Doesn't Seem To Matter as Much Who: Mannix and Mickey Where: December’s House When: Night
Now that everyone seemed to be accounted for, maybe, just maybe, he could get that drink with December. It’d been forever since they’d talked about it. Since the full moon, maybe? And it just kept getting put off as crisis after crisis landed at their feet. While she still might have a morgue full of bodies, he was pretty sure that cause of death was clear for at least half of them, so maybe he could sweet talk her into taking a night off. It was with that in mind that he knocked on the door, hoping he had to drag her out of the house, rather than out of the morgue.
Mickey was up, his sleep scheduled a little fucked after having just crashed for almost a full day after everyone was accounted for. He was partially on December’s schedule, a result of sleeping on her couch, making sure he saw her if she left for work, making sure she was around, alive and well and he had a feeling that went two ways. They were getting better, or maybe just starting over. It left Mickey at ease with everything, which was an improvement on everything else. What had happened to him was still weighing heavily on him. His cuts were still there, including the one on his forearm, bandaged even if it could have gone without because he didn’t want to look at it. There were still bruises on his face and he was still in pain, still hurting both mentally and physically, but it was getting better. Slowly. He heard the knock, frowning and heading towards the door. “Did you forget your keys?” he asked opening it and finding himself staring at Mannix. “Oh, um, hey.”
Though Mannix knew that Mickey had been found, he wasn’t on the list of people he thought he should pay a visit to. On a good day, they tolerated each other, so leaving Mickey alone seemed kinder than wishing him well. If he’d known that Mickey was at December’s house, he would have kept on walking. “Hey,” he said, hands sliding into his pockets. “Guess she’s at work then… Glad to see you survived.”
Mickey leaned on the doorjamb, wondering if December had ever let him inside. He normally would have been jealous, but that seemed pointless at this juncture. Why bother? He was still important to her and if he wasn’t hers, he wasn’t hers. It just went back to what he was thinking when Violet had him, that he could die knowing December was his last even if she wasn’t his. “She just left a little while ago. Still getting caught up with everything.” He nodded a little, running one hand through his hair, giving a flash of the red marks from being tied down. “Glad I survived too. Had my doubts there for a moment.”
“Shouldn’t known,” Mannix said with a little smile. December wouldn’t be ready for another night off until another crisis was right on the horizon. It was too soon for her to come up for air. “Apparently there were more crazies in the dome than I’d suspected. Never thought it’d be safer out there.” But outside the dome, you were either dead or alive. No one was tortured and held captive for days. That shit just wasn’t right. He couldn’t help but notice the shape Mickey was in, the cuts on his arm and his bruised face. “You want something to speed the healing along?” he offered.
Mickey rubbed at his wrist and nodded. “Special level of crazy.” Because Violet had been. He hadn’t realized there was anyone that crazy still out there. He’d been wrong. “I like to think it’s still safe here. Someone comes looking for you here.” Mickey didn’t take any time to consider the offer. “No, no thanks...no more blood.” Not after Violet and her obsession with blood.
“That’s true. And the places they can take you are limited,” Mannix said, though he also realized now how big the dome was. The dome had felt huge with Lily missing. “Okay. Well… Tell December I dropped by.” Maybe he’d go see how Clementine was doing, or just patrol the streets and make sure they were safe. He’d spent too long inside today to go back and sit through the night.
Mickey didn’t know what to do with Mannix. They weren’t friends, that much was for sure, but the guy was still close to December, so much that she seemed to think he’d been better than he had. “You’d think. But it took longer than any of us would have liked to find everyone.” He was still talking like he was on the other side of things, not one of the kidnapped. Maybe because it hadn’t fully dawned on him. “I’ll let her know. I’m sure she’ll come looking for you.”
From the way Mickey spoke, Mannix would have guessed he was one of the ones searching, not one of the ones trapped, but he wasn’t going to call him on it. He couldn’t imagine what it would be like to be tied up, waiting for someone to save him, or to find an opening where he could escape. It was a situation he’d never managed to be in. “Why would you say that?” he asked, a little surprised by Mickey’s response.
MIckey shrugged. “You two are friends. I know that means a lot to her. And I saw how busy she was when I wound up at the hospital, I’m sure it wasn’t much better before that. So she probably owes you a visit or something, right?”
“Sure,” Mannix said with a little laugh, his eyes dropping from Mickey’s as he pulled out a cigarette. It was a distraction, something to do while he figured out what to make of that. December was the closest thing he had to a real friend, but she didn’t visit him. He visited her. He tried to pull her away from her work and maybe have a good time. But it had never happened. And the more he worked at it, the more he thought he should just back off and leave her alone. He needed a distraction that wasn’t December. “She’s got a lot on her plate.”
