Hi.

Sup?

First Shameless fanfic, let's get it.

Inspired by the song "Through It All" by From Ashes to New.

*Set in between episodes 4x12 and 5x01*

God never listened to Mickey Milkovich when he was desperate enough to try and talk to Him, he knew that a long time ago. He also knew that desperate times made for stupid-ass decisions on his part, so why was he surprised at the Google results screen in front of him, blatantly ignoring his prayers? He just wanted one link on his side, one little link that would tell everyone that he was right all along. That couldn't possibly be too much to ask.

"Studies have shown that 25-50% of people with bipolar disorder (manic depression) attempt suicide…"

This statement was somehow worse than reading about the woman who wrote "Do Not Enter. Call 911. Tell Kelly I won't be able to meet her for coffee." on a piece of paper and proceeded to hang herself in the garage. Her family actually used the words 'not a surprise' in the same sentence as 'our sister's/mother's/daughter's death'.

"…the truth is that my sister's spirit died several years ago. No one could have saved her from her disease, not even herself…"

"You're full of shit," Mickey threw the phone across the bed and took a deep breath, pushing his hands through his charcoal locks and keeping a tight grip on his scalp. Research had never done him any good, if his grades were any indication of that, and now was not the time to wade in uncharted territory. He had never given enough of a shit about anyone to Google their name, much less a disease they might be suffering from.

But Ian wasn't sick. He knew that, and somehow, he had to get everyone else on board with that, too. It was creeping up on week three, and the highlight of the redhead's day still only consisted of him opening his mouth long enough to tell someone to fuck off. Ian could cuss Mickey's ass out all the way from the L to the Northside if he wanted to, Mickey couldn't care less about that. But he would have to get out of bed first. Way easier said than done.

He heard Ian quietly sniff beside him. How he could breathe and not cough immediately after was beyond Mickey's comprehension. The boy smelled so bad, his BO overpowered the cigarette and weed smoke that Mickey was pumping in the air just to try and cover it up.

Mickey glanced down at him, sweeping oily hair behind Ian's ear. "Shower for Jesus?"

"Leave me alone."

Mickey rolled his eyes. The quiet reply had become the standard response to anything you said to Ian in the past two weeks, but luckily for the Milkovich, he had figured a way around Ian's useless words: talk him to death. That at least got him a spirited 'shut up'.

He lit a cigarette and blew the smoke down in Ian's face, chuckling "You goin' for Dirtiest White Boy in America? That's my title, man, Veronica's gonna be pissed."

No response.

Mickey hesitated. He knew he had to keep talking, even through his lockjaw and hand tremors, if only to show Ian that he wasn't getting under his boyfriend's skin any more than he already had. He took another drag, a controlled exhale, keeping the aggression in his gut and out of his voice.

"Your family wants to lock you up," he started evenly, terrified. "Do you understand? They want to put you in some fuckin' asylum, drug you up, and…"

He cut himself off. He'd already had enough nightmares of Ian in a straightjacket to finish his sentence. "You need to get up, Ian. You're not sick like your fucked-up mom, and you need to get up and tell them that, 'cause they won't listen to me. Get up, Ian. Please."

Mickey wasn't used to asking permission. He couldn't remember begging anyone for anything, even when he had a pistol to his head. Mickey saying 'please', in his eyes, was the equivalent of him throwing on a dress and heading to the Alibi in Stilettos. Ian knew that, and Mickey prayed that it gave him a couple points in this game that he never wanted to play.

"Monica," Ian muttered.

"Yes," Mickey urged, turning his body and leaning closer to Ian. "fuckin' Monica. She used to lay around and stink up your house, remember that? She was crazy, okay, doesn't mean you are." He placed his hand on Ian's head and gently grabbed a fistful of fire-red hair. "So I'm gonna ask you nicely, one more time, to save your own ass like a goddamn adult, with balls. You can wash yourself or Mandy and Svet can pop in with buckets of ice water. Up to you." Svetlana would relish in making Ian suffer, that was for damn sure. She refused to go into the pungent room, but she was demanding her bed back for her aching, post-baby bones. She would have no choice but to help.

Ian blinked at the wall. "Save myself," he whispered to no one.

Mickey, however, nodded and tossed the cigarette back in his mouth. "Wise choice. Come on," He leaped up and clapped his hands twice. "your muscles are probably locked up tighter than virgin pussy, I'll help—."

"Monica…" Ian didn't budge.

