Rating:

Explicit

Archive Warning:

Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Category:

M/M

Fandom:

Heated Rivalry (TV)

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Characters:

Svetlana Vetrova, Cliff Marlow | Cliff Marleau, Hayden Pike, Grigori Rozanov, Alexei Rozanov | Andrei Rozanov

Additional Tags:

Same Team Au, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, ESL, Dom/sub Undertones, Past Ilya Rozanov/Sasha | Ilya Rozanov's Coach's Son, Past Ilya Rozanov/Svetlana Vetrova, Ilya Rozanov is Obsessed With Shane Hollander, Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Recreational Drug Use, Family Issues, Not Beta Read, Not Canon Compliant, Brief mentions of Ilya/OFCs

Language:

English

Series:

Part 2 of dream team

Stats:

Published: 2026-03-19 Words: 28,155 Chapters: 1/1

to someone from a warm climate

Summary

It's the Raiders' 2013-2014 season and Ilya has the C for the first time. He's ready to face the challenge head on. What he isn't ready for (he finds out quite quickly) is the team's brand new star rookie, Shane Hollander. There's something about him that keeps snagging Ilya's attention. And the first time Ilya puts a hand on the back of his neck, well, he certainly couldn't have predicted Shane's reaction to that...

Notes

ah yes, here it is, the midnight sun version! you do not have to read shane's POV "wild geese" before this, or at all. it's more fun to write the scenes and dialogue a little differently, so i did that here and there. many of the same notes from the other fic apply here:
-Based off the show, including side characters, backgrounds, and appearances.
-Includes OMCs and OFCs, hand-wavey hockey, and hand-wavey Sochi Olympics
-They are 3 years apart
-Ilya’s English is at a level before the, “when did your English get so good” question. I also have a personal headcanon that he gets lazy with English when he’s flirting.
*Includes mentions of off-screen consensual teenaged sex.*
**Please do not repost anywhere. This is locked for a reason.**

That kid’s trouble, Ilya decided, watching Hollander skate easy loops around the rink. He had an earnest, hero-worship situation going on that made Ilya’s hindbrain perk up. That part of Ilya’s brain could not be entertained, especially not when it came to rookies. He’d been so open in his adoration, so guileless, when he told Ilya, “You’re an awesome player to watch.”

They’d only just met. Hollander’s warm hand offered up. Freckles starred across his nose. Terrible haircut, now hiding under his helmet. A good boy, through and through. He was going to be a good add to the team. Good, but more likely great.

Trouble, Ilya repeated to himself, and then focused on practice. 

“He told me they broke up after the draft,” Hayden Pike was saying later. 

The locker room had mostly cleared out and there were only a few of them left. Hollander’s parents were still in town after helping him move in, but they were leaving that weekend. It seemed like Hollander was determined to spend every last possible second with them. He held none of the embarrassment teenagers typically had for their parents, none of that, ‘God, Mom, leave me alone!’ type of thing. He’d easily announced his plans for later that day when asked, no hesitation, no shame. The guys were still getting a kick out of it, gossiping, trying to figure out what made him tick. Hollander had quite the shiny reputation, and the guys were all chattering about the idea of him and passing around the little tidbits that they knew or had heard elsewhere. 

“Hollander!?” Bastien said. “A girlfriend!? Please. That kid is unfuckable.”

“Don’t be gross,” Pike said promptly and in a reproving tone. 

Ilya rolled his eyes. A comment like that showed just how much Bastien knew about anything, which was nothing. There was a certain subset of women who’d love to get their hands on Shane and make him cry with pleasure. Those red-tipped ears. The summer-fresh freckles all over the high points of his body. Well. Maybe Ilya was projecting his own burgeoning wants unfairly onto a group of unsuspecting women. 

Trouble, he reminded himself, and shook the mental images from his mind. 

It was his first year as captain and he was too young for it. Ilya knew this. But the Raiders had been a team in stasis for the past several years, a roster of good guys, yes, but aging guys. The party line when Ilya was drafted was ‘fresh blood,’ and this was the guiding principle that thrust them into Shane’s drafting, Ilya’s third year, and his captaincy. He felt the pressure, yes, but he was not one to be daunted. He had already gone through what had to be the hardest and worst thing in a person’s life, and here he was now. Besides, Ilya was not the kind to back down from a challenge. He met those head on and usually grinning. So he accepted the C and applied himself to doing good work. He did not suffer from social anxiety and he had a good eye for the various threads that tied a team together. Some needed to be pulled taut at times and others needed slack. Being the captain, he could facilitate this.  

Leadership felt…not natural. But definitely something he could grow into. It was something that Ilya knew would benefit from practice, like everything else about the sport. It was his first year and he would make mistakes, certainly, but he was not lazy like his father was so fond of accusing. He would work at his weaknesses in this area, just like he worked at them on the ice and in the gym, and he would endeavor to shore them up into strengths. 

Part of being a good captain was babysitting the rookies. Jim Randolph had the C Ilya’s first year, and had done a decent job of it, though he’d certainly had his hands full. But Ilya couldn’t take too much from Randy’s playbook. Ilya was too close in age to the new guys to assume the position of elder male authority figure. It was a more difficult needle to thread, being twenty-one. He could pal around, but not too much, or he’d become one of their group and lose all respect from the older guys. But he couldn’t play strict either; no one would buy it. He had to be friendly but maintain distance, open but not vulnerable. It helped that Ilya was good at seeing what others needed from him, and fulfilling those needs. Training camp was going well so far and Ilya couldn’t help but feel a little optimistic for the season to come. 

It was unfortunate, then, that the rookie Ilya should not be getting cozy with would not stop following Ilya around. 

“You’ve got a shadow, eh,” Marleau said in amusement. 

Shane had been trailing Ilya around the rink for basically that whole practice. Ilya had skated up to Marleau who was at the boards, and Shane had nearly followed him right up there before realizing what he was doing and awkwardly pivoting away. 

“He think I’m best player,” Ilya joked. “He have my poster on wall.”

“Forgive me if I call bullshit,” Marleau scoffed, rolling his eyes. 

“Poster,” Ilya said. He was kidding, of course, but now he was imagining it. 

“You have an evil gleam in your eye,” Marleau was saying. 

Ilya waved a hand. He had no idea what ‘gleam’ meant and didn’t care enough about Marleau’s opinions to ask for clarity. 

As training camp went on, Ilya decided that Shane Hollander was like a cat. No doubt he would follow Ilya from locker room to rink to weight room if he could, and wind his way between his legs. If he’d been anybody else it might have been irritating, but there was something about Shane that Ilya enjoyed intrinsically, right from the start. He felt fond about Shane’s eccentricities, his brittleness, his cumbersome and almost bro-y attempts to fit into the culture of the locker room. He was trying so hard. Ilya liked pretty much everything about him, even the things that annoyed the other guys, like the way he nattered on and on about hockey, dissecting plays, bringing up stats from twenty years ago, and referencing the names of third liners from other teams several seasons ago that no one remembered. 

The first time Ilya put a hand on the back of Shane Hollander’s neck, he hadn’t really been thinking about it. He did that sort of thing to any member of his team, a quick squeeze that meant, ‘good work,’ or, ‘I’m with you.’ But any other member of the team didn’t react like Shane did, which was to freeze in place and then to slowly release all of the tension from his shoulders the longer Ilya kept his hand there. The sigh he let out was also singular. Ilya squeezed, mesmerized. Shane’s eyelids fluttered. 

“Okay?” Ilya asked.

“Yeah,” Shane said, looking at him so seriously and so openly, almost like he was waiting. But waiting for…For what? For instructions? For Ilya to tell him what to do? 

Ilya had driven home in a trance. What was that? What had that been? How was he supposed to maintain his pitiful attempts at distance when Shane reacted like that to a hand on his neck? It was a terrible revelation. A terrible and wonderful revelation. 

After that, Ilya’d developed a borderline fixation on Shane Hollander’s nape. He had never spent so much time staring at someone’s neck before, never spent so much time trying to orchestrate ways in which he could get his hand on it. But here he was. Everything about it was compelling: the smooth, tan skin, the crisp edge of Shane’s dark hairline, the easy flush that often bloomed there. But most of all Ilya liked what happened when he put his hand on Shane’s nape and squeezed. He’d never had such instantaneous effect on anyone before, from just the press of his hand. But Shane responded to this sort of touch like he was primed for it. It was a heady sort of power, one that Ilya hoarded gleefully to himself, trying (and failing) to dole it out sparingly so as not to waste it, or God forbid, get used to it. 

It was natural then, to try other touches, just to see what Shane would do. He reacted wonderfully every time. He went where Ilya moved him, his stubborn nature melting away at the touch of Ilya’s hand. He smiled happily when Ilya jostled him. And once, when Ilya put his hand in Shane’s hair, he shuddered, full body. 

He figured out pretty quickly that Shane had a lot of people fooled. The hockey robot shtick, the cardboard cutout, ‘we’re just trying to get pucks in the net,’ facade he gave the media. People saw it and thought that was it; no one was curious enough to look a little further. But Ilya was curious. Surely no teenaged hockey player could be that placid, that bland. 

He should be ignoring Shane outside of practice, of course. But instead he was pushing closer, trying to catalog reactions, trying to see into the heart of him. Ilya soon had a working theory that it was in his eyes. In his eyes and the flush of his skin, two things that he could not lock down completely. Couldn’t control 100%. His wet eyes. His red ears. And the way he stilled under Ilya’s touch like he was ready and waiting. 

By the time the first few games rolled around, Ilya just had to admit it to himself. Shane Hollander made Ilya’s hands tingle. He wanted them all over that kid, bad. He was so fucked. 

So, how is he?

Ilya smiled. 

How is who? he sent back, just to irk her a little and also because he didn’t want to text.

The call came through a minute later.

“Don’t be obtuse, Ilya Grigorievich,” said Svetlana. “How is Shane Hollander.”

Ilya hummed. 

“He is good. They didn’t exaggerate.”

Sveta made a pleased sound.

“I’m glad. He will help you to the Cup. You need someone with hockey sense like him.”

“Yes, this eighteen-year-old Canadian will be our savior,” Ilya said, aiming and failing for derisive. Shane really was very good. 

“Mm yes. Eighteen. He’s adorable.”

There was a certain edge to her tone that Ilya knew all too well. 

“You stay away from my rookie, she-beast.”

Sveta laughed. “Who is he living with?” 

Ilya had lived with Alyosha Antonov his first year. His English had been terrible and it was a small mercy that they’d placed him with a Russian, though Alyosha had been in the States for so long he barely had any accent at all. Living with Alyosha had been a godsend and though Ilya had tried not to show it, it had been a terrible blow when Alyosha was traded last year.

“He lives in his own apartment,” Ilya told her. 

“Really?” Sveta said, surprise ringing through her tone.

It was more common for rookies to room together, or with some older guy on the team who had enough space in his house. 

“His choice. A couple guys offered to host him.” 

Svetlana hummed.

“Well,” she said. “Keep an eye on him. You were a wreck your first year despite having Antonov.”

Ilya winced. Alyosha had been very kind, but during that first year Ilya’d been drowning in homesickness (and self loathing for being homesick). He’d finally escaped the clutches of his father and brother, so why had he missed it all so much?

Hollander was not like that. ‘I’m kind of…particular,’ he’d said when Ilya had asked him why he didn’t accept any of the hosting offers. Ilya had double checked what the word meant  when he’d arrived back at home. It was a wonderful word, so perfect for Shane. Of course, ‘particular.’ 

“He’s different from me. Completely,” Ilya said.

Maybe his tone had sounded dismissive, because Sveta made a noise of protest. 

“He’s eighteen, living on his own in a different country. Be nice.”

Ilya scoffed. As if he was anything but an angel to Shane Hollander! Well, he might tease him. A lot. But that didn’t count, and besides, Shane liked that sort of thing. 

“I am nice!” he said, affronted. “I am so nice he’s obsessed with me!” 

At this, Svetlana laughed. 

“Ah so! Now I have the truth.”

Ilya grumbled something noncommittal, but was then saved from interrogation by a commotion on Sveta’s end of the line. She gave a quick explanation through peals of laughter--something about her boyfriend showing up with several cabbages—and then hung up. Ilya sighed in relief. He missed Svetlana very much, but she always saw right through his pretenses. And whatever he was thinking about when it came to Shane was none of her business. He hoped she was too distracted by Misha to think too hard about anything he’d just said on the phone call.  

 Ilya threw his phone on his bed and went downstairs to make something to eat. After a few weeks back in Boston, he had grown accustomed to his giant house once again and he was glad to not be in Russia any longer. The summer had dragged by in circuitous routine: training with the few MLH guys who had also gone home to Moscow, avoiding his father and brother as best he could, giving in and spending interminable meals with his father and brother, and going out at night with Svetlana and her Moscow coterie. Halfway through July she had met someone at one of the clubs, a pretty boy with an indolent quality to him that set Ilya’s teeth on edge. But who was he to judge; he’d hooked up with Sasha for most of their teenaged years. Anyway, Svetlana had been bamboozled by a pair of dark eyes and floppy hair and had very little time for Ilya after that. She was still with Misha by the time Ilya flew back to the states, and he was perfectly content to leave her at it. 

He could always tell how Sveta’s relationships were going by how much or how little she texted him. If she was confident and happy, she would keep up the communication as usual and they would have their phone calls just like always. But if the relationship was strained or going poorly, she would fall off the face of the earth and he’d only hear from her after the break up or after the fight had been resolved. He suspected that talking to him reminded her of things she’d rather avoid while in the middle of a strained relationship, but he’d never asked her about it. Though they had flirted a few times over the years with the idea of a relationship, at his core Ilya knew he didn’t truly want that with her. He valued her friendship over all else, and if they had a go at a real relationship and it crashed and burned, he wouldn’t have that anymore. The risks were not worth it. 

She was still texting and calling like usual, so it was going well, then, with the floppy-haired Misha. It was karmic justice, Ilya supposed, that he was met with his very own pair of bamboozling dark eyes in Shane Hollander. If Sveta ever found out, she’d never let him live it down. Ilya resolved himself to steering their future phone calls well away from any talk of rookies. 

When it came to the steering away of things in real life, however, Ilya had given up. His efforts to keep clear of Hollander had been, at best, pathetic. So what if he couldn’t keep clear? So what if he kept thinking about his neck? Ilya’s thoughts were his own and it wasn’t like anything could ever come of it. Ilya’d thought maybe, at least at first, what with the way Shane reacted to Ilya’s hands on him…But then, the first time Shane had joined the group on a night out, Shane had left with a redheaded white girl who had twice as many freckles on her nose as Shane did. Ilya had thought, oh well, and had applied himself to other, more interesting things. Namely, finding a girl of his own to leave with. 

Shane hadn’t joined them the next few times, but when he did show up for his second night out, Shane left with an Asian girl whose black hair hung in a sheet down to her hips. Well, Shane certainly didn’t have a type, Ilya observed (he privately thought guys who only hooked up with petite blondes were cowards, or worse), and then determinedly put any thoughts of Shane Hollander’s sexual preferences out of his mind. 

Though the team had won their first game of the season, they pretty quickly started floundering. Ilya refused to let himself put too much stock into it, refused to let himself think about what his father would say. There were many, many games ahead. And when the party line was ‘fresh blood,’ well, the fresh blood would need time to adapt, adjust, and click. They were working hard and they were a good group of guys. Ilya took it upon himself to make sure spirits were maintained even after the losses, keeping practices positive and coaxing as many of the team out once a week if only to let the group collectively shake off some of the disappointment. 

Shane usually begged off. He did not like drinking, Ilya had learned. And though he had picked up the first two times he’d gone out, the very few times he joined them after that he stayed for a little under an hour and left alone. Particular, Ilya thought to himself.

Towards the middle of October, Shane deigned to grace them with his presence on a night out again. By that time, the team had largely accepted his prickliness at face value, and the guys spent their chirping energy elsewhere. That night, though, Shane had attracted the attention of a positively glacial looking blonde woman, who had enough height on him in her chunky heels that Shane had to tilt his chin up to meet her gaze, exposing the column of his throat. Ilya couldn’t have looked away from where the two of them stood at the bar even if his booth suddenly caught fire. He saw the way the woman looked down into Shane’s face, the curve of her smile, the short, sensible cut of her manicure as she put her hand on Shane’s upper arm. 

“My God,” said Ilya, under his breath and in Russian.

He was thinking a whole slew of very perverted things. Things like how Shane would look, pushed chest down onto a bed as the woman fucked him, the dark slashes of his brows pulled together, the high color that his cheeks always got from exertion. Ilya shifted and took a sip of his drink. 

“How’d he manage that?” complained O’Neil loudly enough that everyone left in the booth swung their gaze over to the bar. 

A range of surprised and jealous expressions appeared on the faces of his teammates. There were a variety of things Ilya could say in response to O’Neil, namely, ‘how could he not,’ with a further, pointed look at Bastien. Ilya would be able to get away with it, seeing as how everyone viewed him as a crazy Russian, the guy who said ‘I love you’ to each of his teammates after a good game. But he already got chirped enough for the way Shane had him so easily whipped—“rookie favoritism”—and he was feeling churlish at the way Shane kept flashing his pretty teeth up at the woman, so he kept silent.

The thing that the team didn’t understand but many women did was that, under his stiffness, Shane had a sweetness to him that he flashed demurely and irregularly, like a Victorian woman showing an ankle. If you caught him at it, you’d be left wanting more. The team didn’t get it because they thought the only men who had an easy time of it were guys who looked like Chris Hemsworth. But when Shane had picked up those first two times, it seemed like he’d had a very easy time of it indeed. 