“Because she puts it there,” Mickey said. He laughed a little to himself and shook his head. “I sometimes wish I knew her before the zombies. If she was like this then too.” He hadn’t met her until they were on the road together and then, there had been plenty to do because they needed to to survive. Now that they were here, sometimes he wondered if she found things to do to be distracted.
“True. But she’s good at what she does,” Mannix said. If December hadn’t stepped in on the werewolf issue, then who knew how much of a cluster fuck the full moon might’ve been. Since then, she’d been the go-to person for all things crazy, even if she wasn’t in law enforcement. People were just more comfortable taking things into their own hands these days. It was the way he’d always handled it. “I think I’d like to have known her back then, but I’m not so sure I’d have wanted her to know me.”
“She is. She can work magic,” Mickey said with a darker laugh, his eyes cutting to the bandage on the inside of his arm. It wasn’t healed enough to be covered yet. It wouldn’t for a while he guessed, well not without taking Mannix or Zania up on their offers of blood, but he’d have to get over seeing Violet rubbing his blood on her skin to handle that. And he wasn’t sure he was getting over that any time soon. “No?” Mickey took a step forward, closing the door behind him and going to sit on the porch.
Mannix’s gaze followed Mickey’s to the wound on his arm, wondering what had happened there. “She going to cover that for you?” he asked, hoping that was the plan. If it was him, that’s what he’d do. He took a step forward and offered Mickey a cigarette, even if he wasn’t sure if the guy smoked or not. “I wasn’t the kind of guy people wanted to get involved with. You never know who might notice and decide to use it against me.”
Mickey considered the cigarette then shook his head. He wasn’t much of a smoker, more the drinking type. “That’s the plan. Can’t really go around with JERK carved into my arm.” He sounded distanced from it, because he was. It was how he was coping for the moment, trying to be removed from it. He looked over at Mannix. “Use it against you?”
Mannix cringed in sympathy. He’d never been carved on, but he’d seen it done and he had the feeling the scarring was worse than receiving the wound. Yes, it hurt to bleed, but the reminder had a more lasting effect. “Sounds like a good plan. Did you get kidnapped by a thirteen year old girl?” Because JERK wasn’t exactly mature. Mannix tucked the offered cigarette back again and took a drag off his own. “If you can’t hurt someone directly, if the consequences will be too great, then you go after people they care about. I decided it was better not to have anyone to go after.”
Mickey looked at his arm again. “She was older, my age maybe, but she acted...acted like a child sometimes. A teenager.” Which had made her attempts to make him her boyfriend even more humiliating. He ran his hand through his hair again. “Sounds lonely.” Which he kind of understood, though not for the same reasons. He’d just been cut off from others. “What were you into exactly?”
“Sounds like a psychopath.” She had to be to carve Mickey up for no good reason. Not that there were a lot of good reasons, but he was pretty sure Mickey hadn’t known this girl before she took him. “It’s better than living in fear,” Mannix said, his mind wandering back to his first and only girlfriend. Her death had been brutal on him. It wasn’t losing her so much as the feeling that it was his fault. He knew that wasn’t the case, but in some ways it was. “I grew up in the mob. Not really the kind of business you choose to get into.”
Mickey nodded. “At least that. Human though. And I killed her.” He said it plainly, but too plainly. “I guess it is,” he agreed. He didn’t know fear, just distance. At mention of the mob though his eyebrow rose, looking at Mannix harder. “Really? No, I guess you don’t have a choice there.”
“Good for you,” Mannix said with a hint of a smile. He would have done the same thing. He didn’t generally like to kill girls, but if they deserved it, then there was little that would hold him back. “Fear for others is different than fear for yourself. I was resigned to dying before I hit thirty. Now I might live forever.” Which was weird and hadn’t really processed with him. He suspected it would hit home when people around him started to age and he didn’t. “Being locked in here’s been kind of a mixed blessing. I can’t get out, but my father can’t get in. It’s kind of nice being able to do my own thing, even if I’m not sure what that is.”
Mickey shook his head. “Not good for me.” He wasn’t proud of it. He’d needed to do it. He’d needed to kill her, to make her suffer and knowing that about himself was eating him up a little. “But it’s good she can’t hurt anyone else.” He looked at his hands, half expecting there to still be blood on them. “At least you won’t age. You’ll stay good looking forever.” It was a little joke, but it lacked true heart behind it. Not with his mind so clouded by evil things. “Yeah I can see that, freedom without being free. Can’t imagine the mob is still a thing though with the way the world has changed.”