Mickey narrowed his eyes. "What? Why are we still—?"

"She tried," A single tear ran down Ian's face, his voice low and bleak. "saving herself."

Mickey snorted, covering up the rising tension in his body. "Well, from what your sisters told me, doc gave her the only pills she would never take, so—."

"She did, at Thanksgiving…"

Mickey wasn't sure Ian was even talking to him anymore. "What, take her pills? When was she ever around for fuckin' holidays?"

"She almost fixed it…Fiona and…"

Mickey waited for more information that never came. The rage was crawling over his skin so much, he clenched his fists to keep himself together. "Get up, Gallagher. Now."

"I want to fix it, too."

The both of them wouldn't survive to the end of this conversation. Mickey could see himself dragging Ian's body out in pieces on trash day, or Svetlana would walk in to a bloated body in her bed that Ian would refuse to acknowledge.

"Fuck you," Mickey made his way to the door without looking at Ian again. "I'm gettin' the girls. Stay here and marinate in your Ebola-ridden paradise, I'm sick of this shit."

Mickey grabbed a joint from his bedside table and stormed out of his room. He found Mandy in hers, rounding up Kenyatta's crusty clothes with a scowl that her brother had come to know so well.

She took the half-cigarette from Mickey's fingers and shook her head, touching the burning cherry to the end of his unlit joint. "If men are gonna cheat with dirty bitches, why can't they at least wash the tuna and cheap-ass perfume off their clothes?"

Mandy's questions were historically rhetorical, so Mickey ignored her and swallowed more smoke. "Where's Svet?"

Mandy's brows furrowed at Mickey's sudden interest in his wife. "Some crisis with one of your fire-crotch employees, why?"

He inhaled again and held it for a beat longer than normal. The weed wasn't working. "He needs a shower; help me chase him to the bathroom." He started out of the room without waiting for an answer.

"Mick, he's not—."

He flipped around so quick, Mandy nearly dropped the cigarette and ashes snowed on the carpet. His eyes were heinous and she wondered, in the back of her mind, how Ian could still find them beautiful when Mickey's temper exploded like this.

He growled through his teeth. "I'm not asking your fuckin' opinion or permission, Mandy. Just find a bucket and some damn water."

"Iggy's paying the bill now; they didn't turn it back on yet."

"Then get some fuckin' snow from the lawn!" He was falling off the rails quicker than Mandy could keep up with. "He needs to get up or…"

"I know," Mandy disregarded Mickey's less-than-ideal notion to bathe her best friend in dirty slush and touched his shoulder tenderly. "Fiona said it would only be a couple of days so he can slow down and—."

She somehow tripped his wire again without trying. "Any fucking slower and his ass is in the ground, Mandy!" Mickey pushed against her bedroom wall so hard, his veins were popping through his biceps. She recognized this move in violent men that were seconds away from beating someone to death.

"What the fuck are you people not understanding about that?!" Mickey continued, gaining momentum. "I looked up those pills they want to give him and they sedate the hell out of people, turns you into a fucking zombie forever! He's not sick, you hear me?"

It was Mandy's turn to become fed up. "Then what's wrong, genius?" she lashed back. "It's been two damn weeks."

Mickey's fists came up in front of his chest and Mandy flinched, for the first time, away from her brother. He had never laid a hand on her (besides the time she wanted off work and needed a black eye to make her excuse believable, which she paid him to do) and she knew that was simply his last attempt at calming himself before just punching the wall. Living with thugs her entire life had made her tough, but living with Kenyatta burned away her instincts to her very core.

Mickey should have noticed this. Hell, he would have done something about the situation if he had seen it. But everything about him was changing so fast, Mandy couldn't be angry at him or his next retort.

"Fuck you, I'll get the bucket. Move," He shouldered past her, en route to the back yard, and took one more drag of the useless weed before trashing it in the nearest ashtray.

But Mandy wasn't done. "Let's say he's not."

Mickey turned back around, more annoyed than interested, as she continued. "Let's say the little chemicals in his brain aren't completely out of whack and he's doing this as some kind of sick—sorry, not sick—joke. After all the work, everything he and you went through so you could finally man up and come out about who you fell in love with—."

"Shut the fuck up."

Mandy was treading dangerous waters and she knew it. But her brother needed to hear

this and if she didn't tell him, who would? Ian? That was almost laughable.

