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Valentine’s Day on the road is always a bummer for everyone on the team. For Alexei, it’s not as bad as others. He’s always long distance from his boyfriend. But he knows the heartache of it, anyway. It makes the overall mood somber. They can’t get a reservation at any local restaurants, especially not for a group as big as they are. So the team gets dinner catered and crowds into Marty’s hotel room to watch the Aces play the Penguins.
If Alexei can’t be with Kenny, at least he can watch his game.
It takes a little while for everyone to get settled, they’ve got a lot of big bodies and not a whole lot of space to put them. But eventually they make it work. Alexei ends up with his left shoulder pressed against Jack’s right and Snowy lying half way across his right side. It’s probably not the most comfortable position, but at least he’s not on the floor like most of the guys.
The game is physical from the start. Mainly from the Penguins’ side, though the Aces lay down a few hits of their own. Alexei feels like maybe he’s slightly at fault for that, thanks to his rivalry with Malkin. Since Alexei and Kent came out together, his enemies have started going after Kent and Kent’s enemies have started going after him. The slashes and hooks and hits are dirty enough to warrant penalties, but of course the refs aren’t calling anything. Alexei is proud of how well Kent is handling it, though. Instead of retaliating, Kent holds his head high and keeps playing the game. Alexei will have to have words with Malkin again, eventually.
The game is scoreless, about half way through the second period, when it happens. Malkin hooks Kent. Kent turns and slashes Malkin on the calves. The puck skirts away from them both. Kent starts to go after it, head and neck bent down to gain speed. Crosby comes from nowhere, charging at Kent with all his force. Kent goes head-first into the boards, his neck still bent weird, and Alexei feels the air all rush out of him.
“Get up,” Alexei mutters to himself.
But Kent isn’t getting up. Troy has swooped in and has started a fight with Crosby. Gordon has gone after Malkin. Everyone has a partner it seems, but Alexei only has eyes for Kent. Chestney has rushed to his side and is blocking him from the fights with his goalie pads. Alexei sees him yell to the bench and the feed cuts to Troy and Crosby, who are still going at it despite two of the linesmen trying to separate them.
Without warning, the coverage goes to commercial. The entire hotel room is silent and Alexei can feel multiple pairs of eyes staring at him.
“He going to be okay,” Alexei says quietly, swallowing the lump in his throat.
When the coverage comes back, Kent is being placed on a spine board and suddenly Alexei feels like he’s going to throw up. He said Kent is going to be okay. Kent always takes hits like that, sometimes worse. But he’s always okay. Why are they putting a spine board on him? Why are they putting a collar around his neck? Why isn’t he moving?
“It’s going to be okay,” Jack says softly next to him. Alexei stares at him blankly and Jack raises his phone. “George already has a call in to the Aces GM. She’ll find out what’s going on for you.”
Alexei can’t watch the rest of this game. He stumbles off the bed and towards the door, giving a half-assed excuse about needing to make some phone calls. He feels like he’s going to throw up. He doesn’t throw up. He manages not to, though he sits next to the toilet in his own hotel room for a while.
Alexei hears banging at his door multiple times, but he doesn’t care. His body feels too heavy to get up and answer it. He thinks maybe he’s in shock. He has a terrible, horrible feeling in his gut that something is really, really wrong.
His phone is dead silent.
He falls asleep on the bathroom floor, the tiles cool against his heated skin. The thing that wakes him is the sound of his phone going off. He manages to recognize the name, Jeff Troy, though his blurry eyes. He also notices the time is somewhere after four in the morning.
“‘Lo?” he says.
“Alexei,” Troy says. He sounds exhausted. “Hey.”
“He okay?” Alexei asks, wiping the sleep from his face with his hand. “Concussion?”
“Uh… I don’t really know how to put this?” Troy says. “No concussion. They’re still running a whole bunch of tests on him, but he’s got a fracture in his spine.”
Alexei sucks in a breath and feels the pinprick of tears behind his eyes. Troy keeps talking.
“They don’t know how serious it is yet, but he couldn’t—” His voice cracks and Alexei’s strength crumbles. “He couldn’t feel anything. Or—or move anything.”
“Is serious,” Alexei says, the dread starting to set in.
“From what we know right now? Yeah.”
“Need me to come to Vegas?” Alexei asks.
Troy sighs like a man desperately in need of a long vacation. Or a stiff drink.
“Not right now,” he answers. “Let’s see what the doctors say, okay? I just wanted you to know what’s going on.”
