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‘Oh my God.’ Mickey heard a girl whisper behind him standing in line at the coffee shop.
‘Do you think it’s really him?’ the other whispered back.
Out of curiosity, Mickey glanced behind him to see who they were looking at. He blinked in surprise when he saw them staring right at him. They immediately went silent, averting their eyes, and Mickey frowned before turning back to face the front. Almost straight away, they burst into quiet giggles. Mickey rolled his eyes, not sure whether he can be bothered dealing with this for the rest of the time in line — and there were a lot of people today, so it’d be a while. He was tempted to just leave, but Ian was feeling pretty shit today and Mickey knew that a cup of coffee from this place always cheered him up. He sighed and hoped the girls would quieten down now that they knew whoever it was they were looking for wasn’t him.
‘Holy shit, it is so him,’ the first girl hissed. ‘Look.’
After a moment, the other girl gasped. ‘Oh my God, fuck. I can’t believe this. Quick, get Snapchat up so we can send it to Dana! She will be so fucking jealous. You just know that Mickey’s her favourite.’
Mickey's eyes widened, so fucking freaked out at how the fuck these girls knew his name. What the fuck was going on?
‘No, Ian’s her favourite. Jason is the one who likes Mickey. He totally has the hots for him…Oh my God, we should text him to come down and see! He only lives, like, two minutes away and this line is so long.’
At the idea that even more people knew about Mickey, and now Ian, Mickey almost choked on his own spit. After a few minutes of silence from the girls and deliberating over it, he pulled out his phone, intent on sending a text to Ian, telling him all about the fuckery that was going down, but hesitated when he heard one of the girls speak again.
‘Jason, Jason!’ the first girl called.
It was a few seconds before another voice joined the mix in a low whisper, ‘Holy crap, it’s really him! Should—Should I talk to him?’
‘Oh, what are you going to say, Jason? Are you gonna hit on him when he’ll probably know that you only know him because of his relationship?’ The second girl scoffed.
‘No…I just…I don’t know…’ Jason trailed off.
‘Next!’ the barista called and Mickey huffed a sigh of relief, stepping up to the counter. The barista’s eyes immediately lit up and he gasped. ‘You’re Mickey Milkovich! Oh my God!’
Mickey’s eyebrows arched as he tried his best not to panic. ‘What’s it to ya?’
‘Can—Can I get your autograph?’
‘Us too!’ the girls cried out from behind him.
‘Plus a selfie,’ Jason added with a smile.
Mickey, totally overwhelmed by it all, just glanced between them all before turning to the barista and saying, ‘Look, can I just get a fuckin’ coffee? I don’t know what’s going on or how you people know about me — and Ian—’ He shot the two girls and Jason a look. ‘—But I just want a coffee, thank you. No autographs or selfies or anything!’
They all looked disappointed, but they went back to minding their own business…except Jason. He stepped closer, luckily not too close, and frowned in confusion.
‘You really don’t know how we know you?’
Mickey shook his head. ‘No, I really fuckin’ don’t.’
‘Damn, man, have you been living under a rock,’ the first girl laughed. ‘You and Ian are, like, the cutest couple on Instagram…and Twitter…and Snapchat…and everything else, really. Tumblr especially loves you.’
Mickey stared at her blankly. ‘I don’t know what any of those words mean.’
‘The Internet,’ the second girl prompted, before giggling. ‘Hashtag old-man-Mickey.’
‘I don’t use the Internet, except to Google shit,’ he admitted a little sheepishly.
‘Here, I’ll show you,’ Jason offered.
‘Mickey!’ the barista called out and Mickey grabbed his coffee.
To his surprise, the three teens stepped out of the line to join him at a table. Jason sat down next to Mickey gleefully, snuggling up as close as personal boundaries would allow to show him what was going on. Mickey looked down at the phone, Instagram up and running. It was Ian’s profile, and shit, he had a lot of followers — almost three hundred thousand.
‘H-How?’ Mickey stuttered, grabbing the phone off the kid and scrolling through all of the videos and photos of him and Ian. There were thousands of likes and comments, and three photos in, his head was spinning.
Ian often pointed his phone at him to take a photo or a video, but Mickey had thought it was for Ian’s personal use only. He shuddered to think of what was out there. Without another word, he handed the phone back, picked up the coffee, and raced back to their apartment.
‘Ian Gallagher!’ Mickey called out in fury when he came into the apartment.
Ian, looking down at his phone and totally oblivious to Mickey’s tone, wandered into the living room from their bedroom. ‘Oh, hey, babe, did you get me a coffee?’
Mickey handed Ian the coffee and waited until Ian leant in to kiss him on the cheek in thanks before stealing Ian’s phone out of his hand and running away with it. ‘What the fuck have you done, Gallagher?!’
‘Mickey, what the fuck?!’ Ian cried out in anger, putting down the coffee to chase Mickey around the room.
‘What are you tryn’a hide, Ian?’ Mickey sneered from behind the couch, out of Ian’s reach as he looked down at Ian’s phone to see Instagram up. There were thousands of notifications and Mickey’s eyes went wide before they flickered up to meet Ian’s. He tossed Ian back his phone, ignoring his sheepish and apologetic look. ‘Other than our fucking fan base.'
Ian locked his phone before putting it down, heading around the couch to meet Mickey. ‘Look Mick, just let me explain. I just posted one photo of us…and then another…and then another…and…I tagged them “cute couple” and then…it all just kinda got outta control. I was drunk on the likes, Mick!’
Mickey rolled his eyes. ‘Look, man, I’m not that upset that it happened…I’m more pissed off that you didn’t tell me before I got ambushed by teenagers in a coffee house.’
Ian pressed his lips together to keep from laughing, before choking out, ‘Oh, that happened?’
Mickey gave him a flat look. ‘Yes, it fuckin’ happened. They wanted autographs and selfies and everything.’
Ian snorted out a laugh before forcing on a frown to match Mickey’s, wrapping his arms around his boyfriend in apology. ‘Sorry about that.’
‘Yeah, yeah, I can feel the regret flowing from you now,’ Mickey said sarcastically, feeling Ian shaking with laughter. He rolled his eyes and shoved him off. ‘You're a fuckin’ dick.’
‘Hey, at least on the upside, everyone knows what a good boyfriend you are,’ Ian said before grabbing his phone.
As Mickey scoffed and headed into the bathroom, Ian held up the coffee and took a selfie with it. He immediately posted it on Instagram, writing ‘My grumpy bf is the best, getting me a coffee for this shit morning #oldmanmickey’.