Rating:

Explicit

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandom:

Heated Rivalry (TV)

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Additional Tags:

Needle play, piercing kink, unsafe at-home piercing practices, Under-negotiated Kink, Developing Relationship, Mildly Canon Divergent, navigating the trenches of your situationship while in deep denial

Language:

English

Series:

Part 1 of Through-and-Through

Stats:

Published: 2026-02-19 Updated: 2026-03-14 Words: 33,507 Chapters: 3/5

At Pinpoint

Summary

“No one else knows of these,” Ilya tells him, and there it is, that glint of possessiveness in Hollander’s eyes. It makes Ilya’s head reel. And it is why he doesn’t hesitate to say, “I could mark you just like that. If you want.”

“Would last longer than bruises,” Ilya continues. “Maybe forever.”

Notes

anyway...

as always, to kris.

shout out to "sexuality and gender in postcommunist eastern europe and russia” by edmond cleman and theo sandfort, quoted in this article about the “gay ear piercing” in russia, which i enjoyed. thank you also to salad and hothockey for invaluable edits and insight. and to ren, for yelling at me. this fic uses the book timeline for hookups aka they're fucking from 2011 onwards, but everything else is according to the show. i just needed them to to be worse, earlier.

Chapter 1

Chapter Notes

Ilya is fourteen, holding half of a boiled potato in one hand and a thin sewing needle in the other, the first time he pierces anyone. Sasha’s sitting between his spread legs, Ilya leaning forward, his thighs resting on top of Sasha’s. Bare-handed, needle a little shaky. There’s a marker dot on Sasha’s right earlobe. Sveta is lying on the ground an arm’s length away, flipping through a magazine. The man on the cover is half-naked and wet, for some reason, and he’s got one brilliant ear piercing in.

“Just do it,” Sasha whines as Ilya holds the potato, cut in half, behind Sasha’s ear. He has to use his thumb to try to keep Sasha’s earlobe pinned to the flat side of the potato, which is harder than it should be because they definitely boiled the potato for way too fucking long.

“Stop moving, then! Fuck,” Ilya says, squinting as he lifts the sewing needle to Sasha’s earlobe with his other hand.

Sveta lowers her magazine to look over at them, rolling her eyes. “Is this going to take all night?”

Her ears are already pierced, by a professional, and Ilya suspects she also doesn’t trust him with a needle. Which he can’t fault her for, he supposes. He has good hands, but not in that sense.

Sasha is much more reckless with his body. Sasha, who yelps as Ilya pricks his lobe with the needle, not enough to pierce the skin, but for it to hurt. He pinches Ilya’s thigh. “Fucking do it!”

Ilya pushes the needle through Sasha’s ear so fast that they both stare at each other, silently, until Sasha says, “You’re done? It’s done—?” and then squeaks when Ilya pulls the potato off the sharp end of the needle, tugging on Sasha’s bright-red ear.

He stares at the needle in Sasha’s earlobe, long and thin and silver, gleaming, and reaches for it right as Sasha shoves the stud earring into his palm and tells him to put that in soon. Before his ear swells red and round. Sasha whimpers when Ilya pulls the needle out. There’s a prick of blood.

“Do you have—” Ilya rummages around, and Sveta slides the tiny ceramic bowl with ice cubes in it toward him. “Thanks.”

Picking one up, slippery and cold between his fingers, Ilya holds it gently against Sasha’s earlobe for a few seconds while Sasha cusses at the chill of the ice. He keeps cussing the whole way through, too, but by the time they’ve got the stud in, and the clear crystal at the end catches the light—almost as pretty as the needle—he stops complaining.

“Stole it from my mom,” he says. “She’s gonna kill me.”

And he smiles at Ilya, who grins back.

“Maybe I should get a third one,” Sveta says, considering it. “Let me know if that one gets infected.”

“Fuck.” Sasha reaches up to touch his tender earlobe, and Ilya smacks his hand away. “Should we douse it in alcohol?”

Ilya shrugs. Then he wipes the needle clean on his shirt and holds it up. “We can sterilize it with liquor. That works, right? Read that somewhere. Now you do me next.”

“I will not be visiting you at the hospital,” Sveta tells them, but rolls over onto her side to look for the bottle Sasha had brought earlier and stashed underneath his bed. “Well, I suppose it’s not the worst way to celebrate. If you manage to convince another girl to fuck you, maybe you can pierce the other ear.”

Sasha stares at Ilya, who looks back at him.

“I’ll get the vodka,” Sasha says, untangling himself from Ilya.

When he’s out of the room, Ilya wraps his fingers around Sveta’s ankle, kisses her knee. She kicks him.

“I know where your mouth has been,” she tells him. “And the rest of you.”

“I cannot deprive the world of me,” Ilya tells her. “Which part of me do you want to have? Sasha gets my right lobe, you can have the left one.”

By the time Sasha is back, Sveta says she wants Ilya’s tongue. Sasha calls it a miracle that Ilya can go a week without talking. He needs that mouth for chirping and kissing and other more interesting things. Sveta settles for the left ear, as promised. She lets Ilya use one of her stud earrings, small and discreet. Big enough to cause a problem with his father, though.

It does get infected. And Sasha’s mom is pissed off. Both of these things are fine because the next time they try, Ilya’s steady hands pinching Sasha’s cartilage, it’s much smoother.

So when Ilya has Shane Hollander on his back some years later, at twenty, his tongue to Hollander’s ear, he recognizes the scar. It’s not big enough to be visible from a distance, but there’s a distinct, pale line on his earlobe, the flesh around it dipping down toward the scar. Signaling a past wound. Because it would have been a wound. More than a scrape. Blood on the shoulder of his pristine shirt.

Ilya pushes himself up on his hands, hips pinning Hollander down. “You have had your ear pierced?”

Hollander immediately reaches for his right ear. His thumb swipes over the scar. “I—yeah, but only for, like, a couple of weeks. It was stupid.”

Ilya hums, lowering himself onto his forearms so that he can take Hollander’s earlobe between his teeth, kissing his jaw right after. “Why stupid? I think it would look quite pretty.”

“I only did it because someone dared me to,” Hollander says. “After the final in oh-eight, when we lost, they—my team, I mean—thought it was only fair I do something to commemorate the loss, which, it’s not that they forced me—”

“Hollander, get to the point.” Ilya groans. Leaning to the side a bit, he takes in Hollander’s face. Hollander is staring up at the ceiling, touching the curve of his ear again. Skin shiny where Ilya has put his tongue. “You lost finals to me, best hockey player in the world”—Hollander rolls his eyes, which is cute—“and your team make you pierce your ear? Did they pierce theirs, also?”

“Uhm, no. It was just me. But we went to a piercing studio because I didn’t trust any of them to… handle a needle. Or be safe about it. There are so many ways for them to get infected, right, and, anyway, they thought it’d be funny to make their captain get the… gay ear pierced, or something. That’s why I said it’s stupid.”

“You took it out?”

Hollander grimaces. “I… it ripped it out. I forgot I had it and it snagged on my helmet.”

Ilya whistles. Must’ve hurt.

Must’ve bled, too.

Later, when Ilya’s so deep inside of Hollander he swears he’s going to melt into him, he pinches Hollander’s earlobe between thumb and forefinger and presses his nail lightly against the divot of his scar there. Hollander shakes under him, face red and begging for release. Which Ilya can give him, obviously, wants to see Hollander come undone on his cock more than anything—presses his nail harder into the skin—Hollander’s voice breaking, a sharp gasp—Ilya’s nail hard, digging deeper—must hurt, must fucking hurt—and Hollander comes, trembles, eyes wide and glistening and bright as he peers up at Ilya. Come pools on Hollander’s belly and Ilya realizes that somewhere in all of that, he came, too. Came warm and heavy inside of Hollander, through the sensation of Hollander’s skin buckling under Ilya’s nail, his pain mirrored onto Ilya’s own body. His ear throbs. His cock twitches, still shoved deep inside of Hollander.

“What the fuck?” Hollander asks, trying to catch his breath, and Ilya laughs, kisses him, and wonders how fucking stupid his face looks at that moment.

It happens again the next time they’re at Hollander’s Montreal apartment. Ilya remembers the first time he held a sewing needle to someone else’s skin.

Ilya’s got two slivers of a scar on his hip. So pale they are barely noticeable, overpowered by the brown smattering of birthmarks. But they’re there, can be felt against a tongue, and he knows that Hollander has tasted them because sometimes as he is taking Ilya into his mouth, Hollander’s thumb will absentmindedly rub over the raised skin. His eyes trained on Ilya, who peers back at him, puts his hand over Hollander’s to keep it there, on the scars.

“No one else knows of these,” Ilya tells him, and there it is, that glint of possessiveness in Hollander’s eyes. It makes Ilya’s head reel. And it is why he doesn’t hesitate to say, “I could mark you just like that. If you want.”

Hollander moans around him, his hand scrambling to get past the press of his jeans, into his underwear, to get himself off. 

“Would last longer than bruises,” Ilya continues. “Maybe forever.”

He nudges his leg between Hollander’s thighs for him to pivot his hips toward, get himself off that way, arm awkwardly caught between his stomach and Ilya’s shin. And he comes like that, pants still drawn all the way up, his mouth swallowing around Ilya, and Ilya thinks of his own scars on Hollander’s body, silver pricks, like pale freckles, everywhere. His fingers pushing against them.

And the need in him is so deep he feels younger than he is, almost embarrassed by how hot his want is, how badly he wants it, how he doesn’t even have the fucking words to describe what he wants to do to Hollander at that moment. Just knows that if he can figure it out, can say it, then Hollander will say yes, as he always does.

Ilya and Cliff are wandering through BNA, rain pouring heavy outside, the rest of the team split up as they wait for the plane to be readied. Cliff’s halfway done with his pink, fruity drink, flipping through the magazines at Parnassus Books, making some offhand comment about this weekend. Ilya’s eyes catch on the shimmer in the store across from them, James Avery; sleek, glass stands and black signs, completely at odds with the rest of the grey airport. He pats Cliff on the back, thinking he might leave him behind, only for Cliff to bound after him. That’s the fun and annoying thing about Cliff—he follows, like a puppy.

“Buying jewelry for your Montreal girl? Jesus, Rozy, that’s like, serious stuff,” he says, slurping his drink loudly through the straw.

Ilya leans over the glass cases while the woman working the desk stares at them, looking unenthused. He can’t blame her. If he had to work at an airport, he’d be fucking miserable, too. He looks over at Cliff, who is swiping through Tinder, as if they’re not about to step on a plane.

“We are leaving Nashville, you know this, yes?” Ilya asks, gesturing behind them, as if the giant airport didn’t make it apparent. “What the fuck are you doing on Tinder?”

“Premium account, dude.” Cliff doesn’t even look up. “Location set to Boston. You wouldn’t know anything about that, though, I bet, fucking casanova. Are you buying something or not? I wanna get a sandwich before the flight.”

Ilya raises his hand in a quick ‘thank you’ to the woman, who calls out a quick, thanks for stopping by, safe flight! and herds Cliff out of the store. “Not today.”

“Not quite there yet, huh? Better think twice before buying her something real nice, or she’ll get used to it,” Cliff tells him, sipping on his drink. The ice inside the plastic cup clinks loudly.

“Not my Jane,” Ilya says, pressing his tongue against the edge of his front teeth. “She does not care about expensive stuff. Only cares about winning.” Thinks of himself at the end of that sentence, like Hollander’s prized possession.

Cliff howls with laughter, says, “Well thank god she’s already fucking the best center in the MLH, then, otherwise you’d have to stay on your toes. Might wanna think about locking her down.” And Ilya laughs because that’s just not happening. There is no locking down. That’s not what this is.

He pictures Hollander on his stomach, back arched, a surface piercing lodged at his nape. Silver. Gold. Something crystal that catches the light at every angle Ilya takes him. What he wants from Hollander is something of the body; he wants to fuck Hollander until this restless ache in him has worn off. Until he can be inside a woman again and not think of when he will next be in Montreal.

Cliff adds, “Who knows, maybe Hollander wants to finally get back at you for being such a bitch to him. Might take the opportunity to steal her away if you suddenly start playing like shit. Crazier stuff happens.”

Ilya raises both brows and Cliff puts his hands up defensively. “Just saying! He was looking at you real fucking nasty last game. Might wanna watch yourself.”

“Shut the fuck up, Marly,” Ilya says, and Cliff is all laughs.

Into the boards. Hollander’s bruised back, his mottled purple-blue-green thighs and hips from the weight of Ilya’s body ramming into him on the ice. An intentional trip—crowd jeering, one of the zebras sending Ilya away, his giddiness white-toothed—and the explosion that follows in Ilya’s Boston home. Hollander’s teeth on him, the frantic whining, the upset (you fucking asshole, you dick, you piece of shit) as Hollander works his anger out of his system, lets it be fucked out of him until he’s satiated, but not pliant. Ilya curls his fingers hard on Hollander’s hips, so that he can get his nails in there, and Hollander cries out but doesn’t shy away, rocks himself back on Ilya’s cock. And afterward, Hollander touches the marks, stares at the ceiling, says, “Wish those lasted as long as the bruises do.”

Ilya kisses his shoulder, the slope into Hollander’s collarbone, mouth on his pulsepoint.

“I could give you one,” he says, knowing he sounds eager. “Piercing. Like your ear.”

“And how would I go about explaining that to my team? I’m just suddenly into jewelry? I don’t think I’ve ever even been seen in, like, a fucking ring,” Hollander says while Ilya massages his quads for him. Ilya digs his thumbs into the muscles along Hollander’s legs, drags them up, up to unknot the tension there. Hollander lets out a deep, slow sigh of relief.

“Easy,” Ilya murmurs, kissing Hollander’s knee. “Take them out when we are done. It will heal, scar, probably. Maybe not every time. But you would remember I did it, yes? We would know.”

Hollander does it again: touches his ear, eyes unfocused.

“Could be anywhere,” Ilya continues, kissing his way down Hollander’s chest. He puts his mouth to Hollander’s hipbone, says, “Could be here…” to Hollander’s navel, “here…” right above his groin, at the first skirt of his dark pubes, “here…” Teeth against the skin, a mere suggestion of what it might feel like.

Hollander’s cock is hardening against Ilya’s cheek, and he grins, hoping that Hollander catches how sharp his canines are. Hopes that when Hollander closes his eyes as Ilya blows him, the image of them lingers. Sharp as needles.

He’s got him.

Ilya has got Shane Hollander.

He doesn’t bring it up for a few weeks. Next time they meet up, in Boston, Ilya settles for his nails, again, his teeth, though Hollander wriggles desperately under him the whole time, like they’re both seeking an edge they can’t find. The thought of it is heady. Ilya pins him down, holds his arms to the bed as he pistons into Hollander, pants into his mouth, kisses him wet and filthy as Hollander yelps, “Rozanov—fuck!” against his cheek.

And because it’s Ilya’s house he can light a cigarette after, and Hollander can do nothing except furrow his brow and lean against the headboard as Ilya takes a drag and blows smoke through the corner of his mouth. The only terrible thing about this is that now he’s definitely not getting any more action before Hollander rolls out of Ilya’s bed and heads back to his hotel. He weighs his sacrifice, considers putting the cig out. Brushing his teeth again, maybe test how much it’d take to get Hollander to part his lips a final time.

Ilya pinches the cig between his lips instead.

“Have you ever…” Hollander starts, wipes the back of his hand over his forehead. His cute, short bangs ruffle. Ilya wants to fuck him again. “Like, pierced someone before? I mean, at all. Anywhere.”

Looking over at him, Ilya slowly moves to tap the cig over the ashtray at his bedside table.

“Yes,” he says. “Years ago. With Sasha and Sveta—Svetlana. Took sewing needle and potato and pierced our ears, see”—he taps his right ear—“here. But the scar is mostly gone now. My father did not like his son having, as you say, gay earring.”

Hollander’s face twists. Ilya thinks he must’ve had the same thing thrown at him. By the team, maybe. This is the sport of boys: insist on the joke and then turn on each other.

“You think you could do it? Safely, I mean.” Hollander swallows. Ilya watches his throat bob.

Ilya kills his cig. He puts his weight on one hand and pushes himself over to Hollander’s side of the bed, one arm reaching over to rub his thigh. Hollander’s nose wrinkles, probably at the smell of him. It's not the closeness: Ilya knows Hollander better than that

“Where do you want it?” he asks, tapping his fingers against Hollander’s thigh. “Ear? Is the easiest, probably. Or…”

Hollander’s eyes are on his mouth. I have you, Ilya thinks, greedy. I don’t need to do anything to own you. But it stirs something hungry in him, anyway.

“Somewhere discreet, for…”

He doesn’t say for first time, but Hollander must hear it. Ilya's mind fills in: that image of Hollander on his knees, neck on display. Metal gleaming against shiny sweat. Moving his hand up to cup Hollander’s neck, Ilya rubs his fingers over Hollander’s nape. Pinches it. Their eyes meet. Ilya does as he has several other times now—presses the blunt edge of his nail into the skin. Hollander twitches but doesn’t move away, doesn’t even gasp.

“Here,” Ilya says, and it is not a question.

Can’t meet, Hollander says over text. Next time.

It’s three hours before their game. Ilya’s whole body had been vibrating, like he’s four shots into a good night. Now, his body is cold and prickly and off-balance, from one text.

next time is in forever, you will not make it, Ilya tells him, hollander come on. Again, we can be quick. one fuck. i will blow you in the hallway and then door is right there and you can go after, one more, come oooon hollander.

Hollander texts him only half an hour before the game. Fuck off, "Lily."

And Montreal takes the win, to make bad into worse, and Ilya throws his phone into his stall a bit too hard, hears Cliff laugh at him, ask what’s got him so bratty, earns a, “Fuck you, Marly,” and, “I need a drink,” and, “Fuck Montreal,” and, “Fuck Hollander,” with his beautiful two goals and stupid fucking eyes, creased with delight. There’s nothing on the Metros’ schedule tomorrow. Later, when Ilya scrolls through his Instagram, he sees a rare post from Hollander of a night in, some stupid fucking hockey book propped up next to a cup of tea. Because of course he drinks tea at night. Of course he is posting it so that Ilya has to see that he chose not to meet with him. Because Hollander is being a little bitch on purpose, for some reason.

i know you are dying for it, he texts Hollander, because he has no self restraint and also because he’s been nursing his loss with the other guys long enough to be drunk.

The only message he gets is, I don’t know, I’m feeling pretty good about my win tonight, and Ilya’s, i know how to make you feel better than ‘pretty’ good goes unanswered.

Maybe Hollander’s ready to cut him off already, which would be crazy, because that’s Ilya’s call. He started this. Every time he shows up, Hollander’s on his knees before Ilya even has a chance to tell him to do so. For a second, Ilya wonders if Hollander’s mind has made a one-eighty, and he is out there fucking women, or maybe he has a girlfriend he doesn’t want to tell Ilya about. A serious girlfriend. Ilya googles Shane Hollander girlfriend and sees a million photos of random women posting selfies with him, but all of them are fans, and also he is prettier than all of them, which doesn’t matter actually, but they’re not girlfriends. And Rozanov has fucked women just as beautiful. Some news articles speculate, but there’s never anything concrete.

He almost asks Hollander, are you avoiding me? before he realizes that sounds like he is Hollander’s possessive girlfriend. It’s just one missed meeting. He deletes the message, sends instead, girl here at the club has scar on her ear too and when you jerk off tonight, touch your neck like i am there.

Okay. Maybe Ilya doesn’t have Hollander. At least not entirely. But he could.

He knows this; Hollander knows this.

Ilya starts fucking women who look like Shane Hollander; keeps fucking women who look like him. Dark hair, brown eyes. Usually the similarities end there; after all, Hollander’s waist doesn’t slope like that, he doesn’t smell of perfume or have the stickiness of the club on him. He doesn’t have golden hoop earrings or his eyebrow pierced or a single crystal on his cupid’s bow, or wear low rise jeans to show off silver barbells right above his back dimples. The women who sort-of look like him, in the worst light, in the purple light, in the blue light, the red, the yellow-green, like bruises layering themselves on the crowd, a little craven—those women do. And it’s not enough. Ilya doesn’t want to think about why.

They’re in New York when Cliff leans over, holding his fifteen dollar cocktail. He points at a woman across the room, says, “Isn’t that your type?” and Ilya knows he has a problem. That he is building habits without knowing it. Says back to Cliff, “I don’t need you to pick my women for me,” while ordering a Vieux Carré. The rest of the team have scattered across the Lower East Side. Hammersmith is nowhere to be seen. Maybe Ilya will have to pry him out of the bathroom again. He blacks out too fucking easily, and Ilya’s not going to leave him to fend for himself.

“Pick my women for me,” Cliff mouths back, voice high-pitched, grinning wide and toothy as he tips his drink back. Daiquiri. It takes him from smiley to worse. But he is warm, too. Annoying in the good way. Ilya doesn’t mind it. “Just saying you got a type, Roz! Maybe easy for you to forget with the way you cycle through ‘em.” Ilya rolls his eyes, fixes the collar of his shirt. Neckline open enough for the gold cross to show.

Drink in his hand, his phone buzzes in his back pocket. Cliff sees him move to grab it, raises a brow, “Your girl has freaky senses, dude.” Slurps his drink loud, as usual.

