Rating:

Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warning:

Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Categories:

F/F, M/M

Fandom:

Heated Rivalry (TV)

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Characters:

Original Female Character(s), Shane Hollander, Ilya Rozanov, and a smattering of cameos

Additional Tags:

POV Outsider, Canon Compliant, spoilers for "The Long Game", Domestic Boyfriends, Fashion Industry references, Coming Out, the continuing adventures of shane hollander's stylist, and her obliviousness with regards to anything hockey-related, slightly abridged 5+1

Language:

English

Series:

Part 2 of shane's stylist

Stats:

Published: 2026-09-20 Updated: 2026-10-18 Words: 10,839 Chapters: 3/5

this place could be beautiful

Summary

“Is that what he does, then?” she asks, walking down the hallway to put the garment bag next to the one already there.

She turns back, and sees Shane looking at her with a furrowed brow. She thought that question was clear, but perhaps not. “Like, philanthropy?” Given what hot boyfriend wears, he’s got to be making some serious buck. Or he was born into wealth. “My friend James dated a Russian socialite for a couple of months, and she just went to art galleries and threw dinner parties,” Ana elaborates. “Her dad’s an oligarch who, like, defected from the motherland in the late nineties.”

or: four times shane's stylist meets his boyfriend, and one time she finally figures out who the boyfriend actually is.

Notes

the premise was too tempting to not keep adding to it, so this is a direct sequel to 'speak to us of clothes', and this won't make sense if you haven't read that. posting chaptered, probably bi-weekly, to force myself to finish the last two instalments and finally get this off my desk.

i will also eventually reply to all the comments left on the first part, but there are honestly so many i feel slightly overwhelmed. this was meant to be a silly little self-indulgent story, so the response has been nothing short of mind-boggling.

so i hope you enjoy more of ana and the bane of her existence aka hockey players who can't dress themselves. her and i have that in common. you can also come yap at me about why all these men seem to think that patterned suits are hot shit on tumblr.

thanks to my pal k for editing as always.

title is from 'good bones' by maggie smith.

p.s.: fashion links in the end notes.

Chapter 1: 1.

Ana doesn’t have the greatest track record when it comes to making decisions. Her head’s been pounding for days, even after she dropped her mother off at the airport, so she takes some aspirin, washes it down with a bottle of sauvignon blanc, and promptly falls asleep on her parents’ couch. She wakes just past four in the morning, feeling almost as bad as she’d felt the day she’d practically set her life on fire, and throatily groans into the silence.

She gets up, has a lukewarm shower, and puts on a pair of dungarees she’s owned since she was fourteen years old. They’ve got a pretty significant hole right in the crotch, but she’s wearing nice underwear, and she’s waxed, and she really doubts Shane will care when she heads over to his later. It’s still just below twenty degrees, so she picks a cashmere sweater, foregoes a bra, and rummages through the kitchen for something to settle her stomach.

Once she doesn’t feel like she’s about to puke anymore, she finishes packing. Her flight isn’t until tomorrow morning, but she knows she won’t feel settled unless everything’s organized. She’s glad Shane’s an early riser as well, and had readily agreed to meet quite early, because otherwise she might feel paralyzed all day.

Ana has to swing by her favourite tailor before, though; it’s run by an old Vietnamese couple who always offer her tea when she’s there to drop off or pick up. They offer her tea this time as well, but she politely declines. She’d have the time, but her usual pre-travel jitters always weaken her bladder, and she doesn’t want to need the bathroom halfway through the fitting.

She parks on the street across from Shane’s building and lets herself in, carefully avoiding the leftover puddles from yesterday’s torrential downpour. Her loafers are brand-spanking new. Ana takes the lift up to the top floor, muffles a yawn into her shoulder, then knocks on Shane’s apartment door. Then, a minute later, she knocks again. And again.

“Oh, Christ,” she mutters under her breath and pulls out her phone. It’s seven fifty-seven. They’d agreed they’d meet at eight. Ana is about to pull up his contact – maybe he had to step out for something – when the front door opens to reveal a bleary-eyed, crease-faced Shane in a tee and sweats. He must’ve just rolled out of bed.

“Jesus, Ana, what –”

She checks her phone again. There’s no way she’s accidentally managed to switch back to LA time. The sun is up. Mrs. Ngyuen offered her tea. “We agreed to eight, right?”

Shane’s eyes go wide. “Is it –”

“I can come back in like, a half hour?” she offers. He’s finished his season, if she remembers correctly, so maybe he’d needed to sleep in, but he’s never not been on time, and Shane has always struck her as the kind of guy who maintains a very strict routine, even if he doesn’t have to. “Grab a coffee down the –”

“No, no, sorry,” he says, and opens the door wider, “I thought I set an alarm, but…” Trailing off, he steps aside to let her in.

Ana toes off her loafers and moves to hang up her jacket when the whole ‘not setting an alarm’ and forgetting the time thing starts to make sense. Because judging by the very lovely leather bomber jacket already hanging on the coat rack, hot boyfriend is definitely here, and considering what he looks like, she doesn’t blame Shane for forgetting literally everything else.

“Can you give me five minutes?” Shane asks once they’re in the living room, looking mildly flustered and scratching the back of his neck. “I’m just gonna jump in the shower and –”

“Take however long you need,” Ana tells him, draping the garment bag over the back of the couch. He’s so apologetic about literally everything. It’s refreshing after working with assholes for years, but technically, he’s her boss. It’s fine if he’s an inconvenience from time to time, considering how well he pays her. “I’m gonna help myself to coffee.”

“Yeah, sure,” he says, already turning towards the staircase. “Sorry again.”

Ana waves him off, and Shane disappears towards his bedroom. The open kitchen shows remnants of what appears to be at least somewhat of a romantic evening. Plates not yet put in the dishwasher, and two long-stemmed wine glasses in the sink. She needs probably a full minute to find the on switch for his fancy espresso machine.

As promised, Shane walks back downstairs just over five minutes later, wearing a white tee and a pair of Thom Browne sweatpants she definitely didn’t buy for him. Although he shouldn’t have bothered, really, since he needs to undress anyway to try on the new suit and shirt she’s gotten for him. Ana only had him fitted for a tux a couple months ago, but athletes, she’s now learning, apparently gain and lose a whole lot of muscle mass throughout the season, and he’s got enough money that it’s not really necessary to keep taking the same tux in, and letting the seam allowance back out again when needed.

So she got him a nice, new Zegna suit, wool and mohair mix. She likes Italian tailoring on him, she thinks as Shane dutifully steps out of the sweats and into the pants. French and British styles tend to favour a skinnier frame. Italian silhouettes are classic, more bold and generous. Much more suitable for a hockey player.

The pants fit perfectly, which isn’t a surprise. “Wanna squat?” she jokes, handing Shane the shirt.

He snorts, almost a laugh, and it’s nice to see the tension from earlier almost gone. She doubts that he’ll ever be fully comfortable with fittings, but Ana is quick, efficient, which he surely appreciates. She drapes the jacket over the crook of her left arm, and works the buttons, fingers moving practiced and much quicker than if Shane would do it himself.

“Are you looking forward to your trip?” he asks as she smooths out the front and adjusts the starched collar, not – she suspects – because he doesn’t like drawn-out silence, but because he thinks she doesn’t. He tries, bless him, and she doesn’t have it in her to tell him that it’s absolutely fine if he’s quiet.

