Rating:

Mature

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories:

F/M, M/M

Fandoms:

Game Changers Series - Rachel Reid, Heated Rivalry (TV)

Relationships:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov, David Hollander/Yuna Hollander

Characters:

David Hollander, Ilya Rozanov, Shane Hollander, Yuna Hollander

Additional Tags:

Father Figures, Found Family, Angst with a Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Irina Rozanova Haunts the Narrative, Is Irina really dead when she lives in all our hearts?, David Hollander & Ilya Rozanov Bonding, Good Parent David Hollander, Character Study, Ilya Rozanov Loves Shane Hollander, Shane Hollander Loves Ilya Rozanov, Established Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov, No one yearns better than Ilya Rozanov, Post-Book 2: Heated Rivalry (Game Changers), POV David Hollander, POV Ilya Rozanov, Jealousy, Jealous Ilya Rozanov, Jealous Shane Hollander, POV Shane Hollander

Language:

English

Series:

Part 2 of Just Game Changer things that my brain needs to write

Collections:

MCF (My Comfort Fics), AHRFC

Stats:

Published: 2026-02-01 Completed: 2026-04-08 Words: 10,799 Chapters: 5/5

The Words We Cannot Take Back

Summary

Some things, once spoken, cannot be undone. David Hollander is sure he taught his son that. But when Ilya Rozanov and David have been getting along better than well, and Shane unwittingly fractures their efforts, leaving Ilya heavy under a loneliness the boy cannot quite name, David doesn't understand where he went wrong.

Set between Book 2: Heated Rivalry and Book 6: Game Changers.

Chapter 1

Chapter Notes

“Do not make me ask you to leave again, David. Please do not make me—” Ilya broke off, his voice catching painfully in his throat. He could barely make out David’s silhouette through the film of tears blurring his vision, the porch light haloing him into something unattainable. And unattainable David was.

“Why?”

Ilya should have known, should have prepared for this possibility, but he had been naive in a way he had not been since he was twelve, since the day he had sat on the edge of his mother’s bed, sure she would wake up soon from her nap. He was still waiting, and he understood now that he always would be. Perhaps he would have to wait for David as well. In another life, he told himself, and knew it was a lie. Would Shane also make him wait? Even if he did, Ilya knew he would wait for Shane forever.

“We should not— Shane said I cannot— He does not want me to spend time with you—his parents— anymore.”

Shane wouldn’t say that. David’s first instinct was denial. “Ilya, that doesn’t sound like Shane. Maybe it was a misunderstanding?”

Ilya let out a small, broken sound that might have been a laugh if it hadn’t collapsed halfway through. He swallowed and straightened, his voice flattening into something that reminded David of the young Russian boy he once was, unsure of his welcome, protecting himself against a world he was sure was against him. Maybe because it was.

“I don’t want you to spend time with my parents anymore,” he said, carefully, the faintest lilt of Shane’s voice curling around the words. “Is exactly what he said. How you say— quote.”

“Ilya.”

David took half a step forward before stopping himself, unsure if moving closer would make things worse. How could Shane have said such a thing to the man he loved?

Ilya’s lower lip wobbled, betrayed him, and then the tears spilled over. He shook his head as if he could physically dislodge them, as if refusing to cry might make this less real.

“I am sorry,” he said again, the words tumbling over each other. “I love Shane and I cannot—” He pressed his lips together, inhaling shallowly through his nose. “He is all I have left, and I cannot—” His voice broke completely this time. “I am really sorry.”

This is my fault, Ilya thought dimly when David stared blankly at him with eyes that were exactly like Shane’s, the inevitability settling into him with the dull certainty of something he had already accepted. He had let himself get comfortable. He had let himself want things—Sunday dinners, puzzle evenings and movie nights, the warmth of belonging that had crept up on him. He should have known better. Nothing stayed, not even his mother, and she must have wanted to stay and love him, hadn’t she? Hadn’t she?

“Ilya,” David said gently. Helplessly again, when Ilya shook his head, “I’m sure he didn’t mean it like that. Shane might’ve been trying to say something else.”

But Ilya’s fingers were curled so tightly around the door handle that his knuckles had gone white, as if it were the only thing anchoring him. He wasn’t looking at David, his gaze fixed somewhere over his shoulder.

Ilya’s curls lay flat against his head, as though they had absorbed too much of the boy’s sadness. Slightly folded inward, shoulders drawn in, Ilya looked younger than he was, like his shoulders had reached the limit of what they could carry and had no idea what to do with the rest.

“Thank you, David. I love—,” Ilya stopped himself, choking on the words, each one scraping him raw on the way out. “Thank you for being there for me. Even if it was only for a little while.”

It hit David like a punch to the gut. Was. Was. Was.

He opened his mouth to protest, to tell Ilya he was family, that it wasn’t over, or something equally insufficient, but Ilya had already turned away, and the door closed softly behind him, the click echoing far louder than it should have.

David stood on the porch for a long time after that, the cold creeping up his spine through the puffer. He had come by to ask why Ilya had been so busy lately, ask him why he had been cancelling, why every plan had turned into a rain check for nearly a month. Ilya had said he wasn’t home today, and David had believed him, right up until he had driven here, prepared to wait for Ilya to return home and seen Ilya’s car in the driveway. He remembered smiling, already planning to tease Ilya for getting caught in a lie.

This was not how it was supposed to have gone.

His chest felt tight, and a horrible thought took root. Had Shane not misspoken? What had Shane done to this sweet boy David had started to think of as his own?

He shouldn’t be driving, he thought absently, because he couldn’t remember starting to drive. He supposed he knew that he had been stopping at lights, that his hands stayed steady on the wheel, that his phone sat face up in the cup holder.

Shane’s name was right there, only a few taps away. David kept glancing at it, his fingers twitching each time the car slowed, but every time his thoughts caught on white knuckles on a door handle, a boy folding in on himself like he had learned to take up as little space as possible.

What in the absolute fucking hell were you thinking?

The words lined up easily. Too easily for a man who had always been careful with his temper. He knew the damage words could do, had taught Shane how little it took to say something that could never be unsaid. David could hear himself already on the call with Shane, furious, and he hated how righteous he would sound. How justified. Hated that it would feel correct in the moment. But what if David was wrong? What if Shane had meant something else?

What if this was all just a knot of bad phrasing and worse timing, words lost in translation across a call, except David didn’t even know if it had been said over a call, because suddenly it felt like he didn’t know his son at all. His mind was cruel and supplied the reminder that he hadn’t known Shane was gay, that Shane had been with Ilya Rozanov for nearly a decade before David had stumbled into the truth. So maybe he really didn’t know his son.

What if David barrelled in to defend Ilya and caused irreparable damage? He imagined Ilya’s face again, the careful politeness David had thought they’d banished, all the work he had done to coax out the little chirps from Ilya that made his day, the memes he didn’t understand but enjoyed because Ilya took the time to explain, the partner in puzzles and cooking, things neither Shane nor Yuna had the patience for. The friend. The bonus son he thought he would always have. He still had, he reminded himself. He remembered Ilya’s face as he had apologised, an apology meant for David but really for himself.

He could not take anything else away from Ilya.

The city sliding past his windshield in familiar shapes should have been the same one he had known since childhood, but it seemed different tonight. At a red light, David picked up the phone, his thumb hovering over Shane’s contact. Then the light changed, and he set the phone back down, untouched.

