Work Text:
TUESDAY
"I was really glad when you reached out to set up an appointment. You've certainly had an eventful week."
So that's one unexpected benefit to being very famous: the session just started and Ilya's therapist is already caught up on how he got outed by Hayden Pike's FanMail video.
"Hmm, yes, you could say that," Ilya says, pretending to look nonchalant.
"How are you holding up?" Galina asks him.
"I'm really worried about Shane," he says, turning serious. "His team are being assholes, and I know that hurts him a lot. He's very loyal to them, and they aren't returning the favor right now."
She nods. "That must be difficult for him. But how are you doing?"
"I told you, I'm worried about Shane."
Galina gives him a considering look. "We can talk about that," she says, "but first I'd like you to tell me how you're doing."
They're speaking in Russian so the words should come easier, but he's still not sure what to say. "My team has been great. But it's hard. Shane and I weren't prepared for this. And it's really fucking bad timing, with the playoffs coming up."
"You had still been planning to come out this summer, right?"
"That was the plan. And, obviously, that would have been so much better. I think we're both upset that was taken from us."
Galina makes a couple notes. "I read your statement," she says. "Did it help, to put something out there in your own words?"
Ilya waves this off. "Our agent wrote that for us. Which is fine, I wouldn't have wanted to write it anyway. I don't need to tell a bunch of strangers on the internet how I feel."
Galina waits for him to continue. She's good at waiting him out; maybe it's something they taught her how to do in therapist school. Maybe that's also where she learned not to point out the obvious: she's not a stranger on the internet and the whole point of him being here is to tell her how he feels.
"I guess there's a part of me that feels glad," he says. "And then, I feel guilty about that. For so long, I wanted everyone to know about us. I didn't want it to happen like this, but there's a part of me that doesn't care and I'm just happy that it finally happened."
"That's understandable."
Ilya stares past her, looking at one of her fake plants. He wonders if she has to dust them. "I can't tell Shane that," he says. "I know he doesn't feel that way."
"You don't have to tell him. Nobody tells their partner every thought that goes through their head. That's normal. But maybe we can talk about what you're feeling that you do want to tell him."
They talk about that, and who else he has to support him right now, and whether he's nervous about being back on the ice tonight. He tells Galina about the meeting with Crowell and the fluttering feeling he still gets in his chest when he thinks about how Shane chose him.
At the end of the session, he says, "I really am worried about Shane. He keeps a lot bottled up, and his team doesn't support him like mine does. He's out there all alone." That's not true, he's not completely alone. He can begrudgingly admit that Shane does have Hayden. He blew up their lives with his own stupidity, but Hayden's a good friend. "What can he do to make it easier?"
Galina folds her hands on top of her notepad. "I can't tell Shane what to do because I'm not Shane's therapist. Do you know if he's ever thought about therapy?"
Ilya has thought before that Shane could also benefit from talking to someone like how he talks to Galina. Now is definitely not the time to tell Shane that. Maybe this summer. Until then, he was sort of hoping he could talk to Galina and then talk to Shane, like getting Shane therapy by proxy. But it seems like that was wishful thinking.
When he leaves Galina's office, Ilya texts Shane.
Ilya: Send nudes. I need a new lockscreen photo
Ilya: Sexy lockscreen of my boyfriend is okay now!!!
Shane: I just got to practice. And I told you, we are not going to stop deleting nudes! That's non-negotiable
Shane: Did you have a good appointment with Galina?
Ilya: She also thinks you should send me nudes
Ilya: Emotional support nudes
Shane: Oh my god that is not a thing
He sends back a frowning face and Shane responds with a heart. Ilya has a home game tonight and then both the Centaurs and the Voyageurs are finishing out the season on the road. He won't be able to see Shane again until Monday. It's bad timing. The kind of bad timing that they're used to, but it feels more acute and unfair right now.
He can do one thing though. Sitting in the car outside Galina's office, he opens the wallpaper settings on his phone. Right now his lockscreen is a picture of Anya sleeping by the fireplace. He changes it to a picture of Shane that he took at the camp in Montreal last summer, sitting on the bench watching the kids scrimmage and laughing. It looks great, but next week he'll take pictures of Shane and Anya together and then he'll have the best lockscreen photo of all time.
He turns off his phone. Then he turns it back on just to see the lockscreen photo again.
WEDNESDAY
"Now that you're back with the team, we thought it would be a good idea to talk about expectations."
"Sure, okay."
The Voyageurs are flying out to DC this afternoon for a game tomorrow night, and the bus to the airport leaves in twenty minutes. Shane got summoned early for a meeting in Coach Theriault's office. Sitting across from him are his coach, Paul Saxton the general manager and a woman named Marie from the Communications department who Shane has never met before. Saxton is the one doing all the talking.
