Archive of Our Own

and the hardest part of going home
is facing that you're getting older
and everything you've ever known
is over

hardest part — noah cyrus

Ian knocks once on the Wallace front door before letting himself in.

“Honey, I’m home,” he calls out as he kicks out of his red high tops. He has all of five seconds to drop his duffel bag before his nephews hurtle at him from the couch and stairs with abject screams of delight. 

Ian laughs and lets Freddie and Henry take him down right in the foyer, a jumble of shoes jabbing at his ass. He lets them clamor and crawl over him like puppies because it feels good. Feels needed and real.

Feels like he can breathe out again. Family.

“Uncle Ian!” Freddie nearly knees Ian in the balls in his excitement to sit on his lap and stare directly into his face. Everything about him is permanently intense and dialed up to one-hundred. He’s six years old and has the energy levels of an Olympian competitor. “Uncle Ian, is it true you’re staying with us? For a long time?”

“Uh huh,” Ian replies. He was going to say more, but three year old Henry grabs him by the face; two sticky, clammy hands on his cheeks turning him for full attention.

“I saw a lemur on TV today,” Henry informs him. “They walk on two legs. Like a man.”

“Yeah,” Ian says. “They’ll do that, I guess.”

“I’ll be a lemur one day,” Henry replies.

“Don’t let your dreams stay dreams,” Ian says.

“You don’t call, you don’t write,” Lip says as he wanders in from the kitchen, a towel slung over one shoulder. His lazy gaze skims Ian once, quick, probably talking in the puffy ridges below Ian’s eyes and the dark shadows, the gauntness of his cheeks. His mouth quirks in a subtle smile regardless. “I don’t know why I keep letting you back into my life, man. This relationship is so toxic.”

Ian makes a face.

“Ew. Who the hell taught you to talk like that?”

“The unpaid intern hipsters at the company make sure to keep me hip,” Lip says. 

“Oh my god.” Ian fumbles with the doorknob for leverage to stand, but little Henry just wraps arms and legs around his torso like a monkey and holds on for the ride. He must be practicing for his future. “I’m getting you fired just for that.”

“You don’t have the power, little brother.” Lip eyes him one more time before turning back to the kitchen. “The guest room’s all set up for you. Didn’t bring more?”

“Left some shit in my car,” Ian says as he traverses the shoe graveyard and abandoned duffel and little child feet to reach the couch. 

“Tell me you didn’t take the BMW here,” Lip calls out from the stove. 

“I’m famous, not stupid,” Ian says with all the bitterness of a spiteful younger sibling. He aims a small smile at Freddie, who sits right beside him, staring at Ian with Lip’s actual face. 

It’s kind of unnerving, sometimes, how much Freddie is a copy-paste of a single person. At least Henry is a curly ginger, his eyes big and liquid dark like Fiona’s, his features strong and bold like Tami, right down to his height. He’s almost three years younger than Henry, but nearly as tall as him. He’s probably going to be taller than Ian one day. 

The television is on, loud and distracting; some daytime soulmate court show. Soulmates who have fallen out for whatever reason, because belonging together doesn’t mean the world will actually allow it, and now they’re content to air their grievances in a fake court of law for the world to gawk at them. Ian rolls his eyes and turns it off so he can focus on his nephews. 

“How’s school?” Ian asks.

“I love school,” Freddie says. “School is the best. I wish I could go every day.”

“You can’t go every day,” Henry says, his entire expression collapsing in on itself within seconds. “You have to play with me!”

Freddie makes a dismissive noise that’s so reminiscent of Lip that Ian briefly can’t breathe.

“I see you every day of my life,” Freddie replies. “I can’t get rid of you.”

“Hey now,” Ian says, placing a hand on Freddie’s blonde mess of hair. “We can’t talk to people we love like that.”

“Mommy told Daddy that you’re a bad influence on Daddy when you're together,” Freddie states like he hasn’t delivered the most devastating but true fact of his short life. “Are you bad to Daddy?”

Ian feels a familiar cold panic settle into his chest, aching his lungs, stuttering his breath. 

“Um.” Ian’s lips curve on automatic, permanently prepared to please. “No. That’s not true. Daddy and I are brothers too, y’know. We fight and get in trouble with each other like anyone else. But we love each other a lot.”

“I love Daddy more,” Freddie says, his eyes solemn and unblinking. 

“I bet,” Ian says, nodding. 

Somehow he feels like he’s facing a firing squad in his own damn nephews. This will teach him to avoid visiting for more than a half year. 

“Dinner’s almost ready,” Lip says, sticking his head out from the kitchen. There’s no way to tell if he has been listening in or not, but the radio is playing the top forty in the other room, so it’s unlikely. Probably. “Tami’s closing the salon tonight, so she’ll be late. Bring your shit upstairs.”

Ian does as he’s told. Even after all these years, it’s somehow discordant to see the house renovated and lively with color and creature comforts. It was his own early, initial paychecks that went to buying the house for keeps and getting it fixed up for their family to flourish in. 

Then Debbie moved to a proper apartment with Franny, the down payment from Ian. And Carl became a cop who doesn’t want Ian’s money but stays in a nice brownstone apartment near his precinct with his girlfriend. Fiona married and followed the wind out of Illinois with a good chunk of Ian’s cash as a wedding present. Even Liam is living his best life at prestigious boarding school, only home to live with Lip during the holidays.

And Lip got to pick himself up and graduate university. Got some robotics job or whatever. 

Primarily on Ian’s dime.

If Ian crashes and burns at the hands of Chicago crime, just pulp on the sidewalk before he hits thirty, Ian will be proud of his life. He has to remind himself that he is proud of his life. The misfirings of his brain will not take that from him, no matter what. 

No one will take Ian’s pride from him. Even himself. 

***

After a dinner where Lip blessedly makes no mention of why Ian is back or what the future will bring, Ian happily gives Freddie and Henry a joint bath, the same as Fiona used to do with him and Lip. They splash all over the floor and Ian ends up nearly as soaked as his nephews, and it’s worth it. 

It’s love. It’s feeling. Ian had almost forgot what feeling was. 

He reads them three bedtime stories and avoids the children’s book with his own damn face on it in simplistic cartoon form. Kisses the kiddos goodnight and calls their parents to say goodnight too. 

Later, Lip grabs cans of ginger ale, not a beer in sight after all these years, and they sit out back on the stairs, smoking and soaking up the early May evening warmth. Sometimes it’s still snowing this time of year, so Ian is outright basking like a lizard. 

“On a stability scale of Liam to Monica,” Lip says after a few comfortable minutes, “where are you right now.”

Ian snorts. Sucks down smoke and exhales through his nose. He’s fairly certain that no matter how much his hero agency nags him, his lungs are impenetrable to smoke. If he can take a bullet, he can take a fucking cancer stick. It’s all about his image with them. 

“I’m a solid Ian having a decent day, okay.”

“Yeah?” Lip eyes him in that bland way of his, omniscient and bored about it. “You got put on indefinite leave, Ian. They basically put you in the naughty corner for the entire country to see. Your little death roll off the Prudential building went viral. Might still be. And you’re saying you’re decent?”

Ian’s skin feels too tight around his aching bones. His lungs too small, his heart feeble. He has never felt so weak. Not while lucid and out of a depressive dip, anyway. The reality of his world feels like a blackened bruise, tender and sore to the touch, all that blood hemorrhaging and failing to heal beneath the skin. 

“I’m alive, anyway,” Ian relents. 

“You’re hard to kill,” Lip says. “Even when you try. In front of everyone.”

“I wasn’t trying to kill myself,” Ian mutters, looking away.

“Had to see that shit on the news. Didn’t hear from you for weeks afterward. Does that agency even give a flying fuck about you?”

Ian groans and sucks hard on his cigarette. Refrains from blowing it in his brother’s face because he already knows from a lifetime of experience that Lip won’t even blink. 

“Let’s not go down the agency conspiracy road again. They exist to manage me. How else could I legally fight crime?”

“Fuck that,” Lip says, sounding a little more fired up. “Since when have we ever gone legal?”

“Since, I don’t know.” Ian gestures to the general world, unable to articulate. “Since we got stable.”

“Stability is arbitrary. Stable by societal perception, sure, maybe. But you jumped head first off a building in the middle of a depressive episode that your agency didn’t manage or mitigate or notify your family about, so I’d say stable is pretty fucking subjective. Every single Gallagher is one shitty day away from causing a spectacle. Yours just happened to be public.”

“What do you want me to say, Lip?” Ian turns on him then, his face burning, his eyes hot and narrow. “It’s been a lot. Everything has been a lot. I just—it became too much. And now I’m here. Back where I started.”

They stare at each other for a while.

“You’re not Atlas,” Lip finally says. “No one’s asking you to carry the world.”

“Nah.” Ian crushes his cigarette into the railing. Doesn’t flinch at the distant sound of a screaming fight. “Pretty sure Atlas works in Tampa or something.”

Lip huffs a laugh and punches a chuckling Ian in the shoulder.

***

Ian drives Freddie to private school the next morning. With morning traffic, it’s a good thirty minute drive once he makes it out of the south side and nearer to the lake, but he wants to be useful. Ian has never been good at sitting still and he’s certainly not about to start now that he’s taking a post at Wallace like a ghost of Frank past or something. 

Yeah, he has his own high rise apartment in the heart of the city, but everyone in the family, including Ian, agreed pretty quickly that his time spent shut out of work and recovering from the worst dip he’s had since his teens is best not spent alone. 

“I’ll be dropping Freddie off most mornings,” Ian informs Freddie’s teacher as the kids flood the clean, echoing corridors of a school that looks more like a cathedral than a learning environment. It’s not even a religious school, but Ian has always felt like these private school places consider themselves just a step below god or something—even if Ian is the one paying Freddie’s way. 

“Oh.” The teacher, Mrs Shire, blinks up at him with a familiar glaze to her eyes. “ Oh, you’re—you’re Valiant.”

Ian’s smile is tight-lipped but as present as he can manage, considering the circumstances. Henry holds his hand sweetly and keeps his face pressed to Ian’s hip. 

“Yeah, hi, it’s a pleasure. Do I need to fill out a safety information form with the office or anything for pick up and drop off?”

“Well, usually.” Mrs Shire is still starstruck, and that’s fine and all, but Ian would really like to go before the older kids in the hallway clock him out of uniform. “But I mean, it doesn’t get safer than you, right?”

“I’d really like to do this by the book,” Ian says, keeping his smile plastered on. “If it’s all the same to you. Where is the office?”

Afterward, Ian takes Henry to the closest park and wears him out on the jungle gym for the morning. Henry makes Ian push him for a solid ten minutes on the swings, laughing hysterically the whole time, and the entire thing is so simple and pure that Ian remembers what it feels like to smile in earnest for the first time a while. 

Henry dozes in his carseat while Ian heads back toward home. He checks his phone at a stoplight and sees a text from his manager checking in, another from Lip confirming that Ian somehow did not lose his first born son on the way to school, and a final one from fucking Trevor, asking if Ian will come to the LGBT youth center to give a talk about his ‘condition’ in light of his recent relapse and recovery. Christ. 

Ian confirms with the first two and ignores the last. 

After checking that Patsy’s still exists, Ian parks down the street from it and strolls the sidewalk with his nephew in his arms, casually hooked against his side. 

Sometimes Ian tries to remember what it felt like before his super strength kicked in; what it felt like to struggle in a physical way rather than the unrelenting mental and emotional strain he has been experiencing for the last couple years. 

But he can’t remember. Not much. Vaguely recalls the heft and weight of one specific person in his arms as Ian pushed him up against a brick alley wall and picked him up to sit on the kitchen counter when no one was home to catch them. 

A long time has passed since then. He’d been sixteen and starry-eyed when the Chicago Academy of Excellence had whisked him away to exact the tortuous regime of an up and coming hero upon him. That was nearly eight years ago now. He’ll be twenty-four soon.

Ian doesn’t remember what it’s like to hold anyone the way he held Mickey, anyway. 

He really thought they were soulmates back then. Was sure of it, despite no cosmic signs to yet confirm or deny. But they’d never reached their eighteen birthdays with each other; never got a go at the defining kiss that might make them glow like a big bang. 

Never had the chance of much of anything, really.

Ian mentally shakes himself off. He has barely been back in the area and he’s already getting weird and morose about shit he rarely thinks about outside of this insular little world of his youth.

Ian grabs one of those ugly brown plastic booster seats and sets it on a sticky vinyl booth. Helps Henry in and orders one set of pancakes and bacon for them to share. It’s a little weird to be in here. For all the time Fiona worked here, Ian had never visited. He’d been trapped first, then busy. Or maybe those are the same things. 

“After this, we’ll go to preschool, okay?” Ian smiles at Henry, enjoying the way he rampantly scribbles the shitty, overly waxy crayons on the children’s paper menu with unabashed glee. 

Normally, Tami would take Henry to work with her every morning and use her lunch hour to run him to his school for the noon to three-thirty block, but Ian had quickly and gladly taken on the role. 

Maybe Tami will approve of Ian’s presence a little more too. Ian doesn’t like to be disliked, even though it’s not as if Tami has ever even been rude to him. She has just seen Ian and Lip get at each other too many times over the years and she’s understandably protective of her husband. 

Anyway, probably uncomfortable to watch your husband clock a Supe in the face, only for Lip’s own knuckles to bust open and Ian remain unharmed.

Yeah. Shit’s complicated. Ian doesn’t blame Tami. 

And yeah, maybe Ian is a little self-destructive when no one’s looking. Or when the world is looking. He’s working on it, okay. 

They’re nearly done with their brunch, Ian more than content to let Henry’s disjointed ramblings about Bluey and zoo animals and his apparently new love and obsession with salami, when the front door jingles and someone behind the counter calls out. 

“Hey Mickey,” the waitress hollers over the cacophony of chatter. “Got your food to go over here.”

Ian briefly wonders if he has accessed the ability to stop time because absolutely everything in the room goes thick, slow, and distant. 

He looks to the entrance and his heart expands again and again and again. Big, bigger, pressing hard against his straining lungs and his aching, spreading ribs. Ian gawks from across the room, his pulse a thunderous bloodbeat in his ears. 

Mickey Milkovich is so much more beautiful than Ian remembers. 

It’s the first and last thing he can think, because he doesn’t have the brain power to access any more language than beautiful and striking and starkly stunning. His hair is less hedgehog now and more slicked back and sexy, an errant strand curling over his forehead. He has broadened out but hasn’t grown, still stocky and built like a boxer ready for the ring, but his shoulders are rounded with thick muscle and the plain black tee strains around his biceps and fits neatly around his slim waist. 

Mickey doesn’t speak as loudly as the waitress, but it’s clear he thanks her. His full, pink mouth flashes a familiar, fleeting, shy smile before he glances at his watch with one hand and grabs the paper bag with his other. 

Ian doesn’t move. Can’t move. Is more powerless than he can ever recall. 

And then, as Mickey throws down a few bucks on the counter and turns away, he casually glances around the small restaurant and looks Ian dead in the eye. 

For a second, it looks like Mickey doesn’t register Ian’s existence. 

And then he does. 

For one brief, glorious, rose-tinted moment, Mickey’s face goes slack with wonder. Shock and awe, nothing like the aggressive adoration Ian’s fans blind him with, illuminates Mickey’s expression, his gaze gone bright blue and searching, frantically raking from Ian’s face to his shoulders and up. 

The moment lasts maybe three seconds before Mickey’s entire demeanor storms over with foreboding wrath, his attention narrowing and shutting Ian out. Mickey glances at Henry, then back to Ian, then flits faster between the two of them before his mouth thins and his cheeks pale. 

He turns and walks out of Patsy’s. 

The entire encounter doesn’t last more than a minute. 

“Wait!” Ian jumps up, his knees bumping the underside of their table and clattering their plates and silverware with a huge ruckus. Patrons turn to stare while Ian frantically yanks Henry out of his booster and tucks him under his armpit like a football as he rushes between the cramped tables and bolts for the door. 

“I’ll be right back!” he hollers to anyone who will listen. “I’m not dining and dashing! Mickey, wait!’

Ian busts onto the sidewalk, looking both ways before he spots a familiar swagger striding quickly down the street. 