After a few minutes Ilya managed to get distracted by the conversation at the table. But then, all of the sudden O’Neil’s eyes went comically large and his mouth fell open.

“No way,” he said. “No way! He ditched her!” 

Ilya felt a presence to his left and then Shane was scooting into the edge of the booth, his shoulder pressed all up against Ilya’s. 

“What the fuck, Hollander?” demanded O’Neil. “You cannot tell me you fumbled that play. She was totally into you, man!”

“Oh,” said Shane, fingers tapping against his glass. “Well. She was kinda scary.” 

Ilya covered his expression with one hand. Shane was too adorable to bear. The rest of the table went into an uproar. 

“You pussy!” Bastien was caterwauling. “You absolute fucking pussy!” 

“Those are the best ones!” Marleau was trying to council over Bastien’s screeches. “The ones who scare you shitless.” 

“She didn’t scare me that much,” said Shane. “Why don’t you go over there if you’re so interested, eh?” 

“Fuck you, I will,” said Marleau. 

“No, I will,” said O’Neil. 

And then there was a scramble as the two started tussling and the rest of the booth started jeering and laughing and Ilya felt the tension drain out of Shane, who was still pressed right up against his side. 

The booth cleared out soon after that. A few of the married guys said their goodbyes and headed out, a few went to the bar, and who knew what Marleau and O’Neil were doing. Probably bellowing and beating their chests at each other in the back alley. 

“Guys stupid,” said Ilya, low enough that Shane has to tilt his head towards Ilya to hear him over the music and general hubbub of the bar scene. “Do what you want.” 

Ilya jostled his elbow a little into Shane’s side. Shane breathed out something that was half-laugh half-sigh.

“Yeah,” he said. “I am.”

Shane slanted him a little glance that had Ilya’s pulse quickening. Was he…did he mean that? Ilya stared at the side of his face, wondering if he was reading this completely wrong or completely right. The corner of Shane’s mouth quirked up and he ducked his head down towards his ginger ale. There was enough space, then, in the booth for them to move apart. They didn’t. 

—

That year Ilya had submitted himself, as a martyr to the blade, to hosting the Halloween party at his home. It wasn’t that he hated parties; it was more that he hated hosting. He always got too intense about it, thinking of things last minute and kicking himself for forgetting certain snacks or certain types of liquor. If things weren’t perfect, then he’d failed. That year he was determined not to overthink at all, and hired an event planner who he instructed to make every single decision for him. 

A small army of decorators had invaded his house the morning of the party, and had left it looking sufficiently spooky with cobwebs, bats, spiders, and orange and purple string lights covering nearly every inch of the first-floor ceilings. The caterers dropped off the many snack trays around noon, and the alcohol delivery came around 2pm. By the time the guys had started trickling in (those with kids tended to arrive and leave early), everything was set and Ilya had donned his Dracula costume. Despite the team’s losing streak, everyone was in a good mood for the holiday. The gaggle of kids were adorable and the D.J. played all of the family friendly favorites for the early crowd. 

Ilya had wondered if Shane might turn up with a plus one, but he showed up alone and very curious, looking around Ilya’s house with an intent gaze. It was the look he got when he was cataloging something, be it an on-ice play or some bit of personal info a guy had shared off-ice. 

He took a couple shots with Ilya obediently enough and then disappeared into the living room. Ilya watched him go and shook his head. Hollander had no holiday spirit. His costume was tragic. 

The party went on. Eventually the guys with kids said their goodbyes and the younger guys’ friends started showing up, mostly twenty-something men in similarly half-assed costumes like Shane’s and groups of twenty-something women in their cute little skimpy costumes, which Ilya was not above checking out as he made the rounds for refills. The D.J. had moved away from anything family friendly, and there was a pretty decent sized dance party happening in the open space where the living room furniture had been pushed up against the walls. Ilya took too many shots, ate too much candy, and had many loud conversations with friendly strangers. 

It took Ilya a while to realize he hadn’t seen Shane in a little bit. He made a circuit of the ground floor. The bathroom door was closed, but, as he walked by it, a woman dressed as a pink crayon opened it and came out. Hmm. Ilya headed for the stairs.

Shane was up there, standing in the hallway and staring into Ilya’s bedroom. A hot thrill surged in Ilya’s stomach. He approached on silent feet. Shane sighed and turned around, clearly thinking he was alone, and ran right into Ilya. 

“Fuck! Sorry!” he said, stumbling a little. 

Ilya put his hands on Shane’s shoulders to steady him. 

“You nosy,” Ilya accused, absurdly pleased that Shane was snooping around his house. 

Shane squinted a little and faltered through a few half-formed words before landing on, “Yeah. Sorry.”

“I give you tour if you ask,” Ilya said. 

“You were busy! I needed the bathroom anyways.”

“Where your mask go,” Ilya asked. 

Without it, what he was wearing could barely be called a costume. Shane wrinkled his nose. 

“It was annoying.”

Ilya laughed, charmed. He was charmed by practically anything Shane did at this point, but drunk like he was, all of his defenses were leveled. 

“Picky. Nosy,” he said. And then in Russian, “Underfoot.”

Shane made a short, low sound in the back of his throat, one that was becoming familiar to Ilya as a bit of a habit of Shane’s. 

“What did you say?” he asked, narrowing his eyes. 

“Like,” Ilya said, and mimed picking up his feet to move out of the way of some small animal. 

Shane said an English word then that Ilya had never heard. Then, accusingly, “You’re making me sound like a cat!”

It was a wonderful thought, though not a new one. Ilya grinned.  

“You say. Next year you wear ears.” 

Shane laughed, shook his head, and said, “I’m not being a cat for Halloween, come on.”

His Canadian vowels had gone longer and wider thanks to the liquor in his system. ‘Haaalloooweeeeen.’ Even better, Shane had, for some reason, put his hand on Ilya’s shoulder and was now staring at it like he was surprised to find it there. 

Out of nowhere he said, “I don’t like you with black hair. Your normal hair is perfect.”

My God, Ilya thought. This person was put on Earth specifically to torture me. And then, because apparently Ilya also loved to torture himself, he asked, “What else is perfect?”

“Shoulders,” Shane said promptly, and squeezed Ilya’s once, twice, three times. 

He was looking at Ilya’s sternum and his mouth was parted. Maybe he was a little drunker than Ilya had thought. Hollander didn’t drink much at all, and though he was solid with muscle, if he wasn’t used to liquor, he wasn’t used to it. 

“Okay,” Ilya said, feeling warmly tender and protective. “I stop teasing now. You’re being sweet, make me feel bad. Tomorrow you’re sorry.”

“I’m not sweet,” Shane said, which was laughable, but Ilya managed to withhold his scoff. 

Shane had followed him out of the first practice after Halloween, trotting a little to try and catch up. Ilya kept his strides long and quick, liking the feeling of Shane chasing him. When they were in the parking garage, Ilya slowed so they fell into step. 

“Would you wanna talk about some ideas I have?” 

Ilya cast him a sideways glance. “Ideas.” 

“Yeah,” Shane said, shoving a red and white toque onto his head. He then proceeded to start and stop several sentences, his English running together in an incomprehensible jumble. 

Ilya crossed his arms and leaned against the trunk of his car, which they’d come up on during Shane’s rambling. 

“English words mess,” he said. “What you’re trying to say?” 

“Sorry,” Shane said. “I just don’t want to step on your toes. But I wanna talk about the line ups. And the power play. And we’re really struggling, playing defensively—“

“Ah,” Ilya said, suddenly understanding. Shane couldn’t shut up about hockey, but he didn’t really have anyone to monologue to. “Rookie want to talk hockey with captain. You worry captain get mad.” 

“Yes,” Shane said. “I know it’s annoying but I really think—“

“Not annoying,” Ilya said. “We do lunch. Once a week. You say ideas. I say if ideas suck.” 

“Really?” Shane asked, a smile breaking across his face like dawn over the horizon. “You’d do that?”

Ilya felt about ten feet tall, seeing the evidence of how happy he could make Shane with so little. 

“Captain listen to team. Even baby rookies with big mouths.” 

“Thank you,” Shane said, still beaming. 

As if it could be a chore, sharing a meal with him on a regular basis, when he had a smile like that. When just a few nights ago, he’d been peering into Ilya’s bedroom. When he’d said Ilya’s hair and shoulders were perfect. 

“We go now,” Ilya said, greedy for more. “You pay.”

“You’re the one with a sports car!” Shane protested, but he was laughing. 

The lunches were more enjoyable than Ilya expected. Of course they mostly talked hockey, but he also got Shane to talk about himself now and then, and Ilya loved to hear these little asides and tangents almost as much as he loved working through play possibilities and hearing Shane’s insanely high hockey IQ at work. 

The things that Shane most often brought up outside of hockey talk were his mother and father. Shane spoke of them frequently, with simple, easy affection. Even when he was annoyed with something they’d said or did, the affection was there behind it, like an undercurrent. And the comments he made that showed the breadth of their adoration for him were made casually, like throwaways. Ilya had found it irritating at first, then fascinating, and then both charming and painful at the same time. Here was the result of a white picket fence childhood. A warm childhood. Here was the result of parents who’d desperately wanted a child. Parents who would always be parents, even when that child was well into adulthood, decades into the future. And here was proof that being spoiled wasn’t guaranteed to turn a person rotten. Shane was probably the most spoiled boy Ilya had ever met, and there was not a rotten bone in his body. 

It was the only life Shane had known, so of course he would take it for granted. But sometimes this tendency found its way into the questions he asked, the way he kept poking at Ilya about Ilya’s own family. Shane would know, of course, about unhappy families. But he would always assume the best, because that was what he knew. It was usually easy to fend off his questions. Shane would only hazard a couple every now and then, sending Ilya his intent, cataloging gaze, no doubt trying to figure out if he was pushing too far, trying to figure out where the lines were drawn. Ilya had found this irritating at first, too. But as he got to know Shane’s personality better, he realized there was no ill intent behind the questions. They were coming from a boy who’d grown up well-loved, and who, as a result, had a rather naive baseline assumption that everyone else did too. Once Ilya understood that, his irritation quickly drained in to something more like acceptance. 

So, lunchtime was good. The same could not be said for game time. The Raiders were still losing and Shane got hit early on in November, putting at least some of their potentiality on hold. Ilya was on the bench when the hit happened and he didn’t even see it, only the aftermath: Hollander splayed out on the ice. For a moment, Shane was very still. Ilya was trying to stand without thinking, but Marleau had a hand hooked firmly on his shoulder and was holding him in place. 

“No way,” he was saying. “It was a high stick. He’s just stunned. He’ll get up, Rozanov.” 

As Marleau spoke, Hollander rolled and got to his feet, and Ilya felt a sick wash of relief roll from his sternum up into his skull. Ilya watched him intently as he skated off ice and went down the tunnel. It didn’t look like he was moving with a concussion or anything, his pacing was the same as ever. Still, it was a head hit, so the medics would be in a tizzy. 

Ilya sat fuming on the bench until he was sent back on the ice. He played like a shark. Many might assume that, when angry, Ilya would grow even more brash, more rash, more chaotic. But that wasn’t the case. When he was well and truly angry he got cold, calculating, and efficient. This was how he played the third period. While he did manage a goal out of it, it didn’t make a difference. They lost 3 to 1. And by the time the team was back in the locker room, Hollander had already been whisked away for imaging. 

After, there was the road trip. A spate of away games that Ilya had been looking forward to, a way to shake the team up and out of this funk they’d been stewing in. He hated to leave Shane behind, but there was no helping the matter. They got the news from the coaches that there was no fracture, and soon after Shane was texting the team group chat that he was okay and sending his well wishes for the upcoming games. 

Ilya was giddy with relief and made the dubious decision to text Shane separately. 

send selfie. 

No.

The reply came back almost immediately and Ilya grinned stupidly at his phone. Even better, a couple seconds later there came a blurry photo of the side Shane’s face, his swollen eye, his temple, his dark eyebrow, and the mottled color across all of it. Ilya clucked at the photo. Poor bunny. 

bad ((( 

It’s fine.

i mean photo. you do not know how to take selfie? 

Whatever.

They won their away games, and when Hollander finally came back into the locker room for practice, it felt like a reward. He let the guys rag him for a few minutes, all of them swarming him and telling him how ugly the bruising was. But finally he came up to Ilya expectantly, his eyes as dark as anything. Ilya couldn’t help but to put his hands on him, tipping Shane’s face this way and that, surveying the lingering damage to his silky, fine skin. The bruising still looked pretty bad under the unforgiving locker room lights. Ilya announced a hit on the entire state of Florida, to which Marleau enthusiastically added his own support. Meanwhile, Shane was holding perfectly still, eyelids at half mast, the smallest smile quirked at the corners of his mouth. Ilya had to take his hands away otherwise he’d do something insane, like kiss Shane right in the middle of the locker room in front of Cliff Marleau and the entire Raiders team. 

The success of the away games did not carry onto home ice. Shane was back on ice, but the losses had also returned. Ilya could tell that the team’s overall general sentiment was starting to nose dive. Practices were tense, the games were tense, and the interviews with the media were tense. Many iterations of the question, ‘how bad does it suck to keep losing,’ were popping up frequently, and a hockey player could only be asked such a thing so many times before he got testy. Ilya was thinking about all of this on the way out of yet another loss. The team had been subdued in the locker room, post-game. A few of the guys had been sent out to do press, including Hollander, who looked so grim he was almost zombie-like. Ilya was a little worried about him. At their next lunch, he’d make a point to check in. 

Just then, a metallic clatter on concrete made Ilya turn and search for the source. He’d not really been paying attention as he made his way through the arena halls and out into the garage, so he had no idea who else might be around. Ilya’s eyes caught on a figure a couple cars down the way.

“Hollander, you—” Ilya started to say. 

Shane sent Ilya a look that was pure, spooked prey animal and then ducked between the cars, disappearing. 

Well, that wouldn’t do. Ilya changed course and strode over to where Shane was picking up his keys from the cement. Shane straightened and ducked his head, but Ilya had caught a glimpse of bad he looked, even though he was trying to hide his expression.

“Hey,” Ilya said, surprised and more than a little worried. 

“No, no,” Shane said. “I’m just mad. The losses, you know. I wish I could do better—” 

The more he spoke the more Ilya realized Shane was working himself up into a panic. So Ilya did the only thing he could think of, that he knew might settle him. Ilya reached out, put his hand on Shane’s neck, and squeezed. 

Shane’s words cut off immediately. He hitched in a breath, which then dissolved into a shuddering sigh. Ilya watched him carefully.

“You are having panic attack?” he demanded to know. 

Shane’s mouth pursed into an unhappy moue and his brow furrowed. 

“No, I’m. I’m just a little stressed.”

That seemed like an understatement. 

“We don’t win. Okay. We will get there. Is still early in season.”

“I know, I know but…” 

Shane trailed off and then groaned. Ilya waited, but it didn’t seem like Shane was going to say more. Instead, it seemed like he was working himself back up into a freak out. His breathing was getting faster and shorter and his eyes were taking on an absent, glassy quality. Shit, Ilya thought. It was instinct to tug him close, to bring him into Ilya’s body. So he did just that, guiding Shane’s forehead down onto Ilya’s shoulder. 

“Just breathe,” Ilya said. “Talk later.” 

“God,” Shane said, strangled, and fisted his hands into the sides of Ilya’s coat. “Fuck, I’m sorry. This sucks.” 

“Shh, breathe.” 

“You…no…I’m fine,” Shane mumbled, protesting. “You should…You—”

Ilya tsked and squeezed Shane’s neck. There was nothing ‘fine’ about him right now. Nothing at all. 

“Shh. Breathe,” said Ilya, making his tone as firm as he could.

Shane seemed to respond to this. He sagged, and Ilya held him steady, letting Shane lean on him. Ilya kept his hand on Shane’s neck and listened to him try and regulate his breathing. Ilya’s thoughts were scattered and vague. Unhelpful. He didn’t know what to do for Shane besides hold him. He didn’t feel that he was eloquent enough in English to talk about difficult emotions, and it was clear that Shane was going through something a little bigger than just dealing with losing a hockey game. 

After a few more moments, Shane pushed back onto his own two feet and gave Ilya a pitiful smile. Ilya crossed his arms, surveying Shane’s sweaty forehead and his pallid skin tone. 

“Thanks,” Shane was saying. “Sorry. Obviously I know I’m not the only one who’s upset about the losses. I promise I can handle this. And I can do better.” 

Ilya pressed his lips together. He hated feeling so unsure of what to do. His instincts told him not to leave Shane alone. But Shane was being so evasive. He kept telling Ilya to go, so he…he should let Shane go. Shouldn’t he? He was going to let him go, but then Sveta’s voice wafted up in the back of his head. ‘He’s eighteen and alone in a new city…be nice.’ Alyosha had been Ilya’s lifeline after tough losses that first year, calmly and doggedly pulling Ilya out of his black temper. Shane did not have anyone like that, except for his parents on the phone. Talking on the phone wasn’t as good as having someone in person. But there was no one to be in person for Shane right now…unless…Ilya could be that person for Shane, couldn’t he? Ilya could be nice, as Sveta had suggested. Abruptly, the image of Shane returning to his apartment alone was unbearable.

“Maybe I bring you home,” Ilya said. “We talk.” 

“No, please. I’m okay. Really. I don’t need a babysitter.” 

“Not for babysit. For talking. We talk at lunch, this helps you.” 