Alexei has to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from insisting that he’d get on the next plane to Vegas if he needed to. But Troy is probably right to keep him from doing that. They should find out what’s going on, first.
“Thank you, Troy,” he says. “Tell Kenny I’m on next plane as soon as he says word.”
“Of course. And hey— call me Jeff, okay?”
Alexei hangs up and closes his eyes for just a moment. Then his entire dinner comes back up and into the toilet next to him. It’s probably a good thing he fell asleep here.
Alexei doesn’t learn anything for a couple of days. He talks to Jeff multiple times a day, but the Aces have left Las Vegas for a road trip so Jeff can’t offer him much more than what he’s being told by others. Between the two of them, they don’t know much. They know Kent has a fractured spine. They know he’s currently paralyzed. They know he hasn’t answered any of their calls or texts. And thanks to a short phone call Alexei received from Kendra herself, they know Kent’s mother is on her way to Las Vegas to be with him.
It’s really not much to go on, but at least they know this much.
As time passes, Alexei learns more. After a few days, he learns that Kent’s spine is actually fractured in two places. A few days after that, he learns that Kent’s paralysis should go away and that it’s likely caused by all the swelling from the injury, not from the injury itself. Kendra says the doctors say Kent is very lucky he wasn’t hit harder.
The most infuriating thing Alexei learns is that the league doesn’t really care about protecting its players. At least, not Kent. Crosby gets a three game suspension. Thanks to the Penguins schedule, it takes barely a week for him to be allowed to return to the ice.
The hardest part for Alexei is that days pass without hearing from Kent. Days build and turn into a week. A week turns into two weeks. He knows Kent is awake, he knows he’s capable of talking. Jeff even went to see him, though he said Kent hardly paid him any attention. Maybe it’s selfish, but Alexei just wants to talk to his boyfriend.
Kendra calls about two weeks after the injury with good news. Kent is being released from the hospital into her care. The Aces have to hire a live-in nurse to help her take care of him since he’s still paralyzed, but he’s finally going home.
Alexei’s heart breaks for Kendra. They’ve started talking on the phone more often and every time she sounds more and more tired. Kent isn’t taking his current situation well. He’s shut her out—he’s shut everyone out. He says the words he needs to when necessary, but otherwise doesn’t make conversations last. Nothing she tries works—not inviting his teammates over, not making him FaceTime with Alexei, not even trying to talk to him about Kit.
FaceTime is extremely painful for Alexei. It’s the first time he sees exactly the state Kent is in and it makes him want to immediately drop everything and rush to Las Vegas. Kent is bruised on the entire left side of his face. He’s got a large collar around his neck and he’s stuck in his bed. He looks pale, weak, and tired. Worst of all, he looks miserable. Alexei understands the situation doesn’t exactly encourage Kent to be happy, but in a two hour conversation, Kent doesn’t even smile once. Though to be fair, it’s predominantly a one-sided conversation that Kent clearly doesn’t feel like participating in.
It only takes a few days before Kendra calls him, holding back her tears and begging him to come to Vegas. Kent still won’t talk to anyone, not even her. He doesn’t want help, he snaps at her when she does things for him. She says all he does is lay in bed watching MTV. He won’t even let Kit into his room anymore. She’s hoping maybe having Alexei there might help him more, encourage him to open up and at least talk to someone.
Fortunately, the Falconers are nearing their rest week and Alexei was planning on going to Vegas anyway. He already has his ticket and everything. The Aces have a stretch of home games and, months ago, Kent promised lots of time spent in bed together if Alexei made the trip for the week. Alexei doesn’t think this is the type of “being in bed” Kent meant.
Jack drops Alexei off at the airport a few days later, a homemade blueberry pie wrapped up in one hand with Kent’s name on it and a homemade apple pie in the other with Kendra’s.
The flight is long, especially since Alexei’s long legs have gotten used to the Falconers’ private plane. Even more so because all he can think about the entire time is how Kent crumbled to the ice when he got hit, how he was strapped to a spine board and wheeled off the ice, not a single body part moving. Alexei has been waiting to make this trip for three weeks, and now he’s only a few hours away from being there.
Jeff and Kendra each offered to pick him up at the airport, but Alexei refused them both. They’ve got more important things to worry about, and being in a cab for a little while gives him time to get his thoughts in order.
Alexei hesitates at Kent’s condo door. He’s technically got his own key and has been given permission to let himself in whenever he wants, but he’s not sure how Kendra feels about that. Besides, it would be tough to fish out his keys while he’s got his bag on his shoulder and two pies in his hands. So he knocks.
