Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

“What the fuck do you want from me, Rozanov?”

Ilya supposes it’s a valid question. He has not replied to a single text from Shane since the Olympics, too embroiled in his own shit to find it in him to respond to a simple you doing okay? text.

Especially not when it’s from the one person he thinks can actually coax it out of him—everything he’s been keeping buried deep inside.

It’s just too much. Shane Hollander is entirely too much, with his big brown eyes and beautiful freckles, always asking Ilya if he’s okay and having the nerve to seem like he actually cares to know.

Each time he asks, Ilya finds himself—just for a second, before always deciding against it—wanting to be honest for once and tell him, No, Hollander. I am not okay. Everything is shit.

But if he does, he feels like the floodgates will open and it won’t be long until everything’s just spilling out of him. My father is asshole. And he is sick. My brother is asshole. My mother is dead. Only good person in my family, dead. There is no warmth waiting for me back home. And I want you more than I am supposed to. And I don’t know what the fuck to do with all that.

And he just can’t have that. It’s too… vulnerable. This thing that they have—whatever the hell it is—it’s good. It’s easy. It feels like the only thing keeping him afloat sometimes. 

He can’t let it get to a place where it’s more than just a good, convenient fuck and some fun teasing in between. Even if sometimes, in brief moments of tenderness, it already feels like it’s more than that. Or at least like it’s something that can be, if they just let it.

But they don’t. They can’t.

Although sometimes, Ilya does find himself giving in to the urge to look at Shane just a little bit longer, to let his touch be just a little bit gentler, more reverent, than what it would be for something as casual as they claim this to be—albeit sparingly. Just a little bit, he always tells himself.

Sometimes, just for a moment, he lets himself indulge. He lets some of that affection bleed out of him because he feels like he’ll implode if he doesn’t.

But he always catches himself before it can linger.

He lets Shane kiss him on the forehead like it means something, sits in that warm feeling just for a moment, before he pulls away. He holds Shane tighter to his chest just for a little bit after sex, just to see what it would feel like if he were allowed to do it all night, before he gets up to leave.

And he always does. He always pulls away; he always gets up to leave. Always one foot out the door, always gone before the morning.

He lets himself get close just for a moment, just to know what it’s like. But he always takes a step back right after and makes sure the distance is back between them before the closeness can really take hold.

Sometimes, he even entertains the idea of letting the tenderness last for more than just a moment. When he’s feeling really indulgent, he thinks about what it would be like to actually stay the night and wake up next to Shane for once. Is he grumpy in the morning? Would he like it if Ilya made him coffee and cooked him breakfast? Probably not, stupid bird diet and all.

A part of him really wants to know. But he can’t. They can’t.

So he lets those moments just be moments, lets go before they can even have a chance of being more, and lives off of them until the next time he can have one again—siphoning off all the moments’ warmth until he can let himself indulge again.

Because it can’t be more than that. Because then, it means something; it becomes something he can lose. So he simply doesn’t let it.

Instead, he keeps pretending like this is nothing to him. Like it doesn’t kill him to keep Shane at a distance when he would live under his skin if he could.

“I want you to suck my dick,” he says instead. He should apologize, probably. Shane seems pissed. But he doesn’t want to. Because then he would have to tell him why he was too fucked up to reply to a single text in the first place. Then, Shane will see what’s really in his heart and might not like it, might not want to deal with all that baggage. Ilya doesn’t want to find out.

So instead, he deflects. He retreats to the more carnal of his desires because it feels like safe territory in comparison to the deeper want that he actually feels whenever he’s around Shane.

“Fuck you. You are unbelievable.”

Again, fair. Looking at Shane in this dimly lit bathroom, Ilya sees the hurt concealed behind his anger. He’s upset because he hasn’t heard from the guy in six months. And now Ilya just saunters in without a care in the world, smiling expectantly like he actually doesn’t doubt that Shane will be on his knees soon enough.

Because he doesn’t. It’s just what they do. They text sometimes, they hook up even less frequently, and they go on with their lives. What difference does six months of silence make?

“Come on, Hollander. You know you want to,” Ilya goads, the smirk not having left his face since he followed Shane into the bathroom.

“Fuck off,” Shane spits out as he makes a move to leave.

But Ilya is on him. He takes a step forward and holds Shane’s jaw in his hand—firm and commanding, just like Ilya knows he likes.

He sees Shane’s pupils dilate as he has his delicate little face in his grasp. Ah, there it is. The desire, peeking through his anger. Ilya can work with this.

“Look, Hollander. You win MVP tonight, you can go back to my hotel room and I will blow you, fuck you, whatever you want.” Ilya sees the desire flicker in Shane’s eyes with each word he says and thinks, gotcha.

But then he sees Shane’s expression shift, the fire in his eyes gone just as quick as it came, being replaced by something more like resolve. Resolve to do what? Ilya doesn’t know yet.

“No,” he responds impassively as he takes Ilya’s wrist and loosens his grip on his jaw before letting their arms fall to the side. All the fight in him from earlier seems to have dissipated, overtaken by want only for a brief moment before it settled into this, whatever this is. 

“No?” He raises an eyebrow and tilts his head, confused but still playful, still of the belief that he can get Shane in his bed tonight with just a little more teasing.

“We’re not having sex tonight.”

“Ah, you want to save it for next season? Make it sweeter with the wait?” Ilya continues to tease, eyes unashamedly wandering down to Shane’s mouth, hand coming up to touch again before it’s abruptly stopped in its tracks by Shane.

“No, Rozanov. I—” He takes a deep breath, like whatever words are about to come out of his mouth he has to physically claw out of himself. “I can’t do this anymore.”

“What?” Ilya panics for a second before he manages to school his expression to something more neutral. The furrow in his brows remains though, as he looks all over Shane’s face for an explanation.

Surely this is just the anger talking, right? Shane’s just too pissed off to have sex right now, but that’s fine. Ilya can charm him again soon enough… right? That has to be it.

“This,” Shane says as he gestures between them. “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t pretend like… Those six months, Rozanov, I—I just wanted to know if you were okay, you know? With the Olympics and everything, and… I don’t know. Whatever else you have going on.”

Ilya did always think Shane probably knew on some level that he was dealing with something. He never told him of course, so he didn’t know what exactly. But it was probably evident enough in the way he always shut down Shane’s attempts at deeper conversation, flinching ever so slightly at any mention of his family before painting a stoic expression right back onto his face.

Maybe that’s why Shane has been patient with him, giving him grace even when he maybe didn’t deserve it. Because he held on to the belief that Ilya being closed off had more to do with whatever it was that he was dealing with internally, as opposed to Shane himself. So why now? Has his patience just run out?

“So to not hear from you for months… And right after we just—” Shane’s voice falters, and it shatters something within Ilya to hear him sound so pained. He wants to make it stop, wants to reach out and provide some sort of comfort. But he’s never really been good at that.

He doesn’t know what to do. He feels frozen in place, wanting so badly for the sadness in Shane’s eyes to go away, but knowing full well that he’s the reason it’s even there in the first place.

He turns the words over in his mind again. And right after we just—

Shit, so that’s why. No wonder his patience ran out. No wonder he was so pissed. Ilya didn’t even realize that his six months of silence came just after the first time they went beyond hotel room hookups and actually fucked, right in Shane’s bedroom. God, he must think Ilya’s such an asshole.

But Shane has to know that that has nothing to do with why he didn’t respond, right? He has to. But then again, how could he? Ilya hasn’t told him anything.

He thinks about apologizing, reassuring Shane that he didn’t just chase him for years so he could fuck him, only to ghost him for six months after. But he can’t find the words.

Seeing Shane like this, the part of him that always wants to give in to this beautiful man is dangerously close to taking over. But Ilya still finds it in himself to push it back down. 

“I just can’t keep doing this,” Shane continues as he clears his throat and quickly regains his composure. “You can’t just come back after all that and expect me to be right back on my knees when I… I was just worried, you know? And I thought that maybe we—”

“Hollander,” Ilya tries to interject. This conversation is going places he’s nowhere near ready for.

But Shane just sighs as he continues. “I keep trying to, you know… I don’t know. Get through to you, somehow. Beyond just this, whatever this is. I keep trying but you shut me down and push me away every time and I just—”

“Hollander.” He tries again, but Shane looks determined to either finally crack him or just walk away completely.

And Ilya knows; of course he knows. He knows that Shane’s been trying. He would always ask questions, always try to get to know Ilya better, always ask if he’s okay. But Ilya has never really given him anything beyond a perfunctory answer.

He’s just not ready for those floodgates to open. Will he ever be ready? He doesn’t know. But if he ever does open up to someone, he wants so badly for it to be Shane.

But he doesn’t think he even has the time to find out, because the look on Shane’s face tells Ilya that he’s had just about enough.

They’ve been doing this little dance for what, five years now? And no matter how sparse their interactions may have been in that time, there’s no denying the pull they both feel towards the other. They aren’t really anything, but maybe they could’ve been if Ilya didn’t take a step back every time Shane tried to take a step forward.

And Ilya wants. God, does he want. But he can’t. Not when he feels like such a fucking mess inside, and when the world around them feels like even more of a mess.

Maybe he was a fool to think they could keep going like this, with him giving just about enough to keep Shane around, but not giving him nearly as much as he deserves.

They stand in silence for a moment, like Shane is giving him one last chance to open up, one last chance to give him something, anything really at this point.

As the silence stretches and it becomes clear that Ilya has nothing to say, Shane finally walks away.

“Goodbye, Rozanov.”

“Hollander,” he calls out one more time to Shane’s retreating back, because he doesn’t know what the fuck else to say.

His arm reaches out before he can think about it, but Shane’s already out the door.

Six months of silence makes a world of difference, it turns out. 

Chapter Text

Ilya goes through the rest of the awards night and the after party in a daze. He’s sitting by the bar, the buzz of his colleagues chattering around him fading into background noise as his thoughts thrum much louder.

Shane has told him no before. It’s partly why their first fuck got delayed for so long in the first place, post-snowstorm. And that was always fine. But it’s never sounded like this. It’s never held so much weight; it’s never had so much… finality to it. I can’t do this anymore is a world away from just We’re not fucking tonight.

And Ilya doesn’t know what to do if he meant it for good this time.

It feels a little ridiculous to him how much the thought of losing Shane unsettles him. Because it’s not like Shane’s really even his to lose.

So what would he actually be losing? Some banter on the ice? Flirty texts here and there? A good fuck on the rare night that they’re in the same city?

He can get that literally anywhere at any time without so much as lifting a finger. But the thing is, he knows it’s not the same.

As much as he doesn’t want to admit it to himself, let alone to Shane, he’s always felt drawn to him in a way that he’s never felt with anyone else—not before Shane, and certainly not since he met Shane.

Ever since he first tasted those lips in some dingy hotel room… No, before that.

It was when he first saw him smile so openly as they were struggling to finish up that stupid campaign shoot because they were having a fucking giggle fit on the ice. Not a PR smile, or a polite smile—but a genuine, warm, open smile. Perhaps even a chuckle or two. He felt so disarmed seeing Shane like that, when up until that point he thought he was always so composed and proper, and honestly a little uptight.

No, it was definitely even before that. He distinctly remembers being the one to float the idea of that joint shoot in the first place, since he was already curious about the golden boy of hockey at the time.

Maybe it was when they shared a water bottle at the gym after the draft, and he physically could not tear his gaze away from the way Shane’s throat bobbed as he swallowed, the way sweat trickled down his perfect skin, and the way he was panting, catching his breath. Yeah, Ilya has nothing appropriate to say about what that image did to him.

No, no. If he’s being truly honest with himself, he’s felt this pull ever since that cold day in Regina, when he was just minding his business, lighting a cigarette. And this polite, pretty Canadian boy told him that he wasn’t supposed to be smoking there. 

It’s easy to file away as just simple attraction, and maybe it did start out that way. But attraction quickly became curiosity, curiosity became desire, desire became yearning, and it just simmered and grew until it all got away from him before he could even put a name to it—turning into this amalgamation of want and need and longing for something that fucking terrifies him.

So really what he would be losing is all of that, before he can even make sense of any of it, let alone actually do something about it.

As he’s sitting by the bar lost in these thoughts, he watches Shane from across the room looking just as out of it as he feels. He wonders if he’s just as torn up about all of this, if it fucking kills him the way it kills Ilya. The possibility that it does provides him at least a little bit of comfort.

But he can’t just sit here and do nothing. He can’t just wallow in this feeling. He can’t feasibly address it head-on either though, so he does the only thing he knows how to instead.

He takes another drink and texts Shane his room number, just in case he didn’t mean what he said earlier. He couldn’t have, right? This is just another one of their games. All their arguing, it’s pretty much foreplay, right? Surely Shane still wants him.

He sees the man take his phone out of his pocket and put it back just as quickly without a second glance, before returning to whatever boring conversation he’s probably having with Scott Hunter.

Ilya’s jaw ticks at the feeling of being so blatantly ignored.

I’ll leave door unlocked, he texts again. Shane doesn’t even take his phone out this time.

