Rating:

Mature

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandoms:

Heated Rivalry (TV), Game Changers | Heated Rivalry - All Media Types, Game Changers Series - Rachel Reid

Relationships:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov, David Hollander/Yuna Hollander, Yuna Hollander & Ilya Rozanov, Shane Hollander & Yuna Hollander, David Hollander & Ilya Rozanov

Characters:

Yuna Hollander, Shane Hollander, Ilya Rozanov, David Hollander

Additional Tags:

Temporary Character Death, i cannot stress this enough TEMPORARY!!!!! I PROMISE, Grief/Mourning, Suicidal Thoughts, Depression, Mental Health Issues, Disordered Eating, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff and Angst, Heavy Angst, Necromancy, Resurrection, Magical Realism, Supernatural Elements, POV Outsider, POV Yuna Hollander, Family Dynamics, yuna boymomisms, Hurt/Comfort, Near Death Experiences, Near Death, Airplane Crashes, Canon Compliant, Relationship Reveal, Coming Out, Codependency, Soul Bond, Soulmates, kinda....., Good Parents David Hollander/Yuna Hollander, YUNA ILYA HEALINGS YAY, Established Relationship, Character Study, Mental Breakdown, Hurt Shane Hollander, Hurt Ilya Rozanov, Ilya Rozanov is Obsessed With Shane Hollander, Shane Hollander is Obsessed With Ilya Rozanov, i mean it. they are ride or die, Autistic Shane Hollander, Shane Hollander Walks Ilya Rozanov Like A Dog, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, NO AI EVER!!! id rather die, i like my hollanov deeply in love and a lil unwell about it, Yuna Hollander Finds Out About Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov, David Hollander Finds Out About Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov, not a zombie au so ur welcome or im sorry, Autistic Yuna Hollander, Unreliable Narrator, in the sense that yuna is stubborn as FUCK, Russian Translation Available

Language:

English

Series:

Part 1 of Double Dipping

Stats:

Published: 2026-07-02 Completed: 2026-07-22 Words: 41,605 Chapters: 6/6

BOGO

Summary

A fiery plane crash claims Ilya Rozanov’s life in January. By April, Shane Hollander is dead of a broken heart. The truth dies with them.

Yuna Hollander will do anything to get her son back, including hiring a shady shaman to resurrect him. There’s just one complication — Shane isn’t coming back alone.

Now there are codependent (not)zombies in her house wearing Ilya and Shane’s faces. When they inexplicably act more like a married couple than the bitter rivals she expected, Yuna is convinced that they came back wrong.

It’s easier than admitting she never understood them from the start.

Notes

mom said it was my turn with the plane crash scenario

(takes place in a nebulous timeline post-HR where Ilya plays for the Centaurs but no one knows about Hollanov. i pinky promise a happy ending but u Will work for it <3)

 

Russian translation by airyth available here!

Chapter 1: Buy One

Chapter Notes

Everyone knew Ilya Rozanov’s life would end with a bang.

A particularly nasty hit on the ice – his fault, of course – or an overdose on party drugs after a two-week summer bender. Perhaps a dramatic face off with a puck bunny’s vengeful boyfriend, or a scorned ex-hookup, since he had no shortage of either. Or maybe some of those Russian mafia rumors had teeth – and guns to match.

Ilya Rozanov blazed so brightly it was impossible to tell if he was a thriving sun or a supernova mid-explosion. He lived loudly and fiercely and got under people’s skin like he could see the cracks in them. He carried himself like he was untouchable, invincible, floating above the crowds. Everyone assumed that one day he would die how he lived. Something drawn out, adrenaline-filled, flashy. A final scandalous headline to sweep the globe.

In the end, it’s not far off.

Yuna Hollander just never expected to be around to see it proven right.

Being online is legitimately her job. She ensures she’s never without an internet connection or a personal hotspot for longer than three minutes. She has Google alerts set for Shane, the Voyageurs, and a few other major topics closely tied to him. Her email inboxes are neatly organized, perpetually open, and addressed with a level of efficiency and passive-aggressive class that puts the country’s leadership to shame. She keeps her finger on the pulse of hockey out of a blend of managerial obligation to her son’s career, motherly protectiveness over her son himself, and her own fierce passion for the sport.

It makes sense, then, that Yuna Hollander is one of the first to see the video of a smoldering plane falling out of the sky.

Blessedly, she’s at home when it happens. She’s curled up on the couch with a mug of tea and a new contract from Speedo pulled up on her laptop. It had mystified her a bit when she had actually gotten bites from the Speedo people, since they were obviously more primed to sponsor swimmers. But they’re offering Shane a lot of money, and the more skin he shows in his advertisements the better they perform, and the representative had made some sort of comment about wanting to expand their target demographic and how there are just not a lot of options that look like…him…in swimming and how Shane is a rare example of having the skill to back up the demographic check-mark.

Yuna’s eye twitches. It’s good money. It keeps his name circulating and his presence on everyone’s minds. It could probably add another comfortable year to Shane’s retirement, a phase of her son’s life which she tries to ignore could open its gaping maw and swallow him up at any time. It just takes one unfortunate hit, one bone that doesn’t heal quite right, and everything Shane has built could come crumbling down. Yuna can’t imagine her son doing anything other than hockey and she’d never ask that of him, and so all she can do is try to set him up the best that she can, so that one day when it all explodes, he has somewhere soft to land.

Yuna thumbs open Twitter with half a mind to skim swimming fan communities for opinions on Speedo ambassadors and any overlapping interest with the hockey world. If Speedo isn’t the right thread to pull on here, maybe there’s another deal she can strike.

Every thought in Yuna’s head dies with the first video that’s served up on her feed.

Against a backdrop of bleak January sky, crackling flames smear brilliant orange into the dense gray fog. Yuna isn’t sure what she’s looking at until a spiraling plane slips through a gap in the clouds, showing off the inferno blazing on its side like it knows its final moments are being captured. Yuna’s stomach drops as she realizes the fire is coming from the clearly defunct left engine tucked under the wing.

