Rating:

Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandoms:

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

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Characters:

Ilya Rozanov, Shane Hollander

Additional Tags:

Spoilers for Book 6: The Long Game (Game Changers), Ilya Rozanov Needs A Hug, Misunderstandings, Arguing, Panic Attacks, Mentions of Suicide, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Insecurity, Coming Out, Apologies, Shane Hollander Loves Ilya Rozanov, Angst with a Happy Ending, Autistic Shane Hollander

Language:

English

Collections:

hollanov for the heart <3, My favs to reread someday

Stats:

Published: 2025-12-06 Words: 3,780 Chapters: 1/1

you’d been born to bleed, little soldier

Summary

“Ilya,” he whispers. “I want this. I want to know when you’re hurting and when things are hard, because I want you. I want you when you’re sad, and lonely, and messy-“

“-you hate mess,” Ilya teases, drawing a hard-earned smile out of Shane.

“But I love you.”

 

(Or the argument in The Long Game, rewritten.)

Notes

Title from Isimo by Bleachers.

Ilya hears the door click shut and the sound of it echoes around his empty house.

He can’t breathe.

This place isn’t a home without Shane in it, and Shane has just walked out of that door and he might never come back.

Ilya told him to go. He sent him away because - because Ilya loves him more than he knows what to do with sometimes. Because he doesn’t have enough space inside of him for all the love he feels. Because he’s frightened, down to the very core of who he is - down to that scared, lonely little boy who still lives inside of him - that Ilya isn’t worth the risk.

Ilya loves his mom. He loved her more than anyone in the world, right up to the point where Shane Hollander crashed into his life and set the whole thing ablaze. So his heart aches when he thinks about the pain she must have been in, and how strong and brave she was to survive for so long under his father’s iron fist. He doesn’t blame her. He doesn’t even resent her. But it doesn’t change the fact that she left him.

Ilya was just a child when he learned that even the people who love you the most in the world can leave you.

That’s a hard lesson to unlearn when the love of your life is afraid to be seen in public with you.

Ilya shouldn’t have sprang the party onto Shane like that. He knows it was stupid, knows it was far too impulsive for the man who schedules his phone calls with his parents and irons and folds his socks. He just…wanted. He wanted to fill that desperate, lonely void inside his chest that feels like it’s growing bigger every single day. He wanted to tell the team he loves, finally, about the man that he loves.

He wanted, for just one night - for maybe the first time in his life - to not have to hide.

But it was too much to ask for, he knows that. Too big of a risk to expect Shane to take. Because if this got out - if the world somehow found out about all that Shane and Ilya are to each other - he’s not sure their relationship would withstand it.

He thinks, maybe, that Shane would never be able to forgive him for ruining his life.

The reality of that is like a lead balloon expanding in Ilya’s chest. His knees shake and he stumbles backwards, and as soon as his back hits the wall, the gravity of the situation drags him down to the floor.

Ilya Rozanov doesn’t cry. Not since he was twelve years old and his mother took her own life. Not since he learned that the only thing tears would get him was a swift clip around the ear from his father. He’s spent a lifetime learning how to keep things his hidden: his grief, and his pain, and his fear, and his love. He’s become so much of an expert at it that sometimes he can even convince himself he’s okay.

But as silence suffocates him in this house he’d bought here in Ottawa - for him, and for Shane, and for their life together - Ilya finally breaks.

A sob rips its way out of his chest with vicious claws and snarling teeth, shattering the silence with all the pain he’s spent so long trying to keep inside. And after the first one breaks free, Ilya can’t seem to stop. He brings his knees up to his chest, drops his head down between them, and fists his hands in his hair. He pulls on his curls, as if the sting of it might silence him - might remind him of his dad’s hand striking the back of his head until Ilya learned that suffering should be a silent act. A hidden one.

It doesn’t.

Ilya cries and he cries; an ugly, pathetic breaking.

He chokes on his sobs, clutches at his chest, tries to swipe away his tears but they just keep coming. Somewhere, distantly, Ilya is aware that he’s probably having a panic attack. Horrifyingly, he’s also aware that he caught his mom like this more than once in the months before she died. It’s a frightening thought, one that tightens like a vice around his lungs as he tries to catch his breath.

”You wouldn’t even choose me, would you?…If it is between me and hockey.”

He hears those words ringing in his head and he wishes he’d never asked them, wishes he’d never had to see that moment of uncertainty on Shane’s face - that split second of hesitation where Shane genuinely had to consider it. It had felt like a knife in Ilya’s gut. It wasn’t fair to dump that on him, but Ilya was angry, and hurt, and so fucking tired of living a lie. Of having no one to talk to about the biggest, best thing in his entire life.

Ilya has given up so much for Shane.

