Chapter Text
It starts with a sigh.
Not just any sigh — an award-winning, Oscar-level, full-body exhale of tragic proportions.
Mickey pauses mid-receipt at the kitchen table, blinking twice before muttering without looking up, “Don’t even start.”
“I didn’t say anything,” Ian replies from across the room, standing in the kitchen doorway with his arms crossed and his lower lip pushed out so far Mickey wants to slap it back in. Or kiss it. Or both.
“You’re sighing at me,” Mickey says. “Loudly. Pathetically. With intent.”
Ian doesn’t deny it. Instead, he slinks over like a housecat in heat, flopping against the side of Mickey’s chair and pressing his forehead dramatically to Mickey’s shoulder.
“You’ve been doing paperwork forever,” Ian groans. “You’re wasting your life, and mine, and this prime snuggling weather.”
Mickey shrugs him off with a grunt. “Electric company doesn’t give a shit about your cuddle quota.”
“They should,” Ian says, deadly serious. “They should give me a credit every time you deny me affection. Emotional trauma fee.”
“You had your tongue in my mouth this morning.”
“That was hours ago.”
“It was like two hours ago.”
“Exactly.” Ian collapses on the couch behind them. “Two hours of isolation. No kisses. No scritches. No Mickey. I’m touch-starved. I’m withering.”
Mickey pinches the bridge of his nose, trying to refocus on the receipt in front of him. One of many. He’s trying to make sense of the numbers for the shop, but it’s a mess — and Ian Gallagher, resident human Labrador, is not helping.
Ian, sensing weakness, flops upside-down across the couch like he’s melting off it. “You love me less today. That’s what this is.”
“Oh my God.”
“I can feel it in my bones.”
Mickey looks up, exasperated, and makes a show of slowly turning to face him. “Do you need me to physically throw you out of this apartment?”
Ian perks up instantly. “You want to touch me?”
Mickey throws a pen at him. It bounces off Ian’s chest and rolls onto the floor.
⸻
Ian disappears after that, and for a minute Mickey thinks he’s actually left to sulk — a quiet miracle. He gets through four more receipts in relative peace before he hears it.
Footsteps.
Soft, sneaky, padded.
He turns just in time to see Ian reach for him — and then he’s airborne.
“What the—IAN—”
Mickey flails as Ian lifts him bodily out of the chair like he weighs nothing.
“Put me down!”
“No can do.” Ian shifts him over his shoulder, grinning like he’s carrying a prize. “This is an emergency cuddle extraction.”
“You’re a menace.”
“You’re warm.”
“I have shit to do!”
“Your ‘shit’ can wait. Your husband is in urgent need of affection.”
Mickey kicks at him. “You have two working hands and a phone. Go hug yourself or text Fiona or something.”
“I tried that,” Ian says, carrying him down the hall with ridiculous ease. “She told me to stop being needy and go harass my husband. So here I am. Harassing.”
“I hate you.”
“I love you.”
Mickey’s still swearing when Ian tosses him gently onto their bed. He barely has time to glare before Ian climbs in next to him and immediately wraps himself around Mickey like a vine, one leg thrown over his waist, an arm sliding under his neck, the whole nine yards.
“You’re so annoying,” Mickey mutters, trying to squirm away.
Ian tightens his grip. “You’re stuck now. Resistance only makes me cling harder.”
“Is this how you get everything you want? Brute force and manipulation?”
Ian presses a kiss to his jaw. “It works with you.”
Mickey huffs, settling slightly. “You are so lucky I don’t have the energy to kill you.”
“I’m lucky every day,” Ian murmurs, nuzzling into his neck. “But especially right now.”
They lie like that for a long moment. Mickey breathes. Ian breathes louder.
Eventually, Mickey mumbles, “You’re smothering me.”
“You love it.”
“…Maybe.”
Ian grins into his shoulder, smug as hell.
⸻
Twenty minutes pass.
Mickey never actually says yes. But he doesn’t try to get up, either.
Ian runs his fingers through Mickey’s hair, kisses the back of his neck, scratches lightly down his spine in that way that makes Mickey sigh without realizing it.
Eventually, Mickey lets out a content little noise and mutters, “You’re like a walking, talking heated blanket.”
Ian kisses his cheek. “I know.”
“You’re still annoying.”
“You still married me.”
“Because I was tricked.”
Ian gasps. “That’s not true.”
Mickey turns to look at him, lips twitching despite himself. “You gave me sex eyes and made pancakes. I never stood a chance.”
Ian smirks. “You want pancakes now?”
“No.”
“I’ll go make some.”
“Don’t leave this bed.”
Ian grins wide and buries himself closer. “God, I love when you beg.”