Shane paused for a moment, clearly considering. He’d ducked his head again, hiding his expression. But then he looked up and leveled Ilya a gaze so baldly full of want that Ilya knew he had him. 

“Sure, but I don’t think…” Shane began.

“You be good and get in car,” Ilya said, making the decision out loud and cutting off any more protests. “Or I bully you.” 

Shane muttered a low oath but didn’t follow it up with any further complaints.

“Come,” Ilya said, gripping Shane’s elbow and tugging him forward, pressing his advantage. “My car. Leave yours here. Get tomorrow.” 

Shane’s squawking about still being able to drive was thoroughly ignored. Ilya had thought a few times about what Shane might look like in his passenger seat, and was now determined to make those thoughts a reality. 

Shane looked good in his passenger seat, Ilya decided, as he drove them out of the parking garage and into the city streets. Well, he looked good for about a minute, and then he devolved into the worst passenger princess of all time, clutching the door handle and making annoying comments about the speed limit. 

“You drive like a lunatic,” Shane eventually accused.

“You have big wet eyes, like cow,” Ilya countered. 

Shane made an appalled noise.

“Is good,” Ilya said, nodding. All of Shane’s features were good, but especially his eyes. 

“A cow is not ‘good.’” 

“Okay, seal,” Ilya said, feeling generous. 

“No—wait—how do you know what that means in English?”

Ilya told him about the stupid video spot he did rookie year, at the aquarium. Shane an intrigued sound and was quiet for a moment before remembering he was supposed to be irritated. 

“I think you should stop comparing me to animals.”

“Is good,” Ilya insisted. “They tell me, ‘ooooh Ilya I’m so sad,’ then I know what you say is bullshit.” 

“I don’t sound like that,” Shane grumbled.

“‘Oooh, my cow eyes, so big, so wet,’” Ilya teased.

“God, shut up. I’m glad I’m like an open book to you.” 

But Ilya disagreed. It took effort to read Shane. His face was not very emotive unless he was feeling something intensely. And sometimes his mouth said the opposite of what his eyes did. Ilya was getting better, but he knew he was not perfect at it. Probably never would be. 

“You say what you’re thinking people want,” he said. “Not what you’re want. So I’m not know. And English is very bad language.” 

“Yes, your opinion on that has been made clear. Many times.”

Ilya tilted his head. Shane was sounding a bit more level, a bit more like his usual self. 

“You chirp me? Feel better?” 

“Yeah, I feel fine. I feel…I feel like an idiot actually. I freaked out in the parking lot. And now my captain has to drive me home like he’s my mom.” 

His mom! Ilya despaired. Well, maybe he was acting a bit like a mother hen. But what else was Ilya supposed to do when accosted with Shane’s panic in a parking garage? 

“Now you’re chirp yourself?” 

“I guess,” Shane said. “I deserve it.” 

“Sometimes freak out in car park. It’s okay, Hollander,” Ilya said. And then felt the need to add, very clearly, “But never call me ‘mom’ again.” 

When they got to Shane’s building, Ilya bullied his way into a guest spot in the garage and staunchly followed Shane into the lobby and up to his unit, ignoring Shane’s various and increasingly pleading protests for Ilya to leave.

Ilya had not really thought too much about what Shane’s apartment might look like, besides an overabundance of vegetables in his refrigerator. But the apartment suited Shane very well, Ilya realized as he circled the space. There were many floor and table lamps that cast nice, warm light. The furniture was stylish, but not to the point of being uncomfortable. There were throw blankets and pillows, and the rugs underfoot were plush against Ilya’s socked feet. The space clearly had Shane’s mother’s touch all over it, set up out of love, with only Shane’s comfort in mind.

“I’m renting with the option to buy,” Shane said, trailing Ilya as he perused. “My parents say it would be a good investment just to buy it now, but I’d rather wait and see how the season goes.”

Of course.

“You think you get traded after few losses,” Ilya said. 

“No, I don’t think that. But I’d say it’s more than a few losses at this point.” 

Ilya ignored him. He had discovered something delightful on the living room wall: family photos. It was a trio. Each had a Christmas tree in the background, and in the foreground were Shane and his parents. On the far left was baby Shane with his arms extended overhead. Yuna and David each had a pointer finger in his little grasp, and they were helping him stand up. He was wearing a red fleece onesie. The middle one showed Shane in the throws of unfortunate puberty with braces, acne, a buzzcut, and features that he had not yet grown into. His head looked too big for his neck. The one on the far right looked quite recent, with Shane appearing as he did now. In all of the photos Shane was smiling at the camera, but his parents were smiling at him. 

“Cute,” Ilya said, feeling a twinge beneath his sternum. 

He turned, then, and saw Shane holding two bottles of Gatorade. He grabbed one and took a few giant swigs, effectively drowning the little flutters of jealousy and delight that those photos kindled in his stomach. 

“Do you want to, uh, sit?” Shane asked, jerking his head towards the couch. 

Ilya flopped down in the corner, against the arm. He put his Gatorade on the coffee table and then watched Shane, expectantly. Shane sat, a little gingerly, and fiddled with his own Gatorade bottle, still unopened. He kept sliding Ilya these assessing little glances from under his lashes, no doubt wondering if Ilya would let him off the hook. Prepare for disappointment, Ilya thought, and then spoke. 

“So. Freak out in car park. Why?” 

Shane made the low sound in the back of his throat, the one that often proceeded complaints, sighed, and then visibly set his shoulders.

“Like I said, I just feel like I could be doing more. We could be winning. I see the potential. I know you see the potential. But we’re not clicking yet. And people are expecting us to click. When I got drafted, they were expecting—”

“People?” Ilya interrupted.

“Yeah, people. The fans, the staff, the owners. My parents. All the kids who…who look up to me. Us, I mean. Us.” 

Ilya processed these words and then began to think about all the news articles that had come out after Shane’s draft, and the grouping of words that seemed to be included in every headline: Japanese-Canadian. A few things were beginning to become clear, and Ilya felt like an idiot. 

“You do press, after game,” Ilya said. 

“Yeah.” 

“Tonight, little bit different. What they ask?” 

“Usual stuff,” Shane said.

“I don’t think so.” 

Shane pressed his lips together and put his unopened Gatorade on the coffee table. Then he pulled his knees up and slumped over into the back of the couch, resting his cheek there. Ilya waited and watched. Shane’s brow was pulled, and though his eyes were lowered, Ilya could tell they were flicking back and forth, as if Shane was seeing something play out in his mind’s eye. He was working something over, deciding on what to say. Ilya would wait and take what he was given. 

“No, it really was the usual stuff. I just…I hate when they ask about…me,” Shane said eventually. “I know it’s ungrateful. I know how privileged I am. But it’s like…I wish they just saw me the same as all the other players. Like just a human. But instead they see this added layer and they won’t let it go. It’s good for sound bites, for internet clicks. But I’m a person. I’m not a sound bite or a page view.”

‘Me,’ Shane had said. ‘They ask about me.’ Those things that were becoming clear for Ilya a few minutes ago crystalized. 

“They ask about how you’re Asian,” he said.

Shane blinked at him and lifted his head. 

“You heard that?” he asked. He was staring at Ilya, his gaze so intent it was almost a physical thing, pushing hot against Ilya’s face. 

“Not tonight, but they ask before.” 

“I mean, it’s important. You don’t see a lot of Asian guys in this sport. When I was growing up, there was no one who looked like me playing really good hockey. And now here I am. So somewhere out there, there’s a little kid who’s looking at me and seeing himself. The better I can do, the further I can go, the more I can show that little kid what’s possible.” 

Ilya stared, eyes flitting over every single one of Shane’s minute expressions. When Shane went quiet, Ilya mentally repeated what Shane’d said back to himself. The words were ones he knew, but Ilya had to be sure he understood. He didn’t want to mess this up. Shane had shared something big, something that he didn’t talk about with other people. Fuck, if only you could speak Russian, Ilya thought at him, a little desperately. In Russian, Ilya would be clever and comforting and empathetic. In English, he was cut off at the knees. 

“Stress,” Ilya said, holding a hand parallel to the floor. Then he stacked his other hand on top of it. “More stress.” 

It was a paltry effort, but Shane seemed to relax, just a little. 

“Yeah, it’s layered. And the race thing, well, I kind of wish it wasn’t a big deal. But I know it is, and I know why it is. I just wish…” Shane trailed off and shrugged. “I guess I wish I was stronger, and didn’t let it get to me so much.”

Of course Shane viewed it as a personal failing, being bothered by bigotry. Ilya shook his head. 

“You strong,” Ilya insisted. “Maybe, not feel so much now. But every game, every media scrum, every interview and fan meet. Getting stronger and stronger. Team support you. I support you. Yes?”

“Yes, you’re great,” Shane said immediately and emphatically, and then scrunched his nose a little, embarrassed. 

“I try, keep trying,” Ilya said. Now wasn’t the time to gloat over that compliment, but he’d certainly be tucking those words away for later. “We try together.” 

“Yeah,” Shane said, before taking in a deep breath and heaving it out. 

He had the look he got when Ilya put his hand on the back of his neck: settled. Ilya allowed himself to relax. He hadn’t fucked this up, and Shane felt better. Thank God. 

“Okay,” Ilya said. “We talk about freak out in car park. Now, talk about game. Play by play. Make list for practice.”

He beckoned his hand imperiously. Shane closed his eyes for a moment. Then he opened them and nodded. 

“Well first of all, my face off,” he began.

—

As December rolled on, the team started to pick up momentum. The game after Ilya had been to Shane’s apartment, they shut out New Jersey 5-0. After that, the wins kept coming. It was invigorating. Electric. Finally, all the fresh blood that the trading and drafting had brought in was pumping the way it should. The team was clicking. They were scoring. They’d gone from playing desperate, chippy, and defensive to flying across the ice, pucks to tape, pucks in goal. 

It was heady, to be the captain of a team that was on the upswing. It was also heady to have Shane there off-ice, watching him, trailing him, putting himself in Ilya’s way, and turning pink when Ilya put his hands on him. 

The short break for Christmas might be necessary, Ilya realized, if only to give him the opportunity to cool off. Ilya did not hold the same nostalgia or tenderness for the Christmas holiday that most of the rest of his team did, but he still enjoyed the season. He liked the gaudy decorations and the string lights and the way all the commercials on TV suddenly became saccharine and overly cheerful. Still, he hadn’t really paid any mind to what he might do on Christmas day besides order Chinese food delivery. These half-baked plans were ruined when the team ferreted out that Ilya would be staying in Boston alone for the short break, and took it upon themselves to make plans for him. O’Neil was quickly volunteered as sacrifice, and after a brief moment of clear panic, O’Neil enthusiastically warmed up to the idea.

“Of course you have to come, Rozy,” he exclaimed, whacking Ilya several times on the back. “You’ll be better than Santa!”

So on the twenty-fifth, Ilya set out for the O’Neil house around 3:30pm. It was around an hour’s drive, which gave him the opportunity to really take his sports car out. He couldn’t drive it the way he wanted in the city proper, which was an irritating gridlock of old, narrow streets, insane intersections, and drivers who actually deserved the epithet of ‘lunatic.’ 

O’Neil had the strange twist of fate to be drafted for him home team; he was a born and raised Massachusetts Irish Catholic. Ilya didn’t really think of him outside of the rink, but as he walked up to the O’Neil family house he had a realization that this was a person who had an entire, full life outside of the team and an entire, full network of people orbiting him that Ilya might never have known if he hadn’t shown up for Christmas dinner. And each of those people in O’Neil’s orbit were the same, with lives and orbits of their own. On and on for everyone, everywhere. And how many people were like Ilya, tonight, being brought into these previously unknown orbits to celebrate with strangers they might have never otherwise met? This was the point of holidays, he supposed. He felt a little sorry to O’Neil, for not thinking of him as a fully real person; but he supposed that O’Neil didn’t really think of Ilya outside of the rink either, so they were even. 

These were the sorts of thoughts he used to share with his mother, back when she was still alive. Thinking them reminded him of her and made him feel her presence, somewhere back by his brain stem, or beneath his sternum. Sometimes that sort of feeling could be painful. But it wasn’t this time. It felt a little warm and a little sad. She would have liked this house, how American it was, how grand and cheerful. 

 Ilya shook his head and went up to the front door. The house was made of red brick, with symmetrical windows lined up all the way to a third floor. It was a wealthy house, which did not surprise Ilya. A lot of guys who made it into the big leagues came from upper class families. When he knocked, the door opened to a dark-haired, red-faced woman, who looked marginally like O’Neil in the eyebrows and mouth. She smiled upon seeing him. 

“Merry Christmas, Ilya Rozanov!” she exclaimed. “Come in, come in! What’s all that in your arms? You didn’t have to bring anything!”

The woman was named Eileen and she brought Ilya through the house into the kitchen where there was a bit of a circus happening. Everyone stopped and made a big to-do over Ilya, and he was able to pass off the potted poinsettia and bottle of good vodka to Mrs. O’Neil. Then Eileen brought him into the living room where Ilya was quickly introduced to a gaggle of similar looking, dark-haired young women, all of whom might have been O’Neil’s sisters or cousins or a mixture of both before O’Neil waded through the chaos and rescued him. Everyone was in merry spirits, and O’Neil was a surprisingly gracious host, making sure to inform Ilya about various peoples’ backgrounds and connections, explaining inside jokes as best he could, and refilling Ilya’s drink. 

Ilya was glad he had come. He liked seeing families like this; it felt like a storybook come to life. There were people in every room of the first floor, Christmas songs playing beneath the din of laughter and loud conversation, and the smell of ham baking in the oven. There was a grand Christmas tree in the front room with ribbons and white lights and many red and gold glittering ornaments. Then there was a tree in the back room that had all the handmade ornaments from elementary school classrooms over the years, featuring all the O’Neils in various stages of missing teeth, 90’s haircuts, and a surprising amount of dried noodles. 

“Why pasta,” Ilya asked, after inspecting the tree. 

“Oh, y’know,” O’Neil said, shrugging. “Arts and crafts.”

This was not a sufficient explanation.  

Dinner was served later than expected due to the ham needing longer in the oven. When everything was ready, Ilya found that the table in the dining room was not long enough to hold everyone, so there was a card table and folding chairs set up in the adjacent room for the kids, of which there were seven or eight, and who seemed to be in constant fits of giggles. He was a little disappointed that he had to sit with the adults. The food was what Ilya had come to expect from American Christmas. Along with the ham there was also turkey, and various sides and sauces. He ate quite a lot and let the talk of the family wash over him. Two of the uncles had been fighting earlier, which O’Neil had explained in a low voice, and Ilya noted with some amusement that these men had been placed at the opposite far ends of the table. 

It was a nice night. O’Neil could be an entitled asshole occasionally, but now Ilya had a direct line to Mama O’Neil, which he was not above using threateningly if the time ever called for it. 

Any lingering good feeling leftover from the O’Neil family Christmas was squashed the next day because Ilya had to talk to his father on the phone. It was not a good conversation. He realized that the suspicions he’d had over the past summer were coming to fruition. His father’s mind was going and Ilya felt himself standing on the precipice of losing his last remaining parent. He hated how scared and sad he felt about it. He could have happily never spoken to his father again, but ‘not speaking’ was entirely different than ‘unable to speak.’ 

Needless to say, he was maudlin and off-kilter during the first practice back. Shane was a good distraction. He had come back from the Christmas holiday nearly glowing with contentedness, and Ilya’s eyes kept getting stuck on him, on the way his mouth seemed to be constantly on the verge of curving upwards. At lunch, Ilya sat across from him at the terrible salad place Shane had chosen, and looked his fill. In the pitiful, gray December light coming in through the storefront windows, Shane seemed like the one bright spot. 

“Good break?” Ilya asked. “You look happy.”

Shane smiled down at his bowl of leaves.

“It was great!” he said. 

“You tell me about it,” Ilya commanded. 

Shane launched into a summary of his Christmas, which seemed to include a lot of family time with his parents and an aunt that had flown in from New York. Ilya listened avidly, watching the small softening of Shane’s features as he talked about his family. Since he’d met Shane, the feelings that Ilya got from hearing about Shane’s family had steadily morphed from bitter to greedy. He found himself reaching out for these stories, hungry, like Shane was breaking a cookie in half and holding it out to share. 

Shane’s Christmas sounded cozy and quiet, just the sort of thing Ilya might have imagined for him, if he had been pathetic enough to do so, which he wasn’t. Though admittedly he did think about the photos on Shane’s living room wall every now and then. 

“I’m sure O’Neil’s place was crazy,” Shane was saying. “Doesn’t he have four sisters?”

“Yes, crazy,” Ilya said. “Nice people. Many, many nice people all talking at same time.” 

Shane laughed a little and nodded. 

“Sounds about right. What else did you do, besides go to O’Neil’s for dinner?”

Ilya shrugged and waved a hand to signal ‘this and that.’ 

“Uh, how’s, how’s your father? You must have talked to him a little, right? ” 

Ilya made a noncommittal sound and ate the final bite of his wrap. Of course Shane would want to ask about Ilya’s family. It was top of mind for him. He probably couldn’t imagine someone not wanting to spend the holiday with their parents. 

“And your brother?” Shane asked, watching Ilya so intently. “How’s he doing?” 

“Why you’re ask?” Ilya said, trying to keep his tone mild, to beat back his instinctual defensiveness. “Boring.”

“It’s not boring. Not to me. I’d like to know anything you want to tell me.”

“Father boring. Brother boring. Nothing to tell,” Ilya said, his tone souring.  

