Chapter Text
Shane wasn’t a music guy.
Sure, he listened to it, but he wasn’t into music. He had a couple playlists on his phone for his workouts and one he liked to listen to while he was driving, but half the songs were added by Hayden. No one was giving Shane control of the AUX cord in the locker room before games.
He would be hard-pressed to name any specific artists he liked, as evidenced by one of the last interviews he did where a question about his ‘go-to hype song’ left him stumped.
He certainly never paid attention to the music that played during their games. He was always focused on his coach or the next play, and songs were never on long enough for him to recognize them anyway. His teammates teased him about it—Rozanov had teased him about it—but Shane accepted it as a fact of life.
He just wasn’t a music guy.
It was the third game of the season. Shane had scored two of the Metros’ three goals and helped run down the clock before he was pulled off the ice. He collapsed onto the bench and watched as their second-stringers took over.
“I’m telling you, buddy, this is our year.” Hayden nudged Shane with his elbow. “You’re playing better than ever.”
“I think it’s a little early in the season to be saying that.”
“Aw, come on. Power of positive thinking!”
Shane just shook his head with a grin. Hayden had been saying it was ‘their year’ since Shane joined the Metros.
Still, he couldn’t help hoping it really would be. The longer he went without getting his hands on the cup, the heavier it hung over his head. Being called the best player in hockey would mean a lot more with the hardware to back it up. Shane wanted to win. He was tired of only getting close. (And maybe he was tired of knowing that Rozanov had beat him to it.)
Shane watched the rest of the game with less interest than the captain of the team should have. He usually tried to keep tabs on new teammates at the start of each season but his head wasn’t in it. He was sure his mom would have her own opinions anyway when he went over for dinner tomorrow.
His mind was darting from one thought to the next—was he too slow off the faceoffs in the second period? The tape on his stick was peeling again. Would he have to answer a stupid question about Rozanov in his post-game interview?—so he didn’t realize what was happening until it was almost too late.
The game had paused again, Winnipeg calling a final time out before a power play, and music was pumping through the overhead speakers. Shane took a swig of water, leaning back against the bench.
His cock twitched.
Shane almost choked on his water. Hayden glanced back at Shane, still bent over his knees and watching the ice, like Shane should have been.
“You good?”
Shane gulped more water and began reciting the Canadian provinces and their capitals in his head. That had been his move as a teenager for this situation. Except he wasn’t a teenager, and he wasn’t in the dark at the movies. He was a grown man in the middle of a fucking hockey game, getting hard.
Winnipeg, Manitoba. Toronto, Ontario. Halifax, Nova Scotia.
He wasn’t even sure why. It wasn’t, he reflected bitterly, like Rozanov was here.
The thought of Rozanov sent a jolt through his stomach. An image flashed in his head—Rozanov, fucking him right on center ice.
EDMONTON, ALBERTA-
“Shane, buddy. You good?” Hayden pressed again.
They were both distracted by the sudden loud boo that came from somewhere in the stands.
“What the hell are they booing us for?” Hayden complained. “We’re about to win the game.”
Shane shrugged and moved onto world capitals. Anything to stop imagining the feeling of Rozanov’s glove wrapped around his dick. Licking the sweat off Rozanov’s neck. The rubber of Rozanov’s mouthguard while Shane fucked himself back onto Rozanov’s tongue.
MADRID, SPAIN.
The music stopped, along with the boos, when the ref’s whistle cut across the ice.
Shane sat forward. “I’m good,” he promised Hayden. “Sorry.”
Hayden eyed him for a second, but then nodded. Shane’s face felt like it was on fire. He focused on taking deep breaths and thinking about cold showers for the rest of the game.
Montreal won four minutes later, three to one.
“And how are you feeling about your chances for a cup this season?”
Shane smiled and hoped it looked better on camera than it felt. “Way too early to tell.”
“You gotta admit you’re playing the best you ever have.”
Shane shrugged. Does everyone get together before each season and decide to ask the same exact questions?
“Hey, Shane. What do you think of Rozanov’s new song?”
“Well, I know- uh…sorry.” Shane’s standard Rozanov answer—he’s a great player and we’ll see how the season goes—stuttered to a halt as he processed the reporter’s question. “His what?”
“His new song. It came out this morning.”
“I…didn’t know he was a singer,” Shane settled on, still confused. “Okay.”
“Think you’ll make one in response?”
In response to what?
“I highly doubt it. I’m not- you know. A music guy.”
A smattering of laughs from the group. They also remembered Shane’s hype-song answer. “I have a feeling we’ll be hearing it all season. Two million views on YouTube already.”
“Okay,” Shane said again, because what else could he say? Picturing Rozanov singing was too much for him to handle, even if he hadn’t just played a hockey game. He shrugged.
