Casual Sabotage

16 - The Fall

Buying a new car for Mickey to cheer him up, didn't work. Mickey didn't touch the car and still only used his old one, while he planned to give the new one back to get his money back, as soon as he separated those bank accounts, or got his own, new one. He had to do something before Ian drained their account to the last penny.

Why did they have a shared account in the first place?

When they moved together, Ian immediately started working as EMT after graduation, while Mickey didn't work at all. Mickey wasn't used to paying for stuff and work for money he needed to pay for stuff. But since Ian didn't want him to get another conviction, he had to start with that. Before he got a job on his own, he often needed to ask Ian for money when was supposed to easy things like grocery shopping, getting take out or going on a date. This was the main reason he got a job in the first place because he hated feeling like the little trophy wife of a rich businessman or something who always had to ask for money to go shopping. When he got a job he was making very little and often spend it pretty quickly, like he had always done it with the checks from the Kash'n'Grab (of which he always had to give half to Terry). So he agreed to join their accounts so it was easier to pay evenly for their household costs and Mickey didn't have to ask his boyfriend for money all the time. Through this, he also got better at managing money and saving, because he also didn't want to spend all of Ian's money he worked so hard for.

Who could ever guess that saving-every-penny-Ian suddenly bought a new car and was probably mentally ill?

Mickey started taking up extra shifts at work, in order to avoid being at the Gallagher house and with Ian. He came home after an 18-hour shift, he just wanted to go to bed, he almost fell asleep at the steering wheel on the way home, but on the way, he still got some take out he ate on the McDonalds parking lot.

He tiredly stumbled into the living room, where he met the entire family and Kev and V.
Mickey sighed deeply when he saw them.
"Hey Mickey", Ian exclaimed, jumped up from his seat and hugged him, "How was your day?"
"Exhausting", Mickey said pushed him away, "What's this, an intervention?", he asked looking at Lip.

Lip shook his head, "You're not gonna like this."
Mickey sighed and looked at Ian again, "What did you do?"
"I just noticed that everyone is a little tense and in a bad fucking mood the entire time, so I wanted to give all of you a present. I thought they could cheer you up", he grinned into the round.

No one was smiling back.

Ian spent more money. More money on stupid gifts. Mickey now noticed that a lot of newborn-inappropriate child toys lay around the living room, Franny wouldn't be able to use them for another few months or even years. Many of the other times which lay on the coffee table just didn't make any sense for any of them – a pan, oven mitts, a card game, riddle books, glitter pens and an empty flower pot.

Mickey didn't even have the strength to be upset about this. He looked at the presents and Ian as empty as the flower pot was. Then he wordlessly went upstairs.
"Mickey?", Ian asked confused, "Hey, stop running away all the time, don't worry, I got something for you, too."

Ian ran after Mickey, who locked himself in the bathroom quickly. He took a few deep breaths and looked into the bathroom mirror. In the past times, he asked himself again and again if all of this was still worth it. He didn't want to go home anymore after work, he didn't want to be around Ian. He started brushing his teeth and looked at himself.

He was in love with Ian, wasn't he? Sure, he still loved him, loved him so fucking much. But not this Ian. He wanted his Ian back. Somehow this Ian reminded him on the time they had fought about Mickey coming out. After the whole coming out thing, Ian had done a lot to show him he could be compassionate. He had been very ashamed for his behaviour on occasion and made sure to always ask Mickey how he was feeling about things. Now all Ian did seem so selfish and didn't seem to care about anything anymore.