“Not like this,” he murmured to the empty car.

Their house was dark when he got home. He toed off his shoes, hung his jacket by habit, and made it halfway down the hall before something in him finally gave out. Yuna was in the living room, curled into the corner of the couch, watching Shane’s game, the one they should have been watching with Ilya right now. David had imagined surprising her by bringing Ilya home early, had imagined the delight on her face when she saw him. He let out a sob he hadn’t realised he’d been holding. Yuna looked up as soon as she heard him, her expression shifting immediately.

“David?” She set the remote aside. “What happened?”

He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. The tears surprised him with their force, as though they were done waiting for permission. He crossed the room in three steps and folded into her, gripping the back of her sweater like he needed the reassurance that she was here.

Yuna’s arms came around him without hesitation, one hand rubbing firmly between his shoulder blades, the other cradling the back of his head.

“David,” she said softly, “what’s wrong?”

He shook his head against her shoulder, a broken motion. He couldn’t find words that wouldn’t shatter into accusations or grief. All he could see was Ilya standing white-knuckled in a doorway, thanking him for being there as though it were already over.

He tried to speak. He really did, but the story tangled in his throat, too many emotions pressing for space. “I can’t,” he whispered, ashamed of how small it sounded.

“All right,” Yuna said simply, easing his head into her lap, her fingers carding gently through his hair. He turned into her, away from the television, away from Shane’s face on the screen.

He had to fix this.

He didn’t know how yet, but when he woke, when the anger cooled, he would call his sons.

Both his sons.

Chapter End Notes

Who's crying? I couldn't tell you who because I can't see through the film of tears I've been typing through. I sobbed through the entirety of this chapter. More than once because I kind of read it to edit, but who knows what I saw through the tears? And then read it again and cried.

Yes, there is a Shane social media sequel to Ilya fic that I was halfway through before this took over my life today.
Yesterday, I posted another chapter to my Draco/Theo/Hermione fic, which was awesome if I do say so myself, but I'm always amazed people still read it.
I have been dreaming of David inviting Ilya to his buddies' game night, which Ilya (fairly) assumes is poker, but turns out David does puzzles and plays board games with his hockey team from college, and they love having Ilya around. David just says he met Ilya through the Irina Foundation, and because hockey players (!?!), no one questions it? I imagine they would tell Ilya lots of stories about Yuna and David's love story. I don't know, but it's been on replay in my brain, and I might have written down some of that. I'm just all over the place. I haven't written so much since college. I have a job I should be doing! Don't ask me what's going on.

Anyway, please let me know what you think, comments are welcome!

Chapter 2

Chapter Summary

David says a lot of things, many of which he would rather not have said.

Chapter Notes

David POV because he's bringing the heat! 🔥 I like where his backstory is going so far.
Also, the em dashes and the Oxford commas are mine - I ruined them wayyy before AI did.

Shane kissed Yuna on the cheek, dropped his bag in its usual place by the wall, in a house that had never stopped being his. He was supposed to drive back to Montreal tonight, only stopping in to see David and Yuna for a quick coffee.

“Ilya had practice,” he said, like it explained everything.

Ilya had practice. Yuna nodded, already reaching for another mug.

Ilya had practice. David didn’t nod, but neither of them noticed.

Ilya had practice. David was still seated at the table, hands wrapped around a mug of coffee he hadn’t touched.

Ilya had practice. The words sat wrong with him, heavy and unconvincing.

“There wasn’t any practice today,” David said finally.

“What?” Shane blinked, pulled abruptly out of whatever he and Yuna had been discussing about brands and sponsorships.

“Ilya didn’t have practice,” David repeated, quieter now, because both of them were looking at him, and it struck him how similar they were, Yuna and Shane, angled toward him with the same openness. It always had, and perhaps that was why this felt like deja vu, like he’d had this conversation before and failed to remember how it ended.

“Maybe it was optional,” Shane offered, “Or skills. Or—”

“Or he didn’t feel welcome,” David said, and hated how flat he sounded.

“Why wouldn’t he?” Yuna asked, confused now, a crease forming between her brows, unsure what David was getting at.

“He likes spending time with you guys!”

The scoff escaped David before he could stop it, sharp and disbelieving.

That finally did it.

David set his mug down with deliberate care. “It’s easy to be Ilya’s favourite person, Shane,” he said evenly, “when you’re not competing with anyone else.” When you’re not letting anyone else compete. When his past has little to compete with.

“Dad,” Shane started, that twisty little smile tugging at his mouth, the one David would otherwise have found adorable, “I’m not his de facto favourite person because he has no options.”

“I can tell your dad is missing his puzzle partner today.” Yuna laughed softly, rubbing David's bicep affectionately, and it usually made him feel so very warm, but he felt cold today, and her smile faltered when he didn’t smile back.

David should have stopped there and smiled. He should have had a nice afternoon with their son.

“You’ve led a sheltered life, Shane,” David said instead, more than he had ever intended to tell his son because Shane didn’t get it. How could he, when they had protected him so well?

“David—” Yuna cut in, uneasy now.

“He needs to know, Yuna.” David’s voice hardened, lost in a memory that became almost frightening in the certainty he could feel gaining steam. “You were raised knowing you mattered, Shane. Our love was—is—not conditional. And that certainty changes how you move through the world. But the absence of it changes someone just as permanently in a way you will never—”

“Why are we talking about this?” Shane interrupted, his smile gone now. “Did something happen?”

Shane didn’t even know.

How could he not know, when the man he loved was suffering? David knew, rationally, that he was not being fair. He knew how well it could be hidden. He knew how much work it took to hide. How little it took to hide. He knew Yuna still could not tell sometimes.

“Ilya is always surprised that he is valued,” David continued, the thought breaking loose from where he had been holding it, “That he is loved.”

“I understand that,” Shane said immediately, brows furrowing the way they did when he was trying to read a play on the ice. “I tell him I love him all the time. I’ll keep telling him forever. I understand.”

But David was already shaking his head. “You don’t understand,” he said. “And I’m glad you never will. I’m so proud—we’re so proud—that you’ve never had to question your worth in this world. But being told you’re loved is sticking a bandage on it when you’re broken on the inside.”

“David,” Yuna said carefully, “you’re scaring us.”

“Your mother never understood either, other than what I’ve told her, and I’m so glad she has never needed to. That my life with her has not needed her to understand, but she knows.” David swallowed. “And maybe we’ve done you a disservice by not explaining.”

David regretted his first reaction to learning about Ilya, asking Shane if there were no nice men in Montreal. A million times he regretted it, but never more than today. Perhaps he should have asked Ilya instead. He knew he was being unfair to Shane. He knew it. But the night before had lodged itself in his chest and refused to move.

Even if it was only for a little while.

Thank you for everything.

He is all I have left.

Those words drowned out everything else. There was a rushing in his ears, a hollowing out. David was no longer entirely sure where he was, only that something from a long-forgotten past had slipped sideways inside him.

“Did Ilya say he felt like he wasn’t feeling loved? I love him, Dad. I love Ilya.”

“David,” Yuna said softly. Her hand was on his, and it should have felt familiar. “What happened?”

David laughed, sharp and broken, then dragged a hand down his face. Who made that sound?

“David came home last night,” Yuna told Shane, “and cried himself to sleep. Wouldn’t tell me why.”

The colour drained from Shane’s face. “Dad?”