It makes Ilya feel like a piece of gum stuck on his shoe. He feels the bile rise in his throat and keeps typing, still adamant that he can win whatever game Shane’s playing.

Lily

come on, hollander

it’s good room

beautiful view

big windows, as tall as ceiling

whole city can watch as i push you up against glass

Ilya downs his drink as he watches Shane finally pull out his phone. Thankfully, five consecutive buzzes was enough to get his attention again.

He sees Shane subtly scan the room before his gaze finally lands on Ilya. He feels like the entire room disappears when their eyes lock. All the voices fade into the background, and Ilya feels like they’re the only two people in the room, maybe in the world, as he waits with bated breath for what Shane will do next.

Will he nod his assent? Will he tilt his head towards the door so they can get out of there? Will he simply look away and continue ignoring Ilya for the rest of the night?

He feels time slow down to a stop as he watches Shane just shake his head—one, two, three times, with something that looks almost like disdain in his eyes. And then he looks away and the rest of the room comes back into the foreground.

It can’t have been more than two seconds that Shane held his gaze and shook his head, effectively closing the door on them. But to Ilya, it felt like those two seconds would never end.

It’s at this moment that he realizes that maybe he can’t actually win this, because maybe Shane isn’t just playing some game. Maybe this isn’t just another one of their spats after all. Maybe he did mean what he said, and they’re ending before they could even really begin. And he can’t just let that happen.

The fear of losing whatever he has with Shane fully possesses him at this point and he starts typing again, frantically this time, his earlier denial morphing into full-blown panic. He has to do something—just get him in his room, even just get one foot in the door. He can’t let it end in a fizzle like this, or even end at all for that matter.

Lily

please?

i’ll make it up to you

hollander, please.

Far be it for him to beg, but he truly feels like if he lets Shane walk away tonight without getting to hold him in his arms, that he might never get the chance to again.

Ilya watches him read over the texts, clearly contemplating for what feels like forever. Time continues to stretch as he watches the conflict all over Shane’s face. People think he’s not that expressive, like a stoic little robot. But Ilya has studied his expressions enough—on television, from across the rink, underneath him in bed, carefully cataloguing each one—to be able to tell when it shifts even slightly, when other people can’t.

After what feels like hours to Ilya but in reality is probably just a few seconds, Shane finally starts typing back. Anticipation builds as Ilya glances between the three dots bouncing on his phone screen, and the man across the room making them dance.

Jane

fine. i’ll follow in 15 minutes.

Ilya practically jumps out of his stool and barely says goodbye to the acquaintances he passes. He doesn’t know what he’s going to do exactly once they’re up there, doesn’t know if he can find the words to make Shane stay. Probably not, considering he hasn’t had time to process any of this, really.

But maybe he can show him. Maybe he can kiss Shane as softly as he used to only allow in those brief moments of indulgence. Maybe he can hold him closer, tighter, letting the moment linger long enough for it to stick this time.

Maybe he can infuse as much tenderness into each touch to make up for all the words he can’t say, and maybe Shane will be able to glean what’s on his mind from that. 

Maybe he can bide his time this way, just to keep Shane a little longer, just until he’s ready to put all his cards on the table. It’s the only way he knows how.

He certainly hopes that it’s enough, as he leaves the door unlocked behind him and waits for the longest 15 minutes of his life to pass.

***

Shane doesn’t know what the fuck he’s doing.

He should be downstairs, mingling, enjoying the night with his colleagues and not standing outside Ilya’s penthouse suite ready to give him yet another chance to walk all over his heart.

But he didn’t expect Ilya to say please, didn’t even know the word was in his lexicon, as proud and commanding as he portrays himself to be. So, perhaps a little foolishly, he thought the text meant that maybe he was finally willing to open up, even just a little bit.

It’s not like Shane’s asking for too much. He doesn’t need Ilya to suddenly be the poster boy for emotional vulnerability overnight. He knows that shit takes time.

And he knows—well, he doesn’t know, because Ilya hasn’t told him anything, but he suspects—that vulnerability doesn’t come easy for Ilya for reasons beyond his control.

So he understands. It’s why he’s never really pushed before tonight. But he’s taken baby steps, always trying to ask questions that can be light enough on the onset but can lead to more genuine conversation—always careful not to cross any boundaries, but holding out hope that one of these days, Ilya will let him in of his own accord.

And he likes to think that he’s been patient in this pursuit. At least, he’s always tried to be.

But to be on the other side of Ilya’s silence for six months, for his concern to be met with nothing but dismissal and hostility when all that he wanted was to know if Ilya was okay… Well, it made Shane feel like shit.

It was like a splash of cold water to the face. There he was, constantly smiling at his phone like an idiot, waiting for their next game against Boston like some giddy teenager, stupidly thinking Ilya might want him just as much as he does… only to get discarded after getting fucked for the first time.

It made him feel pathetic.

Still, he reached out—worried for Ilya after Russia lost and asked if he was okay, kept worrying even amidst the silence. Nothing.

And the first words back after all that silence? I want you to suck my dick.

Shane’s had enough. He can’t keep doing this to himself. All this time, he’s been trying to slowly chip away at the walls Ilya has carefully built around himself. But what Shane didn’t notice is that he’s also been chipping away at himself in the process.

He’s been hurting, and he’s been pretending otherwise—ignoring all the cold shoulders just so he can bask in the little moments of warmth he gets when Ilya allows it. Because it was better than nothing, and he would take what he could get.

But not anymore. He’s determined to walk into that room and get something, anything, to let him know that he’s wanted for more than just his body. He’s done feeling like he’s just another hookup. That was okay for a while; it was what they had first agreed upon after all. So really, it was okay… until it wasn’t.

It’s just not enough for him anymore. And he needs more. 

He doesn’t need to know Ilya’s entire life story right this second, or every little thing that keeps him up at night. He just needs a little peek behind the curtain, just a crumb to let him know that maybe one day, they can get to know each other beyond hockey strategies and what they like in bed.

He doesn’t even need Ilya to meet him where he’s at, if he’s not ready for that. He just needs him to be willing to take even a single step towards him, just one tiny fucking step, and Shane would be willing to wait for him to get there eventually.

I’ll make it up to you, Ilya had said. And Shane thought that maybe, just maybe, it would mean an apology at the very least. Maybe an explanation for the silence, or just any sort of indication that he’s willing to take that first step.

But as he takes a shaky breath and enters the suite, he quickly realizes that maybe he was wrong to think that.

Ilya is on him immediately, crowding him against the door and kissing him senseless like a man starved—devouring him for a second until he seems to think better of it and shifts gears, the kiss settling on a much gentler pace than either of them are used to.

Shane melts into the kiss for a moment because of course he does. Unfortunately, as has been proven time and time again, he’s a weak, weak man when it comes to Ilya Rozanov.

But he pulls away as soon as he remembers that this is not what he’s here for. He’s not here for sex, he’s here for a conversation.

Ilya just looks at him for a bit, with uncharacteristic softness in his eyes. It’s a little disarming, but Shane does his best to stand firm. He thinks he sees a little desperation in there too, maybe even a little fear. But he doesn’t put too much stock in it, because what does Ilya Rozanov have to fear?

The hand that was cradling his head so it wouldn’t hit the door moves so Ilya can swipe his thumb against his cheek. The touch is so gentle that Shane can almost feel hope blooming in his chest. Almost.

But then Ilya is chasing his lips again, and it takes every ounce of self control he has to turn his head and not keep letting him just take and take and take.

“Rozanov.” He’s a little embarrassed at how breathless he sounds from just a kiss. In his defense, it was one hell of a kiss.

He clears his throat and pries Ilya off of him so he can walk a little further into the center of the room. He needs to not have the man’s hands all over him so he can think straight.

He looks at Ilya expectantly, waiting to see what he has to say.

But no words come. Instead, Ilya’s walking over to him slowly, dropping to his knees and placing his hands on Shane’s hips, nuzzling his crotch like a believer worshipping a deity.

“Rozanov,” he chastises, but his hand finds its way into Ilya’s hair. Call it a little moment of indulgence of his own before he stands his ground again.

“I say I make it up to you, yes? Plow you into mattress until you forget last six months.” Ilya untucks Shane’s shirt so his hands can roam all over his torso, while leaving soft kisses on his belly.

Shane thinks the touch feels almost reverent, like Ilya’s saying with his hands and his mouth all the things he can’t say with actual words.

But the self-loathing he feels for being so pathetic to even be here in the first place is enough to snap him out of it. He doesn’t need touch. They’ve touched plenty. It’s not enough anymore. Shane needs more.

“Rozanov.” His voice is stern as he gently pulls Ilya off of him by the grip he has on his hair, unlatching the lips that were eagerly worshipping every inch of his skin.

“I didn’t come here to get… plowed. Jesus, when did you even learn that term. I came here to talk.”

“Mm, but mouth is good for so many other things. Much better than talking.” Ilya tries to dive back in, but the hand in his hair keeps him in place. 

“Rozanov, I’m serious. Get up.” He obliges, and Shane drops his hand, taking a step back to really look at Ilya. He looks… unsettled. He looks like there are a million thoughts racing around in his head, none of them particularly great. Shane wants so badly to be able to pluck even just one of those thoughts out and lay it out between them so they can finally take the first step towards having an adult conversation.

But he can’t. He can’t read Ilya’s mind, can’t force him to speak it either. So Shane needs him to be willing to offer that up himself. Just one step, Ilya. Please, he thinks.

“Well?” He asks, tone pleading but firm.

“I don’t know what you want me to say, Hollander.” Ilya holds his gaze for a bit before it eventually drifts and he looks anywhere but Shane, seemingly disconcerted.

“I don’t know, something. Anything. I’ve said what I needed to say in the bathroom. You know where I stand.”

Ilya runs a hand through his face, clearly frustrated. Shane sees something within him that seemingly wants to claw its way out, but can’t because of his carefully crafted walls.

A part of him wants to reach out, hold Ilya in his arms and tell him he’s willing to wait around some more. Because he knows there’s something there. He can feel it. He can see the conflict in Ilya’s eyes, can see the struggle to keep it all in.

But Shane can’t keep holding on to all these assumptions he’s made about why Ilya keeps pushing him away. He can’t keep guessing, blindly hoping that one day those walls will come down.

He can’t keep waiting for something that might never come. It might destroy him in the process.

So instead, he walks away—for good this time.

“I should probably go then,” Shane says when the silence has stretched long enough. He starts walking towards the door but Ilya grabs his wrist as he passes, gentle but desperate. Like he’s afraid he might break him if he grips too tight, but is even more afraid to let him go.

“Hollander. Don’t.” Ilya’s voice falters, and it takes everything Shane has to not cave.

He turns back around and looks at Ilya one more time, really looks at what he’s walking away from. The sight of Ilya like this makes him feel bad for leaving, but he tries to remember that he’s given him enough chances to stop him.

He takes Ilya’s face in his hands and offers him a sad smile, a tear escaping despite his best efforts not to let it. “I hope you figure things out. For yourself. Whatever it is, I just want you to be okay.”

He kisses Ilya one last time, pouring everything he feels for the man into it, and hopefully leaving it all behind once their lips part—all his care, his want, his genuine hope that Ilya can work through whatever it is he’s struggling with. He wanted so badly to be there for him when he figured it out, but this’ll have to do. For his own sake.

Just one more kiss for the road that held all the words they never said.

“Goodbye, Ilya.”

***

Ilya should have known it wouldn’t be enough.

Because of course not. Shane made it clear that he needed communication. But foolishly, he hoped. He hoped that even if he couldn’t give him that, that Shane would still be able to read his mind somehow, and stay in spite of everything.

But of course he didn’t. Of course he left. He said he would. Ilya just didn’t want to believe it.

Why was it so fucking hard? Why couldn’t he just tell Shane how he feels? It would’ve been so easy to keep him from walking out that door, if he could just fucking communicate.

But the words always die on his tongue. And now Shane’s out of his life because of it.

He’s going to be thinking about that kiss for the rest of his life, wishing he had the emotional capacity to have stopped it from being their last.

Chapter Text

Ilya finds himself going through the motions because unfortunately, life keeps moving even when you get your heart ripped out of your chest in some penthouse suite in Las Vegas.

He goes home to Russia for the summer, which is always an ordeal in and of itself. But this time, he can’t even escape into his phone and shoot Jane a silly little text when he feels like he’s suffocating and needs a breath of fresh air.

He flies back to Boston gearing up for the next season, hoping he will be in a better headspace once he’s there. And he is—well, sort of. He’s better than he was in the summer, at least. But that’s not really saying much.

He pours everything he has into training, desperate for it to be enough to fill the Jane shaped hole in his phone. It’s decidedly not. He spooks his teammates a little bit with his intensity. A few weeks in, they tease him about why he’s suddenly working so damn hard.

He can be, how you say, lazy, his father’s words echo in his ear. He shakes the unbidden thoughts out of his head, annoyed at how much his father’s disappointment looms over his every waking moment. He knows his teammates didn’t mean anything by it, that it was just a throwaway comment meant to poke fun at their captain. But he hears his father’s voice anyway.

