Carl was still in juvie. Lip was away at college. Liam was over at V and Kev's. So it was just Debbie and Ian watching TV and Fiona agonizing over the bills when Mickey came in. Without knocking, of course. This was Mickey. He wouldn't let a little thing like that fact that Ian had just broken up with him a couple of days ago keep him from walking right in the house.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" Ian asked.

"Just here to see Fiona," Mickey said. "Hey Debs."

Mickey spotted Fiona in the kitchen and started to walk towards her, and Ian got up off the couch, moving quicker than he had in days and blocking Mickey's path. "What the fuck are you talking to Fiona about? Is it about me?"

Mickey rolled his eyes. "What, do you think Fiona and I are going to plan some evil scheme to kidnap you and make you take mood stabilizers? This shit might blow your mind, Ian, but not everything's about you."

"So tell me, then," Ian said.

"Are we not allowed to talk to Mickey? I like talking to Mickey," Debbie said.

Ian ignored her, and before Mickey gave in and told Ian what was going on, Fiona shouted from the kitchen. "It's no big deal. I just asked him if he could throw some money our way. Money's been really tight lately."

"You can't ask Mickey for money. I broke up with him."

No one other than Ian seemed to find this statement a convincing argument. When Ian didn't say anything else, Mickey rolled his eyes and answered. "I was practically living here for like a year, and I didn't exactly pay my way. I owe some food money and I actually have some at the exact minute Fiona needs it. It's no big deal."

"I meant it, Mickey. We're broken up," Ian said.

"Okay tough guy," Mickey said, but he didn't look terribly convinced.

"We're broken up. That means you don't come over here and give Fiona money like you're part of the family," Ian said.

Mickey rolled his eyes. "You're such a fucking drama queen, Ian. Jesus."

Ian huffed in frustration. "I can't depend on you anymore. None of us can."

Mickey made a doubtful face. "We could just forget the whole break up thing. Honestly I'm not really on board with it. That way I could drop off the money and fuck off home and leave you to your pouting or whatever."

"Mickey! This is serious. I don't want to take the pills, and you won't be with me if I don't. You told me if I didn't get treatment you'd force me to. Well, I'm fine. I don't need any fucking treatment."

"Not right now. But the mood swings will come back."

"I know! Why the hell do you think I want to break up?"

Mickey's eyes narrowed. "You ever talked to anyone about being bipolar? I mean, someone outside the family?"

"Like what, a stranger on the street? Me and my family know more about bipolar than most people," Ian said.

Mickey looked doubtful. "Do you? Because when you all talk about bipolar in this family you talk about it like it's the boogie man. I listened to everyone tell their stories about Monica and I thought, shit, this must be the worst thing in the world. But then I looked it up expecting to see like, how terrible it was, but it's not. You do know most of the stuff on the internet on bipolar is really positive, and about how it's just a chemical mix-up in your brain and it's highly treatable, right? It's like, one of the few mental illness that they totally know how to fix. That's good, ain't it?"

"Only if you take the medication," Ian said.

"Okay, but if you don't take the medication, you might go up on the roof thinking you can fly or make a bareback porno thinking you can't get sick from that shit, and if you do take it, you can get your goddamned sense back. So getting used to a little inconvenience should be worth that."

"A little inconvenience? That's what you think it is?"

"Well, that's all it is, right? I mean, the meds work or they don't. So if they don't work you try some other med. You should be glad you don't have like, an allergy to peanuts," Mickey said.

"An allergy to peanuts? You're losing me here, Mick."

"Yeah, if you're allergic to peanuts and your medication doesn't work, you fucking die. If your lithium doesn't work right away it's no big deal, right? You just try some other dosage or whatever. I mean, it's frustrating, but it'll be worth it when you get it right and you can go back to your life."

"What life, like hanging around with you? Being your boyfriend?"

"I don't know. The army didn't work out but I thought you'd want to go to college or some shit. You can't go to college and get a good job if you're going off the rails all the time."

"I couldn't do that on the meds. They make me too fucked up to read or go to class."

"See, this is why you need to talk to someone who's actually getting it right. You know there's support groups for bipolar people? In a city this big there's probably a support group for gay bipolar people. And the people in those support groups aren't useless tools who lay around feeling sorry for themselves because they had to pop a fucking pill, or cowards who are too fucking scared to ask for help, either. They're professional people. People who made the choice to get better and went to school and hold down a good job. Like doctors and lawyers and shit. Your life isn't over because of this diagnosis."