David pulled his hand free from Yuna and started to pace, unable to stay still. “I don’t want you to spend time with my parents anymore,” he said, the words falling out of him like shards of glass. “That’s what you said. I had to beg Ilya to tell me.”

Yuna set her glass down carefully. “I’m sure Shane didn’t mean—”

Shane inhaled sharply. “Dad, I—”

David cut through the air with his hand, the violence of the gesture startling all of them. It wasn’t like him.

“I stood on his porch,” David went on, voice breaking now, “and watched him cry. He begged me not to make him ask me to leave. I begged him to tell me why because I thought I had done something wrong. He thanked me for being there for him in the little time we had. He said goodbye.”

Yuna reached for him again, but David shook her off, the motion abrupt, almost desperate.

“I went by to pick him up after practice so we could watch your game together.” He said, humourless, “But there was no practice, was there? I thought I’d ask him why he’d been cancelling plans for a month, and assumed it would be something funny, very Ilya.” A thread of fury had woven itself into him. “Do you know what he told me, Shane? That he wasn’t allowed. And my first thought was that my son would never have said that.” He laughed bitterly, “and I said so until Ilya had to quote you before I would leave.”

Silence fell between them.

Shane didn’t speak. There was nothing he could say that David wanted to hear. If it finally struck Shane that for all the time he spent with Ilya, there were entire rooms of him he had never seen, he didn’t voice it.

“On the drive back,” David said quietly, “it occurred to me that the son who could lie to us for over a decade had depths I didn’t know. Because the boy I taught that words have meaning and that they can’t be taken back was not the man who said those words. Maybe I was the one who didn’t know Shane.”

Shane flinched. The words landed harder than David had intended. Harder than he could take back. He had tried so hard to keep it all in, but David wasn’t done.

“It wasn’t just his heart you broke, son. It was mine too, and it wasn’t yours to break. Neither was his, but I suppose it isn’t my place to say more than I’ve already said.”

He didn’t say that he knew Ilya better than Shane did in this moment. Shane seemed to have heard it anyway.

“Shane,” Yuna leaned forward and stalled his restless hands, “what exactly did you say to Ilya?”

Shane closed his eyes.

“I said,” he began, voice unsteady now, “that it felt like you know him better than I do now. And that maybe I didn’t want him to spend so much time with you anymore. I didn’t mean for him to take it seriously. Or even remember I said so. But it was over a month ago, and he must’ve seen you since.”

David saw Shane’s eyes fill when neither of his parents rushed to reassure him, watched the tears crest, and felt like he was seeing it through thick glass, moving forward because he couldn’t stop anymore.

“You’re not the victim here, Shane,” David continued, low and furious, voice trembling. Maybe David was trembling a little too. “Sort yourself out before you make him comfort you for something you did.”

David turned away, one hand braced on the counter. “Ilya has spent his entire life being unsure and scared, feeling like the world is always one foot out of the door, and it mostly is.” David let out a sob. Just one, he told himself. He needed it, but who was he talking about? Was it even about Ilya anymore?

“Do you understand that?” Shane nodded. “Congratulations then, you’ve reminded him of his place. I’m sure he won’t forget.”

Why couldn’t David stop talking? He should have stopped a long time ago.

He needed to leave. David couldn’t watch Shane cry, and he couldn’t stop crying, so he grabbed his keys and coat before either Yuna or Shane could stop him and walked out.

Chapter End Notes

I'm a little obsessed with David, okay? Because seemingly mild-mannered Hollander men are the fanfiction kind of freaky?

And I have nothing against Shane? Angsty Ilya is just a siren's call. Shane's not omniscient. They're still in the learning stage of their relationship. Ilya needs to learn to talk to Shane. It's a process, and even the relationships that feel easy need working on. That's what they're doing!

Top 5 in this series would be Ilya, David, Svetlana (because hot!), Marleau (also because hot!), and JJ, in that order, but I would switch Svetlana up. It's just David at the moment. I also have 3 other fics half written and running around in my head aaaaaaargh get them out, but writing takes time ;(
The next chapter is going to be an Ilya POV, running parallel to this chapter. Then comes more angst, another chapter of it before the ending!

Chapter 3

Chapter Summary

Ilya will wait for Shane forever, and then some, and he needs David to know that.

Chapter Notes

The Ilya POV is here, and as usual, I sobbed while writing this, so any mistakes made were missed through the sheen of tears, not that I did much more than a spelling and grammar check. Also, the em dashes and the Oxford commas are totally mine, I've been overusing them for more than a decade.

Ilya was very good at thinking of reasons why Shane could stop loving him.

So when Shane called to say he‘d flown to Ottawa instead and would drive back to Montreal that night just so he could spend the day with Ilya, he had been ecstatic. Stupid happy, he told himself firmly, even as dread began to pool low in his stomach, David‘s eyes overlaying Shane‘s when he closed his own.

No, stay happy.

Shane will be here soon, you‘re happy. You love Shane, you‘re happy.

He had texted I love you before Shane’s game the previous night, sent a chirp when Pike missed a pass, all while his mind replayed David standing in his doorway the previous night, saying Ilya in a way that was so familiar it hollowed something out inside of him.

Shane will say it soon, the way he liked Shane saying his name, soft like it meant something sacred, so why was he dreading it? Was it because David had been saying it more often recently, or was it because David had begun to say it the way Shane did? The thought made his chest feel tight.

Ilya had even sent Shane a selfie, missing him like he was missing a part of his soul, forcing his lips into a curve, but he couldn’t quite get his eyes right. The blue looked too pale, the brightness wrong, and Shane would have noticed—would he, a cruel voice asked in his head, when he hadn‘t noticed Ilya in the past month. So Ilya had cropped the picture down from the lips to his navel, safe enough that Shane would find it easy to want. He loved Shane, and he couldn’t let Shane stop loving him. He just couldn‘t. Ilya simply wouldn’t survive that.

In their perfect summers in the cottage, especially the second, he hadn’t felt afraid at all. There had only been sunlight and the gentle lap of the lake against the dock and Shane’s laugh echoing off the wooden beams. Ilya had, in those weeks, believed it would be forever, that he could hold Shane’s wide smile inside himself until it grew so big it took Ilya apart, and he wouldn’t ever have to see it fall.

The fear had crept back in the months after, when they were apart, and the distance began to feel longer than the distance between Montreal and Ottawa. Was it just him, or did it feel like he was drifting away the longer he went without touching Shane?

I don’t want you to spend time with my parents anymore.

And Ilya had listened—obeyed—because he needed there to be a third summer at the cottage, needed it like he needed Shane, needed it like he needed air to breathe, only Shane was the air he needed to breathe. He couldn‘t imagine how Shane would avoid being invited to dinner at Shane’s parents‘ house again. It wasn‘t his problem anymore, was it?

He wouldn‘t have another chance to make his excuses. David must have already told Yuna by now, and he wouldn’t have to sit at their rickety wooden table, the one Yuna had said David tried to fix but only made worse. He wouldn’t have to feel the aching warmth of being included in something that had not been built for him.

David must have already told Yuna why he had stopped coming.

Would they stop asking?

Not being asked might break Ilya more than not being there, but he would endure. He had endured worse. He reminded himself that he had lived through his mother's dying. He had lived through his father calling his mother an accident. He had lived through Shane dating Rose Landry. He would have to live through this, the same way he had lived through the others, because it wasn’t up to him. His life made the choices for him.

