Rating:

Explicit

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandoms:

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

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Characters:

Shane Hollander, Ilya Rozanov, Hayden Pike, Rose Landry, Yuna Hollander

Additional Tags:

Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Bodyguard, One Night Stands, Mutual Pining, Blow Jobs, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Getting Together, Forced Proximity, Drinking, Fluff and Angst, Living Together, Prime Minister Yuna Hollander, Drunk Shane Hollander, Fluff, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Bodyguard Ilya Rozanov, Slow Burn, Accidental Outing

Language:

English

Series:

Part 1 of campus security universe

Stats:

Published: 2026-03-18 Completed: 2026-10-01 Words: 141,034 Chapters: 14/14

campus security

Summary

“Shane, this is Ilya Rozanov.”

For a world-ending moment, it felt like the ground was falling out from beneath him. The hand he’d been extending to greet the new bodyguard froze in midair, a stab of panic jolting through his entire body.

Because it was the man from the night before. The man he’d slept with.

(Shane Hollander is the son of the Canadian prime minister. He is also the captain of his college hockey team. This obscene balancing act is seemingly going just fine, until he accidentally hooks up with his new bodyguard one night at the bar.)

Chapter 1: shane walks into a bar

Chapter Notes

disclaimer: I am american. like, so american. I wake up every day and wish it wasn't true but it is. I've done my best to research what a prime minister's security detail might look like without accidentally putting myself on some sort of list. please take any inaccuracies with a grain of salt and my sincere apologies!

also: absolutely zero ai was used in any capacity when creating this fic. fuck ai. thanks <3

“Don’t look now, but that gorgeous man at the bar- Shane!”

“What?”

“I said don’t look now! You totally looked.”

Feeling thoroughly scolded, Shane turned guiltily back to face Rose. He’d only caught a glimpse of who she was talking about— a man with shoulder-length brown hair nursing a pint of beer, several feet away from them.

“What about him?”

“He’s looking at you,” Rose said in a hushed, conspiratorial voice. The corners of her lips were turned up into a mischievous smile. “He keeps glancing over here.”

Shane grimaced, dismayed. “Fuck. Do you think he recognizes me?”

“No, Shane, he’s looking at you.” Rose sighed and sipped her drink, lip gloss smudged around the top of the straw. “As if he wants to take your clothes off.”

“Oh.” Shane felt his cheeks heat. He glanced back at the guy. “Are you sure? Doesn’t he seem kind of old?”

 Rose followed his gaze. “Ew, Shane, not that guy.” She wrinkled her nose. “The pretty one on the left. With the curls?”

Shane turned slowly to evaluate the bar again. There was the older guy, distractedly digging his thumb into what must be bar graffiti. Most of the rest of the space was occupied by giggling groups of women, all roughly around their age, but Shane scanned past them until his eyes stopped on what might possibly be one of the most handsome men he’d ever seen.

He was tall, which Shane could tell even though he was across the room and seated on a barstool, wearing a tight gray henley that accentuated each of the muscles in his arms. Shane let his gaze wander from the sculpted shoulders to the broad neck, the fine glint of a gold chain. Waves of golden brown curls crested over his brow, nearly falling into eyes that might have been blue or green but were undoubtedly startling— mostly, they were startling because they were staring right back at Shane.

He jerked his face back immediately to Rose, who was laughing into her drink. Shane’s cheeks felt warmer than they had a few seconds before.

“There’s no way,” he said. “He must just recognize me.”

It wasn’t that Shane was conceited, or that he thought he was incredibly recognizable. He just usually didn’t get stared at like that unless someone was about to approach and ask if he was the son of the prime minster. Usually, those were older men who watched a lot of the news, or sometimes an overeager political science student. Not people who looked like the man at the bar— Shane felt like his image was burned into his mind, he’d been so beautiful. 

“I don’t think so,” Rose said. “He’s practically undressing you- Shane, you idiot, don’t scoot closer to me, what are you doing! He’s going to think we’re together.” 

She used both her hands to push at Shane’s shoulders where he had, admittedly, nervously begun to slide towards her, as if putting space between him and the hot man would make the situation better somehow. 

“You should go over there.”

“I’m not going to go over there.” Shane shot another furtive glance at the stranger, who wasn’t staring anymore. He was speaking to the bartender in low tones, a small smile tugging at his mouth. “Maybe he was looking at you.”

She was already shaking her head. “He wasn’t.”

“Well, I’m not just going to go talk to him, I’m here with you. It’s rude,” Shane countered. “Don’t you want to spend time with me?”

“Shane.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “We’ve been together almost nonstop for three consecutive days. Honestly, I could use a break.”

“Ouch. You’re tired of me already?” 

Shane colored his tone with offense, but he knew it was true. Rose had flown out to see Shane for a few days in Canada before he went back to school for the hockey season— they’d been enjoying the last weeks of summer together, going out to eat and dance (at Rose’s insistence) all over Ottawa. She’d even humored him enough to go on a morning run with him the day before, though they’d turned around before Shane had completed half of his normal route.

They’d see each other back at school, but it wouldn’t be the same. Shane would be lost in the ocean of preseason and trying to get ahead on his assignments so they didn’t catch up with him once they got into actual games, and Rose was always absorbed by sorority recruitment activities for the first few weeks of class. These last few days had been a nice opportunity to pretend they had no other obligations except to be hot and enjoy summer, as Rose had tactfully put it.

She made an exaggerating sucking sound with her straw, dragging the bottom of it through dregs of ice. “My drink is empty,” she announced once she’d finished, pushing it towards him. “Next round is on you.”

“All the rounds have been on me so far.” Shane gave her a look, but Rose just raised an eyebrow at him. 

Shane polished off his beer, then cast another nervous glance towards the bar. The guy was still there, no longer engrossed in conversation with the bartender but scrolling through something on his phone. His hands, Shane couldn’t help but notice, were massive.

“Shane.” She tapped the cup impatiently against the table, a teasing expression toying at her features. “I’m going to die of dehydration if you don’t get up there soon.”

“You know alcohol dehydrates you faster, right?”

“I’m mixing it with water.”

“Yeah, with soda water,” Shane said incredulously, but her smile only brightened. 

“Shane,” Rose said sweetly. “If you don’t get up there and talk to that incredibly sexy man, I’m going to actually kill you.”

Several moments later, Shane was sliding uneasily onto a barstool, just a few down from the man. He was clutching onto his credit card, his palms slick with sweat. He couldn’t tell if the guy was looking at him, couldn’t tell if he was supposed to look back.

The bartender was all the way on the other side of the counter, attending to what appeared to be a bachelorette party ordering a round of bright blue drinks. Shane let out a breath and tapped the edge of his card into the soft wood of the bar.

“That looks like it will take a while,” a voice said next to his ear.

Shane inhaled sharply, fighting the urge to flinch. He glanced to his left, though he knew who would be there. The man had moved over several seats, and was now next to Shane, one of his arms braced on the bar. This close, he could catch the gleam of a single silver hoop at the other man’s ear.

“Yeah,” Shane exhaled. He wasn’t even sure what words were coming out of his mouth. “That’s okay. I can wait.”

He was so bad at this. He could feel his face heating with embarrassment. He didn’t know how to flirt, didn’t know how to speak to strangers like this, particularly not ones with such beautiful eyes. 

“Can your date?”

“What?” Shane turned his head to stare fully at the stranger.

“Can she wait?” The man cocked his head just slightly in Rose’s direction. 

“Oh, um.” Shane felt his ears turn pink. “She’s not my date. Just my friend. And, yeah. She’ll be fine.”

A cursory glance at Rose revealed that she was thumbing furiously away at something on her phone. Shane’s mobile buzzed in his pocket, suspiciously timed, but he ignored it. He glanced back at the stranger, who was studying Shane again, his eyes kaleidoscopic and intent.

“That is good.”

“What?” Shane said again, stupidly. 

“Is good that she is not your date.” He was beginning to pick up on the touches of an accent, something smooth and strong that rumbled in the man’s voice as he spoke. “I was maybe hoping that you had come up here to talk to me.”

The man shifted a little, and it was that small movement that brought his arm brushing against Shane’s. What felt like a shower of warm sparks cascaded down his elbow at the contact, and Shane very consciously did not pull away. 

“Oh,” was all he said. “Um.”

The stranger laughed a little, deep dimples rippling in his rosy cheeks. Shane let out a nervous laugh of his own, glancing down at the bar where he’d continued sketching shapes with the corners of his credit card, and let his arm press a little more comfortably into the man’s.

“Did I misread situation?” The stranger’s voice sobered. “You are okay, yes?”

“Yes,” Shane said quickly. He forced himself to make eye contact again, despite the nervous flip of his stomach. “Yes. Sorry. I just- I don’t talk...”

He let his sentence trail off, realizing that it was going nowhere. The stranger’s mouth tugged up into a crooked grin. “You don’t talk?”

“Not what I meant,” said Shane, and worked on releasing the tension in his shoulders. Without realizing it, they’d begun to creep up towards his ears. “I don’t, um. Do this very often.”

“Do what?”

Shane had been about to answer, but then there was a large hand sliding onto his knee, warm through the fabric of his jeans, and every single word that he had ever known slipped out of his mind like water through a storm drain. The stranger’s smile widened again, knowing.

“What is your name?”

Shane hesitated, only for a moment. “James.”

“James?” The stranger tested the name on his tongue, and Shane immediately wished he hadn’t said it. 

The fake name was maybe a bit of a drastic precaution, but if he’d learned anything in the last five years, it was that he had to be careful. Being the closeted son of a prime minister meant that Shane had to hold a lot of things close to his chest. 

He looked, for the first time, towards the corner of the bar, where his bodyguard John was flipping through a thick novel and not paying him any mind whatsoever. Still, Shane knew that between Rose and John, there were some very close tabs being kept on him.

Taking a deep breath and forcing himself to relax a little more, Shane swiveled very slightly towards the stranger, letting their legs brush together. Down the counter, the bartender was pulling out a string of silver drink shakers for the bachelorette party and had still barely afforded a glance in his direction.

“What’s your name?” He just barely remembered to ask the question back.

“Ilya.”

“Ilya?” Shane tested the name out, but it felt clunky on his lips.

The stranger smiled patiently and pronounced it again, the syllables blurring comfortably in his mouth. Shane tried again, mimicking the sound, and blushed under Ilya’s keen gaze.

“You learn quickly. This is good- not just a pretty face,” he said, and squeezed Shane’s knee. If possible, he felt his flush deepen.

“Are you-” Shane paused, unsure of himself. “You’re Russian?”

“What gave it away?” 

“The accent,” he answered honestly, then grimaced with embarrassment when Ilya laughed. A rhetorical question, then.

The hand lifted from Shane’s knee, and for a pathetic moment, he missed the contact like a limb. Then it resettled at the small of Shane’s back, pushing up the fabric of his shirt to trace small circles on his bare skin. Shane fought the urge to shiver, but Ilya’s smile widened a little, like he could tell what he was thinking. 

He felt so close, now. Ilya had shifted without Shane noticing, and now he had his fingers lazily tracing over Shane’s skin, one arm braced close to him on the bar. Shane could feel his gaze like a brand as it traveled over him.

“So.” He swallowed, his mouth suddenly very dry. The bartender had entirely disappeared from his line of sight. “What brings you to Canada, then? From Russia?”

“I am here for work.” Ilya’s fingers slipped a little further down Shane’s back, brushing against the waistband of his jeans before they dipped back up again. The touch was firm, confident. Shane didn’t remember the last time he’d taken a full breath.

“What do you-“

“What can I get you?”

Shane practically jumped in his seat, turning quickly to face the bartender, who was now in front of him. Her expression was neutral, but Shane’s ears still burned with embarrassment, even when Ilya’s hand slid out from under his shirt and landed again on his knee. The touch didn’t feel much safer.

“Vodka soda, please.” 

“You want another beer, too?”

Shane blinked. It was incredibly hard to focus when he could still feel the warm pressure of Ilya’s palm on his thigh, his chest inches from Shane’s shoulder. If he wanted, he could lean into him. After a moment, he nodded. The bartender took his card and then spun off in the direction of the register. 

“So,” Ilya said. Shane turned to look at him, fighting off the sense that it was like looking into the sun. His hand slipped a centimeter up Shane’s thigh, pleasant through the denim. “Would you like to go somewhere with me?”

Shane thought his heart might be about to give out. “Um.”

Ilya waited patiently while Shane opened his mouth and shut it several times. It was just such a direct thing to ask, and it knocked the wind out of him. Shane had never been so utterly failed by language before— not even when he was fourteen and meeting Barack Obama. 

“I have to bring this drink back to my friend,” was what he eventually landed on. The bartender had floated back in their direction, two glasses in her hands. Shane gratefully latched onto his, letting the feel of the cold pint against his fingers ground him. He took a sip, trying not to notice the way Ilya’s eyes lazily flicked down to follow his mouth as it pressed to the rim of the glass.

“She looks busy.”

Shane turned to look at Rose, and saw that she was no longer alone. A guy their age had settled into the seat that had been Shane’s, and Rose’s entire body was tilted towards him, twirling a strand of hair around her finger. She was so good at flirting. Shane felt briefly envious of it. 

“Still,” he said, his stomach sinking with regret. He risked a look in John’s direction— although he was still seemingly wrapped up in his book, there was no way he wasn’t following the fact that Shane and Rose had split up. It was his job, after all, to pay attention to Shane’s exact location. “I can’t leave my friend.”

“Not even if she leaves you first?” Ilya was staring, amused, at something over Shane’s shoulder. He internally groaned but turned to check again— Rose looked like she was measuring the size of her hand against the guy’s. Fuck. It was the oldest trick in the book. How had Shane not thought of that?

“That won’t happen,” Shane said through a nervous laugh. He took another sip of his beer. “I can’t go anywhere. I’m sorry.”

Ilya had begun to trace tantalizing circles on Shane’s knee. He realized, with a slow-dawning horror, that he was starting to get hard at the contact. 

“We will not leave the bar,” Ilya said. “Promise.”

“What?”

Now, Ilya rolled his eyes, but the gesture somehow didn’t seem truly annoyed. “You ask so many questions. Just trust. Will you go somewhere with me?”

Shane had been going through stranger danger lectures and mandatory security briefings before he’d even hit puberty. It went against every ounce of training in his body to disappear with someone, much less a man he’d met less than ten minutes before. He should say no. He should absolutely say no.

“I’ll be right back,” was what he said instead. 

When Rose noticed his presence back at the table, her smile immediately dimmed from flirtatious to something softer, knowing. The guy she’d been talking to looked curiously between them.

“How’s it going?”

“He asked me to go somewhere with him,” Shane gritted out. 

“Oh my god.” Rose kept her face blessedly composed— Shane had his back turned to Ilya, so he couldn’t tell if he was looking their way, but he still felt like he was experiencing the vestiges of a hot stare against his back. “You’re going?”

“Well, I can’t leave,” Shane said mournfully. Understanding, Rose’s eyes flicked to John. He always gave them as much space as possible when they went out, but he was contractually obligated to stay within a certain vicinity of Shane. 

“I’ll cover for you,” she offered helpfully. “I’ll tell him you’re having explosive diarrhea in the bathroom.” 

Shane rubbed a hand over his face. “Rose.”

“James,” she said teasingly, and Shane froze for a second before he relaxed. He’d forgotten how well she knew him, enough to realize he’d be using a fake name. The guy she’d been flirting with had obviously realized that he wasn’t a part of their conversation and was clearly still listening, but acting accordingly. Shane liked him for that. He also liked him for the fact that he didn’t seem to recognize who Shane was.

He glanced nervously over his shoulder. Ilya was still at the bar, but he’d polished off his drink and was now making eye contact with Shane. He inclined his head, very slightly, towards a nondescript door at the back of the bar, and then slid off the stool and headed that direction. The implication was obvious. 

“Are you guys gonna go make babies?” Rose’s voice dropped low, hushed.

“Rose!” Shane shut his eyes, his body flooded with anxiety and excitement. “What do I do?”

“You chug that beer and then you go. I’ll cover for you.” The first time she’d offered, it’d been mostly in jest, but now he could see that she meant it seriously. 

“And you’ll be okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said. She patted the guy in the booth on the shoulder, letting her hand linger and slide down to his elbow familiarly. “I’m making friends, see?”

So Shane spent a solid minute forcing his beer down his throat before he set the glass down onto the table with a heavy thunk. Then, he went after Ilya.

He was half-expecting someone to stop him. John, maybe, or the bartender, but he didn’t hear any protestations as he slipped behind the unmarked wooden door. He found himself in a dimly lit, somewhat grimy hallway.

Ilya was leaning casually against the wall, muscled arms folded against his chest. “Took you long enough.”

“Sorry,” said Shane. “I had to tell my friend where I was going.”

Ilya didn’t seem like he cared very much what had kept Shane. In lieu of response, he reached out and tangled their fingers together loosely, tugging Shane down the hall behind him.

“Where are we going? Do you work here, or something?”

“I know the owner,” Ilya said as he brought them to another door and began to jiggle the knob. Shane was beginning to become slightly afraid that he was about to be murdered. The headlines flashed in his head— Young Son of Prime Minister Murdered by Sexy Model.  “He will not mind.”

“Oh. How do you know the owner? Are you guys old friends or something?”

Shane blinked at the room they were now in. It looked like someone’s office— a mahogany desk scattered with papers, a few haphazardly stacked crates, a lamp that Ilya flipped on so that the room was hazy with warm light. There was a threadbare couch pushed against one dingy wall.

“Is this the owner’s office? Your friend, I mean?”

“I thought you said you didn’t talk,” said Ilya, and crowded Shane back against the door. His brain immediately began to short-circuit, but that didn’t matter much, because then Ilya’s mouth was on his, and Shane had no more use for questions.

He kissed deeply, possessively, claiming Shane’s mouth like it had always been his. He bit lightly into Shane’s bottom lip, and when he parted his mouth in surprise, took the opportunity to slip his tongue along his teeth, the soft brush of it sending chills up Shane’s spine.

Ilya’s skillful hands had unbuttoned Shane’s shirt before he could even blink, and he reached to help him slip it off, relishing in the feeling of broad, strong fingers squeezing at his arms and draping around his neck. Shane let himself be pushed into the door, then winced at the frigid prod of the knob against his lower back.

Ilya felt the wince and paused. “You okay? You want, yes?”

“Yes,” Shane said, and couldn’t help but press his mouth desperately to Ilya’s again. “Door’s cold.” 

The hand that had been greedily gripping at Shane’s hip slid up his spine until he had effectively been gathered against Ilya’s chest. He pulled them both towards the couch, stumbling over himself until Shane was on top of him, mouthing eagerly at his neck. 

It didn’t take long to tease him out of his tight gray shirt, marveling at the paradise of muscles and soft golden hair trailing down to Ilya’s waistband. He wanted to press his mouth and hands to every inch of skin, but then Ilya was kissing and biting at his collarbone, reaching for the button of his jeans, and there was not much else Shane could do but sink his head into Ilya’s shoulder, moaning with pleasure when he felt the pressure of Ilya’s hand against his cock. 

“Fuck, you’re wet,” Ilya said as he slipped his hand beneath the waist of Shane’s briefs. 

Shane might have been embarrassed in any other situation, but instead he keened, rutting against the contact. Ilya laughed a little before he began the work of tugging Shane’s jeans down, letting them snag around his knees as Shane drove his hips down desperately.

He liked the rough, surprised moan that scraped out of Ilya’s throat when Shane brought his own hand down to grasp at him, liked the rumble of his chest beneath Shane’s lips as he wrapped them around his nipple. Shane wanted him to make that sound again. 

He barely knew what he was doing as he let his mouth and tongue and teeth trail down Ilya’s abdomen, sloppy as he fumbled with his zipper. In moments, Shane was on his knees beside the couch, hesitating for only a second at the thought of how filthy the floor might be before he was letting his knees dig into the carpet, mouthing desperately at Ilya’s hard cock through his underwear.

Ilya moaned again, the sound curling pleasantly in Shane’s stomach. His fingers tugged at his hair. “You don’t have to.”

“I want to,” said Shane, hooking two fingers into the waist of his briefs and tugging them down. 

He was almost unprepared for the reveal of Ilya’s cock, glistening and hard. Shane didn’t have a ton of experience, but still, when he took the tip into his mouth, Ilya let his eyes flutter shut, his rumpled head of curls tossed against the arm of the couch. Soon, Shane found a steady pace, guided by the hand on the back of his neck. He wrapped his hand around the length of cock that his mouth couldn’t reach, stroking in time with his tongue.

“You feel so good,” Ilya said, and Shane couldn’t help but let out a pleased sound of his own, lost in the almost soothing rhythm of the cock on his tongue, the not-unpleasant salty taste, the bands of muscle shifting beneath his hands as he slipped them up Ilya’s body. 

For a moment, he’d risked cupping himself, rubbing his length when he’d taken Ilya deeper into his throat, but then Ilya had moaned again, the sound delicious, his cock so thick and heavy in Shane’s mouth and Shane had nearly finished right then and there, which would have been mortifying. Now, he was faintly aware that his hips were jerking up into the air, seeking friction that he couldn’t allow unless he wanted to come without even having had those big hands on him properly.

Suddenly, Ilya’s hips were moving differently, a tension emerging as he pushed himself up on the couch. “I’m going to- I’m going to-”

He tugged warningly at Shane’s hair, his fingers still tangled and probably making a mess of it. 

Shane hadn’t been meaning to swallow. He’d never done that before, always pulling off before it happened. But now, lost in the haze of Ilya’s voice, his body, the soothing weight of him on his tongue, Shane forgot to pull away. 

When Ilya came, it was with an exhalation of breath, a quiet swear, the tightening of fingers against the back of Shane’s neck. His mouth was there, taking it all. It was more than he’d expected, but he handled it as best he could, swallowing it down. Some of Ilya’s cum had trickled out of the side of his mouth, down the sides of his cock, and when he blinked slowly up at Ilya, he wiped at his cheek with the back of his hand. 

“Fuck, come here,” said Ilya, and then he was gathering him up, pulling him by his shoulders and then his biceps until Shane was back on top of him. He was vaguely aware of the collection of sweat and cum on Ilya’s abdomen, now sticky against his own, but it was hard to care much about that when their mouths were colliding, the kiss slick and hot. 

In one smooth movement, Ilya flipped them so that it was Shane who was nestled into the couch, taking advantage of the new angle to explore his mouth somehow deeper. His hand found Shane’s cock and he nearly cried out in surprise at the touch, just a little rough in a manner that sent shivers through Shane.

Then there was a mouth on his neck, finding some perfect spot at the junction of his neck and his shoulder, and between the delirious pleasure of that contact and the hand on his cock, Shane was inches away from coming. He pinched his own thigh, trying to ward off his orgasm.

The movement didn’t go unnoticed. Ilya used both his hands to frame Shane’s head on the couch, a wicked grin splitting across his gorgeous mouth. Shane fixated, briefly, on the glimmer of the silver hoop in his ear. He was so hot, it felt like Shane couldn’t even properly absorb it. 

“Did you pinch yourself? So good to be with me, is like a dream, yes?” 

Teasingly, he lightly pinched Shane’s side, and he jostled with the movement, surprisingly sensitive.

“Fuck off,” he breathed, but the words didn’t seem to have much effect.

“Tell me what you want.” Ilya bent to press more kisses to Shane’s jaw, trailing back towards his ear. He stroked teasingly at Shane’s cock, his thumb tracing exquisite circles around his tip. “My hands? My mouth?”

“M-mouth,” Shane stammered, almost surprised by the desperation in his voice. His hips rose, chasing the movement of Ilya’s hand. “Please. Your mouth.”

Ilya pushed himself up again, considering him with tantalizing hazel eyes. “Only because you asked so nicely,” he murmured, and then bit softly at Shane’s neck before he kissed his way down his chest and his stomach. He paused for only a moment to scrape his teeth against Shane’s sensitive nipple, smiling at the way Shane arched his back into the contact, a groaned please slipping out of his mouth without his meaning to.

When Ilya finally took Shane deep down his throat, he nearly saw stars. He threw his head back in pleasure, moaning uncontrollably.

Ilya’s mouth moved expertly, dragging up and down the length of Shane’s cock like he’d done it thousands of times, like he lived there. His tongue traced lazy, lush circles around his head before he wrapped his lips around it and sucked eagerly. 

Shane was only half-aware of the fact that he was swearing, whining, sounds free-falling from his mouth. This seemed to please Ilya, who pinned Shane’s jerking hips to the couch so he could get a better angle, taking him somehow deeper. The rhythm and the pressure was divine. Shane sunk his face into his elbow, lost entirely in the pleasure.

He was surprised when he felt fingers grasping at his arm, tugging it away from his face.

“No, none of this. I want to see you. So pretty,” said Ilya, his other hand still wrapped firmly around the base of Shane’s cock. He stroked it smoothly, the skin wet with spit and pre-come, and the sight of it was so obscene, Shane fought the urge to hide his face again.

It only took a few more strokes, Ilya’s head bobbing eagerly, his lips wrapped around Shane’s cock, before he was crying out in warning, grasping at Ilya’s muscled shoulder to try to get him to pull off. Ilya grinned and swatted the hand away, like it was a nuisance. Then, in a scene that was so violently sexy Shane knew he would be seeing it in the backs of his eyelids for months, he confidently swallowed the entirety of Shane’s orgasm.

When he was done swearing and coming and digging his blunt nails into the skin of Ilya’s trapezius, Shane slumped down against the couch cushions, feeling boneless and spent. His chest rose and fell haggardly, like he’d just finished twenty rounds of skating drills. 

Ilya got up and located a box of tissues, wiping himself off carefully before he did the same to Shane. He pulled Shane’s briefs up and back over his tired cock, adjusting the waistband so that it laid comfortably. Shane let his eyes shut for a second, still reveling in the absolute bliss coursing through his body, before he pushed himself off the couch, tugging his jeans back up. 

Ilya didn’t seem like he was in any hurry to get fully dressed. Shane wasn’t even sure where he’d tossed the shirt Ilya’d had been wearing after he’d pulled it off of him— it might have landed somewhere behind the desk, where Ilya now leaned comfortably, his eyes watching Shane.

“That was fun, yes?”

“Um,” Shane swallowed down a smile that felt like it might be too big for his mouth. “Yes. That was fun.”

He shrugged his shirt back on, registering faintly that his hands were shaking a little. Possibly with adrenaline, possibly with anxiety. He made it halfway up the row of buttons before he realized he’d missed one, and had consequently mis-matched every other slot. The shirt was hanging unevenly. He frowned and began to undo the buttons again.

“Let me?”

Shane was surprised when Ilya knocked his hands out of the way, his touch gentle. He undid the buttons that Shane had messed up, and then slowly made his way back up, knuckles occasionally brushing against his bare skin in a way that made him want to shiver. The room fell quiet, filled only with the sound of their breathing, the faintest trickles of rock music from the bar outside. Shane had almost forgotten where they were, almost forgotten that there was a world outside of this shabby room where this total stranger had undone and then remade him again. 

“There,” said Ilya, and reached out to adjust the collar of Shane’s shirt. His hands were sure, confident. He nudged Shane’s chin with his knuckle and then kissed him again, the motion surprisingly tender. He nipped at his bottom lip and then pressed closer, tighter. When they broke apart, it was with a shuddering of Shane’s breath. He wasn’t even that embarrassed by it— whether it was intentional or not, he had made it clear the impact Ilya had on his body.

“You have to go?” Ilya’s hand skated up and down Shane’s shoulder blade, his thumb massaging into his neck.

He sighed, thinking of Rose and his bodyguard and the rest of the world outside. Shane hated the thought of having to return to it, having to leave this bubble. 

“I have to go,” he confirmed. 

“Well, James,” Ilya said, and Shane blinked hard at the name. It felt like dunking his entire body into a pool of cold water— he’d forgotten that he’d lied, forgotten that Ilya didn’t actually know a thing about him. 

“I don’t know how much longer I’ll be in Ottawa.” Ilya leaned forward to press another kiss to Shane’s frozen mouth. “But maybe I could see you again, yes?”

Shane opened his mouth, but didn’t get much farther. His voice snagged on the words, not certain what to say. When he’d lied to people in the past about who he was, even when he’d let himself be flirted with, it had never felt like this. He felt a little like he was choking.

Like he had earlier, when he’d asked him to come to the back of the bar, Ilya waited patiently for Shane to come up with an answer. He slipped his fingers underneath the hem of the freshly buttoned shirt, tracing circles into the skin above Shane’s hips. The contact only served to distract him more, and from the teasing, almost gloating crinkle of his eyes, Ilya could tell.

Shane had just about landed on coming clean about all of it in the hopes that Ilya would understand, that maybe he’d want to see him again anyways, when there was a loud pounding on the door.

They both jumped nearly a foot in the air.

Ilya swore under his breath. “Cliff?”

Shane didn’t know who Cliff was, but he was ninety-nine percent certain that he knew who was behind the door. The knock sounded again.

“Shane, are you in there?”

“Shit.” Shane shut his eyes and exhaled. The doorknob began to jiggle. He hadn’t even realized Ilya had locked it behind them. “I’m in here,” he called, if only so John would stop trying to break the door down.

“Are you okay in there?” John’s voice was muffled through the wood. “Are you alone?”

“I’m fine.” His neck grew hot with embarrassment. Ilya’s fingers had stilled where they were on his abdomen.

“Shane?” He tilted his head, studying Shane like he was a puzzle to be solved. “You said your name was James.” 

His mouth was very dry. “I did, yeah. I can explain, I just-”

The knocking sounded on the door again. “Shane, I’m not sure what you’re doing in there, but I think it’s time to head back soon.”

Shane swore again under his breath. John, normally a pretty easygoing man, did not sound happy. He rarely told him what to do, but Shane could hear in his tone that he needed to get out of the small room as soon as possible before John really did ram a hole in the door. 

“Look, I’m so sorry about this.” 

Ilya had slipped his hands from Shane’s waist and taken a step back, confusion scrawled across his features. “What, you have a boyfriend? He is pissed?”

“No, no, it’s not like that.” Shane wanted to reach for him, but didn’t know how. The air felt suddenly cold against his front in the absence of Ilya, panic spreading through his chest. 

“And you lied about your name? Why?”

“It’s a long story. Listen, I want to see you again, too. That is, if you still want to see me. If you give me your number, I can-”

John pounded on the door again. Ilya was scrambling to tug his jeans up his legs, reaching for the shirt which Shane could now see had tangled itself around the base of the lamp. “I think it sounds like you need to go,” he said. He wasn’t looking at Shane as he turned away, pulling the fabric tightly over his head. 

Shane opened his mouth. Closed it again. He felt like his vocal chords had been severed. He spent a long moment staring at Ilya’s back, trying to work out a way to fix this, but there wasn’t any. 

When Shane opened the door and stepped into the hallway, his eyes were prickling with shameful tears. It didn’t matter, because he didn’t let them fall.

“I am so sorry.” Rose’s voice was pleading as they slid into the back of the black SUV. “I told him you were sick, but…”

“But Rose wouldn’t let you be sick alone,” John interjected, pushing the key into the ignition. He’d grown fond of her over the years. “Plus, you were gone for too long.”

“I had to tell him where you were so he wouldn’t go all DEFCON-5,” Rose said, hushed now. That was enough to get Shane to blink away from the blurry pass of streetlights and face her. 

“Isn’t that an American thing?”

She smiled. “Well, I’m an American thing.”

“DEFCON-5 isn’t that bad,” John said as they steered onto the highway. “DEFCON-1 is where they ground the planes.”

“Well, neither would be necessary,” Shane told them both. “I was fine.”

He looked to Rose, reading the concern that still rippled across her brow. 

“I’m not mad at you, promise,” he reassured, and some of that concern eased. She smiled, and reached out to slip her fingers through his. Shane found the touch grounding. He squeezed her hand. She squeezed back twice.

“Tell me about it later?”

Shane nodded, and then looked back out the window. 

He truly wasn’t mad at Rose. He wasn’t even really mad at John, who was just doing his job. If anything, he was upset with himself— for lying, for still being in the closet, for living the kind of life that required so much secrecy (for not getting Ilya’s number, for not stealing one more kiss from his mouth).

It was par for the course, the same way it always had been. Being the only son of Yuna Hollander was a difficult task. So was being the captain of one of the best college hockey teams in America. Being both at the same time was an unavoidable weight that sometimes felt like it was about to break Shane in half.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

He was still thinking about Ilya the next morning.

Shane had been called to his mom’s office shortly after sending Rose off to the airport, presumably to be scolded about his behavior the night before. John had already pulled him aside to explain his concerns, why it couldn’t happen again, and Shane had apologized and meant it sincerely, but now he sat in one of his mom’s leather armchairs and anticipated the same lecture, only a thousand times worse.

To pass the time, he stared at his favorite painting in the room. It was one that had hung above his mom’s desk at the old house, long before she ran for prime minister and their lives were upended— a swirling ocean landscape with deep streaks of purple and green and a tiny white boat bobbing along the surface. Somewhere far in the distance, dawn was breaking through clouds, early morning beams of brightness that had yet to touch the water. 

His mind drifted, as it had been all morning, back to the man he’d met the night before. He’d been vacillating wildly between vivid mental recreations of the touching, the kissing, the moaning, and between imagining what it might be like if he lived a different life. If he were someone other than Shane Hollander. 

Someone else would’ve been able to say yeah, let me just grab my coat when a hot person asked if they wanted to go somewhere else. Someone else would’ve been able to trade numbers, or meet Ilya on a dating app instead, maybe.

Shane didn’t think about this much. Between hockey, school, and navigating his limited role in the Canadian political landscape, he didn’t have much energy to waste on dating or on worrying about the extent of his human connections. 

But then there was last night. Shane couldn’t remember the last time he felt like he’d felt so drawn to someone. Suddenly, imagining that he was splitting a meal with Ilya, instead of some faceless stranger, was like sinking a thumb into the tender bruise of his heart. He would never have something normal like that— not if he went to the league the way he was projected to, not if he played for the MLH while still remaining the son of one of the world’s biggest political players. He found himself thinking mournfully of the fact that it wouldn’t be long before Ilya’s face began to get murky, forgotten in his memory. 

His reverie was shattered by the sound of the door swinging open.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, honey.” Yuna swept into the room, all swishing fabric and sandalwood perfume. She pressed a quick kiss to Shane’s head as she passed him, moving to take a seat at her desk. “My meeting with the French ambassadors ran late.”

She was flanked by her advisor, Jasper Quaid. Jasper was a tall, crotchety man that Shane wasn’t particularly fond of— most of their interactions involved Jasper sneering at a laptop screen and letting Shane know that it was not reasonable to ask his mother to fit one of his hockey games into her schedule, and that if he didn’t know the exact date of his graduation two years out, there was almost no way she’d be able to attend. He was almost legendarily an asshole, but his mom relied on Jasper for a lot, so Shane never said anything contrary.

“That’s okay.” Shane shifted in his seat, watching her settle. 

“How are you? How was the visit with your friend?” Yuna took a second to sip her coffee while Shane answered, relaxing her shoulders infinitesimally. 

“It was good. I took her on one of those boat tours, she liked it.” He shrugged. “She’d never been to Ottawa, so it was a lot of fun to show her around.”

“It was nice of her to visit. Rose, right?”

She waited for Shane to nod.

“I was sad to not be able to catch dinner with her. Your father says she was very charming.” She peered at Shane over her glasses. “Are you two going out again?”

“Mom,” he said, voice thick with embarrassment. His cheeks burned. He shot a tentative look at Jasper, still perched in the corner, but the man was intently tapping away on his phone. Probably drafting an email renewing his commitments to some sort of organization that specialized in calendar management and kicking puppies.

“Honey,” she mimicked his tone, but she was smiling. “Alright, alright. I won’t push. I’m assuming John told you the reason I have you in here today?”

Shane hated watching her shift back into business mode, like a shell snapping over her features as she looked down, shuffling through a few papers on her desk. He looked guiltily back at John, who had folded his bulky body into one of the chairs by the door. 

“Yeah, about that, Mom. I’m really sorry about my behavior last night. I know it was out of hand, and so unlike-”

“Shane-” John interrupted at the exact moment that Yuna’s head snapped up.

“Last night? What happened last night?” She peered suspiciously at the two of them over her glasses. “I didn’t get any reports.”

“Uh,” Shane shuffled in his seat, then glanced back at John. He’d assumed that his rendezvous with the stranger was what had earned him a meeting with his mother that morning, but could tell from the guilty expression on John’s face that was not the case. Instant remorse kicked in his gut.

“Actually, ma’am, I didn’t have a chance to tell Mr. Hollander the news.” John adjusted his tie, looking more uncomfortable than Shane had ever seen him. “I wasn’t sure when you would be finding my replacement.” 

“Your what?” Shane’s neck was beginning to ache from swiveling it back and forth between John and his mother. “Why would you need a replacement?”

“Hold on a second.“ Yuna held up her palm. Internally, Shane groaned. “What were you saying about last night?”

“It was really nothing,” Shane started, but then found he was at a loss for words. His mouth flapped for a second while his mother studied him intently, like if she stared at him hard enough she could somehow telepathically absorb the events of the night before. 

Much to his surprise, it was Jasper who spared Shane from his fate. 

“Madam Prime Minster,” he said, his tone bored. “We’re running late. You might have to get the details from young Mr. Hollander another time.”

Shane’s mom frowned unhappily, but glanced at her watch and visibly conceded. “Okay. Never mind.” She flapped her hand. “Tell me at dinner. Why you’re here, Shane, is because there’s going to be some changes to your security detail this year at school.”

“What?”

Yuna looked to John expectantly, folding her manicured hands neatly in front of her. Shane fully turned in the chair to look at his bodyguard now. John was smiling tensely, the rest of his expression riddled with guilt. 

“I’m sorry, Shane. I would’ve told you earlier if I’d realized this was what we were meeting about.” At that, his eyes flicked quickly, possibly accusatorially, to Jasper’s corner of the room, before he refocused on Shane. “My daughter’s having a baby in a few months, and I’ve asked to be placed on a security team that will keep me closer to home.”

Shane blinked. “Susie’s pregnant?” 

Warmth bloomed across John’s features. “Four months today.”

“Congratulations,” Shane said, and he meant it. “Wow. That’s big news.”

His bodyguard nodded solemnly, but couldn’t quite keep the grin off his face. Shane’s mother cleared her throat.

“It is big news,” she said, with a smile in John’s direction. “Unfortunately, that means we’ve had to do some reshuffling with the security team. We’ve found someone to take John’s place, and I think you’re going to like him. He’s closer to your age, should be more incognito. He’s even going to be sitting in on some of your classes, I think.”

“Woah.” Shane sat forward in his seat. “What? I’ve never been guarded in class before.”

“That was based off of a recommendation from the department of security,” Jasper said smoothly. “They’d like to keep a closer eye on you.”

“A closer eye on me?” Shane wasn’t sure who to fix with his questioning look. “What do you mean? I already get followed into every building, I bring security on every roadie, I can’t even go for a run by myself. You guys already keep a plenty close eye on me.”

“Shane, honey, I understand that it’s difficult to be accompanied all the time. Trust me,” Yuna said with a little laugh. Shane couldn’t un-tense his hands from where they were grasping onto the arms of his chair. “But this is really for the best. Particularly with the political climate in America right now, we want to make sure you’re safe.”

“School is probably a safer place for me than the city is,” Shane said, but he knew the argument was futile. “Campus is practically a bubble.”

“You’re not always on campus, are you?” Jasper said, his tone snotty. Shane really could not fathom how his mother put up with him for eight hours a day.

“I guess not.” Shane chewed on the inside of his cheek. “So you’re upping my security and you’re giving me a new guard? What else?”

“Nothing else,” Yuna reassured with a wave of her hands, but then John cleared his throat. Shane turned to face him, awaiting whatever terror was sure to come out of his mouth next. 

“There was a change to your living situation,” he began slowly. “Another recommendation from higher ups.”

A pit of dread was opening up inside of Shane’s stomach. “What do you mean? Is something wrong with my apartment?”

Shane had an off-campus apartment at Samwell that he was quite fond of. It was a one-bed, one-bath, sleek and modern in the way that newer buildings tended to be. He liked the bright windows, liked the view of the Gothic campus library and the bell tower in the distance. Mostly, he liked that the space was entirely his. In the past, John had been set up in the apartment next to him, which was already tight enough to make the back of Shane’s neck start to crawl on a bad day. 

“You’ll be staying in the same building, but not the same unit,” John said. “We’re moving you to a two-bedroom. The new guy’s going to be staying in the apartment with you.”

“What?” Shane practically shot out of his seat, the word half-yelped. “What do you mean?”

John grimaced sympathetically. “Listen, kid, we’re just trying to keep you safe. This is par for the course for a lot of people of interest. He’s under instruction to be as unobtrusive as possible, the same way I was, but yes. This is the new protocol.”

Shane’s emotions had pivoted from sharp surprise to the piercing throb of anxiety. It was too much. They were only a week away from the pre-season, three weeks away from classes starting. Shane would have to move all of his belongings and settle into a new place. He’d have to get to know a whole new person, someone who would be shadowing his every move. On top of that, he’d be managing a few new teammates, new professors, new classes. His breaths began to rise a little faster, and he tried furiously to stamp down the discomfort in his chest. 

“Oh my god,” he mumbled to himself. He covered his eyes with his palms for a moment, trying his best to regulate in any way he could. “I have to move?” 

To his embarrassment, the words nearly came out as a whine. Shane tried his best not to seem like a child in front of his mother, particularly not in front of her team, but this was a lot to handle. 

“Your belongings will be already in the new apartment when you arrive,” Jasper said dryly. “The building requested we move you over as soon as possible to free up the unit for new tenants.”

In a way, that was worse. He didn’t love the idea of strangers digging through his things, deciding where they should be placed. It was moments like these where Shane felt truly like he had no control, no agency at all over his own life. He let out a breath, scrubbed his hands over his eyes until he began to see spots. He inhaled and exhaled a few more times before he forced his posture to straighten, blinking into the light of the office. “Okay,” he said. “Okay. When do I meet the new guy?” 

Yuna’s face brightened, but Shane recognized that she seemed a little concerned for him. Probably another topic he’d have to navigate during dinner. “I think he should be in the waiting area, right? John, could you check?”

As John moved to the door, Shane took several more deep breaths. His mother made eye contact with him and fluttered her fingers as if to say how exciting. He wished he could share the sentiment. 

He felt more than saw the other man when he walked into the room. Two imposing figures moved into the space behind him, and Shane forced what he hoped was a congenial expression onto his face as he turned to face them, pushing up from his chair.

“Shane, this is Ilya Rozanov.”

For a world-ending moment, it felt like the ground was falling out from beneath him. The hand he’d been extending to greet the new bodyguard froze in midair, a stab of panic jolting through his entire body. 

Because it was the man from the night before. The man he’d slept with. 

He looked different. His hair was tidied back with gel, and he was wearing a suit, black tie knotted neatly at his throat. There was no longer a silver hoop glinting at his earlobe. But there was no doubt— it was Ilya. It was him.

Rozanov saved the moment by grasping Shane’s hand, shaking it briskly. The contact left warm tingles inside of his palm, but Shane hardly noticed that, still blinking at him in shock. 

“Pleasure to meet you, Mr. Hollander.” His accent was somehow more velvety than Shane remembered. 

“It’s nice to meet you too,” said Shane, after a long pause. He tripped terribly over the first syllable, like he’d never spoken in his life. Mercifully, Ilya shifted his cool gaze from Shane’s blushing face and pivoted to Yuna, extending his hand to shake hers as well.

“Madam Prime Minister, what an honor to meet you.” 

Shane realized as they exchanged pleasantries that he was frozen, still holding his hand in mid-air. John seemed to be the only one who had noticed; he was studying Shane closely, his eyes narrowed in suspicion. He lowered his hand and brushed it off nervously against his jeans.

“It’s my understanding that you come from an esteemed line of police, right? What brings you to Canada?”

Everyone in the room knew that Yuna already knew the answer to that question. Probably, she was asking it so that Shane would know, maybe feel reassured. He thought he might vomit with stress.

Ilya answered in a formal tone. “I was sent to Vancouver for an exchange when I was younger. It is very nice here, so I worked hard to be able to come back.”

“I have no doubts about that,” said Yuna generously. She looked to Shane, clearly expecting him to say anything, but he was pretty certain that he’d swallowed his tongue and would never find it again. 

Ilya looked different in ways that were attributed to more than just the outfit change. Last night he’d been slouchy, sexy, rough around the edges, but he’d also been warm. He’d waited patiently for Shane to finish his sentences, smiled softly but not mockingly when he’d stammered. Now, it was like his face was missing that warmth. There was no sign of that charming dimple, that flirtatious twist of a smile. He was exuding professionalism in a way that made him seem like someone else entirely. 

A not-inconspicuous cough sounded from Jasper. Yuna sighed, faux-exasperated, but Shane could tell that she was feeling the self-imposed pressure of her schedule, too.

“I would love to stay and chat, but I’m afraid we’re running behind a bit this morning. My apologies, Mr. Rozanov.”

Ilya nodded politely, his expression almost painfully neutral.

“I think we have a few loose ends to wrap up with John, here, but maybe you and Mr. Rozanov can take this time get to know each other.” Yuna smiled brightly at the two of them. “Mr. Rozanov, have you seen the gardens here at the house?”

“I have not.” His voice was rumbling, low, like it was specifically designed to make Shane’s stomach flutter.

“I bet Shane would be happy to show you!” She pressed her hands together, clearly pleased. “Right, honey?”

Mercifully, Shane had pulled it together enough to nod. He said a warbling goodbye to his mom, letting her promises to see him at dinner that night wash over him with hardly an acknowledgement.

Shane was uncomfortably aware of the close presence at his back as he led Ilya down the long, air-conditioned hallway. Neither of them said a word— not while Shane turned the ornate iron handle on the glass double doors, not while they emerged onto the stone patio, not while Shane stomped them in the direction of the neatly maintained shrubs and flower bushes. 

It wasn’t until they were half-concealed under a copse of maple trees (far, Shane knew, from any prying ears) that he turned to face Ilya. 

“What,” he seethed, “are you doing here?”

“You did not say who you were.” Ilya let out a breath that sounded incredulous. “James. Very clever.”

“You didn’t say who you were, either.” Shane was aware that his chest was rising and falling sharply. He wasn’t sure if he was angry or just thoroughly panicked. 

“I said I was here for work.”

“You didn’t say what kind!” Shane was almost embarrassed by the sharp insistence of his tone.

“Oh, yes.” Ilya took a step away, raising his hand like he wanted to run it through his nicely gelled curls before he thought better of it. “I am sorry. I was supposed to say I am here to join security detail of the prime minister? What, tell every stranger on the street who I am and what I do? Very secure.”

He had a point. Shane chewed anxiously on the inside of his cheek. “If you knew you were going to be assigned to me, didn’t you know who I was? Why would you-” 

He couldn’t bring himself to finish the sentence. Still, Ilya knew what he meant. Why would you lead me to the back of the bar and take me apart with your mouth? Why would you button my shirt afterward? Why would you ask to see me again?

“I did not know.” He exhaled roughly, and this time he did smooth a hand over his hair. He looked unfairly handsome, ruffled in his suit and pacing anxiously beneath Shane’s favorite trees. “I did not receive my assignment until this morning. I was, er,” he paused, and a guilty look scrawled across his face. “I was briefed on you.”

For a moment, all Shane could do was blink, processing. Then he covered his eyes again.

It wasn’t a secret that there was a neat file somewhere with his name on it that had everything from his fingerprints to his underwear size to the name of the failed French penpal he’d been forced to have in the seventh grade. Now Ilya had seen that file. He knew about Shane’s dating history (or lack thereof— would know about Rose, would know about the few other casual girlfriends he’d had in secondary school). He knew Shane’s medical history (several hockey-related sprains, the surgery to take out his gallbladder when he was fifteen). He knew what classes he would be taking, what grocery stores he preferred, what his hockey schedule looked like. In a matter of hours, he’d gone from a total stranger to someone who had seen every single ounce of quantitative data that the Canadian government could gather about Shane Hollander.

His breathing was worsening. Shane hadn’t noticed, but it was audible, now, a jagged hiccuping escaping his lips each time he inhaled. He pressed his hands over his mouth, tried to stifle the noise, tried to stifle the feeling of crushing doom. There was no way out. 

“Hey, hey.” 

He became faintly aware, through the fog of his panic, that Ilya was trying to speak to him. There was a hand grasping at the nape of his neck. Shane’s breath kept hissing out of him, never quite filling up his lungs enough. Ilya was in front of him, now, his hazel eyes wide. If Shane kept up like this, one of the guards from the back deck would come down to check on him, and it was this thought that made him grasp for something to ground himself.

His palm came down on the trunk of a tree. He pressed his forehead into it, the bark rough against his face, and let the uncomfortable sensation bring him back to earth.

“Hey, Shane. You’re okay. Shane.” 

His breathing began to slow. Ilya’s hand was now smoothing up and down against the nape of his neck, a little rougher than he would have thought he liked, but the contact was good. 

There was just no way this was his life. That morning, Rose had been forcing Shane to demonstrate with his hands how large Ilya’s dick was, wheedling him for all sorts of details that had made him flush beet-red and nearly lose his ability to talk. Shane had fallen asleep reliving the sensation of being kissed by him, tracing his fingers along his bottom lip as if he could replicate the touch and feeling certain he’d never experience anything like it again in his life. Now Ilya was here, in front of him, contractually obligated to be stitched to his side day in and day out for the next year, at least. The thought was enough to make Shane dizzy all over again.

Ilya was studying him intently, his hand still squeezing the back of his neck. He waited for Shane’s breath to return to normal before he nodded to himself, like he’d come to some sort of conclusion just by reading Shane’s expression. 

“Okay. I will tell them I cannot do it. It is a conflict of interest.”

“What?” Shane realized that he was still standing with one hand digging hard into the tree trunk and pulled it back to himself, resisting the urge to brush the dirt off on his pants. “No. You can’t tell them anything.” 

He sent a nervous look back towards the house, but there was no one looking at them. One of the guards who was usually stationed out back was pacing towards the other end of the property, making the rounds that Shane had memorized by now. 

Ilya shrugged. “It makes you uncomfortable. I will ask to be reassigned.”

For a brief moment, Shane was flooded with relief. Yes. That would make his problem (his improbably gorgeous problem) go away. But then he thought about it further. “I don’t know what you would say. Plus, I don’t really have any say in these things. I don’t get to choose who’s on my security detail.”

Another shrug. “I will say you hate Russians. You do not want me near you.”

“You can’t say I hate Russians!” Horrified, Shane wheeled to face him. “That’s a total lie. Everyone would know it.”

“Anything would be a lie.” Ilya paused. “Unless you want to tell them the truth?”

“No!” The response practically punched itself out of Shane. His brain felt tangled, and he lowered his voice to a hissed whisper. “I’m not out, yet. To anyone.”

Ilya raised an eyebrow. “You were not out to your friend? The pretty date from last night?”

Shane sighed. “Okay, yes, she knows, but that’s it. No one else. And no one else can know, okay? It’s a secret.”

“Yes, Hollander, I understand the concept of being in the closet.” Ilya rolled his eyes. “Just trust me. I probably do not even need to give a reason. If I go in there and say that I am unfit to keep you safe, I will be pulled immediately from your detail.”

Shane swallowed. “Would they reassign you? Or would you lose your job?”

Ilya didn’t say anything. 

Immediate guilt swamped Shane. All of his racing thoughts, and not one of them had been to consider the unfair position the other man was in. “You’re here on a visa?”

Again, Ilya didn’t respond. Still, Shane felt certain he knew the answer. He sighed and leaned his head back, focusing for a moment on the fluttering of maple leaves over his head. He let the sound of the nearby chirping birds fill his ears, and took a centering breath, trying to think through his options. It didn’t appear that he had many.

Like it had that morning, his brain lighted for a moment on the wish that he were anyone else. If he were, he could just be a boy with another boy underneath the maple trees. He could be excited to see Ilya again, instead of filled with anxiety and trepidation. If he were someone else, he could ask to kiss him, just once. 

But he wasn’t someone else, he was Shane Hollander, and so he shut those thoughts down. They were not productive. 

“Listen,” he began. Shane ran a hand over his jaw, hardly noticing that his fingers were still trembling slightly. “I don’t want you to lose your job because of what we did last night. It’s not fair to you. Neither of us knew this was going to happen- we won’t do it again, obviously.” He waited for Ilya to nod, ignoring the twist of indecipherable emotion in his gut when it seemed like he sincerely agreed. “I think it’ll be fine.”

“You do?”

“Yes.” Shane put on his best air of confidence. “We’re both adults. We can be mature about this. There’s no reason to put us both into an uncomfortable situation, right? You don’t want to lose your job?”

Now Ilya was nodding. “Right.”

“Okay.” Shane took another breath, tried again to pretend that he wasn’t certain he would come to regret this decision. “Let’s do this.”

Chapter End Notes

thank you for reading, I am really excited for this one :,)

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Chapter 2: shane walks into the weight room

Chapter Notes

this chapter is inspired by hudson and connor's anterior pelvic tilts. iykyk.

minor tw for mentions of vomit (not detailed) and drinking!

also a good time to introduce the fact that this is set at samwell which is a fictional university but is not one of my creation... it is from check, please which is one of my all time favorite stories and is theeee original gay hockey story to me. please go check it out if you haven't!! there's absolutely no crossover between this fic and omgcp besides the location. tbh I just thought it would be fun!

Shane hated the way his new apartment was set up.

The layout was all wrong— the kitchen counter was in the wrong place, the in-unit laundry no longer set up inside of his bathroom but instead in the hall outside of one of the bedrooms. The furniture was different, all placed in the wrong spots. Already, he was evaluating and making mental plans of what to move around— they’d put the silverware in the drawer next to the sink, when it clearly needed to be next to the stove, and he absolutely hated what they’d done to his bookshelf, hadn’t even known his books could be so out of order until he saw them that way. That wasn’t even to mention the way they’d set up the pantry, which looked like it had been done by someone wearing a blindfold. 

 “I know it’s a lot of adjustment, Shane,” his father had sighed over the phone. “Just do your best, okay?”

So, Shane was doing his best. He spent two hours that first night setting up his spaces how he wanted them to be. They’d left no room for his mechanical toothbrush charger on the bathroom counter, and the cleaning supplies were underneath the wrong sink, the towels folded with absolutely no precision upon the shelves. Shane spent well over thirty minutes just moving his clothes onto their proper hangers (hoping that he was just imagining the way some of his favorite sweaters had stretched out a little in the neck) and sorting them by color, the way they always should have been. 

He let out a loud sigh when he saw the disaster zone that was his desk drawers, hastily crammed with loose pens and sticky notes. His hockey notebooks were wedged terribly into the bottom drawer, and Shane grimaced as he pulled one out and saw that the cover had been crushed in the move.

There were other problems to deal with first. Most primarily, there were no groceries in the house, and his stomach was beginning to growl.

“Um. Do you want to order dinner?”

“What?” Rozanov had made himself comfortable on the couch and was clicking through something on his laptop. Shane found it difficult to look right at him. Being alone in a room with him felt like a match that was just begging to be set alight.

It had been a few weeks since he’d met (and been re-introduced to) Rozanov. He’d spent the entire time glaringly aware of the fact that he was being shadowed by not one, but two men. John had sheepishly apologized for the tight coverage, and Shane had said it was fine, ignoring the fact that he was completely thrown for a loop every time he exited a room and was met with Rozanov’s cool expression.

“Dinner,” Shane tried again. He cleared his throat. “We can order something. And we should get groceries tomorrow.”

It felt like an odd proposal to Shane, even though it wasn’t. With John, they hadn’t even needed to discuss going to get groceries. If Shane was going, so was John. But they hadn’t been roommates— hadn’t needed to share a fridge, or cabinet space. Even just the thought of splitting a grocery cart with Rozanov made Shane’s cheeks flush.

“Okay.” Ilya nodded. If he was bothered at all by being alone with Shane, it didn’t show. “I wanted to go over your schedule with you tonight.”

Shane’s brow furrowed. “I thought you already had my schedule?”

“Technically, yes. But we have much to discuss. John says you have lots of preferences.”

“Preferences?”

“Yes. When to work out between classes, when to go to what dining halls, when to see your friends. It would be helpful for me to have a clear picture of how you live your life.” Ilya waved his hand casually, as if he was asking Shane what his favorite color was and not to explain the exact details of his life’s inner workings. “Things like that.”

Again, Shane had the sense that he was looking at an entirely different person than the one he’d met that night at the bar. Ilya’s eyes were serious, focused. There was no smile, no sign at all of what had happened between them.

Internally, Shane grated against the idea of divulging more of himself. Ilya knew so much about him already, and Shane knew just about nothing about him. It was a distance that existed between Shane and many people in his life, particularly those who were attached to him by way of who his mother was, but he especially didn’t like it in this context. Ilya had quite literally seen the barest parts of Shane— knew the press of their lips, knew the way Shane reacted when he felt the pressure of fingers on his hips, knew the way he’d desperately humped the air while he sucked his cock. Now this almost offensively beautiful man was asking how often Shane went to parties. To make it worse, he was lounging comfortably on Shane’s couch as he did it (except it wasn’t Shane’s couch, it was the generic apartment-provided couch and it wasn’t the same shape or shade of gray as his last one had been, wouldn’t be broken-in like his last one had been, and Shane was trying his very hardest not to think about details like that because his brain was cluttered enough with change).

“Can we order food first? There’s a Greek place down the street that doesn’t suck.”

“Sure.” Ilya had become absorbed in his laptop again, his skin illuminated with the brightness of the screen. “Do you ever take the bus to class? John says you do not, but there is no way we’re walking forty minutes to that class in the psych building every week. Too far.”

Shane was beginning to understand that he had a very long year ahead of him.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

In a way, preseason was often the most relaxing part of Shane’s time at school.

It was the two weeks before classes started where his life was entirely devoted to nothing besides hockey. His role on the team, as it almost always had been, was the only area of Shane’s life that remained reliably unchanged. No one had gone into his hockey locker and moved all of his stuff around, the way they had in his apartment. No one had rearranged the practice schedule without letting him know. No one was sticking their nose into each of the drills he ran, asking why they were doing them and whether or not they were productive or would look good for his mother’s image or would help keep him ensconced in the bubble he’d been neatly zipped into since he was fifteen. Hockey was Shane’s space. No one could touch him there.

He relished in the hours and hours on the ice each day. Sitting in the film room discussing game tape with his teammates was practically a luxury, even when their eyes began to glaze over. He was even almost happy to make an appearance at the welcome lunch for the freshmen, a few of whom had yet the lose the somewhat starry look on their expressions when they talked to Shane. That would go away soon enough. Mostly, Shane was excited to be surrounded by his friends and his teammates again. 

Introducing them to Ilya, oddly enough, hadn’t gone as easily as Shane had hoped.

The first encounter happened the night before practices began. Shane had just gotten out of the shower, shuffling a towel through his damp hair, when he heard the voices at the door.

“Either you remove yourself from the vicinity or I will remove you myself. I promise, you will not like the second option.” That was Ilya— his tone inarguable. Despite that, the second voice seemed very much as if it was still trying to argue.

“Listen, man, I don’t know who the fuck you are. I don’t recognize you. Just let me talk to Shane. He knows I’m coming.”

“Does he really?”

There was a pause. “Okay, so maybe he doesn’t know. Either way, he’s probably expecting me. I do this all the time. Let me in, asshole.”

“I will not say it again. You were not invited here. You have five seconds-"

“Wait!” Shane hurriedly dropped the towel onto the counter and padded into the living room. “Hayden, what the fuck are you doing?”

“Oh, thank god.” His best friend sounded exasperated. “See? He knows me. I’m not some random guy.”

“You are some random guy to me,” Ilya said without emotion. His broad torso filled the front door entirely; Shane couldn’t even make out his visitor from behind the muscular shoulders.

“No, no, Rozanov, it’s fine. Let him in.” Shane sighed and ran a hand through his hair.

It looked like it took a lot of effort, but after a moment, Ilya unfolded his arms and stepped out of the doorframe. In front of him was a nearly hysterical looking Hayden.

“Shane, who the fuck is this?” He gave Ilya what Shane knew was the dirtiest look he was capable of producing. Ilya seemed deeply unfazed, his expression cold. 

“This is the new John.” 

Hayden scowled as he kicked off his slides by the door. “I liked the old John better.”

“You know you’re not supposed to come here unannounced,” Shane reminded him. “Part of the rules.”

Hayden let out a very loud and very dismissive breath. “Rules, shmules. I wanted to see my best friend. Sue me.”

“I’d be careful saying that if I were you,” Shane said. Hayden, seemingly unbothered by the frigid looks he was earning from one corner of the room, crashed his entire body onto the couch with an undignified oof. “The Canadian government is not afraid to seek legal action. My mom has some very good lawyers.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard that before. Do you want to play FIFA?"

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Introducing him to Rose had hardly gone any better. Unlike Hayden, she’d given Shane plenty of advance notice: a text that simply read okay work week is over I’m coming to your apartment and getting so drunk I can’t see. An hour later, she’d knocked on his doorstep with three bottles of cheap moscato tucked beneath her elbows. 

“You would not believe what happened,” she moaned the moment he opened the door. She pressed her forehead into Shane’s shoulder in lieu of a hug (her arms too full of wine to wrap around him) and then marched past him into the apartment. “My VP of recruitment got cheated on last weekend. She’s been inconsolable for days. Do you know how hard it is to teach eighty women to participate in a door stack chant when their leader is- oh my god!”

Startled at the exclamation, Shane turned to look at what Rose was seeing. Behind him, Ilya was in the kitchen cooking dinner for himself. Shane wasn’t sure what it was— dumplings of some kind, oil spitting in the silver pan. 

He looked up, one wired headphone trailing from his basketball shorts. “Hello.”

“Hi.” Rose’s voice fluttered with obvious surprise, her eyes wide.

“Rose,” Shane began. “This is Ilya. Ilya, this is Rose.”

There was an extremely uncomfortable thirty seconds in which everyone in the room silently became aware that Rose recognized Ilya and that Ilya recognized Rose and that both of them would rather die than acknowledge that. 

Shane could tell that she’d spent the day in sorority-president-mode when Rose’s second attempt at a greeting still came out polite and polished. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Rozanovs echoed the sentiment, now focused on scraping chili oil out of a jar and into his hissing pan.

“Ilya’s my new bodyguard,” Shane explained tersely. “John’s daughter’s having a baby, so he got reassigned closer to home.”

“Oh.” Rose’s polish was beginning to wear off— the noise was almost a squeak. She adjusted the bottles of wine in her arms with a self-conscious smile. “Well, that’s nice. Good for John.”

She waited until they were safely behind the door to Shane’s room before she dove onto the bed, scrambling up onto the pillows so she could cover her mouth with both of her hands.

“Shane. What the fuck?”

“What?” He attempted to sound casual, but it came out more winded than he would’ve liked.

“There’s no way that’s real.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

She pointed a dramatic finger at the wall, in the vague direction of where they could hear vegetables being chopped. “That’s the guy.”

“What guy?”

His feigned ignorance was destroyed by a lethal voice crack. Rose tilted her head and narrowed her eyes, but there was no hiding the gleeful smile spreading across her face.

“Shane. That’s Big Dick Russian Guy! From the bar! The one who John busted you with!” It looked, for a moment, like Rose was concerned that Shane had somehow not realized who Ilya was (as if he could forget). 

“Okay, okay, okay, be quiet about it! He might hear you!” Now it was Shane who was glancing at the wall, as if Rozanov could materialize at any moment. “Yes. Okay, yes. That’s- that’s the guy.” He flushed at the nickname Rose had given him and thoroughly regretted the demonstration she’d pestered him into the morning after his hookup.

“What is he doing here?” Rose twisted off the cap of her wine bottle. She prodded one of the other bottles across the duvet and in Shane’s direction.

“He’s my new bodyguard,” Shane repeated.

“So, what? The sex was so good, you made your mom hire him?” She lifted her brows as she took another sip. “That’s one way to get a boyfriend, I guess.”

He blanched. “Rose. Not funny.” 

She was still laughing at him, tucking her feet cozily beneath herself and getting situated against his pillows. It was evident that she was having the time of her life. Shane wished this conversation was as fun for him.

“Why is he in your kitchen? Didn’t you tell him I was coming?”

Shane scowled and folded his arms over his chest. “He lives here.”

That seemed to actually shock her. Rose seemed like she was about to spit her mouthful of wine all over his duvet. “What?”

“New security protocol,” he explained. “I don’t know. It’s stupid.”

“It’s the plot of a romantic comedy, is what it is.”

“No, it absolutely is not.” Shane needed to shut down whatever overly-theatrical wires were stitching themselves together in her brain immediately. “He didn’t know who I was when we met, and he didn’t know he’d be assigned to me. He thought he was going to be on my mom’s detail. He’s here because it wouldn’t be fair for him to lose his job for-“

“For giving you the best night of your life and sucking your brain out through your dick?”

“Rose!” Shane hissed. His entire face and neck grew warm. “Stop.”

“Stop what?” She poked the other bottle of wine in his direction again, and he picked it up if only so that it didn’t roll off the end of his bed and shatter. The last thing he needed was to spend the night washing shitty wine out of his rug.

“It’s not going to happen again, okay? It can’t happen again,” Shane stressed. 

She nodded sagely. “Sure. That’s exactly what I say every time I go to Theta Chi when I know I’m going to see Tyler.”

“No, that’s different. Rozanov and I have a professional relationship. Honestly, we barely speak most of the time.” Shane lifted the wine bottle accusingly towards her. “And don’t tell me you hooked up with Tyler again.”

“Just one more time before the summer ends!” 

Rose buried her face in her hands and Shane sighed, taking a seat on the bed. Miraculously, his feeble attempts at deflection worked. It was probably more to do with the fact that Rose had finished half the bottle of moscato already, her cheeks charmingly flushed, than it did with the fact that Shane was good at distractions. If she knew what he was doing, she decided to let him get away with it.

For the most part, Shane was telling the truth. There was a healthy distance between him and Ilya. For the last several weeks before classes started, he’d spent most of the time at the rink, which meant Rozanov hovered outside the locker room or in the stands. The walk to the arena was only five minutes from the apartment, which didn’t leave much room to chat. Rozanov seemed to spend most of his time just observing, eyes wheeling constantly over campus. Shane was never certain if he was assessing threats or if he was just taking in the historic scenery. 

He’d grown pretty used to John’s constant presence over the last five years. Despite his hulking size, the man was generally unobtrusive; he melted right into the shadows of a room, sometimes. He was quiet, and he gave Shane space to the extent that it was allowed, and they’d developed what Shane might consider a solid friendship—if not an odd partnership of sorts—over time.

Similarly, he was acclimating to Rozanov’s presence. A lot of the time, Shane could pretend he still lived alone. He had his own bathroom— no commingling of shampoo bottles, his tube of toothpaste solitary in its cup. When Ilya amassed clutter on the counter or on the living room table, he seemed to catch on to Shane’s constant stares in that direction and would affably move it into his room without saying anything. 

It was odd, still, to be sharing a space. Shane had never had to have a roommate when he’d lived in the dorms (one of the perks of being the child of the prime minister), and he was an only child. It was sometimes surprising to open the fridge and catch sight of a takeout box that wasn’t his, or to have shoes cluttered by the front door that hadn’t made it onto his organized shoe rack. Still, Ilya rarely spent time in the common spaces. He cooked his meals in the kitchen, sometimes leaving more dishes in the sink than Shane would have preferred, but he never ate in the living room or at the counter. Instead, he always sloughed off into his room, where Shane could sometimes hear the trickle of television through the wall.

Once, Shane had walked in on him working out. It had been an accident— he’d been knocking and calling, trying to let Ilya know that it was time to go, but he had headphones in. Shane took one look at the scene in front of him (Rozanov doing shirtless crunches on the floor) then stumbled back and apologized as if he walked in on him entirely naked instead of in loose shorts. What had followed was an extremely silent walk to class. Every time he blinked, Shane was left with the refracted image of glistening golden muscles, sweat-soaked curls. 

Ilya didn’t go into every classroom with him. In his large lectures, he plopped down usually towards the back (Shane always tried to sit as squarely in the middle as possible), fiddling with a notebook and a pen that Shane was ninety percent certain was for show. For his smaller classes—an accounting class, a discussion section for his world literature lecture—Ilya stood outside. 

He wasn’t sure what Ilya got up to while he was in class. Sometimes, there was a whiff of cigarettes following him around for the rest of the afternoon. Other times, he’d be speaking lowly into his phone when Shane got out, always ending the call immediately once he saw the students streaming out of the classroom.

All Shane knew was that whenever he made his way into the hall, Rozanov would be waiting, sometimes with one foot propped on the wall like he was an honest-to-god model posing for a photoshoot. Sometimes, foolishly, just knowing that he was out there waiting for Shane to show up made his stomach flip.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

“Your posture is awful.”

“What did you just say?” Shane paused for a moment in his lift, narrowing his eyes at Rozanov across the weight room.

They were at the athletic facility for an early morning workout— Shane had ignored Ilya’s grumbling when he led them across campus before the sun had fully risen. Golden light poured in through the windows, reflecting off the mirrors and washing the shining silver machines in warmth. Normally, it was full of buzzing fluorescent lights, sweaty men, the loud clanging of metal against metal. Shane much preferred it this way. It felt almost like an act of reflection to be doing his leg lifts while most of campus was asleep.

“Your posture,” Ilya said, his tone bored. “You are lifting all wrong. It will lead to neck injury.”

He was adjusting his grip on a kettlebell, which to Shane’s relief, seemed to mean he was done working his glutes. He’d nearly had to face the wall when Rozanov insisted on so many rounds of squats so early in the morning (and Shane was completely unwilling to notice the fact that Rozanov was doing hip thrusts with a weight that came very close to his own).

Shane was momentarily distracted by the now profound mental image. His arms had begun to protest a little where he was still just holding the barbell against his shoulders. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He hefted the bar back up and went for another few reps, focusing his eyes on the middle distance. His breaths came out deep and even as he bent his knees, pressed the bar from his chest in what he was certain was textbook lifting form.

He nearly dropped the bar in shock when he felt Ilya’s hand, firm against his lower back.

“You have too much tension,” he murmured. “Right here. Feel? You are tilting your hips forward too much.”

Shane didn’t feel anything. That tightness at his back was normal, it meant the lift was good. He felt certain that, after fifteen years in the weight room, someone would have told him earlier if his posture needed work. Still, when Rozanov reached around and pressed his fingers softly into the space beneath Shane’s belly button, he found that his spine immediately reacted to the touch. 

“Straighten here. Good, like that. See how that feels better?” Rozanov’s voice was soft, commanding. Goosebumps bloomed across Shane’s skin— maybe a sudden breeze had come into the weight room.

His arms trembled, just a little, as he lifted the bar again. He felt Ilya’s fingers slide smoothly up to his shoulder blade, the touch confident and sure through the fabric of his t-shirt. 

“And tension here. You need to loosen up, Hollander.”

“Fuck off,” Shane stammered half-heartedly. His hands were so slick with sweat that he was worried he might drop the bar. Still, he let his body follow the suggestion of Ilya’s hands, dropping his shoulder blades and keeping his spine straight where his fingers pressed against him. He did a few reps, noticing that there was the tiniest sense of relief in the base of his back. 

Rozanov hummed with satisfaction and the hands slipped away. Shane, stupid, nearly twisted his body like he could follow the touch. Instead, he did one singular rep and then let the bar slide back into the machine with a loud clang.

Ilya had resettled on a weight bench a few feet away, reaching again for the kettlebell. Shane’s tongue felt heavy and useless in his mouth as he headed towards the lat pulldown machine. If he acted as normal as possible, maybe Rozanov wouldn’t notice the slight tenting in his shorts.

“So, were you an athlete when you were younger, or something?” 

The question was clumsily asked. He’d been wondering about it, of course (had been embarrassed by the fact that he hadn’t asked anything about Rozanov’s life, actually) but this wasn’t a good time. Ilya was now focused on his lifts, his breath leaving him in short, even bursts. He paused. “Did you say something?”

Shane’s cheeks burned. “I asked if you played a sport when you were younger.”

“Oh.” Ilya set the kettlebell down. “Yes. I did.”

An uncomfortable silence. Shane made a show of adjusting the weights on the pulldown machine, pretending like he wasn’t regretting saying anything at all. “What sport was it?”

Rozanov shot him an unreadable look. For a moment, there was only the sound of a car horn going off outside, the distanced laughter of someone in the hall. 

“Hockey.”

“What?”

“I was hockey player,” Rozanov shrugged, like he wasn’t scrambling Shane’s brain. “Very good one, too. Won the youth league in Russia, once.”

“What position?”

That earned him a wry smile. “Center. Played better than you, if you can believe that.”

Shane snorted, derisive. “I can’t.” Still, his mind was whirring. “If you were so good, why’d you stop playing?”

Ilya gestured down. “I broke my knee when I was sixteen.”

“Fuck, that sucks. I’m sorry.” Shane winced sympathetically, his own knee twinging as if he knew even a little what that pain would be like. He glanced at Rozanov’s leg, recognizing for the first time a few silvery scars underneath the hem of his gym shorts. The conversation dropped off again. 

He could’ve left it there (probably should have left it there). Instead, like a door that refused to latch, Shane’s mouth opened again.

“Does it bother you a lot? Your knee?”

“Do not worry, Hollander.” Rozanov laid back down on the bench and resumed his workout, his eyes focused on the ceiling. “I had to pass extensive physical fitness tests to do this job. My knee will not prevent me from keeping you safe, I promise.”

It felt like an answer meant for someone else— like something he’d say in a job interview, or speaking to Shane’s parents. His mouth pinched unhappily; he wanted to be able to correct himself, make it clear that he wasn’t second-guessing Rozanov’s capability, but the alternative was revealing that he was curious about things like whether or not Ilya was in pain, whether or not he liked what he did, and that didn’t seem like a great option to Shane either.

His mind was working over the unsolved riddle of Ilya Rozanov all the way through the rest of the silent workout, the walk back to the apartment. Rozanov wordlessly buzzed them into the lobby, only stopping to confirm that they’d be heading out in an hour for Shane’s class before he disappeared into his room. 

Shane settled onto the couch with his laptop, meaning to pull up one of his class readings (they had started with Gilgamesh for world literature, which he pretty much hated) and skim through it until he had to head out again. Instead, his fingers hovered over the keyboard for a solid ten seconds before he navigated to the search bar and looked up something different, feeling certain the whole time that his instincts were wrong.

Within moments, he was on the International Ice Hockey Federation website, filtering by year and country. It took a lot of searching, uncoordinated clicking around. He wasn’t as good at this as Rose would be (once, she’d found the middle school talent show performance of a random cute waiter they’d had), but still, it didn’t take long to find what he was looking for. 

2007 World Junior Hockey Championships. Canada had beaten Russia 4-2, coming off of an undefeated season. He scrolled down to the rosters, and there it was. Ilya Rozanov. Sixteen years old. Shane had thought they were the same age, but Rozanov must have been a few months older— Shane remembered being upset because he was only a month short of qualifying for the national junior league that year.

If he’d qualified, he would have played against Rozanov. Shane scanned his eyes over the Canadian roster, recognizing a few of the names of teammates he’d had in the past, then went back to look at the limited stats listed next to Rozanov’s name. He’d scored one of Russia’s two goals. The rest of the numbers made Shane’s stomach sink. Ilya hadn’t been lying when he said he’d been good— especially for a sixteen year old, when the junior leagues went up to twenty. Shane wasn’t totally sure what his own stats had looked like four years ago, but he thought they might be neck-and-neck with Rozanov’s. 

Canada had won the championships again the following year. Shane had been on that team, had flown out to the Czech Republic to beat Sweden 3-2. Russia had come third. Rozanov’s name was not listed on that roster. 

There wasn’t much else to find on the website. He did an aimless search for Ilya’s name, but there was nothing else that popped up. It made sense. When you worked on the security detail for the Canadian prime minster, it was probably a pretty good to have a sparse presence on the internet.

It felt a little dirty and invasive to be digging into Rozanov. It wasn’t Shane’s normal style. Still, he reminded himself uneasily, it wasn’t like Rozanov hadn’t literally been handed a folder with all of Shane’s information in it. An eye for an eye, and all that.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

“I need you to be drinking faster.”

“What?” Shane blinked out of his daze. Rose nudged the bottom of her cup against his. 

“Bottoms up, bitch. This is your party! You’re supposed to be having fun!”

“It’s not my party,” Shane mumbled, but he took an obliging sip of his beer and then grimaced a little at the bitter taste. “And I am having fun. This is my ‘I’m having fun face’.”

Rose raised a disbelieving eyebrow. “You look like you’d rather be having a root canal.”

Around them, the room was swirling with music. Colorful lights washed in and out of Shane’s vision as he watched the writhing mass of the dance floor, what felt like hundreds of filthy white sneakers pounding into the already rickety floors of the hockey house. Not for the first time that night, Shane felt immensely grateful that he did not live here. 

The hockey team (typically headed by JJ, their unofficial social chair) hosted a few keggers a semester at the off-campus team house. Shane’s presence was always required, whether he wanted to be there or not. Sometimes, it really was a good time. He liked to play games with his friends (it was practically all he did, after all), and sometimes he got roped into a beer pong tournament. Once, someone had even set up oversized Jenga on the lawn. Shane had liked that a lot. 

Other times, it felt like this. Shane was overwhelmed. He’d tried to go to the bathroom and there had been vomit in the sink. The other bathroom had been full of people smoking weed— Shane had scanned the room quickly to make sure none of his teammates were partaking before he’d scrambled out of there. One of the D-men was at the DJ booth in the corner of the room, and he’d played Sexy and I Know It three times in the last hour (to Shane’s bafflement, the room’s frenetic energy only growing with excitement with each repeat).

The music was starting to reverberate in Shane’s teeth, his drink now warm in his hands which made it even harder to consume. Shane wasn’t sure how much longer he’d have to be here before his captainly obligation was over, but he hoped it was soon.

Rose had taken pity on him and joined him in his little corner for the last fifteen minutes. She was great at parties— floating effortlessly from group to group, each person she spoke to visibly wrapped in some sort of bubble of her sparkling attention. It was one of her many talents.

“I can’t drink that much tonight,” he told her. “Morning skate tomorrow.”

Now both of her eyebrows shot up in surprise. “You let them throw a party when there’s practice tomorrow? I’m surprised, Captain.”

“Er, no.” Shane rubbed at the back of his neck. “Not team skate. I just got an hour for some personal training.”

He’d had to reserve the rink at 5 in the morning, the earliest possible time slot before it opened up for the community skating groups who used it on weekends. The rest of the team was invited, of course, but no one had responded to his GroupMe message about it. He doubted anyone would show up— it didn’t seem like anyone else was very fond of skating before the sun had risen. He understood (or at least, was better at pretending he understood). 

Rose’s attention shifted to something happening by the back door, her eyes shifting curiously. “What do you think he’s saying to them?”

Shane ripped his eyes from the side of the room where he was watching someone attempt to build the world’s largest beer tower. “What?”

“Your boy.” Rose tilted her head towards back door. “What do you think he keeps saying? That’s, like, the third girl in twenty minutes.”

Rozanov was leaning against the opposite wall, his arms folded in front of his chest. When he’d emerged from his room that night, ready to walk with Shane over the party, Shane had been grateful that his swallow hadn’t been audible. 

He was wearing a soft blue flannel over a sweatshirt, his jeans clinging perfectly in every single spot they could. Shane had been making an extremely concerted effort not to stare at him all night, incredibly aware of the fact that Rozanov was keeping tabs on his movements through the house. When John had been his bodyguard, he’d been less subtle about it (it was hard to be subtle when you were a grown man at a college party) but Rozanov blended right into the crowd of partygoers. 

His eyes slipped from Ilya—jaw sharp in the flashing lights—and to the girl who was currently wrapping a hand confidently around his elbow. She was attractive, Shane recognized faintly, with long blonde hair and ears that shimmered with silver jewelry. She was speaking to Rozanov in what looked like a suggestive way, tracing her fingers along his arm.

Rozanov’s expression was impassive but considering, his face tilted towards her as if he wanted to hear what she was saying. Shane felt a little sick. Rozanov’s eyes flicked up and for one heart-stopping moment, they made eye contact, before he was glancing back down at the girl. She had been so bold as to slip her fingers beneath his sleeve, and the flash of her manicured nails against Ilya’s bare skin did something extremely unpleasant to Shane’s nervous system.

Rozanov leaned down and said something to the girl. It didn’t appear that he had spoken for very long at all, but whatever he said had her ripping her hand away and quickly maneuvering away from him, a look of what might have been confusion rippling across her pretty features.

“See?” Shane had almost forgotten Rose was there, he’d been so lost in the scene across the room. “That’s the third girl that’s happened with. They keep approaching and whatever he says to them, it’s like spraying a can of Raid.”

“He’s kind of a dick,” Shane said. “He could be saying anything.”

“Well, it’s not like we haven’t seen him be charming before. When you first met him, you-”

“No, no‚” Shane groaned. “That never happened, Rose, remember?”

Her mouth twisted, displeased, but she took another sip of her drink and nodded. Unfortunately, it wasn’t so easy for Shane to forget. He knew what she was getting at, knew full well the force of Ilya’s smile, the tantalizing pressure of his fingers through Shane’s jeans. It was hard enough not to think about it in his own home, scraping together a bowl of oatmeal in the morning and ignoring the fact that that Ilya had just wandered shirtless through the hall on his way to do laundry. 

“Yo, cap! We need you.” Shane’s view of Ilya was suddenly blocked by the hulking figure of JJ Boiziau. His expression was serious, but melted into a smile at the sight of Shane’s company. “Oh, shit, hey Rose! I didn’t know you were here.”

She grinned back. “Hey, JJ. Nice party.”

JJ looked for a moment like he wanted to forget what he’d come to get Shane for and spend the rest of night flirting (and probably failing, although what did Shane know) with Rose, but he looked back at Shane. “We need you upstairs,” he repeated.

“Why?” Shane was already following JJ through the crowd, wincing every time he collided with a hot and sweaty body.

“Pike,” was all JJ said in response, and Shane held back a groan. 

He knew what he was going to see even before JJ led him into the upstairs bathroom. Hayden was sprawled across the tile floor, his cheek pressed into the ragged bathmat. Shane’s face curdled with disgust before he could hold the expression back.

“Shane!” Despite the fact that he was clearly struggling, Hayden’s face worked itself into a smile at his presence. His words were slurred, but he didn’t seem at all upset about the fact that he was lying on what was probably the filthiest bathroom floor known to man. “Hi, buddy. I haven’t seen you all night!”

“I know, I’m sorry.” Shane shot a questioning look at JJ. “What’s going on?”

“Shitfaced,” JJ said with a self-conscious grimace. “Sorry. Someone made jello shots with Everclear. I didn’t realize how many he’d had until he started to try to do handstands and then threw up all over Mitty’s room.”

“Love jello shots,” Hayden said from the ground. “Sorry about the carpet.”

“It wasn’t my carpet,” JJ shrugged. “You ready to go home, bud? Shane’ll take you.”

Anyone else would probably be annoyed at being saddled with the task of dragging home a drunk Hayden Pike and cutting their night off early without being consulted about it first. Instead, Shane felt a deep, appreciative sense of being known.

“I don’t know where my phone is.”

“I have it. You kept trying to call Jackie.”

“Jackie,” Hayden cooed happily. He took the same hand that had no doubt been wrapped around the seat of the toilet and dragged it across his ruddy cheek. “Is she coming?”

“She’s at work,” JJ said. “She asked us to make sure you got home, so we will.”

Hayden frowned. “I miss Jackie. And my bed.”

“You’ll be in your bed soon, okay? Hollander and his scary Russian mob boss can get you there in no time.”

Shane turned to see that, sure enough, Ilya had followed them up the stairs. He was lurking in the hallway, his eyes raking over the scene in front of him.

“We have to get Hayden home,” Shane said unhelpfully. “He doesn’t live far.”

Rozanov nodded inscrutably. JJ’s eyes flickered between the two of them before he huffed out a sigh and reached down to wrap an arm around Hayden’s shoulders. “Come on, dude. Let’s go.”

It took far longer than it should have to wrestle an intoxicated Hayden Pike out of the hockey house and onto the sidewalk. His strides were long and uncoordinated, sneakers tripping over themselves with every step. He kept insisting he didn’t have his phone, even when Shane showed it to him multiple times, and then whenever he was reminded it was there, he was asking if they could call Jackie.

“Who is this Jackie?” Ilya eventually asked. “His therapist?”

“His girlfriend.” Shane let out a breath as they stopped for a moment, an asshole in a Mazda speeding through a stop sign without letting them cross the street first.

“She’s the best,” Hayden blurted. “She’s so beautiful, and so smart. Best woman I’ve ever met, except maybe my mom.” His face creased with drunken horror. “Oh my god, Shane, please don’t call my mom. Don’t tell her about this. She doesn’t even think I’ve had a beer before.”

“No one is calling your mom,” Shane promised, laughing a little. Rozanov glanced up at the sound, his expression as unreadable as it had been all night. 