Alexei’s arrival is a tale of two welcomes. Kendra answers the door with open arms, quickly taking the pies from Alexei before pulling him into a tight hug. Her tiny stature makes the hug remind him of his Babcia, if she were blonde and American rather than brunette and Russian.
Kent, on the other hand, isn’t happy to see him. When Alexei enters the bedroom, a slice of Bitty’s pie on a plate as an offering, Kent huffs and refuses to meet his eyes. Alexei finds it hard to swallow, but he understands. Kent has so much pride in himself, Alexei knows it’s hard for him to be in this state. Kent doesn’t eat his slice of pie. Instead, he asks Alexei and Kendra to leave him alone for the night, he’s tired and wants to go to bed early.
Alexei is patient with Kent for the first few days. He offers to help Kent bathe. He offers to help Kent eat. He offers to just sit and watch Catfish or Teen Mom with Kent. But Kent turns him down every time and Alexei’s patience starts to run thin.
“I’m understanding if he’s not want help from teammate or random person,” Alexei complains to Kendra one evening. “But I’m not random person. I’m boyfriend. I’m loving him more than anything. I’m just want to be here for him before I’m have to go home.”
Kendra sighs and takes a long sip of wine.
“This is how he’s been since I got here,” she says. “You know how Kenny is.”
“Yes,” Alexei agrees. “Always too stubborn for own good. Push away everyone because he’s not feeling like he deserves love.”
Kendra is silent for a moment. She stares at her glass and Alexei worries for a moment she’s going to burst into tears. She doesn’t, fortunately. But when she speaks again, she’s very quiet and sounds like her heart is breaking.
“Don’t give up on him,” she says. “Please. Whatever he says or does, don’t give up on him.”
“I’m never giving up,” Alexei assures her. “I’m loving him too much.”
Kendra offers him a soft smile, though it doesn’t fully reach her eyes the way Alexei has seen in photos. She’s tired. She’s stressed. She’s been caring for Kent non-stop for the past three weeks. She needs a break more than anything else. After they’re done with their wine, Alexei does a quick google search and one phone call later, he’s booked Kendra a day at the best local spa, complete with a full body massage and any extra treatments she wants.
“Please go,” he says softly, holding her hand gently. “You deserve it.”
“Thank you,” she says through building tears.
Alexei gives Kent’s nurse the day off, too, and by nine o’clock the next morning it’s just the two of them in the condo. Alexei makes breakfast and carefully brings it into Kent’s room.
“Where’s the nurse?” Kent asks, not looking away from the television.
“I’m give day off,” Alexei says.
“And my mom?”
“Spa day.”
Kent’s face twists, but he doesn't say anything. He lets Alexei put the breakfast tray over his legs and slowly eats on his own. Alexei has already eaten, so he settles into the chaise lounge in the corner of the room with his book and lets Kent do his thing.
“You’re already on The Half Blood Prince?” Kent asks a little while longer.
Alexei looks up from the page and notices Kent’s plate is empty. He’s also muted the television and is staring at Alexei. Alexei slides his bookmark between the pages and sets the book down, getting up to retrieve the breakfast tray.
“I’m finish Order of the Phoenix last week,” Alexei answers.
“I didn’t know that,” Kent says.
“You’ve had busy weeks,” Alexei says softly. “Lots more important to think about.”
Alexei doesn’t mention the fact that Kent would have known if he’d read his texts. Alexei texted him entire paragraphs about his thoughts on the Order of the Phoenix. But now definitely isn’t the time to bring up Kent’s radio silence.
Kent gets the message anyway, though. His jaw clenches shut and he turns his attention back to the television screen, where Nev and Max are currently searching the internet for their catfish’s true identity. Alexei doesn’t completely get the show, but Kent loves it so they watch it a lot together over FaceTime. They’ve already seen this episode before.
Alexei takes the dishes out to the kitchen and cleans them up. He also does a little straightening up around the house, too, while keeping an ear out for anything Kent might need. By the time he gets back to Kent’s room, Nev and Max are doing their post-show check up on the two people.
“Want me to stay in here?” Alexei asks. “Can go into living room, too.”
Kent swallows and clenches his jaw again. Alexei really wishes he’d stop that, he’s already had so many issues with grinding his teeth.
“I have to pee,” he says quietly.
“Okay,” Alexei says after a beat. “Tell me what I’m do.”
Kent clearly isn’t happy about having to walk Alexei through the whole process of getting him to the bathroom, but they manage to make it work anyway. Alexei thinks it’s probably a lot easier than when it’s Kendra and the nurse because he’s stronger.