A colder thought followed. Would that mean the Hollanders would now make plans without him? Would Shane go to dinner alone? Would Ilya be expected to wait at the cottage for Shane to return? Bile lurched up his throat as he frantically tried to tamp it down.

He would wait.

He would wait on his knees for Shane at the door if that‘s what it took. He would wait outside in rain or shine. He would wait until his pride rotted away and there was nothing left of him.

He would wait.

Ilya would always wait for Shane. He waited as he heard Shane‘s sensible Land Rover roll into his driveway. He waited for Shane to walk to his door. He waited for the familiar knock, waited for Shane to take his jacket off, and he held tight to the memory of Shane saying I love you, the rope he clung to, the only thing keeping him from drowning. He could only hope the rope did not fray from how tightly he had wrapped himself around it.

He forced himself to be the Ilya Shane needed, warm and easy, as he hauled Shane in as soon as his shoes came off and kissed him like he wanted to crawl inside his skin. He needed this memory to last so many weeks. It would never be enough, but it would have to be enough to keep promising himself this was real, that it was still happening, that Shane would remain his until the next time Ilya saw him.

Later, after they collapsed into bed and he watched Shane snuggle into the crook of his arm, Ilya pressed a kiss to his hair, and wished he could burn this image into the inside of his eyelids so he would see Shane everytime he closed his eyes, and not his mother‘s eyes when he had found her, or his father‘s the last time he saw him, or his brother‘s when Ilya had walked away from the last of his family. Or David‘s wounded eyes when Ilya had closed the door on him.

He was still thinking about Shane’s sleepy little nose scrunch from that morning. Is it time to leave already? Could it never be time to leave?

He told himself that replaying that memory was the only reason why he had let David shoulder his way into Ilya’s house, walking straight to where he knew the good vodka was kept.

Shane had already left for his parents’ place for a quick visit before he drove back to Montreal. Why was David here?

David poured himself a finger of vodka, downed it in one swallow, then poured another, and did the same. Only after that did he retrieve a second glass and pour for Ilya.

“My father was an utter bastard,” David said abruptly, exhaling through his nose as he slid the other glass across the counter before Ilya could ask him what he was doing here, “utter bastard, but he loved hockey, was good at it.”

Who had been good at hockey? “Was he?” Ilya asked, tone carefully neutral, not touching the glass in front of him, wanting to cling to an aloofness that he knew that David knew was put on, but David let it pass without comment.

“He was,” David replied. “Played defence too and taught me everything I know, usually while shouting.” Okay, but why was David talking about his father?

Ilya’s silence didn’t seem to deter David. “I am a large man, and I was almost as big as most grown men by sixteen, but it did not stop me from being afraid of him.”

Ilya stilled, and David laughed then, a little short and a little mean when he noticed and leaned back against the counter. Why was David telling him this? Had Shane told David Ilya had made him unhappy? Was this a warning? Shane wouldn‘t do this, he told himself, but maybe David hadn‘t told Shane he was doing this. Maybe Shane didn‘t know. Maybe David—

“But it never even crossed my mind, even when I was checking men into the boards and knocking their teeth out, that I could defend myself at home, you know? Maybe it made me a better defenseman, really, because I could take all these hits and stand back up.”

David wasn’t looking at him when he spoke. He was looking somewhere past Ilya’s shoulder, like he was seeing a different kitchen entirely.

Ilya’s jaw tightened, and he reached for the glass just to prevent his hands from curling into fists. “Different rules.”

David huffed once in agreement, and they stood in the shared silence of the space where anger and sadness had lived together for so long.

“Your mother?” Ilya asked. Fuck, why had he asked that?

“Left when I was young.” David dropped his gaze to the counter. “He hated that I looked like her.”

Ilya nodded, almost unmoving, before he asked David. “Brothers or sisters?”

“No.”

Ilya finally drank, a long pull, and set his glass down with a clink. “Is bad?”

“What is bad?”

“Forgetting your mother.“

David looked at him steadily. “I don’t remember enough of her to forget.”

“I think sometimes I am forgetting the sound of her,” Ilya shrugged as unbothered as he could manage, which wasn’t much at all, “Maybe is her footsteps, maybe is her voice, maybe her face is less clear in my dreams.”

“I sometimes try to remember her laugh,” David admitted, “and I can’t, I don’t know if I’ve ever heard it.”

“Can be worse,” Ilya muttered, mostly to himself.

“Hell,” David said, voice rougher now, “you’ve been alive longer than she was when she left, certainly longer than the time I had with her. It’s better I don’t remember.”

Ilya didn’t know what to do but hum softly. He did not want to forget his mother, because she hadn’t left Ilya. Hadn’t she? She had loved him, she always told him so. Я люблю тебя, Илюша, моё солнышко. (I love you, Ilyusha, my sunshine.) His mother hadn’t just left him. She had loved him.

“I didn’t come here because of what I said to Shane,” David said to break the air that had become too heavy to bear. “Or because of what he said to you.”

Ilya’s eyes flicked up, sharp despite himself. What had David said to Shane? Wait, why had David said anything to Shane?

“I came because you stopped coming,” David continued. Why would David have said anything to Shane about what Shane had said to him?

Ilya‘s mouth twisted, and something bitter rose in his throat as he repeated himself, “He told me I should not see you.”

I don’t want you to spend time with my parents anymore.

“You know,” David said, almost conversational, “when Shane was born, I remember promising myself that I would make sure, to the best of my ability, that Shane would never have to learn how to leave.” Why would Ilya ever make Shane want to leave? He never wanted Shane to leave.

If there’s anything Ilya has learned about himself over the last few years, it’s that he would live inside of Shane if it were possible.

Still, Ilya looked away, back to the counter, and nodded. Maybe he had been right, and this was a warning. “He won‘t ever have to, I promise.“ Almost inaudible, he added, “But it hurts.”

“I am angry,” Ilya admitted, before David could get ahead of himself. “Angry at myself, but mostly because it should not have surprised me. I am used to it, so why did it surprise me?”

David reached for his own glass, hand trembling with the anger he seemed to be trying to suppress, but it was empty. Ilya reached for the bottle and poured them both another drink.

“I was angry today,” David said after a moment, “angrier than Shane has ever seen me. And it scared him.” His mouth tightened. “I worked very hard to become a man whose anger doesn’t bleed into the room. When I was younger, my anger was the only thing in the room.”

“You were defenseman, yes? Anger is part of job.”

“Yes,” David agreed. “But I did not want it to be part of our home. I didn’t want to be that man, and when Shane was born,” David lifted his glass, and his hand still trembled, but less than before, “I buried it all under rules, under a discipline I didn’t know I possessed before.”

Ilya understood the daily work of not becoming his father. “We are not our fathers, yes?” It came out almost hopeful, like a question he needed answered.

“I did not want Shane to ever be afraid of me.”

Ilya would never hurt Shane for what he had said. Was that really why David had come? To reassure himself that Ilya would never hurt Shane?

“I would never hurt Shane,” Ilya said immediately, the response instinctive. “No matter what.”

David turned to him, surprise flickering across his face before he blinked, as if processing the unexpected declaration.“What?” Wasn’t that what David had been afraid of enough to come see Ilya even after Ilya had shut the door in his face?