She’s not looking forward to her trip, actually, because while she has no family in Canada besides her parents, she has about a hundred cousins in Croatia, and one of them is getting married. So there’ll also be aunts and uncles and old-fashioned grandparents who’ll keep asking why she’s still not married. If it’s even worse than she’s preparing for, a handful of her friends from LA are holidaying in Greece, so she has an escape route.

“Eh,” she replies, non-committal, “it’ll be hot, at least. Plus, I have a really inappropriate dress for the wedding.” It’ll give her family something to talk about other than her lack of husband.

Shane looks surprised. She’d love to look inside his head and see what his idea of inappropriate wedding attire is. Probably not even close to what it means to her.

“Oh, nothing too bad,” she adds. “Just – tits out, you know,” then points to her flat chest. “Not that there is much to be out.” He’s got a much better rack than she does. So does hot boyfriend, if she remembers correctly.

Speaking – or rather thinking – of the devil, heavy steps sound on the stairs just as she hands Shane the jacket. Hot boyfriend is as hot as she remembers, she notices appreciatively when she glances over her shoulder and sees him coming down from Shane’s bedroom, clad in nothing but a pair of scandalously small and tight black boxer briefs.

Even out of the corner of her eye, Ana can tell that Shane is rapidly turning the colour of her freshly manicured nails.

“Good morning,” she says, and gives hot boyfriend a very pointed once-over.

Hot boyfriend pauses, just for a beat, nods at her, then makes his way into the kitchen, bee-lining towards the coffee machine. Not a morning person,then.

“Pants weren’t an option?” Shane says to him, face still aflame.

Honestly, Ana doesn’t blame him. If she were a gay man, she’d probably be on the floor, weeping. Last time, hot boyfriend had been dressed, and she’d been in such a hurry, so she’d mostly just noticed his arms, which are still very noticeable. But so is his very impressive backside.

She turns back to Shane, and pointedly raises one brow. He looks like he wants the ground to swallow him whole. It’s hilarious. “Mazel tov,” she tells him, voice full of glee.

Before he can reply, hot boyfriend comments from his spot in the kitchen, “You took mine!”

The coffee machine whirrs, slightly drowning out Shane’s muttered response of, “Not like we’ve got another two dozen in the closet.”

Ana helps him into the jacket, waits for him to shrug it on before bringing her hands to the lapels. She won’t tell him that there definitely aren’t another two dozen pairs of two-thousand dollar sweatpants in that closet. Shane isn’t stingy, and he gets that quality comes at a price, but she’s pretty sure he’d draw a line at dropping two grand for athleisure. Especially considering he gets most of it for free.

“How’s the fit?” she asks. It looks great, but if he can’t move, she needs to get it back to Mr. Ngyuen before noon for an end-of-day turnaround.

Shane moves his shoulders and lifts his arms a little, eyes flickering to the side where hot boyfriend saunters around the kitchen island, coffee in hand, leans his hip against the marble he might as well be carved out of as well. Ana cannot for the life of her remember his name. It’s possible he didn’t tell her, but it’s just as likely that she simply forgot. She’s terrible with names.

“Fine,” Shane says, clearly distracted, but that is still no excuse.

He’s lucky she just swats at him, and doesn’t pinch his nipples. “Fine? Excuse you!”

“Sorry, it’s good. Great!” he corrects himself quickly, moving his arms demonstratively. He’s still quite red.

“That’s better,” Ana drawls, but Shane is distracted now.

The eye-fucking that’s happening is slightly concerning, given that she’s somehow still practically in the middle of it, but she can’t exactly blame hot boyfriend. Ana’s so good at her job. Shane looks delicious.

It’s probably better if she gets out of here sooner rather than later.

She helps Shane slide off his jacket, puts it on the hanger, then slaps his hands away when he starts undoing the buttons of the shirt. Chastised, he lets his arms drop to his side. Ana doesn’t trust him to properly press the shirt, and he’s just going to crease it pulling at the buttons like that. Her eyes flicker towards hot boyfriend, sipping coffee, entirely unbothered. Locked in on Shane like a hawk.

“Are you going to the dinner thing, too?” She glances at hot boyfriend, who needs a beat to realize she’s talking to him.

He raises one browand tilts his head almost imperceptibly, an expression on his face that Ana can’t really place, and for a moment, she wonders if he hadn’t understood the question. English is clearly not his first language, and while she had the impression his grasp on it was pretty solid, she might’ve been wrong. She’s also been known for talking too fast.

But then he says, “Yes.”

Nothing else. Not a morning person, and maybe not much of a talker, either. To be fair to him, the question was pretty straightforward.

“And? What are you wearing?”

It’s none of her business, and she’s prepared for him to tell her he’s wearing a suit, full stop. But she is just dying to know what the man who wears Thom Browne sweats and vintage Jean Paul Gaultier would choose to wear for a fancy dinner with his probably-still-sort-of-in-the-closet squeeze.

Hot boyfriend continues to look at her, assessing, clearly. Ana isn’t sure what exactly he’s weighing up in his head; she can only tell that there’s definitely something. Thankfully, in the end, he shrugs, and nods towards the hallway coatrack. There’s a black garment bag right there, and Ana can’t believe she didn’t notice it coming in.

“Can I?” she asks, already walking.

He shrugs. “Sure. But, you know, Shane says the dress code is ‘boring', so…”

“What?” Shane squawks, one leg in his pants, one out of them. “I did – my mom told you it was black tie!”

There isn’t too much wriggle room with black tie. It’s not a red carpet. But oh, Ana thinks as she carefully opens the garment bag, it’s not boring. It’s simple, yes, but very sleek, and very sexy. Black Dolce with broad lapels. Black waistcoat, shirt and bowtie. Ana likes him.

She glances at him over her shoulder, and zips the garment bag up again. “All black? Naughty.”

Hot boyfriend winks. Oh, she loves him.

“You know,” she says, turning on her heels and walking back towards the couch, taking the pants Shane just draped over the back to fold them properly along the crease. “Next time, give me a heads up, and I can totally coordinate outfits. Not like Britney and Justin at the AMAs kind of coordinated,” Ana tags on quickly when she sees how Shane instantly blanches, freezing where he’s pulling the two-grand sweats up his legs.

Right, she has to keep reminding herself, still in the closet. “Just something subtle. Complementary. Like…JFK Jr. and Carolyn Bessette.”

God, what a vision, Ana thinks. She’s going to have to start a moodboard for this. Classic, preppy but tasteful for Shane. Sleek and expensive for his blue-eyed beau.

And then, because she absolutely cannot help herself, she throws, “Of course, you’d be the hot blonde,” the boyfriend’s way.

As much as he’s probably annoyed at her presence, and maybe even more at the fact that Shane is now fully dressed again, his brows shoot up in amusement, and Ana guesses he at least appreciates her specific brand of humour. Eastern European queer snark, or something like that, anyway. Hot boyfriend stays quiet though, empties his coffee, and – with a very pointed look at Shane – leaves the kitchen and heads back upstairs.

Shane’s eyes follow him, which is understandable. That ass probably has its own field of gravity. Time for Ana to wrap this up.

“It’s nice, that he’s going to be there,” she still muses out loud as she puts all parts of the suit back in its bag, careful not to crease it anywhere. “What’s the dinner for, again?”