Ilya takes his phone out slowly, sees Hollander’s, Congrats on the win. Don’t get too used to it, though. He flicks his eyes up at Cliff, who is pretending to look away, and tucks his phone away again.

“You’re terrible, Roz,” Cliff tells him, no edge. Ilya downs the rest of his cocktail, orders another one, and decides Cliff can figure out Hammersmith’s deal and get him home.

He dances. This is easy. He can bury his face in the crook of a woman’s neck and smell the scent of her perfume and open his eyes to her face and enjoy it. Let it be just sex. She asks for his number because she already knows his name, and he pauses before he gives it to her. Doesn’t save it when she texts. It’s her apartment and tomorrow there’s an early flight, so he leaves without saying much else. Cliff flips him off when he gets back. Hammersmith puked all over himself in their bathroom, and now he’s sleeping in Ilya’s spot on the bed, so Ilya has to peel the hotel key out of Hammersmith’s fucking jean pockets and go to his room instead. Congrats on the win.

Ilya leans against the hotel door, head spinning, staring at his screen. So white it looks blue. He writes, new york is boring tonight. wish we played montreal not fucking admirals. Deletes it. Sucks a deep breath in through his nose, runs cold water in the bathroom sink, and puts his head straight under the faucet.

Ilya fucks a man who is not Hollander. He misses dick, he thinks. And there is something about the chase, the secrecy of it, the shift in language. If Ilya wants to find a woman, he can walk up to her. It is simple. She will understand. If Ilya wants to fuck a man, he has to play. This guy is toned and tanned and eager and willing to keep his mouth shut, is tattooed on his back, bends over but pushes back a bit when he can tell Ilya’s into that, seems to be enjoying himself a whole fucking lot when he hangs off Ilya’s dick and it’s—fine. Is made only a little more interesting by the piercings on the underside of his cock: straight barbells, silver, two of them parallel. Ilya tongues the metal ball at one end of the barbell. He closes his eyes.

It’s summer before they even have a chance to meet up again. Ilya’s not sure he’s ever sent this many text messages in exchange for such little attention. He begs—asks—Hollander for a photo and gets one of the sunset. Offers one of his cock and gets a photo of Hollander’s middle finger, to which he suggests where he can put that finger if he wants to be a good boy, and then there’s nothing else for a day.

Ilya goes shopping with Sveta. She’s buying a dainty bracelet when his eyes snag on a loop earring with a dangling crystal. Simple gold, definitely an earring. He pushes his tongue against the back of his teeth, staring into the glass case, takes another lap around the shop and ends back up in front of the tiny, gold hoops.

“Stop pacing, you look like a dog that needs to piss,” Sveta says, throwing him a brief look while the attendant adjusts the bracelet for her and asks if she will need a paired necklace. Sveta indulges in a second purchase.

He sends a photo of the gold hoops to Hollander, who does not reply. After a few hours have passed, Ilya adds, not for your ear. Still nothing. Ilya tosses his phone on his bed, meets Sveta, takes a shot and then licks the taste of liquor off her tongue, takes a taxi to a club which is all bodies without distinction, reels in the scent of perfume. He considers men. He knows the cues, how to signal. Hand on the back, sliding low, right tone of voice, eyes always drifting to a door, a bathroom, as if to say, we can go anywhere together. But he ends up squeezed between two women, instead, leans forward to kiss the brunette in front of him, hand on her hip, and discovers the metal ball on her tongue only when it swipes against the roof of his mouth. Thinks of Hollander.

Sveta is surprised that he rides back with her, but she rests her head on his shoulder and does not ask him about the fact he is staring at several text messages that have no response. Ilya tries one last time: want to be inside you.

And Hollander, who is terrifying because he is aware of the extent of Ilya’s desires by now, sends a photo of his shoulders and neck, droplets of water still on him, hair damp, the line of his jaw visible only in the edge of the photo. Not even a glimpse of his mouth, which Ilya misses on his cock and would love to see, but still. This is Hollander’s peace offering.

He texts, this is your idea of good photo? lower your camera, then, cant even see your ass.

Hollander tells him, Fuck you, asshole, and Ilya, who is very nice, promises, hard and deep. how you like it, because it is more fun when Hollander is so into it he is overwhelmed by the boundlessness of his own want. Sweaty with it. Boneless with it. Ilya’s not sure if that is Hollander’s need he is imagining or his own. He puts that thought with the scraps.

gold or silver? he asks, and when Hollander says, I don’t know I haven’t thought about that before, it really means: I didn’t realize I wanted this until you.

He hasn’t commented on the earrings, but if Ilya has any idea of how Hollander’s pretty head works, which Ilya thinks he does, Hollander’s not going to be able to stop thinking about them. Ilya wants him to imagine the prick of the needle, the slide of it through skin, the scar left behind when it comes out. But for Hollander, admitting that means admitting a lot of other things. Like the fact he is going to let Ilya put a needle to him. As if it isn’t enough he is bending over and letting Ilya fuck him, that he sucks Ilya’s cock as if it’s his purpose on earth, gets off on being manhandled and bruised and roughed up and gets off on having Ilya Rozanov of the Boston Raiders’ cock split him open.

See you soon, Hollander texts him.

Sveta asks why he is smiling and he kisses her cheek and says, this year I will win the Stanley Cup, and she laughs, tells him, thank god, finally.

He buys a hollow needle. If he tried to shove a sewing needle into Hollander’s skin, he’d end up with a shiner. Hollander is nothing if not meticulous when it comes to himself. His body, his entire fucking life. Even through text, Ilya has gotten a sense for how obsessive Hollander’s routines are. Down to the quarter hour of his days. Post-training gym sessions, a scale for his food, coconut water and orange juice mixed for hydration. And Hollander is offering that pristine body up to Ilya, who’s just there to get laid. It would be a bitch move to treat him carelessly.

So maybe all of this is not useless labor, he thinks, with ten tabs open on his laptop and a glass of vodka. But it doesn’t feel that way. Not when he is acutely aware of what he will get out of this.

He buys gloves, too. Though, really, he wants to feel the texture of Hollander’s skin when he puts the needle to it. Jewelry—curved barbells, implant grade titanium. He wanted something sparkly immediately, but Hollander had googled too many things, too, and said, It’s not like I will wear it after, it’s a waste of money. Ilya is fine wasting his money, but lets Hollander coax him into titanium this time if only because he is always hornier after winning an argument.

Ninety-nine percent isopropyl alcohol. He pops the cap open to smell it and the scent feels like stripping off all other senses.

There’s a photo of his supplies in his and Hollander’s message thread. He refuses to delete it. Thinks Hollander probably hasn’t, either. It’s a pretty simple photo: his bedroom, the box placed on the chair he likes draping his clothes over.

One of his semi-regular hookups peeks into it, asks, “Are those piercing needles?”

He shrugs, tells her he has hobbies, says, “Good way to make use of my hands when I am not playing hockey,” and she shows him what else he can do with them, which is distraction enough. But only for until she’s gone. It’s probably about time he deleted that girl’s number. She lingers in the doorway too often these days when he walks her out. She leaves, and Ilya’s alone with that fucking box and the echo of Hollander asking him, You think you could do it?

Ilya’s fingers cradle his neck. Dreams of how Hollander’s skin might scar, how Ilya might feel the punctures once they’ve healed. Perfectly round and silvered.

Hollander sends a photo. Another one of those badly-angled, semi-artistic ones that Ilya thinks are definitely not meant to be repeat-jerkoff material for him, like the one of his neck, but he’s gotten off to them anyway.

If you had to pick one, Hollander asks, which one would you do first.

And there’s another photo of his neck, but this time Hollander is pushing his dark hair out of the way so Ilya can see his nape better, the bump of his spine, Hollander’s nail making the skin divot. A second image: Hollander’s hipbone dipping into his underwear, the same place Ilya put his mouth on before, said here, where the skin is especially thin and sensitive.

Ilya’s alone. He is alone and with one hand on his cock he types: i will get both, and Hollander finally, fucking-finally, says, Do you fly out same night? Talking about the upcoming Montreal game. Ilya’s heart is so loud he can hear it in his ears.

morning after. your place.

Hollander asks, Can you bring everything with you?

Ilya’s still hard. He’s hard and he laughs and only manages to tell Hollander, yes, before he’s pulling the photo of Hollander’s hipbone back up, which is a new contender for most unintentionally-hot image Ilya has of him. An undeniable favorite-to-be.

Montreal loses.

“Christ, dude,” Cliff says next to him as Ilya peels his pads off one by one. “Are you seeing your girl again? You’re practically bouncing off the walls. Can’t imagine she’s gonna match that energy if she’s a Metros fan.”

Ilya smiles, his fingers twitching. “You will cover for me, yes? For curfew?”

“Maybe you should learn to cover your ass.” Cliff is grinning back at him, though. “You gonna play it sweet with her? Lick her wounds a bit?”

Sweet is probably the last thing Hollander wants from him right now.

“No problem at all,” Ilya tells him. “She likes me when I am mouthy.” And he clicks his teeth together, like an animal, and Cliff howls, laughs with him until someone else comes to give them shit for it and then Jane is everyone else’s business, too, which Ilya doesn’t like but can’t do much about.

“I’ll drink for you when we go celebrate,” Cliff promises. “Not that I think you’ll feel like you’re missing out.”

So, yes—Montreal lost. Which means Hollander lost. Which means that when Ilya walks the two-hundred meter trek from where his taxi dropped him off to the backdoor entrance of Hollander’s fucking sex-apartment, like he requested, he braces himself for a Hollander who is horny and angry, and not just horny and boastful. With some humility, of course. As is typical of him.

He doesn’t brace himself for Hollander swinging the door open, grabbing him by the belt, and hoisting him inside. Practically shoves Ilya the entire length of the stairs up to his apartment, and Ilya’s never felt—Hollander is fucking scrambling after him, with his hands on Ilya’s hips, pushing, his head against Ilya’s back until they’re inside. The apartment door shuts and Ilya opens his mouth and Hollander’s is right there, licking into him.

“Fuck,” Ilya says, because there’s not much else he can conjure up. “Hollander…”

“Missed you,” Hollander pants, as if he’s not the reason it’s been this long since they saw each other. “Are we—are you going to—?”

Their foreheads meet, the length of Hollander’s nose against Ilya’s. His warm breath.

His eyelashes are so dark this close. Straight and thick and pretty and Ilya kind of wonders if he could pinch them between his teeth. How close to Hollander he can get before it becomes a problem. Or a bigger problem.

“Thought you changed your mind,” Ilya says, because for a few months he really had. “Maybe did not know how to say you wanted to just fuck.”

Hollander licks his lips. Ilya watches him. “You’re not here to fuck me?”

“I will,” Ilya promises. “I am thinking…” He slides his fingers over Hollander’s nape, massages the skin and Hollander preens, tilts his head to the side and rolls his shoulders, leans into the touch. “You have freckles here.”

Hollander’s eyes are heavy-lidded. He is so beautiful that Ilya’s chest hurts. “I wouldn’t know. I don’t make a habit of checking my back out in the mirror.”

“Hm.” Ilya rubs circles into Hollander’s neck, presses one nail in a bit too roughly so he can feel the downy hairs prickle. “Ask me for it.”

Hollander swallows loudly, blinks at him, as if he doesn’t know. He loves pretending he can get what he wants without needing to work for it. “Ask…”

“For it, yes,” Ilya repeats. “Tell me what you want me to do to you, so I can think about it.”

“But we already agreed—we already—” Hollander says, staring at Ilya in what must be genuine bewilderment. Ilya thinks of his eyelashes again. The jut of his hipbones.

“Yes, but that was then, now is now.” Ilya’s grip on the back of Hollander’s neck tightens, his thumb nestled right against Hollander’s jaw. “I want to hear you say it,” and because he has such a good view of Hollander’s face, adds, “It can be my prize. For winning tonight. You will tell me what you want and maybe I am feeling nice.”

Hollander’s lips tighten into a line. His brow furrows. “You don’t think it’s prize enough you get to fuck Montreal’s captain?”

“No, I get to do that anyways,” Ilya says sweetly. “He is my biggest fan, I think, always begging for my—”

And then Hollander is kissing him again, more teeth than tongue and his hands are in Ilya’s hair, tugging him impossibly close. Hollander arches into the kiss, and Ilya thinks he hears him call Ilya an asshole, or something equally unimpressive. Ilya moves his hand from Hollander’s neck to the curve of his back. He gasps, keens against Ilya’s mouth like a starved animal and Ilya is feeling fucking starved, too, a bit sickeningly ravenous, wants to have Hollander’s cock in his mouth, wants to bend him over and enter him, wants to get his tongue into his ass and take his time but all of that is second to what Hollander says into his ear:

“I want you to pierce my neck. I want you to—I want something that’s yours. That you haven’t done to anyone else. I don’t want to share this with any of—any of the other people you’re… fucking, or whatever, I want you to pierce me, and I want it to scar, and—I want to be the only one you ever do that to. Okay? That’s what I fucking want, Rozanov. I want you to pierce me and then I want you to fuck me and come on me. It’s all I can think about and it makes me feel crazy. Happy? Or should I give it to you printed and notarized?”

Hollander’s face is flushed and his chest is heaving and he is so gorgeous like this.

Ilya’s not happy. That word seems trivial and useless right now. It doesn’t matter if he’s happy, because he’s got Hollander, again. Ilya is hard in his underwear. Fully erect, straining against his jeans.

He holds Hollander’s waist with both hands, waits until his attention moves from Ilya’s lips back to his eyes. Ilya tells him, “Take your clothes off and get on the bed,” heat in his stomach, his head, “and then wait for me.”

He thinks of their first All Stars game, when Hollander had sunk to his knees the moment Ilya asked him to. How easy it had looked.

Hollander sways. He is always moving toward Ilya, like a magnetic pull. Even now he tries to lean in for one last kiss, and Ilya wants to give it to him. He does.

“Hollander,” he says instead, voice steady. It tickles his throat. He wants to pry Hollander’s mouth back open and taste the soft spot at the very back of his mouth. Wants to shove his fingers in there and press it.

He leans back against the door, takes his hands off Hollander’s waist, and watches.

“Strip here or in the bedroom?” Hollander asks him.

I don’t fucking care, I just want to see you.

Ilya picks his bag off the ground, says, “Bedroom.”

They walk; Hollander first, Ilya following. The moment they enter the bedroom, Hollander’s neatly made-up bed with all it’s stupid fucking pillows in view, Ilya dumps his bag on the floor again. Hollander thumbs the bottom hem of his shirt, his back to the bed.

“What?” Ilya asks. “Undress.”

“Right. But, like, are you…” Hollander starts, tugging his shirt up just enough to show his happy trail.

“Hollander,” Ilya says, raising his brows pointedly. “Take your fucking clothes off.”

There’s a beat after where Hollander stands completely still, shirt halfway off. Then he moves, as if Ilya’s words are rippling through his body, firing through his veins, joints shifting, tugging his shirt over his head, tucking the short sleeves in neatly and then folding the shirt over twice. He reaches for his pants, undoing the top button before unzipping. While pushing his pants down his thighs, he holds Ilya’s gaze, eyes only flicking down when he has to step out of his jeans and fold those, too. His underwear goes last, and Ilya believes, for a second, that Hollander will hesitate. But Ilya had said to take his clothes off, and so he gets to watch Hollander pry his navy blue boxers off. Gets to see him already hard, how he is wet in a way the color of his underwear had hidden. Hollander glances around and Ilya points at the dresser in the corner. As if this isn’t Hollander’s apartment.

Hollander puts his clothes on top of the dresser, pauses before dipping down to roll his socks off, white, over-ankle socks. He rolls those up.

“Okay,” Hollander says, one hand pausing right below his navel. Perhaps he realizes that there’s not really any point in covering himself up. “I’m naked.”

Ilya waits. Hollander nods, slowly, then backs up on the bed, sits down and scoots back, shoulders raised.

“Good,” Ilya tells him, and then he kneels down in front of his bag. He pulls each item out slowly, one by one, the alcohol; the barbell; the gloves; last, the packaged and sterilized needle. That one he tilts his head up for, so he can get a better look at Hollander’s face when he sees it. And it is so worth it. Hollander’s eyes are blown, chest heaving already, dick hard against the curve of his hip. Ready for him.

Ilya wonders if he should fuck him first or after. What would be better—to watch the piercing glint as he takes Hollander from behind, or to have him loose and sweet after an orgasm, trembling as the needle pushes into his skin? It could complicate things if he’s wriggling about too much. He might need Ilya to put his knees on his arms, hold him in place.

Hollander says nothing. He sits and waits and keeps his eyes on Ilya’s hands, leaning back on his elbows, still a bit out of breath.

“Get on your stomach,” Ilya says, finally standing up. He pulls his own t-shirt off, throws it onto the floor as he unzips his pants.

There’s lube in the drawer. Hollander always buys the same kind. Condoms tucked neatly into the space next to them.

It’s so easy for Hollander to get in position these days. Barely any hesitation as he rolls over onto his stomach and raises his ass up, his hand rubbing up the back of his thigh, stopping short of his ass. Like he was going to spread himself open, too. Eager. “I thought you would—”

“Soon,” Ilya tells him, kissing his way down Hollander’s spine. He leaves his pants on, shoves them down the curve of his ass so he can get his cock out but not much further. The slope of Hollander’s waist is as sturdy as the rest of him, but he always shivers at the touch, and when Ilya rubs his palms over Hollander’s hipbones he pushes his ass back against Ilya’s cock.

“Rozanov…” he says, looking over his shoulder, head resting against his forearms. Eyes wide and wet.

Ilya holds his breath, rubs his nose against the bumps of Hollander’s spine. He puts his mouth to Hollander’s shoulderblade, pulls his lips back, teeth skirting against his skin. All he can taste is skin, warmth. He flattens his tongue against the bend of Hollander’s back and kisses him there again, open-mouthed and sloppy, blowing his cold breath onto the spit-slick skin. Hollander whimpers, fists tangling into the bedsheets as he continues to rub his ass against Ilya’s cock. His jeans against Hollander’s bare ass blushes the skin; it must be uncomfortable, he must love it.

Ilya wants to fuck him raw, make Hollander’s hole leak his come. He drops his forehead to Hollander’s back as he rips the condom open, drags it down over his cock and slicks his fingers with lube. Two fingers to start with, because it hasn’t escaped him how much easier Hollander takes them, these days. Must be fingering himself on the regular. Thinking about Ilya’s cock, surely. He rubs Hollander’s stomach with his free hand, delights in how it flexes as Hollander grinds back onto Ilya’s hand. Twisting his wrist, Ilya sinks his fingers to the knuckles, strokes the seam down to his balls with his thumb and Hollander gasps, wiggling his hips to encourage.

He’s so worked up already. When Ilya slides his hand down to Hollander’s groin, rubbing through his pubes before fitting his hand around the base of his cock, it is smeared with precum. Wet like a girl, Ilya had said one time. It’s true now, too. Leaking all over, begging for Ilya to fuck him in the simplest of languages. Ilya could give him another finger. Ease Hollander into this a bit more.

“Hold still,” he says instead, taking his fingers out. He kisses down Hollander’s spine while circling Hollander’s loose hole with one thumb, kisses the furl of it so that his lips gloss with lube, and then licks a stripe up his taint, over his hole, back to his spine.

“Rozanov, fucking—god, please, please,” Hollander begs, face smushed against the bed.

He reaches back to pull his left cheek to the side and the sight of it, Hollander displaying himself for Ilya, twists white-hot behind his eyes. Ilya sinks his cock into him and Hollander still doesn’t let go of his own ass, giving Ilya a full view of how his rim clings to his cock when he moves his hip back, puffy and dark-red. Gripping Hollander’s wrist, Ilya shoves Hollander’s arm up his back, keeping it pinned there. Like this, Hollander can’t do much to stay upright, whimpers at every thrust, bare chest rubbing over the sheets. Later, maybe Ilya can mouth at his sore nipples for him. With some practice, he thinks Hollander could come just from that. He’s a quick study.

“Roz—Rozanov,” Hollander’s voice is jumbled, and Ilya doesn’t think his name has ever sounded so appealing. He needs to hear it on the ice. Needs to see Hollander with his gloves dropped, those dark eyes blown from something other than desire to be fucked. He would look so good angry, like before the first time Ilya had his ass, shoving at him in the staircase, why the fuck would you sext me before the game?

And with Ilya’s cock in to the hilt Hollander tells him, “Deeper, fuck, deeper, please, come on, come on—” reaching between his legs to tug on his own dick where Ilya has left him hanging. Ilya smothers his grin against Hollander’s neck, bites the skin there and holds it between his teeth as he sharpens the hold he has on Hollander’s hips. Listens to Hollander’s breath hitch, the moan turning into a shallow whimper, a, “Rozanov, that’s—fuck, fuck, that’s, my neck—” shaking underneath Hollander. Ilya lightens his bite, licks over the red crescents and watches the dents slowly rise, flattening out again.

Hollander squirms in his grip, tries to move the arm Rozanov secured behind his back, sobbing as he says, “I’m going to come—”

Ilya flinches, then slaps Hollander’s hand off his cock; Hollander lets him, perhaps because he thinks Ilya is going to help him finish. He looks nearly relieved when their eyes meet over Hollander’s shoulder, and then Ilya pushes him down hard. Like this, Hollander’s cock is pinned between his stomach and bed, and Ilya pulls out, pushes Hollander’s hand away when he tries to grab his own cock, brows furrowed cutely, confusion so stark in his eyes it might as well pour out of them.