"The playoffs start in a little over a week," Saxton says. "We can't afford any distractions right now. We think it would be for the best if you don't do any media."
"I wasn't planning on it, I already told my agent that."
They put Farah in charge of coordinating with a publicist and let her know that it was a blanket no on anything until after the post-season is over, but she says that the requests are coming in droves. Not just sports media, but national news reporters and magazines and late-night talk shows. Shane is hoping after the season they'll have all moved on to something else.
"I don't just mean outside press, but that too, obviously." Saxton says. "What I'm talking about is no pre-game, no post-game. Nothing in the tunnel or the locker room. And absolutely no more social media. Just keep your head down and focus on hockey."
It's bullshit. Total overreach. Makes no sense if he's still the captain of this team. Shane should talk to the player's association. J.J. is Montreal's rep, and J.J. is still kind of pissed at him, but surely he'll see that--
"Yeah," Shane says. "I just want to focus on hockey." Because that is actually what he wants, even if having it forced on him by the Voyageurs' management feels like a barbell on his chest.
Saxton nods. Coach looks like he'd rather be anywhere else, which is one thing he and Shane can agree on right now. Marie has the same pleasant and bland expression that's been on her face since the meeting started. "Great," Saxton says, "So we're all in agreement, then."
"Sounds good."
"Marie will be traveling with the team, in order to handle … everything that's going on," Saxton tells him. "We'll let the two of you get on your way." It's a dismissal, but Shane wants to get out of here, so he takes it.
As they make their way out of the practice facility, Marie turns to him and says, "I just want you to know, I think what you did was really brave."
"Um, I didn't … do anything?"
She readjusts the strap of her laptop bag. "Right, right," she says, "You know what I mean."
He really doesn't, but he nods anyway.
Montreal is finishing out the season on a three-game road trip: Washington, New Jersey and then Philly. Which means that Shane gets to vibrate out of his skin in hotel rooms instead of at home, so that's super fun. There's an actual gaggle of press and photographers waiting for them at the hotel in DC, which is crazy. Hockey is a distant fourth among the pro sports down in the US and most places Shane doesn't even get recognized all that often. Marie steps in to handle it and Shane keeps his head down.
When he gets to his room, he goes through the motions of changing his clothes and unpacking his toiletries. He wishes he could talk to Ilya but he's on a flight to Winnipeg right now and probably won't land before Shane falls asleep. Instead he sits down in front of the TV.
The Voyageurs clinched the number one seed in the division at the end of last week. They did it by winning the game Shane missed while he was benched. Objectively he knows that they won without him because they were playing Vancouver and Vancouver is terrible this year. But it feels like a pointed cosmic joke. There's still a little bit of jockeying at the bottom of the bracket, and that's what he's focused on right now. Specifically he's focused on Toronto.
While he's still scrolling through the channel guide, there's a knock on the door. He checks the peephole first, afraid of a rogue reporter, but it's just Hayden.
He opens the door and Hayden says, "Hey, do you want to go get something to eat?"
He gestures for Hayden to come inside but says, "No thanks. I think I'm just going to order something, I want to watch the Toronto game." Shane also wants to point out that going out in public is clearly not a good idea right now, but he knows that Hayden already feels bad enough.
"Ugh, why?" Hayden asks.
"Well, Toronto only gets the top Wild Card spot if they win out. If they drop one of their last three games, they fall to number two."
"Okay, and?"
Shane raises his eyebrows, wanting Hayden to catch up already. "And so we'd play them in the first round. You know. Instead of Ottawa."
"Oh. Oh. Okay. Now I get it."
Shane walks over to sit back down on the bed. "Yeah," he says.
"Is that what you want?" Hayden asks. Which is a valid question, because Shane feels kind of guilty for hoping that it could work out this way. He tells himself it's okay because it's not like he's rooting for the Centaurs to lose. And it would be a better matchup for Ottawa if they played Columbus in the first round. But that's not the whole answer.
"Ugh, I don't know!" Shane says, flopping back on the bed. "Like, I love playing against Ilya. I've loved playing against him for my entire career, and I especially love beating him, but--"
Normally this is the part where Hayden would say something like, "Gross, TMI, dude," but he must still be feeling really guilty, because he keeps his mouth shut.
"It's all just … a lot right now," Shane says, staring up at the ceiling. "A series against Ottawa is going to be so fucking crazy. Nobody will be focusing on the actual games. I'll be a distraction, and I hate that."
"We could still end up playing them in the conference final, though, right?" Hayden points out. Shane feels bad, because his first thought is that Ilya has done an amazing job and the Centaurs have come an incredibly long way this year but that seems … unlikely. "And, I mean," Hayden adds, "We're gonna play them four times next season. Might as well just rip off the bandaid?"