Your father is an asshole. You need to stop giving a fuck what he thinks, he remembers Svetlana telling him, a welcome distraction from the self-destructive thoughts. It’s thankfully enough to keep the self-loathing at bay. For now, at least. Ilya should give her a call.

He dismisses his team’s jeers by saying they’ll thank him later when they’re back-to-back champions. That seems to satisfy them, garnering some laughs and a few whoops. Everyone packs up to leave and they invite Ilya out to a bar to close out their grueling week of training.

He declines. He’s been doing that a lot lately.

“What’s the matter, Roz? You run out of women to fuck in Boston or something?” Marleau goads.

“Fuck off. Maybe I already have one waiting in my house. So no need to go to bar, yes?” He quips back and leaves with a wink as Marleau wolf whistles behind him.

There is no such woman waiting in his house. His evening plans consist solely of watching the documentary about Shane’s stupid gorgeous secluded cottage. He saw a tweet about it earlier in the day and bookmarked it for later. It’ll probably be boring as fuck, but it’s also the closest he’ll get to seeing Shane and hearing about his life. He can’t wait.

He finds himself with his hand down his pants as Shane does yoga by the lake on his big ass TV. He feels pathetic. He scrapes up every image he has of Shane in his mind—their last time, their first time, every kiss in between, every suggestive text Shane has reluctantly sent (he was always so bad at sexting, but Ilya liked it anyway), all the pretty noises he makes when Ilya’s inside him—and uses it to finish.

He wipes off his mess, but the longing remains.

He feels a little ridiculous, because realistically nothing about the last few months would’ve been all that different had Shane not ended their arrangement.

He still would’ve gone home for the summer, still would’ve flown back to Boston for the next season, and still would not have seen Shane until their next game against each other.

He feels the loss anyway.

More weeks pass in much of the same manner. And before he knows it, the season begins. He looks at their calendar and memorizes the dates for one team in particular, momentarily forgetting that there won’t be any room numbers gracing his inbox anymore.

He dreads their first game against Montreal, wondering what being in Shane’s vicinity again for the first time in months will do to him. But at the same time, he’s still excited to see him in the flesh instead of on his TV—wants to actually hear his voice instead of just trying to remember what it sounds like as he rereads their text thread for the hundredth time.

Shane doesn’t even look at him once. Not on the ice as Ilya’s boring holes into the man’s face through the visor of his helmet while they prepare for a face off, not even on the bench as they sit and wait separated by nothing but glass. Not a single glance.

Ilya contemplates body checking him just for a chance to get close for a moment, but the opportunity for a check that makes sense doesn’t arise. He thinks about doing it anyway, just for the hell of it, even if Shane doesn’t have the puck—penalty be damned. But he doesn’t. He doesn’t want a pointless penalty to make Shane hate him even more than he probably already does.

No, Shane doesn’t hate him, he has to remind himself. He specifically said he wishes him well, even. He may have been angry in the bathroom, but his final words were not of malice or hate. Ilya holds on to the sentiment and continues with the game.

They lose. Not spectacularly; it was close. 3-2. But he knows he could’ve done better. They won the cup just last year, after all. Maybe his father has been right about him all along.

The team sulks in the locker room afterwards and invites Ilya out to a bar to commiserate. He declines. Again. 

“Oh, you going to see your Montreal girl or something? She gonna make you feel better, Roz?” Marleau teases, waggling his eyebrows. He always gave Ilya shit for blushing whenever he was texting his Montreal girl. It was always a little annoying, but overall just playful and ultimately harmless. Ilya doesn’t think so anymore.

He slams his locker door shut. The sound startles his team, causing a rare silence in the locker room for a few seconds.

“There is no Montreal girl,” he spits out once everyone but Marleau is back to minding their own business.

“Jeez, relax Roz. I was just joshing,” Marleau says as he puts his hands up in surrender. “Did you break up or something?” 

“Whatever. I’m going back to hotel.”

The innocent but ill-timed reminder of Montreal Jane has him walking out of that room in a worse mood than he already was. He still checks his phone out of habit, and pretends not to be disappointed by the lack of gloating for having beaten them that night, followed by an inconspicuous string of numbers.

His teammates look a little concerned, but they leave him be. They probably won’t think much of his sour mood beyond this moment; they lost after all. But they will think him refusing to go out after a loss like that is a little strange. They’ve already been questioning his uncharacteristic lack of partying lately.

But he’s deflected it with sly comments whenever they brought it up, so they probably think he just found a girlfriend who won’t let him go out to bars or something. They don’t know that it can't be farther from the truth.

He should call Svetlana. She’s probably the only one who can get him out of this funk.

They do eventually meet up back in Boston once they’re out for the season. She sits on the couch with him as they watch Montreal win the cup with Shane at the helm. 

A swirl of emotions rushes through his mind. Above all else, he’s proud of Shane. If anyone deserves that fucking cup, it’s him—with his boundless talent and endless passion and rigorous training and strict (read: boring) lifestyle.

But at the same time, he longs to be in Shane’s vicinity as he basks in the greatest achievement of his life thus far. He wants to be able to celebrate with him afterwards, maybe offer to do whatever Shane wants in bed as a reward for winning the cup. And beyond that, he wants to be able to hold him after. Stay up all night talking about how fucking great it feels to hold the cup in their hands. Wake up the next morning and fuck some more.

Svetlana notices that he’s been in his head the entire night, because of course she does. No one knows Ilya better than her, which is also why she knows that trying to get him to just talk about it outright is pretty much a lost cause. So she opts for a different approach.

“You wanna go out tonight? My friends are in town, including that girl you hit it off with last time.”

“What girl?” Ilya, for the life of him, can’t fucking remember the last time he hit it off with anyone who wasn’t the captain of the Montreal Metros.

“You know, the one you said was really flexible. Come on, it’ll be fun.”

“I’m not in the mood, Svetlana.” Ilya checks his phone out of habit again. They always used to text after games, either congratulating the other for their win or goading them about their loss. But Shane has no reason to text him now.

Congratulations, he types out anyway. He pauses for a moment, wondering if Shane would even want to hear from him after all this time. He says fuck it and sends it. He wants Shane to at least know that he’s proud of him, if he can’t tell him anything else. Svetlana watches him warily as he stares daggers into his phone.

“Boo, you’re no fun,” she quips. “You’re so boring now, Ilya. What’s going on with you?” She goes for a softball question, keeping her tone light and teasing, but leaving the door open in case Ilya actually wants to talk about it.

He doesn’t, of course. So she goes to plan B—she leans in for a kiss. They’ve always found comfort in each other, whether physical or emotional. If Ilya doesn’t want to talk, then maybe he just wants to forget. She can help him do that much, at least.

Ilya melts into it for a moment, but quickly pulls away. It just doesn’t feel right. A weird feeling settles into his stomach, because kissing Svetlana has felt right his entire life. They may not be in love like that, but they’ve always loved each other. And they’ve always shown it. So what’s changed?

He recognizes that it’s probably the same reason he’s been declining all his team’s invitations to go out. Shane has been the only man he’s slept with since they met, but his reputation as a ladies man isn’t based on nothing. He used to have no problem fucking Shane when they’re in the same city, and then fucking some random woman when they’re not. No big deal.

But since Vegas, he has found himself unable to even look at anyone—man or not—without thinking about this slow fucking hockey player with beautiful freckles and a weak backhand.

And not for a lack of trying, either. He may have been declining all his teammates’ invitations to go out as of late. But it’s only because when he did go out with them when he first got back to Boston, he just stared at his fucking phone all night rereading old messages like an idiot. 

Women would come up to him and they would walk away disappointed because he couldn’t even spare them a second glance. Apparently, rehashing Shane’s poor attempts at sexting made him feel more than the prospect of actually sleeping with any of these beautiful women.

It was pathetic, really. So he just ditched the club scene altogether, because what was the fucking point if he was just going to mope around all night? He could do that at home.

“Is this about Jane?” Svetlana asks gently as they pull away, not wanting to spook him. He’s still spooked anyway, if the bewildered look in his eyes is any indication.

“Oh, don’t look at me like that. Relax. You’re not exactly subtle, you know. You’ve been texting Jane for years. I’m not blind.”

“What, are you jealous?” Ilya scoffs.

“Please. You know me better than that,” she remarks with a chuckle.

“Well?” She follows up expectantly after his lack of a response. Ilya never not wants her, so if he’s pulling away, then this must be serious. She’s determined to get to the bottom of it.

“It’s nothing.” Ilya shrugs, playing it off like he always does.

“It’s clearly not nothing. I’ve never seen you like this before—over a guy, no less. It is a guy, right?”

The look on Ilya’s face is almost comical. It scares him sometimes how well Svetlana knows him. But it also makes him feel seen in a way that he doesn’t feel with anyone else. So he figures, if he’s going to open up to anyone, who better than the one person who’s always been there no matter what?

He always has his guard up, always deflects when things get too real. He needs to—to protect himself. He’s learned that the hard way over the course of his life.

But keeping all of this to himself since Vegas has been hell. He thinks it might be time to take some of the load off his shoulders. And this might be the only real safe space he has to do that.

He’s safe with Svetlana; he knows that. There’s no real need to protect his feelings with her. She’s already seen him with his guard down, at least as much as someone as closed off as him can really be seen. And she’s always stayed. She might be the one person he hasn’t managed to drive away.

So what’s the harm in pulling back the curtain just a little bit more? She’s got him all figured out anyway, so might as well.

Saves him the trouble of having to translate his muddled thoughts into English, too. As if it isn’t hard enough being vulnerable as it is, try doing it in a second language.

“Fine,” he relents. “Yes, it’s Jane. Yes, Jane is a guy. I was sleeping with him sometimes but he wanted to stop because… I don’t know. Because I’m an asshole, I guess.”

Svetlana just looks at him for a moment, studying his face. She finds the answer right there, in the sad glimmer in his eyes.

“So you love him,” she concludes.

“What? No. Fuck no.” Ilya dismisses the thought, because he can’t admit to Svetlana what he can’t even admit to himself. He feels safe around her, sure, but an admission of love might be taking it a step too far. He wanted to pull back the curtain a little bit, not lay his entire fucking heart out bare on the table, bleeding all over the place.

“Please. You can sleep with anyone you want to. Why else would it bother you that this one guy suddenly doesn’t want to, if you weren’t in love with him?”

Svetlana lets him sit with that for a moment. And, well, she got him there. It really shouldn’t bother him. But it does. And he knows why. He may be in denial, but he’s not completely oblivious.

He must look like hell because Svetlana extends her arms out and he crawls into her embrace.

“Ilya—”

“I can’t, Svetlana. You know I can’t. With my father, with Russia, with hockey… I just can’t. It’s complicated.”

“I know.” She caresses his head, hand in his hair, knowing the gesture comforts him. He melts into the touch. “It’s just… I hate seeing you like this. Have you at least talked to him about it?”

Ilya thinks back to their last conversation. He’s replayed that night so many times in his head.

He could’ve talked to him about it. About all of it. Hell, Shane was literally asking him to. That night really showed Ilya that Shane was willing to listen. He would’ve understood. Despite all of his apprehensions, deep down, Ilya knows he would’ve. Because he’s kind. And because he cares.

There’s a plethora of reasons why he still couldn’t—be it his own reluctance to be vulnerable for fear of being hurt, or all the external implications that would arise if he acknowledges his feelings. There were so many things holding him back.

But if he really thinks about it, it always comes back to the fact that Shane would’ve understood. And that’s precisely why he couldn’t tell him.

Because deep down, he knew that Shane would be empathetic. He knew that he would try to find a way to make them work anyway—Russia, his family, and the hockey world aside. And maybe that’s the most painful part.

Because then, this thing between them would be real. Then, he would be Shane’s problem. He would be a burden to him. Something Shane had to plan around. Something to hide. A liability. Something that would cause him harm if shit hits the fan. Useless, once again, just like his father always told him.

Just one more person for him to inevitably disappoint, all because he made the mistake of loving them.

“What’s the point? We can’t be together. Why should I burden him with my feelings when we can’t even do anything about it?”

Svetlana feels her heart shatter at the admission. She just wants her friend to be happy, and yet they don’t live in a world where he can just do that.

“Look. It’s definitely not…ideal. But is being together in secret really that much worse than being miserable apart? At least then you can deal with it together, you know? At least you both know how you feel, instead of you just shouldering this all on your own.”

“He’s not miserable, though. He’s doing just fine.” Shane just won the cup, and spent the entire season not even sparing him a glance. Ilya thinks he’s clearly better off without him.

“How would you know? Did he tell you that?” Svetlana rightfully counters, thinking Ilya’s just assuming the worst. It’s what he’s programmed to do. 

“No. I haven’t talked to him in months.”

“Then stop guessing, dummy.” She lightly pinches his arm.

