Chapter Text
I need the smell of summer. I need its noises in my ears.
–I Will Play My Game Beneath the Spin Light
Shane has actually never heard the stories. Not until he was in his mid-twenties and went searching for them online. Not until it happened to him, and he was desperate to know if he was the only one.
Why would he have come across them? When would he have? His algorithm has never shown him anything LGBTQ+ related except for about two weeks after he bought his first dildo and sex toys were advertised nonstop until Shane trained his algorithm back into hockey, cute animal videos, video games, and the occasional movie breakdown and prank video.
Suddenly he finds himself trolling the internet for as much information as possible regarding some variation of the phrase “how can moderately liberal parents who don’t care if other people are gay care if their own child is gay?”
Turns out there are a whole host of stories from other queer people sharing essentially the same experience Shane is having right now: our parents don’t care if other people are gay, but they sure as shit care when it’s their own child who’s gay.
There’s something arbitrarily ridiculous about this to Shane. How could you possibly be okay if someone else does something but not okay if it’s your own child? Then he thinks about how he’d feel if his parents were into something wildly out of character and suddenly he feels like maybe he understands it? He doesn’t care that some of his friends smoke weed, but he thinks he’d be weirded out if his parents did. Ilya introduced him to someone who is poly, and while Shane is certainly confused as fuck about it, he doesn’t think he cares. The idea of his parents bringing a third into their relationship really sets him off though, and he can’t stomach the idea. Is that what it’s like for them? An inability to bridge the gap between being okay with something theoretically but not being able to handle it in reality?
When things hit too close to home, is that when our real morals make themselves known?
“Ilya, come look,” Shane calls out from the couch where he’s doom scrolling stories from Reddit on his iPad. Ilya, who’s watering the plants he forced Shane to get for the cottage, leans over the back of the couch to see what Shane’s pointing at. “Apparently this is like, super common? There are all these stories.”
Ilya nods, like he does every time Shane brings something like this to his attention, squeezing Shane’s shoulder and dropping a kiss to the top of his head.
“Sad that this happens a lot,” Ilya replies.
They’ve talked about it before, endlessly actually. Shane thinks he has somehow forced this topic into at least 25% of his and Ily’s conversations over the last year. Ilya has never been anything other than supportive, though, so Shane doesn’t think he’s belaboring the topic too much.
“Yeah, it really is. This person said that all it took was time, though, and her parents came around. She said it just took some conversations and occasional meet ups, and, I mean, it was obviously harder than I’m making it out to be. They were even religious, which I don’t have to deal with,” Shane says. “So maybe just a little patience?”
“We can give it time,” Ilya replies, as he always does.
Shane goes back to reading and Ilya goes back to watering plants and no one mentions that it has been one year since David walked in on Shane and Ilya kissing, and Shane’s life came crumbling apart piece by piece.
There was no “No Son of Mine” lecture, no slurs were ever thrown around, and neither Shane nor Ilya were ever banished from Yuna and David’s house or life. Instead, a quiet questioning began, where all of Shane’s choices were investigated for motive and reason.
When did this start? When did it become serious? Are you sure about this? Who initiated it?
And that one was so embarrassing, because then he has to cop to his mother that for years they were fuck buddies, and that who started it and how it started doesn’t matter. In no way, shape, or form does Shane want to admit to sizing up Ilya in the showers and getting hard, and he doesn’t want to throw Ilya under the bus by telling his parents he started jerking off to get Shane’s reaction. It sounds so sleazy, and while Shane knows he and Ilya certainly do not have a meet-cute, it’s just too much to share the reality that for both of them this relationship started out as a pick-up in the locker room shower. Nothing more, nothing less, and not meant to be repeated. Certainly not meant to be long-term, and definitely not something he wants to talk with his parents about. Especially not after all this.
Currently Shane’s biggest issues boil down to two things; the first being that his mom is his manager and relies on the income she earns from Shane to live, and the second being that the tension between them means that Ilya is uncomfortable being around Shane’s parents but Shane doesn’t want to exclude Ilya from anything and he hates that he keeps putting Ilya in these awkward situations but also he isn’t ready to lay down an ultimatum with his parents.
Ilya has never, not once, asked to beg off of a family event. But Shane can’t pretend that it isn’t awkward when Ilya’s there, and he can’t pretend that his parents act normally in front of Ilya. He doesn’t want Ilya to think it’s okay how his parents overlook him and look down on him, or that they try to avoid being alone with him one on one. He wants Ilya to know that he sees what is happening and he isn’t okay with it.