“Open your mouth,” Ilya says as he pulls out and shuffles up the length of Hollander’s body until he can grab his hair and turn his face toward Ilya’s cock.

Hollander parts his lips, eyes on the blurry movement of Ilya’s hand moving over his dick. He even sticks his fucking tongue out, and that’s—it’s so fucking slutty, Ilya thinks, so insanely hot. How he doesn’t complain, just does. Ilya comes in streaks over Hollander’s cheek and the bridge of his nose and his tongue and then he shoves his thumb in Hollander’s mouth, rubs the pad of it over the length of Hollander’s tongue so he has to taste him. Hollander’s throat bobs and he peers up at Ilya, eyes red-rimmed.

“I wanna come,” he says, tilting his hips up so that Ilya can feel Hollander’s hard cock rub against the back of his thigh.

“After,” Ilya tells him, and Hollander stares back at him, mouth open still.

“What? No, I’m—Rozanov, get me off, what the fuck?” He’s pushing himself up on his elbows and Ilya shoves him in turn. Hollander’s forehead wrinkles. He licks his top lip. “What do you mean after?”

“After,” Ilya repeats. “I won our game tonight, so time for my prize, remember? Or did I fuck you so hard you forgot?” He pats Hollander’s waist, smiling. “On your stomach.”

And Hollander, who is hard and indignant but needy all the same, moves onto his stomach again, upper body resting on his forearms. He is breathing so loudly that Ilya can hear him. He kisses Hollander’s ear, rubs his fingers over the spot on Hollander’s neck where he’d bit him. The only thing remaining of his bite are dark pink lines.

That’s fine; Ilya has other, sharper teeth.

“Don’t move,” he tells Hollander while pulling the condom off, tying it neatly, and tossing it into the garbage can by the bed. Nice of Hollander to keep it there. Always the chistyulya. He stuffs his softening cock back into his underwear but doesn’t bother zipping back up, instead walks into the bathroom and takes his sweet time washing his hands, twice over. There’s not a noise from the bedroom in his absence.

On his way back he grabs the alcohol and the flat piercing. The gloves, the needle. When he crawls back onto the mattress, he sits down on Hollander’s back. Curls his left forefinger and drags it up, up, between Hollander’s shoulder blades, until he can tap it against his nape. He cleans the skin and marks two purple spots vertically and a line connecting them, following Hollander’s spine.

“It will be so pretty,” Ilya promises. Hums. “Might hurt.”

Hollander sucks in a breath. Ilya watches his shoulderblades shift. He rests his forehead on the back of his hands, eyes down. It is the only downside, Ilya thinks. That he won’t see Hollander’s face when he pierces him. He does everything slower than he needs to, and when Hollander’s hips lift a bit off the bed and grind back down, trying to get some relief for his cock, Ilya flicks Hollander’s arm. Hollander lowers his hips and does not buck them up again.

Putting his gloves on, he makes sure to snap them against his wrists, if only because the sound makes Hollander jolt. Trying to figure out how far from the point of the needle he is, perhaps.

Ilya pulls the needle out of its plastic bag.

It’s much thicker than the embroidery needle Ilya remembers putting to his body as a kid. Not heavy, but a weight in the room. An extension of himself as much as his fingers, which he uses to pinch the skin on Hollander’s neck. Hollander’s breathing quiets, body tense.

“Breathe out, Hollander,” Ilya murmurs, and when Hollander sighs, he tells him, “Yes, very good,” because he has earned it.

“Remember? I said you have freckles here,” he continues, “so many of them, very pretty, I think”— the round marks lined up between his fingers, the needle kissing the one closest to Ilya, Hollander’s dark-red flush, his quiet, steady breathing—“two more is perfect”—Ilya’s thumb urging the needle through the flesh, buttery smooth, Hollander’s hitched gasp, his arms twitching, the gleam of the needle’s fine point emerging.

Ilya leans back for a moment without letting go of Hollander’s neck. From this angle, the needle looks particularly long and intrusive. He kisses Hollander’s shoulder, then grabs the tongs. There’s not much blood. A dot or two of red. But Hollander’s neck is flushing red like when Ilya fucks him, and Ilya imagines it must be hot to the touch. Feverish. He could put his tongue to it. Could taste the swelling, the pervasive, pink blush. The sweat. Pry himself into Hollander in a new, strange fashion. It would be terrible; Hollander might never let him do this again. But the thought of it makes Ilya’s stomach coil. It makes him hard.

Hollander mumbles something into his hands. His back is broad and muscular, the needle the most delicate thing about him. How it winks near-gold in his moody, yellow lighting, perfectly straight. Ilya remembers some people pin insects for fun. Stretch the wings out, anchor them to a moment in time.

He’s going to remember this sight until the day something finally kills him.

Inserting the jewelry requires him to hold the skin steady, twisting the ball of the piercing onto the jewelry itself, pulling the needle out to finish screwing on the second one. Ilya puts his thumb between the two round ends and feels the metal rod push back. He should fetch the saline.

“Please,” Hollander says, then. His voice is steadier now as he tries lifting his hips again. Ilya’s eyes go down to where Hollander has twisted his waist just enough to show off his hard cock. “Rozanov, please.” As if he isn’t already the most perfect thing on earth.

So Ilya shuffles backward, allowing Hollander some space to push himself up on his forearms. He leaves his glove on when he reaches down to jerk Hollander off, does it hard and fast, covers the entire length of his cock and presses his thumb against his slit and Hollander’s hips jump, ass muscles clenching as he chases his orgasm into Rozanov’s fist. Ilya smells latex and sweat: gloves, used condom, Hollander’s warm body. After waiting for so long, the friction on his cock can’t be anything but too much-too good, balanced out by the drag of the stiff, dry gloves. Even the sound is stuffy until Hollander’s precome has slicked the glove enough to smooth each pump of Ilya’s hand on his cock. Crinkling, Hollander’s groans, his hitched, pleased whine as his orgasm builds again. And this time, Ilya will let him have it.

When Hollander comes—loudly, groaning into the crook of his arm—his white come is stark against the black gloves.

Ilya fumbles to get his own cock out, rips his right glove off with his teeth, holds it in his mouth, and uses the same hand to bring himself to completion one more time that night, eyes caught on the hook of Hollander’s new, shiny piercing. He pushes Hollander onto his back so he can shoot right over his cock. He rips the left glove off, too, drops them both right on the mattress and pretends he doesn’t see Hollander wince. Hollander’s thighs are spread wide to accommodate him, and Ilya rubs the inside of his thigh with his bare hand until Hollander’s eyes start to focus.

He pulls his legs up, arms resting on his elbows, realizing how out of breath he is, too.

Hollander nudges his cold toes against Ilya’s ass. Ilya looks at him.

“I want to see,” he says, tapping the side of his neck.

There’s one photo. After they’ve showered, Hollander uses his thumbs to push the hair on his nape up as best as he can. It’s not that it would’ve covered the piercing, but Ilya has a feeling he wants to be a participant; he wants to show it off. The photo is cropped right at Hollander’s shoulders, showing nothing of his face. Only his neck and the silver piercing.

Afterward, Hollander stares at it, lips pursed. For the first time, Ilya’s chest shifts with worry. Maybe he fucking hates it.

“You can’t tell it’s me, right?” he asks. He’s got a notch between his brows. Thinking face.

Ilya blinks, peering over Hollander’s shoulder down at the picture on his phone. “No.”

“Okay,” Hollander says. He pauses, still looking at the photo, then turns his chin so he can meet Ilya’s eyes. “You can save the photo. On your phone, I mean. You don’t have to delete it.”

“Oh?” Ilya raises his brows. He presses his tongue against the corner of his mouth. “You are letting me keep it? This photo I took?” He reaches out to snag his phone back, meeting no resistance. With a quick kiss to Hollander’s cheek and one hand stroking his waist, Ilya assures him, “It is my photo, Hollander. If I want it, I keep it. Maybe next time I take it while you are on my cock. Just for me to know.”

They stare at each other. Ilya drums his fingers against Hollander’s stomach. He can see the thoughts moving in Hollander’s head, one hundred of them at the same time. Somewhere in the middle of it, Hollander is surely picturing himself spread open on Ilya’s dick, seeing the flash of the camera more so than hearing the shutter go off. Ilya has taken a lot of photos during sex; most of them he is not sure were ever deleted properly. Maybe one day it will fuck him in the metaphorical sense. He does not want that for Hollander, but the idea is appealing all the same.

Hollander touches his own shoulder, dipping up to the curve of his neck, but he doesn’t touch the piercing. “You have to help me take it out tomorrow before you leave. I couldn’t get it out without you.”

Because he’ll need Ilya’s help. If tomorrow Ilya walked out the door before Hollander even woke up, there’d be nothing he could do about it. He imagines Hollander trying to cover the piercing up with a large bandaid, something opaque. Would it even cover the bumps of the barbell? And if he’s out of bandaids, then he’d be at the mercy of a high collar. Ilya imagines Hollander touching his neck throughout practice, praying no one can see the silver lodged in his skin. He would have to go to a piercer to take it out, because Hollander wouldn’t trust some random person to do it for him. He might even wait until their next game, too paranoid that anyone but Ilya might let their tongue slip and say, you know Shane Hollander’s got a neck piercing? Who would’ve thought.

But he kisses Hollander’s shoulder, pats his ass once, and promises, “Yes. Tomorrow.”

When they go to bed, Hollander is on his side, Ilya behind him. The flesh around the piercing is warm to the touch, like Ilya thought it would be, and while he doesn’t put his teeth to it, he does mouth along the side of Hollander’s throat. Getting as close to the fresh wound as he can before Hollander squirms, skirting his teeth instead to the prominent scar on Hollander’s left shoulder, following the length of it with the tip of his tongue.

In the morning, he fucks Hollander on his stomach, again, sucks him off until he comes into Ilya’s mouth. Works him into pliancy, so that he is soft and relaxed. Ilya puts the gloves on one at a time, stroking his thumb up Hollander’s neck, next to the piercing. Bends down to kiss the shell of his ear. The saline spray is cold; Hollander shivers as it settles on his nape. It beads on the barbell and Hollander’s skin, like mist. There’s something magical about it; he remembers Hollander, years ago, sweaty and red and on the verge of his wanting in that gym after the draft.

Ilya holds one end of the barbell with his thumb and forefinger, repeats the grip on the other side, unscrews the balled end slow and steady. The ball rolls into the center of his palm when he’s done. Pulling on the piercing, Ilya watches the bar move out, out, skin clinging to it. Then it’s out, and Ilya stares at the barbell. All that’s left behind are two divots. He sprays the skin with saline again, chest fluttering at Hollander’s pleased sigh, and then he rubs his thumb over the two holes once, twice. One more time, smooth circles, until Hollander shifts underneath him.

And maybe his face mirrors Hollander’s when they stare at each other, afterward, and there is a sort of bitter downturn to the curves of his mouth, even though his eyes are hazy with content. Working through a loss that’s not really a loss.

“It didn’t hurt that bad,” Hollander tells him.

There’s a bandaid plastered over his neck, if only to ease his paranoia. There is barely a discernable mark left behind by the piercing, but perhaps a few weeks from now Ilya will be able to put his tongue to that scar, too.

“If it had,” Ilya asks, one hand on Hollander’s lip, “would you stop?”

Hollander licks his lips, touches his earlobe. Eyes moving down to Ilya’s mouth, back to his eyes. His shoulders sag a bit.

“No,” he says. “I don’t think so.”

He takes a taxi back to the hotel so early that the sun’s not up yet. Both hands folded on his lap, Ilya rubs each of his knuckles, grinds his thumb into his palm. The window glass is cold against his cheek. Even with the radio on, it’s quiet. As if he has been jerked out of a constant thrum of noise, a boundless buzz-hum-pulse beginning at his mouth, his fingertips, and ending somewhere deep inside of Hollander’s body. Tuned into the same, desperate frequency.

Staring at his phone, he pulls the photo up again. Two perfect titanium marks on Hollander’s neck, an echo of his teeth, an extension of him. He thinks of Hollander’s face, again, that what-have-we-lost and what-have-we-gained coexisting. Wishes Hollander was less expressive.

Text me when you get to the hotel, Hollander sends.

Ilya turns his phone off. Closes his eyes. Sees Hollander behind them, anyway.

Ilya Rozanov is not a desperate man: he’s just fucking greedy. And this is only—is only want. Is simple to categorize. It’s only sex. Hollander offers and Ilya takes. Ilya demands and Hollander gives. And because it’s only sex, when Cliff asks him how Jane was as he stumbles into the hotel room, too loud to be courteous, Ilya says it was good, and gives him no other details, even when Cliff demands them, claiming he’s too secretive. Come on, Roz, we don’t even know what the fuck she looks like, that’s crazy. She’s got you locked down, she does. You don’t keep fucking good when you have models begging for it, that’s just not happening.

Look at you, Roz, you’re obsessed. Can’t you see it? Can’t you fucking see it?

And it’s just sex. That’s why Ilya doesn’t reply to Hollander until he’s already back in Boston: hipbone, next time. my place.

Chapter End Notes

something phallic about it, so to say.

tumblr; twitter.
shane's neck piercing

Chapter 2

Chapter Notes

thank you to salad and hothockey for edits this time as well, and to ren and qing for readthroughs and comments, too.

as you can see, this fic is three chapters now. it just happened. i promise there won't be four. also some blood in this one, but not much.

hipbone, next time. my place.

Ilya raises his hand to wipe at his brow, cigarette pinned between his middle and forefinger. It’s been four days since he texted Hollander, and there’s nothing in return. Not a big deal. There’s several weeks until Hollander’s going to be in Boston—whatever’s got him in fucking knots right now can be worked out before then. It’s dark and cold out. Ilya scrunches his nose, blows smoke out one side of his mouth. Cliff won’t rat him out about the smoking. Ilya has him bribed.

He pulls his phone out again. The color of his own text bubble pisses him off.

Tapping into his photo gallery, Ilya swipes up—through blurry selfies, club videos, pictures of the view from an airplane window—until he finds the image they’d taken in Hollander’s bathroom. He’d told Hollander no one could ever tell it’s him; Ilya might be the only exception. At the bottom corner, the fingertip-sized scar on Hollander’s left shoulder is clearly visible. The same one Ilya had put his tongue to so many times. But no one else cares enough to notice things like that. More precisely, no one else is bending Hollander over often enough to remember the marks on him.

He puts his thumb over Hollander’s nape through the screen, moves it down just enough to show only one of the silver balls resting on the skin. In Hollander’s brightly-lit bathroom. His jaw tenses as he presses the tip of his tongue to one of his molars. It’s got a big chip in it he needs to fix. Sharp against his tongue.

Ash dusts off the edge of the cigarette.

Ilya pries the cig from his lips and stares down at it, at the crumpled filter, the indents of his teeth where he has bit too hard. The cherry smolders. He knocks the rest of ashened end off, but drops the cigarette, anyway. Kills it under the toe of his shoe.

He’s exiting the elevator, ready to try to sleep through Cliff’s relentless snoring when he gets the notification: Jane, image attachment. Then: See you next month.

It’s Hollander’s fucking hip, again. It’s just his fucking hip—the jut of it, the soft, tan skin, dewy as if he’s fresh out the shower. And two perfect crescents, like he’s dug his nails into the flesh there. Red and visceral. Ilya drags himself into the shower and runs the water so cold he shivers. He puts his hand to his cock, rubs it furiously as his body tenses against the chill. He can barely stop shaking, comes anyway, watches it wash down the drain, his wet hair falling into his eyes.

It’s an hour until Montreal’s on against Detroit. He’s shaving his beard when he nicks himself on the blade, cusses as he touches his forefinger to the cut. Texts Hollander with one hand, good luck, while wiping the blood off his skin with a wet thumb. Hollander says, Don’t need it. A few seconds later, Thanks though.

Ilya stashes his razor away when he’s done, slicking his hair out of his face with both hands. He’s jerked off to Hollander’s fucking hip photo three times, the imprint of his nails in the skin. Ilya would’ve gripped him tighter. Could have left him redder. See you next month—after days of silence—like Hollander was retaliating. Which would be petty in a fun way, for him. Maybe he sat on his bed after Ilya left in the morning, rubbing his fingers over his neck. Hollander is always scared of things. Of wanting things, especially. This would be nothing new: bending over backwards to control every part of his life. This is also why Hollander is so tense, like a big knot, refusing to unravel. Running himself in circles, one thousand thoughts a minute.

But at the other end of Ilya’s needle Hollander had, if only for a few seconds, released that tightly-held breath and sunk into the mattress and given in and closed his eyes and mellowed out.

It didn’t matter if it was the pain itself or the moment of surrender that had made him come so easily. Next time Ilya should leave the needle in a little longer. Make Hollander look at it, perhaps, to see how the silver sits on his skin. How his body is sturdy enough to welcome it. Can feel good, even, as long as Ilya is on the other end of it.

Hollander must be getting ready by now, if he has not been stolen away to speak to the press. He said he doesn’t need good luck, but Ilya is a very nice guy, and encouragement is not the same as wishing Hollander luck, so he tells him: if you score twice, you can come before.

He’s already down the stairs by the time Hollander responds. Cutting it close, really.

Before what?

Ilya pulls a Coke out of his fridge, takes his sweet time popping the tab open and wandering to the living room. He gives it five minutes. Tells Hollander, before hip piercing. you come, i pierce you, then i make you come again. one for each goal.

Hollander doesn’t ask about other outcomes. Some hours later, when Ilya is sprawled on his sofa, evening dark outside the large glass windows, he gets to watch Hollander’s stiff face on the TV in closeup, the sweat beading on his top lip, damp hair sticking in every direction, eyes blown. There’s a familiar, white strip visible above the high collar of his athletic shirt. The woman holding the mic congratulates him on his assist, asks what about today’s offensive tactics the team can take into their upcoming game against Tampa. Hollander’s eyes are sharp, words precise, but his face is tense. Clammy and pissed off. Ilya wishes they were meeting today. He could work Hollander’s rigid shoulders soft.

Hollander keeps touching his neck. When he shifts his weight from one foot to the other, he winces. His ankle, Ilya thinks. Stubborn fucker. It’d definitely been during second period. Filthy trip, Hollander’s head practically bouncing off the boards by the blue line. Puck right by his feet. Buffalo’s right wing wasn’t anywhere near as fast as Hollander, just huge. And hungry. Buffalo were on a six game losing streak. Seven, now.

Ilya texts Hollander. does it hurt?

It’s not until much later that Hollander texts him back. Swollen ankle, bruised shoulder and my head hurts. I’ve been worse. We won.

Ilya pictures Hollander on his knees. He would flinch if Ilya kissed his ankle. He would scrunch his nose up if Ilya bent him in half to fuck him, shoulder bearing his weight.

not that, Ilya tells him. your neck. it’s covered.

Hollander replies almost immediately this time. Thanks for your concern? Then, Wait, were you watching the game?

Ilya ignores all of it. they are visible? he asks instead, marks from the needle? Ilya almost types my marks. The ones I made on you, he wants to say. The ones I left for you.

Hollander must be celebrating Montreal’s 1-0 win by doing fucking nothing, because Ilya’s phone dings when he goes to change the channel just a minute later.

I don’t think so, it’s just, you know. What if.

Ilya considers this, the what if. How Hollander’s stomach would tangle itself if someone were to ask him about what he’d gotten himself into. He’d have to scramble to make something up quick, and Hollander’s no good at that. He would go quiet, probably. Maybe say bug bites. Maybe claim that he’d tripped somewhere or that he’s not sure what he’d done. He would be tense for the rest of the day. The kind of tense Ilya could fuck out of him.

take it off.

Hollander sends back, What? No.

Ilya stares at the No. Decides he doesn’t like it.

not a question.

Hollander doesn’t reply again, but a few days later there’s a picture of him trudging toward the Bell Sports Complex uploaded on his bare-boned Instagram profile. His jacket hood’s pulled down so it doesn’t cover his neck. No scarf or anything else, either. Just bare skin. Ilya stares at the photo for what’s probably too long. Hollander’s not even looking at the camera. He’s got his bag slung over his shoulder. His ears are red. A puff of opaque air whisks across Hollander’s mouth; Ilya can taste the cold through the photo.

He imagines Hollander on his bed, leaning back on his elbows, legs outstretched. Dim, warm lights. Needle buried in his hip, cock hard. Maybe he could last a minute like that. Hollander would have to take deep, steady breaths. It’s a nice picture.

Ilya tells him, you can come. but after.

‘After’ isn’t a set time. ‘After’ is whatever Ilya wants it to be.

Ilya pulls one of the piercing needles out from their designated box. There’s dozens of them, each individually packaged. He doesn’t take the needle out, instead tucks it into his pocket. Pulls his shirt over his head. Stands in front of the full-body mirror in the bedroom, placed across from the bed. With the way his bedroom lamp is set up, the light always curves nicely along his muscles from behind. More than a handful of photos from this angle have made it onto his Instagram.

He tears the small needle pouch open. Pulls the needle from inside and keeps it pinched between forefinger and thumb, turning his hand over to watch the shadows move up and down its length.