“Look, I’m not here to tell you what to do. I just wish you could let yourself want things sometimes, you know? Fuck your family. Fuck Russia. Fuck whatever anyone else has to say. What do you want?”

Well, if it’s just a question of want, then that’s fucking easy. If his family wasn’t the way that it was, if Russia wasn’t the way that it was, if the hockey world wouldn’t implode at the mere idea of him and Shane together, if he thought that his love wouldn’t hurt Shane…

“I want him, Svetlana. I want him so much it fucking kills me.”

But it’s not just a question of want, is it? It’s not that simple. He can’t just wish away all the things holding him back.

He feels his voice waver and can’t trust it to say anything else without him crumbling. So he just buries his face in her neck as she strokes his back. They stay like that for a while until he calms back down.

“You wanna tell me who it is?” Svetlana asks cheekily, letting a moment of levity in. They could use it after that talk.

“I can’t. He’s not out. It’d be a breach of his trust.”

“Okay. Will you at least tell me if he’s hot?”

Ilya laughs openly for what feels like the first time in a long time.

“Smoking, Svetlana.”

“Good. You deserve no less.”

Svetlana holds him until he falls asleep. Talking to her and letting it all out in the open felt like finally taking a breath after just suffocating for so long. For once, he feels like he’s going to be okay.

His phone buzzes as he drifts off.

Jane

Thank you, Ilya.

Chapter Text

Ilya feels much better after his talk with Svetlana. He feels… lighter.

Carrying the weight of his want for that entire year since Vegas—and perhaps even before that—was entirely too much for one person to bear.

The longing remains, obviously. But it at least doesn’t feel like it’s crushing his chest anymore, now that he’s let the longing breathe by letting it out of the little box locked in his heart.

Just being able to say it out loud and admit it to his best friend, and more importantly admit it to himself… It felt like the release that he needed. He no longer feels like he’s bursting at the seams, so tightly wound that he could snap at any given moment.

But when he imagines pouring his heart out in the same manner to Shane, well, he doesn’t think he’s quite there yet.

Like he told Svetlana, if it was just a question of want, then it’s easy to admit point blank that he wants Shane. Maybe he’s even a little bit in love with him.

If the rest of the world was out of the picture, he would be on the next flight out to Montreal, ready to beg Shane to take him back. He would tell him everything he’s been holding close to his chest, apologize for the way he acted because of it, and build something new with a foundation of trust and vulnerability.

But the fact remains that the world wouldn’t just be so kind as to take itself out of the picture. The fact remains that Russia is still his home. And as much as he loathes the way his family treats him, if something happens to them and he can’t fly home to be there because his queer identity as a public figure somehow gets out—he’ll never forgive himself. The fact remains that Shane loves hockey more than life itself, and Ilya doesn’t want to jeopardize Shane’s career by being something that can be used against him.

So no, he’s not flying to Canada to declare his undying love anytime soon.

Not only do the external consequences terrify him, but trying to win Shane back knowing that he’s not ready to give him what he needs and what he deserves because of said consequences also feels selfish. It wouldn’t be fair to him. It would feel half-baked, and Ilya wants to give him everything.

Maybe someday, he can. But right now, it just doesn’t feel quite possible. So he doesn’t really know what to do.

Because he misses Shane. Now that he’s admitted to himself just how much he cares about Shane, he wants him in his life—in whatever way he can have him.

That was already evident even back then, when all they had was a purely physical relationship and Ilya still would’ve done anything—well, anything short of actually being vulnerable, of course—to keep it. But even more so now that he’s no longer in denial about the extent of his feelings.

However, Shane made it clear that he can’t do a purely physical relationship anymore, and Ilya is simply not ready for something more. So if he can’t have him in that way, then that gets Ilya thinking…

Maybe they can be… friends? Would that be so odd?

Would it still be selfish to want to be close with him in that way, if he feels like it’s the only way he can be close to Shane at all, considering their circumstances?

Is it something they’re even allowed to be?

He turns the thought over in his head and he can admit that it does sound a little ridiculous. He doesn’t even know if he can say that they were friends when they were hooking up. Probably not. Plus, the public thinks they hate each other. And while that’s never really been true, it’s still strange to think of them as friends.

But Shane wanted to get to know him. Shane wanted him to open up. And friends do that too, right? Ilya can’t really say that he has a lot of those, but Svetlana has shown him over the course of their lives just how open and vulnerable a friendship can be, in all the best ways. 

So maybe this can be a way to give Shane what he wanted in the first place, without Ilya feeling like it could blow their whole life up if anyone found out.

It’ll still be strange, sure. But it’s not like Ilya’s going to ask them to hang out in public after games or anything. He just wants to be able to talk to him again, get to know him in a way that they never really got the chance to—even when they were at their closest. 

He’s not ready for a relationship because of the world around them, but he feels ready to at least be vulnerable with Shane even just platonically, if that’s all that is allowed of them at this point in time.

It’ll still be behind closed doors, but the assumed risk is much less terrifying to Ilya. Because if they got into a relationship and the world found out, it would be life-altering. But if they became friends and the world found out, at most they would probably just be a little weirded out.

But the world would get over it. They’re not rookies anymore. Surely, it wouldn’t be all that surprising for grown ass men to move beyond their perceived rivalry and become adults who are at the very least friendly.

So it's certainly possible. But now Ilya's question is, would he even be deserving of Shane’s friendship, after all this time? Considering everything he’s done, and more importantly, everything he’s failed to do for them?

A part of him doesn't believe so.

See, Ilya's perception of love has always been warped—what with his entire upbringing conditioning him to think that love is something that he has to earn. So looking at his history with Shane, he absolutely does not think he's earned his love, even platonically.

And that's a way of thinking he'll probably have to spend the rest of his life trying to unlearn.

But for now, both Shane and Svetlana's words serve as his anchor, tethering him to the ground so his mind doesn't drift away in the belief that he's unworthy of love. If Svetlana can hold him all night and assure him that he's allowed to want things, then maybe he can believe it. If Shane can worry about him and keep trying to get through to him despite Ilya constantly pushing him away, then maybe Shane saw something in him that was worth giving a fuck about.

So he tries to see himself through their eyes. If someone as beautiful and incredible as Svetlana believes that Ilya deserves happiness, then who is he to tell her she's wrong? If someone as kind and compassionate as Shane cared enough about Ilya to try to break down his walls, then who is he to throw away that care, regardless of whether or not he thinks he deserves it?

It's not a perfect fix, having to still derive that value externally before he can see it for himself. It doesn't fix his self-esteem issues by any means. But it certainly helps him be a little bit kinder to himself. It doesn't erase all his doubts, but it's sufficient to get him to a place where he feels secure enough to at least try.

So despite everything, he can believe that he is allowed to want Shane in his life. And he is allowed to ask for what he wants. Whether or not he will get it is entirely up to Shane, but he's allowed to ask. So he will.

Maybe they can be friends for now. And maybe one day, if the world could be so kind as to not be such a hostile place for them to even exist as they are, they can go from there and work up to be everything Ilya wants them to be. 

Maybe this can be a start.

Ilya hopes so, at least. Because he feels like he’ll die if he lets the distance between him and Shane just keep growing, but he’s not quite ready to risk it all when he doesn’t feel like they can even have a future.

Maybe someday, Ilya can make it up to Shane fully. He'll spend the rest of his life making it up to him if he has to. Maybe someday, he can be someone who's worthy of Shane's love. But for right now, he resolves to be the best damn friend Shane Hollander has ever seen.

So as he lands in Boston ready for the new season to start, brain fried from thinking about all of this shit on the flight over, he opens up the text thread that he’s basically memorized at this point.

Lily

Good luck this season, Shane.

I am not letting you win that cup a second time ;)

This should be okay, right? They can be friends… right?

***

Lily

Why would you beat us so hard on our own turf Hollander that is so rude

Jane

Skill issue

Lily

So mean to me

Jane

   😇

***

Lily

Your post game interviews are so boring

How much to get you to swear on TV?

Jane

There are kids watching!

Lily

Booooooo

Mr. PR

***

Lily

Saw your perfume commercial at the gym today

It was nice

Looking very Mr. Businessman in suit

Jane

Oh, uhh

Thanks I hate it

Lily

No, why? Is good

Almost makes me want to buy perfume even though I can’t smell it through the TV

Jane

Lol you’re so right actually

What even is the point of a perfume commercial

***

Lily

Good game

How was your day, Shane?

Shane reads the text three times before he can even start typing. It’s such a normal text, but coming from Ilya? No jokes, no barbs, no quips…

He is so fucked.

***

Shane doesn’t know why the hell Ilya’s been texting him all of a sudden.

Things have not been easy for him since he walked away from Ilya in Vegas. But it felt nice to be able to do something for himself for fucking once in his life. 

And he’s been… okay. For the most part.

He feels good about standing his ground. He knew he wanted more, so if he wasn’t going to get it, then there was no reason for him to stick around. He maintains that he made the right decision. Because if he let them just continue on like that, it would’ve destroyed him eventually. Instead, he got to walk away with his self-worth intact.

But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a persistent ache in his chest when he thinks about Ilya. It gets a little bit duller as time goes on, but it doesn’t really disappear. Simply knowing that you made the right call by up and leaving doesn’t suddenly wash away all of your desires.

It kind of helped that Ilya respected his wishes and didn’t try to contact him last season. But he felt the man’s eyes on him at every free moment whenever they had games, and that was almost just as difficult to resist. He had to make sure he wasn’t looking back at all because god knows what he would’ve done if they locked eyes for even a second too long. He might’ve crawled right back into Ilya’s arms and gotten his heart broken all over again.

Winning the cup for the first time certainly helped, though. That was amazing. He was a little surprised that he managed to channel all of his heartbreak into somehow attaining his lifelong goal, but he did it.

He’s almost as proud of himself for walking away from Ilya as he is about winning the cup. It certainly felt almost as difficult.

The cup still takes precedence, though. And he’s going into this season with a single-minded focus on doing it all again. A back-to-back win would be his dream, and he thinks he might just be able to do it. They’ve been doing really well this season so far.

Everything’s been going well in fact, except Ilya’s been texting him. And it’s been messing with his head.

It started with a simple Congratulations after he won the cup, which was unassuming enough. Completely harmless. Just a colleague expressing well wishes for a player they admired. So Shane replied, not really thinking too much of it, despite it being the first time he had heard from Ilya since Vegas.

But the further they got into the following season, the more frequent and… friendly—for lack of a better word—the texts became.

And Shane doesn’t know what the fuck to make of that. They hadn’t talked in a year, and even before that they never really talked this much. Especially not without the end goal of having sex.

But the messages have been pretty harmless so far, and Ilya never asks to meet up or even texts him anything suggestive or inappropriate. At all. Which is a far cry from pretty much all their text exchanges back when they were still involved.

The texts are even… nice, almost. Ilya still trash talks him before a game, calls him boring every chance he gets, but also asks him about his day. Listens to his mundane anecdotes about his dinners with the Pikes and only pretends to be a little annoyed by it. He’s even gotten a little old good morning once. They never really get into deeper territory, but it feels like a decent start to actually getting to know each other.

And it’s starting to terrify Shane.

It’s unnerving. Because if he’s not careful, he can so easily fall right back into Ilya’s web, erasing the year of gradual progress he’s made in terms of calming his feelings down. 

So as he sits in his apartment having another one of those casual text conversations with Ilya, he decides to straight up just ask him what his intentions are because he might go crazy overthinking it otherwise.

Lily

Good game, Shane.

But why would you fight with Scott Hunter of all people?

He is 100,000 years old.

No respect for your elders?

Jane

Thanks, I guess.

And he’s not that old!

Lily

He is. And almost as boring as you.

How was your night? You have fun with your team?

Jane

Okay, that’s it. Can I ask you a question?

Lily

This sounds serious.

Should I be scared?

Jane

It’s not.

Well, kind of.

I just… What are we doing here, Rozanov?

Lily

What do you mean?

Jane

It’s just that we’ve been texting a lot this season

Maybe more than we ever have.

You’ve even been… nice, which is unusual

When you’re not too busy calling me boring, that is.

So I guess I was just wondering why.

Lily

Ah. This does sound serious.

Should we talk about it in person?

Since I am flying out there for the game tomorrow anyway

Shane thinks about it for a moment before immediately dismissing the idea. He just doesn’t know if he can trust himself to be alone with Ilya and not want him. Walking away from him last year was one of the more difficult things he’s ever had to do, and he’s not so sure he can do it a second time.

Jane

I don’t think that’s a good idea.

Lily

Okay.

Doesn’t feel like a conversation we should have over text though.

Can I call?

Well, that’s new. Shane still isn’t sure if he can handle even just hearing Ilya’s voice, but a part of him misses it too—among other things. So against his better judgment, he lets himself indulge in that at least.

Jane

Sure.

He counts three rings before he picks up, not wanting to seem too eager. “Hello?”

“Hello, Shane.” They’ve called each other by their first names when texting, and he called him Ilya in person once, when he said goodbye last year.