“When I told you all that stuff about being a role model for Asian kids, did you think that was boring?” 

Ilya scoffed. As if comparing Ilya’s family issues to Shane’s struggles with racism made any sense. 

“That is important.” 

“Yeah,” Shane said. “It’s important because it’s important to me. So what’s important to you is also important! I should probably stop saying that word. But do you understand what I’m trying to say?”

Ilya stared at him. Over and over again, Shane kept reaching out. He was so earnest. He was trying. And Ilya kept pushing him aside, deflecting. He didn’t want to show Shane the sad, dull truths of his family. They were so mundane. So what if his father was a tyrant, so what if his brother was a corrupt coward? So what if his mother was dead and so what if Ilya was the family defector, the black sheep? The Rozanov family brand of unhappiness did not feel very special or unique. Not to Ilya. 

“I mean, I know you keep your family stuff private. I don’t want to push you. But I’d like to know, if you want to tell me. I’d like to be there for you like how you were for me.” 

“Okay, Shane,” said Ilya, placating. It was a little scary, how Ilya was feeling himself start to crack. 

“I’m just asking because it was Christmas, and the Olympics are right around the corner, you know? Like, you’re gonna be seeing them soon, right? Will your dad and brother come to see you play?”

“My father, yes, brother maybe.” 

Ilya sat back in his chair and crossed his arms. Shane gave him a sad look and then nodded. Those damned cow eyes. Shane reaching out in these sorts of ways was akin to placing a candle on a windowsill in midwinter and seeing the frost slowly dissipate from the heat of the flame. Ilya was thawing, minutely, gradually. It wasn’t that Shane was eclipsing the truths from Ilya’s past. That was impossible. But he was kindling warmth where there had been none. Or (and?), rekindling warmth that had long been forgotten. Shit, Ilya thought, blinking across the table at Shane’s earnest face. Was he really going to talk about his family with Shane Hollander? Yes, it seemed. 

“My father? Police,” Ilya found himself saying. “My brother? Police. Father, very old-fashioned. And I’m worry, worried,” he corrected himself. “About his thinking. His memory. I talk to him on phone and he’s confused, little bit. Sometimes. I don’t know,” Ilya shook his head. “Maybe is nothing.”

There was a pause before Shane responded. He was clearly surprised that Ilya had elaborated at all. Well, Ilya was surprised too. He didn’t know what he wanted Shane to say and he was trying to reign in the instinct to grow defensive again, closed off and cold. 

“Oh,” Shane said after a moment. “I’m, I’m really sorry to hear that. Did something happen over Christmas?”

“He calls me, thinks my mother is there.” 

“But she’s…” Shane trailed off, uncertainly, tipping his chin down and peering at Ilya from under his brows.

God. Ilya did not want to talk about this. Why was he talking about this? He tore an errant piece of shredded lettuce into further little bits. 

“Yes, dead,” said Ilya. “After little bit, my father is normal. But for little bit, he’s thinking she’s alive.” 

“Jeez,” Shane said. “That’s gotta be really, really tough, Ilya. I’m sorry. What will you do? Can he see a doctor?” 

Ilya shook his head. Of course this was the logical next step. But Ilya’s father’s pride was vast and poisonous. 

“It will have to get worse. Much, much worse. Before doctor.” 

“Well maybe,” Shane said, leaning his elbows on the table. “I mean maybe it’ll be a good thing, to see him at Sochi? In person you might be able to get a closer read on what’s going on.” 

It was another logical point. Ilya was seeing firsthand exactly how Shane reacted when presented with other people’s dilemmas. He was a problem solver, addressing issues and finding solutions. It was endearing. And also, Ilya couldn’t bear it. He didn’t want level-headed suggestions. He just wanted to ignore it all. 

Ilya gave Shane a tight smile, and nodded. Shane’s eyes darted across Ilya’s face. He tilted his head. 

“Listen, I’ll stop asking about him, if you want,” Shane offered. 

Ilya scrubbed his hands through his hair, fingers catching on snarling curls. A part of him wanted to say, ‘yes, please stop.’ But there was another, more confusing part of him that didn’t want Shane to stop asking at all. 

“Is okay,” Ilya said, trying not to sound too grudging. “But maybe not a lot. Only…Cheat day.”

—

Perhaps for someone else, the looming specter of a parent’s onset dementia might affect them in other areas of their life. But Ilya had many years of practice at compartmentalizing. His skating did not suffer. The team’s momentum did not falter. The Raiders were playing beautiful hockey.

After one particularly incendiary game, Ilya strode into the bar for the post-game celebration and saw the team gathered around several tables. He grinned. Here were the ugly bastards with whom he was going to win the Cup. He was not superstitious, and had no qualms about thinking about that possibility. In fact, in his mind it was solidifying, thanks to this group of beautiful, wonderful, ugly bastards. Ilya’s eyes dragged across the group and found Hollander, who was emanating joy as bright as a tractor beam. Ilya was helpless to that pull, and got right up behind him and put his hands on Shane’s face, tipping it back to see him better. Shane had scored a hat trick that night, the last goal off of Ilya’s assist. Their wonderful star rookie who was currently all pink and pliable, all of his gears oiled with liquor. That particular brand of Hollander Want surged up in Ilya’s veins and threatened to drown him. For a moment all he could do was hold himself in check, so great the urge was to bend down and put his mouth to Shane’s. Instead he tore himself away and bought a round of shots.

The good feeling from the game had permeated throughout the bar. There were lots of Raiders fans there, but besides many rounds of selfies, no one was overbearing or irritating. There were a ton of women, many in jerseys, and the single guys quickly dispersed among them. Ilya took several rounds of shots with various strangers and then ended up on the dance floor with a small group of women who did not seem to know who he was, or at least if they did, didn’t care. It would be easy to pick up tonight, but his eyes couldn’t stop following Shane around the room, snagging on him as he chatted with Pike, was swallowed up by a group of Raiders fanboys, was spat out, and was then in a long and animated conversation with a woman during which they both seemed to be mimicking casting a fishing line. 

Ilya was thankfully distracted by his anthropological study of Shane Hollander in the wild by the D.J. playing a series of good songs. But then…then there was a hand at his hip. Ilya turned and saw Shane, blinking at him. His heart leapt. Shane had come to find him. In all of this chaos, on the dance floor no less, which he hated. Shane’s fingers slipped and hooked onto his belt loop. Ilya was pleased enough (and drunk enough) to forget himself, just a little. Hat trick rookie. Trouble. He put his arms around him. 

Shane was wonderfully solid and warm, his shoulders and his neck—his neck!—right there like a siren song. Shane’s hands came tentatively to Ilya’s waist, and then more firmly gripped him as Ilya kept dancing to the beat. That was nice. It was probably the first time Shane had ever touched him off-ice and with intent, save for fist bumps or shoulder slaps. 

“You wanna dance with me, rookie?” Ilya said into Shane’s ear, teasing. 

“I can’t dance,” Shane mumbled, and then put his head down on Ilya’s shoulder. 

That was even nicer, but it was clear Shane was wasted, and therefore Ilya would have to be the responsible one. The crowd at the bar seemed okay, but seeing the Raiders’ captain and star rookie canoodling on the dance floor was probably incentive enough for a few people to whip out their phones.

Ilya was about to pull away when he found himself pressed all up and down against Shane’s body. Shane was gripping him tightly, one arm hooked firmly around Ilya’s mid-back and the other barred across the upper curve of his ass. Ilya went hot so fast he got dizzy. 

“Whoa, whoa,” he said.

Pulling away was terrible, but the responsibility to take care of Shane was more important than the desire to let him keep clinging. Besides, Shane probably didn’t know what he was doing…Case in point, now Shane was glaring at him, eyes all scrunched up like he couldn’t see straight and was saying, plaintively, “What’s going on?”  

What was going on was that they were going. Immediately, Ilya decided. He told him as much, and Shane put up no protest, moving easily where Ilya’s hands pushed and pulled him. Suddenly it was very important that he get Hollander out of there. Someone might see his special brand of sweetness and try to swoop in to steal him.

I’m taking him. He’s mine, Ilya thought as he hurried Shane forwards, one hand pushing between his shoulders. They got their coats from the coat check and stumbled through the entrance way. 

Then, outside. The air was chill and brisk against Ilya’s hot face. The music from inside throbbed dimly through the brick-walled building. The street was not busy, the pavement slick with water solidifying into ice. Ilya lit a cigarette and braced for complaints, but Shane was quiet. One shoulder against the wall, turned completely towards Ilya like a sunflower to its light source. Shane was plucking absently at Ilya’s shirt sleeve, which was poking out of his coat cuff. Ilya held still and let him. 

“This shirt feels nice,” Shane said, the sibilances slurring. “Can I sleep at your house?”

That was quite the non sequitur. Ilya smiled. 

“You crazy lightweight.” 

Shane made some pathetic chirp about vodka and then giggled to himself. He had a terrible sense of humor. But apparently Ilya did too because he was smiling. He’d been smiling this whole time. 

 He was going to send Shane home. But in the cab, he didn’t give a second address. The dawning smile of realization and disbelief on Shane’s face was worth the idiotic decision. 

“Really?” Shane said, his voice warm and happy. 

“Shh,” Ilya said. “Quiet time.” 

In his house, Shane shambled along after him, politely and blearily thanking him for letting him stay over. Ilya kept himself aloof. Hollander, amenable and listing unbalanced, was temptation incarnate. Ilya could take advantage. Push him down on the guest bed. He’d go willingly. Ilya remembered the press of his body in the bar. Instead, he showed him where the extra toiletries were, forbade any early wake up calls, and fled. 

The next morning, Ilya woke up with a dry mouth and a minor headache. But taking Hollander home had ultimately saved him from drinking too much. The thought of Shane in his house made him scrunch his nose so he wouldn’t smile at the ceiling like a fool. He got out of bed and decided he should go check on the rookie before anything else. Shane had been sloshed last night, and Ilya wondered how badly he would feel that morning because of it. When Ilya was eighteen, the only times he ever got hungover was when he mixed liquors enough to black out. It was unclear how much Shane had done of either one of those things. He hoped Shane would be fine, and that he’d not needed the vomit bowl Ilya had so kindly and thoughtfully provided. 

The door to the guest room was wide open. Ilya poked his head in and saw it empty, the bed flawlessly made with barely a wrinkle in the duvet. Had he really left without a word? Ilya refused to pay mind to the sinking feeling in his gut. He would not mope about Shane Hollander. Ilya went back to his own room, splashed some water on his face, ignored the terrible mess of his hair, and brushed his teeth before heading downstairs. It was then that he heard rustling, the sound of paper. He cocked his head and went into the living room. There was Shane, studiously paging through one of the stupid decorative books left there by the interior designer. 

“I thought you left,” Ilya said, grumpy at the insane spike of happiness that had jolted through him upon seeing Shane on his sofa.  

Shane blinked up at him.

“No that would be rude.”

His skin tone was off. Usually it was warm, even under the fluorescent glow of the rink lights. But this morning it was cool and wan, and there were small shadows under his eyes. 

“I will make breakfast,” Ilya decided. 

He watched carefully as Shane ate what he made him. It probably didn’t align with his bizarre diet, but his manners were too deeply ingrained to refuse the food or leave any scraps on his plate. It did him good, Ilya saw with satisfaction. Shane’s coloring looked a little better. 

“So what do you usually do, on off days like this?” Shane asked after finishing his last bite of toast. 

Ilya shrugged. The most important thing about off days was sleeping in. 

“Work out, watch TV, play video game, make food. Call Svetlana, maybe. Relax. Why. What you do.”

“The same,” Shane said, noncommittally. 

Ilya narrowed his eyes. As if Shane didn’t have his entire day blocked out.

“Oh? You call Svetlana behind my back? How you’re get her number?”

His stupid teasing was rewarded with Shane’s laughter. Ilya grinned and leaned too far over the kitchen counter, wanting to be closer to him. 

“Not that part. But the rest of it.”

“Relax? Shane Hollander?”

“I can relax!” 

“Okay, you prove it. We go watch TV. Hang out.”

Ilya jerked his head towards the living room and then padded out of the kitchen. He was bracing himself for more excuses, for Shane to say he had to go and then actually leave. But instead Shane followed him back into the living room and sat next to him on the couch and turned to look at him expectantly. 

Trying and failing not to feel too smug, Ilya set up the controls for BioShock. Shane didn’t seem like the type to play video games like this, but Ilya had a suspicion that he’d get really into it regardless. Sure enough, after a couple hours Shane was hollering at the TV and sitting so far forward on the sofa cushion that he was basically hovering. 

“You so bad!” Ilya crowed. 

“I’m gonna kill you,” Shane yelled. “God! Fucking fuck this!”

Ilya threw his head back and laughed as Shane gave an enraged howl, his avatar dying for the umpteenth time. It was incredible to see Shane, the even-keeled media darling, lose his shit over a video game. Ilya watched, enraptured, as Shane visibly attempted to compose himself. 

“I think I need a break or I’m gonna have an aneurism,” Shane said, stiffly setting the controller on the coffee table and then settling awkwardly back into the sofa. 

There were any number of things Ilya could say then. A tiny, evil part of him wanted to keep pushing and pressing, with the goal of ferreting out any more of Shane’s unsightly personality traits. But that part was easily squashed as he watched the angry, high color fade from Shane’s face and the way eventually Shane settled, loose-limbed, against the sofa. 

“What means ‘aneurism,’” Ilya said, putting his controller down too. 

Shane made a considering sound in the back of his throat. 

“Like, my brain’s gonna explode, or something,” he said. “I’m actually not too sure what it really means, medically.”

Of course. It was one of those things that any native speaker did. They knew a word or phrase intrinsically from hearing it in conversations, but when asked for the actual definition they couldn’t really provide it. 

“You just say anything. Not know what it means. Say anyway,” Ilya grumbled. 

He was used to it, but during his first year it used to drive him nuts. Randy, who had the most patience for trying to explain English idioms, usually got the brunt of it. 

“Well, people understand the sentiment,” Shane said. Then he saw Ilya’s blank look. “Uh, the like, general meaning.” 

“‘Sentiment. Aneurism.’ I bring to tutor.”

“You have a tutor?” Shane asked, voice bright with surprise. 

“You think language acquisition occurs out of thin air?” Ilya said. Then, in English, he attempted to explain how irritating it was, the particles, the contractions, the pronouns, and articles. 

“No, I get it,” Shane said. “I guess I didn’t really think about it. Sorry.” 

Ilya shrugged. No one really thought about the actual work that went into learning a new language if you weren’t doing it yourself. 

“I’m captain. Need to get better. Give better interviews. Communicate.”

The necessity to communicate had been drilled into him during his first season. It had come from all angles. Even Alyosha had started refusing to speak to him at home if he didn’t use English. Despite how annoying and frustrating it was, Ilya could see now how much he benefited from it. There was no way he could have navigated the post-parking garage conversation with Shane if he hadn’t been diligently working year after year on his English. 

Ilya leaned across the small distance between them and bumped his shoulder to Shane’s.

“Need to get better for chatty rookies.”

“Hey, I’m probably helping you by being chatty,” Shane said. 

The corner of his mouth was curled up into a smile.

“Yes, you help. You can help more, help teach me, if I say wrong thing.”

“Really?” Shane asked, turning to face him. “You’d want me to do that?”

Ilya nodded. “Help me get better,” he said. 

 “You’re pretty good.” 

Ilya made a so-so pantomime with his hand. 

“I mean it!” Shane insisted, smiling. “If things were the opposite and I was in Russia, trying to learn Russian in only a few years, I’d be way worse at it than you.”

“No, you probably learn in one week. No accent. Bonjour.” 

Shane waved a hand. 

“That’s different. I learned French in school.”

Ilya shrugged. A silence fell between them then. It was simple and nice. Sometimes delivering the charming, arrogant persona people expected from him was as easy as breathing, and sometimes it got tiresome. And with the guys on the team, Ilya always had to be the captain, the guy who they relied on. But right then, with Shane, he could just be quiet for a little bit, and he knew Shane wouldn’t mind.

“Besides not liking the language, do you like it here?” Shane asked, eventually. “Like, I mean, do you miss Russia all the time?” 

“Russia…” Ilya sighed.

How could he explain how he felt to Shane in a way that was understandable and didn’t reveal how fucked up he was about it? And why did he feel such a big impulse to reveal all of the fucked up parts anyways? 

“I go back for summers,” he continued. “Speak real language. But here we play hockey. I’m not miss Russia during season.”

Shane nodded and then sent a shy look Ilya’s way out of the corners of his eyes. 

“‘I don’t miss Russia during the season,’” Shane corrected and then went still, waiting for Ilya’s reaction.

Ilya parroted him dutifully, and smiled. Shane huffed, a little sound, both amused and relieved. Maybe he hadn’t believed Ilya when he’d asked for corrections, but Ilya had been serious. He could count on Shane to offer them at face value, with no mockery or judgement. 

“I guess it’s probably good you don’t miss it during the season,” Shane said then. “I’d miss my parents. I mean, I do and I’m still in the same continent as them. But maybe you don’t really, I don’t know, miss your dad or brother?”

Ah, Shane. He was always poking and prodding, trying to find a way in. It was clear that he’d probably keep asking until Ilya told him the gist of it. But he wasn’t ready. Didn’t want to. The morning had been so nice. Shane, in his house, eating his food, playing his video games, correcting his English. Shane, relaxing, bit by bit. Shane’s warm brown eyes in the daylight. He didn’t want to invoke his father and ruin all of this. Ilya shook his head. 

