Rating:

Explicit

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandoms:

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

Relationships:

Kip Grady/Scott Hunter, Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Characters:

Scott Hunter (Game Changers), Kip Grady, Ilya Rozanov, Shane Hollander

Additional Tags:

Coming Out, Closeted, Present Tense, POV Scott Hunter

Language:

English

Collections:

fanfics that i keep coming back to read, *Heated rivalry melts my heart*

Stats:

Published: 2025-12-08 Completed: 2025-12-12 Words: 13,162 Chapters: 7/7

A Stopped Clock

Summary

Scott Hunter knew there was something weird going on between Ilya Rozanov and Shane Hollander. He clocked it the first time he saw them interact. He wasn't sure *what* it was, but he knew it was *something*. So he watched. For years.

Notes

I got to wondering, as I thought about that look Scott gives Shane at All-Stars after the hotel room number exchange...what if he really was clocking them? Scott's so up in his own mind about his own stuff that he would hardly call them out on it. But he also wouldn't be able to let it go. And thus, a fic was born.

Chapter 1: The early days

All-Stars game...

“1221.”

Scott Hunter looks at the cocky Russian who just skated by, then at the conflicted-looking Canadian next to him on the bench. Did he just…?

Nah.

Scott shakes his head. There’s no way. And yet…he’s been cruised before. He’s done the cruising before, if only occasionally. He knows what that sounds like. He’s just…never seen it happen on the ice before.

He looks again at Hollander, who’s now flushed, his freckles standing out starkly against the red skin of his face. Scott wonders what face he, himself, is making at this point. “Nice shootin’, rook.”

“Thanks.”

“Glad to see Rozanov didn’t hold my record for more than a minute. What’d he want, by the way?” he asks Hollander casually.

“Oh, nothing, just shit-talking.” That flush isn’t subsiding, though.

Scott nods slowly. “He’s an asshole, right?” And he is. Rozanov chirps like no one else, as if he gets pure joy from angering his opponents.

Hollander snorts a breath through his nose and nods. “I mean, yeah. Basically.”

“Lucky me, I’m in the room next door to him at the hotel.” Had that given away too much about his suspicions? Scott couldn’t just let it go completely unremarked when they were being this obvious and when the consequences could be so bad…for all of them…if they outed themselves. You didn’t just get left alone if people in the NHL found out you liked fucking men.

Hollander’s eyes dart away, and Scott lets it drop then, but his eyes keep coming back to Hollander and Rozanov for the rest of the game, looking for something, anything, that will tell him if he’s imagined this or not. Surely the two biggest-name rookies in the league aren’t doing…that?

And no, he’s not jealous if they are. Just because Scott’s gotten laid all of twice in the past four years, neither of those times with someone who spoke the same language as him beyond yes, no, and please…no, he’s not jealous. He’s worried. Hollander is a good kid. A smart, clean player. And Rozanov is…not. What if Rozanov is just trying to get in Hollander’s head because he, like Scott, has gotten gay vibes from him? Not hitting-on-you gay vibes. Just…looks-at-men-a-little-too-closely gay vibes.

Hollander has a shit poker face.

Still, Scott doesn’t say anything. It’s not his place, either to notice or to comment to Hollander. And he’s certainly not going to challenge Rozanov, who’d almost certainly smack the shit out of him, or at least try.

So he lets it go.

****

That night…

Ok, maybe Scott was worrying about this a little more than he needed to. But he had to know. Had to. So there he was, awake, sitting fully clothed on the end of his hotel bed, listening for the sound of a knock on the door next-door, at eleven o’clock at night.

Because he needed to know.

A series of muffled thumps. Scott jumps to his feet and races to his room door, planting his eye against the peephole. He can just make out the edge of what looks like a navy sweatshirt in the periphery of his view, to the right, where Rozanov’s room is. He twists his head trying to get a better view, to no avail. All he can make out is a shoulder. And yes, it sort of looks like a hockey player’s wide shoulder, but that’s hardly definitive. What is somewhat definitive is that it’s probably not a woman’s shoulder, or at least not the type of women Rozanov typically goes for. Too tall, too broad. So, ok, one way or another, Rozanov has someone with a masculine build coming to his room after lights-out. Definitely interesting, but it doesn’t tell him whether the visitor is poor Hollander.

Scott gives a moment’s thought to slipping the door open to get a full view, but decides that would be way too obvious. So with a sigh, he instead returns to bed, pulling off his hoodie and deciding he needs to sleep. It’s not like this is the last time he’s going to see Hollander and Rozanov, even just this weekend. There’s still time to figure out what’s going on there.

****

Las Vegas, NHL Awards banquet...

Scott approaches Hollander, who’s standing at the bar with a glass of golden liquid. He fumbles for a long moment with an introductory line, finally coming up with an extremely awkward joke about whether Hollander, who’s still not legal, is drinking.

Hollander takes him completely seriously. Calls him “Mr. Hunter.”

Suddenly, Scott feels ninety instead of thirty-two. He fights a wince and tries again, inviting Hollander to do some shots with Scott and couple other old-timers. Actually, he opens the invite to all the rookies who’d been in contention for Rookie of the Year. Hollander immediately bites, and Scott pushes it a little more: “Then where’s your boy, Rozanov?”

Hollander goes still, his smile dropping. “My…what?”

And suddenly Scott feels guilty. Guilty for stressing out this poor kid. Guilty for queer-baiting him. Guilty for pushing anything about this for the sake of his own curiosity. How would he feel if someone walked up to him and started broadly hinting that they knew Scott liked men?

He tries to walk back his comment, handwaving about the two rookies’ famous rivalry, but Hollander doesn’t relax again until they’ve got the second shot into him. And even after that, he’s very, very careful to not look at Rozanov.

Scott thinks he might have miscalculated.

Chapter 2: And then there was Kip

Chapter Notes

Spoilers for Episode 3

Montreal…

“You’re starting to sound like him, Hollander.” Scott knew he’d crossed the line as soon as he said it, but he was tired, demoralized, and out of fucks to give. So he just glared at Hollander, deciding to brazen it out.

“I’m sorry, what?”

Now would be the time to back down. Apologize, or even just pretend he said something different. Give Hollander a break. The kid doesn’t deserve to have Scott’s bad mood taken out on him.

But fuck, Scott’s so angry and on-edge. So he doesn’t. “You fuckin’ heard me, Hollander.” And he glares again.

Next thing he knows, Hollander’s thrown down his gloves and is tackling him. Or, well, trying to; he doesn’t think Hollander’s ever been in a fight on the ice in his life, and it shows. Mostly he’s shouting at Scott and making threatening gestures. Scott, torn between bemusement and frustration, mirrors him until their teammates and the linesmen pull them each backwards. “This isn’t over, Hunter!” Hollander shouts as a parting line.

Beside him, one hand on Scott’s arm, Vaughn snorts and rolls his eyes. “What’d you say to piss off the puppy, anyway?” he asks Scott.

“The what?”

Vaughn shrugs. “You know, because he’s so eager and earnest. Like a little puppy. I didn’t even know he knew how to fight.”

Scott laughs a little. “He doesn’t.”

“Ooh, burn,” Vaughn shoots back immediately, chuckling. “But really, what’d you say?”

Scott considers his options: demur, make something up, tell the truth but downplay it? Tell the flat-out truth, and let the chips fall where they may?

No, he can’t do that last one. He can’t out someone who’s in basically the same boat as he is. Well, ok, presumably Hollander is getting a lot more sex than Scott has been getting the past few years, but still, they have more in common than they don’t.

So he shrugs for Vaughn’s benefit. “Just chirping. Compared him to Rozanov. He didn’t like that.”

Vaughn grins and drags him over the board. “Nice. Who knew you had it in you, Captain America?”

Scott rolls his eyes, sick of the comparison. Just because he’s big and blonde… “I’m hardly Steve Rogers, dude.”

Another player leans over and smacks Scott on the helmet. “Yeah, Steve Rogers at least goofed off every now and then, Cap.”

“Oh, fuck you,” Scott shoots back without heat. This is the kind of chirping he can handle. “If you’re a dick I’m gonna put you on the fourth line next game.”

Vaughn hoots. “Don’t piss off the Captain, especially now that we know he can even get under Hollander’s skin!”

Scott sighs. He’s never going to live this fight down. He slips on his skate guards and heads for the locker room, figuring he’ll see if Kip had messaged him yet. Maybe Kip had even watched the game? He knows Kip isn’t much for hockey, but he’s shown some interest since they started doing…whatever it is they’re doing.

Then again, does he want Kip to have seen that embarrassing face-off with Hollander?

Scott decides that no, he really doesn’t.