But this is the first time he’s actually heard his first name in Ilya’s voice. And even through a tinny phone speaker, it makes his stomach flip. Maybe he was wrong about being strong enough to handle a simple phone call after all.

“So, you think me being nice is weird?” Ilya asks, the tone of his voice a little teasing. Shane appreciates the light atmosphere it creates, because it’ll make it easier for him to say what he needs to say later on.

“That’s not what I said, Ilya,” he replies with a chuckle. He wanted to test the name out on his tongue too, and he’s surprised at just how right it feels.

“Okay. What is the problem then?”

“I guess I just don’t understand why. You know, considering our… history.” I need to know why you’re reaching out now, when you never have before. I need to know you’re not just fucking with my head, Shane wants to articulate. But he can’t, so he just goes with that for now.

Ilya hums, seemingly understanding the implication. “What, are you not nice to people you fucked in the past, Hollander?”

His tone remains playful, and Shane holds on to the levity that’s keeping him from crawling into himself in embarrassment for where this conversation is going. He’s secretly grateful for Ilya’s ability to just acknowledge it directly like that without it feeling too serious.

“I’m not sure I talk to anyone I fucked in the past at all, actually,” he replies with an awkward chuckle. Not that there were many by any means, but he certainly didn’t keep in touch with Jessica, or the small handful of other women he was with before the Ilya Rozanov of it all started making him question everything.

“Hm. Is not that weird, Shane. You are overthinking things. I can tell. You probably have that little wrinkle on your forehead that you get when you are thinking too hard about something.”

Shane scoffs. “What wrinkle.”

“Relax. No one probably notices because it is so small. Is cute. Makes you look like confused puppy.”

“Fuck off,” he responds, with no bite to his voice. Why Ilya would even notice a small detail like that is beyond him, but it makes him feel things that he’s not at liberty to unpack at the moment.

So he just sighs and continues. “Look. I guess I just… don’t want to get the wrong idea, you know what I mean? I can’t go down that road again, Ilya. So I just wanted you to be clear about why you started reaching out in the first place.”

It’s the most honest and straightforward way he can ask without outright saying, I probably still have feelings for you, so please tell me all this texting is not just you trying to butter me up so you can fuck me with no strings again.

“I understand,” Ilya responds after taking in Shane’s words for a few seconds.

“And?”

“I just… want us to be friends,” Ilya declares, as if it’s a normal thing to want from your archrival that you used to fuck. It fries Shane’s brain a little.

“Friends?” He asks incredulously. Becoming friends with someone he used to sleep with is admittedly a foreign concept to him. Although he figures some people do it all the time, probably.

And when he thinks about being friends with Ilya specifically… It feels like such an uncomplicated thing for them to try to be, when all they’ve ever been is quite the opposite. Nothing he’s ever felt for Ilya has ever been uncomplicated.

So can he be friends with Ilya in the same way that he’s friends with, say, Hayden? Rivalry aside—since that’s never really done much to make him actually hate the guy as much as the public thinks he does—can he take all the complex things he feels for Ilya and turn it into something as simple as friendship?

“Yes, friends,” Ilya confirms nonchalantly. “What, is that weird?”

“No…? I mean, I guess. I don’t know.” He still doesn’t quite understand why Ilya would want to be friends with him in the first place. But… What's the harm in trying, really? It’s not uncommon for guys in the league to have friends in opposing teams. Granted, none that have been pitted against each other as much as he and Ilya have.

And when he really thinks about it, talking to Ilya this season without the constant pressure of trying to sneak around and fuck under the threat of being found out has been kind of nice. It’s also been slightly terrifying, sure—considering all of the feelings he’s been trying to bury—but otherwise, it’s been nice.

Ilya sighs. “Look, Shane. Is not a big deal, yes? I like talking to you.” Must have been difficult for Ilya to admit, Shane thinks. “I mean, is nice to hear you talk about Pike having his 18th child when I need help falling asleep.”

“Fuck you,” Shane interjects with a chuckle. Of course, he can’t ever let the conversation rest at a compliment. Of course, he needs to get a jab in there too. It’s annoying in the most endearing way possible. Maybe being friends with Ilya can just be fun for what it is, Shane concludes.

But he still needs to protect his heart. He’s not about to throw away over a year of progress by being careless with how he allows Ilya back into his life. So he wants to make sure that that’s really all there is to it.

“And that’s it, right? You just want to be friends who talk, and nothing else?” He asks, hoping he gets the message across.

“Yes.”

“You promise?”

“Yes, Hollander. I promise I am not trying to get into your pants.”

Shane snorts, secretly relieved that this conversation has not been as mortifying as he thought it would be, thanks to Ilya being able to pick up on what he’s asking while still being so casual about the whole thing. “Shut up. I was just making sure.”

“So? Friends?” Shane thinks he can hear the tinge of hope in Ilya’s voice. Despite the levity with which he has approached this, it does seem like Ilya’s sincere in his desire for them to be friends. So he supposes he can give it a try at least, despite how strange it all feels.

“Fine. Friends,” he relents.

The conversation drifts to more mundane things after that. By the time that Shane leaves the call, he feels better about the prospect of this actually working.

It’s surprisingly easy to talk to Ilya, he realizes. And when he thinks about it, it’s really not that different from Hayden calling him to catch up. They talk about hockey, they talk about their lives—normal friend stuff.

The only difference is that they used to fuck, and that Shane caught feelings that he’s spent the last year or so trying to get over—the success of which is debatable at best.

The thought leaves him feeling confused, because that is admittedly a pretty big difference. What business do Ilya Rozanov and Shane Hollander have being friends, really? Can they even be friends?

It’s such a strange proposition to get from Ilya who has spent the entire time they’ve known each other actively dodging any attempts Shane has made to deepen their connection beyond just sex.

In fact, pretty much the only way Shane feels like he’s gotten to know Ilya before all this is through sex, and the small moments they get in between the sex. But sex was always at the center of their interactions, even as the physical desire bled into his emotional needs. And now Ilya just wants to get to know him without the sex?

It's confusing, to say the least. So much of what they used to be was ambiguous and messy, and it didn't stop being that way just because he walked away from it.

If it were anyone else, Shane could've so easily taken all of their unresolved baggage and used it as a reason to shove Ilya's offer of friendship right back in his face.

He does no such thing, of course. Because that's not who he is. Shane has never been a spiteful person. Ilya may have hurt him, but Shane meant it when he wished him well in that penthouse suite in Vegas.

Instead of harboring resentment for the man who broke his heart, he just kept genuinely hoping that Ilya would figure things out for himself.

And by the looks of it, whatever the hell Ilya has done in their time apart seems to be working. He already seems a lot less closed off than the Ilya that Shane used to know. It doesn't erase any of their history, but it inspires enough confidence in Shane to move past it.

And who knows, maybe someday they can unpack all of that. But for now, Shane decides to take the olive branch for what it is, proud of all the progress Ilya has seemingly made on his own in terms of his willingness to be vulnerable, and eager to see where he goes from here.

He'll have to keep his own feelings in check of course, but ultimately he thinks being friends with Ilya Rozanov might not be so bad.

***

Lily

Saw your soda ad at the gym

Jane

God, don’t remind me.

I always look so uncomfortable in those

Maybe because I am

Lily

I thought it looked good

Jane

Shut up

Lily

You do not like doing commercials?

You mentioned it last time too

Jane

No they’re fine

Just a little annoying sometimes

Like why do I have to be soaking wet to advertise soda?

Lily

Well…

Jane

Nevermind.

Lily

You know you are allowed to say no sometimes, right?

Jane

I know.

But sometimes it’s easier to just keep saying yes, you know?

Make everyone happy

Lily

Sure.

But what about you?

Are you happy?

***

Lily

If I lose tonight it is only because I could not sleep last night

Do not get a big head about it

Jane

I’ll try. Won’t go easy on you though

Lily

Would not want you to.

Jane

You wanna talk about it?

Lily

Yes, actually. That would be nice.

Call?

Jane

👍🏼

***

Lily

Can’t believe you won the fucking cup again

Lucky bastard

Jane

You know, a good friend would just say congratulations.

Lily

I said I wanted to be friends, not that I would be a good one

Jane

😠

Lily

Congratulations, Shane.

You deserve it. Really

Jane

Thank you, Ilya.

I’m going for a three-peat, so good luck next season.

Lily

Not on my watch, Hollander.

***

Lily

Busy?

Jane

My mom has me doing a million brand deals in the off season.

And wants me to befriend a Swedish princess at Wimbledon or whatever? I don’t even know anymore

It’s stressing me out

Lily

Want to talk about it?

Jane

You know what, yeah.

Venting might help actually

Calling

***

Jane

I keep seeing videos of unlikely animals becoming friends

Lily

Oh? Like what animals

Jane

Like a tiger and a bear

Or a cow and a duck.

Kinda reminds me of us

Ilya can’t stop smiling at his damn phone. The idea of Shane thinking of them as an us, even platonically… The idea of Shane even thinking about him at all, really. It makes him so fucking happy he doesn’t know what to do with himself.

Lily

Oh yeah? What animals would we be, my unlikely friend Shane Hollander?

Jane

Hmmm I don’t know

Tiger and bear sounds about right actually

Lily

You think you are tiger? Cute

Mmm more like cat. Bear and little kitty cat

Jane

😾

***

Jane

How’s summer back home?

Lily

Hell.

I was thinking I cannot wait to get back home to Boston.

Don’t know when I started thinking of Boston as home, instead of here.

Jane

You wanna talk about it?

Lily

Calling

***

Ilya finds that he might like talking to Shane almost as much as he likes sleeping with him. It’s been a long while since they’ve done the latter, but Ilya remembers. He would’ve taken the time to catalogue every inch of Shane’s body if he knew that their last time would be their last time. But honestly, he remembers everything just the same.

Actually, maybe he likes talking to Shane just as much. Maybe even more, but that’s not something he’s keen to admit.

He was a little nervous for that first phone call, and tried to downplay it with humor as much as he could. He was scared that Shane would stop talking to him, and would walk away from the idea of friendship just like he walked away from their… little arrangement, if you will. So he tried to carry that conversation as casually as he could, while still assuring Shane that his intentions were good.

And he almost fucked it up by suggesting to meet up. He didn’t even mean to. A part of him just missed being in Shane’s vicinity, so it kind of just came out. Thankfully, he said no and they ended up just talking on the phone. Thinking back on it, it was probably for the best. Ilya isn’t sure how well he could’ve kept his longing at bay if they had to be in close proximity off the ice. It’s already hard enough as it is.

I can’t go down that road again, Shane had said. It reminded Ilya of how hurt he looked back in Vegas, and he cursed himself for ever causing pain to the man that he loved. Maybe one day, he can make it up to him. But for now, this is all that he can offer.

And surprisingly, after a little bit of convincing, Shane seemed amenable enough to the idea of being friends. Ilya will take it. He’ll take anything he can get.

A number of friendly phone calls have followed since that first one, and it’s always the highlight of Ilya’s week.

It feels like they’re making up for all the lost time they spent not getting to know each other in those earlier days. And he’s starting to think there’s not a single thing he can learn about Shane that would make him like the man any less.

There hasn’t really been anyone he could be this open to about almost everything, except for Svetlana. But even then, she always had to coax it out of Ilya because of how closed off he used to be.

Now, it feels liberating to have someone there who’s ready to listen whenever Ilya has something on his mind, and vice versa. It’s a sense of freedom to be vulnerable without fear of being judged that he’s never really felt before.

So it’s been nice. But it’s also made his feelings that much stronger. It’s making the longing unbearable when they have a game against each other and he has to look at this beautiful man across the ice for hours, knowing that he can’t have him in the way that he wants. Sometimes, as he’s slamming Shane into the boards, his mind drifts to the image of slamming him into the mattress instead. And it’s agonizing.

It’s a fantasy he can no longer indulge in outside of his head. He lost the right to have Shane in that way when he let him walk out that penthouse door nearly two years ago.

Part of him thinks it’s the biggest mistake he’s ever made in his life—a feeling greatly amplified on lonely nights when all he can think about is how Shane’s skin used to feel against his own, desperately grasping at the fading memory of his touch.

But part of him also thinks it’s useless to dwell on what could’ve been, because who the fuck knows what would’ve happened if he did end up keeping Shane from leaving? They could’ve lived happily ever after, sure. Fat chance, though. More likely than not, Ilya would’ve just fucked it up some other way, probably.

So as much as he regrets that night and how much it hurt Shane, he can’t really be too mad at where it’s led him. At the end of the day, he’s grateful that he managed to take all that pain and actually build a real connection with Shane that he never even thought possible.

The Ilya of two years ago might’ve known what it felt like to be inside Shane Hollander, but the Ilya of right now knows what Shane’s voice sounds like when it’s three in the fucking morning and he’s too anxious to fall asleep. There has to be a universe where he’s allowed to have both, but it’s certainly not this one. At least, not right now.

So yes, the longing remains. But he persists. Because again, he’d rather have Shane in his life in any way than not have him in it at all. He holds on to the hope that maybe one day, when the circumstances aren’t as bleak as they are, he can be allowed to have him in every way. But he needs to know they can even have a future first before he feels comfortable risking it all.