Shane takes a moment to reply, visibly struggling with tearing himself away from the sight of his boyfriend ascending the stairs. “A fundraiser. For a charity we started.” He clears his throat, cheeks still flushed, and rubs his neck, not meeting her eyes. “Hockey camps for kids in the summer, with the proceeds going to some mental health organizations.”

She hums. That sounds like an on-brand thing for an athlete like Shane to do. It’s still commendable, she guesses. A lot of rich people don’t seem to give a shit. And it’s nice that his boyfriend can be involved in some way, even if it’s probably behind the scenes. Hot boyfriend might also just be attending as a wealthy donor, and not Shane’s plus one.

“Is that what he does, then?” she asks, walking down the hallway to put the garment bag next to the one already there.

She turns back, and sees Shane looking at her with a furrowed brow. She thought that question was clear, but perhaps not. “Like, philanthropy?” Given what hot boyfriend wears, he’s got to be making some serious buck. Or he was born into wealth. “My friend James dated a Russian socialite for a couple of months, and she just went to art galleries and threw dinner parties,” Ana elaborates. “Her dad’s an oligarch who,like, defected from the motherland in the late nineties.”

Ana thinks that explains her thoughts. But Shane is still looking at her like he doesn’t quite understand what she’s saying. She doesn’t get what’s not to understand. Shane’s not an idiot. Surely, he knows what an oligarch is, even if the term “socialite” might not be one he’s heard before. Maybe he’s just distracted, though, thinking about what’s waiting for him in his bedroom.

“Oh, uh,” he stutters eventually, “no. Ilya and I are just doing the charity together.”

Ilya, she registers, and now she’s sure he hadn’t introduced himself last time. She thinks she would’ve been able to remember four letters.

“Right,” Ana says, and feels like they’re still talking past each other. But it doesn’t really matter. She’s tired, and Shane is probably eager to get railed six ways to Sunday, and they both deserve a nice, relaxing summer break. His will undoubtedly be more satisfying than hers, but there’s also nothing to do about that now. “Well, I’m sure it’ll be grand. And I hope you two enjoy yourselves.”

“Thanks,” Shane replies earnestly. “I hope you have fun at your cousin’s wedding.”

Ana sighs. “Unlikely, but I appreciate the sentiment.” She grabs her bag and car keys, and gives him a two-fingered salute. “Text me if you have any sartorial emergencies. I’ll see you when I see you.”

With that, she’s out the door, mind already a few steps ahead, wondering if there’s enough food in the house for lunch and a small dinner, or whether she should just get an iced mocha and a family-size serving of Timbits and call it a day. Distracted, she walks out the door and onto the sidewalk, and immediately steps into a puddle so deep she’s got water splashing around her ankles.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

It’s May, and it’s still below twenty, and she’s just soaked through a one-thousand dollar pair of loafers.

She fucking hates Montréal.

Chapter 2: 2.

Chapter Summary

“I mean,” Ana says, “he’s been at the apartment when I’ve been over for fittings. So I wasn’t exactly formally introduced,” she concedes. “But, I don’t know. I don’t feel like they’d run in the same circles.” Maybe Ana’s reading is wrong, but as much as she’s not a people person, she thinks she’s pretty observant, and outside of her own relationships, tends to be spot on.

Rose doesn’t say anything. Her eyebrows just go up and up and up, and Ana shrugs. “Or was it one of those fabled Grindr hookups that turned into true love?”

Chapter Notes

so the other day my pal k who graciously edits this messaged me saying 'hey apparently macklin celebrini has hired a stylist' and i thought thank god, because they all really need one and then yesterday she sends me a picture of his walk in look and my response was 'is the stylist getting paid for THAT?' and honestly at this point i am living vicariously through ana in the hope that someone else out there will teach all these stupid men how to dress. christ almighty.

title is from 'good bones' by maggie smith.

p.s.: fashion links in the end notes.

The wedding is, just like Ana expected, an absolute fucking shitshow. The bride, her barely-over-twenty-year-old cousin, struts down the aisle in an absolutely hideous, white marshmallow explosion that makes Ana want to poke her eyes out with hot spoons. She’s put her bridesmaids into slip dresses so yellow they’d probably glow in the dark. For most of the day, Ana hides out in quiet corners to smoke and answer work-related emails on her phone. Her Croatian is fine, but she speaks like a toddler, and it makes her feel uneasy. The only pleasant conversation she has is with her equally gay cousin Matej, who’s been living in Stockholm for the past seven years and very much has not brought his boyfriend along, even though they’ve been together for almost as long.

They met at university, Matej tells her over too-warm sparkling wine and wilting canapés. His parents are fine with it, but it’s far from okay, and Ana feels that. Their queerness is palatable if it remains unnoticeable, and strangely enough, it makes her think of Shane, and his situation, and how it was probably easier for him before he got in a serious relationship. She figures Ilya being Russian puts him in a unique position as well, and maybe he’s not putting any pressure on Shane to come out, his heritage complicating it all in a similar way.

But it can’t be easy. Ana never really did formally come out to her parents. She just started dating girls, and that had been that. Although she’s pretty sure her mother still hopes it’s a phase she’ll eventually grow out of. It’s one of the reasons their relationship has been strained for a long time. Her mother doesn’t understand her life, her job, and she makes no effort to, either. Her dad, a quiet and steady peacekeeper, can only do so much to mediate, so she lasts barely over a week in Zadar before she packs her suitcase and is on the next flight to Kos.

It’s a chaotic group she’s known for a couple of years, and they’ve been to Cabo together, which had been fine. It’s fine now; a small villa with a private pool only a short walk from the beach. They have ouzo for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and practically every moment in between. Ana lies awake every night, staring at the ceiling fan, too hot to sleep, and ignores the messages her ex continues to send through Instagram, where Ana still hasn’t blocked her.

Days bleed into weeks and then Rose asks her to come to Venice with her for the film festival, so she has about a week to coordinate with her sometimes-assistant in Paris to get the looks she wants. Rose funds her new flights, and a small AirBnB near the Ponte diRialto for her, the make-up artist,and hair stylist. Ana puts her in two looks from MGC’s latest couture collection and pairs it with jewellery from Lorraine Schwartz. It fits the atmosphere of the city, even if Ana prefers Venice in winter when the smell of the canals doesn’t permeate the air.

It’s a rush, getting back into the swing of things, and Ana loves the process, and she loves this whole circus, surrounded by beautiful things and beautiful people. Getting to work with great creatives. She has to continuously remind herself as the day goes by that while this is fun, she can’t do this every day for the foreseeable future. She loves working with Rose, because Rose is lovely, and kind, and her friend, but it just rubs her the wrong way, always being of service to people. Giving so much of herself and never getting, never asking for, anything in return.

She’s burnt out. Smoke in the air levels of burning out.

At two in the morning, she peels Rose out of her Dior gown, and they share fries and a bottle of champagne, lying on top of the covers in Rose’s hotel suite; Xhana, Rose’s make-up artist, casually draped on top of the chaise longue in the corner, scrolling through their phone. Rose takes a swig of the champagne. It’s uncoordinated, and the bottle is heavy, and some of it spills onto Rose’s chest, pearling around her left nipple.

Ana feels a pang of heat between her legs.

“Ugh,” she groans, “I need to get laid.”

Xhana and Rose both snort.