“I told you. They boring. We not close. I send money. That’s it.” 

He tried to say it lightly, but Shane still hunched a little, interpreting it as a reprimand. 

“Right,” he said. “I didn’t mean to make this a cheat day.” 

“No,” Ilya said. It was instinct to get a hand on him, to reassure him. He squeezed Shane’s knee. “Is okay, cheat day. We do. Order cheeseburger for lunch.” 

Shane was frozen for a moment, staring down at Ilya’s hand. Then, “Um…But…um…I was thinking that I should go.”

Ilya paused. This was not the reaction he had expected, and he looked at the side of Shane’s face intently, for clues. His ears were red and his shoulders were creeping up towards them. 

“Hollander?” Ilya didn’t know where this new and sudden tension had come from. 

“It’s just,” Shane said. “I have errands to do. Grocery shopping, and stuff. And I’ve been here a while. Don’t want to overstay my welcome. So I’ll probably just go now.” 

Ilya watched Shane’s twisting fingers as he spoke. And again, it was instinct again to put his hand over Shane’s, quelling the nervous movement. But it was the same this time too. Shane did not react how he expected. Instead of settling, instead of calming, Shane pulled his hands away and stood up.

“Thanks for uh, everything. But like I said, I’ll just head out now,” he said, and hurried to the front door. 

Ilya sat in shock for a moment before getting up and following Shane to where he was trying to shove his feet into his shoes at the front door. 

“What’s wrong with you?” 

“I’m gonna go,” Shane muttered.

“Shane, hey, calm down,” Ilya said. He put his hands on Shane’s shoulders and squeezed. “Talk to me.” 

Shane squirmed, staring down at the floor. It was clear he was trying to run. Maybe if he had been anyone else, Ilya would have let him go. But this was the person he’d talked down in the parking garage, the person who’d gone upstairs during the Halloween party to look at Ilya’s bedroom, the person who’d pressed himself all up against Ilya in the club last night like a wanton lush. Ilya was not going to let Shane run. 

Shane kept hiding his eyes, looking at the ground, ducking his head. Ilya kept trying to see him, kept trying to check in. Eventually Shane snapped. 

“Stop touching me!”

Ilya’s stomach lurched and the world as he knew it threatened to tilt on its axis. This whole time, had Shane hated it? But no. No. Ilya mentally shook himself. He knew how to read Shane. He knew when Shane was grossed out. This was something else. Fear. And embarrassment. Ilya took Shane’s chin in his hand and tilted his head up so he could gauge his expression. Before Shane jerked his chin out of Ilya’s grasp, he caught a glimpse of Shane’s eyes. They were wet, hurt, and full of wanting. Ilya was about to reassure him, but then a tirade of jumbled words burst out of Shane’s mouth.

“That’s exactly what I mean! You’re too—it’s too…I don’t know…it’s too… It’s confusing me. I know you don’t mean anything by it, but I can’t help myself. I’ve tried and I can’t help it!” 

Ilya blinked. “You think I don’t mean anything…”

“You touch everyone on the team. I know it doesn’t mean anything,” Shane said. 

His tone was accusatory and ashamed all at once. Is that what had Shane been thinking, all this time? That he was just one of the guys? Shane really thought Ilya ran his hand through all of the guys’ hair, that he slung both arms around their necks when he was drunk at a bar? Ilya tsked. It was clear, now, that with Shane he needed to do away with subtleties and give him everything straight up. Well, that would not be a hardship. Ilya slid his hands to either side of Shane’s neck, and tipped Shane’s head up again. 

“I touch the guys like this?” he said. “You’re thinking this?” 

He watched Shane take in his expression, the solemnity of his tone. Shane’s brow creased, doubt eclipsing the embarrassment. 

“I don’t…I…I told you I’m confused,” Shane said.

Endearingly, he’d hooked his hands over Ilya’s wrists, keeping him there.  

“Sorry,” Ilya said. “I’m thinking you’re understand because you never push away.”

“I don’t want to push you away!” Shane exclaimed, as if the very idea was appalling. 

Ah, so he liked it too much, Ilya realized. Everything was making sense now. Shane was trying to run because he liked it, and thought he shouldn’t. A delicious, warm feeling unfurled inside Ilya’s sternum. 

“So you do like,” he said, and rubbed his fingertips along the perfect edge of Shane’s hairline at his nape.  

“Well yeah,” Shane said, brutally honest. Blinking rapidly. “Too much. That’s why you should stop. So I won’t keep getting confused.”

After he finished speaking he let out this huge, juddering sigh, as if all the fight had gone out of him and he was surrendering himself up to whatever Ilya might do to him. He still thought Ilya hadn’t meant anything but any of it. Maybe he thought Ilya was going to kick him out of his house and banish him from the team. Ilya held Shane’s face between his hands and just—just stared. Then he noticed Shane’s brow start to pull and he took pity on him. 

“Here. I don’t do this with the guys,” he said, and then finally, finally, pressed his mouth to Shane’s. 

For the first few moments, Shane kissed like how Ilya remembered girls did when he was a young teenager: tentative, delicate, maybe insecure. Ilya knew Shane had only had a high school girlfriend and a couple other one night stands for practice, so it made sense. Ilya got momentarily sidetracked, imagining it. Shane kissing his high school sweetheart, shy, gentle, making sure she wasn’t uncomfortable, making sure he wasn’t taking too much. That’s not what Ilya wanted here, now. Ilya put his hand to the back of Shane’s neck and squeezed. Then he took his jaw in his other hand and kissed him firm and dirty, with tongue. Be greedy, he was telling him through that kiss. You’re not going to scare me off. I can take it. 

Shane’s lips opened on a low sound and his timidity disappeared into frantic mouthing and grabbing hands. This was better. This was Shane, cracked open, all of his walls crumbling down to reveal the want inside of him. The want he’d been so afraid of that he’d tried to bolt from Ilya’s house. But now here it was, spilling from him in the motions of his hands and mouth, and it was delicious. For several long moments, Ilya lost himself, so relieved to have Shane like this and nearly sick with lust. 

In time, Shane dragged his face away, gasping and Ilya resorted to kissing down his jawline, and, God, his neck. 

“But I,” Shane was saying. He sounded delirious. Drugged. “I’m pretty sure we’re not supposed to do things like this.”

Ilya pulled back and raised his eyebrows ever so slightly. 

“Ah, no,” he agreed. 

“So, then,” Shane said, and swallowed.

He waited, watching Shane’s face. Shane was frowning slightly, his eyes stuck on Ilya’s mouth. He was clearly fighting some sort of internal battle, and Ilya could only hope he chose the side of his devils rather than his angels. 

Ilya hummed with pleasure when Shane pushed his hands into Ilya’s hair and brought his mouth back towards him, a little pushy and a lot needy. So then, if Shane was going to let go of all of his reservations and take what he wanted, Ilya would too. Ilya’s instincts told him that Shane might like relinquishing control in this context, and when Ilya tried it, moving Shane’s head this way and that with a hand on his jaw, Shane responded beautifully. 

But Shane was not passive. It only took a minute or so before Shane was making his own moves, putting his hand down Ilya’s sweatpants and then changing tactics, sliding down to his knees. Ilya held still as best he could. The urge to reach out and drag Shane’s face to his crotch was tingling in his hands, but he wouldn’t do that. At least, not this time. He wanted to see what Shane would do of his own accord, and Shane was currently staring at Ilya’s dick with determination. Then he put his mouth on him. 

“Mary, mother of God,” Ilya said. And then in English, “Fuck.”

Too soon, he had to pull Shane back upright. He didn’t want to come by his front door, and he had plans. Many plans that were multiplying by the second. He wanted to do everything to Shane, all at once. 

“I’m gonna put you in my bed,” Ilya said, which was first on the list.  He said it using one of those sloppy contractions North Americans liked so well.

“Okay,” Shane said, his mouth carnation red. “Hey, that sounded really fluent.” 

“Not talk about English now,” Ilya said, even though he’d been the one to mimic it. 

Shane was grinning wide enough that Ilya could almost see the sides of his back molars. He was so artless and so himself, even in this moment. Ilya could barely stand it. 

“I will ruin you for all other men,” Ilya told him.

Shane made an inquiring noise, not understanding the Russian words but still grinning nonetheless. Ilya could not help himself, and pressed a closed-mouthed kiss mostly against Shane’s teeth. Then he grabbed Shane’s hand and tugged. 

It took very little time to get Shane naked and in his bed. He looked like a vision sprawled on Ilya’s blue duvet, blushing clear up to his hairline. Ilya just had to kiss him all across that flushed color. He didn’t care if it was overzealous. He’d never felt like this during a first hookup, this fatalistic affection.

“Ilya,” Shane said, face upturned and eyes slit under Ilya’s shower of kisses. “I tried not to think about this. I tried, but I kept thinking about it. I wanna get my mouth on you again—”

Ilya moved down Shane’s body and got his mouth on Shane instead, then, to stop the ruinous tirade of honesty. It worked a little too well. Shane made a chorus of shocked sounds and came in no time at all. 

“Fuck!” Shane was saying, while Ilya coughed a little and swallowed several times. “Sorry! Sorry, I didn’t know I’d do that! I would have told you…”

Ilya made his way back up Shane’s body and hovered, looking down at his face. 

“Your first time with a man?”

Shane nodded, panting open-mouthed. 

“We see how many times I can make you come.”

Ilya watched Shane’s pupils bloom then, desire swallowing up the beautiful brown of his irises. 

“Jesus,” Shane said, before Ilya leaned down and kissed him. 

He had thought Shane would be a good fuck, in the sense that it would be satisfying to get under his skin and mess him up. But Ilya hadn’t expected all of this: how sweet he was, how surprised he seemed at how good he could feel, how easily overwhelmed. His red ears and his wet eyes, both now in this new context. Every single one of his reactions wound Ilya up even tighter. Shane Hollander was pushing buttons that Ilya hadn’t known he’d even had. There were so many impulses flaring inside his head. Crazy, sexy impulses like licking all over every inch of flushed skin, and crazy, unsexy impulses like putting his finger into Shane’s mouth and feeling along every single one of his teeth. Unfortunately, that’s the thought that made him come. It swept up and grasped him in a tight, vicious bind of pleasure. He gasped through it, bucking into his fist, shooting all over Shane’s chest and stomach. Shane was watching him the whole time. Hot-eyed. Perfect. 

After, Ilya flopped down next to Shane on the bed and stared up at the ceiling. His ears were ringing. His whole body was vibrating. What the fuck. 

“You killed me, Hollander,” he managed to say. “I’m dead.”

“You’re dead!” Shane wheezed, his voice breaking a little.

He was too much. Ilya wanted to put his face against Shane’s bicep and bite. 

“So,” Shane said, a little while later. “I guess you, like, uh, hook up with guys too?”

He could have made a joke. But Ilya had resolved to be straight up with Shane, and so instead he just told the truth, that he liked both equally. 

“Oh, okay,” Shane said. “I’ve only ever been with girls before this.”

“Yes, you say after I make you come in one minute.”

Shane made a half-hearted protest and then fell silent. Ilya wondered what he was thinking about, and wondered, if he asked, whether Shane would tell him. But then, Shane told him anyways. 

“No girl has ever made me come three times before…” he said.

Ilya resisted the urge to put his face in his hands. Shane would surely kill him with all of these earnest truths offered up as plain as day. 

“You like bossy,” Ilya told him. 

It was important that Shane knew this, and accepted it. Shane made a considering sound. 

“My girlfriend was plenty bossy.” 

“In bed?” Ilya asked, lifting his head, abruptly very intrigued.

“Well, no. But everywhere else.” 

Ilya made a disappointed sound and sank back into the mattress. He’d just had several brief and very delicious mental images that were now squashed. 

“You think it felt so good because you were bossing me around?”

Ilya just hummed, playing it cool, letting Shane come to his own conclusions. 

—

It simply could not happen again. At least, not that season. Ilya told himself this firmly, many times over the course of the next couple weeks. So, since it couldn’t happen again and since Ilya was not going to start living like a monk at age twenty-one, he went out and picked up. She was in grad school and had a small but nice apartment that had to be at least partially on her parents’ dime, what with the location and how Ilya knew vaguely that grad students were supposed to be broke. 

When he was younger he’d usually try to pick up the hottest woman in the establishment, making it kind of a game for himself. But those sorts of vain thrills, which had been so enjoyable during his first season, did not feel the same by his second. By then, what he liked more were certain moments of tension, the way someone’s gaze might catch and linger on him, a tilt of her head, the way she reacted when his hand first touched her skin with intent. The grad student had that sort of quality, and yet the hookup was a disaster. Not for her, of course, but for Ilya, who had not enjoyed it and had spent most of it desperately smothering down the memories of Shane Hollander that kept surfacing inside of his head. Ilya left without sleeping over and, in the taxi ride back to his house, Ilya thought about how he should have just done without it. An orgasm was an orgasm, some said. But that wasn’t true at all, actually. Ilya thought about Shane’s bright, shocked moans, the tender stretch of his stomach as he arched, his hands, always grabbing for Ilya. There was no comparison at all. What was the point of pursuing paler, cheaper thrills when he’d had something that lit him up so well, something that he kept thinking about, something that felt impossible to overcome?

The facts were that Ilya had debauched the Raiders’ star rookie and subsequently descended into a personal hellscape in which his dick barely worked except when he thought about said star rookie. And then it worked too enthusiastically. Well, no matter. They were his own thoughts and his dick was his own dick; no one would know. Since it wasn’t going to happen again this year, his dick would get over it. Eventually. Besides, he had more important things to think about, which included all of the reasons why it couldn’t happen again that season. Namely the fact that the team’s prospects were clearly on the up and up and, as the captain, he had to do whatever he could to maintain that momentum. And, of course, the Olympics. In Russia. 

The games leading up to their February departure went well, and Ilya endeavored to treat Shane the same as he ever had, so as not to hurt his feelings or spook him. But Shane seemed to have become more prickly than ever and Ilya quickly changed tactics, giving him a wider berth. They still had their lunches, though Shane had begged off one of them at the end of the month as his parents were in town to see him before the Olympics. He only talked about hockey, during those lunches, and Ilya only talked about hockey back. It was for the best, of course. He had more important things to think about. 

By early February, Ilya had descended into a spiral about Russia. He was perseverating on it, really. Obsessing over the infuriating dinners he would have to have with his father, the pestering from his brother, the awful pity he’d feel upon seeing his niece, about the ridiculous shmoozing and deferential mingling he’d have to do with government officials, about the shit he’ll have to take from all the old guys on the team who thought he shouldn’t have been given (or accepted) the C. There would be no joy in the game at Sochi. No easy camaraderie on the Russian team. There would be only the push to move forward, to do better. Anything less than gold would be a complete failure. 

Ilya thought of all of this, lying ahead of him downstream like a crocodile with its jaws open wide, and scrubbed a hand through his hair. In times of extremely high stress, Ilya was prone to making rash decisions, decisions that would bring reprieve from the bad feeling. Decisions based solely on quick, easy pleasure. Sex, comfort food, alcohol, weed, retail therapy. He was pulling out his phone before his brain even registered it. And then, like a dog nosing its way into a forbidden stash of chocolate, Ilya ignored all of the higher functioning parts of his mind and sent a text. He wanted a taste of warmth before all of that cold. What of it? He was only human. He was only a man. Couldn’t he have this for himself? Couldn’t he make a few good memories while he still could, to hoard and turn over in his mind throughout the Games? 

(It was a terrible idea. But Shane texted back promptly, and Ilya was out the door in less than a minute.)

In Shane’s apartment, Ilya made a circle around the living space before coming up to survey the trio of photos. Check, check, check, the child, still beloved. His feelings were more complicated than jealousy. The idea of Shane having a father like Ilya’s, or worse, the idea of Shane finding his lifeless mother like Ilya had, was impossible to contemplate. Of course Shane must have adoring parents. Of course he deserved his warm childhood, full of unconditional love. It would be injustice for him to have had anything less. But still, there was a disconnect. There were things Shane was so assured of that Ilya couldn’t relate to. There were things he assumed that didn’t apply at all to Ilya. Their disparate childhoods were in the past, yes, but still rose to the surface in vague and unpredictable ways. Most clearly, now, how differently they’d be thinking about the winter games. Shane, excited, with his parents’ full support. Ilya, full of dread and defiance.

But he didn’t come here to think any more about Russia. He wanted to stop thinking about Russia altogether. Ilya went and sat on the sofa. Shane trailed him, radiating uncertainty. 

“So um, what should we do,” he asked, hovering in front of Ilya. 

The fabric of his hoodie pocket kept rising and falling with the motion of his twisting hands within it. Ilya’s heart squeezed. He patted his lap. Shane’s eyes went wide. 

“You mean…”

Ilya took pity on him and spoke the command out loud. 

“Come here.”

Shane always did so well with following Ilya’s instructions. He settled eagerly into a straddle, his face suddenly within kissing distance. Ilya’s greedy hands found purchase on Shane’s sides, his thumbs pressing into soft skin until they hit his hipbones. Desire yawned through Ilya like a mouth opening wide. Consuming, shuddering. Shane felt perfect on his lap, under his hands. 

“I thought maybe we wouldn’t do this again,” Shane said. 

His hands had slipped from Ilya’s shoulders around to the back of his neck, and his fingers were pressing and stroking distractingly against the curls there. 

“Is bad idea,” Ilya said, even though in that moment it felt like probably the most fantastic idea he’d ever had in his life.

“Right. And the Olympics are basically tomorrow.” 