But when Shane had tried to separate two of the biggest factions of his life, his parents and his partner, it led to dramatically uncomfortable consequences for his mental health. It just isn’t an option to leave Ilya at home for Christmas while he visits his parents, and it’s not an option to not see his parents at Christmas either. Ilya is not a puppy to be left at home when Shane wants to grab lunch with his parents during the off-season, and his parents shouldn’t not be invited to their cottage for a game night just because Ilya also lives there. He refuses to ignore Ilya’s presence in his life when he does talk to his parents, and he won’t let a conversation go by without mentioning Ilya as a steady presence in his everyday life. He hates to make people uncomfortable, but he has recently been asking himself why he has to always be the one who’s uncomfortable in return.
It’s all very stressful for Shane, having to navigate three other people’s feelings while ignoring his own and just hoping that everyone will get along and that his family will feel normal again.
“You’re going to give yourself a tension headache,” Ilya remarks from the back deck where he’s lounging for what will be their last week at the cottage. Shane’s pacing and quietly talking to himself – mostly in his head – practicing what he’ll say to his parents if any number of situations come up when they see each other. He’s preparing because they’re coming for dinner tonight and Shane needs it to go well, and in order for it to go well he needs to spend a few hours freaking out and thinking of every possible scenario and how he might best respond to it.
“No, no, I’m sorry,” Shane says, though he doesn’t stop pacing. “I’m feeling fine. Honestly.”
“Liar,” Ilya remarks, with absolutely no heat behind it. “Come sit down.”
He spreads his legs open on the lounge chair, an invitation for Shane to plop down and be held, and Shane so desperately wants to join him. But he really can’t stop himself from moving so he waves Ilya off and goes back to thinking about how he can bring up to his mother that Ilya’s move to Ottawa is so close to being in motion. Shane can almost taste it – just a few more months and he thinks that this could be official. Maybe by February, if they’re lucky. He thinks he can maybe get her on board to house hunt with him and Ilya, but he has to approach it just right or she will rebuff him, he thinks.
“Do you think I should invite her to come house hunting with us?” Shane asks.
Ilya snorts but then covers it up poorly. “I don’t think she cares where I live, Shane.”
“But she will care where I live, and it’s going to be our house. So I figure I can lay it out like that?”
“Shane, please come sit down.”
He finally obliges, leaning back against Ilya and allowing himself to be ensconced in a familiar embrace.
“I just…I just want this to work out.”
Ilya nods, which Shane can only tell because he feels Ilya doing it behind him.
“What can I do?” Ilya asks.
Shane relaxes against him, finally surrendering to the arms holding him together.
“I don’t think there’s anything you can do,” Shane admits. “You’ve done everything. Everything, Ilya. And they still treat you like an intrusion in their life. In my life.”
“They’ll come around,” Ilya repeats for what has to be the thousandth time. A mantra he’s been repeating to make Shane feel better. Except recently it has not been having the intended effect.
Shane is beginning to wonder if Ilya actually believes this or is just saying it for Shane’s sake. It’s an uncomfortable thought so he banishes it from his head.
Shane doesn’t know if his parents will come around, or when, or even what it will look like if they do. He’s feeling close to the end of his rope, ready to beg and plead with his parents to please please be normal. Go back to being normal.
“I just want everything to be normal again,” he whispers.
Ilya kisses him behind his right ear, squeezes his arms tighter, and puts all his love into their embrace.
After a few moments, Ilya tells Shane that he can invite Yuna to go house hunting. “Really. If it’s what you want. It could be a good opportunity to get to know each other.”
Shane knows an out when he sees one. It’s been a year since Shane was outed to his parents and his relationship with Ilya was put on full blast for them to see. They have all had plenty of opportunities to get to know each other, grow together, and find some semblance of harmony. But it hasn’t happened yet, and Shane still believes that there is something he is missing here that only he can fix. Just one or two levers he can pull, gears he can grind, that will make it so his parents fully accept and welcome Ilya into the fold.
“I’ll bring it up at dinner tonight,” he replies. For now he is enjoying leaning against his boyfriend – his partner – and letting Ilya hold him together.
When David first walked in on Shane and Ilya kissing, and Shane had to make what felt like a walk of shame to his parents house with Ilya in tow, he assumed that all he had to do was rip the bandaid off. There was no more hiding, there was no pretending this didn’t happen. The truth was out there whether he liked it or not, and he was vocal with Ilya about not liking it at all. But, he told himself, he just had to man up. He could do this. Rip the bandaid off, tell the truth, and tomorrow will be better.