“Mickey!” Ian wants to run like he can run catching a criminal, but he currently has a cackling Henry hooked under his armpit like he’s about to go for a touchdown and he can’t exactly go speeding off. 

He can walk real damn fast, though. 

“Mickey, hey, Mickey!” Ian speed-walks with as much self respect as he can muster, but shame has never been one of Ian’s finer points, so he really doesn’t care how stupid he looks power walking after him. And anyway, Ian is gaining on him. “Come on, I just wanna say hi! Please? I’m not going to stop following you, y’know. Not until you say hello!”

“Oh my fuckin’ god,” Mickey whirls on him, a good half block away, but his voice still carries brassy and sharp like Ian remembers. “What the fuck is wrong with you, man? Pretend you didn’t see me!”

Ian’s entire heart is about to vomit from his mouth as he rushes to catch up, squealing to a halt before Mickey, beaming. He actually feels legitimately sick to be standing in front of him again, unsure if he’s ecstatic or terrified, but only knowing he wants to see him. Confirm his existence. 

“Mickey,” Ian whispers, unable to restrain himself as he lets himself properly look.  

Mickey has grown up. They both have. It looks good on him. Stable in ways Ian only wishes he could look these days. 

 Mickey’s looking at him like he has smelled hot garbage. Then he looks at Henry, who seems to have both accepted his fate at being held like a sack of potatoes but also isn’t enjoying it anymore since he has stopped laughing.

“You out to give your kid a concussion or what?” 

“My—oh, no!” Ian laughs, short and goofy and very unattractive as he eases Henry to his feet and clutches his hand. “This is Lip’s youngest kid. Henry, this is my friend Mickey. Say hi.”

Henry looks at Mickey’s incredulous expression with those giant, dark doe eyes. 

“You don’t look like the mouse,” Henry says. 

Mickey makes an objectively unimpressed face at Henry before aiming the brunt of it at Ian. 

“Fuck off this ain’t your kid,” Mickey says, suspicion evident in the high points of his eyebrows. “He looks exactly like you.”

“Not really,” Ian says, but is pleased that Mickey thinks anything of Ian’s face at all. Henry is really cute. “Why would I lie about having a kid?”

“I don’t know, Gallagher,” Mickey drawls, and oh, the lazy drop to his voice has deepened over the years. “I don’t trust Supes as far as I can throw ‘em. You, least of all.”

Ian’s smile falters, tightens. 

“What?” he manages quietly. Suddenly, he feels exposed. Glances around to check if anyone is looking at them and some people definitely are. Every phone being pulled out of a pocket could be bad publicity for his already tanked reputation. “What d’you mean?”

Mickey just blinks at him, stony and unreadable. 

“Well, this has been a shitstorm of a day and it’s not even noon,” Mickey says as he checks his watch again. “Look, it’s been a blast from the past and all, but why don’t you head back to your high tower or whatever it is you do these days when you’re not saving the city and I’ll see you never. Okay? Okay. Great. Bye.”

With that, Mickey is turning on his booted heel and marching away without a moment for Ian’s reply. 

Ian’s entire heart crashes into his stomach and his guts drop to the pavement.

Mutely, Ian watches Mickey turn the corner and disappear from his life again.

“Uncle Ian,” Henry says in a small voice. “Are you sad?”

Ian presses his trembling lips tightly together and musters a faint smile. He squeezes Henry’s hand and turns them around to head back to Patsy’s. 

“Me? Never.”

***

Ian drops Henry off at pre-school and has to perform the same song and dance of filling out child release forms, going as far as making the office call Lip to get his spoken consent when he sees a parent is meant to sign for the damn thing. The amount of people who will simply let a hero get away with anything has always unnerved Ian. He has known plenty of heroes and several of them aren’t great. 

With several hours to kill before he picks up the boys, Ian returns home. Mows the lawn. Smokes half a pack on the porch and watches the world pass by their street. A couple of old-timers pause to exchange a few words when they recognize him, not specifically as Valiant, but as the scrawny ginger kid who tailed Lip around the neighborhood. 

If there’s one good thing about the south side, it’s the people who keep a person humble. Whether it’s Mickey cutting Ian off at the knees and leaving him bleeding out or an old man who remembers shooing Ian and Lip from the gas station where they’d loiter and steal bags of ice on hot summer days. 

Maybe Ian hasn’t been coming back enough for all these years because the fame really has gotten to him. Feeling important to an entire city can be addictive. Coming back to the place that made him and reminds him of his life of fuck-ups isn’t exactly ideal. 

But Ian has also been living a less than ideal inner life since the CAE scouted him and stole him away.

He’d once been so excited. This was going to be better than the Army. He was going to prove himself. Make something of himself. Save the city. Save his family. 

Ian doesn’t know if it was the brutal, secretive regime of the academy that first triggered his bipolar or if the string of dynamite had finally burned down to the detonator, but he’d gone through his first full-fledge episode on that fucking island in the dead of Lake Michigan. Nowhere to run, no way to get a family member to be there for support. 

They’d medicated him, of course. Got a therapist to the academy island every week to place bandaids over his brain. He’d been informed under no uncertain terms that they fully intended to drop him from the program altogether with the condition he was in, and if he didn’t exceed expectations, he’d be back on the south side. A failure. Less than nothing.

And now Ian is back on his porch. Just shy of twenty-four years old and a failure after all. They should have cut him out back then. 

Ian wanders his house, idly smoking a cigarette as he goes. The place is still mismatched and a little cluttered, but in a clean, lived-in way. His old bedroom belongs to the boys and it’s not haphazard with posters and mismatched furniture, but decorated in blues and grays, the furniture white and very IKEA. Ian’s bedroom is Frank’s old room, but no one would ever know it for the fresh coat of muted, olive paint with chipper accents of white, yellow, and gold around the room. 

The Gallaghers made this house a home, but Tami clearly figured out how to dress it up in its Sunday best. Seeing it this way never fails to bring some levity to Ian’s heart. 

So maybe Ian’s not a failure. Not to the people that matter. 

Fuck this city. They don’t know shit about him.

***

“So, I ran into Mickey today,” Ian says at the dinner table.

“Who’s Mickey,” Tami asks as she cuts up Henry’s breaded fish into small bites. 

“How did that go,” Lip says without answering her.

“He accused me of secretly fathering a child and then told me he never wanted to see me again.” Ian pauses, then, “That was after I kind of chased him down the street yelling his name.”

“Yeah,” Lip says, nodding, “I have no idea why he’d want you to leave him alone in that case.”

“He thought Henry was yours?” Tami asks with a frown, clearly doing mental gymnastics to keep up. “Does he even know you’re gay? Who is this guy?”

“My old boyfriend,” Ian says with a shrug. He stabs some peas with his fork and then tries to stab more and more, stacking them on each tine up to the top as he speaks. “We were downlow together for like two years, up until I went to the academy. When I finally got out, I couldn’t find him. He didn’t look for me, either, I guess.”

“You didn’t talk to him while you were in the program?” Tami asks. 

Ian hesitates. There’s only so much he’s legally allowed to say. However, this is the Gallagher house, so who the hell cares. 

“CAE is kind of like prison,” Ian admits slowly. “They take away your phones and ability to contact the outside world off the island. Everyone sleeps in barracks. The training is. . .creative. And grueling. Fiona and everyone wanted to visit, but it cost money to travel to the marina and then get the ferry to the island. I’d talk with everyone during the one weekly call we were allotted. It’s kind of how all the academies are. Secretive and stuff.”

Tami stares. Ian feels seen and he doesn’t like it. 

“Wow,” she finally says. “I had no idea. You don’t hear about that stuff on the news.”

Ian shakes his head. 

“Heroes are shaped by brutality. It’s not all wholesome television montages. They have to make us strong in more ways than physically.”

“That sounds unappealing as hell.” Tami frowns again, but softer. “I’m sorry to hear that, Ian. So what’s up with the boyfriend? Mickey. How did you two break up?”

Ian huffs a laugh and shakes his head. 

“We didn’t. Not really.”

***

“You should know something,” Lip says that same night as they smoke and drink ginger ale on the back steps again. 

“I would like to know a lot of things,” Ian says with a shrug. 

“Hilarious. But seriously, it’s about Mickey.”

Ian abruptly looks at Lip, his smile dropping. 

“What do you mean, about Mickey. That’s so fucking ominous, Lip.”

“Shut up,” Lip says mildly. “What do you know about our local heroes?”

Ian frowns into his ginger ale. Drinks and thinks. 

“Not a whole lot. Agencies tend to send the less flashy heroes out this way because less people care about capturing media of them to share, so it’s like pointless to waste a flashy hero on this shit hole.”

“Great, thanks.”

“Hey,” Ian says, offended on behalf of himself. “You asked. I’m not saying I like it. We’re always getting the short end of the stick. You know they wouldn’t even place me here and I asked to be assigned like, a dozen times over the years.”

“You’ve always been too pretty for the south side.”

“Okay, are you gonna shut up or are you gonna spill the beans on Mickey?”

“Mickey is our local,” Lip says. 

Ian blinks.

“Your local what. Dealer?”

“Are you firing on all cylinders?” Lip stares at Ian’s blank look and sighs. “He’s our local hero.”

Ian barks a loud, short laugh of disbelief before he can help himself. 

“What? No he isn’t.”

“Yeah, he is.”

Ian blows a raspberry in disbelief. 

“No, Lip. He isn’t. I’d know. I’d know if he was a fucking hero. I’ve had Google alerts set on his name for years.”

“God, you’ve always been so creepy about the guys you’re into.”

“Lip.”

Lip lights a new cigarette, the darkness beneath his exhausted eyes highlighted by the flare of flame. 

“He’s a vigilante,” Lip says around the cig. “Licensed Supes aren’t worth shit around these parts. We’re lucky if they even keep to the well-lit streets at night. Most of them just cut out when the sun sets. Mickey is the one who keeps shit solid around here.”

Ian literally cannot process any of this. His brain is a perpetually broken McDonald's ice cream machine, churning nothing. 

“Mickey isn’t Powered,” he says faintly. “I’d know. I’d know, Lip. He was there when I Powered Up for the first time. He’d have told me if he—”

“Well obviously he didn’t,” Lip says with a shrug. “I mean, I know he’s Powered. Got some kind of lucky aim where he can’t miss a target or whatever. Bullets, knives—hell, rocks. He still drinks at The Alibi and Kev’s still got a huge mouth, so I hear shit, but yeah. He’s been doing it for years now.”

“Years,” Ian repeats, dumbfounded. “Years? Lip, you knew what he’s been doing for years and you didn’t tell me—”

“Dude, I had no idea you were still stuck on your little butt-buddy from like a decade ago.” Lip looks at Ian with the kind of scrutiny that makes Ian feel naked and vulnerable. “I had no idea. You haven’t said the guy’s name since, I don’t know, since one of your phone calls from CAE.”

“I kept asking you to pass on a message to him,” Ian says softly, his heart heavy and hanging low, nauseous in his stomach. “Because he wasn’t answering his cell. Then his cell stopped accepting calls. I couldn’t write to him because he lived with his dad and I couldn’t risk it. Hell, I don’t even know if he still lives with his dad.”

“I saw him once,” Lip says, and Ian’s entire body stills. Refuses to even breathe as Lip speaks. “I told him you were trying to reach him. He told me to tell you to stop trying.”

Ian doesn’t say anything. Lip breathes in smoke, breathes out, his eyes to the smoggy night sky. 

“You were having a hard time,” Lip says quietly. “I wasn’t gonna pass on that bullshit. Wasn’t what you needed to hear back then. Silence was better than that.”

Ian grits his teeth even as he understands it to be true.

“Wasn’t your decision to make.”

“Yeah,” Lip says, looking at him, unblinking. “It was. Someone had to care about you, Ian.”

Ian steals Lip’s cigarette and they share it in silence. Somewhere a dog is barking. 

“He have a name?” Ian asks dully. He feels swaddled in gray. 

“The Shrike,” Lip says. 

***

The internet doesn’t have a lot to say about the Shrike. 

Vigilantes don’t get a lot of media attention when the powers that be profit best off tightly leashed Supers rather than assorted do-gooders and violent masked defenders fighting crime without registering their abilities. 

Ian thinks it’s bullshit. The south side has always had better protection from Powered Up locals than any hired Supe, and from what Lip is saying, nothing much has changed. 

A few secretive vigilante forums pop up in Ian’s search, but they’re password protected and you have to answer moderator questions about yourself before they’ll give you access. Ian doesn’t bother. 

A search through social media leaves Ian with a ton of unsettling Hannibal-related posts, some weird bird watching bullshit, and a scant handful of references to the vigilante who is probably definitely Mickey. 

          yooooo the motherfuckin SHRIKE busted my cokehead cousins ass tonite

          literally i would kill a man to get the shrike to notice me. have you seen that ass?

          holy SHIT im fuckin shook. 2 dudes givin me a hard time outside of the whte swllw and this guy just busts their skulls like something out a movie. friend said he’s called the shrike

          the shrike just thru some knifes like a fckn ninja and hit the guy running away w my purse. wuldnt even let me blow him after

          banged the shrikes sister and didnt realize it til the guy walked out of the other room in the morning. shit my pants and left. stay away from bitches called mandy.

          MET THE ACTUAL SHRIKE OUTSIDE THE ALIBI LAST NIGHT. HE BUMMED A CIGARETTE OFF ME. I CAN DIE HAPPY. 

          fuck the shrike. heard he takes it up the ass. pussy.

There isn’t much more. Mickey has managed to keep remarkably under the radar. His real name isn’t mentioned online at all. Ian is kind of impressed. As someone who has joyfully bathed in the limelight up until the past two years, it amazes him that some Powered people can really keep their presence on such a downlow. 

Ian doesn’t sleep well that night. Not that he does most nights, but. This is different. He can’t stop replaying the moment Mickey saw him. The unmistakable surprise and relief, followed by abject dislike. 

Their conversation had barely been a conversation at all, but it’s clear that despite Mickey hiding from Ian during his time in training, Mickey still holds Ian’s leaving against him. 

Ian can’t blame him. When he thinks on it too hard, if Mickey had suddenly Powered Up before him, then left mere weeks later to become a Supe and never spoke to Ian again, Ian would have been beside himself. Devastated. Infuriated. He can’t imagine how Mickey has internalized it all, even if the abandonment was unintentional on Ian’s part. 

And it’s not like Ian hadn’t come back. He’d stopped at Mickey’s house, but his father had still been living there. Had been rotting away inside with his putrid hate. Ian had knocked and was glad the guy hadn’t recognized him. Ian didn’t even ask for Mickey. He’d just said he got the wrong house and walked away. 

The second time he’d visited Trumbull, no one was home. The third time, he’d spoken to Mickey’s brother, the scraggly blonde one with the baby face and goofy grin, eternally stoned. He’d said Mickey wasn’t around and, when prompted, that Mandy hadn’t lived in the house for over a year. 

And then life continued on. Work was busy and the city always needed him. 

People always need Ian, anonymous as they are, just bursts of time between Ian’s long and longer days. 

Ian has never stopped thinking of Mickey, but the less he has come around their neighborhood, the less it hurts to remember everything he has left behind. As far as Ian has been concerned, Mickey is out there living a life that doesn’t include Ian, and if he’d wanted one with Ian at all, the effort would have gone both ways. Even a little. 

But they’d been young. Ian can’t blame Mickey for not feeling for him with the same intensity that Ian has. 

And, truth be told, Mickey has dodged more than one bullet in escaping Ian before both of them were left riddled with holes. 

***

Ian keeps up with his nephews’ school schedules for the rest of the week. 

Freddie really does love school and soaks up his environment like a sponge. Sharp as a tack or not, first grade is a good year. What is there to worry about when you’re six? Ian takes heart knowing that Freddie hasn’t yet experienced a classic Gallagher childhood. 

Henry clings to Ian like he would a parent, and Ian basks in the attention. He wakes up in the morning to Henry’s knocks at the door. He effortlessly holds Henry up to the mirror so he can watch himself brush his teeth instead of standing on the little sink stool. Henry tries to pick clothes that match the colors Ian is wearing that day. He’s sweet and prone to crying, his feelings injured at the drop of a hat, and talks with a vocabulary that matches someone several years older than him. 