The plane banks hard, trying to soldier on to a safe landing with only one working thruster, which swiftly drops to none. Slack jawed, Yuna watches the plane fall from the sky, clip the approaching tree line, and hurtle towards the ground. A thicket of trees briefly obscures the structure before a deafening explosion shatters the night, and the plane crumples nose-first against the earth like an empty soda can.

“Holy shit,” the person recording mutters. The camera shakes, but doesn’t stray from the massive plumes of tar-black smoke billowing up to the heavens.

It’s a horrible tragedy. Of course it is. But horrible tragedies aren’t as rare as they should be. Last week it was a family murder-suicide in the rural mountains of Montana. This week it’s a passenger plane en route to Montreal. Next week it’ll probably be some cruise ship sinking in the Mediterranean or another mass injury event in the States.

Horrible and sad, as all tragedies are. Nothing that crosses into Yuna Hollander’s little bubble, though. Like with all other tragedies both preceding and on the horizon, she can click her tongue in sympathy along with the rest of the bystanders making dinner for their happy and healthy families as the evening news drones on in the background. She can have her moment of sadness for those affected and then move on with her very unaffected life.

Except.

The caption of the video is oh my god Ilya Rozanov’s plane just blew up.

Absurdly, Yuna’s first impulse is to laugh. It doesn’t make any sense. The Centaurs just barely finished up a game in New York and aren’t slated to play Montreal for another three days, so there’s no reason for them to be flying so early. She can’t fathom Ilya ‘manwhore’ Rozanov willingly giving up free days in NYC, where the clubs never close and the alcohol stays flowing and there’s an endless stream of women begging for just a crumb of his time.

(Maybe Rozanov has been absent from the tabloids for a while now, but — a tiger never changes their stripes, right? And Rozanov loves animal print.)

Yuna is intimately familiar with what a hockey team charter plane looks like, and the craft in the video is definitely some commercial Air Canada flight. Surely Rozanov hasn’t gone so broke on that Centaurs salary that he’s flying economy?

She quickly scrolls through the comments, which are stacking up by the millisecond as the video goes viral. There are other videos too – some are alternate angles on crash, others are somber clips of the smokey aftermath. The wreckage is too mangled to get a good look at from a spectator’s point of view.

One post catches her eye.

it’s true, i paid for R’s flight info (long story). according to the broker his name was on the flight log and he even checked in at the gate, so unless he disappeared on the jet bridge, he was on that plane!!

Irritation wells up in Yuna where the shock has hollowed her out. What the fuck is Rozanov’s team doing, letting insiders leak his flight information for a couple of bands? It’s not uncommon in the celebrity world, but the first time Yuna found someone trying to peddle Shane’s personal information, she came at them with the full force of the law until the broker went into hiding.

Maybe this insider is selling faulty info. It could be a scam, a random faceless person on the internet claiming to know more than everyone else. It can’t be true.

Yuna clutches her phone to her chest, switches on the TV, and waits for the story to officially break. It doesn’t take too long for headlines to roll across the screen.

OTTAWA CENTAURS STAR ILYA ROZANOV POSSIBLY ABOARD FATAL PLANE CRASH OUTSIDE MONTREAL: WHAT WE KNOW SO FAR

So far, they don’t know much more than Yuna. But acknowledgement of Rozanov’s link to the flight from an official news network is a bad sign. That means they likely have credible information to build from.

Yuna fires off a couple of texts and emails to her contacts in both the hockey and media worlds. Predictably, no one has the time or patience to loop in the mother of Rozanov’s biggest rival when they’re trying to figure out if their star client is still alive. Yuna isn’t sure why she bothered.

She hates Rozanov. Most people do.

And, sure. Everyone, Yuna included, had an itchy feeling in the back of their mouths that Rozanov’s reckless lifestyle would catch up with him at some point or another, but no one had expected it to happen like this. So soon.

So young.

For God’s sake, he’s only a month younger than Shane. Her baby.

Yuna’s heart squeezes. Like him or not, Rozanov is – was – someone’s baby.

David comes home from work early. He’s frazzled in that way that only Yuna is able to pick out. His glasses are askew and his lips are drawn in a tight line and to the rest of the world his rigid shoulders might read as steady and calm, but Yuna knows he’s bracing to keep from caving in on himself. It’s the same look Shane gets after a particularly brutal loss on the ice.

He loops an arm around her waist and pulls her against his side, smoothing a hand through her hair. Yuna melts against her husband, holding onto him like a buoy in storm-churned waters. Nodding at her phone, he prompts, “What is the hockey world saying?”

“Not much. The investigation is still under way, and everyone involved is very tight-lipped.”

“So no word on…survivors?”

Yuna shakes her head. “Nothing at all. We still don’t even know if Rozanov was on the flight or not. Everything is just rumors and speculation right now, but the media is probably going to grill Shane about it regardless. We’ll need to start workshopping responses.”

David squeezes her hand. “Shane has nothing to do with this. They shouldn’t be looking to him for a statement.”

“They shouldn’t,” Yuna agrees. “But one of them can’t get a goddamn bagel from down the street without the media asking the other to compare their midday snacking habits so they can link the resulting impact on their scoring race. It’s absurd.”

When scary things happen, the easiest response is anger. Anger feels productive, invigorating, purposeful. Yuna can take anger and run with it until she exhausts herself out of all the fear and sadness that threatens to snarl around her ankles and force her to wallow in what-ifs.

Her baby takes at least forty flights per year. The odds of a plane crash are low, but Shane flies so much more than the average person. Every time she blinks, she sees the Voyageur’s logo embossed on the spinning tail of the crashing plane. That could have been Shane.

In every other aspect of their careers, Shane and Rozanov are interchangeable. One of them wins a trophy one year, the other one takes it the next. Any play Rozanov makes Yuna can picture Shane doing, but obviously better. She’s gotten so used to hearing Rozanov’s name and seeing his picture as he soaks in the glory of a win and thinking that should be Shane.

The news flashes a black and white picture of a surly-looking geared up Rozanov from the beginning of the season. Blood red text fades across the photo.

MISSING.

That could be Shane.