****

That night…

Scott sits at the dumpy bar, nursing his beer. Kip’s asleep at home before a long day tomorrow, and after finishing a quick call with him, Scott’s been too restless to hang out in his hotel room after tonight’s loss. It’s the antisocial type of restlessness that means he also doesn’t want to hang out in the hotel bar, commiserating with his teammates. So he took a walk and successfully located this down-on-its-luck little hole in the wall a few blocks away. Still in the nice-ish neighborhood he started in, but it looks like maybe it’s been here since before gentrification hit.

The television behind the bar in front of him is showing highlights – and lowlights – from the Admirals’ past few games. They’ve already shown Rozanov’s grin after he won their game, as well as Scott’s pathetic fight with Hollander. This definitely isn’t making him feel any better.

Finally, the network cuts to the post-game presser featuring Hollander, who easily answers questions in English and French. Scott’s high school French allows him to understand perhaps one word in three, just enough to get that Hollander doesn’t seem to be saying anything momentous. Definitely not And by the way, I’m fucking Ilya Rozanov.

Scott takes another sip of his beer and idly wonders what would happen if Hollander did say something like that. Would people keel over, dead of shock? Would he be kicked out of the league? Blackballed? Would his teammates turn on him?

And yes, Scott is only wondering about this for Hollander. It has nothing to do with his own worries about his own life. Definitely not.

Somewhere on the other side of the room, someone’s Grindr notification tone goes off, and Scott instinctively twitches a hand toward his phone even though he knows, knows, he only runs that app when he’s out of the country.

The bartender looks at him oddly, and Scott musters a chuckle. “Thought I felt my phone buzz,” he mutters.

“Mmhm.” The bartender looks a cross between amused and skeptical. Scott wonders if he knows what Grindr sounds like, too, and has guessed what happened.

Awkwardly, he drains the last of his beer, and he’s just preparing to drop some money on the bar and get the fuck out of there when the captions on the TV screen catch his attention.

Interviewer to Hollander: So, Shane, both you and Rozanov have conquered the Admirals in the past few days. And you’ll be meeting up with each other in a few more to fight it out for a shot at the playoffs. Any thoughts you’d like to share with Rozanov beforehand?”

Hollander stares at the camera, a subtle panic flashing through his eyes for a fraction of a second before Scott can see him consciously clear the expression away and replace it with a carefree grin. “Only that he should watch out, because we’re coming for him and his boys,” he tells the interviewer.

She looks dissatisfied with that. “Nothing else?”

Hollander shrugs. “He knows what he’s in for. Montreal dominates for a reason.”

Scott almost chokes on his own spit as a mental image of Hollander domming Rozanov pops into his head. No, surely…no, never mind. He shakes his head at himself. He doesn’t need to be picturing other players’ sex lives, whether gay or straight.

Scott straightens his ballcap on his head, sighs, and stands up. It’s time to go try to sleep while definitely not thinking about what could be, for himself or for Hollander.

Chapter 3: The Cup

Chapter Notes

Yeah, I lost track of exactly when Scott’s coming-out happens compared to the Hollanov story, and I was too lazy to check the book for the actual dialogue or dates surrounding any of this. So please suspend all disbelief/prior knowledge! Be aware that we’re moving into book spoiler territory now.

Stanley Cup Finals…

Scott can’t believe what he just did. But somehow at the same time, it was the most natural thing in the world to have done. He looks down at Kip, who is unsteady on the slick post-game ice but smiling widely in spite of that, and can’t stop the grin that’s spreading across his own face.

“Holy shit,” Kip breathes, lifting his hand from Scott’s shoulder to his cheek. “You just came out.”

Scott glances over his shoulder, noticing that while some of his teammates are still distracted by their own celebrations, others are staring open-mouthed at him. At least two television cameras are focused on him right now, their reporters yapping madly in front of them. So yeah, the cat’s definitely out of the bag.

He shrugs. “It was time.”

A hand slams down on top of his helmet, startling him, and he turns to see his teammate, Carter Vaughn, bearing down on them. “What the fuck, dude?” Vaughn bellows, good-naturedly, Scott thinks.

Kip ducks back a little, probably intimidated by the sheer size of the man in his pads and skates, and his feet slip out from under him. Scott catches him before he can go down, and ends up with an armful of his boyfriend and a gaping teammate beside them.

Vaughn stares at them some more. “So are you like…gay, then?” he asks tentatively.

Scott bites his lip, then nods. It’s a bit late to deny it now. “Yeah. This is my…” He clears his throat. “This is my boyfriend. Kip.”

Kip waves halfheartedly, still looking wary.

“Jesus fuck.” Vaughn slaps a hand on top of his own helmet, then tugs it off, his curly hair going every which way now that it’s been freed. “For how long?”

“I -” Scott starts, only to be interrupted by Kip doing his best to get his feet under him so he can advance on the other hockey player.

“What do you care?” Kip challenges tightly. “It’s not illegal to be a gay hockey player, and he doesn’t owe you any details.”

Vaughn holds up a placating hand. “Uh, it’s not like that. I didn’t mean…I mean I don’t…it doesn’t matter to me. I just…you think you know a guy, right? And then…” He gestures helplessly. “So I was just wondering.”

Kip hums suspiciously, but Scott has known Vaughn long enough to know he’s one of the good ones. Scott’s never heard him throw around homophobic slurs, in the locker room or even on the ice, where cocksucker is practically a term of endearment between opposing players. He stood up for a gay figure skater during their conversation in Russia at the Olympics. So he runs a hand soothingly down Kip’s back. “About a year,” he tells Vaughn, “as a couple. But I’ve been gay my whole life.”

“Jesus,” Vaughn says again, then shakes his head. “Well, what the fuck ever.” With no warning, he throws himself at Scott, who nearly drops Kip but just barely manages to keep his grip as he digs in his skates and bears Vaughn’s not-insubstantial weight as well. “We fucking won the Cup, dude! And you’re gay! And you have a boyfriend who you just fucking kissed on center ice! Let’s fucking celebrate!” He grabs Kip, who yips in alarm, out of Scott’s arms and starts dragging him over to where most of the rest of the team is gathered. “Ok, so Kip, you’ve gotta meet the guys.”

Scott, bemused but starting to come around to the idea that this all might actually be ok, skates along behind them.

****

That night…

“So,” Kip says that night, as they drunkenly try to undress themselves in Scott’s apartment, “how do you feel?”

Scott pauses with one sock off, thinking about all the answers he could give to that. Relieved? Drunk? Tired? Elated? “Lighter,” he finally settles on. “Optimistic. But also…worried.”

“Worried?” Kip plunks down on the bed, naked, and regards Scott seriously. “What are you worried about? Can I help?”

Scott shakes his head, sighing, and pulls off his other sock. “No, it’s nothing about me. Or at least, not exactly. It’s just…I know I’m not the only gay player in the NHL – I can’t possibly be - and I can’t help wondering whether I just made things easier or harder for all of them.”

“Easier,” Kip says decisively. “You opened the door, babe. Now they just need to walk through it.” He strokes Scott’s bare arm. “Come on, lie down and relax before you fall down.”

Obediently, Scott flops down on the bed. He can’t shake his thoughts of Hollander and Rozanov and their…whatever it is. Ever since his eyes were opened to it, it’s like he can’t not see it when the two men are in the same room, whether he’s there with them or just watching the game on TV. What will they think about Scott’s coming out? Will they, perhaps, come out too? Rozanov could probably get away with it; he’s known as a bad boy. But Hollander? Clean-cut, polite, golden boy Hollander? He’d be pulled down by Rozanov’s reputation.

Scott nibbles at a loose cuticle on his left hand and turns to look at Kip. “So there’s two guys I sorta know. On other teams. And they’re…they’re maybe a thing? Together?”

Kip’s eyes grow wide. “Two hockey players together? Damn.”

“Yeah.” Scott sighs. “I’m worried about how this is gonna affect them.”

“Hey.” Kip kisses him softly, not pushing for anything, just connecting. “It’s ultimately up to them, how they cope with this. You have to live your own life, do what makes you happy. Same goes for them.” He pauses, a new gleam in his eye. “But uh…so, who is it exactly?”

Scott can’t hold in a huff of a laugh. “Lie down with me and I’ll tell you the story,” he says, wrapping an arm around Kip. “It starts somewhere around 2009 with these two punk kids…”

Chapter 4: At camp

Chapter Notes

We're in book territory now, kiddies (though I'm sure it's polluted with bits and pieces of show because frankly it's all running together in my mind). Spoilers for books 1-4.

Montreal, the next year…

Scott steps out of his air-conditioned rental car into the muggy heat of a Montreal summer and sighs. It isn’t that he isn’t used to gross summer heat – New York definitely has its moments – but he’s already grumpy that Kip hadn’t been able to travel north with him, and this weather isn’t helping.

Still, he’s here for a good cause. He, along with a number of other NHL players and ex-players, is going to coach and teach at the Irina Foundation’s summer hockey camp, hosted by everyone’s favorite and least favorite players: Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov.

Who still haven’t said a word, to him or anyone else, about what, if anything, they are to each other, just in case anyone was wondering. And so yeah, Scott is just a little curious about what he’s in for this month.