Mannix took a drag off his cigarette as he shook his head, exhaling slowly before speaking. “I know what road you’re going down. Don’t do it. This one deserved what she had coming. Don’t allow yourself to feel bad about it just because you needed it. If you hadn’t done it, someone else would have.” And then Mickey wouldn’t have gotten the rage out of his system. He knew the two of them weren’t the same, but he also knew that sometimes revenge was what they needed. “I’m not sure how I feel about living forever yet.” On one hand, it gave him a chance to really experience life, to live beyond his father and the hold he had on him. On the other, it could be very lonely. “You’d be surprised. We were made for this kind of chaos. We thrive on it. And outside those doors, someone’s gotta run the show.”
“Yeah, I’m not like that though. I don’t...I don’t think like that. I’m not like that.” He ran his hand over his face, covering his eyes for a moment. “I can’t imagine what it’d be like, to know you can’t die unless someone tries to kill you. I don’t think anyone would blame you for not having your head around it yet.”
“No? Was it self defense?” Mannix asked, not knowing the answer. He saw that as something different, killing to survive. He never felt remorse when he had to make that kind of choice, him or them. “I suppose I could walk into the sun and burst into flame, but when you’ve been fighting to survive your whole life, suicide seems kind of lame.”
Mickey thought about that, then shrugged. “I have no idea. She wasn’t hurting me when I killed her. I could have left. But...I called her back. I killed her.” And he hated himself for it. Part of him died as a result. “That’s because suicide is lame. It’s giving up.” At least that was what they’d taught him in Sunday School. That and it was a sin.
Mickey might have thought he wasn’t like that, that he didn’t think like that, but a part of him must if he’d called the girl back just to kill her. The only difference was that Mannix might have carved into her skin first, to repay the gift before killing her off. “Don’t let it eat you up. You survived. That’s what we do these days. Go do penance, go to confessional, and let it go.” That was one thing he remembered from the time they’d hunted together, that Mickey was religious. So was Mannix, to a small degree, but he couldn’t enter a church anymore. “I don’t like giving up, so I guess I’ll just live till I get bored of living and then piss someone off enough to see if they can kill me.”
Mickey laughed darkly again, feeling the weight of the cross around his neck. It was under his shirt, but still there, even after the run in with Violet. “Not sure if God’ll forgive me for this one.” But he might try it anyway, head by the church in the morning, just to see if it helped. “You’d think you’d come up with something else to do once you get bored, but I suppose it wouldn’t be too hard to piss someone off enough to kill you.”
“I like to think he can,” Mannix said with a shrug. If Mickey couldn’t be forgiven, then he definitely couldn’t be, and that was before taking him being a vampire into account. “Hey, I don’t usually piss people off that bad,” he smiled. “It’s not my goal, at least. And I’m thinking I’ve gotta be pretty damn bored with life to go that route.”
“Here’s hoping,” Mickey said with a sigh. He half laughed again then shook his head. “It’s not your goal? How is it you’re so good at it?” Though everyone else seemed to love the guy so maybe it was just Mickey. He wasn’t as mad about it though and honestly in the moment, he didn’t hate the guy as much anymore. The guy had been there for December when Mickey had failed. He had to give the guy credit for that “How’s your sister? I heard she went missing too.”
“The key is stopping just before they want to kill me,” Mannix answered, though it did make him wonder why he was standing around chatting with Mickey when Mickey thought that way. He’d never gone out of his way for Mickey to hate him. It just seemed to happen. At mention of Lily, Mannix sobered. “She’s okay. Not great, but dealing. She’s stronger than she looks.”
“Or finding someone that just won’t,” Mickey said looking over at Mannix. He nodded about Lily, sombering himself. “You know I almost dated her. Hate that that happened to her. Hate that it happened to any of them.”
“Most people find me likeable,” Mannix said, taking another drag off his cigarette. “You’re just an exception.” Most of the people that didn’t like him had a good reason for it. Maybe he’d killed someone they knew, or fucked their sister. Mickey just didn’t like him because he was the wedge between him and December, though he’d never meant to be. “I know. And I’m sorry about that. I know you would’ve been good to her.” The jury was still out on Lochlan, in his opinion.
“Yeah I’m getting that impression,” Mickey said. “Maybe I don’t care as much as I used to.” He wasn’t sure how that would go over, but he figured it was worth floating how he was feeling. “Probably would have been, but she had stronger feelings for someone else. I can’t fault her that.”