"Yeah, but by next season everything will have calmed down," Shane says. Then he sits back up and sees that Hayden is giving him a very dubious look.
"Everything will have calmed down … a little bit?" Shane tries again. He's thought a few times about next season, how it'll be different. Maybe he and Ilya can go to each other's games when the off-days line up. He's never been able to go to one of Ilya's NHL games as a spectator and watch him play in-person before.
Hayden hangs his head. "I feel like it might be time for me to apologize again."
"Stop," Shane says, waving him off. "You already apologized. It was an accident."
Hayden walks over and sits down next to him on the bed. "So, we're watching the Toronto game. Who are they playing, Seattle?"
"Yeah."
Hayden shrugs. "Well, go Squids, I guess."
THURSDAY
Ilya: Reporter got my number and is asking what I think about parliament trying to ban conversion therapy
Ilya: What the fuck is conversion therapy?
Shane: No idea, maybe it's actually good my team won't let me talk to reporters
Ilya: Am googling this is evil shit. Lucky you didn't know about this you would have tried to send yourself before I finished converting you to my dick
The Centaurs aren't in control of their own destiny heading into the post-season; they've cliched a Wild Card spot but even if they win their last three games they can't improve their playoff position without a little help. Ilya still wants to win them all, though, to go into the first round with momentum. Fortunately Coach Weibe agrees.
They're waiting for the bus to finish loading up so they can head to the arena in Winnipeg and Harris is pulling each of the players aside one-by-one to film for a TikTok. The question is kind of dull -- "What's your favorite pizza topping?" -- but it gives Ilya an idea. Shane's team told him that he's on a total media blackout, but the Montreal Voyageurs are not and will never be the boss of Ilya Rozanov.
"So Roz, what's your favorite pizza topping?"
"I like sausage and pepperoni, but my boyfriend likes olives. So we get all three and I pick off the olives. But, ugh, so gross, I can still taste them." He's taking a little dramatic license here; Shane hasn't even looked at a pizza in over a year. Although the performance diet does seem like it might be the one deserving victim of their public outing; maybe they'll share a pizza again soon. He'll even let Shane get extra olives.
From behind the camera, Harris says, "You know you could just … get olives on only half the pizza?"
Ilya widens his eyes dramatically. "No, my boyfriend needs his olives! Is fine."
After they get on the bus, Harris sits down next to him and says, "So, how are you doing?"
"Okay."
"If you're having second thoughts and you don't want me to post that video, I don't have to," Harris offers. "Things are really crazy right now. I'm sure it's hard to figure out what you should and shouldn't share. I know you said you're fine, but Theresa could probably help with that if you want."
He wants Harris to post the video. He wants him to post it right now. But that feels pathetic to admit, so he says, "No, is okay. Just thinking."
"What are you thinking about?"
"Shane only sleeps on his right side. Will not sleep on his left side because he dislocated his left shoulder twice and it still bothers him sometimes." So much for not admitting anything pathetic. Hayden Pike reveals one little secret and Ilya's just blurting everything out now, apparently.
"Uh, okay?" Harris says, looking confused.
Ilya looks out the window and tries to explain. "I told you about the olives, yes? But there are all these other things that I know about him. And I could not tell anyone because it would be strange for me to know. Even after we told people that we are friends, things that you don't know about your friend, things you only know about--"
"The person you love."
"Yes, that."
"So, what else?"
Ilya takes a deep breath. "He has five different meditation apps on his phone but he does not actually use any of them. He doesn't like mint flavored toothpaste so he gets a gross one from the health food store that tastes like baking soda. He has a scar on the inside of his left knee, but not from hockey. From falling off a jungle gym when he was six." Because this is all starting to get a little bit sentimental, he adds, "And when you suck on his--"
Harris slaps a hand over Ilya's mouth and Ilya sputters with laughter. "Alright," Harris says, "I think that's enough sharing for now."
Harris retracts his hand and they sit together in silence for a minute. Then, Harris says, "I was wondering about one thing. Your Instagram post, it said 'several years.'"
Ilya turns back to look at Harris, smirking. "Thought you said that was enough sharing for now?"
"Fine, keep your secrets. But it's like the number two topic for conspiracy theorists online right now, so you may not be able to keep them for long."
"What is number one topic?"
"Oh, definitely all the sports betting implications. But the relationship timeline tinhats are a strong number two." Harris gives him a meaningful look. Ilya doesn't know a tinhat is, but the look suggests that Harris may be one of them.
And, well, Ilya kept things from Harris before because he didn't want to be gossip fodder. But now his face is plastered at the top of every gossip blog on the internet, so no real point in playing coy anymore.
"It was casual for a long time," Ilya says. He knows that casual is the right word to describe a relationship with long stretches apart and a lot of fucking other people in between, but it still feels wrong in his mouth. Nothing between them has ever been casual. "It got serious about four years ago."