He was really incredibly wrong about that.
Sometimes when Shane closes his eyes he can see the look of quiet disappointment on his father’s face, and utter confusion and borderline revulsion painting his mother’s as he stood in their entryway with Ilya beside him. It’s like nothing he had ever seen before.
He remembers being an average student, earning mostly B’s and C’s because why does a spelling test or a chemistry quiz matter when he was going to be playing hockey? Even if for some reason a professional playing career didn’t work out (which it would – it had to), he had every intention of following through with coaching or training or even podcasting. He could get an Associate’s Degree, find an unpaid internship, and work his way up in any number of hockey related positions. Worst case scenario he works in the AHL – the minor leagues. This was something he was ardently open about in his everyday life, so much so that when he told this to his high school guidance counselor, she called his parents and brought them in for a one-on-one meeting.
They backed him fully and his mom laughed in the guidance counselor’s face when she asked “What if this doesn’t work out?”
“He’s going to the IIHF World Junior Championship this year,” his mom said. “He’ll be drafted. Come on, Shane.” She stood up, grabbed her bag, and off they went.
When he lost his first tooth to a hockey fight in Grade 11, they paid for an oral surgeon. When it became clear Shane was being scouted for the MLH, his mother hired a media trainer to meet three times with Shane so he felt prepared to talk to scouts, coaches, the media – anyone and everyone. His mom went back to college for a Master’s degree in business when Shane was in middle school, and while she has never explicitly stated that it was for Shane, the whole family knew she was never going to work anywhere else. She earned that degree and immediately took the reins of his career and Shane never looked back once.
He’s made so many stupid mistakes in his life, and could point to each and every one of them and proudly state that his parents had his back completely and utterly. Even when he was in the wrong.
But somehow being gay and dating Ilya is where the line is drawn, and Shane can’t figure out why, because being gay and dating Ilya feels simultaneously like the most innocuous thing he has ever done and also the best thing he’s ever done. He wants to stand in front of his parents and shake Ilya profusely and yell look at him! Look at what a catch I got! Look at who is dating me and making me happy and loving me and look who I get to share my life with! Why can’t you see what I see?!
But it’s been one year, and Shane has to brace his knees every time he sees his parents now for fear of falling at their feet and begging their forgiveness for a transgression he doesn’t believe he committed.
Shane thinks that the best way to integrate his parents into his and Ilya’s life is to keep extending the olive branch and bringing everyone together, but under the guise of specific reasons. He quickly learns that they cannot come together unexpectedly or for no reason, and their meetings need to be relatively brief.
A few times Shane tried showing up randomly at his parents house with Ilya, something they never in the past had any issue with Shane doing when he was alone. Frankly, they welcomed it. Their home was Shane’s home, after all. But if Ilya was in tow, suddenly they were very busy and couldn’t stick around long. If Shane offered his and Ilya’s help running errands with them, their assistance was turned down. There were no last minute pool hangouts or visits to raid his parents fridge. Not if Ilya was with him. But with ample notice and a specific agreed upon purpose, Shane thinks he sees some progress being made.
Tonight they are having dinner, celebrating the end of summer and the beginning of training and the pre-season. Shane and Ilya have been at the cabin for most of the summer, but this will only be the third time everyone gets together for more than a few minutes (since all the surprise attempts were an utter failure).
Shane definitely isn’t freaking out.
“Shane, malysh, everything will be okay,” Ilya says as Shane checks that the table settings outside are perfect and the cloth napkins are folded in a way his mother will approve of.
Shane has never cared about table settings or cloth napkin folding, and if this were pre-Ilya he and his parents would probably be eating off paper plates and using paper towels. Suddenly, however, Shane has found himself trying to curate a life he isn’t sure he’s even living, hoping his parents will somehow equate solid blue organic cotton cloth napkins and Chilewich Basketweave Outdoor Placemats from Pottery Barn with Shane being a functional adult in a healthy and serious relationship with the man of his dreams.
“Yeah, of course everything will be okay,” Shane responds. It’s both a hope, a promise, and a prayer.
Ilya raises his eyebrows at him, arms crossed, and Shane has to bite his tongue to point out that he doesn’t need Ilya to supervise him, what he needs is for Ilya to plate the veggie and hummus tray.