Boston was the first place to feel like home to him since he was twelve years old. The first place to accept him, to love him, to not just need him but actually, truly want him. And Ilya walked away from it. He walked away from the team he loved, the team he lifted the cup the with, to play for a team that couldn’t win a game even if their opponent played without a goalie. And he did all of it to be closer to Shane, to give this thing between them a chance of working out.

But the truth is, Shane never asked Ilya for that.

Ilya did it because he wanted to. And he’d do it all again, a million times over, as long as it got him Shane. As long is it stole them more time. He doesn’t regret it, not for a single second; not even now, as he sobs on his bedroom floor. But. But it was unfair of him to ask Shane to do the same - to take risks and make sacrifices - when Shane never once asked that of Ilya.

It doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt, though, when Shane looked him dead in the eyes and asked, ”Would you choose me?”

It had felt like Ilya was being torn in half. Like everything he’d given up, every sacrifice he had made, had been pointless. Because if Shane didn’t know, if he couldn’t see that Ilya has been choosing him for years, then what was any of this for?

Ilya remembers being seventeen, alone in a different country for the very first time. Russia hadn’t felt like his home in years, but it was all Ilya had ever known until those few weeks he spent in Saskatchewan for the WJHC. He remembers being afraid - feeling stupid and embarrassed with his thick accent and clunky English - until a pretty boy with freckles had approached him, and suddenly it seemed a little bit easier to breathe.

Suddenly he didn’t feel so alone.

Now that pretty boy with freckles has just walked away from Ilya, and he doesn’t think he’s ever been this lonely in his life.

He shouldn’t have picked a fight. He shouldn’t have backed Shane up against the wall. He shouldn’t have asked a question he didn’t want the answer to. He was just so desperate for someone - for Shane, only ever Shane - to choose him, that he rushed things. He ruined them.

“I already chose you, Hollander,” Ilya had said.

He had meant it then, and he means it now, and - if he gets the chance again - he will keep meaning it for the rest of his life. Because Ilya will take Shane however he can get him.

It was true when they were terrified teenagers who stole secret moments together, long before they knew what this would become. It was true when they were superstars on the ice, but too afraid off it to admit that what they had was real. And it’s true now, as Ilya sits in a broken heap on the floor and Shane drives back to Montreal, taking Ilya’s heart along with him.

It has always been Shane, it always will be Shane, and Ilya would take a lifetime of hiding with him rather than a single moment without him.

Ilya doesn’t know how long he sits there on the floor, but it’s long enough that his lower back starts to ache from the way he’s slouched against the wall, resting on his tailbone with his knees bent and hands heavy on his thighs. His breathing has finally evened out, and his tears have dried on his cheeks, and the raging inferno inside of him has been shrunk down into something a bit more manageable. A controlled burn, rather than a forest fire. A thing that he can live with.

He’s just considering picking himself up when there’s a series of sounds downstairs: a key in the door, the click of it closing, footsteps on the hardwood.

Ilya holds his breath.

“Ilya?” Shane calls out.

He can’t find the words to respond. His breath is caught somewhere between his lungs and his lips, because the relief of hearing Shane’s voice filling the silence is so visceral that Ilya can taste it.

He hears the familiar squeak of the first step on the staircase, and he knows in an instant that Shane is coming up to find him. Before Ilya can pull himself up off the floor, before he has time to hide the evidence of his breakdown, the bedroom door is swinging open and Shane is standing there in front of him.

His clothes are rumpled - he’s wearing Ilya’s hoodie, which he hadn’t noticed until now - his hair is mussed up like he’s been running his hands through it, and his eyes are red like he’s been trying not to cry.

The second his eyes land on Ilya, his entire face crumples.

“Baby,” Shane whispers, so soft and sweet that Ilya has to swallow down another wave of tears.

He crosses the distance between them with the same speed and grace that he displays on the ice, and in an instant Shane is sinking to his knees to sit with him. Ilya widens his legs just a fraction, making space for Shane to slot between them right where he belongs.

“I’m sorry.” The words tumble from Shane’s mouth quickly, like he couldn’t hold them in for a moment longer. “God, Ilya, I’m so sorry. For all of it. Everything that I said.”

“Shane-“

“You have given up so much for me.”

“For us,” Ilya reminds him, and Shane’s eyes soften just a touch.

“For us,” Shane repeats. “You’ve given up so much for us, and I was so busy trying to slot you into my life where it was convenient that I missed how much you were suffering.”

“I want to fit into your life,” Ilya says. “Is all I want, more than anything.”

Ilya is good at shaping himself into whatever he needs to be. Brave for his mom, a son his dad could be - almost - proud of, a hockey player who can fight, and score, and rally, and lead. He’s spent his life turning into what other people need him to be, and those things were so often weapons. For Ilya, it’s an honour to squeeze himself into Shane’s life; it is a relief that he gets to take the shape of something soft.