Mickey snorts. “I hate you less when you’re warm and quiet.”
Ian closes his eyes, humming happily. “That’s basically ‘I love you’ in Milkovich.”
Mickey doesn’t answer — just loops his hand into Ian’s hoodie and pulls him closer.
He’ll finish the receipts tomorrow. Maybe.
But right now? He has a clingy golden retriever wrapped around him like a blanket, and the world can wait.
Chapter 2: Clingy Wins Again.
Summary:
Mickey tries to work, but Ian’s clingy antics and expert cuddling tactics win—again.
Chapter Text
The next day, Mickey makes a bold declaration.
“I’m getting shit done today. No distractions. No interruptions. I’m locking the bedroom door if I have to.”
Ian, lounging shirtless on the couch like a Roman painting, raises an eyebrow. “You mean no me.”
“I mean no nonsense,” Mickey says, buttoning his shirt like a man preparing for war. “No pouting. No whining. No being physically removed from my seat like a damn toddler in a grocery store.”
Ian puts a hand to his chest, wounded. “Wow.”
“I’m serious,” Mickey mutters, grabbing his laptop and heading to the kitchen table. “Stay busy. Go to the gym. Organize the spice rack. I don’t care.”
Ian watches him leave with a pout so deep it could swallow the city.
Ten minutes pass.
Fifteen.
Twenty.
At twenty-two minutes and thirty-five seconds, Ian breaks.
⸻
Mickey is mid-spreadsheet when he hears it.
The sound of socks sliding dramatically across hardwood. A thump. A sigh.
He doesn’t look up.
“Ian.”
No answer.
Then: a soft whine.
Mickey glances up.
Ian is lying on the floor. Flat. Starfish-style. Face down like he’s just perished from lack of love. His hoodie is rumpled. His hair is a mess. He looks like a rescue dog who’s been denied a treat.
“Jesus,” Mickey mutters, and tries to keep typing.
“I miss you,” Ian mumbles into the floorboards.
“We’re in the same apartment.”
“You’re emotionally distant.”
Mickey looks at him with a straight face. “I just kissed you like twenty minutes ago.”
“That was pre-spreadsheet,” Ian moans. “You’ve changed.”
“I swear to God.”
Ian lifts his head, eyes wide and tragic. “Do you still love me?”
Mickey deadpans, “No. It’s over. This spreadsheet has revealed irreconcilable differences.”
Ian gasps and rolls over. “You don’t mean that.”
Mickey holds his ground—for about thirty seconds.
Then Ian crawls across the floor on all fours, rests his chin on Mickey’s thigh like an oversized Labrador, and says in the smallest voice, “Please.”
Mickey groans and leans back. “You’re gonna whine until I give in, aren’t you?”
Ian lights up. “Yes.”
Mickey rubs his hands down his face. “You are so lucky I’m into pathetic, needy gingers.”
Ian doesn’t waste a second. He wraps his arms around Mickey’s waist and presses his face to Mickey’s stomach.
“Snuggles now?” he mumbles.
Mickey sighs in defeat. “Five minutes.”
⸻
Five minutes turns into thirty.
Thirty turns into Ian dragging them both back to the couch, tossing a blanket over them, and placing Mickey’s laptop firmly out of reach.
“You’re a monster,” Mickey mutters.
“I’m your monster.”
Mickey kicks him lightly in the shin.
“I’ll make you grilled cheese later,” Ian offers.
“You better.”
“And rub your shoulders.”
Mickey tries not to smile. “That’s bribery.”
Ian leans in, voice low and soft. “And later tonight—when you least expect it—I’m gonna use that new head massager on you again.”
Mickey freezes.
“You wouldn’t.”
Ian grins. “I would.”
Mickey tries to hide the flush creeping up his neck. He’s never been the same since Ian snuck up behind him last week with that stupid claw-on-a-stick and made him shiver so hard his knees buckled.
“You’re evil,” Mickey mumbles.
“And you’re cuddling me right now.”
“…Shut up.”
Ian presses a kiss to his cheek, triumphant. “You love it.”
And yeah.
He kind of does.
Chapter 3: The Gallagher Problem.
Summary:
Mickey has a rough day, but Ian uses massage gadgets (and love) to pamper him into mush—ending with a head-scratcher so good it nearly ends Mickey.
Chapter Text
It starts on a Thursday.
Mickey’s had a long day — contractors were late, the guy upstairs flooded the damn hallway again, and he’d forgotten to eat lunch, which always turned him into the worst version of himself. The kind that wants to punch drywall and crawl into Ian’s hoodie at the same time.
He stumbles in at 6:42 p.m. to find the apartment suspiciously spotless.
Too clean.