He’d put this through Hollander’s body. And Hollander had liked it. So much so that he’d stayed hard, and then he had come into Ilya’s hand, enough to let Ilya do it to him again. Ilya thinks of Hollander’s neck. It should probably be embarrassing that he’s getting hard this easily over just skin. Over fucking—scabs. Scars-to-be. The smallest imprints possible. People noticing is a daydream; he hasn’t made his mark at all. But at least Hollander knows, and the next time he pulls a shirt over his neck and feels the tag against his nape, the next time he adjusts his high-collar undershirt, the next time he puts his hand to his cock, he is going to remember.

Hollander listens well. Also plays tag, too much, leaves him on read and then texts back four times in a row. But Ilya likes that about him. If he wanted someone who would roll over and do nothing but take it, he’d go fuck someone else.

Ilya rolls the needle between his fingers. He takes his phone out of his pocket, still holding the needle.

It’s not his best photo. He angles the needle along the line of his hipbone, where he is going to pierce it through Hollander in just a few days. He makes sure that his sweat pants ride low on his hips, so that the trail of dark hair from his navel into his underwear is visible, the first curl of his pubes, too, because Hollander likes that. Hollander who rubs his nose against Ilya’s groin like he is trying to memorize the scent. From this angle, the line of his half-hard cock can be seen right below his wrist. Enough of it to give Hollander an idea, without showing too much. He’s already been up close and intimate with every inch of Ilya’s cock; this is about something else.

It feels ridiculous to send a photo of a fucking needle, glinting against Ilya’s tan skin. As if it’s porn, as if this will get Hollander off. But he wants Hollander to think about it every time he opens his phone. And Hollander will open his text messages, will, when Ilya tells him to admit it, say if he has gotten off to it. So Ilya takes the fucking ridiculous photo, double checks to make sure both his clothed dick and the piercing needle are in view, and then he sends it. The needle goes in the trash.

yours soon, he says.

Hollander responds much later. Doesn’t look like nine inches to me.

Ilya stares at the message, then he turns his eyes to the ceiling. Is so relieved he is alone, so that no one will ask him why he is smiling like this, wide and weird, his laugh barely coming out, stuck in the back of his throat.

don’t worry, Ilya tells him, my pretty size queen will have all his holes stuffed

Hollander says, I’m not a size queen.

ok, Ilya rolls his eyes, and you are also alternate captain for boston raiders and you hate sucking cock. we can make list of things not true.

Hollander takes a few minutes. You’re not funny, then, Why did you waste a needle?

Ilya slides further down on his bed. did it make you hard?

Hollander’s reply is simple. What?

did you get hard? from the photo. is easy question.

He has enough time to peel his pants off by the time Hollander texts him back. Does it matter?

Okay, so, yes then. He tells Hollander as much. Hollander, who immediately says, You sent that for me to get hard and we both know that so what does it fucking matter if I did.

Ilya rests his phone against his bottom lip. Smiles, thin and sharp.

ok so not a waste then, he says.

Hollander is on his knees with his tongue against the ridge of Ilya’s hipbone before they even make it to Ilya’s bedroom. His fingers are pressing into Ilya’s thighs greedily, mouth opening wider to suck on the bare skin, the thick muscle of his Adonis’ belt. Turns his face enough so that he can nose along the underside of it, breath washing over Ilya’s skin damp. Hollander’s eyelashes curve over his cheeks, his freckles especially visible from this angle. It is Ilya’s favorite: Hollander underneath him. Then he turns his eyes up to meet Ilya’s, moves his face to the side so he can lean his nose against the length of Ilya’s cock, and he puts his mouth on that, too.

Ilya asks, “You think you can suck my cock without coming all over yourself? I don’t think you can, Hollander,” and Hollander whimpers and sucks on the girth of Ilya’s cock like it’s an answer.

“Tell me,” Ilya says.

Hollander leans back. Ilya’s cock drags over his cheek.

“No,” he admits. “No, I won’t be able to suck your dick without coming.”

And at least he is honest. Eager and honest and Ilya appreciates that so he shoves his leg between Hollander’s thighs and gets some pressure on his poor, stiff dick and Hollander gasps.

Ilya wiggles his leg a bit. Against his shin he feels the bulge of Hollander’s cock. Through it, Hollander keeps his eyes open and on Ilya. He looks dazed. Pupils blown. It’s nothing new, but Ilya feels as though he is seeing it for the first time, anyway. He is as hard as Hollander is. His fingers twitch. When he pulls his leg back, Hollander groans. Ilya tucks his hard cock back into his underwear, sucking in a sharp breath, nose scrunching up. He, too, wants nothing more than to get Hollander’s mouth back on it.

“Bedroom,” he says, and Hollander is off his knees and scrambling. Ilya on his heels.

He drags Hollander’s shirt off, shoves his pants down. Touches his aching dick in two slow pumps before taking that away again and Hollander looks as though he might complain but doesn’t. Ilya’s own shirt hits the floor. His underwear and jeans pool right right on top of it. Maneuvering Hollander onto the bed is easy work: a palm on his stomach, a hard push. Hollander’s underwear hangs off his ankle, his legs over the edge of the bed as he pushes himself up on his elbows to get a better look at Ilya, who kneels in front of him.

“Do you always—fuck, Rozanov,” Hollander’s words stumble when Ilya licks a stripe up his inner thigh to his balls. He wraps his fingers around Hollander’s hard cock, gives him just enough to feel good but not enough to get anywhere. Hollander squirms when Ilya mouths at his sac, up the underside of his dick. It’s not until Ilya licks the crease between Hollander’s hip and thigh that he manages to say, “You were watching my interview.”

“Yes,” Ilya says, focused on Hollander’s left hip, kissing the dry skin before rubbing it with his thumb, following the sharp line of muscle. Hollander shuffles back on the mattress, making room for Ilya to crawl between his legs on the bed. He holds himself over Hollander’s body, hands on either side of him. “What?”

“Just…” Hollander turns his eyes to the ceiling, but that doesn’t last long. “Do you always watch?”

Ilya makes sure that when Hollander looks back at him, he gets a wide, cocky smile as Ilya kisses his way down Hollander’s chest. Dips his tongue into Hollander’s navel, angles his mouth so his canine tooth can catch on the hole. Hollander’s shoulders twitch. Good. He rubs Hollander’s hip with his palm, smoothes it all the way from his waist to his groin, following the curve. Then he stops. He presses his thumb down right over Hollander’s hipbone. The skin there is soft. Thin. Hollander’s exhale is loud and quivering.

“Not always,” Ilya tells him. His thumb makes tiny circles. “But I wanted to see, this time.” Ilya reaches up, shoves his fingers under Hollander’s neck. Touches the two, tiny bumps there. At his touch, Hollander tilts his head to the side, and it’s not bright enough in Ilya’s bedroom for the scars to be noticeable. But they’re there, dark and slightly raised.

“I didn’t score,” Hollander says, voice strained.

“No,” Ilya agrees. “But you followed instructions, so…” He taps Hollander’s hipbone again. Leans down to kiss the same spot before shuffling backward. “I promised, yes? You can come, after. Because you were good.” He gestures at Hollander’s hip.

The moment Ilya says the word ‘good,’ Hollander’s body shifts, shoulders dropping. Ilya pats his ankle, then fetches the box with his piercing tools. Like last time, he doesn’t rush it. He makes Hollander lie flat on his back, swipes the alcohol pad over his hipbone once, twice, three times over. More thoroughly than he needs to, really. But it makes the scent stick to the air, intrusive, and Hollander’s pupils blow wide.

He pretends to sift through the prepackaged barbells, even though they’re identical. The whole time, Hollander stays put, just his fingers keep twisting into the bedsheets. He’s hard and leaking. But he doesn’t ask for Ilya’s mouth, or even his hands. Knows what’s coming. This is why Ilya thinks he deserves this; this is being good.

It’s easier to get the marks even this time. The skin on Hollander’s hip is taut, and Ilya only has to wipe the marker off one time because he brushes his elbow against Hollander’s cock, Hollander’s hips jerking off the bed, and well, that smears the marks, of course. And then Ilya has to do it all over again, while Hollander’s toes curl as he forces himself to be perfectly still. Two dots and a straight line following the angle of Hollander's hipbone toward his glistening cock.

“Last one did not hurt,” Ilya says, rolling the black latex gloves onto his hands. Hollander doesn’t seem to know if he’s supposed to answer or not, so Ilya pinches his thigh, and Hollander croaks out, “I mean, I could feel it. But it was quick.”

“Hm.” Ilya yanks the needle packaging open. Repositions himself in the space between Hollander’s legs. His own cock is hard, too, and the weight of Hollander’s eyes on it only makes it harder. Ilya can hear him try to keep his breathing steady. He fails miserably at doing so.

He pinches Hollander’s skin between two fingers. Waits. Squeezes it needlessly tight, again, and Hollander winces, his face scrunching up. Closes his eyes.

“Hollander,” Ilya says, and Hollander’s eyes fly open, anchor themselves on the needle, on Ilya’s fingers. “You have to watch.”

“Yeah,” Hollander agrees, a bit breathless. He swallows hard, stomach muscles tensing visible, and Ilya would watch him if he could. He will get this first look, though.

Hollander takes everything so well. Ilya remembers thinking this even the first time, in that hotel bedroom when Hollander parted his lips for Ilya’s thumb, then his cock. Maybe some people are just born for pleasure. Ilya wants to hook his fingers into the part of Hollander that wants, peel away all the layers in between that core and the outside world. So that he can’t close his eyes to it.

He squeezes Hollander’s skin between his fingertips and it bends against the tip of the needle, and Ilya holds it there for a second without pushing harder, so that Hollander has to feel it before, can’t only feel it after, and when Hollander sighs in expectation Ilya strikes the needle through him.

Hollander’s stomach flutters, breath cut short. Ilya lightens his grip. For a moment, as Hollander finally takes a new breath, it looks as if the needle rises and falls with the rest of his body.

Ilya splays his fingers out on Hollander’s stomach, his pinky finger perfectly lined up next to the needle.

“Maybe I try again,” he says, staring down. Hollander’s skin is reddening. He holds the barbell with his other hand. With the tip of his pinky finger, he nudges the long needle, and Hollander winces, a shiver wrecking through him. He moves his hand so that he can rub his thumb over the skin above the needle. Can feel the metal press back against him. “Is a little crooked, yes?”

“Rozanov,” Hollander says, slow but not steady. There’s a dry rasp to his name. But he’s looking.

Ilya keeps his thumb over the needle. Pushes down, down, down. “What do you think?”

Hollander’s lips are a thin line. There’s sweat beading on his forehead, a hot flush from the roots of his hair to his chest. Ilya waits. Hollander’s legs are shaking. He turns his eyes from Ilya’s face to his own hip. Ilya flicks the blunt side of the hollow needle and Hollander cries out, doubling forward only to be met by Ilya’s hand on his chest, knocking him back down.

Hollander says, “I like it,” his hands pushing his damp bangs out of his face. His dark eyes glint. Ilya’s seen that somewhere before. There’s a wet streak from the edge of his right eye to his ear. Ilya’s tongue feels too big for his mouth, should be licking that tear-stripe off Hollander’s cheek, take the salt into his mouth. Swallow his cock right after.

“Me too,” Ilya says, and anchors the barbell to the needle. Slides it through in one go. Soaks in Hollander’s drawn-out whine as his skin stretches to accommodate the titanium. He tells him, “Very pretty, Hollander. Maybe silver is best color for you,” and Hollander is coherent enough to say, “Go fuck yourself.”

Ilya laughs when he twists the rounded end of the barbell on. Doesn’t use his tongs, this time. Instead he pinches the skin with his fingers so that it’s more difficult than it has to be; so that Shane has to sit through his prodding and adjusting. When he looks up, Hollander’s nose is scrunched up, brows furrowed, but he’s smiling, too. Just enough to show the top row of teeth. Expensive teeth.

Ilya bends down, puts his full mouth over the piercing and sucks hard and Hollander moans loudly, tries to get a grip on Ilya’s hair. Ilya lets him, guides his hand by the wrist. He rubs his tongue under one end of the barbell, blood beading at the cut. The metal clinks against his front teeth and he rolls the piercing against his tongue while Hollander whimpers, pulling off only when the taste of metal is rank in his mouth. Rust-sweet, even against the saltiness of Hollander’s sweat. It makes him think of the time he got cross-checked in the face and his nose bled all down his chin. How later, when he was sucking Hollander off, Ilya sniffed so fucking hard while deepthroating him that his nose started up again and smeared blood into his mouth, still on Hollander’s cock. He’d wiped his top lip off with his wrist, pinched his nose, and Hollander came down his throat seconds later. Hollander’s got that same look on him, now, high on just the friction between them, the stuffy, hot air.

Ilya leans back and meets Hollander’s eyes and he aches, needs to get his cock inside of Hollander now.

Ilya rips his gloves off. The lube’s next to the bed, easy access. Condoms, too. He gets one of those on first, so that his lube-slick fingers won’t be a problem later. Hollander lets his legs fall open wider and Ilya pushes Hollander’s right thigh up against his chest so he can get to his hole, doesn’t waste time circling around it, shoves his fingers in hard and Hollander’s body trembles. Every time he moves, the piercing catches on the light. There’s a hickey blooming where Ilya had sucked, and maybe in an hour Hollander will freak out about it, but right now he’s too busy begging for Ilya’s cock.

Ilya fucks him like that, one leg folded up, the other tucked over Ilya’s calf. So that he can see—can watch the shadows move across the silver balls with every thrust. The piercing keeps rubbing against Hollander’s hip no matter how he moves, reddens the skin around it. It makes Hollander squirm. Makes Ilya fuck him deeper. Hollander is hot and tight around him and Ilya feels sweat drip down his back. He tightens his hold on Hollander’s knee, reaches for his hip. Wedges his hand into the tiny space between Hollander’s hip and his thigh so he can roll his thumb over the piercing. Push it into Hollander’s skin until it divots. Until Hollander flinches, moves his hand toward his cock.

He knocks Hollander’s hand away, locks their eyes, says, “No,” and Hollander is shaking. His eyes are red and mouth slick with spit and when he comes, it’s not with anyone’s hand around his twitching cock, but with Ilya’s thumb grinding the piercing into the skin of his hip so hard Ilya’s own hand aches. Deep in his gut something churns. Ilya fucks Hollander through his quivering, doesn’t slow down because Hollander can take it, is already closing his eyes, mouth falling open and Ilya’s fingers will bruise his thigh from their grip but he doesn’t care because he’s coming. It’s like every muscle in his body is a snapped rubberband, vibrating.

His thighs burn with exhaustion, and Ilya drops an arm on Hollander’s chest, holds him down and kisses him filthily. Hollander’s bottom lip catches between Ilya’s teeth and he gasps, parting his lips for Ilya to lick past until they’re just panting into each other. Ilya’s body feels slow and thick.

He pulls his cock out. Hollander’s hole clenches around nothing, smeared with lube, and Ilya shoves his thumb back inside of him so he can hear Hollander groan, watch him cover his face with his arms. Soft and wet around the intrusion, like his mouth.

There’s come running down his cock, a sheen over Hollander’s pubic hair, sweat even down the crease of his ass. Ilya slips his thumb up the seam to Hollander’s balls, down again so he can rub over his winking hole. With the sharp of his nail, he drags it up Hollander’s perineum, stops. Angles the nail into the skin and Hollander gasps, jolts onto his elbows, and Ilya grips the meat of his thigh to hold his leg out of the way before he kicks.

“Rozanov…” Hollander warns, but there’s no strength behind it.

Ilya doesn’t let up. Keeps his nail where it is. “You can get piercing here, did you know?”

Hollander’s leg twitches in his grasp. Ass wiggling a bit. “That’s—we couldn’t—”

“There, or…” Ilya kisses Hollander’s ankle, trails his thumb up to Hollander’s sac. “Maybe on your balls, nice round jewelry… Or your dick…” He hums.

“Not there,” Hollander says, then. Clearer this time. “I—if it got messed up…”

Ilya meets his gaze. Hollander’s got a furrow between his brows.

“Okay,” Ilya says, and lets Hollander’s leg down. Pats his stomach, even though it smears Hollander’s jizz all over his palm. He kisses Hollander between his tits and then his collarbone, his throat, until he can put their noses together. One hand makes its way back to the piercing on Hollander’s hip, touching the metal. It is warm from their bodies. “When do you have to leave?”

Hollander blinks slowly. Every time he breathes, his chest and stomach meet Ilya’s.

“When I can stand up,” he says, and when he smiles it’s small but pleased and Ilya drags the flat of his tongue over Hollander’s entire mouth, shoves his tongue into the slippery corner of Hollander’s mouth and draws a shocked laugh out of him.

“I will help,” Ilya tells him, tapping the side of Hollander’s ass. “Come on.”

They wash up. Ilya takes the piercing out reluctantly. He squeezes harder than he has to when he grips one end of the barbell, hard enough for Hollander to bite his lip and clench his fists. Very sensitive. Very cute like that, Ilya thinks.

It’s a quarter past eleven when Hollander starts trying to find a good spot for a taxi pick-up.

“How far should I walk?” he asks.

Ilya tells him to make them get him at the front door and Hollander flips him off. Hollander knows about the street corner with the giant stop sign: it is not his first time here. Hollander keeps hovering, takes his time tying his shoes and getting his jacket and looking up and down the walls as if Ilya has added anything new since they last fucked here. He hasn’t. Even his suitcase’s untouched since his flight four days ago.

“Who is waiting for you?” Ilya asks, rummaging through his cabinets for a vodka glass. The bottle itself is in the fridge. “Pike? He should spend the time he is thinking about you thinking about hockey instead. Maybe then one day he won’t be complete shit player.”

Hollander frowns at him. “Hayden’s a solid winger. There’s a reason he’s on my line.”

“Yes, yes,” Ilya clicks his tongue. He fetches two glasses, then pulls the Beluga Gold Line out. Maybe he’ll have a cig after this, too. When Hollander has wormed his way back to his hotel to sit pretty next to Pike. “He is great at standing like orange cone in middle of ice. I will make sure to do twirl around him next game just for you, okay?”

“Whatever.”

Ilya turns his head to Hollander, grins. “Do you want a drink?”

Hollander looks at the glasses. “But I’m leaving.”

“Okay,” Ilya says. “Then go.”

Hollander moves as if to head to the door. He doesn’t though. He stays in Ilya’s kitchen, fully dressed, and drinks his vodka. Lets Ilya move onto him, hips slotting together, and crowd him against the kitchen island. Ilya sips and then kisses, does this again and again until Hollander’s mouth tastes fresh and cold. He thinks of the alcohol wipes dragging over Hollander’s hip. He bumps his knuckles against Hollander’s chin, tilts his head to the side, and noses against his nape. Licks over the budding scars. Hollander sighs, forgets his liquor.

“Sad Pike, all alone in hotel room,” Ilya murmurs, mouth to Hollander’s ear. “While you are out having fun…”

“Jesus,” Hollander says, but his eyes are closed, lips twitching with a smile. “Shut the fuck up about Hayden.”

“Maybe you can help keep my big, sexy mouth busy.” Ilya leans back, and Hollander chases him.

When Hollander has left, Ilya stares at the photo they’d taken fresh out of the shower. The titanium barbell angled down toward Hollander’s cock where it rests snugly over his hipbone. Skin pinked from hot water and the wound. It tasted like soap. Plain body wash, because Hollander always whines about the scented stuff.

His ego swells knowing he not only has the last picture of Hollander’s body before he permanently altered it, but also the first one as-it-is-now. Every person Hollander meets from now on, every person he fucks, or holds, or showers next to—they’ll be next to a version of Hollander that Ilya’s latched himself onto. Hollander’s going to touch his scars and have to remember. He’ll have to.

Ilya doesn’t have an album. The photo slots into one of the hundreds in his gallery. No more remarkable than the photo of Cliff’s middle finger at EWR when he’d stolen Ilya’s phone out of his pocket. No more special. That’s why Ilya visits it again, and again, and again. Because he’s just scrolling through his collection, anyway. Photo of snow. Photo of a brand of tape he wants to try. Photo of Shane Hollander’s pierced hip. Photo of meal at nice Boston restaurant with Svetlana’s hands in the background. Photo of new car. Photo. Photo. Photo.

Hollander texts him, Back at the hotel, and Ilya stares at his phone. Lights his cigarette right there in the kitchen, using his vodka glass as an ashtray.

kissed pike good night already? he asks, then imagines Hollander actually kissing Pike, and has to take four long drags just to work the nausea out of himself.

Do you secretly want to fuck Hayden, or are you just trying to be antagonistic on purpose? Hollander asks.

Ilya holds the ashened end of his cigarette over his glass and flicks it. Antagonistic.

do not ever say these words to me again, he tells Hollander, i am going to be sick. i will vomit into kitchen sink. will you pay for cleaner? and, only person i want to fuck is you.

He sends it before he can think twice.

Hollander replies later, bold from the safety of a bed that Ilya is not in, I almost came when you tugged on the piercing, then, It hurt a bit this time. Not bad, and finally, Next time maybe I can stay longer. Hayden was totally knocked out when I got back. Waiting for Ilya to invite him, first.

Ilya breathes in through his nose, slumps forward over the kitchen island, and rubs his fingers over his eyes. Drags them so hard two lashes stick to his rough skin. He flicks them off, dumps his glass into the sink, fills the glass with water, then drops his cigarette into it.