Instead of giving in to the real emotion pressing against her ribcage – the frightened, protective urge to take Shane into her arms and never let him go even when he bats her away for smothering him – Yuna scowls. Rozanov has gotten himself into another news shitstorm, and now Shane will have to deal with the fallout. He’ll be the one hounded for his thoughts on the tragedy, for his opinions on how this will shape the rest of the hockey season, for a snappy soundbite about the man that’s been a thorn in his side for his entire career.

“They’re gonna ambush him,” David says gravely.

Fuck. Yuna tries to get in touch with Shane’s agent, someone on the Voyageur’s PR team, anyone who can strike Shane from the post-game presser. It’s a home game, though, and even on an uneventful day there’s no face Montreal wants to see other than Shane Hollander. After a landslide win on home ice and his only real competition missing in action, there’s no way anyone is going to let Shane slip away from the rink in peace.

Indeed, Yuna is too late. She flips the channel to a broadcast of the game just in time to watch her son shuffle into the press room. Even after all these years he still squints at the camera flashes from the crowd, still fiddles with the microphone as if it hasn’t already been adjusted perfectly for his height, still swallows twice and wipes his hands on his pants once before ever opening his mouth.

“He doesn’t know,” Yuna croaks. “Honey, no one has told him yet.”

“Hollander!” A reporter from the crowd shouts above all the rest. “Do you have any information on Ilya Rozanov’s current status or what business he might have had in Montreal ahead of Friday’s match?”

Shane blinks. “Hey, I’m here to answer questions about tonight’s game. Last time I checked I’m a hockey player, not a personal assistant or a travel agent, right?”

The joke doesn’t land.

Get him out of there, Yuna pleads desperately from the wrong side of the screen. This is not his mess. Leave him out of this.

“Hollander, while there has been no official statement from the Centaurs’ front office regarding the fatal crash, Air Canada just officially named Rozanov as a confirmed passenger aboard flight 44218. Any comment on the ongoing investigation and identification process?”

Yuna sees the moment her son shuts down. His chest sinks on an exhale, then doesn’t inflate again. He’s not breathing, eyes wide and unseeing.

“Crash?” he parrots in a small voice.

The clamor in the room rises as all the reporters realize they’re getting to break the news to Shane Hollander about the presumed fiery fate of his longtime rival. Even better, they’re going to be able to clip his reaction.

Shane stumbles to the side and yanks his phone out of his pocket. Yuna can barely make out the pinkish hue of Instagram opening before his phone tilts out of view of the main broadcast camera. The screen follows him as he fumbles his way to the door, one hand fisted in his shirt and the other going bloodless around his phone as he turns white as a ghost.

Abruptly, Yuna stands.

The heat of her anger has burned away, but she’s left with smoldering embers that need to be funneled towards a goal. She can’t locate a missing person and she can’t solve a plane crash and she clearly can’t prevent the media leeches from harassing her son, but she can definitely drive two hours to hug him tonight.

“We need to–” Yuna starts, but David is already tossing her keys at her, with her purse slung over his shoulder.

Yuna calls Shane as soon as they hit the road. The first three tries go unanswered, which hardens the pit forming in her stomach. She doesn’t relent. On the fourth try, the line picks up.

“Mrs. Hollander,” Hayden Pike’s warbly voice comes over the connection. “Sorry, I – We’re in the locker room. Shane is here, but he won’t move or say anything right now.”

Yuna’s grip around her husband’s hand tightens. She puts the phone on speaker. “Thank you for being there, Hayden. Do you know what’s going on?”

Hayden sighs. “We probably know as much as you. Less, I guess, since we just got off the ice and we’re still catching up. Shane’s taking it really hard, though.”

Yuna’s heart breaks. Her sensitive, sweet boy. He may not like Rozanov, but Shane has a certain degree of respect for anyone who plays good hockey, and Rozanov plays some damn good hockey.

Played. Maybe.

“Shane, honey, can you hear me?” Yuna tries.

“Uh, he’s just staring straight ahead.” Hayden’s voice dims as he moves away from the microphone. “You with us, buddy?”

Silence.

“Hayden, can you make sure he has water nearby?” David chimes in. “And get a hoodie ready, it’ll make him feel safer if he can stand putting it on over the game sweat.”

“‘Course.” Hayden shuffles around and starts quietly trying to coax Shane into sipping on his water bottle. Even his best Dad voice doesn’t seem to be getting through to him. They sit in the tense quietness for a while, David’s foot gradually pressing harder and harder on the gas the longer Shane is unresponsive.

Then Hayden whistles under his breath. “Yikes. I’m hearing from a buddy who was traded through Ottawa and still has contacts there. There’s not much material for the search. It’ll take a while to officially conclude it, obviously, but it’s…not looking good.”

“The search,” David repeats tightly.

“You know, for…” Hayden’s volume drops. “Survivors. Apparently the front of the plane was basically pulverized. No one wants to admit how bleak it is though, especially without an explanation for why Rozanov was even on that flight. People are still holding out for answers, but...God, what bad luck. It's a horrible way to go out.”

A whimper tears across the line and directly into Yuna’s chest. Hayden fumbles with the phone. “Whoa Shane, relax! Let go. Let go. You’re gonna pull your hair out. I thought you didn’t want to be bald by thirty?”

“I – we were – fuck – m’fault, and I never–”

Somehow, the panicked sentence fragments ripped from Shane’s throat are worse than the dead air, even though they provide proof of life. It’s shaky proof at best because Shane sounds like he’s—

“Ill,” Shane gasps once, twice, before falling into a catatonic silence again.

“Ill?” Yuna echos. She casts a glance at David, who shrugs. “You’re feeling ill?”

“I dunno,” Hayden mumbles. He sounds faraway, distracted. The words echo in the locker room acoustics. “Shane, stop. Stop. Jesus. JJ, can you get over here and stop him from scratching? Thanks. Fuck, I just – wait, fuck, did you mean…Shane, was your Lily on that flight too?”

“Who is Lily?” Yuna presses with mounting distress. “Shane! Breathe, honey, we’ll be there soon. It’ll be okay.”

“No,” Shane moans. “No, no…”

“Buddy, I know Lily is from Boston. That flight was coming from New York. There’s no way she was on board. Breathe.”