He continues making micro-tweaks to the table setting, and Ilya eventually walks inside to, Shane hopes, slice radishes in a way that will make his mother forget that they have anal sex on the regular.
Eventually even Shane has to admit that everything is set up and prepared and there really is nothing more he can do but wait for his parents to arrive and hope that maybe the new high-end wine glasses he purchased – Gabriel-Glas Gold Edition set of six, which set Shane back a whopping $560USD – will be enough for his father to actually talk to Ilya about more than the weather or hockey or the exciting projects he’s working on at the Treasury Board of Canada. Those conversations really test Ilya’s love for Shane, because Shane has had to watch Ilya actively try to not have an aneurysm while attempting to seem interested in the updating of accounting standards for multiple government agencies or the cost-benefit analysis of building a bridge versus a bypass.
Thrilling stuff.
“They’re here,” Ilya says from the counter, where he did indeed slice the radishes in a way that doesn’t make Shane want to rip his hair out.
His parents have a code to both his front gate and his front door, so there’s no rush to go and let them in.
“I need you to know I love you,” Shane says frantically, because he’s suddenly realized how absurd this entire situation is and how much money he has dropped and how absolutely nightmarish he has been to Ilya in the days leading up to this. “And I appreciate you. And no matter what happens tonight, we are going to enjoy our last three days here. Okay?”
“Okay,” Ilya says, walking up to Shane and grabbing his chin. “I love you, too.”
“And I swear we will never have to use cloth napkins when it’s just the two of us even though I spent an absurd amount of money on this set up.”
Shane leans in for a kiss that Ilya smiles into, allowing himself a moment of reprieve from the stress he’s been holding onto for days. He feels it seep out bit by bit when Ilya’s tongue seeks entrance to Shane’s mouth and their tongues slide together briefly while Shane wraps his arms around Ilya’s waist. He wants to fall into it more, until he hears a cough from behind him.
“Hi mom,” he says in defeat, leaning his forehead against Ilya’s for a microsecond before turning around and putting his mask back on. “Thanks so much for coming. Here, let me grab that from you.”
He takes the large salad bowl from her hands and deposits it into the fridge, pulling out the hummus and edamame dip while he’s there.
Yuna nods at Ilya, awkwardly placing a hand on his shoulder when she walks past, and kisses each of Shane’s cheeks.
“What can I help with?” she asks, pulling out the cut veggies like she already knows what she’s doing.
David gives Ilya a firm handshake before coming up to hug Shane, and together the three of them bring the appetizers to the back deck while Ilya trails behind with a bottle of wine Yuna and David like.
No one comments on the radishes or the homemade hummus, but his father also doesn’t once bring up the riveting intricacies of an American 401k, which he had been reading about in an attempt to connect with Ilya (who, Shane knows for a fact, pays very little attention to his multiple retirement plans apart from his financial advisor giving a thumbs up or thumbs down during their quarterly meetings). Instead, he comments on the mess on the dock.
“What you got down there?” He nods towards the dock.
“Oh, Ilya and I were out on the lake earlier. Paddleboarding, kayaking. We still have to clean up.”
“Paddleboarding! That’s nice. I’ve always wanted to give that a try.”
“We’d love to take you out,” Ilya offers, biting off a chunk of a baby carrot. “We’re only here for a few more days, but I’m sure we can find some time.”
“Maybe,” David says, nodding as if in deep thought.
“David, honey, do you think that would be good for your back? He strained his back the other day,” Yuna adds.
“What happened?” Shane asks.
“Oh, nothing. Your mom’s being overly cautious. I pulled a muscle a week ago, got a massage, and I’m feeling a lot better now. But maybe she’s right. Best to not cause any undo strain.”
Shane nods, let’s everyone pretend he agrees, and quietly wonders if looking at his watch will make it too obvious that he’s hoping time is going faster than it feels like it is.
They don’t dawdle much through appetizers. Ilya mans the grill, because Shane is not sure he has the ability to perfectly time the salmon and the veggie skewers while his brain is running in thirty different directions at once.
“Dad, do you mind helping Ilya over there? Maybe grab a serving tray from the kitchen for him.”
“Sure, sure,” his dad says, meandering through the glass sliding doors and into the kitchen.
“Mom, how was golfing the other day?”
“It was lovely, actually. Mary-Ann came, thank god, so I didn’t have to be left alone with Deborah. You know how she can be. Oh! And Mary-Ann mentioned her daughter, Liz, officially moved to Montreal for a job in marketing. At Raymond James Financial, I believe. I told her you’d send Liz some of your favorite things to do in the city, maybe show her around.” She pulls out her phone and a few seconds later Shane’s watch buzzes – his mom sent over Liz’s contact card. For the second time in a month.