"Why now? He left, Mick. You can blame that army shit on a disease, but we both know that he ran away because he thought you didn't give a shit. You gave him what he wanted; why wouldn't he ride that high for a while?"

Mickey's face remained enraged, but Mandy could see the heavy layer of tears about to fall from his eyes.

She went on. "That's what you wanted, too, right?" Her tone became softer when Mickey didn't fight her on the truth. "He convinced you to come out, tell the world you have a boyfriend, and as soon as you do, he has a psychotic break."

Steam might have actually been coming off of his head. "Keep fuckin' pushing me, I dare you."

He was hearing her, but old habits die hard. Mickey lived in a black cloud of denial his entire life, about his sexuality, his future, even their father. Mandy knew there was no standing reason to try and talk at him anymore, and it took every ounce of maturity in her to step away from the door.

She did, however, still need to look out for her best friend. "Don't dump fucking water on him. He doesn't need an asshole boyfriend on top of everything else."

Mickey's fist dented the thin wall directly beside Mandy's head. He locked eyes with his sister and finally noticed the childish, fearful spark in her eyes that he swore he would never put there. Mandy was a good friend to Ian, Mickey had appreciated that thus far, but she just didn't understand. Those quack doctors would poke and prod at Ian until they found an excuse to cut his brain open if they couldn't 'fix the problem'. Mickey read about lobotomies that were still performed in modern medicine, and he promised himself that he would level anything and anyone—even both of their families—if that meant keeping the love of his life safe. Fuck a psychotic break.

"He's not broken." His tone didn't put the matter up for discussion.

Mandy swallowed and nodded. "Okay."

She watched as Mickey dug around in his pocket and unveiled his phone, dialing a number and turning his back to Mandy. She could tell he was talking to Fiona after the first line out of his mouth.

"The fuck I need an ambulance for…no, Jesus, he's just…are you done?"

He peeked over at Mandy sheepishly, who raised a defensive eyebrow. That didn't stop her from slowly backing out of the room when Mickey turned away from her again.

"Just need to ask a question, God…look, do you remember any holidays with Monica? Maybe Thanksgiving, he keeps talking about her fixing something and I don't know what he's…yes, Fiona, your mother Monica…yes, I'm fucking sure, what did she fix? What the hell did she do?"

Mandy braced her hands on the door frame and gulped when she watched the horror fall over Mickey's entire body. She could recognize it from their violent childhood, and she realized that she hadn't seen her brother truly terrified in over ten years. Mickey was born for the thug life, excelled in it even. He was well-hardened by puberty and started dishing out right hooks as well as he was taking them by twelve. Mandy had witnessed him convince a crackhead to sell him the gun that he had pointed at Mickey's head for two joints and a mint that he told him was E. Mickey pistol-whipped him, grabbed his weed back, and dragged Mandy—along with her injured ankle—back home, three miles in forty minutes. She remembered him sleeping like a baby that night. He even justified his father forcing roofies down Mickey's 11-year old throat because Terry couldn't afford to feed his kids for the night. "Can't be hungry if we're sleep, right?" Mickey had said a couple days later. "That's just good fuckin' parenting…"

His desperation to drag an ounce of pride out of their father had boiled Mandy's blood her whole life and after Ian's drunken announcement at that bullshit wedding (that she knew was bullshit in the first place), it all made sense. However, when Ian had called Mandy after Mickey's legendary Alibi confession, it became clear that her brother had somehow become tangled in the Gallagher world, just like her. Mandy believed in Lip enough to do several crazy things about it, and she knew how fucking terrifying it was to hear the person you love saying that they don't want you anymore, even if they don't mean it.

Mandy's heart broke for Mickey ten times over. Still didn't give him the right to treat Ian like an inmate.

She was pulled from her daze by her own phone vibrating in her pocket. A quick text from Iggy, 'Bill's paid, using the change to get wraps.'.

Mandy peeked at Mickey through her lashes and took note of his eyes shut tight. He gripped the phone in his hand tight enough for her to hear the screen crack and tried to decide between letting him stew and have a heart attack, or snap him out of it and risk a stampede.

"Water's back on," she mumbled.

Mickey didn't answer. Without giving her another look, he pushed past her and charged back to his room. He cut the light on and felt every muscle in his body clench upon staring at Ian's naked back in his bed. His rising heart rate may have been cause for concern had he not been struggling so hard to control the bite in his voice.

"So, you wanna fix it, huh?"

Ian said nothing, digging his face further into the pillow.

