This was written for challenge 6 of the marveyficchallenge on tumblr, which was 'let me down easy' Wasn't going to finish it or post it, but alas..
"We should go out for drinks."
"What?" Harvey asks, even though he heard him perfectly fine.
"To celebrate you getting me back as your associate."
"First things first, I think you mean to celebrate you getting me back as your boss. And secondly, no."
"Come on, Harvey. It'll be fun."
"So go. Have fun. Just make sure you can still get your ass to work in the morning."
"I'm not going to go drink by myself, that's..well, that's actually something you would do."
Harvey shoots Mike a look.
"Not that there's anything wrong with that," Mike quickly adds. "So will you come with me? Please?"
"Don't do that."
"Don't do what?"
"That thing you're doing with your face. The whole sad puppy in a Sarah McLachlan commercial thing."
"This is just the way my face is. I can't control it," Mike replies, this time purposely working the puppy eyes on Harvey.
Harvey rolls his eyes, he's pretty sure resistance was futile from the get go.
"Fine. I will have drinks with you, but only if you take care of this for me," Harvey says before digging through a pile of manilla folders on his desk and tossing one across the desk to Mike.
Mike picks it up and looks through it. "Nice. Pro bono from Jessica? What is she punishing you for this time?"
"That's not relevant. Can you get it done or not?"
"No problem."
"Good."
"So, about those drinks, I was thinking that-"
"Just give the details to Donna," Harvey interrupted.
"Oh. All right...guess I'll go get to work on this," Mike says, before heading out of Harvey's office and back to his own cubicle.
-
"Harvey told me to give this to you," Mike says as he holds out a little yellow post-it note.
"Ah, this is the information for your date night," Donna replies, taking the note from Mike and looking it over.
"It's not a date, it's just drinks."
"Right. Drinks. Is that what they're calling it these days?"
"Wait, what's that mean? Did Harvey say something?" Mike asks, suddenly feeling flustered.
"Nope."
"Oh. Okay. Well, would you tell me if he had?"
"Nope."
"That's what I thought. Well, uh, I have to get back to work. Can you make sure you get that information to him?"
"That's kind of my job."
"Thanks."
Mike starts to walk away, but only makes it about 4 steps before stopping himself and walking back to Donna.
"Forget something?" Donna asks.
"Can I get some fashion advice from you?"
"Absolutely. Start by burning that tie and we'll work from there."
"Okay, first? Ouch. This tie was a gift. Secondly, about tonight, what do you think I should wear?"
"Do you remember that blue button down shirt that you wore to Louis' surprise birthday party?"
"You mean the surprise party that Louis threw himself? Yeah, I remember it."
"Wear that one."
"All right. Thanks, Donna. You're the best."
"I know. Have fun tonight, Mike. And don't keep Harvey out too late."
"I will make sure he's back to the old folk's home before they even know he's gone."
"That's all I ask."
-
It was about a half hour before Mike has to head out and he is standing in front of the mirror finishing buttoning up his shirt and adjusting the collar on it. When he finishes he runs his hands through his hair a few times, being sure to make it look like he had actually spent some time on it instead of just rolling out of bed like he normally does.
When he finishes with that he takes a moment to admire himself in the mirror. The shirt did look pretty good. He'd have to remember to swing by Donna's favorite coffee shop in the morning to thank her for the sound advice.
As time draws closer, Mike feels more and more nervous, which is entirely stupid. It was just drinks. Regardless, he decides to head out a little early, and maybe grab a drink to take the edge off. Besides, at least if he was early he wouldn't catch hell from Harvey about never being on time.
–-
Mike gets to the bar and finds a nice little spot for Harvey and himself. He is about fifteen minutes early, so he orders a drink and hopes he could drown his nerves with it.
When nine o'clock rolls around, Mike finds himself watching the door like it is his job. Expecting Harvey to show up at any minute, and being disappointed a little more with each person that comes through the door that isn't him.
He knocks back a few more drinks, and sends Harvey enough texts that it starts to feel desperate on his end so he forces himself to stop.
-
By the time Harvey actually does show up, it's two hours past when he was supposed to be there, and Mike is three sheets to the wind.