If nothing else, it might make the mosquito bites worth it.

Rubbing a hand over his short hair and shouldering his gear bag, Scott slams his trunk and heads toward the large, looming building at the other end of the parking lot. Not an NHL rink – he supposes a non-profit couldn’t quite afford to rent one of those out for a month – but a good-sized rec rink nonetheless. The kids will have plenty of room to move around.

The first person he sees when he enters the building is a giant wall of a man, hair and beard unkempt, with, rather inexplicably, a twink wearing eyeliner hanging off his arm. Scott blinks back some of the shadows in the room and finally recognizes Ryan Price, a retired Enforcer who’d spent his career bouncing from one team to another before he’d apparently gotten fed up and fucked off mid-season.

And yeah, Scott had heard something about how Price was actually gay and had a boyfriend, but the little guy standing next to Price is somehow not what he would have pictured for the hulking D-man.

“Price!” Scott says, extending a friendly hand and trying to shake off his surprise. “I didn’t know you’d be here.”

Price runs an uneasy hand through his hair and then shakes hands with Scott. “Uh, yeah, I originally said no, but Rozanov can be very convincing.”

His boyfriend snorts. “By which he means that he was basically informed that he would be here and not given any choice. But,” the shorter man adds, raising an eyebrow at Price, “he is not here to teach the kids to fight.” He crosses his arms and looks back at Scott. “So if that’s what you’re expecting, you can fuck off.”

Scott can’t help his chuckle. The man looks like an angry chihuahua. He resists the urge to pat him on the head. “Got it. No fighting for Pricey. So…” He looks around the dim rink, trying to pick out anyone else he knows. “Who else is here for this?”

Price cocks his head to the side, thinking. “Hollander and Rozanov, of course.” A little smile plays at the edges of his lips as he says the men’s names, and Scott wonders if Price has an inkling, too. “Pike follows Hollander around like a little puppy, so he’s here somewhere. I think a couple of the Centaurs came along with Rozanov. And then Eric Bennett is apparently goalie-coaching, but claims he’s not gonna put on skates the whole time.” He pauses for a second. “There’s more, but those are the names I remember.”

Scott just nods, pursing his lips as he ponders the list.

To his surprise, the twink shoves out a hand toward him expectantly. “And I’m Fabian. You’ll be seeing a lot of me, too.”

Scott raises his eyebrows. “You play?”

Fabian snorts and shakes his head. “Not unless you count my violin. I’m the moral support for Ryan, here.” He pats his boyfriend gently on his massive shoulder. Price flushes dully, but smiles.

Scott is opening his mouth to respond to that – he isn’t quite sure how – when a hand falls on his shoulder so hard it almost brings him to his knees, followed by a heavy body jumping on his back. “Hunter!” a deep, Russian-accented voice exclaims. “My true love, how I have missed you!”

Growling, Scott straightens his posture and does his best to shake off Rozanov, but the other man has now wrapped his legs around Scott’s waist from behind and is determined not to be moved. “Oh, what will your man think when he sees us together?” Rozanov teases.

“He’ll think you’re a fucking jack-off,” Scott snaps, “so basically, the truth. Get off.”

Without being asked, Price reaches over and plucks Rozanov off Scott like he weighs nothing. Holding the Russian by the collar of his Jersey, he leaves his feet dangling a few inches above the floor and peers down at him. “Nice to see you, Ilya,” Price rumbles politely.

“Da, same. Put me down.”

“You gonna harass Hunter anymore if I do?”

Rosanov goes shifty-eyed. “I mean, probably?” Still dangling semi-contentedly, he looks at Scott. “Where’s your boy?”

Scott sighs and facepalms. “Just…drop him, Price. Don’t be nice about it.”

Price shrugs and does as ordered, dropping Rozanov in a heap on the floor.

“You are very rude!” the Russian informs Price, then looks at Scott. “So are you! I just want to say friendly hello!” His wide grin belies his snappish words, and he bounces to his feet and starts wiping dust off his sleeve. “Unless anyone wants a kiss hello, instead,” he offers casually.

A hand comes out of the darkness and bitchslaps Rozanov in the back of the head, and Scott resists the urge to cheer the unseen attacker.

“Honestly, Ilya,” says a feminine voice, and then a dark-haired woman emerges from the gloom, glaring at the Russian. “Can we go two minutes without you sexually harassing the staff?”

“Is declaration of love, Yuna,” Rozanov insistes staunchly. “They appreciate it.”

Who the hell is Yuna? She looks way too old to be a Rozanov conquest, and anyway, Scott has noticed fewer and fewer of those over the years, presumably as Rozanov got in deeper with Hollander

Yuna looks at Scott. “Mr. Hunter? Did you by some chance want a kiss from Ilya?”

Scott shudders dramatically and shakes his head. “Definitely no.”

She looks at Price, who holds up a staying hand, and then at Fabian. Fabian cocks his head to the side thoughtfully. “I mean, just one might be interesting,” he muses. “C’mon, big guy, give me a taste.” He puckers up and leans toward Rozanov.

To Scott’s amusement, both Price and Rozanov blanch. Price throws an arm around his boyfriend’s waist and drags him back, while Rozanov takes an alarmed step back of his own. “I, uh,” he stammers. “That was…”

Yuna scoffs and throws up her hands. “Told you. Leave them alone, Ilya. And come on, the kids have started arriving. For some reason, they want to meet you.”

Rozanov’s eyes light up at the mention of the kids and he straightens his posture. “Right, I come.” He looks over at Scott, Fabian, and Price. “You come too. Meet the children. Hollander is there too.”

Had his voice softened just a fraction when he said Hollander’s name? Scott would swear it had. He keeps that to himself, though, and just shoulders his gear and nods for Rozanov to lead on.

****

Three hours later, after a round of introductions and then a warm-up, the kids are running shot accuracy drills on half the ice while the instructors are mostly gathered at the far side of the rink to shoot the shit. Bennett, true to his word, is hovering behind the boards in his sneakers, which means the rest of them are clustered around the hold-out who refuses to touch the ice. “Did you even bring skates, Eric?” Hollander asks, raising his eyebrows as he skates back and forth idly.

Bennett shrugs. “Yeah, just in case. But seriously, the kids don’t need me on the ice to learn from me. And…” He sighs. “My hip is fucking killing me and if a puck comes at me I know I’m gonna dive for it and that’s just gonna make things worse. Kyle will kill me if I come home limping.”

Rozanov snorts. “Real hockey husband – or wife - knows to expect bruises.” And was he side-eyeing Hollander as he said that? Scott thinks he was. “He finds it sexy.”

Hollander snorts. “Yeah, because a purple and green bruise the size of your head on your thigh is sooo hot.” He pauses, blinks, and seems to realize how that could have sounded. “Or at least, it’s definitely not hot on me.”

Fabian, who had been relaxed back on the bench slightly behind them, raises a hand to join the conversation. “There’s a difference between bruises and a bad joint. Bruises heal. Something like a bad back never really does. Let’s not wish destruction upon Bennett’s body.”

Price grins and ruffles his boyfriend’s hair. “You say that like you don’t have your own repetitive strain injuries in your hands.”

“Eh, fuck off,” Fabian says without heat.

Rozanov, on the other hand, seizes on that statement. “What do you have him doing with his hands, Price?” he asks with a leer.

The entire group groans and Hollander jabs Rozanov in the ribs with the end of the stick he’d been leaning on. “He’s a musician, you neanderthal. He plays with his hands.”

Rozanov grins wider. “So do I.” He makes grabby hands in the general direction of Fabian, only to find himself body-blocked by Price, whose face has gone flat and dangerous, similar to the way he used to look when he dropped the gloves.

“Hooookay.” Rozanov, wisely, backs off, then darts behind Scott. “Protect me, Hunter!”

Scott snorts and shoves him away. Rozanov stumbles into Hollander, who casually catches him as if this is far from the first time he’s seen a flying Russian coming at him. Well, the way those two play on the ice, it probably isn’t.

Once Rozanov is steady, Hollander gives him his own shove, putting him back where he’d started. “No one loves me,” Rozanov moans theatrically. “I am surrounded on all sides by hate. I go play with the kids. They are nicer.” And with that, he jumps the boards and hits the ice, speeding toward the far end of the rink, where the campers have paused their drills under the watchful eye of the mysterious Yuna.

“Who wants to defend?” Rozanov shouts. “I will shoot pucks, you will stop them! Let’s go!”

The men still at the boards exchange looks of fond exasperation. “I swear he’s basically still a kid, himself,” Scott says with a shake of his head. He can’t help glancing at Hollander for his reaction to that statement, but all he sees is a smirk.

“He’s a twelve-year-old in a thirty-year-old body,” Hollander agrees. “Too bad his skills aren’t as bad as his personality.”