He is Ian’s little shadow, and Ian quietly hates himself for not being around more. 

That would have been a bad idea, though. Ian hadn’t been doing well for a long time. No need for the kids to see that shit. They deserve a childhood that doesn’t mirror Lip or Ian’s. 

Ian has also stopped at Patsy’s every single day after the park with Henry, but Mickey hasn’t shown up once. The waitress who’d been there that first day keeps giving him odd looks, but by now Ian can only assume it’s because she has recognized who he is rather than puzzling his connection to Mickey. 

“Am I gonna be a Super one day?” Henry asks, apropos of nothing, as Ian leaves cash at their booth and stands to leave.

“I don’t know,” Ian answers honestly. “Powers aren’t genetic. There’s no way to guess who will get them.”

At Henry’s blank stare, Ian pauses and thinks. 

“Genetic means, like, your family passes things on to you, from one body to another. Like how I have red hair and Aunt Debbie and Fran have red hair and so do you. Red hair is genetic in the Gallagher family. Our bodies are all kind of connected. It’s what makes us related to each other.”

“I want to be famous like you,” is all Henry says. 

“You don’t need to be famous,” Ian says as he takes Henry’s hand and walks him to the door. “I’m already your biggest fan.”

The glass door jangles and Mickey steps right into his path. 

This time Mickey doesn’t look glad to see him before the derision sets in. Instead, his eyebrows jolt toward his hairline before they scrunch together, his soft mouth twisting as he shoulders past Ian like he doesn’t know him. 

“Watch it,” Mickey mutters, shoving into the diner.

“Mickey,” Ian says quietly. He stands there, feeling smaller than he has in a long time. “At least talk to me once.”

Mickey makes a humorless noise and doesn’t turn back, just leans against the end of the serving counter and nods at the same waitress who calls out a greeting. 

“Mickey,” Ian repeats. “Just once. You owe me at least that for ignoring all my calls and the message Lip gave you.”

“For fuck’s sake.” Mickey turns on him, his eyes large and sharp, his features straining for control as he gets in Ian’s face, one finger jabbing into his chest. “I don’t know what you think you’re gonna get outta this shit, but it’s nothin’ good, alright? You—”

Mickey seems to remember where they are because his voice drops low, each word taut with barely restrained menace. 

“We were never anything good, Gallagher. You fuckin’ off was the best thing that ever happened to the both of us. Let’s leave it there.”

Ian stares at Mickey, marveling at the sheer amount of bullshit he just had to hear. It’s almost enough to make him laugh, just shy of hysterical, because what the actual fuck.

“You’re such a liar,” Ian whispers, smiling despite himself. No humor in the way his lips curve to bear his teeth. “Always—”

Vaguely, he registers Henry squeezing his hand and comes back to himself. Looks Mickey up and down. Takes in the way his tattooed fists clench at his sides. The tick in his jaw. The jut of his soft, rounded chin. The sheen in his bright eyes. 

Ian shrugs and takes a conciliatory step in retreat. 

“I’m back home now,” Ian says quietly, watchful for any sign of recognition in Mickey’s face. “For a while. Long while. After what my brother calls the Prudential Skydive.”

Mickey blinks and there it is. The brief, contained startle. The acknowledgement in the way Mickey also steps back and glances away, looks at everything but Ian. 

So, Mickey knows about it. No real way to avoid it, probably.

“You know where to find me,” Ian adds with a faint nod. He turns and opens the door, steps out into the heat. “Seeya, Mick.”

***

Ian’s birthday is Sunday and it feels like everyone and their mother is coming. He has been inundated with texts all Saturday, his family going over the top in support of his return. 

They’re probably all just grateful that Ian isn’t fucking dead. 

Ian still doesn’t know how best to tell them that a fall from a skyscraper will never be enough to end it for him, and even through his depression, he’d known this when he’d jumped. 

He’d just wanted a break. The long fall had been so briefly peaceful. 

All that aside, it’s nice. To feel like everyone wants him around. Loves him. Are returning from their ends of the earth to ransack the backyard and bring a familiar life to the Gallagher home. 

If there’s one thing Ian’s therapist has impressed upon him in these past weeks, it’s that Ian is accustomed to being an island in and of himself. Separate. Distant. Existing without extra life signs to populate the island. 

Ian needs people. He needs this. He just has to keep reminding himself that he wants it. 

Despite all that in mind, Ian finds himself alone, sneaking out late that evening, his birthday just on the horizon of midnight, and wandering to The Alibi. The spring evening is warm but not yet claustrophobic with heat. Easy to walk and get lost in the feel of familiar streets beneath his ancient Timberlands. 

He’s turning onto Ashland, sucking on a cigarette, when he hears a clatter and a crash, a holler and a curse, and then there’s a guy hurtling down the street, panting as he bolts past the few people lingering on the poorly lit pavement. 

Frowning, Ian takes a step aside and watches the guy fly by. Then a whistling sound shrieks past Ian’s face, a whoosh of air pursuing, and the guy cries out just feet away and drops. 

“Uh,” is all Ian says as he turns and approaches the groaning guy. A slim, black matte throwing dagger sticks out of his right shoulder, but no real harm done aside from a big ouch. “You good?” Ian asks. 

“Looks like you got some reflexes on you still,” a familiar, caustic voice cuts through the night. 

Ian, who has crouched beside the collapsed guy, his cigarette hanging on for dear life at his bottom lip, looks up with wonder. 

Mickey looms over him in black military fatigue pants tucked into high combat boots. In the mild heat, he’s only wearing a black tank tucked into the waistband, and his belt is adorned with holders for a dozen black throwing knives. Ian glances down and doesn’t miss the bowie knife handle sticking out from the side of Mickey’s boot. 

Under any other circumstances, Ian would have happily kissed those very boots. He’s not sure he has ever seen Mickey look hotter or more confident. Control looks good on him. 

“I’m on a break,” Ian says, standing up. “Not retired from old age. I’m still the best.” He looks at the guy who was now vaguely crying into the concrete, not even trying to run away. “Trouble in paradise?”

“Fuck off with the best. And this bitch just tried to mug a couple of workin’ girls. Asshole.”

Ian can’t remember the last time he worked the streets when it wasn’t set up for show. Sure, he’d encountered a few petty crimes headed to and from places in the city, but the incidents were few and far between. Big time Supes like Valiant received missions rather than being sent on the beat. Ian was forwarded along to drug busts and sting operations where there would no doubt be a camera operator in wait to record his glorious achievements.

Being bullet proof means that Ian spends more than his fair share of life staring down the wrong end of a gun. Busting down walls with fists that don’t bleed and being the first to walk into a burning building, facing the screams head-on. 

A part of him is glad that he’s able to help. He has always wanted to help. To be a part of something bigger than him. To be noticed, acknowledge, accepted as piece of a whole.

Belong. 

But he’s so tired. He’ll be twenty-four in a few hours and he is so fucking tired. 

So it’s with an oddly renewed sense of interest that he watches Mickey yank the assailant up by the collar and get face to face with him, intimate in ways Ian only has long lost memories of. 

But Mickey’s smile isn’t kind or revved up like he’d sometimes get with Ian as kids. His entire demeanor is big and bold and bloodthirsty, unflinching in the face of anyone or anything. He doesn’t look tired at all. He looks lit the fuck up and Ian wants to lick him like a livewire and hope some of that energy flashes through him too. 

“You get a one-off tonight,” Mickey enunciates in the guy’s face, each word bullet-quick. “Don’t make me regret not making you disappear.”

Without ceremony, Mickey yanks the throwing knife from the guy’s shoulder and smiles wider when the guy cries out. 

“You’re lucky I didn’t aim somewhere that bleeds you out in sixty seconds flat,” Mickey says as he shoves the guy off and away, stumbling back, nearly falling. “The Shrike never misses, bitch. Don’t fuckin’ forget. Now go!”

“Wow,” Ian says with a dazed sense of wonder as he watches the guy absolutely haul ass. He slides a dreamy kind of grin Mickey’s way. “Nice.”

A flash of that shy, old Mickey sparks in and out of existence in a snap, before Mickey’s rolling his eyes and licking his lips as he wipes the knife on his fatigues and slips the blade into one of the holders around his waist. 

“Shut up,” Mickey says. Looks at Ian. Half of his face is in shadow, the other illuminated in the dingy orange streetlight. “The fuck’re you doin’?”

Ian looks around. 

“Walking?”

“Alright smartass, whatever.” Mickey turns on his heel. 

“I’m headed to The Alibi,” Ian calls out, standing stock still in place. He’s not sure why his feet won’t let him chase Mickey. Maybe he feels like he doesn’t deserve to. Maybe he’s just too used to being lonely. “It’s my birthday in a few hours. Was gonna ring it in right.”

“Alone in that shit hole?” Mickey asks, turning back, his face screwed up in some kind of look that Ian doesn’t know him well enough to decipher anymore. “Don’t you got a big bad tower full’a Supes to celebrate your narrow ass?”

Ian shrugs, scuffing his boot on the sidewalk as he looks down and away, flicking his nearly burnt out cig to the sidewalk and watching it glow a weak orange before it burns out completely. 

“The Tower isn’t as buddy-buddy as the media is paid to portray.”

“I hope the shock in my voice is super obvious,” Mickey says flatly, no emotion detected. They’re still speaking from a great distance. Mickey hasn’t approached since he stopped walking away. 

Ian doesn’t know what to say to that. He presses his lips tightly together and nods once, lifts his hand in a motionless, weak wave, and turns back toward his destination. 

He doesn’t hear Mickey follow. 

The Alibi smells the same as ever. Doesn’t matter how many years pass. The sticky floors and old booths reek of childhood. Of hours spent being babysat by the bartenders as Frank drank their lives away. Sometimes Frank would give Ian money for the gambling game machine in the corner and Ian, too young to understand that this wasn’t a simple arcade game, was in fucking heaven for a few hours, until the quarters ran out. 

Lip and him would drink here together, barely thirteen and scraping the bottom of the barrel in search of air conditioning on sweltering summer days. One time, Monica took Fiona, Lip, Ian, and Debbie here to meet some guy to whom she owed money. They disappeared together and Ian remembers ten year-old Fiona changing Debbie’s diaper on one of the lacquered tables. 

“Ian!” Kev is all smiles and it inevitably makes Ian smile in return. It’s indescribably nice to be greeted by his name around here. It’s almost depressingly nice to not be Valiant. “There’s my man! Come on, first shot’s on the house.”

Ian sits before him and briefly considers turning down the shot. His medication has been readjusted and some days he still feels cottony and distant if he lets himself get too cozy in the fog that can threaten his environment. But it’s been weeks, and it’s basically Ian’s birthday, and Mickey is somewhere out there being beautiful and dangerous and full of life, so Ian accepts the shot and the following beer. 

“You excited for your party tomorrow?” Kev asks, all golden retriever excitement. “The twins can’t stop talking about it. Meeting Valiant and stuff. No matter how many times we tell them that yeah, me and V half-raised you kids long before the girls came around, they just think we’re bullshitting them.”

“I mean, yeah, the idea that you raised anyone, half-way or not, is pretty unbelievable,” Ian says, grinning. 

They’re both sharing a laugh when someone wordlessly slips into the seat beside Ian. 

“How far ahead of me are you,” Mickey says, sliding a brief look Ian’s way before his gaze darts away to the bartop. 

Ian blinks, his heart doing that thing where it stretches and expands like something waking up after a long sleep, all long arms above the head, old muscles flexing, filling and challenging the small space between Ian’s ribs. 

“Uh.” Ian swallows and is glad Mickey isn’t looking at him, is lighting up and blowing smoke up and away, because Ian’s sure his entire heart is in his eyes. “Not far. Shot and a beer.”

Mickey scoffs, even as Kev is already setting up the same in front of him.

“You call that a party? Working the Loop has made you weak as hell.”

“This isn’t a party,” Ian says, though he can’t help but crack a smile as he watches Mickey lift the shot with the same hand holding the cigarette between the vee of his tattooed fingers. Mickey’s throat flexes as he downs the shot; turns the glass upside down on the bar and shoves it forward. 

“‘Nother,” Mickey says. He still hasn’t looked at Ian. Not since he first sat. He’s not wearing the same clothes as twenty minutes ago. His faded jeans fit him well but aren’t fitted, giant rips across the knees. His t-shirt is deep gray, a couple of holes in the collar and on one near the hip, like he caught it on something sharp and caused a rip. The glint of a gold chain tucked into the shirt. Same boots though. Ian knows military grade boots, even if they’re only peeking out from under jeans.

“The fuck’re you lookin’ at,” Mickey asks, turning on him now. He doesn’t sound aggressive, but his brows bolt up high, asking a question without the words. 

“It’s good to see you,” Ian says, his lips curved. He hears Kev place their new shots but can’t look away, not while Mickey is making delightfully belligerent eye contact. 

Again, Mickey’s attention shies away, looks elsewhere. Ian wants to grip him by the jaw and demand that Mickey look. Look at him. Remember him. The entire city of Chicago can have its eyes on Ian and it’s not the same as this one wary, daring gaze. 

“Yeah, alright,” Mickey says quietly, which, fuck, is as good as anything he can say. 

“Alright,” Ian says, humor lighting his voice as he grabs his shot. “Happy birthday to me.”

Mickey huffs a laugh, his muscular shoulders slumping a little as he grabs his own shot and knocks it against Ian’s. Their knuckles brush. 

“Sure, that,” Mickey says, and drinks. 

Ian can barely drink for his own smile.

“So,” Ian says as they both nurse their beers and Mickey pointedly stares forward, smoking. “Lip told me you been doing this thing for years now.”

At Mickey’s shrug and long exhale of smoke, eyes relegated straight ahead, Ian leans in, just a little. Infringes on Mickey’s space. Their elbows touch, skin to skin, a subtle, deep burn of connection.

Ian has never been good at self-preservation. 

“Did you. . .” Ian wants to work his words better. Be smoother. But the booze is busting his brain and he’s never been as good with Mickey as he has ever wanted to be. “Were you Powered Up before? When we. . .knew each other.”

Knew each other. Implying they don’t know each other now. It’s not accurate. Not by a long shot. Ian thinks that Mickey may have known him better than anyone at that point in his life; even more than Lip. And vice versa. 

Mickey looks at him then, his blue eyes bright and narrow, his dark brows scrunched. Soft mouth twisted up, a hard pulse beating along his throat. 

“The fuck? Of course I wasn’t. You think I wouldn’t have fuckin’ told you the minute it happened?” Mickey crushes out his cigarette in the second shot glass and leaves it there. “You were already gone, man. On a fuckin’ island, livin’ it up. Escaping the goddamn south side. How was I gonna tell you? On the fuckin’ phone like some long distance girlfriend?”

“Communication is a two-way street, Mickey,” Ian says, feeling instantly sour. 

Living it up. Sure. The grueling, brutal training that had chipped away at his body and mind to carve some kind of living deity, equally powerful as he was fragile in turn, was the absolute highlight of Ian’s life. 

Mickey scoffs at that and looks away again. Drinks deep from his beer. Ian feels like his shoulders are set in stone, a heavy, straining weight, threatening to collapse him as he waits. 

“Yeah,” Mickey says, setting down his pint glass. “And I communicated to your fuckin’ brother that we were done. Wasn’t ‘cause I was Powered. Wasn’t ‘cause you left. Not really. Was the best for both of us. Then and now.”

Ian wants to bite back. Wants to draw blood. Not with his hands, as he is wont to do in his profession, but with his mouth. Wants to tear a bite out of Mickey the way Mickey had once consumed him so wholly that Ian thought they were a part of each other, in each other, maybe even soul—

“You got someone?” Ian asks. 

Mickey does an outright double take. Ian feels a single bubble of humor float up. He has forgotten how fun it is to be around someone like Mickey. Not someone like Mickey. Just Mickey. 

“Got someone what,” he snaps, eyebrows high, his gaze flitting around the room. “Hostage? Not currently.”

Ian laughs then. Can’t fucking help it. Laughs into his Old Style as he brings the glass to his mouth, grinning despite himself. 

