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Kids are gross.
They’re always messy, and constantly sticky for no reason, and above all they’re covered in thousands and thousands of germs. Where do they get them? Who knows where. School, daycare, crawling around on a carpet that hasn’t been cleaned in a decade—whatever.
They’re disgusting.
Like tiny little human petri dishes just running around falling over all the time, spilling their germs onto their siblings, and their parents, and their unsuspecting uncles.
Mickey knows this.
That’s why he’s one hundred percent blaming little Freddie Gallagher for getting him sick—for sneezing in his fucking mouth last week in a moment that shocked and scared the both of them, but Mickey being the adult in the situation had to soothe the baby instead of also crying like he kind of wanted to—for passing on his “little cold” that somehow morphed into the flu by the time it hit Mickey’s immune system.
He has Franny on backup as a scape goat, not convinced that she ever washes her hands for as long as she says she does.
Either way—he feels like shit.
“Fuck. This.” He groans as he rolls over in bed, on day two of being ill and completely over the entire thing. The comforter is bunched up around his head and shoulders, and everything hurts.
The mattress dips next to him. “Feeling any better today?”
Mickey doesn’t even respond—that’s how Ian knows it’s bad—just curls his body a little more until his head is pressed somewhere against Ian’s thigh, or maybe his hip. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t even open his eyes.
Ian runs his hand through Mickey’s hair, wincing a little at how sweaty it is. “Are you hot?”
“Fucking freezing, man.”
Ian feels his forehead. “You’re burning up, Mick.”
“Fuck off.”
“I’m serious.”
Mickey groans. “I hate your nephew.”
“Our nephew.”
“He’s your nephew ‘til I can breathe through my fuckin’ nose again.”
Ian leans down and kisses Mickey’s hair. “You don’t mean that.”
He doesn’t really mean that. Despite being a byproduct of Lip Gallagher, the little bastard is pretty alright as far as kids go. But Mickey’s brain hurts and his body hurts and he’s shivering and sweating all at once, so he just groans into the comforter again.
“I hate this,” Mickey says quietly, his head pounding.
Ian rubs soothing circles onto his back. “So take some medicine.”
“Since when do we have fucking flu medicine?”
“Since I went out and bought some this morning.”
Mickey slowly blinks his eyes open, adjusting to the bright light coming in through the window and only grunting slightly. He looks up at Ian. “You did?”
“Yes,” Ian tells him, smiling down at him fondly. He runs his hand through Mickey’s sweaty hair again, pushing it back off his equally sweaty forehead. “Come on. Let’s go eat breakfast, then you can take some.”
Mickey leans into his touch, rests his cheek against Ian’s jean clad thigh. “Not hungry.”
“You gotta eat, Mick.”
“Bite me, Ian.”
Ian huffs a laugh. “You big baby,” he teases, patting him on the shoulder. “Come on. Just some toast, that’s all I’m asking.”
Mickey groans again, but it ends with a sigh. He braces himself, releases the comforter from his death grip, and tries to sit up.
His balance is so totally fucked, and the dehydration is making his head spin, but strong arms hold him around his shoulders and between the two of them Mickey sits up for long enough to adjust to the feeling of gravity again.
“Fuck,” he mutters, pressing his palm to his forehead.
“I got you,” Ian says softly, one hand still wrapped around his waist. He kisses the side of his head. “I got you.”
Breakfast is wholly uneventful.
“I can’t even taste this,” Mickey mumbles through a mouthful of buttered toast.
“Good,” Ian tells him, pushing his plate closer. “Eat more of it.”
Mickey kicks him under the table, and Ian holds his hand above it.
They move to the couch after that, Mickey still dragging their comforter behind him, wrapped around his shoulders like a cape. It’s soft, and it’s blue, and they just got it a few months ago so it smells like laundry detergent and them, and it’s Mickey’s favorite thing.
Ian doesn’t tease him about it when Mickey wraps himself in the blanket and falls sideways onto the couch.
“Your hair looks ridiculous,” he says instead, lifting Mickey’s upper half off the cushions to slide in underneath, wrapping his husband up in his arms and leaning back against the armrest.
“Your hair looks ridiculous,” Mickey shoots back, even though Ian’s hair looks fine.
“Okay, Mick.”
The sky is gray with storm clouds, and it’s raining softly against the window. It’s a lazy Saturday if Mickey’s ever seen one, and even if he wasn’t down with a 101.4 degree fever, he’d still vote for spending the day curled up on the couch watching movies.
Ian puts on whatever movie Mickey fell asleep halfway through last night, and presses resume play.
“Feel any better after eating?” Ian asks tentatively.
Mickey grumbles a little, shrugging the comforter off his shoulders as he wraps his arms around Ian’s middle. “No.”