Mickey didn't move. This could only end one way and he had to conserve his energy for what he was about to do.

"We probably got less than ten minutes," he shakily continued, "before your entire family busts through the front door with cops because they now know you want to bleed the fuck out on our kitchen floor. They get here and see you in the shower, this all goes away. You're out of options, Ian."

He wasn't prepared for a response. "Let me."

Mickey stepped forward, flexing his fists in front of his face again. "No one's fucking stopping you! Get your ass up!"

"Let me die."

Words have never meant much to anyone in the Milkovich house. They threatened each other's lives by breakfast and someone was always bleeding by lunch over a slick comment said in passing. Terry would kick his kids out of the house and call them two hours later demanding they pick up a gallon of gin on their way home. The boys were there to look out for their younger sister, but she ended up pregnant with their father's child anyway. Words were disposable, useless, a joke.

So Mickey would have to evaluate later why his entire body, for the first time in his life, swayed like the room had started spinning. He could almost see Ian's request hanging from the ceiling like dusty cobwebs ready to swallow him whole.

He choked on the little saliva in his mouth. "What did you just—?"

"Go away."

Mickey paused for a few beats, then his hands were moving to the zipper of his jeans. His fingers flew to undo the button and he dropped them from his body in less than three seconds. He crossed the room in the same amount of time, ripping the covers off.

Ian visibly went rigid. "No," he muttered.

"Fuck you."

Ian was in the air quicker than he could process. Mickey had grabbed his boyfriend's left arm and leg in preparation to toss him over his shoulder, on his way to the bathroom.

Ian started screaming when he realized what was happening. "NO!"

Mickey dug his nails into Ian's leg. "Shut the fuck up!"

He continued kicking and screaming. "LET ME GO!"

"Shut the fuck—."

"NOO, GET OFF ME!"

At first, Mickey ignored his sister and one of the Russians quietly coming to the door to see the commotion. Mandy shooed her away once she saw the situation escalating and opened her mouth to object. Mickey, reading her mind, glowered at her.

Mandy started. "He's not—."

"Lip fuckin' told you about their mom, didn't he?"

Mandy refused to take the blame for this. Fiona told both of them two weeks ago that Ian could end up suicidal at one point. The only difference between them was that Mandy believed her and asked Lip to explain what she should be looking for. It wasn't her fault that Mickey wanted to play Ignorant-Ass Superman.

"They told you, too," Mandy defended herself. "Lip told me to keep an eye out for any 'trigger words'—."

"Like 'Monica' and 'Thanksgiving'?!" Mickey clearly wasn't having it and decided that this wasn't worth the little time he had left. "Get out of here, Mandy."

Mandy looked to her best friend with tears in her eyes. "Ian, you—."

"GO!" Mickey screamed.

"LET ME G—STOP IT!" Ian begged at the same time.

Mickey kicked the bathroom door open and cut the water on, despite Ian's fists still pounding his spine. He smacked Ian in the ass, hard as hell, and told him to shut up again through his teeth. When Ian still didn't calm down, Mickey swung one leg into the tub and roughly threw Ian off his shoulder. He immediately straddled him, locking his weight around him so that Mickey could yank Ian's filthy boxers from his hips. The water hadn't even gotten hot yet.

Cold and defeated, Ian bowed his head and the lump formed in his throat. "Please, Mickey," he cried "Please, please…"

They were fighting and no one could win, Mickey realized, as he grabbed his lover's face and started shaking. "PLEASE WHAT?!" he screamed. "What the hell do you want me to do, Ian?! I don't know what you want me to do; I don't know how to help you!"

Ian's eyes softened almost enough to comfort Mickey, to tell him that everything was going to be okay and Ian would let him wake up from this nightmare any second now. It was almost as if he were ready to stand up and take the shower himself with the way he looked at Mickey. Ian's hand gently fell on top of his, squeezing his fingers and lifting his hand up to his lips. Instead of kissing them, Ian whispered again "Let me die," He clutched Mickey's hand tighter, trembling. "I just want to die."

Mickey didn't move, just stared into his man's dead eyes and searched hopelessly for answers. A dark figure flinched in his peripheral vision and he turned his head enough to see Mandy cover her mouth and shed matching tears, going for her pocketed phone. Mickey, completely lost, let one tear free and sniffed. "Wash the sheets and make the bed," he softly commanded. He shut the door in her face before she could argue and pushed the small bookcase in front of it in case she had a key.