“I don’t…I don’t know anything about Lily.” It’s hard for Yuna to admit. She can count the number of important women in Shane’s life on one hand. One is her, another is Jackie Pike, another is Rose Landry whom he miraculously stayed close with post breakup, and that’s…about it, actually.

Who is Lily, and when did Shane start keeping secrets?

“But I’ll find out what I can. I’m sure she’s fine. And listen, ignore anyone asking you for comments. Rozanov was your rival, your colleague at best, but not your burden. Let his team handle this.”

Shane sobs out something so tortured it doesn’t even sound like English.

“Shit!” Hayden yelps. “Hold him up, JJ. Yeah Shane, just like that. You need to stay awake, ‘kay?”

Yuna urges David faster. They’re flying down the highway. “Hayden, what on earth is going on?”

“Capitaine, breathe deeper. Let go. Your – what hurts? Your chest?” JJ’s voice grows panicked. “Whoa, we stay upright. I know my clean freak Capitaine does not want to lie down on a nasty locker room floor. Let go of your chest. Hayd, a little help?”

“He’s fucking doubled over, I can’t–”

“Hurts. M’arms, can’t…fuck…” Shane slurs.

“JJ, stay with him. I’m getting the team doc.”

“Calisse (Fuck), Hayden, no time! Call an ambulance, he’s having a fucking heart attack!”

“He’s fucking what?!” Yuna shrieks.

David floors it.

Two hours later, Yuna and David are sitting at Shane’s hospital bed with matching stunned expressions. The doctor patiently explains the diagnosis again.

“Takotsubo cardiomyopathy presents similar to cardiac arrest, but is less severe since it’s caused by stress hormones suddenly weakening the heart. His blood tests and imaging are clean of any indications of blocked arteries, so there doesn’t appear to be a need for further intervention.”

“What do we do, then?” David asks.

With a sigh, the doctor tucks her clipboard under her arm and fixes them with a tired smile. “There’s a reason this is commonly called Broken Heart Syndrome. It’s triggered by extreme emotion or a traumatic event. The main mitigation strategies are anxiety management and reducing stress, but we can schedule some follow up imaging to ensure that nothing physical is amiss with his arteries.”

Yuna’s hand presses against her mouth. Broken Heart Syndrome. Oh, her poor baby.

Shane hasn’t made eye contact with them since they arrived. According to Hayden, Shane passed out in the locker room after suffering intense chest pains. He had been mostly cleared by the time Yuna and David arrived, and was just being kept around for a few more hours to monitor for further cardiac events or emotional outbursts.

Yuna tries to run her hands through Shane’s hair. It used to soothe him when he was younger, but he cringes away from the touch now. She tries not to take it personally.

“Long day, huh?” she says softly.

“I’m dreaming,” Shane mutters. His voice is rough and ragged, like he’d been screaming. Yuna wonders when that happened. “S’not real.”

She sneaks a furtive glance at David and tilts her head towards the IV drip. Did they drug him, or something?

“We’re here. We’re real,” Yuna tries. She reaches out for Shane’s hair again, but he turns away, buries his face in the papery hospital pillow, and cries. True, guttural, heart-wrenching sobs.

Yuna hasn’t heard him cry like this since he was seven years old and got lost in the mall. Back then she was also brought to tears with fear as she searched for him. In the end she found him crouched outside the sporting goods store where they always got his blades sharpened. She was able to gather him up in her arms, hold him close, and promise to never lose him again.

He’s right in front of her now. Somehow, she’s still breaking her promise.

________________

Three days later the search is called off, and Ilya Rozanov is declared dead.

Hayden was right. The front of the plane was essentially dust, taking the brunt of the impact and the resulting explosion. The back of the plane didn’t fare much better, but at least there were bodies to recover. All the NHL got was a copy of a boarding pass for Ilya Grigoryevich Rozanov stamped for seat 8A – window seat, of course – and a half melted crucifix necklace. There was blood spatter discovered on some debris that proved Rozanov really had been there, but that’s it. There’s still the chance of matching a stray bone fragment to him, or perhaps a tooth if they can locate a real one, but the odds are low.

The search crews have reported their findings, experts have affirmed that there was no chance of survival for anyone on the front half of the plane, and Rozanov’s empty coffin is scheduled to be buried in a few weeks. Everyone is trying to move on.

Except Shane.

For the first twenty-four hours after being discharged from the hospital, Shane lays in his bed and doesn’t twitch a single muscle. He stares straight up at the ceiling as tears leak passively from his eyes and curve down his face. Occasionally his eyes drift shut, but Yuna can never tell if he’s actually sleeping.

On the second day, Shane is a little more responsive. He still seems to be in shock, asking if he’s at home in Ottawa because of a game injury, and why does his chest hurt so much, and why won’t Yuna let him have his phone, he really needs to text someone, please Mom, she’ll be so worried?

For once in her life Yuna bites back the burning questions about this Boston Lily because as much as it hurts to realize there’s a part of her baby’s life that’s been closed off to her all this time, for Shane’s own health she can’t risk bringing it up. If this Lily girl really was on that flight – which, considering the lack of phone calls to Shane’s confiscated phone, seems likely – then talking about it could easily send him into another tailspin.

On the third day, Shane falls motionless again. Yuna sits by his side for hours, anxiously tabbing between email inboxes that no longer provide her any sense of control.

Some call her a Tiger Mom, but she’s always preferred the term Mama Bear. Throughout Shane’s life there has been little her claws couldn’t solve. Now, though, no amount of threatening legal action or getting patched through to different agents can get Shane the relief he needs. Which is…

God, if only Yuna knew.

After what feels like years, when Yuna is fearful that Shane has completely reverted back to the nonverbal state he lived in until age five, Shane opens his mouth. He speaks it to the ceiling as if it makes it lighter of a burden to carry. His eyes shine with unshed tears. They sparkle at the ends of his lashes.

“He’s dead.”

Yuna swallows. “Honey.”

“I’m never gonna see him again.”

She thought she had done a pretty good job at keeping him away from the news, social media, or anything else that could put stress on his heart. Maybe he just felt the shift, somewhere deep in his core.