But Shane shakes his head.

“No. No I shouldn’t be trying to fit you into my life, I should be building one with you.”

It’s what Ilya wants more than anything. What he has wanted since the moment they first kissed, when Ilya knew Shane was something special - when he knew this was something he wouldn’t be able to walk away from. It had always felt like a pipe-dream, though. A beautiful what-if. Something they could maybe have in a decade or so, if they managed to survive that long.

But hearing Shane say it out loud…it shakes something loose in Ilya. Something desperate, and vulnerable, and wanting.

“I want that, sweetheart. Is why I am here on this team that always loses.”

Ilya smiles when he says it, it’s meant to be a joke. Because sure, the Cens are pretty abysmal right now, but they’re also fucking great human beings. Safe, and good, and close in a different way than the team was in Boston. More genuine. He doesn’t hate his team, and he doesn’t hate being in Ottawa, he just misses his boyfriend a sickening, humiliating amount.

But maybe Ilya’s humour doesn’t translate so well tonight, or maybe Shane is so insistent upon beating himself up over this that he refuses to hear it. Either way, his expression is riddled with guilt as he finally reaches out to touch Ilya. He rests his hands on Ilya’s knees, and Ilya slides one of his up his thighs so they can lock their fingers together.

The feeling of Shane’s skin against his sends a shiver down his spine, and Ilya takes his first full breath since Christmas Eve.

“I didn’t know, Ilya,” Shane whispers.

And his voice is so desperately sad that Ilya would do anything in the world to make it better.

“I didn’t know that all of this was hurting you. I don’t - I don’t always pick up on things like that, but it’s not because I don’t care. Okay?” Shane says. “I just. I just don’t always see things the way everyone else does. I’m sorry.”

Ilya knows Shane and the meticulous way his brain works. He knows that he often sees things in black and white, instead of all the shades of grey that exist between the two. He knows that Shane takes things literally, at face value, because why would someone say something if it they didn’t mean it? Why would Ilya say he was okay if it wasn’t true?

He also knows that Shane is kind, and gentle, and sweet, and he would never in a million years ignore Ilya’s pain if he knew about it.

“Is okay, Shane,” Ilya promises him.

But Shane winces, and those melted-chocolate eyes of his turn big and sad and glassy. He raises their entwined hands and kisses the back of Ilya’s knuckles.

“It’s not,” Shane argues. “I should have known anyway.”

“I did not want you to see. We have such little time together, it is all precious. Did not want to waste it being-“ he waves his around as he searches for the words, but simply settles on, “-this.”

Shane shakes his head and shifts further into the space between Ilya’s legs, until his knees are pressed against the inside of Ilya’s thighs. He tips forward, bumps their foreheads together so that they’re breathing the same air. He reaches up his free hand and tangles his fingers in Ilya’s curls, holding him close. Holding him together.

“Ilya,” he whispers. “I want this. I want to know when you’re hurting and when things are hard, because I want you. I want you when you’re sad, and lonely, and messy-“

“-you hate mess,” Ilya teases, drawing a hard-earned smile out of Shane.

“But I love you.”

The words are heavy as they hover in the space between them. It’s not the first time they’ve ever said them, of course. Not even close. Sometimes Ilya finds himself whispering them over and over again, like if he doesn’t tell Shane - if he doesn’t say it out loud - then he might explode from the effort of keeping those words trapped between his teeth.

But somehow, in this fragile, gentle moment, it feels like they mean so much more.

Because Shane is seeing Ilya at his lowest, seeing him crumpled on the ground with tear tracks on his cheeks and sadness in his heart, and he wants him anyway. Loves him anyway. Even when Ilya isn’t perfect, even when he isn’t easy. Shane isn’t walking away from him. He isn’t leaving.

“I love you, too. So much,” Ilya promises him. “And I am sorry. I shouldn’t have mentioned the party. Is too much to ask of you.”

Too much, too soon, too unexpected. They have a plan, after all, and it wasn’t fair of Ilya to try and deviate from that because he was feeling sad and insecure, and wanted the world to know that someone as good as Shane Hollander could love somebody like him.

Shane pulls back, but keeps his hand in Ilya’s hair.

“No, Ilya, it isn’t. Wanting your friends to know…that isn’t asking for too much,” Shane assures him. “You’re allowed to want good things for yourself.”

“I want you. You are the best thing,” Ilya says simply.

Tears fill Shane’s eyes, and Ilya reaches up to wipe them away when they spill down his cheeks. Shane traps Ilya’s hands against his face, leaning into the touch like a puppy looking to be pet. He closes his eyes, breathes deeply, and Ilya just…stares, watching in complete awe as his beautiful boyfriend with his heartbreaking freckles takes comfort in his touch.