Harris tilts his head to one side. "Oh, okay. So you were just hooking up for a while, and then you caught feelings?" He says this like it's simple. "Kind of a gay relationship cliche, but I'll allow it."
"Hmm." It's confusing. The whole time, he and Shane thought they were going through a singular lonely experience, but maybe this one part was more unremarkable than they thought.
"That video is going to do crazy numbers on our socials," Harris offers. "Keep talking about your boyfriend on camera and you're going to get me a promotion."
In the tunnel before the game, Ilya gets pulled aside by Gabriel Barbier, a right wing who he played with for about five years in Boston. He's been bouncing around the league on one-year contracts for a few seasons now and ended up in Winnipeg at the start of this year.
"Bro, I don't get it. All those girls," Barbier says. "If you don't even like girls, you couldn't have left some of them for the rest of us?"
Ilya shakes his head. "Barbzy," he says. "You once walked in on me going down on a girl in a Dunkin' Donuts bathroom. At seven o'clock in the morning I was doing this, Barbzy. But you think I don't like girls?"
This is a misconception Ilya expected from idiot hockey players, but he's not really worried about it. Maybe if he was still trying to hook up with girls, it would be a different story. But he's going to be a married man soon. The plan is that he's never going to hook up with anybody else for the rest of his life.
"Uh, okay," Barbier says, looking unconvinced. "Sure. Whatever."
"Okay," Ilya says. "Good talk."
"Wait," says Barbier, lowering his voice. "Look, I just wanted to tell you. A couple guys on my team, Sconyers and Cahill, they've been talking about how they're excited to do some, uh--" He winces a little bit. "Some fag bashing tonight. So just watch yourself out there, I guess. And probably tell Barrett, too."
Ilya stands up from where he's been leaning against the wall and claps Barbier on the shoulder. "No need to worry. Last time I did not know how to handle a little fag bashing, your balls hadn't dropped yet."
Later, toward the end of the third period, Ilya is sitting in the penalty box for dropping gloves with Cahill. Barbier skates past him and Ilya waves. Barbier rolls his eyes.
That night after the game, Yuna calls him and Shane both together on FaceTime to check in. She's been doing that every day, because she doesn't know how to love someone without suffocating them a little bit, but Ilya still appreciates it.
Shane and Yuna team up to fret over Ilya's split lip and grill him about his fight with Cahill. He tries to deploy parallel strategies to distract them, but there's only so much flirting with Shane that he can do in front of his mother.
"I meant to tell you," Yuna says, after she passes on the latest news from Farah and a couple updates about potential sponsorships. "We've been getting a ton of online donations to the foundation. Pretty small amounts most of the time, but hundreds and hundreds of people."
The foundation has a stupid fancy gala dinner every year, but other than that and the camps they don't really try to get donations. Ilya doesn't see the point; he and Shane have plenty of money, why should they be asking other people for theirs?
"Why do you think?" Ilya asks.
Yuna smiles. "I think it's just a way for people to show their support for the two of you."
"That's really nice," Shane says, looking a little flushed. His hair is damp like he just got out of the shower and he's wearing his glasses. Ilya loves Yuna but he wouldn't mind if her connection dropped right now.
FRIDAY
When they're out on the ice warming up before the game against New Jersey, the backup goalie for the Demons skates up to Shane and says, "Hey, man. I just wanted to say that what you did was really brave."
After that conversation with Marie at the practice facility, a person in an elevator told him the same thing, and also one of the trainers when he was getting help stretching out his hamstring before the game in DC, and now this guy. Shane thinks again, I got outed. I didn't fucking do anything. But he remembers four years ago, sending a stilted email to Scott Hunter, not wanting to be seen but still wanting to be recognized somehow.
"Thanks, Dietz," he says. "I appreciate that."
"Hang in there," says Dietz, and he skates away.
Since their games this week are basically meaningless, Coach Theriault is limiting everyone's minutes ahead of the playoffs and Shane spends most of the game sitting on the bench. He drinks water even when he doesn't need it just to give himself something to do. He watches and thinks about telling Weathers that he's favoring his right side and needs to get his ribs checked out again but Weathers hasn't looked him in the eye since everything happened so maybe not.
During one of his few shifts out on the ice, one of the Demons' defensemen approaches him at the end of a TV timeout. He's popular with the Demons tonight, apparently. More popular than with his own team. It's Kuznetsov, a Russian player who got drafted the year after Shane and Ilya. Shane tenses up. If Kuznetsov is coming over to punch him on behalf of Russia's honor or something, he's not sure how many of his teammates will even join the fray.
"He knows that he can never go home now, yes?" Kuznetsov says in a low voice. The weird thing is that he doesn't sound accusing. He sounds kind of … concerned, maybe?