“I want to go to Jackie’s,” Hayden whined. He began to pull away from Shane’s grasp. “Let’s go to Jackie’s. It’s just over there.” He pointed a wild finger in a direction that was certainly not anywhere near the way to Jackie’s place. 

“I will handcuff him to me if I have to.” Rozanov’s tone was riddled with annoyance. “It will not be pleasant for him.”

Pike, who had been desperately trying to wander across the grass, stopped dead in his tracks. “You wouldn’t. Shane, would he?”

“He wouldn’t,” Shane promised, with a beseeching look in Rozanov’s direction. “He doesn’t even have handcuffs.” He paused, considering it. “Do you?”

“You would like to know, huh?” Rozanov’s smile was knifelike. Just the sight of it sent shivers through Shane’s body.

 It took another ten minutes of tugging Hayden down the street until they were stumbling up the steps of his little apartment building. Rozanov unhappily fished through the pockets of Hayden’s jeans until he came up with a pair of keys (Hayden had dissolved into unintelligible mumblings against Shane’s shoulder) and let them in. There was another terrible flight of stairs. Hayden sat down on them twice, refusing to move.

“Pike, if you do not come with us right now, I am going to contact your mother,” Rozanov said. His tone was frightening enough to make even Shane’s spine straighten a little. 

“The room is spinning,” Hayden complained, but still wrapped both hands around the banister and pulled himself up, swaying uneasily. Shane reached out to grasp him by the shoulder. 

“You okay, dude?”

“I think I’m going to-” Hayden began to mumble, and that was all the warning he gave before he was doubling over and throwing up all over Shane’s nicest pair of jeans.

It was not a pleasant thing to be vomited on. Shane gagged, covering his mouth with shock at the awful and wet sensation. He stumbled back a step or two, until he ran into a wall that shouldn’t have been there. Two warm, firm hands wrapped around his shoulders, but Shane was too distracted by what was happening in front of him to even notice the contact before he was being hauled out of the way.

Rozanov practically lifted Hayden up the rest of the stairs, his patience clearly gone. Hayden protested weakly, but he was still groaning and out of it all the way into his apartment, the door to which Shane had had to unlock with hands that were shaking a little.

At Shane’s direction, Rozanov practically forced Hayden into his room. Once he recognized that he was home, there was very little other fanfare— he curled up on the sheets, pressing his cheek into his pillow as comfortably as he had with the bathmat at the hockey house. Shane spent a moment collecting himself in the kitchen, trying hard to ignore the squelch of his shoes. He felt, even though he hadn’t had anything to drink, like he was floating very far away from himself. 

It took him a moment to recognize what was happening when Rozanov appeared in front of him, pressing a bundle of fabric into his hands. “Here.”

Shane blinked down at it. “What?”

“Shorts. Unless you want to stay in those pants?”

“Uh, no, no, I don’t.” He paused. “Where did you get these?”

“Pike’s drawer,” Ilya said simply. “I hope they’re clean. I did not sniff them first to check.”

“You’re disgusting,” Shane said before he could think better of it. He took the shorts and made his way to the bathroom, pulling his pants down hastily and frowning at the bundle of wet, disgusting fabric. When he shook out the pair of shorts, he found a pair of clean socks, too, so he tugged off his own damp ones. It was such a relief to be dry, but he couldn’t shake off the sensation or the smell of the denim. He took a moment to wash his hands, although it wasn’t like that would do much. The cold rush of water on his skin, if anything, was grounding.

When he made it back outside, holding the jeans in a complicated fold so that his hands wouldn’t come into contact with the vomit, Ilya was waiting in the kitchen.

“You know, you did not have to go hide to change. I thought you were used to locker rooms?”

“You’re not helpful,” Shane said, but that was a lie, because Rozanov’s gentle tone was beginning to reduce the odd, overwhelming buzzing in his ears. More than that, when Shane looked down, he realized that Ilya was holding out a plastic Walgreens bag towards him.

“Where did you find that?”

“Underneath the kitchen sink. Is where everyone keeps their bags, no?” He held it open and shook it in Shane’s direction. “Come on. For your pants.”

It still felt like everything around Shane was happening very slowly and in a way that was difficult to process. He didn’t loosen his grip on the jeans, so instead Rozanov leaned forward carefully and scooped them into the bag. 

“Your shoes, too. They got dirty, yes?” 

Shane nodded, grimacing at the thought of having to clean his sneakers. “But what will I wear home?”

“Pike has shoes you can borrow.” 

“Did he agree to that?”

“He will survive.” 

Shane sighed, but it was a helpful reminder that they were still standing in the middle of Hayden’s apartment. He went to the kitchen to get a glass of water, relieved and somewhat placed back into himself by the knowledge of where the cups were, what shelf in the fridge to reach for to get the Brita. Hayden was a mostly unresponsive lump on the bed, but he made an aggrieved sound when Shane poked him, so he figured that was good enough. He dragged a little trash can out from underneath the desk and deposited it beside the bed before he turned out the lights and shut the door behind him.

Shane hesitated by the front door, blinking down at the heaps of unfamiliar shoes. He wasn’t even sure which were Hayden’s and which belonged to his roommate. 

“Put on the slides, Hollander.” 

Ilya’s tone was firm. It sent a shiver across Shane’s lower back. He put on the slides.

They didn’t speak again until they were plodding across the sidewalk in the direction of Shane’s apartment, which was nearly a fifteen minute walk away. Still, Shane felt grateful that Rozanov hadn’t suggested calling a car. He liked walking at night— the breeze of the early fall, the whirring of cicadas in the trees, the sense that there might be nothing at all occurring in the world besides for Shane, making his way down the quiet stretch of street. 

For a moment, the only sound was the plastic bag, swinging from Ilya’s fingertips. Shane had tried to reach for it once they’d gotten down the stairs, but Rozanov had held it out of grasp, leaving Shane nothing to do with his hands as he ignored the way the slides dragged (a size too big) beneath his feet.

“I’m sorry about tonight,” he began quietly once they’d made it to the edge of the quad. “I know it’s probably not what you signed up for when you took this job.”

Rozanov shrugged. “I saw someone say once that this job is wiping asses for twenty years. He was not wrong.”

Although his tone was light, Shane still bristled a little with embarrassment. It wasn’t like he’d asked Ilya to steal clean clothes for him, to bundle the dirty ones away, to order Shane around in a tone so simultaneously authoritative and gentle that he’d probably get hard thinking about it later. 

A group of girls were making their way down the sidewalk towards them. Loud, inebriated giggles streamed through the air. Rozanov cut across the street to avoid them moments before Shane was about to. 

“You get your first weekend off when my dad comes, right?”

David Hollander was due for a visit in two weeks— it was Family Weekend, which involved a friendly scrimmage with a local junior college team. Shane wasn’t certain of the security logistics (these things were never fully explained to him, even when he asked) but his dad would be coming with his own team, which meant Ilya got a few days off. 

Rozanov nodded, his face half-washed in the streetlights. Together, they jay-walked in front of the English building, Shane’s borrowed shoes making a horrible rubbery dragging sound when he didn’t lift his feet enough.

“Do you know what you’re going to do?”

“Not really. I do not know much about this area.” Rozanov stuffed his hands in his pockets, still looking every inch the college student. “I have only been able to see your little bubbles on campus.”

“Sorry, yeah, um, sorry.” Shane rubbed sheepishly at the back of his neck. “I should’ve given you a tour, taken you downtown or something.”

Rozanov shrugged, seemingly unbothered. “Is not your job to show me around, Hollander.”

Still, Shane felt a bit ashamed. It must be odd to move to an entirely new place, an entirely new country, and to be shackled to someone else and unable to explore it. Rozanov was pretty much only experiencing the world through Shane, and Shane’s life was relatively boring. He existed mostly in the spaces between class and the hockey arena or athletic facilities— sometimes the library or an on-campus coffee shop or movie nights at the hockey house, if he was feeling social.

“Downtown is nice,” he offered, still a bit embarrassed. “There’s a bunch of little restaurants. People like Tonei's, that’s a pizza spot. There’s a few bars that the undergrads don’t really go to, if you like bars-" Immediately, Shane flushed and cut himself off. 

Ilya liked bars. He'd met Ilya at a bar. It had practically ruined Shane's life.

A nervous glance at Rozanov's face showed that his expression hadn’t changed— maybe he wasn’t even thinking about that night (although how he couldn’t be, Shane didn’t know).

The only way out was through, though, so like an idiot he kept babbling.

“There’s also a bookstore, my dad likes it a lot. This is all right on Main Street, by the way. If you go down King, there’s an antique shop by the animal shelter-"

“Wow, Hollander, you are going to describe the whole town like this?” Ilya’s laugh wasn’t unkind, but it made Shane shut his mouth immediately.

“Sorry.”

Rozanov looked at him, just for a moment. Shane kept his eyes fixed on the streetlamps up ahead. They only had a few blocks before they were home. 

“No, no, is nice,” Rozanov seemed to backtrack. “You like it here?”

Shane took a second to consider it. 

 “I do, I guess. I don’t spend much time off-campus. But I like how quiet it is, and I like how small the town is. It lets people get used to me, I guess.”

“They still stare at you a lot,” Rozanov said casually. “Does it bother you?”

Shane shrugged. “It’s the way it always is.”

He’d gotten quite good at ignoring it by now. He was a known figure in almost every area of his life— his name in headlines sparking speculation about first round draft picks, his face in the paper when he had to make social appearances with his mother. He had his own Wikipedia page. He’d once been featured in Teen Vogue’s list of most eligible bachelors (Rose had framed the magazine and hung it on her wall, to his extreme embarrassment).  Still, he’d be lying if he said it wasn’t always a little uncomfortable at the start of every new semester, weathering the expectations of strangers who always felt like they knew something about him.

That was part of what he liked most about walking at night like this. Shane felt completely anonymous. None of the students passing them seemed to recognize him. Rozanov didn’t seem like his bodyguard, like this (they could be anyone to each other, and Shane pushed away the implications of that thought). 

“I have never dealt with someone so recognizable. Is tricky. Hard to tell if someone is looking at you because they are your friend or because they want to kill you.”

Despite himself, Shane snorted. “I don’t think anyone wants to kill me.” Then, he paused. “So, you’ve been a guard for a lot of others? Anyone I’d know?”

“You know I cannot tell you that.”

“Not about any of them? Come on.” He tried to sound as innocent as possible. “It’s not like I’m going to tell anyone.”

“I sign a very big NDA. Is ironclad,” Rozanov protested, but it only took another moment of quietly trudging along before he was spilling more details. “I don’t think you would know my last guy, anyway. Some finance big shot. That job was very different from this one.” 

They swung around the corner and onto the street the apartment building was on. Shane felt a vague, sinking feeling in his stomach, like he didn’t want the conversation to end.

“How so?” 

“Well, first, I did not live with the guy.”

Shane hummed, waiting for him to continue.

“He did not make smoothies every morning in loud blender. He did not insist on air drying all of his socks on the kitchen counter,” Rozanov counted off on his fingers, ignoring Shane’s groan. “He did not drag me to ice rink every morning at crack of dawn.”

“Oh, that reminds me,” Shane said as he dug around for his key fob. “I have ice time tomorrow at five.”

Rozanov stopped in his tracks. “Five in the evening?”

“No, five in the morning.” Shane held the door distractedly open behind him as he slipped into the lobby. “We have that fundraiser for Rose’s sorority to go to in the evening. The theme is PJs and Pancakes, or something, but I’m not wearing my pajamas outside-”

“Hollander.” Rozanov was still standing outside the doors, blinking at Shane. “You are kidding me. That is six hours from now. There is no time for sleep.”

Shane made a show of checking his watch-less wrist. “So you better get inside, then.”

Rozanov’s loud groan and Shane’s subsequent laughter trailed them all the way into the elevator.

Chapter End Notes

fun fact: canada actually did beat russia 4-2 at the 2007 world juniors!

thank you so much for reading!! I really appreciated all the comments and the kudos on the first chapter, it means so much to me :,) come chat with me on tumblr!

Chapter 3: shane walks into a dance lesson

Chapter Notes

The start of the season coinciding with the beginning of midterms was, as always, a tough reality check for Shane. Days that were already long with class and practice turned into nights that were even longer, often culminating in Shane reading at the kitchen counter trying not to fall asleep on top of his books.

It was normal, though. Not all of the guys cared about their grades the way Shane had to, and everyone knew that the university was typically more than willing to let a few bad exams go if the hockey team had even a fighting chance of making it to the Frozen Four that year. Still— Shane didn’t like the idea of a free pass, of not fairly earning his degree, which meant that the middle of October, generally, was hellish.

Their first few games had been a solid start to the season. They’d beaten Northeastern in their first exhibition game, 3-2, then faced UConn for a tight game that had gone to overtime, ultimately resulting in a 2-1 win for Samwell. Shane spent hours scrolling through game footage, hashing out the drills he thought would be most beneficial based on weaker gameplay spots so far.

His weekends often looked like this one. Shane had spent the entire morning at practice, then headed straight to the library to work on the first draft of an essay he needed to write for his anthropology class. Rozanov had trailed behind him all day, uncharacteristically quiet as he paged through a thick novel, one he’d obtained from who knew where. The title was in Russian and Shane hadn’t bothered to look any closer at it. 

Now, though, it was clear that he was getting antsy. They were on hour four of studying, and while coming from practice meant that Shane had worked his body plenty for the day, it meant that Rozanov had been forced to do a whole lot of sitting around. 

 Shane hardly spared him a second glance when he pushed up from the table and left the study room without announcing where he was going. Sometimes, he took laps of the building they were in. Securing the exits, Ilya called it. Shane secretly thought that he just did it whenever he’d been inactive for too long.

 The bottle hit the table with a wet thunk, right in front of the Shane’s textbook. He stared at it for a long second.

“What is this?”

“Orange juice.” Rozanov looked at Shane as if his brain had begun to leak out of his ears. “Good for you, yes?”

“I don’t need it, but thank you,” Shane mumbled, pushing it out of the way with the back of his hand. He ignored the loud sigh that followed, the same way he ignored the way Rozanov’s feet kicked beneath his chair when he sprawled exasperatedly into the seat next to Shane’s. 

“Hollander.” Rozanov leaned forward and sank his chin onto his hands besides Shane’s notebook. “When is lunch?”

“I’m not hungry,” Shane said. He kept on with his annotations, diligently marking the timeline down from his history textbook and cross-referencing it with the one he had open on his laptop. 

“You had full practice today, only a smoothie and turkey sausage for breakfast and a banana in between. There is no way you’re not hungry.”

“Well, I’m not,” Shane said, and let a little of his annoyance bleed into his voice. “Plus, you’re forgetting the steel cut oats and the fact that it was like, four sausage patties. I ate plenty.”

“I’m hungry. My stomach wiill growl so loud, entire building hears it.”

“So go get food.” He flipped the pencil in his hand, erasing a mistake he’d made. King Philip’s War had ended in 1678, not 1680, which meant he had to recontextualize one of the points he was trying to make.

“I cannot leave. You know this, Hollander.”

“I don’t think someone is going to try to assassinate me in here,” Shane said. He erased more fervently. “I bet that glass is bulletproof. You can go get a sandwich.”

“I am going to die in this room. Perish of hunger,” Ilya said to himself, throwing his shoulders back so dramatically in the chair that it nearly tipped over. “How long do you have this room reserved for, anyway? Surely there is time limit, no?” 

He pointed at one of the signs on the wall, which clearly delineated the fact that study rooms were only available to be reserved for two hours at a time. Shane hardly looked up.

“I don’t have to give the room up unless someone else reserves it. I don’t see anyone coming to take it, do you?”

In his periphery, he could see Ilya hanging his head over the back of his chair, seemingly defeated. He was quiet for another few minutes, the only sound in the room the scratching of Shane’s pencil and the occasional click of his fingers on the keyboard. 

“Fine,” Rozanov announced. He got up and nudged the orange juice back into Shane’s line of sight.  “I am going to the bathroom. Drink that.”

The bottle was still sitting there, untouched, when Ilya returned. Shane expected a frown, or another little comment about how Ilya’s stomach was about to shrivel into itself. To his surprise, there was nothing. Rozanov sat back in his chair, keeping his legs to himself this time, and began to flip peacefully through his book again.

This almost bothered Shane more than the earlier pestering had. Still, he rolled his jaw and focused back on his work, grateful for the silence.

Silence, as it turned out, that only lasted another few minutes. There was a timid knock on the glass door of the study room.

“Hey,” the girl said sheepishly. He recognized her from his one of his discussion sections (Mary, maybe?). “Sorry Shane, but I have to kick you out. I booked the room for this afternoon.”

Shane apologized and scrambled out of his seat, doing his best to scoop his books into his backpack as quickly as possible. Rozanov followed right after him, tucking his book beneath his arm. He took the bottle of orange juice with him.

“Thanks, Mallory,” he said quietly to the girl as they exited.

“No problem, Ilya,” she giggled.

The exchange did not escape Shane’s notice. He waited until they were safely in the hall to turn and stare accusingly at Rozanov.

“What did you do?”

A casual shrug. “I did nothing.”

“How did you get her to do that?” 

Rozanov did a fantastic job of looking like Shane was out of his mind, his eyebrows raised almost comically. “Do what? Hollander, you make no sense.”

Shane sighed and rolled his eyes. “Okay, fine. Let’s go find another table, then. I wasn’t done working.”

He knew it was a nearly impossible task. It was the middle of a Saturday during midterm season; there wasn’t a single table in the library that wouldn’t be taken. Still, Rozanov let Shane duck into every single alcove in the building until he proved that there weren’t any seats left, and then he took him gently by the elbow and steered him towards the exit.

“Come on, Hollander. You can study at home, after we eat.”

“No, we should just go to the history building. I’m sure there are tables there.”

“We are going home.” Rozanov’s voice was firm, now, inarguable in the way he sometimes got.

“I’m sorry, since when do you get to tell me what to do?” They were outside the library now, and Shane shrugged himself out of the grip Ilya had maintained on his arm, ignoring the pleasant warmth that had been seeping through his shirt. 

“It is my job to keep you safe. It is unsafe to faint of hunger, yes? So would not be doing my job if I did not escort you safely home so we could eat lunch.”

“I think it’s also your job to be as invisible as possible,” Shane retorted, but his irritation was waning. He was too tired to really argue, and now that he thought about it, his stomach was beginning to growl. 

Rozanov ignored that comment. He began striding confidently in the direction of the apartment.

“And, seriously, what did you do? Bribe that girl?” Shane said as he caught up. 

“I did nothing of the sort,” Rozanov said, but his tone was too light. “Mallory reserved the room, fair and square. If she became 5 dollars richer before that happened, I would know nothing about it.”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

“Cap! Settle a debate for us.” JJ slung an arm around Shane’s shoulder as they made their way out of the athletic facility. It was a beautiful October day, the fresh breeze a relief against Shane’s still flushed face. “Dominik Hašek. Best goalie of all time?”

Shane took a moment to think about it. “I mean, what about Patrick Roy?”

“That’s what I said!” Wazny came up quickly beside them, his voice ringing with smugness. “Has to be Roy.”

JJ made a sound in the back of his throat and slipped his arm from Shane’s shoulders. “Ugh. I hate that guy. What he did in Montreal was crazy.”

“Yeah, but he did it after giving them two Stanley Cups,” Shane said. “I know people say his attitude sucked, but can you blame the guy?”

“I guess,” JJ grumbled. He didn’t seem content with that answer. “I just feel like Hašek was better.”

“You’re forgetting about Brodeur,” a voice said behind them. The three of them turned, although Shane already knew who had spoken. “Most shutouts in history, almost 700 wins over career. He is best goalie of all time.”

Shane frowned. “I still think it’s Roy. Brodeur was good, but Roy’s the only player in history with three Conn Smythes.”

“Brodeur won the Jennings Trophy 5 times,” Rozanov countered.

“So did Roy,” Shane shot back immediately. “They literally nicknamed him Saint Patrick. Both Montreal and Colorado retired his jersey number.”

A scoff from Rozanov. “Brodeur’s jersey was retired, too.”

“Yeah, but only for one team.” 

“He only played on one team, Hollander. What, you think if someone is good enough, entire league should retire their number? Is stupid logic. Brodeur’s numbers were better. He is better goalie. Simple.”

JJ and Wazny were watching the volley of conversation as if it were a particularly engaging game of tennis. JJ smacked Shane on the shoulder enthusiastically. “Shit, Hollander, he kind of sounds like you, arguing stats. I didn’t know this guy knew hockey?”

“He played,” Shane supplied helpfully. A smile that he knew was a little shit-eating slipped across his face. “Goalie, right?”

Any hint of amusement dropped from Ilya’s mouth as he scowled at Shane. “Center. Back in Russia.”

“No kidding.” JJ looked between them both again. “Hollzy, I like this guy. Are you bringing him to game night?”

“He goes with me everywhere,” Shane reminded him. It was almost funny, the way people in Shane’s life adapted to him having a bodyguard. A few of his teammates, JJ included, seemed to feel as if Rozanov was just a friend that Shane tugged along like an emotional support animal instead of a specially trained operative.

If JJ heard the dryness in Shane’s tone, he ignored it. “I have to go to class,” he said, checking the time on his phone before he pocketed it and pointed at Ilya. “But I call dibs on first round of pong against you. We will be friends!”

With that decisive statement, he jogged off and practically into the street. 

“I like that one. I think he should be new captain,” Rozanov said as they made their way back to the apartment. Shane had another hour of reviewing tape ahead of him before they went to class. “He is good egg. Much friendlier than you, wants to hear my opinions, doesn’t argue.”

“So maybe go follow him around then, if you like him so much,” Shane muttered, but Ilya just shook his head. Then he replayed their earlier argument in his head.  “Listen, Rozanov. You’re just objectively wrong about it. I’d even take Hašek over Brodeur in my Hall of Fame,” Shane began, and then Ilya was rearing back, making a face, and so the disagreement continued all the way home.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Game night was one of Shane’s favorite places to be, possibly ever. 

Once or twice a semester, everyone crowded into the hockey house, bringing whatever board or card game they could scrounge up. The house itself had a shelf of crumbling cardboard boxes full of Jenga and Scrabble and (Shane’s personal favorite) Yahtzee. Every surface became crowded with games, and the house was always practically full, especially since his teammates sometimes brought girlfriends. Shane had even invited Rose a time or two, although he’d regretted it the last time when she forced him into four consecutive rounds of Twister (he’d won all four, as one of the very few people in the room who had ever touched a yoga mat). 

There were parts of it he didn’t like— the space got loud, and sometimes hot, and sometimes people yelled. But usually, he could tuck himself into some corner and play a game with just a few people, able to focus more on the conversation somehow while being grounded by the rules of the game. Like during practice, it made him feel like his competitive streak was an asset, not something to shy from, and it made it easier, he knew, for the teammates he didn’t know as well to approach him.

As it turned out, Ilya was a goddamn menace when it came to game night.

He’d taken JJ up on the first round of pong, which happened on the back porch. Shane had to play mancala on the steps with McDonald while it happened, since Rozanov wasn’t letting him out of his sight with so many people around. 

“Too many variables,” he’d said authoritatively, folding his muscled arms across his chest. 

“Those variables are my teammates,” Shane complained, but Rozanov hadn’t budged. 

It actually wasn’t so bad to play a game outside, the cool breeze slipping through his fingers as he placed his marbles carefully into the board. He beat McDonald three times, twice in an avalanche round, listening the whole time to Rozanov chirping his teammates as easily as if he were actually on the team.

“Nice throw, Witty. Is nice of them to let someone with two broken wrists play college hockey.”

His words were competitive, sharp, just walking the line between good-natured teasing and something that might earn him a punch to the face. It was easy to see that he’d probably been a force of nature when he’d been on the ice. If these were the chirps he was giving the team, most of whom he’d just met for the first time, Shane couldn’t imagine what he would’ve come up with in a game.

Ilya wasn’t only good at chirping. He was good at playing. He crushed the leading pong champs twice over. Once that was over, they moved to a game of Monopoly, which ended with Rozanov clutching onto literal fistfuls of fake money. 

“Do not worry, guys, I am good Russian citizen. If you are lucky, I will share all this property with you,” he said, while Shane watched Wazny try not to rage quit. 

Then he beat all of them in a game of Life, of all things. Shane hadn’t even known it was possible to be competitive at playing Life— that is, until Ilya was racing his tiny blue car into early retirement with a doctor career card and three of the most lucrative real estate options under his belt. 

Shane’s eyes caught on the tendons in Ilya’s throat moving as he bragged and laughed and jostled around with his team, the glint of his gold chain disappearing beneath his plain black t-shirt. He had no business being so attractive while also being so good at everything he tried. It was frustrating and annoying and, to Shane’s slight mortification, completely a turn-on.

When he needed one, he ducked into the kitchen to take a breather. It was quieter back here, if only marginally. The house pulsed with the sound of rattling dice, the occasional shouts of surprise or joy. Shane spent a moment digging through the fridge until he found what he was looking for— a can of ginger ale, one of the only ones left from the stash he’d left the last time he was there. 

He was only on his second sip when someone found him. It was bound to happen, sooner or later.

“Shane!” Jackie ducked her head into the doorframe. “There you are. I was looking for you!”

“Hey, Jacks.” He smiled, leaning against the counter as she moved into the room. “How’s it going?

“Too loud out there?” Jackie ignored his question as she hopped up onto the counter, narrowly avoiding knocking over a teetering stack of pizza boxes.

He shrugged. “Something like that.”

It had been a while since he’d seen Jackie, probably a few weeks. He asked how her lab was going, remembering that she’d been having some problems a few weeks ago. She was halfway through an elaborate story about an asshole professor and some missing equipment, waving her hands exasperatedly, when Hayden moved into the room.

“Shane! We were looking for you.” Like there was a magnet pulling them together, he went straight to Jackie, who looped her arms over his shoulders comfortably. He turned in her embrace so that he still faced Shane, who was fortunately used to the PDA. “Did Jackie ask you about tomorrow yet?”

He looked between them. “No, what about tomorrow?”

“We’re going to see that new Rocky movie.” Hayden fake-punched the air in Shane’s direction, beer can sloshing in one hand as he did it. “There’s an afternoon showing. Wanna come?”

Tomorrow was a Saturday. They had practice in the morning, then Shane was supposed to meet with two of the assistant coaches to go over logistics and give his opinion on strategy for their next game, a roadie against Quinnipiac. After that, he should really hunker down and finish his homework for the next week, at least, so that he could focus on hockey in the spaces between classes.

“Sorry, guys,” he winced, watching their expectant faces immediately fall. “I can’t tomorrow.”

“Dude, come on,” Hayden frowned. “You never hang out with us anymore.”

Shane gestured with his ginger ale can. “I’m hanging out with you guys now, aren’t I?”

“This is a team activity.” Hayden narrowed his eyes. “Doesn’t count. You have to be here.”

“You were on my couch literally two days ago,” Shane pointed out. “You watched three episodes of Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives while I studied. That was hanging out, wasn’t it?”

Hayden still looked put-out. Jackie rubbed her hand absentmindedly against his shoulder, the comforting movement seemingly second-nature. “My friend Lisa is going to be there,” she added, which was what finally made the pieces click into place for Shane.

“Lisa? The one you tried to set me up with at Spring Fling last year?”

“Why yes, Shane.” Jackie grinned shamelessly at him, knowing she was caught. “My extremely beautiful, extremely smart, extremely funny friend who I tried to introduce to you. Remember what happened?”

He winced, burying his face in the can of ginger ale and taking a big sip.

“You quite literally ran away,” she reminded him. “Said you had to go set up the rink.”

“I probably did,” he blustered.

“It was nine at night.”

Shane shut up.

“Come on, buddy,” Hayden pleaded again. “I know you have that meeting with the coaches after practice, but what about after that? The movie’s at 3:30.”

“I’m sorry, Hayd.” Shane did feel legitimately guilty, an uncomfortable sensation settling against the back of his neck. “I really do have to work tomorrow. I have to finish this paper I’m working on for my world lit class.”

Jackie made a face. “Oof. That’s with Hartman, right? I had her for a gen-ed last year. She’s kind of a nightmare.”

“Yeah, I know. She’s really going to be on my ass if I don’t get this draft in on time. It sucks.”

“I like Dr. Hartman,” Ilya said mildly from behind Shane, who flinched with surprise. He’d been holding the lip of the can to this mouth, the cold metal soothing against his warm skin, and some of it dribbled down his neck and onto his collar as he turned to look at Rozanov. Shane hadn’t even realized he’d been in the kitchen.

“Jesus,” he breathed. “When did you come in here?”

Ilya just shrugged, suddenly a man of few words again. In the kitchen, away from the loud laughter in the living room, he looked more like the Rozanov who Shane saw at the apartment, and less like the golden victor who had everyone in the room wrapped around his finger. Shane wasn’t sure how much he liked the difference. 

“I like Dr. Hartman,” Rozanov repeated, nodding to himself like it settled something. “She speaks Russian.”

“What? How do you know that?”

“She has PhD in Russian literature. It was in her packet on the first day of class.” He tilted his head. “How come I read syllabus, and you do not, for class I am not even in? I should not know more than you.” 

Jackie laughed a little. “Yeah, Shane. I thought you were supposed to be the best student on the team.”

“I am,” Shane said immediately, but no one heard it. Jackie was leaning forward in interest towards Ilya, her hold on Hayden loosening.

“So, you go to Shane’s classes with him? Just sit in on them? They don’t make you do the work?”

Rozanov shrugged, moving to take up residence against the counter besides Shane. He wasn’t standing that closely, but Shane still felt like he could feel the heat of his shoulder radiating against his. He was reminded of the way Rozanov had slipped his fingers onto his lower back the first time they’d met, the decadent shapes he’d traced into Shane’s bare skin.

“Yes, no papers or anything. I just sit and listen. He takes boring classes, you know.”

“I’m sure,” Jackie said. “It must be kind of nice just to listen, though. No pressure, right?”

Ilya agreed that it was nice. Between the two of them, Hayden and Shane made strained eye contact, both uncertain what to do with the bonding that was happening around them.

“Do you do the readings? I’m not sure I would.” 

Jesus, how many questions could Jackie possibly have? Ilya shrugged, and this time, the motion did bring his arm brushing against Shane’s. His entire body went still, pathetic, hoping the contact would happen again.

“If they interest me. We read The Death of Ivan Ilyich, I liked that one.” His voice rumbled over the pronunciation of Ivan Ilyich in a way that was much more luxurious than it had sounded coming from anyone in class, including Dr. Hartman. Shane turned his head in surprise.

“I didn’t realize you read that,” Shane said, genuine bafflement coloring his tone. “Did you borrow my copy?”

“It was online.” Rozanov shrugged. “All the books are online because they are so old. Plus, it was a short one, and it was Russian. Of course, I read it.”

It had been a short one. Shane hadn’t particularly liked it— nearly one hundred and thirty pages of a wealthy man moaning about how he’d wasted his life and his family didn’t care about him. In his defense, his family really hadn’t cared about him, but Shane didn’t understand the rest of it. Ivan had chosen this life for himself. He’d buried himself in work and ignored his wife and children, ignored any friendship he had that wasn’t advantageous to his career. Of course, he died sad and alone. That was always going to happen to people like that.

Shane remembered, briefly, that his mind had flickered to his own life while they discussed the book in class. He knew his head was a little buried in the sand when it came to anything else besides hockey, but still. He had friends, right? People cared about him. It wasn’t like he was about to die alone, holding nothing but a hockey stick. The story wasn’t relevant to him. Tolstoy knew nothing about what it was like to be Shane Hollander.

“You know,” he said finally. “Maybe I can try to make it to the movie. The paper isn’t due until Monday, anyways.”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Shane wasn’t sure that yelling fuck at the top of his lungs was going to solve any of his problems, but with the way he was feeling, anything was worth a shot. Frustrated, he kicked at his desk, then swore again and quickly pulled his foot back, trying to see if he’d scuffed the leather on his dress shoes.

Rozanov at least had the decency to knock before he threw the door open. “Hollander? What’s going on?”

“Oh my god.” Shane lunged forward and slammed his laptop shut where it was sitting on his bed. “Dude. You can’t just barge in here like that. What if I was naked?”

Rozanov did not seem to think the question was worth entertaining. His eyes flicked over Shane’s flustered expression, then to the laptop. “What are you doing?”

“Nothing,” Shane said. The response was too quick. Ilya’s eyebrows lowered in suspicion. 

“Nothing? Did not sound like nothing.” Now that he could see that Shane wasn’t in danger, his face transformed into something teasing. He took another step into the room. “I was worried you had maybe been attacked by birds.”

The suggestion was so ridiculous that it briefly made Shane forget how upset he’d been. “What does that even mean?”

Ilya shrugged. “Just the sort of sound you made.” Like it was a casual movement, he leaned forward to lift up the lid on the laptop. Immediately, Shane darted forward, wrapping his hand around Ilya’s wrist.

“What the fuck? Don’t do that!”

“What, you are watching porn? What could you possibly have been doing that made you yell like that?” 

Shane could tell that his defensiveness had only spurned Ilya’s curiosity on further. There was no way he was going to let this go.

“I wasn’t-” Shane cut himself off, not sure what to say next. Wasn’t what? Was it better to let Rozanov think he was watching something explicit, rather than reveal what he’d been actually doing?

Ilya’s eyes shot to the floor, and he laughed a little. “I’ve never seen someone put on fancy shoes to watch porn.”

Shane followed his gaze. He was aware, of course, that his outfit was ridiculous, with his brown leather dress shoes peeking out beneath his gray sweats. He hadn’t thought anyone would see him like this.

“I was just making sure they fit before the roadie,” he lied.

Ilya gave them another appraising glance. “They are same shoes you wear to game last weekend, no?”

They were. Shane scowled. Then, before he could say anything else, Ilya was snatching the laptop from the bed and wheeling away from him to see what was on it.

“Rozanov!” Shane’s voice practically boomed out of him, as loud as it was when he was on the ice. “What the fuck!”

He scrambled forward, grasping at Rozanov’s elbow and trying to pull it away, but the damage had already been done. Ilya was grinning wildly at the screen. From the speakers streamed the sound of a woman counting and the click of heels on a wooden floor.

“Hollander,” he began slowly. “You are watching a dance tutorial?”

The sound that escaped Shane was hardly recognizable. His hold on Ilya slackened, if only so he could bury his face in his hands.

“American waltz,” Rozanov read from the video description. “What, you are taking a dance class I don’t know about?”

Shane’s next sentence was unintelligible, garbled from behind his hands. Maybe he should just hold them over his mouth, and then he would pass out from lack of oxygen, and when he woke up, Rozanov would be too distracted to remember the fact that he’d walked in on Shane giving himself a ballroom dance lesson.

“Hollander, what is this?” 

“It’s nothing,” Shane moaned, pressing his palms into his eyes so hard he saw spots. “Please stop.”

It took a moment. Then, the video paused. He heard the laptop make a soft thump as it landed against the sheets.

“Hey,” Rozanov said. “What’s wrong?” Warm fingers wrapped around Shane’s wrists and pulled them away from his face. “Hollander?”

“I’m fine,” Shane said, but his voice sounded small in his ears. “This is fine. You can go.”

“You are panicked. Why?”

Shane groaned and tried to press his hands into his eyes again. Rozanov’s hands caught his wrists again, firmer this time. The pressure felt nice, like it was calming something inside of him. Still, he kept his eyes shut as he began to speak.

“It’s this dance I have to learn for that thing we have in Québec,” Shane explained. “My mom’s advisor told me I needed to learn how to waltz.”

Rozanov made a comprehending sound in the back of his throat. A week and a half from then, Shane would be off school for fall break, an entire week he usually spent banging around the house and doing puzzles with his dad. This time, he was being shuttled to Québec to make an appearance at some sort of fundraising dinner and gala with the governor general. He wasn’t even certain what the cause was— world hunger, maybe?

“So, what? You don’t want to learn how to dance?”

Even though his tone wasn’t harsh, Shane still bristled at his words. “It’s not that I don’t want to learn, I just-” 

His shoulders slumped a little with defeat. Rozanov waited a few beats, until it became clear that Shane did not intend on finishing his sentence. 

“Ah,” he said. “You can’t dance?”

“That’s not it,” Shane said quickly, although mostly that was it. “I just don’t have the time to learn. This is a stupid use of my time. We leave tomorrow for Quinnipiac, and I have to have that meeting with Rochko before we go, and then I need to work on my midterm because it’s due the day we come back, and I realized this morning that it’s due at 12 p.m., and not 11:59 p.m., which is honestly psychotic, like who does that, and I-”

“Woah, woah, hey.” Rozanov’s hands grasped his shoulders, now. “Hollander.”

Shane was speaking so quickly, he was running out of breath. He felt like someone had accidentally turned on a faucet in the back of his mouth and now all of his worries were pouring out, pooling on his bedroom floor.

“—I thought I could get it all done but my fucking partner didn’t get his section done until this morning and this stupid dance is so fucking hard and it shouldn’t be that hard, the tutorial says it’s for beginners but—” 

“Hollander! Stop.”

Shane stopped.

“Take a breath.”

Shane took a breath.

“What is that American saying Mitty taught me? There’s no crying in baseball, eh?” Ilya’s voice had an unreadable quality, his mouth clamped down like he was trying not to smile.

“I’m not crying,” Shane gritted out. Ilya’s eyes flickered disbelievingly between his for a moment.

“You will be fine. We can figure this out,” Rozanov told him, his fingers tensing and untensing almost unconsciously. It was pitiful, the way Shane’s system reacted to the concept of his problems becoming something someone else (something Ilya) could solve. It wasn’t a feeling he was used to. 

Rozanov let go of him and returned to the laptop, ignoring Shane’s protests. He settled with it half in his lap and resumed the video, watching with his brows furrowed as the lady on the screen demonstrated the steps. Shane practically had them burned into his skull, he’d seen the video so many times, but somehow that didn’t translate to actually learning them. 

He’d been trying for nearly forty-five minutes before Ilya came in. Every time he tried the box step, something he knew was simple, he’d try to add one of more complicated steps and trip over himself, or put the wrong foot forward, or he’d forget to hold his hands out in the air, trying to replicate the idea that there was a partner moving with him.

Ilya watched the video twice, nodding to himself intently all the while. When it was done, he shut the laptop and rose smoothly to stand in front of Shane.

“Okay,” he said, and held out his arms. “Come on. I will be lady.”

“What?” 

Shane took a step back and bumped into his dresser, making the entire thing rattle. Ilya gestured him forward with his hands. “Come on,” he said again. “You need partner to learn. I will be partner. This is very kind thing I am doing for you.”

“No.” Shane’s cheeks burned. 

Rozanov sighed impatiently, and took a step forward. Using that same firm contact he’d used before, he grabbed Shane’s wrist and placed his hand on his back, sliding it up until it landed on the space between Rozanov’s shoulder blades. He was wearing a black tank top— the tips of Shane’s fingers landed on bare skin, and for the blink of an eye, his only thought was warmwarmwarm. 

Ilya captured Shane’s other hand with his, clasping them together. He nudged Shane’s other arm with his elbow. “Come on. Higher than that. Your arm is like limp noodle.”

“Fuck off,” Shane mumbled, though he lifted his arm into the proper position. Every ounce of his body was buzzing with energy— embarrassed, sensitive, excited nerves.

Rozanov made a disapproving sound. “You would use such foul language with a lady?”

Shane barely held back another curse.

They started slow. Rozanov’s voice was no more than a low rumble as he guided Shane through it— left foot, okay, to the side with the right, close, good. It was easier to learn without the lady from the video counting, her voice nasally and brash and inexorable. Here, in the relative silence of Shane’s room, there was only Ilya, his callused hand rough against Shane’s own sweaty one. 

“Did you already know how to dance?” Shane asked once he felt like he’d gotten the plain box step down. They were moving incrementally faster now, as Shane grew more comfortable with the moves.

He felt Ilya’s shrug beneath his palm. “A little bit. They taught us at school.”

“Oh.” Another rotation around Shane’s room. “I never learned anything like this.”

“Not one of those hockey players that took ballet?”

Shane nearly stumbled. “Were you?”

“No,” Rozanov said simply. He did some move where he forced Shane’s hand to grip tighter onto his back, then maneuvered Shane’s left leg outside of his right so they could move across the room. That was for the part of the video the instructor had called ‘the Twinkle’, a move Shane had hardly been able to conceive of accomplishing on his own.

It brought their faces closer together. Rozanov’s eyes were focused down on their feet, where Shane should probably also have been looking, but instead, he found himself caught on the slope of Ilya’s nose, the flutter of his lashes against his cheek.

Shane tripped a little. Ilya waited, patient, while he untangled his feet.

“Why did Mitty teach you that, anyway? The no crying in baseball thing?”

“Focus,” Rozanov instructed. “Come on. This is the French part.”

He snorted a little. “The chassé?”

“Whatever they said,” Ilya said. “The part where we turn to side. Your hips,” he said, and slipped a hand down to Shane’s lower back. “Follow mine.”

For the next several minutes, there was no more talking except for the soft instructions from Ilya. He was patient, his hands light where they touched Shane. He almost wished Ilya would press harder, leaving fingerprints on his bicep as proof that they had touched at all.

 When he finally did speak at a normal volume, it almost took Shane by surprise.

“Mitty taught me at game night.” His hand lifted Shane’s a little higher, correcting his positioning. “I kept beating Pike at Connect 4. He was very angry at me. Is such a simple game, I do not understand how he could not figure out how to play.”

Shane remembered now. Hayden had practically thrown the game across the room, he’d been so mad, and Ilya had been reclined in the chair across from him, long legs splayed out beneath the table. Shane hadn’t been close enough to hear what Rozanov was saying, but it looked like it was practically making steam come out of Hayden’s ears.

“I don’t understand what your deal is with-” Shane began to say, but then he stepped out with the wrong leg, colliding with Ilya. His other ankle tangled, somehow, between Ilya’s legs, trying to move forward at the same time as Rozanov was trying to move back. It was a small mistake, but then he was scrabbling for purchase on Ilya’s broad shoulders, and even Ilya was stumbling, trying to steady him. Shane’s back rammed painfully into the dresser.

“You know, you are very clumsy for a hockey player.”

His words made a faint splash somewhere in the very far back of Shane’s mind, but he couldn’t respond, because he was lost. Ilya’s eyes were searching his, hazel and dark in the low light of Shane’s room, and the knob of his sock drawer was pressing into his back the same way the doorknob had in that dingy bar the night they’d hooked up, and suddenly all Shane was thinking about was how close they were. One of Ilya’s knees had ended up somehow between his, holding him up, one of his hands on Shane’s ribs and the other, the one that had been holding onto his bicep for the dance, slipping up to grasp him by the collarbone. He could feel Ilya’s breath against his chin.

He saw the moment Ilya recognized it. His eyelids slipped a little lower, his eyes flickering to Shane’s lips before they moved back up. His hand shifted against Shane’s ribs, the tiniest upward movement, as if the motion was subconscious.

Shane inhaled, enjoying just for a moment the sensation of Ilya pressed up against him, the clean smell of his shampoo and maybe a hint of sweat. Their foreheads pressed together; Shane wasn’t sure which of them had initiated that touch.

“Hollander,” Ilya murmured softly. The name sounded musical on his lips. It didn’t matter what he was about to say, because Shane was already leaning in.

It could hardly have been called a kiss. Their noses brushed, then their mouths, Ilya’s bottom lip dry and soft against Shane’s. 

Rozanov gasped. “Shane-”

Shane pressed forward, desperate for more, desperate to be kissed. For one moment, it was there. Ilya’s mouth pressed gently against his, a long and sweet exhale of air from his nose brushing against Shane’s cheek. In the next moment, Rozanov was gone.  

“We can’t,” was all he said. His voice was composed, but his face was inscrutably tense.

“Fuck. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” Shane’s chest grew tight with sudden panic, ice water swirling through his bones. 

Rozanov took another step back, bumping into the end of his bed and then taking another step around it, towards the door.  “Hollander, Shane, we can’t- I can’t. We said we wouldn’t.”

Shane’s mouth opened, then closed again. He was lost for words, his brain still scrambled and fuzzy by what had just happened.

“I’m sorry,” Ilya said, and then he was gone from the room, as quickly and as totally as if he’d never been there at all.

Shane felt cold. He blinked at the empty space where Rozanov had been, then groaned. He sank into a crouch, swiping his fists over his face in frustration.

There was no coming back from that.

Chapter End Notes

ooooooooooof! shane buddy. you're in trouble.

if you know anything about ballroom dance and were reading this like 'what the hell' just know that I spent probably an hour of my life watching various waltz tutorials and also that I'm just here to have fun.

also, I put a disclaimer about this on the first chapter but wanted to state here on my most recent update that there is absolutely no AI used in the writing of this fic, and I would sooner scrape out my eyeballs with forks than do so. thank you for reading (esp this very long author's note), and I wanted to stress that I am so so thankful for the comments you guys have been leaving! I appreciate you <3

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Chapter 4: shane walks into the château frontenac

Chapter Notes

For days, Shane had been pretending his mind was a placid, frozen lake. For the most part, it worked. 

He tried his best to navigate the thin patches, aware of the sound of cracking ice surrounding him. He pushed off with one leg and lead his team to victory in Connecticut, wrote his essay the entire plane ride home. He pushed off with his other, attending class with eyes that burned with exhaustion, hands that shook a little when he scooped his backpack off of the seat next to him. 

No one noticed. He was very good at this, Shane knew. It was sort of like folding himself inside out, a second protective layer like the reversible windbreaker he wore to class sometimes. He was a focused captain. He was a hard-working student. He was Shane, same as always.

He and Rozanov hadn’t spoken more than four words to each other in the last seven days.

Maybe Shane was a coward. Maybe Ilya was. Either way, it felt like all of the progress that had been made had completely dissolved. They were back to silently navigating the kitchen around each other, Shane digging in the freezer for his bags of spinach while Rozanov poured a bowl of sugary cereal and then disappeared into his room to eat it. Rozanov walked several feet behind Shane when they went to class together— when he’d done that at the beginning of the semester, it had felt like a courtesy, like he was allowing Shane to feel like he had his own life. Now, it made the walks feel lonely. When Shane met up with Rozanov after practice, he never had any comments about Shane’s backhand, which had always been half-constructive, half-chirp. Instead, the silence between them felt impermeable.

It was all Shane’s fault, of course. He couldn’t stop replaying the moment in his head. It was too painful to think of the minutes before (swirling, slowly, in Ilya’s arms, his voice soft in his ears, his thumb rubbing into Shane’s t-shirt), but as an act of self-flagellation, it was all too easy rewind the tapes on what Ilya had told him. We said we wouldn’t. 

It was a promise Shane had broken. It was a patch of ice on the lake he had been told not to skate over, and he’d practically pirouetted on top of it, then acted shocked when he was plunged into the water. It was his own fault that the warmth had leached from the apartment, from Rozanov’s face, from Shane’s hands. 

Mostly, he was embarrassed. Clearly, he’d misread the cues, misunderstood all of it. Stupid Shane.

This week would be good for them, at least in that they wouldn’t have to be together. Rozanov technically had the week off, since there would be a plethora of other security on the premises, but he had to stay in Québec just in case. Shane was pretty certain they were putting him up at the same hotel as everyone else, but of course, he hadn’t asked. 

“All we need you to do is show up and smile,” Jasper had said to him the week earlier, his tone self-important. “We’re taking care of the rest.”

A few moments later, his mom had joined the call. “It’ll be a nice vacation for you, honey. You’re going to love it, I promise. There’s so much history at the Château. Winston Churchill stayed there. Oh, and so did Paul McCartney!”

On the other end of the line, Shane could hear the telltale signs of Jasper trying to prod his mother towards her next meeting. She brushed him off, but Shane knew that only meant he had another thirty seconds with her.

“You know, your father is trying to convince me to arrange for us to stay in the Alfred Hitchcock suite. Can you imagine?”

It wasn’t until Shane was pulling up in front of the Château Frontenac that he understood, truly, why they said it was the most photographed hotel in the world. He’d seen it at a distance before, but now on the drive out front, he craned his neck, trying to take in every angle of the sweeping, towering building. Hundreds of ornate windows piled into red brick and stone, occasionally capped with elegant spires and clocktowers. The vision was enough to make him dizzy. 

“It’s only eighteen stories,” a familiar voice said from behind him. “Believe that? Looks much taller to me.”

Shane couldn’t help but smile as he turned to face the owner of the voice. He’d been so distracted by the estate that he’d missed his father, standing under the eaves of the entrance. He’d probably been waiting outside for longer than Shane wanted to know.

“Hey, Dad,” he said, and that was all he got out before he was being muscled into a hug. 

It’d only been a few weeks since his father had come out to see him play an exhibition game in Vermont (only an hour and a half drive from Montreal), but even then, he knew the distance wore on his parents. It wore on him, too, although Shane felt like he hardly noticed until he was back with them— like a weight shifted imperceptibly off his shoulders the moment he was back under their watchful eyes. It made him feel like a bad son, sometimes. He just got caught up in the motions of school and hockey, focused so much on his game that he forgot until he got on the phone with them how badly that homesick pain could thrum against his ribcage.

When he finally let Shane go, his father’s eyes caught immediately on something over his shoulder. “How’s it going, Ilya?”

Shane turned to look. Ilya had occupied himself with stacking their luggage on the curb. Shane took a step forward to grab his, but Rozanov had already threaded his fingers through the straps of Shane’s duffel and hefted it easily onto his shoulder. He shook David’s hand.

“I am good, Mr. Hollander, and yourself?”

“Oh, please call me David. Mr. Hollander is my son!” Shane’s dad laughed at the dumb joke, the sound booming and overly friendly. Ilya’s mouth twitched.

Shane would probably rather take a nail file to his teeth than ever relive the several minutes of strained small talk his father tried to make with Rozanov. Eventually, mercifully, one of the ushers from the hotel was prying their bags from Ilya’s hands and pushing them on a luggage cart into the hotel, where Shane could only hope that the mysterious magic of an ultra-luxurious resort would mean they ended up where he was sleeping tonight.

David steered Shane around to look at the view from the back of the hotel. It jutted right up against the Dufferin Terrace, a long stretch of boardwalk which lead to the governor’s promenade, and beyond that was the St. Lawrence river, twinkling almost purple in the early dusk. Inside, there was an opulent lobby, all coffered ceilings and dark wood paneling and glimmering chandelier light. Somewhere between the view of the river and Shane’s father leading him towards the elevator, Rozanov had disappeared. It figured, Shane thought. It was Rozanov’s first full week off in months. If it were Shane, he would’ve been gone probably without even stopping to say hi to anyone.

That night, thankfully, was easy. He got dinner with his parents at the restaurant on the sixteenth floor of the hotel, picking at a plate of wild sea bass and navigating questions about this season.

“Do you think they’re going to try to play Chaplain anytime soon, with his knee? Or are they keeping Hayden on your line for the rest of the semester? You two are good together.” His mother asked this easily around bites of lamb, raising her eyebrows at the look on Shane’s face. “What?”

“Mom, don’t you have a country to run? Why do you know so much about the injury roster?”

“I may have a country to run, but that doesn’t make me any less your mother,” she admonished, leaning forward to squeeze Shane’s chin. He jerked half-heartedly away from the contact, making a face when she moved to sweep the hair from his eyes.

“Also, you need a haircut, sweetheart. Want me to do it tonight? I’m sure the front desk has proper shears.”

“Mom!”

“What?” Yuna’s voice was genuinely confused as she took a delicate sip of wine. She glanced to her husband. “You agree, right?”

Shane buried his smile in another bite of fish. Sometimes, after months of being stranded at school, it was nice to be fussed over. Even if he protested it.

The following morning, he went for a run along the governor’s promenade until he reached the Plains of Abraham. It was a sprawling park, dotted with plaques about the battle that had taken place there two and a half centuries prior. Shane stopped to read them while he stretched, enjoying the relative anonymity that came along with jogging through the trees, baseball cap pulled low over his forehead. No one bothered him while he was running on campus, but it always felt like people were staring. That wasn’t a problem here.

He’d had to take a guard with him, and it was admittedly odd to run without the now-familiar, rhythmic pants of Rozanov a few feet behind him. I hang back to give you space, he always reminded Shane. Not because I am slower than you. You go at turtle’s pace, Hollander.

The guard they’d picked was clearly a practiced runner, holding himself back to keep pace with Shane, which only bothered him more. He wasn’t slow. Shane ran at a perfectly acceptable pace. 

After he got back to the hotel and showered, he had a text from his mom, letting him know that she’d be wrapped up all day but encouraging him to check out the downstairs spa. Deep tissue massage!!! she’d written, as if Shane had ever once been interested in enlisting himself in an hour-long experience of being touched by a stranger. 

Still, he sent a thumbs up emoji and went to go find his dad, sure that he’d be interested in walking twenty minutes to see the Citadelle de Québec. If it was one thing David Hollander could be counted on to do, it was walking around a historical site and quoting random facts he’d learned from one of the novels he kept on his nightstand. 

Three days passed like this. Working out in the morning, showering, going to look at a landmark in town with his father, catching moments with his mother whenever her schedule allowed. The entire time, as Shane moved through the Château without a direct shadow on him, he felt like he was missing a limb of some sort. It was odd to open a door and not have to automatically hold it for someone moving through it behind him. It was odd not to feel the weight of eyes on him, the protective brush of a shoulder against his back when crowds moved too close. 

Whether he wanted to or not, Shane looked for Ilya everywhere. It was shameful. Every breakfast he ate in the lobby cafe, he spent with his eyes pinned to the windows, wondering if he might catch sight of a head of curls passing on the sidewalk. Every time the elevator doors slid open, emitting that fancy ding, his heart jumped a little, as if that was a practical place to be expecting to run into someone. But Rozanov wasn’t anywhere. He wasn’t swimming in the hotel pool. He wasn’t smoking a cigarette on the boardwalk. He wasn’t poking through the gift shop, shaking snowglobes just to watch the flakes of white plastic resettle at the bottom. Shane would know, because he’d looked.

The night of the gala was rough before the dancing had even started. The room was loud— dozens of tables filled with bulging, decadent plates of food and people whose wealthy laughter rang through the room. Shane and his parents were seated at the table of honor with the governor general, an older man with a sheath of white hair.

“You know,” David told Shane before the dinner started. They were standing in the entrance to the elaborate ballroom, watching the governor general circulate and shake hands. “That guy almost went to the MLH.”

He perked up. “Really?”

“He was captain at Harvard for two years, went to training camp in Boston before he got too many concussions, which, for the time, you know means it was probably pretty serious. Kind of crazy that the Queen of England appointed him to this position, right?”

Yuna had elbowed him sharply in the side. “He was also vice-chancellor at McGill, after an illustrious career in law, David,” she warned, and that shut him up, probably for the night. Now, he sat amiably beside her, popping bites of steak into his mouth and happily watching his wife do what she did best— running the table with charismatic small talk, gesturing politely with her fork as she made points that had everyone around her smiling and nodding, laughing occasionally. They were eating out of the palm of her hand. 

Shane was sat across from the governor general’s daughter, a young woman with peach-colored hair who he was certain was soon to be the intended victim of his waltzing lessons. At the start of the meal he had asked quietly, whether she liked Québec, if she lived there. Her cheeks had flooded red, she had stammered out half of an answer, and neither of them had spoken since.

That was fine by Shane. He prodded at his plate, limp broccoli drowned in butter and soggy brown rice surrounding a limp salmon fillet. He thought sourly that the food, at least, should be good at one of these functions. 

“Nancy, I hear you’re a second-year at the University of Toronto, right? What an amazing campus,” Yuna said to the girl across from Shane. She seemed to have noticed that the level of conversation from their end of the table was zero.

“It is,” Nancy said softly. Shane was glad her name had been repeated— he’d forgotten it the moment he’d heard it. 

“And what do you study there?”

“English,” Nancy said. Her voice seemed barely above a whisper to Shane, but Yuna seemed to hear it just fine. She smiled, then asked the girl about her favorite things to read. Nancy brightened a little, rattling off a long list of books, both of his parents nodding knowingly as she spoke. Shane wondered, impulsively, whether any of them were the books he’d seen Ilya carrying around, then drained his glass of champagne and shoved the thought away.

Yuna’s eyes flickered to the glass flute in his hands, then back up to him. Shane knew the look in her eyes— you should slow down. It wasn’t usually a look used for alcohol. It wasn’t even a look Shane received that often. Still, he recognized it, and it made an unfamiliar little swirl of indignance surface in his stomach.

Shane wasn’t sure how many glasses he’d had. It was unlike him not to keep track. Still, the moment his glass was refilled, he took another sip. 

The dancing portion, as expected, was awful. Shane practically trampled poor Nancy’s toes, although she was gracious enough to smile weakly and untangle her skirts from beneath his feet. Even though the moves were practiced, and he wasn’t as bad as he might have been, she was all wrong in his arms. She was soft and small, the chiffon of her dress unpleasant against his sweaty palms. She didn’t smell like sandalwood sport deodorant. She didn’t have broad, rippling back muscles. Her fingers were dainty in Shane’s hand, when they were supposed to be a little rough, a little bigger than his own. She didn’t tease him when he tripped, instead apologizing like it was her fault. Everything was wrong.

Still, when he found his dad after the dance, David only clapped him on the shoulder and smiled. “Not so bad, huh? It’s a good skill to have.”

Shane narrowed his eyes. “Do you know how to waltz?”

David turned to look at Yuna, his eyes softening a little as he looked at his wife. Earlier in the night, one of the other guests had described her as resplendent. Shane thought that she did look beautiful in her sweeping navy gown. Shining earrings brushed her shoulders as she gestured widely, engrossed in conversation with someone Shane recognized from her public relations team.  

“Shane,” he said. “If you think that woman doesn’t make me rehearse ballroom dance every several months, like she has since I had to learn for our wedding, you’ve got another thing coming.”

At that, Shane laughed, pressing his mouth to the lip of his champagne flute. 

“How many of those have you had, kid?”

“Not many,” he lied. His lips felt loose, his tongue lax. He knew his cheeks were bright red, but it was warm in the room with all of the swirling dancers, the dangling chandeliers. 

“Good. We need you up and at ‘em for the hike tomorrow.” David clapped him on the shoulder. “I think your mom invited Nancy and her father.”

“What?” Shane’s head turned sharply to look at him.

“She’s pretty, huh? And very nice.” Now, his dad’s gaze was across the room, where Nancy was tucked shyly behind someone Shane recognized as the governor general’s wife. 

“She said, like, two words during dinner.”

“That’s, like, two more words than you said.” David’s voice was teasing but not entirely without a hint of disapproval. It made Shane feel a little like he was wilting. “We think it’d be good for you two to get to know each other.”

Shane’s face was burning. “What, so you guys can arrange a marriage or something? Seems kind of old-fashioned.”

“Shane.” Now it was David who turned his head to look at him oddly. “What are you talking about?”

“I don’t want to be set up with anyone,” Shane said, his voice embarrassed and strained. He couldn’t stop the words from spraying out. His breath tasted like champagne.

“We’re not trying to set you up,” David said, and took a step back, his hands help up defensively. “We just thought it might be nice for you and Nancy to get to know each other. She’s in pretty much the same position as you, you know. Having political parents isn’t easy, I’m sure.”

“It’s fine,” Shane lied again. His eyes were focused on the marble floor several feet ahead of them, skimming distractedly over the movements of others in their long skirts, their tailored dress pants. 

“You know, I try not to pry,” his dad said softly. “But is this about what’s going on with you and Roz?”

Hot terror flashed through Shane. His eyes were wide when he looked back at his dad. “Me and who?”

His brow furrowed with confusion. “That girl you brought home at the end of the summer. Rose, right? The one who likes to act?”

Shane blinked. Took a second. Floated back into his body. “Yeah. My friend Rose. What about her?”

“It’s okay if you still like her as more than a friend, you know,” David said gently. “Maybe you should ask if she wants to go out again?”

Shane’s next inhale felt sharp, like there was glass in his throat. He tried desperately to swallow the feeling away. “I think I need air.”

Moments later, he was brushing through the crowd, champagne sloshing over his knuckles as he hurried towards the doors leading onto the terrace. The ballroom faced out onto the river, and Shane stumbled gratefully across the cobblestones until he reached the balustrade, a sharp curve of concrete pressing into his ribs. Shane slumped his face into his arms, staring out over the faint ripples in the water and taking shallow breaths.

He wasn’t alone on the terrace. Behind him, there were a few clusters of men smoking cigars and chattering, comfortable laughter. One of them called out.

“Hey, man, you okay? Need something?”

“I’m fine,” Shane mumbled, nodding distractedly. He set his glass down on the balustrade and looked around.

There were no guards. At least, no one he recognized as a guard. He knew the protocol— knew that if he wanted to leave the premises, he was supposed to let someone know. But there was no one here. No one to tell, no one to complain if Shane disappeared into the night. 

So he went down the steps from the terrace, straight onto the boardwalk. It was as empty as he’d ever seen it, although whether that was due to the time of night or due to the event happening at the Château, Shane couldn’t tell. Still, as far as he knew, this was allowed. He was allowed to walk.

So he did. He walked. And walked. There was a faint roaring in his ears. His legs felt a little numb, and so did his fingers, his chest fuzzy. His brain felt distanced and quiet, like it was a radio he’d turned all the way down. His eyes were fixed on the trees ahead of him, the steps he knew lead into the forest and to the park. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do when he got there, but there was no one there to stop him.

He tripped. It wasn’t something Shane did often. A concrete step slammed hard into his shin. When had he reached the steps? Still, he flailed for the railing and pulled himself up, wobbling the rest of the way. The longer he walked, the more his breath would ease. Shane felt certain of that, even though he knew in the back of his mind that he had been walking for quite a while, and breathing hadn’t gotten any easier. He just had to keep going. 

“Hollander?”

The word seemed to come from the trees. Shane didn’t stop. He just kept walking.

“Hollander.” 

A little closer, now. Shane’s head didn’t turn.

“Shane.”

He slammed into something. Someone. The chest was broad, strong. It was like running into a wall. Two hands came up and gripped Shane by the shoulders when he tried to take a step backward, steadying him immediately.

“What are you doing here?”

It was Ilya. He looked good, in the dim light cast from the lamp posts illuminating the path. His curls swept over his forehead, his eyelashes casting shadows on cheeks that were flushed pink with the cold. It was cold, Shane realized. He hadn’t noticed before. His fingers were numb, and his eyes felt dry, like he hadn’t blinked in a while.

“Shane,” Ilya repeated. His fingers tightened around Shane’s shoulders. “What happened?”

“Of course, you would be here. You’re everywhere,” Shane mumbled. Now it was his lips that felt numb, although whether it was because of the temperature or because of the alcohol, he wasn’t sure. “Why are you here?”

His second question went unasked. Where have you been?

“I asked first.” Ilya’s voice was serious, his eyes intent as he studied Shane’s expression. “It’s late. You are supposed to be at gala, no?”

“I was there,” he said. “I went for a walk.”

Ilya glanced over his shoulder. “Long way for a walk. And you are alone?”

“It’s not that long,” Shane said, although he had no idea how far he had walked.

“You did not answer my other question,” Ilya said, not unaccusingly. He raked his eyes over Shane’s appearance again. “You are drunk?”

“No,” he said defensively. “I’m not drunk.”

“You smell like champagne and you are not standing straight.”

“I think you’re drunk.”

Rozanov sighed dramatically. “Okay. Let’s get you back.”

“Don’t want to go back,” Shane said. The words felt like they were struggling to make their way out of his mouth, like they were getting stuck on his tongue somehow. Everything about him felt clumsy and cold and numb. The only parts of him that felt aware of anything were where Ilya’s hands still held him upright. 

“What is wrong?”

“Nothing,” Shane muttered. His eyes didn’t feel dry anymore. “I’m fine. I want to be alone.”

“You are drunk as skunk and lost in woods, Hollander. This is not the behavior of someone who is fine, especially not someone who should be alone.”

“Fuck off,” Shane said, and tried miserably to tip himself out of Ilya’s grip. He was unsuccessful. “Let me go.”

Ilya did. “Your teeth are chattering,” he pointed out.

That wasn’t helpful. Shane clamped his teeth together, ignoring the shudder that worked down his jaw at the motion. He was fine. 

There was the sound of something being unzipped, and then a heavy weight landed on his shoulders. “Put your arms in,” Ilya said exasperatedly, and then he was bending Shane’s stubborn elbows, slipping his wrists into the sleeves of a warm jacket. 

“You’ll be cold,” Shane protested half-heartedly. Immediately, the weight and the warmth and the grounding scents of pine and cigarettes were making him feel a little bit more pinned to the Earth, solid in a way he hadn’t been a moment before. He still wanted to be alone, but the feeling was dwindling.

“Russians do not get cold.” 

“Canadians don’t get cold, either,” Shane muttered stubbornly. It made Ilya laugh.

“I have Canadian right here, shivering like wet dog.”

Shane scowled. “I’m not,” he said, although it came out more like mmnot. He wasn’t sure how it had happened, but Ilya was walking him down the path now, one strong hand pressed firmly between Shane’s shoulder blades.

“Let’s get you back, Hollander,” he said softly when he noticed Shane’s feet dragging. “Come on. Is there monster? Why do you not want to go?”

For a long moment, Shane didn’t say anything. There was only the crunch of their feet through dried leaves and rocks, the heave of his breath in his chest. 

“I don’t want them to see me,” Shane said. His voice was small and trembly in his ears. “I can’t go back. My parents can’t see me like this.”

Now it was Ilya’s turn to be quiet. His hand strummed absentmindedly up and down Shane’s spine. “They won’t,” he said finally. “There is side door. Security will be there, but I can get us in. Hopefully it is a friend of mine. Not one of those government fucks.”

“I thought you were all government fucks,” Shane said before he thought better of it. Ilya laughed under his breath.

“Is different. You would not know.”

For another few minutes, they walked in silence. The night sky stretched like a ribbon through the tops of the trees, and Shane kept his eyes on it. They were too close to the city to see many stars, but he tried anyway, if only so that he didn’t look at Ilya and hunt for them in his eyes. 

“Are you feeling better?”

They were emerging onto the boardwalk, now, which suddenly felt too bright. Ilya waited for Shane to grasp firmly onto the rail before he let them both descend the steps. Shane became aware of the stinging pain on his calf— he’d forgotten he’d tripped here earlier. How long ago had that been?

“Shane?”

“Hm?” He forgot himself and looked up at Ilya. It was a mistake. His cheeks were ruddy with the cold, his perfect mouth parted around a cloudy breath. In the new light, something shone at his earlobe— that silver hoop, the same one he’d been wearing the night he met Shane. For a moment, the world spun, all of his focus centered on the earring.

“I asked if you were feeling better.”

Shane nodded, then shook his head, then nodded again. The movement made him dizzy. 

“Words, Hollander.”

“I’m fine.” The space between the words rolled together as it came out of his mouth, an uncoordinated mmfine. “You put your earring back in.” 

“I did.” Ilya gave him a look. 

Shane felt vaguely sick. “You had it in the night we met.” He stopped walking to turn and look over his shoulder, blinking into the dark trees. “You know, when we really met.”

Ilya’s expression shuttered, immediately inscrutable. “Hollander,” he began, his voice steady, but then he stopped.

Shane’s stomach churned. All he could think about was Ilya at the bar, probably hoping to pick someone up. Was that what he had been doing that night? Before he’d run into Shane? For all Shane knew, that was Ilya’s sex earring. He wore it when he was looking for somebody to fuck. He’d probably been Rasputin-ing all across Québec this week while Shane was stuck looking at historically significant rock structures with his dad.

Were you back there with someone? Shane wanted to ask, though he knew the question was ridiculous. Did I ruin everything?

He stopped walking at the base of the steps. He wasn’t sure why he’d stopped, except now he was staring out at the water. There weren’t a lot of lights across the way. Shane knew from the time he’d spent here in the daylight that it was mostly just a nearly impenetrable wash of trees with little buildings interspersed. His dad had made a comment on the first day about how most of the boats were gone for the season, but here was one, trundling slowly down the waterway. Shane fixed his eyes on it, the reflection shimmering through the disturbed water.

“What is it?”

“Nothing.” Shane turned to Ilya, did his best to straighten his face out. It was feeling very crumpled. “You should go. It’s your night off.” 

He felt his words do that thing again, bunching up clumsily before they fell out of his mouth. He hadn’t been this drunk in a long time— not since his first few weeks of college, probably. 

“It’s fine, Shane. This is my job.”

He didn’t sound bothered, but as he said it, Shane’s mind flickered to a different conversation they’d had, the night they’d had to wrestle a drunken Hayden home. He frowned at the water.

“Isn’t it kind of messed up?” Shane said. “This is your one week off, but you have to stay in Québec. You didn’t get to choose where to go.”

For a moment, Ilya was quiet. The air filled with the sound of the river sloshing up against the boardwalk, the whistle of the wind. Shane wasn’t shivering anymore. He ran a hand absentmindedly over the arm of his borrowed coat. 

“Is same thing that happened to you, no?” Ilya began quietly. “You did not choose to be here, either.”

Shane shrugged. That was different. He was here with his parents. In part, he knew, it was so that he could be visible, part of his mother’s image. Still, it had felt pretty close to a vacation up until tonight.

“It is beautiful city,” Ilya continued. In Shane’s periphery, he could see that Ilya had turned to look at the skyline behind them, the ginormous lurch of the Château in the near distance. “I am enjoying my time here. Are you not?”

“No, I am,” Shane said. He opened his mouth as if to say more, but there wasn’t much else inside of him. His brain felt blissfully quiet as he watched the water move. His fingers curled in the pockets of Ilya’s jacket, bumping up against something rectangular. He pulled it out, making a face at the package.

“Cigarettes are very expensive in Canada,” Ilya said mildly. “I will not share with you.” 

“They’re expensive because you’re not supposed to be smoking. It’s so bad for you.” Shane frowned as he tipped one white cylinder into his palm and twisted it between his fingers curiously.

“Have you ever even held a cigarette before?”

Shane closed his fingers hurriedly around it. “I have,” he said, disgruntled. Then, he deflated a little. Smoking wasn’t cool. He didn’t think smoking was cool, even a little bit. Why was he lying? “Okay, maybe I haven’t,” he said, still drunkenly intrigued by the way they rattled around in the pack. 

“Good. Don’t start.”

“I won’t.” Shane scowled. “And you shouldn’t, either. I should throw these in the river.”

“Wasn’t your mother in the news last week talking about some grand plan to save the environment? Not very good for the fish to be smoking, either.”

Warm fingers closed over Shane’s, deftly removing the pack from Shane’s hands and sticking it into the back pocket of Ilya’s jeans. He stuck the loose cigarette behind his ear, nestled in his dark curls, and the sight made Shane’s stomach flip. Fuck. Smoking was not hot. Absolutely not. 

“She’s meeting with the UN about some green initiative next month,” Shane mumbled. “Why do you know that?”

Ilya raised an eyebrow. “What, you think I am dumb? I do not pay attention to world affairs?”

“No.” Shane shrugged. “I only know about it because she talks about it.”

“Well, maybe you are the one who should be paying more attention.” Ilya’s eyes skated over Shane’s face, lingering indecipherably. “Come on. Let’s get you back up to the castle.”

“I don’t want to go. I want to stay here.”

It was true. Shane wanted to sit on a bench and stare at the river for hours, until his fingers went numb, until his brain felt quiet, smooth and glassy like the water. He didn’t want to have to move. He didn’t want to be asked to do anything.

Still, Ilya wasn’t asking. He hooked his arm through Shane’s and began to tug him back down the boardwalk and towards the hotel.

As they drew closer, the air filled again with the sound of people chattering and clinking glasses. There was a stream of raucous laughter from where more people had filled the terrace. Ilya put his hand back between Shane’s shoulder blades and led him up a different set of stairs than the ones he’d come down. The man who was guarding the door did, in fact, seem to be one of Ilya’s friends. They dapped each other up and then, without other fanfare, Ilya was leading Shane down a quiet hallway.

They had almost made it safely to the elevators that fringed the lobby when he heard it.

“Mr. Hollander?”

“Shit,” Shane said. He meant to say it under his breath. He could tell by the look it earned him from Ilya that it was not. He turned slowly. Behind them in the hall, still wearing the suit Shane had seen him in hours before, was Jasper.

“Why are you not at the gala?” His sentence was clipped, his eyes roving judgementally over Shane’s disheveled appearance. “Did anyone know you left?”

It was the kind of question that in a normal moment would’ve made Shane want to scream with frustration. Instead, he tucked his fingers self-consciously into the sleeves of Ilya’s jacket and swallowed weakly. “I wasn’t feeling well. Just getting some air.”

“Getting some air,” Jasper repeated disbelievingly.  “In an entirely different part of the hotel?” His eyes flicked to Ilya, then back to the jacket that was awkwardly bundled over Shane’s suit coat. “Isn’t it your night off, Mr. Rozanov?”

Shane hated that tone, the snobby purse of Jasper’s mouth. He bristled, and what came out of his mouth next was less than filtered. “He was helping me. Like I said, I wasn’t feeling well.”

“He was helping you.” Jasper echoed Shane’s words again. He fucking hated this game. “I still don’t understand what you would be doing in this part of the building.”

“Well, what are you doing down here?” The words rushed out of Shane’s mouth. He might have been slurring again. He wasn’t sure. 

“I don’t see how that’s any of your business.”

“I don’t see how where I am is any of yours, you-”

“Ah, hold on.” Ilya interrupted whatever Shane was about to spit out, his expression perfectly composed. He pitched his voice lower, like he was speaking only to Shane even though Jasper could certainly hear them. “Tell me again what you had to eat for dinner?”

The question was so unexpected, it took Shane out of himself entirely. He blinked. The dinner he’d eaten only two hours before felt like it had been half a lifetime ago, and he certainly hadn't mentioned it to Ilya. “Salmon?”

Ilya nodded, then addressed Jasper. “You might want to warn the other guests who also ate the salmon. I think Mr. Hollander has food poisoning. I was escorting him to his room, taking him up this path so as not to disturb the other guests.”

Shane wasn’t quite sure what he looked like at that moment, but it must have been at least a little bit believably like someone who had food poisoning. His entire body felt like a crumpled pile of damp paper towels. 

Jasper raked his gaze between the two of them. “If you have food poisoning, it surely isn’t because of anything we served you,” he sniffed authoritatively. “It must have been something else you ate. None of the other guests have complained.”

“Well, still, he is not feeling well,” Ilya said firmly. “Rather safe than sorry, yes? Will you let me get him to his room, or do you have more questions for him?”

For the first time, Jasper looked a little taken aback. Shane frowned. Ilya might come to regret taking that tone with the advisor to the prime minister. 

“No, no,” Jasper said, clearly a little bewildered. He sniffed, then adjusted his lapel. He looked to be visibly in the process of remembering that he was supposed to have manners. “I’m sorry to hear you’re not feeling well, Mr. Hollander. I’ll let you get upstairs.”

“Will you tell my mom where I went?” Shane said. His voice sounded small in his ears. 

“I will.” Jasper’s words were accompanied by a tight smile, the last thing Shane saw before Ilya steered him firmly into the elevator. He knew, without asking Shane, which floor to press, and when they got to it, he knew again which room was Shane’s. A tiny part of Shane, stupid and impractical, wished Ilya had asked. Sometimes, he wished that people would at least pretend they knew less about him. Instead of trying to articulate this thought, he spent a long moment fumbling through his pockets for his key card.

What are you still doing here? Shane wanted to ask when Ilya stepped into the room behind him. Why are you being so nice to me?

Back at school, it hadn’t been like this. Everything had been clinical, professional. Ilya had brushed past Shane almost coldly in the classroom, still panning his head quickly to check the hallway before he let Shane walk into it. His eyes had felt like needles in the back of Shane’s neck while he was on the ice— not cruel, necessarily, but discerning, like he was trying to understand something about the way Shane worked. Every time he glanced up at the seats where Ilya sprawled indecently during practice (both legs thrown over the row in front of him, like he was too big to be contained), he’d had been busy looking at his book. But he had been watching, Shane knew. He was always watching. 

Now, even as Shane shuffled around his hotel room, clumsily unlacing his dress shoes and wobbling toward the dresser, Ilya folded his arms and leaned against the doorframe, still observing. Shane huffed and began to dig through his duffel bag, dislodging several inferior t-shirts while looking for his favorite one to sleep in.

"You shouldn't have spoken to Jasper like that. He could get you fired."

"He will not," Ilya said confidently. "He does not scare me."

"He doesn't scare me either," Shane said, hoping his voice was holding just as firm. It was true. Jasper didn't scare Shane. He just made him feel small, made him feel like a very large creature that was being stuffed into a very small box. “You don’t have to still be here, you know.” 

“You have not given me my coat back.”

Shane grumbled, then realized that he had indeed let Ilya’s coat be stuck in the tangle of layers he’d shrugged off and unceremoniously piled on the bed. He spent a moment unearthing it, then thrust it out in Ilya’s direction. “Here.” 

With his shirt and gym shorts in hand, Shane retreated into the bathroom, hoping that by the time he struggled out of his suit and into bed, Ilya would be gone. When he swung the door back open several minutes later, to his dismay (and it certainly was dismay, this strange lifting in his chest, the flutter in his stomach), Ilya had not left.

“Why are you still here?” He knew he sounded bitchy, but couldn't quite contain his tone. It was like talking to Jasper all over again.

Ilya shrugged, but his mouth twitched with what might have been amusement. “Sounded like explosions going off in the bathroom. It is my job to make sure you are okay.”

Embarrassed, Shane’s mouth pinched unhappily. Yes, maybe he had gone into the bathroom and promptly tripped over the shower mat, and maybe he had accidentally knocked over the few nice glass bottles of hotel-provided face wash in search of his own, and then maybe he’d accidentally poured out the contents of his Dopp kit onto the counter and scrambled loudly through them in search of his toothbrush only to discover it propped on the side of the sink, precisely where he’d left it that morning. He didn’t see how it was any of Ilya’s business.

“I’m fine,” Shane snipped, or at least tried to. He still didn’t feel fully in control of his enunciation. “You can go now.”

“What happened to your leg?”

He glanced down. The skin of his calf was rubbed raw and red where he’d been scrubbing at it moments ago with a damp wash cloth. He’d forgotten, again, that he’d fallen on the steps, until he’d pulled down his pants and seen all the crusted dried blood.

“Just a scrape,” he said.

“It’s still bleeding.” Ilya was frowning at Shane’s leg as if it had insulted his entire family and his favorite hockey team (which, Shane knew now, was Tampa. They have the most Russian players, Ilya had explained in the face of Shane’s surprised spluttering a few weeks prior. Who else would I root for, the Capitals? I like Ovechkin, but not that much.)

“It’s fine,” Shane sighed. His eyes were burning with exhaustion, the room still swaying a little every time he moved his head, like his eyes needed a second to calibrate and rebalance. Everything was fine. He just needed to lay down, but he shouldn’t do that while there was someone in his room.

An impatient sound from the doorway, and then Ilya was stomping in the direction of Shane’s bathroom.

“You shouldn’t go in there.” The words were more of a whine as they left Shane’s lips. He’d left most of his toiletries scattered all over the bathroom counter when he’d spilled them, and he couldn’t remember if the gross washcloth he’d been using to wipe at his leg had made it into the bathtub or if he’d just left it on the floor. If Ilya looked in the direction of the trash bin, he’d see that it was full of dark clippings of Shane’s hair, left over from this morning. It felt like a decade ago, now, that his mother had shown up to his room after his run, arms laden with supplies from the front desk and warning him that she only had thirty minutes.

God, his mom. He was going to get an earful the next morning about leaving the gala without saying goodbye to anyone. 

The thought was enough to send Shane careening back onto the bed, his legs dangling over the edge as his head sank into the mattress. The entire room spun violently. He groaned, shutting his eyes so that he would no longer have to look at the nauseous swirling of the ceiling fan. 

When he opened his eyes again, there was something soft and damp swiping at his leg. He pushed himself up on both elbows, staring down at the sight in front of him. Ilya was back, down on one knee in front of Shane. Maybe he was hallucinating. Did alcohol make people hallucinate? He couldn’t remember.

“You don’t have to do that,” Shane mumbled, but the damp towel felt nice against his skin— much more pleasant than Shane’s own rough scrubbing when he’d done the same thing.

“Lay back down.” Ilya’s clipped response was at odds with the careful brush of the towel. He reached for something on the bed, and Shane turned his head a little to look at what it was. A few bandaids and a roll of wound tape swam into his vision. 

“Where did you get those?”

“Underneath the bathroom sink. Is a very nice hotel, well-stocked. Good first aid kit.”

“You know first aid?”

“Even a toddler could do this,” Ilya responded as he peeled the wax paper away from the bandaid and pressed the adhesive edges carefully into Shane’s leg. “But yes. It was part of training. I could give you a tourniquet, if you needed one.”

Panic flashed through Shane. “Do I need a tourniquet?”

That got a short laugh of out of Ilya, more of a quick exhale through his nose. “No, Hollander. I think you will survive this one. Not too much blood loss. Keep asking questions like that, though, and I might begin to worry.” 

“Shut up.” Shane’s head thumped back against the mattress.

The ceiling fan refused to stay put in his vision, although logically he knew it was stationed exactly where it had been the entire time. He could feel Ilya applying a second bandaid— the cut was longer than it was wide.  

“Do I need stitches, then?” Shane wondered. The words tangled in his mouth, like he was speaking around cotton.

 “If you needed stitches, we would not be here right now.” 

Shane was brave enough to glance down again. Ilya was in the process of nimbly unwinding a stretch of the wound tape to hold the bandaids in place. When he got the amount of tape he wanted, he tore it with his teeth, a flash of white in that pink mouth.

Even as drunk as Shane was, his dick twitched with interest in his shorts. He laid his head back down, because the unstable ceiling fan was evidently a much safer place to be looking than at Ilya Rozanov on his knees in front of Shane.

“What is your training like, anyways?” Shane wondered aloud. “How did you get here?”

“I took plane,” Ilya said bluntly. “Same plane as you, actually. Maybe we should be worrying about that blood loss.”

“No, I mean, like. How did you get here. In this job.” Shane kicked out his other socked foot to jostle Ilya’s thigh. “You know what I meant.” 

Shane felt the pressure of Ilya’s warm palm pressing the tape into place. He sighed. “My father was police, in Russia. One of his friends was police, too, but transitioned into work like this. Private security. He liked it, said it was nice. Easy. You got to see the world, you got paid well.” Shane could practically hear the shrug in Ilya’s voice. “Once I was done with hockey and school, it seemed like the next thing to do.”

“So, what? You had to go to cop school?”

“Not cop school. More like defense classes, tactical courses. My father was happy to enroll me and my brother in both.”

Shane frowned. “That must be hard for your mom. The whole family in this line of work, I mean.”

There was a long silence. Ilya’s hand left Shane’s leg, and his knees cracked as he straightened up. Shane pushed himself up onto his elbows.

“How’d you end up in Canada?”

“I have told you this before,” Ilya said, but he didn’t look annoyed. Shane couldn’t read the expression on his face, although whether that was because it was Ilya’s typical level of impassivity or because Shane was inebriated, he couldn’t be sure. “I billeted in Vancouver when I was fifteen. Only for a few months, before I had to go home for family reasons, but I liked Canada. I wanted to come back here."

Shane smiled a little. “I like Canada, too.” 

“That’s good. You are on all of the posters here, after all.” 

“That is not true!”

“It is true. I saw photos of you just today. They have you on the milk cartons, Canadian golden boy.”

Shane scowled. “I don’t even like milk. You’re lying.”

“Maybe it was the bottles of maple syrup, then.”

“I’ve never done an ad for syrup,” Shane grumbled, but Ilya was seemingly not interested, instead dipping back into the bathroom to toss out the crumpled bandaid wrappers. 

When he emerged, he had a funny look on his face. “Did you give yourself a haircut?”

“Oh, god.” Shane sat up fully and rubbed a hand over his face. When he wearily opened his eyes again, Ilya was standing closer to him, almost within reach. “Yeah. My mom cut it this morning.”

Amusement tugged at Ilya’s full mouth. Shane was not allowed to look at it any longer, so he cast his eyes downward, instead landing on the twitch of Ilya’s hands. He looked like he'd gone to do something with them, then thought better of it.

“Does it look bad?” Shane asked, his voice just shy of plaintive to his own ears.

“No,” Ilya said simply. “How was the gala, then, before you escaped? Did you dance?”

Another groan from Shane. He covered his face with his hands again. “Yes. It was awful. I stepped on her feet, like, twelve times.”

“Is less than you stepped on mine,” Ilya said, not unkindly. His face was still utterly impenetrable, although if Shane didn’t know better, he’d think there was something soft, there, around his eyes. 

Shane froze a little, his brain suddenly swamped with exactly what he had been trying to forget all day. Neither of them had even come close to bringing it up since it happened. As a matter of fact, this was the first actual conversation they’d had since what Shane was beginning to consider the incident. Maybe this was a chance for him to apologize— and if there would be a better chance, maybe in a sober moment, maybe when Shane wasn't so exhausted his eyes were practically gluing themselves closed only a few minutes before, that thought wasn't occurring to him at that moment. 