“Me neither,” Ian says, chancing a glance Mickey’s way and surprised to find him already watching, his mouth softly pouted in the way it gets when he’s trying to form the words to something he doesn’t yet know how to say. “No hostages in my life right now, I mean.”

“Congratulations on being alone,” Mickey says, waving him off like he wants to shoo Ian away. Ian has missed those hands. Small and nimble, murderously quick and strong, capable and coaxingly gentle under different circumstances. 

“Thanks,” Ian says, smiling because he can’t not. “I consider it a lifetime achievement.”

“Aright, drama queen, shut the fuck up with that,” Mickey says, and there it is. That familiar humor and warmth seeping through his words, softening the shrapnel edges. “You’re twenty-four. Ain’t the end of the fuckin’ world.”

“Not twenty-four yet,” Ian says, absently checking his watch. “One more hour. You gonna spend it with me, Mick?”

Mickey’s gaze slams into Ian like a solid punch to the chest, all sudden emotion and surprise across his soft and hard, supple and sharp features, that face a constant, unrelenting dichotomy of the two men Mickey is inside. 

“An hour with you sounds like some hard fuckin’ work, Gallagher,” Mickey says, but his expression say something different. Ian’s heart simply keeps expanding. It hurts in the way that good things sometimes do. 

“Yeah, I’m pretty high maintenance,” Ian says, still grinning like an idiot. 

“Says who?” Mickey asks, his eyebrows high and expectant. “Easiest asshole to please this side of the tracks. Just gotta pet you and say one nice thing and you’re happy for like, a week.”

The fact that Mickey even keeps assumptions like that about Ian after all this time has Ian beaming, his defenses blurred and softened by beer and whiskey. 

Ian leans in. Their arms have been pressed together since some time back. Maybe Mickey has passed on some of that life spark, because Ian is practically aglow, a low level hum in his rushing veins. Mickey tilts his chin just enough, his expression gone mild and quiet as he peers up into Ian’s eyes. 

“You gonna pet me, Mick?” Ian asks quietly, voice dropped low to avoid open ears. “I could be real good for you.”

Mickey ducks his head, their faces so close that Ian’s chin brushes Mickey’s forehead with the motion. If they weren’t so close, Ian would have missed Mickey’s hushed, shaky exhale, but he doesn’t. He hears it and his heart expands again, threatening to break right through Ian’s chest and fall at Mickey’s feet all over again. 

“I’m not—” Mickey starts, his voice vulnerable, husky in ways Ian hasn’t heard in a lifetime. “Not here for that, man. Just—your needy ass ain’t the type meant to be alone. On your stupid fuckin’ birthday or whatever. That shit matters to you even when you act like it don’t. You got me?”

Ian rears back with a sharp breath, his pulse pumping hard in his burning ears. The sudden, damp sheen to his vision is a shock to the system; Mickey’s words more powerful than catching a bullet to the chest. 

He was anticipating a lot of replies, but none of them were that.  

Ian is still sitting there, dumbfounded and dead silent, reeling with the care in Mickey’s words when Mickey flicks that guarded gaze his way and then back to the bar. His entire frame shifts, keeping a physical distance from Ian as he returns to nursing his beer. 

They drink in silence for a while and it’s not uncomfortable. Not really. Feels like catching up with an old friend, minus the words. They already know that they know each other. 

“Did you mean it?” Mickey says, thumbing at his brow again, again, again, staring straight ahead. “When you.”

Ian frowns and doesn’t speak. Folds his arms on the bar and eases into Mickey’s space. 

“Jumped,” Mickey finished quietly. Chews at his bottom lip, all red and tender. 

Ian doesn’t pull back this time, but it’s a close thing. He’s not used to people asking him anything about anything important anymore. Lip, maybe. When he’s feeling excessively pushy. Not even his manager gives enough of a shit to really get into it with him. His therapist, sure, but it’s her job and doesn’t take Ian for a loop like Mickey Milkovich outright asking if he’d once intended to kill himself. 

“No,” Ian says. Once again, he watches Mickey’s shoulders slump and he hadn’t even realized Mickey was holding himself up so tightly. “No, even then I—I didn’t. I’m practically indestructible, Mickey. I’ve stepped on a landmine and been the only one to walk away from it.” That one burns to say out loud, but Mickey has got to know. It’s somehow important that at least Mickey knows it, gets it. “I wasn’t. . .well. I wasn’t well. Not for a long time. I just wanted some fuckin’ peace.”

To Ian’s mute horror, Mickey abruptly turns on him, blue eyes livid with hot, unshed tears. 

“The fuck you mean, peace?” he snaps, his voice hoarse and hushed. “Who would be at peace? You? Your fuckin’ family? Chicago? Everyone idolizes you, man. You’re like—like, everybody loves you. They love you, Ian. You want peace from that? Fuck off.”

“Mickey.” Ian doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t let himself think. He reaches out and places his hand on Mickey’s knee. Beneath the bar, just out of the way from prying eyes; and anyone looking doesn’t care anyway. Not when Ian is Just Ian here. “It’s not—it’s not like that. I wanted peace from myself. I’m sick. I’m sick like my mom was sick. Got sick real bad all the way back at the academy, that first year.”

“What?” Mickey rolls a shoulder, his expression crumpled and incredulous, but he doesn’t swipe Ian’s hand away, nor does he even seem to register its presence. “The fuck d’you mean, sick? You ain’t ever said shit about your ma past she was batshit cr—”

Mickey pauses, his plush lips clamped together, tight and white. He’s stubbornly staring at Ian’s chin, his entire frame stiff. 

“I’m not crazy,” Ian says, and at least he can say that now and feel like he’s not lying. “I just—I’m bipolar. Y’know? Big mood swings. Bad ones. Sometimes worse ones. The worst was at the academy. It’s why I—why I stopped trying to contact you for so long, until I was off-island.”

“And that—” Mickey’s mouth chews on something, his eyes darting around the area of Ian’s chest, then away, lingering on his burnt out cigarette in a shot glass. “That bipolar shit. It’s why you’re all—whatever happened?”

“Yeah,” Ian says. The details aren’t necessary right now. 

Ian startles a bit when Mickey’s gaze bolts back to his, hard and assessing, demanding. 

“So who the fuck been takin’ care of you all this time?” Mickey bites off, his top lip curling back in a sneer, his body taking on the bulky, puffed-out aggression so long familiar to Ian. “Who the fuck dropped that ball?”

There’s too many factors to get into tonight. Ian’s agency with a convenient blind-eye. Ian himself. The lies he’d been playing off to his therapist. His manager with too many Supes on her plate. Ian’s predilection for keeping to himself more and more over the years, so no one was around to notice. 

“There’s no one specific to blame, okay,” Ian murmurs, attempting to soothe. He squeezes Mickey’s knee and Mickey jolts like he really hasn’t noticed Ian’s touch, but again, does not push him away. Ian takes a deep breath and offers a small, warm smile. Mickey’s concern is both shocking and humbling. Heartening. Warm. Feels like family, after all this time. “Thank you for worrying, though.”

“Wasn’t worried,” Mickey mutters, turning back to the bar with arms folded across the surface, thumbing at his nose as he catches Ian’s gaze, then glances away, then back. “Was pissed. Still pissed. Saw your ass at Patsy’s and wanted to deck you for all the shit you been pullin’ these days. Reckless as fuck, even for you.”

“Aw.” Ian grins, shouldering at Mickey and squeezing his knee again. “You been keeping tabs on me, Mickey? That’s cute. Have you been my biggest fan all along?”

“Fuck off with that shit.” Mickey short-punches Ian in the shoulder, hard, and Ian makes a show of saying ow even though it barely registers on his pain scale. He grins at Mickey all over again, relishing the high color to Mickey’s soft cheeks. “Still obnoxious as hell.”

“Don’t fix what isn’t broken,” Ian says cheerfully as he finishes off his beer. No more for him, he reminds himself. Tomorrow is a birthday party and, more importantly, Mickey is apparently not interested in any kind of petting, heavy or not, so it’s best Ian doesn’t get himself entirely wrecked around the guy. 

“Think this is more a case of no one’s perfect and you sure as fuck ain’t,” Mickey shoots back, but his lips are curved as he drinks too. 

“Um, have you met me?” Ian asks with an exaggerated air of importance. “I’m Valiant, my dude. I’m flawless. Beyonce basically wrote that song about me.”

“First,” Mickey begins, finishing off his drink with a large swallow and signaling Kev for another. “Call me dude again and lose a finger. Second, ain’t nobody as alien-lookin’ as you get to call themselves flawless. And third, Beyonce wrote that song in like twenty-thirteen. You weren’t shit then.”

“Mm.” Ian nods in silent, thoughtful agreement. Then, “So you’re a Beyonce fan.”

“Fuck you is what I’m a fan of, Jesus fucking Christ.”

“What’s your favorite song? Old school, like Crazy in Love? Single Ladies? Halo?”

“You namin’ all these fuckin’ songs is the gayest shit I ever heard and I watch goddamn porn!” Mickey half-hollers, his face red as he shoves at Ian’s arm again and then again, boyish and charmingly riled. 

Ian starts laughing, can’t help it as he shoves Mickey back, deftly avoiding the solid attempt at a jab to his chin, and laughing again. 

“I’m more of a—” Ian barks a laugh and dodges a slap, “Countdown and Love on Top kind of guy!"

“Fuck off!” Mickey sputters a flustered laugh and kicks at Ian’s shin, landing a good one. 

“Partition,” Ian manages around deteriorating giggles, spreading his legs wide to avoid another kick. “You like 7/11? That’s a good—ONE!”

The wind knocks out of Ian for a brief moment as Mickey solidly digs his elbow into the meat of Ian’s thigh, just high enough that being near his dick with that kind of roughhousing energy is both a threat and promise. Ian actually has to take a moment to catch his breath.

“Not so indestructible, huh,” Mickey says, radiating smug victory as he shoulders Ian one more time and turns to his fresh beer for a long, cool drink. 

Ian chuckles and folds his arms on the bar, rests his brow upon them as he smiles, his cheeks aching. He can’t remember the last time he laughed like that. 

“The fuck you laughin’ to yourself for,” Mickey drawls, slow and amused, and when Ian turns his head to pillow his cheek upon his arms, he finds those eyes sparkling with that familiar something they’ve always had, through thick and thin. Fuck if Ian hasn’t experienced that with only one person in his entire lifetime. 

Ian wants to kiss him. Just one more time. To know if they glow together.

The desire must show in Ian’s expression because Mickey’s face flushes pink up to his sweet little ears, his eyes rolling as he looks away and thumbs at his plush bottom lip, then licks it. Then, as if someone dared him to, Mickey returns to Ian and grabs his arm, holding it out to glance at his watch. 

“Happy birthday, asshole,” Mickey says, his hands a warm brand around Ian’s wrist and his racing pulse.

Their eyes meet and Ian keeps his cheek pressed to his other folded arm, feeling excessively comfortable and safe in ways he can’t remember since sleeping in his childhood bed surrounded by his brothers.

“Thanks, Mickey,” he says softly. Reverent. Remembering this moment forever. 

Not long after, they burst from The Alibi doors and stroll, slightly off-center, bumping against each other as they head back. Ian doesn’t know where Mickey lives now, but he’ll walk with Mickey as long as it’s allowed. 

Despite it being barely past midnight on a Saturday, this stretch of the street is relatively undisturbed. They turn onto a residential street, the sidewalk dark and poorly light as they keep their hands to their pockets and their elbows knocking. 

Ian hums something very specific under his breath, daring to glance at Mickey every other second. Mickey aims a narrow look at Ian, knowing. Ian grins. 

“Ohhh,” Ian starts quietly, finding the key to match the depth of his voice, “killin’ me softlyyy. . .”

“Stop.” Mickey starts walking faster. 

“And I’m still fallin’, still the one I need, I will always be with youuu,” Ian sings, picking up his pitch with vaguely drunk confidence, giggling when Mickey groans and scrubs a hand down his face, lingering over his mouth. 

“WoOah,” Ian sings again, getting into it on purpose, beaming as he catches Mickey looking away with a snort of laughter. “You got me all gone, don't ever let me go!”

“I will cut your fuckin’ tongue out!” Mickey shoots Ian a murderous look, entirely ruined by how red his face is as they pass beneath lamplight. 

“Say it real loud if you fly, if you leave me you’re out of your mind!”

“My baby is a TEN,” Ian starts, shoving up against Mickey, grinning wildly as he continues, “We dressin’ to the—now you, Mickey.”

“Now I kill you? Great idea.”

“We dressin’ to the—” Ian stops. Waits, waits, keep walking.

Mickey sighs. Seems to deflate entirely. 

“Nine,” he says, despondent. 

Ian thinks this is the best birthday present he has ever had in his entire life. 

“He pick me up—”

“We eight.”

“Make me feel so lucky—”

“Seven.” There's a smile.

“He kiss me in—”

“His six.”

“We be makin’ love—”

“At five.” A blush as Mickey looks away but keeps playing along.

“Still the one I do—”

“This four.”

“I’m tryin’ to make us—”

“A three.”

“From—”

“That two.”

“He still the one,” they sing together, barely holding it together before Ian cackles like an absolute idiot and throws his arm around Mickey’s shoulder, dragging him along. 

“I knew it!” Ian crows. “You can’t hide from me, Mickey Milkovich. I am a GOD.”

“You’re fuckin’ drunk is what you are,” Mickey says with a short, breathless laugh as he ducks away from under Ian’s arm. 

“Not me. I’m a fuckin’—I’m solid.”

“You sure are.”

“Hey.” Ian stops, looking around with a frown. “You don’t live this way, do you? Are you walking me home? You know I can kill like five guys, alone, with my bare hands.”

Something about that must really get Mickey going because his breath hitches in a way Ian suddenly remembers after the longest time. Mickey licks his lips and looks down the street, scratching at his eyebrow. 

“Just makin’ sure your drunk ass still remembers where you live.”

“Hard to forget,” Ian says, but he can’t help smiling. Leaning in to really savor every emotion shifting across those pretty features. “But that’s nice. You’re still nice, Mick. Always real nice to me.”

“You’re delusional as fuck when you drink,” Mickey mutters, but eventually he turns back in the direction of the Gallagher house as he shoves at Ian until they get walking again. 

Ian is happy to walk along beside Mickey, feeling excessively young again, but in the good way. Not the confused, hurting way. Not right now, anyway. That will come later. Ian thinks he still might be going through growing pains. 

Is everyone still growing at twenty-four? His therapist says he has a skewed view of personal growth and responsibility from watching his siblings mature into adulthood before puberty even hit.

It doesn’t sound wrong. Just weird. 

“Well, this is me,” Ian says as they approach the gate. He leans back against it, both hands gripping the metal railing, and smiles down at Mickey. “Thank you,” he says earnestly. “This was the best birthday.”

Mickey’s eyebrows rocket up. 

“Yeah, okay, big guy.”

“S’true.” Ian nods, probably too enthusiastically, because his brain kind of sloshes around his skull for a second after he finishes. “Birthdays suck. Don’t even celebrate them unless the family makes me. Or, like, for media purposes. Thought it was so fun in the beginning. Now it’s just annoying. None of them care about me. Know me. Not really. You know?”

Mickey looks at him for a long time, his brow wrinkled, his mouth downturned. Thinking hard, Ian imagines. 

Thoughtlessly, Ian leans in. 

Mickey’s hand spreads across the center of him. Stops him, a firm, warm weight where Ian’s heart has been growing. It leaps against Mickey’s palm and Ian whines once, softly, his chin angled for the kiss that won’t come. Denied. 

“You don’t want to do that, man,” Mickey says quietly. Stern. Eyes gone midnight dark and just as shrouded from understanding. When Ian huffs out a breath of frustration and pushes against Mickey’s hand, Mickey does not relent. He softly says, “Ian, no,” and Ian stills. 

“I don’t care,” Ian whispers, meeting Mickey’s eyes as he watches the expression drop to confusion, maybe disappointment. “I mean, I—I don’t care if we don’t glow. Never have. You—you make me—”

“Hey.” Mickey’s hand pats Ian’s chest twice, slides up to lightly slap Ian’s hot cheek once. They’re close, but not close enough, but Mickey meets his eyes in the dark and gives him a quelling look. “Cool it with that shit. Let’s just think of this as a not half-bad birthday, alright? Get some sleep, man.”