It must be complicated. Despite how much Rozanov needled him, the constant chirps and taunts, the way Rozanov was the only obstacle standing in the way of Shane easily sweeping the entire league, her softhearted boy must have at least gotten used to having the guy around.

Yuna remembers what it was like to hear that one of her childhood neighbors passed away in a car crash several years after she had moved away. It was strange. They weren’t close, and he was irritating at best, but it was odd to think that he was just…gone. Just like that. A constant presence at the periphery of her life, gone.

Never coming back.

“Fucking asshole,” Shane spits at the ceiling. Yuna wonders if he remembers that she’s still here. “Beating me to everything.”

Yuna doesn’t know what to make of that. She sits with him until his anger subsides and finally, finally, he slides his gaze over to meet hers.

“I can’t play hockey again.”

Yuna’s eyes blow wide. “What? Shane—“

Jaw clenched so hard it must be grinding his teeth, Shane just manages a tiny shake of his head.

“I, I know it’s scary right now.” Yuna is a puppet with its strings cut, a loyal dog abandoned off the leash, a lightbulb in a black hole. Utterly lost. “But the doctors said you can make a full recovery. Your heart — it wasn’t a physical problem. Nothing permanent. We’ll take it slow, ease you back into training, get regular checkup scans, find a nice therapist. You can live a normal, fulfilling life. I promise.”

Shane shakes his head again. “I can’t. Won’t. Not w-without—” He cuts himself off with a choked cry.

Yuna’s heart thumps in her throat. In all her worst nightmares about the end of Shane’s career, she saw him retiring from hockey after growing so old and achy that no team could justify keeping him on payroll anymore, probably after setting the record for being the first eighty-year-old to play professionally. If his career stopped early it would only be after snapping some crucial hockey bone.

Something physical. Something Yuna could lay a bandaid over, kiss better, and assure him that he did all he could, and it wasn’t his fault.

Maybe she was raised more old-fashioned than she thought. She had never considered that emotional injuries could be career ending. That a day would come where Shane wouldn’t want to get back on the ice.

Where he’d give it up willingly.

Her mind just circles back to the Russian Menace of it all. It’s not like Shane witnessed a paralyzing hit against JJ or Hayden, or someone else he’s close to on his team — is there anyone else? — this was Ilya Rozanov.

Shane would quit hockey over Ilya Rozanov?

“I know the rivalry was important to you,” she tries to empathize. During her brief stint as a competitive swimmer in middle school, she hated training alone. She always needed someone in the next lane over so she could pace herself, push herself, see them reach out for the wall and lunge to beat them to it. The adrenaline of competition, the desperate fervor of a neck-and-neck race, the achievements one could never dream of reaching alone. Winning feels better when you have to work for it — when there’s someone worth beating.

“You knew each other for a long time, I’m not blind to that. I know it’s sad, and it’s scary, but you can stand on your own. Your career isn’t just the rivalry, and there will always be other people who can challenge you.” Yuna’s words falter at the glazed film over Shane’s eyes. She’s verging on hysterical because for the first time in her life she can’t get through to her son. “Shane. You love hockey. You once told me you wouldn’t give it up for anything. It’s the most important thing in your life.”

“Not anymore,” Shane whispers. “Not…for a long time.”

Yuna can’t believe she’s pleading with her son to not set fire to everything he’s — they’ve — worked to build.

What is Shane Hollander without hockey?

What is Yuna Hollander, without Shane Hollander playing hockey?

Hockey or not, she will always be his mother. But is that enough to protect him?

Shane is usually pretty easy for Yuna to read. That’s her son. Her baby. She’s spent years and years training to decode all his microexpressions, and yet she has no idea what’s currently swirling in those teary brown eyes. She’s never felt so set adrift. He’s never felt so unreachable.

“He must have been so scared,” Shane sniffles. “And alone. It – It wasn’t supposed to end like this.”

Yuna searches for words of reassurance. She’s not so good at this form of comfort. She’s good at taking action, at unraveling the layers of a problem until she finds the first step to take towards fixing it. But what is she supposed to solve when her only son is grieving a man they all hated?

“He…didn’t suffer,” she tries, wishing she could sound more convincing to herself. “It happened so fast, he probably didn’t even know what was happening.”

She’s doing her best. Despite the years she and David spent pouring over parenting handbooks and taking classes and interviewing friends and family about their experiences raising children as they tried and tried and tried for their own, nothing has prepared her for navigating a situation like this.

Hell, most of the advice in those handbooks stopped applying after Shane’s path diverted from normal nerdy kid to once-in-a-generation hockey superstar in the making.

Well. Twice in a generation.

Ever so slightly, Shane shakes his head. “Alone,” he repeats, and the tears spill over. He opens his mouth as if to continue, but seemingly loses the will to speak, and his gaze goes vacant again.

At least he lets Yuna wipe his tears this time.

_____________________

“He just needs time,” Yuna says tersely. “Just a few more days. I can hold them off for that long.”

“Yuna.”

She fires off another email full of flowery bullshit. Yes, Shane is on a break from the public eye. No, it’s not serious or terminal or career-ending. Yes, he’ll be back on the ice and in front of cameras again soon. No, there’s no need to void any contracts. Shane Hollander never lets anyone down.

“It’s just shock. It’ll wear off.”

Any day now, Yuna is convinced Shane will wake up and jump out of bed for his morning run like usual. He’ll be embarrassed to learn about the fugue state he’s been in for the last two weeks, but she’ll have his protein smoothie ready for him and will reassure him that they sent someone to his Montreal home to take care of any spoiled food and Shane will smile at her again with so much relief because he knew he could trust his Mama to keep his life together even if he falls apart and it will all be normal again.

“Honey.” David’s voice hasn’t sounded this pained since their string of ill-fated pregnancies before having Shane. Their little miracle.

“Have some faith, will you?” Yuna snaps. “He’s our son. We’ve seen him go through tough times before. Change is always hard on him, he just needs time to adapt.”

It’s only half true. Sure, Shane is not good with transitions. When he first moved out to Montreal, he struggled visiting Ottawa because he’d suffer homesickness on both ends, like his heart was still confused on where it should call home. He’s going to retire his jersey with the same team that drafted him, not only because they’re the cream of the crop and pay him well and his whole life is in Montreal and he's their God, but also because he would never be able to handle the status quo blow that would arise from trading teams.