“I missed you this last month kid,” David said after floundering for a few seconds, eyes as wide as they had been when he had found Ilya groping Shane’s ass in the cottage, “I miss you, and I came by yesterday planning to stay as long as it took for you to get back from practice so we could go watch Shane’s game together.”

Ilya’s throat closed.

Why was David doing this to him? Ilya had already begged David not to make him ask David to leave, but here he was, needing to be sent home again, where Shane was waiting for him.

Ilya couldn’t cry again. He had already tried to exhaust his tears in the shower before Shane arrived that morning, standing under the spray until the water ran cold. He had kept Shane busy—hands, mouth, laughter, distraction—stacking sensation on top of sensation so there would be no space left for grief to split him open. He had focused on memorising Shane’s face, the exact tilt of his smile, the faint crease between his brows when he concentrated, as if it could hold him together for the weeks apart, until David had arrived, levelling all that careful work to the ground because he was going to cry now. He was going to sob, and who would stop him this time? Shane would be back in Montreal in a few hours and would not see him for weeks.

“David, please.” Ilya stood across from him, the glass warm in his palm, fingers tight around it like it might anchor him. It felt cruel that, for the first time in a month, the loneliness had shifted into something shared, and it was about to collapse back into solitude.

“Shane didn’t mean it, he said so.”

“It does not matter,” Ilya’s voice wavered despite himself, “he thinks it enough to say so is true.”

David’s brow furrowed. “That’s not—”

“That is exactly how it works,” Ilya said, something sharp breaking loose, “Shane is all I need, Shane is enough. He is more than enough. I do not need—”

“Ilya.”

There was the faint sound of the front door opening somewhere in the house. Neither of them heard it.

“I do not need dinners, or puzzle nights, or—” Ilya’s voice shook, “I do not need anyone else.”

“I don’t.” Ilya’s hand came up to press against his own chest, trying to hold himself together by sheer will. “He is enough. If I have him, I am fine. I am fine.”

Behind them, in the living room, footsteps stilled.

“You’re not fine.”

“I am,” Ilya insisted, and the first tear finally slipped free. “I learned how to survive on less. I can.”

David went very still.

“I was enough for my mother,” Ilya said, voice softening into something far younger than he meant it to. “She told me every day. I was her sunshine.” The memory came soft and bright and unbearable.

Neither of them noticed Yuna and Shane standing stock still in the living room, Ilya’s voice echoing through the house.

“Shane is my sunshine,” Ilya continued, “I did not understand before. I thought if she had really loved me, she would have stayed. I thought maybe I was not enough to make her stay.”

“Ilya—”

“But now,” Ilya swallowed, “now I understand. It was not because she did not love me. She loved me so much.” The love he felt for Shane was something that burned too hot to live inside.

The room felt smaller, and David walked around the counter. “Kid—”

“I love Shane so much, he is all I need,” Ilya tried to reassure David, in case David thought he was saying Shane wasn’t, “If he wants me with you, if he wants dinners and cottage, I will sit and be grateful. If he does not, I will still stay. I will stay until he tells me to go.” Ilya’s voice broke fully now. “Even if he tells me to go, I will stay.”

David placed a hand on his shoulder, but Ilya barely felt it.

“I do not need to be anyone’s son again,” Ilya said, the words tumbling, helpless and raw, “I already had my turn, and I wasn’t—I just need Shane now.”

“She was tired,” Ilya said gently, protecting her from accusation, voice trembling but steadying with the logic of it. “She was tired of him, of everything. And she loved me enough that she did not want me to see her disappear little by little.”

David’s face had gone pale. Ilya knew David knew he was going to go there. He knew he should not be saying this, but he could not seem to stop talking once he had started.

“I don’t ever want to ever leave Shane,” Ilya said firmly, wiping at his face with the heel of his hand. “I will try but—”

David’s voice dropped to a whisper when he said Ilya’s name again, shaking his shoulder as if he could snap Ilya out of the conversation.

“I was enough for her. You should tell Shane that if I ever—” Ilya’s voice faltered, not because he didn’t know what he had said, but because he did.

“No, Ilya, you cannot do this to—”

“I know,” Ilya said again, sharper, but knowing did not change the ache. “I will try my best to stay, but maybe I am too much like my mother and one day it will be too late, so you should tell Shane—”

A gasp filtered through the air, and David’s eyes flicked past Ilya too late. In the doorway stood Shane, unmoving, with Yuna just behind him, her hand pressed to her mouth.

Chapter End Notes

Thank you so much for reading and do let me know what you think! :)
Onwards and upwards and sideways to posting more this week because I'm on vacation and finally have the time to write without needing to make my brain think of work 🤞

Chapter 4

Chapter Summary

Shane didn’t just love Ilya. Shane was obsessed with Ilya.

Chapter Notes

I was just so blown away by the comments on Chapter 3 that I had to post this as soon as I wrote it, and was so impatient I only did my usual grammar and weirdness check, mwah mwah mwah, shouldn't be as emotionally draining as the first three chapters :)
Thank you for reading this <3 I'm overwhelmed, and this somehow has more subscriptions than the fic I've been writing for three years, but anyway, wait's over, time to resolve and resolve and resolve, hope you enjoy my version of Shane!

Shane didn’t just love Ilya. Shane was obsessed with Ilya.

He usually did a good job of tamping it down when he was with Ilya, and he didn’t talk about Ilya to other people enough for them to find out, but Shane was obsessed with Ilya to distraction. Shane loved Ilya like an obsession.

Shane is my sunshine.

Ilya was Shane’s sunshine too, and he would always know where Ilya was in a room, turn towards him to bask before he even recognised he was doing it.

“I will never let you go,” Shane said before he knew it, “and if you ever want to, find a good hiding place because otherwise, I will chain you in your basement and never let you leave.” Maybe he shouldn’t have said that, after all the work he’d done to keep it contained.

Ilya didn’t flinch, and Ilya didn’t laugh, but his parents were looking at him with wide eyes, his mother’s hand on his sleeve and his father’s hand on Ilya’s shoulder, their expressions stripped of everything but alarm.

Shane had already said something unhinged, so he reasoned what was some more if it meant Ilya looked like he looked now, shaking with something that wasn’t panic, eyes dark with a desire to hear more, like he wanted to crawl inside of Shane. Shane wanted to crawl with him until they were not two separate people, but one in every single way.

“Ilya.” He knew Ilya loved the way Shane said his name, and wasn’t disappointed when a shiver ran through the already shaking blond.

“Shane.”

“I meant it when I said I didn’t want you to spend time with my parents anymore.”

“Shane!” came from his parents, Yuna gripping him tighter, probably wondering why he wasn’t saying any of the things she told him he could say on their way to Ilya’s house. Their house. Shane had nodded through his mother’s monologue, lost in locking away the parts of his brain that wanted to chain Ilya to him, breathe in his scent every hour of every day, keep him so close everyone would know there was no such thing as a Shane Hollander without an Ilya Rozanov.

I don’t want you to spend time with my parents anymore. It had been so long since Shane had said this that it felt unfamiliar, but he had meant it at the time.

“I know, David did not understand this.”

Shane gently unclipped his mother’s hand from his sleeve. She followed him into the kitchen anyway, sliding her hand into his father’s and pulling him half a step back from Ilya. Ilya was his. His parents had never seen this side of him. No, they had, but they had assumed he was only this way about hockey.