“Are there no lesbians in Montréal?” Rose teases, and Ana holds out her hand for the bottle.

“You know I’m not good at meeting people,” Ana reminds her. The two of them are only friends because Rose tends to imprint on emotionally unavailable people and gets attached. They’d both been young and broke in LA, so it had also made sense to stick together. Rose had been there when she’d met her ex, too, so Ana knows it wasn’t thanks to her people skills. “I just want to fuck; I don’t want the awkward conversations that lead up to it.”

She omits the food blogger she’s seen every time she’s gone down to New York this past year. She also doesn’t mention the unanswered messages from her ex in her DMs that she’s not deleted, the last one quite bluntly asking Ana if she was finally done throwing a hissy fit.

Ana passes the champagne back to Rose. “How did Shane meet his boyfriend, by the way?” He seems equally avoidant of most social situations; a clear discomfort, palpable even when they only talk about events he has to attend. Hot boyfriend – Ilya, Ana reminds herself – didn’t give Ana any vibes that he was out there collecting strays like Rose. His presence, from his clothes to the lack of them, felt quite intentional, but also restrained.

Rose freezes, bottle halfway to her mouth. Ana hopes she doesn’t spill more. Who knows if they can get their hands on another one. “You’ve met Ilya?”

She sounds shocked, which – sure. Closet and all. But Rose knows him as well, so its walls seem to be at least semi-transparent.

“I mean,” Ana says, “he’s been at the apartment when I’ve been over for fittings. So I wasn’t exactly formally introduced,” she concedes. “But, I don’t know. I don’t feel like they’d run in the same circles.” Maybe Ana’s reading is wrong, but as much as she’s not a people person, she thinks she’s pretty observant, and outside of her own relationships, tends to be spot on.

Rose doesn’t say anything. Her eyebrows just go up and up and up, and Ana shrugs. “Or was it one of those fabled Grindr hookups that turned into true love?”

It makes Rose squawk with laughter. “Oh, I am so gonna tell Shane that’s what you think,” she sing-songs, and keeps laughing, even as Ana throws fries in her face.

“You’re children,” Xhana says. They get up and walk over to the bed, pick the fries off the bed. “Stop wasting food.” They press a kiss to Rose’s flushed cheeks, and catch the next fry Ana throws straight out of the air.

For the next few minutes, they just pass the rest of the champagne between the three of them, then Xhana deposits the bottle on the nightstand, and lies down next to Rose, head on Rose’s tits.

“You still haven’t been to a hockey game, have you?” Rose asks eventually, and there’s something in her eyes that tells Ana she’s definitely being made fun of. Canadian and not into hockey, or something, haha.

“I’d rather die,” Ana replies, melodramatically. But she can think of about a thousand things she’d rather do. “Why?”

Rose snorts. “No reason.” She stretches, and puts her arms around both Xhana and Ana. “Hey, we should have a threesome!”

Ana sighs. “I don’t fuck straight people.”

She wriggles out of Rose’s grip and swings her legs over the edge of the bed. There’s sweat in every crevice of her body, dried and tacky. Ana feels disgusting.

“I’m gonna go drown myself in your shower.”

Ana heads to the atelier of a small Venetian brand on her last day in the city. She’s been a fan for a while, and picks up a coat and pair of pants for herself, and some looks for Shane. She’s sure he will appreciate the simplicity and quality of the craftsmanship; one hundred percent natural fibres, and timeless design, with a modern edge.

She takes a small detour to New York for Pierre’s fortieth birthday, which they spend day-drinking, hopping from brunch to lunch to dinner to dancing, and then straight to breakfast, dark designer shades heavy on their faces as they sit in the sun on Bowery, nursing Bloody Marys. As always when Ana is in New York, she spends the rest of the day – once she’s napped and sobered up – thrifting. She’s glad she’s come with checked baggage, because she unearths a lot of treasures. Nothing quite like the thirty-dollar Chanel dress she stumbled upon in Greenpoint a few years back, but still.

There are also some great vintage Yohji Yamamoto pieces she almost buys for Shane. He’d look incredible in them, but she talks herself out of it. They’re too dark, and too fussy in a way she knows Shane won’t appreciate. Maybe she can slowly introduce him to Yohji via Y-3. If he ever gets out of his Reebok deal, his mom should angle for a contract with Adidas. Hot boyfriend can most definitely afford it, but Ana is sure he won’t mind some freebies, and dipping into the brand’s ongoing collab with Yohji Yamamoto would be a nice way for Shane to play more with his heritage.

Food blogger slash culinary influencer slash cookbook author messages her later that day. Apparently they have a mutual friend and she saw Ana on said friend’s Instagram story about Pierre’s party. Ana did mean it when she said she needed to get laid, so she agrees to head up to Astoria for a late dinner, a shared bottle of Lillet, and a fumble in the bar’s bathroom to take the edge off, which only makes her hotter and wetter, legs like jelly when they do eventually stumble out into the night and to food blogger’s apartment. They fuck in the kitchen, and on the living room carpet, and eventually on top of the sheets until the early hours of the morning.

Ana slips out before they can even talk about her staying for breakfast.

She spends the last days of summer in Montréal, carefully photographing outfits and then removing the tags from the clothes she’s picked for Shane and neatly putting them away in her possibly over-the-top filing system in case she needs to return any of them. Ana hopes he won’t mind that she’s pushing the envelope a little. Not as far as she’d like, given what she’s working with, outrageously beautiful athlete and all. Some more colour, and some more textures, but ultimately still within the confines of his particular box of masculinity. Ana desperately wants him in silk and lace, contrasted with heeled boots and patent leather, complementing his delicate features.

But those ideas will have to remain on her moodboards, along with the far-too-extensive deep dive into JFK Jr. and the inimitable Carolyn Bessette.

It’s a shame, really. Ana’s never had a lot of male clients. She knows part of the reason for that is that a lot of men – gay and straight alike – don’t really want to be dressed by women, just as they don’t want to wear clothes designed by women. But the more Ana works with Shane, and the more she has to think about masculinity and gender conformity and performance, the more she is intrigued by it.

Ana is a bit of a tomboy herself, even if she’s always hated that term. Always a tad too skinny, no curves to speak of, but being gay, femininity and the male gaze hadn’t really been at the forefront of her mind for most of her life. By contrast, masculinity probably features very heavily in Shane’s.

She tries to conjure up Scott Hunter’s image as she loads garment bag after garment bag into her truck. A handsome, all-American guy, she recalls. Good-looking, for sure, but also more generic than Shane, for obvious reasons. It’s probably a lot easier for a guy like that to blend in than it is for Shane.

So Ana will stick to her recipe, and she will continue to wrap Shane in clothes that protect rather than expose him, until one day, maybe, the world will find itself becoming a kinder place. But she isn’t holding her breath.

It’s still early when she drives to Shane’s, but it’s unusually warm for this time of year, her bare legs sticking to the leather seats, sweat already gathering at the back of her knees. She definitely feels damp when she assembles the garment rail once she’s parked in the underground parking garage of Shane’s building. After a couple of minutes, she hauls the rail and herself into the lift, squeezing into a corner, and presses the button for the penthouse.

Shane is waiting for her in the short hallway to his apartment, ready to help her with the frankly shockingly overloaded rail, but Ana shoos him out of her way.