“Uh, sure, uhm. Okay,” Shane says, knowing he has no interest in connecting with Liz just so he can share what coffee shops he occasionally stops in or what Chipotle has the freshest lettuce. He didn’t want to connect with her a month ago when his mom first tried, either.
“I’m sure we could send her some of our favorite spots,” Ilya chimes in, placing the salmon on the tray his father deposited next to the grill. “There’s a few bars in Saint-Henri and Mile End I like. Maybe we can grab a drink?” It comes out as a question aimed at Shane, who isn’t able to respond before his mother does.
Yuna purses her lips and takes a sip of her sauvignon blanc. “Very kind of you, Ilya. I’m sure she’d appreciate it. Shane, really, it would be kind, while you’re in training at least, to connect with her. Mary-Ann is very kind to me.”
Shane clenches his jaw and asks her if she’d like a wine refill.
By the time they all sit down to eat, Shane is trying desperately to think of ways to get the conversation flowing better.
“Thanks, Ilya, for cooking. Mom, I found this lemon dill salmon recipe online, and Ilya has perfected it this summer.”
“Looking forward to trying it,” Yuna says, placing a small piece on her plate before passing it to David. “I wanted to check in about the Liquid IV sponsorship. I emailed you about it, but they are requesting an Instagram–”
“Mom,” Shane interjects. “Can we not talk about work right now? I was actually hoping to–”
“Shane, honey, it won’t take too long. I’m sure Ilya won’t mind.”
Shane rolls his eyes. “I’m not trying to avoid the conversation because I think Ilya will mind.” He takes a deep breath and tries to refocus himself. “I just…I have three days left of vacation. This seems like it can wait until then. Plus, Ilya and I were hoping to ask you something.”
Shane places his hand on Ilya’s thigh, and Ilya understands that as his cue.
“Yes! Yes. Uhm,” he coughs. “We think that my deal with the Centaurs will come through later this year. And Shane and I were, uhm, planning to start looking – maybe not seriously, not yet. Just to get an idea! – at some houses in Ottawa. We were hoping you’d be able to maybe help us, or lead us in a good direction.”
“It would be nice to look at places with you,” Shane says, more to the point. He doesn’t want to equivocate.
“Oh!” Yuna exhales, placing her fork down and putting her hands in her lap. “I didn’t realize you were actually planning on transferring.”
“Mom,” Shane says, a slight warning in his voice. “We’ve been telling you for a year that Ilya was a free agent after this season.”
“Well, yes, Shane. But–”
“We have been saying that he was in talks with the Centaurs,” he reminds her. “You know that we had Farah take him on as a client last year so that she could help bring him to Canada and so we could have someone on our team who knows about our relationship.”
“It’s just…that’s a big move is all I’m saying! And the Centaurs have historically struggled with even having winning seasons. It seems like quite the mismanagement of his car–”
“I think what your mother is trying to say,” David interjects, “is we are surprised, is all. That you, Ilya, are seriously considering moving to Ottawa. That’s all.” His father, per usual, pronounces his name as Ee-lee-yuh. Shane has corrected him multiple times until Ilya told him to just let it go.
Ilya squeezes Shane’s hand and interlaces their fingers on his thigh.
“Of course I was serious,” he says. “Shane and I want a future together.”
No one says anything, and Shane stews in the silence between them.
“Well,” his mother says as she stands up from the table with her partially full plate. “I’m sure I can look into high-end realtors. David, honey, can you help me clear the table? The boys cooked, so we’d be happy to clean up.”
“Of course, of course,” David replies, following suit and carrying the roasted vegetables inside.
Shane was going to go for seconds, but whatever.
When the table is cleared and dessert has been brought out and picked at listlessly, Shane decides to try one more time.
“I’ll send you some properties we are thinking about looking at, and maybe you can take a look at them and send us pictures and your thoughts?”
Yuna nods slowly, her face a blank canvas that makes Shane feel like he’s looking at himself.
“I’m rather busy this upcoming fall, what with the increase in your sponsorships and my golf lessons. But of course feel free to share what places interest you. And I will send realtor options. Diane worked with someone a few years ago who came highly recommended. You remember her, Shane? I met her through your Nike deal. Anyway, I’ll just reach out to her.”