“Really bad idea. After first time, I think we should not do again. With stranger is risky, but with teammate is risky and stupid. Maybe big mess.” 

“Right,” said Shane. “But you texted me.”

“Yes. Because I’m not thinking about good idea. I’m thinking about how many times I get you to shoot off. I’m thinking…I want to fuck you.”

As he spoke, Ilya grabbed two handfuls of Shane’s ass through his sweatpants and spread him, just a little bit. He watched as Shane’s lips parted and his eyes went half-lidded, lust blooming, dark pink, across his face. 

“You want?” Ilya said. It was barely a question. Shane’s eyes were nearly all pupil.  

“It’s a bad idea. But yeah. I really want you to fuck me,” Shane said, and then lowered his honest mouth down to meet Ilya’s.

“Yes,” Ilya hissed against his lips.

Ilya’s brain went fixated, as narrow and sharply aimed as a pointed arrow. There were no thoughts of Russia in his head anymore. They quickly tugged off their hoodies and shirts and pressed up against each other, skin to skin, and kissed and kissed and kissed. The only thing that mattered now was Shane’s body on his, his mouth on Ilya’s. Each time Ilya had the thought to pull away, to try and move things along, he got lost in the feeling of how good it was, kissing Shane. He was obsessed with Shane’s mouth. He couldn’t get enough. The idea of coming just from Shane’s grinding movements and from the feeling of Shane’s tongue, his teeth, his lips, was sounding just as good as the idea of getting up into him. 

But no. Ilya pulled away, gasping. He was going to fuck him. 

“Lube,” he managed. “Condom.” 

“Bedroom,” Shane said. 

Time slipped and morphed. They were naked. Shane was holding up his knees. Ilya was inside him. One finger. Shane made a noise like he might be dying. Ilya was expecting him to go soft, at least a little, but he didn’t. If anything he was wetter, harder. Ilya worked at him, totally locked in. He was hyper-focused, could barely remember to breathe or swallow. 

“God, do it, just do it,” Shane started saying over and over again,  too soon. “Enough, enough, I’m ready.”

Ilya blew out a breath and gritted his teeth. He only had two fingers in him, then. Shane was driving him crazy. His heartbeat was pounding, pulsing, in his dick. 

“Pretty boy,” he muttered. “You don’t even know what’s good for you. You’d let me do anything.”

“God, what are you saying?” Shane said, eyes squeezed shut. “Are you being mean?” 

The intrigued lilt to the second question made Ilya grin. 

“No,” he said in English, because being bossy was different than being mean. 

Eventually, Ilya deemed him ready and pushed in. Their mouths fell open, in sync, and Ilya could barely recognize the sound of his own voice when he asked if Shane was okay. He sounded drugged, shaky. 

“Okay,” Shane was saying in a hitching voice. “Okay, God, okay. Go, go.” 

It was instinct to turn him, after a few minutes, to get him on his knees. It would be a better angle that way for Shane. And Ilya also got the view of a lifetime: Shane’s gorgeous back, sloping down into the mattress, his neck bunched from where he had his head turned and pressed against the bed. The side of his face, red. His eye, squeezed shut. His mouth, open and moaning. 

It was only a couple minutes before the moans turned loud and shocked, and then Shane was writhing, clenching, and coming—Fuck! He was coming untouched! Ilya’s brain short-circuited. He knew he was talking, saying things, but he didn’t know what, could only hope they were in Russian. He was nothing but want, at that moment. Nothing but wanting to come. Ilya needed to, his brain deaf and dumb to anything else. His orgasm rolled through him like thunder, deep and elemental, and Ilya fell forward onto Shane’s body, mindless with the good feeling. 

Time passed. When his brain had halfway reformed in his skull, Ilya rolled off, dealt with the condom, and then lay back down on his side. Shane was still flat on his belly, his right cheek smushed against the mattress. Eyes closed, lips parted. He looked peaceful, despite the wreck of his hair and how red his face was.

Ilya breathed deep, in and out of parted lips. What if he’d stayed in Russia and played for the KHL, like his father had insisted? What if he’d been unable to break those chains of familial loyalty that had still held him tightly at seventeen, eighteen? He’d have never met Shane. He’d have never gotten to this moment, here. Well, maybe they’d have met at Sochi. Ilya would have been aware of him, at least. The Russians always kept tabs on MLH players. But he would have been some distant figure at the fringes of Ilya’s life. So far away that Ilya might have never even known he had freckles. 

Ilya thought back to his draft year, the howling and raging his father had done, the manipulation tactics employed to try and keep Ilya at home. The eventual forking over of most of his signing bonus to his brother so Alexei could do God knew what with it. The pathetic homesickness, despite all of that. The infuriating consistency of not being able to express himself in English. But the first time Ilya’d stepped on MLH ice, he knew all of that had been worth it. That he would go through all of it again, a hundred times over, to have that moment. 

Ilya felt the same, here. It was all worth it to be in Shane’s apartment in his bed, to have felt him shudder apart beneath Ilya’s hands. To have him now, like this, at rest. 

Ilya wasn’t a sex god; he was twenty-one. But he knew a thing or two. It didn’t seem that Shane knew as much, if anything. He had just come untouched. His first time and he’d shot off like popped champagne. Shane wouldn’t know the difference; maybe he thought that sort of thing happened all the time. There was an intense impulse rising up in Ilya, the urge to squirrel Shane away and keep him so that no one else could get their hands on him. Even the nebulous thought that someone else could have gotten this first sent a hot wash of irritation and jealousy surging under his breastbone. Good Lord, what if Ilya had kept listening to his higher morals and never came here to do this? Shane might have given it up to some idiot Canadian in the Olympic village, some good-for-nothing douchebag who didn’t know what a gift this was, didn’t know anything about Shane besides his scoring record, if that. No, Ilya thought, gnashing his metaphorical teeth. If Shane was going to give up huge things like this, then Ilya was going to be there to take them. All of them. He would collect them like sea glass, like the bright treasures they were. He would not allow anyone else to get the opportunity. 

There was no thought in his head of the hows or whys of it. There was only certainty. 

—

On the plane out to Sochi, Ilya drank several little plastic cups of bitter red wine and then took a sleeping pill. He woke up in a fuzzy, nebulous headspace and sat, zonked in his seat. The plane interior was dark, save for pockets of brightness from an overhead reading light or the back seat screen. The hum of the engine sounded like the ocean. Ilya turned his head to the window, which revealed nothing but the dim reflection of the plane cabin. He realized soon enough that he was thinking of his mother. Not in a direct way, but in the nebulous way that he was sort of always thinking of her. She was like the hum of a fan in the background of a room. It wasn’t that he was perseverating or obsessing; he’d done enough of that in the couple years after her death. No, it was more like she was just there. All the time, like his pulse, or the constant, inner workings of his organs. Sometimes he thought things at her, sometimes he ignored her. Sometimes he missed her with an aching as big as the sea, sometimes he didn’t feel sad at all. That was just grief. It was undefinable, changing, and ever present. 

So he was thinking about her, and as he focused more on her, she came forward, and he began to think to her, like he had done near constantly as an early teen and now did only once in a while. 

I don’t want to go back. I don’t want the C. Not for this team. Why couldn’t they have given it to Viktorovich, after all? Papa will be awful. Alexei will be awful. I wish Shane was on my team. All of these thoughts and more. Soupy with the lingering vestiges of the sleeping pill, but all truthful. He did not want to be back ‘home’ and he did not want to captain team Russia. And yet he was.  Last year, maybe, he wouldn’t have felt as resentful. But this year the interruption felt like a personal affront. The Raiders finally had wind in their sails. The team was winning. He’d had Shane Hollander under him, blissed out and moaning. And now the Sochi games were descending upon him like a garage door closing, steadily blocking out sunlight until nothing was left but the damp darkness of a bare concrete room. 

His mother could not answer, but it still felt like a conversation, sometimes, thinking things to her like that.

Ilya made it to the Olympic campus blearily jet lagged and brewing up a massive headache. He was in a foul temper. As he unpacked his suitcase in the Russian dorms, he thought sullenly about the various things Shane might be getting up to with his countrymen in the Canadian dorms. He thought uncharitable things about all the members of the hockey team, as well as those big air guys with their goofy personalities and too-long hair. He did not even spare the little brunette female figure skater from his poisonous thoughts, although thinking of the two of them together eventually devolved into something licentious about big brown eyes looking up at him…

Regardless, they had agreed not to speak while at the Games, not to even text. Ilya was not Shane’s keeper, no matter that his Id was protesting loudly against that truth, banging pots and pans in the dark corners of his mind. Shane could do what he wanted. And Ilya…Ilya would deal with Russia and everything that came with it. 

The Games passed by in an interminable slog punctuated by flashes—spikes—of misery. The Russian team was in shambles. Their goalie was hurt. Practices were grim. The game with Latvia ended in a whimper, beneath the outraged roars of the Russian crowd. Ilya felt himself retreat somewhere, deep into the back of his head where things would be quieter and he wouldn’t have to feel so much of the devastation.

Hollander texted him twice, despite their agreement not to talk. Ilya barely read the words before the call from his father came through.

“Yes, Papa,” he said upon answering.

He was still so far back into his head that the tirade his father unleashed barely registered. He hung up, eventually, and the slog continued, dragging him forwards through terrible meetings, press, meals with his family. But it was all expected, of course. He would not have allowed to lick his wounds in private.  

At the state-sponsored gala where Ilya would have to publicly self-flagellate in front of various dignitaries and acquaintances of Papa, there was one bright spot. Svetlana was there, on the arm of her father. Ilya came back into himself, a little, upon seeing her. 

“So, then, here you are,” Svetlana said after she’d detached herself from her father and came over to Ilya, appraising him. “I’m sure your papa has already given you a warm welcome so you won’t need one from me.” 

Ilya cracked a smile. She was a sight for sore eyes and she knew how to lift his spirits, at least a little, even after all these months apart. 

“Come here, my girl,” he said. 

She grinned back and him and then he had her, once again, in his arms. 

“How bad has it been?” she asked, pulling back to see his face. 

“Awful,” Ilya said. 

“Poor bunny,” she said, and patted his arm. “Let’s get a drink in you before the commissioner finds you.”

“And how is Misha,” Ilya said, watching as she flagged down a waiter with a tray of champagne. “You haven’t dragged him to this farce, I assume?” 

“No, no, I’ve spared him.”

“Kind of you,” Ilya said, and took a long sip of the champagne she handed over to him. 

“Chin up, Ilyushka,” Sveta said. “Only a few more days of this and then you’ll be back in Boston.” 

She was right, but it didn’t make the act of suffering through it all any easier. The night dragged on; Ilya gritted his teeth through many conversations. Even seeing Sasha grated. Sasha, with his knowing eyes, his easy sensuality, his playful, biting humor. Sasha was never serious. Or rather, the only thing he was serious about was making sure other people thought he was beautiful. Ilya had used to find those qualities enticing. But he felt numb, seeing them turned his way once more. When Sasha left the room, Ilya felt nothing at all. 

Then, worst of all, Shane. Shane coming up to him in the skating arena, Shane’s low, concerned voice. His brown eyes under harsh fluorescent lighting. At the sight of him, the raging hurt inside Ilya, the enormous swell of emotion he’d been swallowing down ever since the plane had landed in this Godforsaken country, reared up. Safe, warm Shane. All of that nasty emotion reared up and spewed out at him. The look Shane sent Ilya before turning and leaving was one of pure, open hurt. Ilya felt it physically, watching Shane disappear around the curve of the upper hall. Fuck. He’d never, ever seen Shane look like that before. And he’d done it. He’d been the one to make him look like that. 

But it was Shane’s fault, Ilya thought viciously, turning determinedly back towards the ice. He was the one who kept trying to overturn Ilya, to expose his underbelly. If all he found were bugs scuttling back towards darkness, well, that’s what you got for overturning stones in the first place.

Ilya flew home in disgrace. At least those fellow countrymen who recognized him were too disappointed in him to do anything besides send him dirty looks at the airport and mutter under their breath at the security line. 

His thoughts were scattered, jittery. He kept dancing around the memory of Shane’s face, that day in the upper ring of the skating arena. Ilya couldn’t face the image head on. Kept trying to distract himself. He drank too many vodkas on the plane and when they touched back down in Boston, he was dry-mouthed and well on his way to hungover. 

At their first practice back, Ilya tried and failed not to look for Shane immediately upon entering the locker room. Shane, sitting on the bench, shot him a wary glance. Ilya jerked away from it, burned, and ignored how it made him vaguely nauseous to be on the receiving end of a distrustful look from Shane. 

He avoided him at practice and gave his best attempt at fleeing the scene afterwards. Shane was not to be deterred. Ilya heard the footsteps coming up behind him. For a wild moment, he considered breaking out into a sprint. 

“Hey,” Shane said, catching up and falling into step with Ilya. 

“Yes, Hollander,” said Ilya, trying not to sound as jumpy as he felt. 

“I think we should get lunch,” said Shane. 

Ilya glanced at him. Shane was staring at him, determinedly. 

“Shane,” Ilya said, sighing. “I’m tired.” 

He was more than that, really. 

“Okay,” Shane said. “Me too. I’ll come over to your place, then. Or you can come over to mine. I meal prepped.” 

“You can’t take a hint?” 

“Nope,” Shane said. “I famously cannot.” 

Ilya made the grave mistake, then, of meeting Shane’s gaze full on. He had not looked at him  like this, for any amount of time longer than a second or two, since before Sochi. It was…a lot. Ilya found he could not say no, not when Shane was looking at him so openly, so seriously. Ilya tsked his tongue and nodded in defeat.

“Fine,” Ilya said, his emotions knotting, snarling, in the pit of his stomach. “Your place.”

Back inside Shane’s apartment, Ilya first made his way first to the trio of photos. He looked at Shane, smiling, and then at David and Yuna Hollander, smiling at Shane. This was what Shane knew. This was where he was coming from, always, including at the Sochi arena. He did not know what it was like for Ilya because Ilya still had not worked up the courage to tell him the full truth of it. And now here they were. Ilya heaved a sigh and headed back into the kitchen. He plopped down on a stool at the counter and watched expectantly as Shane trailed after him.

“What you feed me,” he said sullenly, putting an elbow on the counter and resting his chin on his fist. 

Shane opened his fridge and took out a couple Tupperwares of brown rice veggie bowls. 

“My God,” Ilya said, upon seeing them. “Not only are you going to torture me with your tragic brown eyes, but you are also going to torture me with your tragic brown rice bowls.” 

“It’s healthy,” Shane said primly, not understanding the Russian but clearly understanding Ilya’s disparaging tone. He put both containers in the microwave to heat up with a pointed look over his shoulder. 

At least Shane allowed them to eat in silence. Ilya was starving, post practice, and even though Shane’s food was overly fibrous and depressingly under-salted, at least it filled his stomach. When he was done, Ilya pushed his Tupperware away and leveled a look at Shane that he hoped wasn’t too panicked. 

“Yeah,” said Shane. “I want to talk about Russia.” 

“I’d prefer it if you’d just kill me instead,” Ilya muttered under his breath. Then, so Shane would understand, he said, “We say before we go, we don’t talk. But then you text. You find me.” 

“Well after that game I wanted to check in. I was worried, I was thinking about you and your dad and stuff. It just seemed like you were under a lot of pressure, and probably no one knew about it except me. I think it would have been kind of shitty of me to just ignore it.” 

Ilya blinked. He had been expecting accusations from Shane, not calm logic. He felt askew and strangely shy, like Shane had simultaneously pulled the rug out from under him and given him a soft place to land. 

“You…” Ilya started. But he didn’t know what to say. He ran a hand over his mouth and just shook his head. “Okay.”

“So I understand, right? The pressure? And I understand there was probably more stuff you were dealing with too, stuff that you didn’t tell me about. But it doesn’t make up for the fact that you were a huge asshole. I was just trying to see if you were okay.” 

They sat through several long minutes of quiet. Ilya fidgeted with the cuff of his sweatshirt and jiggled his left leg. He did not want to have to speak. He wanted Shane to do it all, to shepherd the conversation. Shane was good at this, facing emotional things head on. Ilya was awful at it. 

But it was clear that Shane had said his piece and was now waiting for Ilya. Ilya groaned and then forced himself to say something. Anything. 

“Russia…is hard for me,” Ilya admitted finally. “I’m sorry. I see your face before you walk away and I wish I could take it back. I’m sorry.” 

He deflated. That was what he’d wanted to say the whole time, really. But he always got so in his head about apologies, so prideful. It wasn’t as hard as he’d expected, though, with Shane. 

There was a long minute of silence, during which Ilya wondered if Shane might not accept the apology, if Ilya had really ruined things completely. But then Shane got up, bodied his way between Ilya’s legs, and hugged him. Ilya tensed for just a moment, and then slumped, clutching his arms tight around Shane’s waist. He put his nose to Shane’s collarbone and smelled him. It was the same as Ilya had remembered: a good, human skin scent beneath the herbal freshness of his shampoo and deodorant. 

“I’m on your team, remember?” Shane said, pressing the words into the crown of Ilya’s head. “Don’t forget again.” 

Shane was forgiving him. Ilya would not let this go to waste. 

He would not let it go to waste, but Ilya also didn’t really know how to act around Shane afterwards. He wanted to grab at Shane like he’d been doing, but didn’t know if he was still allowed. Ilya knew that the guys saw him treating Shane carefully and were ascribing some sort of post-Sochi meaning to it. But it was important to him, to be careful. He’d nearly ruined things once and he wouldn’t do it again.