"I know more about this fucking disease than you could learn in a couple of fucking google searches!"

"Ian, I know you fucking Gallaghers forget this sometimes because you've been on your own a long time, but you're just a kid. You're seventeen years old. Most kids your age are still practically babies. It's okay to ask for help sometimes. Despite what you think, you don't actually know everything."

"Oh, but you do."

Mickey gave him a dirty look. "I don't know shit. But people who have lived with bipolar for twenty years and held down jobs and maintained relationships without sleeping with every gay guy in Chicago know more than both of us about what works and what doesn't."

"It wouldn't make a difference. You don't know what it's like to be saddled with a genetic hand-grenade like that. Don't fucking act like you understand!"

"You got to be fucking kidding me, Ian. Jesus. Remember Terry? You think I don't wonder every day if I'm going to end up like him? Drink a couple beers too many and hurt someone I love? Kill someone I love? Maybe Yevgeny, maybe you? Maybe just some random stranger in a bar I think looked at me funny? Fuck, I almost killed that bitch Sammy. You think I'm not worried that I'm going to end up an evil old man? I mean, shit, everyone says I'm just like Terry was when he was young, you know, except for the gay stuff. Being a goddamned evil fuck is so much worse than just acting crazy sometimes. I mean, fuck. Of course I understand worrying about ending up like my parents."

"It's not the same and you know it!"

"I don't know that it's all that different."

"You would never hurt Yev. You listen when people tell you you're being a dick or you're drinking too much. You can choose not to be like Terry. I can't choose to not be like Monica."

Mickey gave him that snotty look, the one that always made Ian want to kiss him and punch him in the face in equal measure. "Isn't that what you're doing by not even trying to get better? Choosing to be like Monica? You know what, what the fuck ever. I'm going to give this money to Fiona and go."

Ian let him walk into the kitchen and Ian watched him throw some crumpled up bills on the table.

"Thanks Mickey," Fiona said.

"Hey, like I said before, we're family, whatever dickhead over there thinks," Mickey said.

He went out the back door and Ian resisted the urge to run after him. Had to take a minute to remind himself that he'd actually asked Mickey to leave. He sat down on the couch and Debbie gave him a look. "He's pissed off at you," she said.

"I'm not afraid of Mickey," Ian said.

"Yeah you are," Fiona said. She came up behind him and massaged his scalp lightly with her fingernails like she had always done when he was a little kid. "Nothin' scares a Gallagher more 'n someone who really loves 'em."

"He basically just told me I'm being a whiny little bitch. Is that what you all think?"

"Maybe table the decision about medication before you learn a bit more about it. Mickey's right. Our only experience with bipolar is with Monica, and she's hardly the poster child for keeping her condition properly medicated. Maybe you should go to one of those support groups. Ian, Mickey's right. You are just a kid. Maybe we both are. Maybe you need to talk to someone older and wiser. I don't know what you're going through, and Monica is going to give you all the wrong answers. Will you at least do that much?"

"I thought I could depend on you all to love me no matter what I chose," Ian said.

"Oh boo-fucking-hoo," Mickey said. "Cry me a river."

Ian looked up and saw Mickey in the kitchen. "I thought you left."

Mickey looked sheepish and unsure for the first time since he'd appeared in the house. "I just wanted you to know that, you know, even if you want to break up, I'm still here for you. I'll always be here for you. Even if it's just as friends or whatever."

"Can I walk you home?"

"Why, is there a suspicious character hanging around the neighborhood or some shit?" Mickey asked dryly.

"Just fucking walk," Ian said, pushing Mickey toward the door. He grabbed his coat and boots and went after him.

"You got something to say to me?" Mickey asked, but for Mickey, he said it in a pretty non-confrontational way.

"Will you come with me, if I find a support group I want to join?"

"You know I will," Mickey said.

"You're not just fucking with me, are you?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I let you go. I set you free. You don't have to put up with this stupid disease. You can go off and have fun and have a normal life. I'm stuck with it. I really did sleep with half the gay guys in Chicago. I'm no fucking prize, and it might take years for me to be the kind of guy you deserve."