And Ilya shouldn’t be looking at his photos of Hollander in public, but Hollander had said he could keep them, and had agreed it was impossible to tell that’s him in the photos. He’s in the locker room in Tampa, shedding gear, when his phone buzzes. It just so happens that the last thing he looked at was Hollander’s bare hip, zoomed-in, titanium metal bright in the photo.

Cliff whistles. “Dude.”

Ilya flips his phone over so fast it slips and drops from his hand, clattering into his stall. He looks at Cliff, who has removed everything except his underwear, and who has both eyebrows raised.

“Dude,” he repeats. “That your Montreal girl? You’re really looking at her nudes right now? We got places to be!”

Places to be in fucking Buffalo? Ilya tries to knee Cliff in the thigh, but Cliff moves out of the way, and all they manage to do is knock over a bunch of the shit piled onto the bench.

“Get your eyes off my fucking phone, Marly,” Ilya tells him, stuffing his phone into his bag.

“You’re the one flashing me.” Cliff shrugs, rummaging around his stall. “But if she’s into stuff like that…” He pauses, scratches his beard. “And if she’s open… Maybe you shouldn’t get her earrings, but something for her tits—”

“Shut up about her fucking tits.” Ilya grabs his cap, shoves it down his head.

Ilya can’t stop thinking about Hollander’s tits, now. Which would be less of a fucking problem if they weren’t weeks from seeing each other. He could ask for more photos, but Hollander’s been kinda sparse with them recently. Like Ilya should have enough just from their meetups now. He pictures Hollander on his side, Ilya’s thigh shoved between his legs. Arm wrapped around Hollander’s chest so he can squeeze a pec, thumb over a hard, brown nipple. Ilya likes that he’s sensitive. He likes that now, when Hollander blows him, he reaches up to grab at Ilya’s chest. Moments like those, it’s so obvious who Hollander’s learned his tricks from. Ilya has enmeshed himself in Hollander’s body in every way that matters.

Ilya rubs the back of his hand over his eye and rummages through the bags of ground coffee beans in one of his cabinets. He pulls the stovetop espresso maker from right next to them out, too, before turning the gas stove on.

The next time Hollander fucks a girl, face to her cunt, maybe he’ll try find himself trailing a hand up her stomach, toward her chest. Ilya right there in the movement. Hollander might stiffen up for a second, in the moment, and picture Ilya in her place. Or after they’re done, girl on his arm or head on his chest or half-dressed out the door already, Hollander will think of how he hesitated and rest his fists over his eyes, realizing the same thing Ilya already knows.

He adds the ground coffee to the filter, screws the top and bottom chambers of the espresso maker together. Maybe Hollander finds himself with cravings even when Ilya is not around. Has he fucked other men? Gotten on his knees for someone else, face put to the pillow, neck bared and soft and freshly scarred? Hollander’s too anxious for that—and Ilya is easy and safe. And very willing.

Ilya pours his espresso. His kitchen feels empty, huge. Giant ceilings hovering above him. So much space, and still he finds himself leaning against the table in the same spot he crowded Hollander up against last time they met. His lips are warm and wet from the drink. Hollander had opened his mouth before Ilya even put his tongue to it. Like opening for Ilya is an instinct.

He finishes the espresso. Stacks the cup away in the dishwasher.

Hollander has been instinctual for Ilya, too.

The Raiders go to Ottawa. Everywhere he walks, the salt crunches under his shoes. In the daylight, it looks green.

Hollander is fucking everywhere in Ottawa: on fucking bus stop ads and screens and lining checkout ailes. Ilya wonders if they know there are other people in the world. He doesn’t even play for their team. He buys the magazine anyways, reads the feature, stares at Hollander’s stiff, photo-polite smile, the one without teeth, his press-face. He’s airbrushed and pristine. One of the pics has erased his freckles. Ilya is ugly on the inside when he stares at that one, Hollander’s brown eyes capturing studio lights, the shadows emphasizing his muscles, shirt off. Is this how people see him? Is this the man they want to fuck? Ilya stares at a Hollander who is blandly desirable: tailored clothes someone else has put on him, styled hair. But he’s got no angles to him. Ilya doesn’t know that man.

He sends a photo of the cover to Hollander, who just texts back, Did you buy that? then, Why did you get that?

Ilya makes sure to take a picture of the inside spread, too, with Hollander’s quotes blocked out in large, bold text. studying my enemy, Ilya writes, before next game.

And he can practically hear Hollander roll his eyes when he responds. Whatever. It’s your money.

Ilya joins back up with Cliff, who squints at the magazine Ilya has rolled up and shoved into the water bottle pocket of his backpack. Hollander’s face is warped into a tube.

“Is that fucking Hollander?” he asks. He’s holding one of his iced, fruity drinks. This one’s orange.

“Yes,” Ilya says. “I needed something to wipe my hands on. Breakfast was greasy.”

Cliff laughs. “You’re such a dick to him. And I mean, like beyond regular assholery. What’s he even done to you? Did he actually fuck one of your girls?”

“When we were rookies, he said not to smoke.” Ilya thinks of 2008. Of Saskatchewan. It feels like fifty years ago and also like yesterday. He doesn’t think Hollander’s interested in the kind of women he’s fucking; then again, Hollander doesn’t want to talk about women at all. Gets prickly and annoyed anytime they pop up. “And still now he is not leaving me alone. Very annoying. Everywhere I go is Shane Hollander.”

“Never thought I’d see you jealous. Roz.”

Ilya gapes at him. “Of Hollander?”

“Sure.” Cliff waves at his face. “You’ve got a weird look in your eyes, man. Usually I can’t tell what you’re thinking at all.” He pauses, then sloshes the ice inside of his cup around obnoxiously, leans in, and says, “Well, unless you’re texting Jane. Then it’s aaaaall over your ugly face.”

“So you are blind,” Ilya says. “Blind and stupid.”

Cliff pushes his hair out of his face with a wink. “And good looking.”

He tries asking Hollander about them, though. Women. you have gotten blowjob yes?

Hollander texts him back a few minutes later. Did someone wipe your memory?

Ugh. not me, Ilya says, by a woman.

The next reply takes longer. I don’t really think that’s any of your business, unless you’re asking me if you should get tested.

ok grumpy. Ilya picks at a scab on his knee. There’s a fat, purple bruise from a puck right above it, spreading across his thigh. tell me. i want to think about it.

I’m not telling you about any women I’ve had sex with so that you can jerk off. Hollander doesn’t respond for hours, even though Ilya says, does not have to be about women, and, we can trade. i will tell you about woman i fucked last week. she had piercing on her clit. was interesting.

I don’t care about the women you’re fucking, Hollander tells him. And I don’t care about their fucking piercings. Maybe you should focus on making playoffs instead of getting your dick wet at opportunity. Could do you some good to remember you’re a hockey player and not a pornstar.

Ilya stares at the long message. It takes up half his fucking screen.

He texts back, cock definitely big enough for porn. if you want to make video call me first ok? i will make oscar winning movie of you on my dick, and, you are giving me hockey lessons now? for free. so generous. thank you second best player in league. Then, when there’s still nothing but silence, he adds, hollander what is the problem. Hollander does not reply.

Ilya thinks of that girl again, her thighs parting, the weight of the barbell on his tongue when he licked into her. She had squirmed. A bit too loud, though. Like she wanted to prove that she should be there, even though she must have known she wasn’t getting a second call, anyway. Definitely not in fucking Buffalo. Maybe Hollander liked quiet girls who didn’t cause him trouble or make any demands. Or ones with big tits. Maybe he liked them tattooed and mean. The kind of woman who would tell him what to do so he didn’t have to think too much about it. Hollander must be different with women. Or maybe he’s the same: eager and wet and greedy. Ilya pictures the Hollander he has—on his back, legs spread—for someone else.

Hollander plays a nasty game against Toronto. For a moment, Ilya thinks Hollander might actually get himself into a fight. He hooks 47 from the left side, as if he’s going for the puck at his feet. It could almost pass for an accident. Ilya knows it’s not. When the zebras call it, Hollander fights them until they send him off ice, and the camera spends a good amount of time getting a close up of Hollander’s face in the sin bin. He ends up there one more time in third period, gets back in rotation, scores the goal that puts the Metros up 2-1, and spends his entire post-game press talking like he's got a bad taste in his mouth. Doesn’t comment on the penalties. Doesn’t let them pry into “where his head was tonight” and “what might’ve caused his shift in play, something we don’t usually see from you, Shane.” Hollander tells them he’s a hockey player, that they’re watching hockey, and then he walks off.

Ilya texts him, how is view from inside bin? and zebra is not blinded by star center hollander’s complaints this time. good for him.

Nothing.

Ilya grabs his sweater, zips it up, and toes his running shoes on. Untangles his headphone cord halfway before giving up and shoving the earbuds in. He runs until his t-shirt’s soaked through. By the time he’s made a few loops, he’s back at the corner with the stop sign. He nudges the pole with the toe of his boot. It’s cold enough to sting once he’s stopped moving. When he tilts his head against the pole, watching a few cars pass, he thinks of Hollander in his kitchen. His awkward, fiddling hands. Eyes always darting to the door. Waiting to be shooed out.

Ilya takes his phone out of his pocket. Types out, are you ok? Deletes. Types out, who put a stick up your ass hollander. Deletes. Types out, in three weeks you stay the night?

And it’s a reply in and of itself when Carmichael shoves the photos in Ilya’s face the morning after: Hollander at some bar with the other Metros. He looks about as excited to be there as he’d been enthusiastic in his post game interview. But there’s at least four photos, and in half of them, he’s touching someone—hands on a woman’s hip, her waist, pushing her hair behind her ear. Some indistinguishable drink in his other grip. He has to lean down to speak to her.

So, too busy getting laid to text back.

“Why are you showing me this?” Ilya asks. Around them, the gym machines are whirring.

Carmichael shrugs. “You’re always keeping up with Hollander. Figured you’d get a kick out of this.”

Ilya adjusts the weight on the leg press. He doesn’t keep up with Hollander—the entire fucking hockey world does. How is it Ilya’s fault if he’s on the fucking TV, if he’s on the magazine covers and the ads and the bus stops, on every sports news segment? As if sports writers don’t love putting their names in the same headline.

“Out what? Hollander fucking one woman? Good for him, I will send flowers to Montreal,” he finally says, plugging his earbuds back in before Carmichael can say anything else.

They make it to Tampa. Ilya’s digging through his backpack when he finds the magazine stuffed into the bottom, wrinkled. Hollander’s face has a crease running right down it. He throws it onto the bed. Smoothes the fold out with his thumb until there’s a pale line running from one edge of the magazine, slashing across Hollander’s chest, to the other end. He tugs his shirt off, undoes his belt and unbuttons his pants without taking them off. The mattress dips under his weight when he climbs onto it.

He tips the magazine against his forehead, gets a real close look at Hollander’s face on the cover, then flips it open. The spreads are more shirtless pics. Ilya’s always wondered about those. Hollander didn’t even want to get naked their first hookup: since when is he shooting ads half-nude? He skims the interview attached to it, but he keeps going back to the full-page image of Hollander in pale jeans and a watch so intricate it’s begging the reader to google its price. No way it’s his own. They must’ve wrestled it onto him when they fit him in those ridiculously tight jeans and tight, white tank top that doesn’t make it all the way down to the hem of his pants. Ilya can see the trail of hair leading down to his groin disappear into his boxers. Even when sitting down, Hollander’s plump ass is noticeable.

The Hollander Ilya knows wears gym clothes and hoodies and gym sneakers with special insoles good for his feet. He dresses like he walked into the Gap and pointed at a rack and said, all of this, thanks.

And isn’t the running joke that his mom’s his fucking agent? His mom’s been running his shit since he was ten. You call his phone and she picks up. Ilya’s father had left him a very delightful voice note when Ilya posed in nothing but his underwear just a season ago. There’s a lot of ways to call someone a manwhore if you’re creative. How long before Hollander’s stripping down, too? Ilya would bet big money he’s already gotten emails from CK. Maybe this is the compromise.

One of the quotes is in Metros-blue: I can’t really think of a time before hockey; there’s no line that separates when I was a hockey player and when I wasn’t. I can’t remember a winter I wasn’t on the ice, or a weekend I wasn’t at a game. My mom’s Metros scarf is older than I am, and now she has a jersey with our last name on it that she can wear to the games. That’s everything to me.

Okay, Ilya thinks, folding the magazine so he can’t see any text, just shirtless Hollander with the smooth skin and downturned eyes. Maybe they asked for sultry. If the photographer wanted sexy they should’ve invited Ilya to fuck an orgasm out of Hollander before putting him in front of the camera.

He holds the magazine with one hand, rubs his thumb over the print. No freckles on this one, either. He scratches his nail over the paper, shoves his free hand down the front of his pants. The elastic of his boxers stretch over his wrist, pin it to his stomach as he scratches through his pubes, down to the base of his cock.

They’ve taken his earring scar and smoothed that out, too. As if anyone gives a shit about some scars on a hockey player. Isn’t that what the entire fucking interview is about? That’s everything to me. I can’t really think of a time before hockey. Hollander’s brain is hockey. His body is hockey. Is strangely warped and prepared for mass consumption here. When they took these photos, had Ilya already put a needle to his neck? If Hollander turned just slightly, eyes away from the camera, would the scars be there, faint enough to be overlooked? Something unremarkable for everyone else.

His dick twitches. Grows hard under his fingers even without him touching himself, and it’s simple work to wrap his hand around his cock and stroke lazily. He stares at Hollander—the Hollander that belongs to the world—and builds the pressure in his gut, pleasure simmering. Dropping the magazine onto the mattress, he lifts his ass off the bed long enough to shove his jeans down his thighs. Puts his hand back on his cock and flips onto his knees, forehead smushed against one of the pillows.

In his photo, Hollander’s face is turned away, but his eyes are toward the camera. Meeting Ilya’s gaze. Ilya sucks a breath in through his nose. He drags his palm over the head of his cock to smear the precome down his length. The noise of it is wet and frantic. His thighs burn, stomach flexing. He wants Hollander’s real mouth, his freckled face, his scars; all of those things soft against Ilya’s tongue.

He comes with a choked noise. Gets come on his thighs and underwear, his fucking jeans. When he shoves the magazine to the side, his jizz blots the glossy paper, making Hollander’s bare chest look slick.

Ilya rolls onto his back, breaths quick. He gets the napkins from the bedside table, wipes his hand. Then, after a pause, wipes the come off the magazine page.

Throws the magazine in the trash after.

Hollander texts him back a day later. Not the whole night. But later than usual. Then, Didn’t keep the bandaid on in the showers. Skin’s not red anymore. Looks like old bug bites.

Ilya ignores how it feels like they’re waving white flags at each other. They’re not close enough to fight.

Chapter 3

Chapter Notes

hey guys. don’t listen to anything i say anymore i’m just a big liar. just buckle up. we’re getting there. i promise, just one more. i’ve got it planned out this time. i just found i had a lot more to say here than i expected and i’m gonna ride that wave.

shout out to my usual people: salad, who knows detail like no one else, and star, for telling me what i need to hear, both to thank for exceptional edits. ren for hockeypicking and redundancy checking. also thanks to garagepaperback for tagging along so i could harass them about the “emotional arc.”

Ilya sets his tools out the night before. There’s a low, round table in his bedroom, right by the floor-to-ceiling window and the lounging chair. Usually meant for his ash tray and whatever junk he can’t find a place for. He clears the table and wipes it off twice before dragging it over to the foot of his bed. He puts three of the needles side by side; knows he is only using one. Even through a layer of plastic covering, they glint.

That first time, he’d made Hollander wait while he got ready. Gave Hollander no choice but to observe how each tool fit into Ilya’s hand. Tomorrow he wants Hollander to imagine what will happen before Ilya even touches him; how many piercings, with three needles? Will Ilya use all of them? Will he be disappointed if Ilya doesn’t?

Next: the saline solution, the alcohol wipes, two straight barbells. Ilya remembers how the metal clicks against his nails when the jewelry isn’t bagged. Even louder when it snags on Ilya’s teeth. His mouth cradling Hollander’s hip piercing. Ilya wants that again, Hollander so loud there’s not much else to think about. He wants the kind of noise that sticks to the inside of his head, like the tap of a stick on ice. Metal on teeth. Click, click. His body never really quiets. It makes him restless. His body aches, always, for movement—for a push-against, a twist of muscle, a twinge of clarity. His father calls him undisciplined.

He goes outside to smoke his cigarette. Leaves the empty ashtray, cleaned out, on top of his dresser. Hollander will bitch at him if he has to put his clothes close to the cigarette dustings, even if they’re days old.

Ilya always fucking hates losing, but especially against Hollander. On fucking home ice.

It’s not Hollander’s problem. It’s definitely Hollander’s fault, though.

Ilya fires three shots on goal before Hollander breaks the distance to say something. He skates past Ilya, away from the Metros’ goal. The tip of his tongue pushes against his bottom lip, the way Ilya’s own does sometimes, says, “That shot looked a few inches off, Rozanov. Maybe nine? Wouldn’t be the first time you got that wrong, right?” He’s so fucking giddy with it. Giddy enough to slip in a chirp loaded full of implications. Like being there with Rozanov is fun. Like it lowers his inhibitions, if only a little.

It makes Ilya’s stomach churn, and he can’t keep his lips from curving. And he makes fucking sure Hollander sees that, too. Puts his tongue over the front of the mouthguard, mimicking Hollander’s grin as they bend over for second period.

Ilya loses that faceoff, and Hollander scores. Pike’s all too smug about his assist.

Ilya’s not a petty guy. He doesn’t even check Pike all that hard when he digs the puck out of its place by Pike’s feet and he trips on it—his fault, not Ilya’s.

Ilya is shoved in the penalty box right as third period dips into its last ten minutes. Which means he’s blessed with the best seat in the Garden just in time for Hollander’s second goal of the night, in the first twenty seconds of Montreal’s powerplay. Chews on his mouthguard until there’s a streak of spit on his chin. And again, because Ilya’s not a petty guy, Ilya makes sure to go for Hollander next—knows it’s a stupid move, does it anyway. Hollander doesn’t buckle, is too sharp on his turns for Ilya to slam into him. But the tussle jams the butt of Hollander’s stick into Ilya’s ribs and fuck, Ilya wheezes so loud. He catches Hollander grinning as he skates off. The air never gets back into his lungs properly after that. With a minute and a half left on the clock, Ilya gets one last futile shot on goal.

When he exits ice, he holds his breath for as long as he can.

Boston’s fans have big lungs. Good for cheering. Good for booing. Boston loves him hard, and with that love comes expectations. You want to be the star center, Rozanov? Then fucking act like it. Tonight was an embarrassment.

And now they’re letting Rozanov know just how loud they can be. He’s going to feel it tomorrow.

It’s a walk of shame the whole way to the locker room.

Ilya leaves last. Sits on the bench in front of his stall, hunched over his phone, and wonders what the fuck he’s doing. Still thinks, after a game like that, I’m going to invite Shane Hollander to my house. Going to put him on my bed and call him pretty and fuck him loose on my cock. And my team is going to go nurse this loss with a few drinks and think I’m being a fucking hermit bitch about it, pitching a fit all alone instead of going with them. Like a good captain should. Be a good captain, Rozanov.

He’s not going to be a good captain tonight. Instead he sends Hollander a message the moment he is done changing. no alcohol. enjoy your party.

If tonight’s game had been against anyone but the Metros, Ilya would’ve already made his way downtown. Now he skulks through his house, checks on his tools in his bedroom, moves the bedsheets a bit so they’re not too neat.

He is pissed about losing. He’s pissed Hollander scored twice and pissed he’s not already in Ilya’s house, naked, offering to check with his throat if Ilya’s really lying about those nine inches. Wants to get him back for today but also just wants to have him. He wants a drink and can’t have one because he needs to put Hollander on his back, and if his hands aren’t steady Ilya can’t thread that needle through Hollander the way they both need.

The reply comes an hour after he’s returned home. His hair is still damp from his shower.

Fifteen minutes away, Hollander texts.

Ilya tells him, come get your prize. Smiles at his phone even though it stings.

Ten, Hollander says.

Hollander is smiling when he arrives. Not even in an asshole way, which could’ve been nice. Ilya likes it when Hollander gets pissy with him. There’s a pink tint to his cheeks and ears and normally when he stumbles into Ilya’s home, he acts like he’s intruding. Shuffles his steps, toes his shoes off even though Ilya tells him not to; a hunch to his back, reaching for Ilya immediately, to anchor him to the house. But Ilya knows Hollander feels his best when he wins. Second place reserved for the feeling of Ilya’s cock in him, undoubtedly. Knowing he’s going to get both of these things tonight—Hollander must be fucking euphoric.

“Rozanov,” Hollander says into Ilya’s mouth before he’s even gotten his shoes off.

Ilya knocks his knee against Hollander’s thigh hard enough to have him tumbling back against the door. Hollander scrambles for a grip, finds it on Ilya’s shoulders. Chasing him down, Ilya puts his mouth on Hollander’s again. His breath is warm on Ilya’s tongue, tastes a bit sour, and Hollander smiles lazily into the kiss when Ilya rubs his tongue along the soft inside of Hollander’s cheek.

He pins Hollander against his door with one arm across his chest, holding him there as he pulls away.

Hollander’s eyes open slowly. Lips parted enough to show his front teeth, stupid cute.

