mikey!!

"So, I hear you've finally caved and watched the first Alien movie?" Mickey asks you one Friday night. You two have been together for six months at this point, known each other since September, and have elected to spend the weekend together at your apartment. You're in the kitchen and Mickey is leaning against your counter top for the moment. "Why haven't you said anything about it yet?"

"One word, Altieri," you retort. You're in front of the kitchen sink while Mickey leans on the counter at the end of a small kitchen island. You're filling a water bottle because you have nothing else to drink in your fridge and water with ice is about the closest thing to a decent drink you'll be able to afford before your pay cheque hits. "Facehugger. I took one look at that motherfucker and I just couldn't. They're gross, they're weird, and they brought a fuckin' facehugger onto the ship, for what? To save Kanes life? Only to decide 'oh no it's worth it to cut the literal alien off of Kanes face because it's providing him oxygen and it might kill him too if we take it off?' bullshit."

"They're interesting!" He retorts. "They attach themselves to a host, wrap their tails around the hosts neck to keep them from moving, and they paralyse the host before they implant an alien egg, basically. That is at least cool on a base level. Plus, the only reason they did that was because Ash's procotol was to steer the ship in the direction of the xenomorphs and consider the crew expendable."

"Facehuggers are freaky, spider looking alien sons of bitches, and the rest of that crew initially refuses to take it off of Kanes face because of a theory? A theory? I know on Ash's part it was cover because of 937 and the crew not mattering, but still. I am not a scientist or an astronaut or even remotely equipped to be in any scenario where aliens are also involved, but--that's fucking stupid! All respect to Kane, the fictional character he may be, but bringing him onto the ship in the first fucking place was a stupid move!"

Mickey chuckles. "On Ashes part, he was following his code. On the part of Dallas and Lambert, Kane was a crew mate, and they were trying to save his life," he rebuts.

"If they wanted to save his life they could've tested the theory that the facehugger was providing Kane with oxygen while keeping him comatose, and then acted accordingly! I know the theory turned out to be partly right, but again, bullshit!" You retort, carrying on quickly because you are not yet done with your rant.

"I am so, so fuckin' sorry, and I know plot convenience and this and that yadda yadda ya, but, even for a crew mate, I would've probably just chickened out, taken Ripleys side. They should've never let Kane back onto the ship because guess what? Alien life form and Ashes protocol aside, facehuggers bleed acid. Acid that destroyed a part of the ship, acid that could've easily gotten them all killed before any of the rest of the movie happened. They could've been stranded in space because of some spider looking bastard and an android they thought was a person until it came out that he wasn't."

Mickey shakes his head. "The sequel is better than the first, and it probably explains a lot more about the facehugger 'spider looking sons of bitches.'"

You know he's saying probably because he's trying not to spoil it for you, a person who has never watched any of the movies that are out to date and has somehow avoided spoilers, but part of you has an internal chuckle that he's using that verbiage because he truly can't remember the answer.

"Okay, stopping you there," you retort, setting your water bottle on the counter and walking the two steps from the sink to the freezer. You grab an ice tray, crack it so that the water that'd spilled out of the moulds and frozen over the gaps cracks. "The first movie is objectively great, which makes it a horror classic even twenty-eight years later. The acting is solid, the visuals are amazing, and the scares? Brilliantly executed, though technically I can't really discuss how good they are because I never liked movies that involved aliens to begin with. Alien does aliens justice, though, and don't forget, Mick, the sequel wouldn't exist had the first one not done as amazing as it did back in the 70s."

"I hate it when you make fair points," he retorts. You pop ice cubes into your water bottle, set the tray back in the freezer, and screw the top of the bottle into place. "It was a good movie, but the sequel is a lot better."

"You're an awful lot luckier than you realize for the fact that opinions are subjective," you snark back, your voice honeyed and sweet. "I haven't watched the second one, so I can't really say, and after sitting down and watching the first at ten o'clock on a Monday night, I want seven full days without thinking about the sequel or about how Randy was wrong when he corrected one of our classmates about the "get away from her, you bitch!" line."

Your and Mickeys relationship had begun from nights similar to this one. Nights in your apartment, though on that particular one you both had booze. You'd both been standing in your kitchen after a few too many, and then you'd kissed because it seemed like a natural progression, and since that night, six months down the line, Friday nights are spent bickering with him, not because you're mad, but because it's easy to bicker when he's so sarcastic and it's practically your second form of communication by now, dry wit and easy rebuffs.

"You're my favourite person to talk movies with," he says, his voice open and little bit too honest. "Better than fuckin' Meeks, at least."

"I am a writer," you retort like the words offend you. "I like journalism and I like caffeine, but apparently some horror movies aren't half bad, either. You only like talking movies with me because I don't consider sequels to be the fuckin' antichrist."

Mickey lets out a surprised snort, closes the distance between the two of you in four steps. "Yeah," he agrees. "You would drown yourself in coffee if I let you, probably, but your lacking propensity for movies aside, I am allowed to genuinely enjoy being around you. That is par for the relationship course."

"Mickey Altieri, do not pull the sarcasm and the flirting just because I yapped for five minutes about a movie you happened to at least moderately enjoy," you retort as his hands go to your hips, resting on them like it's habit, like it's the easiest thing in the goddamned world. "I hate facehuggers, I will not watch the Alien sequel, and no amount of flirting or you doing that thing with the eyes will ever actually change that."

That thing with the eyes being what he's doing right now, looking at you like you he means the words he says, like he's not just dramatizing his feelings for the sake of it. Like he actually enjoys spending time with you, hearing your opinions about his favourite cult classics or their predecessors.

"I could think of at least a bribe or two to get you to watch the second one," he says. "Like the fruit you like from the supermarket that costs you an arm and a leg, or pizza from the local spot that also costs an arm and a leg, or a kiss, which is the cheapest option because all it costs is an hour and fifteen or so minutes of your time to watch Ellen Ripley kick ass once again."

"I don't know the first thing about the sequel, nor will I learn about it for anything other than to maybe prove you wrong about it being better than the first," you respond. "What if it's bad? And--James Cameron? No thank you."

"Are you seriously going to stand in front of me and diss the man who created the fucking Terminator movie?"

"I am," you nod. "I haven't seen it, never plan to, but what I hear of it? Not interesting at all."

"You and your questionable taste in movies are going to drive me crazy one day," Mickey chuckles. "Tomorrow night, popcorn made with Flavacol so we can have a taste of the movie theatre shit while sitting either in your living room or in my room on campus."

"Aliens, and then Texas Chainsaw Massacre?"

"I knew I didn't just like you for your writing talents!" Mickey retorts. "Sounds like a date to me."

And, despite yourself, you catch a smile forming on your lips. Genuine happiness settles in your chest, just like it always does whenever you're around Mickey.

When Mickey kisses you, it's steadfast, easy, and simple. You're still grinning when he kisses you, which he, naturally, laughs about in the time after he pulls away and just before he pulls you closer and you feel every single other thing in your life at that moment effectively stop mattering.