Mickey got his own tears under control and grabbed a semi-clean towel from the rack before he pulled Ian up into a sitting position. He stared him down again, watching the water hit Ian's face, and tried to tell the shower water apart from the tears. Ian closed his eyes and pulled his knees up to his chest, resting his head on them. Mickey took a breath, swung his other leg into the front of the tub, and knelt in front of him, holding him up by his chest one-handed. He grabbed his shower rag in his other hand, cut the water off, and squeezed stolen body wash onto Ian's shoulders.

The words didn't want to come, but Mickey forced them. "You think I'm not scared, too?"

Ian didn't move. He barely even blinked, just let Mickey lift his arms to scrub his ripe armpits. Mickey pressed the rag against the nape of Ian's neck and watched the suds slowly run down his strong, freckled back.

"Two options," he started "you know exactly what the fuck you're doing, making me look like an asshole, in which case, you won't leave this tub alive. Or," Mickey made his way down Ian's stomach and stopped his eyes from falling upon the redhead's, as Svet called it, "ugly skin stick" that Mickey missed so damn much the last couple weeks.

"I'm making myself look like an asshole, 'cause you're not hurting me on purpose. Either way, I'm over it. And I suggest you get with my program before your family puts you in one that kills every last brain cell you got left."

He admitted that that was a little harsh and didn't expect very good results. Mickey backed away from Ian's face and reminded himself that it was just the two of them in the room, no one else would hear the words Mickey never thought he would say.

"I wake up in the morning with three cigs and two beers before I leave the house to go round up a group of pissy Russian whores who I'm pretty sure are gonna try and run soon. My office is a moldy hole above a shitty bar and my idiot business partner doesn't seem the slightest bit fuckin' worried about all the money we're not pullin' in, even though he reminds everyone about his three new brats every time someone orders a goddamn drink. I have to steal food for me and at least ten other people, depending on Svetlana and her fuckin' attitude. I have to look a wife and baby that I can't stand in the face every day, people that shouldn't be here in the first place. A wife that's trying to kill us both every chance she gets."

Mickey lifted Ian's chin with his pointer finger, leveling his eyes with Ian to see them unchanged, still navy and foreign, still begging death. He lowered his voice, in case anyone was parked outside the door eavesdropping.

"I'm the reason they're both here," His voice was sincere but his words contradicted every homophobic lesson his father ever taught him. Ian turned his head away. "I'm the reason this shithole is full of bitches. And you never would have left if I wasn't acting like…" He could only say so much before what little pride he had left got the best of him.

He was shocked to find that his confessions had chipped away at Ian's inexplicable wall, if only a little, when Ian muttered "Shut up."

'You're listening,' Mickey thought to himself, and went on. "I scared you, just like I wanted to. We can't have weaknesses in these streets, and even now that everyone knows, I can't…"

'Fuck…' The bottle said 3-in-1, so Mickey squeezed a quarter-sized amount into Ian's hair and started to lather. "I was just starting to think that I didn't have to worry about you. You were willing to walk away from me twice; you forced me to fight. To chase after you like…" He sadly chuckled to himself at the irony. "Like a little bitch. Good one, Gallagher. I deserved that, and I don't usually mean it when I say I'm sor—fuck."

He felt Ian's head flinch after he noticed his nails digging into the boy's scalp. Mickey swallowed the fear of going on and powered through it. "It's hard. I gotta do this the only way I know how, and that's to pummel something. And you're not sick, so I can't be mad at this bi-whatever-the-fuck because it's bullshit."

Mickey turned the water back on and rinsed the soap from Ian's hair. He picked the rag up, along with Ian's long leg, and started washing down his thighs. His chin dared to rest on Ian's knee.

"Now, if you've changed your mind about the picnics and wedding dresses, that's fine," Mickey's stomach fell a little, and he was surprised to find himself secretly disappointed if that half-sarcastic comment were to be true. "No starwatching for us, whatever. But you told me our lives would be better if I admitted to this and what?"

The anger was bubbling back up and Mickey fought like hell to keep it buried. "You suddenly can't take the pressure? You tryin' not to hurt my fuckin' feelings or somethin', 'cause we can settle that right out front if you want," He grinned, the memories of their fist fights flooding his brain almost as heavily as their sexual adventures. "Square up, let's see if I can still drag your ass up and down the Southside."

Dead air, as expected. Ian's tears had apparently subsided, which Mickey was counting as a small victory.

