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Mickey is relishing in his evening alone.
Ian's out with Carl at a baseball game, the younger Gallagher brother having won two tickets from a raffle at the precinct. Pretty decent seats, according to what Ian told Mickey as he got ready for the night out. It's nice that they got to go out for the night. Ian had smiled all giddily after he had received the phone call. Mickey knows that the two brothers might not spend a whole bunch of time together, but one thing that they do share is their love of sports. Whenever there's a game that the two of them are free for, they usually go out to a bar and watch it together, or Carl will come over to their apartment and share a few beers with the game on the tv.
It's rare that they actually get to go to a game, live, where they can cheer for their team and share shitty, overpriced concession stand food together.
This, of course, allows Mickey to get to spend the night free from anyone save for himself.
It isn't often that he gets the apartment to himself, he and Ian practically connected at the hip, but whenever is does he usually tries to luxuriate in the rare silence.
Don't get him wrong, he loves being with Ian and hanging out with him every day (try and find the definition of unhealthy co-dependency and there's probably a picture of the two of them dead centre), but it's still nice to get some alone-time every once in a while.
He can eat whatever the fuck he wants on the couch without Ian nagging in his ear about potential stains or crumbs, he can watch Jackass reruns without Ian complaining about the injuries sustained (leftover instincts from his time as an EMT), he can drink straight out of the milk carton, he can just sit and stare at the wall, who fucking cares, he can just do whatever. It's great.
A wonderful and enjoyable night alone might not stop him from staring at the clock in anticipation of his husband's return, but that's neither here nor there.
In any case, he's having fun just lounging in their bed, playing a shooting game on his phone (absolutely destroying these other players, hah), abandoned bag of chips laying next to his hip, when he hears the buzz of someone trying to be let into their apartment.
He frowns. Ian should have his key, right? Did he forget it?
He hauls himself up from their bed with a groan, trudges over to the little receiver buzzer by their front door.
"Forgot your key?" he asks in lieu of a proper greeting.
"Nah," a voice that is not Ian responds. "He's just too fuckin' drunk to use it."
"Carl?" Mickey says, frowning even further. "Wait, he's drunk?"
"Yup," he says, without any further elaboration. Mickey's about to ask when he speaks up again, "can you let me in? This asshole's pretty heavy."
He buzzes them in, crosses his arms and taps at his bicep while he waits for them to come up, opening the door without a moment's hesitation when someone kicks at the base of it.
He's greeted with the sight of Carl holding Ian up, one hand holding Ian's arm around his shoulders, while the other grips at his waist. Ian, on his part, is completely slumped over and seemingly not helping his younger brother at all with moving around.
"Thanks man," Carl grunts out as he borderline stumbles into their apartment, walking unsteadily towards their living room to drop off the dead weight.
"What the fuck did you two do tonight?" Mickey asks after Carl drops Ian onto the couch, the latter seemingly out cold.
"Went to the game, then went to the restaurant right inside the stadium," Carl says. "They were celebrating the win and offered five free shots for every beer someone drank. Ian didn't wanna waste the alcohol," he shrugs, like that isn't completely insane and a horrible business model for this restaurant to follow.
"And you let him?" Mickey crosses his arms. He knows Ian can drink, but he doesn't usually anymore. He isn't as…high-strung about Ian's decisions regarding shit he should and shouldn't do on meds anymore, 'cause the man's a grown-ass adult and can make his own decisions, but still. It doesn't stop Mickey from worrying about it. No other signs of an upswing have been present recently, but Mickey'll still make a mental note of this. Just in case.
"What was I gunna do? Stop him?" Carl asks, arching an eyebrow. "Learnt a long time ago not to meddle with this kinda shit. He's doing fine anyways, I made sure before he started on the shots."
Of course he did. Carl is Ian's brother, Mickey guesses he should've expected that.
"And he has you, doesn't he?" Carl adds. "To take care of that sorta shit."
Mickey clears his throat and ignores the warming of his cheeks, the small ball of pride that wells up in his chest at being the guy to take care of that sorta shit. Pride that Carl trusts him enough to do it. Not that Mickey would care if he didn't, he doesn't give a flying fuck what people think of him, but still. It's nice. Whatever.