Shane runs the same route through Montreal every morning and has a shortlist of restaurants in the area that either cater to his diet or are willing to accommodate for it. He knows the best way to avoid traffic getting to the rink and which shops stock the freshest fruit and everything in his current life is perfect and in its place and he’s happy there.

At least, he was. She's pretty sure.

But Shane has never really experienced grief. Not like this. He was probably too young to remember his paternal grandmother’s slow decline. Her eventual passing at 92 in her sleep was as far from a shock as it gets. Yuna dressed Shane in his little tuxedo for the ceremonies and adjusted his tie and watched him take cues from them about when to look sad and how to respond to the constant stream of I’m so sorry for your loss.

That was really it. Shane is an only child, both his parents are only children, and he only has a smattering of distant cousins on David’s side. His circle of friends has always been tight and well-protected. He’s never really lost anyone.

There’s a niggling guilt at the back of Yuna’s mind that tells her he never really experienced tough times either. Of course there was the odd training camp where Yuna noticed Shane not really gelling with the other boys, but she never had to escalate a bullying scandal to the higher-ups. He had a few breakups under his belt, but even though he was never the one to cut things off, he never seemed particularly torn up about them either.

Shane has been shouldering the expectations of the entire hockey world since before he was old enough to train his body to handle the weight. Yuna had always felt like that was more than enough. She would stand between him and the world outside his training rink that just wanted to taketaketake until there was nothing left of her baby. She would handle everything for him so he only needed to think about getting on the ice and playing the best hockey anyone has ever seen, so no one could underestimate him again for the crime of looking like his mother.

All parents want to shelter their kid from harm. Shane just needed a little more sheltering than others, and Yuna was more than happy to do that for him.

David gently closes her laptop lid. She blinks away her blurry vision and he dabs at the resulting tears that arc down her cheeks. “He’s not getting better.”

“I know,” she whispers. For the first time in years, she doesn’t know how to move forward.

Emails are easy. Phone calls are even easier, because she can leverage her no-nonsense tone to get her way. Statements are a pain in the ass, but necessary and she’s gotten good at vetting them over the years. She can still fix the world for Shane.

She just doesn’t know how to fix Shane himself.

He only leaves his bed to relieve himself, and even that doesn’t seem to be more than once or twice a day. Very quickly he has run out of anything to empty. Bowls of yogurt and granola – separated, because he hated the lumpy texture when they were mixed together as a kid – spoil on his bedside table. Dinner trays go untouched even though David tries every recipe Shane has ever liked. He won’t even drink water until his lips get so chapped and his throat so scraped raw he can’t breathe, and even then Yuna has to force ice chips into his mouth.

Her son has disappeared and left a ghost in his place.

He’s like a doll splayed out on his bed, waiting for Yuna to pose him back to life. She searches for a string to pull, a little tab on the doll’s back that will activate his voice and tell her what he needs from her, but she comes up empty every time.

When he was young he used to go boneless like this when she was dressing him, turning when instructed and quietly ducking his head or arms through all the proper openings. He was such an easy child. He always nodded and listened and agreed with his mommy and sometimes it would scare her, that total obedience.

Right now she wants nothing more than for Shane to throw a tantrum. At least it would be something. She knows how to calm him down from a meltdown. She doesn’t know what to do with a ghost.

Time passes. Yuna starts dodging calls from the Voyageur’s front office. Shane has been placed on long term injury recovery to ensure he heals fully from his weakened heart tissue, but the season is winding down and Montreal hasn’t been getting the recovery updates they want to hear. Yuna can relate. She doesn’t know how to pivot the conversation from a physical ailment that has a treatment timeline and the lab results to prove it, to whatever psychological break Shane has clearly suffered.

A tearfully hushed midnight discussion determines that Shane will not be attending Rozanov’s funeral. David thought maybe it could provide Shane with some closure, but all Yuna can think about is Shane’s shaky voice repeating alone. In stark contrast with the memorials set up around Ottawa and Boston that fans flock to in droves, Rozanov’s services are limited to just family and friends.

Just friends, actually. It doesn’t seem like he had anyone left in his family. From what Yuna hears, the main attendees will be the Ottawa Centaurs and whichever Boston Bears are willing to make the drive. Scott Hunter. Some Russian girl claiming to be his childhood friend. That’s about it – no partner, no siblings, no network of grieving unspecified loved ones. For all his charm and bravado, it seems Rozanov didn’t actually have many true connections.

Alone.

Yuna can’t let Shane see himself proven right. These days, anything could be the final straw.

An invitation for Shane arrives in the mail a week before the services. Yuna can’t bring herself to shred it because it doesn’t belong to her, even though she wants to erase any trace of Rozanov’s presence around her vulnerable son. She instead hides it in a stack of old baking recipes she knows Shane will never touch.

“Talk to me,” Yuna begs late one night. She’s clutching one of Shane’s hands in both of hers. His wrists are bony and his muscles are clearly atrophying from lack of movement and nutrition. “Please, Shane. Can we call someone? We can get you help. You can check into a nice facility and they’ll fix you right up.”

Surely a professional can figure out what got shaken loose in Shane’s brain from the shock of Rozanov’s death. They can slot it back into place and reconnect the frayed wires and Shane will go back to being her awkward, perfect, beautiful son.

With great effort, Shane licks his lips.

“No.”

It’s barely a word. Barely a breath. Shane has spoken for the first time in two months and it’s to refuse help.

But he spoke. He acknowledged her. He heard her words and he’s clearly in there somewhere and they just have to keep guiding the spoon to his mouth until he’s strong enough to hold it by himself.

Yuna never learned to give up. She spit in the face of every coach who told her Shane was too weak to make it as a hockey player, which Yuna correctly translated as too kind, too quiet, too Asian. She refused to leave David even when her parents disowned her for it. She tried and tried and tried until she delivered a healthy baby boy that curled into her chest like he already knew how much he was treasured.

She won’t give up now.

She doesn’t care about hockey anymore. It doesn’t matter if Shane never laces his skates up again, if he never again touches a stick or places blade to ice. She just wants him to smile and call her mom again.