Ian smiles down at him. “Still cold?”
Mickey just shrugs, nuzzling his face against Ian’s soft t-shirt. Ian changed back into pajama pants before they ate, ready for today to be a lazy day from start to finish, and Mickey is still only in boxers and socks.
Ian pulls the blanket up higher across his bare shoulders. “You gonna fall asleep on me ten minutes in again?"
He's expecting a quip, or a taunt, or even a simple, “Fuck you,” from his husband, but when all he gets is another shrug, Ian pulls him closer.
“Sleep,” Ian says softly. “If you want. I’m not going anywhere.”
Mickey presses his lips to Ian’s stomach in maybe the softest kiss he’s ever given him, his eyes already heavy as he blinks at the TV.
Ian gets his arms under the comforter and settles in for a long afternoon on the couch.
He drags his short nails over Mickey’s warm back, absentmindedly trying to comfort him while they watch the movie play out in front of them, and he doesn’t think anything of it until he stops and Mickey wiggles.
“Keep doin’ that,” Mickey says so, so quietly, his nose still completely stuffed up and his throat scratchy. “Feels good.”
Ian grins as he leans forward to kiss his husband’s head, then starts raking his nails up and down his back once again.
Mickey gets his clammy hands up under Ian’s t-shirt in the back and he squeezes him gently. “Love you,” he breathes out, his shoulders slumping on the exhale.
Mickey falls asleep less than four minutes later, and Ian loves him too.
The movie was dumb, but it has a sequel, so Ian puts it on just so he doesn’t have to pick anything else.
Mickey dozes in and out throughout the films, occasionally adjusting himself to try and get more comfortable, or to try and breathe easier. By the end of the second movie, he’s lying between Ian’s legs with his back to Ian’s chest, the comforter bunched up by their waists.
Ian has his arms wrapped around his husband; his nose buried in his hair.
“Feeling any better, baby?” he asks softly as the credits roll.
Mickey shrugs. “My head isn’t pounding anymore.”
Ian kisses his temple. “Good. How ‘bout your nose?”
Mickey sniffles. “Still fucked.”
“Anything I can do to help?”
“No,” Mickey sighs, leaning his head back and turning it so his forehead is pressed to Ian’s jaw. “This is nice. This helps.”
Ian squeezes him around the middle, dipping his head to kiss his warm forehead.
They sit like that for a while, the TV back at the Netflix home screen and the remote too far away on the coffee table. Mickey breathes slow and heavy, his eyes closed as he leans fully against his husband. Ian is almost convinced he’s falling back to sleep when he finally hears him speak again.
“Sorry for ruining your Saturday,” Mickey says in a quiet, raspy voice.
Ian furrows his brow. “What are you talking about?”
“I don’t know. We usually go outside and do shit on Saturdays.” Mickey shrugs one shoulder.
“Mickey, it’s raining.”
“Shut the fuck up. You know what I mean,” he grumbles.
Ian kisses his forehead again. “I don’t, though. I planned on spending my Saturday with my husband, and that’s exactly what I’m fucking doing.”
Mickey reaches up with one hand and lightly touches at Ian’s face. He tilts his chin up to press a soft kiss to Ian’s neck. “Still. Sorry.”
“Stop,” Ian tells him. “You’re sick. It happens. It doesn’t make me stop loving you.”
Mickey grins against him. “In sickness and in health?”
“And all the rest of that bullshit too.”
Mickey laughs softly. “Yeah. Okay.”
Dinner goes just about as well as breakfast.
“Pizza?”
“No.”
“Chinese?”
“No.”
“Burgers?”
Mickey makes a face. “God. No.”
“What the fuck do you want then?” Ian asks, flipping through takeout menus in one of their kitchen drawers.
“I don’t know. Everything’s gonna taste like fucking cardboard.”
“Okay,” Ian starts. “I am once again circling back to my first suggestion—soup.”
Mickey groans into the back of the couch. “Just get something without me. I’m not even hungry.”
Ian slides the menus back into the drawer and pushes it shut. “Soup it is!”
Mickey glares at him over the back of the couch, looking oh so menacing in the floppy hood shielding half his face.
Before they started talking food, Ian decided to wash all their bedding after two nights of fever-ridden Mickey tossing and turning and sweating in their sheets. He stripped the bed and stole the fucking comforter right off Mickey’s shoulders, dropping a sweatshirt in Mickey’s lap to trade it for instead.
It’s Ian’s dark gray hoodie—his favorite sweatshirt—and he doesn’t let anybody else wear it, no matter how many times Mickey tries to swipe it. Mickey basically lives in the rest of Ian’s hoodies on the weekends. Ian gets to keep one for himself.