And Scott can’t resist just a little poking at the bear. “I mean, I don’t think his personality is that bad,” he says slowly, as if he’s thinking it over as he speaks. “And Kip says he’s hot as fire. I mean, not that I’d look at him that way, but…” He shrugs. “Apparently lots of gay guys do.”

Have Hollander’s lips tightened, just a bit? He looks like he’s debating how to respond to that, and Scott waits eagerly to see if there will be any jealousy.

Instead, before Hollander can weigh in, Bennett chuckles. “Kyle said he’d let Rozanov, and I quote, ‘fuck my brains out’ but then, also quote, ‘I’d have to kick him out afterward before he started talking’.”

All five men burst out laughing, Hollander just a fraction of a second slower than the rest. “I’d kick him out of bed for eating crackers, for sure,” Fabian opines through his giggles. “Because I bet he deliberately gets the crumbs everywhere and then is like,” and here he puts on a deep Russian accent, “Da, you roll in my crumbs or I no fuck you again.’”

The men laugh again, but this time Hollander adds, “That sounded nothing like him, just for the record.”

“In bed, or out of it?” Fabian asks oh-so-casually, and Hollander blanches and starts stammering.

“What? I…I meant on the ice, duh. Or I guess maybe at a team dinner or something. I don’t know…I mean, obviously I don’t know what Rozanov sounds like in bed. Or whether he makes crumbs!”

Oh, this was painful to watch. Scott hides a wince and claps a hand on Hollander’s shoulder. “We can do a Rozanov sound-alike contest over drinks later. It’ll be hilarious,” he announces, deliberately diverting attention away from the blushing Canadian. 

“Preferably with Rozanov right there!” crows Bennett, nodding enthusiastically.

Hollander smirks and rolls his eyes. “I’ll win. I fucking hear that guy’s voice everywhere.”

That was too easy. Way too easy. Does Hollander have no sense of what he’s saying? Scott lets it go and just smiles. “I think this means you all agreed to come out for drinks later. Yes, even you, Bennett.” He claps the teetotaler goalie on his shoulder. “Kyle’s here, right? Maybe he can make us some artisan mocktails.”

“Yeah, he’s back at the hotel. And he brought mixers he made at home.” He checks his watch. “Practice ends at four, group dinner at 6, right?” Nods all around. “Let’s meet in my room at eight for drinks. But I swear to god if any of you fuckers snack in my bed I will end you.”

****

They regroup in Bennett and Kyle’s room that night, drinks – some alcoholic and some not – in hands. There’s limited seating in the standard-issue hotel room, and they end up with Bennett and Kyle on the bed leaning against the pillows, Fabian perched on the small desk, Price in the desk chair, Scott standing with one shoulder against the bathroom doorway, and Hollander and Rozanov next to each other on the end of the bed. 

And are the two of them sitting just a bit closer than the indent of the mattress calls for? Scott squints, trying to decide, but before he can make a final judgment, Kyle throws something at him. Is that…is that a sock? He wrinkles his nose and picks it up by pinching it between two fingers, then immediately lets it drop when he realizes what it is. “What the fuck?”

Ignoring him, Kyle chucks his other balled-up sock at Rozanov. “I hear you hockey players are superstitious about your socks. So I just wanted to give you an opportunity to sniff good ones.”

“What the fuck?” Rozanov echoes, except in his deep, accented voice it sounds a lot more threatening than Scott had. “I don’t want your fucking sock!” He holds the sock out at arm’s length and takes an angry swig of his drink with his other hand.

Hollander snickers. “It’s a good luck charm!”

Rozanov considers that for a second and then, before anyone can react, stuffs Kyle’s dirty sock down Hollander’s shirt.

“Fucking hell!” Hollander squeals, his hand following Rozanov’s down past his collar as he contorts and tries to retrieve the sock. “What the fuck, Ilya?!”

Everyone else laughs, Kyle loudest of all. “Yeah, what the fuck, Ilya?” he echoes. “How dare you make a weapon of my dirty sock? And against such a nice, polite boy like Shane Hollander?”

Hollander scowls, finally dredging the sock out of the depths of his shirt and dropping it on the floor. “Just because I’m not a dick doesn’t mean I can’t take a joke.” He huffs. “Everyone’s always telling me how nice and polite I am and I’m like, hello, yes, I’m Canadian but have you seen a Canadian play hockey? We can be vicious fuckers.”

“Aw, yes,” Rozanov coos, patting Hollander on top of his head as condescendingly as humanly possible. “You are very vicious little hockey player. We all fear you.” He looks around the room meaningfully. “Right, guys?”

A moment of silence as everyone stares at this strange interaction, and then Price waves his bottle agreeably and says, “Well, I definitely was always afraid I’d have to fight Hollander and that I’d hurt him.”

“Nobody ever let me fight,” Bennett complains, wrinkling his nose. “They always took them out before they got to me. But I sure as fuck feared Hollander getting near my net.” He glares at Hollander. “You’re a deadly shot.”

Hollander preens, buffing his nails on the front of his shirt. “Damn right, I am.”

Scott shrugs nonchalantly. “I’m not afraid of you, Hollander. We can go head-to-head any time.” He grins. “I mean, we do, regularly. And I seem to remember winning most of the face-offs.”

“Aw, fuck off, Hunter.” Hollander picks up the sock he dropped and chucks it at Scott, who eeps and jumps away. The sock lands harmlessly on the bathroom floor.

“Gross, I have my own filthy socks to deal with, I don’t need Kyle’s. Or anyone else’s,” he adds after realizing the opening he left for the others. Scott brushes himself off and resumes his leaning position, taking a casual sip of his drink.

Rozanov grins widely at him. “Hollander won your last three face-offs, Hunter. Perhaps you should fear him a bit more, hmm?”

“You have his stats memorized?” Scott can’t help but ask.

Rozanov’s face becomes noncommittal. “I study my competition,” he says with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Like any good player.”

Uh-huh. “How many face-offs have I won this season?” Scott challenges him.

Rozanov studies him for a long moment, takes a sip of what Scott thinks is at least two fingers of vodka, and holds it in his mouth before swallowing. “One thousand, four hundred and twelve.” He pauses, looking thoughtful. “Not counting the All-Star games.”

Scott can only blink at him as the rest of the room erupts in laughter. Scott isn’t actually sure if Rozanov got it right down to the last digit, but if not, he’s damn close. “Holy shit, Rozanov,” he says on a disbelieving laugh.

Rozanov shrugs. “Like I say. I study my competition.” Then, without warning, he throws an arm across Hollander’s chest and flops back on the bed, forcing the other center to go with him. Hollander struggles the whole time. “Besides,” Rozanov says without lifting his head. “You are very predictable.” A pause. “Hm. Is difficult to drink in this position. Damn.”

Hollander lifts his head off the bed, where it fetched up just short of Kyle’s hip, and snorts. “Let me up, asshole. If we sit up, you can drink easier.”

Rozanov grins lazily and waves his free hand in the air. “In a second. Am enjoying the…moment.”

Scott almost cringes at the sentimentality in his tone. How the fuck have they kept their thing on the down-low for this long when this is how they are together? Scott still doesn’t know if they’re a couple or just fuck buddies, but he’s starting to come around to the former, because Rozanov is downright soft around Hollander sometimes.

He takes a large sip of his beer and inwardly sighs, debating with himself whether the time has come to say something to the pair about how obvious they’re being. Because if they don’t want to come out…they’re going to need to check that shit.

Chapter 5: The confrontation

Chapter Notes

Ok, buckle up, we're getting a little angsty from here on out. How did this happen? I have no idea, I just write the story! Spoilers for books 1-4 and 6.

Montreal, the next day, still at camp

Scott enters the hotel lobby loaded down with three carrier bags full of groceries and a milk crate full of hockey gloves. He isn’t quite sure how the camp’s organizers had overlooked all this stuff in their pre-camp planning, but somehow it had fallen to him to go collect all the items tonight.

He pauses to shift a particularly heavy bag to the other hand, wondering how he, a professional athlete, could be struggling to support some gear and a bunch of kids’ snacks. This is just embarrassing.

And of course, at the moment the embarrassment hits him, he locks eyes with Rozanov, who is slumped over a high-top table at the hotel bar off the lobby, hand curled around a stein of beer. The Russian raises an eyebrow at Scott, then glances guiltily over his shoulder at…something. Or maybe someone, Scott muses, as Hollander emerges from a hallway that looks like it leads to the bathrooms and plops down in the seat across from Rozanov.

Scott looks down at his groceries, then up at the hockey players. No better time than the present, carrier bags or not. Grimly determined to warn the two about their behavior before it blows up in all their faces, he makes for the bar.

Rozanov’s other eyebrow goes up as Scott approaches. “Help you, Hunter?” he asks flatly as, across from him, Hollander draws back in his chair.

Scott sets down his load with a huff of effort. “How the hell did I become a pack mule, anyway?” he grumbles, grabbing an empty chair from the next table and dragging it over next to Rozanov. “Mind if I sit?” he says, doing it without waiting for their answer.