“Kendra say you have to have bath today,” Alexei says once Kent’s safely back in his bed. “We can do now or can wait, but I’m like to do before she comes home.”
Kent huffs and clenches his fist before taking a deep breath and letting go.
“Don’t want to bother her,” he says quiet enough that Alexei isn’t sure he’s meant to hear it.
“Hey,” Alexei says, gently taking Kent’s hand. “Kendra love you. She’s wanting to be here. She’s taking care of you always. I’m just thinking she needs day to herself while I’m here.”
“So you’re the one who’s stuck dealing with me? I’m sure you love that,” Kent says sarcastically.
“I’m wanting to be here too,” Alexei says simply. “I love you more than anything. I’m wanting to drop everything and come three weeks ago. Only wait because is my job to be with team.”
“You should be on a beach somewhere relaxing. Not wasting your week here babysitting me,” Kent argues.
“You don’t get to say what I should spend my week doing,” Alexei snaps. “You’re thinking I’m not want to be here but you’re not listening. I’m wanting nothing more than to be here. I’m already sad I’m have to leave soon. You’re not talking to me or letting me take care of you or anything, but is still better than spending my week somewhere else. I’m still trying to take care of you because is all I want to do.”
Kent doesn’t respond, he just stares at the blanket across his legs. After a moment, his face twists and Alexei has been with his boyfriend long enough he knows what’s coming. He quickly leans down and carefully wraps his arms around Kent’s shoulders. He presses his lips to Kent’s forehead and sucks in a breath.
“No, Kenny,” he says. “Don’t cry. No, I’m sorry. Not meaning to yell at you.”
Kent takes a deep breath anyway and lets out a sob. Alexei knows he’s past the point of return, so he carefully climbs onto the bed next to Kent and holds him gingerly, careful of his neck, as Kent cries.
“I’m sorry,” Alexei mutters over and over.
It takes a while, but eventually Kent runs out of tears. He calms down but Alexei still doesn’t leave his side.
“I’m sorry,” Alexei says again. “Not meaning to yell at you. Just… frustrated. Just want to help you.”
“I don’t deserve you,” Kent says.
“Why you say that?” Alexei asks.
“I’ve been a brat,” Kent admits quietly. “I’m—I’m scared. But that doesn’t mean I get to take it out on you. Or my mom.”
“Is okay,” Alexei says. “We are understanding. Is very scary for everyone, but especially you.”
“I’m so scared, Lex,” Kent says, closing his eyes. “What if I never walk again? What if I never skate again?”
“Doctors say is not forever,” Alexei explains. “You’re going to be okay. Is bad now, but you’re going to be okay.”
Kent threads his fingers through Alexei’s and sighs.
“What if I’m not, though?” he asks.
“You will be,” Alexei encourages. “But even if you not, I’m still here. Kendra still here. We still love you most.”
Kent’s shoulders sag under the collar, like he’s relaxing just a bit for the first time. He’s still got an edge to him, Alexei can sense it. But he’s made progress with Kent, and that’s not to be overlooked.
“Hurting?” Alexei asks, knowing Kent hasn’t had any of his pain medications yet today.
“A little,” Kent admits. “But I’m good for now.”
“Can I have favor?” Alexei asks hesitantly.
“Yeah.”
“Don’t keep everyone out, please.” Kent tenses but Alexei is quick to bring their hands to his lips, giving Kent’s fingers a little kiss. “I’m know you are independent and strong person. But people want to be here for you. People love you very much. Mama and me, yes. But also teammates and other friends.”
Kent swallows, but he agrees with a small “yeah.” Alexei knows it will be tough for him. Kent is a very stubborn person and getting him to change something like this is like trying to change the direction of a hurricane. But Alexei believes in him and loves him, so he’ll endure whatever storm Kent wants to throw at him.
Surprisingly, he sees the change in Kent immediately. By the time Alexei is ready to head back to Providence, Kent has started to open up more. He’s letting Kendra and Alexei take care of him without complaining or giving them a cold shoulder. He’s being more honest about when he’s in pain. He’s even agreed to invite Jeff over once the Aces get back from their current trip to Calgary.
Things aren’t perfect. He still snaps at them when he starts to feel overwhelmed and he still sometimes refuses help with certain things. It’s what they expected, though. Alexei has learned that nothing is ever perfect when it comes to being with Kent. The important thing is that he’s starting to get better, which was all Alexei could have hoped for when he got on the plane to Las Vegas.