So for now, this’ll have to do.

Chapter Text

Shane goes into the next season feeling on top of the world. He just won the cup for the second time in a row—a lifelong goal, twice over. He feels great with his team and the synergy that they’ve built. The league loves him. The fans adore him. He has countless sponsors lining up to get a piece of the golden boy of hockey. His parents are extremely proud of him.

And yet, there’s still something missing. Something feels… not quite right, and hasn’t for a very long time, if he’s being honest.

He’s learned a lot about himself in the eight or so years he’s spent in the position that he’s in, both professionally and just as a person. He’s grown a lot from the polite, meek boy that he was when he started.

But there’s an aspect of himself that he’s never fully grasped—an aspect that he’s questioned maybe his entire life, but even more so when he met one Ilya Rozanov all those years ago.

It’s the one facet of himself that he could never quite mold to perfectly meet everyone’s expectations of him, no matter how hard he tried. So much so that he’s starting to think that maybe it just can’t be helped. Or maybe… he just needs to try even harder?

It’s been on his mind even more than usual lately, particularly because of how close he and Ilya have gotten. Over the past year, they’ve shared nothing more than constant texts and Facetime calls, the occasional smile from across the rink like a secret message in a crowded room, and chirping on the ice that would actually sound more like fond banter if anyone was actually paying attention.

But he’s finding it increasingly difficult to attribute it to purely platonic feelings—the warmth that envelops him whenever he talks to Ilya, and the disappointment he feels that they’re not something more. And it’s starting to become a problem.

When he first walked away from Ilya in Vegas two years ago, it was difficult, sure. But realistically, all he was walking away from was a hookup that he cared a little too much about. A hookup that had the potential to be something else entirely, but as it stood was a purely physical relationship. Nothing more.

But now, Ilya is a friend. Now, their connection feels more real than it ever has, the limits imposed by its platonic (and secret) nature notwithstanding. If Shane lets his feelings spiral out of control and he finds himself having to walk away from him again because of it, he would be losing something so much more valuable than a hookup.

If walking away from Ilya then was difficult, walking away from Ilya now feels impossible. 

Walking away back then meant feeling the ghost of Ilya’s touch on lonely nights spent in his apartment, missing what they had and mourning what they could have been.

But walking away now would mean feeling his absence the moment Shane wakes up in the morning without a drooling, snoring Ilya on his phone screen because they both accidentally fell asleep on Facetime the night before. It would mean not having Ilya’s gruff 3AM voice talking him through whichever one of his anxieties cropped up for him that night, preventing him from getting any rest.

It’s the kind of loss that Shane would feel everywhere—not just in phantom touches, but something much more pervasive. Something that would permeate his every waking thought.

So he can’t let it get to that point. Ilya’s friendship has become too important to him for him to mess it up by letting his feelings get in the way again, especially when he barely understands them to begin with.

Because what does he even want from Ilya, really? He values his friendship and loves talking to him, but sometimes finds himself wanting more. It’s ironically pretty much the opposite of what they used to have. They went from all sex no talk, to nothing at all, to all talk no sex. And it seems that no matter what it is that they have exactly, it’s just never quite enough. Shane always finds himself wanting more.

But, is that because he’s in love with Ilya? Or is it just because he’s having a hard time reconciling the onslaught of desire that came with their prior entanglement, with the platonic warmth that they have now?

It’s like he tried so hard to compartmentalize, the first time Ilya came to him with the prospect of friendship. He put everything he used to feel for Ilya into a box, sealed it away in the back of his mind, and walked away from it when he walked out that penthouse door in Vegas. He had a year to distance himself from it, so he figured it would be fine.

Then, he put his newfound friendship with Ilya in a fresh box, trying to keep it away from the old box that has been festering in the corner—treating it like something brand new instead of reconciling it with everything that came before.

And that’s where the disconnect and the confusion is coming from. Because the reality is that you can’t just file those feelings away in the deepest recesses of your brain, hoping that they never see the light of day again. If you slice Shane’s head open, you won’t see separate boxes for friend Ilya and Ilya I used to fuck.

It’s more like one big confusing blob of all things Ilya Rozanov—everything Shane has ever felt for him all constantly battling to take up the most space in his brain. It’s an amalgamation of desire and warmth and lust and friendship and yearning and hurt and affection and pain and care and longing and a plethora of other things he can’t even name. And Shane doesn’t know what to do with all of that.

So is he in love with Ilya? Maybe. Possibly. There’s a non-zero chance that he is. But the truth is that he can’t say for certain.

Between struggling with coming to terms with his sexuality at all, and trying to make sense of the mess of things he feels for Ilya, he doesn’t even know where to fucking begin.

In fact, the sexuality stuff and the Ilya stuff feel so closely intertwined that he’s unsure if he can figure one of those things out without having to figure out both. It’s kind of a tall order when the only time he’s ever felt true to his desires at all is when he was with Ilya.

But he wants to try. Because he can’t mess with the delicate balance of their friendship if he’s not even sure what he would be risking it for. He needs to figure his shit out separately before he can even think about the Ilya of it all.

This is the state of mind he finds himself in when JJ gives him a call and invites him out to some random party with supposed celebrities in attendance.

Now ordinarily, it would be an easy skip for him. He would much rather be tucked up in bed reading a book, potentially expecting a call from Ilya who was probably going to talk his ear off about practice that day. He would pretend to be annoyed at his teammates’ antics, but Shane would hear the fondness in the captain’s voice anyway.

Ilya would request to switch the call to Facetime in the middle of his rambling, teasing him about his reading glasses the moment Shane clicks accept. Ah, Professor Hollander, nice to see you again, he would say. Shane would take them off with a huff, and Ilya would whine until he put them back on again.

The conversation would get warmer after that, Shane getting under the covers as Ilya shuffles into bed while asking him about his day—tone notably gentler and sweeter than it had been when he was teasing. They would talk and talk and talk, voices gradually getting quieter until one of them falls asleep. Or both of them. Waking up to the sound of snoring coming from a tinny phone speaker is a treat all on its own.

But Shane always secretly wishes that Ilya would fall asleep first, so he could have an excuse to look at his face without trying so fucking hard to hide the affection that’s always bubbling just beneath the surface. He’s almost certain it always bleeds through his eyes anyway, try as he might to conceal it. He would take off his glasses and end the call once he’s had his fill of unadulterated staring, trying not to wonder if Ilya does the same when Shane falls asleep first.

But that’s exactly the problem, isn’t it? Shane doesn’t like how dependent he’s become on those calls just to feel something. He’s a man of routine, and Ilya phone time has carved out a place in his day just as set in stone as his morning jogs or his bedtime reading or his pre-planned meals.

He can tell himself it’s platonic all he wants, but he’s never fallen asleep on a Facetime call with Hayden, has he? He tried to convince himself in the beginning that this was just going to be like any other friendship, but he should’ve known that trying to have separate Ilya boxes in his head was never going to work.

And of course, when he starts thinking about his feelings for Ilya, the overarching question of his sexuality inevitably permeates his thoughts. He’s definitely not straight, that much has been clear since the moment he let Ilya walk into room 1410.

But a part of Shane—a really big part of him, honestly—is still holding on to the fact that not straight doesn’t necessarily mean completely gay, either.

He’s holding out hope that just because none of the women he’s ever been with hold a candle to those hotel room trysts, doesn’t mean he’s not into women at all. He just hasn’t found the right one, he often says to placate himself.

It would definitely be easier if that was the case. If he just finds the right woman, then he wouldn’t have to untangle the jumbled mess of identity and sexuality in his head.

He wouldn’t have to explain anything to anyone. He wouldn’t have to feel like he’s hiding something, and actively lying, even though it would technically still be just a half-truth. That would be enough; the other half could just stay buried, if he never acted on it again.

He wouldn’t have to tell his mom that there’s yet another thing that’s different about her son in comparison to his peers. Yet another thing that she would have to worry about affecting his brand—as if he hasn’t heard the phrase first Asian-Canadian ambassador and other variations said about him countless times like a fucking slogan, often making him feel more tokenized rather than just plainly accepted.

It’s the type of acceptance that often feels flimsy at best, somewhat reluctant, and definitely conditional on his skill. He’s so damn good at the game that he feels like maybe they chose to overlook something that would normally bother them in favor of taking advantage of his talent. And it sometimes feels like they think he should keep his head down and just be grateful for it. Grateful for the opportunity, despite knowing damn well that he got to where he was based on his own merit. 

Would they feel the same about him being queer? Would they offer the same reluctant acceptance as long as he kept playing well? Or would that be where they draw the line?

Truthfully, Shane doesn’t want to find out. He feels enough pressure being in the position that he’s in, and he doesn’t want to rock the boat for the sake of his own self-discovery.

But selfishly, a part of him also yearns to understand himself in this way. Sometimes, this part of him that he’s kept buried feels so all-consuming that he thinks he owes it to himself to figure it out. Maybe then, the hollow ache he feels in his chest—an ache rooted in feeling so disconnected from a significant part of his identity—will finally go away.

But how can he even do that, when instead of doing something, anything at all, in an effort to understand his sexuality more, he’s cooped up in bed on a Friday night waiting by the phone for the guy who incidentally was also the last person he had sex with more than two whole fucking years ago?

Not that it’s the lack of sex that matters, per se. It’s more the fact that he wants to gain a better understanding of himself and his sexuality. And yet, he’s not doing anything about it because he’s, what, hung up on some guy he used to sleep with? The only guy he’s ever slept with, actually. And maybe that’s what needs to change, if he has any hope of ever understanding himself in this way.

Him and Ilya are friends. Nothing more. If he wants to figure himself out, he can’t look to Ilya. Not in this regard, at least. He has to go on this journey himself.

So instead of getting into bed and waiting for Ilya’s call, he gives in to JJ’s invitation.

He tries on three different outfits before he finds one that makes him feel the least uncomfortable in his own skin, puts his phone on silent, and heads to the party not knowing what doors it’ll end up opening for him in the long run.

It feels more like a detour at first, but it ends up being the path he was meant to be on all along. Shane learns why people always tell you to stop and smell the roses.

***

It’s Friday night and Ilya’s call goes straight to voicemail.

What started as phone calls that only came whenever one of them texted wanna talk about it?, has gradually transitioned to regular calls whenever they have the time. Usually after long days of training, sometimes after a particularly interesting game, on nights when they can’t fall asleep, or even on lazy days off as they watch the same movie while occasionally chirping in each other’s ear.

Ilya has become unreasonably glued to his phone. And he doesn’t think it’s the healthiest thing in the world, but he’s willing to bet anybody would act the exact same way if they had Shane Hollander on the other end of the line.

He feels a pang of disappointment that Shane doesn’t pick up, but ultimately it’s not a big deal. It’s just one phone call. He shoots a quick you busy? text before putting a random TV show on and sinking into his couch.

He doesn’t get a response until the day after, but he doesn’t really think much of it.

Jane

Sorry! Was out with JJ and his friends

Lily

Oh? Mr. Party Boy now? 😈

They decide to start a TV show together, and that’s that. The conversation moves on. Ilya doesn’t chirp further about the uncharacteristic night out, all too happy that he’s guaranteed multiple episodes’ worth of uninterrupted Shane phone time for the foreseeable future.

But it is on one unsuspecting day at the team gym that he realizes that maybe he should’ve thought a little more about that night or maybe asked Shane more questions. Because he’s greeted by his teammates showing him headlines of his good friend Shane Hollander spotted with Rose fucking Landry.

They’re all in awe at how one of their own managed to bag a famous movie star, whining about how lucky Shane is. Ilya defensively thinks that they’ve got it backwards—that anyone who gets even a modicum of Shane’s attention should be the one to count themselves lucky. Himself included. But the thought soon gets drowned out by a slew of emotions he’d rather not name.

Tabloids are unreliable… right? This doesn’t necessarily mean they’re dating, they’re just… leaving a restaurant holding hands. Right. Sure. Shane Hollander who has never been seen with anyone romantically in public, leaving a restaurant holding someone’s hand.

Huh.

In all his overthinking about what being friends with Shane was going to be like, not once did it even cross his mind that it might mean having to watch him be with someone else.

It sounds like such a silly thing to fail to consider, but Shane was always so straitlaced that Ilya just forgot to account for this possibility. How was he supposed to know that boring ol’ Shane Hollander—intended in the most affectionate way possible, by the way—of all people, was going to get himself a celebrity girlfriend?

Honestly, he feels a little fucking stupid now. What, did he think Shane was just going to stay single until the world became a better place and they could take their friendship to the next level? What a ridiculous fucking thing to hope for, in hindsight.

Fuck. Maybe being just friends with Shane is going to be much harder than he anticipated.

***

Rose comes into Shane’s life at a time when he didn’t even know he needed her, let alone what he needed her for, exactly. But it becomes clear soon enough.