Both men blink, then exchange a look. Rozanov shrugs slowly. “Suit yourself.”

Scott considers signalling the waitress for a fortifying drink, but isn’t sure what he’d do with himself while he waited for her to bring it, so he decides to get right into things. “So.”

“So?” Hollander echoes, drawing out the word confusedly. “Is everything ok, Scott?”

Scott waves that away. “Oh, everything’s fine with me.” He glances around, making sure there is no one else nearby. He does not want to accidentally out anyone. “It’s you guys I’m worried about.”

Rozanov’s eyebrows wings up again and he shoots a look at Hollander, then focuses back on Scott with a clearly-deliberate calm. “Oh?” There's none of the usual teasing in his tone. “Why would you worry about us? We’re both awesome.”

“At hockey, sure,” Scott agrees easily, then leans forward and lowers his voice. “At not being obvious about how you feel about each other? Not so much.”

Hollander’s jaw drops and he flushes. “W-what?” he stammers.

Rozanov, meanwhile, has gone ramrod-straight in his chair. “The fuck?” he demands, eyes locked on Hollander’s face even though the other man is looking anywhere but at him.

Scott sighs and runs a hand through his hair. “Look. So, like…it’s none of my business what you guys get up to or how public you are about it. God knows I took long enough to come out in my own relationship. But I wanted to give you a heads-up that…well, you’re not as subtle as you think you are.”

Silence for a beat, then a longer one. Rozanov stares at Hollander. Hollander stares at the floor. Scott watches the expressions flash across Rozanov’s face: concern, fear, anger. When he hits that last one, he moves his gaze to Scott and scowls. “Do not know what you are talking about, Hunter.”

That isn’t going to fly. Scott shakes his head. “Don’t. I’ve known for years. I clocked you at your first All-Stars. You were a lot more subtle then. I think you’ve gotten complacent.”

Complacent, Rozanov mouths, and looks at Hollander, who can apparently read his confusion, because he explains, “Too comfortable to be safe.” Then he looks at Scott. “Clocked what, exactly?” he asks slowly, carefully.

Scott waves a finger between the two men. “This. You. I mean, you gave him your room number, Rozanov. Not a lot of ways for that to be useful to Hollander, especially back then when you were mortal enemies.”

“You misheard,” Rozanov says flatly, his face expressionless and yet somehow still dangerous.

Another sigh works its way out of Scott’s depths. “Seriously, you guys, I don’t care. I’m fucking gay, I’m hardly going to freak out if you are too. But if you don’t want everyone to know, you’re going to have to dial it back. You’re too…touchy. Flirty. You look at each other.”

“We are friends,” says Rozanov.

“I’m sure you are,” Scott agrees easily, “or at least, I’d hope you are. But I think you’re also more. Don’t,” he adds, holding up a staying hand as Hollander opens his mouth to speak, “try to bullshit me. Just fix it.”

“How?” Hollander bursts out, then looks shocked, like he hadn’t expected his own words. He swallows visibly, then drops his volume. “If we don’t even know what we’re doing, how are we supposed to fix…you know…anything?” He leans forward, eyes darting to the side uneasily and voice dropping even more. “We already try to play it off as much as we can.”

“Shane -” Rozanov starts, twitching in his seat as if he wants to jump to his feet.

Hollander holds up a hand to stop whatever he’d been about to say. “I…” He swallows again. “I think he’s already figured everything out. And he does have experience faking it. Maybe we should, you know, use the resource.”

Scott winces at the mention of faking it. He doesn’t like to think about that time when he’d been keeping Kip a secret and hurting his beloved so badly.

Rozanov’s lips tighten, but he nods slowly. “Very well.” He looks at Scott. “What do we do to fix?”

Considering that, Scott draws a finger through the condensation on the tabletop. “I assume you’re not interested in coming out?”

There's a loaded silence as Hollander and Rozanov look at each other. Rozanov’s eyes look…pleading, but Hollander shakes his head and turns back to Scott. “We can’t. We’d blow up both our careers.”

Scott hates it, but he probably isn’t wrong. It's one thing – and hard enough - to be a gay hockey player; it's quite another to be a gay hockey player who's fucking the competition.

“Sweetheart,” Rozanov says softly. The table jostles slightly like one of them has just lightly kicked the other. “Maybe we could -”

Hollander shakes his head again, more definitively. “We can’t. So tell us.” He turns to Scott. “Tell us what to do.”

“Ok, well, first of all,” Scott says, thinking as he speaks, “are you two, like, an item? Or is this just blowing off steam?”

“We are item,” Rozanov says firmly, his hands tightening on the table in front of him. “Have been for…oh, years.”

“Hollander?” Scott asks the man who always seems to measure his words so carefully. “It’s serious for you, too?”

Hollander spikes a hand through his dark hair, leaving it in disarray, but nods. “Yeah. Yeah, it’s…it’s serious.”

Scott blows out a breath and leans back in his chair. Despite everything he’d seen, he’d still half-expected them to deny or downplay it. “OK, well, the flirtiness needs to get dialed back.” He looks at Rozanov. “No more throwing your arms around Hollander or making sex jokes to him.”

Rozanov’s eyes widen. “But his reactions are so funny!” he protests.

Hollander definitely kicks him under the table this time. “Stop it.”

“Besides,” Rozanov goes on, crossing his arms belligerently, “I hug lots of people. I threw myself at you, Hunter, just today.”

Scott rolls his eyes. “You didn’t look like you wanted to hump me.”

“Fuck,” Hollander mutters, faceplanting on the table.

“The heart eyes are kind of ridiculous,” Scott says apologetically, patting Hollander’s shoulder. “From both of you. I’m surprised nobody else has commented on it yet.”

Rozanov twitches his nose, then shrugs. “Price knows. He would not tell. The rest…” He makes a derisive noise. “Unobservant jocks.”

Hollander looks up from the table, but doesn’t look convinced, and Scott is with him on that. “I think it’s probably a bit optimistic to assume that,” he says carefully. “Bennett, particularly, sees a shitload more than we give him credit for. Comes with being a goalie.”

“Fuuuuck,” Hollander moans again.

Rozanov’s arm moves under the table, and Scott imagines him squeezing the other man’s knee. “Is fine,” he says firmly. “We can handle this. I will be less playful. You will…look at me less like you want my -”

Hollander slaps a hand over Rozanov’s mouth before he can finish his thought. “No.”

Rozanov sighs and looks down at his lap. “I will be better.”

Damn, now Scott feels like he’s kicked a couple of puppies. “I’m not saying you guys can’t, you know, do your thing,” he attempts weakly. “You just gotta…keep it better under wraps if you don’t want it to come out.”

Rozanov licks his lips. “Would…would it be so bad?” he asks tentatively, though Scott isn’t sure if he's asking him or Hollander. “If the other instructors knew, only? Maybe a few teammates?”

“I came out to my teammates well before I came out to the world,” Scott offers, trying to be helpful. “They were supportive. It’s not a terrible idea.” He looks at Hollander, who is biting his lip and seems unconvinced. “Does anyone know?”

Hollander nods. “My parents know. And Hayden. Rose. That’s pretty much it.”

“That’s rough.” Scott tries to imagine himself back in that position, desperate to have both a relationship and his secret. It feels like it happened to another person. “The closet isn’t a comfortable place to hang out.”

Hollander shakes his head miserably. “I don’t know how my team would take it. Some of them are…not great on the diversity front. And that it’s Ilya, specifically…” He sighs.

“Look,” Scott reasons, “think about the core group we were hanging out with last night. Price is gay. Bennett is…whatever he is. He has a boyfriend, at least. I’m fucking married to a man. You come out to us, you’re not going to get any disgust.” He shrugs. “I dunno about the other instructors. Most of them are your people, Rozanov. You’d know better than me. Maybe just start with the group we know are queer.”

Both Hollander and Rozanov look like they're considering it. “But…” Hollander ventures. “If we were partway out and got comfortable with that, wouldn’t it be harder to conceal at other times?”

“That, I can’t tell you,” Scott sighs. “You’ve gotta make up your own minds. But I’m just saying, if you keep up as you have been, especially around the queer group, I’m not going to be the only one who clocks you.”

Hollander rubs his cheek with one palm tiredly. “Goddamnit.”

“Hey folks!” booms a voice from a few feet away, and all three of them jump and whirl to find Kyle standing, grinning at them. He loolks unconcerned, so hopefully he hasn’t overheard their discussion. “Sorry I missed you last night. I figured, when I saw you here, I’d stop by and say hello.”

“Uh, hi,” manages Hollander, dropping his hands to his lap primly. “Nice to see you again.”

Scott dearly hopes Kyle isn’t just hiding what's actually shock at the Hollander-Rozanov revelation. “Hey, Kyle,” he says as calmly as he can manage. “Where’s Eric?”