"You didn't wanna get sloshed too?" he says, changes the subject. No need to dwell on cheesy shit.
It doesn't seem like Carl to miss out on something like that, especially when booze is cheap and flowing.
"Early shift tomorrow," Carl shrugs. "And someone had to drive us back."
Mickey tilts his head in assent, hears a thump from the living room, which makes him sigh. Drunk Ian's harmless, but a lot to deal with. Especially when Mickey isn't drunk himself, when he has more patience for drunk-Ian shenanigans.
"Ye-ah, have fun with him," Carl pats him on the shoulder, looks back as he leaves their apartment with a shit-eating grin. "I'd get a bucket for later."
"Oh, fuck you!" Mickey calls after him, uncaring of the neighbours that he's probably annoying. He closes the door as he grumbles under his breath about shitty brother-in-laws, takes a deep breath before going into the kitchen. Time to take care of his absolutely plastered husband.
First things first, he needs to get him a glass of water and something to eat. Either he'll have to wake the guy up and deal with him being all sappy and shit, or he'll have to immediately sprint to get something for the man to throw up into. Ian isn't used to drinking this much anymore, and Mickey sees a killer hangover for him in the near-future. Might as well hydrate while he can still keep fluids down, and hopefully the food'll help soak up the alcohol and sober him up.
He settles on making him a simple peanut butter and jam sandwich. He isn't about to make him a gourmet meal, and the comfort food might be easier to eat than anything requiring the use of utensils. He also grabs two Advil and Ian's nighttime meds, places them on the plate with the sandwich like some kind of lame side dish. He shrugs to himself. Better than nothing.
"Hey, dickhead," he calls out as he walks into the living room, meal and glass of water in hand. "Wake up, time to chow-down."
Ian doesn't stir, laying slumped over on the couch, head awkwardly tilted onto his shoulder and half-laying on his side, one arm hanging limply off of the cushions. Carl seems to have mis-judged Ian's height, so one leg is resting on the arm of the couch, foot extended well past and looking real uncomfortable. His shirt is pulled up slightly, showing off a sliver of skin, one sleeve of his jacket somehow pushed up to the elbow while the other stays down by his wrist.
His cheeks and nose are red from the booze, highlighting the freckles speckled across his face, hair curly and messy on his head. His mouth is slightly open, soft breaths audible as he exhales in little puffs. The thump from earlier seems to have been his foot falling off of the couch, shoes still on.
In simple terms, he looks a mess.
But he does look cute like this, Mickey thinks to himself, allowing himself a small, indulgent smile.
He sets the plate and cup on the coffee table, stands over his husband with his hands on his hips. "Ian, wake up. You gotta eat somethin' before you hurl."
He snuffles at that, head tilting in Mickey's direction. A moment later, right before Mickey goes to nudge him with his foot, his eyes blink open, green and hazy.
"Wakey wakey, Sleeping Beauty," Mickey says, eyebrows rising high on his face, tampers down the smile that's threatening to break through.
Ian just stares at him in silence, expression slack and mouth agape, and Mickey starts to worry the longer he just sits there, motionless.
"Uh," he starts, "Earth to Ian? You with me, man?"
"Holy shit," Ian breathes out, and Mickey snorts.
"Yeah, hello to you too assho-" he starts, but Ian's up in a flash, standing so quickly it's a miracle he doesn't fall over with the amount of alcohol in his system, grabbing at Mickey's face and getting so close so fast it startles Mickey half to death.
"Christ!" Mickey yells out, nearly jumping out of his skin. "The fuck are you doin'?"
"Mickey," Ian slurs unhelpfully, gripping at his cheeks hard enough that Mickey feels his face getting squished.
"Ian, fuckin'—" his voice comes out muffled, pulling at Ian's hands without any success. "Let go of me you—!"
Before he can finish, Ian lurches forward again, tries to get their faces closer together in what Mickey can only assume is a really shitty attempt at kissing him, which pushes way more weight onto him and causes him to stumble backwards.
"Fuckin'—" Mickey squawks as their legs get tangled together, his eyes widening as gravity suddenly inverts and he loses his footing, falling back onto the couch.