But watching the grin curl up on Mickey’s face when he held it up from his lap was absolutely worth giving it up for a night.
“I don’t know, man,” Mickey answered one time when Ian asked why he liked that one so much. “It’s comfy and it fucking smells like you, okay?”
It’s two sizes too big on Mickey—hence the floppy hood—but Ian can’t fault him for the smell thing. He gets it.
Even if Mickey can’t smell a fucking thing right now.
So, Mickey glares at him in the dark gray hoodie with his red, stuffy nose and glassy eyes, and Ian pretends to be offended by it as he pulls two cans of soup out of the cabinets.
They eat chicken noodle soup side by side on the couch while they watch reruns of old Wheel of Fortune episodes and Mickey pretends to hate it, even though Ian can tell the warm broth feels good on his throat.
When they’re done, Mickey puts their empty bowls on the coffee table and pulls his hands inside his sweatshirt sleeves again before leaning his head on Ian’s shoulder.
“You need to shower.”
“No.”
“Mickey—”
He sighs heavily. “If I stand up for too long, I might actually die.”
“You’re so fucking dramatic,” Ian teases, leaning over the couch and getting his face close to Mickey’s. “That’s why I’m getting in with you.”
Mickey narrows his eyes. “Really?”
“Yes.”
Mickey looks him up and down, bouncing his eyebrows in a way that’s supposed to be seductive, but misses sexy by a mile when it’s interrupted by a sniffle. “You didn’t say that part before.”
And Ian laughs, because his husband is fucking cute, even without the stuffy nose and the sore throat and the cough in his chest that sounds like it could warrant a doctor’s visit if they were the kind of people who could afford health insurance.
“Come on,” he says, reaching his arms out and holding Mickey under the elbows. “You need help standing?”
“Fuck off,” Mickey shoots back, and Ian beams at that small hint of playfulness that probably means he’s feeling a little bit better—even if Mickey does grab onto his forearms and leans into him a little as he stands.
The walk to the bathroom is not a particularly long one, but by the time they get there, Mickey is sweating again. His bangs are plastered to his forehead and his legs shaking.
“You need to drink more water,” Ian muses, turning on the shower to a lukewarm temperature.
“Stop nagging me.”
Ian laughs, even if Mickey does look a little pale, and he kisses him soft and quick. He helps Mickey out of his hoodie, lets him balance one hand on his shoulders as Mickey steps out of his boxers and socks. Then Ian strips down himself and helps his husband step into the shower.
The water is a little chilly for Ian’s liking, but he used to take cold showers at ROTC camps, so he’s not all that bothered by it. And even if he was, the way Mickey practically moans when the cooler water hits his hot, irritated skin is enough for Ian to not say a single fucking thing about the temperature.
Mickey, to his credit, does not die, or pass out, or fall over in the shower, but other than that he’s pretty much useless. That’s fine—Ian is there to take care of him.
He pours shampoo into his hands and rubs his palms together before lathering up Mickey’s hair, blunt nails scratching at his scalp in a way that makes Mickey’s eyes close. Ian takes his time with it, slow circular motions with his fingers that soothe and clean and care for the man standing in front of him, for his husband whose hands are holding on gently to his hips.
He washes Mickey’s hair like he’s not a fully grown man with working limbs and a consciousness of his own because—well, because he can, and because he wants to, and because Mickey lets him.
Ian gets the bodywash going next, soaping up his husband with soft touches and gentle strokes. It’s not sexual in nature, not even a little bit, but it’s intimate, and it makes Ian want to kiss him under the water spray, so he does.
Mickey leans forward and presses his forehead to Ian’s collarbone after that, sighing deeply and letting his shoulders relax as Ian washes his back.
“All done,” Ian whispers when it’s over, and Mickey nods against him a good ten, fifteen seconds before he actually lifts his head.
He kisses Ian again because he wants to. Because he can.
The shower breathes new life into Mickey, and Ian laughs as he runs the towel over his husband’s hair and makes it stick up in ten different directions.
“Dick,” Mickey breathes out around a smile as he studies himself in the mirror. He swats his hand at Ian’s chest, but Ian just holds onto his wrist and kisses the warm skin there.
They take turns drying each other off, Mickey insisting that he gets to help. He rubs the towel over Ian’s pecs and shoulders, down his abs and over his back. He lets Ian do his own legs and tie the towel around his waist, then Mickey pretends to be annoyed when Ian says it’s his turn.
With his own towel tied around his own waist, Mickey sits on the closed toilet lid and sniffles. “Does this shit actually work?”
Ian blinks at him, then glances down at the store-brand VapoRub container in his hands. “You’ve never used this before? Not even when you were a kid?”