“About that, actually.” Shane swallowed nervously, trying to compose his scrambled brain. He’d been thinking about what he’d say, if given the chance, although granted he’d been doing most of that thinking while sober. “I wanted to apologize. I’m so sorry about what happened when you were helping me. It wasn’t fair of me, and I shouldn’t have done it, and I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable, and I totally overstepped and put you in a position—”

His rambling was interrupted by the feel of Rozanov’s hand curling around his wrist. He paused, momentarily confused, following Ilya’s line of sight to where Shane had been anxiously and repetitively rubbing his thumb over one of his knuckles. The skin had turned white with friction.

“Is okay, Hollander,” Ilya said softly. “I know you did not mean to. It was confusing moment, yes?”

“Yes,” Shane breathed, so grateful that Ilya understood. “Confusing. I was confused.”

Ilya slipped his fingers off of Shane’s wrist. Immediately, he mourned the loss. “It will not happen again,” he said, although he was still avoiding Shane’s eyes. Maybe Shane’s eyes were avoiding him. It was hard to tell. Ilya straightened, and cleared his throat. “I will go now. You need to sleep.”

“Okay,” Shane said softly, his eyes still glued somewhere around Ilya’s shoulders. With a lot of effort, he cast them up once more to study Ilya’s face. His eyes were dark, his jaw cut sharply against his nice shirt. Shane had forgotten to ask what Ilya had been up to that night. He’d forgotten to ask why he’d put the earring in.

When Ilya slipped out the door, the hotel soft-close mechanism letting it snick quietly shut behind him, Shane wasted no time in curling into the bed, tugging the sheets up to his chin and immediately relishing in the comfort of the pillow cradling his tired face. The last thing he saw before he fell asleep was a fresh glass of water on the nightstand. He didn’t remember putting it there.

Chapter End Notes

as always this work is unbeta'd

all that stuff about the 2015 canadian governor general going to training camp in boston before becoming the vice chancellor at mcgill was completely true and I just thought it was neat and wanted to include it!!

thank you for all the love and support on the last chapter!! I appreciate you guys a lot for reading :) I did read a tweet yesterday about someone suggesting a hollanov chasing liberty au and it kicked my ass into gear in terms of finishing this chapter lol

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Chapter 5: shane walks into study group

Chapter Notes

tw for internalized homophobia in this chapter, which is also not beta'd

Shane spent rather a lot of time worrying about his perception through the eyes of others, which is how he knew he was not considered to be a particularly approachable person. He heard about it all the time from all sorts of people. Freshmen on the team after months of getting to know him, eventually confessing after a few beers in the springtime that they were so scared of him at first. Members of his mom’s staff who tentatively commented that he was someone who took awhile to warm up to. Even the rare fan who asked for his signature, sighing with relief and saying you’re not as intimidating as I thought you’d be!

As it was, he didn’t get spoken to a lot in class. He kept to himself, mostly, as much as possible. This was why it took Shane a solid minute to realize that the guy in the seat next to him had started speaking to him the moment the lecture had ended.

“Sorry, what? Were you saying something?” Shane paused in the act of zipping up his backpack to look at the guy. Shane should know his name. They’d for sure done group work together in discussion— this was the same person who had told that very long-winded story about his grandmother’s cat, Shane was pretty sure. Maybe he’d been asking to borrow notes, or something. He wasn’t really sure why else they would be speaking. 

“I asked how your fall break was.” He smiled self-consciously, and Shane could see that one of his teeth was a little snaggletoothed, wobbling intrepidly in front of the others. What was his name? Grant? 

He hoped his expression was concealing his surprise. “Oh. It was good, uh, I just went back to Canada, spent some time with my family.” That was a bit of an oversimplification, but Shane wasn’t about to dive into the details.

“Oh, neat! I’ve never been to Canada before, what part are you from?” Grant (Shane had decided his name was definitely Grant) had big brown eyes, blinking slowly as he looked at Shane.

He hadn’t been expecting a follow-up question, and his response was perhaps a bit more blunt than was polite. “I’m originally from Ottawa."

“That makes sense." Grant smiled generously. "Ottawa is the capital, right? All the politicians must live there, so with your mom and stuff..."

Shane tried not to make a weird face the way he always had to try not to make a weird face when he was talking to someone for the first time and they just casually sprinkled in the knowledge of who his mother was. The whole campus knew about him, of course— he wasn't exactly subtle. But still.

"Yeah, I guess. I was in Québéc for break, though, which was nice."

"Are those close to each other?” Grant seemed genuinely curious about the answer. 

“Um, sort of. Like three hours driving, probably?” Shane fidgeted nervously with the straps of his backpack, fighting the urge to look towards the back of the room, where he knew Ilya would be waiting by the door.

“That’s cool! I love a road trip.”

Grant didn’t seem to be in any rush for the conversation to end, clearly waiting for Shane to say something else. An awkward silence ensued.

“This is the part where you ask how my break was,” he prodded helpfully. His tone still felt overly charitable. “Or where I’m from. Whichever.” 

Shane was aware of the fact that he had committed several social faux-pas and that Grant was continuing to forgive them, for whatever reason.

“Oh, right.” His fingers remained tangled in his backpack. Around them, students were filtering out of the classroom, the air filled with the squeaking sound of the door and the jostling of coats. He ached to be like them. “How was your break?” 

He didn’t ask the second question, but Grant seemed pleased and answered it anyway. “It was good! I went back to Boise, which, thank god, is a little bit warmer than it is here. Not by much, but at least it didn’t drop below fifty while I was there. I’m still getting used to these east coast winters, you know?”

Shane had not a single idea where the fuck Boise was— he was generally okay when it came to identifying the fifty states, but if it was a town without an MLH team, he was pretty much lost. Still, Grant laughed a little, so Shane did too, although it sounded forced to him. If Grant could tell, it didn’t seem to bother him. He leaned closer to Shane, blinking his eyes slowly some more. Maybe he had something stuck in them? 

“Anyway, I know we haven’t spoken much,” Grant continued on. Or ever, Shane mentally added, but didn’t say. “But I’m having a few people over on Sunday afternoon to work on our papers together, and I was wondering if you wanted to come?”

“Oh,” said Shane. “Um.”

Over Grant’s shoulder, he finally caught sight of Ilya, and then every semblance of language left Shane’s mind because it appeared that Ilya was not, in fact, standing by the door waiting for Shane like he was supposed to be. Instead, he was standing at the top of the lecture hall stairs and flirting with their professor.

They seemed locked in conversation. Ilya’s face was warm, the purse of his mouth charming as he said something that made Dr. Hartman laugh and tuck a strand of dark hair behind her ear.

In front of him, Grant had tilted his head curiously. “Shane?”

“What?” Shane blinked back into himself. “Uh, yeah. Sunday. Sounds awesome.”

Grant’s expression brightened. He looked far happier than Shane’s hesitant agreement could warrant. “That’s awesome! I’ll give you my number?”

So Shane passed his phone across the gap between their desks and kept watching Ilya and Dr. Hartman talk. 

She was nice-looking, Shane supposed, though it had never once occurred to him. Her long brown hair was streaked with silver (although she seemed much too young to be going gray, the skin around her eyes perfect and creaseless). She often wore big sweaters and dangly earrings and, in class that day, had gotten very passionate about the toroidal planet theory as it had shown up in their Edgar Allen Poe reading, her cheeks still spotted with red from the exertion of standing on her tiptoes to draw the Earth as shaped like a donut on the blackboard. Still, he didn’t think she was Ilya’s type. Not that he spent a lot of time thinking about Ilya’s type.

As Shane watched, she reached out and squeezed Ilya familiarly on the arm before leaving the lecture hall.

He felt entirely stricken. It reminded him of when he was a child, realizing one of his schoolteachers had gone to high school with his dad. It had been strange to see Mr. Harper doubled over with laughter with David at his parent-teacher conference. This was even stranger— a new understanding of the world crash-landing in his consciousness.

I like Dr. Hartman, he remembered Ilya saying at the party a few weeks prior. Was this what he’d meant? Had he asked her out? Was that even appropriate? Sure, Ilya wasn’t her student, technically, but they’d still met in a context in which she was teaching. How they’d met at all, Shane wasn’t certain. 

He squinted, trying surreptitiously to see if Ilya was wearing his earring that day. He wasn’t. As he stared, Ilya’s cool gaze swung in his direction, but it was at the same moment he felt something poking gently at his arm and bringing him back down to his body.

“I texted myself so I’d have your number, too,” Grant said. “I’ll send you the details.”

“Oh, thanks,” said Shane, taking his phone back. Because he felt like he was supposed to, he smiled. The expression seemed to startle Grant— he blinked for a moment, something a little dazzled in his expression, before he grinned wider and slipped out of his seat.

“What were you talking to Hartman about?” Shane couldn’t help but ask as he and Ilya made their way out of the building.

“Ah, nothing.”

“It didn’t look like nothing.” Shane tried to keep the bitter curiosity out of his tone as they crossed at a light and made their way towards his next class building. “You were talking for a while.”

“What, you are jealous?”

“No!” Shane’s voice came out a notch higher than he meant for it to. Ilya snorted. 

“No, no, is okay. You want to talk to me all of the time. Maybe it is natural to be jealous when I talk to someone else?”

“Shut up.” Shane’s cheeks burned with embarrassment. He pushed the door to the academic building open harder than he’d meant to, the noise recoiling loudly in the vestibule.

“Oh, Shaney, don’t be that way,” Ilya crooned, his voice full of laughter. 

“Don’t call me that!” Shane said. Ilya had heard Yuna say it when they were parting ways back in Québec, and had yet to let the nickname die. He continued speaking, a desperate attempt to force the attention off of himself. “You were totally distracted. Not even doing your job.”

Ilya’s smug smile, if possible, grew wider. Shane’s stomach churned at the sight. “So this is what this is about. You know you have all of my attention, Hollander. Is in my contract. Trust me, I was watching you make new friend after class. Good for you.”

“Fuck off.” Shane scowled over his shoulder, face still hot with mortification, and pushed his way into the next classroom. It didn’t escape him that he’d never gotten an answer about what Ilya had been discussing with his professor.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ 

Shane meant to find a way out of the study group. He hadn’t even really meant to agree, after all— it wasn’t until he’d checked his phone after practice and seen a text from Grant containing an address and six smiley faces that he remembered he’d committed to anything at all. When he told his dad on the phone that morning that he’d been invited to go do work with some friends from class, he’d been excited about it. 

“You should go, Shane. It’d be good to have some friends outside of hockey, right?”

Still, Shane really hadn’t been planning on it— except the essay was due in two days, and he’d had made almost no progress on it. Every time he sat down to peck away at it, he found his attention waning, pulled away either to hockey or to the looming presence of Ilya, whether he was in the room or not. 

So for all of those reasons, Shane found himself knocking on Grant’s door that afternoon, unsure whether or not he would come to regret this decision. His knuckles had barely graced the wood before it was being pulled open.

“Shane! Hi!” Grant’s eyes were bright, that same big smile wobbling onto his face, before they landed on Ilya behind Shane, and the smile dimmed a little. “Oh. Aren’t you in our lecture? I’m sorry, I don’t think we’ve spoken before.”

“This is Ilya.” Shane jerked his head in Ilya’s direction. “Sorry, I should have warned you he’d be with me. He’s my bodyguard.”

“I have to do a sweep of the apartment,” Ilya said in lieu of a normal greeting. His voice was inarguable.

Shance winced, and turned to face him. “Are you sure?”

He knew that Ilya was sure. He had to do a sweep of every residence Shane entered. Sometimes, like before a party when no one noticed Ilya ducking his head into every room, it was fine. Other times, like when Rose had invited Shane to study at her sorority house, it was less fine.

Ilya didn’t even bother arguing with Shane. He just raised his eyebrow and held the expression for a moment, face mostly obscured by sunglasses that were wholly unnecessary in the December gloom, until Shane sighed and turned back to face Grant.

“Is it okay if he just takes a quick look around? I’m so sorry.”

Ilya hardly waited for Grant’s stuttering agreement before he was clomping into the apartment. He didn’t bother to take his shoes off first, and Shane rushed to apologize again.

“No, no worries. It’s not like there’s much to see.” Grant shrugged. He appeared to be right— by the time he was done with that sentence, Ilya was already stomping back up what looked to be the apartment’s singular hallway.

“I thought you said this was study group?” With those big black sunglasses still on, it was hard to tell whether he was addressing Shane or Grant. 

“I thought it was,” Shane said.

Grant’s cheeks flushed red. “There were some cancellations,” he admitted sheepishly, fingers fidgeting nervously where they were holding onto the doorframe. “Sorry. I should’ve let you know that it was just going to be the two of us.”

“No, it’s fine,” Shane tried to reassure him. “Don’t worry about it.” He sent a glare in Ilya’s direction, knowing he was aware of how nervous he was making Grant. “Are you done here?”

“Oh, is he not joining us?” Even to Shane’s eyes, it looked like Grant was trying to hide relief on his face.

“No, he’s not.” Shane made sure he was out of the way of Ilya, who sighed childishly but took a few steps towards the door.

“Won’t he be cold out there?”

“No, he’ll be fine. Bye, Ilya!” Shane made sure the door shut firmly behind him. 

It wasn’t until Grant led Shane into the living room that he understood the gravity of the situation. He’d been mentally imagining a study group. It was stressful enough to worry if there would be people there he wouldn’t know (or worse, people from class he should know, but didn’t), but he’d sort of been relying on the fact that he could hang out quietly in some corner and do some work and then leave feeling like he’d accomplished something social. This was not that.

There was a fragrant vanilla candle lit on the coffee table, the rest of the room illuminated by string lights haphazardly thumbtacked to the wall. Every stretch of paint was strewn with posters— Shane took a second while he was unzipping his coat to study a few.

“Are you, uh,” he paused, leaning in to read one. “A big fan of Lady Gaga?”

“Oh, I love her,” said Grant easily, plopping into the corner of a shabby couch and folding his legs gracefully beneath himself. A solid amount of his shyness seemed to have waned, now that they were alone. “I have all of her albums on vinyl. Do you want to see?”

“That’s okay.” Shane laughed awkwardly, taking up residence on the other half of the couch. There was a single armchair in the corner of the room, but its surface was so stuffed with pillows that Shane immediately got the impression he wasn’t supposed to sit there.“I don’t know much about music.”

“Who do you listen to?”

Shane blinked. Hadn’t he just said he didn’t know much about music?

“Uh.” He thought for a minute. “I guess I like what my dad plays, sometimes. It’s old stuff. John Prine? Willie Nelson?”

It was the first thing he’d thought of. He could’ve mentioned something more normal, something like what Hayden and JJ played during team workouts. Kendrick, or Maroon 5, or whatever it was. 

Grant giggled, which made Shane regret his choices even more. “Isn’t Willie Nelson the one who sings that song about the gay cowboys?”

Shane paused where he’d been reaching into his bag. Every single inch of his body had gone cold. “What?”

“I think my brother used to play that one when he was driving me to school,” said Grant. He reached for the slim silver Macbook on the table and began to type. “Yeah. Cowboys are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other? You know that one?”

“Uh, no.” Shane tried to hide how shallow his breaths had become. “I definitely don’t.”

If Grant noticed the panic he was inciting in his guest, he didn’t show it. He hummed and clicked around a few more times. “I’ll send you the link. My brother was being such a dick when he’d play it, he knew I didn’t want to come out yet.” He shrugged. “It’s a good song, though.”

Shane was too busy gulping down half of his thirty-two ounce water bottle to reply.

Even when they settled into doing their work, a small mercy Shane was immensely grateful for, he was tense all over. He hadn’t known Grant was gay.

Some guys on the team seemed to have a knack for it. They zeroed in on guys in the cafeteria like they had X-ray vision, immediately aware from some clue in the way their mouths moved when they talked, the way they dressed, the people they were surrounded with. Even Rose was pretty good at it. Once, he’d noticed her looking at a guy across the bar and asked if she was going to flirt with him. Rose had wrinkled her nose fondly at him and said no, Shane, I think he’s more likely to climb up your tree than mine if you know what I mean.

Shane never knew what she meant. Even now, studying Grant surreptitiously from the corner of his eye, there was no way to know that he was gay, at least not to Shane. He was wearing dark wash jeans, a Samwell hoodie, clean white socks digging into the fold of the couch cushion between the two of them as he typed his essay outline. He had nice hands, clean pink nails, not overly feminine in a way that was identifiable. He wore his hair short, cropped similarly to Shane’s. There were no earrings, no other jewelry. But did jewelry make you seem gay? Plenty of the guys on the team wore chains.

In a way, this made Shane more nervous. He didn’t spend much time alone with gay people— not that gay people bothered him, obviously, he was one. But the room was warm, the smell of the candle almost overwhelming, and his fingers were sweaty against his keyboard. When Grant asked Shane to look at his essay, he leaned way into Shane’s personal space, his chest practically pressed into Shane’s shoulder.

“Does this make sense?” 

Maybe Shane was making it up, but Grant’s voice sounded breathier than it had been when he’d first gotten there. Shane cleared his throat and scrolled through the outline, skimming it quickly.

“Uh, yeah, I think so. Better than mine,” he said, because he was supposed to. It wasn’t actually better than Shane’s, and Grant could tell, because he scoffed before leaning closer to read off Shane’s laptop.

“Dude, you’re so much farther ahead than I am. Did you go to office hours or something?”

“Uh, no.” Shane’s cheeks felt hot with embarrassment. “We had a roadie last week, so I was on the bus for a few hours. Nothing else to do but work on my homework.”

“Oh, so you’re like, a really good student then.” Grant leaned one arm on the back of the couch, propping his chin against his knuckles as he looked at Shane. “Because of hockey?”

“No, not because of hockey, just sort of how I am.” Shane shrugged. “Nobody wants a slacker for a captain, you know?”

He hadn’t meant it to be funny, but Grant laughed anyway, pushing his fingers teasingly into Shane’s bicep before he resumed his previously held position on the couch. Even with just an extra few centimeters of space between them on the couch, Shane felt himself breathing easier. 

It wasn’t like Grant was ugly. In fact, he was kind of cute. He had big brown eyes, and rosy pink spots on his skin near his jaw, and a strong nose. His lips were kind of flat and his laugh was kind of braying but on another day, Shane could see himself maybe being interested.

For a moment, he imagined it—what it would be like, on this other day, for this other Shane. Maybe he’d slide closer to Grant on the couch. Maybe he’d catch the fingers that lingered on his arm, tangle them together, maybe he’d try to tease back. If Grant had even been trying to tease, that is. It was like a puppy pawing at his leg in comparison to the chirps Shane heard in the locker room. 

He was pretty certain Grant might be giving him signals, which was what terrified Shane. Did he know? Was there something about Shane that gave it away? 

He did everything in his power to seem as not-gay as possible. His freshman year, he’d hooked up with a few girls at parties, enough in front of his teammates to be certain that they’d all seen and they would all know he’d done it. He’d endured the towel a senior whipped at his leg the next morning at practice, the teasing whoop of his name, the jeering that had followed Shane all the way back to his dorm until he could stick his hand down his pants and think about that senior again, the lean muscle of his torso.

He dressed as plainly as possible, mostly in hoodies and athletic gear, which was also his preference but served the purpose of lacking any self-expression. He only wore sneakers he’d picked because they were optimized for his tread. He avoided anything that was even a little bit gay— queer movies, books, songs, just in case someone might ask him about it. Shane would do anything in his power to crush this small part of himself deep and down into his gut. 

Still, he worried sometimes it was obvious, anyways. He’d heard one of his friends growing up say that someone had a “gay face”, and the concept had horrified Shane. It couldn’t be possible that there was something intrinsically gay about the shape of someone’s mouth, the way they held themselves. If that was true, that meant it could be true of Shane. It meant that there might be nothing he could do to hide.

Still, it wasn’t like he’d rejected any of Grant’s advances so far (if it was, in fact, advances that he was making). Contrary to the way he normally acted, he hadn’t done anything to signal his heterosexuality to Grant. He wasn’t sure why he hadn’t, but he hadn’t.

Shane swallowed and forced himself to refocus on his essay. They were only working for another half an hour before he was bowing out and making excuses about something he had to do that evening. He was starkly aware of the fact that Ilya had been sitting outside the entire time— the sun had yet to sink below the horizon, and it wasn’t that chilly outside, but it must not have been pleasant for him. 

Still, Ilya made no complaints when Shane stepped out of the apartment. His nose was flushed a little pink with the cold, but he was adequately bundled with gloves and scarf. He straightened from the bench he’d been sitting on, tucking the shabby business card he used as a bookmark into what he had been reading. Shane had taken a look at the book that morning where Ilya had left it on the counter— it was just called “We”, the author’s name long and Slavic. Shane had meant to look up what it was about, but had forgotten. 

“Ready to go?” Ilya’s voice was brisk.

“Yeah.” Shane tucked his hands into his pockets and was half a step away from the door when it opened behind him.

“Shane!” Grant’s face ducked into view. “Oh, I’m glad I caught you. You left your hat, silly. It was stuck in the couch cushions.”

“Oh, thanks.” Shane held his hand out to take it, but Grant was already in his space again, tugging the hat down over Shane’s head and straightening it against his brow. His hands brushed briefly over Shane’s shoulders, the touch entirely unnecessary, before he took a step back again.

“What’s the funny Canadian word for it, again?”

“Um,” Shane swallowed— entirely flustered by this display in front of Ilya, wondering what he would think about it. “A toque?”

“Right.” Grant giggled a little, and though Shane had heard the sound maybe a dozen times since he’d arrived (and earned it maybe only half of those times), this was the first time the noise made his posture tighten uncomfortably. “A toque. I’ll remember that. Okay. See you, Shane.”

His eyes flew to Ilya, over Shane’s shoulder, and he looked for a moment like he was considering saying a cordial goodbye to him too, but then his face changed, and he was stepping back into the apartment to shut the door without another word. Shane turned, trying to see whatever expression Ilya had been making, but it was gone. If anything, his face seemed only a little tighter than it had been moments before as they made their way to the sidewalk. 

“Sorry to leave you in the cold,” Shane said sheepishly. “I didn’t think I’d be in there for so long, but I felt bad that I was the only one who showed up.”

“It is fine.”

The silence felt like a frozen tundra between them. Shane swallowed, his hands fidgeting nervously in his jacket pockets.

“You were being scary, you know, earlier,” he said. It sounded more like a complaint than he meant it to. “I don’t like it when you scare people.”

“Is it not my job to be scary?”

Shane exhaled, the sound impatient. “Not like that. Not to my friends.”

“And is he?”

“Is he what?” 

“Your friend?”

Shane didn’t like the sound of the word on Ilya’s tongue, the derisive way he said it. “Fuck off,” Shane said, although it sounded more like an admission of guilt than he’d meant for it to.

Ilya made a considering sound under his breath, his eyes intent as they studied Shane. “Do I scare you?”

The question was unexpected, and Shane’s stomach flipped dangerously. He hoped that the way he shivered could be attributed to the bracing breeze at their backs, and not the dark, enticing tone of Ilya’s voice. He nearly tripped over an uneven patch of sidewalk, and took a moment to steady himself before he mustered up a response.

“Of course not,” he said softly. “You’ve never scared me.”

Ilya hadn’t looked away from Shane’s face. He looked for a little longer, then nodded, the motion more to himself than it was to Shane. “Okay, then,” he said as if their conversation was done, and kept walking. 

Shane sped up a little to match his strides, his cheeks flushed with an unexplainable heat. “So, I was thinking,” he said in a desperate attempt to change the topic. “I have another early skate tomorrow.”

If Ilya was surprised that Shane had scheduled ice time before class on a Monday morning, his expression didn’t betray it. He didn’t say anything to prompt Shane further.

Shane pushed on. “I invited the guys, but I don’t think they’re going to join me. They never do. So, I was wondering— there’s a bunch of spare skates in storage at the facility. I don’t know if any of them will fit you, and I know they’re probably old, but I was wondering if you might want to try a pair and come skate with me.”

That seemed to jar Ilya out of his cloud of stoicism. His head jerked a little in Shane’s direction. 

“Skate with you? Why?”

Shane shrugged, hoping the movement was as relaxed as it had seemed when he’d practiced this conversation in his room over the last few days. It had taken nearly all of his courage to bring this up. “I could use someone to run drills with me, you know? Someone to dribble with, at least?”

“Oh, so I am just warm body for you to pass to?” The bitterness in Ilya’s voice was a surprise, and it made Shane’s face turn, hard, to stare at him.

“What? No. That’s not what I meant. You’re the one who said my stickhandling was sloppy last game. You could show me what you meant by that.” 

Ilya didn’t say anything. Shane gritted his teeth, but kept going.

“Obviously, you don’t have to. I just thought…” Shane inhaled. “I thought you might miss it. Hockey, I mean. I know I would.”

He didn’t mean for his voice to sound so soft. Still, his words seemed to loosen the defensive tightening of Ilya’s shoulders. He exhaled, his eyes still cast downward as they made their way up to the front of their apartment building.

“I don’t think so, Hollander.”

Shane waited a moment, thinking there would be an excuse or an explanation, but one never came. It was just Ilya’s refusal— plain, inescapable.

“Okay,” he said, and hoped it wasn’t clear from those two syllables that something in his chest was smarting with the rejection.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ 

“This weekend was so boring without you,” Rose complained a few days later. She was in the process of getting cozy on the couch, tucking her socked feet into the space between Shane’s lower back and the cushions. The position was actually more comfortable than it would seem, and Rose gave a satisfied smile when it became clear that Shane was going to allow it.

“Semi? Why? I thought you were going with Miles?” The questions were distracted as he looked over his to-do list, trying to figure out where to start on his homework. 

“Ugh, I was supposed to, but he bailed last minute so I let Katie set me up with one of her friends,” Rose explained, twisting awkwardly to dig around in her backpack for something. Instead of unearthing her laptop or a notebook, she pulled out a blue lollipop, which had clearly been her intended result. She took their studying sessions quite a bit less seriously than Shane, but he had come to expect this.

“Was he nice to you?”

“He was nice, I guess,” Rose said around the lollipop, although she rolled her eyes as if this was an obnoxious trait. “But he was sweaty, and not funny at all, and didn’t even want to dance. Like, why come to semi if you don’t want to dance?”

“You took me to semi last year even though I told you I didn’t want to dance,” Shane reminded her. 

“Right, but you’re objectively not sweaty, and also you’re not a creep, and you always dance with me a little,” Rose rattled off, as if these were traits that made Shane the perfect date.

“You didn’t say I was funny,” Shane grumbled to himself.

Her toe nudged at Shane’s spine. “Shut up, you know you’re funny.”

This made him smile a little as he uncapped the pen. “Sorry that I couldn’t be your date this weekend.”

“That’s okay,” said Rose. Her voice changed. “I heard you had a little date of your own.”

He stiffened, looking up at her for the first time. “What?”

Her blue-tinged smile widened, teasing and happy that Shane had taken the bait. “A little birdie was asking about you at the ultimate frisbee house.”

Shane’s panic stepped off the gas for just a moment to allow confusion to fill the space instead. “What? What were you doing at the ultimate frisbee house?”

“We had a random pre-game with them.” She shrugged.

“At the ultimate frisbee house?”

 “Free booze is free booze, and they’re nice guys. Anyway, I didn’t even know you knew Grant.”

“I don’t, really,” Shane said slowly. “Do you? Is he even on the ultimate frisbee team?”

There had been no frisbees in the apartment, at least that Shane had seen. Grant hadn’t seemed like much of an athlete— although, Shane thought (and it was a shitty thought) he wasn’t sure how much athleticism ultimate frisbee required.

“No, his roommate is on the team. They hang around with Miles sometimes. It doesn’t matter.” Rose waved her hand in the air dismissively. “Anyway, he was, like, totally asking about you.”

Shane’s entire body felt cold with dread. His fingers cramped a little where he was still gripping at his pen. “What was he asking?”

Rose recognized the tone and pushed up onto her elbows, face immediately sobering. “No, no, Shane, don’t worry about it. He was just like, asking me how I knew you, because he’d heard we were friends or something.”

“Rose, um.” Shane’s words caught nervously in his throat. “You didn’t, like, suggest I was gay or anything?”

“No!” Rose’s voice pitched up with offense, genuine hurt rippling across her features. She pulled her feet out from behind Shane’s back and sat up fully on the couch. “Oh my god, Shane, that’s what you think of me? Of course, I didn’t.”

Shane had regretted the question the moment he’d asked it, knowing his was a secret that Rose kept guarded, but still, the pressure in his chest eased a little as he believed her. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that, I just-” He swallowed. “I did go over to study with him, and I think he knows I’m gay, and I don’t know how he figured it out.”

“Maybe he just picked up on it?”

“Picked up on it?” Shane asked despondently. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Rose sighed, pulling her knees up to her chin and resting it on them. “Tell me what happened when you went over there, and then I’ll tell you what he asked me about. We’ll compare.”

So Shane explained, going into too much detail about the posters and the lack of physical space and the scene with the toque after he’d left. Rose winced and nodded.

“Yeah, I mean, I don’t know, he was probably just trying to test the waters. I’m serious, he didn’t ask that much about you, but he was definitely trying to find out if you were seeing anyone.” Rose wrinkled her nose. “Actually, now that I say that, maybe he was trying to see if you were seeing me.”

“Hey,” Shane said. “Don’t make that face. You were into me, once upon a time.”

“Best ex-boyfriend I’ve ever had.” Rose sighed dreamily, wiggling her toes back beneath his thigh. “Anyways, are you into him? I mean, he’s kind of sweet, right?”

Shane sighed, digging the capped end of the pen into his bottom lip as he thought about it. “I mean, I don’t know.”

Rose made a knowing sound. “It’s nice that he’s into you, right? The attention?”

“I wouldn’t put it like that.” Shane winced.

“How would you put it?”

There was a long moment before he was finally forced to concede that yes, the attention was nice.

“And what about-“ Rose jerked her head in the direction of Ilya’s bedroom door. “What did he think?”

“What do you mean, what did he think?”

“Come on, Shane. What does Ilya think about you going on study dates with another guy?” She gasped. “Oh my god, was he in the room? Watching you be flirted with? That’s hot.”

“No, he wasn’t in the room!” Shane made a face. “And you don’t have to whisper, he isn’t here.”

“Oh.” Rose’s voice immediately returned to normal volume. “Where is he?”

Shane shrugged. “I don’t know, it’s his weekend off. You didn’t see Gavin outside when you came in?”

“I don’t really spend that much time thinking about your security situation,” Rose admitted, voice ringing with pure honesty.

Ilya had only had three full weekends off, all semester. It was part of the job, although he also sometimes got a random weekday to himself. When he was off, new security showed up, usually just guarding the door after verifying whether or not Shane was alone in the apartment. When he left to go to lecture or practice, they shadowed him the way Ilya would (except not exactly the way Ilya would, not teasing Shane for his need to be ten minutes early to every class, not trying to race him across the quad). In a lot of ways, it highlighted the manner in which Ilya was less-than-professional, but that had never bothered Shane.

Whenever Ilya came back from a weekend off, Shane asked what he’d been up to and received noncommittal answers. Ilya usually returned to the apartment to sleep, but it was always late at night. Sometimes, he stopped by during the day, but it was only to shower and change clothes, toeing off a pair of extra-dirty sneakers by the door. On one of these occasions, Shane had noticed he smelled a little like a barn. Ilya had said that he was with friends, although doing what, Shane could not fathom, before he was heading out the door again.

Maybe, he thought hysterically, one of those friends was Dr. Hartman. He’d always assumed that was code for people he was picking up at the bar, maybe meeting on a dating app or something. 

Shane tried not to let the clear fact that Ilya wanted nothing to do with him when he was off the clock bother him. These passing, impersonal answers about what he got up to on his own time weren’t supposed to sting. This was just a job to Ilya, Shane reminded himself. Their relationship essentially went no farther than coworkers.

Except he had to admit it didn’t always feel that way. Ilya, tweaking Shane’s earlobe to let him know he was blocking the silverware drawer and laughing when Shane swatted him away in annoyance. Ilya, greeting Shane with two cups in hand after a long discussion section— hot tea for Shane, an iced coffee with three pumps of caramel and cream for himself. “Don’t worry, I did not spit in it,” he’d say upon handing Shane the cup, which always made him pause and regard it suspiciously. Ilya, on his knees in front of Shane, cleaning his wounds. 

There was, of course, the other thing. The time it had been Shane on his knees, not Ilya. But Shane was not allowed to think about the other thing, and they were not allowed to discuss it. He jerked his attention back to Rose, who had been going on about her thoughts on Grant based on her limited conversation with him in the liminal space of the ultimate frisbee pregame, which Shane still could not believe she had attended.

“I’m just saying, it could be good for you,” she finished, tapping her now bare lollipop stick against her chin. “A rebound.”

Shane scoffed. “I don’t need a rebound.”

“Everyone needs a rebound, every once in a while.”

“I don’t like calling it that,” he winced. “It sounds gross.”

Rose sighed, but she looked amused. “Okay, so we won’t call it that. A hookup, then. Grant’s a good guy, I’m sure he’ll be subtle about it, but you need some dick.”

A disbelieving scoff fell out of Shane’s mouth. “Rose!”

“What!” 

“I don’t need dick,” Shane hissed, lowering his voice just in case Gavin the security guard could somehow hear them through the door. 

“Shane, it’s fine. We all need dick sometimes.” Rose’s voice was matter-of-fact, as if she was informing him of the bodily requirement for food and water. He wanted to bury his face into the couch and asphyxiate himself. “You should invite him to the party next week.”

“I’m not doing that.”

“Why not?”

“Because!” Shane rubbed anxiously at the bridge of his nose. “It’s too forward. Plus, the whole team will be there.”

“Fine,” said Rose. “Then I’ll invite him. He’ll show up with me and Miles, no one will think anything of it.”

Shane groaned, but he could already see that she was opening Snapchat on her phone and beginning to type. A moment later, her phone buzzed, and she smiled.

“See! Not so hard.” She put the phone down and gave Shane a considering look. “You know, if you’re really not into Grant, you could always ask Miles. I know he’d be down to give you some rebound-"

This time, Shane really did try to suffocate himself.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ 

It was exactly like every other college party Shane had attended, which is to say, unspectacular. Rose found him about an hour in, fashionably late as always, with her eyelids twinkling with glitter. Shane was buried in conversation with Jackie on the couch, his hands folded idly between his knees as he listened to her explain the differences between being a registered nurse and a nurse practitioner.

Rose wrapped both arms around Shane’s shoulders and squeezed in eager greeting, half-straddling the couch leg to sit close to him. She waited for Jackie to be distracted by Hayden across the room yelling something about whether or not he could take a gorilla in a fight before she leaned in to speak to Shane.

“Your boy is here,” she said conspiratorially. Her breath smelled like melon-flavored vodka. On instinct, Shane’s eyes flickered to Ilya, leaning against the wall talking to Wazny.

He looked handsome that night. He looked handsome every night, of course, but especially here— there was something about the casual brace of his foot against the wall (probably leaving a smudgy print behind), his black sweatshirt gapping at the neck to reveal a slice of clean white t-shirt and the glimmer of his chain against his throat. His curls were frizzing a little in the heat of the party, bronze waves lapping over his brow in a way that made Shane feel desperate to twine his fingers into them. 

Rose patted him on the cheek. “Not that boy, Shane,” she admonished, her voice absent of malice. “Grant. He’s by the door.”

When they met eyes, Grant waved shyly. He was wearing a navy blue button-up, his hair gelled nicely back. Shane tried to muster up a sense of anticipation, excitement at his presence. Instead, his brain felt quiet. Maybe that was a sign of something good. Maybe it was nice, not to be panicked about the presence of someone who was interested in him. 

It took another few minutes for them to actually exchange words. Rose shooed Shane off to the kitchen to get another drink, smiling like she knew something he didn’t, and she probably did, because it was only a few moments before Grant found Shane refilling his cup of water in the kitchen sink.

“You’re not drinking tonight?”

Shane turned at the sound of the voice. “Uh, not really. Went too hard the last time, you know?” 

It was a bland and only half-true explanation. He’d learned a long time ago that it was hard to get away with not drinking at a hockey party— the trick was to always have a cup in hand and to always have an excuse, if he didn’t feel like drinking. Shane hadn’t had a sip of alcohol since the champagne in Québec. The hangover he’d earned the next day, partnered with the swirling half-memory of having a panic attack in the woods in front of Ilya, had been enough to ward him off any serious drinking until the end of semester.

“Ah, right.” Grant took a step closer, the rim of his cup bumping into Shane’s chest. It was full of the jungle juice Shane had watched the rookies dump an entire box of Hawaiian Punch mix into. His teeth were stained a little red as he smiled at Shane. “Big, scary, hockey captain taking care of his teammates?”

“Something like that,” Shane said. He tried to make the step back he took be subtle— he knew he should be flirting back, knew that part of that involved letting the other person exist inside of his personal space bubble. But they were still in the kitchen of the hockey house, where anyone could see. “You think I’m scary?”

Immediately, he regretted the comment— his mind flashing to the conversation he’d had with Ilya after leaving Grant’s, the way he’d laid in bed each night since then and replayed the words do I scare you?, Ilya’s sinful long eyelashes as he waited for Shane to cough up a response. 

“Hm.” Grant made a show of running his eyes over Shane. The gaze felt like a prickling brand as it traced over him. Shane tried to convince himself this was a good feeling. “Yeah, maybe.”

“Really?” Shane took a big gulp of water. 

“Yeah,” Grant said. His voice was soft, maybe trying to be sultry. Maybe he liked the way Shane had to lean in to hear him better. “You’re intimidating, I think. Hard to read. It’s kind of cute, though.”

“Oh.” He really didn’t know what to say to that. In the other room, there was a big cheer, an explosion of laughter, the chanting that surely meant someone was being forced to chug something disgusting in the next room. Shane tried not to show that the noise was distracting him. He fixed his eyes on the bridge of Grant’s nose, a trick he used to use to mimic eye contact when he was a kid. 

Grant smiled again, and took another step closer to Shane. Now, his back was pressed into the counter, his hand fidgeting nervously where it had curled around the edge.

“Would you maybe want to-”

“Shane.” 

His head turned automatically. Wazny was leaning into the doorframe, Ilya looming behind him. It was Wazny who had called for him, but Shane found himself watching Ilya instead— wondering what he was thinking as his eyes skated between Grant and Shane, standing just a hint too close in the dimly lit kitchen.

“Beer pong tourney. You and me against Rozy and JJ.”

Shane raised an eyebrow. “Rozy?” Then, he gave an apologetic look to Grant. “I’m sorry, I gotta-”

“No, no, you should go.” Grant raised his cup in the direction of the living room. “I saw some people I need to say hi to, anyway. I’ll catch you later.”

So Shane let himself be tugged back into Ilya’s orbit of gravity, sidling up to the table. One of the rookies, Salzy, was still in the process of choking down the bitch cup from the last game. Shane winced at the realization that it hadn’t just been beer— one of the other rookies was holding onto a jar of peanut butter and a bottle of ketchup.

“Don’t worry, captain.” JJ thumped him hard on the back. “Just beer for you. Only the best.” 

In front of Shane, Ilya was already assembling the cups into pyramids. Wazny was behind him, pouring an imprecise amount of Natty Light into the bottom of each. 

Shane was pretty good at beer pong. All it really required was depth perception and hand-eye coordination, two skills he’d been honing since he first got on the ice as a kid. In fact, he sort of expected his winger to be a better partner— still, Wazny’s first shot glanced right off the table and into the small crowd who were watching. There was a chorus of teasing sounds as he went diving across the sticky floor to retrieve it. 

Shane shook his head with dismay. It was JJ’s turn to shoot. His ball landed precisely in the center of the bottom row just in time for Wazny to reappear at the table. He grinned and chugged the cup easily. 

Across the table, Shane caught Ilya’s eye. He was watching Shane with an unreadable expression, eyes dark in the swirling party lights. A sharp square of turquoise laser caught him across the jaw, casting a shadow against his nose. Shane was still staring when Ilya reminded him it was his turn to shoot.

The ball sank easily into the first cup of the pyramid. Ilya raised an eyebrow, nodding to himself as he plucked the ball out of the cup and drank. Shane felt a satisfied tingling of pride in his stomach. 

He was pretty certain Ilya wasn’t supposed to be drinking on the job. He was also pretty certain that he’d never say a word about this, and Ilya knew it, too. He felt sure that a few sips of beer at a college party paled in comparison to the straight vodka Ilya had been drinking the night Shane had met him— two glasses of the stuff, and he’d still been perfectly coherent when he slipped his hand onto Shane’s knee, asking if he wanted to go somewhere with him.

Ilya landed his next shot. Shane drank the beer, stale and warm against his tongue.

There was some back and forth. Wazny managed to land two. JJ landed another. Halfway through the game, neither Shane nor Ilya had missed a shot. It was getting harder, though, as the gaps between the cups got wider. 

“I want a rerack,” Shane announced the moment they were down to four cups. Everyone at the table looked at him, surprised.

“I thought you said he did not play often,” Ilya said to JJ as he obediently reorganized the cups on the table. 

JJ grinned. “He doesn’t.” 

Shane tried not to let the competitive satisfaction swim to his head along with the beer. He sank his next ball, and Ilya drank, his eyes fixed on Shane above the rim of the cup. 

Shane was vaguely aware of onlookers. Mostly, it was other people waiting for their turn at the table— he’d heard Hayden call for playing winner after this one, but clustered by the wall were Miles, Rose, and Grant. Miles and Rose were leaning into each other, giggling into their cups. Grant was watching Shane, his smile widening when he caught Shane’s eye.

Across the table, Ilya was tugging his sweatshirt off, like the heat of the room was finally getting to him. Greedy, Shane’s eyes latched onto the flash of muscular abdomen, the dark stretch of hair that disappeared into Ilya’s waistband as his white t-shirt got caught in the hoodie.

He missed his next throw, badly. The ball bounced limply on the table and dribbled onto the floor. The crowd erupted— he even heard Rose’s distinct come on, Shane! through the din. Across the table, Ilya’s eyebrows raised.

“You can do better than that, Hollander.”

Shane gritted his teeth. Ilya made his next toss, called for a rerack. Wazny complied while Shane sipped slowly on the cup of beer, ignoring the feel of Ilya’s hot gaze as it raked over him. If there was a flicker of recognition, realization of what had distracted Shane so badly that he’d missed that shot, it didn’t show.

In the end, it came down to this— they were each down to one cup. JJ shot, missed. Wazny shot, missed. Ilya stared down the barrel of the table at Shane, his lips curving into a confident smile. One of his eyes squinted a little with concentration as he lifted the ping pong ball into the air, mock-throwing it a few times before he took aim.

It was a very loud party, the floor vibrating with the sounds of the Pitbull song on the speakers, the air humming with chatter and laughter. Still, it felt like the entire room held its breath when the ball arced through the air and clattered solidly into the last remaining red solo cup on Shane’s half the table. 

The space exploded. Wazny was hanging off of Shane, burying his face into his collar. JJ jumped and yelled, but Shane was too busy polishing off the cup of beer to make out what he was saying.

“Shane gets a redemption shot! Shane gets a redemption shot,” Hayden made a point of reminding everyone. “Bitch cup isn’t his yet.”

“Alright, alright.” JJ made a show of taking a step back from the table. He gestured to the single remaining cup, slightly off-center on the table in front of Ilya. “Captain?”

Shane dunked the ball into an abandoned cup of water (or what he hoped was a cup of water), hoping the weight of the liquid would help the ball land true. He inhaled and exhaled, the energy of the room and the buzz of the beer swimming through his veins.

Right before he took the shot, he made the mistake of locking eyes with Ilya. His gaze was dark, focused, his mouth slick and half-parted as he looked at Shane. 

The shot missed. It bounced off the rim of the cup, swirled for a heartbeat, then flew out. Once more, the crowd exploded. Wazny groaned like he was in pain. JJ was practically on top of Ilya, his arms draped over his shoulders. 

It was Rose, supposedly Shane’s friend, who bestowed him with the bitch cup. It was full to the brim with beer, sloshing over the edge and trailing down her dark manicure. “At least it’s just beer.” She cringed as she handed him the cup. “Sorry, sweetie.”

“Et tu, Brutus?” Shane asked, but he was smiling as he lifted the cup to his lips. It was so loud, the room swirling with the cheers of chug, chug, chug. If nothing else, it was nice to be included, and so Shane did his best to chug. Beer spilled down his jaw and neck, a sensation that would surely dry unpleasantly in a few moments. Someone thumped him very hard on the back as he drained the last of the cup and set it on the table, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Good game, Hollander,” Ilya said. He was standing closer than he had been at all party, and Shane was sharply aware of the proximity, the way the edges of the room had gone fuzzy with the alcohol.

“Good game yourself, Rozanov,” he said. He poked Ilya in the arm. “You have to keep going, right? Tournament?”

“Right.” Ilya glanced over his shoulder, to where they were already resetting the table. “Hayden and Jackie next.”

“Watch out for Jackie,” Shane warned. “She’s, like, really fucking good at this.”

They both turned to look. Jackie was wearing someone’s baseball hat backwards, pouring beer haphazardly into the cups. Across the table, Hayden was looking at her like he wanted to marry her right then and there. 

“Are you going to watch?” Ilya asked, and when Shane turned to look at him again, he found that Ilya’s eyes were latched to the damp collar of Shane’s shirt before they trailed up to meet his. 

“Maybe,” Shane said. His mouth felt fuzzy and warm as he smiled at Ilya. “I’m going to go get some water, but I’ll circle back.”

Whether he was letting him know that as his bodyguard, who he had a professional relationship with, or as Ilya, who Shane would have wanted to pin to the wall if he were meeting him for the first time, Shane couldn’t be sure. He blinked for a long moment, taking in the shadows of Ilya’s eyelashes in the purple party lights, before he went off to the kitchen.

He made his way to the sink, enjoying the grounding sensation of the counter digging into his stomach as he leaned over to fill his cup. 

“I didn’t know you were so good at beer pong,” someone said behind him. Shane turned, and saw that it was Grant.

“Oh, hi.” The smile came easily to Shane. “Thanks. It was a fun game, even if my partner couldn’t really hold up his half.”

Grant crossed the kitchen slowly, and Shane was briefly reminded of a lion stalking its prey. 

“Haven’t we already met like this tonight?” 

“We have,” Shane admitted, not sure where this was going.

 “But then we were interrupted.”

“Right.” Shane nodded. His body felt like it was vibrating, perfectly in the sweet spot of drunk enough to socialize, his words loose as they slipped out of his mouth. This was good. He was tired of feeling stressed about talking to boys.

“I was wondering-” Whatever Grant was wondering about was interrupted by boorish cheers as something happened in the other room. He made a face, then turned and took another step closer to Shane. “I was wondering if you’d want to go outside with me.”

“Outside? Isn’t it too cold?”

Grant’s face fell a little, and Shane winced internally. That clearly hadn’t been the right response. “I know, but just for a second. I just...” He let his knuckles brush against Shane’s wrist, the touch too lingering to be an accident. Shane let it happen, enjoying the pleasant warmth of his hand. “I thought we could talk somewhere private.”

Somewhere deep inside of Shane’s buzzed brain, a lightbulb went off. He found himself nodding, letting Grant tug him outside by the bottom of his shirt. 

The hockey house had a pretty spacious porch, but half of it was dominated by people who were smoking. Shane made a face at this, but Grant didn’t see it. He was too busy pulling Shane down the stairs and around the side of the house. Shane tripped a little over a patch of frozen mud, but righted himself just in time to find himself face-to-face with Grant, closer than they’d ever stood before.

Shane looked nervously from side to side, but no one else was there. The side of the house faced into a fraternity that Shane didn’t know the name of, but the house was dark, no one out on the porch. From the party they’d just left, Shane could hear the remnants of music and laughter, but the noise was dimmed, like it was just a background track.

“Hi,” said Grant, once Shane refocused his eyes on him (again, the bridge of his nose, because the eye contact felt like too much).

“Hi, said Shane, though it felt stupid.

“I wanted to say thanks for inviting me, tonight.” Grant looked like he was trying very badly to squash an overeager expression. “I wasn’t sure if I was reading you right.”

“Reading me?” Shane thought it was better not to say that technically, he hadn’t invited Grant (Rose had), but it had clearly not been interpreted that way. 

“Shane.”

He became aware of the fact that the brick siding of the house was digging into his back, his shoes half-sunk into the hard dirt where white clover would sprout in the spring. Grant stepped even closer, one of his fingers tracing the hem of Shane’s shirt again. In the back of his head, Shane hoped that the other boy hadn’t stretched it out when he’d physically pulled him out of the house, then realized he probably wasn’t supposed to be worrying about things like that at a time like this.

“You know I’m gay, right?” Grant breathed. Shane could feel the air leaving his mouth, spilling warm across his chin. 

“Uh,” Shane swallowed, fighting the urge to check again for spectators. “Yes?”

Something about the way he said it must have been funny, because Grant laughed a little. Shane could feel his knuckle dragging against Shane’s abdomen, the touch transient and slightly ticklish. 

“Okay, that’s good.” Grant smiled, and his other hand came up to latch onto Shane’s shoulder. He was very close. So close, now, that Shane had to look squarely between his eyebrows. “So, let me know if you want me to stop, okay?”

Grant leaned in, his pink lips parting slightly, and Shane knew that he was about to be kissed. He knew that it was not a good idea— they weren’t fully in private, anyone could come out and see them at any time. He was in the middle of deciding whether or not he was going to allow it to happen anyways when suddenly Grant disappeared, a gust of wind accompanying his slight yelp.

“Hey, what the fuck!”

A shocking sense of clarity slammed into Shane as he took in the scene ahead of him. Grant’s arms flew out indignantly as he was dragged away from Shane, his eyes practically popping out of his head. Over his shoulder, hand gripped firmly onto the neck of Grant’s blue button-up, was Ilya.

He looked almost like an avenging angel, not that that was a thought Shane had ever had about anyone before. His cheekbones glowed silver in the moonlight, his entire face drawn and severe as he looked between Grant and Shane.

“Hollander,” he said. His tone was stark, ice cold. “It is time to go.”

“What?”

“You heard me.” He let go of Grant, who stumbled away another few steps, scowling. Mercifully, it did not appear that Ilya had brought anyone out of the party with him to witness the spectacle.

“I don’t want to go home.” Shane forced himself to stand up straighter. “It’s still early.”

“I do not care. Come on.”

Grant’s head wheeled disbelievingly between Ilya and Shane, his jaw dropped a little in shock. “Um, hey, you were interrupting something.”

Ilya did not so much as spare Grant a glance as he laughed, the sound utterly humorless. “Trust me, it did not look like much. Come on, Hollander. We have to go.”

“Why?” Shane folded his arms over his chest, hoping the motion gave off indifferent and confident rather than fucking freezing, which is what he was beginning to realize he was. 

Ilya rolled his eyes. “Because I say. Now come on.”

He turned and took a few steps towards the front of the house. Shane sighed and looked to Grant, whose surprise seemed to be settling into anger. “I’m so sorry about this.”

“Is he allowed to just make you leave?” Grant narrowed his eyes at Ilya. “I thought he was just your bodyguard? He’s not, like, your keeper.”

“No, he’s-” Shane started to answer at the exact moment that Ilya impatiently latched his hand onto Shane’s elbow and began to pull. Shane was growing tired of being dragged around all night. “Hey, come on, Ilya. At least let me say goodbye.”

“I think you have said plenty,” said Ilya. He kept his eyes straight ahead as he pulled Shane behind him, and Shane went stumbling into his back, the broad expanse of it a briefly warm reprieve from the frigid night.

“Okay, whatever!” He heard Grant call from somewhere behind them. Shane didn’t even turn to look, his eyes fixed with burning intensity on the nape of Ilya’s neck as he stomped them both all the way to the sidewalk in front of the house and then turned in the direction of their apartment. 

“You’re not even going to let me get my coat?” The surprise and confusion was beginning to leach out of Shane’s body, replaced swiftly by anger. “Dude. What the fuck. It’s freezing.”

“You will get it tomorrow.”

“I want to get it tonight,” Shane insisted, trying to pull himself free from Ilya’s grip. His breath fogged the air in front of him. “Let me at least say good night to Rose?”

“We are done with the party, Hollander.”

The finality in Ilya’s tone made even more anger flood Shane’s chest. “I don’t see how that’s a call you get to make.”

“It is my job,” Ilya said. His voice might have sounded calm to anyone else, but Shane could hear the tightness in it, the way his accent had thickened. “I do not have to discuss it with you. When I see that a situation is unsafe, we leave.”

Shane scoffed, disbelieving, even as he tramped behind Ilya down the sidewalk. “Unsafe? You’re fucking joking. How was that unsafe?”

“We will discuss when we’re home,” Ilya said. His voice brokered no other argument, and Shane found himself clamping his mouth shut if only so Ilya would not hear the chattering of his teeth.

A minute later, a warm bundle of fabric was being stuffed into his arms. Shane hadn’t even realized that Ilya was still holding his hoodie, having never put it on after the game. If Ilya was cold in his white t-shirt, he didn’t show it.

“What is this?”

“For you to put on,” Ilya said, like Shane was dumb. “If you are so cold. Cannot have son of prime minister freezing to death.”

“Oh, fuck you,” Shane said, and didn’t put the sweatshirt on. He hoped Ilya wouldn’t look at him closely enough to notice how tightly his fists had wound into the fabric.

It was odd for Ilya to bring up Shane’s title. Not that it even really was a title, of course, it wasn’t like he was royalty. It was just a position he held. Still, the reminder slammed Shane back into himself. They weren’t Shane and Ilya, right then. They weren’t two guys at a party who might have been friends, an hour before. They were the son of the prime minister and his bodyguard. It was a distinction Shane had rarely felt so sharply.

He didn’t even wait for the lock to turn fully beneath his fingers before he was snapping at Ilya. “Okay, so what the fuck was that?”

“What do you mean, what the fuck was that?” Ilya wheeled around, his brows drawn. “You sneak off at party, out of my eyesight, to kiss some random guy. Breaks protocol.”

“Oh, don’t act like this is about protocol. You were playing fucking beer pong with my fucking teammates. There’s no need to pretend you were acting like a professional tonight.” Shane kicked off his shoes so angrily that one of them left a little mark on the wall. He tossed the sweatshirt onto the end of the couch.

Ilya’s face drew even tighter. “You are right. I am sorry. Will not happen again.”

Shane really wasn’t upset about the beer pong. In fact, he’d been enjoying himself watching Ilya get along with his teammates, blending right in as if he had always belonged there. What he was really upset about was this useless, childlike feeling he’d been left with. He’d felt it before— with Jasper, with his mom, with other members of his mom’s team. In many areas of his life, there was no sense of personal agency for Shane. Ilya had seemed, all this time, to be trying to allow Shane to be his own person, to make his own choices. Tonight had been the first brutal reminder that it wasn’t true.

“You didn’t need to pull Grant off of me,” he said, returning to his original argument. “That was not cool.”

“Not cool?” Ilya repeated, then blew out a breath. “You would have been caught. If not by me, then by someone else.”

“It would’ve been fine.”

“No, it would not have been fine, Shane.” Ilya sneered a little. “Oh, I am sorry, or are you James tonight?”

Shane didn’t mean for his intake of breath to be so sharp. “Fuck you,” he said, anger coursing through the tight words. “You don’t know anything about that. You don’t get to use that against me.”

“I do not know anything about what?” Now it was Ilya whose arms were folded, his hip leaning into the kitchen counter like they were having a casual conversation. Still, his voice was stiff. “I have not forgotten how we met. You were being reckless that night, too, same as you were reckless tonight.”

It wasn’t the same. It wasn’t the same at all, but Shane couldn’t admit that. He felt the wrongness of the statement thudding through his entire body, matching the rhythms of his frustrated heartbeat. For a long moment, all Shane could do was splutter. His tongue felt too big for his mouth, his teeth so crowded he could hardly get a word out around them. He was angry. He was so, so angry.

“I wasn’t going to let him kiss me,” Shane said. “Really. I was going to stop him.”

Shane wasn’t sure if that was true. He thought it was— in the moment, he’d been thinking almost clinically about Grant, weighing whether or not he was going to let himself be kissed. There had been no heady feeling in his stomach or his head, no thrumming excitement at the prospect of being touched by him. 

If this had happened a few months prior, Shane thought bitterly, he wouldn’t have known to expect those feelings. He wouldn’t have known what it was like to want, aching, with his whole body, to be kissed.

But he did. And the reason he knew that want was now scowling across the kitchen at him.

“It does not matter if you let him kiss you or not. There were cameras, Hollander.”

Shane froze. “What?”

“Security cameras. All over the place.”

“The hockey house doesn’t have cameras on it,” Shane said, but it might have been a bluff. 

Ilya shook his head. “It does not. But the fraternity next door does. On the side of the house. If you were not caught by that one, then you were caught by the cameras on the back of the sorority house behind it.”

“How do you know?”

“What do you mean, how do I know?” Ilya’s crooked bottom teeth were showing, his words over-enunciated and pissed. “It is my job, Hollander. I pay attention to cameras everywhere we go. I know about most of the ones on campus.”

“Oh.” Shane swallowed, and it was only then that hot panic began to flood his veins. What had been caught on the footage? Would it be clear that it was Shane, allowing himself to be pulled around by a hand on the bottom of his shirt, allowing himself to be backed into the side of the house? Had Grant slipped his hand up to hold Shane’s face? How intimate had it really been? 

He fought to compose himself. “You still had no right to pull him off of me. It was needlessly aggressive. Nothing was going to happen.”

“How was I supposed to know that?” Ilya shrugged. “Listen. You want to fuck that scrawny kid? That is fine. It is your own-“

Shane watched Ilya struggle, for a moment, to find the word he was looking for. His eyebrows were still furrowed angrily.

“Funeral,” Shane filled in, at the same moment Ilya found “prerogative.” He pronounced the word like he'd only ever read it before.

For a long moment, the silence stretched before them, each taking in what Shane had said, how revealing it was. Hot shame puddled in his stomach as Ilya continued. “If you want to fuck men, fuck men. I do not care. I will not say anything. But do it here, somewhere you know is safe and secure. Do not be fucking stupid. Do not insult both yourself and me by putting yourself in danger.”

“I was hardly putting myself in danger,” Shane scoffed. He tried thoroughly to hide the way the words if you want to fuck men, fuck men were ringing around and around inside his ears like he’d been decked upside the head.

“You leave my eyesight for ten seconds, and nearly create a scandal large enough to rock both Canadian politics and the hockey world. What, you don’t care anymore about being first round draft pick?”

“I’d still get drafted,” Shane said, although his confidence was wavering a little bit.

Ilya was kind enough not to say what he was thinking, but Shane saw it on his face anyway. Yes, Shane probably would still be drafted. But he wouldn’t be a first round pick, or even second. He’d go to a team that was sinking and that, combined with the vitriolic hate he would experience in the league, would make it impossible for Shane to swim.

He was still angry. His emotions fizzed in his veins, and his hands felt like they were made of tight rubber. He was trying to keep his chin up, maintain that argumentative slant to his mouth, but Ilya’s words were sinking in. He was right. Whether it was because of the alcohol, or because Shane just hadn’t been thinking straight, there was potential that he could have wrecked everything tonight. The thought burned him. For so many others, getting caught kissing a man was not such a big deal. For Shane, it would have been life-ruining. He knew that. He had always known that. It was why he’d freaked out when Ilya became his bodyguard in the first place. It was why he’d had that drunken panic attack after his dad suggested he should start dating Rose again. It was why he was steadfastly ignoring, again and again, the feelings that Ilya incited in his stomach.

The worst part was that he wasn’t even interested in Grant. It wouldn’t even have been worth it to ruin his life for that. 

“Are we done here?” Shane gritted out. 

“I guess we are.” Ilya’s jaw was still clenched, too. He was still angry, then. Shane kind of liked knowing that they were on an even emotional playing field.

Shane was halfway to his room when he heard his name called. Always a well-trained dog, he turned.

“Why did you think I pulled him off of you?” Ilya said. “If you did not understand about the cameras.”

It was a dangerous question. Shane’s stomach flipped. “I understood,” he said, trying to keep his tone casual. “I just didn’t like how you went about it.”

Ilya’s eyes narrowed. Even though he was practically across the apartment from Shane, it felt like he was close enough to see right through him. “Liar.”

“I’m not lying,” said Shane, too quickly. Ilya’s eyebrows raised, then, and Shane didn’t recognize the expression on his face. A little sharp, a little teasing, a wolf that had found a chew toy. 

“You thought I was jealous,” Ilya said. “That is what you were saying, earlier.”

At this, a disbelieving laugh spilled from Shane’s mouth. There was no way they could be having this conversation.

“Maybe you drank more than I thought,” Shane said. “You would have no right to be jealous.”

Not after he’d made his rejection of Shane so clear, he thought but didn’t say. Shane was the one who had kissed him out of bounds, Ilya had been the one who had stopped it. He wasn’t stupid enough to cross that line again. 

“You are right, I would have no right. I do not care who you fuck,” Ilya said coolly. “Even if he would not know what to do with you.”

The sound that left Shane was practically a snarl. “What, like you would?”

Ilya was silent. Shane could tell he regretted what he'd said, the way he'd shown his cards. He swallowed, and Shane swore his eyes ticked down just a centimeter before he fixed his eyes on the floor.

Say something, Shane thought. Anything. He was a little angry, a little turned on. Something wild was racing through his body, a live-wire of energy he couldn’t tap until Ilya said the word. Ilya’s jaw twitched, but he wouldn’t look back up at Shane.

“That’s what I thought,” Shane said tightly. “Now good night, Ilya.”

It was unlike him, but Shane was so exhausted he fell asleep on top of the duvet, still in his jeans. He did not dream.

Chapter End Notes

sorry for the wait on this!! this chapter was a doozy for reasons you can probably understand :,) thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed!! come talk to me on tumblr

Chapter 6: shane walks into morning practice

Chapter Notes

as always not beta'd, apologies for any mistakes!

Shane had been avoiding Ilya for two days now.

It was admittedly somewhat difficult to avoid someone who was contracted to follow him around, but Shane was doing his best. He kept his headphones in at all times, on his walks to class and around the apartment, ignoring how annoying it was to constantly have the white wires tangled in front of him while he cooked and while he did yoga and even in his private bathroom while he brushed his teeth (just in case). He was rarely listening to anything besides brown noise, sometimes a playlist of nature sounds if he was feeling creative. 

If this bothered Ilya, it was hard to tell. His face was often impassive— Shane found him nearly impossible to read. Once he’d realized what was happening, he’d seemingly wordlessly agreed to disappear back into the bodyguard role, allowing Shane to communicate with him solely through texts if something in his schedule changed. It made Shane feel like a coward, but he convinced himself that it was fine. It was fine to attempt to entirely block out the sound of another person in the apartment, trying fruitlessly to forget there was someone there at all. It was fine to wait for Ilya to retreat into his room before Shane ventured out to make dinner. 

They had, in fact, spoken since the fight. Just once.

The morning after, Ilya had approached Shane while he was making his morning smoothie, his eyes unfocused as he watched the spinach and protein powder get pulverized by the blades of the blender. 

“Good morning,” Ilya had said stiffly. 

Shane had blinked up at him in acknowledgement, but hadn’t said anything.

“I was hoping we could talk,” Ilya continued when it became obvious Shane wasn’t going to speak. “About last night.”

Shane felt like he had barely slept, although he knew logically that at some point he had closed his eyes and reopened them several hours later. His eyes burned with exhaustion, his fingers fumbling with the lid of the blender as he dumped the smoothie out. A decidedly unblended chunk of banana plopped out and into the center of the cup, sending minute splatters of greenish liquid onto Shane’s sleeve. He barely flinched. 

“Maybe later,” he said. “I have to work on a reading before class. Sorry.”

That night, Shane swore he heard the creaking of the floorboards outside his door. He cranked the sound of the game tape he was watching in hopes that it might drown out the sound of a knock. That had been two days ago.

He couldn’t get away with avoiding his problems forever, but he could surely try. Shane didn’t feel prepared to approach the argument they’d had that night— he wasn’t proud of how he’d snapped, how he’d pushed at Ilya about crossing boundaries that Shane knew had been poorly established in the first place. In the moment, it felt like a flare of confidence, assertiveness, as Shane stood up for himself. When he came back to himself, though, it felt like he had burned his hands, and each entangling interaction with Ilya was like digging his thumb into the blisters. He still wasn’t happy, of course, with how Ilya had handled the situation, but he couldn’t act like he didn’t understand it. 

The nature of Shane’s life was to feel like he was being buried alive. He couldn’t fault Ilya for being paid to pick up a shovel.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ 

On the third morning, Shane had early ice time booked. As always, he’d invited his teammates. As always, the locker room was blessedly empty when he walked into it.

He took his time strapping himself into his pads, lacing his skates. The first clean glide of his blades on the ice immediately eased some of the tension holding court in his lungs. Shane shut his eyes, blissful, and enjoyed the cold air streaming through his throat and into his lungs for just a moment. Outside the high windows of the rink, he knew without looking that the sky was barely beginning to lighten, early-December morning curling slowly through the gray clouds. Shane began to run his first drill, soothed by the quiet shushing sound of the puck beneath his stick.

This early ice time wasn’t really so much about running drills or plays for Shane, which is why it didn’t normally bother him that none of his teammates ever joined. It was more like meditation, time for him to live solely inside of his brain and on the ice with no other distractions. He didn’t have to think about anything— not how he was going to apologize to Grant (who, he had to confess, he’d barely thought of in the last few days), or how long it had been since he’d reached out to his mom, or what his next public appearance would inevitably be. There was no clutter here, no finals stress, no worries about his team or his publicity. It was just Shane, his stick and his skates. Pure peace.

That peace was interrupted about four seconds later by the sound of a second pair of skates clattering onto the ice behind him. 

Shane whirled. Ilya was thundering over the side of the boards, completely ignoring the perfectly functional gate to his left. A spare practice jersey was bulky over his full pads, his smile crooked and still smug even when his blades landed a little awkwardly on the ice.

“What the fuck are you doing?” 

Ilya shrugged, his smile not fading a bit as he glided towards Shane. “Skating. You invited me, no?”

Shane could feel the flush crawling across his face. That was a week and a half ago. Things had been different then. 

“You said you didn’t want to.”

He’d said it quite clearly, no room to argue in a way that had embarrassed Shane. He’d regretted even asking, feeling stupid for assuming Ilya might want to get back on the ice. 

Another shrug. With a deft move, Ilya swiped out with his stick and stole the puck from where it had been perched behind Shane’s. “Maybe I have changed my mind.”

“Fuck off, give that back. Get off my ice,” Shane said, suddenly angry, but it was too late. Ilya was already off to the races, skating to the end of the rink and slapping the puck into an unmanned goal. He whooped, as if he’d accomplished something. Shane sighed.

“You can share your ice, I think,” Ilya said, skating back breathlessly. His cheeks were already beginning to flush a little, probably a combination of exertion and the cold air.

“Where did you even get pads and skates?”

“Reggie said he could help me find some extra.”

Shane’s face scrunched with confusion.“Reggie? How did you meet Reggie?” 

Ilya laughed, like there was something funny when in fact nothing at all was funny, Shane had an interloper on his rink and he couldn’t get rid of him. In theory, it was Ilya’s job to fix problems like that, but he couldn’t do that if he was the one causing it. 

“I spend so many hours standing around in this facility, Hollander. Easy to make friends that way.”

Shane blew out a breath. He’d spent many more hours in this facility than Ilya had, practically lived there for the past four years, and even he hadn’t successfully befriended Reggie the equipment manager. The man was so generally unfriendly that Hayden liked to joke that he kept such a tight inventory of the closets because it was where he stashed his bodies.

Shane remembered that he was still standing stuck on the ice, hands wrapped around his stick so tight that the knuckles were turning white. Just because he had company on the ice didn’t mean he had to entertain it. He pushed off to the side to grab another puck, setting himself up to do a different drill on the other side of the rink. 

This didn’t please Ilya. His smile dropped, but there was still something certain about the curve of his mouth. In seconds, he was skating to Shane and interrupting that drill, too.

It went on like this. Ilya inserting himself into Shane’s plays, Shane refusing to let him. 

“You know, you would be getting more practice in if you would just share,” Ilya complained. He didn’t even seem phased by the exercise, although his chest was rising and falling sharply. The curls at his temples were damp with sweat.

“I’m not negotiating with you.” Shane prodded one of his cones back into place with his stick, contemplating putting himself through bag skates if only because he knew Ilya wouldn’t be able to keep up with him.

Ilya swiped lazily at the puck. “Come on, Hollander. Let’s do that passing drill that Pike hates. I will be better at it than he is.”

Shane skidded to a stop. “Hayden doesn’t hate any of our passing drills.”

“Yes, he does.” Ilya began to demonstrate the drill he was talking about, though he kept the puck tucked neatly into his stick with no one to pass to as he skated circles around Shane. “What is it called? Lightning pass? He was whining about it after practice. Not the first time.”

Shane couldn’t ignore the fact that Ilya was clearly a good skater. His edges were clean, his pivots tight. Once, he’d sped towards the goal and pulled off a backhand trick shot that had Shane’s pants tightening a little. He would have known, even without the prior investigation of his junior league stats, that Ilya was an excellent player.

Of course, under a closer eye, he could see just an fractional second of hesitation whenever Ilya planted his left skate. He’d said his old knee injury didn’t bother him anymore, but Shane knew better than anyone that the body remembered. There were some turns he was stiffer on than others, not to mention he was wearing skates that didn’t belong to him. He might be in a world of pain later, all for this stupid stunt that Shane couldn’t understand.

After the passing drills were done (and Shane had to admit, Ilya was a little bit better than Hayden at most of them), they had just twenty minutes left on the ice. Ilya called for a game of one-on-one.

“Are you sure?” Even though he was asking, Shane tapped his stick on the ice with anticipation.

“Why, because I am playing number one MLH draft prospect?” Ilya made a show of rolling his shoulders. “I am not afraid of you.”

Five minutes later, Shane had Ilya down 2-1. Admittedly, the single goal Rozanov had scored had been a real feat, the hit clean and true. 

“Oh, no need to take it easy on me, do not worry, Hollander,” Ilya said, his plush lower lip poking out.

Shane gave him a cutting look. “You don’t want me to take it easy on you.”

“My goalie sucks.” Ilya flapped his hand in the direction of the open goal, and to his dismay, Shane let out a stupid spluttered laugh. “Is not my fault I cannot score. Also, I think you are taking it easy on me. You have not checked me once.”

“That’s because I don’t need to check you. This is just practice,” Shane hedged, and fished the puck out from under Ilya and back into play. They resumed.

One moment, Shane was flying towards the goal, certain to score again. The next moment, he was being checked into the boards.

It had to have been the most gentle check of his life. Nothing hurt, except for maybe the mildest twinge in his shoulder when it hit the glass. Still, when Ilya pushed into him, Shane found himself pinned against the boards, the puck spinning loose.

“Rozanov! Get off!”

Ilya held him there. His eyes were wide, his smile a little wonky, cheeks flushed pink. Shane was powerless to move.

“Tell me you won’t take it easy on me,” he said calmly. “Play me like you play Pike.”

“Hayden is my teammate, and you’ve been out of the game for five years.”

He shrugged. “What, you are worried I could beat you?”

“Not possible,” said Shane, and shoved Ilya off. He heard the laugh follow him all the way down the ice.

Once the first check was out of the way, they continued to play up against each other— usually nothing more than bumping of shoulders, scrabbling of sticks. They fought over the puck like children, not like serious athletes.

Shane was shocked to find another laugh rising out of him the first time Ilya swiped pettily at the puck and made a frustrated sound. This was fun. Shane couldn’t remember the last time he had true, weightless fun. 

He scored another goal. So did Ilya, and from the way he celebrated, you’d think it had been a hat trick. Shane bumped his shoulder into Ilya’s, letting him drive the puck for a half a second longer than he should have before he got it back into his possession.

He wasn’t sure how they ended up this way. The childish fighting over the puck turned into swatting hands, laughter from Ilya, a fuck off from Shane that was half-interrupted by what he refused to call a giggle. And then Ilya was pushing him into the boards again, still gentle but firm, strong, all those hours in the weight room evident behind his padding.

“Get off me,” said Shane, but he wasn’t struggling. His cheek was smushed to the glass, and he could feel it beneath his teeth as he laughed. “Ref! Ref! He’s playing dirty!”

“There is no ref, only God is here,” said Ilya, his tone half-serious, and somehow that made Shane laugh harder. 

“Dirty check!” Shane called, his voice echoing in the empty rink. 

He had no idea where the puck had gone. He’d lost possession of it what felt like ages ago, but he only noticed that when Ilya stopped pushing him into the boards, his smile dimmed a little, and Shane realized the position he was in. One thigh spread over Ilya’s, somehow, his arm braced over Ilya’s shoulders like he’d been pulling him closer in the jostle instead of pushing him off. 

Ilya was handsome. Objectively, Shane knew that, and he had always known that, but there was something about the twinkling of the harsh rink lights in his hazel eyes, the way Shane was close enough to see a faint spray of acne scars across his chiseled cheek, a few dotted along his broad and slightly crooked jaw. Beneath the helmet, his bronze curls were flattened across his brow, damp with sweat, and Shane became dangerously aware that maybe no one had ever been so attractive in his life.

He was definitely imagining the way Ilya’s eyes flickered to his mouth before returning to his eyes. Shane averted his gaze, attempting to calm the thunder of his heart. He checked the fluorescent clock on the wall.

“Ice time is over,” he breathed. “Someone else has the rink reserved.”

“Okay,” said Ilya, and gently shuffled away from Shane, who tried his best not to squirm. He knew no one would be able to tell because of the gear, but Shane was half-hard in his jockstrap. It was mortifying.

Once they were both a safe distance away from each other, Ilya let out a breath.

“Okay,” he said again. “You win. We talk now, yes?”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ 

Forty-five minutes later, after a post-practice shower (in separate locker rooms, although Shane never asked where Ilya had changed or what he had done with the spare padding) and a quiet walk across campus later, they sat in the kitchen together. Shane was nervously shuffling his knees where they were pressed against the island, resisting the urge to twist anxiously on the stool. Ilya was across the counter from him, both arms braced on the granite in a way that made his muscles bulge beneath his long-sleeved Samwell t-shirt. Shane wasn’t even sure when he’d had time to visit the gift shop, or why he would want to, but this wasn’t the moment to wonder about that.

“Are your ankles bothering you?” Shane asked, because he didn’t want to have the conversation he knew they were supposed to.

Ilya frowned. “No.”

But Shane had seen him limping out of his boots when they’d gotten home. “We have ice packs in the freezer, you know. And you should probably sit. That was a lot of time on the ice in skates you hadn’t worn before.” 

“Hollander, I am fine. I skated for my whole life. A few blisters is nothing.”

He caught himself looking down his nose at Ilya as if trying to see through him, a habit Shane had no doubt picked up from his mother. “If you need bandaids, we have-”

“First aid kit in the closet, yes, yes, I know,” Ilya interrupted, not unkindly. His expression was intensely difficult to read as he looked at Shane. “Fine. You want me to start?”

“What?” Shane asked, but Ilya was already inhaling, unleashing his next onslaught of words.

“I am sorry for the other night. The way I spoke to you was not fair. I should have taken a moment to explain to you why I was removing you from the situation, rather than pulling you from it the way I did.” He took a breath, swallowed. “What I will not apologize for is doing my job. If something like that happens again or if you are not safe, I need to know that you trust me enough to listen.”

The first realization Shane had was that it was the most he’d ever heard Ilya speak. The second realization was that he must have practiced it, the speech rolling stiff but uninterrupted from Ilya’s tongue. It made something inside of Shane soften, any sense of argument he might have still been holding onto deflating like a popped balloon.

“Er, I’m sorry, too,” Shane began, his language much more stilted than Ilya’s. “I shouldn’t have gotten so mad at you. I know you were just doing your job, and I should have trusted you in the moment. I do trust you, most of the time. I just didn’t realize what was happening with the cameras.”

“Right.” Ilya nodded. “Also, I looked into it, and I think it will be fine. You were too far away to recognize, and they are, uh, closed-loop. Footage would probably be deleted in six months, but I have fixed it. All gone.”

Shane exhaled slowly, relief tugging at his spine. He’d spent the last several days anxiously ruminating on what would happen if that footage had gotten out and how bad it might have looked.

“Thank you,” he said. 

Another tight nod from Ilya. “You are welcome.”

They were both quiet for a moment. 

“I am sorry, also, for uh,” Ilya paused, thinking. “Blurring lines. I should not have called you a liar, or said you were jealous. I also should not have been drinking with your friends. It was very inappropriate, will not happen again.”

Ilya’s head was lowered so he was speaking into the counter. He couldn’t see the frown on Shane’s face as he thought over what Ilya had said.

He knew objectively that this was the right thing. His bodyguard should not be talking about Shane’s choices in hook-ups. His bodyguard should not be entering beer pong tournaments with his teammates. Probably, there were lots of things Ilya was doing that had crossed some sort of professional boundary, but Shane found that more often than not, he liked it. He liked that Ilya had become visibly more and more comfortable in a room with Shane’s teammates. He liked that Ilya teased him, liked knowing that Ilya was paying attention in a way that was maybe more than analytical. 

(The truth, really, was that Shane liked Ilya. Full stop. But that wiggling thought was so far across the line it might as well have been in another continent, so Shane ignored it.)

“I don’t mind how friendly you are with my teammates,” he began slowly. “I think it’s nice, actually.”

Ilya’s head lifted a little.

“I mean, yeah, the drinking probably wasn’t great.” Shane let out a dry laugh. “But you weren’t drunk, right?”

Immediately, Ilya’s head darted up and he shook his head.

“No. No. My priority always is you, keeping you safe. I was not even tipsy.”

My priority always is you. Shane’s swallow felt like a scrape as he tried not to commit the words to memory, knowing with useless certainty that he’d be replaying them in his head before he fell asleep that night. 

“Okay,” he said. “So, that’s good. It’s fine. Like, maybe don’t do it again, but I don’t need you to just be all stiff and weird and in the corner when we’re at team events.”

Ilya nodded, his expression a little less rounded with shame. 

“I think-” Shane began, then cut himself off. He wasn’t at all certain about the next thing he was going to say. “I think I get confused because of how we met. It makes the blurred lines even blurrier, you know? So, when you act like you did that night, or when you say stuff about, like.” He blushed. “The stuff about Grant, it makes me feel like there’s something more going on.”

“Right.” Ilya nodded solemnly. “And there cannot be something more going on.”

The phrasing was what killed Shane. If he read into it, it seemed to dodge any potential desire. It seemed to suggest, to his stupid and willful heart, that maybe there was a possibility that it wasn’t that Ilya didn’t want something more, but that he felt the way Shane did. That if they’d met under different and less impossible circumstances, maybe they would’ve already been something more by then. 

Shane’s dad used to say something whenever he asked for something he couldn’t have as a child. If wishes were horses, beggars would ride, he’d say, squeezing Shane’s shoulder when he’d pleaded for a second bowl of ice cream or to stay up for another half an hour to finish the movie that was on. The saying had stuck with Shane. Whenever he wanted something he knew he couldn’t have (and Shane felt so ungrateful to be wanting for so much, but here he was), he thought of the horses and the beggars.

Still, a very small and very idiotic presence in the back of Shane’s brain carefully folded Ilya’s wording away into a file, saving it for later.

“Right.” He blew out a breath, fighting the urge to shut his eyes so that he didn’t have to try and read the expression rolling across Ilya’s face.  “There cannot.”

“Maybe, um, clean slate, yes? It will not come up anymore. I will not bring it up, you will not bring it up. We start fresh.”

“Okay.” Shane inhaled deeply, letting the slightly stale air of the kitchen fill his lungs and pretending it felt restorative. “We start fresh. Okay.”

A long silence permeated. Shane kept his eyes closed, the cool darkness a relief against the overwhelming visual assault of Ilya— his serious eyes, the cryptic purse of his bowed mouth, his knuckles brushed red with the dryness of winter. 

“I do still think about it, you know. I think about it a lot,” Shane admitted softly. 

His words were so quiet he wasn’t even sure that Ilya would have heard them. He said them because maybe this was the only time he could, here in the kitchen where his eyes had been closed so long that he no longer felt like he was in the kitchen at all. Maybe he was alone. Maybe he had been alone the whole time. 

He heard Ilya’s exhale, long and slow, across the counter. When Shane cautiously cracked his eyes open, he found himself pinned into place by the expression he was wearing. There was something raw there, his face drawn open and vulnerable as he studied Shane. 

It seemed to take him a moment to realize Shane was studying him right back. As soon as it processed, he blinked, and the expression shuttered itself away again.

Still, his voice still sounded a little rough when he next spoke. “I think about it, too.”

For a moment, Shane’s stomach gave a desperate and pleading little flutter. His chest rose sharply, his breath catching soundlessly in his throat. 

Ilya kept speaking. “But we can’t, Shane. Right?”

He wasn’t sure why Ilya was saying it like he was asking. Like Shane could say the word and change the fate they had been dealt. 

“Right,” he said, and wished that he didn’t feel the confirmation sinking like a stone in his gut.

Chapter End Notes

kind of nervous about this one, bit of a shorter chapter but it's because I've split this one up into two :,))) I hope you enjoyed, thank you so much for reading (!!) and let me know what you think, I should hopefully have the next part up in a few days!!!

also side note I wrote most of this chapter in a little coffee shop vestibule with someone who was wearing a rozanov raiders sweatshirt and it made me feel like I had a friend. shoutout if that was one of you (it probably was not) (but it could have been)

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Chapter 7: shane walks into a hotel room

Chapter Notes

Shane was alone in his hotel room when the flood began.

It had been a very long day. He’d woken and dressed at six-thirty in the morning, triple-checking his neatly packed game bag and his backpack in the dim light of his bedside lamp. It was out of pure strength alone that he wasn’t delayed by the sight of a tired Ilya at the kitchen counter, groaning about how it was too early. His cheeks were pale in the morning light, his hair rumpled and soft, and it took everything Shane had to swallow whatever fondness arose within him and shuffle them both off to the parking lot of the athletic facility where the team bus idled.

Before they took off, Coach Rochko had stood at the front and drummed his hands on the leather seats to get the attention of the twenty half-conscious hockey players in front of him.

“Listen up! I don’t have to tell you this, but big one today, boys. Try and get some sleep, it’s about a three hour drive. Union’s been kind enough to let us use some of their practice facilities-”

Coach wasn’t saying anything Shane hadn’t learned from his emails over the last few days, so he let his head loll back against his seat. He fought to keep his eyes from straying in the direction of Ilya’s maroon hoodie a few rows ahead.

“- and you’ve probably already noticed, but no Pike today. He’s out for a family emergency, so Chaplain, you’re up on first line tonight.” 

Shane sat up. He ignored the sound of someone smacking Chappy on the shoulder, the quiet let’s go from a few seats back as, even though Coach had already said he wasn’t here, he scanned the bus uselessly for Hayden. He hadn’t realized he wasn’t there, but now the seat beside Shane felt suspiciously empty. Shane felt an odd pang. He probably should have noticed that absence by now.

He pulled out his phone and shot off a text. Hey man, everything okay?

The bus rumbled to life and Shane barely had time to put his phone down before it buzzed with a response.

Hey yeah sorry. I’m about to board a flight, my grandma died.

A pause, then Shane’s phone vibrated again. Not like that time Wazny said his gamgam died but he was actually in Aruba. I really do have to go to a funeral.

Shane frowned and slowly tapped out a response with his condolences, asking Hayden to let him know if he needed anything. The rest of the bus ride passed through fleeting flashes of dreary highway, Shane’s eyes drifting open and shut again with restless sleep. Once they’d arrived in Schenectady, they’d hardly had a chance to absorb the details of another drizzly and small liberal arts college campus before they were dismounting the bus and heading in for team workout and warmup before their game.

The game, at least, had been solid. There had been a moment of adjustment to Chappy on his line, but Shane had scored in the first two minutes of the game. Union had put up four points against Yale the week prior, and Shane had spent at least fifteen minutes of the team game tape session pointing out any miniscule gap in their defense he could find, which had mercifully seemed to pay off. Most of the time, when one of the burly D-men came pounding down the ice towards one of Shane’s teammates, it was swiftly handled. They played cleanly, if not desperately, going score-for-score throughout all three periods until Samwell eventually scraped out on top. 

After the game, the team had been exhausted. Despite the win, it had been a relatively quiet locker room, the players pleased but wiped as they tramped back up the steps of the bus. In the hours since they’d entered the rink, it had begun to rain, heavy sheets that lashed at their shoulders in their game-day suits. Mitty had said wondrously that he hadn’t even known it could downpour like this on the East Coast in December. Shane had barely noticed, too lost in the post-game cloud, replaying what he could in his mind until he had the actual footage up on a screen in front of him. The sound of the droplets drilling the window nearly lulled him to sleep in the fifteen minute ride from the rink to the hotel, the bus rumbling soothingly beneath his seat.

After he’d gotten back to his room, the space oddly empty without Hayden’s loud sighing and collapsing on the bed, it took Shane quite a while to even notice something was wrong. It was only when he’d shut off the lights and clambered into bed that he heard the dripping.