“I am so obsessed with you,” he said plainly to Ilya, “not just in the way that I think about you when I’m lacing my skates, or the way I check my phone between practice even when I never have, or the way I flew to Ottawa instead of going to Montreal because a day without you felt longer than the drive.”

Shane stepped closer. “I am obsessed with you in the way that makes me want to chain you to me so you can never leave.”

Perhaps Shane was being a little delusional in thinking he saw his obsession reflected in Ilya’s eyes, but he went on, walking to Ilya.

“You don’t get to be the only person who loves me to death,” he continued, ignoring his father’s whispers when Shane had said chain, and then death, and Shane knew, distantly, that he was toeing a dangerous line, “You’re mine, and you’re never leaving without me, do you understand?”

Ilya’s eyes were red, almost feverish. He looked like someone who had been cornered and hadn’t found the door yet. He looked like he didn’t want to find the door.

“Then why,” Ilya asked him, hands settling against Shane’s ribs, gripping fabric like he wasn’t sure it was real, “why?”

“I was jealous.”

David spoke first. “Jealous he was able to spend more time with us than you could?”

“Shane—” Yuna started, but Shane cut her off.

“No,” Shane felt something lodged in his throat, ugly and small and honest, “I was jealous of you,” Shane clarified, jerking his head slightly toward his father, “I was jealous that you’ve sat in this kitchen more times than I have, that he’s told you more about his family than he’s told me, that mom knows how he takes his tea.”

Yuna’s brows lifted slightly, and Ilya stared down at him like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

“Jealous?” Ilya repeated.

“I didn’t know how you take your tea,” Shane said, “and you mentioned puzzle nights with dad when I can only get you once or twice a month if I’m lucky, it made me so mad.”

Ilya stared at him like he’d just shifted languages and laughed in Shane’s face.

“You’re an asshole,” Shane muttered, trying to pull away from Ilya’s death grip on his shirt.

“No, no,” Ilya said, a grin transforming his face, ”I love it.” And Shane thought, fiercely, that no one but him knew this Ilya. What Ilya sounded like, how easy he made it for Shane to ask, to take, to have. To obsess.

“Shane, you know you are my everything,” Ilya leaned down to peck Shane’s lips, “I love you so much, and I am so happy with you. You are my everything.”

Something inside Shane broke at that, to hear Ilya speaking those words like they were as casual a fact of existence as the weather. You know you are my everything. Shane surged to kiss him again.

“I hate it,” Shane sank into Ilya’s grip and looked away from his family, “I hate that mom and dad know pieces of you I don’t know yet. I want to know everything about you, and I want to know it now.”

He heard his mom giggle behind him, his dad and Ilya's little snorts lost in the sound, and knew she was going to embarrass him. “Shane was the same when he started playing hockey. He wanted to be the best first, before he knew how to skate, even before he was tall enough for a stick.”

Shane groaned and looked back up at Ilya, “You’re mine, and I want to know the way you line up your skates, the stupid songs you listen to, what your room smelled like when you were a kid. I want your first story, and the last one, and all the ones in between.”

Shane’s hand slid up, fingers brushing into Ilya’s hair almost absently. He really wanted Ilya to spend time with his parents. He liked that Ilya did, which was why the jealousy had scared him.

“You know, I used to dream of you meeting my parents?”

Ilya swallowed. “You did?”

“I used to be obsessed with the idea of you meeting my parents,” Shane had said obsessed a lot already, but he was, and needed to say so, “I would imagine introducing you at the NHL awards one day, and asking mom and dad if they’ve met Ilya Rozanov, and you would all shake hands, and you would be polite in the way I know you can be when you try, and you would tell them it’s nice to meet them.”

The three of them were staring at Shane now, and Ilya must have been shocked because he’d let go of Shane’s shirt. Shane ruffled his own hair and figured he might as well get it all out.

“It would have meant the world to me to just know that all the people I love have touched each other, that you all exist in the same world,” Ilya wiped away a tear that Shane didn’t know was on his cheek, looking at him in the soft way Shane hoped Ilya reserved for him and him alone, “The second thing I want most in the world after wanting to be with you is for you, and Mom, and Dad to love each other the way I love you.”

“Maybe not exact same way?”

“Shut up, Ilya,” Shane laughed wetly, “I just—”

“Oh, Shane,” Ilya whispered, pulling him close. Shane sniffled into his shoulder, embarrassed, “You think I do not understand, котик? I also dream of you meeting my mother, but I always wake up too early for you to meet her. Maybe one day, yes?”

“One day,” Shane felt his eyes well up with tears. “I’m sorry if I made you feel like—” his voice came out strangled, barely more than a whisper. Hadn’t his mom said something similar the day he had come out? “Please forgive me. Forgive me, Ilya.”

“You are the person who knows me best, Shane,” Ilya said quietly, “I want you to know everything, Shane, and I want to know everything about you. I belong to you.”

Shane wanted to tell Ilya that he knew Ilya believed people couldn’t own each other, but he wanted that, for Ilya to own him, and for him to own Ilya. Someday, Shane would tell him, but that day was not today and definitely not in front of his parents.

“You just like that I’m jealous about you.”

Ilya huffed a small laugh. “You’re a jealous person, Shane, I know this.”

“I can deal with being jealous,” Shane brushed his thumb under Ilya’s eye without thinking, “I’ve been constantly jealous for a decade, but at least now it’s only my parents.”

Ilya’s eyes softened as he snuggled his face into Shane’s palm. “We can be jealous together then.”

They had been staring at each other for a few minutes when David cleared his throat. “We love Ilya too, Shane.”

Shane and Ilya both turned, almost startled to find David and Yuna still there.

“I dream of the day I can tell everyone I have two hockey greats in the family,” Yuna said, bright and unapologetic. “Most people don’t even get one.”

Shane let out a weak, almost hysterical huff of laughter. “Mom!”

“What?” She lifted one shoulder. “It’s true. I’ve earned bragging rights.”

David rolled his eyes slightly, though there was nothing but fondness behind it. “Well, she has been keeping stats on you since you were five.”

Shane scrubbed a hand down his face, embarrassed and absurdly relieved they were choosing to ignore all the weird things he’d said today.

David glanced at Ilya, then at Shane, and then back at Ilya. “I’ve been wanting to invite you to game night with the boys.”

“Who boys?” Ilya blinked.

“Dad’s hockey team from college,” Shane clarified, then added, “and some other friends he plays with.”

Yuna snorted, “Yes, the ones who think they’re still twenty-five.”

“We are twenty-five,” David said flatly.

“Only in your mind,” Yuna shot back.

Ilya had gone very still beside Shane, and his thumb traced slowly over the inside of Shane’s wrist, back and forth, back and forth, an unconscious motion. He was avoiding looking at Shane now, so it looked like Shane might actually have to resort to desperate measures.

Shane turned fully toward him, lowering his voice. “You do forgive me, don’t you, Ilya? I was just jealous for a little bit, but I’m more than incandescently happy you and my parents have each other.”

Ilya’s brow furrowed faintly. “I do not know this word.”

“Brilliantly, wonderfully happy,” Shane amended quickly. “Like, aggressively happy. Stupidly happy.”

“Okay, but what would you tell your friends, David?” Ilya asked after a moment, finally looking over.

“That, my son, who has never been interested in game nights,” David said, ignoring Shane’s immediate eye roll, “has a new friend, publicly established by the Irina Foundation, who also lives in Ottawa and likes to play games.”