Mickey shakes his head, staring warily at the unconvincing chest rub written on the label in bright blue letters.
“Fiona did this for us all the time,” Ian says, kneeling in his towel on the tile between Mickey’s legs. He unscrews the cap and swipes a dollop onto his fingers. “Works like magic.”
Mickey twitches a little as the cold cream comes in contact with his chest, but he rolls out his shoulders and relaxes his muscles as Ian starts to rub it in.
“It’ll help you not cough so much tonight,” Ian says softly, concentrating on his work.
“Sorry,” Mickey says quietly.
“It’s okay,” Ian tells him. “Just want you to be able to sleep.”
“Been sleepin’ all fucking day.”
“Yeah, and you still look like you’re about to keel over right here right now.”
Mickey laughs at that, his smile spreading across his whole face for a second before he reigns it in.
When he’s done, Ian puts the cap back on the cream and sets it on the counter. He looks at his husband with a soft smile and runs his hands up his towel-clad thighs. “You gonna be okay here for a minute while I go get the sheets out of the dryer?”
Mickey rolls his eyes. “I’m not, you know… incapable.”
“I know,” Ian says, pressing a soft kiss to his jaw. “But if I come back to find you face down on the bathroom floor, I’m gonna be really pissed.”
Mickey laughs again, shoving Ian’s face away. “Go. I’ll be fine.”
Ian ruffles Mickey’s still damp hair, then moves away before he can retaliate.
He slips on a pair of clean shorts and a tank top and goes to get their bedding.
By the time he has the bed all made up, he finds Mickey standing at the sink taking another dose of the cough medicine from this morning.
“Did it help?” Ian asks. “Earlier?”
Mickey nods as he washes his mouth out with water. “Yeah. Helped a lot actually.”
“Good,” Ian says, moving in next to him at the sink and wetting his toothbrush.
They brush their teeth side by side, poking and teasing each other as they smile at their reflections in the mirror.
“You got a zit,” Mickey says around a mouthful of toothpaste, tapping at Ian’s jaw. “Right there.”
Ian spits in the sink. “At least it’s not gray hair,” he fires back, flicking at the few silver hairs sprouting behind Mickey’s ear.
It’s the most normal they’ve felt all day, and it’s nice. A little moment in the bathroom just for them. It feels familiar and soft and intimate in a way the shower wasn’t, but neither of them has the right words to explain.
It feels like home, and it feels like love, and it feels like every other sappy fucking thing that rolls through Mickey’s head as Ian wraps his arm around his waist and leads him into the bedroom.
Mickey pulls out a pair of striped boxers and a pair of green and white flannel pajama pants—both once belonging to Ian, but now live in the shared drawers of underwear and t-shirts and miscellaneous things they share.
Ian smiles to himself as he watches Mickey drag them up his thighs, loving the sight of his husband in his clothes.
They get into bed early, but it feels late.
Ian slides up behind Mickey and drapes an arm over his side, careful not to mess with the VapoRub still on his chest.
Mickey wraps his hand around Ian’s wrist, pulling him closer. He plays with his fingers, spins the wedding ring against his skin.
“Thanks,” Mickey whispers into the darkness.
Ian kisses his shoulder. “For what?”
“For today,” Mickey says with a small shrug. “For takin’ care of me and shit.”
Ian nuzzles his face against Mickey’s back. “You don’t have to thank me for that. I want to take care of you. Especially when you’re sick.”
Mickey sniffles. “Never really had anyone who wanted to do that kind of thing before.”
Ian kisses his shoulder again. “Well, now you do.”
Mickey relaxes back into him a little, still spinning the silver band on his husband’s finger.
“We take care of each other, you know,” Ian whispers against his skin. He flips his hand and threads his fingers with Mickey’s, wiggling his ring against them. “That’s what this shit means.”
Mickey smiles against his pillow, a puff of air coming out through his nose. “Pretty sure I’m the one that told you that.”
“Yeah, and now I’m reminding you,” Ian teases, tangling their legs together under the blankets. “That’s what husbands do.”
“Oh, well,” Mickey says with a grin. “If that’s what husbands do.”
Ian squeezes his hand, then lets go. He flips it back over to lay his palm flat against Mickey’s stomach. “Love you, Mick. Hope you feel better in the morning.”
Mickey swallows thickly as Ian rests his forehead against the back of Mickey’s neck, warm skin pressed against warm skin. He closes his eyes against the tears threatening to form and revels in the warm embrace of his husband, in his all-encompassing love.
“Yeah,” Mickey whispers, laying his hand over Ian’s. “Love you too.”
They fall asleep not long after that, tangled together and ready for whatever the next morning brings.