It was different than the sound of the heavy rain hitting the windows, the noise Shane had been expecting (and even a little bit pleasantly anticipating). This was louder. Closer. When he eventually surrendered and climbed back out of bed to investigate without turning the lights on, he found that his socks squished horribly into sopping wet carpet about two feet from the wall.  

All of this to say, Shane had been having quite a nice if not exhausting day when he realized that his hotel room was experiencing a terrible flood.

Once the lights were back on, it wasn’t hard to locate the culprit. One of the windows was gushing water from the bottom unrealistically quickly. He could see, now, the swelling line of dampness spreading along the wall and underneath the second bed (the one he’d been ignoring, since Hayden usually took the bed by the windows). 

Shane spent a solid five minutes bundling every towel from the bathroom and wedging it below the flooding window, each one immediately soaked. It was like now that the leak had been spotted, it wasn’t wasting any energy on being subtle. Water poured rapidly out of the crevice, pooling onto the HVAC system jutting out from the wall beneath it. 

He felt delirious with both exhaustion and the randomness of the event. Shane had never dealt with something like this— he only had memories of a basement that had flooded once when he was a kid. Half of their DVD collection had been destroyed, he remembered, all the covers washed out and disgustingly damp beneath the plastic. But this was not a house he lived in, this was a hotel in Schenectady, New York, and it was this thought that made Shane realize he could probably safely shelve most of the slap-happy panic he was experiencing, because this was not his problem.

Shane took a second to change into dry socks before he padded down to the front desk, immediately relieved by the dry warmth and grateful that he always packed for roadies as if he might be gone for five days instead of two. He’d contemplated calling down to the lobby, but he’d never so much as called for room service before, much less had to report a biblical flood to an employee who was probably overworked and underpaid, so he tugged a sweatshirt on and made his way down to the lobby.

The girl at the reception desk looked young to Shane, her round eyes wide with surprise while he sheepishly reported what was happening in room 506. She let loose a string of effusive apologies while using a sparkly blue fingernail to punch a series of numbers into the desk phone, holding it up to a heavily pierced ear. Shane fidgeted nervously with a loose edge on the cheap reception desk, listening to her relay the information to someone on the other end of the line.

“I am so, so sorry about that, sir,” she said to Shane when she was done. “They’re sending someone up to take a look at that right now, but let me see if I can fit you somewhere else for tonight. You’re here with Samwell, right?”

Shane nodded, then tried to avoid staring at her while she began to type fervently into the keyboard. It was while he was gazing off, vaguely dissociating in the direction of a speckled carpet tile, that he heard his name.

“Hollander?” 

Shane turned, and there was Ilya, because of course, there was Ilya.

“What is going on?” 

Ilya took in the scene in front of him— Shane, pinching the fabric of his hoodie between his two fingers so he didn’t accidentally tear up a chunk of the particleboard desk, and the receptionist, a concerned furrow forming in her brow as she paused her typing to look between them. She blanched a little, eyes flickering down to the room information on her screen.

“Hollander? Shane Hollander?”

He nearly groaned out loud. Several things became clear to Shane at once; the girl had not recognized him, but she had been surely briefed on the fact that they had a highly sensitive guest staying at the hotel that night. Prior to this interruption, she been treating him like any other guest, just some average college student whose room had flooded at the mid-range hotel she worked at. All of that normalcy was about to stop.

“My room flooded,” he told Ilya. “Not a big deal. What are you doing down here?”

Ilya took a step closer. He was dressed like he’d started to go to bed and then realized he needed to run an errand, his sweats half-obscured by his bulky coat. “You should have come and told me.”

“What, so you could have brought your tool kit and fixed the window yourself?” Shane gave a small smile, but Ilya’s expression didn’t budge. “I figured I’d just wait and text to let you know what my new room number was.”

In truth, Shane hadn’t been thinking about the fact that he was supposed to notify Ilya if he left his hotel room. He’d been so frazzled by the water seeping into the carpet, the soaked towels dripping over his hands and his pants, that there hadn’t been any other thought on his mind besides rehearsing what he would say when he got down to the front desk.

Ilya’s eyes narrowed. He didn’t even have to open his mouth for Shane to fill in the blanks of what his next complaint would be. Per security policy, Ilya was supposed to always be stationed in the room next to Shane’s. If Shane was moving, Ilya would, too. Shane not immediately informing Ilya of his predicament was probably a breach of their agreement that he would do his best to let Ilya perform his job properly.

“Er, I’m sorry,” the receptionist interrupted. She tapped the keyboard with a little more fervor than was probably necessary. “We actually don’t currently have any rooms open for you to switch to, Mr. Hollander.”

“Oh,” said Shane quite eloquently.

His mind spun for a minute, as if he himself could stumble upon a solution that wouldn’t involve either sleeping in a room that had a waterfall inside of it or having to wake more members of the team up. God forbid he had to bother Coach after curfew.

He could almost see her doing some intense mental math, trying to figure out a way to resolve a problem she seemed not quite qualified to handle. Shane felt certain that if he were any other hotel guest, he might have already outright been told he had to sleep in the flooded room or find a new hotel.

“I’m certain we can arrange something, but I’ll need to reach out to my manager who is currently out of office. We’ll find some new accommodations for you as soon as possible,” she insisted.

“That’s okay,” said Shane. He hoped his tone was reassuring, but he was so tired, and this just was not what he wanted to be dealing with after such a long day. “I’m not in a-”

“Ah, do not worry about finding a new room for him,” Ilya interrupted. “He can stay with me.”

“What?” Shane’s head jerked in his direction.

“It is fine,” Ilya shrugged. “There are two beds in my room, no water. Not a problem.”

The receptionist’s face immediately washed with relief, though she tried to cover this up as her eyes swiveled to Shane. “Would that be a reasonable fix, Mr. Hollander?”

“Um,” Shane said. He couldn’t quite find a reason to say no, but there was something nervous fluttering in his stomach at the concept. Still, they’d been living together for four months. Surely sharing a hotel room wasn’t any different. “Yeah. That’s fine.”

It wasn’t until Shane bundled himself into the elevator with Ilya that he realized why Ilya had been downstairs at all. Up close, he smelled like cigarettes and fresh Old Spice.

“Seriously? You came downstairs to smoke? There’s a huge storm outside.” Shane did a poor job keeping the judgement from his voice. Ilya only raised an eyebrow at him and shrugged.

“I could not sleep. The rain was too loud,” he said simply as the doors dinged open again. “Perhaps I felt disturbance. You were not where you were supposed to be.”

Shane was sure he didn’t mean anything by it, but something about the attentiveness of Ilya’s words sent a shiver across his shoulders. He hoped it wasn’t noticeable as he fumbled around for his key card and disappeared to retrieve his bags. There were two new men in Shane’s room, one holding a bucket and the other carefully dislodging the stack of soaking wet towels Shane had stuffed on top of the HVAC. Shane pressed his lips together in a sympathetic smile as he gathered his mercifully dry belongings.

He regretted being in such a rush to move once he was shut inside the new room with Ilya. He must have showered when they’d gotten back from the game— the room was warm and a little humid with a heady smell of Ilya’s bodywash, sort of spicy and citrusy in a way that made Shane’s head spin. One of the beds was disturbed, the duvet half thrown back, the sheets crumpled where Ilya had lain. Shane forced his eyes away from the imprint and instead focused on gathering himself in front of the second bed, pristine and untouched and identical to the one in Shane’s room. This was fine. This would be fine.

They didn’t say much in the shuffle as they both got ready for bed. Ilya discarded his coat, tossing it onto the back of the desk chair, while Shane came to terms with the fact that he was wearing a hoodie that was much too warm for this room. He waited, feeling suddenly shy, for Ilya to disappear into the bathroom before he shucked it off.

Ilya had seen him shirtless a dozen times before. Ilya had seen him shirtless the first time they’d even met, his brain supplied unhelpfully. Then, even less helpfully, his brain called up the image of Ilya kissing down Shane’s chest, a teasing flash of teeth at the swell of his pec.

When Ilya finally emerged from the bathroom, Shane was resolutely curled up on the mattress facing the other direction. He waited for Ilya to turn the lamp off, and then the room went still.

Neither of them said anything until twenty minutes later when Ilya let out an exaggerated breath. “Hollander. You are tossing and turning. Stop.”

“I am not,” Shane complained, although he definitely was.

He couldn’t find a comfortable position. The sheets were too warm against his skin, the pillow not sturdy enough beneath his cheek. His mind was racing with thoughts of the other person in the room, a constant stream that sounded like ilyailyailya. His eyes snagged just for a moment on a sliver of bare shoulder blade in the other bed before Shane forced himself to stare out the window, instead. 

“You keep sighing so loudly.”

“I do not,” insisted Shane, although again he certainly had been. “I just can’t sleep.”

“Well, don’t make it my problem.” Ilya’s voice was a little slurred, like maybe he’d been drifting off until Shane disturbed him. The windows cast moonlight across his silhouette, although Shane didn’t let his eyes wander higher than the slope of Ilya’s hip beneath the duvet. He thought about whether or not Ilya would be looking at him, too, then realized he probably didn’t want to hover on the answer to that question.

Another five minutes passed. The time ticked agonizingly slowly on the bedside alarm clock. Shane tried his best to stay still, but the sheets were uncomfortable and he felt a little like he was suffocating. He finally let out a breath and threw them off, the brush of cooler air an immediate relief.

“Hollander,” came the groan from the next bed. “Stop.”

“I can’t,” Shane said, his voice dipping perilously close to a whine. He was so tired, but his brain just couldn’t latch onto sleep. 

“Do you need me to tell you a bedtime story?”

“No,” Shane said immediately, then frowned into his pillow. “Do you even know any bedtime stories?”

A pause. “Not really. In Russia, we have this one about a crocodile and a fairy, I think. My mother used to tell me it, but I cannot remember.” His voice was still a little low with sleep, but something else was there. Something sad, maybe.

“So, tell me something else.” Shane burrowed deeper into his pillow. “If you’re up.”

“I am only up because you are,” Ilya grumbled, but Shane heard him shifting on the bed. “What do you want me to tell you?”

“I don’t know.” Shane shrugged. “Your day? I don’t really know what you got up to after I went into warmups.”

“I did not get into much,” Ilya warned, then sighed. “But fine. Maybe it will be helpful. My day was so boring, it will put you right to sleep.”

Except it didn’t. Ilya talked with surprisingly specific detail about every moment of his day— being woken up by Shane’s alarm through the wall (Shane cringed a little and apologized, but Ilya waved it off) and how on the bus ride, he’d only slept an hour because Mitty had been behind him and kept slamming his knees into the back of Ilya’s seat in attempts to be comfortable. 

“I had a very okay chicken sandwich for lunch, and then while you were in team meeting, I did a quick security briefing with hotel staff,” Ilya said mildly. “Then I had to call in to a larger security debrief with the rest of the team in Montreal. John says hi, by the way.”

Shane perked up a little. “You talked to John? How’s his daughter?”

“I did not ask,” Ilya yawned. “We had other things to discuss.”

“Like what?”

He could almost hear Ilya’s smile across the aisle between their beds. “Classified.”

“I think if it’s about my security, it shouldn’t be classified.”

“Too bad we did not ask for your opinion then,” Ilya said, then continued on describing his afternoon. “While you were in the gym with the team, I talked to the head of security for the university and her people. We spoke on the phone last week, so just had to go over some stuff. Then, I escorted you to dinner, then to warmups. I watched game, and we came back to the hotel.”

“I didn’t realize you had so many meetings,” Shane said quietly. “What are they even about?”

It was hard to come to terms with the fact that realistically, Shane knew so little about Ilya’s internal world. There was practically nothing about his prior home life, his friends, what the parts of his days looked like when Shane wasn’t there that Shane heard about. Partially, he knew, that was because Ilya held a lot close to his chest, but another part of it was because Shane simply hadn’t asked.

“Security protocol and compliance, mostly. Is all boring. Not for you to worry about.”

“I don’t worry about it,” said Shane truthfully, but Ilya was barreling on.

“I know you are desperate to hear what we are all saying about you, but you have interrupted your own bedtime story.” Ilya yawned. “We got back to hotel, I showered, then felt disturbance. I went downstairs to investigate and you were there, not where you were supposed to be, so I handled security breach and now I am stuck in room with Hollander who will not stop talking to me and let me sleep.”

Shane scoffed disbelievingly. “You didn’t go downstairs to investigate shit! You went downstairs to smoke a cigarette. In a rainstorm.”

“Hotel has that big roof out front, I stay dry.” He could practically hear the shrug in Ilya’s words. 

“Whatever,” Shane grumbled.

The room lapsed into a brief quiet. The rain drummed at the window, and Shane’s eyelids were still heavy, but he wasn’t any closer to sleep.

“Bedtime story did not help?” Ilya guessed.

“It didn’t, but thank you for telling me anyways,” Shane mumbled, shuffling his shoulders against the mattress. “I’m sorry. I’ll try not to keep you up anymore.”

“No, is okay.” He could hear the rustling of the sheets across the way, but Shane kept his eyes resolutely pinned to the ceiling. 

Another stretch of quiet. Shane felt certain that Ilya had fallen asleep until he spoke again.

“I can hear you thinking.”

I’m not thinking,” Shane lied.

“What are you thinking about?”

“I just told you, I’m not thinking.”

“Liar.”

Shane huffed out a sigh, tracing his eyes over the suddenly fascinating contours of the dome-shaped light fixture on the ceiling. There was something about this— the fuzzy half-truth of time in a dark hotel room in New York, the liminal space it felt like he was occupying. His skin still buzzed with overt warmth, the rain still pounding the window, the only other noise the sound of Ilya’s breaths, occasionally audible. It made Shane feel like nothing was real. It made Shane feel like crossing a line.

“Can I ask you a question?” 

A loud, exasperated sigh sounded from the other bed, but Shane wasn’t phased by it. He was used by now to Ilya’s dramatic sighs.

“What is it, Hollander?”

“It’s about our conversation the other day.” Shane nervously rubbed his pointer finger against his bottom lip. “The thing we said we wouldn’t talk about again.”

There was no over-exaggerated sigh this time. For a long, heart-halting moment, Ilya was quiet.

“There was a reason we said we wouldn’t talk about it,” he said eventually. “We even shook on it.”

Shane had almost forgotten that part. He’d laughed awkwardly as they did it, half to settle their argument and half to agree on their clean slate. Mostly, he’d been distracted by the dry warmth of Ilya’s fingers sliding against his palm, the way the ghost of that touch had lingered long after Ilya had left the room.

“I know,” he said. “Sorry. That was dumb. Never mind. I don’t have to ask.”

Shane turned over a little in the bed, angling his knees away from Ilya’s side of the room. He dug his flushed cheek into the pillow, curling his fingers against his sternum anxiously.

“Hollander,” Ilya said. “Come back. Ask me your illegal question.”

“It’s not illegal,” Shane said, rolling back over to face Ilya. 

In the darkened room, he could just make out the sharp edge of Ilya’s jaw, a slant of cool light illuminating his cheek and his brow. He looked like something out of a painting. Shane’s breath wanted to catch in his chest at the sight. 

“I wanted to ask...” Shane paused, fidgeting anxiously with the hem of the pillowcase. “I wanted to ask what you meant when you said you still think about it. That night we met.”

The sound that left Ilya was half-laugh, half-breath. “You are the one who said it first, Hollander.”

“I know that,” Shane said. “I know what I meant by it. But I don’t know what you did, and I’m curious.”

Shane knew, of course, that when he said he still thought about it, it meant that every time he’d jerked off since August, it had been to the memory of Ilya’s body on top of his, the miles of muscled and golden skin tracing along Shane’s body. The way Shane had literally pinched himself so that he wouldn’t come too fast beneath Ilya’s tongue. It meant that he thought of the way Ilya had kissed him up against the door, the way he’d so gently re-buttoned Shane’s shirt afterward. The way he’d asked, almost nervously, if he could see Shane again. 

There were other things he thought about. The confused look on Ilya’s face when he put together that Shane had given him a fake name, and the corresponding stab of guilt. The panic and fear of the following days, the cold and withdrawn expression in Ilya’s eyes that had seemed to linger for weeks. The distinct lack of trust and communication that had flooded a space that initially had been so warm and so welcoming, the way Shane had yearned for something so delicate that he hadn’t even been able to keep it alive for an hour.

“I’m not sure you want to know what I think about.” Ilya’s voice was throaty, a little rough. Shane heard him swallow.

“I do,” he insisted.

There was no response. Shane watched his chest rise and fall several times.

“Please, Ilya,” he said eventually. His voice sounded breathy and small in his own ears. “Tell me?”

“Blyat,” he heard Ilya say softly, and then “okay.”

Shane’s heart stopped, then started galloping. He kept his eyes fixed on Ilya’s, although his expression was impossible to read in the dark.

“I think about your mouth, mostly,” he began. Shane’s breath hitched. “I think about kissing you. I knew I wanted to, the moment I saw you from across that room. You were so eager, when you let me kiss you. So responsive.”

Shane exhaled. His eyes fluttered a little, immediately overcome by the memory of Ilya’s mouth on his.

“You were talking to Rose, and I remember hoping there was nothing between you.” He laughed a little. “I remember thinking that if there was something between the two of you, then you were acting drier than a desert. I wanted to show you how it was done- I was planning on approaching you first. Did you know this?”

“No,” Shane said. His words were more air than sound. He was entirely lost in the tableau Ilya was painting for him. “I didn’t.”

“I was going to walk over there. I was figuring out what I would say to this boy with the freckles, the nice shirt, and then I look to my side at the bar and there you are, looking at me.”

Shane didn’t remember what shirt he had been wearing that night. What he did remember quite distinctly was that he had been trying, in fact, very hard not to look at Ilya. That he had been stunned and surprised and thrilled by the way Ilya had sidled close, had slipped his hand up Shane’s thigh and then, even more temptingly, just a little up the back of his shirt. Even now, the phantom touch of those calloused fingers on his lower spine made goosebumps rise along his skin.

“I think about touching you, and how smooth you were beneath me. So perfect, Shane.” Ilya’s breath sounded a little heavier. When Shane looked, his eyes were shut, like he was as lost in the memory as Shane was. “I was considering leaving a mark on your neck. Something to remember me by. But all you wanted was to put your mouth on me, so desperate, like you were made to do it. I got lost.”

Shane shifted a little against the sheets, something stirring deep inside of him.

“I wanted to take my time with you. I wish all the time that I had, wish that I had been able to convince you to come home with me.” His laugh was a little more bitter. “Of course, now I know that I could not have. Not unless we wanted to bring John with us.”

“Don’t talk about John right now,” Shane exhaled.

A pause, then Ilya’s tone changed. It became silkier, more dangerous. “Ah. You like this, Hollander? You are touching yourself for me?”

Shane blinked half-back into himself and became aware of the fact that he was, indeed, touching himself. The hand that had been self-soothingly rubbing into his sternum had shifted down, lower, and was palming desperately at his abdomen and his pecs, brushing the band of his sweatpants. There was an extremely obvious bulge just a few inches below.

“Fuck off.” Shane flipped onto his front, trying to hide the hard-on, but that was a miscalculated move. The friction that resulted between his cock and the bed made an involuntary whimper slip out of him.

“Fuck, Hollander, I have been thinking about that sound for months. Make it again.” Ilya’s breath quickened. “Touch yourself, please.”

A quick glance in Ilya’s direction revealed that he was palming himself over his sweats. At some point, he’d pushed the covers back, and Shane was left to stare at the smooth planes of his abdomen as they shifted with the movement, the thick trail of dark hair leading into his waistband.

“You’ve really been thinking about it? All this time?”

“I have been a fucking saint, Hollander,” Ilya panted. His hips rolled into the air, rocking against his hand. “You have no idea.”

“Tell me,” Shane said, his voice dangerously close to pleading.

“Wanted to take you over the kitchen counter on the first night,” Ilya groaned. “Wanted to hear you say my name, wanted to see your lips wrapped around my cock again.”

“I want that too,” Shane said. His hips rutted against the mattress, gripping at himself inside of his boxers. “Want it so bad. Want you so bad.”

“Knowing you were just a door over from me, knowing I couldn’t do anything about that fuckable mouth-”

Ilya groaned. When Shane opened his eyes, he could see that Ilya had taken his cock out. It looked bigger than Shane remembered, flushed and curved, Ilya’s fingers long and capable as he stroked himself. The sight made Shane’s mouth water. He let out a whimper.

“I’m close,” he said pathetically. It was too much, too soon. All he had was the pressure of his own hand and the mattress against his dick, the sound of Ilya’s pants and moans as he got himself off to his own fantasies of Shane. It was the hottest thing he’d ever heard. “Fuck.”

“I heard you in the shower last week,” Ilya continued. “You had such a long day, and I heard those sounds through the wall. I wanted—bozhe moi—I wanted to join you. I should have gone in there and sucked you until you were crying. Should have fucked you until you did not know your own name.”

“Jesus Christ,” said Shane, bucking desperately into his own hand. Later, he would be embarrassed at the realization that Ilya had heard him getting off, but right now there was electric heat pooling in his stomach. His face was buried in the pillow, nearly suffocating, but the image of Ilya swallowing him down had him panting desperately, drooling into the pillowcase.

Across the aisle, Ilya was still speaking, long strings of sentences about all the ways he wanted Shane.

“—those lips, fuck, your hands, all those times in the weight room. That time I walked in on you doing yoga-” His voice grew strained, his hand moving fervently as he tugged at his cock. “I got off on that for a week. Fuck, Shane, I know I can’t have you, but if I could—”

And then Shane was coming, his eyes squeezing tight, wetness spurting inside of his boxers and all over his hand as he gasped and moaned. He thrust his hips desperately into the mattress, riding out the sensation until he became too sensitive.

“Oh shit, did you just-” and then Ilya was coming too, a muffled moan, one hand clamped over his face as his hips bucked aimlessly. Shane watched, fascinated and exhausted, as come spurted over his hand and his abdomen, muscles rippling in his arms as he brought himself over the edge.

For several moments the room was filled only with the sound of two people breathing heavily, a mountain of space between them.

Then— “I should clean up,” Ilya mumbled, tugging his boxers up and over the mess he’d made on his cock. He wiped his hands with a Kleenex from the nightstand before stumbling in the dark towards his bag.

Shane waited for the bathroom door to shut firmly before he rolled over and buried his face into a clean pillow. His heart was still racing, his throat dry as he swallowed. There were so many feelings coursing through him— the ecstasy of the orgasm, the panic of what they’d just done, the glimmering echo of Ilya moaning his name. 

When Ilya emerged from the bathroom, he found Shane standing over the bed, wearing clean clothes and frowning at the sheets.

“What is it?”

“Nothing,” Shane said, but he jerked the top sheet back over the damp spot a second too late.

“What, don’t want to sleep in your mess?”

The teasing note in Ilya’s voice was enough to make Shane turn his head incredulously. Lit only by the light streaming from the bathroom, Ilya didn’t look like he was panicked. He looked ridiculously relaxed, actually, in low-slung sweatpants, his curls tousled sinfully over his forehead. Shane’s eyes flickered down to the still-damp hair of his happy trail before he forced himself to look somewhere more appropriate, trying not to envision Ilya taking a damp washcloth to his chest.

Shane couldn’t dignify him with a response. He tried not to stomp as he made his way into the bathroom, spending a cursory few minutes cleaning himself up. When he came back out, Ilya was already laying in the same spot where he’d just jerked himself off not ten minutes before.

The difference between the two was that Ilya hadn’t come while humping the mattress. Mortification burned at Shane’s ears as he realized he would have to crawl back into bed and awkwardly arrange himself all night so as not to lay in a patch of his own come. 

He wondered how much cash he had in his wallet, and whether or not it would be enough for an adequate housekeeping tip. 

“Just sleep here, Hollander,” Ilya said, like the offer came easily. His eyes were half-lidded and sleepy as he patted the bed beside him. 

“Are you sure?” Shane stammered a little, his eyes darting nervously between Ilya and the paddling pool Shane had made of the other bed. 

“Yes,” Ilya said, covering his eyes with his elbow. “Is not a big deal. Just lie down already, the light is bothering me. I want to go to bed for real, this time.”

So Shane shut the bathroom door until only a sliver of light carved the room in half (in case someone needed it at night) and curled up into bed besides Ilya. They weren’t touching, but Shane was glaringly aware of Ilya all the same— the proximal distance between his knee and the back of Ilya’s calf, stretched languidly across the sheets, and the space between Ilya’s shoulder blades and the front of Shane’s chest. There was enough space to wedge a pillow between them, if Shane was really worried about it. 

They should talk about it. He knew that. But now that he was sprawled in bed beside Ilya with his head cushioned by pillows, listening to the gradually slowing hush of the other boy’s breathing, he found that he couldn’t quite bring himself to say another word. Before he knew it, Shane was drifting off to sleep. 

At one point in the night, somewhere in the space between dreams, he woke and found himself engulfed in warmth. He was sweating a little under the pleasant weight of it, the sense of something comforting tucked up against him. He tried to drag his heavy eyelids open so he could see what it was, but found himself swelled back down into sleep before he could.

When Shane’s alarm went off the next morning, the empty sheets beside him were cold, and the shower was running.

Chapter End Notes

picture me hitting "post chapter" and then slamming my laptop shut and screaming like a tiny little mouse

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Chapter 8: shane walks into the cozy turtle

Chapter Notes

started sweating reading the comments on the last chapter saying slow burn war is over… I regret to inform you war is not in fact over. but I can promise we are out of the woods very soon :^)

please be gentle with this chapter!! as always, it is not beta'd <3

Rose nearly dropped her bowl of flour and oats when Shane told her about it.

“What?” She set the bowl safely down and then made a show of pretending to clean out her ear with her pinky finger. “I’m sorry, Shane, surely I must have misheard you. Repeat, please?”

“We had almost-sex,” Shane mumbled shamefully.

His ears felt warm with embarrassment as Rose stared at him over the chaotic array of baking ingredients she’d scattered over his counter. She’d come over that afternoon to use Shane’s oven, since she didn’t have access to one in her sorority house. She obviously had not been expecting a confession like this one while she was assembling some sort of cookie bar to bring to tech rehearsal.

“You mean, you almost had sex,” she corrected.

“No, Rose, I mean that we had almost-sex.” Shane leaned across the counter to hiss the words at her, taking extra care not to set his elbow in the plate of thawing sticks of butter again. “On the roadie this weekend.”

“Shane, that makes no sense.”

“It does to me.”

“How the fuck do you have almost-sex?” Rose frowned and continued combining her ingredients.

Shane’s cheeks went hot as he explained to her in as modest detail as possible what had happened that weekend. His brain had no difficulty pulling up the mental image in pure technicolor— the sound of Ilya’s moans, the image of his large hand tugging and teasing at his cock as he told Shane about all the ways he wanted him. What he conveyed to Rose, in comparison, was extremely tame.

“Okay, but he was like, totally normal when I got here,” she said. Then she plopped the mixing bowl into Shane’s lap. “Here, use your big strong hockey muscles to stir this. I have to start melting the caramel.”

“You’re not going to destroy one of my pans again, are you?” He winced, remembering the sound of the smoke alarm and the way the sticky black substance had refused to peel off the bottom of his favorite saucepan.

“Hey!” She pointed her spoon at him. “That was just the once. I’m an experienced baker, now. Keep telling me about the Ilya thing.”

Shane grimaced, but obediently picked up the whisk and began to stir together the ingredients. “Well, I guess that’s really it. Like you said, he’s been normal. We haven’t discussed it at all.”

He wasn’t lying. When Rose had arrived an hour earlier, arms laden with grocery bags, Ilya had popped his head out to say hi, which was actually maybe a little more social than normal, but other than that, he had been acting exactly the same. It made Shane feel like he was living in an episode of the Twilight Zone.

Neither of them had said much the morning following what Shane had begun to refer to, in his head alone, as the incident. Like the night before, Ilya had seemed perfectly relaxed (cheery, even) while Shane felt tense enough to snap like a twig. He’d practically gawked as Ilya started whistling, of all things, while helping others load their bags into the bus. They’d trundled home three hours later and Ilya had immediately gone for a nap while Shane cooked himself dinner, and the next day they were back to business as if nothing had happened. 

The only other change was that Ilya had been a little handsier than usual. The other morning, he’d reached around Shane to grab a spoon from the silverware drawer and splayed his palm against Shane’s lower back, holding him in place. Shane had let out a sound not unlike a squeak and caught the tail end of a smirk from Ilya before he moved out of the kitchen. On the way to lecture afterward, they’d started bickering about whether or not Buffalo had what it took to win the Cup that year, and Ilya had grabbed Shane by the elbow so he didn’t step into a crosswalk where a car was rolling through a stop sign. His hand lingered, slipping up to squeeze Shane’s arm for a half of a heartbeat before they kept walking. 

It was driving him crazy. Shane felt like a man possessed. Each interaction with Ilya found him praying he would be touched, that Ilya would slide their knees against each other underneath the table at the library or let his knuckles brush against Shane’s while he held the door open for him. His entire body buzzed, struck dumb with the contact, each time this happened. 

The afternoon prior, Shane had asked to borrow his pencil while they were sitting in a study room together. Ilya’s eyes had flicked to Shane’s bag, where he had to have known Shane kept at least six spare writing utensils at all times, before he nodded and handed Shane the nub of a yellow pencil he was using to annotate his book. For just a moment longer than was necessary, their fingers tangled together, Ilya meeting his eyes with that heart-stopping and all-knowing grin.

He had a habit of chewing on his pencils. Shane had been witness to it all semester— it was extremely unsanitary and (unfortunately) distractingly sexy. Shane’s eyes always caught on the reveal of his sharp white teeth, the plush pink bottom lip and gums.

So Shane took his time jotting down an entirely unnecessary note onto his study guide and traced his thumb reverently over the grooves Ilya’s teeth had left in the wood. When he handed the pencil back to Ilya, his heart jolted anew at the contact.

Shane was classy. He didn’t tell Rose any of that. He kept it down to the bare bones of what had happened at the hotel and a few of the other touching incidents. By the time he was done explaining it all, he was holding onto a bowl of well-mixed dry ingredients.

“Okay, so, he’s flirting with you,” said Rose like it was obvious. “He made a move, now he’s waiting for you to make one back. Duh. Ball’s in your court.”

“What do you mean? How am I supposed to know that?” Shane frowned. “I’m not even sure he wants me to do anything.”

He looked up at the sound of the spoon clattering against the side of the pot just in time to see Rose using two hands to grab a ginormous imaginary dick in front of her.

“Shane, I want you, but I can’t have you,” she mimicked in an accent that sounded like Dracula. “Please, put me out of my misery-”

“Okay, stop, stop, stop.” Shane fanned his hands desperately in front of himself and only narrowly avoided smacking a bag of brown sugar across the room. They weren’t speaking very loudly, but the last thing he needed was Ilya overhearing any part of this conversation, much less the parts where Rose imitated him getting off. “His dick isn’t that big.”

Rose’s eyes sparkled with mirth as she went back to stirring steadily at the heap of caramel in the pan. “That’s not what you said after the first time.”

“Oh my god.” Shane contemplated just sliding off of his stool and laying on the kitchen floor. Maybe that would make this conversation less painful.

 I just don’t get it,” she continued. “He wants to fuck you. You want him to fuck you. What’s the problem here?”

Shane squirmed. “I don’t know, don’t you think it’s kind of… bad?”

“Why would it be bad?” Rose lowered the heat on the stove.

“I mean, like, don’t you think there’s maybe a power imbalance? And, also, he’s here on a visa,” Shane began, fidgeting anxiously with his fingers. 

“Power imbalance? What, did you read that somewhere?”

So maybe Shane had been up since dawn scrolling through Reddit threads about the morality of hooking up with someone who worked for you or who worked near you or who was your coworker. Ilya, technically, was none of those things to him, but his was a very niche situation and Shane was trying to cast a broad net.

It wasn’t like he could post on r/relationshipadvice. I (M21) want to sleep with my live-in Russian bodyguard (M21). We have already had sex one and a half times. Any help would be appreciated!

“I don’t think it’s bad, Shane. I think the lines are blurry.”

Shane buried his face in his hands. “That’s my exact problem, Rose! The lines are so blurry. It’s, like, maybe there aren’t even any lines at all, but there should be.”

“You don’t pay his checks, do you? You’re not his employer. You’re also not in charge of him, like in his chain of command.” Her arm jerked as if she wanted to point the spoon at him again, but had thought better of it, since it was drenched in melted caramel. For the sake of his counters and floors, Shane was grateful. “And what does this have to do with his visa?”

“Well, I don’t want to mess with his employment,” Shane said carefully. “If we got caught, he’d lose his job, and probably because of his contract he’s on a closed work permit so he’d be able to stay until whenever it was supposed to be done, but I don’t, like, know that. What if he’s, like, blacklisted for this? I don’t want him to get sent back to Russia because of me. I think he wants to work permanently in Canada. And that’s assuming he’s even actually on a closed work permit, but he could be on an open one, which I guess would be better-“

“Why do you know so much about the visa situation?” Rose wrinkled her nose as realization dawned. “Oh my god, I bet you’ve spent hours googling it.”

Shane nodded weakly.

“… You made a pros and cons list, didn’t you?”

Another nod.

Rose’s stirring slowed. “Where is it?”

“Hidden in my desk drawer.”

“Can I see it?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Oh, you’re no fun.” She frowned at him. “And you haven’t even tried to talk to him about all this? Seen how he feels about it?”

Shane shook his head.

“Why not?” She tapped the spoon against the edge of the metal pan and Shane winced at the unpleasant noise. 

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “We’re always saying we’re not going to talk about things so we can just get over them.”

“And how’s that working out for you?”

He grimaced. She had a point.

“Listen, all I’m saying is that it’s clear he’s waiting for you to make a move. You don’t have to, obviously, but Shane, I think you’re a fucking idiot if you don’t.”

Shane frowned. “Hey.”

Evidently done with her caramel, Rose threw her hands in the air. “Whatever. It’s up to you if you want to spend the rest of the year dealing with all this homoerotic touching and not doing anything about it.”

Shane stared at her. “I’m not fully sure I understand what that word means, but I hate it.”

“I’m just saying!” She tossed her now-melted sticks of butter into her dry ingredients. “I’m rooting for you guys. Hashtag Shilya.”

He was surprised he didn’t break his neck from how quickly he whipped his head up to stare at her. “What the fuck did you just say?”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

The sun had sunk fully beneath the horizon by the time Rose was done baking. Shane had been grateful once the conversation had shifted to other topics— rehearsals for her upcoming show, whether or not Shane would come if they did a spring break trip to Miami.

“That could be a matter of Canadian national security,” he pleaded, although he was actually just hoping to avoid the over-crowded, drunken beaches.

Rose had flicked water at him from where she was washing her dishes. “You’re lame.”

When it came time for her to go, Shane insisted on walking her home. 

“Shane, it’s cold as fuck outside, and it’s only like a ten minute walk. You don’t have to do that.”

“It’s dark out! We’re going to walk you home.”

“Do you promise that the two of you will talk about your gay tension on the walk back- ow!” Rose pulled her arm out of Shane’s grasp, frowning and rubbing at where he’d lightly swatted her. 

“I’m going to tell the tabloids,” she told him smugly. “Shane Hollander, son of Canadian prime minister, hits his friends.”

“You’ve hit me way harder! Remember when you made me do that pie thing sophomore year? You nearly broke my nose.”

Rose let out an outraged gasp. “You promised you weren’t going to bring that up again. I tripped!”

Shane was still laughing as he made his way down the hall to knock on Ilya’s door, but it took a while for him to answer. Shane had to knock twice more, and was considering what he’d do if Ilya didn’t answer at all, when the door finally swung open.

“Oh,” said Shane. “Sorry. I didn’t realize you’d gone to bed.”

It was only nine at night, and he knew Ilya to be a night owl. Still, it was undeniable that he’d been asleep. His cheek was creased with the imprint of a pillow, his hair gently mussed, cheeks red and warm-looking. His eyes were heavy-lidded and soft as he blinked slowly at Shane.

Behind Ilya, he could see the lights were still on in his room, his bedsheets crumpled and a few books strewn across one of his pillows. Shane had the distinctly awkward feeling that he had just walked in on something he shouldn’t have.

“Is okay. Sorry, I did not mean to-“ Ilya’s voice was thick with sleep, his accent heavy. “Is just nap.”

“Right.” Shane nodded. “I told Rose we could walk her home. Is that okay?”

It took Ilya a moment to process. Shane wondered if he’d forgotten Rose was there at all. But then he was nodding and disappearing behind the door to grab a sweatshirt.

“Smells good in here,” he said once he’d made it into the living room. “What did you make?”

Rose brightened immediately. “They’re chocolate caramel oat bars! I left a plate for you and Shane, but here, you can try one of these. They’re still warm.” She pried open the lid of the tupperware in her hands and offered it to Ilya.

He looked like he was lost in a post-nap haze. Still, Ilya obligingly crammed the entire oat bar into his mouth. “Is good,” he said around it, the sound muffled.

Rose beamed.

Even though he’d said they wouldn’t, Shane almost did expect them to talk about what had happened a few days prior. There, under the lamplit cover of night, his face a little numb with the cold, he felt like maybe it would have been safe to bring it up. Hey, we jerked off in the same room the other night. Would you like to discuss?

But something about Ilya was still off. He was quiet as they walked— none of that attentive spark, no teasing Shane for the elaborate story Rose had told about this pool party they’d gone to their freshman year. The moment she’d disappeared behind the door of her sorority house, Ilya had let out a long exhale, and then all had been quiet.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

The next morning, Ilya slept through his alarms.

It wasn’t like him. He liked to sleep, Shane knew, but he was also one of those people who set alarm after alarm, sometimes ten in a row, to go off every few minutes. Shane had gotten used to the repeated buzzing noises through the wall while he brushed his teeth and got ready for class.

Seven minutes before they had to leave, he was just contemplating knocking on the door when he heard a muffled fuck! float through the wall. Then, there were all the noises of someone in a rush— harried slamming of dresser drawers, the gush of the bathroom sink. 

Shane didn’t say anything about it when Ilya finally stumbled out into the kitchen, his hair a mess. The clock had ticked three minutes past when he normally liked to leave to make it to lecture, which they were both aware of, but something about Ilya looked haggard this morning. His eyes were puffy with sleep, his skin drawn and pale except for the flushed tops of his cheeks. 

“Sorry, sorry,” he mumbled as he shoved his feet into his running shoes. His voice sounded a little raw.

“It’s okay,” said Shane, and was surprised to find that he meant it. Ordinarily, it’d be easy to reach for that irritated prickle in his chest and say something bitchy about being on time. But Ilya had to pause shrugging on his coat just to wipe the sleep from his eyes, the sleeves slipping off his shoulders, his breath a little heavy, and Shane just couldn’t find it in himself to be annoyed.

The cold rush of air that greeted them outside seemed to jolt through Ilya. He coughed a few times, then winced. It looked to Shane like the expression of someone who was trying to hold in a coughing fit, but he didn’t say anything as Ilya continued to let out weird little shuffling breaths for the entire walk to class.

He waited until they were halfway across the quad to ask. “Are you feeling okay?” 

“Yes, of course.” Ilya looked a little more aware now that he’d been confronted with the blistering cold of the winter day, his eyes wide and more blue than normal against his navy toque. The skin around his nose was dry and red.

“You just seem tired,” Shane hedged.

Ilya jogged ahead a little to pull the door to the psych building open for Shane, who found his cheeks heating a little stupidly as he ducked underneath Ilya’s arm. “I am fine, Hollander.”

“Okay,” said Shane, not believing a word of it. 

Ilya left in the middle of lecture. Shane wasn’t sure exactly when— he only noticed in the last five minutes of class, when he zoned out a little during Professor Vick’s question-and-answer session about their final, which was in two weeks. He was thinking about how quickly the semester had flown by, and then he’d flicked his eyes to the seat he knew Ilya had been occupying and found it empty.

He thought about texting him, but class was almost over, so he waited impatiently for Vick to dismiss them before he was one of the first people out of the classroom. His shoulders relaxed a little at the sight of Ilya, leaning casually against the wall. 

For a moment, he looked normal. Then he was buckling a little, bringing his elbow up to cough into it. By the time Shane reached him, his eyes were watery, his cheeks red.

“You’re sick,” Shane said. His voice sounded more scolding than he meant for it to.

“I am not,” Ilya croaked. The impact was lessened by the way he immediately began to cough again. “I am okay, Hollander- stop!”

He swatted away the hand Shane was trying to press to his forehead.

“No, you stop, let me just-”

Shane was too distracted to notice the bystanders watching the son of the prime minister and his bodyguard squabbling and struggling against each other for several moments. Shane found himself wobbling up onto his tiptoes as Ilya fought back until finally he managed to get one hand wrapped firmly around his wrist, pinning it down as he pressed the back of his palm to Ilya’s sweaty brow.

“Holy shit, you’re burning up.”

“I am fine,” Ilya said, but it sounded less convincing than the several other times he’d said it that morning. “I was just wearing my hat. It makes my head warm. Now, come on. We will be late for anthropology.”

“Fuck anthropology,” Shane said. He studied Ilya’s face, with his lips pale and dry, his eyes still bleary in a way that couldn’t be excused by oversleeping the way it had been that morning. He thought about the nap he’d interrupted the night before, and the way Ilya had seemed extra sore after their workout the prior morning. “We’re going home.”

“You have class,” Ilya spluttered.

Shane was already walking towards the doors. “I’ve never missed, and Garrison doesn’t take attendance. Come on. You need to go home.”

“Today was the lecture about street art and cave drawings,” Ilya whined. “I wanted to see which cave drawing looked most like you. Was going to make it your contact photo.”

“We can look at the slides later,” said Shane, pushing through the double doors and back out into the frigid December day. “Come on.”

“You cannot miss class because of me,” said Ilya stubbornly, although he was trudging in Shane’s wake. “Is not professional. I am not supposed to impact your schedule.”

Shane laughed, thinking of all the times Ilya had begged him not to force him to sit through more hangouts with Hayden, or more dull hours in the library. “Oh, and you think you’ve done a good job of that so far?” 

Ilya went silent. When Shane looked back, he was bracing his face into his elbow, letting loose another stream of coughs. By the time they made it back to the apartment, he was uncharacteristically out of breath. Shane pushed him towards his room.

“Go lay down,” he instructed. “I’ll bring you some stuff.”

By the time he made it into Ilya’s bedroom, his arms heaped with sick supplies, it was too late for him to realize that he’d never fully been inside it before. Yet another line crossed. Shane tried not to look at the loose t-shirt strung over the back of his desk chair, the haphazard stacks of books on the dresser. He stepped on more than one loose sock as he navigated toward the bed where Ilya was sitting up, his hair rumpled from the hoodie he must have just pulled on. His forehead glistened a little, clammy with sweat. 

“Put this under your tongue,” Shane instructed, passing Ilya the thermometer. “I brought Gatorade and crackers. We have a can of chicken noodle soup in the cabinet, if you’re hungry I can heat that up.”

“I don’t like the purple Gatorade,” Ilya complained, thermometer flapping loose. 

“Well, it’s what we have, so you’re going to drink it. Also, don’t talk, your temperature reading won’t be accurate.” Without quite thinking about it, Shane gently nudged him below the chin, and Ilya obligingly clamped his mouth shut.

Shane paused for a moment, his brain scanning through what else they had in the house and what else Ilya might need. “Does your chest hurt? How bad is the cough?”

Ilya raised his eyebrows, as if to say you just told me not to talk. The thermometer beeped and Shane pried it out of Ilya’s mouth, wincing at the number. 

“101.2. That’s, what, 38.4 Celsius?” Shane looked down at Ilya. “You didn’t answer me about how bad the cough was.”

“You have barely given me a chance to speak,” said Ilya, his tone a little grouchy although it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Cough is not bad. More like–” He rubbed at his chest. “Like something is stuck? I do not know how to describe.”

“Congestion? Like, kind of wet and uncomfortable?”

He waited for Ilya to nod. He kept asking questions, trying to ascertain his symptoms. Ilya’s head was hurting, his nose a little stuffed but not running. It was an active cough but not a very bad one, mostly produced by a need to clear some feeling from his lungs that he couldn’t quite get rid of. In all, it didn’t sound like a very bad cold at all. Shane had maybe been hasty in forcing Ilya home. But still, there was the matter of the fever, and the tired glaze in Ilya’s eyes. There was no doubt that he needed rest, if nothing else. 

Shane nodded to himself.“Okay. Let me go see what we have.”

He wasn’t sure who had stocked their medicine drawer, but it was comprehensive. Shane dug through piles of every variety of pain medication, pills for indigestion and heartburn, and stacks of bandaids in every size before he finally located the cold medicine. He spent too long reading the descriptions on each box before he finally settled on which one listed the most of Ilya’s symptoms.

“Here, take two of these,” he said after dropping one of the foil sheets onto Ilya’s lap. In his hands, he had a cup of water and another small glass bottle he’d dug out of the fridge. “And then you can try this.”

Ilya regarded the bottle of orange liquid skeptically. “What is that?”

“It’s an immunity boost shot,” Shane said. “You’ve seen me take them before. It’s, like, full of Vitamin C and some other stuff that’ll make you feel better, kinda like orange juice. There’s ginger, so there might be a little bit of a kick to it.”

Shane only realized his mistake when Ilya downed the shot in one desperate gulp and immediately started coughing and spluttering. “Eugh! Blyat. Iisus Khristos. What the fuck, Hollander? What was that?”

Ilya floundered for the cup of water and gulped down half of it in one go. Shane was too busy doubled over with laughter to be any help.

“That was disgusting,” Ilya whined, smacking his lips unhappily. “I think something died in there.”

Shane nearly howled, one hand clamped firm over his mouth.

“‘A little kick’?” Ilya mimicked Shane. “A little kick, you say. Hollander, this is assassination attempt. You have tried to kill me.”

“I said there was ginger in it,” Shane gasped out.

“That was worst thing I have ever drank in my life.” Ilya nearly ripped the entire packet of pills in half with the force of his grip, prizing the two round orange pills from their foil beds and swallowing them with the rest of the glass of water. 

“I’m sorry,” Shane panted, vaguely aware his lashes were wet with tears from laughter. “I should have warned you.”

“Hmm.” Now that the taste was out of his mouth, Ilya was struggling to keep his smile from his face, clearly at least a little amused by Shane’s laughter. “Is okay. I am strong and brave. Your attempt to kill me has failed this time.”

“Well, I’ll try again next week,” said Shane, although the threat might have been lessened by the way his palm was pressed, again, to Ilya’s clammy forehead. He moved it then to Ilya’s cheek, pausing for just a moment to feel the warmth against his hand.

It took him a moment to realize that Ilya was staring. His eyes were heavy-lidded, blinking slowly as he studied Shane. His cheek was plush and puffy beneath Shane’s fingers.

“Um.” He pulled his hand away and resisted the urge to shake it out beside him. The warmth lingered. “Okay. I think that should be all. You should rest, but I’ll be in the living room if you need me, okay?”

He tacked the last words on as he retreated back through the door, then felt like an idiot for it, rewinding them in his head the entire time he got situated on the couch with his laptop. I’ll be in the living room if you need me. Ilya wouldn’t need him. 

Skipping class wasn’t great, but this lecture, at least, wasn’t much— Garrison had scheduled it as a sort of pre-finals reprieve. Shane could better use the time to meagerly chip away at one of the papers he had due in a few weeks. He continued to make his mental to-do list; after that, he’d pivot to making flash cards for his anthropology exam, and then he’d put together his notes for the team about the game they’d played in Schenectady.

Half an hour later, he heard the creaking of Ilya’s door swinging open. He turned his head a little toward the sound, listening to the heavy padding of footsteps as they grew closer. In moments, he was collapsing onto the couch beside Shane in a pile of blankets. 

“Oh,” said Shane. “Hello?”

“Is better for nap out here,” Ilya mumbled. “Too bright in my room.”

“Do you want me to close the blinds for you?” Shane was already half out of his seat, laptop folded in his hands. 

“No, no.” Ilya scooched in until his hair brushed the side of Shane’s thigh, patting his knee weakly with one broad hand before he tucked it tightly into his cocoon of blankets. “Is fine. I nap now, okay?”

“Okay.” Shane ran his eyes over Ilya in profile as he nestled deeper into the couch. It was an awkward angle for staring at someone— his lashes dark against his purplish under-eyes, a flush of red around his nose where it was dry. Shane made a mental note to retrieve the Aquaphor from the bathroom the next time he got up.

Still, it was sort of nice to pass the time this way. After a few minutes, Ilya’s breath gentled until he was snoring softly, the soft shush of it soothing and rhythmic. For two hours, he slept while Shane typed away at his paper about Ulysses, which had ended up being his favorite read of the semester. 

Shane made it through a big chunk of his essay, then, when he began to feel burnt out about it, got up to retrieve his anthropology book. After a second thought, he made his way back into Ilya’s room to rescue the thermometer from where it had been stranded on a very cluttered nightstand. 

He balanced the book carefully on the arm of the couch, careful not to jostle Ilya as he resettled himself. Then, negating all of that work, he reached down and shook Ilya’s shoulder gently.

“Hey, Ilya. Hey. We should take your temperature again.”

Ilya groaned and buried his face into the couch. “Fuck off.”

“No, come on.” Shane shook him again. Beneath the layers of the blanket and his sweatshirt, Ilya’s shoulder felt damp and hot. “I’ll do all the work. Just open your mouth.”

A sleepy, satisfied smile was tugging at Ilya’s lips. “I have been waiting for you to say something like that to me.”

Shane blinked, rethinking his wording to himself. Then he flushed and pinched Ilya’s shoulder. “Shut up. Come here.”

It wasn’t quite what he meant, but Ilya took that as an invitation to shuffle himself up the couch until his head was cradled in Shane’s lap, his mouth open obediently. He kept his eyes shut, waiting as Shane slipped the thermometer beneath his tongue and patted the bottom of his chin so he’d clamp his mouth down around it. They waited. Shane tried not to dwell on the closeness of Ilya, the heavy weight of his head in Shane’s lap.

After what felt like an eternity, the thermometer beeped. Shane checked it. 

“Same temp,” he said, but it didn’t seem like Ilya had heard him. He was rolling over, getting more comfortable. Shane expected him to get off his lap, but if anything, Ilya came closer, turning over so his nose was buried into Shane’s stomach. He nuzzled close, letting out a satisfied hum when Shane brought his hand down and carded it through his curls.

He hadn’t meant to do that. It had just been instinct. Shane spent a moment blinking down at the predicament he’d found himself in— Ilya, clearly already half-asleep, comfortable with his head in his lap and Shane’s fingers curled into his damp hair. 

Shane knew distinctly that if it were anyone else, he’d be grossed out. He’d spent an entire week this semester avoiding Hayden completely because he had a hacking cough he refused to cover all the way. One of the freshmen on the team had a runny nose for most of the month of October and Shane refused to so much as share a table with him at team meals. He hated being around sick people germs, and he wasn’t particularly good at this whole caretaking thing. At least, he thought he wasn’t.

Still, here was Ilya with his face buried in Shane’s shirt. He looked so vulnerable like this, his cheeks flushed and warm. Shane forgot sometimes that they were the same age, and that Ilya was still so young to be so far from his family, so far from home. Whenever Shane was sick like this, all he wanted was his mom. He wondered if Ilya felt the same way.

Shane’s legs were cramped by the next time he made Ilya move. He hadn’t wanted to, which was something he fought hard not to admit to himself. He’d even found himself drifting off to sleep a few times, soothed by the sound of Ilya’s soft snores. He kept blinking himself back to consciousness and reminding himself that he had to keep working, until enough time had passed and he had to get up to go to a tape review.

He spent several long minutes debating his options. He wasn’t about to wake Ilya up, forcing him from his sickbed to stumble through the cold to the athletic facility. Simultaneously, over his dead body was Shane missing tape review when he was more than capable of being there. He had pages of notes scrawled out about their gameplay in Schenectady, and it was one of the last reviews before finals until they came back to playing in January. Frozen Four, if they made it there, wasn’t far off. Shane had to make sure his team was as prepared as possible.

So as much as he wanted to sit on the couch and trace his thumb over the shell of Ilya’s ear, feeling the slightly uncomfortable warmth of his breath against his navel through his shirt, Shane had to get up. He had somewhere to be.

As carefully as possible, Shane shifted Ilya gently back onto the couch and off of his lap. Ilya grumbled, but turned back over easily enough, drifting what seemed immediately back to sleep.

Shane felt a little guilty as he crept through the apartment, getting ready to leave. He knew he shouldn’t be doing this. He knew Ilya would be upset if he woke up and didn’t know where Shane was, or if he woke up and realized Shane had left without him.

Still, Shane was grown. He was an adult. He had never fully agreed to the constant shadowing of a bodyguard (even one like Ilya), and he wasn’t going to let the temporary incapacitation of that bodyguard prevent him from living his life. It would be fine. The athletic facility wasn’t even ten minutes from his front door. 

It felt like he was a kid, sneaking around the house pretending to be a secret agent or something. Shane had never zipped up his coat so slowly and quietly in his life, fighting not to let it rustle too loudly as he slipped his backpack over his shoulders. He shut the front door as softly as possible, holding the handle and very carefully slotting the lock back into the place so the sound didn’t wake Ilya up. 

It had begun to snow, thick and heavy, since they’d come home that morning. Shane tucked his hood up around his ears and relished the odd, freeing sensation of walking outside and being completely alone. There were no footsteps crunching besides his. There was no breath clouding the air besides his own. It was odd to think that this was an experience Shane had never had while at college, always accompanied either by Ilya or by John.

For four years, he had been living this way. The claustrophobia of it swam up on him quickly. He kept his head down and moved swiftly on his walk.

Hayden was the only person who noticed that Ilya wasn’t with Shane when he showed up.

“Thank god,” was all he said. He didn’t seem to be particularly concerned about the fact that Shane was alone. “I haven’t forgotten what he said about my flip shot the last time I saw him.”

“To be fair, he wasn’t wrong,” said Shane. “Sorry, but the one you hit at Union was kind of foul.”

Hayden pantomimed being stabbed in the heart. 

When they emerged from the film room, Shane’s phone didn’t have any texts or calls on it. He half-expected to be jump-scared by Ilya waiting in the hall, but it was empty as the team filed out. He waited until everyone was gone, always playing captain duty, then shouldered his bag again and headed out into the full snowstorm occurring outside.

He had one more place to stop before he went home. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

The lump of blankets on the couch didn’t move an inch even as Shane thundered through the kitchen, an avalanche of sound compared to how quietly he had left. His arms were filled with brown paper bags, and he set them down carefully onto the counter before shrugging off his wet coat and hat. 

The snowfall outside had been the kind of heavy, wet snow that melted immediately upon contact, the effect more like rain. Shane’s hair was dripping into his eyes as he stumbled into his bedroom to change into something dry and warm.

Ilya didn’t stir at all until Shane shook his shoulder again, the groan loosed from his mouth deep and raspy. 

“Come on, Ilya, there’s food. You haven’t eaten yet today.” 

His eyes blinked slowly open, a little crusty. Shane ignored the fact that this was a categorically gross thing that he couldn’t quite find it within himself to find all that gross. “What?”

“Food,” Shane said again. “I picked stuff up. Come on. I’m not bringing it to you.”

Shane had already unpacked half the bags by the time Ilya wandered in the kitchen, his steps still lethargic. His face was round with sleep, but his eyes looked brighter as he took in the sight before him.

“What is this?”

“Um,” Shane paused for a second. “One of those is borscht, the other is another kind of soup but I don’t remember what it was called. Something that started with an S. There’s dumplings in here.” He hefted the container he was holding. “I honestly don’t really know what the rest is. I told her whatever she thought was good for someone who was sick.”

Shane conveniently skipped out the part of the story where he’d shown up, pitiful and soaked with snow, to this restaurant near campus that had (according to Wazny) good Slavic food, and pleaded with the lady old enough to be his grandmother behind the counter to give him whatever she thought was best. She’d taken one look at his sopping wet hair and the credit card in his hand and wordlessly disappeared into the kitchen, returning only when she had several bags full to the brim with food. She’d pointed at each container and explained what it was in heavily accented English, but Shane could only remember so much. There were so many types of stuffed dough, a lot of things topped with onions. He’d thanked her profusely and paid what was truly a ridiculous sum of money before marching back into the storm. 

“This is from where? The Cozy Turtle?” Ilya inspected the bags, but they were unlabeled. 

“Um, yeah. How did you know that?”

He shrugged, inhaling the smell from one of the steaming dumpling containers. “Is place I go sometimes on days off. Only place around here with food like this. You order from Dorota?”

“I don’t know,” said Shane, baffled as always by the small reveals of what Ilya got up to in his free time. “There was just an older lady working.”

“Dorota.” Ilya nodded. “You should have said you know me. She thinks I am very handsome, always gives me free medovik.”

“Oh,” said Shane. He had no idea what medovik was. Feeling like an idiot, he kept himself busy by reaching into the cabinet to retrieve two bowls and plates. “How are you feeling?”

“Better,” said Ilya. Then, he set the container down, and narrowed his eyes at Shane. His stomach sank at the expression. “You said there was older lady. You saw her? Or you speak to her on phone?”

“Um.”

Realization dawned on Ilya’s face. His eyes flickered to the door, the damp patches left on the doormat from Shane’s boots. He reached out and felt Shane’s wet jacket, laid out to dry against the back of one of the kitchen stools.

“You went out.” It wasn’t a question.

“Well.” Shane swallowed. “Yeah. I had tape review.”

“Tape review,” Ilya repeated slowly, as if the term was offensive to him. “You should have woken me.”

“You had a fever. Probably still do.” Shane ran his eyes appraisingly over Ilya’s features, like he could somehow do a temperature check just through sight. “I had to go.”

“You did not have to go,” Ilya said immediately, his tone bristling. “And if you did, you should have woken me. I needed to go with. Is protocol.”

Shane scoffed. Without much thinking about it, he had taken a plate and was piling it high with food. He added a heap of steamed broccoli next to what he thought were the pork dumplings, then began to jumble some of the pickled vegetables onto it. He added a roll of brown bread on top. 

“Well, I lived to tell the tale,” he said. “No one tried to kill me. No snipers out on top of the gym- not that you could even do something, by the way, if that happened. The worst threat I faced was slipping and falling on ice, and even that didn’t happen. Do you want soup?”

Ilya nodded, his mouth drawn as he looked at Shane. 

“Which kind?”

“The shchi,” he said softly and a little petulantly, pointing at the one that looked like potato and cabbage. Shane nodded and shoved the plate he’d built into Ilya’s hands. 

“That’s for you, you should take your temperature before you eat.” He jerked his head in the direction of the living room. “Go sit down. Don’t get beet juice on the couch.”

With a face like he’d eaten something very sour, Ilya retreated to the living room. Shane put a bowl of the shchi in the microwave, watching it heat while Ilya returned to grab two forks and an entire container of sour cream from the fridge. He stomped off with both in the direction of the couch.

When Shane met him in there with his own plate and a steaming bowl of soup, the thermometer was beeping in his mouth. “100.4,” he read aloud. 

“That’s down a little, that’s good,” said Shane. Now that he was standing above him, Ilya looked very small on the couch, his eyes a little glassy and his throat still raspy. He handed him the bowl of soup and then resettled in his original spot, where Ilya had left the second fork for him.

“Shane, it is my job to go with you everywhere. To protect you,” Ilya said slowly. “I am not happy that you have done this.”

“I know,” said Shane, poking with his fork at the cabbage on his plate. “And I’m sorry that you’re not happy, but I’m not sorry that I went about my life. You were sick, and I wasn’t about to bring you with me. You probably would have passed out in the hall or something, and then whose fault would that have been?”

“Mine,” said Ilya immediately, “and at least I could have chosen to be there. Not a choice you get to make.”

Shane laughed dryly. “Of course. Story of my life. And what would have happened if you passed out? We would have taken you to the hospital, and what would you have done then? Handcuffed me to your hospital bed so I had to stay in your sight? Jesus.”

“Shane-”

“No, no,” he interrupted. “Listen. I get it, okay. It’s your job, it’s what you’re here to do. But I’m sorry, sometimes it drives me up the fucking wall that I haven’t gone anywhere alone in four years. It’s so frustrating. There’s no privacy, there’s no choice. So yeah, forgive me, but I made a fucking choice today. And it felt pretty fucking good, and I’m home safe now, so we can just pretend it didn’t even happen, alright?”

“But we can’t,” said Ilya. “If someone found out-”

“No one is going to find out. Who’s going to tell? You? Me?” Shane raised his eyebrows. “No one on the team gives a fuck. All they know is that I showed up, because I’m their captain and it’s my job. I wasn’t about to not do my job just because you weren’t in a position to do yours.”

Ilya flinched back a little. Shane half-expected a thorny response, some barb, but instead he was studying Shane like he’d never seen him before. Like he was coming to some understanding about Shane, right then and there. The look terrified him. 

“I get it,” he said finally, and then ate a dumpling. “Suffocating, sometimes, to be you, yes?”

Shane shut his eyes, considering the words. He couldn't decipher whether or not they were biting. If they were, he would deserve it.  

He didn’t want to be ungrateful. He lived a great life. He attended one of the best hockey schools in the nation. He was getting a great education at entirely no expense to himself (and even if he was paying, his future hockey salary would be more than enough to cover it). He spent most of his life in homes that were well-furnished and peaceful, surrounded by people who only wanted the best for him.

Still, he nodded just a little. Sometimes, it was quite suffocating to be Shane.

“Okay,” said Ilya. “Next time it feels this way, we talk about it, okay? Maybe there is a way for you to feel like you have space.”

There isn’t, Shane thought but didn’t say. Instead, he nodded jerkily and impaled a dumpling (pelmeni, as Ilya informed him a few minutes later) with his fork.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

An hour later, Ilya insisted he was feeling a lot better, although he didn’t protest when Shane put on something dumb and animated for him to watch while he stayed curled up on one end of the couch. Shane busied himself doing things on his laptop, although he was pretty much caught up on all of his work. Mostly, although he’d never admit it, he was sitting there absorbing the warmth of Ilya next to him on the couch, the little noises he was making as he watched the movie. 

When the movie rolled to an end, it was nine o’clock. Ilya turned off the TV, then got silently off the couch and left the room. A little part of Shane’s stomach sank wistfully. He hadn’t even said goodnight, which felt like a far cry from the behavior of this afternoon— Shane was still thinking about the pleasant weight of Ilya’s head resting in his lap, the softness of his hair between Shane’s fingers.

Moments later, Ilya padded back into the room, book and pencil in hand. With a loud huff, he plopped back down into the space he’d previously occupied, as if nothing had happened. Shane hid his smile in the palm of his hand.

The room was hushed, lit by low lamplight. Out the window, snow streamed down, bunching up on the windowsill. Shane found that he was growing tired, but he didn’t want to be the first one to get up and ruin the moment.

Ilya seemed to be turning his pages at a snail’s pace, probably as tired as Shane. Still, when he realized Shane seemed to be taking a break from his work and staring off into space, he settled the book against his chest.

“I’m going to class tomorrow,” he said determinedly.

Shane looked at him. “Not if your fever doesn’t break by then." 

“My fever is broken already.”

Shane reached for the thermometer on the living room table and chucked it in Ilya’s direction. “Prove it.”

They studied each other while waiting for the thermometer to beep. Ilya’s eyes were dark, half-lidded as he looked at Shane. When he wiggled his toes, they brushed against Shane’s thigh, and he couldn’t tell if the touch was an accident.

“You know, you have a lot of friends,” said Shane randomly, thinking about earlier that day. Dorota, the lady at the Cozy Turtle. Reggie, the equipment manager. Shane’s teammates. He wasn’t quite sure what he was getting at, but the thought was wiggling at his brain.

Ilya’s lips pursed around the thermometer. He pulled it out, even though it hadn’t beeped yet. “Yes, Hollander. I am very likable. Good with people.”

“I guess,” said Shane, although it wasn’t much of a response.

“Many people like me very much, you know,” said Ilya. “I think you do, too.”

 He was still staring at Shane, his expression indecipherable. His eyes dipped incrementally to Shane’s mouth before they traced back up again.

“You didn’t finish taking your temperature,” Shane croaked nervously, jerking his head back to his laptop. He was in the middle of typing out an email to his coach, one he would schedule send for the morning. He could feel the rebellious heat of Ilya’s eyes tracing down his side profile even while Shane steadfastly refused to look that way. He only broke once he heard the thermometer beep.

“99.4,” Ilya read aloud. “See? No fever.”

“You’re not out of the woods yet,” said Shane. “That’s 37.4 Celsius. Low-grade.”

Ilya threw the thermometer back at Shane and rolled his eyes, picking his book back up. The room lapsed once again into that hushed silence. From the kitchen, he could hear the hum of the dishwasher. He could feel Ilya’s socked feet pressed against his thigh. 

Twenty minutes later, Shane looked over and found Ilya dead asleep— book flat on his chest, pencil nub dangling from loose fingers. He was immensely grateful that no one in the room was conscious enough to see the fond smile that split over his face. 

Chapter End Notes

I hope you enjoyed!!! sorry if maybe wasn't what you expected after the last one, but I have been super excited to write this chapter.

my intention statement with this fic so far has been to write it as indulgent and fun and fanfiction-y as possible. so fuck it sickfic chapter! fuck it inverting the caretaker dynamic!! if you’ve ever read anything else i’ve put out on ao3 you’ll know i’m addicted to making shane take care of ilya and this is no different lol.

anyways thank you for reading :)) and also thank you so much for all the comments on the last chapter!! I was honestly overwhelmed but like in the best way. it means a lot to me!!

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Chapter 9: shane walks into ilya's room

Chapter Notes

not beta'd and I am so sleepy. let me know if there are any truly egregious errors! <3

“Cap.” A large hand clamped down on Shane’s shoulder as he made his way out of the practice facility, post team workout. “Tell me why Pike says you’re not coming out with us tonight.”

Shane smiled wanly at JJ. “Because I’m not going out with you guys tonight.”

 He hadn’t realized half the team was walking out behind them, but he heard their loud groans echoing down the corridor.

“Come on, Hollzy!” That was Mitty, now, smacking his hand onto Shane’s backpack. “Last Friday before finals. Let’s get it.”

“Sorry, guys,” Shane said. “I have to get work done tonight.”

More groaning. Technically, Shane was telling the truth. He had an infinite amount of studying to do before finals week, and hadn’t even made it through half the vocab terms he needed to learn for two of his exams. More than that, though, was just the simple truth that he had no desire to spend his evening in a very loud and very sweaty room when he could be safely and happily ensconced in his apartment.

Hayden thundered up beside them. “Would it help if I told you it was Jackie’s birthday, and we needed you to celebrate?”

Shane made a face. “Jackie’s birthday isn’t until April, isn’t it?”

“Oh.” Hayden’s smile dropped. “I was hoping you wouldn’t know that.”

He couldn’t help but continue. “Plus, Jackie isn’t even going out tonight. She and Allison are studying at the Brig.”

They reached the double doors leading outside and stopped walking, the team puddling around Shane as they procrastinated heading back into the cold. He accidentally caught eyes with Ilya, hovering several feet back from the group.

“Dude, how do you know that?” Mitty frowned. “No one told me, and I was literally with Ally this morning.”

“She texted me.” Shane looped his hand casually through the strap of his backpack. “They invited me to join.”

“What?” Hayden’s jaw dropped. “Jackie’s studying neuro tonight. She never lets me go to the library with her if it’s neuro.”

Shane shrugged, tracing one of the floor tiles with his shoe. “I don’t know, maybe I’m not distracting?”

Both Hayden and Mitty scoffed, rolling their eyes at each other. From the back of the group, one of the freshmen piped up.

“Guys. Isn’t anyone worried about the fact that Hollzy’s about to steal your girlfriends?”

A pool of ice water cracked open inside of Shane’s chest, the way it always did when someone put his name in the same sentence as the word ‘girlfriend’. His head jerked up, and he prepared an apology, wondering if maybe he had been playing it too close with Jackie and Allison. They were his friends. It was normal to be friends with girls, right?

Again, he locked eyes with Ilya, who had one eyebrow raised with interest.

But then Hayden laughed, and clapped Shane on the shoulder. “Dude, I’d be more worried about fucking Reggie stealing my girlfriend than I would be about Hollz.” 

At that, the group exploded, half laughter and half telling their most recent Reggie stories. One of them had seen him disappearing into a utility closet with a bucket of dry ice. One of them swore he had two pet turtles living in his office. Shane took a shaky inhale, trying to calm the riotous way his heart had begun to beat. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

That night, Shane couldn’t find it within himself to regret his decision to stay in. Outside the living room window, the sky was growing incrementally darker, so crowded with clouds that there was no semblance of a sunset. Shane was sitting legs folded on the couch, working on his flashcards in the warm lamplight. A foot away from him, Ilya was sprawled, legs thrown wide open with one foot propped on the coffee table as he played Skyrim.

Neither of them had spoken much about the day when Ilya was sick. It had just been a 24-hour-bug; here one day, gone the next. Maybe Ilya had just needed to rest. Maybe Shane had just needed an opportunity to think.

It was stupid, but it felt like something had changed. Every night since then had found the two of them in the living room, although they never touched. Ilya, of course, never put his head back in Shane’s lap. Shane, of course, didn’t even miss it.

He felt guilty for some aspects of the conversation they’d had after Ilya was sick. He did feel, admittedly, a little guilty for endangering Ilya’s job. He also couldn’t stop replaying the way he’d snapped— I wasn’t about to not do my job just because you weren’t in a position to do yours. It wasn’t how he’d been raised, to speak to people like that. It wasn’t Ilya’s fault that he’d gotten sick, and it also wasn’t Ilya’s fault that Shane lived the life he did. Still, any time he opened his mouth to reopen the subject and apologize, he found himself shrinking shut again. He was embarrassed, maybe. Ashamed.

“Don’t go into that cave,” he warned. “There’s going to be a shitload of frostbite spiders in there.”

“I hate those fuckers,” Ilya murmured, controller clicking in his hand as he did exactly what Shane had just told him not to. A series of feral cries exploded from the speakers.

“Dude,” said Shane. “Stop wasting your arrows. Use your silver sword.”

He watched Ilya shoot through half his quiver before he finally sighed, annoyed, and listened to Shane’s advice. The spiders went down a moment later, and Shane adjusted his shoulders, satisfied, against the couch.

“Okay, I lied,” he said a few minutes later. “You’re going to need your arrows again for this thing up here, I think.”

Ilya sighed loudly again and rolled his eyes. “Oh, I am sorry, do you want controller? Is your turn, since you want to play so badly?”

“Oh, sorry,” Shane said, his cheeks burning. He dragged his eyes back down to his flashcards. “Backseat gaming. Hayden hates it when I do that.”

“Backseat gaming,” Ilya repeated to himself as he flipped through his game inventory. “What does this mean?”

“It’s, um.” Shane rolled his pen between his fingers. “When someone tells you what to do. The actual term I think is ‘backseat driving’. Like when someone sits in the back of the car but is really annoying about telling you how to drive or where to go.”

“Oh.” Ilya nodded knowingly. “My friend Svetlana is the worst at this.”

“Really?” Curious, Shane glanced back up. “Is she one of your friends from back home?”

On the screen, Ilya was distractedly trying to pet a horse. Shane didn’t have the heart to break it to him that that wasn’t a function of the game. 

“Yes, since childhood,” Ilya said, once he’d abandoned his attempts to befriend the horse. He'd been so distracted doing it that he'd completely ignored the screeching of a draugr about to attack him. “She learned to drive only a few months before me, so annoying about it. She says I drive too fast, turn too close.”

His voice pitched higher as he let loose a rambling string of Russian. The only words Shane caught were Ilya’s own name, dragged out in an imitation that he could only assume was quite close to the real thing.

“I don’t think you’re a bad driver,” said Shane thoughtfully when he was done. “At least, from when I’ve driven with you.”

Ilya smiled, a little teasing as he ran his eyes over Shane. “This is because when I am driving with you, there is special cargo.”

It was stupid. It was cheap, easy flirting. If Ilya had winked just then, it would have been punctuated with a cartoonish sparkle and a sound effect. Still, Shane’s stomach flipped like a fish out of water. He glanced in the direction of the carpet, cheeks heating.

“Fuck off,” he coughed feebly, landing instinctually on something he didn’t mean at all. 

Then Ilya’s phone lit up on the coffee table.

It wasn’t uncommon for his phone to ring. Since that conversation they’d had in the dark of the hotel room, minutes prior to the incident, Shane was actually noticing it more and more. Ilya was always checking in with people on a phone call. Most of the time it was in English, clearly his supervisors on Shane’s security detail. Once, it had been Russian, casual and languid as it slipped from his mouth. He had been laughing a lot. Shane wondered if that was Svetlana.

Ilya tensed when he leaned over to read the caller ID. He paused the game instantly and picked up the phone. Shane caught a flash of the screen— Roxy. 

“Hello?”

Ilya stood up to talk, but not before Shane picked up the faint string of what the other person was saying. Ilya! Hi, so sorry to bother you, you know I wouldn’t be calling if it wasn’t— and then it was inaudible as Ilya took a few steps away from the couch.

Shane had never heard him mention anyone named Roxy. He never really mentioned anyone, to be fair, but Shane would have recognized the name. The voice was feminine, but he couldn’t tell much else about it besides that. 

“Emergency?” Ilya said, then cursed under his breath, pinching his brow. “What did the v-”  His eyes flicked to Shane. “What did the doctor say?” 

He spent a moment nodding along to what the other person was saying. Shane watched, bewildered and trying desperately to understand the look of concern scrawled over Ilya’s features.

“That is not good,” Ilya said slowly, and then frowned some more. He looked at Shane again and swallowed, looking visibly guilty. Shane couldn’t fathom why. “I am sorry, but I cannot help. I am working tonight.”

“No,” Shane said before he could think about it. “You can go. There’s an emergency?”

Ilya made a sound, his eyebrows furrowed. 

“You can go,” Shane insisted again.

Ilya shook his head, but then he spoke again into the phone. “Hold on Roxy, yes, I am so sorry, one second I promise.”

Shane waited for him to mute the call. “What’s going on?”

For just a moment, Ilya blinked, rolling his lips together like he was thinking very hard. Shane would realize later that he was figuring out how much to divulge.

“A friend is sick,” he explained slowly. “I got asked to go sit with her. But is okay, they will find someone else if I cannot go.”

“No,” Shane said again. He shook his head. “It’s an emergency, right?”

Ilya nodded. For the second time in a few days, he looked young, fingers wrapped tightly around his phone.

“So go,” said Shane. He felt shockingly level-headed about it. When he thought about this moment later, he’d come to the realization that he’d just wanted to do whatever he could to erase that look of tense panic from Ilya’s expression. “To the hospital or whatever. It’s fine.”

“You can’t come with me,” Ilya told him, though he looked crestfallen to be saying it. “There are, um, policies. I can’t go and bring you with.”

“Well, that’s okay.” Shane shrugged. He was feeling a level of calm that reminded him of decision-making on the ice. One of his teammates needed assistance. It was second-nature to make the quick decisions that would allow it. “I’m not going anywhere anyway. I’m in for the night.”

Ilya let out a sound that was close to tormented. “I can’t leave you alone again,” he said. “It is fine. They will find someone else to help her-“

“No, Ilya,” said Shane. “I’m telling you it’s okay. I can tell you want to go, so go. Help your friend.”

Shane had a lot of questions— like, for example, why his friend wasn’t seeking proper medical attention if it was what she needed. Like who the fuck is Roxy. Like what is this double life you are clearly leading, and why can’t I be a part of it?

Shane didn’t ask any of those questions, at least not then. Instead, he waved his hand impatiently at the phone. “Tell her.”

“Shane,” Ilya began slowly. “If anyone found out-"

“No one is going to find out,” said Shane. “I guess it’s up to you, but I’m here saying you can go. I won’t leave this apartment, swear on my life.”

He held up his fingers in a Scout’s honor, although he’d never been in the Scouts and he had no idea whether or not the organization existed in Russia. Still, Ilya scraped his eyes over Shane, then nodded to himself, like he saw something there that he could believe in.

“You swear? This is okay?”

Technically, it wasn’t okay. Ilya would be terminated from his post immediately if anyone of any importance found out he’d left Shane. But neither of them would ever tell, and Shane found that he wanted to do whatever he could to make sure he never heard that saddened concern in Ilya’s voice again.

He nodded, and that seemed to be the last of the assurance needed. Ilya unmuted the call. 

“Roxy? Yes, send me the address.” He began to cram himself into his winter gear. “Yes, no, it is fine. You don’t have to bother Victor. I’ll be there.”

Victor, Shane mouthed to himself, trying to place the name. He’d never even heard of a Victor at Samwell.

“Okay,” he said once Ilya had hung up. He tried to sound patient, but could tell his voice was betraying him. “Who is this friend of yours?”

Ilya’s tone was the one he always used— both clear and evasive in a way that usually made Shane feel powerless to ask for more. “Just a friend.”

He was determined not to feel powerless anymore. He wanted to know what was happening. Shane leaned impatiently over the arm of the couch, half-calling after Ilya as he went to retrieve something from his room. “Okay, but a friend from where?”

“Don’t worry your pretty head about it, Hollander.” Ilya returned to the hallway and shoved a hat that had at some point belonged to Shane over his curls. 

He was trying to be stubborn, interrogative. Still, Shane’s cheeks went a little warm at the suggestion of being called pretty. “No, seriously, Ilya. How do you know these people? How do I know you won’t be murdered? Shouldn’t I at least know where you’re going?”

“No murder, I think,” Ilya said with his hand on the doorknob. “I’ll check in if I won’t be back before midnight, Hollander. Don’t get into trouble without me.”

The words were light-hearted, but Shane heard the truth stark behind them. Ilya’s eyes met his, once, before the door shut behind him. 

Shane had made a promise. He intended to keep it.

So he bundled himself up on the couch and tried to pass the time in the newly-quiet apartment. Ilya hadn’t even bothered to properly save and close his game, so Shane took care of that for him. Then he tried to return to his homework, although the words he was reading refused to solidify into anything of substance in his brain. They practically blurred as he read them.

In the end, Shane abandoned his homework. In a last ditch effort to entertain himself, he picked up the paperback Ilya had left on the coffee table that afternoon— Tuesdays with Morrie. He’d read it in grade eight on a school assignment, and Yuna had plucked it out of his bag and read it too, on the drive to some event in Sherbrooke of all places. She read everything Shane did back then. It was one of the ways she stayed involved with his life while being so busy all the time. He didn’t remember much about the book, but he did remember the tears that had dripped off of her face when she finished it, the long conversation they’d had at the end about his grandfather and the kind of care he’d received at the end of his life.

Ilya hadn’t finished the book yet. His looping graphite annotations paused halfway down the page he’d marked, completely illegible to Shane. Cyrillic, the alphabet was called. Ilya had told Shane that once when he’d caught sight of one of his grocery lists, scribbled down on a notecard he’d stolen out of Shane’s desk.

Shane traced his finger over the words, careful not to smudge them. On some pages, he’d written cramped, long strings of sentences beneath the text. In others, he’d written just a single word with a few exclamation marks next to it. Shane tried to make heads or tails of it, but even if there were cognates, he couldn’t decipher them.

Shane read a few pages, squinting his eyes at the soft scratchings of Ilya’s pencil, before he put the book back where he’d found it. He drifted off to sleep while scrolling meaninglessly through his phone, waiting for Ilya to return.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

“Hollander.” Someone was shaking his shoulder. “Time to wake up.”

Shane groaned a little, burying his face into the couch cushion before he rolled to face the voice. “What?”

“Come on.” The hand shook him again. “You will get ache in your neck, and bitch about it all day tomorrow, and then this will be my problem. You cannot say it is my fault you slept on couch.”

“Mm,” Shane groaned, coming back to himself. He forced his eyes open, blinking sleepily at Ilya.

It took him a moment to reorient himself. Ilya’s skin looked flushed and rosy, his curls wet like he’d just gotten out of the shower. He’d changed, since Shane had last seen him, into a tight gray t-shirt that hugged unfairly close to his arms. Shane’s eyes latched onto the vein working from his bicep to his inner elbow. He swallowed dryly.

More came back to him. He remembered when, exactly, the last time he’d seen Ilya was. “What time is it?” he asked blearily. “You’re back?”

“I’m back. It’s midnight.”

Shane groaned, throwing his head back onto the couch. He’d slept for three hours. This unplanned nap was probably going to fuck with his delicate sleep schedule, and right before finals week, of all times.

“I know, I know,” said Ilya. He shifted a little, and Shane became glaringly aware of the warm, spicy scent wafting off of him. He’d for sure showered since arriving back at the apartment. “This is why I told you to wake up, besides letting you know that I am home. You would not be happy if you woke up at three in the morning on this couch.”

Shane pushed himself up onto his elbows and swiped clumsily at his eyes. “How’s your friend?”

“She’s fine,” said Ilya shortly. He didn’t sound tense, but it was clear he was trying not to say too much. Shane kept pushing.

“Did she go to the hospital?”

“No,” Ilya let out a small laugh, which seemed like an odd response. “Hospital was not needed. Thankfully.”

“So, what?” Shane sat up fully and Ilya moved to give him space. Shane wished he hadn’t. “That’s all you’re going to say? You’re not going to explain what that was?”

“Is not much to explain.” He shrugged. “My friend was sick. I helped her. Thank you for staying here while I did that, but it will not happen again.”

Shane inhaled, then vocalized the fear that he’d hardly allowed himself to articulate inside of his head.

“Are you,” he swallowed nervously. “Are you, like, dating her? Was that your girlfriend? Is that why you’re being so weird about this?”

At that, Ilya let out a full laugh. “Hollander. I am not dating anyone. I do not have the time for that.” He stood and made his way towards the kitchen. “You know this.”

Shane spluttered and got off the couch, shoving off the blanket he didn’t remember curling up beneath. “Why are you being so weird, then?”

The kitchen sink turned on. Ilya had his back to Shane, washing dishes from a meal Shane hadn’t seen him eat. He wondered how long Ilya had been home before he’d woken him up— long enough to eat, evidently, and also to shower.

“I don’t think I’m the one being weird,” Ilya was saying. Deflecting, really. “I think it is you. So many questions.”

“Why won’t you answer any of them?”

“Because,” Ilya sighed. “Is not a big deal, but if I answer your questions tonight, you will have so many more.”

“You don’t know that.” Shane took another step closer. 

“Yes, I do.” He could hear a smile in Ilya’s voice— probably that smug, evasive one, the one that Shane sometimes wanted to knock right off of him with either his fist or his mouth. “I know you, and I know this. You will have so many questions. We would be up all night, answering them all.” 

For a moment, Shane leaned against the doorway and watched the movement of his muscles through his t-shirt, the rhythmic ripple of tendon near his elbow as he scrubbed a plate with the sponge. Shane felt like he was trying and failing to pick at a very stubborn loose thread. He wanted to understand Ilya, wanted to know what exactly all these secrets were that he could tell Ilya was keeping.

His eyes snagged on a piece of Tupperware on the drying rack. It belonged to Rose— he was supposed to return it to her that week, left over from when she’d been there to bake a few days prior. Between both Ilya and Shane, the chocolate caramel bars hadn’t lasted two days. 

He thought about the conversation he’d had with her. Ilya made a move, now he’s waiting for you to make one back.

It was late. Shane was thinking about Ilya’s fingers brushing against his over a pencil in the study room, tracing shapes on his lower back in a dim bar. He was thinking about Ilya’s hair, soft against his knuckles. He was thinking about Ilya’s voice, rough and raspy in a hotel room. I have been a fucking saint, Hollander, he had said. The words had practically tattooed themselves into his brain.

It was late, and Shane was thinking about Ilya. 

(It was late, and Shane was thinking about making a bad decision.)

He thought about Grant, flirting with him. The way he’d made it obvious, blinking at Shane from beneath his lashes. He’d seen Rose do something similar, once, back in the disastrous few weeks of freshman year when they’d tried to date. He’d seen her do it to others since then, dumb frat boys who would race off to the kitchen to get her another drink or to the moon to get her a cool rock, if she asked.

 Shane had never done anything like that. He wasn’t sure he knew how. 

The sink turned off. Ilya was rubbing the dishes dry with a paper towel— Shane hated that he never used the reusable cloths for this, but he’d complained enough about Ilya leaving crumpled and damp rags littered around the sink that now he pretty much only used paper towels. He set the dishes carefully on the drying rack, next to Rose’s Tupperware. Shane was still thinking.

“So, you’re really not going to tell me what tonight was about.”

Ilya sighed dramatically. “Yes, Hollander. I have already told you this.”

Shane took a step closer. Ilya still had his back turned as he dried off the mug Shane had used for tea that afternoon. 

“Because I’m going to ask too many questions,” Shane said slowly. “And you’re scared of my questions.”

Another laugh from Ilya. “I am not scared of your questions, just of what might happen when-”

When he turned to look at Shane, he paused. Shane was standing close. Very close. He lifted his eyes to Ilya’s, blinking very slowly.

“That is not fair,” Ilya said, the words a little lost in a breathless laugh. 

Shane’s breath hitched. His heart picked up. “What’s not fair?” 

“You don’t get to-” Ilya waved his hand half-heartedly, gesturing to Shane. “Is not fair.”