Shane nods, understanding that the conversation has come to its natural conclusion. He tries to not let his stomach roll too badly from upset.
“That was awkward, right? It was awkward,” Shane states after his parents have left and the kitchen has been cleaned.
“No more awkward than the last few times,” Ilya laconically responds.
“Do you think she’ll actually help us look at places?” Shane asks.
Ilya drops the rag he was using to dry the dishes and turns towards Shane.
“You know her better than I do. What do you think?”
“I think she was bullshitting me. And did you hear her mention Liz? Liz, Ilya! Liz! Liz is the same girl she brought up last time we got together, a month ago. Remember?!”
Ilya nods, and Shane knows that he’s likely trying so hard to hold his tongue. Shane has been complaining about Liz for a while now. Not because he dislikes her – he’s never met her. But his mom keeps breathing down his back to meet up with her.
“I don’t want to meet up with fucking Liz, Ilya. And what was with her weirdly trying to get out of helping us house search? Do you know how involved she was when I had this cabin built? Every property I buy she wants to walk through before I sign the papers!”
Ilya nods, but keeps his distance, and Shane is grateful for that because he is working himself up and doesn’t think he’d appreciate Ilya trying to calm him down right now.
“Why aren’t you saying anything?” Shane exclaims.
Ilya takes a breath and caves in on himself a bit, and Shane immediately apologizes and steps forward, arms raised in surrender.
“Sorry, sorry. I’m just annoyed. Not at you!”
“You’re allowed to be,” Ilya acknowledges. “I…You are so close with your mother, Shane, and I really don’t want to get in the middle of it. I just want to support you however I can.”
“I know, I know that. And you do. You really do. But you’re allowed to have thoughts and opinions, too.”
Ilya nods and contemplates for a moment.
“I don’t think she will help us look for a house. And yes, you are right to feel annoyed at her bringing Liz up again. But I do think that this went well, tonight.”
“Did it go well or did it just not go poorly?”
Ilya steps forward and hugs him. He doesn’t answer Shane’s question, but his silence is answer enough.
He lets a few tears slip from the corner of his eyes.
Last month when Shane and Ilya went golfing with his mom, she made a few comments that didn’t irk Shane until a few days later when he finally connected some dots. They did a half-course at the country club his mother is a member of because Shane did not want to subject Ilya to four hours with his mom on a full course.
She mostly talked to Shane, though occasionally asked Ilya a question. She wouldn’t let Ilya drive the golf cart, only herself or Shane, making some underhanded comments about a golf cart being different than a Lamborghini. Ilya chose to laugh at them as if they were an inside joke, but it didn’t take a genius to know it was forced and made him uncomfortable. Shane, truly afraid to stand up to his mother, shared a conspiratorial eyeroll with Ilya and apologized to him afterwards.
“When is Rose coming out to visit?” his mother asked Shane as they drove to the next hole, Ilya sitting in the back with all of the golf bags.
“Hmm?” Shane asked.
“Doesn’t Rose come out every year?”
“Uh, she came for a weekend last year, during playoffs when Ilya and I went over to the cottage a bit early. But that’s the only time she’s come out during the summer. Usually if she visits it’s in Montreal.”
“So she isn’t coming out this summer?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t invite her.”
“Why not? She’s so lovely.”
“You’ve literally never met her,” Shane replied.
“Well, I would love to one day.”
Ilya stayed quiet, and Shane changed the subject to something entirely unimportant but one that Ilya could be involved in.
It took almost three days until Shane shot up off the couch, Ilya nearly falling over as his legs had been lying on top of Shane’s lap, and exclaimed, “Was my mom asking about Rose because she was like, trying to get me and her back together?”
“Yes, dear,” Ilya responded sarcastically, closing his book to give Shane his attention.
“Oh my fucking god.”
“Did you really not pick up on that?”
“I fucking swear. I had no idea until now.”
Ilya snorted. “Shanya, she was absolutely trying to set you two back up.”
“Fucking hell.” Shane felt scandalized. “In front of you?! That’s so fucked up.”
Ilya raised his eyebrows and opened his book back up. “Yup.” He popped the ‘p’ and went back to reading.
What Shane couldn’t wrap his mind around was why, a full year after he came out as gay, his mom kept trying to have him meet women. Why she thought it was okay to bring up in front of his boyfriend.
He sat back down on the couch, felt unsettled, and gave Ilya a foot massage, hoping that would somehow miraculously heal how disastrous it must have been to have to sit through that conversation on the golf cart and keep his mouth shut.