“Let me guess,” Marleau said, during one practice. “You jumped down his throat after the Russia games and now he’s got you in time out.”

Ilya slanted Marleau an irritated look. He was worse than the neighborhood gossip, constantly sticking their head out the front door to see who was parking in their neighbor’s driveway. 

“Shut up, Marly,” Ilya said. “You not know anything. You were not there.” 

“Ouch,” said Marleau, unfazed. “Well maybe stop staring him down like that then.”

“Like what,” Ilya said, and then wished he hadn’t.

He wasn’t staring at Hollander, anyway. He was simply looking at him from time to time. 

“Like you want to kill him. Or eat him. I haven’t decided which yet.” 

“You do bag skate,” Ilya threatened. 

“Fuck off,” Marleau said. 

“Bag skate!”

Boston was thawing. Most of the ugly piles of dirty snow had melted and the barren trees were just starting to bud when the team went on a pretty long stretch of away games. They won the first one and Ilya knew then that he’d shaken off whatever ghoul or demon had been riding his back in Russia. He was tearing up the ice, flying. He was back home with his team, and they were winning. 

St. Paul was the last stop. They trounced the Nomads and made it back to the hotel before the forecasted snow storm hit. Ilya had turned on the TV and was watching the weatherman gesticulate excitedly at the night’s sky. He understood maybe every three words or so. Pressure. Wind. Inches. 

“You sure you don’t wanna come, Roz?” Marleau said, grabbing his key card from on top of the wardrobe. 

“You go, freeze. I stay here. Warm.”

“What’s a little bit of snow for a guy from Moscow,” Marleau teased. But he didn’t wait for a reply and was out the door a moment later. 

Ilya spent the next ten minutes flipping through channels and trying not to think about how he would have an empty room for at least two hours, if not more. Marleau was really close with some of the guys on the Nomads, and he was a talker. No doubt that dinner would last ages. So, then. An empty room…basic cable…But…

u come over. 30min.

Ilya stared at the text. Well, it was too late now. He couldn’t regret sending it when the thought of Shane actually coming over was almost too delicious to bear. 

Marleau? came the quick reply. 

uptown for dinner. maybe he get stuck and freeze.

Haha, brave of him. But he’ll probably come back soon enough?

no u come. 

Ok.

Ilya sent him a couple smilies and then put his phone on the nightstand. Shane knocked exactly thirty minutes later, and Ilya was quick to open the door. For a moment his brain tripped over the sight of Shane’s face, then he grinned. 

“What’s this,” he said.

“What’s what?” Shane asked, walking into the room.

Ilya closed and dead-bolted the door, tapping his own temple with a pointer finger. Shane flushed. Ilya stepped up to him, entranced. 

“Oh, I wear them for reading and stuff,” Shane said, moving to take them off.

Ilya hurried to still his hands. As if he was going to let Shane take off those glasses.

“What,” Shane said, uncertainly.

“Glasses stay on,” Ilya said very clearly.

“C’mon…” Shane said, laughing a little, looking aside and then back at Ilya, obviously thinking he was being teased.

But Ilya wasn’t teasing. Slowly, Ilya adjusted his grip, taking Shane’s wrists into one hand. He brought his other hand up to Shane’s jaw. Ilya’s heart was galloping. God, Shane, under his hands again. He was so warm and still, intently focused. 

“Okay?” Ilya asked.

“Yes,” Shane said, serious, sloe-eyed. 

Ilya swooped in then, and kissed him. In the steps it took to push Shane up against the door, Shane broke free of Ilya’s hold on his wrists and brought his arms around Ilya’s shoulders, drawing him in, holding him tight. Yes, he thought. God, yes. Shane still wanted him like this. 

“Wait, wait,” Shane said, pulling away, gasping a little as Ilya changed course and kissed along Shane’s jawline and down his neck. “You actually like these?” 

Ilya pulled back to see his expression. Shane looked drunk, his color high and his eyes heavy-lidded. Ilya was such an idiot. This is what he would have been missing, what he might have ruined for himself if he kept acting like an asshole the way he’d been during the Games. He felt the sudden urge to grovel, kowtowed by covetousness and remorse and the memory of Shane’s hurt eyes when Ilya had yelled at him during the men’s free skate. 

Instead he just told a simple truth. “Yes, glasses.” 

Then, Ilya couldn’t resist pressing a kiss to the corner of Shane’s mouth, because he was smiling and his ears were as red as cherries. 

“Well, okay,” he mumbled. 

“What other secrets you keep from me?” Ilya asked.

He had Shane by the elbows and was pulling him to his bed. 

“I wasn’t keeping a secret from you,” Shane said, following where Ilya led. “I’m not doing a lot of reading in your presence.” 

A sorry excuse for hiding those incredible glasses. Ilya would punish him. Severely. He pushed Shane down and leapt on top of him, grinning. 

“Hey!” Shane gasped, laughing, all of his perfect teeth on display. 

“You tell, you tell,” Ilya demanded, and did his best to attack Shane’s sides with questing fingers while fending off Shane’s flailing retaliation. 

Ilya lost sight of his original goal of getting Shane into his room in the ensuing wrestling match. Shane’s laughter was filling the room in peals of bright joy, his red face and dark hair against the pillow, his eyes crinkled into delighted slivers. Ilya could have happily played with Shane like this for hours, but then Shane somehow got all of his limbs around Ilya’s body and squeezed him flat, pressing him all up against Shane’s body. 

“Got you.” Shane’s voice was warm and low in Ilya’s ear, sending a rush of goosebumps all across Ilya’s skin.

Shane ground his hips in a dirty roll against Ilya’s. All of his blood was rushing south, desire pooling in his groin. He let out a breath against Shane’s shoulder.

“You cheat, fight dirty,” accused Ilya, and lightly bit Shane’s neck. 

“I don’t cheat,” Shane said, tightening his grip.

“Yes, penalty box,” Ilya said, and then zeroed in on Shane’s ear. 

Maybe Ilya had been a little nervous about the possibility of their chemistry suffering after Sochi. But Shane was as he’d been the first two times, pliable, hungry, and very nearly on a hair trigger. The way he sighed, the way he moaned Ilya’s name with those long Canadian vowels. It felt like a gift, and Ilya was roaring with relief, tenderness, and possessiveness. He didn’t last long either. 

After, Shane lay panting, arms akimbo, his sweatpants still only pulled down to his upper thighs, his hoodie rucked up to his sternum. Ilya, who had sat up to grab tissues, got his eyes stuck on the picture Shane made like that. God, he thought. He wanted to press his face against Shane’s stomach and pull Shane’s hoodie down over his head and just live there in the dark, against his skin. 

Ilya took care of the mess as quickly as possible. When he got back from the bathroom, Shane had fixed his clothing and was making to get off the bed. 

“Where on Earth do you think you’re going,” Ilya said. “As if I would let you out of my sight.”

Shane blinked at him owlishly, not understanding. Ilya kneed up on the mattress and then maneuvered Shane how he wanted under the duvet.

“Warm,” Ilya said in English. “Stay.”

“Okay,” Shane said, taking off his glasses so he could lay his head comfortably on the pillow. “For a few minutes.” 

Ilya was working on a hypothesis that Shane was only amenable like this for twenty or so minutes after orgasm, and Ilya was not above using it to his advantage. He loved how Shane had mirrored Ilya’s position and pressed his bent knees against Ilya’s. Shane had tucked his hands under his chin, glasses held loosely in one curled fist. He was the picture of sweetness.

“You want Marleau to find us like this?” Shane asked.

“Marleau say I ‘play favorite’ with you. He come in, not surprised.”

Ilya winked. Shane smiled a little, though it was half smushed by the pillow. 

“The guys think you’re mad at me,” Shane said. “I’m not the favorite anymore.” 

The guys were busybodies who barely knew what was happening in front of their faces, let alone right under their noses. 

“They stupid,” Ilya summed up succinctly.

Shane was grinning fully now. 

“So you do? Play favorites?”

Ilya, unable to help himself, reached over and put his fingers to the curve of Shane’s cheek before carding them through the side of his hair. Playing favorites? More like playing for keeps. But now didn’t feel like the right time to dump that truth on him.

“First day of training camp, you come up to me, ‘Ooo Ilya you’re so cool, ooo Ilya you’re best player, I’m so excited to be here—‘“

“—I don’t sound like that!”

“I think, ‘this rookie trouble, Rozanov.’ But you follow me around like baby duck.” There was a sculpture of this in the Boston Public Garden, which Ilya had seen during his first year and was still inordinately charmed by. “I make stupid choice and let you. I’m curious.”

“Well I’d wanted to play with you ever since I saw you at world juniors,” Shane said. 

Ilya rubbed his thumb along the very edge of Shane’s hairline at his temple. He was remembering Marleau’s comment during those early practices. ‘A shadow,’ he’d said. And then Ilya had said something about…

“Only play? First year I’m on Raiders, you put poster of me in bedroom. Jerk off.”

Shane made an outraged sound and smacked at Ilya’s hand and then shoulder. Ilya laughed, moving his hand out of the line of attack. 

“I absolutely did not, asshole!” 

“Poster!”

“You are drunk with power,” Shane accused, jostling him again. “And making things up. I wouldn’t have had a poster of you. You’re only a few years older than me.”

“Fine, Scott Hunter.”

“What!?” Shane squawked. 

“He’s hot,” Ilya said, smirking. “You like.”

“I had a Metros poster, if you have to know,” Shane said, sounding a bit prim. 

“Okay,” said Ilya, relenting. “Fine. Boring.”

Shane was so easy to tease, but then he yielded truths about himself so earnestly that Ilya went from teasing to sentimental in a flash. Shane wriggled a little against his pillow and then moved a little closer. 

“I’m playing favorites with you too,” he said, a little shy and a little flirty, and Ilya felt himself go completely moon-eyed.

—

Ilya stopped counting their hookups after that third time. But they usually were able to do it once a week, despite the playoffs looming ever closer. He’d thought maybe, because of that, that Shane might suggest they stop for a while and focus on hockey. But he never did. Shane seemed just as needy for it as ever, and Ilya was right there with him, ravenous for his smooth skin, the noises he made, the way he always went where Ilya’s hands pushed him, the way he said Ilya’s name. The way he said ‘please.’ 

And time was unspooling fast. It seemed Ilya had looked down for a second and suddenly it was fully springtime, trees blooming, tulips in the Common, another hour of daylight at night. Despite the wonderful weather, Shane had come down with a cold and was skating sluggishly during practice, having to go over the boards where he had stashed a tissue box and a plastic bag that was quickly filling up with used Kleenex. His poor nose was raw and red at the nostrils from so much wiping. The next two days he was out sick, doctor’s orders. But by the time Ilya had badgered his way into Shane’s apartment with Chinese takeout, it seemed like he was on the mend. His visions of coming over and finding Shane swooning on his sofa like a tubercular maiden, Ilya having to press damp washcloths to his forehead for his fever were squashed. It was an unfortunate blow to his moral compass to discover that he liked the idea of Shane at his mercy no matter what the cause. But no matter. Ilya’d never claimed to be a saint. 

“I’ve never had to take this much cold medicine. I just don’t understand,” Shane was complaining, oblivious to Ilya’s perverse machinations. “I get the flu shot every year!”

“So is not flu,” Ilya observed helpfully. 

“Maybe the virus mutated,” Shane said into his container of soup. 

Ilya did not know what ‘mutated’ meant but had learned what ‘virus’ meant early in his first year thanks to Alyosha’s germ-infested children. He let Shane mutter about germs for a few more minutes before deciding the wrangle the conversation into more interesting territory. 

“You hook up with two girls in September, then you stop.”

If Shane was put off by the change in topic, he didn’t show it. In fact, he perked up. 

“You were watching me?” Shane said hopefully. 

“You were watching me,” said Ilya. This was true, but it was also true that Ilya was deflecting just a little.  

“No,” Shane said, his ears going red. 

“Two girls. That’s it,” said Ilya.

He had a personal theory about this, and wanted to know if it held any merit. So what if he’d chosen a time when Shane was hopped up on cold medication to do so? 

Shane put down his container of hot and sour soup. 

“Well yeah,” Shane said. “I don’t…really like it. Hooking up.”

“No?” Ilya asked, doubtful. “You seem to like it a lot.”

“That’s different. You’re not a stranger. You’re you.”

Ilya took a large bite of his beef and broccoli so he wouldn’t start grinning. He loved the way Shane just said things like that, no hesitation.

“I’d rather just do it with you,” Shane continued. “Obviously. I mean, I’m not saying that you have to…I’m just talking about me.”

Ilya replayed those words again in his head, making sure he hadn’t misunderstood. Sometimes Shane used so many qualifiers and double negatives that, to Ilya, the true meaning behind Shane’s sentences got a little blurred. But this one seemed clear. For a long moment, Ilya didn’t know what to do with it. It was pretty much everything he would have wanted Shane to say, the things that Ilya would never have requested for himself, but the things he wanted deep down in his truest places. The places that felt so possessive about Shane, so covetous. He could feel Shane start to tense up unhappily next to him, no doubt misreading the silence. 

“For rest of season…” Ilya said. “Maybe we just do you and me.” 

He felt dizzy even suggesting it. The greedy, wanting parts of himself were wide awake and eager, ready to take everything and anything that Shane would give. 

“Yeah?” Shane asked, voice high and tight.

“Yes,” Ilya said clearly, so Shane wouldn’t misunderstand, and then watched Shane’s face carefully after he spoke. Relief was sweeping across it, like geese winging in a vee across the sky. 

After a moment, Shane curled forward and down, putting his forehead to Ilya’s thigh. Ilya said his name like a question, carding his fingers through Shane’s hair, checking in. His heart felt swollen. It was overwhelming, the fact that Shane sought him out for comfort in this way.

“I’m happy,” was Shane’s muffled response. 

Ilya hummed. He would have said that he was happy too, but the word was too pale for what he felt a that moment. Ilya was nearly crushed by tenderness. It felt huge and fragile, both of those things at the same time, to have the palm of his hand pressed to Shane’s skull. Those bones that held Shane’s beautiful, wonderful brain, his brain that wanted Ilya and Ilya alone. 

—

They ended up winning the Cup. It was the most fulfilling moment of Ilya’s entire life. After everything it took to get to adulthood, to get to the States, to get the C, to get through Sochi, to get through the playoffs, to get here: center ice, the Cup in his hands. Ilya had never felt joy this vicious before, this consuming. He wanted to open his mouth and swallow up the entire arena whole, so he could keep it all inside him and never forget a moment of it. Instead he ended up swallowing several bottles of champagne, and by the time he and the rest of the team had been deposited at own of the owner’s houses for a pool party, he was drunk. 

Ilya slung himself from one teammate’s shoulders to another, all around the giant first floor of the mansion, and out into the backyard where he cannonballed into the pool. 

“You ugly bastards,” Ilya crowed after resurfacing. “You ugly bastards really did it. We won the fucking Cup!”

Marleau hollered something in French and got Ilya in a headlock, play-dunking him. 

“Why don’t both of you speak American,” O’Neil suggested inanely from where he floated on a lime green inflatable raft. 

In that moment, Ilya and Marleau shared one mind, and they moved in sync to tip O’Neil right off his raft and into the pool. 

The party blurred. The adrenaline Ilya had been riding high on eventually dissipated, and his drunken brain had suddenly remembered Shane Hollander existed. Before he knew it, Ilya was meandering around the first floor, looking for him. Shane had been crying, on ice, when they’d won. His mother had hugged Ilya like she’d known him, or cared about him, or something. Ilya had kissed him, both cheeks. Well, he’d kissed everybody. But maybe there would be pictures of him and Shane; he wanted to see what they looked like together like that—Shane!

“Hollander,” Ilya said, pleased and relieved to have finally found him. 

Shane’d been in the pool early on, and still hadn’t put his shirt back on. Ilya wanted to rub his cheek against Shane’s shoulder like a cat. But then Marleau came up with a crazed look in his eye, talking about sucking dick and then careening away to go accost Pike, who had the misfortune of catching Marleau’s attention as he walked by. Ilya watched, amused, but mostly too drunk to do anything but think about how nice it was to be standing next to Shane after drinking so much champagne and also winning the Cup. 

But Shane…

Shane was stepping in front of him, drawing his attention. He was tilting his head invitingly. All of Ilya’s (admittedly sodden) senses snapped to high alert. 

“Okay?” Shane was saying, and Ilya was saying it back. As if he would say no to Shane Hollander when he was giving come-hither eyes…

It took everything he had to play it cool and not tail Shane into the bathroom. Ilya went into the kitchen, dumped the contents of his solo cup into the sink, and filled it with water. He chugged it, and then left the cup on the counter before making his way to the bathroom. Ilya’s pulse was flying as he went in, barely remembering to flick the lock after he closed the door.

“Shane,” he said stupidly. 

Shane, who had been leaning against the sink, stood upright and then closed the narrow space between them. He pushed Ilya’s hips back against the door and then slid down to his knees. He pulled down Ilya’s swim trunks and pressed his face to where, despite being wasted, Ilya was already half hard.

“Fuck,” Ilya said, his hands fisting greedily at Shane’s hair.

Shane started to work him over enthusiastically. All of the higher functioning parts of Ilya’s brain turned off one by one, like lights going off in a big warehouse at closing time. The only thing that was left was sensation. Shane’s hot, wet mouth. His tongue. His shaky exhales against Ilya’s skin. His silky, damp hair in Ilya’s grip. Fuck, Ilya was going to come way too fast. He wanted to keep Shane here, on his knees, forever. But Shane pulled off. His sweet eyes and swollen mouth, upturned towards Ilya.  