“You were drinking,” Ilya says. He tips his head back, clenches his jaw. White ceiling above. Hollander’s sharp-liquor taste on his tongue. When he lowers his gaze again, Hollander’s eyes are on his mouth. Have probably been stuck there the whole time.

“Just had one,” Hollander tells him. He pushes back against Ilya’s arm. “I’m not even tipsy. Come on.”

“Hollander,” Ilya says, slowly. He moves his free hand to Hollander’s hip, shoves his thumb under the hem of his shirt, rubbing his finger over the skin. “You think when I say no alcohol it is to be fucking boring?” Leans in real close, until Hollander’s breath hitches. Ilya imagines how the alcohol would make Hollander bleed worse. “You are so careful with everything, but not this? Maybe you liked me sucking your cock with bloody nose too much.”

The truth of it is, Ilya would put a needle to Hollander right this moment. He resists only because he knows this will feel better. Will compound.

And because he lied—he is petty.

But Hollander stares at him, the flush on his face not fading one bit, and Ilya thinks some of it must be embarrassment. Hollander is being scolded after doing everything he is supposed to: win, go and be a good captain and drink with his team, show up at Ilya’s house, on time, open his mouth for him, be needy. And he is being told he has done something wrong.

“It was just one drink,” Hollander repeats. “They insisted. Come on, we were—we won. We were celebrating, and I’m their fucking—I’m their captain. It was just one drink.”

“Okay.” Ilya keeps his arm on Hollander’s chest. “How long ago?”

“I don’t know,” Hollander says. “Thirty minutes? It was right before I left.”

It won’t make any difference.

“What did you have?”

“A greyhound,” Hollander tells him.

Ilya did not take Shane for a cocktail guy. “Gin or vodka?”

Hollander’s tongue presses against his bottom lip. “Vodka.”

Ilya lightens the pressure on Hollander’s chest. Hollander stays right where he is.

“Okay,” Ilya says, again. “Come.”

He doesn’t look over his shoulder when he walks to his bedroom, knows Hollander is following by the sound of his steps. Hollander, still in his shoes, in his jacket, with his phone clenched in one hand, awkwardly waiting in the doorway to Ilya’s bedroom. Looking like he wants to be held. And Ilya is going to do that for him. Just not right away.

“Thirty minutes,” Ilya tells him. “You will wait thirty minutes. Was one drink only, yes? Some time ago, thirty minutes, whatever, is not important to you. So your time, right now, I can waste it. Because this is not important.” He gestures at Hollander, then the chair in the corner. “Everything off. Put it there. Then wait on the bed.”

Hollander repeats again, “It was just one drink, Rozanov.” He’s got sad eyes. Ilya’s mouth is fever-warm.

But he walks over to the chair. He does it fast, efficiently. Nice, blue shirt unbuttoned and folded. Ilya leans against his dresser, thumbing at the edge of the ash tray. Hollander’s pants go next, and he rolls his belt up into a nice spiral. Everything becomes a neat square, even his socks, which Hollander puts on the seat of the chair. Then he looks at Ilya, who nods in the direction of the bed.

Hollander touches his own elbow, shifts his weight from one foot to the other. He eyes the bed, then Ilya. “You’re really going to make me sit here for thirty minutes and do nothing?”

“We have time.” Ilya moves to the corner of the bed, right next to the low table with the piercing equipment.

“I could just go,” Hollander says. He walks over slowly, eyes on the low table. On all of the tools, laid out. Ilya sees his fingers twitch. An absentminded caress over his hip.

Ilya’s eyes follow there: to the pin-sized, pink-scar marks, pale against Hollander’s skin. He wants to know if they’re flat to his skin, or if he could feel them with his eyes closed.

“Yes,” Ilya agrees. “You could just go.”

They stare at each other in silence, and then Hollander sits down on the edge of Ilya’s bed. His leg bumps into the side of the table, and Hollander’s attention is drawn back to the neatly laid-out tools. He looks, and looks, and looks, and Ilya says nothing. Instead he pulls his tanktop off, dropping it on the floor. Leaves his sweats hanging low on his hips. Hollander doesn’t watch him undress, but with only a few steps between them, Ilya can see Hollander’s throat bob.

“Are you going to stand there the whole time?” Hollander asks. His eyes back on Ilya.

“Maybe.” Ilya takes one step closer, and Hollander immediately angles his body toward him. But he keeps his knees pressed together, hiding his cock. Hollander peers up at him from his spot on the bed, the mattress dipping under his weight. And then his eyes go low, low.

There’s a dark bruise on Ilya’s ribs, fresher than the other ones. Medic had cleared him, not a significant injury. Only tender in flesh and loud on his skin. Hollander swallows loudly again, staring right at it. Maybe concerned, or a bit guilty. The thing about Hollander is he plays the game and he loves the game; but maybe it is hard for him to realize how much he loves this part, too. The backwash of it all, the bruises. The sex.

Hollander says, “You looked pretty pissed about losing today.”

Ilya keeps his eyes fixed on Hollander’s face. “Yes, Hollander. I am pretty pissed about losing.”

“You sure you’re not hated in Boston, too?”

This time, Ilya laughs. Hollander finally looks at him again.

“No,” Ilya tells him. “And they will love me even more when I bring them the Cup.”

“Well, better start playing like it, then,” Hollander says.

Shaking his head, Ilya takes one step closer. He nudges his leg against Hollander’s closed knees. Hollander doesn’t budge.

“Spread your legs,” he tells him.

Hollander hesitates. From here, Ilya can see his thigh muscles flex, and he wants to put his teeth to them. Feel the tendons against the tip of his tongue, under the skin.

It’s when Hollander asks, “Are you gonna take it out on me?” that Ilya pauses. He considers it: he thinks, right now, there are few things Hollander would not accept from him. Remembers the jab of Hollander’s stick into his side, his grin. How right now, Hollander is mesmerized by the imprint of himself on Ilya’s body, and Ilya thinks, I know this side of you better than anyone, am maybe the only one who does, at all.

“I think you would like it too much.” He wedges his knee harder against Hollander’s, and this time it bears weight, Hollander’s legs splitting to show his half hard cock. Already there’s a sheen on Hollander’s inner thigh from his precome. Dripping wet from nothing more than sitting down and waiting. From talking shit. He is so easy. Ilya loves that about him.

“You wait thirty minutes, Hollander,” Ilya says. “I won’t touch you, and you can’t touch yourself. You will sit on the bed with your legs spread and your hands on your sides. Then, in half hour, I will give you what I promised. Okay?”

Hollander’s entire face is red, now. He grinds his teeth against his bottom lip.

“Okay,” he finally says. “Yeah—okay. I’ll wait, I’ll—be good.”

And it’s not Ilya’s word for him; this time, it is entirely Hollander’s.

Ilya gestures to the center of the mattress. “And legs open.”

“I know,” Hollander says, maybe just to get a word in, as he scoots back on the bed.

His hands stay at his sides, fingers twisting the bedsheets in a tight grip. There’s a drop of sweat at his temple; Ilya keeps his room a few degrees hotter than the rest of the house. Hollander looks down at his knees, still tilted together, then up at Ilya. Sweat at the line of his collarbones, too. The warm light of the bedroom looks good on him. Looks even better when, little by little, Hollander finally spreads his legs. Takes it slow because he must know that Ilya wants a show, that this bit—the waiting—is part of it, too. The wanting. Ilya touches the waistband of his sweats, shoves his fingers past the elastic, but only to the first knuckle. Does not touch his cock, yet.

Hollander’s tongue wets the corner of his mouth, and Ilya can see the muscles of his shoulders sag a bit as he eases himself into this moment. He eyes Ilya’s hand on his groin and Ilya moves his hand a bit, hooks his pinky finger on the outside of the sweats with the rest of his hand shoved as far down as it’ll go. The bedsheets strain from Hollander’s grip. Sports media likes to pretend Hollander is difficult to read. He looks at Hollander now, whose lips have parted enough to give away how shallow his breaths are, his eyes flicking between Ilya’s crotch and his chest and his mouth, and wonders how the entire world doesn’t know they’re fucking. When on the ice tonight, Hollander’s face had flushed red the same way it does now.

And then Hollander spreads his legs a little further, feet no longer firm on the mattress, giving Ilya a nice, full view of his hardening cock, and the rest of the world can wait.

“Good?” Hollander asks, fishing for a compliment. He pushes his chest out a bit. It shows off his tits, but maybe he knows that. Ilya could pinch his nipple, and press his nails in sharp. That much Hollander can take. Might like.

“Yes,” Ilya tells him, not relenting. He takes his hand out of his sweats and pulls his phone from his pocket, finding the timer app. When he’s set it to thirty minutes, he faces the screen toward Hollander, wiggling the phone in his grip. “Now stay.”

Ilya’s own cock is plumping up, too, but he’s not shy about letting Hollander get a look at it. The bulge curves the sweatpants over his thigh. Hollander’s always staring at his cock. Ilya is happy to give him this while he waits. It will only make Hollander more eager when he puts his mouth on it, later. Ilya reaches over the bed and places the phone screen-up between them.

“I like your ass.” Ilya tugs at the drawstring of his sweats, stepping around the table by the foot of the bed. He leans forward, puts one finger over a packaged needle. Slides that bag left, then right, so that the plastic rustles against the wood. “Like touching it, like putting my fingers in you… It takes my cock better than anything.”

Ilya can’t see Hollander move, but he hears how he sucks his breath in, how the bedsheets move as he does.

“And I love fucking you from behind. You are always pushing back on my cock, did you know? Very greedy, Hollander. Wiggle back and forth to get me deep in. And above your nice, round ass, you have these—marks, dimples, I think. These are very nice, too,” Ilya says, glancing up at Hollander, who is staring right back at him. Ilya picks one of the packaged barbells up, holding it so Hollander can see it. “I am going to fuck you like that today. In”—he glances at the timer—“twenty-six minutes, I will finger you open and you will get on your knees. Then I am going to fuck you until you come, and when you are sensitive and sore, my cock still in your ass, I will pierce you.”

Hollander tilts his head to the side, then back, facing the ceiling, rolls it in a circle once, twice. His eyes screw shut, a cute pucker to his mouth. Every time he moves, his neck and shoulder muscles shift, prominent, Ilya’s teeth aching to bite. Against the crease of his thigh and hip, Hollander’s cock is fully hard and wet at the tip, down the underside. It twitches.

“What do you think?” Ilya asks, still holding the barbell. “Does this count as prize?”

He watches Hollander pry his eyes open. He’s white knuckling the deep blue sheets. Maybe one day he can make Hollander come pretty just talking to him.Hollander’s bangs are flat against his forehead, damp, his brows slightly furrowed. There are divots on his bottom lip where he’s bitten it. He eyes the screen, watches twenty-three minutes edge into twenty-two and fifty-nine seconds.

Maybe he could have that cigarette after all. But it would require leaving, and Ilya—he doesn’t want to step outside of this room, right now. Wants to watch Hollander the whole way through. Is giving Hollander something by staying, too.

“How was the bar?” he asks. “Pretty girls there? Good drinks?”

Hollander shakes his head, eyes jumping from Ilya’s face to the low rise of his sweats. “Pretty normal bar. Closed early.”

“So little Montreal mice are trying to find a nice hole to party at, now? Without their captain.” Ilya thumbs the elastic of his sweats. Slips his finger past the band, then up, following the jut of his hip muscle.

Hollander lowers his chin, works his jaw side to side. Ilya is grateful the light in his bedroom is enough to catch Hollander’s growing stubble. Always prickles against his thigh when Hollander is between his legs. “They’re probably back at the hotel. There was a bar there.”

“Did you buy the drink?”

With one eyebrow raised, Hollander asks, “Does it matter?”

And Ilya supposes it doesn’t. But he wants to know. “Yes.”

Hollander holds the answer, angles his head back for a bit so that Ilya can’t see his face. Only the slow rise of his chest, the twitching of his fingers, his knees turning in before he stops himself.

“Mitty got it for me,” he says. “Said it’s his favorite.”

Both of them are hard. Ilya thumbs at the elastic of his boxers again, trying to give himself some relief from the pressure. It does little good: leaves him more restless than anything. At least Hollander is naked. Naked and laid out, nipples perked up. Nineteen minutes more like that.

“I think I will have a drink, too.” Ilya pushes his hair out of his face, turns to the door right as Hollander asks, “You’re leaving?” And then, “Do I…”

“Yes,” Ilya says. “You stay.”

Gives Hollander nothing but the view of his back as he leaves, makes his steps light and quiet down the stairs. Rummages through the fridge longer than he needs to because it is always organized perfectly, Coke cans stacked on the side door. The can is so cold to the touch it stings his fingertips when he fetches one. Doesn’t pop it open until he has made it all the way back up the stairs and into the bedroom.

Hollander isn’t glaring at him. He’s sweatier, though. His jaw tightens when he sees Ilya, tongue prodding against the inside of his cheek in a way that lets Ilya see. For a moment, Ilya imagines replacing it with his cock, sliding against the soft flesh.

He pops the tab on the can. The sound fizzles throughout the entire room.

“Didn’t get me one?” Hollander asks, voice strained.

“I did not,” Ilya says, shrugging. “You can have one after I fuck you.”

Hollander stutters through a laugh. Watches the whole time Ilya sips from that can, leaning against his dresser. Some good distance between them.

The drink is cool; Ilya’s body is hot and restless. That nasty bruise on his ribs throbs whenever he moves, sore enough for him to scrunch his lips when he moves his torso too much. He moves the can against his exposed bruise. Nose wrinkling at the chill. Hollander’s smiling, now, and there’s something about his heavy-lidded expression that sparks through Ilya’s body so strong it’s unpleasant. Like his tongue to an electric outlet, he imagines. He could call it off. Could make Hollander roll over and offer his ass up and not wait another twelve minutes and thirty-seven seconds.

“How are your ribs?” Hollander asks, voice snapping against Ilya’s ears.

It rattles throughout his body, making Ilya so horrendously aware of every stretched, aching muscle in his body all at once, aware of how his toes curl against the floor, how his jaw is set so tight it hurts. His clenched molars building pressure all the way up to his temples.

“Is nothing,” Ilya tells him. “Little fly came flying at me during game, so I swatted him away.”

“Asshole,” Hollander says, tongue wobbling around the word. “The way you were playing today—what were you doing? You could’ve tied instead of—why were you on me, you should’ve—”

“Oh, see, now that this is about hockey, you have so much to say.” Ilya rolls his eyes. “You think I don’t know this?”

“Then why’d you do it?”

“I don’t know,” Ilya says, holding Hollander’s gaze. “What do you think?”

Thinks of Hollander’s weight against his own on the ice, how rarely he gets to see him up close there, in his most natural state. How, for a few seconds, Hollander had been as playful there as he is now. Chipping away at the edges. Six minutes and Ilya’s nape is damp, too. His hair curls tightly at his neck. This is a stupid idea. Is the best fucking idea he’s ever had.

“Rozanov,” Hollander says, shoulders no longer sloping down, but pulled high. He is leaning forward, one leg flat on the bed and the other raised. His fingers tense and then relax, over and over again. There’s sweat on his top lip now, too. His chest heaves, each breath louder and louder. “Please. Come on, it’s just five minutes.”

“And it was just one drink,” Ilya replies. “Just, just, just.”

He moves his hand into his underwear, squeezes his cock for the first time that night, so he can watch Hollander swallow hard again. Hollander’s cock jerks, sad and untouched. Ilya tugs at the length of his own dick once, feels the skin move over the head, slick on the downstroke.

“It’s not fair if you’re touching yourself.”

Ilya laughs. “Okay, sorry, did not know sex was about being fair. Should we call in ref for you? He can decide if it is okay for me to touch my dick right now.”

“You can imagine it,” Ilya tells him. “How I will feel inside you. I will give you exactly what you want.” He twists his wrist, exaggerates the movement and bites down on his bottom lip right. Catches his own smile there. Pictures his cock as it pushes into Hollander’s body; the needle through skin.

Hollander glares at him. It makes Ilya harder.

Three minutes. If he comes now, he won’t be able to fuck Hollander like promised, so he pries his hand out of his underwear, fully hard. His fingers slick with his own precome. When he wiggles them, Hollander’s tongue dips out the corner of his mouth.

“Three minutes, Hollander,” he says.

And then he leaves the bedroom. He washes his hands in the en-suite bathroom and does so slowly. Soap under his fingernails, down to his wrists, lathers his hands twice before washing them off. Even after he’s done, he lets the tap run for another few seconds, the water loud as he dries his hands. When he exits the bathroom, he flicks his hands three times out of habit.

One minute and thirty six seconds, thirty five, thirty four…

“This one, I think.” Ilya picks one of the three packaged needles up, turns it around a few times.

Hollander has closed his eyes. Legs still spread enough for Ilya to see his cock between his legs.

There’s no buzzer, because Ilya turned that off thirty minutes ago. Instead he kneels on the bed, watches Hollander’s eyes fly open, turn to the phone, then to Ilya, and when Hollander sighs, it’s against Ilya’s mouth. He kisses him like he’s waited longer than half an hour. Days. Weeks. Longer, maybe even—

“Need you to fuck me,” Hollander says, more of a plea. “Need your cock in me, Rozanov, fuck. I need it so bad. Haven’t stopped thinking about it all day, please, please—want it, want—I want all of it, please. Fuck me. This is so—”

“Yes, yes,” Ilya promises, pushing on Hollander’s shoulder so that he gets on his back. He noses his way back down Hollander’s chest, pauses to kiss the off-colored, fresh scars on his hip. So tiny, but there. Puckered against the bridge of Ilya’s nose, his lips.

Hollander whines, knots his fingers into Ilya’s hair and shoves Ilya’s face against his cock. Ilya lets him, kisses him there on the base of his hard dick, too, before spreading his ass with his hands and getting to his hole. Shoves his thumb in alongside his tongue before pulling it out, fingers Hollander open only enough to get him soft before saying, “Okay,” and kissing his throat.

Ilya uses the top sheet to wipe the lube off his fingers, then grabs the piercing tools he needs from the table. Drops them on the bed next to them. He shoves his sweats down his thighs until his cock comes free. Sliding his palm underneath Hollander’s body, Ilya rubs his stomach before grabbing his hip, urging Hollander onto his knees.

Hollander is trembling when Ilya slides a palm down the back of his thigh, pushes his fingers into the crease behind Hollander’s knee to make him jerk. Snickers into Hollander’s skin when he bends down to kiss his spine. He holds his cock at the base, letting the head snag on Hollander’s hole. Pushes in shallowly, to watch the skin stretch, Hollander’s sigh soft the way his hole is. Hollander breathes in. Ilya anchors his hand on Hollander’s shoulder, slots his thumb over the large scar there—and yanks him back onto his cock so hard they both groan.

Hollander is everywhere: hot and tight around him, loud and desperate underneath him, is under Ilya’s skin, too, in the desperate twinge to every thrust.

Hollander comes the second Ilya reaches around to fist his cock, his grip so tight Hollander yelps. Ilya fucks him through the aftershocks, until Hollander’s shoulders are shaking, whimpering into his own hand, a choked-up sob escaping. It’s only when Hollander’s body droops that he slows down: when Hollander no longer tries to fuck himself back onto Ilya’s cock, is too sore for it.

“You are so good,” Ilya tells him, rubbing Hollander’s back. He’s gnawing the inside of his cheek raw, stomach muscles clenched tight, trying to stop himself from coming, too. It gets harder when Hollander looks over his shoulder, eyes red rimmed and beautiful and nose snotty and lips red and swollen. “So pretty, Hollander. I will be good to you, too, yes?” And he rubs up and down Hollander’s back before wiping Hollander’s come off his hand using his sweats.

He pulls the latex gloves on, snaps them against his wrist loudly. Hollander winces at the sound. His hands are clammy inside them. Ilya reaches around to put his hand on Hollander’s chest, helps him straighten his arms.

“Can’t,” Hollander groans, elbows buckling. Ilya feels Hollander’s sob to the very core of him. “Rozanov, I’m—fuck, I’m so—”

“You can,” Ilya says, using one of the alcohol wipes to clean the skin around both of Hollander’s back dimples. It must be cold, because Hollander shivers and clenches around his cock at the touch. With his thumb, he rubs into the divots, one at a time, tilting his head. “Left… Right… Where should I put it, Hollander?”

He thinks of the deep, purple bruise latticed over his right side. Uses the marker to mark out the spots on Hollander’s right hip dimple.

He takes his piercing needle out of its package, pinches the package with the barbell between his teeth. Hollander keeps his head low, still trembling. When Ilya pinches the skin of Hollander’s lower back—has to hold it tight, the skin there thick and taut—their inhales mirror each other. Holding the same breath. Ilya’s air pushing past his teeth in a hiss, the barbell’s plastic bag crinkling when he bites down harder. Needletip to the purple market dot, Ilya holds it there for a few seconds, until Hollander’s shoulder blades flex, his whole upper body sinking into his exhale; the needle pushes through without resistance. Hollander gasps, ass clenching around Ilya so hard that his vision blacks at the corners, all of his cusswords dying behind his clenched teeth.

Ilya makes sure it lines up with the second mark, and as it emerges, the needle winks with light. Hollander’s breaths ripple through Ilya’s body, an agonizing squeeze around Ilya’s hard cock.