So Shane takes a chance and replies in carefully enunciated Russian. "He's known that for a long time." Kuznetsov's eyes widen, and Shane continues in English. "You should talk to him."
He worries about Ilya having enough connections to his home country, now that he really can't ever go back to Russia. He's been texting with Svetlana since he saw her in Boston, but that's just one person.
"Oh no, no, no," Kuznetsov says, also in English. "We hate each other. Always have. Since we were kids. But that does not mean that I want--" He trails off and shrugs.
"Yeah," Shane says. "Uh, thanks, I guess."
Kuznetsov nods and skates away.
In the shower after the game, it's still the fall of 2017 all over again, when he'd just come out to the team and showering felt like navigating a minefield. Shane scrubs down quickly and stares straight ahead at the tile, his eyes tracing and re-tracing the spot where there's a piece of missing grout.
Back in the locker room, one of the rookies has the aux and is playing reggaeton that Shane doesn't recognize. The music feels louder when everyone goes silent as Shane walks into the room. While he's getting dressed, Comeau and Pope return from doing the post-game press. Hayden had a good night in his limited minutes; he probably should have talked to the reporters instead of Pope. They learned after the game in DC though that it is not a good idea for Hayden to do media right now either.
J.J. asks, "How was it out there?"
"Getting real fucking tired of answering questions about Hollander's fucking sex life," Comeau says. Shane keeps his head down.
When they get on the bus, he sits in the back and scrolls on his phone. Every couple of hours, whenever he's not on the ice, he goes online until he gets too angry or too mortified. He usually lasts about ten minutes. As soon as he gets to the hotel, he sends Ilya a FaceTime request. Ilya shows up on the screen in front of a blank beige wall.
"Hey, where are you?"
"At the airport."
Hearing that Ilya is in a public place, his first instinct is to hang up and call back without video, or offer to call again later when his flight has landed. But … huh, they don't have to do that anymore.
"When's your flight?"
"Pretty soon," Ilya says. "How are you?"
"Okay. I mean, you probably saw we lost tonight. But that's not really a surprise with who we had out there for most of the game." Shane understands resting guys after clinching the top seed, but he'd rather go into the playoffs on a high note. It feels like the whole team is seizing up and sputtering right now.
"Yes, your benchwarmers are very bad. But how are you?"
"I'm … fine."
"Ah, so you have been looking at the internet again, yes?" Ilya asks, giving him a knowing look.
Shane rubs the back of neck. "Fuck. What gave me away?"
"What was it this time?"
Shane grimaces. "Reddit thread with a bunch of girls telling stories about hooking up with you in Boston."
"Any good ones?" Ilya asks, his eyes lighting up.
"Ew, no."
"What else?"
"I ended up on the Reddit thread because it was linked from an article," Shane admits. "'Ten Reasons Ilya Rozanov Definitely Isn't Gay.' And then in the comments of the article there were a bunch of people talking about how I managed to turn you gay."
Ilya briefly looks excited, because he's probably going to go find this article and read the comments and think they're hilarious. But then he shakes his head. "Don't read the comments, Shane. Farah has told you this."
Shane's not sure whether he wants to say this next part when Ilya could be overheard, even if it's just by his team and some airline employees. But Ilya has his earbuds in, so maybe it's fine. "I was thinking -- in the statement, we never really specified how we, like, self-identify? I don't know, maybe we should have done that."
"Or we can just let people think that you turned me gay," Ilya says, raising his eyebrows exaggeratedly. "Sounds like a very sexy time." Ugh, Shane should have remembered that Ilya can make anything sound horny. Hopefully no one is listening. Being able to be more public now is going to be, like, a whole new realm of potential embarrassment for Shane.
"Shut up, asshole, it's not funny," Shane says. "I don't want you to feel, I don't know, invalidated."
"Invalidated -- what, like parking?"
Shane isn't sure how to answer because it's something he read in an article and he doesn't really understand it either. "No, it means like -- being bisexual is an important part of who you are, it's not fair for people to just ignore that."
Ilya seems less concerned. "Is kind of funny, though," he says. "People thinking that you turned me gay."
"I guess."
Ilya smirks. "Is funny, because if anything I was the one who turned you gay."
"Fuck off." Although, Shane's sexual orientation has basically been Ilya Rozanov and no one else will do since he was eighteen, so maybe Ilya isn't necessarily wrong.
"Harris told me yesterday that hooking up for a while before catching feelings is a gay relationship cliche."
Shane sighs. "Well, I'm glad that I managed to do one part of being gay right."
Before Ilya can reply, his phone camera jerks and Shane is left looking at the blank beige wall. When Ilya reappears on the screen, his earbuds are out and Zane Boodram is also there, his arm slung around Ilya's shoulder.