“I am a strong, independent woman,” she huffs, wheels of the rail rattling as she pushes it out of the lift and towards the front door. “Watch your feet.” Thankfully, Shane presses himself against the wall less than a second later, saving his toes. “One of the first jobs I did,” Ana rambles on, “girl came in with flip-flops, and an hour later, some guy wheeled a garment rail across her feet. Fucking gnarly, I’m telling you.”

He looks a bit green around the nose when she looks over her shoulder, and pointedly stays out of her way, even though Ana can tell he finds it really hard not to help her. She may have gone a bit overboard, but she has a weakness for outerwear, and it’s not like Shane can’t afford an extra coat or three. She is sweating like a whore in church, a fact that becomes even more uncomfortably apparent to her when she steps over the threshold and into Shane’s air-conditioned apartment.

It’s a tight fit along the hallway, Shane hovering behind her, and she almost rolls over the multiple pairs of sneakers by the door, but no items of clothing or footwear are harmed in the process of getting Shane’s fall-winter wardrobe into the living room. The large flatscreen tv is on, showing a muted soccer game, and hot boyfriend – Ilya – is slumped on the couch, feet up on the coffee table, with a tablet in his lap.

He’s fully clothed this time, which is unfortunate. Athletic shorts and a silk short-sleeve shirt open at his impressive chest.

“Hi,” she greets him after she’s pushed the rail into a good spot, fanning her heated face. “Good summer?”

They certainly both look it, Ana thinks, as Shane shuffles up next to the backrest of the couch. A good tan on both of them.

“Yeah, it was good,” Shane tells her, “and yours?” When he folds his arms in front of his chest, Ana can’t help but gape for a second. Christ, he hadn’t been kidding about bulking up over the summer. There’s probably an extra ten pounds on him. It’s a good thing she’s always generous with sizing.

From his position on the couch, Ana can’t tell if Ilya is even more muscly and sculpted than before, but they probably train together, it occurs to her. All of her gay friends are insane about going to the gym, and they’re not even athletes, so it figures that Ilya probably has no problem matching Shane’s pre-season workouts. Couples who work out together stay together, or some shit like that. Maybe Ana should’ve gone to Pilates with her ex more often.

“Nice tan,” Ilya says before Ana can reply to Shane, pointedly dragging his eyes from her ankles to her face.

Ana knows she’s barely a shade away from looking like a problematic Halloween photo. “Thanks,” she responds flatly. “I went to Europe’s Easy-Bake Oven, also known as Greece.” The Canadian winter will strip it off of her, along with her will to live.

Shane frowns. “I thought you were going to see your family in Croatia.”

“Oh, yeah.” Ana pulls a face. Shane probably has a wonderful relationship with his parents. “For a week. Then I escaped and joined some friends in Kos. Though Lesbos would’ve been more fitting.”

It’s not a good joke. It’s not even funny. Ana doesn’t even know why she says it. Maybe the heat’s gone to her head after all. Shane very evidently doesn’t understand either, a fine line appearing between his brows.

Ana needs to learn when to shut up. But not today, apparently. “Lesbos,” she repeats. “You know, because I’m a lesbian?” She shrugs. “Sorry, bad joke. Didn’t even read any Sappho.”

She might as well be speaking Chinese. Shane looks at her, puzzled, then exchanges a look with a clearly bemused Ilya, who raises one perfect brow. Ana doesn’t know why she keeps talking.

“You know, the ancient poet. The lesbian one. From Lesbos. Which is where the word ‘lesbian’ comes from.”

“Oh,” Shane says. “Right.” Like that’s never occurred to him. Or rather, like he’s never wondered, which is probably true. She keeps forgetting he’s a jock. He’s probably never even watched Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. The most contact he’s had with queer culture was probably walking past a movie poster for Brokeback Mountain, or being called a fairy by a rival team.

Pretty sad, she thinks. She hopes Ilya shows him at least some of this stuff.

“Let’s get this show on the road,” Ana says after a beat, and unzips the first garment bag. “Maybe crank up the AC. There’s a lot of knitwear.”

They get through the first couple of items quickly; mainly outerwear that doesn’t need any adjustments, sizing spot on, because Ana – while not wanting to toot her own horn – has a great eye for measurements. Ilya has gone back to whatever it is he’s watching on the tablet, tv still silent, only occasionally glancing, hopefully approvingly, their way.

He seems particularly interested in the BODE cotton-twill pants with adjustable straps at the waist that are a stroke of genius, truly, because they’ll fit Shane all year round, regardless of the amount of muscle he packs on or loses. The fact that they make his waist look itty-bitty and his backside delectable is a big selling point, and Ana is glad she got them in three colors.

There are a handful of items that Ana considers essentials in a well-constructed wardrobe, like a decent puffer jacket and woollen trench that she’d left out before, mainly because she’d wanted to start small and see where Shane was willing to go. She’d thought about getting a canvas Carhartt jacket too, but that was too pedestrian for him. Too lumberjack-y, and not in a good way.

She does like to borrow from the outdoors for Shane, and keep his style grounded in that way, but infuse it with a lot of luxury and comfort. Which is why she absolutely could not stop herself from spending an absolute fortune on a couple of incredible pieces from God’s True Cashmere, which Pierre’s husband wears religiously.

“That’s really soft,” Shane exclaims when he tries on one of the shirts she’s selected; this one a nice, smoky blue.

“It’s a cashmere-wool blend,” Ana explains, checking that it fits around his shoulders. “It’s basically like a sweater. It’ll keep you warm even when it’s minus a million degrees come January.” It has beautiful press buttons as well. An easy garment to put on and take off, which she knows Shane will appreciate.

Her favourite piece, however, is the fleece she pulls off the hanger next. It’s so soft and fluffy, like wearing a cloud. Normally, Shane doesn’t really have a big reaction to any of the clothes she picks for him. He’s quietly appreciative, sometimes pleasantly surprised, because Ana plays it pretty safe with him. And while she is aware of how nice the jacket is, she doesn’t expect Shane’s eyes to widen when he sees it.

“Oh,” he breathes.

Ana freezes, gripping the fleece by its shoulders. “No?” She doesn’t need him to try it on if he absolutely hates it, but she doesn’t understand why he would.

Shane shakes his head. “No, sorry, it’s…I had a fleece like that for the Olympics.”

Ana breathes a quiet sigh of relief. He doesn’t hate it, then. Just surprised. Shane visibly shakes himself, clenches his fists twice like he’s resetting, then gives her a silent okay to proceed, so she helps him shrug the fleece on.

“I didn’t know hockey was an Olympic sport,” she says, assessing the fit and the length of the sleeves. They hit Shane’s hands just an inch below his wrist. Perfect.

“Oh, the – uh. Winter Olympics,” Shane replies, rolling his shoulders a bit. Right, Ana recalls, there are crazy people who exercise in the snow. She can barely walk in it. “This is a lot nicer, though, than the one I had in Sochi.”

“I’d hope so. This was handmade in Italy.”

Shane’s lips twitch. He looks a bit wistful, which Ana finds a bit surprising. Until now, he hadn’t struck her as the type of person who had any sentimental connection to an item of clothing. But she guesses that being part of the Olympics, even the cold ones, is a big deal for an athlete.

But he’s not paying attention to her anymore. Instead his eyes have found Ilya, who has abandoned the tablet and has an expression on his face Ana can’t quite gauge.