Candles are lit. Something smells like vanilla and smugness. And Ian’s just sitting on the couch with that smile — the one that means mischief and affection and he’s up to something, Mickey knows it.
“What’s with the face?” Mickey mutters, toeing off his boots.
Ian sets down a mug of tea like it’s part of a ritual. “No face. Just happy you’re home.”
“Yeah?” Mickey narrows his eyes. “You clean or something?”
“I did, actually.” Ian pats the cushion beside him. “Come sit. You look like you got hit by a truck.”
Mickey shrugs off his jacket and grumbles, “Felt like it.”
He sinks down onto the couch, letting out a long sigh — and that’s when he sees it.
The box.
Small. Innocent. Sitting on the coffee table with quiet menace.
“What is that?”
Ian grins. “A full-body shiatsu massager. And… bonus,” he reaches behind a pillow, “the head-scratcher 2.0.”
“No.”
“I haven’t even asked anything yet.”
“You don’t need to. That thing’s dangerous.”
Ian leans in. “Dangerously relaxing.”
Mickey groans. “Last time I went limp in the middle of the goddamn hallway and you laughed for like twenty minutes.”
“I did not laugh,” Ian says, already crawling closer. “I was concerned. And deeply entertained.”
“You’re not putting that spider thing on my head again,” Mickey insists, even as Ian gently swings a leg over to straddle him on the couch.
Ian cups Mickey’s face. “You’re so tense.”
“No shit, Gallagher. The water bill was a crime today.”
“Then let me fix it.”
Mickey squints. “With toys?”
“With love.”
Mickey snorts. “You’re the worst.”
“And you’re letting me sit on you while you grumble, so.”
Mickey goes quiet.
Because yeah. He is.
And it’s kind of… nice. His thighs ache, his neck is stiff, and Ian’s weight feels warm and grounding. Like an anchor that doesn’t ask for anything but to be held.
“…Fine,” Mickey mutters.
Ian lights up like a golden retriever handed a stick twice his size.
He grabs the box and starts unwrapping things like it’s Christmas morning. Mickey watches him with the weary gaze of a man who’s lost this battle before.
First, Ian presses the back massager gently behind Mickey’s shoulder blades and turns it on.
Mickey stiffens… and then lets out a shocked breath. “Shit.”
“Told you,” Ian whispers smugly.
The thing moves in little circles, heat rising under it, like a tiny army of warm thumbs working through every knot Mickey’s ever had. Ian guides it down his back slowly, and Mickey lets his head fall back against the couch with a low groan.
“Goddamn.”
Ian beams. “You’re not even ready for the next part.”
“Oh, there’s a next part?”
There is.
Ian gently sets the full-body massager down on Mickey’s lap, guides his legs to stretch out along the couch, and turns on the foot rollers.
Mickey makes a sound that is, frankly, not human.
“Jesus—fuck, that’s—”
“Nice?” Ian grins.
“Weirdly nice,” Mickey pants, eyes fluttering half-shut. “I hate that you’re right.”
Ian leans in like he’s sharing a secret. “And now… for the finale.”
“Oh no.”
He pulls the head massager from behind the couch cushion like a magician with a wand.
“Mickey Milkovich,” Ian says solemnly, “you are about to know peace.”
“Don’t you—”
It’s too late.
The little metal legs hit Mickey’s scalp and slide down gently.
And Mickey shatters.
His back arches, legs twitching, mouth falling open in a gasp he barely gets to finish before a second pass makes him let out a noise that’s somewhere between a whimper and a sob.
“Ian—Ian—”
“Uh-huh,” Ian says, smug and way too pleased with himself.
“I—my—fuck—”
His voice cuts out. Like his soul just bailed mid-sentence.
Ian presses a kiss to Mickey’s forehead. “You okay, baby?”
Mickey is fully nonverbal now. Eyes glassy. Body limp. There may or may not be tears.
Ian catches him just before he slumps completely sideways.
“Whoops,” he murmurs, guiding Mickey into his lap like a ragdoll. “There he goes.”
Mickey clutches his shirt weakly, face half-buried in Ian’s neck.
“I’m gonna destroy that thing,” Mickey mumbles hoarsely, which would be more convincing if he didn’t sound like he’d just been blessed by an angel and hit by a truck in the same breath.
Ian strokes his hair, grinning into the crown of Mickey’s head. “Sure you are.”
⸻
Ten minutes later, Mickey is tucked under a blanket, foot massager still running, face slack with the softest expression Ian’s ever seen on him. Like someone who just transcended space and time.
“I hate you,” he mutters sleepily.
Ian kisses the tip of his nose. “You love me.”
Mickey sighs. “Unfortunately.”