Before Ian can pull himself together to fight for—for whatever this is—Mickey is turning away and walking down the street. His swagger is so distinct, so familiar that Ian’s heart threatens once more to break free. 

Ian keeps watching Mickey walk away until he can’t see anything at all. Lets himself inside, trips over twenty pairs of shoes, and stumbles up the stairs. Falls face down in bed, clothes on, and dreams of Mickey’s hand on his chest. 

***

Surprisingly, it’s a lot easier to remain sober when surrounded by the chaos of Gallaghers & Co. than it is when Mickey Milkovich is smiling and drinking and smoking beside him.

Ian doesn’t really get hangovers—something about his body chemistry flushes out toxins remarkably fast. Unfortunately, his medication still makes it simple to get white-girl wasted if he gets carried away. Singing Beyonce in the street definitely falls under that category. 

He distracts himself from the unfinished feeling of last night by moving through and around his family and friends. Everyone seems to have been on board for this shit and, again, Ian is almost positive this is some kind of wordless show of solidarity in the face of Ian’s recent struggles rather than anyone actually caring this much about his birthday, but. 

Ian is, yet again, trying to remind himself that he needs people in his life more than his brain claims he wants. It’s also a work in progress, okay. 

“This is what I was made for,” Ian says as he holds both arms out and walks around with a multitude of laughing children hanging off either arm. Henry and Freddie and Fran cling to one, and Fiona’s two kids, Lucy and Felicity, giggling on the other. “I’m gonna spin!” 

“He’s like a human jungle gym,” Fiona says from somewhere in the distance as Ian spins and grins, and the kids scream and squeal.

“I really need him to get on my roof and fix the shingles,” V says wistfully. 

“I can fix shingles,” Kev says, sounding vaguely injured about it all. “Never met a shingle I couldn’t fix.”

“You can be his moral support, baby,” V says soothingly. 

Later on, Fiona gets her claws in him properly. Corners him on the stairs where he’s smoking and checking his phone. He’d just finished checking in with his manager, confirming that he’s alive and well but not ready for duty yet, and then wishing he’d managed to squeeze Mickey’s cell number out of him. 

“How you doin’, Sweetface,” Fiona says as she drops down beside him. Her body feels so small beside Ian these days. She’s always been larger than life; the real Super, the powerhouse behind the house. 

“I’m here, aren’t I,” Ian says with a bland, tight smile. 

“Uh huh.” Fiona gives him a knowing look. Bumps at his shoulder. “Times been tough, though.”

“Times have always been tough.” Ian inhales deep of his cigarette. Holds onto the smoke and eventually exhales when he realizes Fiona isn’t going to speak until he gives her something to work with. “I’m alright. Stable enough. Feeling the normal kind of down that anyone feels when they fuck up their life again.”

A small, cool hand rests on Ian’s forearm. Ian’s been so long without touch, up in that fucking tower. Strange to really let it happen again, after all this time. It’s not the same as fans grabbing at him like he’s meat. 

“You didn’t fuck up your life, because you’re still alive, and that’s all that matters.” Fiona pauses. Squeezes Ian’s arm. They’re both staring out at the backyard, clogged with loved ones. Carl’s holding Fran in a piggy back and she’s practically strangling him with her arms around his neck. “If anything, you have an opportunity to reassess your life for what you want to do with it going forward.” 

Ian frowns and glances at her placid profile. 

“I’m only good for one thing, Fiona. It’s all I’ve ever done. All I know. Forward isn’t a direction I have available to me.”

Fiona looks at him then, and there’s that Gallagher fire. The furnace that keeps them all burning bright and hard, unrelenting in this fucked up world. 

“Fuck that shit,” Fiona says. “You’re an incredible human. Not a Super. A human being. Ian Gallagher. You’re smart as hell. Dependable and driven and dauntless. You unhappy? You fucked up with your life? Only you can change it. And you can change it.”

Ian’s jaw tenses against the words, his eyes burning in their sockets. He can’t hold her gaze for long and looks away. 

Fiona sighs and squeezes Ian’s arm once more before releasing. She stands up and briefly ruffles a hand through his hair, ignoring the styling product and messing it up as she pleases. 

“You got choices, Ian. You’re twenty-four. Whole life ahead of you. Make it worth it.”

***

Monday brings the usual school schedule and Ian embraces it wholeheartedly. 

While he doesn’t think the world of childcare is anything he’d be good at in the long term, Ian has missed out on so much uncle time that getting to do this for the boys feels like a second chance at this whole thing. 

Ian has been thinking a lot about second chances lately.  

The day is abruptly cold and rainy, as early May is wont to be. Ian can’t take Henry to the park after dropping off Freddie, but Ian and his incredible Google skills discover a local bookshop that has a kids reading time, and they head there. 

Henry doesn’t want Ian to step away, even though story time is obviously for little kids, but Ian sits at the back of the crowd and Henry sits on his lap, content. Ian takes a selfie of the two of them and texts the family group chat. 

          Lip [10:26]: I hope you’re not trying to indoctrinate my son as your own, because I have legal rights. 

          Ian [10:27]: I’ve been told we look alike.

          Lip [10:27]: Yeah well you and Clifford the Big Red Dog also look alike but no one thinks you fucked a dog to make that happen. 

          Carl [10:30]: Woah, the chat is poppin this morning. Bestiality, right in front of my salad 🥗 🐶

          Fiona [10:33]: You two are too cute! Give me more bonding! 😍

          Ian [10:36]: Get the girls in the same state as me and I’ll take on every Gallagher child in existence. 

          Fiona [10:40]: SOON

Afterward, Ian lets Henry pick out a couple of books to buy, and they have cookies and warm drinks in the cafe next door while they go through the books together. As they’re reading about the bear who loses his hat, a vast, encompassing glow like a swirling lighthouse illuminates the entire cafe, so bright that Ian quickly places a hand over Henry’s eyes and shuts his own. 

The glow dissipates as quickly as it came, leaving two women staring at each other in abject shock as they part from what must have been their first kiss. One of them bursts into tears while the other simply gawks, looking absolutely flabbergasted.

The entire room bursts into applause and Ian politely claps along before pointedly turning his back on the ruckus to focus on Henry. 

“They’re soulmates?” Henry asks with a frown. 

“Yup,” Ian says, trying not to think too hard on it.

“They don’t look happy about it,” Henry says. “That one is crying.”

“Some people cry when they’re happy,” Ian says as he turns the page. “Or surprised.”

“Oh.” Henry won’t stop looking at the women. He keeps glancing past Ian’s shoulder, his face eternally serious. “I don’t want a soulmate if it makes me cry. That’s too sad.”

Ian smiles despite himself. Ruffles Henry’s copper curls. 

“Crying is good for you,” Ian says, because that’s what his therapist says and not because he’s actually comfortable with it himself. Him and Henry have more than hair in common. Henry is as much a crybaby as Ian has always struggled not to be. The world in which he grew up certainly helped crush out the compulsion, but his emotions have always lurked dangerously close to the surface. For better or worse. 

After dropping off Henry, Ian drives through the rain and heads home. He checks his social media accounts and writes a broad spectrum thank you to all the fans who wish him a happy birthday, and likes a couple of the more exemplary messages and fanvids before closing out and feeling antsy as hell again. 

He drops by at Kev and V’s to discuss the shingles. Because that’s what Ian has amounted to these days. V is actually really knowledgeable and helpful about the whole thing, and she sends him to Home Depot with a list of what to purchase to make it happen once the rain stops and dries out. 

With his trunk and backseat filled with shingles and tools, Ian picks up Freddie from school and listens to the smarty pants go on about starting multiplication in a special math time he is pulled out for every day. If Ian feels this proud, he can’t imagine how Lip and Tami must feel. 

In the evening, Ian watches television with the family and errantly glances at his phone as if he can will Mickey into existence. They don’t even know each other’s numbers, but Ian’s inner dreamworld has always been a lot more deluded than the average person.

Tuesday brings more rain, which means no park again. Bundled up in cozy sweaters, the both of them, Ian takes Henry to the library near Freddie’s school. There’s an entire floor dedicated to the kids section, with fantastical interactive areas like a massive train set and a doll house, an entire wall of chalkboard to draw on, a miniature store filled with plastic toys and a working register with toy money, and an area of iPads with kid games installed. 

Ian loyally follows Henry around, taking videos to share with the chat, and pretending to work at the little corner store as Henry comes in to shop. Ian lets Henry get away with a bit of shoplifting because he just loves him that much. 

It’s kind of a thing with Ian. 

Afterward, Ian drops off Henry and again finds himself at loose ends. He hasn’t been so unburdened in so long that he hasn’t a fucking clue what to do. Ian had been sixteen when he’d Powered Up and immediately decided to get trained to be a Super, to pursue a future of greatness and glory. And even before that, he’d worked an after school job, helped with Lip’s ice cream truck in the summer, actively worked out, and spent all of his free time harassing Mickey. 

Now what? 

What to do with a life put on hold? 

Ian spends the hours before picking up Freddie simply watching television while eating cereal from an unnaturally small children's bowl, shoveling that shit right in his mouth as he watches embarrassingly bad, back to back episodes of Ghost Adventures. 

“I’m gonna haunt the shit out of everyone when I’m dead,” Ian says to no one. “Just, indiscriminately haunt. No one is allowed to forget about me.”

Wednesday brings the sun. The park is muddy, but Henry has his little Bluey rain boots and he mostly enjoys pulling worms out of puddles to save their slimy lives. Ian trails in tow, his own battered Timbs clinging with mud up to the ankle. On the way back to the car, Henry splashes in a puddle the size of Lake Michigan and mud splatters across Ian’s jeans right up to the thigh. 

Ian looks down at his jeans, then to Henry’s big, pleading eyes. 

“Nice,” Ian says with a considering frown. “Good air on that jump.”

Henry giggles and jumps again for good measure. They’re both good and painted with mud by the time they get in the car. 

Patsy’s greets them with the now-familiar scent of diner coffee and bacon, a welcome reprieve as they find a both seat and the sun streams in, across the chipped formica table. 

They’ve only just ordered when Ian gets a weird feeling and looks up and out to the street where their booth is bumped up against. On the sidewalk, standing almost directly in front of their table, is Mickey, looking in.

Ian’s entire heart does that thing where it swells too big for his body and he beams, waving like a dork. 

Come in, he mouths, gesturing for Mickey to hurry it up. 

A complicated expression crosses Mickey’s face, taut and unsure, before he stiffly nods and heads in. 

“Mickey!” hollers that nice waitress whose name Ian now knows is Betty. “You’re early. Don’t have your order ready yet.”

“S’fine,” Mickey says, attention already locked on Ian as he makes his way to their booth. “Hey,” he says, not sitting. He looks at Henry. “Hey. . .”

“Henry,” Ian reminds him. 

“Right.” Mickey looks at Ian again, his gaze guarded and unreadable, but scanning Ian nonetheless. Ian feels himself warm beneath the assessment.

“You wanna sit?” Ian says, scooting over to press himself closer to the window. 

Mickey doesn’t say anything, but he does sit. Beneath the table, their knees brush, and Ian can’t help but think of their night at the bar, roughhousing and exchanging touches like that’s normal for them. It’s not. This isn’t normal. None of what is going on is normal and, somewhere in the back of Ian’s head, he recognizes that good things don’t just happen to him, so this will inevitably turn into something that will cease to be good. 

Ian just hopes this lasts a little bit longer before he has to return to his Mickey-less life. 

Mickey scratches at his temple and looks out at the diner, the clamor somehow softened with him as a barrier between Ian and the rest of the joint. Then Mickey mumbles something while glancing away and Ian has to lean in with a frown. 

“What was that?”

“I said you—” Mickey looks at him and oh, sometimes his eyes are so much bluer than others. His dark lashes drop, gaze lowered to the table top where his tattooed fingers brush across a paper napkin. “You been gone. Or whatever.”

“Gone?”

“Hadn’t seen you around, y’know.” Mickey thumbs at his nose and glances at Ian, then away again. “Here.”

Realization hits and Ian can’t help his answering smile whatsoever.

“Mickey,” he says quietly, a little reverent. He wants to touch, but he doesn’t, not here. “The rain kind of changed our schedule. Usually I drop off Freddie and take Henry to play outside, then we eat here before I drop him at preschool. With the rain, I’d been taking him elsewhere and the diner didn’t work out. I’m sorry you thought I was—”

“Just wasn’t sure if you were pissed about.” Mick pauses, shrugs. Looks at Ian and this time doesn’t look away. “Before.”

Ian thinks of their night together. Ringing in his birthday laughing and joking despite all the history that threatened to bog them down. Ian thinks they aired out the majority of it the other night; that maybe there’s a chance for, well, something. Anything. Even if Mickey has turned him down, uninterested in entertaining anything past whatever this healing process is, Ian's happier with any Mickey in his life, for as long as that lasts. 

“I’m not pissed,” Ian says, still smiling. “I told you that was the best birthday I’ve had and it’s true.”

Mickey’s face does another complicated thing, but eventually he rolls his eyes with a scoff and taps his fingers a few times on the table. 

“Whatever. Your standards are lower than my brothers’ combined IQ.”

Ian busts out in a laugh, shouldering at Mickey as the tension dissipates. 

“Hey, you,” Henry says, looking at Mickey. 

“His name is Mickey,” Ian reminds him.

“What’s it say on your hand?” Henry asks.

Ian and Mickey exchange a look. 

“You’ll find out when you’re older,” Ian says. 

“Starts with F,” Henry says, his attention rapt on Mickey’s hand before it quickly disappears beneath the table. “Freddie’s name starts with F, so I know.”

“Very good,” Ian says, quickly followed with, “Henry, can you draw me a picture?”

“Of what?” Henry asks, his crummy diner crayons already worn down with his rampant scribbles. Art is definitely not his forte, but he enjoys it, and that’s what matters. 

“A car,” Mickey says. 

“I can draw a car,” Henry says. “And a truck. Can’t draw a plane ‘cause the wings hard.”

“Go for it, kid,” Mickey says, sharing an amused glance with Ian. 

“So,” Ian says as soon as Henry gets to work. “Where do you go every day after you get lunch here?”

Mickey shrugs. 

“The autobody shop. Y’know the one—”

“Wait, the one you and your family used to smuggle coke in the tires?” Ian asks, frowning. He really doesn’t care; not from a Super standpoint or his own. Southside business is its own brand of business, but Ian is somehow surprised to hear Mickey is still up to that shit after he hated it even back then. 

“Well, we ain’t doin’ that shit anymore, are we?” Mickey snaps, as if Ian should already know. “I run the place now and my brothers don’t step foot inside unless it’s legitimate business. Iggy’s the only one who stayed on. Dumbass actually learned how to change oil, run diagnostic checks and shit. He’s good for the simple stuff and I ain’t complain’ as long as he keeps himself clean from the hard shit."

“Wow.” Ian beams. “So you’re, like, a business owner? That’s hot Mickey.”

“What,” Mickey seems to choke out, a flush riding up his pale throat as he quickly looks away, his hands busy tearing a napkin to shreds. “Shut the fuck up.”

“Responsibility is hot, Mick.” 

Mickey looks at Ian like he just offered him shit for breakfast. His face is delightfully red.

“The fuck is wrong with you, man? Get a fuckin’ grip. Desperate as hell.”

Desperate for you, Ian wants to say. Doesn’t say. He’s not drunk anymore and he’s also not entirely stupid. 

This is nice. This, what they’re doing right now. Talking. Relearning each other. Clearing out the cobwebs. Ian realized after Mickey walked away from him the other night that he doesn’t want to ruin this. Whatever Mickey lets this be. 

“Hey,” Ian say. “Lemme give you my cell. In case you wanna get together or whatever.” At Mickey’s look, Ian feels his own face burn as he shrugs, looks down. “Or not to get together. Just to. . .have it.”

“Why the fuck everything gotta be a big deal with you?” Mickey mutters as he takes out his phone, unlocks it, and sets it on the table for Ian. “Just do the fuckin’ thing already.”

