Work Text:
Something not many people know about Ian is that he’s allergic to pineapples. Like seriously allergic. Mickey knows that, he knows because Gallagher liked to talk, about the most random crap. But Mickey wasn’t supposed to remember Ian telling him about the time that he almost died because Monica had given him pineapple. He’d only been little, hadn’t known better than to not eat it. He’d been rushed to hospital when his throat closed up.
Mickey wasn’t supposed to remember that, he didn’t like the fact that he did. But there was that one moment, not long after he’d gotten out of Juvie for the second time when he was glad he had listened to Ian Gallagher when he spoke.
He’d been hiding in his room, because he could hear Ian and Mandy in the kitchen or the living room, talking about random crap. Mickey hid because he hadn’t faced Ian yet, he couldn’t face Ian yet. Not after what he’d said.
And then Mandy had screamed.
Honestly, Mickey didn’t think he’d ever moved so fast in his entire life. One minute he was lying on his bed glaring up at the ceiling and then in a space of a heartbeat it seemed, he was in the kitchen. Ian was slumped on the floor, like he had fallen off of his chair and his eyes were all wide and horrible looking and he was going red in the face, almost purple. They could all hear the rasping, struggling breaths he was trying to take.
Mandy was sitting in the corner freaking out, screaming at Ian, thinking he was having some sort of fit or something. She didn’t even notice Mickey until he swore at her to shut the fuck up because he was on the phone. She stared at him for a minute and then it seemed to click that he was ringing an ambulance; because Mickey knew what was wrong.
He practically screamed at the woman on the other end of the line, because he knew how little time they had, because Gallagher was definitely purple now and a vein was bulging out of his head. In one big rush Mickey said their address and explained about pineapples and the woman told him that the ambulance was on its way and he had to try and keep Ian calm and conscious.
Mickey was hanging up on her before she’d even finished her sentence.
“Fuck, Gallagher,” Mickey crashed to his knees beside the redhead and caught hold of his flailing arms by the wrists, held him down a little and that made Ian look at Mickey and he could have sworn those wide eyes focussed for a minute. “You just have to hold on, the ambulance is fucking coming, okay?” Mickey said to him, even though he knew Ian couldn’t answer given the swelling in his throat.
Honestly, Mickey had never been so scared in his entire life, but he couldn’t admit that. He wouldn’t.
“Fuck, Firecrotch, just stay awake,” Mickey said, because he couldn’t seem to start any sentence without a swear word at the moment, “Just look at me okay.” And he remembered that that was what Ian had said to him all those months ago when Mickey had been shot by that prick Kash.
All over a fucking Snickers bar and yet not over a Snickers bar at all.
Mickey could see Ian fading as they waited, could hear Mandy still freaking out in the corner, but he couldn’t take his eyes off of Ian. He refused to stop looking at him, just in case one of these moments was the last. If it was, Mickey had to see it, he knew it was probably sick, but he had to.
He was pushed away when the paramedics came and he sat with his back pressed against the counter and just stared as they shot Ian up with something. When they spoke to him, he didn’t even hear the question, he just said, “Pineapples, he’s allergic to pineapples.”
And the guy in front of him nodded, so Mickey thought that was maybe what he’d asked.
They lifted him up on a stretcher and Mandy went with him in the ambulance and nobody even thought to tell Mickey whether or not they’d even gotten Gallagher to breathe again. They just left him sitting on his kitchen floor, staring at the spot where Gallagher had been lying.
He didn’t know how long he sat there, but when he finally stood up, his knees cracked and he couldn’t stop himself. He pitched the glass of fruit juice across the room and it smashed on one of the walls, glass and liquid flying everywhere. He knew his Dad was probably going to kill him for that one later. But he didn’t care. He stripped off his clothes as he walked and sat down inside the shower until the water turned cold and his limbs went numb. He sat there until he felt as numb on the outside as he did on the inside.
And he hated himself, because he knew that this was what it felt like to fucking feel. Mickey hated feelings, he decided. It was just a fucking shame he couldn’t really control them.
————————————————————————————————————————————
Mandy felt like she was dying inside, like everything had just frozen. It had all been just one massive blur, from Ian collapsing to her being in the hospital and phoning Fiona in hysterics to tell her what had happened. She couldn’t lose Ian, she just couldn’t. He was her best friend and okay, she maybe was kind of in love with him as well, but that wasn’t the point. The point was that they were a pair and she just couldn’t lose him.
She’d had no clue he was allergic to pineapples, not even when his eyes started bugging out of his head and he’d been choking. She hadn’t had a clue. But Mickey had known, she wondered how the hell he knew something about Ian that she didn’t. It didn’t make sense, but she was too panicked to question it.
Ian was hooked up to a drip to get the swelling down, but the shot the paramedics had given him had reduced the swelling enough to allow him to breathe a little. He had a tube feeding him oxygen and Mandy was glad he looked pale, because it was better than that horrid purple colour he’d turned.
A few hours after he’d been admitted and all of the Gallagher clan had turned up, plus a few, Ian woke up. Mandy had been sitting on Lip’s lap, clutching at him and it had been the only thing that seemed to be keeping her together a little, holding on to Lip.
Ian frowned and mumbled something incoherent when he woke up and Fiona was at his side in an instant. “Ian, Ian baby, it’s okay,” she said, smoothing a hand through his hair and smiling down at him. “You’re in the hospital,” she told him softly as he looked around with wide eyes, “It was the pineapples again.”
Ian offered her a weak sort of smile, to show he was okay and the entire room seemed to relax. Mandy was pretty sure her heart only then started beating again. Later on the nurse had come in and said, “Things could have turned out a lot worse if it hadn’t been for your friend here knowing about the specific allergy.”
And everybody, including Ian had looked at her and smiled and looked grateful and she just hadn’t been able to take credit for that. “Oh it wasn’t me,” she said, looking at Ian when she spoke because for some reason she wanted to see his reaction most of all, “I was kind of freaking out, it was Mickey who called the ambulance, said it was pineapples.”
She’d never seen Ian look so shocked but so outright fucking happy in her entire life.