Kyle rolls his eyes. “Yoga.” He grins. “Though I can’t complain about the flexibility it helps him keep.”

“Ew,” Rozanov deadpans, then reconsiders. “No, wait, tell us more about your sex life.”

Kyle shoves Rozanov’s shoulder. “You’re disgusting. I don’t know what any women see in you.”

Rozanov blushes almost imperceptibly, and that isn’t something you see every day. “Neither do I,” he admits.

Across the table, Hollander turns a snorted laugh into a half-hearted cough. “I don’t know what anyone sees in you, asshole,” he taunts, voice somehow light and carefree.

Ok, Hollander is a better actor than Scott has been giving him credit for. Rozanov continues to be hopeless, though.

Scott just hopes they get it together before things go out of control.

Chapter 6: Denouement

Chapter Notes

Probably some more timeline and The Long Game fuckery going on here. Please don't judge me. Massive spoilers for TLG.

Summer the following year, New York City

Oh, fuck. Scott stares down at his phone, caught somewhere between horror and titillation. On the screen, Ilya Rozanov and Shane Hollander are caught in a heated embrace, backed by a forest of some kind. Hollander’s leg is wrapped around Rozanov’s hip, and it would be hot as hell if Scott didn’t feel like he was going to throw up at the implications of this private moment being caught on camera.

“Scott? What’s up?” Kip’s voice over his shoulder startles Scott, and he almost drops his phone. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

Kip is in the kitchen section of their penthouse apartment, fiddling with the blender as he does nearly every morning they spend together. When Scott doesn’t immediately answer him, though, he pauses what he’s doing and starts to cross the room to him. “Scott?”

“I…shit.” Scott isn’t sure what to do, but he’s sure he should be doing something. Call Hollander? Prepare a statement of support to release to the press? Post a rainbow flag on BlueSky? “They caught Hollander and Rozanov.”

Kip freezes, staring at him, a few feet from the couch Scott collapsed on. “Define ‘caught’.”

“Um.” He looks down at his phone, which has gone dark, and taps the screen to wake it up. The tiktok clip starts over, and Scott passes the phone to his husband.

Kip watches it through once, twice, and then lets the hand holding the phone drop to his side. “This is public?” he asks, as if he’s hoping Scott somehow got access to Hollander and Rozanov’s private self-porn stash.

Scott can only nod. “It’s going viral. Hayden Pike posted it on FanMail – I assume by accident – and the guy who commissioned Hayden immediately screencapped it and posted it on Twitter. X. Whatever the fuck that hellscape is called these days.”

Kip sighs. “Hellscape, indeed.” He unsticks his limbs and comes around the couch, plopping down next to Scott and handing back his phone. “What’s the news cycle saying?”

“Absolutely nothing, at least in the mainstream media,” Scott says with a sigh. “I’m not sure if that’s a positive or a negative, honestly. On the one hand, good for them for not dignifying this crap with coverage. On the other hand, the longer it percolates without being addressed, the more it’s going to spread.” He runs an agitated hand through his hair. “I can’t even imagine being outed this way. Being outed, period.”

“You should call them,” Kip suggests, gesturing at his phone. “Check in on them.”

“I mean, maybe they don’t even know it’s out?” Scott says hopefully, wishing a few more minutes of peace for his friends.

Kip shakes his head. “I guarantee they got tagged. And honestly, if it were me, I’d want – need – to know.”

“Fuck,” Scott sighs, rubbing his face and feeling his morning stubble prickle over his fingers. “Okay. I’ll check in.” He opens Signal, where he has a periodically-active thread with Hollander. Using the encrypted chat when they talked had been Hollander’s idea – apparently he spent a lot of time thinking about privacy – but now Scott is glad for it. The last thing they need is someone intercepting their messages.

Scott: Hey. I saw. You guys ok?

He isn’t sure whether to expect an immediate reply or not – if he was Hollander, he might well have chucked his phone into the wall the moment he found out about this – but before Scott’s screen goes dark, the typing dots start dancing.

Hollander: No.

Well, that was to-the-point. Scott takes a moment to ponder what to say next that won’t make things worse.

Scott: Anything I can do? How’s Rozanov?

Hollander: He broke his phone

Yeah, there it was. Somehow, Scott wasn’t surprised.

Scott: Anything from the league?

Hollander: No. They’re probably deciding how to cut us loose. I’m sure we’ll hear from them when they figure it out.

He follows that up with the ‘dying’ emoji, the one with X-ed out eyes, and Scott huffs a laugh.

Kip, who has been reading over his shoulder, slugs him halfheartedly in the biceps. “It’s not funny.”

“No, I know,” Scott agrees immediately. “It’s just…Hollander is not the emoji type. It surprised me.” He sighs. “I’m not sure what to tell him. Part of me is like ‘the league would have to be absolutely insane to let its two star centers go over this’ and the rest of me is like ‘yeah but it’s not like they haven’t weaponized the morals clause before’. Add in some homophobia, and…” He shrugs. “It could go either way.”

“Be supportive,” Kip urges him. “Don’t get into the details about what might happen; just let him know you’re there for them.”

It’s as good a plan as any, so Scott nods and thumbs in a new message.

Scott: Well, I’m here for both of you if you need anything. It absolutely sucks that it came out like this. What was Pike thinking??

Hollander: Hayden didn’t even notice us in the background before he posted it. He’s a wreck now. Which makes…three of us.

Ouch. Scott winces, imagining Hollander’s best friend beating himself up about outing them. Pike is a nice guy, not someone who has a malicious bone in his body even when fighting on the ice, and it must be killing him to have fucked over Hollander like this.

Scott: Take deep breaths and try not to panic

Scott: Ugh that was the most inane advice I’ve ever given.

He knuckles his forehead, sighing again. 

Scott: Just…I’m here for you. I don’t know what I can do, but I feel like I should do something.

He feels useless, all the way down here in New York while Hollander and Rozanov are stuck in hell in Canada. As if intuiting how he feels, Kip wraps an arm around Scott’s shoulders and kisses the back of his neck. “Maybe we should start working on a public statement?” he suggests. “You’re kind of the voice of the queer activists in the league.”

Scott snorts. “Yeah, all two of us.” The league has made some small strides over the years, but it’s been a one-step-forward-two-steps-back sort of thing a lot of the time. He knows the league’s Commissioner isn’t particularly happy about Scott’s activism, though the man has never had the balls to directly confront him about it. He probably knows Scott would go off on him. Once he came out of the closet, he was done with the secrecy and guilt, and he’s not ashamed of that. He just wishes Hollander and Rozanov had gotten the same opportunity.

Scott: Would it help if I made a statement? Like, as a fellow gay hockey player?

He can almost picture Hollander sighing at that before his reply comes in:

Hollander: You don’t have to. This is our mess.

Scott grits his teeth, hating this, all of this. 

Scott: No, it’s your life. Yes, okay, it’s a little messy, but you’re not alone. And I feel like I should make that clear.

Hollander: It’s up to you, Scott. You don’t need to get involved if you don’t want to.

Kip seizes the phone from Scott’s hands before he can react and starts typing, narrating his words out loud to Scott as he goes:

Scott: Fuck that. If people are being shitty, it affects Scott and every other queer athlete, too. Scott and I will put together a statement.

Scott: This is Kip, btw. Thinking of you guys. What a craptastic morning.

He hands the phone back to Scott, biting his lip. “Maybe we can make this, like, a thing. So it’s not just you. Who else might sign on to a supportive statement?”

Scott considers that. “Pike, of course. Probably a lot of the Centaurs and Admirals. Maybe some staff who are out? Beyond that, I don’t know. People keep their support on the down-low.”

Kip scoffs loudly. “Which is bullshit, by the way. It’s hardly ‘support’ if they’re not being supportive.”

Scott can only shrug. “It’s how it’s always been.” Mostly to comfort himself, he tousles Kips already-messy hair, loving the way it curls over his forehead. 

“Pull up the group chat,” Kip orders, gesturing to Scott’s phone. “See who you can grab.”

Scott knows he’s referring to the Admirals’ ongoing WhatsApp thread, so he pops it open and considers what to say for a long moment.

Hunter: Who else has seen the Hollander-Rozanov news this morning?

Vaughn: Me. Fucking hell. I feel like an idiot for never picking up on it.

Matti: Me too. I am very worried about them. They are both nice guys, you know? What happens now?

Scott can’t stop his grin at being given the perfect opening. I’m glad you asked, he types.

Hunter: I want to put out a statement. Before this really hits the mainstream media and turns into a shitshow. So far it’s mostly tiktok and Twitter, but you know ESPN is going to have to address it sooner or later if it keeps up.

Andersson: This is ridiculous. I’m in. I don’t care who likes to suck dick as long as they’re not trying to suck mine.

Brisebois: Snort. You’d totally take a blowjob from Hollander, Andersson.