“Come on my face,” he said, totally guileless, voice near wrecked.

“Fuck,” said Ilya. “Fuck, I will.” 

He dragged one hand roughly to the front of Shane’s hair, fisted it there, and held him still. Shane’s mouth dropped open, loving it. Ilya knocked Shane’s hands away from his dick, and jerked himself rapidly, too greedy for the pleasure twisting in his gut to go slow. The first stripe of come landed across Shane’s chin and nose. Then Ilya pressed his tip to Shane’s mouth and let the rest bubble there until he wrung himself out.

Ilya panted, looking down at Shane who was blinking his eyes open and tonguing at the come on his mouth. 

“You’re going to be the death of me,” Ilya said, before switching to English. “Up. Up!”

Shane rose clumsily and went where Ilya pushed him, up and onto the sink counter. He sat there quietly, come all over his face still, and watched as Ilya sourced a hand towel out from under the sink, wet it, and began cleaning him. Shane tilted his face into the rubbing, a smile curling at the corners of his mouth. A smile that he probably didn’t know he was making. 

“You’re trouble,” Ilya said, so he wouldn’t say something else. “Whole team outside, owners, coaches, trainers, sneaky fans.” 

“Hey, you didn’t have to follow me,” Shane said, as uncaring as Ilya had ever seen him.

Ilya spent a moment or two rinsing and wringing out the towel before hanging it on one of the door hooks. He did not want to leave a cum rag in Bob’s nice, elegant suburban bathroom. But since he was going to, the least he could do was rinse it. 

“What do you want?” Ilya asked once that task was complete. “Stanley Cup rookie.”

Shane, who had been watching him intently the whole time, smiled and shrugged. Like he’d gotten what he wanted already. If Ilya could have gotten hard again, he would have. Everything about Shane seemed like it was created specifically to drive Ilya crazy. 

“You say,” Ilya demanded. 

“Just kiss me, then,” Shane said, and held out his arms. 

God, Ilya thought, and did as commanded. Shane loved to be kissed. But it was also true that Shane seemed to love pretty much everything they did together. And Ilya was not letting him out of this bathroom without making him come. So, eventually, he tore his mouth away from Shane’s in exchange for pressing his forehead to Shane’s collarbone and watching his hand move on Shane’s dick, jerking him until his abs clenched and he shot up and all over them.  

After the second clean up, they left the bathroom separately and moved off to different parts of the party. Ilya floated around for a while, his drunken mind greedily replaying the way that Shane had wanted to kiss him, the way he’d held open his arms to be held in return. 

Ilya lost track of time soon thereafter. At some point he ended up in the basement, trouncing a couple of kids at Mario Kart despite the fact that technically he was drunk driving. He only knew the party was winding down because the kids’ mother came down and suggested kindly to the room at large that they didn’t want to overstay their welcome. Ilya emerged from the house to pouring rain, and the driveway and street largely cleared of cars. No doubt everyone was going home to sleep it off a little before reconvening at some club or another. Ilya was about to call a car when his eyes snagged on familiar figure walking a little ways down the street. Ilya was chasing after him before his brain even made the decision. He got up to him and slung an arm around his neck.

“You leave me, Hollander,” Ilya accused.  

“Oh hey!” Shane said, sounding pleased. “I thought you’d already left. Where were you?” 

“Basement,” Ilya said. “I beat seven-year-old at Mario Kart.” 

“You haven’t already won enough?”

“No,” Ilya said, grinning. 

“C’mon,” Shane said. “I’ll drive you home.” 

But they’d won the Cup. Ilya was going to ask for what he really wanted. Ilya said, “Stay with me. Sleep in my bed.” 

“Oh,” Shane said, clearly pleased. “Okay, thanks.” 

Ilya woke up to feeling of the mattress dipping and the covers pulling down off his shoulder. His brain was currently cooking up a diabolical headache, he could feel the pain ramping up as he slowly gained consciousness. For a moment, he wondered who was in the bed with him, and then he remembered flashes of earlier: a bowl of cereal, the sunset steaming through the big windows, Shane smiling against Ilya’s pillow, Shane’s eyes slipping shut. 

Shane who was now moving around, and causing Ilya’s hangover to flare.

“Lie down,” Ilya demanded, and fumbled a hand out, looking for purchase, finding it, and pinching the skin under his fingers.

“Hey!” Shane yelped. “Jeez, I was just trying to see the time. It’s late, eh?’

“Seeing as how it’s pitch black outside,” Ilya said snidely. “One could assume so.” 

“When I learn Russian, you’ll be in for it,” Shane warned him. “Maybe I’ll do it over the summer.” 

Ilya groaned and shifted, stretching out on his back. Fuck, he was sore and hungover. 

“Right,” he said. “Summer.” 

Shane lay back down on his side, facing Ilya. Ilya stared up at the dark ceiling. Shane was still chattering away. It was clear he had something on his mind, but Ilya was too brain dead to figure it out. He hoped Shane would just outright ask the foundational question that was prompting the rest of the rambling. 

He rolled over onto his side, mirroring Shane. Shane always responded well to focus, and to touch. 

“But…what will we do this summer?” Shane asked.

Ah, so. There it was. 

“This summer…” Ilya shrugged his free shoulder. 

He wanted to say, ‘be mine.’ He’d wanted to say that months ago, on Shane’s couch eating Chinese food. But he’d been a coward then and was a coward now. Besides, Shane was nineteen and had just discovered what sex was, that sex could be good and fun and not a list of boxes to tick off methodically one by one. He should have the summer. Explore. Ilya did not want to tell him this, but he would anyway. He would be as selfless as a saint, benevolently granting Shane the opportunity to act freely with no strings attached, when instead Ilya would much prefer to keep a hand on Shane’s neck for the rest of their lives, never letting him go, not once. 

The only solace was that maybe Shane would have a lot of bad sex and then come slinking back to Ilya during the pre-season. And Ilya would say something like, ‘I’m the only one who takes care of you the right way, the way you need,” and Shane would look at him and say, ‘yeah.’  

“I go to Russia. You go to Canada. Next season we come back, see what we want.”

There. They would be in their separate countries, having their separate summers, and when they came back, maybe they would have this again. God, Ilya hoped so. 

“Yeah,” Shane was saying. “That sounds good.” 

Ilya couldn’t read his tone, and it was too dark to read anything from his eyes, except for the glint of them catching in the moonlight from the windows. 

“You text about boring Canada. I text about Russia. Maybe send pictures.”

“Okay,” Shane said. “Yeah. We’ll text.” 

Shane didn’t sound too enthused, but then, neither was Ilya. 

Russia. He didn’t want to go back to Russia. He had no interest in the summer break. He wanted to run from that reality and bury himself forever in the good feeling that was Shane Hollander: playing with him, eating meals with him, being next to him, talking with him, fucking him. But the post-Cup celebrations could not last forever. Soon the guys were all packing up and heading out to their various summer locales. 

Ilya went back to the motherland in a tremendous sulk. At least the nightlife was good. Much better than Boston. For the first couple of weeks he smoked too many cigarettes and did too much coke and pissed off a handful of women by flirting too hard and then leaving them hanging, heading out alone. But he didn’t want to hook up with a stranger. The last time he had, that grad student in Boston, it had been disappointing enough for Ilya to decide that he simply was not going to do that while he still had Shane in his head. 

He’d forgotten how good it could be with someone steady and it was addictive. The last man he’d fucked consistently had been Sasha, but they’d been teenagers, both more enamored with the illicitness of the act than they were with each other. Ilya had thought it was very hot at the time, but now he knew too much about Sasha to find that sort of thing tempting. Sasha got off on being pretty, on people thinking he was pretty. There was no artlessness with him, no surprises. He would never deign to let himself go enough to risk being ugly. Even when he submitted, he was playing at it, thinking about how beautiful he might look on his knees and how much the other person would like to see him like that. There was no true needfulness there. No relief in the act of surrendering. Ilya looked glumly at his text thread with Shane and sighed. Shane Hollander bent to Ilya’s will like a fish unhooked from the line and slipped back underwater. Like he was back where he belonged, like his body could breathe it, metabolize it, live off of it. He’d rewired Ilya’s mind just by being how he was. He hadn’t even been trying. 

Ilya’s bender did not last much longer than it took to fully reacclimatize to the timezone. The comedowns from the alcohol and the coke weren’t worth the buzz anyway. As the summer continued, Ilya focused on training hard, spending too much time with Svetlana and her boyfriend (who was still somehow hanging around), and endeavoring to try and convince Alexei that there was something wrong with their father. And if he developed a habit of scrolling through his messages with Shane and counting down the days until he flew back to the States, well, no one would know but him.  

—

The muggy, hot air of Boston in high summer enveloped him snugly when he returned. It was gross and also grounding, a firm indicator of where he was. Ilya broke out into a fine sheen of sweat just from dragging his luggage from the taxi to his front door. The aircon inside was a stark difference, sending goosebumps all up and down his arms. The summer had felt interminable and the fact that he was back at his house was dreamlike, unbelievable. Soon there would be pre-season practice. Soon there would be Shane. 

Ilya was already on the ice by the time Shane got there that first day, but his eyes snapped to him the moment he came out. Shane, smiling. It felt like Ilya hadn’t seen him in a century. It felt like he’d seen him just yesterday. He was tan and sporting a firmament of freckles across his nose and cheeks. He looked like the sun had loved on him for many weeks straight, no breaks. Ilya wanted to put his mouth just to the side of Shane’s perfect nose, in the sloping angle it made where it met his cheek. Instead he clapped him on the back. Shane’s body language was open, eager.

“Hollander,” he said, grinning. 

“Hi,” Shane said. “Good to see you.”

Ilya gripped his shoulder and gave him a little shake. Shane’s smile was so wide and so beautiful. Ilya’s heart didn’t know what to do with itself besides race hectically, frantically.

“Lunch after,” Ilya said, amazed that his voice didn’t sound crazy.  

Shane nodded. 

 They went to a deli that Ilya preferred and Shane tolerated. They sat in a booth towards the back and made their way through their sandwiches and the cursory coverage of both of their summers. Ilya tried not to be impatient, but his left leg was jiggling a mile a minute under the table. He wanted to drag Shane back to his house and get his hands all over him. But first…

“So, what you think?”

Shane gave him a wide-eyed look, checking. Ilya nodded and Shane blew out a breath. 

“Look,” he said. “I’m gonna tell you the truth.”

Ilya went on high alert, sitting up a little straighter. It wasn’t really what he expected Shane to say, and he looked so serious. Of course Ilya had considered that Shane might not want to continue what they had last season. But he hadn’t been too concerned. Maybe he’d been too cocky. Maybe Shane—

“—I don’t want to ruin things,” Shane was saying. “But I’ve been thinking about it all summer and I can’t pretend anymore. So I’m gonna just say it: I missed you. A lot. And I want this with you. Seriously. Like, not just for the season. I think I like you, uh, too much.”

Shane was muttering to his sandwich wrapper. His words were coming out fast and low-pitched, and Ilya applied himself completely to parsing through them. Shane slid a glance up at Ilya’s face. Ilya didn’t know what sort of expression he was wearing. It felt like his ears were ringing. ‘Too much,’ Shane had said. I like you too much.

“So, um,” Shane continued. “Sorry if that’s not what you want to hear. Or if you don’t agree. But that’s what I think.” 

Ilya stood up on a huge crest of emotion. It was too much, just to sit. He wanted out of there. He wanted to grab Shane, throw him over his shoulder, and run. Shane looked up at him, a  stricken tinge to his eyes, lips parting on a question. Ilya crumpled up his sandwich wrapper and jerked his head.

“We’re going,” he said. 

The stricken look on Shane’s face was quickly eaten up by surprise. Ilya watched as Shane hurriedly cleaned up his trash and then got a hand on him. He herded him out of the shop like that, gripping Shane’s elbow. When they were out of earshot of anybody, Ilya let him have it.

“You say all this to me in public. I cannot kiss you in public!” 

“Sorry,” Shane said, even though it was Ilya who’d prompted the conversation. 

Ilya’s body was buzzing, humming with kinetic energy. He had no where to put it, not right now. The necessity of the car ride home was incredibly irritating. He wanted to be there already. Ilya put a hand to the middle of Shane’s back and shoved him towards his car. 

“Forty minutes to my house,” Ilya said. “Forty!”

“Mine is fifteen,” said Shane. “In the other direction.” 

Shane’s place it was, then, and Ilya decided not to pay attention to minor inconveniences like Massachusetts traffic laws and city speed limits. He squeezed his car recklessly into a too-small street parking spot and was in the vestibule of Shane’s apartment lobby by the time Shane came in from the tenant parking garage. Shane smiled upon seeing him, like it was instinct. 

“You found street parking?” Shane asked.

God, Ilya had missed him and his inane questions that he seemed genuinely curious about, wanting to know the answers. 

“Fuck parking,” Ilya said.

Ilya managed to get into Shane’s apartment before fully losing his mind. But once the door closed, he snapped. Pushed Shane right up against it and pushed his mouth against Shane’s. Shane moaned, mouth blooming open, petal soft. Ilya could not kiss him enough. It wasn’t even sexy, it was a devouring. But Shane took it eagerly like he took everything else from Ilya. 

“You’re mine,” said Ilya. 

He sounded like a lunatic. He hadn’t meant to say that. Shane messed his head up so bad…But then Shane was sighing and agreeing. He was saying ‘yes’ and hooking his arms more firmly around Ilya’s neck, dragging his solid torso, his hips, all up and down Ilya’s front. 

“No one else,” Ilya said, maybe like he was checking, maybe like he was demanding. 

“Of course not…” Shane was saying, voice tripping as Ilya opened Shane’s stupid khaki shorts. “not even during the break…” 

“Good,” Ilya said, distracted by the feel of Shane in his grip, as hot as blood, not really paying attention to what he was saying. “Me neither.” 

Shane had been trying to push Ilya’s t-shirt up with both hands, but he stilled after Ilya spoke. 

“You didn’t at all?” Shane asked, his tone high. 

Ilya had not meant to admit that, but also he had not meant to say pretty much anything he’d said once they’d entered Shane’s apartment. The vulnerability didn’t feel embarrassing or bad, not when he had Shane like this, all to himself, and so clearly on the same page. 

“You think I’m big slut,” Ilya half-joked and half-accused, and then slid down to his knees.

“Oh, God,” said Shane, prayerfully, and shoved his hands into Ilya’s hair.

“You’re jealous,” Ilya said, mouth to the leaking head of Shane’s dick.

“Well, yeah,” Shane breathed.

Ilya rewarded his honesty immediately, getting his mouth on him. He wanted to make Shane come so quickly and so hard that all of those summer days he’d spent alone were worth it. He was going to prove it with his mouth. And Shane was easy. In no time he was tugging at Ilya’s hair, trying to get him to pull off.

“Please,” Shane said, voice cracked open, skittering higher and higher. “I don’t want to come so soon!” 

But Ilya would not grant him mercy. He barred a forearm across Shane’s hips, pressed him hard into the wall, and swallowed him down. Shane cried out, a hot, bright peal of sound. The hands in Ilya’s hair slipped and slid and then Shane’s forearms were there instead, wrapping around the back of Ilya’s skull and holding him in place, selfishly. Shane’s body curled over Ilya’s head and he came down Ilya’s throat, cursing and calling out Ilya’s name. 

Ilya pulled off, both his mouth and his forearm. Unsupported, Shane slid down the wall and onto the floor. His legs were still caught up in those stupid shorts, unable to sprawl open. Ilya climbed over them and straddled his lap. He tipped Shane’s head up with his hands. Shane blinked up at him, panting. He was as red as a pomegranate and his eyes were hazy. All the times Ilya had thought about him, over the break, and here he was, better than anything. Ilya kissed his open mouth and then his nose and forehead and temple and cheeks. 

“No one in Russia have these,” he said, mostly to himself. 

But Shane was listening to him, like always. 

“My freckles?” Shane said.

“Yes,” said Ilya. 

Ilya pulled away and stared at him again. He liked how Shane was letting him hold the weight of his head in his hands. It was a wonderfully solid head. Ilya felt himself smiling and Shane smiled back. 

“We should probably talk about this,” he said.

Ilya nodded. He was hoping at least to be able to come before it but…

“Now?”

“No, later,” Shane said, in his bossy voice that meant he’d already formulated a plan for how he wanted the rest of the afternoon to go. “Are you gonna fuck me?”

He asked it hopefully, his hands pushed up under Ilya’s t-shirt. Despite the fact that Ilya was so hard he felt on the verge of insanity, he was also very, very endeared. 

“Mm, yes,” said Ilya, and then, head spinning, proceeded to expound upon the many times this month and in the future that he would continue to do so. 

Shane’s smile got bigger and bigger as Ilya spoke. “Oh yeah?” 

“You want?” Ilya asked, mostly just to tease but also to check in a little. 

“For sure,” Shane said, giving a sheepish laugh. “I want. I’ve wanted since game one, last year, and never stopped wanting since.” 

Ilya smiled. He thought back to all those months before. The first time he’d put his hand on Shane’s neck. The way he’d stilled under that touch. The first time he’d put his hand in Shane’s hair. The way he shuddered. 

“I know,” Ilya said. “First time I put my hand on your hair, after practice, you almost come in pants.” 

Shane cursed at him, jostled him. He was laughing. Ilya would never get tired of making him smile like that. ‘And next, and next, and next,’ Ilya had told him. He meant it.