"Hey Hollander," Boodram says, waving. "Sorry we have to steal your boyfriend, but our flight is boarding."
Shane blinks. "Oh, hi Boodram." They've never really talked before, but Ilya says he's been great about everything. His whole team has been great about everything. Shane's trying not to feel jealous. His team is great on the ice, that's what matters.
"It's good to see you, man," Boodram says. "Hope you're holding up okay. Don't worry, we're taking good care of your boy."
"Uh, thanks. Thank you."
"Goodnight, sweetheart, I love you!" Ilya says, grinning and blowing a kiss at the camera. "It will be past your old man bedtime but I will text you when we get to Detroit."
"Bye Hollander!" Boodram says, and he blows a kiss, too.
When Shane is lying awake at two in the morning, his phone starts chiming with a series of texts from Ilya.
Ilya: Comments say you dickmatized me
Ilya: Comments want new NHL award, Shane Hollander Trophy for best gay performance of the year
Ilya: They say your throat game must be as good as your wrist shot
Ilya: Shane this needs to get added to your scouting report
Ilya: Never mind, too many people in here talking about what they would do to your ass I will burn internet to the ground
Shane: Please do not confirm for me what throat game means but I think my wrist shot is probably still better
SATURDAY
Ilya can't believe they have an off day and he has to spend it in fucking Detroit. Not that it really matters where he is, because going out anywhere right now is a shitshow. He spends the day cooped up in his hotel room, and for the first time since the FanMail video leaked, he starts to worry about the sad feeling coming back. It's not here yet, but he can feel it creeping at the edge of his thoughts.
Remembering what Galina said about who else he has to support him, he walks down the hall and knocks on Troy's door. Harris flew back to Ottawa separately after their game in Winnipeg, so he knows Troy is on his own tonight.
When Troy answers, Ilya stands at the door feeling uncharacteristically hesitant. "Was thinking about watching the Montreal/Philadelphia game," he offers.
"Sure," says Troy. "Come on in."
They sit on the bed and Ilya grabs the remote from the nightstand. While he searches for the game, Troy offers a bag of teriyaki salmon jerky and Ilya makes a fake gagging noise.
"So, you must watch a lot of Montreal games, huh?" Troy asks after Ilya has found the right channel. It's still showing pre-game coverage, and he keeps the TV on mute because this week every pre-game show is the Did you know two of the biggest stars in the NHL are destroying the league by fucking each other? show.
Ilya would rather get his news from Twitter than willingly listen to sports pundits. At least on Twitter they talk about how he and Shane are hot. "Oh yes, many Montreal games," he says, giving Troy a winning smile. "Sometimes a Montreal game is better than porn."
Troy groans. "Yeah, so I could have gone my whole life without thinking about porn starring Patrice Drapeau."
"Take that back!" Ilya squawks in outrage. "Obviously the star of this porn is Shane."
"Maybe I liked you better when you refused to talk about your sex life."
Ilya snorts, enjoying Troy's sour face and thinking about those early years when he played in Boston. Ilya used to narrate his hookups to his teammates like they were an epic poem. He made a bet with Marlow about who could pick up more times in a single month and they kept tally on a white board in the locker room. One time he went with a couple other guys to see Hammersmith in the hospital when he broke his leg and then made them wait around while he got a blow job from one of Hammersmith's nurses in a supply closet.
Ilya's teammates in Ottawa have never known that version of him. He's not going to transform back into being a twenty-three year old playboy again, but being out now will be another different version of himself, and he wonders what that version will be like.
Back in his own room two hours after Shane's game has ended, Ilya sends him a FaceTime request. Some days it feels like all they do is FaceTime. Sometimes he worries that they'll have to get married on FaceTime.
Shane got limited minutes again tonight and the lack of playing time is making him nuts, so he rants about that for a while. Ilya is glad again that his team is keeping their foot on the gas.
"Oh, but one other thing that's really annoying," Shane tells him, "is that people keep telling me 'what you did was really brave.' Like, multiple people have said that to me. And I guess it's the kind of thing that they think you're supposed to say in this situation, and they're forgetting that I got outed, and I didn't actually do anything? Are people saying that to you?"
Ilya makes a show of looking pensive for a moment. "No, but maybe people already thought I was very brave."
"Oh yeah?"
"Very brave to be so openly handsome and talented in a league full of ugly guys and losers."
Shane rolls his eyes. "Sure. Of course."
"Anyway, you did do one thing. No, wait, you did two things!"
"Hmm, what's that?"
Ilya smiles wide. "Many, many years ago, you decided to start fucking best and hottest player in the NHL. And then also many years ago, you decided to become best friends with dumbest player in the NHL. And now here we are."
Shane shakes his head, looking bewildered but not as frustrated. "Here we are."