Ian gleefully adds the number and texts his own self an orange heart. 

“Absolutely not,” Mickey says, snatching his phone away and pocketing it. “None a’that shit.”

“I drew a great car.” Henry turns the paper around and shoves it at them. Ian and Mickey make appropriately impressed sounds about it until Betty calls out Mickey’s order and Mickey darts a look to Ian. 

“I’ll see you around?” Ian asks. Hopes. 

“Guess so,” Mickey says. He briefly studies Ian’s face and Ian hopes it’s not as red as it feels. “Seeya 'round, Gallagher.”

“Seeya, Mick.”

After Ian drops off Henry, he heads back home, but detours to V’s instead to assess the shingles. He climbs a ladder up the side and stands atop the roof, not a splinter of fear for the height or way he agilely walks along the slippery, post-rain shutters, several patches rotted all the way through and shifting beneath his boots. 

A fall like this probably wouldn’t even break a bone. Ian’s drop from the Prudential tower had shattered part of his spine, but by the time the ambulance arrived, he’d already been standing on his own two feet with an aggravating headache and a sore ass to show for the entire thing. 

His phone buzzes with a text about two hours into ripping off the shingles and throwing them down in the yard. Wiping a grubby hand down his jeans, Ian pulls out his phone and nearly floats when he sees it’s from Mickey. 

          Mickey [2:47]: Beer at the buildings?

Ian doesn’t have to ask for clarification. The same buildings they’d always fucked around in. The same place Ian had Powered Up for the first time. They’d been horsing around on the third floor, shoving and jostling each other, when Ian had tripped and toppled over the side where a wall was entirely busted out and open the world. 

He doesn’t remember the fall but he remembers waking up in his own crater, staring up at Mickey’s red, tear-streaked, snotty face. That had been the beginning and end of a lot of things. 

          Ian [2:48]: Totally! When?

          Mickey [2:50]: After 6

          Ian [2:50]: See you then! 😎

With renewed vigor, Ian tears the shit out of Kev and V’s roof, making record time, if there is a record for shit like this. 

With plans to get the shingles installed the next day, Ian quickly throws his ass in the shower and tugs on some fitted jeans that aren’t so tight it looks like he’s trying too hard, a burgundy tee, and shrugs into his lightweight olive Carhartt jacket. He sings along to the radio for the first time in forever on the way to pick up Freddie, and lets them stop for ice cream on the way home, effectively ruining the kid for dinner, but no one needs to know. 

Mickey wants to see him. Asked to see him. Definitely doesn’t hate him. 

Lip is suspicious as hell of Ian all through dinner. He probably looks too happy. Apparently Ian being happy is highly suspect behavior and he can’t even argue it these days. But maybe being shoved off his job has been the best thing to happen to him in a long time. 

“You goin’ somewhere?” Lip asks from the couch. Both boys sandwich him as they watch a nature documentary about, shockingly, lemurs. Henry definitely has a lemur problem. 

“Gonna meet up with Mickey.”

“Oooh, Mickey,” Lip goads, in true brotherly fashion. 

“Oooh, Mickey,” Ian shoots back, not giving Lip shit to work with as he lets himself outside. 

The temperature has dropped since the rain, and Ian pockets his hands in his coat as he strolls along. He has always found it strange that pain doesn’t necessarily affect him, but the hot and cold feel as average to his body as anybody else. He won’t die from hypothermia or heat stroke, but he won’t feel fucking great about it either. 

Sometimes Ian wonders what it would take to kill him, but his therapist says it’s probably not a limit he should test, even within the confines of his mind, so he keeps that locked away in a very high shelf. 

Ian buys a six pack at the place that was once the Kash and Grab before Linda sold it and moved. The walk to the lot of abandoned, crumbling buildings is a good twenty minutes away, but the darkening evening is cool and the air is fresh and scrubbed from rain, even the stank of garbage kept at bay as he lights a smoke and lets himself revel in blending in with the crowd. 

Ian’s phone buzzes and he automatically answers without checking the ID, somehow assuming it’s Mickey, this close to the time. 

“Hello!” Ian answers cheerfully. 

“Well don’t you sound right as rain these days,” Sue’s sober voice comes through the line. 

Ian’s entire gut drops at the sound of his manager. 

“What’s up, Sue,” Ian says, trying to keep it light. “I told you yesterday that I’m doing well.”

“And that’s what we love to hear,” Sue says, speaking as usual of the omniscient ‘we’. “You’re exam to clear you for work is next Monday,” she says, unknowingly putting the absolute fear into Ian like few things can. “But before that, we’d like you to turn up this Sunday for our new agency branch opening. You know, the one for the baby Supes coming out of training.”

There’s very little in the world that sounds less appealing. 

“But I won’t be cleared by then,” Ian hedges. He accidentally bumps into someone on the street, distracted and apologizing in the face of a few aggressive curses as he speeds up his walk. 

“Yeah, but you’re not doing anything,” Sue says. “Stand there, smile, say how happy you are that the agency has created a safe space for blah blah blah, the kids or whatever.”

Ian’s back teeth ache down to the bone as he clenches his jaw. 

“Don’t you think it’s too soon?”

“It’s been nearly a month, Ian.” Sue pauses and they both breathe over the line together. “No one’s asking you to be a hero here. Just stand there and look pretty. You’re Valiant, for fuck’s sake.”

Ian stops on the sidewalk and shuts his eyes. Releases a shaky breath. 

“Wear your uniform,” Sue says.

“I left it at my apartment.”

“Then go to your apartment,” Sue says. 

Fuck. Fuck!

“I’ll text you the details,” Sue says when Ian doesn’t reply. “Take care of yourself, Ian. You sounded happy.”

Sounded. 

Ian pockets his phone and walks in a daze to his and Mickey’s old spot. His feet feel heavier than before. 

By the time Ian reaches the ruins, he has managed to talk himself out of being entirely despondent. He has a job to do, after all, and this is like a baby step back into it. So, he’ll have eyes on him. Cameras on him. Judgment. He has handled that his entire adult life. Nothing has changed. 

Nothing changes. 

Ian takes the stairs up one specific building, the one they’d mainly haunted. He pauses on the third floor and peeks out through the gap in the wall. The crater is barely visible now, the cracks grown in with plant life and weeds, a bright green bed of regrowth through the destruction. 

Mickey is on the roof, sitting on a big, overturned cement bucket and smoking to the darkened purple sky. His profile is beautiful, heart-wrenching; the strong line of his nose and the pout of his plush lips around the cig, his soft, gentle chin and cut jaw shadowed with subtle stubble. 

Those steely blue eyes flash to Ian as he approaches. Lingers, holds, doesn’t stray. 

“You good, man?” is the first thing Mickey says, and it almost brings Ian to his knees then and there. 

Ian waves him off and pulls away a beer, hands it to Mickey, then takes one for himself before sitting on his own bucket. 

“Work shit,” Ian says, cracking his Old Style and drinking long from it.

“Work?” Mickey’s gaze is hot on Ian’s face, but this time it’s Ian’s turn to shy away from eye contact. He doesn’t want Mickey to see the anxiety, the fear, the failure. “Thought you were on a break.”

“Yeah, well, apparently I’m needed to smile and look pretty for a photo op on Sunday.”

“You only just got here.” Mickey sounds a little breathless, maybe panicked. Ian looks at him in alarm and finds Mickey’s eyes wide, his teeth chewing at his full bottom lip before he adds, “I mean. I just thought you’d be here for—longer.”

“I—” Ian licks his lips and nods, small and somehow unsure. “I’ve been out of work longer than I’ve been back home. I was. . .institutionalized. For a little while. Some private place that looks like a spa, but isn’t at all, y’know. They let me out and sent me home, but apparently they—”

Ian gestures with his beer in the general direction of everywhere but here. 

“Need me. Or something.”

Mickey looks at him hard. He’s panting a little, his shoulders rising and falling noticeably. 

“Aren’t you sick of it,” he rasps, hard and low. “This fuckin’ life, man. I don’t know you like before, but it don’t take an expert to see you’re miserable as hell and it ain’t just your bipolar or whatever.”

Ian’s smile is thin and tight as he shrugs. 

“What else am I supposed to do, Mickey? This is who I am.”

Mickey stares at him, eyebrows high and incredulous. 

“Bullshit,” he says. “You’re someone who wants to help. Don’t need to be a fuckin’ slave to The Tower to do that.”

“But I make a difference,” Ian says wearily, looking into the dark mouth of his beer can, his frame slouched forward, elbows on his knees. 

“So do I,” Mickey says. “Don’t see me puttin’ on a collar and leash for all of fuckin’ Chicago, do you?” 

“I’m not like you,” Ian murmurs. “I—”

Need to be liked. Loved. Acknowledged. Important to somebody. 

“You work from the shadows,” Ian says instead, looking at Mickey and not finding any disagreement in his expression. “I don’t think I’m made for that. To be selfless like you’re selfless.”

“Fuck off with that shit.” Mickey guzzles the rest of his beer, belches, and chucks it over the side. “We’re not playin’ the morality game, ‘cause you can bet your narrow ass you’d win no matter what bull you try to pull. I’m jus’ sayin’ your world right now ain’t the beginning and end of your career. Put that big brain to some goddamn use after all this time.”

Ian grins despite himself. Offers Mickey another beer. Mickey takes it but Ian doesn’t release, and they stare at each other as the tension melts, replaced by an edge of amusement before Ian lets go and Mickey cracks the top. 

“So what can you actually do?” Ian finds himself asking as they work through their seconds beers. Old Style is basically water and even Ian and his medication don’t react to two cans this quick. He merely feels relaxed, and that’s mainly to do with the company. “What can the Shrike do, I mean.”

Mickey looks at him and smiles, easy and free, his slightly bigger, front bunny teeth utterly wrecking Ian for life all over again. 

“See those beer bottles,” Mickey says, pointing across the canvernous courtyard to the other building across the way. 

“Hell no I don’t,” Ian says, squinting. It’s fucking dark on top of it. 

“I can,” Mickey says. 

“What, like night vision.”

“Sorta.” Mickey stands and, to the absolute lack of shock on Ian’s part, reveals a Glock from the back of his jeans. He aims the gun, his form perfect but at ease, comfortable. “More like anything I wanna aim at, I’ll hit, even if I can’t make it out. If I know it’s there, I can hit it. S’like luck more than anything.”

Mickey lets off six shots and Ian can hear the glass pop and shatter in the distance. 

“Luck, huh.” Ian stretches out his legs and crosses them at the ankle. “It work for anything else?”

“Weird shit,” Mickey says. “Like standing in the right place at the right time. Dodging a punch. Getting home right before the rain starts. Avoiding accidents on the freeway by less than a minute. But mostly, I never miss.”

Ian laughs. 

“Isn’t that something James Bond said?”

“Depends on which Bond you mean,” Mickey says with a shrug as he tucks his gun to the small of his back and returns Ian’s grin. “I only watched the movies with the hot Bond.”

“They’re pretty much all hot,” Ian says, wiggling his eyebrows. 

“Hell no they’re not.”

“It’s Pierce Brosnan Bond who says he never misses,” Ian says. “The World Is Not Enough.”

“He was hot, I’ll take it.” Mickey finishes off his second beer and stands once more. Aims that briefly shy, subtly soft look at Ian before he snatches Ian’s empty, his own can, and a long faded glass bottle from the ground. 

And then he simply juggles, easy as air. 

Ian gapes in awe, wonder overcoming the shock as he bubbles up with a delighted laugh as Mickey seems entirely at ease, a jaunty grin lighting up his features in the dark. 

“Don’t get it twisted,” Mickey says as he slowly walks around and continues to juggle the cans and bottle. “This ain’t some nerdy fuckin’ hobby. S’part of the ultra-dexterity thing I got goin’. Throw me something else.”

Ian looks around and finds another glass bottle. Tosses it in the general vicinity of Mickey, who snatches it without a flinch and incorporates it into the trick. Ian bursts out another laugh, clapping like an idiot until Mickey seems to think that’s plenty showboating and catches each one neatly before punting one after the other over the side of the building. 

“That’s so fucking cool!” Ian knows he’s grinning like he’s twelve, but he can’t help but feel dazzled. This Mickey feels so much freer than the one he knew, even if Ian feels more caged than he has ever been. He’s indescribably happy for Mickey. 

“Don’t jizz your pants over fuckin’ juggling, man,” Mickey says, sounding more embarrassed than Ian has ever heard him, and that in itself just makes him laugh again. 

“Just gimme a fuckin’ beer,” Mickey demands, and Ian complies, smiling happily. 

“Why the Shrike,” Ian asks over their third and last beer each. “I mean, I know it’s a bird.”

“I didn’t come up with that shit, but Mandy was fuckin’ determined I start using a name to build respect or whatever. It’s called a butcherbird. Kills its prey by piercing small animals on long thorns. Impales ‘em right through and leaves ‘em to die ‘til they’re ready to eat.”

“Woah.” Ian’s eyes go big as he nods along to the explanation. “That’s scary.”

“Are you seriously twelve right now? Of course it’s fuckin’ scary.” Mickey gestures expressively at Ian with his beer, his movements looser, more comfortable now. It’s dark as hell and Ian is glad they’re sitting close, leaning into each other more and more. “It’s meant to be scary. And since I mostly use the knives, it makes sense. Could kill a bitch with one of those little guys thrown just right.”

“But you don’t,” Ian says. 

Mickey gives him a look. 

“It’s rare,” is all he says. 

“So why don’t you register,” Ian asks. “If you’re basically operating legally. Any small-time southside agency would be thrilled to have you.”

“What’s with the twenty questions,” Mickey snaps in reply, looking adorably harassed as he drinks long and licks his lips, his gaze raking Ian from head to toe, then again, leaving Ian feeling hot and seen. 

“I just want to know you again,” Ian says quietly, leaning in until he has to press a large palm to Mickey’s sturdy, muscular thigh for balance. In the dark, Mickey’s pale face is faintly illuminated by the surrounding city glow, but his eyes are too dark to read as they meet Ian’s. “Mickey.”

“Dumbass,” Mickey says. “You always knew me. Pissed me off. Still does. Don’t have to try so hard right this second, like it’s the end of the world or some shit.”

Ian shudders out a breath. Licks his lips and watches Mickey watch his mouth. 

“Sometimes,” Ian admits, hushed and scared to say it out loud. “Sometimes it feels like it. The end of the world. Sometimes I wake up and I think I’m gonna fall through the cracks that keep opening up in my life and no one will ever remember me when I go.”

“Ian.” A warm hand drapes over Ian’s, calloused fingers naturally falling into the gaps between Ian’s spread fingers. Mickey’s breath is a familiar beer and smoke haze against Ian’s cheek. “I’d never forget you. Couldn’t, even when I'd tried for the best of us.”

“What about now,” Ian whispers, swallowing hard, searching for all that brazen bravery he usually carries like armor. “Do you—is it still best for us?”

“Ian,” Mickey says again. A shaky exhale in the dark. Mickey’s body heat radiating in the space between their chests. 

An explosion in the near distance shatters the night to shards. 

Ian and Mickey jolt to their feet, both looking to the ominous, hellish glow several city blocks to the south. 

“Fuck,” Mickey bites off. “We gotta—”

“Let’s go.”

Ian turns and hops off the side of the building. 

“IAN!” 

Ian lands with a dull thud, his knees briefly aching from the impact as he places a palm to the cement to steady himself. 

“IAN, JESUS CHRIST!” Ian looks up and can barely see Mickey through the dark. Remembers what happened the last time he went over this building. 

“SHIT, SORRY, MICKEY!” he hollers up to the roof, feeling sheepish. “DID I TRAUMATIZE YOU?”

“I’M KICKING THE SHIT OUT OF YOU WHEN I GET DOWN!” is all Mickey screams before he disappears into the building. 

Ian doesn’t have to wait long before Mickey is bolting from the building at a dead run. 

“Asshole!” Mickey body-checks Ian with his entire weight and sends Ian stumbling to the side. His face is livid. “What the fuck is wrong with you? Here, of all places?”

“Sorry, sorry,” Ian mumbles, but he’s already distracted, looking around, listening. “We gotta go. Let’s go.”