"Fine," he shrugged "you wanna know what I think?"

He gripped Ian's darkened hair between his fingers and turned his head to look at him again, this time not budging when Ian tried to fight him on it. "What I would tell people if they ever asked, 'why him? Why go through all this for a skinny army brat'?"

He forced Ian's head to become flush with his, even if his eyes didn't want to come up right away to meet Mickey's.

"Because it's like you breathe for me. I've been walking around holding my breath my whole life, and you said it was okay to let it go; let you take care of it, take care of me. And I listened for the first time ever," Mickey smiled despite the tears he couldn't fight anymore. "Someone told me to calm the fuck down, and I listened because it was you. I didn't care about anyone else because I knew they would fuck with us until one of us snapped. Sounds retarded, but I thought I was protecting you, and you saw right through that shit."

Mickey shook his head and realized that his chest already felt ten times lighter, in spite of Ian's commitment to treating him like a ghost. "You didn't sugarcoat anything, Ian, you just said I didn't have to be ashamed. You took care of me, you never gave up on me, and I let you down."

He leaned his forehead against Ian's and gulped down the fresh scent of him, closing his eyes and imagining that nothing had changed since the Alibi. They were sitting on the hood of that car, battered and nearly broken from Terry's blows. Fellow bar patrons walked by breaking their necks for a couple seconds and then moved on. Kev even came out with a bottle of Patrón and filled their flask without a word, simply fist-bumping them both and strolling back inside. That was, hands down, the greatest day of Mickey's life and he would take that beating from his father every day for the rest of it if it meant he could feel that sweet freedom with Ian after.

The water was starting to go cold, so Mickey pulled the towel up from the bathmat and turned the faucet off. "I know you're not hurting me on purpose, so…we'll find the problem, I've got you. I promise you that." He leaned in and placed a long, chaste kiss on Ian's wet forehead. "I've always got you."

Mickey stood up and stepped out of the tub, quickly drying himself off first. Ian was slumped over the side, wet and clean, and still refused to look him in the eye. Mickey grabbed Ian's towel and threw it over his drooping shoulders, taking his hands and lifting him up. He dried Ian's entire body without another word, just in time to hear Fiona's shrill demand for someone to open the door.

The boys stared at each other, Mickey silently asking him if it was okay to let her in and Ian replying that, like everything else, he didn't give a fuck. Ian lowered himself onto the edge of the tub and Mickey moved the bookcase back, as well as unlocked the door.

Fiona wasted no time violently pushing it open so quick, it nearly bounced off Mickey's head. She was red in the face, and Mickey could see Liam and Mandy sitting on the freshly made bed behind her.

She growled at him through her teeth. "Fucking fix it—!"

Mickey held his hands up innocently, however still annoyed. "I told you we're cool, calm the hell down."

Fiona stabbed her finger into his solid chest, pushing him back two footsteps. "You do NOT call me with that Thanksgiving bullshit and tell me everything is okay, Mickey! Where the hell is he?!"

"Right fucking here!" Mickey referred to Ian even though he was still shielded behind Mickey's back. "If there was a problem—."

"There IS a fucking problem, don't you understand?!" Mickey inwardly rolled his eyes at Fiona's sudden jump in street confidence. She would never have gotten in his face like this before she went to prison for what, three days? If that? "He needs to go see a doctor, and I won't tell you again!"

"Quit talking about him like he's not right fucking here—!"

"Move."

Ian's whisper was barely audible. It was him shouldering past the group that finally silenced the room, dodging Fiona's open arms and soundlessly making his way back to the bed. He dropped his towel shamelessly in front of everyone and crawled back in between the sheets as if the last half hour never happened.

Fiona carefully watched Ian before glaring at Mickey, then Mandy. She slowly moved Mickey's pillow to her lap and took its place beside Ian's head, crossing her mile-long legs. Liam stayed quietly at Mandy's side, peeking at his big brother with curiosity.

"Go away." Ian didn't even sound like he meant it anymore.

Fiona gulped. "I'll shut up, I swear."

She honored that statement for a few moments, looking around the room to see if there was anything there that could possibly give her an excuse to bring him back home. She saw no guns, no hard drugs, not even old food sitting around on the floor. A half-smoked cigarette sat in the ashtray and she picked it up, smelling it to confirm it wasn't laced, and pulled a lighter out of her pocket.