Andersson: Fan dig

That was a Swedish expression they’d all picked up pretty quickly, with Andersson on the team. It meant fuck you. 

Hunter: ANYWAY

Hunter: Putting aside for the moment Andersson’s dick – gross, btw, I have to see that shit regularly – I’m serious about making a statement. I just need to know who’ll co-sign.

Vaughn: Me, definitely. I can probably bring in some of the PWHL, too. My sister and her wife have connections.

Brisebois: I guess me? I got nothing against Hollander and Rozanov, and if someone put out a video of me and Geneva getting it on I’d be pissed

Matti: Put me down for it. Andersson will, too.

Andersson: Wait, what?

Andersson: I mean, not that I won’t, but what the fuck, Matti

Matti: Dude, we’re Nordic. We speak out about this shit. We represent.

Andersson: Sigh. Yeah, sign me up I guess.

At Scott’s side, Kip has somehow found a scrap of paper and a pencil and is scratching down words madly. “Who else outside the Admirals?” he asks Scott. “Who can you get in touch with?”

Scott considers it for a second. “I can probably get to anyone, given enough degrees of separation.”

“Is there, like, an all-NHL group chat?”

He laughs. “No, babe. If there was, the PR people would demand to be in it and nothing good would ever happen.” Scott kind of can’t imagine the disaster such a chat would turn into.

“Ask the Admirals,” Kip instructs, “who else they know and can get in touch with that would be supportive. I’ll make a list.” He waves his paper demonstratively. “Then we can do systematic outreach and really get going.”

“You’re amazing,” Scott says with an amused shake of his head. “Also, kind of a nerd.”

“I’m your favorite nerd,” Kip shoots back, then puckers up and plants a big, fat kiss on Scott’s lips. “Now, get moving. We want to get on the record as soon as possible.”

Scott: So guys, I need contacts. Give me everybody you can think of who’d come out in support of Hollander and Rozanov. Kip and I are going to put this together, and then we’ll get a draft out to everyone later today to review.

People start throwing out names and numbers, and soon Kip’s longhand can’t keep up with the influx. “Fuck yeah,” he says as he scribbles down the name of a PWHL goalie Scott’s never even heard of. “This is going to be great.” He pats Scott’s shoulder reassuringly, and Scott realizes he’s been alternately grimacing and chewing nervously on his bottom lip. “We’ll get so many people together on this that the league won’t dare ding them.”

Scott isn’t quite as confident, but he decides that he might as well do his best to believe it. “Yeah,” he says quietly, squeezing Kip’s knee. “I mean, if we don’t stick up for them, who will?”

Kip grins and covers Scott’s hand with his own for a moment before returning to his notes. “But let’s maybe not mention that you clocked them a decade ago. That would lead to…questions.”

Scott shrugs. “Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.”

Kip snorts and starts humming to himself as he writes. After a moment, Scott recognizes the tune. It’s You’ll Be Back, from the musical Hamilton. It features in a moment where a heavily deluded British king sings about how he holds all the power over the little colonists. Right before the colonists kick his ass.

Scott can’t help but smile at the metaphor. Yeah, maybe the Commissioner is a dickbag and they all know it. But he can’t fire all of them.

Let him try.

Chapter 7: The wedding

Chapter Notes

Look, I read TLG and promptly forgot everything except the broad strokes of the plot. So if the book covered the details of the wedding and this doesn’t match…oops. Let’s play pretend.

Ottawa, summer 2021

Scott slouches against a high-top table in the yard, gazing at the arbor at the head of the aisle. Beside him, Kip makes an undignified squeeing noise. “This is so awesome!”

Scott gazes down at his husband. “It’s not like we didn’t have our own, you know.”

Kip shrugs. “Yeah, and it was awesome too, as you know. But this is…Shane and Ilya! After so long!” He takes a sip of his champagne. “Plus, I mean…they’re still playing after coming out. More or less.”

Scott can’t stop his snort. “Ottowa is still the NHL, even if they suck. And with the two of them playing, I bet they won’t suck for much longer.”

“Yeah, very true.” Kip rests his head on Scott’s shoulder. Well, as close as he can get to Scott’s shoulder while they’re both standing up. “Hey, by the way.”

“Hmm?”

“I love you.”

Scott grins. That never gets old. “Love you too. Weddings make you mushy, huh?”

A shrug and an answering grin. “Or maybe it’s the champagne. I’m still not used to drinking it, not serving it.” Kip looks around the area they’re standing in thoughtfully. 

It’s Shane and Ilya’s backyard in Ottawa, but it’s been prettied up – probably by Shane’s mom – and decorated within an inch of its life. Definitely not Rozanov’s taste, and probably not Hollander’s, either, but when it comes to mothers and weddings…you give them what they want.

“Oh my god,” Kip gasps suddenly, and Scott straightens up in a hurry. That’s his oh shit tone.

“What?” he asks, looking around for the threat.

“The fucking dickbag is here.”

Scott blinks. “What?” That’s their name for Commissioner Crowell and his bag full of bigotry. But surely he wouldn’t be here, today. At a gay wedding??

Scott tries to look casual as he looks around the yard and yup, there stands Crowell in a full three-piece suit – so incredibly out of place among everyone else in their shorts and t-shirts – looking like he just bit into a lemon. “Holy shit,” he breathes. As he watches, Crowell examines the attendees slowly and critically, a scowl clear on his face. “Oh, it’s fine,” he tells Kip offhandedly, “he clearly hasn’t changed.”

Kip snickers. “No shit. He looks like his mommy took him by the ear and forced him to come here under penalty of no dinner.” He pauses, thinking. “Wait, do you think someone did force him to come here? Because, I mean, surely he wouldn’t be here on his own.”

Scott considers that. “I’m not sure who has the power to force him, honestly. Though maybe if a lot of the owners got together and applied pressure…” He shrugs. “Could be that. Or maybe he just knows the optics would be awful if he didn’t show his face. People go crazy for Hollander and Rozanov.”

“Aw, baby,” Kip soothes, patting Scott’s chest, “they still go crazy for you too, don’t worry.”

“Alright!” booms a voice from the back of the yard, and everyone turns to find Ilya Rozanov standing in the door between the yard and house. “We will get started in few minutes! Assume the positions!”

A titter goes through the crowd at his phrasing. “I think it’s Hollander who usually assumes the position!” someone shouts, causing more laughter. Almost certainly a hockey player. No one else would be that crude in public.

“Fuck you!” Rozanov shoots back cheerfully. “Now, you all shut up. I’m getting married!” He steps back into the house and shuts the door.

“Well,” Kip says, rubbing his hands together briskly, “I guess this is it. You ready for this?”

Scott separates Kip’s hands and holds one gently. “I wish we could do it again.”

Kip stares at him, aghast. “Scott. You almost divorced me before we even got married because you hated the wedding planning so much.”

He winces, because Kip’s not exactly wrong. “Well I mean, the planning did suck. But getting married to you absolutely didn’t. I remember the look on your face just before we kissed, and…” He shakes his head, finding himself almost without words for that moment. “Any day, any time. Over and over again.”

“Aww, boo.” Kip stretches up to press a kiss on his lips. “I’d marry you again, too.” Then he faces the impromptu altar at the end of the half-assed aisle the guests have accidentally formed due to the lack of chairs – that was definitely a choice by the grooms. It’s just a table, a plain old table, with an embroidered cloth thrown over it. The embroidery looks extremely fancy, though, and Scott wonders if it’s handmade.

Kip claps his hands briskly. “Let’s get this show on the road,” he says to no one in particular.

As if in response, the door to the house opens again and Hollander’s parents walk out and down the aisle, closing the door again behind them. No music accompanies them, and they walk casually, holding hands and chatting quietly to each other. Scott overhears a snippet of Yuna as they pass him and Kip: “…can’t believe finally…”

Beside him, Kip sighs happily.

David and Yuna take up positions next to the table…altar…whatever and smile out at the crowd. Yuna’s lips move, but Scott can’t make out what she’s saying. There’s an awkward minute of everyone standing, staring at each other, and then the door slams open with a bang that makes half the group jump.

Out come Ilya Rozanov and Shane Hollander, walking arm-in-arm and both grinning. A heavy guitar riff suddenly blares out of hidden speakers. Is that…Led Zepplin? Scott can’t hide his smirk.

Hollander and Rozanov make no effort to walk in time to the music as they stroll down the aisle, each nodding every now and then to someone they recognize in the crowd.

Then Rozanov pulls Hollander to a halt halfway down the aisle. His face goes hard. The music continues playing, but the laughter and chatter among the crowd die out as everyone reacts to the sudden shift in mood.

Scott leans forward to see what’s going on, and somehow he isn’t surprised to see that Rozanov is facing Crowell. “Oh, shit,” Kip mutters. “You think he’s gonna fight him right here?”

Scott wouldn’t put it entirely past Rozanov, but even as he holds his breath, Rozanov scoffs, the sound audible even over the music, and starts walking again. Scott looks at Crowell, whose face has gone beet-red, either from embarrassment or rage.