“I’m already going, bitch!” And, true to his word, Mickey is already sprinting down the sidewalk. Despite the circumstances, Ian can’t help but briefly smile before dashing after him in tow. 

Of course, Ian is inhumanly fast. Not fast enough to make a big deal about it, but faster than any Olympian will ever be, so he bursts past Mickey in seconds, overtaking him as he books it down the sidewalk, zipping between clusters of pedestrians as the scent of smoke and sound of screams fill the air. 

It’s not long before he’s approaching a four story brick and brownstone with the third floor blown out completely. Black smoke pours from both front-facing windows and Ian is already assessing entry points before he even arrives at the front step where a crowd has gathered. 

“What’s going on?” Ian asks as he squeals to a stop, looking around for anyone to give him information. “I’m Valiant. I’m a Supe. Someone talk to me!”

“My grandma!” screams a woman around Ian’s age, dressed a robe, her bare feet standing on the glass and rubble sidewalk. “She’s on the third floor! I don’t—I don’t know what happened! We’ve got space heaters up where the heat don’t reach, but—”

Ian takes the stone steps two at a time and through the open front door without a second thought. Bolts up the first flight of thin, rickety stairs, then balks and recoils as the wave of oppressive, violent heat encroaches the second floor. The fire hasn’t reached the stairs, though, and Ian takes them quickly, only to be met with several closed doors, but only one singed around the hinges, as if from explosion. 

Ian grabs the knob, hisses when the metal sears right through the first layer of flesh, and rips the door off the hinges, hurling it down the sweltering corridor. The skin of his palm goes with the doorknob, leaving one hand raw and bubbling with blisters and ragged, stinking flesh. 

Thick, roiling smoke pours from the doorway, choking Ian’s lungs as he steps in and drops to his knees, squinting through the black haze for signs of life or lack thereof. The fire has devoured one entire wall, the place of explosion busting straight through the plaster and into the next room over.

But it’s near the blown out window that a woman lays face-down on the floor in a nightgown and one pink slipper. 

Flames lick and roll across the ceiling, eating through it, black smoke choking the sky as Ian knee-walks over and rolls the grandma to check for a pulse. It’s there, but the burns are evident up her leg, like she was standing near the explosion when it happened, and her breathing is labored. 

Coughing hard and regretting not wrapping his shirt around his face, even if the smoke probably won’t make him pass out, Ian hacks up and spits black off to the side and crawls over to the exploded window. Peeks his head out and spots the increased crowd, camera crew, ambulance scrambling with paramedics, but no fire truck yet. 

“Alright,” Ian rasps out as he stands, allowing the smoke to assault his head and shoulders. “Let’s go, grandma.”

With that, he takes off his jacket to drape over the woman’s body and head, picks her up in a princess carry that weighs the equivalent of a toddler to him, and bounds down the creaking stairs, through the hellhole of heat, and out the front door. 

The crowd has cleared to the edges of the sidewalk and street, likely at the demands of the paramedics and arriving police, and Ian is thankful to place grandma on a waiting stretcher, where she is whisked away by uniformed men and women doing their duty.  Her granddaughter immediately rushes past him to the stretcher, weeping with relief. 

A little wrong-footed from the suddenness of the situation, Ian turns around—

And Mickey slams into Ian’s embrace, desperate hands grabbing him by the face and yanking Ian in to devour his mouth in a hot, wet, desperate kiss. 

Ian’s heart expands again and again, and then it’s not simply his heart outside of his body; it’s a light. A shuddering detonation between them, flaring out in a blinding glow, reverberating from Ian’s core and outward, encompassing the entire fucking block as Ian grips the back of Mickey’s neck and moans into his mouth. 

Trembling down to his toes, Ian whines into Mickey’s damp, parted lips and changes the angle, his thumb catching on Mickey’s chin to open that sweltering mouth further, to swipe his tongue in deeper, licking him out, savoring the taste as Mickey’s hand fists in Ian’s hair and keeps him in place. Behind Ian’s shut eyes, the light still glows like the most aggressive, sunny day, and his lungs are struggling and Mickey is panting hard through his nose, but neither of them separate yet. Not yet, not yet. 

Ian is filled with light. 

Mickey groans against Ian’s mouth, his hands melting down Ian’s neck, then his shoulders, a hot grip smoothing down until he’s gripping Ian’s biceps. Ian sighs in reply, pulling back just enough to kiss at Mickey’s swollen bottom lip before he finally opens his eyes. 

Mickey is already looking at him, eyes like stormy skies, color high on his cheeks as Ian keeps that precious face cupped in his hands and simply gazes upon his soulmate. 

“Hi,” Ian whispers. 

“Hi,” Mickey replies, obviously dazed with the way he licks his lips and swallows, his foggy gaze sweeping over Ian’s features again and again. “Asshole.”

Ian beams.

“Yeah?”

“Reckless asshole.”

“Says you,” Ian murmurs, brushing his nose to Mickey’s.

“That was some big damn hero shit,” Mickey says against Ian’s lips as he tips his face to meet Ian’s smile.  

And then, as if their cocoon has popped, the cacophony of the crowd implodes in on them like a bomb and Ian gasps, looking around almost frantically. The black, soulless eyes of the cameras are the first thing he sees and he stares at them in shock, unable to process that the entire city may have just watched him find his soulmate. His purpose. 

“The fuck you all lookin’ at?” Mickey hollers, all brash confidence that inevitably leaves Ian grinning like an idiot as Mickey raises both middle fingers to the NBC Chicago camera. “You ain’t ever seen two dudes in love before? Get a goddamn life.”

Ian thinks he might just learn to fly after all. He hauls Mickey by the arm until he turns, that belligerent look still all crooked and cocky on his face. 

“What?” Mickey snaps, crabby in the way Ian knows he’s going to get to love forever. 

“Let’s get the hell outta here,” Ian says breathlessly, unable to stop smiling. 

Mickey’s expression softens, his kiss-darkened lips pulling at the corner. 

“Yeah, alright. Let’s blow this fuckin’ joint.”

“Best wishes to your grandma!” Ian calls over his shoulder with a big, gleeful wave as Mickey marches down the street, dragging Ian in tow. “Bye!”

***

Mickey doesn’t live far from Patsy’s at all. In fact, he stays right around the corner from the autobody shop, in his very own ragged brownstone that is comically thin but three stories tall. Mickey actually has a padlock on his front gate that he unlocks and studiously relocks behind them, like he’s got a home to protect for real instead of the dilapidated Milkovich home on Trumbull with the eternally open door. 

“Your house is so tall and skinny,” Ian comments as they step in and remove their boots.

“I must have a type,” Mickey says, and when he looks up, he groans and rolls his eyes. “Are you gonna make that face every fuckin’ time I talk now? ‘Cause I’m gonna need to rearrange it with my fist if this keeps up.”

“I’m happy,” Ian says, breathless to say something so simple out loud and mean it. He stands there in the foyer, staring Mickey down, practically vibrating with the desire to touch, to claim, to keep. 

Mickey must see it because his own eyes darken before he presses a hand to the center of Ian’s chest, the same way he had outside the Gallagher house, seconds before he’d rejected him. 

Ian cocks his head but says nothing. Waits. He’s been waiting for so long already, hopeless. He’s full of hope now. This is a new kind of waiting. 

“You literally just stepped out of a house fire, man.” Mickey pats Ian’s chest, then grips the smoke-stained shirt in his fist and hauls Ian in for a quick, firm kiss. They part, but don’t stray far, sharing each other’s air. “Shower, alright,” Mickey murmurs, his warm gaze smoothing over Ian’s features, up to his hair and back to meet Ian’s eyes. “Upstairs, first door.”

“You don’t wanna shower with me?” Ian asks, grinning as he hooks fingers in Mickey’s belt loops and pulls him in. 

“I do that and we ain’t gettin’ anywhere near a bed, like I'm plannin',” Mickey says as he matches Ian’s smile. The sight of such a free expression once more leaves Ian breathless and aching. He gets distracted by Mickey’s mouth before he tunes into Mickey mentioning food. 

“Is there food?” Ian asks, perking up. 

“There can be food if you get your ass in the shower,” Mickey says, his eyebrows arched and expectant. 

“Alright, alright.” Ian makes a show off dragging Mickey in by the belt again and kissing him once, twice, three times, lingering on the third, soft and plush and sweet. “We glow,” he murmurs against Mickey’s mouth. 

“You thought we wouldn’t?” Mickey asks dryly. Ian frowns.

“What, you always thought we would?”

Mickey looks at him pointedly and Ian’s knees go weak. 

“Upstairs,” Mickey says simply before he turns and heads through the simple, bruise-toned living room, toward what Ian assumes is the kitchen.  

So, Ian obeys. Mickey’s bathroom has an old school tub, huge with high, curved sides, and a shower installed into the wall that precariously arches over the clawfoot. The walls are painted an almost claustrophobic dark gray, but the new-looking hardware is shiny silver and all the towels and accessories and shower curtain and shit are bright, cheerful turquoise and white. Ian has to wonder if Mickey’s secretive hobby of drawing finally grew into something that embraces color and art. 

Ian takes his time soaping up and scrubbing, scritching the smoke stink out of his hair as the spicy scent of Mickey envelopes him in warmth and comfort. The entire experience is so surreal that Ian loses track of time, just being in the bathroom and wandering into what is obviously Mickey’s bedroom, more blues on grays on deep, almost purple-blacks with errant skulls and stormy, bleak landscape art on the walls. 

On the bedspread, Ian smiles at the clothes left out. He pulls on the loose, comfortable plaid boxers and black tank, unreasonably giddy about it all. He’s grabbing his clothes from the bathroom floor when his phone falls out. 

His smile waning when Ian notices all the waiting messages, he ignores his family chant with a whopping forty-three messages and opens his managers texts. 

          Sue [8:34]: We need to talk. 

          Sue [8:34]: Supes are stationed where they’re meant to for a reason. You know this. You’re too important to waste on house fires. 

          Sue [8:35]: Call me ASAP. 

Ian frowns at the phone, quietly wondering at the odd sense of energy filling his limbs, buzzing in his brain, strengthening his spine. Filling his heart. Something about it makes him think of the old Ian. The starry-eyed kid with a heart for helping and a steely resolve to do good not just for everyone else, but for himself. To advocate for his own damn self. 

          Ian [9:07]: I’ll call you soon. We need to discuss terminating my contract anyway.

Ian doesn’t wait for a reply. He turns off his phone and leaves it on Mickey’s dresser. 

A little shaky and a lot shocked with how at peace he feels, Ian wanders downstairs and follows the buttery smell of food. 

The kitchen is a lot less maintained than the bathroom or the bedroom and living room. The appliances show their age and the laminate is some kind of 70’s era orange and avocado pattern, peeling in the corners here and there. Mickey’s wide shoulders are to Ian as he pads in and, with a huge sigh of relief, presses his brow to Mickey’s shoulder and simply stands there, breathing Mickey in, hands resting on his hips. 

Mickey hums in reply, turning his head to faintly nuzzle his cheek to Ian’s damp, curling hair, before returning to the stove.

“You good?” Mickey asks, not the first time tonight. 

“Yeah,” Ian smiles against Mickey’s neck, and means it. “Real good. You?”

“Yeah, I mean, could be worse,” Mickey drawls, earning a pinch to the soft flesh at his hip. 

“A ringing endorsement.” Ian hooks his chin over Mickey’s shoulder and settles in, arms firmly wrapped around Mickey’s nipped waist. His body is a little different from what Ian’s hands remember. Less small and compact, more bulked out and sturdy. That waist is the same, though. Notably smaller than the rest of him with a subtle squish of stomach and hips, and an ass that Ian has simply never forgotten about, not once. 

“Who the fuck I gotta endorse you to? You got brand endorsements out the ass already.”

“Probably not in the future,” Ian says as he watches Mickey flip a pan with what is obviously french toast. He must have done something to the soaking batter because the aroma of cinnamon and vanilla rises up to make Ian’s stomach rumble. 

“Why?” Mickey lightly elbows Ian out of his space, but only because he seems to be done. Two plain white plates that look stolen straight out of a diner are both piled high with french toast and when Ian takes both plates and brings them to the small, round dining table wedged into the corner of the cramped kitchen, Ian smiles at the syrup already waiting there. 

“‘Cause I just quit,” Ian says as he sits and digs down into the fluffy, custard-puffed bread with the side of his fork, sinking through all four slices and shoving the whole bite in his big mouth. “Texted my manager,” he says with his mouth full. 

“No shit?” Mickey sits across from him and looks at him hard, like he’s searching for panic or doubt or whatever. When Ian merely shrugs and offers a smile as he chews, Mickey makes a face. “Close your fuckin’ mouth.”

They both devour their food, sending each other inquisitive stares as they load up on energy for whatever’s coming next. When Ian hopes is coming next. 

“You sure about all that?” Mickey finally asks toward the end of their meal. “You’re like, the most loved Supe in Chicago these days.”

“Yeah,” Ian says. He can’t argue against it. He knows. It’s what the agency wanted for him. It’s what he thought he wanted for himself. “That’s not what I want anymore. I’ve realized I’ll be happiest if just one person in Chicago loves me. And not because I’m a Supe.”

At Ian’s pointed look, Mickey gives him a hard stare before standing up, palms on the table, and leans across the small space to press a kiss into Ian’s hair. 

“Shut the fuck up,” Mickey mutters as he collects their empty plates and dumps them in the sink. “If that’s what you want, then you already got it.”

Ian feels the light inside of him grow. He’s going to burst at this point. 

Following instinct, Ian gets up and boxes Mickey in against the sink, either hand curled around the edge of the cold steel as Mickey turns around and backs up, his eyes no longer shying away from Ian’s but searching them out. 

They stare at each other for a long moment. Breathing each other in. Noses skimming each other’s cheeks. Lips faint against the hard line of jaw, the soft curve of ear. Chests pressing with each deep inhale, Ian’s hips flexing against Mickey’s lower belly in a slow, sumptuous roll as Mickey exhales shakily, his hands gripping Ian’s waist to encourage the shift into something hot and humid, dripping wet and soaking through the rising scene. 

“Mickey,” Ian murmurs against Mickey’s stubbled cheek, one hand caressing wide and proprietary up Mickey’s hip, to waist, to ribs, shoulder, cradling the back of Mickey’s head. “I loved you always, y’know.”

Mickey’s breath shudders out, hitching in his throat like the emotion he’s swallowing down is too thick, too big. Ian presses adoring, encouraging kisses down the length of Mickey’s throat, his ear, his temple, waiting, the best kind of waiting. 

Then Mickey inhales like he’s coming up for air, long drowned and swimming to the surface. He looks up, dark sky and hard rain eyes meeting Ian’s. 

“Love you too,” Mickey says, patting the center of Ian’s chest like he does. Like he’s reminding Ian that his heart has been in there all this time, and Mickey knows how to jump start it with his electric lust for life. 

Ian’s lips curve and he presses them to the wrinkle between Mickey’s eyebrows. 

“Get me in your bed, Mick.”

The tension doesn’t fade this time, but it mellows and warms, dreamy and dazed as Mickey takes Ian’s hand and leads him up the stairs. Half way up, Ian gets distracted, palming Mickey’s ass through his jeans as he follows him up the stairs. Mickey laughs, short and surprised, when Ian presses him into the wall, their heights all wrong with Mickey on the higher step, but it makes it easier for Ian to heft Mickey into his arms, hands where they belong on his ass. He effortlessly carries Mickey up the stairs and tosses him on the bed. 

Mickey bounces with a gasp, because it’s not like Ian ever forgot how he loves to be manhandled. Ian is on him fast, unable to wait any more, not even the good kind. Balances himself on one elbow as he gives one hand free reign to ride beneath Mickey’s shirt, hiking the material higher, higher until it bunches beneath his armpits. Insinuates a long thigh between Mickey’s strong, warm ones and lets Mickey helplessly grind up against Ian’s leg. Ian's tongue sinks past Mickey’s parted lips as he scrapes a thumbnail over Mickey's tight nipples. 

Ian licks up the drawn out, helpless sound Mickey makes at the stimulation and drapes his body more fully over half of Mickey’s, keeping him pinned and at the mercy of his mouth and hand. 