He has approximately half of a second to think to himself this is going to hurt, before Ian's full weight crushes down onto him and knocks the wind right out from his lungs.
"Jesus," he wheezes as Ian scrambles on top of him, getting his hands back on Mickey's face.
He doesn't manage to get any other words out before Ian tries to dip down again, tries to kiss him, and promptly smashes their foreheads together hard enough that Mickey swears he sees stars.
His eyes squeeze shut as he swears loudly, pushing Ian's head back with a hand on his face, reaches between them with the other and rubs at his forehead. Shit, that really hurt. It feels, somewhat nonsensically, like his nose it about to bleed. He knows that's just his body getting all confused, going a little light-headed at the suddenness of the pain, but still. He wipes a hand under his nose, just in case.
The rapidly forming bump on his head will probably bruise from the sheer force of the accidental headbutt. This has got to be the stupidest, and yet gayest fucking way Mickey has ever been injured, ever. How does one get a near-concussion because his husband wants to kiss him, and misses the mark so bad he injures them both?
"Can I fuckin' help you?!" Mickey yells out, glaring with one eye as the other one stays closed, pain still radiating and causing his eyes to burn slightly from the pin-pricks.
Ian just looks at him with wide eyes, like he isn't even feeling the pain (he probably isn't, the copious amounts of booze in his system dampening just how hard the actual impact was, lucky bastard), his lips still parted in an alcohol-induced daze.
"Did you get fuckin' brain damage, jackass?" Mickey spits out. Yeah, he's going to get a fucking bruise. Fucking ouch. "Or are you stayin' quiet just to piss me off?"
"Uh," Ian finally says after another moment of silence, "whoops."
Fucking whoops.
"'Whoops' he says," Mickey breathes out in disbelief. He shoves at Ian's shoulders a second later, nearly growls in frustration when the big oaf doesn't move. "Get the fuck off of me, asshole, I need to get a bag of frozen peas or some shit."
"No-o," Ian whines out, shoves his head down into the crook of Mickey's neck, nearly headbutting him in the chin in the process, which would've been the cherry on fucking top. "Mickey, no, don't."
"Oh my fuckin' God," Mickey grumbles, wiggles from underneath his husband as he tries to escape. "Gallagher, let me go."
"No!" Ian practically wails, head shooting up and bombarding Mickey with big, watery green eyes that stare into his own. "Why're you callin' me Gallagher? Why're you mad at me?"
"Did ya miss the part where you headbutted me?" Mickey asks sarcastically. He tries to wiggle again but Ian only wraps his arms tighter around him, until Mickey drops his head back down onto the couch with a disgruntled sigh.
"Don't be mad," Ian says, kisses at his cheek.
"I'm not fuckin' mad at you," Mickey denies, scrunches his face when Ian kisses his other cheek. "I'm…mildly frustrated."
"You're mad," Ian shakes his head, lip jutting out in a small pout. "You've got that wrinkle between your eyebrows."
Said eyebrows rise up in mild outrage. "You ain't exactly helpin' your case here, asshat."
"Here," Ian shuffles some more, shimmies up Mickey's body in a distinctly non-sexy way, with elbows digging into ribs and knees pressing into shins.
"Would you—" Mickey complains, before Ian drops his weight back down again, "—agh."
"Lemme kiss it better—"
"Oh, for Christ's sake—"
"C'mere—" Ian interrupts him, gets both of his hands back on Mickey's cheeks and presses a big smooch on his forehead. "See? All better now, you can stop bitchin' about it."
"Bitching? Are you serious right now?" Mickey exclaims. "You nearly gave me a concussion you dumbass!"
"You gotta kiss mine now," Ian ignores him, which makes Mickey sputter in outrage.
"Hell no, you're gunna let me up so I can grab some fuckin' ice for us."
"C'mon," Ian drags out, "you gotta kiss your husband better. It's the rules."
"I don't give a flying fuck about the rules, you asshole, I'm tryin' to make sure we don't fuckin' bruise—"
He tries to wiggle out from under him again (fruitlessly), as Ian tries to move at the same time, his knee slipping from their precarious position on the couch, and once more, Mickey feels gravity invert as they start to tumble off, Ian gripping at Mickey's side and pulling him down with him.