“What do you think?” Shane asks him, surprising Ana. Shane’s never asked for his boyfriend’s opinion on anything she’s put him in. Ilya’s appreciation is probably obvious enough. Though Ana would wager he’d rather see Shane out of these clothes than in them.

Ilya takes a moment to answer. “A nice – how do you say – throwback.”

Shane smiles. “I’m surprised you remember that fleece. You barely even looked at me.”

“Oh,” his boyfriend drawls. “I looked.”

And then they just – stare at each other.

God, not this again, Ana thinks. 

She clears her throat, and two sets of eyes are suddenly on her. “Well, glad this is tickling your fancy,” Ana says, and then, as always, can’t help herself. She zeroes in on Ilya. “What else would you like to see him wear?”

Ilya’s eyes noticeably light up, and Ana is already excited before Shane decides to ruin her fun.

“Don’t answer that,” he practically yelps, flushing, and Ana suppresses a sigh.

Ilya waggles his brows, mirth tugging at his lips. Then, sadly, mimes zipping his mouth shut. Somehow, he still manages a shit-eating grin.

Ana snorts. “I’m just gonna assume the answer is ‘not much’.”

Shane splutters, and Ilya throws his head back with a loud laugh. Ana feels pretty pleased with herself. They’d both been strung a bit tightly the last two times she’d seen them. Not completely tense, but not exactly relaxed around her either. With Shane being in the closet, they probably don’t go out much. But maybe coming out is on the horizon for Shane, what with Scott Hunter laying the groundwork, and this is like a stepping stone for them. Being around other people more and more, outside of their inner circle.

The rest of the fitting goes by quickly. There are only a few shirts and one pair of pants that need some alterations, so Ana bundles them up, pinned and ready for Mr. and Mrs. Nguyen. They’re wrapping up, Ilya engrossed in his tablet again, when Shane forces himself to engage in smalltalk once more, because nobody has said a word in about five minutes. Maybe that’s how far he thinks a silence is allowed to stretch.

“So, uh – any plans for Thanksgiving?”

Right, Ana thinks, that’s coming up pretty soon. It’s not a tradition that her parents ever really got into. They didn’t even properly celebrate other holidays, and so Thanksgiving had mostly passed her by without much fanfare growing up in an immigrant family. Once she’d moved to the States, it had become a bit of an animal on its own, first doing Friendsgiving with a couple of pals, eating Chinese food on someone’s living room floor. In later years, she’d once gone to Portland with her ex to celebrate with her family. That had been such an all-around unpleasant experience, though, that Ana had declined the invitation every year since then.

She has an invite now; an unanswered text sitting on her phone that she’s been mulling over for a few days. And sure, Ana could just tell Shane that she doesn’t have plans and that would be that. No reason for him to question that. But he’s looking at her with his big, brown, earnest eyes and Ana feels words crawling up her throat without her active consent.

“A friend of mine from New York has invited me,” she says. “For American Thanksgiving, that is. Her parents have a cabin up in the Catskills, but I don’t know if it’s a good idea.”

She half-expects Shane to nod and not know what to do with that piece of information, putting an end to their conversation. Ana is already eyeing her bag on the kitchen counter.

“Why wouldn’t it be a good idea?” he asks, genuinely puzzled. “I heard the Catskills are nice. Good hikes.”

He’s such a good Canadian boy. Ana refrains from rolling her eyes and instead just pointedly raises one of her brows. “Do I look like I enjoy the outdoors?”

Shane – bless him – actually gives her a thoughtful once-over, and Ana would quite like to know what goes through his mind when he looks at her. The obvious answer is that she very much does not enjoy the outdoors. She goes on LA-style hikes, which are leisurely walks to the observatory with a cooler full of hard seltzers. Her idea of an outdoorsy activity is having brunch on a terrace in Silver Lake. Not whatever Shane probably does when he puts on the hideous and bulky hiking boots he’s got in his closet.

“Not really,” Shane concedes.

It’s not really about the outdoors. And she’s still so scarred from spending years living from paycheck to paycheck that she usually accepts invites to free trips without a second thought, especially if that free trip comes with free food and free drinks. But Amanda and her wife are friends with her New York hookup, who is also invited, and Ana doesn’t know what the fuck she’s supposed to do with two things she’s kept separate suddenly overlapping.

Ana sighs. “I’ve been hooking up with this girl in New York for a bit, and I only recently found out we have mutual friends, and she’s going to the Catskills, too, and now I’m worried it’s gonna be weird.”

Shane’s eyes go wide, and even out of the corner of her eyes, Ana can see Ilya sit up straight, interest piqued. Great.

“What’s her name?” Shane asks just as Ilya goes – “Is she hot?”

Ana splutters. Despite the AC blasting cold air into her face, she suddenly feels a bit flustered. But they’ve opened this can of worms now, and there’s no getting the worms back into the can.

She takes a deep breath. “Her name’s Elise,” she answers Shane’s question, then has to take a moment, tipping her head back and staring at the ceiling for a few beats and another long breath, before looking over at Ilya. “And yeah, so hot.”

Ana feels even warmer, actually, when her mind conjures up an image of Elise standing in her cramped kitchen in nothing but an oversized tee, hem brushing just below the soft curve of her ass. She’s hot as hell, sure, and probably way out of Ana’s league, because she really seems to have her life together. Meanwhile, Ana is still living in her parents’ house, without any real idea how she’s supposed to get back on her feet, what she wants to do.

Elise writes cookbooks and recipes for the New York Times. Ana can barely boil water.

Shane leans against the back of the couch. One of his hands comes to rest on the cushions, and Ilya’s comes up, tangling their fingers together. Ana’s teeth ache with how sweet they look.

“How long have you been seeing her?”

That’s a good question Ana doesn’t really have a good answer to. It’s probably almost as long as she’s been back in Montréal and started working for Shane. She’s been down to New York quite a lot, and she hasn’t seen Elise every time, but – almost.

“A while, I guess,” she replies, and pulls her lower lip into her mouth, biting down. “It’s casual.”

They both look at her like they’re not buying it. And that’s fair, Ana guesses. If it were casual, she probably wouldn’t freak out over spending more time with her. But she’s not good with relationships, and they don’t live in the same city, and Elise is nice, and sweet, and Ana is an absolute bitch on her better days, so –

“I mean,” Shane starts, “we’re probably not the best people to give relationship advice,” and throws a wry look over his shoulder at his boyfriend, who waggles his brows. “But what’s the worst that could happen?”

Ana opens her mouth, and immediately shuts it again. She doubts Shane and his hot boyfriend want a full rundown of the list she’s compiled over the last couple of days. In general, she’s mostly stuck on how she should even talk to Elise. They get along well, but they haven’t hung out without hooking up. Ana isn’t sure about the etiquette. She’d dated as a teen, then had a couple of one night stands, too busy working to do much else, and then she’d met her ex, who she’d been with for eight years. On and off, sure, but – eight years.

Ana just – she doesn’t know how to do any of this.

Ilya pulls his legs onto the seat and twists until he’s facing her. “You go to cabin and either you have a good time with friends, or you have a good time with friends and also fuck a hot woman, yes? Win win.”

Huh, Ana thinks. If he puts it like that.

“I’m overthinking this, aren’t I?”

“Probably,” Shane says.

