Casual Sabotage

20 - Pumpkin

Ian's birthday was in late October.
It's been a weird month in a way. Ian didn't dare to touch or pick up Franny. He was quiet and spend a lot of time 'just thinking' as he called it, what looked a lot like staring into nothingness while having an existential crisis. The siblings still wanted to send him to a hospital "If he's fine they're gonna tell us and we can be happy, if he's not fine, they're gonna tell us and we can deal with that" – but Mickey didn't want to hear any of it and neither did Ian. Both just repeated "I'm not Monica" and "He's not Monica" over and over again.

Mickey didn't let any of the siblings get to him, they tried to remind him of his feelings during the "manic phase" but Mickey didn't want to hear it. Ian and Mickey were good at denying this to the core. "Manic? No, just happy, hyper, it was bad, I know, but it won't happen again" "Depressed? Look where we're living and there were so many mistakes made, who wouldn't get depressed about it?" – They seemed to reassure each other in these lies and comfort each other with them. In a way, they valued the "healing" of their relationship over Ian's mental health.

Ian quit his job at the club again, but the siblings wouldn't let him go back to being an EMT just yet "not until we know for sure, what was going on with you" which was hard, since Ian refused to get examined.

So he spent the entire day doing chores, watching TV and trying to make everything good and right for Mickey. Ian has never been out of work since he has been 13 years old. This was new and he didn't know what to do with himself. The house was pretty clean during that time since Ian cleaned up while he had nothing to do. When Mickey came home, he was eager to make him feel good: Hot tea, massages and cuddles, no matter if Mickey really needed them or not.

Ian was desperate. Desperate to convince his siblings he was not bipolar, desperate to keep Mickey. He had nightmares about Mickey saying he'd move out, about him leaving through the door again.

Ian had never experienced the threat of losing Mickey before. There was a time he thought about leaving him – but now, years later, being left by him? The knowledge that one mistake could lead to losing this man for good made him go a little crazy. "You're gonna burn out if you keep it up.", Mickey had said multiple times while Ian asked what he needed over and over again, almost starting to cry when Mickey did so much as roll his eyes at him.

Now it was late October, pumpkin season, which led to Mickey calling Ian Pumpkin lovingly from time to time, because when they spent their first Halloween in the Milkovich house together, Ian got super excited about pumpkins and carving faces into them, while his hair colour resembled the pumpkins perfectly.

Mickey woke up slowly, he noticed that it was fairly bright in the room, and he woke up on his own – but he set an alarm so he could wake up before Ian and start his birthday properly. Mickey quickly grabbed his phone to check the time, did he oversleep that alarm? He turned to look at his boyfriend, but he didn't lie behind him in the bed. Confused, he sat up and spotted Ian sitting on the bed by Mickey's feet.

"I switched off your alarm last night", he said.
Mickey looked at him confused, "Why?"
Ian shrugged.
"I wanted to wake you up properly for your birthday."
"I know"
Mickey sighed, "And you didn't want that?"
Ian shrugged and gnawed on his bottom lip.

"Come over here", Mickey mumbled and waved Ian over to him, he hesitantly came to him, "Under the blanket, Pumpkin, it's fucking cold."
Ian crawled under the blanket and lay half on top of him, snuggled against him.

"Happy Birthday", Mickey mumbled and kissed Ian's forehead.
"Thanks."
"I don't have work today, any birthday wishes? Wanna go somewhere, do something? Nothing too expensive if possible."