"Ian—!"
They land on the ground, Ian letting out an oof as he lands on his back, Mickey landing hard against his chest and knocking his knee painfully against the ground.
"Ow," Ian says, staring at the ceiling, room probably spinning if his wide eyes are anything to go by.
"Oh. My. Fucking. God!" Mickey yells out, muffled against Ian's sternum, emphasizing each word with a fist thumping hard (but not hard enough to actually hurt him) against Ian's shoulder.
He head shoots up when Ian starts to giggle (giggle, is he for real? Mickey married a five-year old, for fuck's sake), shooting him with a pointed glare.
"I hate you," he says, and Ian laughs even harder at that, eyes crinkling at the corners, head thrown back as his chest shakes up and down. It makes Mickey's lips twitch upwards, unable not to laugh a little too at the sheer idiocy of it all.
"I really, really, do," he continues through a chuckle, poking at Ian's chest, but Ian just grins, wide and unabashed, cheeks flushed pink.
"No you don't," Ian sing-songs.
Mickey huffs, doesn't say anything in response (not like the man is wrong, afterall), fixes Ian with a tired, albeit fond, look.
"D'you think you can eat and take the meds now? I'm tired man, I wanna go to bed. And you need all the rest you can get before the hangover kills you."
Ian pretends to think about it for a moment, eyes looking up to the ceiling as he plasters a pondering look on his face, before focusing back on Mickey.
"Only if you kiss it better."
"Seriously?"
"Seriously."
Mickey sighs, closes his eyes for a second in exasperation. "Okay, c'mere."
He has to catch Ian's head before he headbutts him again, the man practically shoving his skull into Mickey's face, but he does press a kiss to where Ian's forehead is already getting a bit blotchy, because he's a good husband like that.
They untangle from each other not long after, but Ian still keeps a leg over Mickey's lap while he eats and takes his pills (not like Mickey was going to leave him alone in here, not after the display from the past however long it's been, but whatever), and Mickey tries not to fall asleep sitting up. It's pretty late now, and he's tired, desperately wanting to sink into bed and sleep until late-morning tomorrow, since they have nothing to do.
Ian seems to be feeling the drowsiness to, eyes heavy as he swallows down the rest of his water. It doesn't take much convincing on Mickey's part to get him up and into their bedroom, half-dragging him as he leans most of his weight on Mickey, somehow managing to get them both to brush their teeth, moving on to help him strip down to his boxers (Mickey forgoes trying to put him into actual pjs, since the man's limbs are unwieldy on a good day and he isn't about to give one or both of them a broken bone tonight), and letting him plop down onto the mattress.
It doesn't take long for Ian to fall asleep, practically gone from the moment his head hits his pillow, and Mickey looks at him fondly as he sinks onto his own side, his own eyes feeling a bit heavy after he pulls up the sheets to their chins. He doesn't have the energy to ice his forehead, which'll bite him in the ass in the morning, but he can't bring himself to care anymore. It'll fade in a day or two anyways.
For all of the hassle of tonight, he can't help but smile at how affectionate Ian was. It's nice to be reminded of how obsessed his husband still is, even after all of these years, even when they're comfortably past their honeymoon phase and completely settled in their domestic life phase. It's sweet.
And while he's feeling sappy and fond and completely, irrevocably in love, he's still going to tease the shit out of Ian in the morning after he wakes up.
It's least he could do, after tonight.
When Ian wakes up the next morning (late, much later than he usually gets up, so Mickey had a chance to admire him as he slept before letting himself prepare to tease him relentlessly for last night, sitting up with his back against the headboard, spending some time just scrolling on his phone while he waited for his husband to wake up), Mickey makes sure to watch him with a raised eyebrow and arms crossed over his chest.
"Ugh," Ian groans out, immediately cradling his head in his hands and curling into a ball when he tries to open his eyes, the bright light of the room most likely sending shooting pains directly into his skull.
"Mornin' sunshine," Mickey drawls, tapping his fingers against his bicep. "Have fun last night?"