Shane licks his lips as he opens his eyes and looks at Ilya’s. “You need to know - I need you to know - what you mean to me, Ilya. Please, please tell me you know.”

“Shane, moya lyubov. Of course I know you love me-“

Shane shakes his head.

“No, no it’s - it’s so much more than that.”

He sounds frantic, untethered, like a wild thing that’s finally been unchained. He takes hold of both of Ilya’s hands and squeezes.

“You’re - god, Ilya. You’re everything.” It’s a declaration, a promise, a prayer. “None of this matters without you. The money, the fame, the awards…hockey. It would be meaningless if I didn’t have you to come home to at the end of it all.”

Ilya doesn’t know what to say or do. He simply stays motionless, completely frozen as his eyes well with tears for the second time tonight. He bites down on his bottom lip and tries not to cry - tries not to say something insane, like marry me.

“I would choose you, Ilya. Today, tomorrow, always, I would choose you. In every single lifetime.”

And really, there’s nothing left to do but kiss him.

Ilya surges forward, closing the space between them and capturing his boyfriend’s lips in a searing, tender, honest kiss. A kiss that holds a thousand promises and declarations and silent I love yous. A kiss that feels like having life breathed back into his lungs - like the start of something new, but also like coming home. Like everything Ilya has ever dreamed up, but never really believed he would be allowed to have.

Ilya gets lost in the taste of Shane, and Shane - desperate and frantic and in love - clambers onto Ilya’s lap, straddling him as he takes Ilya’s face between his hands so he can’t pull away.

“I love you,” Shane whispers. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”

“Shane, baby. Ty moya zhizn'.” You are my life. “Ya lyublyu tebya.” I love you.

Breathless, Shane pulls back. But instead of moving away he drops his forehead onto Ilya’s shoulder and allows his body to melt into Ilya’s.

“I shouldn’t have left.”

Ilya hums. “I shouldn’t have told you to go.”

Silence descends upon them again, cloaking them in something private, and intimate, and honest. They breathe together, their chests rising and falling as one as their heartbeats thrum in sync with each other. Ilya’s back is still hurting, but he doesn’t dare move. Not with Shane all pliant and sweet on top of him, his lips brushing against Ilya’s neck in a series of gentle kisses.

Once upon a time, Ilya could never have imagined this life for himself.

Not just Shane, a man, his biggest rival. But this: getting to hold someone that he loves, and who loves him back. Getting to make mistakes, but still be forgiven for them - but still be loved in spite of them. Getting to have someone who says sorry when they hurt him…who admits when they are wrong.

He used to think he would always be that teenage boy, living in a mausoleum with a ghost for a mother and a monster for a father. Living in a country that would not love him if it really knew him.

He can’t believe this is his life now.

“We should go to the party,” Shane says, his voice loud as it breaks the silence.

“What? Shane, no, we-“

“You deserve to tell people about us. I want that for you,” Shane tells him as he sits back to look Ilya right in the eyes.

“This is enough for me. You are enough.”

Shane’s careful hand caresses Ilya’s cheek as he says, “I know. But I think it’s time. Ten years…it’s too long to wait, when we already wasted so much time.”

“Moya lyubov, we don’t have to rush,” Ilya insists.

He doesn’t want to force Shane into doing something he isn’t ready for. He doesn’t want to push him into making a decision that he will regret. He would die if Shane grew to resent him.

But Shane smiles at him, leaning in close so he can brush his nose over Ilya’s, one, two, three times. I and love and you.

“We’re not, we’re taking it nice and slow. Starting with your team.”

So overcome with love, and adoration, and devotion, Ilya grabs Shane’s face between his hands and pulls him down for another kiss. Shane giggles against his mouth, and soon they’re both smiling and laughing so much that it’s not even a kiss at all. Ilya feels so light, so filled with joy, that if Shane wasn’t sitting on his lap he might just float away.

“They’ll be fine about us, right?” Shane asks. “Your team?”

There’s a hint of nervousness in his voice that he doesn’t try to conceal, but he doesn’t seem hesitant or like he’s doubting his decision. He’s just looking for reassurance that Ilya is more than happy to give to him.

“They will be great. Excellent. They are good people, Shane. I am happy with them.”

Shane sighs, a long, deep breath of relief, like hearing those words from Ilya’s mouth soothed some of the things he was still worrying about. He leans into steal another kiss - or three - from Ilya, and then he smiles big, and wide, and brave.

“Let’s do this, then.”

And two hours later, when they show up on Bood’s doorstep, Shane doesn’t let go of Ilya’s hand once.