“You should go, Ilya,” Shane said gently. He meant more than just the words. He meant, let us keep you, let them be your parents too.

Ilya studied him for a long second. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay.”

Chapter End Notes

Oof, almost at the end of this emotional rollercoaster you and I signed ourselves up for. Inspired for the most part by Dylan Walsh, who plays David Hollander in Heated Rivalry and used to play Lieutenant Al Burns in Unforgettable, omg he was my favourite in that show. I had to look up how I knew this actor, and it snowballed from there.

This means I now need to write more of David, and that tragic backstory I've established, and the whole David's game night idea has taken firm root in my brain, and will happen, so it would be a sequel once I'm done with the epilogue, but with less crying, and more saucy Ilya, and middle aged hockey men with jobs and hobbies (and character sheets I might already have written)? Look out for that one!

You know, a few commenters pointed out to me that Ilya and David might have had an overreaction to what Shane said, and yes, this fic is an artistic representation, but also, I don't think it's an overreaction? Things that the people we love say to us stay with us beyond the conversation, definitely for me, and my brain likes to remind me of what they said frequently and it's a spiral, the way this fic was a spiral. Sometimes all I need is to hear from the person why they said it, sometimes I need an apology, but I can let go. Forget and forgive, right? That's what I tried to bring to this story, hope that came across.

And Shane doesn't have a sad backstory, just lots of repressed feelings because he's not sure where they all go. This is exactly how i imagine Shane feels, and this whole fic has been my take on, you know, things.

I borrowed from Rachel Reid about how Shane dreamed about wanting Ilya and his parents to meet, so this could be canon? At least not not canon.
While this might not be exactly how you imagined the resolution, I knew this was where I would take it when I started the fic, so please be kind to me in the comments! Thank you so much for reading, and do let me know what you think! :)

Chapter 5

Chapter Summary

Ilya brings up jealousy, and the conversation derails, as it does.

Chapter Notes

I've been trying really hard to write an ending since my last update at the end of February, but it's been challenging because I find myself physically unable to write too much happy, so I did it my way with some angst, a talk about jealousy, and a loooooooot of love. Enjoy!

I've been constantly jealous for a decade.

"I'm jealous of Pike also." Ilya didn't know how else to bring up what Shane had said almost a month ago.

Shane made a noise that might have been a word if it hadn't been muffled against Ilya's chest. "What?"

The room was dim except for the spill of streetlight through the curtains. Shane was half-asleep, heavy and warm where he lay draped across Ilya, and Ilya swept his thumb across the thick muscle on the side of Shane's throat. They were still catching their breath after what Ilya considered a very successful first round, Shane sprawled across him like he had no intention of moving again tonight.

I've been constantly jealous for a decade.

"You said something weird last month," Ilya murmured.

"So?" Shane grunted into Ilya's chest, "You say lots of strange things, and I don't bring them up, asshole."

One of Shane's legs was hooked over Ilya's thigh, an arm draped across his waist, and Shane wiggled even closer until his face was pressed into the warm skin just below Ilya's collarbone. Ilya had a lot of plans for Shane tonight, but this thought had been stuck in his head for weeks now, slowly marinating in the back of his mind ever since Shane had said it, and Ilya knew himself well enough to understand he wouldn't be able to let it go until he asked.

"You know why I hate Pike?" Ilya found himself saying, "He gets to play with you every single day, Shane, and I am very jealous that he gets that when I don't, to be with you."

Shane made a faint noise of understanding and dragged himself up just enough to rest his chin on Ilya's chest. His hair was a complete mess, his eyes barely open.

"We're both jealous people, I know," Shane mumbled. "Why are we talking about this now?"

Shane had also said he was obsessed with Ilya, but Ilya was equally obsessed with Shane, so it wasn't a problem as far as Ilya was concerned. However, Shane had said he had always been jealous, but Ilya had only met Yuna and David a little more than a year ago, so who were all these people Shane was jealous of? They had already talked about Sveta, and Ilya was sleeping with no one but Shane. His old Boston teammates occasionally texted Ilya, but they definitely didn't know more about him than Shane, so who else was left?

"Who are you jealous of?" Ilya shifted slightly, turning his head so he could look down into Shane's pretty face.

Shane blinked up at Ilya as if the question was ridiculously absurd. "Are you fucking serious?"

Ilya lifted one shoulder in a half-hearted shrug, and Shane rolled onto his back with a dramatic exhale, dragging Ilya with him so Ilya ended up half on top of him anyway. Shane's hand slid up into Ilya's hair, fingers threading through the strands at his neck.

"I don't really have anybody, other than you," Ilya said, his fingers tightening slightly against Shane's chest, "and no, don't shake your head at me, Hollander, I know you are shaking your head."

"That is so not true." Shane's hand dropped back to Ilya's hair. "You remember when you were photographed with that model?"

Ilya thought about it. "Which one?"

"Exactly," Shane gave Ilya a look, "and the actresses in LA, and the woman with the big, you know, in New York, and the women in bars, and the—"

"Yes, okay, I get it," Ilya interrupted, rolling his eyes slightly, "but that was so long ago, Hollander." Ilya shifted slightly, propping himself up on one elbow so he could look at Shane properly, "You did not even want me then."

Shane might have abstractly wanted Ilya, but it felt like that time belonged to an entirely different life now that Ilya was in Ottawa and Shane was in his bed, looking like he had never belonged anywhere else.

"I know we were not together then, but I have always wanted you," Shane said quickly, tugging lightly at Ilya's hair, "though there were so fucking many of them."

Ilya raised an eyebrow, humming thoughtfully. "You paid me back with Rose Landry, and that was equal to a thousand of those others."

"A thousand?" Shane squeaked, and Ilya discovered, with a slow spark of delight, that a jealous Shane turned him on in unbelievable ways, something Shane noticed. "Ilya!"

"You were jealous of everyone who was with me," Ilya tilted his head, studying Shane with clear fascination, his obsession rising happily to the surface, "for almost ten years."

Shane groaned again and covered his eyes with his arm. "Please stop telling me numbers."

"Shane?" Ilya gently pulled the arm away, "You know, I am like that thing that sticks to the bottom of boats, what is it?" Ilya snapped his fingers as if that might magically produce the word, then swiped away the little furrow that had appeared between Shane's brows.

"Barnacles?"

"Yes, this," Ilya nodded decisively, "the longer you let me stay, the harder I am to get rid of, and now you are never getting rid of me, Hollander." Ilya wanted to form a hard shell around the two of them so nothing and no one could get close enough to separate Ilya and Shane. Hollander and Rozanov.

"I know, but," Shane shrugged helplessly, "I just hate that I have none of your firsts, while you have almost all of mine."

"I'm sorry I did not wait for you, Shane," Ilya said, flopping back down, "I should have waited."

For a moment, neither of them spoke.

"It's okay," Shane traced absent circles over Ilya's hip, the kind of lazy touch that came when Shane was thinking too hard. "I have you now."

"You have me, yes."

Across the room, the soft glow of a phone lit up the nightstand, but neither of them moved to check it. Shane was quiet for a second longer, staring at Ilya like he had all the answers. "But I still want more of you, and more of you until there's no more, until I can love all of you."