Hollander glances between the two men for a moment, then allows Rozanov to pull him along. He speaks quietly to the other man as they go, and Rozanov nods.

They finally reach the end of the aisle, the music cuts off, and Hollander exchanges hugs with his parents. Then, to Scott’s surprise, Rozanov does the same. He hadn’t realized Rozanov had that kind of relationship with Hollander’s parents.

Rozanov releases Yuna, then turns to face the crowd. “Ok, fuckers, shut up!” he shouts. “We’re getting married now!”

“Fuck you!” someone who sounds like Hayden Pike shouts back, followed by the smacking sound of his wife’s hand landing on a chest.

“Jesus Christ,” Hollander mutters, Scott mostly reading his lips to understand the words.

Kip laughs out loud. “This is awesome.”

A gray-haired woman steps forward between Hollander and Rozanov and claps her hands. “Alright everyone, let’s calm down and do this,” she announces, then turns to the two men. “We gather today to join Ilya Rozanov and Shane Hollander in…”

And ok, yeah, Scott tears up a little as she goes through her little spiel. Not because the words are so touching, though honestly, they kind of are. No, it’s because of the way the two men are gazing at each other, absolutely entranced. He’s pretty sure they no longer have any idea they have an audience.

Beside him, Kip is openly crying, and Scott hears sniffles and whimpers from all over the yard as well. He looks around and sees at least three hockey players, including someone best known – only known, really - for being a vicious fighter, with tears rolling down their cheeks. He shakes his head and wipes surreptitiously at his eyes. Sappy motherfuckers.

“You may now kiss,” announces the officiant, and without hesitation, Rozanov seizes his new husband by the arms and yanks him close, planting a deep kiss on his lips.

Whoops and hoorays echo through the yard. Someone throws what looks like birdseed in the couple’s general direction, though it falls far short and settles mostly into the hair of a woman Scott doesn’t know.

Rozanov releases Hollander, who is panting and wide-eyed, and takes his hand, hoisting it in victory. “We did it!” he shouts at full-hockey-rink volume.

Wild applause.

“Now…we party! Who wants to do shots?”

Hollander facepalms, but he’s smiling. Then his eyes snag on something – or someone – and his expression falters. Scott looks over his shoulder and spots Crowell again. The older man has thrown his jacket over his arm and is looking around the yard disdainfully. Scott can see him sniff in disgust before he turns away and starts striding back down the aisle, and Scott rolls his eyes. Good riddance.

“I don’t know why he bothered to show up,” he tells Kip, “if he’s just going to be a dick about everything.”

Kip follows his gaze and shrugs. “PR.”

“Fucking PR,” Scott grouses, then throws his arm around his husband’s shoulders. “Come on. You want to do shots with Rozanov?”

“Fuck yeah,” Kip breathes excitedly. “There’s a reason we got a hotel and a car, and this is it.”

Scott can only shake his head. Oh, to be ten years younger and a lot less prone to hangovers.

They cross the yard to the happy couple, who are surrounded by well-wishers, and Scott reaches out to clap Hollander on the back. “Congratulations, you guys.”

Hollander grins. “Thanks. So apparently we’re doing shots.” He mock-glares at his husband. “I was not informed of this ahead of time.”

Rozanov shrugs nonchalantly. “You should have predicted it. You know me.”

Yuna bounces up to them, grinning. “So, guys…shots?”

All four of them gape to the 60-something woman who seems more eager to drink than even Rozanov. Finally, Rozanov smiles and nods. “Definitely shots. Come.” He gestures the group toward the house.

They pick up a handful of other people on the way, and by the time they’re standing in the kitchen, clustered around the island, it’s crowded and there don’t seem to be enough shot glasses. “Alcohol sterilizes,” Rozanov announces. “We will share.” He gulps down a shot of vodka and slams the glass down, then passes it to his left to Pike. “Drink!”

“Gross,” Pike remarks, looking down at the used glass, then promptly shrugs and fills it from one of the four bottles. He holds it up in a toast. “To the newlyweds! May you be blessed with as many children as me and Jackie!”

“Uh, Pike, bud,” Bood says slowly, even as he joins the toast, “you know it doesn’t work quite as easily for them, right?”

The bottles slowly work their way around the island until nearly everyone has a shot prepared. The ones who don’t seem to be eagerly awaiting the next empty glass that will be passed to them. Everyone hoists their glasses and/or empty fists and cheers, then gulps their shots.

Pike wipes his mouth and grimaces, then looks at Bood. “Fuck that. You know they’re trying anyway. Four times a day.”

The group breaks out into laughter as Hollander silently flicks the finger at Pike.

Rozanov has no such restraint, and he leers. “Only four? We will never get pregnant with only four!” He wraps an arm around Hollander. “We will aim for six.”

“When will you have time to play hockey, then?” someone asks.

Rozanov grins. “Locker room showers are there for a reason.”

“Gross,” Pike says again. “People gotta use those showers, you fucker.”

Rozanov just shrugs, supremely unconcerned. Beside Scott, Kip snorts a laugh into his fist and then mumbles something that sounds like “AU empreg”. Scott has no idea what that means, but it seems to be amusing his husband, so he grins.

“Another!” Rozanov shouts to the group at large. This time he simply picks up one of the bottles and takes a swig, not bothering with a glass.

“Jesus, Ilya,” Yuna says, nevertheless pouring herself another drink, “you’re going to have to carry me out of here.”

“And me,” Hollander chimes in, squinting down at his own shot glass. “I inherited that from Mom.”

Scott, for all his muscle mass, is actually also starting to feel the first shot. Hm, maybe he shouldn’t have skipped lunch. He looks down at Kip, who grins dopily back up at him. “This is awesome,” he enthuses for at least the third time today.

Scott can only shake his head. He fingers his phone in his pocket, already planning how he’s going to roll his husband out of this party after who knows how many celebratory shots. While Scott has no problem picking up a cooperative Kip, a deadweight Kip is a different matter. Hm, maybe the driver will help.

“I have announcement!” Rozanov shouts, unnecessarily loudly for the size of the group. Everyone goes quiet and looks at him, and he grins. “Announcement is: I love my husband!”

A collective awww goes up. Hollander blushes, but smiles. “I love you, too,” he says quietly. Then he sighs. “But maybe let’s lay off the vodka, eh? You’ll want to remember tonight.”

Rozanov wiggles his eyebrows suggestively, and everyone laughs.

“Oh my god,” Hollander chokes out, “not like that.”

“I didn’t need to know this,” Yuna announces loudly.

“You definitely did not,” her son agrees, directing a glare and a swat at his husband.

“I did!” Kip crows, and slugs back another shot without waiting for anyone else. He gasps and chokes. “Jesus, I always forget how strong that shit is.”

“Puts hair on your chest,” Rozanov comments encouragingly.

Kip looks down at himself as if he can see his chest hair through his shirt and shrugs. “I’m good.”

****

Half an hour later, the group in the kitchen is fully inebriated except for Scott and Hollander. Yuna is leaning on her son’s arm, grinning up at him. Pike is slumped over the counter, mumbling to himself. Scott is supporting nearly all of Kip’s weight with his right arm, his left propped against a cabinet.

“So,” Rozanov says, his words slurring just slightly, “when can we leave?”

Hollander glares at him. “We can’t ditch our own wedding!”

“No, you definitely can,” Pike disagrees without looking up from where his head is resting on his arms. “Get the fuck out of here. Go boink.”

“Boink?” Rozanov asks quizzically, the word apparently too much for his drunken English skills. 

Hollander sighs. “I’ll tell you later.”

“Ok. Let’s go,” Rozanov announces. “Pike says we can.” He tugs on his husband’s arm.

Kip sighs audibly into Scott’s side. “So romantic.”

Scott stares down at him in shock. “You think that’s romantic? ‘Hey, let’s go fuck’?” he asks incredulously.

“They’re in love,” Kip insists.

“I mean, probably,” Scott allows, “but even so, that was not a romantic declaration.”

Kip pulls back just enough to consider Scott for a long moment, then smiles sweetly. “Hey,” he says slowly, “wanna go fuck, too?”

Scott chokes, then looks around at the rest of the group, most of whom are grinning at them. “You’re so drunk,” he stage-whispers to Kip.

Kip shrugs. “Still horny. Let’s go.”

Rozanov claps his hands and grins. “Ok. Everyone go fuck. Team, break!”

“I think that’s football,” Pike mutters, mostly to himself.

Kip tugs on Scott’s hand. “You heard the man.”

Scott can only roll his eyes and offer his arm to his drunken husband. “Ok, honey. We’ll go back to our room and…yeah.” He knows Kip well enough to know he’s going to pass out the moment they get to the bed. Scott’s not getting laid tonight.

That’s ok, though. This has been a good day.

Chapter End Notes

Thank you so much for reading!