Shane slid his hand up Ilya’s side. It was broad and warm beneath his palm, Ilya’s breaths deep through the soft cotton of the t-shirt. “You’re really not going to tell me?”

“Not tonight,” Ilya said, even as one of his hands found home on Shane’s lower back.

He strummed it up Shane’s spine, tugging him closer. His breath was warm and faintly minty, like he’d just brushed his teeth before he came to get Shane off the couch.

“Are you asking me for answers? Because it kind of seems like you’re asking me for something else, right now.”

His hand curled intrepidly around Shane’s ribs. Shane knew he could feel the racing of his heart. 

“I’m asking for whatever you’ll give me,” he said. It was too vulnerable. It was too honest. Something in Ilya’s eyes darkened as he flitted them over Shane’s face. 

“Hollander,” said Ilya with a hint of warning. 

Shane paused. “Do you want me to stop?”

Ilya was still shaking his head even as his grip tightened on Shane’s hips, even as he walked him back into the other side of the counter. Shane twisted his fingers greedily into Ilya’s t-shirt, breathing in the heady mix of spice and warmth. He felt drunk, delirious with proximity. He wanted more.

He nosed along Ilya’s jaw, feeling the faint scrape of stubble against his cheek. Shane allowed himself a deep inhale, his forehead pressed to the hollow of Ilya’s brow.

“Hollander,” Ilya said again, but the words were more breath than sound. One of his hands slipped up and cupped Shane’s jaw, his thumb swiping just once over the edge of it.

“Ilya,” Shane sighed. The tip of his nose brushed against the side of Ilya’s. “Please.”

He only made it through half of the second word, because then Ilya was kissing him.

For the span of a heartbeat, the kiss was soft. Ilya’s closed mouth slotted perfectly against Shane’s, his lower lip sweet and full beneath Shane’s. Then— 

The sound of someone’s ragged and desperate exhale. Ilya’s hand, slipping up the back of Shane’s t-shirt. Shane, helplessly pulled into Ilya’s orbit, his mind completely blank.

He’d never known himself to be capable of making the sound that rose from his throat— keening, close to a whine, as Ilya’s mouth pressed against his own, his teeth nipping at his bottom lip. It was dirty and deep and demanding. It felt like the first real breath Shane had taken in months.

His lips parted so easily for Ilya, like it was second-nature. The edge of the counter bit almost uncomfortably into his waist but Shane couldn’t worry about a thing like that when he could feel the velvet brush of Ilya’s tongue against his own, could feel the soft groan rumbling in his chest.

They could barely stand to let their lips part for more than a few seconds while they wrestled off each other’s shirts— Ilya first, then Shane. He shivered a little when his bare back met the cold granite of the counter, then shivered again when Ilya slipped his lush mouth to the sensitive skin of Shane’s neck.

“Fuck, just like that,” Shane panted. For a moment he wondered if Ilya was going to leave a mark, and then his brain glitched at the thought. His fingers threaded through the curls at the back of Ilya’s neck, pulling him impossibly closer.

Shane’s other hand fumbled for the waistband of Ilya’s sweats. He slipped it down until his fingers were curling around Ilya’s hard length through his underwear, feeling the patch of dampness spreading along the fabric. He swiped his thumb exploratively over the tip, then used his palm to press down, feeling dizzy with curious desire.

With a profane sucking sound, Ilya broke off from Shane’s chest and groaned. The skin beneath Shane’s collarbone was already pink and patchy where he’d laved at it with his tongue and his teeth and his lips, each point of contact more decadent than the last.

 They couldn’t have been kissing for more than a few minutes, Shane thought, but Ilya’s lips were swollen, his eyes heavy-lidded over blown pupils as he buried his nose in Shane’s neck. 

“Yes, Hollander,” he murmured as Shane palmed at him again, breathing for only a moment before he went back to sucking and licking at Shane’s neck, the feeling so ridiculously pornographic that Shane worried his eyes might roll back into his head. 

Ilya reached down and undid the button of his jeans, spreading Shane’s thighs with one leg between his for easier access. Shane moaned at the unintentional friction, his hips rolling desperately. 

“Easy, kotik, you will finish in your pants again if you continue this way,” said Ilya, although his words were combatted by the way he grabbed Shane’s weeping cock through his briefs. “So easy for me. Even better than I remembered.”

He kissed Shane again, his tongue sweeping against Shane’s. His kiss was like an attentive prayer, like devotion Shane had never known. His hand slipped from Shane’s cock to his ass, spreading him open just a little.

Later, Shane would try to remember if it had been like this the first time, all those months ago. He remembered, of course, that Ilya had been an incredible kisser. That it had only taken minutes for Shane to slam onto his knees in the back of that dingy bar, so immediately certain that his only purpose for the next little while was sucking Ilya’s cock. He could feel that pleasant, syrupy feeling slipping back over him again.

Shane groaned, his legs spreading even more over the muscle of Ilya’s thigh. He was beginning to feel weak, trembly all over with the effort of standing in the kitchen and being absolutely devoured by Ilya.

They seemed to be thinking similarly. Ilya spent a few more precious moments sucking at Shane’s bottom lip, rolling it just once between his teeth before he pulled back, looking satisfied as he surveyed what he had done to Shane. He couldn’t see himself, but he knew he looked wrecked— his hair destroyed by Ilya’s hands, his chest and neck a haze of bruises in the shape of Ilya’s mouth, his lips parted and swollen and awaiting Ilya’s return. 

“My bed, or yours?” 

“Yours,” Shane panted without pausing to think about it. Though he’d never confess it, this was a fantasy of his that he’d entertained sometimes— Ilya’s hand pressing his face into a mattress that smelled like him, like his sweat and his soap, until Shane was coming and drooling and drowning in a cloud of pleasure. 

He grazed his fingers up Ilya’s abdomen, half-dazed at the sensation of the hair and the muscle there. Ilya smiled as if bemused at the gesture before he gently nudged Shane’s hands up, bringing them to rest around his neck.

“What-” Shane started, but couldn’t finish, because in one swift movement, Ilya was hitching both of his hands beneath Shane’s spread thighs and then Shane was being carried down the hallway.

An unexpected laugh burst out of him. He buried his face in Ilya’s neck. “Jesus Christ, put me down! You’re going to pull something.”

“I do not spend all that time in the weight room with you for nothing,” Ilya said without an ounce of exertion, his hand broad against the expanse of Shane’s back. Shane was about to form another complaint, but then Ilya was swallowing the words from his lips, kissing him quiet as they made their way down the hall. In this position, Shane’s hard cock was pinned against Ilya’s abdomen, the friction exquisite. 

Shane’s shoulder bumped into the doorframe as Ilya hefted him over the threshold. He half-expected to be dropped onto the bed, sure that Ilya was eager to set down the two-hundred-pound hockey player he’d lifted like he was nothing, but he was surprised to find that Ilya laid him down as gently as possible on the sheets, taking advantage of his new leverage to once more slip one of his legs between Shane’s. He kissed him thoroughly the moment Shane’s head was cradled by a pillow. 

If possible, this kiss was more feverish. Ilya lingered there for a while, tangling his tongue with Shane’s, before he began to move down Shane’s abdomen, pressing kisses into his skin all the while.

“I want to suck you,” Ilya mumbled into the waistband of Shane’s underwear. He was shocked he even still had them on— he had no recollection of losing his pants, but felt certain they were crumpled somewhere on the floor between the kitchen and the hall. 

“Please,” Shane begged. “Please. Want you.” His fingers tangled in Ilya’s hair, pressing him down. “Need you.”

It was all the permission Ilya needed. In an image so sinful Shane half-expected himself to catch on fire just for looking at it, he used his teeth to tug Shane’s briefs part of the way down, tangling his fingers in the fabric and pulling it the rest of the way when they snagged on his hard, leaking cock.

“I forgot how wet you get,” Ilya said, a little awed. He pressed his mouth to the base of Shane’s cock, sucking and licking at his balls. The sensation sent tingles up Shane’s spine. “So perfect, always.”

Shane shifted a little against the sheets, his sternum pricking a little with bashfulness at the unabashed want in Ilya’s face. He opened his mouth to speak, but the only sound that left him was a wanton moan as Ilya slipped the head of Shane’s cock into his mouth, sucking with a plush precision.

“Oh, fuck,” Shane cried out as Ilya wrapped one hand around his length. His back arched a little off the bed, humping into the air, and Ilya used his free hand to pin his hips down. “Oh fuck, fuck. Ilya. Feels so good.”

Ilya’s tongue was swirling around the tip of his cock, his cheeks hollowed just slightly as he bobbed his head. Then, with no warning, he took Shane all the way down his throat, pressing him so deep that his nose brushed against Shane’s pubic bone, the dark hair there.

Shane cried out. His entire world was reduced to the wet perfect pressure of Ilya’s mouth, the obscene sucking noises he was making around Shane’s cock. He eased off for just a breath, then went back to it, pressing his thumb to the seam below Shane’s balls.

It made his hips jerk. He moaned again, tugging on Ilya’s hair. “Ilya, Ilya. I’m going to come, I’m going to-”

Ilya’s hand spread Shane’s cheeks again. His thumb slipped, brazenly, to Shane’s entrance, pressing gently there. The vulnerable pressure, the suggestion—

Shane’s body exploded with pleasure. With a ragged shout, his hips jerked, and he came, pulsing twitches of his cock that Ilya swallowed down eagerly. His breath expelled from his lungs, chest heaving as Ilya spent several long moments pressing his mouth attentively to Shane’s lower abdomen, the skin of his thighs.

Eventually, he crawled back up Shane’s body and kissed him again. Shane could taste himself on Ilya’s lips, and that alone made his spent cock twitch valiantly against his stomach, as if already prepared for another go.

He pressed his hands into the bulging muscles of Ilya’s arms, enjoying being pushed into the pillows, the force of Ilya’s mouth. Then he flipped them over so that he was on top, straddling Ilya’s hips and kissing him deeper.

Ilya was still wearing his underwear. Shane lowered himself down the bed, trailing lips and tongue across each stretch of Ilya’s skin the move availed to him, until he reached the waistband. He looked up at Ilya, meeting his eyes as he mouthed wetly over Ilya’s hard length.

Ilya’s hair was rumpled, his cheeks flushed. His mouth was parted as he watched Shane press a long, deliberate kiss to his tip. 

A rough hand carded through Shane’s hair, pulling slightly. He moaned, then didn’t waste any more time pulling down Ilya’s briefs. His cock curved long and hard against his stomach, flushed and leaking. Shane blinked at it for just a moment before he leaned forward and sucked it into his mouth.

“Fuck.” Ilya’s head landed on the pillow, his hand curving at the back of Shane’s neck. “Yes. Just like that, Hollander.”

“Shane.” He frowned and the words came out muffled around Ilya’s length. He pulled off for a second. “My mouth is on your dick. Call me Shane.” 

It made Ilya laugh, that charming and crooked smile lighting up his features. “I will call you whatever you want if you keep doing that,” he said, and so Shane returned to his task, kitten-licking at the pink tip as he wrapped his hand around the base of it.

He was only working for another moment before Ilya was groaning and pulling him up by the shoulders. 

“What?” Shane’s word came out more like a whine, soothed only by the sweep of Ilya’s hand up his side.

“I’ve changed my mind,” he said with a soft kiss to Shane’s shoulder. “Lay on your side. I want to fuck your thighs.”

“What?” Shane said again, but he let Ilya curve around him, adjusting him until he was positioned on his side. He was growing hard again while he listened to Ilya reach into the nightstand.

“I want to fuck your thighs,” Ilya said like it was simple. He pressed more kisses to the divot between Shane’s shoulder blades. “Is that okay?”

His hand palmed Shane from behind, slipping into the tight crevice that formed between his thighs when he laid like this. He could feel Ilya’s knuckles, his broad palm as he gripped at Shane’s thighs. His cock pressed up to the cleft of Shane’s ass.

“Like this,” Ilya said, slipping his hand back and forth. His voice was low, so close to Shane’s ear that it sent goosebumps up his skin. “You have such soft thighs, like velvet, kotik. And strong, so much muscle.”

"Fuck," he panted. "Yes. Please."

So Shane listened to Ilya squirt out lube, felt the press of his wet cock between Shane’s thighs. The moment that Ilya was grinding up behind him, one firm hand on his hip, pleasured pants of breath rolling over his skin, he understood completely.

“Shane,” Ilya groaned. “Fuck. So good.”

His grip felt almost bruising as he slid his cock between Shane’s legs, the friction against Shane’s balls so tight and unexpectedly pleasant that Shane buried his face into the pillow, moaning. Sparks of pleasure scattered up his spine, his fingers twisting into the sheets. He’d never felt anything like this in his entire life.

Ilya curled up close behind Shane, his mouth sucking and kissing at the hinge where his jaw met his neck. He somehow managed to arrange Shane so he was almost on top of Ilya, his cock still working feverishly between Shane’s legs while his other hand reached around to grasp Shane’s now straining length.

He cried out, jolting into the touch. There were so many sensations— the punishing pace of Ilya’s hips, the slick grip of his hand as he stroked Shane’s length, the intoxicating scent of Ilya’s pillow beneath his cheek and the drag of Ilya’s mouth on the back of his neck. Shane could feel that he was drooling a little, could hear the soft moans punching out of his throat each time Ilya stroked him in rhythm with his hips.

He might have been embarrassed, if he were more aware of himself. Instead, he was drowning in the smell of the sheets—of Ilya—surrounding him. He wanted to live here forever, deep in this floaty heaven with his eyes half shut and Ilya’s mouth laying ministrations on what felt like every part of Shane he could reach.

Curious, Shane squeezed his thighs together. Ilya groaned at the pressure. “Yes, yes, keep doing that,” he said. His words were blissed out, half-moan.

“Fuck me, Ilya, fuck,” Shane slurred, his words mostly absorbed by the pillowcase. Ilya’s hand tightened on his hip, the other hand still dragging luxuriously down Shane’s cock. 

Shane turned his head, and like a puzzle slotting into place, Ilya’s mouth found his. He knew exactly what Shane was looking for without him having to ask.

When Shane came for the second time, it was with a moan that was stifled around Ilya’s tongue. Fireworks exploded behind his eyelids, his entire body shivering into the mattress. Behind him, Ilya shifted back and then made a sound, his mouth parted and slick against Shane’s back, and then he was coming. Shane could feel the warmth and wetness between his thighs, Ilya’s cock probably sensitive as he slowly pulled it out.

For a long moment, neither of them said anything. Shane’s body felt like it was made of sand— so heavy, so wonderful. Ilya stayed tucked up against him, one arm wrapped around Shane’s waist.

Eventually, he felt Ilya pull away. Shane sighed and shuffled onto his back, his arms leaden with exhaustion. A second later, Ilya hovered over him, wiping gently at him with a wadded up t-shirt.

“Where did you get that?”

Ilya shrugged. “It was on the floor. I did not want to go far.”

Shane laughed, but the act of spreading his thighs so Ilya had easier access made it so he could feel the way they were stuck together with come, and he groaned. “Ew. That is maybe the grossest thing I have ever felt.”

“You seemed to enjoy it while we were doing it,” said Ilya mildly.

“I did,” Shane said softly before he could think better of it. Ilya’s eyes flickered up to his, and if he didn’t know better, he would even say there was something shy in his expression, before it disappeared and his lips tugged up into that crooked and familiar grin. He flung the t-shirt in the direction of the hamper and collapsed on top of Shane.

“Ew, you’re sticky too,” said Shane, but he widened his posture, pulling his arm out from beneath Ilya so he’d have a comfortable place to lay. “I should shower.”

Ilya nodded, but didn’t move. “You should.”

“You should too,” said Shane, poking at Ilya’s ribs with a finger. “But not at the same time as me.”

He felt more than heard Ilya scoff. Their second week of living together, Shane had clattered out of the shower, squawking about the way his water had run ice cold because Ilya had turned his on at the same time. Ever since then, they’d carefully choreographed their showers around each other. Some days, Shane was bitchier about it than others.

“Okay,” said Ilya, and sighed. He rolled off of Shane. “You go first. I am gentleman.”

It had only just dawned on Shane that he probably could have suggested they shower together. People did that, right? For a moment, he imagined standing under the warm spray with Ilya, stealing his shampoo. Lathering his hands and running them through Ilya’s thick curls, feeling the press of his stomach against Shane’s, leaning in for a kiss—

“Hollander,” said Ilya, jolting him out of his reverie. “You said you wanted to shower.”

So Shane went to go shower.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Standing by himself in a shower that had never felt lonely before, Shane’s mind began to race for the first time all night. He wasn’t sure how he’d managed to cling onto a shred of composure throughout the whole night—letting Ilya run out on his own, then letting Ilya get away with being so evasive about it, flirting with Ilya in the kitchen—only to suddenly feel like he was on the verge of a panic attack while he was scrubbing the sex sweat off of his skin. He felt cold all over, deep in his bones, like a sea of panic was flooding his limbs.

He was conscientious enough to not let the shower run long, although he did spend an exorbitant amount of time toweling himself dry and rubbing unscented lotion into his elbows and knees. Moments after he’d stepped out of the tub, he heard Ilya’s shower turn on through the wall. He tried not to revisit his earlier fantasy as he mechanically brushed his teeth.

It was only after he’d opened the door to his bedroom and the mirror unfogged that Shane had enough presence of mind to recognize what he looked like. His chest and his neck were covered in developing bruises, swells of pink and red and even a few purplish spots that looked to be in the shape of Ilya’s teeth. He gaped, tracing his fingers over the skin before he realized how tender it was.

“Jesus Christ,” Shane mumbled to himself. To his dismay, his cheeks were warm at the sight, and he knew it couldn’t be blamed on the steam from the shower. A part of him (a part of him he wished he could shove deep inside of himself) thrilled a little at the knowledge that he was going to be able to keep these marks for a while— a reminder that what had happened tonight was real. If he got to keep nothing else, at least there was this— as transient as it might be. 

Even if he was going to have to ice the fuck out of his shoulders (per the Internet’s advice) and hope the hickeys were gone by the next time he was in a locker room.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Shane practically jolted out of his skin when he heard the knock on his door.

It had only been twenty minutes since he’d heard Ilya get out of the shower. He’d done his best to stare at his book and pay no attention at all to the shuffling sounds of drawers opening and closing, the creaking of floorboards as Ilya got ready for bed in the next room. But now, perplexingly, he was here and knocking on Shane's door. 

The minute Ilya was inside, he was collapsing onto Shane’s bed. He was kind enough to pick the side that was unrumpled, leaving Shane’s preferred half open.

“What the fuck,” said Shane.

Ilya wrapped his arm around one of Shane’s pillows and pulled it snugly beneath his cheek. He was shirtless, wearing only a pair of low-hanging sweats. From here, Shane had an excellent view of his back dimples, the faint sheen of golden hair that dusted over them. He forced his eyes up to Ilya’s face, although that view was no less enticing.

“My bed is dirty,” Ilya explained. “I am too tired to deal with it tonight, so I sleep here. You owe me.”

Shane couldn’t contain the spluttering sound that left him. “I owe you?”

“Yes.” Ilya nodded into the pillow, his eyes still peacefully shut. “I give you two orgasms. You let me sleep in your bed. Fair trade.”

“You’re an asshole!” He hovered by the bed, unsure of what to do. Ilya seemed only to be interested in making himself more comfortable, pulling the duvet up and over his waist.

“You can come back, you know,” Ilya said through a yawn. “I did not mean to disturb you.”

“Oh, I’m sure you didn’t,” said Shane, but he moved the book off of his bed anyway, carefully slotting his bookmark back into place and setting it onto the nightstand. He hesitated for only a moment before he clambered into the bed beside Ilya, keeping a healthy amount of distance between them. 

He paused, then reached for the lightswitch, sending the room careening into a soft darkness. The only light came from the streetlight drifting through the slats of his blinds, just enough to make out the silhouette of Ilya in front of him as Shane tucked himself nervously into his own pillow.

“You fucking mauled me, by the way,” Shane complained quietly. “Those hickeys better be gone by the time finals are done.” 

“I could not help it, Hollander.” The weight in the bed changed as Ilya shifted towards him, pressing his thumb into a spot on Shane’s collarbone that was especially tender. How Ilya could find it so perfectly in the dark, Shane didn’t know. “You were so tasty.”

“Fuck off,” said Shane immediately, grateful that Ilya couldn’t see his blush in the dark. He made a point of flipping over, facing the opposite direction.

The room was quiet for a moment. Shane was just coming to regret this decision, feeling the cold air on his shoulders, all of the miles of distance between him and Ilya, when he felt the fingers twisting into the back of his shirt. 

“Come back, Shane.”

Ilya’s voice was soft. Hardly more than a murmur. Shane huffed, but didn’t waste a second before he was rolling over. Ilya lifted his arm, shuffling down the mattress, and Shane curled into the space that was created, burying his nose in Ilya’s chest like he’d secretly thought about doing for weeks. A warm arm draped over his shoulders, pulling him closer.

The room drifted into silence again. Ilya’s thumb swiped soothingly back and forth over the shoulder seam of Shane’s old t-shirt. 

“What are you thinking about?” Ilya asked eventually. The room had drifted into silence for so long that Shane assumed he might have been asleep. 

“Nothing.”

“I can feel you thinking,” said Ilya. He tapped his thumb against Shane’s temple. “Right here.”

Shane sighed, shifting just a little so he could try to catch more of Ilya’s expression. He was looking back at Shane, eyes dark and calm in the limited light. Shane almost wished Ilya was wearing a shirt, if only so that he had something to tangle his fingers into.

“Where you went tonight,” Shane started slowly. “I know you don’t want to answer my questions about it, and I get that, it’s your right, but...”

Ilya waited a long time for Shane to finish his sentence. When he never did, Ilya nudged his shoulder gently. “But?”

“But will you ever tell me?” Shane tried not to sound petulant. “Where you went? Who your friends are? I feel like you’re living this whole separate life outside of the apartment, and I know nothing about it. You know everything about me, and I know nothing about you.”

“Shane,” Ilya said gently. “I don’t want you to worry about this.”

“I’m not worried.” Shane hoped he didn’t sound sullen. “I’m annoyed. You keep so many secrets.”

Ilya let out a big sigh, and Shane’s head rose and fell with the movement, pillowed on Ilya’s chest as it was. His thumb resumed the tracing of Shane’s shirt sleeve, the contact almost pacifying.

“I will tell you,” he said eventually. “Not tonight, like I said. Just let me keep it for myself a little longer, okay? I know you are nosiest man alive, but can you do this?”

He made his tone purposefully light with the last phrase, gripping Shane’s shoulder and shaking it, as if he was just teasing. As if they weren’t walking very slowly across a lake that was covered in very thin ice. 

“Okay,” said Shane, and nodded into Ilya’s bare skin. “Yeah. That’s fair enough. I can do that.”

Ilya continued to trace shapes into Shane’s skin. Shane’s nerves, which had felt so frayed just moments before, began to soothe underneath the balm of his touch. He sighed and buried his face back into Ilya’s chest, curling his fingers around Ilya’s ribs and holding onto him. 

“You know, we have to talk about this tomorrow. What we did tonight,” Shane said. “We can’t just not talk about these things anymore.”

Ilya laughed, the sound breathy and somehow not dismissive. His fingers slipped up and carded through Shane’s hair. “Go to sleep, Shane.”

He tried to be huffy about it, but Ilya's touch was like a sedative. His hand smoothed broad, calming circles into Shane's tender shoulder blades. Before he knew it, Shane was drifting off.

Chapter End Notes

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(p.s. if you are enjoying this fic, it would mean the world to me if you hit kudos :))

Chapter 10: shane walks into something he shouldn't

Chapter Notes

For the first two minutes of his morning, nothing about Shane’s routine was disturbed. 

The same alarm that he had set to go off every weekday morning all semester long buzzed somewhere near his head. The same dim streetlight was washing through the blinds, the quotidian and peaceful quiet of a morning so early that the sun hadn’t even begun to rise yet. 

He didn’t even have to open his eyes as he fumbled for his phone and shut the alarm off. It was the same exact way he’d woken up for months— a comforting, if not exhausting, cycle.

Shane nearly jumped out of his goddamn skin when an unexpected and heavy arm slung itself around his waist. 

“Jesus Christ!” 

Ilya, his face scrunched with a half-asleep mix of offense and surprise, leaned back. “What is your problem,” he groaned. 

“I forgot you were here,” Shane panted, realizing a moment too late that it probably wasn’t an admission he should make. “You scared me.”

“Wow. You really know how to make me feel special.” 

“I’m sorry,” Shane said, and was surprised to find that he was laughing, his breath still punching out of him a little after being startled. He hadn’t noticed any tension in his posture, but Ilya seemed to relax a little at the sound of Shane’s laughter, dragging his mouth over Shane’s shoulder.

“Is too early for this, Hollander,” he murmured, then buried his forehead into Shane’s back. 

“It’s the same time my alarm always goes off.” Something inside of Shane was feeling abnormally tender about the soft rise and fall of Ilya’s breaths through his shirt. “You get up at the same time, don’t you?”

“Mm, no.” He felt Ilya’s head shake back and forth against his shoulder blades. “I set my alarm ten minutes later than you.”

“That’s like, hardly anything.”

“Is ten more minutes of sleep,” Ilya mumbled. He sounded like he was halfway back to unconsciousness anyways. Shane sighed, then rolled over again, reaching for his phone. 

“Okay, so get ten more minutes. I’ll set a timer,” he said, secretly pleased at the way Ilya was so pliable. He rolled with Shane, then nosed contentedly into his chest, curling an arm around his waist. He hadn’t expected Ilya to be so clingy, but then again, for every touch he’d initiated, it felt like Shane was desperate to earn another. “I have to get up, though.”

Ilya made a grumbling sound of dissent. 

Shane wanted to stay. If he could, he would cement himself into this bed with this sleepy and warm man, and he would never get up again.

But he couldn’t. At the back of his head, his responsibilities pulsed like an impending migraine. He had ice time in half an hour, which meant he really needed to be up and brushing his teeth in the next five minutes. After ice time, he was due at a meeting with one of the defensive coaches. Then after that, he had two classes, then studying time. They only had half as much team practice as usual because of finals, but that didn’t mean it was time for Shane to slack. 

“Ilya,” he tried. He poked Ilya’s ribs. “I need to get up.”

There was no response. Ilya’s breaths rose and fell evenly against Shane’s stomach. With his entire body relaxed over Shane’s, he was effectively pinned.

“Hey, I’m serious.” Shane prodded him again. “Ilya. I know you’re not asleep, come on, get off.”

Ilya ignored him. If he wanted to—if he really, really wanted to—he could roll Ilya off of him. He was strong enough. They were both aware of that. 

“You’re an asshole,” Shane said, but his heart wasn’t in it. His whole body was warm, soothed by the pressure and weight of Ilya’s body. It was too easy to relax into the pillows, letting his breaths sync up with Ilya’s.

Ten minutes later, he was jerking back awake to the sound of his phone. He groaned, swiping a hand over his face. He was immediately reminded why he hated ignoring the first buzz of his alarm— he felt twenty times as tired as he had a few minutes ago.

The same didn’t appear to be true for Ilya, who rested his chin on Shane’s pec. It was almost uncomfortable, the sharp press of it into the muscle. “Ice time this morning, yes?”

“Yeah,” Shane said blearily. “Wanna skate with me?”

The question was only half-formed as it left his mouth. He’d been considering asking for the last week or two, ruminating on it more last night before the evening had totally unraveled. It had been fun to skate with Ilya the last time— once Shane had stopped stomping around, irritated because Ilya knew exactly how to get under his skin.

In hindsight, it was almost frighteningly clear what Ilya had been doing. Approaching Shane on the ice, his most comfortable and confident place. Letting him set the pace, but not letting him run away. Invading Shane’s space and making him laugh until he nearly forgot what he’d been pissy about in the first place, until they were batting the puck around and playing like children and Shane was the most relaxed he’d been in weeks.

There was a little thrum of unsettled emotion in Shane’s chest at how clearly Ilya seemed to see through him. He wasn’t sure what it meant.

He wasn’t sure what any of this meant, if he was honest. Here they were— Ilya’s chin now snuggled into his chest near his armpit, his fingers tracing absentminded shapes into Shane’s ribs. They hadn’t kissed again. Shane wanted to, of course, despite the probable morning breath, but they hadn’t. 

Was this just another hookup? Was this just another thing they’d pretend hadn’t happened?

Oblivious to Shane’s internal turmoil, Ilya’s head perked up. “Really? You want me to?”

“I mean, yeah,” said Shane. “You were pretty good with the drills last time. It was good practice.”

Ilya scoffed and pushed himself up. “Pretty good,” he mimicked. “I was more than pretty good.”

He really had been. Shane had seen Ilya pull moves off on the ice that he knew some of his teammates wouldn’t be capable of, but he wasn’t about to admit that.

It was hard to gauge whether or not hockey was really a sore spot for Ilya. They spoke a lot about it in abstract ways— debating the merits of teams and players both past and present, pointing at Shane’s laptop screen and dissecting plays together whenever Ilya had a thought on a specific one. Ilya had the occasional insightful comment on how Samwell was playing; once or twice, Shane had even brought one of those comments to his coaches in his strategy debrief emails. 

It hadn’t escaped his notice that they never spoke very specifically about Ilya’s career in hockey, however. He never mentioned going to World Juniors. He never talked about what the team culture had been like, what kind of coaches he’d had. Shane wondered about all of these things, but like most aspects of Ilya’s opaque life, he wasn’t quite brave enough to ask about them.

This wasn’t a good time to ask, anyway. Ilya’s eyes had dragged down Shane’s face and to his chest, his mouth curling into a satisfied grin.

Shane groaned aloud when he followed Ilya’s gaze. The skin from his neck to his sternum was dotted with rosy pink bruises, the entire stretch of Shane’s chest a map of all the places where Ilya’s mouth had lingered the night before.

Ilya traced his thumb along the swell of Shane’s pec, admiring his work. “They will fade. I promise.”

“They better,” Shane mumbled, but his cheeks were too warm with the memory of the night before and the sweet openness of Ilya’s face to really complain very much. Ilya squeezed his ribs once before he clambered out of the bed.

“Come on, slacker. Ice time, yes?” He grinned at Shane, his hand on the doorknob. “I did not know you could be so lazy, stay in bed so late.” 

He was shutting the door behind himself so quickly that he probably didn’t even hear Shane’s indignant spluttering. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Half an hour later, Ilya was suiting up and skating onto the fresh ice behind Shane.

He was less of a nuisance than he had been the first time, although Shane might not have minded it this time. They’d played their last game of the semester the weekend before at Cornell, a win Shane has secured with a goal in overtime. They weren’t playing again until January; Shane had kept his ice time on the calendar more as a way to maintain his schedule and make sure he was keeping his head clear. 

For the first thirty minutes, Ilya kept up gamely with Shane’s drills. He even showed Shane a few new ones. By the end of the hour, though, they were precisely where they had been the first time— smacking the puck back and forth, bumping shoulders and sticks and telling each other to fuck off repeatedly between bouts of laughter. Again, it was the most fun Shane could remember having in a long time.

Besides last night, his brain supplied unhelpfully, as he watched Ilya tug his helmet off his damp curls. Shane flushed, remembering the feeling of the bronze strands between his fingers twelve hours earlier.

“Hey,” said Ilya when he caught his eye. He had a knowing, cocky smirk on his face. “Family-friendly on the ice, yes?”

“Shut up,” said Shane, pushing half-heartedly at his shoulder. “I didn’t even say anything.”

“Ah, but you were thinking it.” Ilya glided closer on his skates, casually tossing a puck from hand to hand. 

“Come on,” he mumbled. “One more round before we get off the ice.” 

Ilya’s smile grew wider, more wicked. “Yes, sir.”

Shane didn’t even bother to dignify that with a response.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

The smoke alarm went off while they were making dinner.

Shane had never set off the smoke alarm in the apartment before— had never so much as burned a bag of popcorn in the microwave. He was an attentive cook, not very adventurous in the kitchen, and generally a very focused person.

Still, he was learning that it was quite difficult to pay attention to a thing like a tray of broccoli in the oven when Ilya Rozanov was pinning him to the counter, gripping his jaw with one hand and his waist with the other, kissing Shane like he had been starving for breath and Shane was fresh air. 

He was moaning, curling his fingers against the nape of Ilya’s neck. Ilya had done that thing again, spreading Shane’s thighs with one of his, and Shane was rolling against the meat of his muscle, completely ignorant to the smell of smoke until suddenly the high-pitched screech of the alarm filled the room and he fell out of Ilya’s arms with a yelp.

“This is your fault,” he scolded as he fished the pan of burnt broccoli out of the oven. “You distracted me.”

“How is it my fault?” Ilya finally poked the smoke alarm enough that it stopped shrieking. His hair was rumpled where Shane had been running his hands through it, his mouth a little swollen where Shane had been sucking on his bottom lip. When he smirked at Shane, he looked like nothing else besides the cat who had gotten the cream.

“I’m not cutting up more, so you have to do it,” Shane said in an attempt to be stern. He furrowed his brows, trying to remember their last trip to the grocery store. “We have more, right?”

Ilya traced his fingers over Shane’s lower back as he passed him, moving across the kitchen. “I am sure we do."

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

It was only after dinner, with their plates discarded on the living room table and Shane’s feet tucked beneath Ilya’s thigh while he worked through his vocab cards, that his phone began to buzz.

Shane glanced at the screen, then grimaced apologetically. “Shit. I forgot I had a call with my mom tonight.”

He set down his cards and began to maneuver off the couch, but stopped when he felt Ilya’s hand on his leg.

“Is okay,” said Ilya, and hefted the book in his hands. “Stay. I am good at tuning you out.”

Shane frowned, about to retort, but Ilya’s hand was still on his leg, his thumb swirling around the ball of Shane’s ankle, and the call was about to ring out, so he sank back into the cushions and pressed the green button.

“Hi, Mom,” he said. Ilya shuffled deeper into the couch, holding his book close to his face as if to indicate just how focused he was on it. 

“Shaney! Oh, it’s good to hear your voice.” He could hear the faint clamor of people behind her, the buzzing and beeping of whatever office she was in, half a world away. “How are you?”

Talking to his mom was slightly overwhelming, although it hadn’t always felt that way. There was pressure in knowing how valuable her time was, that this thirty-minute window he had was the only free moment her team been able to carve out for her to speak to Shane entirely uninterrupted. There was pressure in having something good to tell her, convince her that he was doing well.

As expected, when Shane told her he was good, it wasn’t enough. She prodded about whether the scores on all his midterms had come back (and Shane bit back a comment about how it was December, of course his midterm grades had come back), and asked about Rose, then whether or not he was hanging out with the team very much.

“Yeah, yeah, the guys are great,” Shane told her. He ran her through what few team updates he had that she wouldn’t already know about. There was speculation that one of the coaches was leaving to go to Minnesota the following year, and he listened to Yuna hum and make several pointed comments about the inferior state of Big 10 hockey, as if their conference wasn’t always right on the tail of ECAC in terms of rankings. 

“It’s all about the money for some people, I guess.” She sighed, then changed the subject. “How’s your finals schedule looking? Are you studying?”

“I just have my anthropology exam next Wednesday, and then accounting the day after,” he told her. “And two essays to write, but I’ll get those done in time so I don’t have to worry about them while we’re at the cottage.”

His mom sucked in a breath, and from the sound of it alone, something inside of Shane wilted. He knew what she was going to say without her even having to open her mouth.

“Actually, honey, that’s part of why I wanted to make sure I called you today,” she said, her tone already thick with apology. “I don’t think we can swing the trip to the cottage this year.”

“What do you mean?” 

“Well, it’s just- Jasper and I have been talking about it. With that craziness that’s going on with Parliament, you know, I just don’t think it’ll happen.” She paused, interrupted by what was unmistakably the sound of someone speaking to her on the other end of the phone. She must have either nodded or shook her head in response to what they needed from her, because in a moment, she was back to Shane. “I’m sorry, honey. I know it means a lot to you, but I think I’m needed in Ottawa.”

“The cottage is near Ottawa,” Shane said feebly. He didn’t mean to complain, or to make her feel worse, but his stomach was sinking at the concept of not getting a chance to see the cottage this winter.

“Shane,” she said, her voice now tinged with exasperation. He could picture the manicured hand pinching her brow. “You know what I mean. I’m needed on the Hill.”

“I know,” he told her. Then his brain began to work. “I mean, what if I still went? Just for a few days?”

His mind had immediately conjured the image of himself languishing at home in those transient few days before Christmas, bored out of his skull and mostly alone. If he was going to do that, he wanted to do it at the cottage, where at least he could look out over the frozen lake and enjoy the peace and quiet. They’d been going to the cottage for the holidays every year since he was little. It was, without a doubt, Shane’s favorite part of the year, and the only place he could go where he wasn’t overly burdened with stress and anxiety. 

It was his senior year of college, the last year before he entered the MLH. He needed the cottage now more than ever.

“By yourself?” Her disapproval was clear. “I don’t think so.”

“I wouldn’t be alone,” said Shane, thinking quickly. His eyes tracked to the other person in the room with him. “I could ask Ilya if he wanted to come with me.”

Ilya’s eyes flickered once in Shane’s direction, inquisitive, before he trained them back on his book.

“Your bodyguard?” If she hadn’t been frowning before, she for sure was now. “I think he’s supposed to have winter break off, right? Jasper said he put John back on your detail for the rest of December once you get home.”

“Well, I could at least ask,” Shane blustered. He wasn’t even sure where he was going with this, just that the words continued to unspool uncontrollably from inside of him. “If he wanted to come, I mean.”

“I didn’t even know you liked him that much.” His mom sounded confused now, and he imagined her skeptical nose wrinkle. “You’d want to go to the cottage with him? Just the two of you?”

If it were anyone else in the world, Shane thought, he wouldn’t. The cottage was a safe space, just for him and his parents, the way it had always been since he was a kid. But he really wanted to go— and he had to admit that a few days sequestered with Ilya, with the way things had been changing between them, didn’t seem like the worst thing in the world.

“Yeah, he’s cool. He’s really good at giving me space,” said Shane, at the exact moment that Ilya put down his book and stopped pretending that he wasn’t listening to Shane’s conversation. He picked up Shane’s arm and mimicked taking a bite out of it, as if that was a normal way to insert himself into his personal space. His mom kept talking, but Shane was now thoroughly distracted.

He found himself mouthing you’re annoying at Ilya while, at the same time, a feeling like a trickle of warm honey was spreading in his chest. He took the arm Ilya was holding onto and grabbed the back of Ilya’s neck, accidentally inciting a wrestling match.

“Yeah, Mom, it’s fine. I just want to go up and rest for a bit. I’ll drive back down to the house the night of the 23rd, so I won’t even miss that luncheon thing on Christmas Eve.”

The entire time he was bargaining, he was squirming down the couch with Ilya, half-heartedly scrabbling against each other in an attempt to get the other’s arms pinned. It wasn’t a fair fight, with Shane’s one hand occupied holding the phone, but he was putting up a struggle as he held back a laugh.

“I don’t know, Shane.” His mom sighed. “I can ask your dad if he wants to go? I mean, maybe that’s the right answer. I guess I don’t need to keep him down here with me if I’m going to be working the whole time.”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Shane insisted, one of his hands looped around Ilya’s wriggling wrist. “You know he likes to be with you when stuff like that is going on.”

It was true— Yuna’s job was always stressful, but David liked to be close when it got extra bad like this. Shane had lost count of the times he’d seen his dad sit up late in his recliner, his only purpose getting up every hour to bring Yuna a fresh cup of tea and to wash the mug she’d just emptied. David wouldn’t enjoy being at the cottage knowing that Yuna was back in town with no one to deliver freshly cut carrot sticks and soup to her when she was stuck on her calls.

“Shane, it’s hard to hear you.” There was a brush of impatience in his mom’s tone. “There’s a bunch of rustling sounds.”

“Oh, sorry.” Shane jerked up a little, pressing the phone tighter to his ear with one hand and using the other to push Ilya back. Ilya sighed at the clear signal that he was done playing, but then he melted easily into Shane’s chest, as if it’s where he’d meant to be the whole time. 

Something in his ribs tightened, the warm honey sensation spreading down into his stomach. He fixed his eyes on the ceiling, but kept his palm flat between Ilya’s shoulder blades, utterly powerless to do anything but hold him close.

“Just let me ask, okay? If he doesn’t want to go, then I’ll come straight home,” Shane said. He was aware of the fact that he was no longer really asking her permission to go, and it felt like a sort of prickly, uncomfortable confidence. “I was just really looking forward the cottage this year.”

On the other end of the phone, his mom sighed. “I know, honey. I’m sorry that I can’t make it happen the way we usually do. Let me know what he says, okay?”

“Okay,” Shane agreed, and then perked up as he remembered something. “Oh, I forgot to tell you, but I got an email from the Oilers today. My interview’s confirmed for January, the dates you sent me.”

They weren’t dates Yuna had sent him. They were dates Jasper had sent on her behalf, trying to coordinate Shane’s MLH interviews with the places his mom would be while he was on winter break so they could maximize family time. That was one of the weirdest parts of his mother being so important— receiving communication from her second-hand, filtered and sanitized through an assistant or an advisor because she was just too busy to sit down and type it out herself.

She really was too busy, Shane knew. And she worked with a lot of good people who did a lot of good work, and how could he begrudge them for taking something off of her plate, making her life easier? Even if that something was communicating with her kid?

He knew it had to be weird for her, too. For years, she’d managed her own political career while still being very active in Shane’s hockey one. By the time he’d turned fourteen, that had changed, which was fine. Fourteen was old enough to handle it— he knew by then how to show only his most polite and friendly and focused self to scouts and coaches, how he was supposed to market himself. He was maybe more clumsy at it than he should have been, but he found most people were able to look past it when he showed his skill on the ice. In a lot of ways, he thought, this was how he’d made it through life.

On Shane’s chest, Ilya’s head lifted, his eyes questioning in a way Shane couldn’t quite decipher. 

“Oh, that’s great!” He could hear her smile. “I’m glad that worked out. What about-” and Shane was already readying his response that he’d heard from both Montreal and Chicago, slotting those interviews into place behind the one he’d already had scheduled with the Centaurs. 

Still, Yuna hadn’t even finished asking her question when she cursed beneath her breath instead.

“Shoot, I have to go,” she said. Shane pulled the phone back a fraction to check how much time had elapsed on the call— thirty-two minutes and seventeen seconds. He’d earned an extra two more minutes of her time than he was supposed to have.

“Don’t worry about it, Mom, I should go back to studying anyway.” His fingers tangled lazily in the back of Ilya’s hair.  He was still studying Shane’s face intently while he spoke, their eyes locked. Shane blushed a little under the intensity of the attention, stumbling through his goodbyes with his mother.

“You’re not going to play for Edmonton,” Ilya said the moment Shane set his phone down.

He sighed. “I’m going to play for whoever drafts me.”

“Right, but not Edmonton. They have not been to playoffs since, when? 2006?” Ilya’s brow furrowed, and he pushed himself up a little, looking genuinely concerned in a way that made Shane want to laugh. He hadn’t realized Ilya might be so concerned about Shane being drafted to a shitty hockey team. 

“Yeah,” Shane sighed. He fidgeted absentmindedly with the back of Ilya’s collar, his mind wandering to the thought that Ilya might only care so much because there was a chance he might still be tethered to Shane when he got drafted. “Edmonton is a nice city, though.”

“Sure, if you are Wayne Gretzky,” Ilya said, which made Shane huff out a laugh. His expression was considering, now, clearly having flitted away into a different direction. “And what is this I hear about you having something to ask me?”

“Oh, right.” Shane suddenly felt a little shy. His fingers had slipped beneath the collar now, curled anxiously against the downy warm skin at the base of Ilya’s neck. “Um, so I think I’ve mentioned that I was supposed to go to my family’s cottage for Christmas.”

Ilya nodded. 

“Basically, my mom can’t go anymore, because of work,” Shane said, as if his mother was a lawyer or an accountant and not the prime minister of Canada. “My dad won’t be going, either-”

“Yes, yes, Shane, I gathered all this.” Ilya rotated his finger in a universal hurry it up movement, and despite himself, Shane cracked a smile.

“Do you want to come to the cottage with me? It’d be just for a few days, I don’t know. I know you’re supposed to be off, but.” Shane flushed a little. “I don’t think it’d be, like, work, you know? It’d be just the two of us up there, relaxing and hanging out, or whatever.”

“Or whatever,” Ilya echoed, and traced one finger into the strip of skin where Shane’s shirt had ridden up. His cheeks grew hotter.

“Yeah,” he said. “I mean, you don’t have to, I don’t know if you already have travel plans or something, but it’s a nice house, and you wouldn’t be there as, like, my bodyguard, you’d be there as my friend.”

Ilya’s grin widened, teasing and dangerous. His finger paused where it’d been tracing shapes into Shane’s skin. “Your friend?”

Embarrassment rippled through Shane. He fought the urge to bury his face into Ilya’s neck. “Shut up, you know what I mean-” 

And then Ilya was kissing him.

Shane let out a surprised sound, a muffled noise that replaced whatever it was he had been about to say as Ilya kissed him deeply, that now-familiar nipping at his bottom lip, the slip of his tongue against Shane’s. He let his eyes flutter shut, enjoying the lush way Ilya trapped his bottom lip between his, the firm ripple of muscle in Ilya’s back as Shane ran his hand over it.

Eventually, he surfaced for air. “You didn’t give me an answer.”

For a long moment, Ilya just blinked at him, their noses inches apart. “Yes,” he said simply. “I will come with you to the cottage.”

He liked the way the word rolled off Ilya’s lips, the accent soft and closed around the vowels, exploding softly around the Ts. Shane had often thought Ilya’s accent was sexy, intriguing. He’d never really thought of it as pretty before.

Here, sotto-voce on the living room couch, there wasn’t a single other word that could be used for it. His accent was pretty; so were his evaluating hazel eyes, his soft golden hair. So pretty, Shane almost couldn’t stand it.

It wasn’t clear who kissed who after that, but for a while he was melting into the cushions, enjoying the pleasant weight of Ilya nestled between his legs, his arm slipping beneath Shane’s back and underneath his shirt to pull him impossibly closer.

Still, even with the distracting and dizzy pleasure of Ilya pressing kisses into the sensitive skin of Shane’s neck, there was one last thought he couldn’t quiet.

“Wait.” 

Ilya’s lips were swollen when he knocked his forehead against Shane’s. He let out a heavy sigh. “What is it?”

“Um.” Shane squirmed a little, still thoroughly pinned by every inch of long-limbed Russian on top of him. There wasn’t a place in the world he’d rather be. “Don’t you think we should maybe talk about this?”

He wasn’t quite sure what this was. He wasn’t even sure he was ready to do a thing so reckless as defining the relationship— this was something Rose always complained about the boys she was seeing being unwilling to do. Even just the thought made him feel like he was drowning, so he brought up a different but similarly pressing concern. 

“I just mean- if we get caught, that would be really bad. You would lose your job, you’d probably have to go back to Russia. We’d both get outed. It would be bad.”

Shane’s voice sounded uncertain in his own ears. He added this last thing as if being outed was a fate worse than deportation. He knew it was selfish, but to him, it was. 

It was a lot easier to picture the consequences for Shane than it was to picture the consequences for Ilya. They were concrete, the contours of his punishment clear because of how many times he’d thought about it. For him, it meant no more hockey, at least not in any way that was meaningful. It meant news articles, press releases, a deep and drowning shame. Ilya's fate was murkier, harder to imagine, mostly because Shane had never tried to think very hard about it before.

He became aware of the fact that he had started to anxiously roll the delicate chain of Ilya’s crucifix between his fingers where they were still tangled around his neck.

“Yes, I know all this.” Ilya seemed unimpressed. “Is risky, sure.”

Shane waited what felt like an agonizingly long time for him to say more, but he didn’t.

“So?”

“So what?” Ilya’s brow creased. “You want to stop?”

“No,” he said immediately. “I don’t want to stop.”

“Okay, then.” Ilya knocked his forehead against Shane’s again, but it felt like there was more affection in the touch. Maybe Shane was making that up. “So we will not stop.”

Something on Shane’s face must have given away that this wasn’t quite the reassurance he was seeking.

 “What is it you said, after sneaking out on me last week? No one will find out?” Ilya grinned teasingly, his vowels warped in a way that clearly indicated he meant to imitate Shane.

“That is not what I sound like,” Shane said with a frown, then groaned. It was his turn to press his brow to Ilya’s. “But I am sorry about that.”

“Sorry for what?” 

“I was such a dick to you that day.” Shane slipped his hand down and pressed his thumb into the edge of the crucifix, grounding himself, and Ilya glanced down, his expression unreadable as he clearly chose to let Shane keep fiddling with it. “I said that thing about not doing my job because you couldn’t do yours. I didn’t mean it, I was just irritated. I’ve literally been regretting it ever since I said it.”

Those hazel eyes seemed to be taking in every aspect of Shane’s expression, considering something he couldn’t decipher. 

“Is okay, Hollander,” he said matter-of-factly. “I thought I was very nice to you about it.”

Shane let out a disgusted groan. “I know you were nice about it. It made it so much worse.”

That made Ilya laugh, the movement jostling Shane. After a moment, he was smiling too, despite himself.

“The point is that I’m sorry,” Shane said again. “I shouldn’t have snuck out. And I’m also sorry for being awful and entitled after I did it.”

“You were not all awful.” Ilya’s eyes gleamed a little. “You brought me food while I was sick.” 

Shane had to concede that it was true. It looked like Ilya was considering kissing him again, his gaze drifting lazily down to Shane’s lips, so he hurried to say the rest of what he needed to say.

“So, we’re not going to stop,” he breathed. “We’ll just be really, really careful. And we won’t get caught.”

“Right,” Ilya agreed, adjusting his hand where it was resting on Shane’s waist. “So careful.”

And Shane had been right, because Ilya kissed him again, and then he was slipping one thick thigh between Shane’s legs, the pressure rolling a wave of bliss through him. 

By the time Ilya was sucking on his bottom lip, peeling Shane’s t-shirt up from the waist, he found he couldn’t worry about anything at all. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

The peace, of course, couldn’t last forever.

In fact, it only lasted about a day and a half.

They were fifteen minutes late to morning skate. Shane had woken up in Ilya’s bed, where he had slept for reasons that were both honorable and understandable, and there had only been a few minutes of drowsy mumblings between them before Ilya was sinking down the bed and wrapping his still sleep-warm mouth around Shane’s cock. 

Every time he looked up at Ilya in the stands, his cheeks grew warm. There was something about the indecent sprawl of him in the plastic seats, one leg thrown over the row in front of him, that had Shane thinking about that big body, the way it had curled around him the night before. He'd had to make sure to be the first one on the ice and the last one off in hopes that no one would notice the hickeys all over his chest. 

He was only jostled out of his daydreaming when JJ swirled past him and knocked the stationary puck from his stick, giving Shane a confused glance.

“You sleeping much, Hollzy?”

“Um, yeah.” Shane fought the urge to glance at the stands again. “Yeah. Why?”

“You just seem tired.” JJ shrugged, and followed Shane’s stubborn eyes up to where Ilya was paging through his book, not paying attention to the ice. “Need anything?”

“I, for one, need you both back in the drill,” one of the offensive coaches said from where he had apparently been hovering a few feet behind them. Shane jumped guiltily, then hustled back into position.

He waded through the rest of his classes, lost in a fog of drifting between stress about his finals and thoughts of Ilya. When he left his last discussion for the day, his shoulders slumped a little with relief at the sight of Ilya, exactly where he knew he’d be. 

“Hey,” he breathed. Ilya matched his step perfectly as they began to head towards the stairs. “Ready to go home?”

Ilya was nodding, mouth open to respond, when they heard someone calling his name.

Shane almost forgot to stop walking, it was that unexpected. When he thought about it later, he would realize that was because no one had ever—ever, in all these months—tried to speak to Ilya before they spoke to Shane.

“Ilya!” Dr. Hartman was a little out of breath by the time she reached them, loose strands of hair drifting around her face. “Man, you guys have long legs. I’m so glad I caught you.”

“Me?” Ilya’s brow furrowed, something stark and a little panicked in his eyes as he met Shane’s confused expression.

“Yes, silly.” Shane became aware of the garishly orange folder in her silver-ringed hands at the same moment she brandished it towards Ilya. “I know you said I could email it to you, but I prefer hand-written notes. I thought you might, too, and I was hoping to catch you last week, but neither of you were in class.” She smiled at Shane. “Hopefully feeling better?”

Right. Shane had emailed her to let her know he was sick, and would be missing one of her lectures. It wasn’t a big deal— Hartman had a lax attendance policy anyway, and it was the end of the semester and he hadn’t missed any other lectures. Never mind the fact that it hadn’t been Shane who was sick; it was Ilya.

Still he nodded, entirely baffled, as Hartman directed her attention back to Ilya. She pushed the folder in his direction again, and he tentatively took it from her.

“Thank you,” he said quietly.

“Don’t worry about it.” If she noticed the strain on Ilya’s face, her expression didn’t show it. There was that smile again, bright and wide. “Send me your edits, okay? I’ll be drowning in grading essays for the next few weeks, but I’ll try to get back to you quickly, probably after the holidays.”

“Okay,” said Ilya. Again, the word was muted in a way Shane had never heard him speak, almost shy as he glanced again, wide-eyed, at Shane. 

So many questions were flooding through him. He knew that Ilya had to be seeing them all, scrawled across his features.

“Well.” Dr. Hartman jerked her thumb over her shoulder in the direction she’d come, her smile now a little awkward. “I have to go, but again, glad I caught you. Let me know if you need anything.” She looked at Shane. “Don’t forget— your final is due next Wednesday.”

“I won’t forget,” Shane said, his mouth dry.

“I’m excited to see what you wrote, Shane,” said Hartman as she backed away. “I really liked what you had to say in your last mini-submission. Keep it up!”

 She seemed to genuinely mean it, and Shane floundered a little under the compliment. Before he could deliberate too long on a response, she was disappearing behind the door of a classroom with a jaunty wave.

Ilya wore a backpack around campus more as a prop in his attempt to blend in than anything else. It usually flapped limply against his back— empty, Shane knew, except for a few sparse notebooks and the occasional crumpled plastic waterbottle. Now he shuffled the backpack off of his shoulders and unzipped it in a rush, stuffing the neon orange folder inside of the bag as if, should he get rid of it quick enough, Shane might forget he’d seen it at all.

For his part, Shane felt like he had been glued to the linoleum tile. He felt frozen, stiff with confusion. They had been standing still in the hall for too long, taking up space; around them, students parted in waves, some of them sending nasty looks in their direction.

“Come on,” Ilya said once he’d shouldered the backpack again. “Let’s go.”

When Shane didn’t move, he reached out and tugged at his sleeve, and Shane jerked his arm back instinctively. He hadn’t meant to, but the touch had surprised him. 

Still, Ilya flinched. “Shane,” he tried again. “Let’s go home.”

So they went home. 

The frozen grass was stiff beneath Shane’s boots as they made their way across the quad. His brain was buzzing, processing.

Shane felt like he was wiping frantically at a very foggy window. A moment ago, he’d caught a glimpse through a clear patch on the pane. It was something he wasn’t supposed to see, and now he was pawing at the glass, desperate to see more.

He remembered two months ago, seeing Ilya and Dr. Hartman chatting at the top of the lecture hall. The comfortable, familiar way she’d squeezed his arm before they ended their conversation. Shane had assumed Ilya was flirting with her, but that had never really made sense to him. His thoughts flitted from explanation to explanation, but none quite fit. 

Beside him, Ilya’s head was low, his eyes fixed on the snow-stained sidewalk. 

Neither of them spoke until the door was shut and latched behind them. Ilya strode immediately into the kitchen, where it appeared they would once again have a very difficult conversation. Shane thought to three nights prior, where he’d stood in this exact spot and begged Ilya for answers he wouldn’t give. When that hadn’t worked, Shane had instead begged for something Ilya would give.

In the last seventy-two hours, the room been thoroughly altered with Shane’s memories. They’d made out against the sink. They’d burned dinner after Ilya hitched Shane onto the counter and kissed him until his lips were swollen. They’d eaten breakfast at the counter, Ilya’s hand sweeping soothingly up and down Shane’s thigh whenever he wasn’t using it to shovel cereal into his mouth.

Now, Ilya pinned himself into the corner where the cabinets met, as far away from the entrance where Shane was standing as possible. His arms were folded defensively in front of himself.

“Okay.” Shane exhaled. “Are you going to tell me what the hell that was about?”

There was a long pause. “I can explain,” Ilya said slowly. Then, he closed his mouth and didn’t say very much at all.

It took Shane a moment to realize what was happening. He had only very recently become accustomed to some of Ilya’s moods, the way they carried in his body. This defensive posture, partnered with the way he was swallowing at the floor, wasn’t something he was used to seeing. It made Ilya look younger, somehow. 

“Ilya,” Shane said. “I’m not mad. You know that, right? I’m just-” He swallowed. “I’m really confused. Like, objectively, it is super fucking weird that that just happened, you know?”

Across the room, Ilya’s gaze flicked up, as if to check the validity of what Shane was saying. His shoulders relaxed a little at whatever it was he saw.

“I can explain,” he said again. Then he seemed to get stuck again.

Shane only nodded, forcing his posture to relax. His hip pressed into the counter, one of his hands braced beside him. 

He realized, distantly, that he fully trusted Ilya. That, although he was anxious about whatever he was about to say, something inside of him inherently believed it couldn’t be that bad. Shane wasn’t sure what to do with a realization like that, so he pocketed it. 

Still so many feet away, Ilya finally spoke. “I go to her office hours.”

“What?” 

“I go to her office hours,” he repeated. “Sometimes. While you are in accounting class. Her office is across hall.”

Oh. Shane’s shoulders slumped a little. Accounting met twice a week, one of those classes that was too small for Ilya to fit subtly into. In theory, he was supposed to be spending the entire time right outside the door in case Shane needed him, but Shane had never checked whether or not that was the case.

It was a weird feeling. It made him strangely bereft to realize that maybe Ilya had not always been exactly where Shane presumed he’d be. 

“When did that start?” 

Ilya shrugged. “September, maybe? I do not know.”

“Okay,” said Shane, and waited for more details. Ilya’s shoulders had begun to creep up towards his ears.

“Is no big deal,” he mumbled. “We just talk about books.”

“Books?” 

It wasn’t all that surprising. Ilya liked to read. Dr. Hartman was a professor of literature. Shane found it hard to imagine that there was discussion of much else occurring at her office hours, but he would never know, since he had never been. Still, his mind struggled to stitch together the image of Ilya crammed into an office with her, talking about— what? James Joyce?

“How did it start?” Shane prodded, when it became clear that Ilya was hesitating to say much more. He was preoccupied, his fingers pinching and pulling at what appeared to be a loose seam in his jeans pocket. “Er- actually, do you want to go sit down? Talk about it on the couch?”

It wasn’t really in Shane’s nature to try to put someone else at ease. He’d never been particularly good at it. Still, he was relieved to see that Ilya’s shoulders dropped an inch when he tucked himself into his usual spot on the couch. Shane drew himself tight on the opposite end, resting his chin on his knees and angling his entire body to face Ilya’s.

“Dr. Hartman is my friend, kind of.” Ilya started, then stopped. “She is very nice to me when she sees me standing in hall by myself. I asked her question once about Tolstoy- what other short stories she likes, since we read Ivan Ilyich in class, and we started to talk about Russian authors. She invited me in, said no one else was coming to office hours that day.” His eyes flicked, still rimmed with guilt, to Shane. “I know it was bad to leave you. But nothing ever happened, and you were right across hall-”

“Ilya,” he interjected, although this was an immediate breach of his internal promise not to interrupt. “I don’t care about that.”

He seemed to scan Shane’s face again, as if still trying to verify the truth, before he nodded to himself. “Is really nothing, like I said. If no one comes to her office hours, I go in there. She gives me books sometimes. She has copies of a few in Russian and in English, so I can flip back and forth when the English is harder to translate.”

And just like that, another piece of the puzzle settled in Shane’s brain. He’d forgotten what Ilya had said at that party, all those months ago. She has PhD in Russian literature. How come I read syllabus, and you do not?

 “You guys speak in Russian?”

He nodded. “Sometimes, but she likes to challenge me. She makes me speak and read in English so mine gets better. She says is like independent study.” His brow furrowed. “Except, of course, I am not real student. Independent study is not technically allowed.”

He said the words like he was echoing them from the mouth of someone else. There was a weird pang in Shane’s chest at the look on Ilya’s face. 

All at once, he felt ashamed. He’d never asked what Ilya might have studied, had he gone to school. He’d never even asked if Ilya wanted to go to school, but it was evident, in some part, that this was something he’d been enveloped in for months without Shane even noticing.

“So, what was in the folder, then?” Shane asked, his eyes darting curiously to the crumpled backpack where it had landed by the door. He fidgeted with the bottom of his pant leg. “She said she was giving you notes.”

“Ah.” Ilya pinched his lips for a second, his cheeks puffing with breath as he considered his answer. “Is practice essay.”

“A practice essay?” Shane raised his eyebrow. “You wrote an essay for fun?”

“Yes.” Ilya nodded, but his eyes were stuck on the carpet. “Like the mini-submissions you do in class. Sometimes I write drafts for her and she gives feedback.”

“Why?” Shane tried to keep the raw bafflement from his voice, but he wasn’t doing a good job. He couldn’t fathom why someone would voluntarily choose to write the same essays that had him nearly wanting to pluck out his eyebrow hairs.

Another shrug. “Like I said, she challenges me. Makes my English better. Is nice to use my brain.”

There were lots of other questions he wanted to ask. Like when exactly Ilya had scrounged up the time to write a practice essay, when he was working full-time shadowing Shane and seemed to spend all the rest of his time doing pull-ups around the apartment and flipping through paperbacks. Like how many of those paperbacks had come from the shelves of Dr. Hartman. Like when, if ever, Ilya was going to tell him about this.

Instead, the question that left his lips was: “So, you’re not, like, flirting with her?”

Ilya’s head jerked up. For a breathless moment, he studied Shane, before his eyes lit up and a wide grin spread across his mouth. He began to laugh— loudly, and very much at Shane. 

“Okay, okay, dumb question,” Shane mumbled, feeling somehow like he was frowning and smiling at the same time. He buried the expression in his hand as Ilya kept laughing, his shoulders shaking.

“You think I am flirting with Dr. Hartman?” He eventually panted out. “She is very pretty, yes.”

He let Shane sit in that for a few seconds.

“And so is her wife,” he eventually added, and it was sort of unfair, for his eyes to be twinkling like that as he looked at Shane.

“Oh.” His cheeks heated. “I didn’t know she had a wife.” 

“Yes.” Ilya nodded sagely. “Dr. Kazan. She visited once. Dr. Hartman had forgotten her lunch at home, it was very sweet.”

Shane rocketed up in his seat. “What!” 

“What?” Ilya looked startled.

“Kazan was my fucking game theory professor sophomore year,” Shane griped. “She was a total hard-ass. Made my life hell because she wouldn’t accept late work the fucking week of the Frozen Four. They’re married? To each other?”

Ilya’s brows arched with delight. “Extremely married,” he said, then leaned forward and patted Shane’s knee. “See? Nothing for you to be jealous about. Just lesbians.”

“I wasn’t jealous.” Shane frowned. “I was just trying to understand why the fuck you’d be hanging around my professor when you’d literally never mentioned it before.”

Ilya’s face had returned to a modicum of the seriousness it had held before. He hesitated, still fidgeting with the loose seam on his pocket, before he asked his next question.

“You really are not mad at me?”

“No,” Shane said immediately, shaking his head. “Genuinely, Ilya, I don’t mind. I mean, I wish you’d told me about it, but I guess I can understand why you didn’t.”

He didn’t understand it, not fully, but his words seemed to be the last of the reassurance Ilya needed. He relaxed back into the couch cushions, his curls smudged across his forehead.

 A lightbulb went off in Shane’s head.

“Wait a minute. Is that who called you the other day? Is that who you were with?” 

He wasn’t quite sure why Hartman would be calling Ilya at eight on a weeknight, or why the call would send Ilya rushing out of the house. Maybe she was his friend who was sick. Maybe she had introduced him to the friend who was sick? The story wasn’t fully lining up, but Shane was determined to keep pulling back the layers.

Ilya wasted no time sitting back up. He gave Shane’s knee one more pat with his broad, warm hand before he shuffled off the couch.

“Okay, question time is over,” he announced. “You have homework to do. I have call with Jasper. Both very boring, but we must persevere.”

“Ilya,” Shane groaned, “that’s not fair. Just tell me, I've basically already figured it out.”

On his way out of the living room, Ilya ruffled Shane’s hair. He craned his neck up at him, trying his best to fix him with an expression that would convince Ilya to spill the rest of his secrets.

“Is very cute that you think you have figured me out, Hollander,” he said with a cheeky smile. “Maybe I will take you somewhere fun this week. You can figure out some more.”

With that cryptic wording, he wandered out of the room, leaving Shane alone on the couch.

Chapter End Notes

some housekeeping notes:

- shane is still eligible for the draft after college bc the mlh draft works differently from the nhl draft and actually it's a very normal thing for players to do and this is true bc I said so <3 sorry hockey lovers suspend your disbelief (and tbh if you're reading this fic I already know you've done plentyyyy of disbelief suspending!)

- sorry for the fluctuating chapter count but 14 should be it for realsies I think! updates might be slowing down a little (much like this one did) bc we are approaching the end of the story and I still have a lot of pans in the fire and I want to land this plane as intentionally and carefully and wonderfully as I can. also bc I'm a busy mf for these next few weeks but mostly bc of the whole pans in the fire thing.

hopefully you guys enjoyed finding out one of ilya's secrets :,) been holding onto this one. I need us all to take a moment to picture ilya in office hours with a giant mug of hot cocoa talking about how conflicted holden caulfield makes him feel.

again, thank you all so much for reading and kudos-ing and commenting. genuinely each comment makes my entire day I am not joking when I say I am printing these out and taping them lovingly into my journal. okay I'm sleep-deprived and might delete this entire author's note in the morning but love you bye also no one beta'd any of this chapter as usual

Chapter 11: shane walks into the shelter

Chapter Notes

some notes for clarity: reading day in usually a day before finals week at American universities where there's no class, ostensibly so people can study more. I think they have it in other countries (revision week maybe?) but wanted to mention that in case it wasn't clear :)

also, there's a bit more Russian than usual in this chapter (little phrases, not full sentences!) and I chose not to translate it with coding in the text because I think it's interesting to emphasize the fact that we're limited in Shane's perspective and he can't hover over dialogue and easily translate it to English lol. that being said, I do think most of it is clear with context clues.

as always, this chapter is not beta'd! I hope you enjoy :)

The next several days passed quickly. Shane tapped his pencil through the last of his lectures. Made out with Ilya afterwards. Sweated through his morning workout. Spent several hours studying at Rose’s sorority house, ignoring the wails of a girl who was certain she would never make it to med school. Cooked crispy chicken cutlets for dinner and came in Ilya’s mouth before bed, his fingers clawing so desperately at the sheets he was surprised he didn’t tear a hole in them. Called his dad to talk about Christmas plans. Spent an afternoon taking accounting practice exams. Spent an hour and a half on the treadmill, trying to sprint away the stress. Got more stressed because he wasn’t working on his essays. Had sex with Ilya in an attempt to release the stress. The cycle continued.

The night before reading day, Shane settled in at the kitchen counter, the same way he had every night that week.

His eyes were stinging, his notebook dotted with coffee rings. He didn’t know how long he’d been sitting there— just that it had been since Ilya took his plate after dinner, whenever that had been. They’d picked up banh mi as a treat from a place Ilya liked, a block off campus. The fresh vegetables had tasted like cardboard in Shane’s mouth, his only thought about how on earth he was going to finish all of the studying he had to do on top of his essays, which were going terribly.

He barely even blinked when Ilya entered the kitchen, Shane’s eyes fixed on his laptop screen. There was the faint clinking of Ilya lifting Shane’s empty mug off the counter, the running of the sink as he rinsed it. Shane might have mumbled a thank you, but he wasn’t sure.

Ilya left the kitchen. Shane spent a few more minutes scrolling through slides from class, the words blurring in front of him.

A few moments later, he jumped out of his skin when two arms folded around him from behind and tugged him off his stool. The move was clumsy, because Ilya was enveloped head-to-toe in a duvet cover, which he was now entirely in the process of wrapping Shane into. 

“Ilya!” He tried to pull away, but he was thoroughly trapped as Ilya tugged Shane back into the duvet, his arms tight around him.

“Is bedtime,” Ilya said quite calmly. “Come on.”

“I have to keep working,” Shane insisted, although he wasn’t struggling against the warm hold. He let Ilya pull him into the hallway, their socked feet stumbling over the duvet. 

“You have worked enough. It is three-thirty.”

That made Shane stop in his tracks, and his ankle tangled between Ilya’s. They both tripped a little, and Ilya’s arms wrapped tighter around his waist. “Is it really?”

He felt the nod against his neck. “Yes, really.” He pulled Shane along. “Past bedtime, yes? The work will be there tomorrow.”

By the time Shane was snuggled into the bed, dwarfed in the warm comforter, he was in no mood to argue. He hadn’t even brushed his teeth, which he was sure he would regret in the morning, but his eyes were already slipping shut in the dark of the room.

Maybe that wasn’t why Ilya had brought him to bed, though. Shane reached slowly, blindly, until his fingertips brushed at Ilya’s waistband, curling into the hair that ran from his bellybutton down. He was kind of too tired to do much, but if it was what Ilya wanted—

Instantly, Ilya’s hand caught his, thumb smoothing over his knuckles.

“Not tonight,” he said, gently but inarguably. “Sleep, Shane.”

The next thing he said was either in Russian, or Shane’s brain had reached the point of exhaustion where he could no longer process English. Either way, Ilya’s thumb was rubbing soothingly at the nape of his neck, and Shane was fast asleep before he was even done speaking.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

When he woke, he became aware that he was in heaven. 

The sun streamed in across his pillows. Everything was warm. Ilya’s breath puffed slow along his neck, his face snuggled into the crook of Shane’s shoulder. There were birds chirping outside. Shane felt truly relaxed for the first time in weeks— the kind of peace that only settled in his body after a truly solid night of sleep. 

It was this that made him realize something was wrong.

The sun, streaming in at the wrong angle. His eyes, pleasantly heavy. His body, too well-rested considering when he’d gone to sleep the night before. 

Shane shot up. All at once, the moment was disturbed. Beside him, Ilya groaned as he swiped at his eyes.

“H’llander?” he mumbled. “What’s wrong?”

“I overslept,” Shane breathed, his chest immediately tight with panic. “What time is it?” He half-crawled over the sleepy form next to him to grab Ilya’s phone, checking the screen.

It was ten in the morning. Shane hadn’t slept past nine-thirty since he was a teenager. 

“Fuck. Fuck, I have to- I have to-” His mind was scrambling. “My phone must still be in the kitchen, it probably died. We slept through ice time.”

“Hollander,” Ilya said. He was sitting up now, too, curling his arm around Shane’s waist and nosing, sleep-warm, into his neck. “Lay back down. No class today, da? Reading day.”

Right. Shane hardly relaxed, but he let Ilya coax him back down into the bed. For a minute, no one said anything. Shane’s eyes darted around the room as he went through the mental gymnastics of recalculating his day. 

Ilya’s eyes, when he caught a glimpse of them, were big and clear and studying Shane. He ran a comforting hand up his back. 

“I am sorry,” he said, and seemed genuinely apologetic. “Is my fault. I did not think about your alarm when I came to get you last night.”

Shane exhaled, feeling the panic drain out of him a little just by being tucked back into the bed. He hadn’t realized, the night before, that he’d been pulled into Ilya’s bedroom instead of his own, but he liked Ilya’s bed a little better anyway. The sheets felt softer, the duvet fluffier. Not to mention, the entire thing smelled like Ilya, clean sandalwood and sport deodorant. Still, his brain was working overtime, trying to account for what he had missed.

“We slept through ice time,” he said, although he knew he was repeating himself. 

Ilya cracked a tiny smile. “I think the ice will be fine without you,” he said. “There is no practice, yes?”

That was true, but Ilya didn’t get it. There had been a thoroughly constructed plan for his day. Shane worked best, even at times when he wasn’t stretched to the limit with stress, when his internal clock was working on a rigid schedule. It wasn’t just about ice time, which would’ve let Shane get a little bit of steam out. It was about leaving ice time early enough to make it to the library and snag his favorite spot— the table on the third floor, tucked into the corner with the rounded windows peeking out onto the snow-capped bell tower. He’d told Rose he’d save her a seat. She was going to sneak a salad and a smoothie into the library for him so that he could spend the entirety of the day doing more work, in hopes of finishing one of his papers by the time the library closed. 

So it wasn’t just ice time. It was that most of the spots at the library had probably been snatched up by now. It was that if he ate now, he wouldn’t be hungry enough for the salad Rose snuck in for him, which would fuck up when he ate dinner, which would fuck up how much time he could spend in the library. It was that his entire day was off. 

He tried to explain this to Ilya, who was running his fingers through Shane’s hair. He waited patiently, nodding, while Shane rambled through all the ways in which his day was totally ruined.

“But you slept well, yes?” he said, when Shane was finally done. 

“Um,” he paused. “Well, yeah, I guess.”

“So, that is one good thing,” Ilya said. He soothed his thumb over Shane’s brow. “You need sleep.”

“I can sleep when finals are done,” Shane insisted, but Ilya only shook his head. He was doing that thing where it seemed like he was looking right through Shane.

“So, you will not go to the library anymore?”

Shane shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s reading day, you kind of have to get there before eight if you want a good seat. It’s probably full by now.”

“Okay.”

For another long moment, neither of them said anything. Ilya’s eyes were heavy-lidded, still a little puffy with sleep. His thumb had wandered seemingly absentmindedly to the curve of Shane’s ear, tracing along it in a way that proved conducive to Shane’s zoning out. 

Ilya’s chin dipped imperceptibly in thought, as if making a decision to himself. “You know how I said I might take you somewhere, sometime?”

Shane had only thought about it several times an hour every hour since Ilya said it, approximately two days ago. Still, he only nodded.

“Today is the day, I think,” Ilya said. His fingers slipped down beneath the edge of Shane’s t-shirt collar and massaged the nape of his neck. “You need a break.”

He frowned. “Not that I’m not curious, but I said I wasn’t going to the library, not that I don’t need to do work today.” Even as he argued against it, Shane’s brain was reshuffling, immediately trying to accommodate whatever it was Ilya wanted him to do. “Just because I don’t have class-”

“Two hours,” Ilya bargained. “Give me two hours. I promise, it will be worth it.”

It was hard to argue with Ilya when he was speaking so softly, his face so open and his fingers so gentle as they explored Shane’s skin. 

“Only two hours?”

Ilya’s grin widened a little. “Maybe two and a half.”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Ilya placed an embargo on Shane asking where they were going the minute they left the apartment building. 

“Is twenty minute walk. You only have to wait that long,” he said, and let their gloved fingers brush against each other as they walked. The touch was so chaste, it was hardly there at all, but it took everything inside of Shane not to crane his neck and make sure there was no one around to see it.

It was maybe the slowest twenty minutes of Shane’s life. He occupied himself by watching his breath cloud in front of him, trying to guess where they would turn. For a half a moment, they were headed in the direction of the athletic facilities, but then they turned down a street that was where seniors lived in rental houses that were falling apart. They walked past a couch abandoned in someone’s lawn, covered in a foot of accumulated snow. 

Then there was another turn, and the houses changed. It was a nicer street, the little cottages where professors tended to live with their families. There were crooked I love my public library! signs in the front yards, a pride flag waving from the front porch of a tiny green house. 

“Are we heading into town?” Shane asked, baffled. It was the only feasible explanation, but this was a roundabout way to get there. The scenic route, really. He hadn’t pegged Ilya as someone who would want to take the scenic route.

“Stop trying to ruin surprise, I told you that I am saying nothing.” Ilya’s voice was both smug and thoroughly entertained. “I know is hard to not know everything, but I think you can make it ten more minutes.”

They didn’t stop at the used bookstore, which was where he’d eventually assumed they were going. They didn’t stop at the Samwell movie theater, which was advertising the new Hobbit movie. They didn’t stop at the little international market, or any of the boutiques, or anywhere else Shane could think they would be going.

His eyebrows rose when they made their final turn, down a side street he’d only been on once or twice. Besides the older apartments, there was only one establishment down here that Shane knew of.

The bell on the door to the Samwell Humane Society tinkled pleasantly as Ilya pushed it open. 

It was a cheery yet shabby little reception area— speckled white linoleum tile, faded yellow wallpaper dotted with paw prints. Behind a large desk in the center of the room, a plump older woman with long dark braids was sitting. When she laid eyes on the two of them, her face broke out into a sunny smile.

“Ilya!” She dropped the file in her hands onto the desk and stood, moving towards them. Shane’s eyes caught on her scrubs, which were turquoise and covered in what looked like iguanas. “I wasn’t expecting to see you today!”

“I know,” said Ilya, leaning down to accept the hug she offered him. “Is not my day off, but I had time anyway. I hope that is okay?”

“Of course it is, sweetheart, you know we need people on Fridays.” She kept one hand on Ilya’s bicep, squeezing fondly, before she fixed her eyes on Shane. “I see you’ve brought me a man!”

Shane blushed instantly, feeling shy, but Ilya only grinned. “This is my friend Shane. Shane, this is Roxy. She is in charge of everything here.” Ilya’s grin widened, became cheeky. “She is very good at her job.”

“Oh, stop it, you’re such a flirt.” Roxy scoffed, but her eyes were twinkling. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Shane.” 

She shook his hand, enveloping it in a surprisingly sturdy grip, before she turned and began to dig through the stacks of papers on her desk.

“You boys have perfect timing,” she said to them. “I was in need of someone big and strong to lift some bags of dog food in the supply closet for me.”

“Of course,” said Ilya. “After, I was hoping to give Shane some time in kitten room?”

Roxy, finished with her rummaging, surfaced with a clipboard and a pen. She handed them along with a few sheets of paper to Shane. “That would be perfect. No one’s cleaned those cages yet today.”

Ilya made an expression that Shane had never seen before—some kind of pouting, pleading look—and Roxy laughed, patting his cheek. 

“Don’t make that face at me, baby. It’s never gotten you out of it before.”

“This is true.”

Ilya’s face relaxed again into a smile that still felt a little unlike any Shane had seen before. He tore his eyes away from it to focus on the volunteer forms Roxy had given him, quickly scrawling down his name and the other relevant information. All things considered, Shane thought, he was adapting quite quickly to this situation.

“How is Princess?”

“Oh, she’s good,” Roxy said. “Thank you, again, for stepping in so quickly the other night. Poor Sam was a wreck about having to leave the puppies alone. I don’t know what we would have done without you.”

Shane’s head snapped up, halfway through recording whether or not he’d ever lived with an animal. Roxy, who seemed like someone generally eager to tell a story, filled him in.

“One of our foster dogs was sick last week. She was staying in a home with one of our volunteers, Sam, who’s also fostering a recent mama and her puppies. We called Mr. Ilya last minute to ask him to come watch the puppies while we took Princess to the vet- he was a real hero!”

Shane blinked at Ilya. “I thought you said you were going to help out a friend?”

“Yes,” said Ilya without a hint of irony. “My friend, Barley. She is Golden Retriever.”

Shane blinked again, struck dumb, then returned to the volunteer form. 

By the time he’d finished filling it in, Ilya had pulled his phone out and begun to flip through photos of himself with the puppies he’d apparently spent all of last Wednesday night cuddling while Shane was on the couch spiraling about the fact that he was living with the most secretive man alive.

Roxy cooed at the photos. “Sam’s bringing them in next Saturday for check-ups, if you’ll be around. We might need the extra hands for wrangling.”

“I will be out of town that day,” said Ilya apologetically. He didn’t clarify, but Shane realized he was talking about the fact that they’d both be back in Canada, in theory heading to the cottage. He was still wondering just how much Ilya had told Roxy about his job when she passed the phone with the photos on it to Shane, and every other thought was wiped out of his brain.

The first was just a photo of a playpen full of blurry balls of golden fur, all of them eagerly gathered in front of whoever was taking the photo. The next was of two of the puppies, snuggled up together, while a few more wrestled in the background. Those were fine— cute, sure, but fine. 

The photo that stopped Shane in his tracks was the third. Ilya, in his cozy sweater, cradling a puppy to his chest. Soft yellow fur visible through the parts of his fingers, sweet pink nose nestled into the hollow of his throat as the puppy curled contentedly into him. Ilya’s cheeks were flushed, like it was warm in the room, with his curls all mussed and his smile closed and happy. 

Shane was utterly unprepared for the swell of emotion in his chest, looking at the photo. It made him want to do something irrational, like print a copy out and fold it into his wallet. Like tape tiny copies of the photo above every lightswitch in the apartment, just so he had an opportunity to look at it more. 

Ilya, oblivious to the puddle of feelings Shane had become, swiped onto the next photo, which was another jumbled mess of puppies. They looked identical to Shane, but Ilya began to confidently point and identify them.

“That is Wheat, and his sister Ale. This little one that’s trying to eat my shoe, this is Cereal. Rye and Malt are back there with mama Barley,” he explained. Shane laughed a little at the names.

“We name about a hundred animals a month,” Roxy explained, taking the clipboard from Shane and meandering back towards her computer. “Our volunteers have to get creative.”

Ilya took Shane’s jacket from him, hanging it on a rack off to the side, then busied himself at a little station Shane had missed when they came in. He handed Shane a nametag with his name on it, a crooked and endearing Sharpie smiley face curving beneath the letters. Then they spent about ten minutes hefting fifty-pound bags of dog food from the shelves of one supply closet to another seemingly identical supply closet, at Roxy’s direction. 

“See?” Ilya grinned at Shane. “You do not need ice time. Being here is enough of a workout.”

Next, Shane followed awkwardly behind Ilya as he swung through the rest of the rooms, completing little tasks without Roxy even asking him to. 

“Uh oh, looks like you guys need water. Very thirsty, huh?” he said to a cage of what appeared, from Shane’s perspective, to be several moving piles of hay. 

This greeting, combined with his fidgeting with the water dispenser that was affixed to the bars of the cage, set off an avalanche of squeaking noises until anything Shane had ever heard.

“Yes, yes, hello my friends. Squee squee squee to you, too.” Ilya was entirely unfazed, grinning down at what were, upon closer inspection, maybe guinea pigs. Shane was keeping a healthy distance, listening to what he hoped was happy squeaking and chirping coming from the hay, until Ilya beckoned him closer. 

 “This one is Winona,” he said about a loaf of brown and white fur in the corner of the cage. “She is my favorite, but bit me very hard last time I saw her, so we keep our hands to ourselves this time.”

Shane, who had been not even a little tempted to stick his hand into the cage, offered Winona his most civil greeting. 

Water bottles crowded into Ilya’s hands, they headed into a sterile white kitchenette to refill them, and ran into a girl who was sweeping. She was young— couldn’t have been older than sixteen, braces peeking through the shy, practically adoring smile which she tried to angle at the floor rather than at Ilya.

“Mishti!” Ilya freed up a hand so he could drum it on the doorframe. “How was your violin concert?”

Mishti went about six different shades of red in three seconds. “It was good,” she said. The words were so soft Shane practically couldn’t hear them, but Ilya wasn't bothered.

“Good, good.” His face turned mock-disapproving as he began to fill the bottles at the sink. “You are skipping school today?”

Impossibly, she blushed even deeper. “I’m on winter break.”

The broom in her hands hadn’t moved an inch since Ilya started talking to her, nor had she spared even a glance towards Shane.

“Ah.” He fixed her with another broad grin, and Shane couldn’t even blame Mishti for the way she looked like she wanted to melt into the ground. “I must take my friend to see the kitties, but I want video of your violin song later! Do not leave without showing me, okay?”

He waited for her tentative nod, then pulled Shane along behind him down the hall.

Shane became startlingly aware of the fact that this was the first time he’d ever seen Ilya totally comfortable and in his element. Even places like game night, or the parties after Ilya had gotten to know Shane’s teammates; those were still spaces where Ilya was technically working. This was the first time that boundary had been lifted and Ilya— Ilya looked like an entirely different person. Like the personality that Shane caught glimpses of at home, dialed up to eleven. He was loose-limbed. He was electric. 

It took what felt like forever to make it back to the guinea pigs, because Ilya stopped into every room to say hello to someone. Everyone lit up the moment they saw Ilya, and each conversation went much the same the one he’d had with the shy (visibly crushing) teenager. He asked an older woman who was attending to a pitbull on a leash if her son was feeling better. They ran into another volunteer—a broad-shouldered, heavily tattooed Filipino man who might have been quite handsome, not that Shane was noticing—and Ilya teased him about a girlfriend he’d heard about the last time they visited. 

“So.” Shane waited to speak until Ilya was crouched back down besides the guinea pig cages. “How long have you been coming here?”

He cursed under his breath, extremely focused on latching one of the water bottles back into its complicated wire contraption. “September, I think. My first weekend off.”

