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Mickey isn’t sure what he expected. That somehow the past weeks and 5 years wouldn’t haunt them – that they could win. Somehow.
It was a kick in the nuts when he realized it wasn’t about winning. You can’t really win you can just, keep going.
The second week after they got back to New York was the first night that things got bad. It was 4 in the morning and Ian had been pacing back and forth across the floor near their bed. He’d tried to pretend that he didn’t notice. God he tried so fucking hard to just go back to sleep.
But he couldn’t, he never could.
“Ian –“ He’d been making more of an effort to use his first name. It helped him remember who he was. Mickey figured he’d heard Gallagher and Lip so much over the years; it was time he got back to himself. “Come back to bed.”
The pacing paused momentarily before starting up tenfold. It reminded him of when he used to snort just a little too much coke. To the point where it wasn’t fun anymore and you can’t do anything but make your feet keep going because you were going to jump out of your skin. It was the worst feeling, like you were melting but each drip of false liquid would harden on its way down, trapping you inside a concrete shell of when will this be over?
Mickey jumped out of bed as the realization smacked him in the face.
His fingers curled around Ian’s bare shoulders and he pressed them deeper into his skin. Fear coursed through his chest. “Hey- hey look at me.” Ian’s eyes jumped from each dark corner of the room until finally landing on Mickey’s. His pupils were the size of dimes.
It’s funny because Mickey knows what he would tell any half-whit fuck to do in that situation. He’d tell them to shut up and let them ride it out. To grow a pair and see if there was any left over – maybe even to fuck it out. After all sex on coke was great.
But his hands were shaking and each jump of Ian’s muscles made his heart constrict to the point where he wondered if he was going to have a heart attack. It would be a really awful time for his heart to give out – in the literal sense. Metaphorically he was already dead and buried.
“I just –“ Ian slammed his hands hard against Mickey’s chest and the smack of skin on skin resonated around them. It stung, he would have a mark. “I just need to catch my breath.”
Tremors underneath Ian’s skin raised to an alarming level of near convulses and he saw him start to hyperventilate. His eyes widened more bringing the dimes to quarters and it was a domino affect. Mickey understood that look and that moment when your thoughts take control. Because nothing has ever felt so real as your mind telling you you can’t breathe.
“Hey hey—“ He moved his hands away from Ian’s shoulders and gripped either side of his face. “You’re fine okay? You’re fine. Talk to me.”
Ian’s face scrunched into a mask of pain and his breaths came shorter and quicker. His forehead crashed painfully into Mickey’s collarbone and Mickey wanted to kill himself. Wanted to smash every mirror and glass in the apartment in rage because this was his fault. It was his coke – in case of emergencies. Just a bag full of last chance white dust ensuring that Mickey still had an out for when he was sure he wasn’t able to breathe.
The irony.
A sob wracked through Ian’s body and Mickey summoned every ounce of everything he had to wrap his arms around the man before him. Because it hurt, it hurt so fucking bad. Worse than anything he’d ever experienced – the feeling of helplessness.
“I can’t breathe—“ Ian huffed out each word with such strong arches of his back Mickey was genuinely surprised he hadn’t passed out yet.
The window next to their bed was cracked open a few centimeters because it was broken and old and they weren’t gonna pay to get it fixed. He practically carried Ian over to it and collapsed both of them onto the floor. It wasn’t comfortable. Only a few feet of dirty clothes and bodily fluids allowed space between the wall and the bed and his elbow popped painfully while trying to maneuver Ian against his chest.
Mickey jammed his right hand under the window and pushed it up feeling a rush of relief at the sound of splintering wood. A breeze swept through the screen and Mickey braced Ian firmly against his chest.
“Feel that?” He whispered into his ear. “Feel my breathing? Breathe like me.” He steadied his breaths fucking counted them out loud. He needed Ian to know that he could breathe just goddamnit breathe. “C’mon Ian just relax and breathe with me okay? You can breathe.”
Another gush of wind pushed through the window and after what seemed like an eternity Mickey could feel Ian’s heart starting to calm. Each time his chest rose in a gulp of oxygen intake Ian’s back would arch away from him in his own mimicked attempt at one.
The relief made him dizzy.
“M’tired Mick—“ Ian spoke slowly through labored audible gasps, he was counting too.
Mickey slowly moved out from behind where he had Ian plastered to him, his bones creaked with fading adrenaline. Ian’s skin was hot under his touch and he was momentarily mesmerized by the way his fingers left little white imprints on him. Red and white and blue bruises from something stupid he’d walked into the other day.
Red white and blue – the colors of the flag, of fucking patriotism. The colors that spurred Ian forward into the army and ripped away his smile and kept him up at night. Colors of cocaine mixing with red blood from a nose and leading to blue lips of someone you’ve lost –
The colors used to describe something hot—a flame moving past red to white and blue to show that pain is so goddamn colorful. The worst fucking colors. He hated those colors.
Ian rolled over onto his stomach and shivered but Mickey didn’t close the window, just pulled the thin blanket up over his shivering frame knowing that the best thing now was to sweat it out.
He walked to the kitchen and shakily picked up the phone on the counter.
“Hello?” Fiona’s voice was groggy.
Mickey relayed the night, choking on the part about it being his stash – jumping when he thought he heard Ian get back up. He wasn’t sure why he called her, why the fuck he thought she needed to know about it.
“I’m sorry.” He huffed out finally while dropping his head down onto the table and wiping away a tear that rolled into his mouth.
“This is life Mickey.” The line buzzed quietly. “Life is one event after the next and moving through that and surviving it and going on to the next. That’s never going to stop.” She sighed a little. “That’s just life Mickey, that’s it, that’s the big secret.”
He hung up and lingered in the door of their bedroom for a few minutes, watching quietly with tears still unabashedly running down his face.
Ian was practically glowing in the moonlight and Mickey wondered if he’d remember any of this in the morning. If it would just be another moment in time burned into one of their minds – haunting and important but still, just another moment.
He crawled back into bed and laced an arm around Ian’s body happy to feel that his skin had cooled a little bit.
Mickey didn’t sleep much that night, he was too busy counting breaths and tracing skin. His tears didn’t stop either and when the sun rose and Ian moved next to him his pupils were back to normal.
They didn’t say anything about it, no apologies or worries. Just two kisses placed on top of Mickey’s puffy eyes and a crooked grin saying that it was okay.
The moment had passed.