"You're still here," Harvey says as he slides onto the seat next to Mike.
Mike doesn't look up or acknowledge Harvey at all, he just stares down at the glass in front of him.
"I'm sorry, Mike. I had this emergency with a client, it turned into a huge nightmare and-"
"If you didn't want to come you could have just said so," Mike says bluntly, before picking up the glass in front of him and polishing it off.
"I said I'm sorry."
"Oh, you did? Gee, I feel so much better now," Mike says sarcastically.
"I got here as soon as I could."
"You could have called," Mike snaps back.
"I didn't have my cellphone on me."
"You just have all the answers, don't you?"
An awkward silence falls between them, and Mike uses that silence to flag the bartender over and order another drink.
"Maybe you should slow down, Mike."
"Maybe you should save the bossing me around for when we're at work."
"Fair enough."
"Just leave, Harvey. You never wanted to come to begin with."
"I told you it was a work thing."
"You could have found a way to let me know! Have Donna call me or text me if you didn't want to do it yourself. God, Harvey! I spent extra time getting ready, I wore this stupid fucking shirt to impress you and I don't even know why. It's like... I'm supposed to be this genius, but you have a way of making me feel so god damn stupid all the time!"
"I'm sorry you feel that way, Mike. That's never my intention."
"Just leave. Please."
"Yeah, sure. If that's what you want," Harvey says, a little bit of defeat and hurt in his voice.
He gets up and offers some money to Mike for a cab, saying it's the least he can do, which Mike immediately refuses before knocking back yet another drink.
-
Mike stays at the bar until it closes, and stumbles his way out the front door. He walks to the edge of the sidewalk and tries to flag down a cab.
He's startled when he feels a hand grab his shoulder. He spins around only to be greeted by Harvey Specter staring back at him.
"You stalking me now?"
"No. But I wanted to make sure you got home safe."
"I can take care of myself," Mike says as he staggers down the sidewalk.
Harvey follows closely behind. "Where are you going?"
"Home."
"You know you're walking down an alleyway."
"It's not an.." Mike pauses to look around at his surroundings, before realizing it was in fact an alleyway. "Just shut up."
"Let me take you back to my place. You can sleep on my couch or in the guest room."
Mike is too drunk to argue with it, and he's pretty sure he'd wake up on a sidewalk somewhere if he didn't accept Harvey's offer, so he does.
–-
"You know I am sorry about tonight, right?"
Mike has his head resting against the window of Harvey's car, eyes closed and so focused on making the world stop spinning that he didn't even hear Harvey.
"You okay, kid?"
"Harvey, I-"
"What?"
"Pull over."
"Oh Jesus. Mike, do not throw up in my car!"
"Pull over!"
Harvey speeds up so he can get to some place safe to actually be able to pull over, but it's all for naught. Even though it's too late, Harvey pulls over so Mike is able to get out and finish.
Harvey puts down all the windows and is thankful they only have a short drive to get to his place, because he's positive he would be the next one to lose his lunch if he had to stay in the vehicle any longer.
When they get back to Harvey's place, Harvey helps Mike stay upright long enough to make it to the couch where Mike all but face plants.
"Don't go anywhere," Harvey orders before disappearing from the room.
-
When he comes back Mike is curled up on the couch sleeping. Harvey grabs a pillow from the other couch and uses it to prop up Mike's head. He walks back to the linen closet and grabs out a blanket and covers Mike with it, which causes Mike to open his eyes.
"How are you feeling?"
"I think my insides still want to be on the outside," Mike replies.
"Bathroom is right down the hallway, but I'm going to put a trashcan right by the sofa in case you can't make it. Okay?"
Mike nods his head.
"I'm also putting water and aspirin right here on the coffee table if you need them."
"Thank you, Harvey. I'm sorry about what I said earlier. You're so nice. I mean you can be a jerk but you're still like.. the nicest person I know."
Harvey can't help but laugh at that. "All right, Mike. Let's not say things we're going to regret in the morning."
"I love you, Harvey. I really do."
"Just get some sleep, Mike."
Mike pulls the blanket up to his neck and closes his eyes. Harvey stays there for awhile to make sure everything is okay before heading to bed himself.