"You know it's not the cheating that gets me, Ian. I understand being young and hot and horny and having basically any gay guy you see down for it must be tempting. What gets me is the fact that I'm not convinced you even enjoyed it, most of the time. And you were reckless with your health and mine. You know you didn't wear a condom half the time when we fucked. I know I told you I was fucked for life, Ian, but that was before you came along and made me want things. Made me brave enough to get the things I wanted out of life. I ain't trying to tell you what to do, Ian. But you kicked my ass and made me demand the life I wanted to live regardless of what Terry or Svetlana or the damned neighborhood thought about me. I thought I owed you the same ass kicking."

Ian smiled, and for the first time in a long time, it didn't have that brittle feel his smiles had these days. "So that's why it seemed so familiar."

"I just want you to be happy. It don't have to be with me," Mickey said.

They were at Mickey's door. Ian smiled. "Thanks for the cash. I'll text you about the support group."

"What the fuck, Gallagher? Are we broken up or not?" Mickey shouted after him.

"You figure it out," Ian shouted back without turning, running a little because of the cold.

They'd broken up so many times, and it never really seemed to take. Mickey just pretended the break-up hadn't even happened, or Ian begged and pleaded and Mickey took him back, or they just ended up in bed together somehow without consciously making the choice to jump in bed. They always got back together and it was always better when they got back together than it had been before they broke up in the first place. It didn't really matter if Ian and Mickey got back together right now, because it was kind of a sure thing that they would get back together eventually. No wonder Ian's family had seemed pretty unconcerned about the breakup. They hadn't bought it any more than Mickey had.

Because Mickey had somehow, for some crazy reason, apparently decided Ian was it for him.

Ian had known Mickey was it for him since Mickey had told the whole bar he was gay on his son's christening and they'd battled Mickey's psycho father together. Or maybe since the first time Mickey had kissed him. Or maybe it was the first time they'd fucked. Shit, if he was honest, maybe he'd known it when Mickey had taken a piss on first base in little league.

He'd broken up with Mickey because he'd been frustrated with being everyone's problem instead of just being…Ian. His brothers and sisters were stuck with him, but he could give Mickey a break and let him get on with his life—but only if Mickey actually left, which it didn't seem like he was going to do. The least Ian could do is stop asking Mickey to do something that neither of them really wanted him to do.

The next day Ian was playing video games when Mickey flopped down beside him. "Hey loser."

"Hey Mick," Ian said, "Grab a controller."

"I'm gonna kick your ass," Mickey said.

"I'll press reset," Ian said.

"Can I get some of that action?" Mickey said.

"What?"

"Can we start over? Go back to before I fucked it up so much you don't want me anymore?"

"I'd never set reset," Ian said. "I don't want to change one thing about our story, Mickey. I'm right where I want to be."

Mickey looked sad and confused until Ian took mercy on him, grabbed his shirt and pulled him close for a kiss. Mickey barely even kissed him back, but when Ian pulled away, he clung to Ian and buried his face in Ian's neck with that particular brand of desperate violence that was such a part of Mickey that it made Ian feel safe and loved.

Like home.

"I was scared to admit I had a problem. Scared of what everyone would think of me. I called you a coward for not coming out as gay but I was just as ashamed of being bipolar as you were of being gay."

"Bipolar is kind of a bad word in this house," Mickey said. "As bad or worse as gay was in the Milkovich house. I mean, my dad did awful things when he knew what I was, but I didn't care whether or not what I was hurt him. You being bipolar was devastating to all of you, except for maybe Liam. Just the diagnosis itself was hurtful—almost worse than all the crazy shit you did because you were bipolar. Of course you'd be in denial about it."

"But I wasted so much time I could have spent getting better being stupid. I put my health in danger and yours. I was a slut. And I was a dick to everyone."

"Come on, Ian. You're a fucking teenager. Ain't all that shit your job?"

Ian laughed, feeling light-hearted all of a sudden. Maybe it was because Mickey had seen scary shit growing up so nothing phased him these days, or maybe he just didn't scare easily, but he seemed cool about things that freaked other people out. It had taken a while for Mickey to start seeing bipolar that way, but now he did, and it helped Ian hold his own panic back.

"I don't know if I can promise you that I be a good boyfriend yet," Ian said.

"I can't promise you that I'll be a good boyfriend ever, Ian. We just gotta do what we can do, I guess. I don't like when we're apart. I like living with you and helping you and being helped by you. I like being your partner and knowing we have each other's backs no matter what."

"Maybe we should get married," Ian said.

"Please tell me there's some happy medium in that pea brain of yours between being a sex worker and being married."

"Yeah, but—"

"You're seventeen years old, Ian. Jesus. Relax."