Hollander’s upper body shakes. Ilya rubs his waist, humming as he uses his teeth to rip the bag with the barbell open. This gets easier, too. He doesn’t fumble with the barbells as much anymore. Anchors the jewelry to the blunt end and threads it through. Ilya’s thighs ache, up to his ass muscles and his back and stomach, pleasure less a flash and more a constant, overwhelming pulsation. Thumps even in his throat.

“Fuck,” Hollander says when Ilya pats him between his shoulder blades, folding in on himself. Chest to the mattress. “Can you—” He stops, breathes for a few moments, and Ilya continues to stroke his back, following the curve of one shoulder blade with his thumb before moving it down, down to rub the reddening skin around the piercing.

“I want to—want to suck you off,” Hollander manages to say, peering over his shoulder up at Ilya.

“What if I want to come like this?” Ilya asks, rolling his hips slowly so that Hollander has to feel the swell of his cock move inside of him. Keeps his focus on the barbell, plays with it as he keeps fucking into Hollander steadily. Each thrust mirrored in the slide of the piercing back and forth. He’s dizzy at the sight of it, Hollander’s body shifting for him.

Tells Hollander, “Every hole is so eager for me. You are taking me anywhere I want you,” as he nudges the barbell with one finger, then worms that finger underneath one balled end so that Hollander’s skin pulls up, hole stretching with the metal. Hollander groans, the sound cut off when Ilya tugs on the piercing and the skin bunches at the end. A drawn-out, shuddering sob.

He pushes his hips flush against Hollander’s ass, slides the barbell forward at the same time. Hollander clenches around him.

He flicks his eyes to Hollander’s. “You think you do better than this?”

Hollander’s eyelids flutter as Ilya strokes the raised skin over the barbell. His lower lashes are clumped together. But he nods.

“Okay,” Ilya says. “You can suck my cock, Hollander.”

He pulls out, barely has the condom rolled off when Hollander pushes him onto his back and envelops him in his soft, warm mouth. He reaches for Ilya’s ribs, presses his fingers into the dips of the muscles over the bruise, pushes hard. The pain cuts through Ilya’s chest, sharper than the pleasure. Hollander swallows around him, hand moving up to meet his lips before pulling the foreskin back so he can suckle on the head, tongue dipping into the slit and Ilya comes with a shout and his hand fisting Hollander’s messy hair. Hollander’s throat bobs. Ilya stares at the ceiling, then at Hollander. His face tingles, his chest and ass and fingers, too, everything—he can’t really—

Hollander lets Ilya’s cock slip out of his mouth, kisses the underside of the head before letting Ilya’s cock rest against his cheek, and says, “I love this,” clarifies, “Love your cock, love it inside of me—mouth, my ass, just—fuck, it’s so good, Rozanov, it’s—” and Ilya doesn’t want to hear it. Yanks Hollander up by his neck and takes his mouth with his own and bites his lip, then his own tongue, cussing into Hollander’s mouth as they share the taste between them.

He keeps touching the piercing: rubs the end between fingertips, pushes it around so the skin moves with it. Hollander squirms, spent cock and stomach pressed into the mattress.

“Fuck.” Hollander sighs, scrunching his nose. Eyes closed, mouth open. Like he’s blissed out. “Are you taking it out?”

It would be difficult for Hollander to undo this one himself. Even his neck piercing he would’ve been able to finesse out of himself with the right mirror and a lick of determination. Ilya rubs his thumb between the two visible metal balls. Pushing down on the metal rod underneath the skin, he can feel how hard it is. Can roll it under his touch. Some part of him is still inside of Hollander’s body.

The piercing looks small next to his hand, titanium bright. Looks nice. He should buy a silver ring, next. Says to Hollander, “Maybe I leave it in,” as he dips his thumb into the dimple above Hollander’s ass.

Hollander’s laugh stutters. “Come on.” He peers over his shoulder, raises both brows.

Ilya shrugs, draws a circle around the piercing with one finger. He moves his other hand to Hollander’s hip.

“Rozanov,” Hollander says, more stern this time. Ilya likes the sound of it. “Don’t play around. I have to leave and I can’t—you know I can’t take it out myself.”

“Yes,” Ilya murmurs. “I know.”

“Okay, so…” Pushing himself up on one elbow, Hollander reaches back, grabs Ilya’s wrist. “Take it out.”

Ilya hums, rubs Hollander’s waist with the hand not stuck in his grip. “Is this how you ask nicely?”

He worms his hand out of Hollander’s grasp, puts his palm to the mattress and leans forward. Covers Hollander’s body with his own, puts his teeth to his neck, drags them down Hollander’s spine until he dips between the shoulderblades, kisses there.

Hollander’s eyes dart between the clock on Ilya’s wall and Ilya behind him. Says, “Please,” then, “Rozanov, please—take it out, yeah? That’s the”—doesn’t seem to find the right word for it—“that’s what you… Take it out for me. Please? I can’t do it without you.”

“You could,” Ilya promises. Turns his face so his cheek rests on Hollander’s back. “You could take it out yourself. Or maybe you want excuse, yes? You get to wear it tomorrow, the day after… But is my fault.”

“That’s not it, I just…” Hollander’s face is flushing, too. His frustration so clear in how his brow furrows, his lips thin.

“Just…” Ilya can’t help it when he grins. “If you ask again, I will help you. Because you can’t do it without me, yes?”

Hollander dips his forehead to the mattress. Rolls his ass back against Ilya’s hips.

Says, a bit softer than Ilya wants, “Please take it out for me.”

“Can’t hear you.” Ilya strokes his waist, then moves his hand down to Hollander’s hip. “What was it?”

“Please,” Hollander repeats. “Please take it out for me. I can’t do it on my own.”

Ilya mouths the line of Hollander’s spine and leans back. Hollander is not looking at him.

“Okay,” he says. “I will take it out.”

Relief curves Hollander’s whole body: his shoulders slack with his breath, face nudging into the mattress, back sloped. And he says, “Thank you,” as if Ilya isn’t still nudging the piercing, thinking—I could leave this in you. Would you know? I could leave myself right there, on you. Maybe you would notice right away. Or in the taxi, going home. Or tomorrow, when you are getting dressed and it snags on your underwear. Or maybe not until the showers. Maybe it is your teammate, calling it out. Asking how drunk you were last night. Who did this to you? How willingly did you let them do it? And you would not be able to tell them Rozanov bent you over and fucked you and you came on his cock with his needle in your skin. All needy holes. And you would be terrible. You would be so mad at me you would not be able to think of anyone else.

His bare hands will do for this. And he’s not unkind when he holds one end of the barbell tight, at an angle, so that the knuckle of one finger drives hard into Hollander’s back. This is just how he must navigate Hollander’s body. Digs it in harder when he turns the other end of the barbell so that the balled end screws loose. He drops it on the mattress and it rolls into the dip by Hollander’s knees.

Hollander’s weight shifts. Ilya wonders if he is confirming for himself that Ilya is doing as he promised.

Ilya puts his forefinger to the open end of Hollander’s wound. When he slides the piercing out he pushes down on the empty end, drags his finger down, following the exit path of the titanium rod. The barbell comes out red, the skin spilling blood from Ilya’s prodding, still swollen, adjusting to the loss.

He tosses the barbell up the mattress so that Hollander can get a good look at it without twisting in the sheets.

“There,” he says. “It’s out.”

Hollander’s hand immediately reaches back to touch the spot. Smears the pearled blood, voice shaking a bit when he sees it, “Shit.” But he rolls onto his back, anyway. Clearly does not care that the blood will stain Ilya’s sheets, now.

Hollander keeps looking at his fingers, then glances at Ilya. At his mouth.

“See?” Ilya asks as he wraps his fingers around Hollander’s and pulls his hand toward his mouth. Ilya sucks Hollander’s knuckles into his mouth, tongue dipping between two of his fingers, pointing out on the other end. Hollander’s chest snags on a breath. “You always get what you want, Hollander.” And he takes Hollander’s dirty fingers into his mouth.

Not much later, Ilya returns from the kitchen holding a chilled water bottle. Hollander takes it graciously from where he’s lying on the bed on his stomach, and pushes himself up onto his forearms so he can unscrew the top. Ilya watches the bottlemouth squish his top lip, a few drops of water running down his chin.

“I didn’t actually mean to jab you in the ribs,” Hollander says when Ilya slides back onto the bed.

“Sure, okay.” Ilya leans against the headboard. “Whatever you say, Hollander.”

“I really didn't," Hollander insists.

Ilya rolls his eyes. “It is not a problem. What was it you said—this is hockey, I am a hockey player, yes? Same thing as this. Is just one bruise. Tonight, I look better than usual, even. Next time you can hit me harder.”

Hollander snorts, turns over so he’s on his side, and hands the water bottle over to Ilya. The water’s cool. When Ilya glances at Hollander out of the corner of his eye, he finds Hollander staring at him. Maybe they mirror each other like this, too, because Hollander’s gaze is heady. Maybe this is what Hollander sees when Ilya is on top of him, fucking him. Or just when he watches Hollander drink water.

“You’re right,” Hollander says, shaking his head. “Next time maybe try to score, and I’ll leave you with something nice to remember me by.”

Ilya smiles at him. “Yes, do that. It will be very sexy for me.”

Hollander narrows his eyes at him.

“What? Is—blyat—” Ilya slaps his hand down over Hollander’s where it is pinching his tricep—“what the fuck, Hollander?”

And Hollander laughs at him, wiggling his fingers until Ilya moves his hand away. His upper arm throbs. Ilya puts the water bottle on the bedside table and reaches out to squeeze Hollander’s waist, lightening his touch when he slides his hand toward his stomach, feeling Hollander’s muscles tense under his fingertips. Humming, Ilya drags his hand toward Hollander’s groin, nails scraping the flesh, and Hollander shivers, chest jumping.

“You are ticklish,” Ilya says, smile widening. He squeezes Hollander’s hip, then goes for his ass.

Hollander purses his mouth. “I’m not—okay, maybe, like, a little, but—”

“Maybe? A little?” Ilya repeats, shoving Hollander onto his back so he can get his hands into Hollander’s armpits and squeeze him there too, groping his tits while Hollander squeaks and yanks on Ilya’s hair so hard his scalp stings. “Oh, I think maybe a little is exactly like just one drink...”

Hollander is still pulling on Ilya’s hair when he dives down to press a sloppy, open-mouthed kiss to Hollander’s throat, then the swell of his left pec, the soft flesh right by his armpit. He digs his teeth in there as Hollander moans. But he doesn’t push Ilya away, even with his fingers knotted into Ilya’s curls, even when Ilya licks into Hollander’s armpit through the soft hair and then up the length of his bicep, into the crook of his arm and bites there, too.

“Fuck, Rozanov,” Hollander gasps, and Ilya wishes they had another hour.

Ilya sees him off at two in the morning.

“Do you always keep a pack of unopened underwear at home, or what?” Hollander asks.

They’re in the hallway. It’s so dark outside the tall, glass windows might as well be walls.

Ilya shrugs. “Figured you would not bring your bag with you, since this is not a sleepover party… And you get very wet, so.”

Hollander looks at him then, that furrow between his brows returning, a quiver to his lips. For once, Ilya can’t get a read on him. It makes him uneasy.

“Right,” Hollander says. “Well, thanks. I guess.”

“No problem,” Ilya says. “Do you—”

“Stop sign, I know.” Hollander looks down at his phone, watching the approaching car on the map. “Thanks for the bandaid, too. And everything.”

“No need to say thank you for everything.” Ilya leans against the wall, crossing his arms. “Was fun for me, too.”

Hollander is hovering again. Ilya reaches out to loop Hollander’s hoodie string around his finger, leans in for one final kiss. Hollander sighs into it.

“Bye, Hollander,” Ilya says, pushing the door handle down, then out, inviting the cold air inside.

Hollander nods, shoves his hands into the front pocket on his hoodie, and leaves.

Ilya cracks his cigarette pack open and smokes two back-to-back in his bedroom, polishes off the water bottle, and texts, hotel? Is half-asleep until some hour later, when Hollander texts him back: You should ice your bruise, it’ll help, at which point he drags himself out of bed, finds a bag of frozen edamame, and presses that to his bruise until the plastic bag is dripping with condensation.

A week later, as Ilya is driving past the train tracks to the Garden parking garage, Jane flashes on the screen. As soon as his car engine’s off, he’s pulling up the message. I took the bandaid off.

How long does it take for a wound to scar? The holes might’ve closed, but the skin should be raised, still. Ilya’s face is hot. He texts Hollander back as he gets his bag out of the car’s trunk: picture.

He’s walking toward the entryway with his phone in his hand when it pings again. Not now, I’m out.

Ilya pushes the door open with his shoulder. He passes the men’s bathroom, raising his hand to greet two staff members, types, just go into bathroom stall, then, is easy. no one cares what you do. When there’s still no text back, he adds, i think you are being a tease.

Nothing for a few minutes. Ilya’s molars press together. He rolls his jaw side to side.

That’s not it, Hollander says.

Ilya shakes his head, tells him, ok. lie to yourself. i will know, only to hear back immediately. He can hear Hollander’s voice in his ears when he reads the: You are so fucking annoying.

and who is texting annoying me, he sends back. He thinks of Hollander underneath him. How saturated with red his skin is when he’s turned on and tired and aching for release. The slope of his back when he arches into position, pushing back on Ilya’s cock like it’s got all the answers in the world. Hollander tells him, It’s scabbing. It’s not sexy or anything. And it’s hard to get a good angle when it’s on my back. Ilya stops, puts his back to the wall next to the locker room door. There’s noise crowding inside. Cliff’s voice cuts through it, but Ilya can’t make out the words. His mouth is warm. Feels fucking overrun with saliva, like he’s getting sick. His tongue dips against the back of his teeth, restlessly dragging over the too-smooth edge of his implants.

picture, he repeats, adds a, now, right after, in case Hollander wants to continue to dance around it. He waits a minute, then stuffs his phone into his bag before kicking the door to the locker room open, chin turning up right as Cliff throws an empty Superfeet Carbons pack at his head.

Cliff’s got one hand on his jersey—the other’s empty. He grins, looking not even a bit apologetic. “Whoops, sorry cap! Was aiming for the trash can.”

“Motherfucker,” Ilya says, grabbing the water bottle on the side of his bag. He’s across the room in seconds, drops his bag off his shoulder mid-stride, and Cliff howls, ducking away right as Ilya yanks the collar of Cliff’s shirt back so tight it snags on his throat. He pops the cap lid on his water bottle up, squirting water straight down the back of Cliff’s shirt as he tries to wriggle out of it.

Cliff gets him back easy.

Later that day, hunched over burgers so stuffed with condiments and fillings that Ilya’s fingers are slick with grease, Cliff asks him about Jane again. He does that a lot, now. More than usual, at least. More than maybe two years ago, when Ilya first began fucking Hollander on the regular. He thanks his stupid, nineteen-year-old self for putting Hollander into his phone as Jane. Had thought, at most, they’d meet a few times. Ilya likes fucking men, and he likes fucking Hollander more than most people—it is perfect, really, to have him this available. And sometimes he is funny. When he doesn’t try to be.

“Is she like…” Cliff scratches his beard. Hamburger-grease glossed beard. Cliff keeps talking before he’s done chewing the burger patty in his mouth. “No, like, Roz, dude… You know, you’re allowed to date people. I’m sure it’s nice to be the MLH’s stallion or whatever, but you’ve been meeting this girl for two years. I’ve seen you with, I mean, shit, a hundred women, maybe. Even Svetlana, there’s always this, I don’t know, it’s already over to you. But you don’t ever say I’m not seeing her again with this Jane girl… You sure you don’t like her, at least a little?”

Ilya makes a face. He almost says, three years.

“What are you, twelve? Scared of cooties?” Cliff tips his beer back to gulp it down, raising both brows at Ilya while doing so. “I just think if you’re fucking a girl for that long and texting her every day, looking all—I mean, I’m not the only one who notices that shit, okay? Everyone else just shuts their mouth about it. What’s the holdup? Can’t WAG someone who loves the Metros?”

“Jane is just a fuckbuddy,” Ilya says, dropping his burger onto the plate. “I am not going to date her. She will not date me.”

“Oh.” Cliff looks away, wiping his fingers with a napkin. He crosses his arms over his chest, then turns his face back to Ilya. “So she said she wouldn’t date you? Really?”

“What?” Ilya leans back, confused. “No. What? I told you, I will not date Jane and she will not date me. This is—mutual agreement, okay? Do you want to date every woman you fuck?”

“No, but I’m not usually texting them for two years.”

Ilya shakes his head, stuffs the last of his burger into his mouth, and then tosses his napkin onto his plate. He takes his time finishing his beer while Cliff sits there, silent.

“Jane is, you know…” Ilya pauses. “Maybe not friends, but—she knows me. So it is easier.”

“Right,” Cliff says, reaching for his wallet. “Okay, well, you let me know when she beats some sense into you so I can make sure to tell her I tried doing that way long ago.” He snags the check off the table before Ilya can get to it, continues, “Just saying. Maybe look in the mirror next time she texts you. Might learn something about yourself, buddy.”

Ilya rolls his eyes, licks the grease off his thumb and forefinger, and flips him off.

Jane does text, but not until that evening, when Cliff and Ilya have already parted ways and Ilya has squeezed a quick two mile run in before his shower. It’s hard to make out too much of the background, but Hollander must’ve propped his phone up and used the timer, because both his hands are visible in the photo. One hand keeps his shirt pulled up, showing his lower back, jeans pulled low enough to show the top of his ass and his hip dimples. One of his thumbs is hooked into the waistband, keeping the jeans at an angle. The camera is close enough to Hollander’s body that Ilya can see the bright red marks.

When he sends Hollander a good boy back, Hollander doesn’t tell him to fuck off, just asks, Still gonna fuck me when we knock you out of playoffs? Or are you going to be a sore loser again?

Ilya turns his chin up, stares right at his bathroom mirror. Remembers Cliff’s comments during lunch. The mirror’s fogged up from his shower, and he wipes some of it off, enough to see his eyes, the soft quirk of his mouth. He purses his lips together, splashes cold water onto his face, and calls Carmichael. It is not too late for drinks, for company. Jane’s name flashes on the screen again; he leaves it unread.

Did you ice your ribs? Is it better today?

They’re landing in Toronto within the hour, and Ilya has spent most of the flight with his cap pulled down over his eyes to try to get a nap in. Doesn’t work that great when Hanny keeps switching between reading his Instagram DMs out loud to the other guys and watching YouTube videos with the volume on. Every now and then he will hold his screen up to show a highlight reel video from a game, or a photo of a girl he’s following, or a clip about, like, stone facts. Geology, he says.

“What do you think?” Hanny says, voice pitched from the front of his mouth. No one likes ragging on him for his Swedish accent. They save all that shit for Ilya. As if he doesn’t make himself perfectly understood every fucking interview—that’s why they plaster Ilya’s soundbites all over the internet.

He says, “You need Papa to approve your date?” and stretches his legs out while rummaging around for the bag of chocolate covered almonds he’d bought. “I don’t care who you are fucking, Hanny.”

“Men va fan…” Hanny points at the screen. “Just tell me, do you think she’s hot? Kind of your type, right?”

There’s a brunette woman with a cropped top and an obnoxiously large jewel on her belly button piercing. For what it’s worth, Hanny isn’t entirely off—she is hot. Ilya pops a handful of almonds into his mouth at once, holding the bag out when Cliff taps him on the shoulder from the seat behind him. Ilya remembers a vaguely similar conversation many months ago, at some bar in New York City.

Ilya says, “If you are trying to invite me to threesome with you and her, you need to ask nicely. But if she forgets you are there, this is not my fault, okay?”

Hanny says something Ilya can’t make out, flips him off, and then goes back to watching videos about types of rocks in Ireland, or whatever. Ilya offers him some chocolate almonds and he takes them without looking, chewing loudly. Ilya wonders if Hollander would let Ilya pierce his navel. He wishes Hollander wasn’t so fucking opposed to a crystal or two. Hollander could ride him, let the lamp catch on the pale stone.

“Roz has Jane these days, and he doesn’t seem very interested in sharing,” someone says, and Ilya’s mid-thought when he hears it, and so by the time everyone’s hooting about it, he can’t figure out who said it.

He sinks deeper into his seat and shoves his cap down again, folds his hands over his stomach.

Maybe Ilya should find a blonde. Or an older woman. Much older. Summer in Moscow will be good to him, he believes. Too many hours between Russia and Canada for texting back and forth, too many things to do in a day with Svetlana to bother picking his phone up. She will kill him if he texts while having a conversation with her, again: this was a promise she’d made, and he knows her well enough to believe her.

They win gloriously in Toronto. This is their year. Ilya feels it in his bones.

On for end of April?

I have an hour after but that’s it.

Private hotel room this time.

Come?

They lose in Tampa. Even worse in New York. April lurches toward May.

Ilya catches Hollander’s presser when he returns home from practice one night. Someone in the Metros’ room must’ve soaked his CCM undershirt in water, because Hollander’s shirtless and glistening. His smile’s soft but it’s there, answers polite but longer than usual. We really connected today, so now it’s just about maintaining that energy throughout the playoffs, and, you know, keeping our focus on the next game… Continuing those good habits we set in place, beyond practice. It’s about treating our bodies right so we can go out there and do the work as best as we can. We’ve built confidence in each other these last few years, and that shows on the ice now… He doesn’t immediately retreat into the room again. Shoulders rolled back, posture straight. But his eyes don’t move, focused on a singular spot behind the camera, avoiding the interviewer.