Mickey's teeth clenched when Fiona locked eyes with him and exhaled. Her words were for Ian, but she didn't take her gaze off Mickey's face. "At least tell me if you're hungry, Ian."

If it were up to Ian, his stomach probably wouldn't have roared right then and there in response. Fiona blinked and raised an eyebrow at Mickey, who could feel his fists start to vibrate. What was he supposed to do, force the food down Ian's throat? He wanted to argue how much better that would fare with her than letting him go hungry, but kept his mouth shut.

Mandy broke the heavy silence and stood up with Liam. "I'll go heat up that sub from last night. Kenyatta won't eat it."

Mickey and Fiona continued their stare-down long after they heard Mandy rustling around in the kitchen. Without wavering, Mickey grabbed a hoodie from the desk beside him and slowly walked over to the spot on the floor beside Ian. He snatched a fresh joint from his ashtray and watched Fiona smoke his last cigarette. It was 5:15 PM, he reminded himself, she would have to leave in the next half hour if she wanted to make it home for curfew. He could withstand her condescending stare until then.

Mandy and Liam returned with a six-inch turkey and cheese sub and reluctantly handed the paper plate to Fiona. She sat opposite of her brother on the floor and watched as Fiona unsuccessfully tried to coax Ian into taking just one bite of his food. It did smell damn good and Mickey ignored his own raging gut for the next twenty minutes that it took Ian to take that bite. He nibbled on the toasted bread and a piece of lettuce, probably for Liam's sake and to shut them all up. He was about to try for another when Fiona's alarm tone went off on her phone.

Her face fell and she cursed under her breath. She rubbed Ian's arm and leaned over to his ear. "I'll be back in the morning, okay? Let me know if you need anything. Have a good night, I love you." She kissed his cheek and looked at Mickey again, nodding towards the door. He grudgingly got up to follow her and Liam out to the living room.

"There is no strike three," she started with fire in her voice. "If he so much as looks at a butter knife for too long, you call an ambulance. And if he does something to himself on your watch, it's all on you and I'll never let you forget that. I'll make sure you go right back to jail if you refuse to get him the help he needs before it's too late, do you understand?"

Mickey knew that the question was rhetorical, so he answered by opening the front door and looking Fiona dead in the face as he would anyone else that has tried to take Ian from him in the past. Fiona was mother hen, he understood that, but she would soon realize that Mickey had it handled. All that talk about suicide earlier was bullshit. If he wanted to kill himself, he would have knocked Mickey out and went buck wild. There were always too many people in the Milkovich house anyway; Ian always had a babysitter. They had nothing to worry about. So, for Liam's sake, Mickey kept his creative comebacks to himself and crossed his arms.

He shut the door behind them and turned to see Mandy standing a few feet away at Mickey's door. She looked tired and puffy, and just as Mickey was about to tear her a new one for letting Fiona in, she cut him off.

"We all just want what's best for him, Mick," she reminded him meekly. "You don't have to do it all yourself. Can't really help him if you're burnt out."

Mickey rubbed his eyes and took a weary breath. Whether she was right or not, he couldn't deal with any more of it right now. He grabbed his coat from the sofa beside him and threw it on. "I'm gonna go handle shit at the Alibi. You don't leave that room unless he goes with you." He wasn't asking, Mandy realized again.

Mickey gathered a couple of things from his room, kissed Ian on the cheek, and left. When he returned with Svetlana later that night, he changed his son's diaper in record time before handing him off to his mother and running in to check on the one he really cared about. Mandy was in bed next to Ian, downloading music onto both of their phones. They made brief eye contact and Mickey nodded once to thank her. He dropped his coat and headed into the bathroom for a quick shower. When he came out, he took Mandy's place in bed and finished the beer she had left on the nightstand, staring at Ian's hunched back for a while before leaning over and kissing his shoulder.

"I'm here, Ian," he whispered genuinely into Ian's warm skin. "And I won't move until you tell me to, okay?"

The next day started about as normally as it could for the times. Mickey had his cigarettes and booze before making a light breakfast of eggs and toast and taking it in to bed. He almost got to the mattress and spoke when he noticed that it was empty. With every nerve now on high alert, Mickey nearly ran outside to look for Ian, but then noticed the water running in the shower. He opened the door and stole a glance behind the shower curtain just enough to see Ian was in fact slowly cleaning his body and not drowning himself. He decided not to overwhelm the boy with a shower and breakfast and shut the door. After eating his own food out in the kitchen, he returned to see Ian back in bed, his plate still untouched. Mickey was about to mention it when his phone buzzed and Kev was, once again, up his ass about bills. He kissed Ian's face before finding Svetlana in the other bathroom.