Ian doesn't answer in words, more like garbled noises and groans. Mickey catches him say something along the lines of "horrible mistake" in there too, which almost makes him break, but he stifles the laughter down as he continues to stare. He waits until Ian is composed enough to lift up his head slightly and stare at him with half-closed eyes, watches as he mentally buffers, eyes raising to a spot right above Mickey's eyeline.
"Why d'you have a bruise on your forehead?" Ian asks blearily, reaching out and grazing his fingertips against the tender spot.
"I dunno," Mickey says, "why d'you have a matchin' one?"
Ian blinks at him for a second, squinting his eyes even more as he tries to remember the previous night, before they widen comically as the memories come rushing back to him.
"Oh my God," he lets out as he buries his head back into his pillow. Mickey allows the smile that's been threatening to break through this entire time to spread across his face, one hand going to drag through red strands as he witnesses his husband's ears go red in real time.
"I can appreciate you bein' so excited to see me," Mickey starts, grinning even wider when Ian interrupts him with an embarrassed groan, one of his hands shooting out and trying to block Mickey's mouth. He dodges it with a laugh. "Y'know. Pleased as punch you ain't bored of the ol' ball and chain just yet. But next time, keep the headbutting for the bar fights, yeah?"
"I'm so sorry," Ian says, half-lifts his head from the pillow. His face is completely red, lips pulling downwards.
"In your defence," Mickey continues, a teasing lilt to his tone that makes Ian throw his head back down, "you did try to kiss it better. But it didn't really do shit when you immediately threw us both to the ground. Think my knee might be bruised, too. Had to stop you from kissing that better too. Who knows what kinda injury you would've given me next?"
"Stop. Please," Ian begs, red ears probably burning to the touch.
"It's nice to know you love me so much," Mickey ignores him, fake-sighs wistfully, sinking down to try and meet Ian's gaze, laughing as Ian dodges his attempts by trying to burrow even further into the pillow. "Really, it is. Don't gotta be so fuckin' aggressive about it, though."
"I hate you," he hears muffled into the pillow. His grins widens even further, and he pecks at the still-visible skin of Ian's cheek.
"No you don't," he sing-songs, lets out a loud laugh when Ian goes to hit him blindly on the shoulder with a thwack, no doubt remembering the conversation from last night.
He rests his head on his hand, looks down fondly at his husband, still hiding, flush spreading down to his neck.
"How 'bout you make it up to me, hm?" Mickey asks, the small, teasing smile still on his face.
Ian harrumphs from where his face is still half-buried into his pillow, fixing Mickey with a half-hearted glare.
"Gimme an actual kiss," Mickey says, "'cause I didn't get one last night. Or, I didn't get an injury-free one."
Ian's lips twitch upwards at that, a small huff of amusement escaping. "Fine."
He gets up and moves to cup the side of Mickey's face with one hand, before pushing him down onto the bed to loom over him with a glint in his eyes.
"I said injury-free!" Mickey cries out with a wide smile, laughing as Ian ducks down and presses light pecks on his cheeks, a few on his forehead, one on his nose, his chin. He pulls back with a fond smile of his own, eyes flickering down to Mickey's mouth.
And Mickey can't help but to poke at him one more time. He deserves it, after all the shit he went through last night.
"Make sure not to miss this time, tough guy, my mouth is down here," he says with a grin, laughs when Ian lets out a long-suffering sigh, moving his face back down with a "Shut up."
They're both smiling as they kiss, careful not to bump heads, Mickey's hands reaching up and resting around Ian's shoulders and down his back, while Ian's other hand goes to cradle the other side of his face, thumbs gently stroking across his cheekbones.
"Hey, you did it," Mickey needles, but it's contradicted by his soft smile. "Congrats. No bruise."
"You are insufferable," Ian smiles back.
"I think you mean irresistible," Mickey shoots back. "I have it on good authority that you lose all sense of finesse when I'm there—"
"O-kay," Ian interrupts him with another peck. "Lemme show you just how much I can kiss you without causing any bodily harm—"
Mickey laughs, bright and happy, as Ian presses him deeper into bed, peppering kisses all over his face, smiling against his cheeks with each press of his lips.
Drunk Ian is a lot to deal with, that's true, but if it leads to this kind of treatment the next morning…
Who is Mickey to complain?