“Missed this,” Ian whispers into Mickey’s mouth, lapping at his bottom lip and biting down hard, harder, until a breathless stutter kicks up between them. His palm paints long, possessive drags along the length of Mickey’s body, fingertips only barely diving past the waistband of Mickey’s jeans to scritch in the short curls above an already full, throbbing cock. Mickey just moans and rolls his hips against Ian’s thigh again, followed by short, thoughtless ruts, mindless humping as Mickey fists both hands in Ian’s hair and drags him in for a deeper, messier kiss. 

“If you missed this so much,” Mickey pants out as he forcefully yanks himself away, grappling for Ian’s shirt and tearing at it, getting it over Ian’s head and chucking it aside with an alarming amount of aggression, “then fuck me already.”

Ian’s breathless laugh of delight drops into a dark, hoarse moan as Mickey reaches between them and shoves his hand right into the boxers, taking Ian’s cock in a firm, impatient hold and pumps him loose and quick, with purpose. 

The vague, distant drive to savor the moment instantly melts and drips away, leaving Ian shaking as he drops his brow to Mickey’s and struggles to find control beneath the bossy hand of his soulmate. 

“Fuck, Mickey,” Ian rasps into Mickey’s hair, sounding to fucked-out for his own good already. “So fuckin’ hot. Shit, shit, hurry—”

Ian sits up abruptly and takes Mickey along. Mouths locking wet and messy, lips parted and tongues licking at each other without finesse, they tug at each other’s clothes with clumsy hands and impatient growls, racing, racing for skin on skin, for that expanding light that seems to swell and stream through the blood the more contact they make.

Mickey, naked and confident with it in a way that always has Ian’s salivating and sighing, knocks Ian off-balance with a hard shove. Crawls up between Ian’s spread legs and yanks down the boxers, not bothering to get them off both legs as they hang off Ian’s ankle, and drops his mouth to lap a long, thick line of hot, wet tongue up Ian’s big, obscenely red cock. 

They both groan in tandem, shameless and loud. Mickey takes the swollen, shiny crown of Ian’s cock in his mouth, sucking and swirling his tongue, playing at the leaking slit as one hand grips the base, fingers not long enough to touch around the thickest part. Ian watches, lounging back on his elbows, jaw dropped, licking his bottom lip as he feasts on the sight of Mickey at the mercy of his dick, taking it down until he chokes, then trying again, again, until Ian can feel his throat relaxing into it, slopping and dripping down Mickey’s chin. 

Mickey looks up, expression glazed over and cock hungry, all heavy bedroom eyes and radiating confidence as he works Ian’s dick like he has never stopped since the last time. Ian moans with abandon, head dropping back, eyes falling briefly shut as he lets Mickey make a fucking mess over his mouth on Ian’s dick. He knows he has got to be leaking hard into Mickey’s mouth, but Mickey’s answering hum and the vibration that ransacks through Ian is a clear signal that Mickey’s hungry for it. 

“Wait.” Ian’s eyes pop open as he bolts up, breathing hard, desperate not to come yet, whining with the realization that he may not be able to fuck Mickey, like, immediately. His hands cradle Mickey’s head, easing him off even as Mickey makes a needy sound and looks up at him with a ravenous expression that has Ian’s entire body going molten and breathless. “Wait, wait, Mickey, gotta fuck you, gotta—”

Mickey’s sound of impatience would be comical if it weren’t for the desperation of the situation. He sits up and suddenly they’re face to face and Ian’s at a loss against the urge to haul Mickey in by his fisted hair and kiss him deep, an eating kiss of wide open mouths and tongue, licking each other out as Mickey’s hand drops to his own dick to relieve the building pressure. 

Ian pulls off with a gasp. Stares in wonder at Mickey before him; the strength and softness of his body, that thick cock and the milky beading leaking over, those soft, smooth thighs waiting for bruises. Ian knows he makes a noise but he can barely hear it over the sound of their mingled panting. 

“Where’s the stuff,” Ian manages tightly. He digs his nails into his palms to keep from reaching out, just once. 

“Side table,” Mickey says, and holy shit, holy shit he sounds wrecked, all gravel voice and debauchery as those blown out eyes watch Ian’s every movement like some kind of predatory animal. “No condom. Fuck me up. Fill me up.”

“Oh god.” Ian flings himself down the other end of the bed to ransack Mickey’s side table. “Oh fuck, oh god, yeah, gonna stuff you full. Gonna—fuck.”

Ian turns around to the sight of Mickey already rolled over, face down to the mattress, ass presented high, the curve of his lower back a work of art. 

Ian wants to come all over Mickey’s back. More than once. Just fucking cover him until he’s more Ian than Mickey. 

At Mickey’s long, hoarse moan, Ian vaguely realizes he said that out loud. 

“Look at you,” Ian murmurs in wonder as he sidles up behind him. Kneads up the sweat-damp backs of Mickey’s thighs to roll the muscle and meat of Mickey’s ass between his fingers, reveling in the release and jiggle that follows every hearty grab. Ian spreads Mickey’s cheeks and brushes his thumb across Mickey’s hole; watches it twitch and beg for more. “Hottest thing I’ve ever fuckin’ seen,” Ian says, mainly to himself, but Mickey is a bonus. “Gonna die if I don’t get to watch your ass stretch around my dick, Mickey. You gonna take me good? You want it?”

“Fuck you is what I want,” Mickey breathes out, and Ian laughs, because that’s definitely his Mickey who takes it so damn well. 

Ian slicks up his fingers and cock, his attention rapt on the way Mickey impatiently sways his ass, if Ian isn’t fucking getting to it already. He doesn’t waste a lot of time with prep. Knows how Mickey likes that first stretch and burn. Knows how much Mickey loves the tease of his fingers with the incoming threat of his cock. 

Briefly, Ian allows himself the pleasure of watching Mickey fuck himself back on just two fingers, the stretch and pull, the pink flush to his hole as Mickey thrusts back on him, mindless and needy, his noises rising and falling with each increasing thrust. 

Then Ian pulls his fingers away and kneels there, watching with a creeping, volcanic heat as Mickey’s ass struggles to cling on nothing, gently gaping and waiting. The best kind of waiting.

“Ian,” Mickey whines out, his hands stretched forward, fisted in the blankets. Begging, if briefly. 

And that is what Ian has been waiting for.

Without stuttering or stopping to ease into the stretch, Ian stuffs the head of his cock past that first blessedly tight ring of muscle and eases inside, driving slowly forward, forward, holding Mickey’s hips still as he feels the beginning of a writhing thrash shudder through Mickey’s trembling body. Their moans mingle, a harmony so long lost to Ian that to hear it and feel it again brings a heat behind his eyes. 

“Fuuuck,” Mickey grits out, the soft, supple skin of his hips and ass already growing damp beneath Ian’s merciless grip, the clean sweat scent of him just begging to Ian to lick it off. “Right there,” Mickey mumbles into the sheets, vaguely delirious as Ian barely begins to pull back and slide forward, filling Mickey deep, then deeper as his body opens up for him and squeezes around his cock in short, sudden tremors. “Right there already,” Mickey manages, his voice slurred and dick drunk. 

Ian wants to rail him. Wants to pin Mickey to the bed with a hand on the back of his neck and impale him again and again on his cock. And he will. He will. But for now he basks in the slight tremor taking over his own body as control gets slippery. Watches the wide, glistening stretch of Mickey’s ass take him, suck him in, crave him, milk him. 

Quickly, it’s too much. Overwhelming, encompassing as Ian pulls out and knocks Mickey’s legs apart with one sharp slap to the inner thigh and another, not too hard, but enough to startle a short, bright noise of pleasure-pain-surprise as he spreads his legs further, causing his hips to drop and his dick to nearly touch the mattress. 

“Now don’t move,” Ian murmurs, the ease of command unsheathing like a sword. “Like you spread out like this. If you drop, I stop fucking you, ‘kay? Don’t move for me, Mickey. Don’t move.”

Mickey trembles. Head to two shivers, his breath coming in shallow pants now, knuckles white in the blanket as he whines something akin to agreement. 

This time, when Ian feeds his cock back into Mickey, the sound they make is absolutely pornographic. Ian folds forward, threatening the stability of Mickey’s vastly spread knees, fucking into him shallow and riding that edge of frustration as Ian rains open mouthed kisses along the back of Mickey’s blushing neck, licking right up the knobs of his spine, up into his hairline. Savors the salt and sex taste and smell of him, the sweet, small noises knocking out of Mickey as Ian thrusts into him, short and wet and steady. 

When Mickey starts to shake, his hips beginning to drop, Ian eases off with a placating hum, both hands chasing the sweat-damp shift of back muscle as he massages them up Mickey’s back and down to hold his hips again, an iron hard grip, bruising as he admires the way his fingertips sink and sink into the tender flesh of his ass and sides. 

“Ian,” Mickey whispers, each puff of breath heating the room further. “God, fuck, please, fuck me up.”

And then Ian fucks into him hard. Outright smiles, glorious and sweaty and overheating fast as he watches the ripple of each increasing thrust run through Mickey’s body like water, each deep, frantic slap sending Mickey further and further along the bed no matter how he fists into the sheets. Each rapid smack of hips to tight, clenching ass fucks an uh, uh, ah, ah, ah! from Mickey, and it’s a chorus that rushes through Ian’s blood like a dynamite with an exceptionally flammable detonation cord.

Ian doesn’t let Mickey’s hips fall. Doesn’t have it in him to play that game in earnest tonight, not now, not after the years and desperation and the waiting. He holds Mickey’s hips up, the weight of his soulmate negligible as he uses the heft of his position to physically pull Mickey back onto his cock again and again and again, Mickey’s knees lifted entirely off the bed with no control to the situation but to sob into the mattress as Ian takes him at his pleasure. 

Mickey comes untouched, because of course he does. His cry cuts through the heavy, humid air, loud and long as he shudders on Ian’s cock, his ass milking Ian until he lets go with a dark, rough sound, his bruising grip growing tighter and tighter as he fills Mickey up. Takes care of him; real good care of him, just like Mickey asked. 

Ian releases Mickey first and watches him collapse before he crashes alongside, slipping out as he allows only half of his body to drape over Mickey’s sweaty, heaving frame. The light is back, aglow between Ian’s bones, seeping through his skin, all gold and encompassing them both, he’s sure. He’s sure Mickey feels it too. 

Absolutely unable to help himself, Ian drapes a hand down Mickey’s back, dipping into the cooling sweat that pools in the dip of his spine, then lower, thumbing across the valley of his lower back, and lower, lower until he can sink two fingers between the firm, full cheeks of Mickey’s ass and find his hole. He sweeps inside the tender muscle and Mickey whines with it, his thighs vaguely spreading to welcome the intrusion as Ian slowly, purposefully, fingerfucks the leaking cum back into Mickey’s ass. 

“Mmhmm,” Ian hums to himself, excessively pleased. 

Mick pulls out a heavy arm from beneath the wreck of his limp body and slaps blindly at Ian’s arm until he retracts it with a huff of a laugh and lets his hand finally rest on the small of Mickey’s back. 

“Jesus,” Mickey mumbles, still literally face down in the bed. He finally turns his head, cheek pillowed on a folded arm as he cracks one eye open to take in Ian’s smile. “Jesus,” he says again, his eyebrows scrunching together. “Put that thing away.”

Mickey closes his eyes and Ian doesn’t stop smiling. In fact, he watches Mickey’s own slow, sleepy smile alight his lax features, the peek of those bunny teeth melting Ian’s heart. 

He leans in and kisses whatever spots of Mickey’s face he can reach, a low chuckle rising with the challenge as Mickey groans in annoyance and flops onto his back, his entire arm draping across his face. So Ian kisses around it, then kisses his arm, then up his arm until he reaches Mickey’s armpit and shoves his face there, inhaling until Mickey squawks in dismay and shoves at Ian proper. 

“Nah man,” Mickey mumbles, his voice still subtly slurred with pleasure. “That’s where I draw the line.”

“Aw, come on.” Ian nuzzles at the side of Mickey’s face, demanding entry from the cover of Mickey’s arm. “You smell so good. Can I lick your armpit, y’think?”

“You can lick my goddamn balls, Gallagher,” Mickey says, but he lets his arm fall with a great sigh and just lays there while Ian rubs his nose against Mickey’s cheek, pressing kisses where he pleases. “This is unbearable,” Mickey says after a moment, as he makes no move to escape. “Stop.”

“But I love you,” Ian says, smiling at Mickey’s profile. 

Mickey stares at the ceiling but the curve of his lips is unmistakable. 

“Whatever,” he says. “I love you too, but you don’t see me being extra about it.”

“You told multiple city-wide news centers that we are two dudes in love, Mickey.”

“Yeah, well.” Mickey pauses. Darts that suddenly shy look at Ian, as if after all of this, he has got anything to be timid about. “We are. So.”

“So,” Ian repeats, smiling.

“So, go get me a glass of water and a fucking towel,” Mickey says. He smacks Ian’s ass as Ian escapes from the bed, and that’s more than enough to keep Ian smiling for just about forever. 

***

“Honey, I’m home!” Ian’s voice cuts through the cacophony of builders putting up drywall in the gutted building. 

Mickey looks up from his phone, along with five other semi-hot builders who eye Ian with curiosity. Sighing, Mickey pockets his phone and wanders to the glass front entrance where Ian is removing his hat and shaking off his hair, fluffing the wild disarray with fingers bright red from the cold. 

“Why you gotta say that shit when there’s like eighty dudes in here,” Mickey says upon approach. 

Ian beams at him, the drab and gray winter backdrop behind him only highlighting his sunny disposition. The further the year crept toward cold desolation, the happier Ian has been.

But that has nothing to do with the weather. 

“Why?” Ian asks, a whirlwind of affection as he pounces in on Mickey, arms wrapping around him as Ian places a noisy kiss upon Mickey’s head. The arms of Ian’s winter coat are frigid as fuck and Mickey shoves him away, shivering even in his hoodie. “Is your masculinity threatened?”

“The fuck, no,” Mickey snaps, his eyebrows scrunching as he vaguely gestures at the dudes putting up walls behind them. “You’re gonna give these assholes ideas.”

Ian looks excessively pleased about this, because of course he does. 

“What kind of ideas? Please, I want details. Are they raunchy? Have you only hired gay guys, because statistically, at least one in these guys has got to enjoy some dick, at the very least on the side.”

“How much fucking coffee have you had today,” Mickey says, instead of acknowledging literally anything that comes out of Ian’s mouth. It’s not allowed to encourage him once he gets rolling. 

“Only the one this morning,” Ian says as he unzips his coat to reveal a dark purple button up. He’s dressed for business, his deep gray slacks doing absolutely unholy things to those legs that Mickey will simply not recognize if he wants to get anything done today. “I’m just happy.”

It’s nice to hear. Doesn’t matter how many times Ian says it. To hear it means they’re doing something right. 

“So it’s done?” Mickey asks as he turns and gestures for Ian to follow. Ian doesn’t answer as they sweep past the main entry room and through the back where Mickey can close the doors on an office that doesn’t yet have walls, just bare bones of planks and completed electrical wiring. 

Ian closes the door and meets Mickey’s expectant look. He breathes out slow, contained. Smiles. 

“Yeah,” he says. “It’s done. My contract is finally complete and I don’t have to suffer a single job more for them.”

“The city is gonna cry,” Mickey says, smiling about it as he closes in on Ian and takes his face in both hands. 

“Let ‘em.”

“The Tower’s probably gonna publish mad shit about you.”

“Love that for me.”

“Everyone’s gonna miss you.”

“Well.” Ian lightly shrugs as he eases into Mickey’s space, his ice cold nose brushing Mickey’s warm one. “They might be a lot happier if some nice upstart southside agency hired me fresh off my sudden and crushing retirement from mainstream Super stardom.”

“Oh yeah?” Mickey lightly rubs at Ian’s freckled cheeks, warming them up as they grin into each other’s stupid faces. “Well, it turns out I might have just the job for you.”

“Mmm.” Ian leans in and searches Mickey’s gaze. “Show me where to sign, boss.”

And when their lips touch, no matter how briefly, there is a light. And they glow where it matters.