Ilya nods, then turns back to his tablet, hand still holding Shane’s at a slightly awkward angle. Ana wants to be sick.

Instead, she awkwardly clears her throat, and then proceeds to try and stop Shane from assisting her in putting his new clothes into his closet, where boyfriend corner has now taken over a substantial portion. There’s a lot more in there in general now than there was this time last year, and Ana makes a mental note to forward Shane’s mom her contact at TheRealReal. They can do a celebrity charity auction of the stuff Shane doesn’t like anymore. Thankfully, Ana has a rather severe case of OCD and has kept all of the removed tags in a neatly organized folder. She can sew them back in before they ship the stuff off.

She puts the few items that need alterations onto the garment rail and gets ready to wheel it back out again, because she’ll need it at home when she has to start preparing for an upcoming shoot for Men’s Health. Ana waves at Ilya, who has put down the tablet and is now fully stretched out on the couch, and then at Shane, who is hovering awkwardly, because apparently his parents didn’t raise him to let women do any kind of manual labour.

Then she takes her leave.

Chapter End Notes

- Rose Venice Film Festival Look 1

- Rose Venice Film Festival Look 2

- Items from Barena Venezia

- Ilya's shorts and shirt

- Puffer jacket

- Wool Trenchcoat

- Cotton pants

- Fleece jacket

- Cashmere cardigan

- Cashmere wool blend shirt

Chapter 3: 3.

Chapter Summary

Embarrassingly, it takes Ana at least an additional ten seconds before she realizes that they’ve been staring at each other in awkward silence for too long for them to just shuffle past Ilya and this guy without saying anything. She clears her throat.

“Sorry, uh -” she starts, and her tongue feels a bit heavy in her mouth, “Small world, eh?”

Chapter Notes

my algorithm now keeps suggesting i watch these videos of people who clearly know nothing about fashion commenting on hockey players' fashion choices and it is so unbelievably painful, because apparently, nobody understands how trousers are meant to fit or how proportions work and sure, taste is subjective, but their opinions are objectively wrong.

also i have come down with the fucking plague; part 4 is done but part 5 might take a bit longer.

title is from 'good bones' by maggie smith.

p.s.: fashion links in the end notes.

Against her better judgment, Ana goes to the Catskills. A lot of things she’d initially worried about, like sleeping arrangements, evaporate into thin air as soon as they step into Amanda’s parents’ cabin. There are only two bedrooms, and so naturally, Amanda and her wife take the master, while Ana, Elise, and two of Amanda’s wife’s friends take the second with two bunkbeds.

And it’s nice. It’s so nice that Ana spends the first day and a half waiting for the other shoe to drop. It takes her a while to realize that it’s not going to, and that maybe – just maybe – she has a lot of unprocessed trauma that causes her to constantly expect the worst and hover between fight or flight mode. Like her friends are going to shun her if she says something wrong, or sleeps in too late, or isn’t up for some of the activities.

Instead, conversation flows easily and the second morning in upstate New York is peaceful, and nobody has an issue with Ana begging off a morning hike to head to the nearest town to have a quiet start to the day. She browses, sits in a café by herself, and smokes a few too many cigarettes, fall sun warm on her face. She meets up with the rest of the group at the local grocery store to pick up a few more ingredients for their Thanksgiving dinner, and then it just so turns out that she and Elise stay back to get a few bottles of wine.

Ana knows she’s in trouble when the weathered owner of the store has them do an impromptu wine tasting, because not only is Elise hot, and beautiful, and – God, fuck her – kind, but she’s also interesting. Ana rarely finds people interesting. But she listens to Elise talk grapes and harvests with a man who could be their grandfather, and her voice washes over Ana, and she is suddenly struck by the urge to put her face to Elise’s neck, right by her ear, where she somehow always smells sweet, like spun sugar.

Dinner is a group effort under Elise’s patient direction, and it’s incredible, because Elise is a genius in the kitchen. It’s lovely, and they laugh too much and have far too much wine, and then the sun sets and one by one, their friends head to bed until it’s just Ana and Elise out on the porch by the fire. They talk and they talk, about everything and then nothing and then suddenly, they talk about Ana’s ex, and how Ana has always felt like Jen never really liked her, but only the idea of her, and probably the fact that Ana was young and broke and desperate for affection, even if it was barely more than scraps. How Jen would belittle her, and act like Ana was embarrassing, and too much and not enough at the same time and, with a lot of tears, Ana realizes she spent eight goddamn years of her life dating an exact fucking replica of her mother.

It should scare anyone away, but Elise just gets them another bottle of wine, holds her hand, caresses her knuckles, and listens. And then she kisses Ana and kisses her and kisses her and somehow, two days later and without really knowing how exactly it happened, Ana leaves the Catskills with a girlfriend.

Once Ana gets back to Montréal, there are two things on her agenda. One, prepping for Shane’s upcoming cover story for Men’s Health. And two, devising a plan to finally get the fuck out of Montréal. The two – somehow – turn out to be connected, because during the shoot for Men’s Health, where she puts Shane in shorts so tiny she expects Ilya to send her a goddamn fruit basket, she starts chatting to the photographer they’ve flown in, making casual plans to meet up for drinks in New York. Usually, these plans never go anywhere, but this time, Ana is determined to take him up on it.

She likes working with Shane, and from what she’s seen from the pictures he’s shared with her of his teammates, she could make bank styling hockey players for the rest of her life. They all seem to have a terrible and ill-placed penchant for patterned suits, and none of them seem to understand how pants are meant to fit. But Ana doesn’t want to stay in Montréal, especially because once her mom retires, her parents will probably head back to Croatia for good to take care of her grandmother.

She also doesn’t want to style hockey players, or celebrities. She doesn’t want to be Karla Welch, it starts to dawn on her. She’d much rather become Katie Grand.

So Ana jumps over her own shadow, and the next time she’s in New York to see Elise, she texts Dario. They meet at Soho House in the Meatpacking District, sit out on the roof terrace despite the cold until well past two in the morning, drinking whisky sours, and Ana takes the subway back to Elise’s place in Astoria with a slight wobble in her step and the card of Dario’s agency in her pocket. She feels drunk and cautiously optimistic and thinks that maybe, just maybe, there is something else for her out there.

Over the next couple of weeks, she works on her portfolio. It drives her absolutely insane, sending her through all five stages of grief simultaneously. Having to go through all of her editorial work of the past decade – which isn’t as much as it should be – is a form of torture for her, and brings all her self-doubt bubbling to the surface. She tries to distract herself by going apartment hunting, even though Pierre says she’s welcome to stay in his and his husband’s guestroom for as long as she needs. Elise also offers for her to stay at her place indefinitely, but Ana convinces herself to ignore the state of the New York rental market and try this whole being independent thing for a bit longer.

Ana definitely needs to downsize Marie Kondo-style, but she spent a lot of time curating her wardrobe and she’s not about to let go of vintage Isaac Mizrahi because some stupid studio in Greenpoint doesn’t have enough closet space.

She introduces Elise to Pierre in December, meeting for dinner at their favourite restaurant just off of Hudson Street. Ana is so nervous she can’t eat, because these are her two favourite people in the whole world, and feels drunk after her first glass of Pinot Grigio, but she needn’t have worried. Pierre and Elise get on like a house on fire, which Ana considers a good omen, because Pierre had fucking hated her ex.

