days.
He has muscle, but he clearly didn't eat enough in prison. He has new scars, and a cagey look to his eyes that he'd only just lost when everything went to shit that summer.
You've been staring at the border post for the last few minutes while he made his final preparations and took a piss in the bushes -- and, well.
"I want to," you whisper, worried it'll get lost in the wind, but from the resigned look on Mickey's face, he hears it anyway.
"I want to," you repeat, louder, desperate for him to know. "I want to, I want to, I want to-"
Mickey crosses the distance between you in six long steps, and the moment he's in arms reach you grab him and kiss him-- you missed kissing him. Kissing him is electric, kissing him is music in motion and memory in the melody. Kissing him is when your very soul cries out to hold him and never let go.
You never should've let him go.
Mickey pulls away first, rests his head against yours, strokes your hand where it cups his face.
"You can't," he confesses into the space between you. "I- I always knew, I think. I shouldn't have asked you to come."
"No," you insist, because no matter what happens here you'll cherish these days for the rest of your life. "No, I'm glad you did."
He smiles, bitter. "Yeah, okay."
"I'm serious," you insist, grabbing his chin and making him meet your eye. "I don't regret a thing, except…"
"Except that you have to go back," he sighs. "I know. Your family- they need you. You got a job, boyfriend-"
"I love you," you promise, the truest thing you've ever told him.
"I know," Mickey says, but doesn't say it back. The wind whips around you, arid and stinging the wet streaks on your face.
"Promise you'll take care of yourself," He whispers, leaning forward for another kiss. "Go to parties and dance and sing in the shower and do all that gay shit I hated, okay?"
Hes crying now, staining the makeup he meticulously tried to put on him -- thank god you'd grabbed waterproof mascara. Maybe, subconsciously, you knew you'd be breaking his heart today.
"Be happy," His voice finally cracks. "Just-- be happy, that's all I ever wanted for you."
"You make me happy," you tell him, and when he goes to scoff you squeeze his chin hard enough that he winces. "No, listen you- you made me so happy, all the time. I'm under your skin but you're in my fucking bones, Mick."
You're sobbing, big, ugly tears. You need him to know that he's always with you, always in your heart. "you make me so happy, I have never not loved you, I'll always love you, I can't fucking stop."
When you were in EMT training, studying anatomy, you learned about the cardiac plural cavity -- the space in your chest where your heart goes, surrounded by a thin layer of fluid and protective muscle, and even though you'd been with Caleb at the time you'd thought that's Mickey.
Mickey always kept your heart safe for you, just waiting for the day when you'd see him again and take it back.
"It wasn't supposed to be like this," You cry, "you- why'd you have to break out, huh? I was waiting, just like I said, I know I-"
"Shh," He soothes, "Ian-"
"-know I shouldve visited you but I will this time, I promise, let's just turn around-"
"Ian-"
"-i'll leave him, I will, I'll visit you every week, don't fucking leave me-"
"Ian," Mickey says, grabbing your face. "Breathe."
You let him pull you forward to cry into his shoulder. You sob and sob and sob, you feel like you're splitting in two.
"It's okay," He says in your ear. "I forgive you." And when you shake his head he repeats, "I forgive you."
You pick up your head again, and he puts on a smile for you- not his real one, his brave one. He used it for Terry, for Svetlana, for buisness. He never used it around you except for when you were in that stupid hospital and he was scared of you, because you held his bruised heart in your shaky, useless hands and you fucking broke it.
"You deserve better," Mickey says, "you deserve a life, away from me, away from this- you deserve to be safe, and fucking loved. You're out there saving lives, man, I was never fucking prouder than when I saw you in your EMT uniform."
"I'm gonna miss you," You tell him, wrapping your hands around his wrists. "I'm gonna miss you more than you know."
"Fuck, I'm gonna miss you too," the smile falters, and he blinks away tears again. "But I can't go back. And you can't come with."
"Am I ever gonna see you again?" You ask, and flash back to two days ago, when he asked you the same thing.
To your surprise, Mickey smiles again- real, fucking beautiful. "Fuck, Ian," he says, taking one hand back from you to wipe his cheeks. "You and me always seem to end up together again. Like fucking… magnets, or some shit. Prison and the military didn't stop us, the fuck can a border do?"
And against all odds, you laugh.
"Yeah," you whisper, leaning forward to kiss him again. "What can a border do?"
"'sides," he shrugs, pressing a hand to your chest. "I'm always right here."
"Always," you promise.
Tell me goodbye, he'd said a few days ago. You'd never done that before, really. Closest you'd come was before you left for the army.
He steps away, out of your arms, out of reach.
"Fuck you, Gallagher." He calls as he gets in the car, and you chuckle.
"Till next time, Mick." You say back.
He beeps at you as he pulls away, and flips you his favorite finger. You watch until the car dissappears over the horizon.
When you wake up from fitful sleep the morning you're being brought to jail, you feel dizzy, off balance.
It isn't your meds, you think, it's been about six weeks now, things are regulating. You feel like something is just outside your line of sight, at all times, and no matter how often you turn your head, you can't catch it.
Like something is missing.
Ultimately, you amount it to nerves, put on your bravest fucking face, and let your family drive you to prison.
It's the same prison Mickey was in. The minimum security section, when Mick was in max. They have a supermax building where you know he has some family too.
This place was terrible enough that he needed to escape, you keep thinking, no matter how hard you try to stop.
You should've run, you think.
You'd gotten a single message from a blocked number a few weeks after the worst day of your life -- safe. I love you.
The number had never worked again. You'd tried.
You could've found him, you think, if you'd tried. It would be just like him to leave breadcrumbs to wherever he was.
After this, you decide as you get out. After I get out, I'll go find him.
As you walk in, you try to make yourself bigger, scarier -- it's hard, in a canary yellow jumpsuit that doesn't fit, but you've always been a bit intimidating, and you did become a cult leader a few months ago, so, you think you manage.
Once you're in your cell, you barely have time to breathe before the door is opening again, and you groan internally. You bet it's some fucking-
The world stops. Everything in you aches.
"I rolled on the cartel I was working for, and in exchange guess who gets to pick where he gets locked up," says Mickey fucking Milkovich, the love of your stupid fucking life.
You want to say; I'm never letting you go again.
You want to say; I missed you more than you can physically comprehend
You want to say; I haven't felt truly safe and happy since you crossed the border
You want to say; no one has ever loved me as much and as well as you do.
"Holy fuck," you choke out, because Mickey's fucking here. He somehow some fucking way heard you needed him and he came.
He smiles.
Your missing piece slots back into place like it never left.