Sweats hanging low on his hips, dark hair trailing to his groin. Hollander reaches down, two fingers brushing over his hip.

Ilya knows that spot. He turns the TV off, texts Hollander back, finally: yes, still meeting, then, hotel?

The Ritz-Carlton. 947. A few minutes after, You didn’t answer me.

not a problem, Ilya tells him. you should see bruise on my thighs from new york. is as large as the city.

Hollander sends a laughing emoji back. Ilya rubs his hands over his eyes, then goes to dig out an ice pack from the freezer.

When Ilya comes to a stop in front of Hollander, he’s so close that his knee knocks into Hollander’s shoulder. Hollander, mid-stretch on the ice, legs bent and spread, looks up.

“You know, I heard in the wind…” He holds a gloved finger up, as if he can feel the air. “... that Captain Hollander spent extra money to have a private luxury room at the Ritz tonight.”

Hollander lifts his chin, brows knit together, but he looks flustered more than anything. “Don’t you know warmups are usually done with the people on your team? Last time I checked, you’re not a Metro.”

“Would be difficult for you if I was,” Ilya tells him, resting both hands on the butt of his stick. “You are probably worse wing than center.”

“Whatever, Rozanov.” Hollander shakes his head. A few seconds pass, and then he turns his eyes back to Ilya, glances around a few times, then says, “You didn't bring…? Nevermind, just—text me after the game. Now fuck off.”

Ilya smiles, is about to tell Hollander that if he’s that desperate, Ilya will drive back home to get a needle just for tonight, when Boiziau skates up. He comes to a stop right next to Hollander.

“Looking a little lost, Rozanov,” he says. “You can’t tell directions even in home arena? Maybe this is why you haven’t scored in two games. Do you need me to point you to your goal?”

It’s hard not to grin at that, because what the fuck else is he supposed to do? Those assists don’t feel even a tenth as good as getting puck to net, and every player out there knows it. Hollander’s back to staring at the ice, and so Ilya slides backward, throwing Hollander one last look before crossing back to where Cliff is speaking to Dubek.

Ilya knows exactly where the fuck he is: that’s why he’s scored twice by the time second period ends.

The third goal’s his favorite, though. Hollander on the ice across him, shifting his body in time to intercept the puck when he sees Ilya sprint. It’s too bad for Hollander that he has not played much against Sebbin, doesn’t know how quick he’s gotten since being drafted, how he is right where Ilya needs him to be, on the right, only a few strides behind Ilya. Sebbin taps his blade twice, calls for a drop pass, voice certain. They’d worked on that, too. Who to teach confidence but Ilya Rozanov? Ilya knows he’s a slut for ice attention; he’ll take the cameras on him and the jeering and the nasty articles, and then he’ll score. But tonight Sebbin’s calling for it, fucking finally.

Ilya nudges the puck around a Metros winger, gets him in the shoulder on the way, then slides the puck back to Sebbin. And the Metros Ds are on Ilya, break away a second too late when they see the puck connect with Sebbin, Hollander the only one reacting before it does. But Sebbin’s worked for this moment. Ilya has watched him puke his guts up in a trash can after drills and patted his back. So he knows without a doubt, even as he moves toward the goal to meet Sebbin there, that he won’t make contact with the puck again before it strikes net. Sebbin dekes Metros’ 26, takes the shot—

and it’s a beautiful goal. A clean backhand. Looks even better when it’s up on the board, putting the Raiders up 3-1.

Ilya slaps his hand down on Sebbin’s helmet, and by the time Sebbin’s back on the bench after a line of fistbumps, he’s beaming. Ilya remembers his own rookie season every time Sebbin makes strides during his own. Third period sees one Metros goal by 11 to join Hollander’s from the first period. Cliff gets the last one of the evening, then trips right over 26’s stick and earns himself a nasty cut right across his cheek. Doesn’t matter, though, because the red light sirens as Ilya hoists Cliff back onto his feet.

Ilya’s skating leisurely toward the bench when he catches Hollander looking at him. It’s only for a second, and then Pike and Stedlund are right there with him, blocking the view. They’re talking as they move; Ilya catches one more glimpse of Hollander’s stern face between the other two guys’ shoulders, mouth moving stiffly. Angry, angry. Ilya digs his mouthguard out of place with his tongue, grinds it between his teeth.

Ilya shakes his hair out while tossing his helmet onto his jersey, draped on the bench in front of him. Coach sent Sebbin out for his presser, shirtless and beaming, holding the specially-made cannon linstock in both hands. At least it isn’t the plastic gold crown from Spirit Halloween someone had brought with them one day. Though Ilya hadn’t hated that one—maybe because got to wear it more often than any other guy in the room before they tossed it out at the end of his first season.

He takes his phone out from his jacket pocket, fires off a fifteen minutes to Hollander.

Door’s unlocked, Hollander says. Ninth floor.

very brave of you, Ilya texts him, maybe you do want people to see us fucking

Ilya can practically hear Hollander’s peeved voice in his head when he gets the next message: Maybe I should lock the door after all and you can go jerk off at home alone.

this would be worse time for you than me, Ilya writes back, i was good loser last time. is your turn now. Doesn’t text that if Hollander doesn’t want to put out, there are other people in Boston eager to do so. He takes that thought and throws it in the trash along with the empty bottle of orange juice-coconut water mix he’d stolen from Feller.

“You coming out, Roz?” Cliff says, glancing at him with pouty lips. He gives Ilya that look, his stupid I-know-the-answer-bro! look.

Ilya shakes his head, drags his long sleeve over his head before wriggling one foot into a sock. “No.”

Cliff asks, “She flying out, now?” Fails to sound disinterested.

Maybe Ilya’s too quick when he says, “Not her.”

“Okay, well, she’s texting you, so…” Cliff gestures at Ilya’s phone screen. He really needs to change his fucking settings.

“You miss me too easy,” Ilya tells him, rummaging around for a second sock. “Don’t worry, Marly, you are the only girl in my heart, okay? I will never cheat on you.” And he blows Cliff a kiss before tossing his soaked-through CCM undershirt over his phone, watching the black fabric light up as another text message comes through.

Ilya enjoys the Ritz. He enjoys it even more when he can use the large, brown-beige marble shower to get Hollander on his knees with the hot water washing over them. The floor is slippery and hard, but Hollander’s not complaining, has Ilya so far down his throat his nose rubs into Ilya’s treasure trail.

Ilya wants to savor it: he threads his fingers into Hollander's hair and guides him off.

Hollander rests his cheek on Ilya’s thigh. Uses one hand to rub Ilya’s ankle slowly, thumb circling the bone.

“Looking pretty pleased with yourself, Rozanov,” Hollander says, voice raspy. Ilya loves knowing it is his cock that made it so. He doesn’t tell Hollander this, just hoists him onto his feet and kisses him greedily, pushes Hollander’s hair out of his face and grips it tight again.

When they’re drying themselves off in the bathroom, Ilya steps behind Hollander and reaches out to touch his nape. Hollander shivers.

It’s hard to think the scars on his neck are a year old, but they’ve flattened out a bit. Silvered. He leans in to put his tongue to them and this time Hollander doesn’t just shiver, he groans, tilts his head back so he can rest it on Ilya’s shoulder and give him access to his mouth. They kiss lazy and slow. Hollander’s mouth kind of tastes like soap.

Ilya snakes an arm around to rub over Hollander’s hip scars, too, then slides his palm to cup Hollander’s half-hard cock. He brushes his thumb over Hollander’s groin, through the short, dark pubes. Presses his thumb down hard as he puts his mouth to Hollander’s ear and says, “Next time, I will pierce you here. Right above your cock…”

Hollander’s eyes widen, but he doesn’t say not there.

Ilya watches as his chest rises, breath held. He takes that air from Hollander’s mouth when he kisses him again. Continuing to rub the skin, he kisses the shell of Hollander’s ear, tells him, “Will need to shave you, I think. This bit here. Maybe I will be nice and do it for you.”

“As if you wouldn’t like doing it,” Hollander says.

Ilya hums, nosing along Hollander’s jaw, kissing there, too. “Yes, I like touching you. And I like when you squirm.” He squeezes Hollander’s left tit hard, grinning over his shoulder when their eyes meet in the bathroom mirror, and Hollander reaches back to tug on his hair.

Ilya can feel the full length of Hollander’s body against his own like this, Hollander’s back to his chest. His hard cock grinding into the Hollander’s plump ass.

Hollander twirls one of Ilya’s curls around his finger. “Can you maybe make me squirm on a bed, then? My legs are cramping and I’m exhausted."

“Terrible stamina for professional hockey player,” Ilya teases, but drags Hollander to the bed anyway, crawling between Hollander legs when he spreads them. He kisses Hollander’s stomach, his left pec, squeezing it again. “I can help you work on this. Very generous of me, I know.”

“Shut up.” Hollander digs his heel into Ilya’s thigh and grinds it hard into the tender muscle as he moves it up Ilya’s thigh. It fucking burns, but Ilya just shifts on his knees, leans back to give Hollander a better view of his pink chest and face, still running hot from the shower. Hollander licks his bottom lip, his faint smile growing. His foot comes to rest on Ilya’s hip, toes curling against the harsh line of muscle toward Ilya’s cock.

Ilya wraps his hand around Hollander’s ankle, like he’d done in the shower. Drags his foot down toward his cock, almost touching. Hollander quirks a brow at him and Ilya shrugs.

“So,” Hollander says. “What do you want? From me, I mean. As your prize.”

Ilya blinks, continuing to rub Hollander’s foot, and slides his hand up to Hollander’s shin. He scratches him there, then slips his hand back to his ankle. What did he want? This was outside of their structure—when was the last time they fucked without a needle involved? Months. Ilya knows he is being too quiet, so he lifts Hollander’s leg up to hook it over his shoulder, kisses the side of his foot. Hollander jerks and Ilya thinks, ticklish.

But he’s fucked a lot of other people in between, and not once has he thought of doing to them what he does to Hollander. With Hollander.

“I want to suck your cock,” he says, taking Hollander’s plump dick into his hand.

“Seems kind of like a treat for me,” Hollander tells him. “But be my guest.”

“You love sucking my cock, you think I do not like having your dick in my mouth?”

Hollander tilts his head and pushes his hips up a bit, into Ilya’s grip on him. “It’s all yours.”

Ilya laughs when he dips down. This is familiar, their bodies. His hands are perfect tools, and Hollander is perfect for pleasure, so it is good sex. He kisses the underside of Hollander’s cock, licks the beading precome off the head while stroking the length, then takes him into his mouth. Rubbing his tongue over a fat vein, Ilya sucks hard, invites Hollander deeper into his throat, so deep his stomach tenses as he steadies his breathing through his nose. Hollander groans above him, movements in the periphery, and Ilya looks up so he can watch Hollander’s fingers rub over his mouth to choke down a moan. He pats Hollander’s stomach with his hand. Calls his attention down.

Hollander cracks his eyes open and Ilya loves when they glisten like he’s going to cry because it’s so good, and then he sucks harder. Works those tears out of Hollander with intention. Ilya smoothes his hand back up to Hollander’s collarbones, waits until he feels Hollander’s pulse against his fingertips and curls his fingers into a claw, digs, nails denting the skin—drags them down, leaves Hollander red-striped, the skin coloring furiously as welts form from his tits to his stomach. Hollander throws his head back and sobs, shows the gorgeous column of his throat, and Ilya scrapes his teeth over the underside of his cock to make Hollander hiss again. It comes from somewhere deep inside of him, the same place that craves the needles. That desires Ilya’s body, what that body can do for him.

Ilya pushes down on Hollander’s stomach. Swallows around him while shifting his weight onto his left forearm so he can move his right hand from Hollander’s stomach to his ass. Circle his asshole with a dry finger, pressing only the tip of his thumb in as Hollander clenches up and shivers.

Hollander groans again, a whimper trailing the noise. His stomach muscles are so tense. Cock twitching on Ilya’s tongue.

He comes with a stifled whimper because even here, in his expensive private suite, Hollander is always concerned with being discovered. Ilya pulls off his cock before it softens, and with Hollander’s eyes locked on his, he widens his mouth to put his teeth to the base of Hollander’s dick, makes him look, tightens his bite. Hopes Hollander feels the individual ridges of Ilya’s teeth, knows they are freakishly white in the bright hotel room light. Jaw aches from the holding-still, balancing Hollander’s pleasure with whatever pain Ilya wants to inflict on him. Some mix of arousal and desperation to shallow Hollander’s breaths.

Moving his mouth up to the head of Hollander’s cock, he sucks it back into his mouth as he softens, licks around the sensitive head and smiles. Shoves Hollander’s hips flat onto the bed so he can’t move away, has to sit through the rippling pleasure as it tingles into pain, into too-much. Hollander’s short breaths stagger into a low whine as tries to buck up anyway and fails. Ilya loves watching his eyes widening, how he can’t look anywhere but Ilya’s working mouth. Holds his gaze there as he reaches down to tangle his fingers into Ilya’s hair. His hips push into Ilya’s palms.

Ilya retreats only when he can’t even taste Hollander’s come in his mouth anymore, only skin. Kisses his way up Hollander’s chest to his mouth.

“Jesus,” Hollander says.

Ilya laughs, takes Hollander’s hand and brings it to his own aching cock. Hollander’s calloused palm is steady as it jerks him off, rough where he likes it. He comes down Hollander’s throat after he’s crawled up his chest, thighs bracketing Hollander’s head, one hand on the headboard. Hollander licks him clean and kisses his hipbone. Squeezes Ilya’s ass with a thin smile after.

Ilya flops over onto his back with a pleased sigh.

“Enjoy it,” Hollander tells him, turning his head to the side so they can look at each other. “Won’t be long before you’re out of the playoffs. We’re taking it.”

“Sorry, did you score secret three goals tonight? Did Metros win?” Ilya pinches Hollander’s waist and earns a slap on his chest. “Maybe you need to get your eyes looked at, Hollander. I remember very different outcome for tonight. At least you had amazing sex to ease your loss.”

“You’re so fucking—” Hollander folds his hands over his stomach, shaking his head. “Whatever. Have fun watching us win the Cup.”

“Hmmm…” Ilya rolls onto his side, scooting closer. He shoves his thigh between Hollander’s. “It is not good for you to daydream so much. Maybe this is why your eyes are terrible.” He wiggles his fingers in front of Hollander’s face. “No wonder you cannot hit puck straight.”

“Shut up.”

“Okay,” Ilya says, sweet with it. “Help me.”

Hollander shakes his head, but his hand is already on Ilya’s arm, fingers skirting past his elbow to Ilya’s bicep. Ilya makes an encouraging noise, chases after Hollander’s mouth until it is on his own. Hollander continues to touch him: kneads his arm, his waist, his ass, even down to his thighs, where Ilya’s body aches the worst. He pushes Ilya onto his back after a few minutes and Ilya complains when he breaks the kiss, but only until Hollander begins to rub his hands up and down Ilya’s chest, uses his fingers to trace every ridge of muscle on Ilya’s body from his shoulders to his quads, lets his tongue follow his hands like a shadow.

It’s been a long time since someone took their time with Ilya’s body. Hollander mouths along the crease between Ilya’s thigh and groin, kisses the inside of his knees, bites down on the muscle of Ilya’s inner thigh so hard he has to grit his teeth through it. The pain pinched and rippling at once. Everything radiates outward from Hollander’s touch. Feels good. Hollander massages everywhere it aches, and then he blows Ilya one more time. Doesn’t take much for Ilya to come when Hollander is prodding at his bruises, grinding his fingers into the greens and purples like he’s trying to pry his way inside, moaning around him.

Ilya puts his fingers to Hollander’s neck, over the scars. Jabs his nails in until Hollander whimpers and thrusts against Ilya’s thigh where it is trapped between Hollander’s legs. Ruts on him, seeks him out. And when Hollander’s catching his breath after he’s come, Ilya touches the marks on his chest, up and down. Rubs his fingertips where they’re the most sore until Hollander flinches and turns his head to the side.

Ilya moves his hand to cup Hollander’s cheek, kisses the corner of his mouth, the side of his nose, down his throat and collarbones and puts his tongue to those bright red lines.

Ilya’s already done wiping come off his leg when Hollander washes the come off himself in the bathroom sink. When they’re somewhat clean, he tosses Ilya a pair of clean underwear from his bag.

“Trading you, for last time,” he says, then puts on a pair of sweatpants. Ilya considers telling him to stay naked. Instead he steps into the underwear. They fit well. Look kind of new.

Hollander orders room service for them without asking; beet and fig salad, some salmon dish, and a sirloin. When Hollander grabs a towel and spreads it out on the mattress instead of moving all the food onto the perfectly good dining table, Ilya raises both brows.

“I’m beat,” Hollander says, as if that explains anything. “You’re… are you staying here tonight, or? Our flight’s not until, like, eleven. There’s, uhm, probably a replay of the Detroit and Ottawa game somewhere, we could watch it.”

Raiders’ have morning practice tomorrow, but Ilya doesn’t say that. Just sits there in the hotel room under Hollander’s name, eating food Hollander has paid for, in underwear Hollander has bought, wrung out from an orgasm at Hollander’s hands. And he doesn’t really want to go home to an empty house. To put the TV on for noise and stretch out naked on his bed with the bedsheets half-draped over him.

“I will need alcohol if you are making me watch Detroit and Ottawa play,” Ilya says.

Hollander gets the vodka from the mini fridge. Back on the mattress, Hollander pushes the sirloin over to Ilya’s side of the towel. Ilya steals the beets off Hollander’s plate with his fingertips, takes some of his salmon, too. When he sees Ilya ignoring all the cauliflowers on the sirloin plate. Hollander stabs them with his fork and shoves a bunch into his mouth, says, “What? Can’t eat your veggies?”

Ilya flicks one of the cauliflowers right at him, then gestures at the beet on his fork. “What the fuck do you think this is, then?”

Ilya stretches his leg out, knocking his knee against Hollander’s. Hollander keeps his eyes on the screen, but his lips twitch. Almost smiling.

They watch Detroit win. Ilya makes no more comments on the quality of play once Detroit’s on the board for three while Ottawa’s still goose egging it. It doesn’t matter. In just a few days, Ilya is going to personally knock Detroit off their two game win streak. And then he’ll text Hollander, just so he knows. As if Hollander doesn’t already keep track of every team in his division. Of Ilya and the Raiders more than anyone, surely.

Ilya does the same.

They clear the plates off the bed, and when Ilya squeezes back onto the mattress, it’s easy to let his legs fall over Hollander’s. To scratch the top of his head.

Hollander fiddles with his hands, then Ilya’s hands, moves one leg over the other, pulls his knees up then straightens them again, touches his own face, his stomach. Eventually, Ilya pushes all the decorative pillows onto the floor and drags Hollander as close as he can get. They sit propped up against the headboard, shoulder to shoulder, as Hollander traces circles onto Ilya’s thigh. The game ends as Hollander sinks into a comfortable spot against Ilya’s chest, and all Ilya can see is the cute top of his head, his dark hair, flyaways rampant. He moves his finger in a spiral, following the hair whorl.

Hollander doesn’t tell him to stop, so he drags his finger down to Hollander’s ear, thumbs at the long scar from his earring. It’s easy to rest his chin on Hollander’s head and slide his hand down from his ear to his shoulder, rubbing over its curve before trailing that hand past Hollander’s pecs to his stomach. Ilya curls his fingers right over Hollander’s bellybutton, then straightens them out. Wiggles his pointer finger into Hollander’s navel.

“Stop being weird,” Hollander says, nudging Ilya’s hand.

“No,” Ilya replies, and Hollander leaves it.

There’s some movie on afterward. Ilya doesn’t pay attention to it; has no reason to do so with Hollander swinging a leg over his thighs and climbing onto his lap. They kiss until they’re just holding their mouths together and breathing. Ilya rubs his hand over Hollander’s back, following his spine to the textured scars, taking a squeeze at his ass and earning a laugh in turn. He laps that noise up and Hollander’s hands find Ilya’s chest, thumbing at his nipples before replacing one hand with his mouth and fuck, that’s good, too. Works the both of them up until Hollander shoves Ilya’s underwear down, then his own, and takes them both into his hand.

Ilya’s almost too sensitive, isn’t sure he’s even going to be able to come right now, does so anyway with Hollander’s voice in his ear, urging him on—please, please, Rozanov, wanna see it, wanna see you come all over yourself, wanna touch it, wanna lick it. And then Hollander’s tongue drags through the jizz on Rozanov’s abs and it’s so fucking late and they have to sleep, need to go to bed. They fall asleep with Ilya’s head between Hollander’s shoulderblades and Ilya’s arm over his waist.

He leaves before Hollander is awake, still wearing Hollander’s underwear. His body feels like it has lost all edges, is just static and warmth. Fresh out of an expensive, deep-tissue massage. Ilya takes a cab home and texts Hollander, thanks for last night. Hollander texts him back when Ilya returns from his morning run, says, You owe me room service next time. Or really good takeout.

Ilya makes sure the shower he takes is hot enough to fog up the mirror.

Chapter End Notes

really grateful to all the nice comments and kudos on this. thanks for noticing what i’m laying down. that means a lot.

as you can see, i’ve added pinpoint to a series because thanks to salad, i’ve been spinning a shane pov accompanying piece in my head. it might be after raw meat retirement gets done but no promises.