–-
Mike is startled awake by the sound of his phone's alarm going off. He blindly searches for it, desperate to make the sound stop as quickly as possible. Eventually he's able to find it and make it stop. Even without the phone his head is still pounding.
He looks around, and only now realizes that he is on Harvey' couch, in Harvey's condo. Even with his eidetic memory the details of last night are fuzzy.
He notices the aspirin and water on the coffee table and makes that his first priority. He then heads to the bathroom and splashes some water on his face to try and wake himself up. When he checks himself out in the mirror it looks like he hasn't slept in a month, and then he notices something on his shirt.
Upon inspecting it closer he realizes that it's vomit, and in realizing that he almost wants to throw up again. He also now remembers the fact that he threw up in Harvey's car last night. He doesn't remember much beyond that, but he is still alive, so it couldn't have gone too badly. Unless Harvey was waiting for him to sober up before he killed him, which Mike figures is still a viable option.
-
After Mike showers he checks the condo to see if Harvey is actually there, which he's not. Mike then considers running back to his place to grab a suit, but after a time check, realizes that would be impossible, if he was late today, Harvey definitely would kill him.
He instead borrows a shirt from Harvey's closet, and throws on the pants he wore yesterday and rushes out the door, knowing he has a spare suit at the office that he can change into when he gets there.
–-
Mike is changed and at his cubicle no more than ten minutes before Donna shows up.
"Rough night?"
"Jesus, Donna. You scared the shit out of me."
"You look like shit."
"That's the look I'm going for actually."
"Harvey wants to see you."
"He sent you to tell me that?"
"Actually, he seemed pissed. Something about his car. So I'm just trying to steer clear of him completely, so I figured I'd take a walk and come get you."
"Oh god. I'm dead. Or fired. Or, I don't know. Maybe he'll fire me and then kill me." Mike rubs at his temples, his headache seemingly worsening by the second.
"Good luck."
"Thanks for the reassurance. Maybe I'll just go to Jessica and hand in my letter of resignation."
"Well, whatever you do, you better do it fast and not keep Harvey waiting."
Mike let's out an a sigh of exasperation, before heading towards Harvey's office.
–-
Mike stands outside the door of Harvey's office, trying to work up the courage to actually enter. Realizing he's never going to find whatever courage it is he's looking for, he settles for taking a deep breath and entering anyway.
"Donna said you wa-"
"Sit down."
Mike sits down immediately and Harvey gets up and walks around to the front of the desk. There's a silence that lingers and Mike is waiting for the proverbial foot to drop.
Mike can only take the silence for so long before he has to break it.
"Harvey, I am so sorry about last night. I drank too much and I threw up in your car and I don't know what else I did but it was probably awful. I'm never going to drink again and I'll pay for your car to be cleaned and I just..I feel nauseous and my head hurts so just please, whatever you're going to do, just let me down easy."
"Go home. Get some sleep. Be ready by seven."
Mike scrunches his face in confusion. "I don't get it."
"We never got to celebrate you being my associate again, so I want to take you out to dinner tonight."
"But what about the car? Donna said you were pissed."
"I gave her permission to play with you a bit," Harvey says with a devilish grin.
"You're a dick!"
"That's not what you said last night."
"Wait, what?"
"Oh, nothing. You just gushed about how nice I am. I mean, it's no big deal. I know a drunk mind speaks a sober heart."
"Oh god, give me a break."
"Can't make this stuff up. But really, you should go get some rest now. I have a car outside waiting to take you back to your apartment, and I'll be at your place to pick you up tonight."
"No work things going to get in the way this time?"
"No work things. I promise."
"Thank you, Harvey."
"I owe this to you."
Mike smiles, and then makes his way to the door. Before leaving he stops and turns back to Harvey. "Actually, I've got to know. Besides gushing about how nice you are, did I say anything else as horrifying as that?"
Harvey pauses for a moment, replaying the 'I love you, Harvey' Mike gave him over and over in his head, the way he'd been doing since Mike had said it to him before answering,"Nah. It was just a bunch of nonsense mostly."
"Good," Mike replies, simultaneously breathing a sigh of relief.