They meet purely by chance on that rare Shane Hollander night out that JJ dragged him out to, and hit it off immediately. But they fizzle out unspectacularly when Rose quickly notices that their emotional connection doesn’t necessarily carry over to the physical side of things.

And Shane tried. He really fucking did. He liked Rose a lot. More than anyone he’s ever been with—with one obvious exception. And he figured that if he was ever going to be able to mold that piece of him to conform to the rest of his carefully sculpted life, he liked Rose enough to try with her.

If he could make this work, then maybe he didn’t even have to answer all the questions he had about his sexuality. He yearns to understand it, but maybe he doesn’t have to. If he could make this work, then that part of him could just stay locked away in all of the dingy hotel rooms that he and Ilya had shared, never to be unearthed again. It’s his best chance at the normalcy he so craved.

Also his last chance, as it turns out, because Rose sees through the veneer immediately.

It’s initially the most unnerving thing Shane has ever experienced—being confronted about your sexuality by your own damn girlfriend, when you’ve barely even confronted it yourself. But Rose does it in the gentlest way she could, and it really gives Shane the courage to be honest for once in his fucking life.

Rose is direct, but she’s kind about it. It’s the most tender wake up call he could’ve asked for. He doesn’t feel as cornered as he thought he would, if this moment ever came. And it makes him feel safe enough to finally admit what he’s suspected for a long time.

That Shane Hollander is gay.

He thinks he held on to the possibility that he wasn’t completely gay for so long because of just how askew that piece of him felt beside everything else in his life, at least in theory.

Shane Hollander—superstar hockey player, generational talent, role model, all around good guy, perfect son, golden boy. He felt like that part of him just didn’t fit. And he’s spent his entire life sculpting and molding everything else about him just so it’ll all fucking fit.

And there were already aspects of himself that he couldn’t control—things he knew would never actually fit, as the world likes to remind him. He just happens to be good enough at hockey that they overlook it for the most part, even tokenize it to an extent.

So he’s always felt like he was on shaky ground to begin with, that his perfectly sculpted life already took a lot of effort to hold together, even without this one piece that felt particularly out of place.

So he thought he could keep trying to make that one piece feel less askew. And Rose was his last attempt at it, before their disaster of a relationship confirmed what he’s been too scared to accept all along.

That it’s not something to fix. That it’s not something for him to sculpt or mold into something that it’s not, just so it’ll fit the perfect little image of Shane Hollander that everyone has—the image that he stubbornly held on to himself.

That it instead is something to accept and embrace as simply a part of who he is, just like everything else about him. That it’s something that he has no more control over than any of the other things that make him “different”.

And to have even just one person tell him it’s okay... To have someone give him permission to be himself—not that anyone should need permission, but for the longest time he felt like he didn’t have permission. So for it to just be handed to him like it’s something he should’ve never had to ask for in the first place?

It feels like a giant weight being lifted off his shoulders. It feels like letting out a breath he’s been holding for god knows how long.

And Rose instantly becomes his closest confidant, being the only person who explicitly knows this about him. It also helps that she tells him she’s actually bi, but really it’s her unbridled acceptance that gives Shane the comfort that he’s always craved.

The public still thinks they’re dating, and they haven’t really gone out of their way to deny any of it. Shane feels a little bad, not wanting to unintentionally be using Rose as a beard. But it’s not like they ever confirmed their relationship in the first place. People just assumed, and maybe they assumed correctly for a month or two. But beyond that, they just kept assuming.

In reality, all Rose and Shane are doing these days is hanging out every chance they get while she’s still shooting her movie in Montreal. Shane appreciates his time with her so much because she’s pretty much the only person he can really be himself with.

Well… One of two people, maybe.

It’s one such weekend when they’re hanging out at his apartment that he apologizes to her again for the accidental beard treatment she’s getting.

“Shane, I promise I don’t mind. We don’t owe them anything. We’ll only say something if you really want the rumors to stop. Or maybe if I meet someone nice and actually want to do something about it,” she says with a chuckle as she gets comfortable on his couch. “Otherwise, let ‘em keep guessing their little hearts out.”

“You sure?” Shane asks apprehensively as he settles in next to her, placing snacks and drinks on the coffee table, mostly for Rose. He’s not gonna touch anything other than the ginger ale, especially not since the season has started. He turns the TV on at a low volume, since they’re probably just going to talk over it anyway.

He always insists on putting one of her movies on when they hang out—partly to tease, mostly to support. She was initially mortified by the idea, but reluctantly agreed once Shane promised that they would at least stay away from the ones that she thought were really bad. They’re saving those ones for a rainy day, like if one of them is really upset and in dire need of cheering up via playing a drinking game over a truly horrid movie.

“Yes, baby. Honestly, it kinda keeps people off my back too. No one’s looking for dirt on me because everyone thinks I’m openly dating the perfect man,” she says, waggling her eyebrows. “So I’m good, I swear.”

Shane sighs. “Okay, if you’re sure. But tell me if you change your mind, okay? I’m not trying to hold you hostage or whatever. You’ve had enough kidnappings in your lifetime,” he quips, making Rose chuckle. She waves her hand to dismiss the idea.

“All good. Plus, our cover keeps you free to find a man on the DL too,” she teases. “Seeing anyone yet?”

“No!” Shane denies with a chuckle. “The season’s started, Rose. I barely have time to meet up with you, let alone find a man.”

Rose hums, narrowing her eyes at her friend. “For someone who doesn’t have a man, you sure are glued to your phone, though.”

“What? No I’m not,” he rebuts unconvincingly.

“Please. You’re not as good at hiding your blush as you think you are, Shane!”

Shane looks away, trying and failing to hide said blush.

“See, I knew it!” Rose giggles as she lightly pinches his cheek. It’s still a little unnerving for Shane to feel seen like this. But Rose seeing him was exactly what led him to this place where he feels more comfortable with himself, so he’s not complaining.

“Soooooo, tell me about the guy,” she urges as she props up her arm on the back of the couch, resting her chin on her hand, ready to listen.

“There is no guy,” Shane insists. But his phone dings on the coffee table, as if choosing that exact moment just to mock him. He instinctively perks up for one second before realizing that he’s proving her point by doing all that. He tries to school his expression, but it just makes Rose laugh. 

“Shane.” She tilts her head and the look on her face says, Hey, it’s me. You can tell me anything.

“Fine,” he relents. “Maybe there is a guy…” He remembers that Rose is literally the only person he can talk to about this. And considering how in his head he’s been about everything, maybe some girl talk with his ex-girlfriend turned friend about his ex-situationship turned friend would actually be helpful. Jesus, what has his love life come to.

Rose squeals. “Tell me everything!”

“I can’t, because there’s nothing to tell. We’re just… friends, I guess.” 

“Oh.” Rose’s eyebrows furrow and she visibly deflates as she sees the sad shift in Shane’s expression. “But you want to be more than that?”

“Maybe… I don’t know, actually.” Shane sighs as he proceeds to recount his entire story with Ilya—without naming him, of course. He tells the story as it is, meaning it’s gonna be obvious that it’s another player, but leaves out enough details as to not specifically pinpoint Ilya.

From meeting him when they were teenagers, to only getting glimpses of him once every six months (all very sparse but insanely magnetic), to those charged moments finally culminating in his first time with a man, to their infrequent dalliances ending with Shane walking away after being ignored for half a year, all the way to the friendship that followed.

It feels like a fucking emotional roller coaster, reliving their history like this. He’s never said any of this out loud before, and never even thought about the entirety of those eight years or so like this in one sitting. It’s… a lot.

He can feel himself smile as he recounts those early days, still vividly remembering the nervous excitement in his veins like it was yesterday. He hears Rose coo at small moments like them sharing a water bottle or their shoes touching at a press conference. He feels his heart shatter again as he talks about Vegas and the Olympics, and feels it stitch itself back up as he talks about their current friendship.

“And you love being friends with him, but you find yourself wanting more?”

“Basically. I don’t think I know how to not want more with him, honestly.” He ponders for a moment before just completely unloading everything that’s been on his mind.

“It’s like… Before I met him, I repressed my sexuality for so long that when he first approached me, it felt… freeing. It felt like I finally wanted someone, and they wanted me back. I had been with other people—girls—before that, but I had never felt that kind of pull before. It was liberating. It was all so… new. And exciting. But then it started to feel… contained. Like within the four walls of whatever hotel room we were in was the only place where my desire was allowed. And I haven’t let it out since, because I haven’t been with another man since.”

Rose reaches out to hold his hand, sensing his unease with the subject. He grips it like a lifeline, never having felt this cut open before. It’s terrifying. But the more he lets it out, the freer he feels. So he takes a breath and keeps going.

“And I want to let it out again, now that I feel like I’ve come to terms with my sexuality. I want to feel that way again. And I want to understand it more. But whenever I think about wanting to be close to someone in that way, my mind always drifts back to him. But I can’t do anything about it, because we agreed to be friends. And I don’t want to ruin that. Plus, I can’t even tell if I feel this way because I’m actually in love with him, or if it’s because he’s the only person I’ve ever even allowed myself to look at in that way. Like, are those residual feelings just getting muddled by how close we are right now? Does that make sense? Sorry, I feel like I’m rambling—”

“Hey, don’t apologize. I literally asked you to ramble,” Rose quipped, getting a light chuckle out of them both. “You want my advice?”

“Please. There’s no one else I can talk to about all this, so I’ve been pretty in my head about it.”

Rose squeezes his hand before letting go now that Shane feels more at ease with the conversation. She gives him a small smile that says she’s happy to be his person.

“Well, from what you’ve told me, it kinda sounds like your queer journey so far has been pretty intertwined with this guy. Like, he was there when you were questioning things, he was there for your first experiences with a man…”

Shane nods, signaling Rose to continue.

“And there’s nothing inherently wrong with that. But it can also be… intense. I understand that it can be difficult to separate those feelings that are tied to him, from your own individual desires, when you’ve never let yourself feel them outside of this one person. It’s definitely easy to conflate that feeling with love.”

Shane thinks Rose sounds like she’s speaking from direct experience and makes a mental note to ask her about it later. For now, he lets her continue.

“And who knows? Maybe you are just in love with him. Maybe that’s why he comes to mind whenever you think about wanting to be with someone. But you said you can’t tell for sure, right?”

“Yeah, I don’t know. I’m so confused, Rose. I’ve only just accepted that I’m gay, and I really do wanna understand myself better in that regard. But I don’t know how to do that when my mind is so preoccupied with thoughts of him. Thoughts that I can’t do anything about, because I don’t want to fuck up our friendship. Thoughts that I can’t even tell if they’re there because I’m in love with him, or if it’s because he’s the only person I’ve ever been with whom I’ve actually been attracted to.” 

“No offense, by the way,” Shane adds, making them both laugh.

“Oh, none taken, baby!”

Rose continues when their giggles die down. “Well, I can’t tell you how you feel. And it looks like you can’t, either. But I see a couple ways this can go.”

“Okay, shoot.”

“One, you can talk to him and tell him everything you’ve told me. It’s not an outright confession, but if you want to keep figuring things out with him specifically, then you can start with that.”

Shane considers it for no more than a second. “God, no. I can’t do that. I think our friendship’s become too important to me for me to risk it on trying to figure myself out.”

“Okay, I figured you might say that. In that case, there’s really only one surefire thing I can suggest that can help you gain some clarity.”

“Which is…?”

“A little bit of healthy exploration, baby.”

Shane hums, considering it for a moment. It’s definitely something that has crossed his mind before, but he’s always been too cautious about his secret to even spare the idea a second thought.

“That makes sense. But even if I want to learn more about myself in that way… I can’t just hook up with some random guy. What if they out me?”

“I mean, Miles would definitely be down. And he would never out you if you told him.”

Shane snorts. “Rose, I can’t sleep with another friend. My two closest friends right now are both people I’ve slept with—to varying degrees of success.”

They share another giggle at that. Shane’s glad that their disastrous attempts at sex have at least completely evolved to be things they can both just laugh at.

“But yeah, no. No more sleeping with friends.”

“Got it. Well, lucky for you I know theeeee most discreet place to find just the kinda guy you need.”

“I don’t know, Rose…” Shane chews on his lip, still very much apprehensive at the thought of sleeping with a stranger. He’s always so careful about everything, especially this.

“Trust me, Shane. It’s a super exclusive bar—invite only. And the people who work there even sign NDAs and stuff. It’s all very serious. Miles and I have been going there for years. You’re not gonna get outed. It’s just a bunch of celebrities who have the same secret, looking for a place where they can be themselves.”

It feels like a bad idea. He doesn’t exactly feel good about having to trust random people with his best kept secret. But he trusts Rose, and doesn’t feel like she would lead him astray. She’s always made him feel safe. So even if it sounds terrifying, the fact that it’ll be Rose holding his hand through it does a lot to calm his nerves.

“I’ll think about it.” He settles on that, still not completely sure if he’s up to it. But he does feel an undercurrent of excitement at the idea. So maybe he just needs to say fuck it, for once. 

Rose perks up at his consideration. “Okay. Just let me know whenever, and me and Miles will take you! Or just me, if you don’t wanna tell him, of course.”