Yuna reroutes his mail from Montreal to Ottawa so nothing gets lost or stolen. She gets Rose on the phone, but she can’t get through to him either. Yuna handles his bills and organizes fan letters and starts stacking PR packages on his bedside table in hopes of jumpstarting some sense of routine and familiarity. Maybe he just needs to read a couple supportive words from people that love him for his craft, or open some custom jackets or cases of sponsored drinks, and everything will click back into place.

He’ll remember how much he loves hockey, how much people love him for loving hockey, and how it feels to be on top of the world.

But the packages pile up. The letters go unopened. Shane doesn’t speak again.

Four months after Ilya Rozanov dies in a fiery plane crash, Yuna walks into her miracle baby’s room and can’t find a pulse.

“Just one spoonful,” Yuna bargains, setting the smoothie bowl on the nightstand. It’s healthy enough for him not to worry about the macros, and she painstakingly blended it so he doesn’t even need to chew. It should go down nice and easy. Shane has always been such an easy kid.

He doesn’t respond when she touches his shoulder. That isn’t unusual. Gently, Yuna rolls him onto his back and tries to prop him up enough to let gravity take the food down his throat. It’s always a tough process. Maybe David was right about getting him a feeding tube.

Not a muscle twitches as Yuna poses her little doll. He’s even more limp than usual. She blows out a long, pained breath. It hurts to see. He’s a tall, bulky hockey player and she shouldn’t be able to push him around like this.

Yuna pries open his mouth, thumb lingering against his lip as she digs out a scoop of thick smoothie. She freezes at the sensation that hits her finger.

Rather, the lack thereof.

Shane’s mouth is bone-dry. His slackened jaw is jammed open by her thumb, but he doesn’t even seem to notice. With growing horror clawing at her stomach, Yuna notices the lack of breath ghosting across her finger.

“Shane,” she says. Or maybe screams. She’s not sure.

For the first time in months, Yuna lets herself really look at her son’s ghost. Really understand what’s happened to him. His skin is pale and cold, freckles stomped out from the lack of sunlight. His collarbones poke out from his skin and his cheeks are gaunt and the skin under his eyes is bruised purple like he’d just taken a nasty punch. A gold chain is tangled around his knobby fingers and there’s a package on the floor with a small hole in the corner and Cyrillic on the return address. There are dried tear tracks on his face, but he looks more at peace than he has since January.

His chest isn’t moving.

The spoon clatters against the bed. Oh no, Shane won’t like that. He hates messes. Yuna can fix this. She’ll apologize for the ruckus and throw the smoothie-stained sheets in the wash and set Shane up on the couch, maybe, swaddled in a new clean blanket with those seamless socks that don’t irritate him and she can put on a hockey game and–

“Yuna,” David chokes out. She wonders when he got there. Maybe he wants to feed Shane his smoothie this morning. Clearly Yuna isn’t doing a very good job of it.

David’s shaking hand lands against Shane’s cheek, stroking it gently. His thumb traces the harsh cut of his cheekbones, then trails down to press against the side of Shane’s neck, right underneath his jaw. “Oh, Shane,” he breathes. David is crying. Why is he crying? Shane is fine, he’s just tired. It’s been a hard few months. David knows that. He needs his rest.

All he’s been doing for the past four months is rest and he still looks so, so tired.

“Leave him alone, you’re hurting him,” Yuna gasps through sobs she didn’t realize were tearing from her mouth. She grabs onto David’s arm and pulls and pulls as he drives the heels of his hands into Shane’s chest.

“Yuna, he’s–” David cries. He can’t say it either. “We need to call for help.”

“No!” Yuna lunges for his phone and hurls it across the room. It shatters somewhere against the dresser. “No, no, he’ll be so embarrassed, David, he hates attention. He can’t stand when people think he’s weak or vulnerable. Don’t you remember when we pulled him out of a game in Juniors because he had the flu and he wouldn’t talk to us for three days? He’ll hate us, David, David I hate myself, I–”

David catches her as she collapses into him and they both sink to the ground. There’s nothing they can do but curl up in a pile of broken limbs next to their son’s deathbed and weep until night falls again.

Did he cry out for Mama in his final moments? When Yuna was downstairs, blending a stupid fucking smoothie she knew would meet its fate at the bottom of the garbage disposal, did her baby reach out for her one last time?

Was he scared, all alone?

In the light of a new dawn, Yuna gets up. She carefully peels the sheets out from under Shane’s – from under Shane. She swipes stain remover over the smoothie residue before putting it into the washer and wrangling new sheets onto the bed. Bamboo, because Shane’s skin is sensitive and these are the only sheets that don’t make him sweat at night. She tucks her son in and watches him sleep.

And sleep. And sleep. And sleep.

Eventually David rises from the floor too. It’s taken him longer to bounce back, but at least he seems to have processed some of it. His large hand rubs circles into her back but she can’t feel it. She can’t feel anything but the gaping hole in her stomach where Shane used to be.

It’s all her fault. It’s always been her fault.

David pulls her out of the room and Yuna follows because she doesn’t know what else to do. She doesn’t have a plan for this. She never thought she’d be around to see Ilya Rozanov’s sins catch up to him. She never thought she’d outlive her own son.

“We need to make preparations,” David is saying. Right. There are people to call and official channels to go through, and then there will be statements and announcements and so much I’m sorry for your loss and phone calls and paperwork and cemetery plots to buy and what would Shane have wanted on his tombstone and did he want to be buried or cremated because Yuna never asked because she never imagined, never in her whole life did she imagine she’d need to know.

Suddenly, Yuna understands exactly what Shane has been feeling for the last four months. Her chest is hurting like someone just sliced through the vessels keeping her heart in place. She’s drowning in the gushing blood and all she can do is open her mouth and croak out, “No.”

David’s face crumples again. He’s trying to be strong for her while Yuna is trying to follow their son into that closed off place he found in January and never stepped out of again. “Honey, he’s…gone. We need to figure out what comes next.”

“I’ll fix it,” Yuna pleads. “Let me try.”

Shane was right. It wasn’t supposed to end like this.