Shane’s brow furrowed. He remembered Ilya’s first weekend off— it had been Family Weekend, four months ago. His dad had come to visit, and they’d spent an hour poking around the campus bookstore while Shane tried not to wonder where Ilya had sped off to. They’d been shadowed by Alex, a guard that his dad was quite fond of because he liked to talk about golf. Alex was fine, but he wasn’t Ilya, although this wasn’t an opinion Shane had voiced. 

Even still, it didn’t seem like a few sparse days over the course of four months was enough time to earn this level of familiarity with the other volunteers. It would’ve taken Shane months, maybe years, to warm up to this many people.

“So, you just come here and clean cages?”

Ilya’s knees cracked when he straightened up. “Not usually. Sometimes, yes, but normally I am here with the dogs. I prefer them.”

“Oh.” Shane’s brow creased even further. “Why did you say you wanted to take me to see the kittens?”

Ilya was already moving down the hall. Preoccupied by opening a random cabinet to grab a stack of rags and a sloshing spray bottle of cleaner (once again exhibiting a perfect and baffling familiarity with this place), he took a moment to respond. 

“We are here to relax you. You would not find the doggy room relaxing.”

“Why not?”

“Is loud. There are smells. You do not like things that are loud or smelly.” Ilya shrugged. “I would think you like cats more.”

“I do, but I like dogs, too,” said Shane, maybe more defensive than he should have been. 

The truth was that Ilya had nailed it right on the head. The Hollanders just weren’t pet people— David reminisced, often, about several beloved childhood dogs, but no one had the time to take care of one while Shane was growing up. Yuna didn’t mind dogs, but wrinkled her nose at the concept of the hair and the drool. Shane, as a result, had really only experienced his Aunt Sue’s two cats when he was a child, apart from the rare occasions he’d met dogs in his neighborhood or at a teammate’s house.

He liked cats. Cats had rules. You could tell when you’d pissed a cat off. You could tell, mostly, when they didn’t want to be pet. They were much easier to read, Shane thought, than most other animals.

“You know, I could be allergic to cats,” Shane said to Ilya as they approached a door marked ‘Open Carefully— Watch for Escapees!’. 

“You are not,” he said assuredly, tucking the cleaner underneath his elbow so he could reach for a giant bottle of hand sanitizer and pump some into his hands. Shane followed his lead. “Only bees. And kiwi.” 

Shane expected to feel that typical pulse of dismay that he always experienced when someone knew something about him that he hadn’t explicitly mentioned to them. The sense that he had been flayed open, his insides put on display without his agreeing to it. 

Instead, there was only the slight feeling of warmth inside of his stomach at the smile on Ilya’s lips, the way he read Shane’s expression and the grin widened incrementally. 

“Ready?”

Shane nodded. Ilya pulled open the door and grabbed Shane’s wrist with his free hand, tugging him quickly inside. Immediately, it became clear why— a brown blur was darting across the room towards their feet. Ilya hustled to shut the door behind Shane, swearing under his breath as he managed to slam it just in time.

“Chert voz’mi, Yogurt,” Ilya chided, scooping up the creature. “Always with this behavior.”

The cat wriggled in his hold for just a moment before she settled. She had long stripey fur and eyes the color of cantaloupe, her ears twitching curiously. Shane cautiously held out his hand for her to sniff.

“Hey, kitty,” he said softly. 

“This is Yogurt,” Ilya introduced, as she tentatively sniffed Shane’s knuckles, then pressed her face fully into his hand, seeking pets. “Yogurt is an asshole.”

Shane, who had begun to stroke what might have been the softest cat of his life, glanced up in surprise. “What? Why?”

“She waits for us to clean cages, then runs in and steals the wet food of other cats,” Ilya explained, frowning. “She is escape artist. She bites. She antagonizes Pippin.”

Yogurt had begun to purr very loudly, making biscuits contentedly into Ilya’s chest.

“She seems nice enough to me,” Shane said, then glanced around. The room they were in was lined with shining silver kennels. “Which one is Pippin?”

“Back here,” said Ilya, and led him down a few stations. The cat in question was a large orange tabby, fluorescent yellow eyes blinking unsettlingly at Shane. He was curled regally up on a small bed tucked into the back of the cage, his massive fluffy tail flicking lazily. “Pippin is my favorite, probably. He is diabetic. Yogurt, little dickface, likes his special food the most.” 

“Wow, you kind of are an asshole,” Shane said to Yogurt, who blinked once at him before she returned to nuzzling her little black nose into Ilya’s shirt. “I didn’t even know cats could get diabetes.”

His eyes caught on the cage next to Pippin’s. The door, left slightly ajar (but probably, Shane realized, not by a human), had a neon yellow slip of paper pinned to it. 

“Oh.” He pointed. “Is Yogurt getting adopted? That’s good news, right?”

Ilya leaned closer to read the slip, and a series of odd emotions rippled across his face. His fingers scritched absentmindedly through Yogurt’s fur.

“Your reign of terror will be over soon,” he said to the little cat, who seemed to be too busy trying to climb into his shirt collar to hear him.

Ilya introduced him to a few more cats in the cages, several of whom were more social than others, before he latched Yogurt firmly back into her space and led Shane to a metal door at the back of the room. They both sanitized their hands again.

“Okay,” Ilya exhaled. “It is kind of crazy in here. You might die of cuteness.”

Shane rolled his eyes. “I think I’ll be fine.”

The room was more expansive than he expected. It was large and bright, courtesy of the big windows lining one wall, which contrasted with the dark tile floor. There were a few boxy and colorful couches, towering cat trees dotted around the perimeter. 

Shane hardly noticed any of that, because there were kittens everywhere.

In the center of the room, a black kitten skittered across the room, startled by their entrance. There were several curled up in a donut-shaped cushion on Shane’s left, their fuzzy bodies so tangled in each other that he couldn’t tell which paws belonged to which one. There were kittens sitting in the window, kittens scratching at a column in the center of the room that seemed dedicated to that exact activity. A black and white cat emitting a sound not unlike a very quiet vacuum cleaner butted its head and then the rest of its body against Shane’s leg.

“Welcome to the kitten room,” said Ilya, that wide smile back on his face. He ran Shane through some rules— he wasn’t supposed to pick up kittens, even if it seemed like what they wanted, but he could get floor-level with them and let them crawl on him. If a cat seemed irritated—twitching tail, growling, ears flat back—he should leave it alone.

“I’ve been around cats before,” Shane scoffed, and Ilya only shrugged. 

“You would be surprised. I have to tell everyone the rules.”

“How come the kittens get to run free, and the older cats get stuck in cages?” Shane asked, feeling that the arrangement was slightly unfair.

“The older cats are socialized plenty,” Ilya said. “Is nice for them to have their own spaces. They are more comfortable than you think.” He pointed towards another separate room that Shane hadn’t noticed before. He was beginning to realize this place was mazelike. “Kittens have cages in there. I will be cleaning those.”

"Oh.” Shane’s nose wrinkled. “And you... brought me here to help with that?”

This made Ilya laugh, Shane’s eye catching on the mole in his cheek. “No, no. I did not bring you here to do more work.” 

He led Shane over to the wall of windows, gesturing to a specific spot where sunbeams pooled across the tile. 

“Sit.” 

Shane made another face. “On the floor?”

“Oh, drama queen.” Ilya rolled his eyes. “Yes, on the floor.”

“There’s, like, a million chairs in here.”

“Trust me, Hollander.” Ilya’s eyes were doing that unfair playful twinkling thing. “This is best spot. Floor is mopped six times a day. Sit.”

So Shane sat, stretching his legs out in front of him. The sun crested warm over his hair and part of his face, streaking along his jeans. 

“Now what?” he asked, but when he glanced up, Ilya was already moving away from him.

“Let me know if you need anything,” he said over his shoulder. “Drowning in kittens, someone pees, let me know.”

“Ilya. Wait. Is a cat going to pee on me?” Shane’s posture straightened, his eyes widening, but Ilya had already let the door swing shut behind him.

Just like that, Shane was alone. Rather, as alone as he could be, in a room with thirty cats. This was a predicament he truly had never found himself in.

He reminded himself of the thought that he’d had a few days before, learning the truth about Ilya going to Hartman’s office hours. He trusted Ilya, even if he wouldn’t necessarily say that aloud. Whatever it was that he seemed to think was about to happen to Shane, he thought would be good for him. So Shane stayed put, back flat against the wall, hands folded patiently in his lap.

It didn’t take long for the first kitten to approach. 

He was maybe the fluffiest cat Shane had ever seen. His fur exploded around his face like a lion’s mane, stripey in the way that Yogurt had been. He was big, but Shane could tell he was still a baby— his paws oversized compared to his body, like he had yet to grow into them. His ears were extra pointed, silky beneath Shane’s fingers when he tentatively reached out to pet him. The cat regarded Shane for a moment, before he flopped over on to his back against Shane’s leg, baring a long stretch of fuzzy stomach. 

Shane wasn’t sure if cats liked getting belly rubs the way dogs did. He remembered petting Lucky, his Aunt Sue’s cat, the wrong way once as a child, and the way the claw marks had lingered as scars on his hand for a year afterward. So he was very careful, moving excruciatingly slowly so the cat could map his movements, when he reached down to stroke his fingers gently across the cat’s belly.

It made a little sound, a tiny mrowp, and Shane froze. The cat batted a single paw at his hand, no claws extended. Still, Shane cautiously pulled away.

The cat rolled over again, rubbing its forehead into Shane’s thigh. He was so distracted by the fluffy creature that he almost didn’t notice the second kitten approaching— a lean black one, eyes curious. It planted its paws on Shane’s thigh, sniffing curiously at his jaw.

“Hello there,” he said softly, and traced his hand down its back. It didn’t seem to feel any particular way about being pet by Shane— it sniffed him a few more times before it backed off.

It seemed that Ilya knew what he was talking about when he said this was the best spot to sit. The cats probably cared more about the sunbeams than they did about Shane, but either way, for the next thirty minutes he had a rotating lapful of kittens, each of them purring and butting their faces into his hands and his chest, sometimes standing on him with weight that was shockingly dense. One curled up across his knees, another draped lazily between his calves. A larger black cat spent a minute pawing at Shane’s lower back until he scooted forward a little, and then, unexpectedly, wedged itself into the space between his spine and the wall for a few minutes, seemingly comfortably, before it moved on. 

Through the wall, he could make out the muffled sound of Ilya’s whistling, cage doors opening and shutting rhythmically. At times, Shane could make out the timbre of his voice, although whether Ilya was speaking to himself, or to another volunteer, or simply to the cats, it was unclear. 

At one point, he called out. “Shane. I am going to the dumpster. Do not go anywhere.”

Shane, who currently had four separate cats seeking his attention, had absolutely zero plans to go anywhere. 

It was nice. There wasn’t much to think about, here in this warm spot of sun, surrounded by creatures so soft and so small. He understood why Ilya had taken him here, even if he couldn’t fully understand why, suddenly, he had decided to fold Shane in on this secret pocket of his life. 

He wondered if it was ever hard for Ilya to return to his normal job after being somewhere like this. If it felt like a shuttering, like slotting a lid on top of who he was while he was here—someone so warm, so charismatic—and becoming, once again, the mostly quiet presence who had to follow Shane around all day. 

“Shane?”

He blinked out of his thoughts and up at Ilya, who was standing in front of him. 

“How is it?”

“Good,” said Shane, his voice a little croaky with disuse. His entire body felt loose from the sun, his fingers curled into the fur of a black kitten who was purring like an engine. The noise was almost like the faint sound of ripping velcro— he could feel the tiny vibrating breaths through her delicate ribs as she curled into a perfect ball on his lap.  

Ilya’s eyes snagged on the kitten, and his smile widened. “Ah, you met malen’kiy izyuminka. I did not realize she was still here.”

He folded his legs and sat clumsily down beside Shane, apologizing under his breath to a cat he startled out of sleep on a nearby bed.

“You know this one?” Shane asked, which seemed like a silly question, but Ilya nodded. 

“Her first day was mine, too.” He reached out and stroked a single finger along her spine, and the kitten made a little surprised sound, but stretched into his touch. 

She yawned—impossibly tiny white teeth, teeny pink tongue—then curled back up into Shane’s hand. He pressed his lips together, fighting the urge to let out an audible aw.

“They found her under a car,” Ilya explained, still absentmindedly petting her fur. “First freeze had just happened. Apparently it is common for them to hide under vehicles when it is cold. She had broken leg, little pink cast. Only five weeks old. So small, Roxy was feeding her with a...” He paused, then mimicked using a dropper with a finger plunge. “Shprits. Like for medicine.”

This time, Shane did let out a sound, frowning down at the kitten. “Syringe,” Shane filled in. Ilya nodded. 

“I couldn’t hold her,” he said. “Obviously. I was new, and she was hurt, and very scared. But Roxy let me visit with her every time I came in. Last I saw her, we were getting ready to introduce her to the other cats, but she was still very shy.” 

When he smiled at Shane, it was crooked.

“She must like you. She does not seem very shy anymore.”

“I think she likes the sun, not me,” Shane responded, but his heart was too busy melting for there to be any real feeling behind it. “What did you call her?”

“Izyuminka. It means, ah, little raisin- not the name the shelter went with, I don’t think, but is what I call her. When I held her for the first time, she fit in the palm of my hand. She is so big now.”

Her black fur was almost brown in the sunlight, but Shane could see what Ilya had. An impossibly small black kitten, a shock of pink cast against her fur. He scritched his finger below her chin, and her purring intensified.

“What’s the word for kitten in Russian?”

Ilya, who had been watching Shane’s careful interactions with the cat, suddenly glanced away. He coughed a little.

“Ah, kotenok. Or kotik, sometimes.”

It took a minute to process. Shane still had his hand half-buried in fur when his head snapped up. “What the fuck?”

For a moment, Ilya’s lips pressed together, like he was trying to hide his reaction. Then he brought a hand up to cover his mouth, his laughter spilling out through his fingers.

A month ago, right after the Grant incident. Ilya spotting Shane’s deadlift with a heavy barbell. A few more reps, kotenok, come on. A week ago, Shane’s mouth open and gasping with want. Easy, kotik, you will finish in your pants if you continue this way. That morning, after he’d convinced Shane to stay in bed a few minutes longer, his hand stroking and slick and perfect. Kotenok, you look so good like this.

For a moment, all Shane could do was stammer. Ilya was laughing, a deluge of sound like Shane had never heard before. He buried his face in his hands.

“Not funny, asshole,” said Shane, but there was an incredulous laugh of his own that followed it. “You’ve been calling me kitten? This whole time?”

Ilya genuinely laid fully down on the floor of the kitten room, gasping for air. A curious orange cat padded closer, watching him giggle.

“Is because-” He started, then couldn’t keep going. Shane had never even seen him laugh this hard, and though he tried to act like he was still irritated, he couldn’t help the fond expression that must have found its way to his face just then. “Is because you make that face.”

“What face?”

“Your angry kitten face.” Ilya heaved out a breath and wiped his eyes. If Shane didn’t currently have three different cats curled up in his lap, he’d reach out and shove his knee.

“Fuck off, I do not have an angry kitten face.” Now, though, Shane was laughing because Ilya was laughing, the sound hiccuping and hilarious.

“Yes, you do, it’s like-”

When Roxy walked in on them a moment later, it must have looked like they were doing nothing but making faces at each other, dissolving into stupid giggles every time. 

“Okay, sweet boys,” she announced from the doorway. She’d donned a pair of rhinestone-crusted eyeglasses since Shane had last seen her. “Ilya, are you done with the cages?”

Ilya, wiping honest-to-god tears from his eyes, nodded. Shane did his best to school his expression. Their laughter had scared off all of the kittens in his lap except for Izyuminka, who was standing in front of him with her fur all rumpled, a look on her little face that Shane could somehow read as disgruntled, like she was annoyed to have had her nap disturbed.

“Good, because there’s a family coming in. I'm sorry, but I have to kick you out.”

“It is okay,” said Ilya, this version of himself always affable. He pushed himself to standing, then offered Shane a hand, his strong fingers curling firmly around his wrist. Shane pulled away maybe a bit too quickly, fighting the urge to shake off the staticky sparkling warmth of Ilya’s touch. 

“I was wondering if you’d be willing to take one of the dogs out before you go. We’ll manage if not, but Mishti had to go a bit earlier than expected so we’re down a person.”

Ilya frowned good-naturedly. “She was supposed to show me her violin video before she left!” 

Secretly, Shane was a little glad he’d been spared having to witness that painfully shy girl dredge up a video of a performance (that had no doubt stressed her out on its own) only so that the very hot older guy she volunteered with could watch it. He didn’t know much about what it was like to be a teenage girl, but he could imagine that it was the stuff of nightmares.

Ilya, none the wiser, turned to Shane. “What do you think? Do we have time to walk dogs?”

He checked the time. They were nearing the threshold of the day where, if Shane hadn’t begun to study soon, he’d start to feel his stomach twist with stress. He could already feel, nagging somewhere in the back of his neck, that he was steeply behind on everything he had ever tried to accomplish in his entire life. 

In front of him, Ilya was making that face he’d made earlier, when he’d been asked to clean cat cages and was trying to get out of it. Pouting sweetly, his bottom lip pushed out just a little.

It hadn’t worked on Roxy. To his utter dismay, Shane couldn’t say the same.

“I’m not picking up dog poop,” he said, and Ilya’s pout dissolved into a radiant smile.

“Deal.”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Twenty minutes later, Shane found himself holding tentatively onto the leash of a ten-year-old Collie mix named Angel. 

“Her name is Angel, because she is so sweet,” Ilya had said before handing her over to Shane. “Also old. Easy to walk. You will like her.”

She was sweet— nosing wetly at Shane’s hand, probably in search of treats, then calmly letting him stroke her velvet-soft ears. Ilya was walking a smaller dog with a high-pitched, yapping bark.

“Angel is mostly deaf,” he told Shane as they swung out onto the sidewalk. “So she does not mind the barking so much.”

For a few minutes, they were walking in silence. There was a cloudless and blue winter sky ahead of them, the sunlight watery but warm as it trickled down on them through what few leaves remained clinging onto the trees. Shane found that he wasn’t very cold, his mind swirling slowly through all of the questions he wanted to ask.

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you speak so much Russian before today,” was what he came up with.

If the comment was unexpected, Ilya didn’t show it. “I like speaking it with the animals,” he said. Angel had stopped to sniff something at the base of tree, so their steps slowed, crunching on the salted sidewalk. “I know they cannot understand me, but no one here can, so.”

“Except Dr. Hartman,” Shane said, and the look Ilya shot him was curious, rimmed with amusement.

“Yes, except for Dr. Hartman,” he said. Angel, satisfied with her sniffing, continued plodding along. Shane waited, in case Ilya wanted to say anything more, reveal something else about the nature of his relationship with Dr. Hartman, but he didn’t. 

“I’m just saying,” said Shane, and for some reason his ears burned a little. He pivoted to the question he actually wanted to ask. “So, is this, like, what you want to do?”

Ilya adjusted his hold on the leash. “What do you mean?”

“Well, you clearly like animals a lot. Do you want to be a vet, or something?”

“Ah, no. I do like animals, but I hate science. I was never very good at it in school.” 

“Oh.” Shane nodded. “Me either, really. I used to like math a lot, but never science.” He swallowed, still feeling brave enough to ask questions when he had his eyes fixed ahead of them. “So, what made you come to the shelter, then? Did you volunteer with animals back in Russia?”

That made Ilya laugh, the sound short and brusque. His abrupt breath clouded in the air. “No. I never worked with animals in Russia. It was always hockey, hockey, hockey.” He looked, again, to Shane, whose eyes were resolutely fixed on the dogs. “My life before I came here looked a lot like yours, Hollander. Believe it or not.”

Oh. Well, that made Shane feel like an asshole. He couldn’t imagine going from a life that looked like his to a life that looked like Ilya’s— and even then, he knew that this was a thought he could never repeat. 

Mercifully, Ilya didn’t seem bothered. He kept talking. “I was out for a walk, on my first day off. You say there are things downtown to see—I would argue not very much—but the shelter had sign on the door that they need volunteers. Roxy was outside, actually, talking to the people who had brought in Izyuminka. She saw me looking at sign and basically dragged me inside because I was tall and she needed someone to help her hang up curtains in one of the back rooms.” Ilya shrugged. “She gave me tour, and that was that. I kept coming back.”

“And you really like it,” Shane filled in.

“I do.” A smile tugged at Ilya’s lips, seemingly unconsciously. “I like the animals. And it is nice to be somewhere they know me.”

There was no malice in his tone. He clearly hadn’t meant for the statement to pierce Shane the way it did, but what went unsaid was that it was probably one of very few places (at least on this continent) where Ilya felt known. The realization sank in Shane’s stomach like pebbles in a pond.

I’m trying, Shane wanted to say. It scares me. But I’m trying.

Ilya, completely unaware of the desperate way Shane felt like he had to latch onto the thread he’d caught that day—the complicated and slow unwinding of the ball of twine that was Ilya Rozanov— clicked his teeth at the smaller dog, then cooed a string of Russian at him.

They kept walking.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

“Thank you for bringing me here,” Shane said after they’d washed their hands in a gushing industrial sink in the back of the shelter. “It was fun.”

When he turned around, Ilya was closer than expected. It was a cramped space to begin with— more of a glorified hallway, with the big metal sink embedded in the wall beside a door that led outside. A pane of glass in the door, partially obscured by a dingy flowery curtain, let in pale December light. Ilya's big body took up more space than Shane had realized, and suddenly their faces felt inches apart.

He tried to take a step back, but the backs of his thighs hit the sink. Ilya’s eyes darted down, and he grinned, like he knew what feelings his proximity stirred up in Shane—that dizzy, sticky, anxious want—and like he enjoyed it.

“Fun, yes?” 

The light changed, and Shane realized that this smile of Ilya’s wasn’t cocky. It was shy, almost, as he ducked his head. Shane was struck yet again by the fact that he had never seen Ilya smile so much. He’d never had the opportunity to categorize so many of his facial expressions outside of the usual ones, which tended to be grumpy or impassive or stern.

“I am glad you like it here,” he continued. “I think is one of the most special places in the world.”

It was a vulnerable admission. The words sank into Shane, and his entire chest did something squishy and sentimental. He felt stupid with affection.

“Yeah,” he agreed. “It’s really special.”

“I took photo. Do you want to see?”

It seemed to be a rhetorical question, because Ilya was pawing at his back pocket and pulling out his phone— his personal phone, Shane noticed. He was only able to distinguish it from Ilya’s government-issued work phone because one of them had a navy case on it, and the other didn’t have one at all. It was a massive exercise of Shane’s self-control not to order a drop-proof case online every time he caught a glimpse of the screen, cracked in the corner, because Ilya insisted he didn’t need one. 

Shane didn’t notice the cracks as much this time, because he was too busy looking at the photo.

It was of him, sitting on the floor where Ilya had left him that morning. He was drenched in the rosy sunlight cascading through the window, his hair a spiky shock of dark in the halo of light. He wasn’t looking at Ilya, of course— he’d had no idea the photo was being taken. He was preoccupied by Izyuminka in his lap, her little head cradled in his palm, one of his other hands distractedly curled into the fur of one of the cats who had laid against his thigh. He was smiling.

Shane’s mouth went a little dry.

“You should probably delete that,” he said, because there wasn’t anything else to say. Because the photo was revealing. Because the photo was vulnerable and soft and Ilya had taken it on his personal phone. Because the knowledge of that, and the knowledge of Ilya liking it enough to keep it, made something inside of Shane glow like a coal, and his instinct was that he had to snuff it out.

“Why?” Ilya frowned, stuffing the phone into his pocket. “Is just a picture of my friend Shane.”

He waited for Shane to make nervous, brief eye contact, and then his face relaxed as if he understood, when Shane knew he could not. Still, Ilya cuffed him jocularly on the shoulder. The move was boyish and platonic and totally at odds with the moment, the way he’d smiled softly at his phone before he’d stuffed it in his pocket.

“Come on. Time to return to real life, yes? Studying waits.”

So Shane followed Ilya out of the building, ignoring the tugging at his ribs. 

Chapter End Notes

another layer of the ilya onion has been peeled back! sorry its not anya!! but in my mind she’s ilya’s soul dog so he has to meet her later in life when he’s in a place where he can adopt her and love her forever :,) also nearly wept with laughter at those of you who thought ilya might be leaving to attend to a horse... i am sure there’s a fic out there where ilya is a farm vet but sadly it is not this one (and actually editing this note later to add: the great divide by katonline is an EXCELLENT ilya with horses fic that I am loving rn!!)

some notes bc I'm feeling chatty:

Shane being allergic to kiwi is a piece of my personal canon that comes entirely from clear to a hedgehog by magneticwave, which is one of theee best fics :)

also, I know I said uploads would be slowing down and that this isn't ~that~ slow but I've been so geeked about this chapter for months I basically already had it written out paragraph-by-paragraph in my outline. they really will probably be taking a bit longer after this, which I am sorry about, but the rest of the fic cannot be sunbeams and kittens as much as I would like it to. next chapter we must return to The Plot!

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Chapter 12: shane walks into the cottage

Chapter Notes

hi friends :) thank you guys for being so so patient with me and thank you so sooo much for all the wonderful comments on the last chapter, they were so motivating and kind. i'm sorry the wait was two months!! this chapter is very long and i’m sorry if that’s not your cup of tea. i thought long and hard about splitting the chapter in half so i could post sooner but tbh while the outline and i may at one point have had a wonderful partnership, it is now a hostage situation and she gets what she wants

a note about this chapter: you might notice that i've changed the timeline of one specific event in ilya's backstory. i wanted to point this out to make it clear that it was a deliberate choice and has informed the way i've written him the whole time :)

I'm also posting this on my birthday eve so legally you have to be nice about it because it's almost my birthday (shoutout august 31st) and that's the rules. I really, really hope you like this one. <3

“Ilya, for the last time, we’re only going to be there for three and half days. We don’t need two tubs of ice cream.”

Ilya scowled. “One of them is dairy-free. Is for you.”

Shane only paused for a minute before he let his hands settle on the rail of the grocery cart again. “It’s December.”

“So?”

“So, I don’t want ice cream when it’s cold.”

Ilya looked genuinely offended. “It is for our hot fudge sundaes!”

“Hot fudge sun—” Shane turned to re-evaluate the contents of the cart. Sure enough, Ilya had snuck in a jar of fudge and a container of maraschino cherries. “Why are we making hot fudge sundaes?”

Ilya’s stare made it evident that he thought Shane was the dumbass in this situation. 

“We are on vacation. When else would we make sundaes?”

Shane sighed. “Well, we can just get one tub, then. It’s fine. We have Lactaid at the cottage.”

He picked up one of the tubs that Ilya had just tossed without ceremony into the cart and handed it back to him. 

Ilya still looked offended. “No, your tummy will hurt.” 

“Not with the Lactaid, it won’t.”

Ilya stared pointedly at Shane as he plopped the container of dairy-free dessert back into the cart. Shane sighed, but decided to drop it. 

They’d been traveling all day— first an hour’s drive to the airport, then the hour and a half flight to Ottawa (just long enough for Shane to watch Forrest Gump and for Ilya to pretend he wasn’t also watching Forrest Gump, just over Shane’s shoulder with the subtitles on), then nearly two hours in the rental car before they’d stopped at the store to stock up on groceries before they arrived at the cottage. 

It was all normal. Very normal. Except for the fact that Shane had a secret.

Shane had a secret, and that secret was currently buried at the bottom of the grocery cart, hidden beneath a strategically placed package of corn tortilla chips and weighted down by a biodegradable bag of apples. 

He’d had to be fast, ducking around the corner of the aisle and sneaking the items into the cart when Ilya was distracted looking at disposable razors, since he’d forgotten to pack one of his own. Every couple of seconds, Shane’s eyes flicked anxiously towards the bottom of the cart, as if the secret items might begin to emit a radioactive glow and spoil the entire thing.

Ilya, none the wiser, made his way around the cart to where Shane was staring at a sea of blue PopTart boxes. “What are you looking for?”

“Um, the brown sugar cinnamon ones.” Shane’s ears heated a little. “I know we already got eggs and stuff for breakfast, but I thought it could be good to have these too.”

“I have never seen you eat PopTarts before,” Ilya said, his eyes on Shane instead of the boxes. 

“But you like them, right?”

Shane kept his eyes glued on the shelf. He was torn between wanting Ilya to notice that he knew his favorite type of sugary breakfast food and hoping that the entire situation was going unnoticed, like it was normal. A dog at the shelter, seeking affection while simultaneously a little afraid of the hand.

In his periphery, he could just make out the twitching of Ilya’s lips.

“Yes, brown sugar cinnamon is the best flavor,” he said, then reached out and snagged a box about an inch from Shane’s chest. “They are right in front of your face.”

“Oh.” Shane blinked.

“Maybe if you wear glasses, you would have seen that.”

“No, you’re always fucking saying this, I do not need glasses—”

“You do,” said Ilya, his tone not absent of glee. “I turned corner earlier, and see you looking at bag of frozen spinach like this.” 

He made a show of holding the box of PopTarts so close to his face that it nearly pressed into his nose. 

“I am not even sure what you are reading so close,” Ilya said. “Is just bag of frozen spinach. Same as every other bag of frozen spinach.”

“I was trying to see if it was organic, asshole.” Shane knocked the box out of Ilya’s hands and into the cart. “I do not need glasses. Maybe you do.”

“No, my eyesight is perfect.”

“Oh, yeah? Can you see this?”

Shane checked the aisle to make sure they were alone before he lifted his middle finger. Ilya’s mouth dropped, a faux-shocked gasp. He took a step forward and folded his very broad and very warm hand over Shane’s vulgar gesture.

 “This is very rude, Shane. And in public, too? Not very polite for the prince of Canada.”

“I’m not a prince,” he mumbled, tugging his hand free before it burst into flames. 

This shouldn’t be novel. They’d gone grocery shopping together probably fifty times in the last five months, swinging through the aisles of the dinky campus Market Basket together, but they’d never shared a cart. Even when they each only had a few things to pick up, they’d done separate baskets, separate checkouts. This was the first time all of their groceries had jumbled together; the first time they’d shared a list, talked through all the items and what they would eat and how they would make it. It had felt very adult and very precious, even with Shane’s heart rate picking up every time Ilya so much as glanced down towards the cart. 

In the line to check out, languishing behind a mother with two full carts and three rambunctious children making chaos out of the conveyor belt, Shane waited until they’d already slotted the plastic divider into place and began to heap groceries behind it before he made a show of checking the list again. 

“Oh, shit, I think I forgot the salad dressing.”

Ilya made a face. “I thought you grabbed it?” 

It proved to be a tactical misfire when Ilya raked his hand through the top layer of the grocery cart, trying to find a bottle of salad dressing that Shane knew wasn’t there. His heart began to pound, his palms a little sweaty.

“Would you go grab it?” Shane asked, the words rushed. The woman in front of them was beginning to dig through her purse for her wallet. “The balsamic vinaigrette, you know the kind.”

Ilya’s brow was still wrinkled with confusion, and it looked like he was about to say something about the way Shane had triple-checked their list. Shane tilted his face up a little, leaning half a breath closer into Ilya’s space. He couldn’t feel the warmth of Ilya’s chest through his winter coat, but he knew it was there all the same. 

“Please? It’s almost our turn.”

For a moment, Ilya’s tongue wetted his bottom lip, his eyes locked on Shane’s. Then, although he didn’t look totally convinced, he nodded and turned in the direction of the salad dressings.

Shane didn’t have much time. The woman with the kids was paying now, tapping at the little screen in front of her. He plunged his hand into the cart, digging through bags of bell peppers and frozen berry mixes before he unearthed the cardboard boxes.

If the cashier, an elderly woman with a nametag that said Gladys, thought it was odd for him to stick the boxes right at the front of what she was scanning (completely eschewing his organized system, which was refrigerated items, then freezer items, then pantry goods), her face didn’t betray it.

Shane’s eyes were glued to the boxes as she picked them up with wine-red nails.He was surprised he didn’t twitch when the scanner made the little bloop. Shane mentally categorized the fact that they landed out of sight into the same bag as the fresh kale before Ilya was returning, holding onto a bottle of Shane’s favorite balsamic. 

Ilya’s fingers pressed lightly, teasingly, to Shane’s lower back as he leaned over him to place the bottle on the conveyor belt. “There,” he said. “Your precious dressing.”

“Thank you,” said Shane, blinking up at Ilya and smiling. His relieved breath fanned out of him as he adjusted the bottle, moving it so it would be bagged up with the other things that went into the pantry. 

Ilya helped Shane load the rest of the groceries onto the belt, none the wiser to what he had just gotten away with. When it came time to pay, Shane’s card was already in his hand, although Ilya tried to bat it away.

“I’m paying,” Shane gritted out. 

“No, I will pay,” said Ilya. “One of us has a job, and it is not you.”

What proceeded was some childish jostling, elbows shoving the other out of the way. Gladys looked deeply unimpressed with the two of them as Shane eventually succeeded, slamming his credit card into the machine. 

“Fine,” Ilya sniffed as he began to pile their grocery bags into the cart. “I guess you will have that fancy MLH contract soon, anyways.”

Shane grinned. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

By the time the wheels of their car were crunching up the gravel drive of the cottage, Shane could already feel the muscles in his back unwinding.

It wasn’t a particularly large house— his parents had bought it a few years after he was born, right before Yuna had been elected to the House of Commons. They’d needed a place to relax in the summers, close enough to Ottawa to abscond for a weekend, and so they’d picked this Muskoka-style cabin near Lac Simon. It was all exposed timber and angled roof, with a sweeping wrap-around porch in the cedar that matched the rest of the house. 

It was prettier in the summer, when the honeysuckle bloomed and the sugar maples shadowed the drive with dense green leaves. There was nothing like the beams of July sun streaming across the deck, the buzzing of the cicadas and the soothing sound of the lake lapping at the dock behind the house.

Still, even in winter, it was a marvel.

It had been a very snowy season. The roof was capped with white peaks of it, delicate icicles dangling from the porch banisters. The towering pine trees that lined the drive looked like they had been dusted with icing sugar, quintessentially Christmas in a way that made Shane feel the holiday in a way he hadn’t yet after the stress of exams. 

Someone had come to the cottage the day before to do ‘opening duties’. In previous years, there was a family from town they paid to handle upkeep, although Shane wasn’t sure if that was the case anymore. The driveway had been plowed, the steps shoveled off and salted. His dad had said on the phone that the water would be on, the house already heated, everything ready for them.

It made Shane feel a weird sort of elation, watching Ilya take the cottage in, knowing that everything was prepared. He had never been to the cottage without his parents, and again there was that bubbling, blossoming sensation of adulthood in Shane’s chest. 

“Very nice,” Ilya murmured, leaning forward to see the house better through the windshield. 

Shane jammed his hat back onto his head, scrambling to get out of the car so that Ilya might not see the giddy grin splitting across his face.

It took several trips up to the house to get all of their stuff inside. The bag with the kale and Shane’s secret purchase had been buried in the trunk beneath their other groceries, so he had to wait to grab it, worried that rushing to dig it out would be too conspicuous. He was incredibly patient as they piled their suitcases by the stairs, then the rest of the grocery bags on the entryway table. Ilya took a second to shuck his coat off, and Shane seized the opportunity to hurry back outside and grab the last of the bags. 

He thought he had played it well, even as he was speed-walking across the gravel. 

What he hadn’t accounted for was that Ilya always recognized a race for what it was, even if he had no idea that it was anything more than senseless competition. Shane’s jaw dropped in shock when he was beaten to the trunk, Ilya’s shoulder jostling against his as he grabbed the groceries out of Shane’s hands. 

“What the hell?”

“Ha, I beat you,” Ilya said, shoving his hands through the plastic handles. He stuck his tongue out childishly at Shane, his arms overly crowded with the bags. 

“You’re ridiculous,” Shane scoffed, shutting the trunk and trying to be casual despite the nervous sweat that had begun to sprout at the nape of his neck, below his coat. 

“I am a gentleman.”

“No, the fuck you’re not. You literally just stuck your tongue out at me.”

“I thought you liked my tongue?”

Shane didn’t bother to dignify that with a response. He shut the door behind the two of them, keeping his eyes focused on the bags swinging recklessly from Ilya’s hands as he toed off his boots. He didn’t wait for Shane to be done unzipping his coat and kicking off his own boots before he was wandering blindly down the hallway. 

“The kitchen is on your left,” Shane said. He grabbed the car keys from where they had been dropped into their dish by the door, thinking quickly. “Hey, actually, sorry, I know you just took your shoes off but would you mind putting the car in the garage? I can put the groceries away.”

Ilya’s response was confused. “Do we have to do that now? I can help put things away.”

Shane made his way into the kitchen and froze. In Ilya’s hand was The Bag. The Bag with the Secret Stuff in it. His eyes darted nervously down to it, then back up to Ilya, who was making another face.

“Why are you being weird?” He took a step forward, and something in his expression softened briefly. “What, you are nervous to have me here?”

“No,” Shane said. “That’s not— no.”

When his eyes flicked back down to the bag, Ilya’s brows lifted. He couldn’t figure out if, from the angle the plastic was parted, Ilya had already seen what was in it.

“You are being weird,” said Ilya again, as if confirming it to himself. He gestured towards one of the kitchen stools, like this was his house. “Sit. Let me put the groceries away, and then I will put the car away—”

“No, you really don’t have to do all that,” said Shane, but the way his eyes had lingered yet again on the bag meant Ilya had caught on. His eyes followed Shane’s, down to the handle which was swaying lazily from his fingers. 

His mouth pinched with amusement, then stretched into a grin when he saw Shane’s eyes widen— a lion watching its prey disappear into the grass, knowing it had a good chase ahead. 

“Shane. Is there something going on?”

“No,” he lied.

“Is there something in this bag?”

“No,” he lied again.

“Is it a bomb?”

“No,” Shane snipped, and now he was scowling. He leaned forward to rip the bag from Ilya’s hands. “Give me that—”

Shane was fast, but Ilya was faster. He darted back, his smile widening with glee, and dug into the bag.

“I do not know what the big deal is, only veggies in here—” and then he froze.

Shane’s eyes lifted skyward, like maybe if he wasn’t looking, what was happening in front of him would stop happening. Like maybe time would freeze and he wouldn’t have to live in this embarrassment for the rest of his life. 

“Shane,” Ilya said, the word dragged out and slow and teasing. “This is my Christmas gift?”

He heard the rustle of the plastic bag being set down. When Shane was finally brave enough to glance back down, his cheeks warm with embarrassment, Ilya was a few steps closer to him.

In his hands were a box of condoms (Durex, ribbed, latex) and another box containing a bottle of lube (Pjur, silicone, highly recommended on Reddit). 

Shane groaned and immediately tried to cover his face with his hands, accidentally smacking himself in the eyebrow with the car keys. 

“Shane,” Ilya said, and there was laughter in his voice as he tugged at Shane’s wrist. When he surfaced, blinking at Ilya through the gaps of his fingers, Ilya’s face was fond and he was biting his lip like he was trying to hide a much larger smile. “Did you sneak these into the cart?”

“Sort of,” said Shane. “I mean, yes.”

A week prior, Ilya had been kissing down the midline of Shane’s chest, his hand stroking lazily at Shane’s cock while he became a whimpering, wet mess. Ilya’s fingers had tripped down his skin, the touch flirty, teasing, when they found his entrance.

“Has anyone ever touched you here?” 

Shane shivered. “No.”

“Would you want me to...?” Ilya’s words lifted at the end suggestively as he sucked and kissed at the sensitive skin of Shane’s thigh.

“Want you to what?” Shane panted, his eyes fluttering. There was a spike of nerves in his stomach. He knew what, but he wanted to hear Ilya say it. 

He crawled back up Shane’s body, kissing every stretch of skin he passed. When he got back up to eye-level with Shane, his eyes were earnest.

“I want to fuck you,” he breathed against Shane’s mouth. “Please.”

Shane shivered again. It was not cold in the room— in fact it was very, very warm. Still, the anxiety was crawling into his throat. He wasn’t expecting for Ilya to ask for this tonight. He hadn’t prepared, physically or mentally. 

Ilya was very good at taking him out of his head, away from the realities of the world outside of his arms. Still, Shane was now hurtling out of the warmth, his mind suddenly racing.

“You are scared,” Ilya observed. His tone was not cruel, but Shane bristled anyways. 

“I am not scared,” he bit out. 

“Is okay,” said Ilya. He traced his thumb along Shane’s jaw. “It can be scary, I know. Is not for everyone. We do not have to.”

“I’m not scared,” Shane repeated, and tried to mean it. “I just— maybe not tonight. Okay?”

“Okay,” Ilya had murmured back, nodding easily, and then he kissed Shane softly. “Do you want to keep going? Or do you want to stop?”

“Don’t stop.”

For a sharp second, Shane felt awkward about it. There was the burgeoning need to overexplain—I don’t mean never, I just mean, like, not now, maybe, but if you want I can—until Ilya ducked his head and wrapped his mouth around Shane’s nipple, his hand finding its way back to Shane’s cock and fisting it as if they hadn’t even had this little interlude. He was not concerned with receiving any sort of an explanation. 

When Shane came ten minutes later, it was with two of Ilya’s fingers hooked in his mouth, his cock as far down Ilya’s throat as it could go.

He hadn’t forgotten what Ilya had asked. Hadn’t forgotten the way his eyes had looked, soft with need, when he’d breathed what he wanted against Shane’s lips.

Neither of them had brought it up since. Shane felt rather certain that Ilya might never ask again. He knew it was about respecting boundaries, and making sure Shane was comfortable— and that was nice and all, but Shane had prepared since. He’d watched videos. He’d read forum posts. He’d practiced with the dildo he kept tucked hidden deep beneath his bed.

Shane was ready to be fucked. He was just feeling shy about asking for it.

Hence the secret purchasing of the lube and the condoms (not to mention the douche he’d had to discretely order online— the only reason he hadn’t ordered the other supplies with it was that he was worried the package might be too large and Ilya would ask what was in it). He hadn’t had much of a game plan when it came to actually presenting the items to Ilya, but he felt certain there would be a moment where it was right. 

This was not quite what he was imagining. Ilya was still grinning as he studied the boxes and then set them down on the counter, choosing instead to crowd Shane against the sink.

“Shut up,” said Shane, although Ilya hadn’t said anything. He sank his face into Shane’s neck, his next words muffled by skin and fabric.

“Hollander, what am I going to do with you?” 

Shane inhaled deeply, summoning all of his bravery. 

“I mean, hopefully you’re going to fuck me.”

He expected another burst of laughter, but Ilya’s hands only tightened where they were wrapped around Shane’s waist. He sank immediately to his knees, his fingers fumbling for the button on Shane’s pants.

“Ilya,” he hissed. His fingers tightened on Ilya’s shoulders. “I didn’t mean right this minute, we have groceries to put away!” 

When Ilya blinked up at Shane, his pupils were blown, his expression wanting. His bottom lip rubbed pathetically against the zip of Shane’s jeans, which he had to admit were significantly tighter than they had been a moment ago. 

“I mean it,” Shane said. “The ice cream is going to melt. Plus, we’re covered in airplane germs.”

Ilya blinked again, and a little bit of awareness swam back into his expression. “Hollander,” he moaned. He stayed on his knees, nosing at the hem of Shane’s sweatshirt and pushing it up with his hands so he could find the sensitive strip of skin below his navel. “You are a temptress. You are killing me.”

“I think only women can be temptresses,” Shane said, tugging a little on Ilya’s curls. It’d been a while since he’d had a haircut, and Shane liked the extra length.

“This cannot be true, because you are tempting me. You are temptress,” Ilya repeated, his breath still fanning warm against Shane’s stomach. When Shane tugged again at his hair, pulling him up, Ilya went easily.

“I am not a temptress,” Shane said, experiencing a strange mix of emotions— powerful and amused and endeared, all at once. He used one hand to cup Ilya’s face, thumbing over his cheek. Ilya’s eyes fluttered shut at the contact, his hands still gripping Shane’s hips. “I don’t know what the male version is.”

“They have not invented it yet,” Ilya said, leaning forward to kiss Shane through his words. “There has never existed a man so tempting before you.”

“You are shameless.” Shane giggled, letting Ilya kiss him for just a second before he pushed him back, redoing the button of his jeans. “But I’m serious. We have to put the groceries away, and then I need a shower. Okay?”

Ilya was still grinning like a kid whose birthday had come early for the entire time that they were putting away the produce.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Shane’s shower was delayed by the realization that he hadn’t given Ilya the house tour yet. 

He knew that he was being too detailed— he dragged Ilya from room to room, their fingers loosely intertwined, explaining that they’d had to redo the powder room on the first floor after a pipe leak when Shane was nine, and that they kept all their old family videos in the little standing cabinet in the dining room. Ilya probably didn’t need to see what was inside the linen closets, or hear about when the cottage was built, that there were still height marks on the inside of the pantry door from the kids who’d lived there in the eighties, but he listened patiently as Shane went through all of it, an unreadable expression on his face the entire time. 

It was exciting, was all. Shane loved the cottage, with its squashy furniture and its charming built-in bookshelves, the large windows that looked over the lake. His mother had recently updated the kitchen, so it had green cabinets and butcher-block counters, every appliance brushed stainless steel, but the rest of the place really hadn’t been changed since Shane was young. There was a vaguely ugly gingham couch in the living room, a faded ornate rug underneath a coffee table that David had built with Shane the summer before eighth grade. 

The cottage was piney and comforting (very Canadian, Ilya had intoned, ignoring the way Shane pinched his wrist). There were family photos on every wall, carved wood duck statues and rustic patterned lamps that were admittedly a little ugly. It was his favorite place in the entire world. 

Shane hadn’t had anyone there in years— not since his friend Clay in the fifth grade, who had come up for one summer weekend. It was almost exhilarating to walk Ilya through a place that was so sacred to him, and to watch him listen as Shane accidentally monologued about a feud David had with the family next door. 

The photo that made Ilya stop dead in his tracks was the next to the mudroom. It was Shane on the way home from the rink— six years old and asleep in the back of a car, his arms wrapped around a hockey stick and his face slumped against the window, mouth just agape enough so it was evident that half of his teeth were missing. He was wearing an Ottawa Centaurs jersey that was too big for him, and he’d kicked his shoes off before falling asleep, little blue and yellow smiley-face socks peeking out of the bottom of his pants. 

“Oh my god,” said Ilya. “This is the best thing I have ever seen.”

“It’s my dad’s favorite,” Shane said sheepishly. He tried to pull Ilya along, but he was leaning in to study the photo closer. 

“You are so little,” he breathed. “Tiny Shane. I will be stealing this picture.”

“You won’t be stealing anything,” Shane said, tugging again at Ilya’s hand. “My mom would kill you.”

“That is okay. Bury me with this photo.”

Shane rolled his eyes, flushing with embarrassment, and dragged Ilya down to the sparsely furnished basement. 

“Those dents in the molding right there,” he pointed out while they were down there. “I set up a net down here without asking, sent like twelve pucks into the wall before my mom heard. I was grounded for two weeks.”

Ilya squeezed his fingers. “I see your shooting percentage has not improved since then.”

“I was like seven, you dick.” 

“I would have guessed seventeen,” Ilya said mildly.

“Oh, is that how it is?”

Shane let go of him, trying desperately to maintain his mock scowl even when Ilya immediately darted close to him, a softly whined Hollander, nooo as he followed Shane up the steps and tried to catch his hand again.

The second floor had less to see. Shane didn’t show him the master bedroom, because that felt weird and private, but he showed him the landing that Yuna had turned into a makeshift office, then led him into the guest bedroom. It was nothing special— sage green wainscoting, a queen bed with a forestry-themed quilt spread across the top of it, a cedar dresser with a big vanity mirror on top of it. 

“This one shares a bathroom with my room,” Shane explained, gesturing towards the door that bridged the two. “It’s right through there.”

“Ah,” Ilya said, and nodded. His fingers slackened on Shane’s, only so that they could find purchase on his waist. “Is this where I will be sleeping, then?”

“Um, I don’t know.” Shane’s breath felt a little short. “I haven’t thought about it.”

That was a patent lie. Of course, Shane had thought about it. He’d thought about it on the plane. He’d thought about it on the drive. He’d thought about it two days prior, his phone cupped close to his face while he scrolled through the condoms marked in stock on the website for the Loblaws closest to the cottage, trying to make his choice ahead of time so he didn’t have to worry about it in-store. 

He’d thought about the bedroom situation plenty— he just hadn’t made a decision. 

They had separate rooms at the apartment, but they hadn’t slept apart in two weeks. The one night that Shane had tried—he’d been up late studying, and didn’t want to disturb Ilya’s sleep—he’d stumbled into Shane’s room at three in the morning and curled up, grumbling and disgruntled, onto the mattress beside him. They hadn’t even had sex. 

There was a little teasing smile at the corners of Ilya’s lips. “You thought about whether or not we’d have enough time to get through two cartons of eggs this weekend, but not about the sleeping arrangement?” 

So, maybe Shane was more transparent than he thought.

He sighed. “You’re the guest, so you pick. Where do you want to sleep?”

Ilya’s smile broadened, a little wicked. “Show me your room, and I will decide.”

So Shane showed him his bedroom. 

Like the guest room, it was nothing special. He’d been allowed to redo it when he was sixteen, so it was missing a lot of the most embarrassing vestiges of his childhood— gone was the bunk bed with the sports-patterned bedsheets, the garish wallpaper covered in hyperrealistic trout and carp from when his father had hoped Shane might grow into someone with a real passion for fishing. The bed had a blue flannel quilt on it that went with the faded navy of the walls. There was a desk Shane had sat at maybe four times in his whole life, a matching bookshelf with some well-loved paperbacks left from summers before and a few of his hockey trophies that weren’t up to snuff with the ones Yuna kept on display at the house in Ottawa. 

“This is perfect,” said Ilya, evaluating the room. “I will sleep here. You can take the guest room.”

Shane’s mouth dropped open. “Nuh-uh, that’s not what we agreed to.”

“I thought you said I can choose?” Ilya’s smile was sharklike, his eyes twinkling. Shane wasn’t sure how he’d done it, but he’d somehow circled around Shane, walking him slowly backward until the backs of his knees bumped into the bed. “I will sleep in here. You can sleep in the guest room, or on the couch. I do not care.”

“I thought—” His words stuttered a little when Ilya’s hands slipped up his sweatshirt, his touch like a hot brand on Shane’s waist. “I thought we would—”

“You thought I would share with you?” Ilya’s head cocked. “Hmm, I will consider this.”

He drew a little closer, brushing their noses together. Shane’s center of gravity was off. It was taking everything in him not to topple onto the bed. 

“I could convince you,” he breathed. His hands skated up Ilya’s arms, one cupping his bicep and the other curling at the nape of his neck. “To let me stay.”

“Oh?” Ilya’s smirk widened, but he was so close, Shane could only tell because he could feel it against his mouth. They weren’t quite kissing— not yet. “Convince me how?”

Shane pulled Ilya onto the bed with him and showed him exactly how. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

An hour later, when he did finally emerge from the shower, he found Ilya on the phone in the sunroom.

It was one of Shane’s favorite spots in the house. Huge sash windows faced out onto the back deck, the room barely wide enough for an overstuffed forest green couch and another coffee table (this one not handcrafted by the Hollanders). There were low bookshelves crammed with more of the beachy paperbacks his mom used to favor when she had the time to read for leisure, fat historical tomes that his dad would spend the whole summer paging slowly through. 

And there, looking like he belonged, Ilya was tracing a finger along one of the cedar windowpanes and speaking to someone on the phone. 

He didn’t notice Shane watching him— his eyes were fixed out on the frozen lake, the frosted tumble of the grass down to the dock. His voice was audible, rolling and smooth, through the gap in the glass door, and he was speaking Russian, a river rush of syllables. 

Something was making him laugh. Shane could see from this angle only the lifting of his cheek as he smiled, that sliver of his face washed in the winter-bright light. 

If Ilya left a smudge on the window, Shane might even be grateful for it. Evidence he was here, even if temporarily. Evidence that he had stood inside of Shane’s heart, that he had spent time looking out at one of Shane’s most favorite views.

He didn’t think he’d been staring for very long, lost in thought, but he nearly jumped out of his skin when Ilya called out to him.

“I know you are there, creep.”

Shane blinked, coming back to himself. “I’m not a creep,” he mumbled. “Are you still on the phone?”

“No.” Ilya leaned one shoulder casually against the window, his eyes now latched onto Shane instead of the view.

“Who were you on talking to?”

“Svetlana. She was just checking in.”

“Making sure you’re all good for your trip next week?”

That morning, Ilya had casually mentioned that he was doing a big trip with Svetlana once he was officially off duty for the rest of winter break, traveling around to a few different spots in Canada. Shane had instantly had so many questions. Where were they going? How were they getting there? Did they need help picking out good spots to visit? His mind had run rampant, eager to help plan a trip to showcase the best of the place he loved so much.

Ilya had gotten a little cagey, seemingly not half as interested in the conversation as Shane was. He mostly begged off telling the details by claiming that Svetlana had organized most of it and that he was only along for the journey. It had been like pulling teeth to get him to divulge that they’d started planning it after Ilya had liked being in Québec City, and had heard it was such a good city to be in the winter, that they were flying to a few other touristy spots afterward. 

This was when Shane had learned that Svetlana was not only wealthy but the daughter of Sergei Vetrov, famed KHL goalie. He’d had so many questions about that, enough so that Ilya looked genuinely a little relieved to be pulling into the chaotic airport parking lot. 

“Yes.” His smile went lopsided, like he was remembering a joke. “She wanted to make sure you hadn’t brought me out to this cabin to murder me.”

“It’s only been half of a day. Still plenty of time.”

“That is true.” Ilya’s smile softened and went a little pouty, his eyes running up and down the length of Shane where he lingered in the doorway. “Why are you still so far away?”

“Because it’s super cold in there.” Shane wrapped his arms around himself and rubbed at his sleeves. The windows were beautiful, but they didn’t make for great insulation, and the December cold was seeping right through the walls.

“I will keep you warm,” said Ilya, the line so cheesy it made Shane roll his eyes.

Still, when he outstretched his hand to Shane, his chest gave a little tug and he went. The carpet was freezing beneath his thin white socks, and he made a mental note to go digging around for a warmer pair, but Ilya was already making good on his promise, gathering Shane into his arms and resting his chin on his head.

“Better?”

“Still cold,” Shane said, but the tone was undermined by the way he let himself nuzzle into Ilya’s chest. Now that he was standing properly close to the frosted glass, he could feel the chill through the panes. 

“Is a nice view,” Ilya said. “Better in the summer, yes?”

Shane bobbed his head in a nod, turning a little to see better out the window. “Yeah. The lake’s really pretty, and there’s always a lot of boats out.”

“Your family owns a boat?”

Shane nodded again. “It’s really my dad’s thing, but it’s nice. We store it in town, break it out in June.”

“Fast boat?” Ilya’s eyes were gleaming a little, like he was imagining it. Shane had only very recently learned of his predilection for things like sports cars and jet skis. 

“Kind of? We don’t really ever go very fast.” He shrugged. “Sometimes, in the really early morning when the water’s good, we go water-skiing with the neighbors, but I suck at it. They always put me on flag duty.”

Ilya laughed. “I thought you were good at everything. Mr. Perfect, no?”

“Shut up,” Shane mumbled, his eyes fluttering a little at the sensation of Ilya’s fingers brushing against the nape of his neck. He was growing tired of the cold against his back, so he wrapped his arms around Ilya, taking wide steps and waddling them both backwards until they collapsed onto the couch. 

With the exception of a very quiet oof, Ilya gave no complaint. Shane liked that— he was pushy, sometimes, with Shane, especially when they were in bed. A hand wound tight into Shane’s hair, a bruising grasp on his hips when Ilya took him all the way down his throat. Shane liked being manhandled, liked being pushed around in a way that he couldn’t think too hard about without flushing red.

Other times, it was like this. Inescapably tender— Ilya shifting back on the couch, making room for Shane to sprawl beside him so they could both look out of the window. They weren’t necessarily on top of each other but their legs tangled, Ilya’s hand still tracing soothing and familiar shapes into the back of Shane’s neck. 

Shane was never quite sure what to do when it got like this, cozy and wonderful but a little frightening, also. It seemed the touch came a lot easier to Ilya than it did to Shane, who always got in his head about it. Still, he tried his best to relax, shuffling his hips until he was pressed up against Ilya’s side. 

“You know,” he said, and pointed out the window. “My dream growing up was always to build a house over there.”

“Across the lake?”

“Mhm.” 

Shane could feel his hair brushing against Ilya’s jaw as he followed where Shane was pointing. There wasn’t much to see across the way— more snowy sprawl, a thick patch of trees, a dock where Shane had never seen a boat. It was perfect, untouched.

“My plan is to buy land somewhere on the lake, basically, like, as soon as my contract is signed. Don’t tell my parents, because they would totally lecture me about it, but it’s kind of more important to me than owning real estate wherever I end up playing.”

“Ah, yes.” Ilya’s fingers tweaked Shane’s sides teasingly. “Better to own house up here than in Edmonton, eh?”

“I’m not playing for Edmonton,” Shane said instinctively, before he quickly shut his mouth.

“Oh?” Ilya’s brows lifted. “What is this you say to me a week ago? Edmonton’s a nice city, no? I would be honored to play wherever I get drafted?” 

He had a terrible imitation of a Canadian accent. Shane covered his eyes with one of his hands.

“Fuck off.”

“No,” Ilya said, delighted. He wiggled a little closer on the couch. “The truth comes out. Shane Hollander would rather cut off his hand than play for Oilers.”

“I did not say that,” Shane groaned, but he was laughing. “Edmonton is fine, okay? Like, as a place. But the coaching situation over there’s a mess, and you were right, they haven’t made the playoffs in forever.”

“But if they get first draft pick…”

“Don’t,” said Shane, and this time his voice had a bar of steel in it. His chest tightened a little anxiously. “You’ll jinx it.”

Ilya laughed, but let the topic drop. “So, this house. You have big plans? Fill it with big hockey family?”

Though he felt a little embarrassed about it, Shane did have big plans.

When he was twelve, a little too old to be babysat but simultaneously a little too young to be left alone (per his parent’s standards), his neighbor Josie used to come over to hang out after school sometimes. She was sixteen and played the cello and harbored a deep love for the television show MTV Cribs. They would watch hours of it on the couch in the living room while Shane chipped away at algebra worksheets. 

It was where Shane grew to have strong opinions on home decor. Josie would fiddle with her nose piercing and opine about sponge-painted accent walls and heavy drapery. Her favorites were the episodes with the musicians—Mariah Carey, Colbie Caillait, Missy Elliott—but Shane always liked the ones with the athletes. Shaq had an entire episode devoted to his sprawling mansion with a full-sized basketball court inside. There weren’t many MLH players who went on the show, but he’d never forgotten the episode with Luka Doucette’s synthetic ice rink in his polished basement, his movie-theater sized television.

He and Rose had gotten distracted once during a study session looking up apartments in LA as inspiration for her moodboard. She’d teased him for having expensive taste; he liked walls of windows, open layouts, sleek quartz counters. He’d shrugged it off like he was embarrassed, but the truth was that he didn’t see the problem with it. Shane liked what he liked. He wanted things to be the best quality, and he knew that he would be capable of building something like that for himself, so why wouldn’t he?

The second half of Ilya’s question was what struck him. He’d never thought much about building around a family— except, of course, guest spaces for his parents, but that was different. The dream home had always been just for him, and he figured that when he eventually did have a family of his own, it would somehow magically work itself out.

He tried, for a moment, to picture it. His dream home was, after years of planning it, more of a palace in his mind, although he would of course have to realistically adjust when he was building the real thing. Still, it wasn’t hard to conjure up the image.

He was coming home from practice, nudging the garage door open with his practice duffel, and the smell of dinner was floating towards him. Someone called out in greeting. 

For a split second it was a woman at his counter, stirring something in a pot. She had long blonde hair. She looked like every other hockey WAG that Shane had ever seen in his life, and he knew it was all wrong, so he blinked again and—

—and then it was someone with bronze curls and a smattering of moles up the back of his neck, turning from the stove and smiling. He was wearing a soft and worn t-shirt that looked like it might have been Shane’s. There was the patter of little feet in the other room, and he turned instead to look in that direction—

Shane inhaled jaggedly, came back to himself. He was still pressed against Ilya’s side. He had taken far too long to consider and answer a question that had originally been quite simple.

“Yeah,” he said, shifting just an inch away from Ilya where he had become too warm. “A family.”

He could feel the stare on the side of his face, could tell that Ilya was studying him, but Shane kept his eyes out the window, tracing them over the pine trees.

“You should talk to Svetlana,” said Ilya, his voice just a little too loud when he changed the subject. “She is getting into luxury real estate. It would be a big deal to have Shane Hollander in her portfolio.”

“I don’t think having a realtor who lives in Russia would help me very much.”

“No, no,” said Ilya. “She lives in Boston.”

Shane sat up straight on the couch. “What?”

Ilya’s mouth twitched with amusement. “Yes. She quite likes it there, I think.”

“Your best friend lives in fucking Boston and you’ve never mentioned it?” True, cold shock trickled through his system. They had been forty minutes away from the mysterious Svetlana for months, and he’d had no idea. “Why did you never say anything?”

He shrugged, his eyebrows furrowed in a way that Shane couldn’t read. “You never asked.”

For just a moment, Shane floundered, but then he recovered. “Well, why hasn’t she visited?” 

“She has.”

Shane’s mouth flapped, went dry. “When?”

There was another deathly casual shrug. “A few months ago? November, maybe? On my weekend off.”

Shane had the vague memories of a weekend before fall break, that nebulous and awkward trip to Québec. Ilya had been off for the weekend, and John had come to stay with Shane instead. It had been nice to see him again— almost nice enough to distract from the fact that Ilya disappeared for the entire time he was off. He hadn’t even come home to sleep. 

The week before was when Shane had half-kissed him during the awkward dance lesson in his bedroom. They hadn’t exactly been on speaking terms afterward, mostly due to Shane’s mortification and Ilya’s constant stoic impassivity.

The absence had prickled at each of Shane’s nerves, but he hadn’t asked where Ilya went off to. He didn’t even know if he’d wanted to hear what the answer was. But now he knew, and he was blinking, knitting this new information together.

“What did you guys do?” he asked stupidly. “When she was in town.”

“Not much,” said Ilya. “I wanted to go visit her in the city, but she was curious about Samwell. I told her is not much to see, but she got a hotel room. We walked around and went to Tonei’s.”

Then Ilya was digging in his pocket for his phone, flipping through his camera roll. Shane averted his eyes respectfully until the screen was being flashed in his direction. 

It was Ilya’s smile he found himself staring at first. Languid and warm, his eyes crinkling. Beside him, Svetlana’s eyes were cool and dark, her glossy smile small and knowing. She was wearing an outfit reminiscent of something else Rose would save on Pinterest— creamy pearl earrings poked out of her curls, her oversized turtleneck sweater the color of eggshells. 

Ilya had his arm around her in the booth at Tonei’s— it was a booth Shane knew well, the one tucked into the window in the front of the restaurant. He and Hayden and Jackie had sat there once, splitting a pizza in celebration of Jackie passing organic chemistry. Of course, Ilya had gone there with this gorgeous woman on his arm, apparently intimate enough to share the same half of a table. 

He remembered that Ilya hadn’t come home that night, the sour way Shane had listened for the sound of front door until it was far too late and he had to go to bed. He remembered the words hotel room, and he swallowed.

Ilya didn’t seem to notice this reaction. He pocketed the phone. “It was a nice weekend. I like Tonei’s. You have been?”

“Um,” Shane swallowed, blinking a few times and hoping the ugly feeling in his stomach would dissolve. “Yeah, actually. That’s where I took Rose on our first date.”

“Oh, yes. Before you knew you were— what was the word she used again?”

Shane groaned, covering his face. “Don’t say it.”

“‘Strictly dickly’, I think she said,” Ilya announced, a shit-eating grin on his face. “Probably my favorite term in English.”

“Shut up,” Shane moaned, his face still buried in his hands. “I hated it when she said it, I hate it even more from you.”

“But it is true, yes? You did not know when you dated her?”

“That I was gay? Yeah,” Shane admitted, although something inside of him still gave a nervous little tweak when he said the word. He begrudgingly lowered his hands when Ilya wrapped his fingers around one of his wrists and tugged gently. “I had an idea, maybe, or at least I knew I’d never really been interested in anyone I’d dated before. I thought Rose would be different, because I liked her so much, but...”

“But she did not have a penis,” Ilya said bluntly. 

He huffed out a surprised laugh. “No. No, she didn’t.” He was quiet for a minute. “I mean, she’s practically the one who told me I was gay, actually.”

Ilya’s fingers dropped to skate over his knee, both pleasant and a little ticklish. “Tell me about it.”

Shane squirmed. “It’s really not much of a story.”

“Tell me,” Ilya said. “Please. I want to know.”

“Well, we were—” he started, then broke off, his face heating with the memory. “God, this is so embarrassing. I don’t know if I can—” 

“Hollander,” Ilya whined. He drew his knee up onto the couch, draping it over Shane’s hip, and Shane felt something behind his ribs hitch. “Tell me the story. I told you something, you tell me something, yes?”

He groaned, but eventually nodded. “Okay, fine, but you have to promise you won’t laugh, okay?”

Ilya’s eager little grin as he nodded didn’t seem as innocent as Shane might have wanted it to be, but he accepted it nonetheless.

“We were freshmen,” he started. “Like, eighteen, new to school, a lot of people kind of just start dating the first person they meet. At least, I did.”

It had only been three years since then, but his memory of Rose was that she seemed so much younger. They’d been wearing the same tacky Samwell freshman orientation t-shirt, although Rose had cropped hers, and her hair was in two complicated braids. She’d swung into the seat next to Shane, completely ignoring John’s hulking presence on his other side (which had seemed, up until then, to be a daunting deterrent to most of Shane’s friend-making), and offered her hand with a bright smile. 

He’d liked her right away, of course. She was so funny, and she knew about hockey, and she was pretty. Shane had only met his teammates at school so far, but Rose had already cobbled together a friend group from the people on her dorm floor. She invited him to join them for dinner at the dining hall, and had pressed her knee into his a few times beneath the table, and when he’d asked if she wanted to go for pizza the following weekend, the answer had been a resounding yes.

“So, we’d been together for, like, two months. It was late, and we were in this rec room at the dorm that you could rent out to watch a movie together.”

For a moment, Shane was back in that rec room— the unforgiving vinyl couches, the scratched pool table, the unavoidable dank basement smell. They’d been watching the Game Plan, that movie with Dwayne the Rock Johnson and the little girl and the peanut allergies, although it had quickly been abandoned in favor of making out on the loveseat.

“And we’d already, you know.” Shane’s cheeks went warm. “Done stuff. Together. So I thought we were fine, but then she stops kissing me, and she just goes... Shane, do you think you’re gay?”

The memory is vivid in Shane’s head. The cold wave of panic, Rose’s sweetly furrowed brow, the genuine curiosity behind the question before she heard the way it’d come out. 

Ilya’s cheeks puffed out with a laugh that he was clearly trying to hold in. 

“Don’t,” Shane warned, but the threat was marred by the fact that he was holding in his own laugh. “She just asked! And then of course immediately realized how bad it sounded, she apologized a bunch, but the cat was out of the bag at that point. I freaked.”

In the moment, it wasn’t that funny. Shane had thought he was going to vomit and die. Rose had been mortified.

It wasn’t like Shane had known he was gay. He’d never even given himself the space to worry about it. He’d had a few girlfriends in high school, he’d had sex with women before Rose, but when he explained the way these girls made him felt—that he really, truly, liked them, but no, he didn’t get butterflies or some giddy crush feeling, maybe his attraction just didn’t work that way—Rose’s expression had softened like fruit left on the counter.

Now, when they rehashed the story between themselves, it was between bouts of laughter. It was the memory of that part of the story that had Shane breaking, finally smiling and rolling his eyes and leaning into the ridicule.

“She just said that I didn’t seem that interested in her, but I thought I was just being respectful, you know, I wasn’t feeling her up or anything, like sorry I’m not groping you-”

“You were not being respectful,” Ilya crowed delightedly. “You were being gay.”

“Okay, yeah, maybe I was being gay, but you can’t just ask someone that!”

Shane’s cheeks were warm with embarrassment, but secretly he was a little bit pleased at the way Ilya had bent over with laughter. He’d never had the opportunity to tell someone this story, but had always suspected that it was as funny as he and Rose thought it was. 

“You want to know how I know,” Ilya gasped out behind his laughter, “that you were being gay?”

In lieu of a response, Shane went limp, burying his face into Ilya’s neck. 

“Hollander,” he said, shaking Shane’s shoulder incessantly. “Hollander. I asked if you want to know how I know.”

Shane didn’t say anything, but now he was hiding a grin in Ilya’s collar.

“Shane,” Ilya whined, shaking his shoulder again. “Come back. Let me tell you how I knew you were so gay.”

“Ugh,” Shane groaned, but it was mostly theater. “How did you know?”

He felt Ilya’s breath against his ear, a playful nip at the shell of it. “I know, because you are never so respectful when you are making out with me. You love to touch my tits.”

His hand worked up to Shane’s chest, squeezing the muscle there, and although his voice had been teasing, Shane’s breath hitched.

“Fuck off.”

“You’re smiling,” Ilya said, trying to roll them over on the couch so he could see Shane. “I can feel you smiling, Shaney, show me.” 

“Don’t fucking call me that,” Shane groaned, but when he finally surfaced from where he’d been hiding in Ilya’s neck, he was indeed smiling. The grin only lasted a millisecond before Ilya was kissing it off of him, his hand slipping below Shane’s shirt to properly knead at his chest. 

It took them awhile to make it off the couch.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

“I like seeing you here,” said Ilya after dinner. “You are more relaxed.”

Shane smiled, his eyes pinned to the blue ceramic dish in his hand as he scrubbed off the remains of his chicken and rice bowl. “Really?”

“Yes,” said Ilya, who was supposed to be on drying duty but whose hands were noticeably empty when they wrapped around Shane’s waist. “I can tell this is your favorite place.”

“It is,” Shane agreed. “It’s just... really special.” 

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so calm,” he continued, as if he were marveling at it. “Is only day one.”

“Well, it’s been a stressful few months, okay,” said Shane, feeling a little defensive as he set the bowl off to the side. He reached thoughtlessly forward to paw at the faucet and turn it off, the cuff of his sleeve slipping down and getting soaked. “You haven’t exactly seen me at my best before now. Where’s that pan I gave you?”

“Already dried.” Ilya punctuated the words with a little kiss to Shane’s jaw.

Shane expected it to escalate— expected Ilya to palm him over his jeans, to grind him into the woodwork right there in the kitchen. Instead, Ilya just lingered for a moment, pressing a few more kisses to his jaw, before he took a step back and picked up the clean bowl Shane had abandoned, moving to dry it and put it away. Shane smiled to himself, warm and happy all over, before he turned the sink back on. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

When Shane got out of his second shower of the day, Ilya was on the bed. 

He looked casual as sin— still fully dressed, his arms propped on the pillows, legs crossed casually. He wasn’t scrolling on his phone, or flipping through one of the books Shane had left abandoned beneath the nightstand. He was waiting. 

For just a second, Shane balked nervously at the door. He’d gotten fully dressed after his shower— it felt stupid, knowing that he was just going to take it all off again pretty immediately, but he’d grabbed the flannel pajama pants and the navy t-shirt out of his suitcase on autopilot, and it would’ve felt silly not to change into them. 

The room was lit only by the lamp on the bedside table, casting the room in a soft and warm glow, and Ilya’s eyes were roving over him as if he’d come out in just his towel. 

“Come here.”

Shane went.

He braced one knee on the bottom of the bed, crawling slowly up the duvet. The movement was embarrassing until it wasn’t— until Ilya was gathering him against his chest, their mouths crashing together. Shane shoved his hands up Ilya’s shirt, greedy for the slip of skin, the patches of hair beneath his fingers.

He made a little desperate sound against Ilya’s mouth and he groaned in response, his hand threading through Shane’s hair.

Shane was moving quickly, his lips shifting from Ilya’s mouth to his jaw, down his neck—

Ilya used the hand that was in his hair to pull him back, his eyes heavy-lidded but considering. There was now what felt to Shane like far too much space between them, even with his legs snared over Ilya’s thighs. His hips gave a petulant, friction-seeking jerk, but Ilya’s hands tightened, holding him still. His mouth twitched with amusement, an expression settling into his eyes that made chills sweep over Shane’s back. 

“Slow down,” he murmured, the words almost a croon. “I want to take my time with you.” 

Shane’s breath hitched. Ilya rolled them over until he was pressed into the pillows, kissing him and kissing him until Shane’s lips felt swollen, his leg hitched over Ilya’s hip, his cock grinding at a devastatingly slow pace. 

When he peeled off Shane’s shirt, the motion was devoted, his lips skimming over what felt like every expanse of revealed skin. He took a moment to loosely fold the garment before he tossed it onto the ottoman beside the nightstand, and Shane inhaled.

The pants came off next, just as slow. Ilya paused for a second to mouth wetly at the bulge in Shane’s briefs, grinning into the fabric at the sounds Shane made. He gave Shane’s thigh a sweet kiss before he folded the pants too, and Shane’s heart gave a stupid little lurch. 

Ilya was not so careful with his own clothes, which he only parted with after Shane impatiently tugged at them. They landed in a crumpled heap in the direction of the dresser, and then Ilya resumed that devastatingly slow crook of his hips against Shane’s, sweeping his tongue into his mouth. 

He let himself be kissed until the world around him went fuzzy. He was enjoying the sweep of Ilya’s hands up his biceps and down his sides, squeezing and massaging everywhere he could. Ilya’s mouth wandered reverently to the hollow of his throat, the flat of his collarbone.

Shane was only half-aware of the sounds he was making— little desperate whimpers and moans as Ilya dragged his cock against Shane’s, his eyes at half-mast taking in the golden sight in front of him. Ilya’s curls were mussed, his own breath hitching.

It was only when Shane began to wonder if it might not be Ilya’s plan to fuck him at all, instead to kiss Shane and drag his thigh against his erection until he came in his underwear, when Ilya reached for his waistband. 

“Do you still want?” The words were low, hummed against the skin of Shane’s chest as Ilya looked up at him. He nodded languidly.

“I still want,” he breathed out, and watched as Ilya rolled his briefs down his legs. He moved slowly, ostensibly so that Shane could map each of his movements before he made them, but Shane was fully relaxed against the mattress, watching as if he were in a dream.

Ilya slid his hands below Shane’s thighs, pressing his mouth to the concave bend of his knees and nipping at the surprisingly sensitive skin there. He pushed Shane’s legs up, up, until Shane wrapped his own hands around his thighs and held them open for him.

At the first brush of Ilya’s tongue against his hole, Shane stiffened, just a little, before Ilya’s hands wound around his hips and he forced himself to relax. The buzzy and warm atmosphere of the room had ebbed just a little with his nerves, but then Ilya pushed forward again, his tongue teasing at the ring of muscle, and Shane’s head rocked back against the pillows.

It was both electric and sensual, soft waves of pleasure lapping up his spine. Ilya worked him open slowly with his tongue while Shane’s hips jerked, his hard cock bouncing and blurting pre-come against his abdomen. Ilya’s hands were granite on the crevice of his thigh in a way that made him impossibly harder.

Ilya worked him open with his tongue until Shane was gasping for it. His eyes were fluttering shut when he heard the uncapping of the lube, and he glanced down to see the first press of Ilya’s fingers at his entrance. 

“Is this okay?” he asked when he had just a fingertip worked past Shane’s rim. Shane nodded desperately.

“More,” he pleaded, the word slipping like syrup from his lips, and Ilya grinned, kissing his thigh again before he complied.

He worked Shane open slowly— long passes of his fingers in Shane’s entrance, little shockwaves of pleasure ricocheting up his body. He was up to three fingers when he let them brush against a spot inside of Shane that had him crying out, his hips attempting to fly up while Ilya kept him pinned so that he didn’t get accidentally hit in the face. 

“Easy, lyubimyy,” he breathed. “Feels good?”

“So good,” Shane whined. “Ilya, please. Need— I need—”

“Need what?” 

His eyes were dark as they scraped over Shane, his fingers still pressing in and out of him in a steady rhythm. His smile was crooked, waiting, widening when Shane said what he said next.

“You,” he exhaled. “I need you. Please, Ilya.”

He expected Ilya to keep teasing him, but it seemed that the foreplay might have been getting to him, too. When he crawled up Shane’s body, he was visibly rock-hard through his briefs, a wet spot spreading from his tip.

They kissed and Shane palmed at his hardness, satisfied when Ilya groaned against his mouth. The whole world was so warm, so soft, every spot on his body that Ilya had touched buzzing with pure pleasure. 

Shane watched through lidded eyes as Ilya rolled the condom on, the tip of his dick flushed red. Ilya was still intent on taking his time— pausing with the lube in his hand to kiss Shane deeply, until he was whining, moaning, hitching his leg over Ilya’s hip moaning please, please. 

When he felt Ilya stretch past his entrance, Shane let out a wanton gasp. He’d known, objectively, that Ilya was big. Thicker than the dildo, for sure, and even though he’d spent all that time preparing Shane’s hole, there was still a pleasant stretch. 

Ilya stopped when he must have only been halfway in. He was braced on his elbows, his eyes desperate and searching as they combed Shane’s face. “Is okay?”

“Yes, fuck, keep going.”

Shane lifted his hips, and Ilya slid in a little deeper. He caught his bottom lip between his teeth, his head falling until his forehead brushed Shane’s chest. 

“Give me a minute,” he panted. “You feel so good. So tight, Shane. Fuck.”

Shane clenched down reflexively at the praise, and Ilya gasped a little, his forehead now pressed fully into Shane.

“This is not giving me a minute,” he teased, but then he began to move, easing further into Shane. 

When he finally slid to the hilt, Shane felt like he might burst open. It was fullness in a way he couldn’t have imagined, Ilya’s hips rocking gently, each brush of him against Shane’s prostate sending sparks behind his eyes. 

After a few moments of that gentle pace, Ilya picked up the speed. There was an obscene squelching sound each time he fucked in and out of Shane, and he knew that there had to be lube all on the sheets, lube slipping down his thighs, but he couldn’t give two shits about any of that when he had Ilya rocking between his thighs, letting out little curses each time he sank into Shane. His breath was panting in and out of him, sweat beginning to collect on the back of his neck.

The room was dissolving around them. There was nothing else in the world that mattered besides Ilya’s cock inside of Shane, his grip on his hips, the exhalations he made when he sank to the hilt inside of him. Shane was aware that he was moaning, making all sorts of sounds, his hands grabbing for every inch of Ilya that he could touch, but he was completely lost in the sea of pleasure and sex.

He hadn’t even touched his own cock, still bouncing uselessly between their stomachs, but he could feel the pressure building inside of him, that staticky and wonderful tightening of his stomach. 

“I’m not going to last,” he panted. “Fuck, Ilya, fuck, I’m close—”

“Shane,” Ilya breathed, and captured his mouth with his. A good kiss probably wouldn’t even have been possible, with the pace of his hips crashing into Shane’s, but with the warm wet sensation of his tongue against Shane’s, his breath on his chin, his cock plunging again and again inside of him—

Stars exploded inside of him. Shane shot off, rockets of white come painting his chest. He panted, ragged, his hands gripping desperately at Ilya’s back, his mouth dragging over Ilya’s neck. He bit down on his shoulder, muffling his moans into his skin.

“Fuck, Shane,” Ilya cried, and then his rhythm was interrupted, his thrusts growing jagged as he pushed deep into Shane and came, his cock twitching inside of Shane’s hole.

For a long moment, they were both quiet, the room full only with the sound of their gasping breaths. Ilya peppered Shane’s chest with kisses as he slowly pulled out, rubbing comfortingly at Shane’s side when he let out a little whine at the emptiness.

Shane felt entirely spent. His arms and legs were tingling, slack against the mattress, as Ilya worked his kisses up to his mouth.

“You are okay?” 

He nodded, bringing one hand up to trace it absentmindedly up Ilya’s spine. He’d collapsed mostly on top of Shane after pulling out, and the weight of him was pleasant, if Shane ignored the stickiness of his come slicking between their chests. He was growing incrementally more aware of the sensation of lube between his thighs, dripping out of him.

Ilya slid off of him to take care of the condom, tying it with what Shane pretended didn’t seem like expert familiarity and lobbing it into the little wastebasket beneath Shane’s desk. He pressed a kiss to Shane’s knee. “Stay here, okay?”

Shane nodded again, as if he wasn’t sure his legs would collapse beneath him if he tried to stand. He felt wobbly and worked out and absolutely euphoric.

Ilya, to his pleased surprise, didn’t seem totally unaffected as he made his way to the bathroom. His shoulder collided uncharacteristically with the doorframe, like he was having trouble walking straight, which made Shane let out a little laugh beneath his breath. He watched the light flick on, heard the running of the sink, before he let his eyes slip shut.

It was only a few moments before Ilya returned with a wet washcloth. Shane didn’t bother to open his eyes as he enjoyed the lush attention, the warm cloth careful around his sensitive hole and more firm when it scrubbed the drying residue of come from his chest. He felt like he was only half-awake, listening to Ilya clean up around him.

“Open your mouth.”

Shane opened his eyes instead.

Ilya was hovering by the side of the bed with a green Gatorade squeeze bottle that he must have retrieved from Shane’s backpack. He had the orange mouthpiece tilted towards Shane, clearly ready to squirt the liquid into Shane’s (now that he thought about it, very dry) mouth.

“Absolutely not,” said Shane. “Is that mine?”

“Yes, I took it from your bag. Downstairs is too far for water.”

Shane sighed and reached for the bottle. “Give me that. I don’t trust your aim.”

“What do you mean, you do not trust my aim?” Ilya frowned and held it out of reach. “You let Pike do this during games all the time.”

“He’s done it, like, twice.” Shane scowled as his hand remained outstretched. It was a joke, some dumb thing they’d seen some guys on the football team do, squirting water at each other’s mouths from a distance on the sideline. “And don’t bring up Hayden right now. Give me the water, you dick.”

Ilya’s grin was catlike as he propelled a stream of water into his own mouth, then acted like he was going to try to spit it into Shane’s. 

“No! Ew!” He grabbed a pillow and covered his face with it defensively. “Don’t you fucking dare, ew, Ilya, that is so gross.”

Ilya swallowed the water and his frown deepened. “Is grosser than kissing me? Grosser than letting me use my tongue to—” 

“Okay, okay, I get it,” said Shane, and picked up the pillow to thwap him in the stomach with it instead. He lurched onto his knees and wrestled Ilya for the bottle, although Ilya pretty much immediately acquiesced when he had Shane gathered up against him. 

They collapsed again onto the bed, trading the bottle back and forth. Their fingers tangled over it unnecessarily each time it got passed back, and despite the fact that it was probably the least intimate way they’d touched in the last hour, it made something inside of Shane go soft.

After what couldn’t have been longer than ten minutes, Ilya got restless. He turned onto his side, facing Shane properly. “You know what sounds good right now?”

“What?”

“An ice cream sundae.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“Trust me,” said Ilya, and he was already pushing out of the bed. “It will be best ice cream sundae of your life.”

Shane snorted. “Oh, so you won’t go downstairs for water, but you’ll go downstairs for ice cream?”

“Is for a good cause,” said Ilya nobly, pressing a kiss to Shane’s chest before he got up to leave again. Shane tried to hold back what felt more like a pout than a frown at the notion of being left alone in the bed again. 

For what seemed like far too long, all Shane could hear was an unimaginable amount of clattering echoing from the kitchen. It sounded like Ilya had cracked open every single cupboard and dug through every single ounce of dishware they had in the house before he appeared back at the door, two bowls in his hands and a satisfied smile on his face.

As he approached, Shane could see the difference in the two bowls. The one that Ilya kept for himself was ridiculous— craggy mountains so doused in fudge than Shane couldn’t even seen the ice cream. 

“I hope you like cherries,” he said to Shane, and handed him the other bowl. Two and a half scoops of what he assumed was dairy-free vanilla, what was clearly an attempt at artful fudge distribution, and approximately seven cherries gathered into a wonky shape.

“What is that?” Shane asked, squinting. Ilya, who had crashed in a rather undignified manner into the bed beside him, scowled.

“Is a smiley face.”

“That is not a smiley face,” Shane said, frowning again. “Where’s the eyes?”

“Right there,” he said like it was obvious, gesturing at two cherries that might have been slightly offset from the rest of the cluster. “And this is a nose.”

It was certainly not a nose, just a cherry island in the center of what was not a smiley face, but Shane snorted and said okay if only to appease Ilya, who already had a tiny smear of fudge along his bottom lip. 

He took a bite, and had to concede that it was nice. The bowl was cold against his still slightly overheated skin, the ice cream sugary and almost crisp. 

Ilya burrowed into the pillows besides him, completely disregarding Shane’s personal space in the same way he had all weekend. Shane wouldn’t dream of complaining about it.

“So, what’s the deal with the ice cream sundaes?” Shane finally asked. “I’ve literally never heard you mention them before today.”