“Thank you, Rose,” he says earnestly before letting his friend ramble on about all the cute outfits they can wear and all the fun times they can have. Things have started feeling a little lighter, having her by his side. He’s so glad he went to that random ass party. He should send JJ a gift basket or something.

***

After being shown the news, Ilya spends the rest of that day in a daze. Shane Hollander was seen out and about holding hands with Rose Landry.

He thinks about bringing it up to Shane, asking him questions. Friends talk about this stuff, right?

But he doesn’t know where to begin. How could he even phrase it without letting any of the jealousy he feels seep through?

So, Rose Landry huh?

Got yourself a girlfriend, Hollander?

I wonder what people would say if we were spotted walking out of a restaurant holding hands. I do not think they would be as nice.

He types and deletes more messages than he can count. Not knowing what the fuck to even say, he ends up deftly avoiding the subject entirely, despite his curiosity eating him alive.

He figures it’s not all that strange, considering they never really talked about relationships even before the headlines. But that’s because there wasn’t much to talk about, at least not on Ilya’s side. All he ever had were random hookups and casual arrangements with friends. And where would he even find the time to start seeing someone now when his screen time has gone up 47% just talking to Shane?

Oh god, has Shane been seeing someone this entire time? Not that he’s not allowed to. Of course he is. Ilya just hasn’t thought about it. But he’s definitely thinking about it now.

How many people has Shane been with since their last time? Is Rose just the first one to go public because she’s famous? Has Shane been with other men since? Ilya feels a brief flash of anger at the thought before he chastises himself for being possessive over someone he has absolutely no right to claim.

The pictures and the comments keep coming, and Ilya can’t help but sift through them all. Neither Shane nor Rose have confirmed anything, but they’ve been seen together so much these past couple months that even Ilya’s yearning ass can’t deny that there’s something between them anymore.

He feels like he’s going insane. But every time he wants to bring it up to Shane, he chickens out. Maybe because the hours he gets to spend talking to Shane are always the highlight of his week, and he doesn’t want to ruin them by bringing up something that will actively hurt him.

It’s a specific kind of pain he’s never felt before, really. Partly because Shane has never been seen with anyone literally ever.

But mostly because it’s a different kind of pain seeing someone you have only ever been allowed to love in secret, be loved so openly.

And no one questions it. The same way no one questioned the girls he used to be seen with at clubs back when he used to frequent them.

And yet, when he and Shane were meeting up in secret, they could never dare to step even a little bit out of line or the consequences would be catastrophic. All they had were stolen moments. Quiet touches. Whispered room numbers. Sketchy back alleyway entrances to buildings. They couldn’t even go through the front door, it was that bad. Even their contact names were a farce, for fuck’s sake.

His traitorous mind chooses this exact moment to remind him that the one time he kissed Shane outside—on the rooftop after he won rookie of the year—he shoved him and walked away. It was dark. No one could see them. He’s pretty sure Shane wouldn’t shove Rose Landry even if she kissed him in broad daylight in the middle of the street.

It’s so fucking unfair. He’s loved Shane for years. Rose has known him for mere months. How come she gets broad daylight, when all Ilya ever got was the darkness of night?

It’s neither of their faults, but it’s infuriating nonetheless.

Ilya just lets the feeling quietly simmer within him until it finally slips out as they’re on the phone ahead of the All-Star Game in Florida, talking about how they’re looking forward to playing on the same team for the first time.

“You think they’ll put us on a line together?” Shane asks excitedly.

“Maybe. Can you even play wing, Hollander?” Ilya teases.

“I don’t have to, Rozanov,” Shane quips right back, the smirk evident just through his voice.

“Ah, I see how it is. You get a stylist and now you have celebrity ego.” Ilya can’t hold back a smile of his own. Teasing Shane has always been fun, but it’s even more fun now that he’s comfortable enough to always play along.

Shane gasps overdramatically. “Ilya. I told you that in confidence. How dare you use it to make fun of me?”

The tone of his voice makes Ilya think of the way Shane would bat his eyes innocently, always rendering Ilya completely useless. Like putty in his hands. It’s a good thing this isn’t a Facetime call—small mercies. Ilya would never fucking win an argument again if Shane kept bringing those eyes out. God, focus, Ilya.

“I can use the information you share however I please, Hollander,” he responds with a chuckle, and continues absentmindedly. “Why did you even get a stylist in the first place? Requirement for having a celebrity girlfriend?”

Shit. That just came out. Ilya was too comfortable joking around with Shane that his brain to mouth filter stopped working for a second.

Well, it’s out there now. Might as well see what he has to say.

Shane has been wondering when Ilya would finally bring it up.

See, he’s noticed a very slight shift in Ilya’s behavior ever since the tabloids started reporting on him and Rose. It’s nothing major, but he’s been just a tad bit grumpier, especially on days when Shane was seen out with her.

He doesn’t want to assume any correlation, but the timing certainly lines up. Not that Ilya has ever asked him about it directly, though. And it’s not like Shane’s about to volunteer that information out of nowhere. It would feel presumptuous to just assume that Ilya would care about his relationship. Although he supposes it’s a normal thing for friends to talk about. He just feels a little weird about it, all things considered.

But he’s not opposed to talking about it, if Ilya asks. So he waits to see if he brings it up. And he doesn’t, not for a long time. Hell, the relationship has already died in the time it takes for Ilya to finally mention it.

“Oh, so you read tabloids now?” Shane teases.

“Can’t help it when your face has been all over my feed for months, Hollander.”

“And yet this is the first time I’m hearing about it?”

They both keep their tone casual, but there’s an undercurrent of awkwardness considering it’s not a subject they usually broach.

“Hm. I did not want to pry.”

“We’re friends, Ilya. You could’ve asked. I wouldn’t have minded,” Shane offers sincerely.

Yes, but it would have hurt, Ilya doesn’t say.

“Okay, I am asking now then. How is your famous celebrity girlfriend?” He says instead.

“She’s not my girlfriend.”

“No?” The relief Ilya feels is immediate and bone fucking deep. He hopes Shane doesn’t hear it in the giant breath he lets out.

“No.” Shane sighs. “I mean, we tried for a while. And she’s great. I love her.”

Ilya bristles at that. He wonders if it’s something Shane feels for him, even platonically. They’ve certainly never said it out loud.

“We’re still friends to this day,” Shane continues. “It’s why the media assumes we’re still together. But we broke up a while ago. We’re just not… compatible, I guess.”

“Compatible?” Ilya’s pretty sure he knows what that means, but he’s curious to hear more.

“Yeah. Not in that way, at least.”

“What do you mean?”

“I…” Shane pauses, carefully considering what he’s about to say. “Ilya, you’re actually sworn to secrecy this time.”

“Sure.” 

“I mean it, okay? Not a word to anyone. And no making fun of me, either,” Shane adds with a chuckle to lighten the atmosphere.

“Okay, okay.” Ilya chuckles right alongside him, but assures him earnestly anyway. “I promise, Shane.”

“Okay. Uhhh, she kind of… helped me realize that I’m gay.”

There’s a little pause before Ilya laughs, and Shane wants to be mad at him for it but before he knows it, he’s laughing too.

It makes Ilya press the button to request to switch the call to Facetime. It’s his favorite sound in the world, but he would prefer getting to see the accompanying smile too.

Shane takes a moment to accept, so what Ilya sees instead is a little pout trying to mask the smile that was obviously there just a second ago. The sight is so fucking cute that it goes straight to Ilya’s chest. He doesn’t even try to hide how endeared he is by it, his smile getting bigger the longer he looks at Shane’s lips quivering in an attempt not to laugh.

“I said no making fun of me,” Shane chides, but his ridiculous little angry kitten face drowns out any bite his voice could’ve had.

“I am not making fun of you, Shane.” Ilya tilts his head, endlessly endeared. He wants nothing more than to reach out through the phone and drag his thumb over Shane’s stupid adorable little pout and kiss the crinkles off of his slightly scrunched up eyebrows. If only.

“You were laughing two seconds ago!” Shane scolds, but he can’t keep the smile off his face any longer.

“Sorry, I did not mean to! It’s just…” Ilya starts, clear amusement all over his face.

“Just what?” Shane narrows his eyes, curious what Ilya’s getting at.

“Hm. Just… We did lots of gay things, Hollander. Thought that might have clued you in.”

Shane scoffs in disbelief, but he’s still smiling. They don’t really talk about that a lot; it’s the one topic they’re both a little iffy to bring up. But it’s refreshing to be able to talk about it so casually. “I know, you asshole. But you’re not gay, so.”

“No, not completely.”

“Well, I am. Completely.” Shane takes a breath, grateful for the moment of levity but shifting gears to a bit of a more serious tone. “But I guess I held on to the possibility that maybe I wasn’t for longer than I should have, ‘cause… Well, you know.”

Ilya hums. He does know. They’ve talked about the kind of crazy expectations Shane has on his shoulders, and how much pressure that puts on him. He imagines it must be difficult to accept your sexuality when you don’t feel like it aligns with those expectations.

Ilya’s relationship with his own sexuality is a little different. He’s never tried to deny it to himself like Shane has, just knowing from an early age what he wants. All the external factors at play may have impacted how he acted on his desires, but never his own acceptance of their existence. It’s always been a nice anchor. The world may have been able to dictate what he was allowed to do out in the open, but he has never let it control his innermost desires.

For Shane, he seems to have internalized the external pressures so much that it made the same kind of self-acceptance impossible for him. Until now, that is. Ilya’s happy that he can at least have that. The world doesn’t really give them much, so a little self-acceptance goes a long way.

“Hm. But not anymore?”

“Not anymore. I’m definitely gay.” Every time Shane says it out loud, he feels reaffirmed. He feels just a little freer each time, like a tiny thorn is dislodged from his lungs and he can breathe just a little bit easier. He wonders how many times he has to say it, and who he has to say it to, until every breath can finally feel completely clear.

“I’m proud of you, Shane,” Ilya says earnestly. He might love needling Shane, but he knows how much this means to him, and how hard it must’ve been for him to get here. So he lets himself be nothing but sincere for once.

“Thanks. It’s scary as fuck. But having Rose has been really helpful. And you too, I guess.” Shane clears his throat and briefly looks away at that last admission, always feeling a little bashful when his vulnerability is directed at Ilya.

They sit in that warm feeling for a while, just taking in how grateful they are to have each other in whatever way they can.

“No more celebrity girlfriends for you then, huh?” Ilya quips after a moment, needing a reprieve from all the warm feelings in his belly.

“Nope,” Shane confirms, popping the p.

“Good.” Ilya smiles at his own admission. He’s secretly grateful for entirely selfish reasons, but he can just turn it into a joke later on so he doesn’t have to tell Shane how he really feels.

“Good?” Shane raises an eyebrow.

“Yes. It distracts my team, seeing your headlines. They start thinking they can get celebrity girlfriends too.”

“Right.” Shane shakes his head fondly.

“Wait, how exactly did she help you realize you were gay?” Ilya asks, eagerly going back to his favorite hobby of annoying his adorable friend.

Shane snorts. “Fuck off. I am not going into details.”

They end up talking for what feels like hours that day. Ilya’s glad Shane feels comfortable enough with him to share something so personal, especially knowing just how closely he usually keeps that stuff to his chest.  

A part of him wishes he asked about Rose sooner. It would’ve alleviated his pain earlier if he knew that they weren’t even together that long. But he’s a coward, so this is what he gets. At least the wondering is over now.

But he does realize that although he doesn’t have to worry about the Rose of it all anymore, that doesn’t mean this sort of thing won’t happen again. In fact, with Shane feeling more comfortable with his sexuality, it might not be long before Ilya has to deal with stupid jealousy again. What a horrible fucking emotion. It makes him want to brace for impact, just so he can prepare himself for having to inevitably face it again.

But he’ll cross that bridge when he gets there. For now, he can’t wait to see Shane at the All-Star Game in Florida. They’re playing on the same team, and finally have an excuse to actually have friendly interactions on the ice—and maybe even off of it—more akin to the ones they have behind closed doors.

It would be a nice little taste of what they can have in the future, if the world ever decides to let up.

***

Shane feels even lighter after coming out to Ilya. He was originally planning on doing it in Florida, since it felt like the kind of conversation that would be better had face to face.

But Ilya finally asked about Rose, so it all kind of just came tumbling out of him.

Well, all except the fact that he’s actually taken Rose up on her offer to go to that bar. And that he’s been… having a little bit of fun with it.

See, Shane has never been a club person. Or a dancing person. Or a casual hookup person. And he still isn’t. Not really.

But he can’t say that dancing with Miles and Rose until he locked eyes with some hot guy from across the room and eventually went home with him wasn’t a pleasant experience.

But more than that, it’s also been a revealing experience, in terms of understanding how he really feels. Rose was absolutely right about the clarity that a little bit of exploration can bring.

Shane feels like he’s had an epiphany, a few outings later. But it all really started unraveling that first night they went to the bar…