“You should give it a listen.”
Sometimes, Shane liked to lean into the rivalry. Especially if he knew he’d be seeing Rozanov soon. Stuff like this always riled him up. They hadn’t seen each other all summer—Shane wanted him pretty riled when they played next month. If he wasn’t sure of that before, his little mid-game fantasy confirmed it. Shane wanted Rozanov to take him apart the next time they met.
Shane knew his two goals tonight put him ahead of Rozanov in this season’s scoring race. And Montreal’s three wins were ahead of Boston’s two-one.
“I think he’s gotta make more noise on the ice first.”
Lily:
You will be the one making noise 😈
Shane smirked and texted back. You stalking me?
“Hollander, did you hear about this shit?”
Shane glanced up from his phone. “What?”
“Come here, look.”
Shane crossed the locker room to stand beside Hayden. J.J. tilted his phone screen towards them to show a news headline.
‘Iced Out’ Is Catching Fire: Russian Rap Song Goes Viral Thanks to Hockey Star Ilya Rozanov
“What the hell?” Shane heard himself ask. “Wait, they just asked me about this.”
“I fucking hate this guy,” Hayden groaned. “I swear to God he did this purposely to fuck with all of us.”
“It’s kinda a good song.”
The three of them whipped their heads over to where Miitka stood undressing in the corner. He shrugged.
“What? It is! Roz is good.”
“You cannot even understand what he’s saying,” J.J. scoffed.
“Don’t need to. A good song is a good song. He’s got the flow.”
Hayden leaned over to pick up one of his gloves and chuck it at Miitka’s head.
Shane tried not to seem overly interested. A brief skim of the article’s first paragraph told him Rozanov had a feature on an up-and-coming Russian rapper’s new song, and it was going viral on YouTube. Shane caught a glimpse of the video’s thumbnail—a guy with a buzz cut and face tats leaning down into the camera while Rozanov smirked in the background, shirtless under a fur coat. Shane’s eyes went to the gold crucifix Rozanov always wore. He'd seen it enough, swinging in his line of sight back and forth while Rozanov-
His phone buzzed.
You look pretty on TV.
And then-
Prettier with my cock in your mouth.
“Next up, the Russian sensation that’s sweeping the nation! Here’s Iced Out, by DJ-”
“Turn it off!” J.J. screamed from the back of the car. “Turn it off!”
Shane winced in the driver’s seat. “Shit, sorry.” He nudged the radio dial to change the station. “Better?”
“Better. Rozanov is out to get us, I swear. He wants to give us bad mojo before our night out.”
Somewhere in the last two weeks, the Metros decided Rozanov’s new song was a personal attack on their mental headspace. Any note of the song would completely throw off their game. Another superstition to add to the pile.
Shane, who had yet to hear it, let them believe what they wanted. If anything it was a good bonding activity, something he was supposed to support as their captain. And if it meant he kept having ammo to throw at Rozanov in his post-game interviews, then he was all for the superstition continuing.
Rozanov’s texts were coming more frequently. Shane liked that. It felt like Rozanov was the one chasing him for once.
“Any word on the song, Shane?” a reporter asked him yesterday.
“Still haven’t heard it.”
“Not even on the ice? The arenas are playing it non-stop.”
“Not with the Metros they’re not.” Shane had shrugged then, emboldened by the hattrick he scored earlier. “Maybe I have heard it and I just don’t remember.”
When Shane got home later that night, there was another text from Lily.
If you heard it, you wouldn’t forget. Wrote it just for you 😏
Shane got ready for bed before Googling to see if it was true. He found an interview with the rapper and read for five minutes about how he approached Rozanov at a club last year and they struck up a friendship. It was natural, he said, having Rozanov jump on the track. Rozanov hung out with him at the studio sometimes (which was news to Shane, before he reminded himself he barely knew Rozanov, much less what he got up to during his summers in Russia). And yes, Rozanov wrote the feature himself.
Shane scrolled to the end of the article to see a link to the music video. He stared at the thumbnail for almost a minute, at war with himself. J.J. and the other Metros had put a moratorium on the song. Yeah, he was home alone in bed, but still. It didn’t feel right.
Shane closed out the tab and texted back. Was it your idea to wear the fur coat?
Why, came the reply. Want to borrow it?
Shane scoffed, tossing his phone down.
The Metros played their next four games on the road. Shane, to his confusion, got hard during each one. When he ran out of world capitals, he switched to the alphabet. Shane hid in the hotel shower the morning of the fourth game and worked himself over until the water ran cold. It didn’t matter—in the middle of the game, his cock started to stiffen, without any reason or warning. Shane was so frustrated over that he almost forgot to be upset about their four-one loss.
The game against Boston couldn’t come soon enough.