“Mm,” Ilya hummed around a giant spoonful. “Rose and I saw an ad for them at... what is that place? TGI Fridays? I do not know. She says it looks good, I told her I had never had one.”

“Never?”

“Nope.” He licked his lips, missing the smudge of chocolate. “At least, not big proper American sundae.” He gestured down to his cavernous bowl. “Rose says I need to try, so I try. You like it, too, yes?”

“Well, yeah, everyone likes ice cream.” Shane frowned at Ilya, certain he would remember a conversation like that between him and Rose. “Where was I during this?”

He shrugged. “Bathroom, maybe? It was two weeks ago, at the sorority house.”

Shane hummed to himself, taking another spoonful of ice cream and trying to remember. They’d done a lot of studying at the sorority house, but his brain was mostly fried after the last few weeks, and nothing specific stuck out. 

“Is it as good as you thought it would be?”

Ilya nodded happily. More than half of his bowl had already disappeared. 

“That’s good,” said Shane, and he meant it. He wanted Ilya to have everything he’d ever wanted, and he wanted it to be perfect. He’d run to the store and get ten more cartons of ice cream, if that was what would make Ilya happy. 

His eyes were still fixated on the smear of chocolate near Ilya’s chin, so he reached out almost absentmindedly to thumb it away. Ilya let out a content purr and leaned into the contact.

They went back to their ice cream and were quiet for a moment before Ilya spoke again, his words almost lumbering. 

“Not a lot of sugar in my house growing up, is probably why I have such a big sweet tooth now,” he offered— and it was an offering, Shane would realize later, this unasked for piece of Ilya’s past. “Did you?”

“Um, eat a lot of sugar?” Shane thought about it. “Yeah, I mean, not tons. My mom’s not crazy about it, but my dad loves sweets. He always keeps muffins and candy and shit in the house.”

Ilya was quiet for a minute, his spoon clinking against the bottom of his bowl.

“I’m guessing yours wasn’t?” Shane tried to keep his tone light. He had never heard Ilya mention his father, outside of the vague dregs of memory he had from the night he’d been drunk and panicked in Québec. Ilya’s dad was police. That was the only thing he knew.

“No,” he said, and there was humor in the word that didn’t quite reach his face. “My father did not like sweets.”

This time, when his spoon hit the bowl, it clanged a little harder. Ilya looked like he was going somewhere, like he was floating out of his body and away from this bed, and it made Shane nervous.

Maybe he should ask. But the bubble here in the room had been so warm, so cozy, so perfect. He couldn’t bear to pop it. 

“Want to see something?” 

The question was nearly a blurt, as unexpected for Shane as it clearly was for Ilya. He blinked away from the vague spot on the blanket he’d been staring a hole into. “What?”

Shane reached for one of the cherry stems that lingered at the bottom of his bowl and popped it into his mouth, hoping desperately that this was a skill he’d retained. 

He hadn’t tried to do this in years, but mercifully, muscle memory saved him, and when he opened his mouth a moment later, there was a neatly tied knot in the stem.

Ilya’s borderline confused frown melted into a dropped jaw, his eyes immediately alight. “How did you do that?”

“With my tongue,” Shane said after he’d plucked the stem from his mouth. “I learned when I was a kid. My neighbor used to know how to do it, and she showed me.”

“Magic. Do it again,” said Ilya, so Shane did. 

Soon, Shane had four neatly knotted stems in front of him, while Ilya had his mouth tightly closed, visibly fumbling around with a stem against his cheek as Shane tried to explain how he did it.

“Okay, so you have to kind of make a loop, like against the front of your mouth, if that makes sense?” He laughed as Ilya’s tongue slipped out. “And so once you’ve done that, you—”

“Hold on, Hollander, I have not done it yet,” Ilya gritted, his face furrowed with concentration. “This is hard.”

“It is,” Shane allowed. “But I think you can do it.”

“I know I can do it,” he said impatiently. “I am very good with my tongue.”

Shane blushed.

It took another ten minutes before Ilya gave up, flopping back against the pillows. His face was flushed. 

“Is not going to work,” he said exasperatedly. “Mine is defective.”

Shane snorted, rolling his eyes, and secretly added defective to the list of words he liked in Ilya’s accent. “I don’t think it’s the stem’s fault.”

“Oh, so is me?” His hand curled against his chest in mock offense, his eyes wide. “I am failure who can never accomplish anything? This is what you are saying?”

“Jesus, Ilya, no,” said Shane, but the corners of Ilya’s mouth were turned up into a smile, which meant Shane was allowed to laugh. “It’s a tricky skill to learn.”

Ilya pushed himself back up onto his elbows. “I think you should just show me.”

“I have been showing you.”

“No, is not enough. I need a closer demonstration.” His smile was a little devilish, and he tapped one finger against his bottom lip. “Show me, Hollander.”

Shane’s cheeks heated as the meaning became clearer. “I don’t think that’s going to work, Ilya,” said Shane, embarrassment coloring his tone. Still, it didn’t stop him from popping the stem into his mouth and leaning forward to try.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

After lunch the next day, he walked into the living room to find Ilya on his hands and knees on the rug, peering up into the fireplace.

“Did you lose something up there?”

“Blyat!” Ilya jolted, clearly spooked, and turned to look at him. “We need to put a bell on you.”

Shane grinned. “Sorry.”

“I’m trying to see if the chimney is open,” said Ilya. “Can we light it?”

“Um, good question,” said Shane, who had never once touched the fireplace. That was a task that had simply always belonged to David Hollander and which Shane had never considered to be his business. “I can call my dad and ask?”

“Oh.” Ilya shuffled to his knees. “Is okay, we do not have to bother him.”

“No, it’s fine,” said Shane, already pulling his phone out of his pocket. “The fireplace is a good idea.”

They’d been having, by all means, one of the greatest mornings of Shane’s life. Before they’d even left the bed, discarded bowls of ice cream stacked on the nightstand, Ilya had fucked Shane into the mattress until he was a garbling and drooling mess, his hands grasping at the sheets so tightly he was surprised they didn’t rip. After they’d cleaned up, they’d driven up the road to skate at a little pond that almost always froze solid by this time of the year, batting a puck lazily around the ice with a few neighborhood kids. Then they’d stumbled home, Ilya’s cheeks bright red with the cold, his hands bundled into a pair of maple-leaf patterned mittens he’d stolen from the mudroom, and Shane had sucked him off before they’d even fully discarded their snow boots. Now he was clean and wrapped in his favorite sweater, and they had loose plans to watch hockey and play cards all afternoon. Shane wouldn’t have been shocked to learn he’d died and gone to heaven.

It took twenty minutes and some very thorough and exasperated instructions from Shane’s dad, but eventually there was a low fire crackling in the hearth. It had begun to snow outside, fat white flakes flurrying past the windows over the lake. 

When Ilya came back into the room with two mugs in his hands, Shane’s eye caught on something glinting at his ear. He straightened from where he’d been prodding at the logs in the fireplace. 

“You put your earring back in.”

Ilya set down the mugs down on the table, his hand flying sheepishly to the silver hoop. “Yes. I, uh, like to wear it when I am off duty. I know that technically, I am working, but—”

Shane was already shaking his head. “I don’t want you to be working this weekend. At least, I don’t want it to feel that way.”

“Ah.” He nodded, then the corner of his mouth curled. “So, if I am not on duty this weekend, when big scary men break into the house and there is no bodyguard here...”

Shane rolled his eyes. “I mean, it would be nice if you helped, but I can probably take care of it.” 

Maybe it was inane, but Shane had always thought that he could actually protect himself. It wasn’t like he’d never thrown a punch on the ice— it was rare, sure, rarer still now that he was more of a public figure beneath his mom, but it happened on occasion. He had a lot of muscle to put to use if anyone were to try to attack him in the real world. This was an argument that his mother and the rest of the security team had refused to listen to the first few times he’d chafed at the idea of having a bodyguard. 

At some point, they had gravitated towards each other in the center of the room, Ilya’s hands finding Shane’s waist, Shane’s arms winding around his neck. 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” said Shane, fighting the urge to brush his thumb against the earring just to see what it felt like, the soft skin of his lobe against the curve of the metal. “Let me protect you for a change.”

“That would be nice,” said Ilya. “Not having to worry about you so often.”

He made a face. “I’m sure you don’t worry about me that much.”

Beneath his hands, Ilya’s shoulders shrugged, still scanning Shane’s face with his eyes in that intense way he had.

“So, if I am not your bodyguard this weekend, who do you want me to be?”

Shane felt his brows pinch a little. It was a surprising question— a dangerous one, even. Dancing frighteningly close to the electrified third rail that they had both silently sworn not to touch. 

 Ilya’s face changed as he read Shane’s. Maybe he’d meant to be teasing. Maybe he hadn’t meant to ask at all, but the question was out there now. 

If Ilya reached for the rail, maybe Shane could, too.

“I want you to be yourself,” he said, his voice stupid and soft. One of his hands slipped up and cupped the back of Ilya’s head, stroking through the hair. “I just want you to be Ilya.”

It was still a censored answer. Shane knew he couldn’t say what he really wanted— couldn’t even say it to himself, really, not even in the dark of his room, not in the space behind his eyelids. 

Still, the words seemed to strike Ilya. His eyes softened, his hands tightening just a fraction on Shane’s waist, and then he kissed him.

He had expected it to be a hard kiss, but this was soft. Ilya sucked at Shane’s bottom lip, kissed it once, twice, three times. Shane kept his hands in Ilya’s hair, letting himself be drawn closer into the embrace, enjoying the slip of Ilya’s tongue into his mouth. 

When they pulled away, Ilya’s eyes lingered on his face for a moment, before they flickered over his shoulder and caught on what Shane had been up to before he’d entered the room. “Was there an explosion?”

“Oh.” Shane turned his head to see what Ilya was seeing. There was a massive pine chest tucked beneath one of the windows, and it had been flung open, piles of fabric cascading out of it. “No, I was just— I was looking for this.”

He went to the chest and unearthed what he had been searching for. 

“A blanket?”

“Not just a blanket,” Shane said with complete sincerity. “It’s the best blanket ever.”

He made a point of folding all the other subordinate blankets back into the chest and shutting it before he flopped into his favorite corner of the couch, stretching his legs out and bundling himself beneath it. The blanket was massive, the kind of fabric that was usually supposed to pass as faux-fur, but it was patterned with blue and red flannel. Shane had been taking the best naps of his life underneath it since he was small, curling contentedly beneath it even in the summers when the AC was blasting and his dad was watching golf tournaments. 

Ilya raised an eyebrow, reaching forward to feel the blanket before he lifted the edge of it, gesturing for Shane to budge over. “Why is it the best?”

“It just is,” said Shane, scooching obligingly so Ilya could crash down beside him. “It’s so, like, heavy, and warm, and soft. It’s my favorite blanket ever and I only get to use it while I’m here.”

Ilya nodded, still petting the fabric contemplatively before he gave Shane a look. “Why only here?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why not take it home with you? You could use it all the time.”

The question, frankly, struck Shane a little. It had truly never occurred to him to take the blanket back to his house in Ottawa. It seemed like something that could only exist here, in the magic that draped over the cottage, like it might have been breaking some kind of invisible rule to let it go anywhere else.

He had vague memories of being a child and asking if they could find any more of them online, but his dad hadn’t been able to find a tag on it and there were hundreds of blankets out there that looked just like this one but were significantly inferior. The search had died quickly and Shane had resigned himself to the fact that this blanket was one of one, and looked forward to laying with it each winter and each summer. 

“I don’t know,” he answered quietly. “Just never thought of it.” 

They turned on the television and spent far too much time picking a movie, settling eventually on Elf, because Ilya had never seen it. 

“Oh, I know this guy,” Ilya said only five minutes in. “He is funny. I like him.”

“Everyone likes Will Ferrell,” mumbled Shane, already beginning to succumb to the environment they’d set up. The fire was crackling faintly and he was cocooned in the warmth of the blanket, Ilya’s heartbeat so steady beneath his temple. Buddy the Elf had only just arrived in New York before Shane’s chin was dropping onto Ilya’s chest and he was falling fast asleep. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

When he came back to consciousness, there was a moment where everything was still dark. He could hear the faint murmur of the television, could feel Ilya’s thumb passing over the stretch of hair behind his ear, back and forth in a soothing rhythm. He cracked his heavy eyes open to see that snow was still drifting lazily down outside of the windows. 

He took a deep breath and shifted to get more comfortable, his arm a little numb where it had been tucked strangely against the couch and Ilya’s torso. When he glanced up, Ilya was watching him, his expression something that Shane had never seen before. His eyes were soft, his brow furrowed. It made Shane’s heart do a flip.

“What?” he croaked, his mouth dry.

The thumb paused its ministrations in his hair. “What?”

“You’re looking at me,” he said.

“No, I am not,” said Ilya, but he still was. If Shane didn’t know better, his cheeks looked a little red, but then again, the room was now very warm. Shane was sweating a little beneath his layers.

“You are,” he said, his chest flooded with that glowing warmth he was beginning to grow familiar with. He opened his mouth to say something else when Ilya nudged his attention back to the TV.

“Shh, I am watching the show. Is very educational. I am going here next week.”

Shane turned to see what was on. The movie was over, and whatever they were watching now was showing aerial views of a winter wonderland that he eventually recognized was Montreal, the river covered in cracked ice.

“On your great Canadian road trip?” 

Ilya nodded.

“You know, Ottawa is the best place in Canada during the winter,” he scoffed now. “You can go skating on the canal, there’s good skiing—” 

“Yes, I know,” said Ilya, thumbing at Shane’s chin. “You said this last time. This is why we are ending our trip in Gatineau.”

“Gatineau is not the same as Ottawa.”

Ilya rolled his eyes. “Is close enough. We are going there to see our friend, and then it will be easy for me to pick you up.”

Shane’s cheeks warmed at the phrasing, which sounded much sweeter than the truth. It made it seem like Ilya would be knocking at his door before a date, rather than acting as part of a security detail so intense it often made Shane feel like a toddler on a leash.

“I didn’t know you had a friend in Gatineau.”

“Yes, Cliff. He lives in Ottawa, actually, we are only renting a spot by Gatineau Park because Svetlana was being bougie and wanted chalet. Cliff owns a bar in Ottawa.” Ilya’s face did something funny. “You have been there.”

Shane’s head jerked up, a puzzle piece slotting into place in his brain. “No way.”

He’d only met Ilya almost five months prior, but it felt like a lifetime ago. There had been a lot more to focus on at the time— the way he was ushering him into the back of the bar, the melting heat of his mouth, the zipping thrill of the fact that Shane had never snuck off to hook up with a hot stranger in his life and he probably never would again. He’d completely forgotten the reason why Ilya felt so comfortable sneaking him into the back in the first place.

Shane might not have heard much about Cliff, but he sure had given Ilya a blowjob on the threadbare couch in his office.

“Oh my god.” He groaned with the realization, burying his face into Ilya’s chest. “I totally forgot you said you knew the owner of the bar.”

“Yes,” said Ilya, his chest rising with a laugh. “Cliff Marleau. I billeted with him when I was a teenager, is how I came to like Canada.” 

“Oh my god,” he said again. “Jesus.”

Ilya’s laugh was more full now. “It was a good night, yes?” His hand stroked over Shane’s back. “Good memories.”

“I guess,” Shane mumbled into Ilya’s shirt. “Am I going to meet them?”

“Cliff and Svetlana? You would want to?”

He still felt a little warm with embarrassment. “I mean, yeah. You’ve met my friends, right? And you guys will be in Gatineau when I come back from my interviews?”

Ilya nodded, his eyes unreadable. “Yes.” 

“So, I could meet them.”

“Yes, probably, but might be tricky.” Ilya shrugged. “We would have to explain to John why you want to hang out with me on your break. I worry it would seem unprofessional.”

“Right.” Shane’s heart sank into his stomach. He wanted to know more about Ilya’s life, wanted to know who his people were, but they had to be able to balance that with not blowing their cover. Ilya had a point.

He read Shane’s face, and his hand slipped up to cradle his neck. “Maybe in the spring, I can invite Svetlana back to Samwell. Or we do weekend trip to Boston. You could meet her then.”

Shane straightened a little, immediately perking up. “Really? We could do that?”

“I don’t see why not.” He brushed the hair away from Shane’s forehead. “If you wanted to. I think you and Svetlana would get along. She knows so much about hockey.”

“Because of her dad?”

Ilya shrugged. “Maybe a little, but Sveta does not do anything because of anyone else. She is smartest person I know. She could keep up with you, even. You two would have much to say about the fucking Pittsburgh Penguins.”

“That would be fun,” Shane said, but then a moment of doubt crept in. “That is, if you want me to meet her. You don’t have to introduce us just because I asked.”

“I know,” said Ilya simply.  “I would not introduce you to her if I did not also like the idea. As for Cliff, I do not know. Maybe you will meet him sometime, but would be harder to do.”

Shane nodded, watching as a thought occurred to Ilya and his smile grew cheeky. He cupped the side of Shane’s face with one broad hand.

“It would be fun to go back to Cliff’s bar, though. We could relive old times.”

“Oh, shut up,” said Shane. He buried his pink cheeks into Ilya’s sweatshirt, enjoying the jagged rise and fall of his laugh.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

It’s only after they’d eaten dinner together, some distance put between them on the couch (although Ilya still had his legs strewn into Shane’s lap), that Shane felt brave enough to bring up what he’d been meaning to ask all weekend.

“So,” he started, rubbing absentmindedly at the ball of Ilya’s ankle through his sock. There was a hole forming at the heel of it. “Tomorrow is Sunday.”

“Yes,” said Ilya, shuffled so deep into the couch cushion that it seemed to be devouring his shoulders. “Tomorrow is Sunday.”

Shane was focused very hard on some loose fibers sprouting up in the rug. 

“I was wondering if you wanted to go to church.”

A surprised breath left Ilya, maybe half of a laugh. “What?”

Shane’s eyes snapped up and he tried to keep the offense out of his tone. “What? I’m serious.”

“You do not go to church.”

This much was true. Shane had grown up in a largely non-religious household. He had some grandparents on his dad’s side who clung to traces of faith, and his mom had never really shown any apathy to the idea of religion, but if Shane had ever stepped foot into a religious structure, it was more often than not due to some social obligation. 

“I’m not talking about for me,” he mumbled, glancing away again. “I was thinking for you.”

“What?”

Ilya’s tone was more serious, now. Shane risked a look at him, but that was what it was—a risk—and a moment later he was glued back to the carpet.

“I was just thinking that you’re off duty this weekend,” he said. “I know you’ve never mentioned church, but you wear that cross, and you haven’t had a chance to go if you wanted to, obviously. I don’t know if there are any orthodox churches around— you are orthodox, right?”

It was his best attempt at being casual, trying desperately not to reveal that he did, in fact, know where the nearest Russian orthodox church was— nearly an hour and a half away, practically all the way back to Ottawa, but that was fine, Shane was willing to make the drive. The last thing he wanted was for Ilya to learn that his search history was filled with a string of variations on things like what religion do russian people celebrate and are russians christian and difference between crucifix and cross. 

 On the other side of the couch, Ilya was quiet.

“I don’t have to go with you, I could stay in the car, or like even just stay here if you wanted, but—”

“Hollander,” Ilya interrupted. “Shane. Breathe. You are squeezing the shit out of my foot.”

Startled, he glanced down and realized Ilya was right. He was inadvertently strangling Ilya’s ankle. He loosened his grip and mumbled an anxious apology.

“I do not go to church,” he began slowly. “I have not been in a long time. Years.” 

“Oh,” said Shane, mostly to himself.

“Where is this coming from?” 

Shane shrugged. “I don’t know, I just... Wanted to offer. I don’t want you to feel like we always have to do what I want to do, and if there’s somewhere you want to go, I just want you to feel like you can tell me.”

“Why do you feel like I can’t tell you?”

“Well, I don’t know,” Shane shrugged. “I think you’re kind of not supposed to, because of the bodyguard thing. But I want you to.”

“You would not offer this if someone else were your bodyguard.”

“Well, fucking obviously,” said Shane, his shoulders creeping defensively towards his ears. “But it’s not someone else, it’s you, and I—”

He had to cut himself off, because he’d been about to say something stupid like I care about you. 

“I’m just thinking,” he started again, “that this could even be when we go back to school, you know? You have my schedule. If you want to do more shifts at the shelter, let me know and I’ll come with you, or I’ll study in the waiting room or something if you want space. Or if you want to go to the bookstore, or— I don’t know. I just don’t want you to feel like you’re stuck following me around all the time.”

He was aware that his words were rushing out of him, nearly a mile a minute at this point. He only stopped when Ilya pulled his legs out of Shane’s grasp, instead sitting up fully beside him.

“Shane,” he said. “Where is this coming from?”

“I don’t know.” The words, to his embarrassment, were almost plaintive. Ilya reached for his face, steering it to the side until their eyes met. “I just want to make sure you’re happy.”

“Of course, I am happy,” Ilya said, his brows furrowing with genuine confusion. “I live good life. You know this, yes? We go for walks, I can use nice gym, read books, go to shelter in my spare time, and yes, maybe I wish I had more time to do these things, but I like my job, too. I like keeping you safe. Is not perfect, is not forever, maybe, but I am happy for now.”

Shane’s shoulders tensed involuntarily at the word forever, went even tighter at the slip of the for now. 

The happiness was temporary. He thought despondently that it always would be. 

“It is my life,” said Ilya, baffled. “I mean, yes, maybe it would be nice if we could find time to go to the shelter together. I think the time away would be good for you, I think you would like the people there, but I do not want you to change your life for me.”

He couldn’t say this, but Shane’s life had already changed. He felt certain that anyone who looked closely enough could see— Shane’s heart wasn’t even beating before he met Ilya. 

“Will you just tell me?” Shane asked. “If there’s something you want to do. Will you promise to let me know?”

Ilya sighed, but he nodded. “I will tell you. I promise.”

Something in Shane’s chest caved a little with relief, a releasing of breath. He turned to face Ilya better and held out his pinky, waiting patiently until Ilya puffed air out of his nose and wrapped his own around it.

“You are happy?”

“I am happy. Sorry I tried to make you go to church.”

That made a more full-hearted laugh burst out of Ilya. His hand wrapped fully around Shane’s, squeezing softly.

 “Is okay. I see why you would think... but no. I have not been in too long. Maybe one day.”

Shane drew his knees up onto the couch, letting them curl against Ilya’s lap. He braced his elbow on the lip of the couch and rested his head against his fist, his other hand still sweeping a thumb over Ilya’s knuckles.

“When was the last time you went?”

Like always when he asked one of these questions—one of the ones that required every ounce of his bravery, ones that he knew Ilya would not want to answer—Shane steeled himself for an evasive response. He could practically predict what Ilya would say. It was a long time ago, he’d say again, maybe mention something about how it was back in Russia like that part wasn’t obvious. Something cryptic for Shane to turn over and over in his head, making desperate attempts to decipher it. 

“It was after my father’s funeral.”

All of the air guttered out of Shane, a candle being extinguished. He almost forgot to take another breath. 

“Oh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”

Ilya gave a small shrug. “Is okay. It was a while ago.”

“When— when did he—”

Now it was Ilya who was looking away, his eyes fixed in the direction of the dark window. In his lap, the hand that wasn’t holding Shane’s was pushing and pulling at the blanket tangled beneath his legs.

“Two years ago.”

“Oh.” Shane nodded, then waited for more.

“He was very sick, and old. It was his time.”

“Sick like cancer?” Shane gnawed on the inside of his lip, now completely stuck on staring at Ilya. It felt like he might lose this moment of truth if he looked away or even blinked wrong.

“Mm, no.” Ilya shook his head. “Dementsiya. I think English word is same. He was forgetting things, people, who he was.”

“Oh,” said Shane. “I’m so sorry, Ilya. That must have been really hard.”

Shane had never had a family member get dementia, but his neighbor from across the street had it when he was growing up. Over the span of a year, Mr. Arlington went from someone who would ask Shane how school was, teaching him how to help prune the weeds from his yard, to someone who would wander aimlessly into the street without shoes on, unsure which house was his. It had been really frightening. Now that he thought about it, Shane wasn’t sure he knew what had happened to Mr. Arlington.

“It was,” Ilya admitted, now fidgeting with Shane’s fingers. “He could not drive or cook, but he thought he could. He would get mad when we did not let him. He drove through the garage door and kept setting fires on the stove.”

“Who’s we? You and your mom?”

Ilya’s inhale veered on sharp, and Shane immediately regretted the questions. Their hands stilled between them.

“Ah, no,” he began softly. “Me, my brother, and my stepmother. We were all stuck in the house together taking care of him.”

“Oh,” said Shane, but he didn’t risk asking his next question. 

But it seemed that Ilya could read the inquiry on Shane’s face regardless. He sighed, sweeping his thumb along Shane’s palm.

“My mother died when I was twelve. Long before he did. She was sick, too, but different— not like cancer,” he said, jumping ahead of Shane’s earlier question. “She was... sad. It was terminal.”

It took him a second to realize what Ilya meant, turning the words over and over in his head. When the realization sank in, he felt vaguely nauseous.

“She was my favorite person.” 

Ilya’s shoulders gave an odd little shake, almost like a twitch. When Shane looked at him properly, almost squinting in the light, he could see that a tear had escaped, crawling down his face towards his jaw.

“Hey,” said Shane, then repeated it. “Hey.”

He reached for Ilya, pulling him in by the shoulders. Ilya went easily, shifting onto his knees until he was pushing Shane back into the couch, letting his arms wrap tightly around his torso. He buried his cheek into Shane’s chest, and Shane could feel his chest hitching.

“I’m so sorry,” he breathed into Ilya’s hair. “I’m so sorry. I can’t even imagine.”

It seemed to be easier for Ilya talk when he was cradled against Shane’s chest, his fingers pinching absentmindedly at the fabric of his sweater. 

Slowly but surely, the picture of Ilya’s life was stitched together before him. The loss of his mom at such a young age. Alone in the dark house, hockey his only solace, the only thing he knew how to do. 

“I lost a lot of friends after I lost hockey,” he said, and Shane’s heart broke.

He’d always had teammates who he knew would want nothing to do with him outside of the rink, who wouldn’t have given him the time of day if he didn’t have half the talent he possessed. Still, he couldn’t imagine the same was true for Ilya. Ilya, who was brazen and big-hearted and funny. Ilya, who knew the workers at their local restaurants by name. Ilya, who spent his spare time taking care of animals. Ilya, who liked to read books and who always bit his knuckles during the tense parts of movies and who could charm a brick wall. How could his team have abandoned him?

“I had Sveta, of course,” he explained. “But I was miserable to be around after I fucked my knee. I will admit. I yelled at everyone, all of the time. I did not make jokes. I stayed in bed until my father beat me out of it. It was very dark, for a while. Very Russian of me.”

Shane’s breath caught in his chest. He was running his hand back and forth between Ilya’s shoulder blades, although if the movement was supposed to be more soothing for him or for Ilya, he couldn’t be sure. 

There were drugs, Ilya admitted, a trace of timidity in his voice. “But of course, not anymore, very clean bill of health is needed to come work in Canada,” he added quickly, as if afraid Shane might judge. He was ashamed to admit that if it were anyone else, he thought he might have. “No drugs. Not in a long time.”

Shane smudged a kiss against the top of his head, humming in a way he hoped seemed understanding. 

“It was Sveta who forced me to try at this job,” Ilya admitted. “I would have been happy to do nothing for a long time. But I could not have stayed in that house, especially after my father died. Her papa knew someone who did private security, someone who probably owed my father several favors. I don’t know how it all happened, but one day Svetlana comes into my room and tells me I need to get my ass into shape, because I have an interview with Canada.”

“So you didn’t want to do it?”

“Is not that,” Ilya sighed. His hand rubbed up and down Shane’s side. “I did not want to do anything, really. I had no dream outside of hockey. I had never needed one. I was supposed to head straight to draft, it would have fixed everything.”

This, Shane could understand.

“When I left Russia, I was so angry, so hurt. I came to Canada, I wanted my life to be different. I wanted to be doing good work. I think protecting is an easy way to do this. I work a few gigs and it is fine. And then... I meet you.”

Ilya craned his head, just for a minute, to make eye contact with Shane. He wasn’t sure what his face was doing, but he could feel that it was crumpled, could feel that there was a sheen in his eyes as he blinked down at Ilya.

He pressed a kiss to Shane’s chin rather than strain to meet his lips, then stuck his face back into Shane’s chest. 

“You met me,” Shane repeated. “That was a good thing?”

“Yes.” The word was muffled by Shane’s sweater. “It was a very good thing.”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

They talked for a little while longer, answers coaxed out of Ilya like medicine into a spoon. Shane could only hold him, listening to him describe his tumultuous relationship with his brother, the way things had been before his mother died.

Eventually, Ilya fell quiet. His words had slowed the more he spoke, until eventually—

“I am going to fall asleep if you keep doing this,” he said, and yawned.

Shane paused. He’d been tracing his fingers in circles through Ilya’s hair, enjoying the rhythmic pass of bronze curls through his fingers. 

“You can,” he said quickly. “Fall asleep, I mean. If you want.”

He liked the idea. They’d tossed the last of the logs from the mudroom into the fireplace, and it was burning low. The room was softly lit, the muted television running through some sort of sitcom cycle, and the world felt very precious in a way that had him ignoring the crick in his neck, the way his arm was growing numb beneath Ilya’s weight. 

“Not what I want right now,” said Ilya, and tilted his face up to meet Shane’s.

The ascent up the stairs was a slow one, hindered by the fact that they couldn’t pass a doorjamb or a hall table or a banister without pushing up against it to kiss. Shane lost his shirt somewhere in the front entryway. Ilya’s pants tangled at the bottom of one of the stair railings. 

The sex was as tender as it had been the day before, which Shane hadn’t thought was possible. He let Ilya work him open with his fingers until he was melted into the sheets, and then he flipped them over, pinning Ilya down into the mattress and straddling his hips, pressing Ilya inside of him as slowly as he could bear if only to hear the way Ilya groaned with pleasure. 

If Ilya was embarrassed about the fact that he didn’t last very long with Shane riding him, he didn’t show it. He rolled Shane over and sucked him off, two fingers still working inside of him, before he was hard again. He fucked him deftly, the sound profane and wet, Shane grasping desperately for something to hold onto and finding Ilya’s hand. He made Shane finished twice before he came a second time on his own, jerking off over Shane’s ass so his come pooled over his back.

When they were finished, Shane let Ilya tug him into the shower on wobbling legs. It was a luxury he had never known, to feel Ilya’s strong fingers scrubbing shampoo into his scalp, to feel him massaging Shane’s thighs with a washcloth drenched in body wash. He pressed soapy kisses to Ilya’s chest, whimpering when Ilya held him close, pressing a very open-mouthed kiss to Shane’s throat until he pushed him away, making him swear not to leave a mark.

“You cannot attend the Hollander holiday lunch with hickey on your neck, I know,” Ilya murmured into his ear, sucking the sensitive skin below it. The sensation was so good that Shane began to chub up a little, which made Ilya chub up a little, and then Shane was dropping to his knees for an improbable third round.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

He woke up the next morning and felt a little pang of anticipatory sadness in his chest.

It was their last full day together, the only thought he could sustain while he watched Ilya slowly blink awake, his face tucked against Shane’s sternum. He was still thinking about it when Ilya pushed two brown sugar cinnamon PopTarts into the toaster, then when they curled up in the chilly three-seasons room to eat breakfast and look out the window.

He couldn’t tell if Ilya was feeling as bothered by it as Shane was. He probably wasn’t— he was a much more rational thinker than Shane was, and he knew that this was not a very rational sadness. They’d be apart for two weeks, which Shane would be spending busy with his parents, traveling around to meet with prospective teams, and which Ilya would spend enjoying his time off with his friends. When they came back together, they’d go back to Samwell, and they’d be back to Shane’s schedule, which was hockey and school and more hockey and maybe, now, included quite a bit more of Ilya.

When Ilya finished his food, Shane took his plate for him, focused on scraping the remnants of scrambled eggs down into the garbage disposal and try to put a lid on any of the slightly doomed feelings he was experiencing. By the time he came back into the room, Ilya was digging through the weathered boxes of board games on the shelves. 

“Find anything good?” 

“Yes, I like this one.” Ilya turned to show Shane the box he was holding. 

He couldn’t help but snort. “Really? We got that for my little cousins to play a couple years ago.”

“So, what, you are too old for it? Too cool?”

“I’m not saying that, I just—”

“Okay, great,” said Ilya, setting the game down to lift the dusty lid of the box. “I am going to beat your ass at Hungry Hungry Hippos.”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

They spent an hour playing games until Ilya got hungry again and consequently bored. Shane had him sit at the kitchen counter and cut vegetables while he slapped together sandwiches, another thing that felt surprisingly domestic.

They cooked meals together sometimes, back at campus. This shouldn’t have felt so new— much like the grocery shopping and the laundry and the waking up in bed together shouldn’t have felt novel, either, but it all had. Ilya was helping Shane dig out a skillet he was pretty sure he’d only ever seen his father use so that they could grill their ham and cheese sandwiches. He was pressing a kiss to the back of Shane’s neck when he got up to scrape his carrot peels into the trash can. They ate together at the counter, kitchen stools dragged so close together that Ilya’s thigh was pressed into Shane’s the whole time, even if the actual eating passed in a mostly companionable silence, and the idea that this might be what it was like back at campus sent a little flutter through Shane’s stomach.

When the dishes were put away, even as Ilya grumbled that the pan could’ve soaked a little longer, that feeling was stirring in Shane’s stomach. He refused to let his eyes flicker to the clock, although he was well aware of the time— less than twenty-four hours left in this perfect bubble.

“We are out of wood,” Ilya declared after lunch. Even with his back turned as he dug into the pantry for a fresh roll of paper towels, Shane could hear the pout in his voice.

“You want to light the fire again?”

“Yes. Was nice yesterday. Very cozy, no?”

“It was,” Shane agreed, laughing under his breath and reaching into his pocket. “There’s probably more wood out in the shed, let me text my dad and ask. I’ll also have to tell him you owe him a new Hungry Hungry Hippos board—”

Ilya gasped, dropping his own phone onto the counter with a clatter and immediately trying to take Shane’s from his hand. “Ah, ah, do not do that! This is not true! You are the one who broke it.”

“You were cheating,” Shane said, holding the phone aloft and giggling as Ilya pinned him to the counter trying to reach it. “I didn’t break anything—”

“I was not cheating, you are liar, you are the one who slammed—”

They bickered all the way through shoving their feet into their boots and clomping into the snow to reach the back shed. Shane hadn’t bothered to put on a coat or gloves, which he promptly regretted the moment the cold started seeping through his sweatshirt. 

“I’m not playing any more games with you,” said Ilya, his arms crossed defiantly. He was stupidly cute, Shane thought, with his little fake frown across his lips and his cheeks glowing pink with the cold. “Not if this is how you will be.”

“No? What was it that you said you wanted to play yesterday?” 

Shane pretended to give it a moment of thought even as he heard Ilya gasp in realization. He tugged hard on the door to the shed, jerking it open against the force of several inches of accumulated snow beneath it.

“I guess I’ll have to find someone else to challenge in strip poker, then. Bummer.”

“No, no, wait, Shane,” he heard Ilya protest immediately, following him into the darkened shed. “I did not mean it!”

“Don’t walk into any spiderwebs,” he warned, and enjoyed the peripheral image of Ilya ducking down instantly. 

There was a neat stack of chopped wood tucked in the back, right by a bunch of power tools that had been gathering dust for years. Shane bent down to scoop a few logs into his arms. As he was reaching for the last of them, aiming for a pile up to his chin, a sharp pain lanced through his hand.

“Fuck,” he swore, and promptly dropped all of the logs. They thudded and rolled across the floor as he shook out his wrist. “Ouch. Shit! Fuck.”

“What happened?” Ilya was there in seconds, cradling Shane’s fist in his and tilting it towards the light streaming in from the doorway.

“Just a splinter.”

His hand was beginning to throb— it was a big shard of wood, embedded in the base of his pointer finger. Ilya made a tch sound as he inspected the injury.

“It hurts?”

“Not that bad,” Shane said, and tried to use his blunt nails to pull the splinter out, ignoring both Ilya’s warning and attempt to bat his hand away. He swore again when it was clear that this only both snapped the splinter in half and pushed it somehow deeper. 

“We need pinchers,” Ilya said solemnly.

“Tweezers,” Shane corrected absentmindedly. “Yeah. Fuck, that was dumb of me.”

“It was,” Ilya agreed, and then he was bending down to pick up the wood that Shane had dropped. “But we’ll get it out.”

He refused to let Shane touch another log of wood, so Shane had to trudge dejectedly up behind him to the house. Ilya made him open and shut all of the doors with his uninjured hand, his own arms laden with firewood.

Shane wanted to be irritated by being ordered around. Instead, he sort of liked the little flutter that happened in his stomach when Ilya patted the kitchen counter and said hop up. He liked the serious set of Ilya’s brow when he returned with a pair of tweezers dug up from who knew where, the focus in his eyes as he tilted Shane’s hand from side to side to look at the injury.

He couldn’t help but let out a little ow when Ilya first prodded at it with the tweezers.

“I am sorry, solnyshko, I’m going to get it out, okay?” He seemed legitimately apologetic as he went in for a second time. “It’s all going to be fine. The ouchy will be over soon.”

Despite the fact that he was pretty certain his heart was actually physically melting in his chest seeing this side of Ilya, Shane was having a thought he couldn’t help but point out. 

“You know, in October when I took that hit playing Cornell and my face was bleeding like crazy, you didn’t seem half as concerned as you do right now.”

Ilya’s eyes flickered to his, unamused, before he returned to his task. “You were okay.”

“I was arguably less okay than I am right now,” said Shane, and then, “oop, sorry,” because he’d gestured with his hand on accident and nearly pulled it out of Ilya’s grasp. 

Ilya let out a little inhale of success as he fished out the first half of the splinter. His hands were rough and warm against Shane’s, and he could feel Ilya’s breath streaming along his fingers. 

“I was worried about you then, too,” he said softly.

That took Shane aback. He couldn’t even remember Ilya giving him so much as a second glance that night in October. They’d only been on campus together for a month and a half at that point; they were barely even speaking to each other.

In lieu of a response, Shane swung his legs where they were dangling off the kitchen counter, finding Ilya’s calf and rubbing against it with his socked foot.

It took another few minutes and muttered apologies, but eventually Ilya got the second half of the splinter out, his heavy brow immediately lifting as he held the scrap of wood up for Shane to see. “Look! All better.”

Blood was beginning to well up from Shane’s hand. It was no more than a drop, but Ilya scrambled to grab a napkin, pressing it gently to Shane’s still somewhat throbbing wound. 

“Feel better?” He waited for Shane to nod before he lifted the napkin, pressing it down a few times just to be sure. Then he pulled out a tube of Neosporin, dabbing it gently over the red spot.

“Thank you,” Shane barely remembered to say. His brain was entirely absent of all thoughts as he watched Ilya be so gentle. It was like the goddamn puppy photos all over again.

“No problem.” Ilya capped the Neosporin. “Okay. Now I have a surprise for you.”

Shane’s brow crinkled with confusion. “What kind of surprise could you possibly have?”

He reached into his back pocket and rustled up something that was small and paper-thin.

“A Bandaid?” Shane couldn’t help but sound a little unimpressed.

“Not just any Bandaid,” Ilya said, his tone completely serious as he stripped it of its waxy wrapping. His face then melted into a smile as he brandished his find. “A dinosaur Bandaid.”

It was a purple galaxy Bandaid, spotted with stars and comets and a big green T-rex. Shane couldn't help but laugh.

“Oh my god, that thing must be ancient. It’s not even going to stick.”

“It will stick!” Ilya promised as he pressed it down into Shane’s palm.

It most certainly was not going to stick— it wound awkwardly around a crease in Shane’s hand, which meant it would probably fall off the moment he tried to pick something up, and it also had to be at least ten years old, but Shane entertained it anyway, if only to see Ilya’s pleased smile.

“There,” Ilya said, and pressed a kiss to his palm. “All fixed.”

I love you, Shane thought.

It struck him like a crack of lightning. He’d been trying to ignore this feeling all weekend—  the glowing of coals in his chest, a tenderness in his heart that he had never in his life felt before he laid eyes on Ilya. 

Now the thought was here, and Shane knew it was supposed to scare him. It did scare him, a sliver of fear worming its way into his stomach. But that fear didn’t overwhelm the soft thrill of realizing he was in love for the first time. It couldn’t, not when Ilya was standing between his parted thighs, pressing the softest kiss imaginable to Shane’s mouth. Not when his thumb was still swiping soothingly over Shane’s injured hand, the pressure easing whatever tiny fragment of pain still lingered. Not when he was sliding both his hands down Shane’s back, scooting him to the edge of the counter, encouraging him to wrap his legs around his waist so he could carry him to the couch and collapse on top of him, heavy between Shane’s thighs. 

He loved him. Fuck, he loved him.

“Is not the first time I have bandaged you up, huh?” Ilya still had a trace of teasing in his voice as he looking from Shane to the Bandaid.

It took him a second to catch up, still lost in some rhapsodic stream of feeling about the way Ilya’s hair flopped over his forehead, the kaleidoscope of his eyes. “What?”

“Maybe you do not remember,” said Ilya, and it was this prompting that had the realization slamming into Shane.

It was a memory he’d revisited fairly often, to his mortification. A little drunk in a hotel room in Québec, Ilya on his knees in front of him. The gruff but attentive sweep of a damp washcloth on Shane’s calf, the way Ilya had bit off the strip of wound tape and Shane had gotten a little hard in his sleep shorts. 

“Oh my god, that night was so embarrassing.” Shane ground his palms into his eyes. “I still can’t believe I did all that.”

“It was a big night. You made the security team very nervous.”

Shane surfaced, blinking at him. “Really?”

“Is big party, everyone sees Shane Hollander drinking lots of champagne, everyone sees Shane Hollander dance. Then suddenly no one has eyes on Shane Hollander.” Ilya shrugged. “Was not a fun time.”

“I didn’t realize anyone noticed I was gone,” said Shane, feeling his imaginary leash grow tighter. “No one told me they were looking for me.”

Ilya’s grin was wolfish. He squeezed the back of Shane’s neck. “This is because I found you first.”

Shane had only blurry recollections of the night as a whole. He’d been drunk and sad and stressed, mad at his parents for no tangible reason. He’d gone for a walk and not wanted to come back. Ilya had found him, lost in the dark of the woods, and guided him back towards the light. 

The next morning, he’d been scolded by his mother, but not for worrying the security team or for making them panic. Only for leaving the gala early and without saying goodbye to their hosts. You can’t do stuff like this, Shane, she’d said, hand plastered to her brow. Please. For me. We have to do better.

“You came looking for me?” Shane puzzled. “But you were off that night. I always thought you were just… out. And ran into me.”

It felt dumb to say it out loud— that Shane had assumed Ilya had been out walking the same dark path that he had, that their meeting was happenstance. The odds of them running into each other in all of Québec were statistically incredibly low, now that he gave it an ounce of serious thought.

“No.” Ilya shook his head. “I mean, I was out, yes. But then my phone is buzzing in my pocket, no one knows where Shane is. So I come back.”

“Oh.” The syllable was short and small, like ash in his mouth. “I’m sorry.”

“No sorries,” said Ilya, his hand cupping Shane’s jaw. “I was glad to find you.”

“Yeah, but I ruined your night off,” said Shane, guilt souring in his gut. “I’m really sorry, Ilya. That was stupid of me. And irresponsible.”

“It is okay, Shane,” Ilya breathed, and kissed him gently. “I did not mind.”

Shane slipped his fingers beneath Ilya’s shirt collar, fidgeting nervously with his chain. It had become a bit of a habit for him— sliding the chain through his fingers while they watched the Montreal-Boston game the night before, adjusting it when the clasp slipped too far around his neck and was dangling down by the cross. At first, he’d worried that Ilya didn’t like when he played with it, but now, Ilya’s eyes followed his hands and his lips pulled into a little smile. He kissed Shane’s chest almost like a habit.

“Where were you, that night?” Shane asked timidly. “I mean, before. I always wondered, because you, like, completely disappeared that week.”

Ilya’s grin was crooked. “Ah, did you miss me?”

He didn’t dignify that with a response, but the flush across his cheeks was probably answer enough.

“I was at some bar. Random place, few blocks from the hotel.”

“Were you picking someone up? Hot date?” Shane asked, a flaccid attempt at a joke that flopped out of his mouth and made him instantly hate himself.

Ilya considered him. “I was talking to a girl, yes. She was very pretty. Wanted me to take her home, I think.”

It was like an ice pick to the lung. Shane kept his eyes steadfastly pinned to a print on the wall over Ilya’s shoulder. “Oh.”

“I was looking for a distraction.”

Shane was torn between hanging onto every word and wanting to stuff his ears with wax. Still, this made his eyes flick up for a half a second. Ilya’s expression was as inscrutable as always.

“A distraction from what?”

“Hmm, let me see,” he drawled, his thumb stroking over Shane’s jaw. “Distaction from my job. Distraction from being alone in a big city. Distraction from beautiful boy who tried to kiss me the week before.”

Shane groaned, turning his face away. 

“No, no, come back, Shane,” Ilya’s voice was teasing as he steered Shane’s face back to him. “You are the one who asked.” 

“I know,” Shane said. “But I’m embarrassed. I thought for sure you were going to quit that week.”

Ilya exhaled through his nose, clearly still amused. “Why would I quit? Things were just getting interesting.”

“Be serious, please,” Shane said. “I thought I totally scared you off.”

He scoffed. “You did not scare me, I was just surprised. And I like my job. Wanted to keep it.”

He chuffed Shane below the chin with one of his knuckles.

“Is not your fault,” he continued when Shane was quiet. “I mean, yes, you kissed me, big whoop.”

Big whoop, Shane couldn’t help but mouth to himself.

“I had been thinking about kissing you for weeks at that point. Was very dangerous for me to be stuck in that apartment with so much temptation.”

Now his thumbs were smoothing across Shane’s temples, the touch firm and settling. 

“Why would you dance with me, anyway?” Shane mumbled, still a little stung. “You’re the one who offered to teach me. You could’ve just left.”

Ilya tsked under his breath, cupping Shane’s face. “I could not have left. Secretly, I was being very greedy. There is this boy in front of me with these big brown crying eyes—”

“—Fuck off, I was not crying—”

“—and he needs my help, I think I know how to fix his problem, so I try.” Ilya’s voice had taken on a sighing, plaintive tone. 

He paused.

“And then he tries to hop my bones, this happens all the time—”

Shane couldn’t help the laugh that burst out of him. “Shut the fuck up, that is not the saying and you know it. I didn’t try to jump your bones!”

Ilya’s smile was gleeful, slipping his arms down to curl around Shane’s stomach as he laughed. “It is what happened! I am truth teller!”

For a long moment, there was only their shaking laughter, Shane’s hands skimming up and down Ilya’s biceps. 

The laughter died down, and suddenly Shane felt serious. 

“I’ve never done anything like this before,” he said, as Ilya bumped their foreheads together. He pulled back, hazel eyes both considering and evaluative before they softened. It was like Shane watched him decide in real time what his response would be. 

“Me either,” said Ilya. “This is very… new for me. It is different.”

“Bad different?” A spike of insecurity shot through Shane.

“No,” said Ilya immediately, shaking his head. He kissed Shane. “Good different. Very, very good different.”

Shane paused for a moment before he let Ilya kiss him again, considering the words and what they meant.

Whatever you’ll give me, he found himself thinking as Ilya finally pulled him in. I’ll take whatever you’ll give me. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

They made out on the couch for a very long time. Shane’s fingers carded through Ilya’s curls, sucking and licking and biting at his bottom lip. Neither of them reached for the hardness in their pants— Shane hitched a leg over Ilya’s hip and they ground slowly together, the friction both decadent and unbearable. Shane finished in his underwear with an almost embarrassing whimper streaming through his parted lips, and they kept making out after that. He wasn’t sure when Ilya had finished, just that at some point he shifted and felt the twin patch of dampness against his, and it should have been disgusting, but it wasn’t, not with Ilya’s tongue curling into his mouth, his hands massaging every part of Shane he could reach. 

They kissed like they had all the time in the world. Of course, they didn’t. 

The only thing that summoned them from the couch was the growl of Ilya’s stomach. Shane laughed, his mouth feeling sensitive as Ilya stole one last kiss from it.

He surfaced from the kiss to blink blearily at the windows— stomach plummeting as he realized that the sun was long gone, sinking below the tree line and leaving behind only a melancholic purple haze. The last of their full days at the cottage was officially behind them. 

In his lap, Ilya looked distractingly wrecked— his hair destroyed from the way Shane’s hands had been carving through it, a lazy smile perched on lips that were swollen and pink. He was flushed all the way down his neck. 

They both had to go change their pants before they could stumble back down to the kitchen. Shane felt a little drunk, particularly as they stood in front of the open fridge door, cramming food into their mouths.

“We’ll have to do laundry again before we go tomorrow,” said Shane around a bite of ham.

Ilya had simply grunted, holding up a full red bell pepper to the light as he visibly debated the merits of biting into it raw. It was this that had Shane flapping him off to go sit at the counter so he could make the dinner they’d planned for that night. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Despite his best attempts to ward it off, Shane’s morning was soaked with dread.

He woke up facing away from Ilya and immediately wormed as close to him as possible, wrapping an arm around his waist. Ilya had hummed a little, adjusting himself against the mattress, but didn’t wake, which was good. He deserved the rest.

When he did finally wake up, they scraped together breakfast using the last of what was in the fridge— pickles and eggs and a few leftover scoops of brown rice. Ilya insisted on polishing off the rest of the ice cream in the freezer, scarfing it down standing over the kitchen sink while Shane called him a heathen.

After breakfast, there wasn’t much time left. The morose feeling in his chest swelled with each miserable piece of clothing he folded back into his duffel out of the laundry basket, tossing Ilya’s things half-heartedly into a pile on the bed whenever he came across them. 

The feeling crescendoed when Ilya emerged from the bathroom and had visibly slipped back into bodyguard mode— his hair slicked back in a way he only ever wore it when he was going to be around his supervisors, his black collared shirt buttoned almost all the way up with his chain tucked safely below it. He looked stupidly handsome. Shane tried valiantly to swallow his disappointment.

On their way to pull the car out of the garage, Shane noticed Ilya stopped again in front of that baby photo of him by the mudroom. He was studying it closely, as if there was something he wanted out of it.

Shane felt a stupid and warm glow in his chest as he watched Ilya take in the picture. “You ready?”

Ilya looked to him, smiling softly, and nodded.

It wasn’t until they’d finished packing the trunk, boot prints in the snow tracking to the car and to the house and then back again several times over, that Ilya sighed and finally said something.

“You are sad.”

The instinct to deny it was strong. But Shane just blinked at Ilya, his stomach churning, and said: “Yeah.”

“You think things are going to be different when we go back.”

“I know things are going to be different when we go back.” Shane kept his voice even. “It’s just. These last few days were really nice, you know? And I—”

To his mortification, his voice came out thick. He shut his eyes, swallowing desperately, and heard rather than saw Ilya’s entire body slacken, his quick approach across the porch. His hands braced Shane’s shoulders through his coat, and Shane didn’t waste the opportunity to fall into him, his face finding the warmth of Ilya’s bare throat. The zipper of his coat scraped unpleasantly against Shane’s nose, but he only held himself closer, relishing feel of Ilya’s arms around him.

“We have plenty more days,” Ilya said, but he sounded sad, too. “We’ll be back at school in no time, I promise. We will be back in our little apartment and you will be back to being annoyed with me about the fucking dishwasher so soon.”

That made Shane laugh as he pulled back, relishing in the words our little apartment. “Okay, but you are so bad about loading the dishwasher.”

“I didn’t say I wasn’t,” Ilya conceded, and pressed a kiss to Shane’s temple through his hat. “Now go, do final check, I will start the car.”

So Shane did a final sweep of the house, checking outlets for chargers that were left behind, emptying the trash fully. When he finally locked the door behind them, the slip of the keys into his pocket felt like a death knell.

Ilya drove. Shane liked watching him drive, his eyes roving over the fine bones and muscles in Ilya’s hands as they gripped the steering wheel. He had, objectively, very nice hands. There was a scar on the ridge of his thumb from when he’d burned it on a hot oven a few months back, a sweet pair of moles at the base of his palm. Over the last few days, Shane had pressed kisses to both spots too many times to count.

It was a long and peaceably quiet drive, the world outside streaming by in a blur while Shane thumbed through Ilya’s playlists and pretended he recognized any of the songs. They stopped for gas and Ilya went inside to use the bathroom, emerging with a bag of trail mix that he tossed into Shane’s lap. 

“Feed me the M&Ms,” he said, and so Shane did, munching contentedly on the almonds and peanuts as he did. 

They were in the middle of what was becoming a heated discussion about the upcoming X Squad reboots, whether or not they would be worth watching when the originals were so good (and, Shane was arguing, nothing held so much as a candle to the comics), when Ilya’s phone rang in the console.

He checked the caller ID and swore when he saw that it was Jasper, fumbling around in his pocket before he pulled out a little black earpiece.

“Since fucking when do you have one of those,” Shane gaped, but Ilya was already pressing a button and answering the call.

“Mr. Quaid?” His tone was crisp and professional. Shane couldn’t hear Jasper’s response, but Ilya’s brow pinched. “Yes, I am driving with him now. One hour out.”

Shane drummed his fingers anxiously on the car door.

“Okay. Yes.”

He was nodding, although Jasper couldn’t see him, his eyes still narrowed as he took in whatever information he was being fed. Shane could only tell when the call had ended because Ilya’s shoulders slackened almost imperceptibly. He shot Shane a look.

“Change of plans. I am supposed to drop you off at your mom’s office.” 

“Why?” 

He shrugged. “I do not know, is not my business if it comes from Jasper. Check your phone, maybe your mom said something.”

Shane looked and sure enough, there was a text from his dad. Hey bud, excited to see you tonight! Dinner rez at Riviera for just the three of us, let me know how that sounds. 

“I guess we’ve got some dinner plans downtown,” he said. “We’re probably just leaving my stuff at her office until afterward.”

Ilya nodded and gestured for Shane to give him another M&M. He held the bag to the light, squinting in attempts to see if there were any left in the sea of abandoned raisins he’d eaten around. 

“Tell me again where you guys are going in Gatineau,” he said, and Ilya obliged him.

Soon, the barren winter scrub outside the windows gave way to the city. Ilya was a very smooth driver, although he hit a few left turns that had Shane reaching for the grip handle. 

They rolled into a parking garage where Ilya had to fish out a very official-looking badge to show the attendant. By the time they were waved through and into a parking spot, Shane’s heart was in his stomach. He didn’t want to say goodbye.

Ilya put the car in park and got out quickly. “Stay there, I will get your door.”

“That’s ridiculous, you don’t have to—” Shane said, but the moment he reached for the handle, Ilya was already there, pulling it open with a mischievous grin on his face.

“Just doing my job,” he said, and offered Shane a hand to help him out. Shane rolled his eyes, but took it. 

It was an extremely empty parking garage—most of the government employees off for the holidays—and they’d parked in the very far corner of it. Squeezed into the gap between the car and the concrete wall with Ilya, Shane paused for a second and took him in. 

“You still have your earring in.”

Ilya’s brows shot up, and he lifted a hand to his ear. “Oops. Cannot have Jasper seeing this.”

He unclasped the earring and grabbed Shane’s hand again, opening his fingers and pressing it into his palm. 

“Keep it safe for me?”

Shane was powerless to do anything but nod, his eyes still tracing over every inch of Ilya’s face in an attempt to soak it in. 

“You will keep this safe for me too, huh?” 

Ilya reached forward and tugged at Shane’s hood, and he blushed. He’d been hoping Ilya wouldn’t notice that the navy hoodie Shane had slipped on before he’d left had actually come from Ilya’s pile of laundry. There was a different hoodie he’d coveted more— a rusty red sweatshirt with some sort of crest on it that looked just the right amount of oversized and worn, but it’d had Cyrillic writing on it. The blue one was more subtle. 

“I thought it was mine,” he tried weakly. Ilya gave him a disbelieving look, so he amended the statement, his fingers twisting where they were still tucked into Ilya’s. “Okay, fine. I’ll give it back to you in two weeks.”

“It is a good hoodie,” Ilya said seriously, but his eyes were crinkled fondly. “Promise to give it back?”

“I promise,” Shane said, and became aware of Ilya’s hand on his hip. They’d probably been standing on the side of the car for too long, but there was no one around to see. The wind whistled through the garage, the only other sound from cars on the street below.

“Are you ready?” Ilya asked. His thumb brushed over Shane’s fist, now closed over the earring. 

“I guess,” Shane sighed, but he didn’t move. “Are you?”

“I think so,” said Ilya, but he didn’t move, either.

Shane leaned up and kissed him. It wasn’t particularly long or particularly intense— just a sweet press of lips, once, twice, in the darkened corner of the parking garage. When he pulled back, Ilya was smiling sadly, sweeping his thumb across Shane’s jaw.

“Okay, solnyshko, time to go for real. Many people will have my head if you are late,” he said, and took a step out from behind the car. Shane followed, unaware of the lovedrunk smile that stretched across his lips.

That moment felt like it lasted forever.

When Shane watched it back, he would see that it was only a minute or two.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

The next few days were a blur of uneventful holiday celebrations. Shane went to dinner with his parents and dutifully called his long-distance grandparents. He helped put the last of the sentimental ornaments onto their tree at home, which Yuna and David insisted had gone undecorated because they were too busy, but Shane knew was really because they didn’t like to decorate the tree without him there. 

He and Ilya texted sporadically throughout the day. More often than not, Ilya just sent photos. Snowy mountain peaks. His breakfast, waffles drenched in good Canadian maple syrup. Svetlana, blurry and caught visibly off guard with a Tim Hortons cup raised to her lips. 

Shane responded in kind— photos of a puzzle he was doing with his dad, roaring fireplace conveniently framed in the background because it made him think of their weekend together. A picture of the book he was reading in his mom’s office while she stayed up late doing work. A chaotic scramble of his cousins at their white elephant gift exchange, the photo his dad had taken of Shane posing awkwardly with the gigantic singing stuffed pickle he’d been forced to take home. 

Late on Christmas eve, after everyone had gone to bed, Ilya called him on the phone.

“What are you doing up so late?” Shane asked. He was curled up in bed, his light already turned out. 

“We are about to go out,” said Ilya. In the background, Shane could make out bursts of music, some chatter. “We made some friends.”

“You’re going out?” Shane wrinkled his nose. “It’s so cold for that, isn’t it?”

“It is never too cold for Russians to party,” said Ilya, and Shane heard someone in the room make a whooping sound and then promptly get shushed. There was some rustling, and then the noise got quieter, like maybe he’d gone into the next room.

“I just wanted to say hi,” said Shane, feeling shy although Ilya was the one who had called him. The call had most certainly been triggered by the photo Shane had sent of the Christmas pajamas his mom had insisted he wear. 

“I can let you go to bed,” said Ilya. “You are having a good time with your family?”

“Yeah,” he said honestly. “It’s been nice to be home. We’re laying low, mostly.”

I miss you, he thought but didn’t say. I wish you were here. 

They talked a little while longer, until Shane was practically nodding off with the phone tucked beneath his ear, soothed by the sound of Ilya telling him a story about how someone had set off the fire alarm in their hotel and the entire place had had to evacuate while it was below freezing outside. When they finally did say goodnight, Shane was practically sighing into the phone, and Ilya was laughing under his breath, and Shane stayed on the line until he knew Ilya had hung up.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

The morning after Christmas, Shane let himself sleep in later than normal. It was the first real day of having nothing on his schedule since he’d arrived back in Ottawa, and he was relishing in it. He had plans to get in the first solid workout he’d had since he left school, and then he’d probably watch a movie with his dad before the New York-Boston game started. His mom had promised she’d make herself available so that they could all watch it together, and then she wanted to go over logistics for Shane’s upcoming interviews, and then Rose wanted to call him and catch up about their holidays. He was hoping to talk to Ilya again before bed. It would be the perfect day.

He checked his phone, but there weren’t any texts from Ilya, to his dismay. He’d gotten a little used to hearing from him in the mornings since they’d been apart, but that was okay. Distance made the heart grow fonder, or whatever it was that people said. He spent some time stretching sleepily in his room before he padded downstairs, still in his flannel pajama bottoms.

He was standing in the kitchen squinting at the instructions on a frozen sausage breakfast bowl when his mom called for him.

“Shane, honey? Is that you?”

“Yeah,” he called back, his eyes still narrowed at the tiny print on the box.

“Can you come here, please?” 

He put the bowl back into the freezer and made his way down the hallway, rubbing tiredly at his face. “Mom, I think I need to go see the optometrist, I keep—” 

He froze as he landed in the doorway and saw that there were far too many people in his mother’s office for this early in the morning. 

First, his eyes landed on his dad, which wasn’t that unusual. He often ate breakfast in there with Yuna. What was odd were the two strangers— silhouetted in the window were two people in suits, a burly woman and a shorter man, neither of them recognizable.

“Have a seat, honey,” said Yuna tersely. She looked off—  her face was colorless, her hands clasped so tightly that her knuckles went white. His dad didn’t look any better, his smile uncharacteristically tight as Shane settled uneasily on the edge of the cushion next to him.

“What’s wrong?” Shane asked. “What happened?”

“Shane,” his mom started, and if he hadn’t already been able to tell that something was vastly, horribly wrong, her tone would have told him. It was the same tone she’d used when there were hazing rumors going around about his junior leagues team, the same tone she’d used when photos of Shane at a hockey party somehow ended up in a shitty tabloid his freshman year. His blood ran cold.

Somewhere, he knew, a bomb had gone off. He hadn’t seen the explosion yet, hadn’t heard the ricochet of sound, but the world was already beginning to implode. He could feel it. 

“Shane,” his mom started again when he didn’t directly respond to his name. “We have to talk to you about something.”

“What happened?” Shane blinked and looked towards the people in the window. “I’m sorry, who are you?”

“My name is Amanda Abbas,” the woman said, the words smooth and even. “I’m head of security for your mom’s team, and subsequently, yours. This is my associate.”

She didn’t offer a name for the man, and Shane didn’t ask, looking nervously from Abbas to his mother. “Is someone going to tell me what happened?”

Yuna swallowed, adjusting her hands on her desk, still not answering the question directly. “What’s important, Shane, is I want you to know you’re not in trouble. Okay? I promise, you’re not in trouble.”

Cold sweat sprouted beneath Shane’s shirt.

“A few days ago, there was a glitch in one of the security systems on campus,” she began, referring to the series of government buildings that were smattered across the Hill. “Just a random glitch, they don’t know what caused it.”

She paused, as if Shane might already be able to tell what she was getting at. He felt like he’d stopped breathing, so anxious his hands were beginning to feel like ice. He was distantly aware of the fact that his father had put his hand on his shoulder. 

“So they’ve been taking a closer look through all of the security camera footage from the last few days, just as a precaution, to make sure they didn’t miss anything,” she continued, with a glance at Abbas. “As of right now, it’s been ruled accidental. They don’t think anyone hacked in or anything. It might even have been weather related, you know?”

She was stalling.

Shane's hands were damp where they gripped the couch. “So what does a random glitch have to do with me?”

Yuna sent another look to Abbas, who nodded, before she looked back at Shane. “Well, maybe it’s easier for me to just show you what Jasper showed me this morning, okay? It was something they found while they were looking into the feeds.”

Shane nodded mechanically, realizing just then the noticeable absence of his mother’s right-hand man. Yuna’s hands were shaking a little when she reached to turn her monitor around, the screen stilled on a fuzzy black and white image. She tapped a key, and the video began to play.

At first, Shane didn’t recognize what he was looking at. It was stretch of grayness with some faint lines drawn on it, light streaming in from a source Shane couldn’t see at the top of the screen. Then, after a few seconds, a dark Jeep pulled into shot, and Shane realized he was looking at a parking garage.

His already racing pulse kicked up several notches, until he could feel it in his fists and his throat and his ears. The car was still for a moment, and then a figure got out of the driver’s side door. It sped to the passenger side, pulling the door open just a fraction of a second before whoever was inside could open it themself.

The footage was grainy, but not grainy enough that Shane couldn’t tell immediately who it was. Not grainy enough to be able to deny.

The two figures leaned into each other, tucked in the corner between the car and the wall. One of them grabbed the hand of the other, and Shane felt the phantom press of an earring in his palm. 

He didn’t remember that he’d reached for Ilya’s face while they were talking, but the figure with the dark hair, the one with his back pressed to the car, was doing just that. And Shane knew what was coming.

On the screen, Ilya had his hand on Shane’s hip. He was making Shane promise to give his hoodie back, and Shane was leaning forward, pressing his face for the briefest moment into Ilya’s neck. He didn’t remember doing that, either, but there it was, damningly captured on the monitor. 

And then, there it was. Immortalized in film, in the fuzzy black-and-white CCTV footage, video-Shane was pulling video-Ilya into a kiss. They lingered for a while, murmuring back and forth to each other, before Ilya’s hand slipped from Shane’s hip and they stepped out of the safety of their little hiding spot. 

In real life, Shane wasn’t looking at the screen anymore. He’d been forced to put his head between his knees, the edges of his vision going black. 

Chapter End Notes

alright guys deep breaths we're gonna be okay!

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Chapter 13: shane walks into a hotel room, part 2

Chapter Notes

hi guys :) apologies again for last chapter's cliff hanger. hopefully this chapter makes up for it <3

angst warnings: shane has a bit of a panic attack/autistic meltdown. he self soothes with hair pulling, a little biting. there are descriptions of depression and a bit of internalized homophobia in this chapter as well.

Shane wasn’t aware of much that happened around him for a while. His entire body was on fire, his chest heaving, fists clenched and racing over his thighs with hard pressure. At some point, his mom had gotten out from behind her desk and knelt beside him, smoothing her fingers through his hair. Come on baby, you’re okay, just breathe. 

He knew he was scaring his parents. He could hear it in the tightness of his dad’s voice, the way his palm swept rigidly up and down Shane’s spine. The touch was somehow both soothing and also like a thousand needles, prickling into his skin. He clenched his jaw harder and his mom made a sound he’d never heard before.

The two strangers had been dismissed from the room at some point. Shane had missed whether or not they’d excused themselves or if his parents had waved them out. He wasn’t sure why they’d been there in the first place— hadn’t they known that this was going to burn his life down? Hadn’t they known that this was going to ruin everything?

At some point, his dad had wrapped an arm around Shane’s chest and pulled him tightly into an embrace, and it was this that helped him calm down the most. Tight pressure, the telegraphing of his dad’s breathing against his shoulders, the way he was clearly taking much deeper and more audible breaths in hopes of coaxing Shane into doing the same. 

When he finally swam to the surface, his jaw ached and his palms were chafed and red where he’d been digging into them. Shane’s cheeks were wet, the collar of his shirt soaked with tears. He felt like a child, sandwiched between his parents, blinking at that dumb boat painting above his mother’s desk and wishing he was inside of it, feeling like he was drowning into nothing.

“Shane,” his mom said softly once the heaving of his chest began to slow. “Shane, you’re alright. Can you drink some water for me, honey? Please?”

Shane’s eyes focused on the sweating cup of ice water that had been placed on the coffee table in front of him. He nodded dully and reached for it, the cold glass pleasant against his aching hands. He took a sip and realized only then how raw his throat was. 

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” his mom was saying, her lips pressed to his hair. One of her hands cupped his face. “I shouldn’t have done it like that.”

“I don’t—” Shane started to say, but his voice broke off. “I don’t know—”

His dad was still rubbing his back. “We didn’t mean to ambush you, bud.”

“Then why—” Shane’s voice was scratchy. “Why—”

“Abbas thought it was important that you see it,” Yuna said. “So you had the full context of what we’d seen, and you’d understand the questions we had. I shouldn’t have done it in front of them like that, I just wasn’t thinking. I’m sorry, Shane.”

It took another few minutes of Shane sipping the cold water and wiping the tears from his face before she finally sat back on her haunches, her eyes considering.

“Do you think you’re ready to talk?” Her voice was gentle but unyielding— it was clear to Shane that he was being given the choice of when he wanted to talk, not whether he wanted to. “Amanda has requested to be in the room when we discuss the more formal details of what was going on between you and Mr. Rozanov, and I’m sorry, Shane, but I don’t really have a choice but to let her. She’ll have discretion, I promise, but this is important.”

Shane couldn’t do anything but nod weakly. His entire body felt sapped of energy, like all the blood had drained out of him. 

When Abbas crowded back into the office, she looked sorry to see Shane. He wasn’t sure what he looked like— his face was dry now, but it felt puffy. His shirt was still a little wet. He was clutching onto the glass of water like it was a lifeline, even though now it was mostly empty. She resumed her position by the window, greeting everyone with a small nod. 

“You should know,” his mom began, now back behind the desk in what was probably an attempt to preserve a modicum of professionality, “that I fired Jasper this morning.”

The words were such a surprise that they shocked Shane mostly out of his stupor. “What?”

“It was him who brought this to my attention, this morning,” she said, her tone prim and tight in a way that Shane knew meant she was pissed. “The way he went about it was not ideal.”

“What does that mean?”

She winced. “Well, he took the liberty of speaking to Mr. Rozanov about it before he spoke to me. He made the decision to— to—” She looked at Abbas. “How did you word it, again?”

Abbas sighed, then regurgitated something that sounded straight out of a briefing. “Mr. Rozanov had indicated a hesitancy to renew his employment contract with us at the end of August. We were expecting an answer about whether or not he would be returning in a few months. Given the contents of the footage, and the fact that he was considering leaving regardless, Mr. Quaid took it upon himself to terminate the contract early.”

All of the air sucked out of Shane’s chest. His mind whirred as it processed the information. “He— he fired Ilya?”

Of course, he could have drawn that conclusion himself. He’d always known it was one of the risks of what they were doing, had even expressed concerns of this exact thing to Rose a few weeks prior. That felt like it had been a lifetime ago. 

“Can he even do that?” Shane asked, the words coming out panicked. 

His mom was rubbing her forehead like she was developing a headache. “Apparently, yes. It’s unfortunate. I think I can speak for both myself and Abbas when I say that we wish he’d gone about it differently.”

In the corner of the room, Abbas was nodding, her expression severe. 

“Obviously, he couldn’t have stayed on your detail if you two were... involved,” Yuna said delicately. Shane let out an involuntary sound at the word— a tiny, strangled hum. “But I would’ve liked to have spoken to the two of you about it first. Surely other provisions could have been made. But I’m afraid that I think what’s done is done.”

Still perched on the couch beside him, Shane’s dad went back to rubbing his back. Shane was too ashamed to look at him.

“I think what we need to clear up before we discuss this any further,” Abbas interjected, “is the nature of the relationship between you and Mr. Rozanov. Our first priority is to make sure there weren’t any abuses of power, or that you weren’t coerced at all.”

“What?” Shane blinked up at her. “No, I mean— no. No one was being coerced.”

The room stayed silent, waiting for him to qualify it more.

“We’re… friends,” he mumbled, the term sounding meager and pathetic once it floated into the air. “Just friends, and we’re the same age, so, you know. No one was coerced, or, or, forced to do anything they didn’t want to do.”

“So, it was consensual?” Abbas continued brusquely. “Was the relationship sexual in nature?”

“Oh my god,” Shane moaned, and buried his face in his hands. 

For a long moment, he could focus only on breathing mechanically, his chest rising and falling with a not unnoticeable strain. The rest of the room waited for him, although he could practically feel his mother buzzing with the need to intervene. What she could possibly say to fix all of this, Shane had no idea.

“Why does it even matter?” he asked eventually, almost surprised to hear the bitterness clear in his flat tone. Now that the panic was ebbing away, there was anger swelling to meet it. He was angry at the invasive nature of the questions, angry at himself for being so reckless, angry at the world for all the ways in which it was deeply unfair.

“Shane, they’re just trying to understand,” his dad said, the first thing he’d said since Shane had come out of his panic. 

“I think they understand plenty,” he said, the annoyance now rolling through him. “Yes, Ilya and I were... involved, okay, and I’m sorry. I know we broke the rules, but you guys have already punished him enough.”

Hot tears flared in his eyes as he realized the truth of the statement. Ilya was fired. He wouldn’t be able to stay in Canada much longer— if he was even still in Canada, he thought with a stab of despondent fear. It was all Shane’s fault. 

It was stupid to think that the rest of the video would be deniable, but it wouldn’t be half as incriminating if it weren’t for the kiss. The kiss Shane had initiated, greedy and gullible and desperate for one more touch from Ilya. 

A quieter part of him was still unspooling part of what Abbas had said—that Ilya had been hesitant to renew his contract, that he was maybe already planning to leave—but that didn’t have a place in this conversation. Not yet.

“Honey, I’m sorry that this is how it all came out,” his mom said. “Really. But I need you to work with us for just a minute longer, there are a few more questions—”

“Well, that’s the problem,” Shane burst out. “That there’s an us at all. I mean, you haven’t even acknowledged the fact that I’m fucking gay. All you want is to what, interrogate me about Ilya? Is that really what matters to you right now? I mean, fuck, you said you were sorry for doing it this way, but then you kept fucking going.”

Across the desk, his mother flinched, a crack in her previous composure. Shane would feel bad for snapping later, he knew, and also for the profanity, but his voice was breaking, his eyes wet again. 

“Shane, bud, I don’t think that’s fair,” his dad started to say, but Shane was already pushing off of the couch.

“I have to go,” he said. “I can’t— I can’t do this. I’m sorry.”

No one tried to stop him as he fled the room, the glass-paneled door slamming hard into the wall as he shoved it open. Down the hall, the guard on duty jumped in surprise, and Shane glared as he stormed past him.

When he got back upstairs, stomping extra hard on every step and hoping a little that one of them would cave beneath him, the first thing he did was reach for his phone. In his absence, there had been a dozen text messages and a few missed calls, all from an unknown number.

shane this is ilya, the first text read. please call me back. something very bad has happened. When Shane didn’t respond to that, another message: please please call. 

Shane’s heart sank as he realized that this must have been Ilya’s personal number. He’d never had a reason to have it— they had barely texted before the cottage happened, given how much time they spent together on campus. There was never any need for it. All of the photos Ilya had been sending over the last few days had come from his government number, highlighting yet again the stupid risks they’d been taking.

The phone barely rang in his hand before it was answered. “Shane?”

His eyes fluttered shut at the sound of Ilya’s voice, thick with concern. He opened his mouth to speak, but no sound came out.

“Shane?” Ilya said again. “Are you there? I am sorry, solynshko, it took me a while to track down your number. They took my work phone. Are you okay?”

“Ilya,” Shane said, his voice small and tight. “They know.”

He heard Ilya’s exhale. “I know, sweetheart. I know. I’m sorry.”

“Where are you? Are you safe?” It was so hard to speak around the block of emotion lodged in Shane’s throat.
“I am fine. I am still in Montreal with Svetlana, they called me in for meeting at office here. I had no idea why until this morning. Jasper was there.”

“I’m sorry,” Shane gritted out. “This is all my fault. My fucking parents know, Ilya, my mom knows, they brought in the head of fucking security and she was asking me if the relationship was sexual. It’s a mess. I don’t know what to do, I don’t—” 

He felt hysterical, standing in the middle of his bedroom while the rest of the world crashed down around him. His hand twisted into his hair and pulled hard.

“Shane. Please, take a breath. It is going to be okay.” 

“It’s all my fault, it’s all my fault,” he said. “Fuck, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.” 

“It was not your fault, it was Jasper’s,” Ilya insisted. “That creepy fuck. He said something to me after I left you with the rest of the team, but I did not know he would do something like this.”
Surprise pierced through Shane’s panic, a sharp prod in the world of dull pain. “What did he say to you?”

“Just—” Ilya groaned, his tone laced with frustration. “It was stupid. Something about making sure I kept an appropriate distance between us, that I stay professional with the client. That he had noticed some unseemly behavior, whatever the fuck that means, in Québec, and he is keeping an eye on me. He has never liked me.”

Shane sniffled pathetically. “My mom said it was a glitch. Just a freak accident or something. They were checking the cameras and caught us instead.”

“This is what they say to me too, but I do not believe it,” Ilya spat. “What are odds? Just some random glitch that fucking ruins your life? I think spineless, evil dickweasel checks the cameras himself, and it is his lucky fucking day. Next time I see Jasper, I am killing him.”

Shane’s next breath was more of a hiccup. 

“It doesn’t matter how it happened,” he said. “My mom fired Jasper.” His words stuttered. “Ilya, they— they fired you. Fuck, I’m so sorry.”

A sob fell out of his mouth, and Shane clapped a hand over it, a failed attempt to muffle the noise. 

“Shane, it will be okay,” Ilya was saying. “I am okay. They are not sending me back to Russia, they have no grounds to do this. I can stay in Canada until my visa is over in August.”

“Right, but what are you going to do then?”

There was silence on the other end of the phone.

“They told me you were planning on leaving,” Shane remembered, his lungs feeling strangled. “When your contract was up. You never fucking told me that. You never fucking—”

All of the air sucked out of Shane’s chest. His knees gave out from beneath him and he shuddered to the floor, curling his knees tight against his ribs and letting his head thud back against his closed bedroom door. His lungs were tight, his breaths ragged, his jaw clenched through the tears.

“Shane? Are you still there?”

He could hear Ilya on the phone but suddenly the words were murky, like he was listening through water. 

“I’m sorry. Shane, sweetheart, please talk to me. Please. I’m sorry.” Now it was Ilya’s voice that was strained.

“Is it true?” Shane was still sniffling, his words drowned and damp. “You were going to leave?”

There was another very long pause. 

“I was going to tell you,” Ilya said eventually. “After we got back to Samwell. It wasn’t certain, I thought I had more time.”

Shane wasn’t sure when his knuckle had worked its way into his mouth, only that the sharp spear of pain from biting into it was the only thing keeping him grounded. His chest heaved, a silent wail. 

“You were going to leave,” he repeated, pulling his hand away from his mouth. He’d left a sore crescent of teeth marks over his fingers.

“Shane, it was not like that,” Ilya pleaded. “I will be there in a few hours. I can explain—”

“No,” Shane interrupted, panic flaring again. “No, you can’t come here right now. I— I can’t. My parents are freaked and the house is full of security, there’s no way you’ll be able to see me.”

His breath hitched on another sob before he said the thing he feared the most.

“There’s no way out of this, Ilya.”

“Shane—”

“I don’t think we can do this anymore.”

The words were like shards of glass in his throat when he said them. He curled tighter into himself, burying his face in his knees to hide a sob.

“What? Shane, no, please,” Ilya said, his voice pleading. “Please, do not say this. We can figure it out. We can do something.”

“Like what?” His hand had fisted in his hair again.

“Just let me come see you, please,” Ilya begged. “Is not so far, we can talk about this. Svetlana is already looking at flights, or I can drive, is only a few hours. I need to see you.”

Shane’s cleanly broken heart was tugging desperately, wanting so badly to give in, but understanding had already solidified in his brain. It was the only option that he could see, the only way to make some of this pain go away for the both of them. 

“You can’t come see me,” he said, the words cracked. “I— I just can’t do this. I don’t think we should talk. It’s only going to make this worse.”

“Make it worse how? Shane, please. Tell me I can see you. At least—” and if that was Ilya holding back his own sob, Shane couldn’t hear it over the ringing in his ears. “At least let me say goodbye to you.”

“I’m sorry,” Shane said, and then he hung up. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Shane sat crunched up against the wall for hours, staring blankly ahead as tears slipped silently down his face. Outside his bedroom window, the winter light faded, any hint of color draining from the sky like water down a drain. Shane did not move an inch.

At some point late in the evening, there was a tentative knock on his door. 

“Shane? Dinner’s downstairs,” David called through the door. “Come eat, please?”

Shane didn’t answer. He blinked back into himself just enough to recognize that his body was aching, his eyes still stinging, his throat impossibly wretched and dry. He stretched out his legs if only so that he could crawl to his bed and lie there catatonically until sleep claimed him.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

It was late when his bedroom door cracked open. 

Shane was lying very still, his body heavy and wrong and half-numb. He kept his eyes closed, listening to the soft approaching footsteps of his intruder.

A weight settled on the edge of his bed. “Shane? Are you asleep?” 

He didn’t move. 

His mother had always been good at knowing when he was pretending to sleep, even when he was a kid. There were always jokes told about how he’d been a toddler in the backseat after a long drive, playing dead so his dad would have to carry him inside. Surely, she’d be able to tell now that Shane was doing that again. Playing dead until she left him alone, playing dead until the rest of the world faded away.

Her hand smoothed over his hair. She smelled like lavender and the cold cream she used after a shower, the smell so comforting and familiar that it made hot tears prickle at the inside of his closed eyelids. Shane squeezed them tighter, not caring if she knew he was pretending. 

He felt her lean forward, pressing a kiss to his head. She lingered there for a moment. “I’m sorry,” she murmured into his hair. “I’m so sorry, Shaney.”

He expected her to keep talking. To ignore the fact that he was pretending to be unconscious just so he didn’t have to speak to her. To push on, to keep talking, to do the thing she was so good at and talk and talk and talk until he forgot what the point was anymore.

Instead he just felt the pressure of another kiss to his temple before she left the room.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Shane laid there, tears dripping down the side of his nose and dampening the pillowcase, until the hesitant winter birds began to chirp.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

There was a blurry pass of hours in which Shane couldn’t tell if he was dreaming or awake. He didn’t look at his phone, feeling somehow both apathetic and afraid of what might be there. Instead, he stared mostly at a deep scratch on the wall by his dresser, wondering how it had gotten there. 

Shane waited until he knew for certain his parents had left the house—twin latchings of the front door, one an hour later than the other—before he braved the downstairs. He was ravenously hungry, still in the pajamas he’d worn into his mom’s office the morning before. In the middle of the night he’d gotten up to fill his water bottle in the bathroom sink even though it went against his constitution to use anything besides the filtered water from the fridge, then had to blink back dumb tears because the last time he’d used this bottle, it had been Ilya who’d filled it up for him, bringing it rattling with ice to the living room in the cottage and knocking it impatiently against Shane’s shoulder until he took it.

Shane scrambled to the fridge with his socks silent on the tile, his eyes scanning the shelves until they locked onto a Tupperware container that seemed promising. He’d only pried it half open when someone spoke.

“There’s an omelet on the stove for you, kiddo.”

“Oh my god!” He flinched with surprise.

David Hollander was nestled into the breakfast nook, paging through a copy of the Economist. He raised his coffee mug to his mouth to hide an amused smile at Shane’s surprise.

“Oh,” Shane recovered, and glanced towards the stove where a covered pan lingered.

“Figured you’d have to come down and eat eventually.” His dad set the mug down, his expression now subdued. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m okay,” said Shane, although the words were paper-thin. His voice was rasping a little. “I thought you left for work.” 

“I took the day off. Not much going on at the office this close to New Year’s, anyhow.” He shrugged. “I left to pick up some groceries this morning, is all.”

He was trying to be casual, but Shane saw right through it. They hadn’t wanted Shane to be alone at the house (not that he was ever alone, of course). 

“Get some food, Shane.”

He became aware of the fact that he’d been standing stock-still in the draft of the open fridge since they’d begun to speak, his spine rigid, his hands still clutching onto the Tupperware. He put it away and made a plate for himself, noticing now the bowls of cut fruit on the counter, the open bag of bread and adjacent container of butter full of crumbs that signaled his dad had been making toast.

With both full breakfast plate and glass of water in hand, he settled down tentatively at the kitchen nook across from his dad, careful to make sure the chair didn’t scrape across the floor.

“I want to talk about yesterday,” David began. “If you’re open to it.”

Shane hesitated, but nodded. His dad looked relieved.

“Firstly, I owe you an apology. We both do, really. Yesterday was just straight-up a bad parenting moment. I think I speak for the both of us when I say it’s going to haunt us for the rest of our lives.”

Shane fought hard to swallow his first bite of omelet, his eyes fixed on the edge of the table.

“I can’t justify what happened, or the way we went about it, but I think I can recontextualize it a little bit. Hopefully.” 

He could feel David studying his face as he talked, but Shane still didn’t make eye contact. He nodded again.

“We were asleep when she got the call from Jasper. He was all excited, I couldn’t tell if he was panicked or if he was gloating or what. She couldn’t get him to calm down. He said he’d already met with... your friend, and handled the situation, but that she needed to see something.” His dad paused, and his voice sounded different, thicker when he added: “He said she needed to know something about her son.”

David’s fist clenched and unclenched around the handle of his coffee mug. He and Shane had both quietly mutually agreed on their dislike of Jasper long ago.

“Then Abbas showed up at the house,” he continued. “Guns blazing, she said she needed to talk to you. She wanted to pull you out of bed, even, but your mom refused. Then she showed us the video.”

Shane’s shoulders, which had been just beginning to relax after hearing the words your friend, wound back up again.

“That little guy he had with her, he was really the problem. They were making what sounded like threats, saying this could... blow up our lives, really. They were— I don’t want to say scaring your mom, nothing scares your mom, but they were talking about all of these consequences if it leaked. They brought your hockey career into it. They brought her potential for re-election into it.”