Mannix raised an eyebrow, trying to decide if he believed that. Mickey didn’t seem like the kind of guy to try and play him, but he had a hard time believing he’d get over his grudge as well. “If I’d known the way things were gonna play out…” He shrugged. He often wished he’d never shown his hand. At least then he could pretend he had control over the outcome. “You can’t be in love with someone after meeting them once, but Lily believes in things like soul mates. Maybe it’ll last. Maybe it won’t. There’s really no telling.”
“Play out with the three of us?” Mickey asked. “Because I’m pretty sure most of that falls on me. I was a dick. I...I love that girl. Not sure how exactly, but that’s the only word that works. I panicked that I’d lose her. It was stupid. I’m not going to do that anymore. Hold on loosely you know?” He shook his head about Lily. “It’s not a bad thing to believe in. And if it’s true and she’s right? Then she deserves it.”
Mannix couldn’t say that he loved December. He couldn’t say that he loved anyone that wasn’t family. It was a strong word, one that expressed a level of physical and emotional intimacy that he didn’t think he’d experienced. The physical part was easy, but the part where someone got to know him, really know him, hadn’t happened in years. “I don’t think you could ever lose her,” Mannix said, though he thought Mickey had come close. Oddly, his getting kidnapped had helped December get over her issues with him. “The last guy Lily was in love with hit her. I have a hard time trusting her judgement.”
“I used to think that. I know better now.” Mickey was very aware of how close he’d come to losing her and he wouldn’t let it happen again. But then he’d almost died and he realized that none of the things he’d been upset about mattered. Not when he could both lose her or die. “I heard about that. Shame. But you don’t think she’d notice the signs?”
“Okay, well, don’t be an ass and you should be fine,” Mannix said with a little laugh. “She seems reasonable enough. Even promised not to kill me, so long as I was good.” Good was a relative term, but Mannix had been on his best behavior since meeting December and it wasn’t just because he didn’t want her to kill him. “You never know. She didn’t exactly grow up in the best environment to foster healthy relationships.”
“Working on that.” Mickey laughed to himself. “Thanks for being there for her. She said you were a good friend when I wasn’t.” He smiled a little at him. “Promising not to kill you was a good job. Great start actually.” Thinking about Lily, he wound up shrugging. “I guess you’re right. I suppose...if you need keeping an eye out for her I can help.”
“I try.” Though it was hard to get past the part where he wanted more with her. Mannix wasn’t used to being turned down and to continue seeing her after that was a challenge for him, but not the kind of challenge he enjoyed. It would have been different if he thought working to get her was the way to go. “I think you under-estimate how difficult it is for me to be good,” he smirked. “But if you don’t mind with Lily, sure.”
Mickey smiled. “Maybe you just need a lesson in being the good guy,” he said. “She might not want me around, but I can be. Glutton for punishment if you will.”
“Being a good guy is different from being good,” Mannix chuckled. He thought he was a pretty good guy when it came to how he treated December, but he had problems elsewhere. it was difficult for him not to pick fights just for fun, or steal things because he could. Mostly, it was all out of boredom. The last few days had kept him busy, which was a relief, but before that had started he was ready to go hunting just for fun. “I’d say she wants you around if you’re staying at her house.”
“You have a distorted view on good guy,” Mickey said. He looked back at the house and nodded. “I didn’t want to go home. It’s hard...being alone. She was willing to give up the couch and she didn’t seem to want me out of her sight. I give it a couple of days before she is ready to get rid of me completely.”
“Probably. But I’ve never really cared before,” Mannix said. If a girl didn’t want to be with him, he’d find another. He wasn’t investing in anything. And then there was December. “Well, if she does kick you out, I have a house full of girls that would love your company,” he teased.
“You know, you don’t do it for someone else. You do it for yourself. Even me, I just didn’t want to be trouble, to be a bother. Wound up with a sister that hated me and brother that paled in my shadow. Pretty sure he didn’t appreciate either, but he didn’t talk much before he left. It’s not...It’s not an easy thing to do. The good guy doesn’t always get the girl like in the movies. Doesn’t get the good job or the rich life. You probably had a better angle going than I did.” But Mickey didn’t know how else to be. “Which is why I will probably just drag my ass to my house instead of yours. Your girls don’t want a guy like me. Not for what I’d be paying for.”
“See, that’s why I’m not trying to be the good guy. I’m not trying to be anything but me, with a little less on the trouble side. And not just for December, but because it’s smart.” They were trapped in a dome. If he stirred things up too much, someone would come for him. They might even drag him out into the sun. It was better to play it safe. “I never had an angle, Mickey. If I did, I did a piss poor job of working it.” Mickey had gotten closer than he had with who he was and if that’s what December wanted, then she was never going to find it in Mannix. “Just thought I’d offer. Sometimes company is better than nothing.”