"You did do something, though. What you said in Crowell's office. That was very brave."
"Yeah, but they don't know about that," Shane points out. They decided not to do anything with the recording after the league lifted the benching, even though there's a big part of Ilya that wants the whole world to know the full extent to which Crowell is a fucking asshole.
"No," Ilya says. "That was just for me."
At the end of the call, when they're both lying down with their phones propped up and Ilya knows that they should hang up and try to get some sleep, Shane says, "Toronto beat the Nomads tonight."
"Yes, I saw that." Toronto had an easy schedule this week, so Ilya hasn't wasted too much time hoping that they would drop a game and fall out of the top Wild Card spot. He only pays attention to the things that he can control, but he knows Shane isn't like that. Shane thinks he can control everything if he tries hard enough.
"So, I guess this is really happening," Shane says.
Ilya laughs, not wanting to add his own nerves to Shane's swimming pool of anxiety. "I understand," he says, "You are worried about how embarrassing it will be when you lose. Very big upset when a Wild Card team knocks out the number one seed. You don't see that every year."
Shane's face scrunches up into a very cute scowl that Ilya has spent an absurd amount of time trying to elicit over the years. "Fuck you," he says. "We're not losing."
"Hmm."
"Goodnight," Shane says, nestling deeper into his pillow. "I love you very much, and I'll still love you after my team humiliates yours."
"I love you too. And I will still love you when this historic playoff loss gets added to your Wikipedia page."
SUNDAY
Rose: Aww, your boyfriend told the whole internet that he picks olives off his pizza for you
Rose: That's true love!
Shane: What?
Rose: I forgot you're allergic to TikTok
Rose: Go watch this cute video of your boyfriend instead of doomscrolling more articles about the sports betting implications of your relationship, your blood pressure will thank you
The Voyageurs fly back from Philly to Montreal first thing in the morning and Shane drives straight to Ottawa. Ilya won't be back from Detroit until Monday, so Shane goes to his parents' house. Mom waits until the three of them are all sitting at the kitchen table before she pounces.
"You said before that you were thinking about getting married this summer, is that still the plan?" she asks.
"Yeah, we haven't really had a chance to talk about it. But I figured sometime the second or third week of July, before the camps start?"
Dad nods encouragingly. "That makes sense," he says.
Mom seems less enthused. "Sure, but it's really not a lot of time. I know you're both going to be busy with the playoffs, so I'm happy to start planning things for you."
He's preparing for a deep run into the post-season that ends with taking his team to the Final and going back-to-back for a second time, but that will wrap up by mid-June. It seems like enough time to get everything together for a wedding, but what does he know?
"Uh, like what?" Shane asks.
"Well, wedding venues are usually booked up a year in advance," Mom says. "But I'm sure we can still find something."
He's been to a lot of teammates' weddings over the years. He has zero desire to rent an ugly hotel ballroom or traipse out to a vineyard. "I don't think we'll do anything like that," he says. "I figured we could just have it at Ilya's house. It's nice in the backyard, by the river."
"That does sound nice," Dad offers, but Mom looks skeptical.
"Okay," she says. "I guess you could rent tables and chairs, but I worry about ruining the lawn."
"Oh, I don't think we'll need all that."
"So you want to keep it really small?" she says. "That makes sense."
Shane does want to keep it small, but even if he didn't, it's hard to imagine right now that more than, like, ten people will want to show up. They can do the ceremony outside in the backyard and then go sit around the dining table. Honestly, he just wants to be married. They can have the wedding on the moon for all he cares.
He begs off when his parents ask him to stay for dinner, promising that he has a few frozen pre-prepared meals at Ilya's. He's slept like shit the past week and all he wants is to crash out early in Ilya's bed, even if Ilya himself won't be there. He's not even sure he'll be able to stay awake to watch the Centaurs play the Falcons tonight.
He picks up Anya at the dog hotel on the way to Ilya's house. Ilya texted him this morning, telling him that he put Shane down as a secondary contact so he can pick her up and bring her home. And Shane's clearly losing his mind a little bit, because being listed in some computer database as another person who's allowed to pick up Ilya's dog feels … romantic.
He starts thinking about all the other ways they can put their names next to each other: emergency contact, life insurance beneficiary, a joint bank account. They can get a family plan for their cell phones. And then this summer, a marriage license.
Shane is measuring out Anya's food when Hayden calls.
"Hey, man," Hayden says. "Jackie and I were wondering if you wanted to come over for a late dinner. I think she's worried about you being stuck alone in your house right now."
"Thanks, but I'm already in Ottawa. I'm going to stay here until Tuesday morning and then drive back for practice."
"Oh, I thought the Centaurs were in Detroit tonight."