An involuntary sound left Shane’s throat.

“They were pressuring her to let them stay in the room. She knew it was wrong but again, like I said, they were so pushy. I don’t even understand why.” His dad’s face did something complicated. “It should have been a private family conversation. I’m sorry that it wasn’t.”

“Did you tell her not to let them stay?”

The question surprised even Shane as it came out of his mouth. His dad paused, his mouth flattening unhappily in a way that told Shane a lot of things, but he didn’t directly answer.

“The important thing is that we’re sorry— I’m sorry. We love you a lot, and we should’ve lead with that. I know it can be scary, and I’m sorry we found out this way, without you getting to tell us. But if you like Ilya, if you want to be with him, I think we can figure it out.”

His voice was devastatingly earnest. Shane blinked, then blinked again more desperately, trying to ward off the sheen in his eyes.

“He’s always been very polite when I talked to him, you know,” his dad added, which only made Shane’s face crumple more. “Good handshake. Always friendly—”

“We’re not together,” Shane blurted, the words wobbling and incoherently strung together. “And he has to go back to Russia, unless he finds another job here, somehow. We’re not... anything. It’s nothing. I— I can’t. Not with hockey, not with school. There’s never been...”

He didn’t finish the sentence, but he knew his dad would know what he meant. There had never been a gay MLH player. Shane did not intend to be the first.

“Have you spoken to him, then?” He paused. “Ilya? He’s okay?”

“He’s okay,” said Shane, embarrassed to find that he had to sniffle. He wiped at his nose. “He’s on a trip right now, I don’t know where he is, but he’s with people. He says he’ll be okay.”

His dad nodded, still studying Shane. 

“He thinks Jasper did it,” Shane found himself adding almost involuntarily into the silence. “Apparently he, like, said something to him a couple days ago, he must have— must have seen something before, although I don’t know what he could have seen, maybe in Québec, I don’t know. Ilya thinks he’s the one who told them to check the cameras and that the glitch thing was a lie.”

It felt odd to say Ilya’s name here, in his family’s kitchen— almost raw, vulnerable, like Shane was telling a secret. Of course, he didn't have a secret anymore.

“I wouldn’t be surprised.” His dad’s jaw ticked. Shane wasn’t very used to seeing him angry. “I hate that guy. I’m glad he’s not working for your mom anymore.”

“Me too,” Shane mumbled, the corners of his lips turning up as he remembered Ilya calling him a spineless dickweasel (and Shane might have wondered where he picked up a phrase like that, except it was one of JJ’s favorite insults). The smile dropped a moment later.

“We’re going to figure something out,” his dad said. “Your mom and I talked about it. I mean, even if you two aren’t… you know. If he wants to stay in Canada, we can find work for him, pull some strings. It’s the least we can do. She’s already got people working on it.”

Shane’s head bobbed distractedly with a nod, but he was having a hard time focusing his gaze. His dad got up to refill his coffee, clapping his warm hand over Shane’s shoulder as he passed. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

When Shane got out of the shower that afternoon, he had a visitor waiting for him in the living room. 

John looked good— better rested than he had when he had been Shane’s full-time security, which Shane had to concede was probably his own fault. His schedule had kept John at the library late and up for practice early the same way it had kept Ilya. Now, the man was bundled in the same navy coat he’d worn when he’d walked Shane to class all those months, his graying hair tucked into a Metros hat, like he’d barely even taken his boots off while he waited for Shane to stumble downstairs.

“What are you doing here?” Shane froze at the doorway, his hand still lifted to adjust the neck of his hoodie where it had been sitting awkwardly. 

“Now, what kind of greeting is that?” John stood, brushing invisible lint off of his pants. “It’s good to see you too.”

“Sorry.” Shane’s face went hot. “Hi. It’s good to see you.” 

He normally saw John more frequently when he was in Ottawa, but Shane had been spending a lot of time at home, which meant less interaction with security. He hadn’t requested any sort of escort for any kind of outing, which was why it was especially baffling that John was standing in the middle of the family room. 

His face, faintly lined with wrinkles, cracked into a smile, but he was still studying Shane, his eyes tracing over him like he was looking for some sort of open wound. “Want to go for a walk?”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

They set out for the path they’d been walking since John was first assigned to Shane, three years ago. It stretched nearly two miles, weaving through the path of snow-dappled woods behind the house and winding around a frozen pond a mile away. 

Shane liked to take this walk when he was anxious. At first, it hadn’t been intentional to go for these walks with John— the truth had simply been that Shane wasn’t allowed to go by himself, and so he’d had the company. 

At some point over the years, across all of the time they’d spent together, he and John had gotten to talking, and the walks had become friendly, familiar. John knew hockey, had played for Concordia in college before a shoulder injury forced him to pivot. He had a couple of kids not much older than Shane. He was a good listener, a quiet one, not someone who jumped in and tried to fix every problem Shane told him about. Sometimes, he even told Shane about small problems of his own, and it felt nice to be confided in.

They hadn’t gone for a walk in six months, not since last summer when the sun was beating down on them and the cicadas were thrumming in the trees. They had certainly never gone for a walk without Shane instigating it, which was part of the novelty of the fact that John had simply showed up on his own.

“Did my mom call you?” Shane asked once they were safely embarked on the path. His hair was damp beneath his toque, the sensation slightly unpleasant on his forehead. 

John shrugged, which was a yes. “Seemed like you could use a walk, is all.”

The path was hardly visible beneath the blanket of snow, a few spots crunchy with ice. When Shane snorted disbelievingly, his breath came out fogged with cold. 

“It’s freezing out.”

“Oh, it’s not so bad.” John made a point of looking upward, where the bare tree branches latticed across the white winter sky. Shane regarded him suspiciously.

“Did she tell you what happened?” 

“No,” said John, earnest. “I just heard that it was a rough morning for you yesterday. I also heard that they were looking for someone to send back to campus with you in a few weeks. No specifics on why.”

Shane’s frowned, his fingers fisting anxiously in his pockets.

He didn’t know if John knew he was gay. He’d been a first-hand witness to the crash and burn of Shane’s freshman year relationship with Rose, although Shane hadn’t said anything to him about what the breakup had been like for them to have remained such close friends afterward, and John hadn’t asked. When Rose had gone through a phase of setting Shane up with her theater friends sophomore year, guys she insisted would be lowkey about it, Shane had been extremely careful to mention in abundance all of the studying they were getting done. When John had caught him hooking up with Ilya at the start of the year, he hadn’t actually laid eyes on Ilya— Shane had shuffled out of the room, his face flushed with shame, and shut the door quickly behind him, leaving Ilya behind. 

Rose had told him once that John totally knew. But if he did, he’d certainly never said a word.

“You don’t have to talk about it,” he said. “Just thought I’d get you out of the house, eh?”

Shane swallowed and nodded. He wanted to feel ready, but he wasn’t.

For a long while, there wasn’t another sound except for their footsteps crunching through the snow and the occasional lone birdcall over their heads. When Shane spoke, it was the same petulant question that he’d been wanting to ask for years.

“What if they didn’t send anyone back with me?”

John made a noise in the back of his throat. “Back to campus, you mean?”

Shane nodded, his eyes nailed to the forest ahead of them. 

“No security at all?”

When Shane shrugged, a little sheepish, John shook his head.

“I don’t know about that, Shane. It’s hard having you in another country. If anything were to happen to you...”

John didn’t finish the sentence, but Shane knew what he was getting at. Still, the reminder of the supposed danger he was constantly in wasn’t a helpful balm to his prickling annoyance. 

“Literally nothing has ever happened to me,” he said, the words a little snippier than he meant them to be. “No attacks, no kidnapping, no... anything. Not even a threat.”

“That you know of,” John cut in, gruff, and the tension in his voice made Shane do a double-take. His stomach flipped at the expression on John’s face.

“Really?”

He nodded, but clearly wasn’t going to elaborate. Shane nodded to himself.

“Okay,” he said slowly, knowing he’d be lying awake processing that information before he went to bed that night. “But still. I’m twenty-one, I’m an adult”—ignoring the amused breath John blew out at this statement—“I can’t just be followed around forever. I didn’t sign up for this.”

“I know that, kid.”

“And,” Shane continued, his tone growing more strained, “what’s it going to look like when I graduate? When I get drafted and buy a house? I’m not saving a spare room for some random guy to live with me, or— or— building a guest house for security, or something. I won’t do it.”

John stayed quiet, so he kept going. The words were rambling, a panicked unraveling in his chest.

“I get keeping security when I’m with my mom, or maybe at games or press conferences or whatever. But, what, I’m going to be thirty and shadowed by a bodyguard when I need to run out to the grocery store and pick up eggs?”

“I’ve been saying the same thing.”

Shane froze. “You have?”

He nodded. “We’ve been talking for a while about scaling down your detail once you graduate. I mean, I can’t make any promises, and you might still not be happy about it, but, yeah. Probably not 24/7 accompaniment. Mostly when you have big public outings, places people know you’ll be.”

In his surprise, Shane had to bite back what would’ve been his first genuine smile in days. “Really?”

“Really.” John shrugged, then gave him a stern look. “Again, no promises, it could change at any time. Your safety is top priority, hear?”

“For sure.” Shane nodded, then nodded some more, imagining what his life might be like without a shadow. Free to go for walks alone. Free to go the gym alone. No longer feeling like an asshole for leaving someone outside while he was hanging out with his friends. “Thanks, John.”

“No need to thank me. Rozanov was making the same recommendation the last time we spoke about it.”

And just like that, Shane was hurtling back to earth. His ears buzzed, some twisted pang of emotion blooming in his lungs. He looked sharply at John. “He did?”

“Yeah.” John nodded, either oblivious to what Shane was feeling or very kindly ignoring it. “Good kid,” he added, as if speaking to himself.

Shane swallowed and nodded, training his eyes back onto the wintry forest.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

The walk only lasted for another half an hour before Shane’s cheeks and nose began to burn, the cold seeping through every part of him. John walked him back to the house, waving him off with a promise to send a photo of the nursery he was painting for his future granddaughter and to see Shane at the airport in two days. 

His stomach twisted at the reminder of the fact that he was due to fly out to Detroit for his first prospective team interview. He’d had so much swirling through his head over the past few days that he almost hadn’t had the bandwidth to be anxious, but now the thought was looming as he stumbled upstairs, tucking himself into warmer clothes. 

He felt apathetic and exhausted at the concept of checking his phone, which sat like a stone on his nightstand, so instead he opened his laptop. His agent had sent him interview prep documents in September, and Shane had reviewed them probably forty times since then, but it couldn’t hurt to take another look.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

When he missed dinner that night, it wasn’t on purpose. He’d stared at his laptop with dry and sore eyes for hours, his cheek buried in his fist as he went over all the ways in which he had to make himself marketable. 

It was a lot of pressure for a team to draft someone as public as Shane, it had been explained to him. He’d heard from enough coaches and scouts to understand that teams would be chomping at the bit to have him, given his stats, but it was a lot of responsibility and liability to take Shane on because of who his mom was. 

The thought made his teeth grind. He didn’t want to be a weight on the team before he’d even been drafted. He didn’t want to bring so much scrutiny and publicity with him— and that was ignoring the fact that he brought a lot of that anyway, just on principle. He wanted articles to be written about him because he was about to lead the league in goals. He didn’t want those articles to begin with the fact that he was the son of Yuna Hollander, like that meant anything at all when it came to his skill on the ice.

It was this uneasy rumination that sent him into sleep— a nap that left his neck sore, his cheek imprinted with the edge of his laptop. He didn’t remember what he’d dreamt about, but when he jerked awake, his anxiety was worse than it had been before he fell asleep. There was a sick churning in his belly as he pushed himself up on the bed, blinking and taking in the way the sun had set outside the window.

He padded intrepidly out of his room, stomach growling, and followed the alluring scent of butter and lemon and garlic wafting from downstairs. The house was mostly dark with the exception of yellow light spilling out of the kitchen, the sound of pans shuffling around. 

“Hey, Shane-o.” His dad smiled when he wandered in. “Lemon chicken okay for dinner? I’m doing broccoli, too, just got to finish this first. Unless you want Brussels, we have those too. Whatever you want.”

Shane got the sense that he was still in the act of trying to apologize for the day before.

“Broccoli is fine,” he croaked, still disoriented from his accidental nap, and moved to take a seat at the counter. “Is Mom home?”

“Uh, no.” David frowned a little. “She’s stuck downtown. Won’t be home until late, I think, so we’ll just save her a plate.”

Shane nodded again, not sure whether or not that was the answer he wanted to hear.

Dinner was good. They ate again at the breakfast nook, and David filled Shane in on the book he’d been reading about the Viking settlement at L’Anse aux Meadows. 

“I was thinking we could go and check it out,” he said. “This summer. Before training camps, or, you know, whatever other craziness is going on. Maybe your mom could even come for a day or something, if we planned it right.”

Shane nodded, but he was barely processing. He’d taken a bite of broccoli and thought of the time he’d burned an entire pan of it, too busy kissing Ilya to notice he’d never set an alarm, and suddenly everything was sitting like a rock in his stomach and he was not at all hungry anymore. 

After he got back to his room, he was finally brave enough to plug in his phone and check his texts.

One from Hayden, something about an announcement for the next Chel game. One from JJ, belated holiday wishes and a question about hosting team dinner in January. A few from the team group chat, where he was generally pretty quiet anyway. There were eight from Rose, which made him wince. 

They ranged the full spectrum of emotion— from heyy!! ready 2 call whenever :) to I am dying to hear about your mysterious cottage weekend... don’t leave me hanging too long... with a string of seventeen winky faces.

Then, when it’d become evident he was blowing her off for more than a day: don’t make me look at flights to canada and shane hollander pick up ur stupid phone i will kill u and then for the record and for the matter of canadian national security that was a joke and then an hour later, just let me know you’re okay?

There were no texts from Ilya. 

Not that there should have been. Shane had said they shouldn’t talk anymore— surely Ilya wouldn’t want to talk to him, after he’d made him lose his job, after he’d ruined his life. After Ilya had already been planning to leave anyway. Still, his stomach crumpled with disappointment, and he had to shut his eyes and breathe very slowly until the feeling went away.

He thumbed out responses to both Hayden and JJ, gnawing on his lip before he went to respond to Rose.

I’m okay, he wrote. Sorry. Call me when you get a sec?

The phone was buzzing in his hand less than a minute later.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

He found while speaking to Rose that there actually wasn’t much to say. Shane laid very still on his bed, the phone on speaker on his chest, and recounted very dully all of the ways in which he had been profoundly stupid until eventually, his words stuttered to a halt and his hands were trembling and staticky. He listened to her hum sympathetically the entire time, but the moment she made even an attempt at advice (which sounded like she was going to tell him to do something stupid like talk to Ilya), he forced the topic to change and asked about how her Christmas had been.

“Shane,” Rose had said, her voice both sad and disapproving. “Come on. We’re not done talking about this.”

“I am,” he said. “Please. Tell me what it was like at your dad’s for dinner this year. Was Katherine being nice?”

There was a long pause, and then a sigh that he knew meant she wasn’t going to let it slide for long, before Rose got into the drama about her new controversially young stepmother.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

When Shane stumbled downstairs some time later to fill up his water bottle, he was intercepted by Yuna Hollander in the living room.

He responded to her call of his name before he could think better of it— an instinctual turn, a kneejerk reaction to the sound he’d been hearing all his life. She was sitting in the corner of the couch, looking at him over the thin reading glasses perched on the edge of her nose. 

He stopped in the doorway, and for a long while, neither of them said anything. She looked almost delicate in her pajamas, although the effect was lessened by the fact that she was buried in piles of papers, her laptop sitting crooked on her knees and bathing her face in white light. The dark circles beneath her eyes were pronounced, and it was clear she had a long night ahead of her still. 

“Will you come sit?” Her voice was muted, like she maybe hadn’t spoken in a while. 

Shane swallowed and nodded, taking a seat in the spot she cleared on the cushion beside her. She shut the laptop, and they were left only in the light from the standing lamp and a pine-scented candle on the coffee table. 

“Your father said you two talked this morning.”

He nodded. 

Yuna shut her eyes, composing her words. Shane waited, digging his thumb anxiously into the knee of his sweatpants, wishing he’d refilled his water before they’d started this conversation. 

“The first thing I have to tell you is that I am sorry,” she began, her eyes settling again on his face. “I am so, so sorry, Shane. I am horrified by the way that I handled yesterday— there were a thousand other ways to go about it and maybe if I had been gentler about it... if I had—”

“You really don’t have to,” Shane interjected, the back of his neck going prickly. He didn’t know if he had another emotionally fraught conversation in him for that day. “It’s okay, Mom.”

She looked stricken, her voice tightening. “It is not okay, Shane. I owe you every apology. What happened yesterday should never have happened.”

“Well, that’s not your fault, that’s mine,” he said. “I’m the one who— who—”

The words died in his throat. He was the one who had been having an affair with his bodyguard. He was the one who had gotten them caught on camera. 

“I never should have let them ambush you like that. It was awful of me. And just showing you the footage like that, I don’t even know what came over me.” She pressed her hand to her forehead.

“Dad said they were ambushing you first,” Shane said, an instinctive attempt at generosity. “They cornered you.”

She nodded faintly. “That was nice of him to say, but still. You deserve accountability.”

He knew she meant it, but the words sounded like a slogan, something they’d cook up for an ad campaign. He was reminded in that moment that his mother was an extremely successful public servant. 

“I just wish you had told us,” she confessed, letting the hand drop from her brow. “That you were... I mean... how long have you known?”

Shane had unwittingly tensed, waiting for her to wield the word gay as if it were a bloody knife. His mouth was dry.

“A few years,” he admitted after a moment. “Since Rose and I broke up freshman year.”

That earned him a curious look, Yuna’s brow’s furrowing with what was probably many unasked questions. 

“She didn’t, like, turn me,” he explained, rambling, immediately aware that it was the stupidest thing he’d ever said. “She just kind of picked up on it, if that makes sense, and I realized some things. I didn’t think it mattered, honestly. I didn’t... I didn’t want it to matter.”

That was the truth. He’d thought it was a secret he could hold close to his heart for as long as he needed to, a sick hunger that he could keep caged within himself. He’d hide it as long as was necessary if it meant he was protecting his life, his future, the people around him. 

No one would ever need to know if all he focused on was hockey. He’d never met someone worth turning his head from that goal for— and if he had, well, now that was over too, so it mattered even less. 

“Honey...” his mom breathed, and reached for his hand. Her palm was soft and small and cool where it curled over his knuckles. “Were you ever going to tell us?”

“I don’t know,” he said, immediate and confessional, his stomach wrenching the moment he saw the devastation on her face. “I’m sorry. I just hadn’t considered it. I mean, with hockey...”

He didn’t have to finish the sentence. He saw the understanding dawn in her eyes the same way it had in his father’s that morning. 

“I’m sorry,” he said again, and this time, the words were a little choked, stranded in his throat. “I was trying, Mom, I promise. I really, really tried.”

She inhaled sharply, her eyes brimming with horrified sadness, and then she was gathering him against her chest.

“Shane, honey, you have nothing to be sorry for.”

Her grip was almost uncomfortably tight on his shoulders. The edge of her closed laptop, still on the couch, was digging painfully into his thigh. Still, Shane shut his eyes and ducked his face into her neck, blinking wetly.

“I mean that,” she repeated, squeezing him impossibly tighter. “Nothing to be sorry for. We love you more than anything in the world, whether you’re gay, or bisexual, or pansexual, or whatever other—”

Shane’s laugh was a hiccup. “Jesus, Mom, did you read a pamphlet or something?” 

“Several of them,” she admitted into his hair. She rocked a little, still holding him tight. “I don’t want you to ever feel like you have to hide something from us, especially not... especially not who you love.”

Her voice broke on the last word. It was enough to get Shane to lean away from her, scrubbing at his eyes with his palms. “Okay, okay, I get it.”

“Do you?” Her tone was serious. She leveled his gaze with hers and held it. “Do you get it? I love you, Shane. I want you to live your life as you, as authentically as possible, and if that means... having a boyfriend, if that means coming out...”

“It doesn’t,” he said, his tone a little pleading. “Please. I don’t— I don’t want to come out. Not before the draft, maybe not even until after I retire. I want to play good hockey, which is apparently hard enough, and I just, I really don’t need... I mean, you know how the locker room is, even without—”

His voice broke. Yuna nodded soberly, her mouth thin. 

“And I don’t have a boyfriend, I don’t...” 

Shane wasn’t sure where he was going with that sentence, so he let it hang in the air. She tilted her head, studying him with a slightly raised eyebrow.

“So, he really isn’t...?”

“No,” Shane said, his cheeks heating even as sadness pooled in his stomach. “He’s not. We’re... we’re not anything. I broke it off. I don’t know. I don’t really want to get into it.”

“What, no boy talk for your old mom?” She smiled a little sadly, smoothing his hair off of his forehead.

Before he could contain it, he let out a breath of surprised laughter. “Absolutely not,” he said, and he meant it, but now she was smiling and he was, too. Just a little.

Yuna leaned back, folding her arms across her chest, and Shane relaxed, grateful that the sappy part of the conversation was over. He watched her expression sharpen, her head tilting consideringly as she became once more a shark in the water.

“Okay, then, let’s talk Detroit. Are you ready for your interviews?”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

The next week was a blur of flights to indistinguishable cities. Shane phased in and out of mostly identical hotel rooms, his dad always a door or two down. He spent the time between interview prep and traveling in the gym, always a heavy lift and a long run, working until his body protested, until he could stumble upstairs and pass out in the hotel bed, his sleep dreamless and deep. He kept himself so busy that he couldn’t think of anything else but what was immediately in front of him— the bad thriller movie on the flight, the plate of protein for breakfast, the elevation on the treadmill. On the one free afternoon he had that week in Ottawa, he went to see the optometrist, feeling extremely blank as he tried on pair after pair of reading glasses and didn’t think at all of Ilya, who had been the one to point out he needed them.

He sat in his suit in the interviews, sore in every way, nodding and smiling politely and presenting the most palatable version of himself. He mimicked what he’d seen his mom always do, particularly in the early days of her career— firm handshake, active listening, eager to respond but not always to overly please in case it came off desperate.

Shane was succeeding. He knew he was succeeding. He was being let out of conference rooms with slaps to the back, with roaring approval, with coaches who couldn’t make any promises but made it obvious they’d be thrilled to have him in their roster. 

There were lots of winter walks through the miscellaneous cities, slush beneath his boots, cold air chafing at his chin. He peered unblinking at the chunks of ice floating in the Chicago river. He walked with his dad down a stretch of historic homes in St. Paul, mercifully allowed to be quiet as David read what was on the plaques. 

His parents had been generous with him. He felt a sharp flare of shame each time it became obvious they were handling him with kid gloves, but the feeling couldn’t outweigh the relief of being able to stay mostly quiet through dinner, picking at a plate of salmon and vegetables. He almost always got to pick what movie they watched, even though he mostly made his picks based on the level of excitement in his dad’s voice when he read out the options. No one said a word when he spent ninety percent of the day holed up at the gym or in his room.

Their grace would only last so long, he knew. He couldn’t be allowed to float spectral and distant at the end of this tether forever. But for now, maybe until the end of winter break if he was lucky, he was allowed to do things like claim a headache to beg out of public appearances— even the New Year’s Eve gala, although that had clearly been a bit painful for his mom to let go of.

She’d frowned, her mouth pinched, but a guilty look from David had her face smoothing out. She’d ushered Shane downstairs to say goodbye before they left and to at least take photos, and it was another act of generosity that she didn’t make him put on the suit hanging in his closet in preparation for his Arizona interview. 

“I like this sweatshirt,” she said when she’d pulled back from hugging Shane a second time. She ran her hands over his shoulders, feeling the fabric. “It’s nice. Is this one of the ones Aunt Sue gave you for Christmas?”

There was a cold jolt of anxiety in Shane’s stomach. He took a step back.

The scent on the hoodie had faded, even when he pressed his nose to the neckline and inhaled as deeply as possible. He’d limited himself to wearing it only on nights he thought he needed it— and tonight, thinking of a conversation he’d had with Ilya about Russian New Year’s and how important it was, wondering where Ilya was and if he was celebrating, Shane had needed it.

“No, it’s not new,” he said, swallowing. “I’ve had it for a while.”

There was no way to tell the hoodie wasn’t his. It fit like most of Shane’s sweatshirts did, if a little oversized, not stretched out in the wrists the way his usually were (the product of anxious twisting). He’d chosen the hoodie deliberately because he thought no one would know— but still, now, he felt like his mom could tell. 

Yuna ran her eyes over him the same way she always did— like she was taking an inventory, maybe searching for a pulse. It was only when Shane’s dad called for her that her head turned, elegant pearl earrings flashing through her pinned-up hair. 

“The car’s here, honey!”

“Coming!” She gave Shane one last appraising glance and a kiss on the cheek before she swept out the door, both of them shouting an early happy new year in the direction of their son.

Shane curled his fingers into the sleeves of Ilya’s hoodie, retreated upstairs, and slept through midnight in a bed that felt very cold.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Winter break was nearly over by the time Shane heard Ilya’s name again.

He was making his way back to the living room, cradling a bowl of popcorn to his chest with one arm and holding onto a freshly reheated mug of tea for his mom with the other. As he approached, the conversation from his parents grew clearer, and he stopped dead.

“— how much longer are we going to let him keep going like this? Yuna, he’s barely speaking.”

“I know, honey, I know, but…”

They weren’t fully audible, but Shane’s stomach sank. He took a few shuffling steps closer, craning to hear.

“… he’s obviously heartbroken.” That was his dad, voice thick with concern. 

“Maybe when he gets back to school, back on the ice, he’ll feel better,” his mom suggested. “It’s doing him no good to be here, clearly.”

There was a hum of agreement. He could picture his dad’s nod.

“At least he’s almost done with his interviews, and thank god, those are going well. I mean, seriously.” There was a rustle of leather as someone shifted on the couch.

“Speaking of interviews,” his dad began, his voice even lower. Shane almost spilled the tea in his hand leaning forward to hear. “Any word on…”

He didn’t finish his sentence, but his mom’s loud sigh meant that he didn’t have to. “No, still no answer. They gave him until Friday to decide.”

“I just don’t get it.” Shane couldn’t read the emotion in his dad’s tone— frustration, maybe, if not genuine confusion. “He needs the job, right? Kid’s gonna lose his visa. Why hesitate?”

“I don’t know, David.” 

His mom sighed again, and she kept speaking, but her voice was too hushed for Shane to hear over the sudden thundering of his heart, loud in his ears. 

A floorboard creaked and Shane realized belatedly that it was beneath his own foot. He’d taken too long with the popcorn, anyway, so he took a shaky breath and rounded the corner.

His parents had masterfully schooled expressions by the time he could see them. If it weren’t for the swish of Yuna’s hair as she leant back, he wouldn’t even have been able to tell they’d been whispering conspiratorially about Shane’s heartbreak and the apparently fucking idiotic Russian who had caused it.

“Here you go, Mom— ope, sorry,” Shane said, wincing as a little bit of tea sloshed over the side of the mug and onto the coffee table. He set the popcorn down on the table quickly enough that hopefully it disguised the shaking of his hands. “Hold on. I’ll go get a paper towel.”

He was out of the room quickly enough that neither of his parents could respond, although he could practically feel their surprised expressions through the wall. 

Shane was allowed three seconds of deep breathing in the kitchen before he returned with the entire roll of paper towels clutched so tightly in his fist that his fingers left indents. 

“You okay, bud?”

“What?” Shane sounded breathless to his own ears as he sopped up the spilled tea. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

Neither of them looked like they much believed him, but it didn’t seem like they’d realized he was eavesdropping, either. They exchanged a look, and much like they had every time Shane acted strangely that week, they let it go.

The movie pick was something set during WWII. Shane couldn’t remember the name even moments after his own thumb had mechanically pressed play. He blinked blandly through two and a half hours of dust and explosions and gunshots, men in suits having arguments, typing out telegrams. At the end, his mom was wiping tears from her eyes. Shane realized he had been sitting rigid the entire time, his chest rising and falling sharply, his mind a world away.

The moment he was able to get to his room, he had his phone in hand.

It rang once, twice. He thought about hanging up, but his lungs were a twisted and gnarled thing in his chest, and this was as close as he might get to a release.

It made it through half of a third ring before someone picked up.

“Shane?”

The vowel was short, compressed, the way it sounded when Ilya had just woken up. Shane eyed the clock— it would have had to be a very early night for Ilya to be sleeping, if he knew him, which he’d thought he had.

“You have to take the job,” he said, his voice tight. “What did they offer you?”

Ilya sounded confused. “Shane, what—”

“What did they offer you?” he repeated, still breathless.

He heard a low swear on the other end of the phone, a moment of hesitation before Ilya spoke. His voice still sounded gravelly.

“Year’s contract in Toronto. I do not know specifics.”

“Take it,” Shane ground out, hoping Ilya couldn’t make out the way his voice was choked. “You have to take it, Ilya, don’t— don’t be an idiot. Take the help.”

“Shane, please, wait—” Ilya began, but Shane had already hung up. 

His face was wet, his lungs heaving. Shane crumpled up against his pillow, squeezing his eyes shut in an attempt to ignore his phone when it buzzed again. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

The next day, with sore eyes and a crick in his neck, Shane flew off to Edmonton.

He swiped the notification away before he could see how many times Ilya had called. He knew it was more than once, knew that eventually he’d had to turn his phone all the way off and set the alarm on his nightstand instead just so that he’d stop waiting to hear the vibration.

His family was staying in Edmonton for two days— this was one of the interviews they’d been able to plan coinciding with Yuna’s schedule. She had some sort of conference, something to do with unions and an inaugural award she was delivering. Shane had thought he had been listening when she explained it, but he barely listened to anything, these days. 

He made it through the day the same way he’d made it through all of the others. Protein smoothie and eggs for breakfast. He helped John pack the car for the airport, sat in the back with his dad and listened to his mom take calls. Outside the window, Ottawa whizzed by, a blur of wintry gray, and then he was bundled off to the plane, and four and a half hours later he was stumbling onto the tarmac.

There were paparazzi there, awaiting his mother. The photos wouldn’t go anywhere since it wasn’t a very notable occasion, but Yuna Hollander looked polished as ever— chic wool coat, heeled boots clicking, arm-in-arm with her handsome husband. Shane, in comparison, shuffled out behind them, the flashes catching on his dark circles, his suit wrinkled from sitting.

He barely had time to straighten himself out before the interview, which was fine, except that he was focused on trying to impress a coach who probably wouldn’t be there to see the end of the season if sports rags were to be believed. After the interview was a very long dinner at a very nice restaurant with guests who ignored Shane, sat like a child at the end of the table.

He almost preferred it this way— a bookend to the conversation, quietly watching his mom as she wooed her audience. No one tried to bother him while he picked at his wild rice and broccoli. No one tried to ask if he was okay.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

It was a mercy that Shane had his own hotel room. The moment he was alone, he squatted down, enjoying the stretch of his muscles, groaning lowly as he scrubbed at his eyes. He was tired. He was so, so tired.

It took seconds for him to loosen the tie at his neck, an immediate relief although he knew that he realistically hadn’t spent his entire day being choked out. Shane wobbled to the shower, ran it hot, washed his hair twice and his body three times, and then he tucked himself into a pair of sweats and collapsed onto the hotel bed. 

It was tempting to fall asleep like this, with the lamp still on, city twinkling outside the window. Still, he couldn’t help but roll over and check his phone, just in case. 

What he saw made him sit up straight, his heart drumming fast in his chest.

1181.

The text was from Ilya, delivered thirteen minutes ago, probably while Shane was scrubbing his teeth and zoning out in the direction of his reflection in the silver faucet. 

It was a random number. It meant nothing to Shane. Still, his mouth was dry.

He set the phone down. He picked it back up. He set it back down again, then somehow it landed back in his hand, his thumbs typing out a response before he could think better of it.

What is that?

The text pinged as it went through. Ilya didn’t let it sit unanswered for more than thirty seconds, which simultaneously sent both a wave of relief and a bolt of anxiety through Shane’s nervous system.

my hotel room number, the text read.

Ilya picked up the phone on the first ring.

“You can’t be serious,” Shane said. He was pacing again, every part of him tense, his grip on the phone so tight he was briefly worried the case might break.

“I am,” said Ilya, and Shane paused briefly to bury his face into the duvet cover, breathing deeply before he remembered he was inhaling hotel duvet germs and that had to be taking a year off of his life.

“You can’t be here,” was what he said when he resurfaced. “You’re not here. Tell me you’re not in fucking Edmonton right now.”

There was a long pause. Ilya’s voice was soft when he next spoke, unbearably calm in answer to Shane’s panic. 

“Shane,” he said. “Please. Come here.”

“How do you even know we’re in the same hotel,” Shane blustered. The back of his neck felt hot. “I could be in a different hotel. What, you’re stalking me now?”

“Shane,” Ilya said, and his voice was still patient, but now Shane could hear something else beneath it. “It is same hotel. I promise.”

“There’s security at the elevators,” Shane said, not sure why he was putting up such a fight. 

“I know.”

“And what do you think I’m going to be able to do about that?” Shane bit nervously at a loose cuticle.

“There is a set of stairs at the other end of the hallway,” Ilya said. “This time of night, they have locked down your floor. Elevator is code access only, yes, but you can still use the stairs. Breaks fire code to block.”

“How do you know that?”

This time there was a little amusement in his voice, although Shane couldn’t fathom what could possibly be funny. 

“Same way I know what hotel to book, Shane. Before they fired me, I spent many hours making sure this trip is safe for you.”

All of the breath whooshed out of him, a giving-in, a defeat. Shane was standing still now, his eyes shut, thinking and thinking and thinking.

“Please come down,” said Ilya, his voice softer. “11th floor. Please.”

Shane hung up. He tossed the phone as if it were burning onto the bed, then scrambled to pick it up again.

Please, Ilya had said. He was here. He’d booked the flight, booked the room. It was a simple ask. An impossible one.

He’d been planning to leave, Shane couldn’t help but remind himself. He’d been planning to leave and hadn’t said a word to Shane about it. 

Shane looked pleadingly toward the ceiling, forcing a few deep breaths. Then he was shoveling his feet into his shoes, slipping his keycard into his pocket, and racing out of the room.

He barely in his haste remembered to hold onto the handle of the door so that it didn’t make a sound closing behind him. The last thing he needed was John or his parents, both in the rooms on either side of him, hearing Shane escape.

Unlike his hotel door, the crash bar into the stairwell echoed unavoidably loudly in his ears, as did the stairs beneath his feet. Shane counted the floors anxiously, grateful to take his nerves out in moving his body even a little bit. He jogged so quickly down the steps that he considered what would happen if he slipped.

It wasn’t a long stretch of hallway before Shane found 1181. He wanted to be able to pause in front of the door, take his time preparing to knock, but he knew all too well by this point the danger of lingering, of being caught on camera. He tugged his hood tighter around his face and stood close to the door, knocking quietly once, then twice.

It swung open, and there he was. 

Shane’s heart caught in his chest, a tangled mess of want. He took in every detail, greedy for it.

Ilya’s face was more limned with shadow than it was the last time Shane had seen him— the thin skin beneath his eyes gray-ish purple, his burnished golden curls tousled and a little lank, like he’d been running his hands through them. Still, he was unbearably handsome.

He didn’t move directly out the doorway when Shane brushed past and into the room. Shoulder met chest, elbow brushed stomach, and there was the smell of him—warm and comforting and tantalizing and familiar, the scent Shane had been chasing on his stolen hoodie for weeks. Shane was breathing easier just for being in the same room as him (to his slight dismay).

He made a point of standing straight once he was inside, brushing off of one of his sleeves and fixing his gaze somewhere in the direction of the floor.

For a long moment, it was like that— Shane staring at the patterned carpet, Ilya staring at Shane.

“What are you doing here,” he said eventually, more breath than question, although he’d meant to say it sturdy and tough and unphased. He’d meant to say it like someone who hadn’t even been missing anything. 

“I wanted to see you.”

Shane blinked hard, didn’t look up.

“I wanted to explain,” Ilya said, and he took a fraction of a step forward. There was still an unfathomably huge gap between them. “I know you are hurt, I—”

“—I’m not hurt,” Shane interrupted, voice finally like iron. He braved a look up, and Ilya was studying him, eyes soft. “You didn’t need to fly all the way here just to check on me. I’m fine.”

“I know,” Ilya said. “I know that. But I was traveling anyway.”

“Not here,” Shane said, the bitterness in his tone the most he could cling to.

“I changed my flight.” 

Ilya’s tone was still light, easy, like they were chatting about the weather. It made Shane feel irrationally more upset.

“Yeah, to the other side of the country,” he bit out. “I’m serious. You shouldn’t be here.” 

“You don’t want me to be?”

The question was simple. Shane swallowed hard, unable to answer.

“You know, I thought you wanted me gone.”  Another small step forward across the carpet, Ilya’s testing of the waters. Shane gnawed on the inside of his cheek. “You tell me to leave you alone, so I do not text, I do not call, I think you want nothing to do with me. It would make sense.”

He took another step closer.

“But then you call me two days ago, and you are my Shane, my angry Shane, my brave Shane, you think I am fucking up my life, you call me just to yell at me. And—” A little laugh bubbled out of Ilya. “It makes me so happy, you still care. So I change my flight, I come here. I had to see you.”

“What, just to leave again?” Shane forced his eyes up, brows drawn, hoping to anything he looked more angry than sad. “I mean, fuck, Ilya, you’re just making it worse. You were going to quit, you were going to leave, that’s fine. No fucking need to drag it out.”

He felt like a cornered animal, his chest blooming tight with pain. Shane took a step back and looked away from Ilya again as he did it. 

“No, Shane, please,” Ilya said, and now his voice was tight, all humor sapped from his face. “It was not like this, I promise. I was not going to leave you.”

“Well, clearly you fucking were,” Shane said, crossing his arms over his ribs. “They fucking told me as much. You weren’t going to resign your contract.”

“Shane—”

“Which is fine,” he ground out. “That’s allowed. You don’t, like, owe it to me to stay or anything, if you don’t like the job you can quit, it’s fine.”

Shane’s voice broke on the last word and he gnawed hard on his lip, staring a hole into the wall over Ilya’s head. He wanted the words to be true, and he knew that on paper, they were. Ilya was within his rights to quit his job. It wasn’t supposed to be some grand betrayal if he didn’t want to resign his contract, if he didn’t want to work with Shane anymore. It wasn’t supposed to hurt this badly or to be this personal.

“No, no, you are not understanding. I promise is not like that,” Ilya said again, and this time, he sounded properly choked up. “I was going to tell you. Back on campus, I promise, I was going to tell you after hockey season is over. I didn’t think I had to tell you before I knew— I thought I had more time.”

It was the same thing he’d said on the phone. The words washed over Shane but did nothing to soothe the ache. He swallowed hard.

“I mean, I guess you’re right, I’m not understanding.” His next breath was half derisive laugh, half gasp. “Okay, fine, you don’t want to be my security anymore. That’s fine. But you don’t have any work lined up, right?”

He waited for Ilya to hesitantly bob his head.

“So why not take the help from my mom? You said you wanted to stay in Canada, you said Russia has nothing for you, so what the fuck are you going to do if it’s August and your visa expires and you haven’t found anything? I mean, don’t let your pride get in the way—”

“I’m going to be on a student visa,” Ilya interjected. And then, his voice quieter, he added: “Hopefully.”

Shane blinked, his head physically jerking back with surprise. “What?”

“I, um.” Ilya took a deep breath. “I am applying to university. Here. In Canada. I get results back by April, hopefully. Is why I thought I had more time to tell you that I might not be back next year. Because I will be student.”

“What—”  Shane couldn’t hide the surprise in his voice. “What?”

“Dr. Hartman has been helping me,” said Ilya, looking more reserved than Shane had ever seen him. He straightened a little, clearing his throat. “When you saw us in the hall, that day. I said she was giving me back practice essay, but I lied. It was an admission essay she gave notes on. I am sorry for lying.”

“That’s okay,” said Shane, more on shocked autopilot than anything else. All of the bitterness had been wiped clean out of him, leaving only confusion in its wake.

That orange folder. The way Ilya had crammed it into his bag, hesitating before he told Shane what it was (hesitating, Shane supposed, before he lied about it). 

“I did not want to tell anyone until I had already applied,” Ilya said, straightening a little more and clearing his throat. “Until it was sure thing. And you are right, it is not sure, but I am trying. If I commit to job contract in Toronto, I cannot go to school in the fall. I would have to start all over again, and I do not want to do this.”

“Right,” Shane said, taking manual breaths. “Um, studying— what do you want to study?”

A hint of a smile touched Ilya’s lips, and Shane did not like the butterflies it sent through his stomach. 

“Literature,” he said, and Shane felt like he should bludgeon himself over the head for asking such a stupid question. “I am not sure to do what. Professor, maybe, is the dream. I like the idea of teaching. I also like the idea of translating novels, but this is hard to get into. My English would have to be very, very good.”

“Your English is great,” Shane said dumbly.

That made Ilya smile a little more, although he still looked bashful in a way that was unfamiliar. 

“That is nice, but it would have to be perfect. Better than yours, maybe,” he said, and Shane couldn’t tell if he was joking. “It will be hard. Theory is difficult even for native speakers. I will study Russian lit, probably, which is easier for me, but hard to find stable work for.” 

Shane nodded again.

“I know, it maybe does not make sense. Maybe I will decide to study something more practical. But I see you at school, I spend all this time in classes, and I want—”

Ilya paused, thinking. 

“I want,” he said again, shrugging simply like that encapsulated all of it. 

Shane understood. The picture was falling into place. Ilya in the back of the lecture hall, the time Shane had caught a peek at his notes and was surprised to see that he was genuinely writing everything down. The stack of annotated books by his bed, the voluntary office hours. Ilya befriending Shane’s classmates, his TAs, his professors. Slotting himself into that life with an ease that Shane himself had never had.

It was easy to picture Ilya with that life on his own. Sitting by a stack of textbooks and drinking a very hot and very sweet coffee at an ungodly hour in the library. Raising his hand in discussion section maybe a few too many times, arguing a point with his instructor. He would belong in that world effortlessly. 

Across the room, Ilya was watching him get lost in his thoughts. “You are still mad at me, is okay.”

“What?” Shane stopped trying to picture Ilya in a sweater vest and instead took in the real Ilya, standing in front of him.

He had one hand wrapped nervously around his wrist, his shoulders hunched, looking at Shane like he was about to deal some sort of fatal blow. Shane softened immediately, his posture going slack.

“No,” he said. “No, of course, I’m not mad, fuck, will you just— will you just.” He paused, struggling to ask for what he wanted, now that he wasn’t upset, now that he was picturing this beautiful life for Ilya and realizing that it was Shane himself who had been very selfish and very dumb. “Will you just come here—”

He wasn’t sure who stepped forward first. Before he could blink, he was surrounded by Ilya. His arms were tight around Shane’s shoulders, his face buried in Shane’s neck. 

“Shane, my Shane,” he said, and that was when Shane heard how truly rough he sounded. The relief in his voice as he clutched Shane impossibly close, his mouth on his neck not to kiss but just to feel that he was there. He was sniffling, his breath warm and wet in a way that should have been gross but wasn’t.

 “I’m sorry,” Shane breathed. He shivered a little, and Ilya held him tighter. “I’m sorry I was so mad at you, I’m sorry you didn’t feel like you could tell me. I think— I think that’s going to be really great for you. School, I mean.”

“Really?”

Shane nodded into his shoulder, still breathing him in. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” Ilya said after they’d wobbled to the bed. He’d ended up with Shane’s head cushioned on his chest, his mouth pressed to his hair. “I know I should have. At the cottage maybe.”

“No, no, I get it,” Shane said, looking up at him. What a wonder it was, to see Ilya again so close, to feel his chest rise and fall beneath him once more. Their legs tangled and Shane slid his knee against Ilya’s thigh. “I would’ve been nervous, too. This is a big deal.”

Ilya nodded, but he still looked troubled.

“Where did you apply?” Shane asked, hoping to distract him. He wanted, possibly still selfishly, to know more about this future Ilya was planning. 

He thought about it, counting off on his fingers. “McGill, Dalhousie, UBC. There are some others,” he added. “My hope is McGill, but this is very difficult program, very fancy school. Like Samwell.”

Shane smiled a little. “My dad went to McGill.”

“Really? For what?” 

“Something in economics,” Shane shrugged, toying with one of the drawstrings of Ilya’s hoodie. “Nothing cool like Russian literature.”

“Oh, you are flattering me now,” Ilya said, the flat teasing in his tone something Shane had missed with his whole entire heart.

“I’m not,” he insisted, although he was. He also meant it. Shane had never thought much about other career paths, other desires, besides hockey. He’d never needed to. Shane was earning a shapeless degree in business simply because he'd been told it would be easy— and here was Ilya, who had once been much like Shane, being brave enough to try something new.

There was a moment of quiet. Ilya’s hand was drawing soft circles at the small of Shane’s back.

“Were you disappointed when you got stuck on my detail?” Shane’s fingers trailed, tracing the familiar lines of Ilya’s cross through a layer of fabric. “Stationed in America, I mean? You could’ve been accumulating days in Canada this whole time.”

“What do you know about days I need in Canada?” Ilya raised a brow. “You study immigration law now, too?”

Shane’s mouth twitched. He bit the inside of his lip, feeling suddenly a little shy. “Well, I had a reason to do some research.”

In the light of the hotel room, Ilya’s eyes were soft as they pinned to Shane’s. There was a fond little furrow between his eyebrows, a parting of his lips, and then he was leaning down for a kiss.

It had only been a few weeks since their last. Still, Shane had thought this might never happen again— he was a little desperate for it, opening his mouth easily, sucking on Ilya’s bottom lip. Their tongues brushed and Shane sighed happily, a sound of relief as Ilya cupped his jaw and kissed him deeper.

“I missed you,” he said when they pulled apart.

“I missed you too,” Shane breathed, and leaned in for another chaste kiss. “You didn’t answer my question.”

Ilya looked considering, his hand slipping up to strum through Shane’s hair. 

“Disappointed is not the word I would use,” he began eventually. “Yes, it would have been nice to get days in Canada. Helps with citizenship. But not for one day did I regret time with you. It was some of the best months of my life.”

Despite his best efforts, Shane’s chin wobbled. He felt very soft and vulnerable at the sincerity in Ilya’s tone.

He buried his face back in Ilya’s chest, listening to his soothing hum, the slight shake of his chest as he held Shane closer.

“Don’t laugh at me,” he mumbled petulantly. 

“I am not laughing, moy lyubimyy,” Ilya said, but he still sounded amused. Then, his voice grew somber. “I am still sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” Shane tipped his head back up.

“That I could not stay. At least not for a few more months. We were supposed to have more time.”

Shane was already shaking his head. “You have nothing to be sorry for. The video was my fault, okay, I just wasn’t thinking, and it’s also my fault that you got fired. I don’t even know how to express how sorry I am for that, or how to make it up to you.”

Ilya was now the one shaking his head, and Shane had a feeling they would disagree on this for as long as they knew each other. He kept going, pressing his thumb into the divot of Ilya’s chin.

“But don’t apologize for not coming back as my bodyguard, or for not planning to renew your contract, or whatever. I’ve always personally thought that job would suck.”

Ilya shrugged. “Is not so bad.”

“You know what I’m saying,” Shane said. “Yes, sure, it’s the job that got you out of Russia. But you have no obligation to it, and I’m really, really fucking glad that you’re going to school. Seriously.”

Now it was Ilya whose eyes were wet. He blinked, one calloused palm covering Shane’s.

I do think,” he paused. “I do think I would follow you anywhere, maybe. But even if it was with you, it would not be enough if I could not also have my own life.” 

“I know,” Shane said, nodding and nodding and trying not to get stuck on the words I would follow you anywhere. “I wouldn’t want you to. You have to do what makes you happy.”

Ilya sighed, his fingers slipping up to trace syrupy slow patterns into Shane’s hair.

“This is the problem. You make me happy, too. I do not want to give you up.”

Shane fought the urge to bury his face in Ilya’s chest again. There was an impossibly large lump in his throat.

“I don’t want to give you up, either,” he confessed, and when a tear slipped down his cheek, Ilya was quick to wipe it away. “I want…” 

His sentence died as he was inundated by all the things that he wanted. This, with Ilya. To play a solid hockey career. To make his parents happy. To build a home, to settle in it.

“I want,” he settled on, much like Ilya had. Ilya nodded, understanding settling into every line of his face.

“Maybe we can have it,” said Ilya, but the words sounded hedged, like he was afraid to ask. “What we want.”

For a long moment, neither of them spoke. Ilya’s kaleidoscopic eyes darted between Shane’s, his hold not loosening.

Shane inhaled, and said what he was thinking.

“Montreal’s not having a great season,” he said. “Maybe they’ll do well in the draft lottery. Not saying that I’ll go early, but—”

Ilya snorted. “You know you will go early, Shane—” he started to say, but Shane covered his mouth with his hand.

“Stop, okay, you’ll jinx it!” It took a lot to keep the whine out of his words. “I’m serious. You’ll go to McGill, if that’s the program you want. If you’re there, maybe if I go play for Montreal, or somewhere else close. Boston, even, or fuck, maybe the Cens. Maybe… maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.”

Ilya was shaking his head. “McGill will be tricky. I do not want to get my hopes up. Very impressive program, and deadline is in a week but I am still waiting to hear back from my old coach about my letter of recommendation. Some bullshit about translating, I told him to let me do it but he has not sent it over yet.”

“Oh.” Shane tried not to let his expression drop as he considered what Ilya had said. “Who were your other letters from?”

“Hartman wrote one,” Ilya admitted. “Very nice of her. And so did my old English teacher from Moscow. I almost asked Roxy, from the shelter, but she has a lot to do. Did not want to bother her.”

“What happens if your coach doesn’t get the letter in on time?”

Ilya shrugged. “I do not know. I am hoping he will, Hartman says maybe I can appeal if he does not. Not somewhere like McGill, but one of the other programs might look past it.”

It wasn’t an answer that satisfied Shane. Ilya settled back down, still twining his fingers through Shane’s hair. 

When the solution came to him, it was like a bolt of lightning. Shane shot up a little bit, narrowly avoiding elbowing Ilya in the side. 

“I have an idea,” he said, unable to hide his delight. Ilya raised his eyebrows, already smiling a little. 

“I am listening.”

“What if,” Shane began, and a ridiculous grin was ripping across his face before he could even finish the sentence. “What if I could get you a really, really good letter of rec?”

Ilya paused, his brow furrowing. “Is a nice offer, Shane, but I do not think—”

His words froze as he realized Shane’s meaning.

“What if,” Shane said around what was almost a giggle, his fingers teasing the curls at the nape of Ilya’s neck. “What if I could get you a letter of recommendation from the prime minister of Canada?”

Ilya was shaking his head, but his eyes were glowing, going a little misty again. “Shane, you can’t. You don’t think it’s cheating?”

A dazed laugh burst out of Shane. “No, I mean, it’s definitely cheating. But she’s like, kind of your previous employer.” He made a face. “In a way.”

Ilya covered his mouth with his palm, unbearable smile stretching wide behind it. “You are serious?”

“Dead serious,” said Shane. “Please. She feels so bad about how the whole security camera thing went down, and she’s been really, really nice to me since I got outed to them. She would do basically anything to make it up to us, I think.”

“Shane,” Ilya said, mock-scolding. “Is not nice to take advantage of your poor mother when she feels guilty.”

“She forces me to go to like, eighty public appearances a year,” Shane said. “I think she can write one little letter of recommendation. I’m sure she’s already got a template for it and everything, she does it all the time for interns she likes.”

Ilya’s brow furrowed. “But she is okay? I mean, both your parents... After...”

It took a second for Shane to catch his meaning, but he nodded, taking Ilya’s hand in his. 

“Yeah, they’ve been really good about it, actually. Like I said, I think they mostly just feel bad. They’ve been letting me get away with a ton of stuff this break that they normally never would’ve. I’ve been—”

He cut himself off, feeling like he was about to say too much. Still, Ilya’s smile softened.

“Svetlana says I have been big mope all trip,” he said, as if to soothe Shane’s embarrassment. “Maybe you were a little bit the same?”

Relieved, Shane nodded. “Yeah. Just... not a super fun winter break.” And then, “Oh shit, where’s Svetlana? Is she, like, here?”

Shane looked around the hotel room, but there wasn’t another suitcase besides Ilya’s, nor was there someone hiding in the room. Ilya laughed.

“No, she is in Gatineau with Cliff,” he said, running his thumb over Shane’s fingers. “She helped me book this flight but the chalet was nonrefundable. She says it is my loss.”

“It probably is,” Shane said, stomach sinking. “I’m sorry. You’re missing out on time with your friends.”

Ilya snorted. “Well, I am now without job, so I will have plenty of time to spend with them after this. Most likely I will be picking up shifts at Cliff’s bar until I hear about uni.”

“Right.” Shane nodded, feeling a pang at the reminder that he’d be returning to campus without Ilya in a week. “Until you hear back from McGill, you mean.”

“It might not be McGill,” Ilya warned. “Even with great letter. I need financial aid, probably, I have savings but not much. There are some scholarships I am hoping for, but it depends which school lets me in.”

“Right.” Shane nodded, already doing the math on what his rookie contract might look like and how insane he’d have to be to put a decent chunk of it towards someone else’s college tuition.

It wasn’t the first nonsensical idea he’d had during this conversation, all of his ideas born out of a desperate need to make things easier for Ilya. His brain had wandered wildly while entertaining one of the ways in which he could help Ilya become a Canadian citizen— a method that involved a ring, and a future that stretched far beyond what he had been capable of imagining even that morning. Shane had shut that particular idea very neatly into a mental drawer with the goal of examining it later.

“What if...” Ilya started. “What if you do go somewhere far? What if it isn’t Canada?”

“Then I fight like hell to get to Montreal,” Shane said, before he could think better of it. “Maybe I ask for a trade, or... I don’t know. I can do something.”

Ilya was shaking his head, smiling sadly. “I don’t think you can, Shane. Is very nice of you to say, but.”

He was right. The realization throbbed as it sank into Shane, but it was true. He didn’t have the luxury of being picky about where he was sent. He couldn’t do anything but continue to be as diligent and hard-working of a player as he’d had to be on every team he’d ever played on— the news headlines were already writing themselves in his head, should he be anything less. 

“But even if it is far,” Shane said tentatively. His hands were beginning to sweat. “We’d be together, yeah? I mean, you wouldn’t be in school forever. We could... We could figure it out together, right?”

He faltered as he spoke, realizing the gravity of what he was saying. Maybe he was scaring Ilya. Maybe it was too big, too heavy, too much. Maybe Ilya didn’t want to saddle himself to Shane, with all of his baggage, all of the stress, all of the hiding. It would be more than reasonable, especially with Ilya starting this new chapter of his life.

Ilya’s eyes filled with tears, and Shane’s stomach sank. Fuck. He’d fucked up. He’d said too much, ripped open his abdomen and let his feelings spill everywhere, and now Ilya was going to have to let him down gently. 

He opened his mouth, ready to take it all back. “I mean—”

But then Ilya was rolling them over, burying his face in Shane’s shoulder, pressing kisses everywhere he could reach. 

“Fuck, Shane,” he breathed, pressing his mouth to the juncture of Shane’s neck, his jaw, his cheek, his mouth. 

One of his arms wound around Shane’s waist, the other between his shoulder blades, holding him tight. 

“Ya tebya lyublu. Ya tebya lyublu.” 

Shane caught Ilya’s mouth with his, bracing his hands on Ilya’s face as he pressed the words, whatever they meant, into his skin. 

And then—

“I love you,” Ilya said, pulling back to look at him. His lashes were damp, his cheeks rosy and flushed. Shane felt the words crack open inside of him, a flood of warmth, his own eyes immediately filled with tears. 

“Ilya,” he murmured, slipping his hand to cradle the back of his neck. “I love you too.”

The words were a confession, a secret, a release. He felt the weight on his chest ease as he said them, as Ilya kissed him again before burrowing into Shane. He pressed his mouth to Ilya’s cheek, his forehead, his curls.

“I love you so much,” he said, now that he could. He poured every ounce of meaning into the words. “So, so much.”

He could feel Ilya’s shoulders shaking. Shane became aware of the fact that his cheeks were wet, his shirt collar damp. It was all he could do to hold Ilya closer.

“Together,” Ilya said, when he could speak again. “Yes. We will do it together.” 

Shane beamed, pressing another kiss to his hair.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Hours later, Shane was still in a hotel room that was not his own. They were laying in bed in just their boxers, after what he could only describe as the slowest and most loving sex of his life. Ilya was wrapped around him, his breaths even and slow against Shane’s bare shoulder. They’d set an alarm to allow themselves a few hours of sleep before Shane had to sneak back upstairs.

“You know,” he said, eyes barely open. “My parents are in town.”

Ilya managed a hum of acknowledgement. His palm was rubbing soothingly up and down Shane’s flank.

“We’re doing breakfast in the morning,” Shane continued. “Not at the hotel, there’s some place my dad wanted to try. I bet they’d like to meet you.”

“Really?” Ilya sounded more awake.

“I mean, yeah.” Shane nodded, cheek rubbing against Ilya’s forehead. His fingers tangled in Ilya’s curls, tugging lightly.

“They have already met me. Many times.”

Shane snorted. “Okay, well. Not as my bodyguard. As my boyfriend.”

For a split second, they both paused. Not even Shane had been expecting that word to slip out, despite the promises they’d made in the last few hours.

Ilya pushed himself up to hover over Shane, his eyes gleaming in the light from the window. “Your boyfriend?”

He smiled a little, hope fluttering in his stomach. “I mean, yeah, right?”

“Yes, yes, please,” Ilya said, nodding, and then he was kissing Shane deep into the pillow, his lips plush and warm and perfect as they slid against Shane’s.

“Plus, it’s better if you’re there when we ask for the letter of rec,” Shane said when they pulled away from the kiss, re-situating themselves. Ilya rolled over so that Shane could snuggle into his side. “She can’t say no if there’s double the guilt.”

“This, again, about guilting your mother,” Ilya sighed, but he sounded amused. “But yes. It would be nice to meet them on even ground.”

“I agree, said Shane, nodding against Ilya’s chest. His eyes were growing heavy. 

“It’s not like I was a very good bodyguard,” Ilya mumbled into his hair, hand sweeping up and down Shane’s spine in a way that was going to put him to sleep in minutes. 

His laugh was breathy. “You were a great bodyguard, Ilya.”

“You were always getting away from me,” Ilya said, and the words were a little distant, like he was thinking about something.

“Not anymore,” Shane said without thinking. He burrowed deeper into Ilya, twining their legs together, tightening his grip on Ilya’s ribs until he squirmed a little bit, his breath lifting Shane’s hair as he laughed. “You aren’t getting rid of me now.”

“Okay, okay, solnyshko,” Ilya said. “I see. I am not going anywhere either.”

Shane hummed contentedly, breathing Ilya in. His eyes were fully closed now, listening to the pleasant thump of Ilya’s heart beneath his ear. “Love you, Ilya,” he managed to mumble, the words almost slurred with sleep. 

“I love you, Shane,” Ilya said, and it was the last thing he heard before he drifted off.

Chapter End Notes

things I might have accidentally played fast and loose with (but tried really hard not to): canadian immigration law, hockey draft rules, university admissions policies :/

next chapter is an epilogue and will include some hopefully fun news :) thank you for being here!! please let me know what you thought! it has been agony sitting on this one last ilya secret and I am very glad that all has been revealed :,))

thank you for reading <3
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Chapter 14: epilogue

Chapter Notes

welcome to the end :,)

for this epilogue I owe big big thanks to bea for letting me blather on about logistics and timelines and for just generally being so so so sweet. i also owe a giant thanks to angelina for helping me with the Russian translations!! lastly I am blowing one thousand kisses to my chronically offline roommate who will probably never read this but maybe one day will. I love you and thank you for listening to me yap about this story for like eight months.

I did try to figure out how to code the Russian so if you hover over it or click it, there should be translations. hopefully that works okay, I have no business digging around in html, let me know if it doesn't! as always, this is not beta'd. :)

The press exploded when they saw Shane emerge from the locker room.

Four years into his time with the Metros, he was used to the post-game clamor, the calling of his name from journalists who were desperate to get the first question in. He shuffled his hand sheepishly over the back of his head, hair still damp from the post-game shower, and fielded as many questions as he could with his eyes slightly averted from the blinding lights of the cameras.

Yes, it had been a great game. Yes, the Admirals had put up a good fight. Yes, he knew Montreal had just ruptured New York’s eight game winning streak. 

And no, he thought to himself, he didn’t feel bad about that.

It was his second year of captaincy, and despite what most called a formidable showing during playoffs the year before, Montreal hadn’t taken the cup. This, he’d sworn, would be his year. They’d just pulled up a promising new winger from the farm team. Caval, a recent trade from Toronto, was on a fucking tear on the goal, and hadn’t let Scott Hunter get a puck in one time. Everyone was leaving their blood and sweat and tears on the ice— the Metros had what it took to make a real push, but Shane couldn't exactly say it like that, so he was as polite and brief as possible.

It was only after his coach and one of the communications reps had waved him out the press area that Shane let his shoulders relax a little, the relief of the win actually washing over him. New York had been a tough battle after an alarmingly quiet few weeks— a tsunami looming after they’d been paddling through games against teams like Vancouver and Columbus. Shane had been so tense he nearly chewed a hole through his cheek, trying to stress that they couldn’t coast off of their most recent wins every time he addressed the team.

Back in the locker room, he relaxed a little more, clapping the arm of one of the rookies as he passed. The kid was only eighteen, fresh from somewhere in Alberta, and had gotten his first real MLH ice time that night, pulled in to cover for their third-string center out with a hamstring injury. 

“Great job tonight. You did just like Coach talked about at practice, that body hustle,” he said to the rookie, who had made a spectacular dive to stop a puck that Shane was already planning to highlight during tape review. “How’s the shoulder?” 

When the rookie smiled, it was wobbly and revealed a chipped bottom tooth. “It’s good, Cap. Thank you.”

He looked like he was summoning all of his bravery to say something else—and sure, Shane knew he could be intimidating, but he wished he knew what he did to warrant that frantic, eager, star-dazzled reaction in younger players and how to get rid of it—when Winston, his right wing, was shouting across the room.

“Holly! You’re coming out with us tonight?”

Immediately, all the attention in the room was on Shane. He was already wincing, reaching up to thumb at his earlobe. “Actually, guys, I—”

They didn’t even let him finish as the locker room filled with groans. Someone thwacked him in the back with a loose towel, and Shane could only hope against hopes that it was a clean one. 

“Come on, just one drink,” said one of the vets. “Even I’m going out tonight. It’s worth stopping to celebrate every once in a while, you know.”

“It is,” Shane conceded, but he was still frowning as he shrugged his game bag over one shoulder and adjusted his suit. “I’ll be there next time, I promise.”

He meant it. Shane spent a lot of time very carefully calculating how much time he was getting in with his team and whether or not it was enough to create close enough bonds. He rarely missed the other, quieter social activities— team lunches, family skates. Tonight, he had somewhere to be. 

There were a few other pleas from across the room, but Shane stood firm.

“I hope you all have fun, but I’m afraid I have other plans tonight, boys.”

Like he knew it wouldn’t, the implication was not missed by the rowdy men. The room erupted with suggestive whoops and whistles, and Shane couldn’t help but crack a smile, catching another towel before someone could whip it at him. 

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Shane found his boyfriend exactly where he thought he would— curled into his usual booth in the far back corner of Gulley’s.

This late on a Tuesday night, the bar was mostly empty. Most of the other patrons seemed to have filtered out after the game ended, although Shane kept his head down just in case.

It was a seat Shane knew Ilya had chosen not only because it was easier not to be distracted with a view of the rest of the bar but also because he was directly underneath a TV that was still showing the highlights of the Admirals versus the Metros. When Shane’s gaze flickered up at the screen, he was watching a close-up of his own goal, scored late in the first period.

Ilya’s head was down, dark blonde curls feathering over his forehead. He was engrossed in what Shane recognized as his collection of Gogol’s short stories, one hand tracing a pencil carefully down the page while the other rubbed soothingly at his cross, the way he always did when he was very focused. His laptop glowed in front of him, sitting beside the same stack of dog-eared and heavily tabbed novels Shane had seen him him lug around all semester, along with several empty glasses and a dirty plate that (if he knew his boyfriend) had probably once held an order of fried pickles.

He jumped a little with surprise when Shane slid into the same side of the booth as him, quickly tugging his wired headphones out of his ears. He took Shane in with what looked to be a big inhale— he’d made no secret, over the years, of the fact that he loved a Shane who was clean and crisp in his post-game suit. For just a moment, they studied each other in quiet greeting, Shane soaking up Ilya’s presence like the sun even though he’d only been without it for about nine hours.

“Hi sweetheart,” Ilya murmured eventually, the greeting soft.

There was no one around to see the way Shane scooted closer to Ilya, his hand landing familiarly on Ilya’s thigh as his eyes roved over him. He was wearing a Metros crewneck Shane had brought home for him during the preseason, a bright sliver of white t-shirt visible at his throat. He looked rumpled and like he’d been working very hard and it made Shane want nothing more than to kiss him senseless.

“Hi baby,” he said just as softly. “How are you?” 

“I am good.” Ilya’s smile was big. “You got here very fast. I thought I had at least twenty more minutes.”

Shane shrugged, not willing to admit to how quickly he’d rushed out of the arena and through traffic. His hand rubbed up and down Ilya’s thigh absentmindedly as he peered down at the notes. “How’s it coming?”

“Terrible.” Ilya sighed theatrically. “I think I should drop out.”

“Hm, I don’t know about that. How was your thesis review?”

That made Ilya fully groan, burying his face in his elbow. “Dr. Markley said it has lots of promise.”

Shane’s brows furrowed. “And that’s a bad thing?”

“Well, she said this and then she gave me very many notes of very many things to fix. She did not have half so many notes to give to Katherine.”

“Well, fuck Katherine, I bet her thesis sucks and is super boring,” said Shane, who did not know a single thing about Katherine except that she was the bane of Ilya’s existence and that she was really fucking annoying about Jane Austen.

Ilya had been buried for months in this honors thesis, although he had until the spring to complete it and that felt to Shane like quite a bit of time away. The central argument always sounded a little different to Shane each time he heard Ilya explain it, something about depictions of madness in literature that had him combing through thick novels and mumbling in his sleep about Mikhail Bulgakov. It was this, Shane knew, that Ilya would be using to apply to PhD programs— it was also this that seemed to be turning Ilya into a little bit of a madman himself.

When it took Ilya a moment to resurface from his elbow, Shane remembered what he’d been practicing in the car. 

“Davay ya otvezu tebya domoyLet me take you home,” he said, the pronunciation slow and imperfect. Still, it made Ilya’s head pop back up to look at him, his smile nearly blinding.

"Ochen koroshoVery good,” he said, reaching forward to pinch Shane’s chin fondly. Still, Shane didn’t miss the way the smile faded when his eyes flicked back in the direction of his laptop.

“Do you need more time to work?” Shane asked. He pressed a quick kiss to Ilya’s shoulder and then nuzzled his nose into it, again confident that no one could see them over the back of the booth. “I ordered food, but I can go pick up and then swing back and come get you, if you want.”

Ilya considered it, but his eyes were fluttering with exhaustion. He leaned his cheek into Shane’s hair. “Mm, no. I can keep working at home.”

Shane nodded, but neither of them moved for a minute. He was tired after the game, and Ilya was cozy and warm beneath his cheek. He smelled like laundry detergent and his woodsy cologne and the same sport deodorant he’d been wearing for as long as Shane had known him— the scent so intoxicating that Shane wanted to drown in it.

“I am sorry I missed the game.” Ilya used his remaining hand to shut his book. “You looked very good tonight.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Shane said. “I still don’t know how you can watch ice hockey and work on your paper at the same time.”

“Mostly during commercial breaks,” Ilya admitted.

“Did anyone end up coming to study with you?”

“Nina and Isaac, for a little.” He shrugged. “There was some party tonight. Last big one before finals, I think, so they left to go to that.”

“Oh.” Shane frowned. “Didn’t you want to go?”

“No,” said Ilya, his voice light. “I tell them my sugar daddy boyfriend is big Metros fan, he will want to pick me up in his fancy car and take me to fancy dinner to celebrate big win.”

Shane rolled his eyes, but he was smiling, nosing back into Ilya’s shoulder. He squeezed his knee beneath the table.  

Most of Ilya’s friends from school knew that he was in a deeply private relationship. There was an extremely small circle of very trusted individuals who knew that he was with Shane, specifically, but mostly it was kept under wraps. Ilya’s friend Nina was in the trusted circle— Isaac, her new boyfriend, was not. 

Private but not secret, they had used to echo to each other in the early stages, while they were still figuring out how to go about it. Ilya didn’t want to lie to his friends, and Shane didn’t want to make him, but the truth of the matter was still that Shane was a highly visible and deeply closeted public personality. No one on the Metros knew about Shane’s sexuality, although most of Ilya’s classmates knew about his.

Private, but not secret. It hadn’t been easy. There were days where it felt far more secret than private— days Shane would’ve killed to have been able to have had Ilya by his side. But still, he heard what happened in locker rooms, he heard what went unsaid about how much the league was willing to accept from him. For now, they had to take what they could get, which looked like this— weeks spent in discreetly rented villas during the summer, evenings spent tucked away in the back of the bar where no one could see.

“Alright, we can leave,” Ilya said with a sigh, shutting his laptop and sliding it across the table towards them without extricating himself from Shane’s grip. “I just have to pay my tab.”

“No,” Shane said, the word muffled by fabric as he mumbled it into Ilya’s shoulder. “I settled it on my way in.” 

He felt more than saw the stretch of Ilya’s grin. “See? Perfect sugar daddy boyfriend takes care of everything for me. Did you leave big tip for my friend Allison at the bar?”

“Yes,” Shane said honestly, leaning back to give Ilya space as he dug his backpack out from underneath the table. Allison was one of his favorites of the staff at Gulley’s— a butch lesbian with a series of facial piercings that both fascinated Shane and made him a little squeamish, she often had her girlfriend perched at the end of the bar working on a laptop while she poured drinks.

“Good.” Ilya hummed to himself as he tugged the zip up on his bag. “I did not buy enough drinks from her to justify how long I have stayed.”

“You know you can stay here as long as you want.” Shane lowered his voice. “I kind of own this place.”

Shane had been part-owner of Gulley’s for the better part of a year.

He’d become part-owner when he heard that the original owners, a couple who had been running the bar since the eighties, were struggling to keep it afloat without selling out to something like private equity investors. He’d been able to pour a bit of money and assistance into it, hiring advisors to provide suggestions for improvement while mostly allowing the business to run as it had been. His involvement was low and not-advertised, which was how he preferred it. There were a lot of reasons that Gulley’s was a good investment— it was a bar beloved by Metros fans, it was nice to put money into the local economy, it got good traffic on the weekends and business had only gotten more stable over the last few months.

None of those reasons mattered to Shane so much as the fact that it was Ilya’s favorite place to study.

He didn’t blink at the reminder that his boyfriend owned the bar. “I know, but it is principle.” He paused and studied Shane. “Where did you order dinner from?”

“Vinci,” Shane said, and relished the way Ilya’s face lit up.

“Did you remember the—” Ilya made a little pinching motion. “Arancini balls?”

Shane’s brows drew with mock-offense. “Of course, I did, who do you take me for?” As they slid out of the booth, he added: “I’m just hoping you didn’t spoil your dinner.” 

“Of course, I did not spoil my dinner.” Ilya slipped one of the backpack straps over his shoulder. “I had fried pickles. That is a snack. Is basically vegetables.”

“Yeah, right.”

It was very late. Shane had left most of his winter gear in the car, parked in his reserved spot in the back, and now the night air streamed clean and cold right through his buttoned shirt. Ilya, bundled with a toque that had once been Shane’s and the heavy coat David had gotten him for Christmas the year before, looked far more comfortable. When they made it to the car, he slung his backpack into the backseat and sprawled into shotgun, his head leaden against the window. 

“Ugh,” he moaned. “I am so tired. Such a long day. Finals are going to kill me.”

Shane turned the car on and cranked the heat, checking that Ilya’s seat warmer was on before he reached over and threaded his fingers through the curls at back of Ilya’s neck.

“I know,” he said, thinking back on his own years of finals with a pang of sympathy. “But in a week, they’ll be over.” 

Ilya moaned again, but he leaned into the touch for a moment before Shane shifted the car into drive. 

“Yuna’s Christmas gift arrived today.”

“Oh, did it?” Shane hit his turn signal as he steered out onto the road. “Did you open it?”

“Yes, I knew you would want me to make sure nothing was broken.” Ilya sighed and shuffled against the seat, his arms folded across his chest. “The glasses set is very pretty, she will like them. The box is maybe a bit bigger than we thought, but it should fit in the trunk just fine.”

This was the first Christmas that Shane and Ilya were spending at their cottage— not Shane’s parents’ cottage, but their cottage. It had ostensibly been built just for Shane, if anyone asked, but it was Ilya who had picked out the kitchen counters, Ilya who had selected the bathroom tile (keeping in mind whether or not it seemed like it might dig in painfully if someone were kneeling on it, which had made Shane flush pink). The cottage was made of both of them in equal part and it made Shane’s heart do something melting and stupid every time he thought about it.

“Have you packed yet?”

Ilya snorted. Shane couldn’t look at him and drive, but he would’ve bet Ilya’s eyes were long closed by now. “What do you think?”

“Just making conversation.” Shane bit back a smile, tapping his hands anxiously on the wheel as they idled at a red light. 

What Ilya didn’t know was that Shane had already begun to pack— that there was a little velvet box in the bottom of Shane’s duffel, stuffed deep in his closet, containing a ring the same shade of gold as his cross. 

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When they made it through the front door, Shane barely made it a step inside to take his shoes off before he tripped over the cat.

“Jesus, Chowder, are you trying to take me out?” Shane held out a hand to keep his balance, frowning down at the loudly purring ball of fluff at his feet. Chowder pawed at the ankle of his suit and let out a plaintive meow. 

“Maybe she was rooting for the Admirals tonight,” Ilya said, kicking off his shoes and immediately swooping the giant black cat into his arms. 

“Don’t say that.” Shane scowled as he hung up his coat. “She would never.”

The name Chowder hadn’t been Shane’s choice. Neither had the cat, really. 

Ilya had been spending time over the summer volunteering for an animal rescue, his closest approximation to his time spent at the Samwell Humane Society (which Shane knew he missed dearly). One afternoon in July, he’d come home to find Ilya on the couch, cradling a ball of fuzz to his chest. She was so little he could barely even tell she was there, perched in the cup of his hand. She might have been a loose sock Ilya had found on the floor if not for the impossible amount of love he had on his face, holding the kitten as if she were made of glass.

“Absolutely not,” Shane said, frozen in the doorway.

“Her name is Chowder, she is five weeks old,” Ilya had said in response, not even bothering to look up as he swept his thumb over her fur. “She has a little kitty cold, they did not want her to spread it to her siblings Soup and Bisque. They needed someone to foster.”

“Ilya, no,” Shane said, but the fight had already been lost. Ilya was standing, moving very slowly across the room to unfurl the fingers of one of Shane’s hands and then Shane had a palmful of vibrating cat (impossibly soft, impossibly small). This close, he could tell she was sick— one of her blue eyes was a little goopy, her tiny chest rattling a little when she purred. 

He remembered all those years ago, back at Samwell, sitting in a sunbeam because Ilya had told him to. He remembered a little black cat that had slept in his lap that afternoon, the way Ilya had scritched below her chin and cooed to her in Russian, one of his first friends in that country.

It was dirty fucking play to hand Shane this tiny sick kitten and then to wrap burly arms around his waist and press kisses to his shoulder, asking so sweetly for him to let the thing stay.

What is the point of having a guest room if we do not put guests in it, she will be most polite guest we have ever had, we do not even have to change the sheets.

So, fine, they’d fostered Chowder. It was only six weeks. And then six weeks came and went and Shane sat with Chowder every day in the bathroom with the stupid humidifier to cure her stupid cold and she had a favorite shelf in his closet to sleep on and she curled up in his lap whenever he sat for longer than five minutes and when Ilya didn’t take her back to the shelter, Shane didn’t say a word about it.

The apartment was more complete with her in it. With the both of them in it, really. Shane and Ilya had tried to live separately for their first year together— mostly so that Ilya could be independent at school, and so Shane could focus on his first year in the league. It was only when they did the math and realized that they were still managing to spend nearly every waking free hour with each other that they decided it made no sense for Ilya to keep driving to crawl into Shane’s bed after games, or for Shane to have to leave Ilya’s place early to go home before practice.

So this was their home. Exposed brick walls and warm wood tones, bookshelves stuffed to the brim with hockey nonfiction and whatever Ilya could get his hands on. There were cat toys and scratching posts scattered throughout, two pairs of house slippers skewed by the door, two mugs each morning sitting on the drying rack. Shane had never been happier in his life.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

Ilya waited for him to slip into his comfy clothes—navy sweatpants and the softest t-shirt they owned, something advertising a gym in Moscow—before he asked Shane to take off his top.

“Let me eat dinner first, perv,” said Shane, but he didn’t shrink away from Ilya’s hand on the slope of his hipbone. The counter was scattered with half-open takeout containers— cacio e pepe and crunchy roasted broccolini and chicken vesuvio, and Shane’s stomach was growling. Chowder had settled onto one of the kitchen stools, watching the food with rapt attention.

“You know why I am asking. Lift your shirt, let me see.”

Shane heaved a sigh, setting his plate down on the counter, and reached for the hem of his shirt, rolling it carefully up until Ilya could see what he was looking for. 

He’d taken the hit at the top of the second period— Adrian Pawlik had rammed into him, and really, Shane had recovered so well that it was almost more like he had checked Pawlik instead of the other way around. He’d almost scored on that drive. It hadn’t stopped the stick from catching beneath Shane’s ribs or the resulting sear of pain, but relatively, it was nothing. He was surprised Ilya had even noticed the hit, watching on TV. 

“Ohh, my Shanya, moya tykovamy pumpkin, poor baby.” He lifted Shane’s shirt higher, leaning down to press smooching, dramatic kisses to the bruises. It would look worse in the morning, but for now, it was still purple and blue, a little sensitive beneath Ilya’s gentle mouth.

“Okay, okay, it’s fine.” Shane laughed and threaded his fingers through Ilya’s curls, letting him press kisses all over Shane’s stomach before he came up to leave one on Shane’s mouth, slow and sweet. “I’m fine. It doesn’t even hurt.”

“Did Lucifer look at it?”

“Stop calling him that.” Shane frowned, knowing Ilya was referring to Lucien, the team doctor who had okayed Shane to play with a dislocated shoulder two seasons prior. “It wasn’t him, it was Megan, and she said it’s fine. Surface-level.”

“Hmm.” Ilya didn’t look satisfied, but he let Shane lower the shirt, turning instead to heap his plate with carbs.

“What was the word you used? Tykova?”

Ilya’s smile was mischievous. “Guess.”

Shane’s mouth pinched in thought as he got his food and curled up in his usual spot on the couch, Ilya slotting in diagonally.

“I don’t know,” he said eventually. “Is it a word you’ve taught me before?”

“Mm, I don’t know, maybe,” said Ilya. “I think little green owl would have told you.”

Shane continued wracking his brain, working his way through mental piles of Russian vocab. He’d been taking lessons for three years, but it was a complicated language, and little words tended to evade him.

“Can I have a hint?”

Ilya tangled one of his feet between Shane’s legs. “Spooky word.”

“Spooky word... Tykova...” Shane repeated softly to himself, still thinking, brow pinched. Across the couch, Ilya stuffed his mouth with pasta, smiling as he watched. 

“Ghost? No, that’s prizrak.” Ilya had taught him that one in October when Hayden had sent a photo of his newborn dressed up like Casper. “Bat, maybe? Is it close to the word in English?”

“No.” Ilya shook his head, and Shane felt a pinch of irritation. He usually wasn’t this stumped, but it had been a long day, and his brain was running on fumes.

“I give up,” he finally bit out after ten minutes of thought, and Ilya’s smile widened.

“It means pumpkin,” he crowed, setting his bowl down to spring across the couch and pepper kisses on Shane’s cheeks. “You are my little pumpkin, yes?”

“Oh my god, Ilya.” Shane had to use his reflexes to hold his food out of the way so Ilya didn’t knock it over and into his lap, momentarily disgruntled until he realized how ticklish the kisses were and then he was melting into the cushions, a laugh bubbling out of his chest. Eventually, he pushed Ilya off with a hand on his chest, his cheeks warm.

As Ilya settled back into his seat, his hair sticking up in funny places, Shane thought about it more.

“Wait a minute.” He couldn’t keep the annoyance from his voice. “That is not a spooky word. Terrible hint.”

“Yes, it is! Pumpkins and ghosts and bats, all very Halloween, very spooky.”

“Okay, but a pumpkin isn’t like, inherently spooky. It’s a type of squash,” Shane said, and thus launched the squabble that carried them all through dinner and into the kitchen again, packing up the leftovers and loading the dishwasher in tandem. 

When they were finished, Ilya stood in the cold draft of the freezer and spooned ice cream straight into his mouth from the carton, then leaned in to kiss Shane, his lips cold and sweet, until Shane told him he had to either shut the door or get a bowl. After the spoon was put away, Shane crowded Ilya into the kitchen counter, pinning him in place with his hands braced on either side of him.

For a moment, he buried his face in Ilya’s neck, breathing him in, and Ilya’s hand came up to cradle the back of his head.

“You’re tired,” Shane said. “You should go to bed.”

“You are the one that is trying to go to sleep right now,” Ilya teased, his fingers gentle as they played with Shane’s hair. “I have more work to do.”

Shane knew this was true, but Ilya had been yawning as he rinsed off the dishes, covering his mouth with the back of a sudsy hand. He’d slipped in and out of sleep as Shane had driven them home, barely jostling awake to accept the warm bag of food Shane had set in his lap. He’d been up late every night this week, tapping away at his computer.

“You know,” Shane began, pulling back to look at Ilya. He slipped his hands up Ilya’s broad shoulders, tangling them at the back of his neck. “When I was in college and fucking with my sleep schedule, someone told me I should rest when I was pushing it too hard. He said sleep was more important than finals.”

Ilya smiled softly in recognition. “Ah, who said that?”

“I don’t know.” Shane feigned nonchalance, slipping one hand below the collar of Ilya’s sweatshirt to rub at a tense muscle. “Some old bodyguard of mine.”

“That guy sounds like he is full of shit,” Ilya said, even as he pulled Shane closer, drawing him up into a kiss. It was soft and deep, Ilya sucking at Shane’s bottom lip, his tongue tracing like velvet into Shane’s mouth. They made out against the counter until Shane was lax and loose in Ilya’s arms, a puddle of moans.

When Ilya pulled back, his eyes were hazy. 

“Come to bed,” Shane murmured, and he did.

First, they brushed their teeth at their shiny double sinks, silently competing to see who would brush the longest until Shane’s mouth was filled with white foam and Ilya had a drip of it down his chest. Shane washed his face and moisturized and wrapped himself around Ilya’s back for the remainder of the time, waiting for him to finish with his fancy serums and his emulsifying.

By the time they actually made it to the bed, Chowder curled up on the end of it, exhaustion had seeped through them both. Shane could barely keep his eyes open long enough to turn off the hall light. Ilya sprawled across the pillows, his chest rising and falling evenly as Shane collapsed beside him and burrowed into his side. He was sore all over from the game, his muscles sinking gratefully into the mattress. He’d be pinching himself in the morning for staying up so late, but there was nothing he could really bring himself to regret about soaking up these extra hours with Ilya, at least for now.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

In a few days, they would be at the cottage. Shane would line the windowsills with electric candles and he would wear Ilya’s favorite sweater and he would get down on one knee and ask to have this, forever. 

For now it was enough to drift off to sleep in Ilya’s arms, the safest he had ever been.

Chapter End Notes

and that, my friends, is it for campus security!! I cannot thank you enough for reading and for sticking around, especially given how ridiculous this premise is, and for all of your kind words and your kudos. it has been so so so fulfilling and wonderful to write this story and I don't even know how to put my gratitude into words.

that being said.... this version of Shane and Ilya are not done with me (or you) yet. I have decided to write a companion piece with some Ilya's pov! my vision is vignette style, probably ~30-40k words, in a one shot. I don't plan on regurgitating the entire story from ilya's pov as that sounds redundant and silly but there are some scenes that were challenging to have to write through Shane, and I also know that (much like the first season of the show), this isn’t necessarily a perfect happy ending for them with the relationship still in the closet and a long way to go. so, a little selfishly, I'm taking the chance to explore those moments as well as write a bit into their future :,)

if you want to be notified when I post that, I've made the fic into a series and you should be able to subscribe and then get an email when I add a work to that series I think? I am not as adept with ao3 as I should be, so if that's incorrect let me know.

thank you again for reading and for being here. <3
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