Mickey smiled a little and nodded. “Seems like there’s plenty of trouble in here without you adding to it,” he said with a shrug. “But you’re right. It is smart.” Someone would stop him. If what he’d seen with the reaction to the kidnappings was any indicator, someone would stop him. For a moment he was quiet, looking at his hands. “I don’t know if I ever thought you were. I don’t blame you for liking her Mannix. Not everyone sees it, but there’s something special there. And you’re right, if you were working an angle, you’d have done a better job and I would have rearranged your face when you hurt her.” He smirked some and ran his hand over the back of his neck. “You might not believe it, but I’m kind of a loner.”
“Why are you so sure I’d hurt her?” Mannix’s jaw tightened, though his smile remained. He’d gone out of his way not to hurt December. Sometimes he wondered what he could have done differently, come on to her sooner, harder, taken a risk that he wouldn’t have even thought about any other time. But he liked her, dammit, and that made it matter and so he’d managed to fuck it up. “I believe it. But I also know that even loners need friends from time to time. I don’t think you’re a hermit.”
“If you were working an angle…” Mickey said looking Mannix’s way, but smiling still. He let out a long sigh, running his fingers over the marks on his wrists from being tied up. “I have always had friends, just not like other people do. I keep to myself. The first few years she knew me,” he nodded towards the house. “I didn’t talk. Even when it was just the two of us, a few words here and there. Friends or not, I’m always alone. Except for her that stubborn pain in my ass.” He laughed a little to himself, but that was it.
They were very different, Mannix thought. He had friends, but that didn’t mean he let them in. He liked to be around people, liked a good loud party, because he was more comfortable with a hundred acquaintances than ten people who knew everything about him. “To each his own,” Mannix said, putting out his dying cigarette on the porch railing. “I’ve always been a talker.” He’d talk to anyone. The question was whether or not there was substance to the conversation.
“And I’ve always been better at listening,” Mickey said. “The perfect boyfriend, someone told me once. At least for the first three months.” Then they wanted more from him, more about him and he couldn’t give it, probably just as closed off as Mannix was.
“Listening’s good, but you have to give a little for it to be a conversation,” Mannix pointed out. “But I get it. It’s easier to listen. It’s safer to listen.” To share a part of yourself was to make yourself vulnerable. It wasn’t something Mannix did often. In fact, he was a bit surprised with how much he’d been willing to give Mickey.
“You’d be surprised at how much people want to talk about themselves.” Though Mickey wasn’t sure why he was telling Mannix any of this. Maybe it was his version of an olive branch. Maybe they could figure out how not to get on one another’s nerves so much.
“Well, yeah, and most people will, especially if you seem interested.” Mannix knew this. He’d used it. Though he’d found it had changed a bit since the zombies came. “These days it’s a little different. People don’t want to talk about the past, but they all seem to be looking for a distraction. I don’t really blame ‘em.”
Mickey looked out over the lawn and nodded. “I don’t either. Though usually I have a wrench or a hammer and seem distracted.” It was different though. People wanted to feel that connection again, with other humans, especially those who hadn’t been around many since the zombies.
“Why don’t you want to connect with them?” Mannix asked curiously. He had his reasons, even if they didn’t apply as much as they used to. Some habits were hard to break. But Mickey seemed like the kind of guy that would have a handful of close friends if he’d let them in.
Mickey was quiet for a while, not answering right away. For a moment he even wondered if he could ignore the question altogether, but he doubted Mannix would let him. “I just don’t get close to people. That’s all.”
“By choice?” Mannix asked, not pushing for the reason, since he had the feeling that Mickey didn’t want to share it. Just because Mannix was in a sharing mood didn’t mean that Mickey had to be.
Mickey looked up at Mannix and nodded. “Yeah, by choice.” He knew it might be hard to believe, but it was the truth.
“We all have our reasons,” Mannix said, understanding even if he didn’t know Mickey’s. In most cases, he found it felt safer to keep people at arm’s distance, but sometimes it was worth it to let them in. If it was the right person. “I should get going,” he said, looking up at the moon, then back to Mickey. “See you around?”
MIckey nodded, feeling like that mostly answered the question. He has his reasons. They boiled down to Rose, but that was reason enough. He didn’t need to lose anyone else. “Not dead yet, so yeah you will. I’ll tell her you swung by.”
“Thanks,” Mannix said with a little smile. “Have a good night.” He hoped Mickey got to feeling better, which would take healing and time. Hopefully they’d have some of that before the next crisis fell at their feet.