It’s close to midnight when they deposit Pierre into an Uber Black and send him off to Brooklyn, before they make their way towards Washington Square Park. It’s cold, but Ana has gotten used to Canadian winter, so she can hand Elise her gloves, and press a kiss to her cold, freckled cheek. Elise continues to gush over the crostatina they had for dessert, dissecting the flavors. Ana can’t remember anything besides sugar and the heat of Elise’s hand between her thighs, sliding up and up and up as they’d emptied a third bottle of wine.

God, she’s so stunning Ana doesn’t know how she deserves her. They walk together, hands clasped, sidewalk wide and empty this late at night and during the week, and she hopes that she’ll catch herself before she can fuck this up. Hopes that Elise never cottons on to the fact that she’s way too good for her.

So really, Ana is a bit distracted when they round a corner and suddenly, she collides with someone and stumbles a step back.

“Oh, jeez, sorry,” she splutters, Canadian bleeding through, looks up and – huh. Well. Not who she’d ever expected to bump into on the streets of Manhattan.

Ilya, Shane’s hot boyfriend, is staring at her just as wide-eyed as she’s probably gawking at him. His face is flushed, probably from the cold, cheeks rosy and cheekbones as sharp, draped in a dark coat. He looks hot and effortlessly stylish, as always. In black from head to toe, some interesting knitwear peeking out through his open lapels.

Ana needs another solid three seconds to see that Ilya is not alone. Next to him, opposite Elise -who’d fortunately had had enough foresight to stop before they’d collided as well - is another extremely handsome guy, maybe a bit younger than Ilya, broad shoulders in stark contrast with the look on his face, which Ana can only liken to a deer in the headlights. He’s got a bit of a mullet situation going on, brown hair haloing around his head, partially tucked into the collar of his coat. Sneakers and workwear jeans.

Embarrassingly, it takes Ana at least an additional ten seconds before she realizes that they’ve been staring at each other in awkward silence for too long for them to just shuffle past Ilya and this guy without saying anything. She clears her throat.

“Sorry, uh -” she starts, and her tongue feels a bit heavy in her mouth, “Small world, eh?”

Christ, she thinks to herself. How she’s made it this far in life with this abhorrent lack of social skills is beyond her. Ilya, bless him, continues to blink at her, seemingly at a loss for words, but then again, it’s not like Ana gave him much to go on with her hell of a conversation starter.

“You, uh -” Ilya picks up after a bit, “visiting…?” He trails off, gaze clearly flickering between Ana and Elise, perfectly shaped brows raised, and Ana is painfully reminded of her little Thanksgiving-related meltdown a few months back.

“Yes, um – sorry,” she apologizes, again. “Sorry. Elise,” and she points at her far too patient and beautiful girlfriend. “Ilya. Ilya, this is Elise.”

They give each other brisk but friendly smiles. Ilya mirrors Ana, gesturing towards his companion. “This is Troy.”

“Hi,” Ana says lamely.

Troy nods, corners of his mouth pulling slightly upwards, not even close to a smile, and continues to look like a woodland creature about to be run over by a Ford Ranger.

Ana turns to Elise. “Ilya is,” she wants to go on, and then her brain screeches to a sudden halt, because – fuck. Fuck, she has no idea who Shane is out to. She can’t just blabber to anyone about his boyfriend, and Troy – well. Who knows who Troy is. Maybe a friend of Ilya’s or a colleague. Wouldn’t be too far-fetched to think he was a fellow potential underwear model. What if Troy isn’t just a friend? Plenty of queer couples are open, especially if they’re in long-distance relationships, and as far as Ana can tell, while Ilya spends a decent amount of time at Shane’s place in Montréal, he doesn’t live there permanently. So maybe Troy is an approved side piece. He could be unapproved as well, and – oh God – Ana hopes she hasn’t just run head first into someone’s affair. Although Ana doesn’t really pick up a vibe like that. But who’s to say?

And who’s to say Ilya is out to everyone and their mother, being Russian and all? Fucking hell, Ana thinks, and has no clue what her face is doing while her mind spirals and her heart is pounding.

“We work together, once,” Ilya says, for Troy’s benefit, clearly.

Christ, of course. “I’m a stylist,” she tacks on, and tries not to let out an audible sigh of relief.

Troy opens his mouth twice before he mutters out a quiet “cool” and goes mute again.

This has got to be the most awkward encounter of Ana’s life. She feels Elise squeeze her hand, and finds her pulse slow down at least a little bit. “So, uh, what are you in town for?” she asks, because she’s an idiot, and evidently, the encounter needs to go for a little while longer. “Business or pleasure?”

Ilya’s face does something, then. Ana has seen this expression before, slightly puzzled, like he’s not really sure what she’s asking. But surely, her question couldn’t have been clearer. He glances at Troy, whose shoulders have gone up to his ears, then looks back at Ana and Elise. “Business,” he says after a moment.

So maybe Troy is a colleague after all, and the paranoid voice at the back of Ana’s mind can be quiet. No affair, no cheating, no awkward side piece conversation. Just two colleagues or business partners out in a city where people do a lot of business. He’s probably going to buy Shane a little souvenir.

“Right,” Ana says. “Well, it was nice seeing you,” and she just catches herself before she can tell him to give her best to Shane.

“You too,” Ilya responds, and after some more awkward shuffling, they pass each other on the sidewalk and continue on their way in opposite directions. Once Ilya and his friend slash colleague are out of sight, Ana lets out a long breath.

Elise squeezes her hand again. It’s soft, and warm. “That was weird,” she comments. Understatement of the fucking century.

Ana groans audibly. “You can say that again.” She shakes herself once from head to toe, and immediately feels better. “Sorry,” she utters as they slowly pick up the pace again. “That was Shane’s boyfriend. You know, the hockey player I work for?”

“Oh.”

“Yeah,” Ana sighs. “He’s not, like, out out. I don’t think. So I panicked. I’ve met Ilya,” she adds, “but I didn’t know the other guy.”

“That makes sense.” Elise is too nice. Ana doubts anything about that performance was sensible. “He’s really hot though.”

“Oh my God,” Ana laughs, “right? Last time I was at Shane’s he was in these itty bitty shorts. The amount of eye-fucking I’m subjected to…”

Elise snorts. It makes her nose scrunch up and Ana is overcome with the urge to pull her into the nearest alleyway. Get her mouth on Elise’s neck and her hand up her dress.

“The other guy was pretty cute, too. Troy, was it? Bit weird though.”

“Maybe he was high.” Wouldn’t be that far out of the ordinary. She’s seen a lot of people who zone the fuck out after they take speed or some other shit. “Or jetlagged. I’ve actually got no idea where Ilya lives.”

“He looks like he should live in LA for sure,” Elise says.

Ana hums. She sees the subway stop up away, but she’s not tired at all. A bit wired still, after that run-in. “Hey, you want to go for a night cap?” Soho House isn’t too far. She could also go for some bodega ice cream.

Elise smiles. “Sure. Got nowhere else to be but here.”

Ana’s stomach swoops. She leans in, slips Elise a bit of tongue. Tastes the peach from her dessert. They bundle up, and continue on their way.

Chapter End Notes

Troy (k said these choices are too nice for troy and i know but he is my pookie and i want him to have nice things):

- Parka

- Trousers

- Trainers

 

Ilya:

- Coat

- Jeans

- Sweater

- Boots