Ilya stilled and let the thought settle in the corners of his heart. Shane wanted all of Ilya, and Ilya wanted the same thing. He wanted to climb inside Shane's life and sit there permanently, to be every memory, every thought, and every plan Shane ever made, but people did not work like that. Even Ilya knew this much.

"You cannot love all of me, Hollander," Ilya said quietly, wishing Shane would understand him before he had to explain the rest. "No one can. We can love people and still hate things about them."

"I do love all of you," Shane said immediately, then frowned and made a small, scandalised noise. "Do you hate me?"

Ilya was tempted to lie, and almost did, but he forced himself to tell the truth. "Sometimes yes," Ilya saw tears gather in Shane's eyes, and rushed to reassure him, "but I also love you more than anything in the world."

"I love you more than anything too." Shane didn't love Ilya more than hockey, but that was a wasp nest Ilya would not be touching tonight.

Shane looked sad, like Ilya had broken his heart by admitting that tiny pinch of hate, but how could Ilya not when Shane was not in his arms every minute of the day and every second of the night, when he spent even a moment alone wishing Shane was with him? Shane had practices, games, teammates, and a life that continued even as Ilya was alone in his house, thinking about Shane, even if Ilya had all of those same things to do.

Ilya needed Shane to understand what he meant by hate in this stupid language he still couldn't find the right words in, so he kept reaching for more.

"You think I do not hate my mother, Hollander?" Ilya asked when Shane turned them over and snuggled into Ilya's chest, and Ilya felt a tear land on him, "I loved her, but she also left me alone in this world."

"Ilya." Ilya didn't want Shane to think too long about what it meant, and Ilya didn't want to think about hating his mother, even if it was only a little bit.

"You think I do not love my father?" Ilya didn't know what was happening to him anymore, and the words kept spilling out even when he knew he should probably stop. "He was an asshole, yes, but he taught me hockey and took me to hockey practice and held my hand when I was in the hospital and came to all my games and—"

"I—" Shane stopped, opening and closing his mouth a few times, unable to decide on what he wanted to say.

"You think I do not love my brother?" Ilya went on stubbornly. He wanted to blame the Hollanders for this sudden honesty, because he was certain he hadn't been like this before them. "He used to beat up the boys who teased me, before I became big enough to help him, before he became one of them." Andrei had been a good brother until their mother died, until Andrei had learned how to hate.

"You mean hate like it hurts you?" Shane ventured slowly, trying to untangle the knot Ilya had just dropped between them, "That kind of hate?"

"No," Ilya considered it again and sighed, "maybe, but I also mean burning kind inside me. You think I do not hate Svetlana?" What was Ilya doing? It felt like he was listing every person who had ever mattered to him, but it was the truth, and Shane deserved his truth, however ugly it might be. “You think I do not hate Marly or Sebby or Viggy or—”

"I know a tiny part of you is fond of Hayden," Shane offered carefully, like Ilya was a grenade waiting to blow, making Ilya snort a small laugh, and he was grateful Shane hadn't made it into a big thing. Shane just accepted the mess of Ilya, the way Ilya's feelings came tangled together. Ilya hated so many people.

Sometimes, Ilya hated himself.

"I wanted to say we cannot be everything for each other, Shane," Ilya exhaled slowly and dragged his hand through Shane's hair, "even though we want to be very much. I want to be everything for you, but I know I'm not, and it's okay."

"You're trying to tell me one person cannot be everything? You?" Shane tilted his head up at Ilya. "You literally told me in front of my parents that I was your everything."

"You are."

Shane waited, blinking those beautiful eyes up at Ilya, and Ilya had never been able to resist the pull of that brown.

"Just because you are everything to me," Ilya continued, searching for the right words, "does not mean I am everything to you, and it's okay, Hollander." Ilya might not ever mean more than hockey to Shane, but second best was still a place beside Shane, and Ilya would take it. Ilya would take everything Shane gave him.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Shane sat up slightly in outrage, and Ilya shoved him back into the mattress with one large hand, grinning at Shane's angry kitten face. It never failed to make Ilya smile, and if he regularly looked up videos of Shane's angry face to jerk off, it was his business.

Ilya looked down at Shane's body, raising an eyebrow when he saw an interest stirring. "Oh, you like that?"

"Fuck you." Shane grabbed Ilya's wrist and dragged him down into a messy kiss that was half protest and half laughter. When they broke apart, Shane pressed his forehead against Ilya's. "I love you."

“Я тебя люблю.” Ilya pulled Shane into his arms and traced slow circles on Shane's back with the tips of his fingers, trying to calm Shane down.

"Explain what you meant then." Ilya hadn't meant to make Shane mad with what Ilya considered the truth of the matter, and he needed to fix the night because Ilya wouldn't be able to see Shane for another month, and Ilya didn't want to part on a sad note. It would only haunt him until Shane was in his arms again.

"I am just saying, for example, like hockey is also something you love very much and sometimes, maybe, probably hate a little."

"I suppose so." Shane stared at Ilya and nodded thoughtfully. "I wish I could play hockey forever, and not have to do the rest of it, but I suppose it's true that as much as I love hockey, I do hate it on occasion."

Ilya was so relieved Shane hadn't followed up on what he was getting at before. As much as Ilya would have loved to hear Shane say he would choose Ilya over hockey, Ilya wasn't sure it was what he would have heard, and Ilya wasn't ready for that world of hurt, not today. Maybe in a few years, Ilya would be brave enough to ask, but Ilya wondered if he would have to be hurt enough to ask instead. He didn't want to think about it anymore.

Shane spoke again, voice muffled. "I don't want you to hate me, Ilya."

"I don't hate you, Shane," Ilya smiled into the dark and pulled Shane closer, pressing a slow kiss against Shane's hair, "I just hate that you're not always with me."

"Okay, I hate that too," Shane said softly and tightened his arms around Ilya, "and I love you so much."

"Not more than me, Hollander."

"You're an idiot." Shane huffed a quiet laugh. "Why does it have to be a competition?"

"It's always a competition," Ilya said, smirking because he knew Shane couldn't see it, "do you not want to argue you love me more?"

"I know I love you more," Shane muttered, probably pushing down the urge to squabble because he didn't want to prove Ilya right, "I don't need to argue about how much I love you."

Ilya snorted but didn't bother correcting Shane. Outside, a car passed somewhere on the street, headlights briefly washing across the ceiling, and Shane's voice faded against Ilya's chest, the warmth of him there slowly lulling Ilya to sleep.

Chapter End Notes

Since this is canon parallel, this fic happens in Ilya's second season with the Centaurs, so this is as far as we can get, and maybe I like how it ended? I might like it more on another read, idk how I feel about it right now.

Hammer/Sebbin is my close personal headcanon is where I've been at while I tried to finish writing this, and I'm happy to say I gotten quite far with it, to the point where I might be a little too obsessed, but this fandom has gotten me to write about 50k words in 2026, something I haven't done in years, so I'm grateful.

I also started David 'I’m bringing my son’s friend to game night' Hollander, which was inspired by my A/N in the last chapter and something I'm rather proud of writing! It builds off this fic, and David takes Ilya with him to game nights, and these middle-aged men become fond of Ilya as they go on.

Ultimately, this fic has been a catharsis and has probably been as much about my own feelings as Shane's, Ilya's, or even David's. I feel so much lighter having written all of this out, so thank you so much for staying with me on this journey, for reading, and for the love of this fic, which continues to amaze me. <3 Always love to know what you think!