Shane wedges his phone in his shoulder so he can hold Anya's bowl while he fills it with kibble, smiling down at her where she's already sniffing around at his feet. "Yeah," he says. "They'll stay over after the game and fly out tomorrow."
"So you're with your parents? That's good."
"No, I saw them earlier, but I'm back at Ilya's now."
"Okay," Hayden says, but in a way that it's clear he thinks it's weird Shane drove two hours to stay alone tonight at Ilya's house. "I guess I'll see you on Tuesday, then?"
Shane loves Hayden and also sometimes he wants to strangle him. Things between Shane and Ilya were secret for so long, and then even after Hayden knew, their relationship has still been mostly hidden from view. But it's like Hayden forgets that Shane has known and been together in some way with Ilya for longer than he's been with Jackie. He wants to ask Hayden if he wouldn't want to sleep in the bed he shares with his wife just because Jackie was out of town.
"Yeah, I'll see you on Tuesday," Shane says. "Tell Jackie thanks for thinking of me and tell the kids I said hi." He hangs up the phone and watches Anya. She's so enthusiastic about her dinner that she's nudging her bowl around on the floor while she eats from it.
Shane was so sure for so long that he didn't want to come out until after they retired. But now he feels sick thinking about another ten years letting his relationship be something that could be out of sight, out of mind.
Maybe it's not completely terrible that every single thing in his life will be different now.
MONDAY
Holmberg: Hey some reporter just slid into my DMs to ask about you, what do you want me to do
Holmberg: I think they're getting desperate if they're hitting me up because wtf half the beat reporters don't even remember I'm on the team
Ilya: Shane and I agreed no media until post-season is over. But that is just us, you can say whatever you want
Ilya: Say you are very impressed your captain managed to pull second-best player in the NHL
Holmberg: I think I'm just gonna ignore it
Holmberg: ngl I am kind of impressed tho
Shane and Anya are waiting for him at the front door when Ilya gets out of the car. Shane looks tired and beautiful. His smile is bright but there are dark circles under his eyes that weren't as obvious this past week on a phone screen.
"Jesus Christ, I'm so fucking glad you're home," Shane says. He comes out to kiss him when Ilya is still in the driveway, where anyone could see. If that's the welcome that Ilya can expect every time he comes home now, he's definitely not mad about it.
"Me too," Ilya says when they pull back to catch their breath. His lip stings from where it's still split up from his fight with Cahill on Thursday but right now he doesn't care at all. Anya has followed Shane out into the driveway and Ilya reaches down to scratch between her ears. "So happy to see my best boy and my best girl."
They go inside and collapse together on the couch while Anya trots behind them and lays down in her bed. Ilya wants a sandwich and to fuck Shane until he cries, but right now he just needs to be close to him for a little while. He tugs Shane down so he's resting his head on Ilya's chest and starts rubbing his thumb along the side of his neck.
"You have been worrying," Ilya says.
Shane shifts even closer to him, wrapping his arm around Ilya's torso. "I guess I've just been thinking. Sometimes I don't understand why you put up with me."
"When you try to make me drink gross protein shakes and steal all the pillows in the night, yes, I also wonder this. But what do you actually mean?"
What Shane says next surprises him. "I wanted us to wait until we retired. What the fuck was I thinking?"
"It wasn't just your decision. Was a decision that we made together."
Shane huffs out a frustrated breath. "C'mon. Let's be honest. You wanted to tell everyone like two days after we said that we loved each other. Four months ago I was still planning on making us wait for another ten years."
That's not untrue, but it would feel like a garbage time goal to agree with Shane right now.
"Maybe," Ilya says. "But maybe that wouldn't have been the right time. Good things have happened since then, yes? You won another cup. I signed a record-breaking contract that is going to keep us in caviar and fine jewelry when we retire. I have permanent residency in this boring maple syrup country. Maybe those things would not have happened if we had come out then."
"I guess."
"What is making you think about this?"
"I don't know," Shane says. "I think what I'm trying to say is that everything that's happening right now is terrible and I hate it. Everything that's bad is just as bad as I thought it was going to be. But I love you so much. I think I didn't realize -- I just love you so much more than I hate this. I didn't understand that part."
It feels big. As big as telling Crowell to fuck off. Too big inside Ilya's chest. He leans down to press kisses all over the top of Shane's head, and then tilts up his chin so he can kiss him on the mouth. "Ya tebya lyublyu," Ilya says. "Fuck, I love you more than anything."
They sit there in silence for a few moments, and then Shane says, "Series starts on Thursday."
"Yes. You are nervous? Afraid of losing to your future husband? This is understandable. But don't worry, I will still want to marry you after your team gets bounced in the first round."
"In your dreams, Rozanov."
Ilya used to dream about being able to tell the whole world how much he loves Shane. He's excited to see what other dreams might come true.