"Keep an eye on him." He called in to her.

Svet poked her head from behind the curtain and glared at him. "I watch Carrot Boy, you watch baby."

Mickey rolled his eyes. "You watch Carrot Boy, or I'm watching immigration come take you back to whatever raft you floated in on. Have a nice fucking day."

He returned three hours later to find Ian asleep and alone in the room, but all that remained on his plate were toast crusts and a bite of scrambled eggs.

The nightmares still wouldn't stop. Ian had escaped the straitjacket and was screeching a Joker laugh while stabbing at his wrists with a butter knife. His heartbeat was just louder than his screams and it pounded in waves, sending chills down Mickey's imaginary spine. Ian fell to his knees, still laughing, and plunged his hand into the pool of blood at his feet. He drew something with it before kneeling over, growling a guttural "Let me die," before the heartbeat stopped and Mickey could finally see what Ian had done. He heard his own screams when he saw the message Ian was mocking him with and the bloody Mickey Mouse ears that he had drawn on the asylum floor.

Mickey damn near jumped out of his sweaty sheets with a yelp. He recognized his posters, his empty beer bottles, and, finally, the empty spot beside him.

Oh, my God…

Completely forgetting underwear, Mickey darted out of his room and didn't see Ian in the living room or the bathroom. He was seconds away from carelessly streaking outside when he smelled the eggs and sausage wafting through the stale air. With his breath still shallow, Mickey hurried over to the kitchen and allowed his heart to finally stop being so dramatic.

Ian had his bare back turned to his boyfriend while he stared at the running microwave, waiting for what Mickey assumed was a frozen breakfast burrito to finish cooking. He had a mug of fresh black coffee between his hands and slowly sipped it without blinking or waiting for it to cool off. All that aside, his pajama bottoms were clean and his wrists were still intact; Mickey didn't know how much more he could ask for.

Still ass naked, Mickey watched the timer go off and waited the five extra seconds it took Ian to take the burrito out of the microwave. He stared at it for a long moment, like he was unsure if it was even food at all. His empty eyes finally blinked as he took a small bite of the burrito and moved towards the bedroom doorway. When he finally saw Mickey, he froze. Mickey braced himself for anything, for a collapse or even a spontaneous fist fight, and didn't realize he had nothing to worry about until Ian's eyes fell over Mickey's body and stopped at his crotch.

Spontaneous morning sex, maybe?

Ian looked back up at Mickey's face for a second, then resumed eating and walked past him sheepishly.

Mickey turned his head an inch and went for it. "Morning, Army."

Ian didn't reply verbally, just raised his hand in a slight wave and disappeared behind the infamous "Stay the Fuck Out" cardboard sign.

Mickey waited until the door was shut to beam and wipe his ecstatic tears away before they fell below his cheekbones. He nodded to himself with a satisfied grin, grabbed his own coffee mug and sighed.

"Fuckin' Gallaghers…"

Just a funny backstory:

Binged on Shameless at the end of last year and became obsessed, just like everyone else. So obsessed, in fact, that I did something I haven't done in years: I picked up a pencil at the end of season 7 and started brainstorming for fanfiction. I haven't written a line in over a year, and haven't written for fanfiction in almost three. So thank you, Shameless, for helping bring my passion back. You'll always be appreciated.

I always wondered what went down while Ian was, well, down, and decided that writing that scene would at least get my feet wet again. I had to go back and re-watch a couple of episodes to confirm some details for this story, and wondered if this plot was realistic enough for the Shameless world. Mickey wouldn't get that soft, would he? Even though he did come out less than a day before Ian shut down, he was still Southside Trash. I mean, this is a missing scene, not an original universe; I should make it at least a little similar. I recapped on the Thanksgiving episode and completely forgot 1: the toll that Monica's depression had on Ian (part of him already knew what Mickey was going through) and 2: that Sammi forcefully bathed Frank while he was sick.

So if that bitch was crazy and loyal enough to help her PoS father, so could Mickey. Problem solved.

Read and review. Thanks, y'all :)

~Rachel

P.S: The article/blog post Mickey is reading in the beginning is called "The Expected Unexpected: Losing My Sister" on oursideofsuicide . com.