Yuna picks up the phone.

_____________________

I’ll cast a spell, Yuna had teased once.

It was a joke that started when Shane was young and completely mystified by the speed of Yuna’s fingers flying over the clunky keys of the family computer. She had told him that she was a witch in the same tone that she told him that turning the ceiling lights on in the car at night would get them abducted by aliens, or that under-the-bed monsters loved dust and vacuuming his room kept them away.

Her wonderful boy took everything at face value, looked up at her adoringly with those big brown eyes, and quietly requested for her to use her witchy powers to make the puck manifest in front of his tiny hockey stick.

Yuna enrolled him in private lessons and then spent the summer learning magic tricks on the bleachers, just to preserve that wide-eyed wonder for a little longer.

Years later, she’d developed a hell of a sleight of hand technique and a great running gag. Respond to your texts, Shane, or I’ll watch you with my crystal orb – Life360. David, pick up your socks from the floor before I turn you into one and toss you into the dryer on high. Ugh, I’m gonna hex those catty moms at the company bake sale so their sourdough loaves never rise correctly again.

It’s a lie.

Technically.

Yuna can’t perform any magic herself. Her family is just old, and traditional, and still clinging on to cultural practices long abandoned by the fervor of modern sensibilities.

So no, Yuna can’t cast a spell. But she knows where to find someone who might.

Two days later, a woman steps into a freezing house in Ottawa.

Yuna shivers when she opens the door. She’s cranked up the air conditioning to an absurd degree for mid-April, but it’s the only way to slow decomposition. Sort of. She’s not sticking her son in a goddamn freezer.

“Uh, thank you for coming all this way,” Yuna stumbles through clunky Japanese. It’s been a long time since she’s needed to speak anything other than English. The visitor reaches out a wrinkly hand, the one not clutching her mobility cane, and somehow finds Yuna’s wrist. She pauses for a second, like the pulse roaring under Yuna’s skin means anything, then relents.

“You may call me Miko. Show me the boy.”

Yuna had begged David to go back to work. One of them had to remain connected to the outside world and it couldn’t be Yuna. She promised that she just needed a quiet day to spend with Shane and say her goodbyes and then they could deal with everything that comes next after she makes her peace with it.

It’s technically true. She just needs to try something first.

Yuna never spent much time in Japan. Her parents were born there and occasionally dragged her back to see extended family and connect her to the culture, but she never saw the point. She was Canadian. She wanted so badly to just be Canadian, like everyone else.

She only learned the language when her mother started refusing to speak to her in English. Every new year she went with them to the only Shinto shrine in Montreal and prayed to deities she didn’t believe in. She awkwardly grinned through conversations with cousins she never got close with about shamanism and mountain gods and talismans.

When she was young all Yuna wanted to do was sever the ties that made her different. They were chains, not anchors. So she made white friends and assimilated and spent the rest of her life trying to compensate for where she came from and what that meant for her son and everyone else who looks like them.

After Shane was born, her attitude shifted. The features she wished didn’t exist on herself looked beautiful on her baby. Her stomach twisted when she imagined her little boy looking at himself in the mirror and superimposing another version of himself, one with blonde hair and blue eyes and a lot less to prove, over the face staring back at him.

Just like Yuna.

She refused to let that happen. She taught Shane that their heritage was something to be proud of, even if at times it felt like nothing more than an invisible cinderblock hampering their pace. She atoned for their cultural estrangement via brand campaigns championing diversity in sports, and a mentorship program for minority children interested in hockey.

Yuna embraced their identity as Canadian-Japanese, but the focus was always on the Canada of it all. She never personally reconnected with her Japanese side, no matter how many times she told Shane it made him marketable made them special.

She’s done a lot of talking about being proud about being Japanese, and not a lot of actually being proud of it.

Now, the heritage she dodged is her last hope.

Canadians don’t believe in spirits. They indulge in horror movies and haunted house attractions and a month during the fall where some might let themselves toy with the idea of it all being real, but there’s no deep-rooted cultural acceptance of mediums and miracles. Maybe some indigenous populations carry similar traditions, but certainly not among the modern public of Canada, the people Yuna brushes shoulders with day in and day out. For them, death is the end, and the afterlife is a nice thought that comforts those that get left behind.

But Japan believes.

So Yuna opens her door and welcomes the itako into her home and prays to deities that she’ll gladly start believing in that the woman’s blindness actually does connect her to the spirit world, as legend has it.

Miko hovers in Shane’s doorway for a heartbeat. She hums low in her throat, then ambles towards the chair Yuna prepared next to the bed. She shoulders off the smooth black tube on her back and leans it against a stack of boxes. According to the frantic research Yuna did after placing the call, it’s full of protective charms and proof of her itako training.

The woman arranges a complicated pattern of string necklaces over the bedspread. Yuna shudders at the animal bones mixed in among the smooth glass beads. She can see shells and teeth, which aren’t that weird, but also what looks like jaw bones and small skulls.

“A terrible tragedy,” Miko rumbles. She strokes one spindly finger across Shane’s palm. Yuna only understands half the words from her thick dialect. “You were not supposed to be separated. How sad. You must have gone looking for him.”

“What?”

Miko turns to Yuna as if just remembering that she’s there. “I will begin the ceremony now. I cannot promise I can find him, or bring him back, or make him speak with you, but I will try.”

“Yes, yes, anything.” Yuna swallows back her tears. “I’ll pay anything, just try. Please.”

She tries not to cringe as the itako scatters rice and salt across Shane’s body and around his bed. She listens quietly to the woman chant folk songs and call upon local kami spirits to protect them as she opens the connection between the living and the dead.

For a long time, nothing happens. There’s just a deepening wrinkle in the old woman’s forehead, the breeze blowing outside the window, and the sinking realization that Yuna just got scammed by an elderly lady.

She’s not sure what she expected. Maybe for the lights to go out, or for the itako’s eyes to roll back or start glowing, or for the hockey book on Shane’s shelf to start levitating. It’s nothing like the movies. Miko just sits there, still as death, and waits with bated breath.

After an eternity, she reaches a blind hand out and somehow navigates straight to the chain still wrapped around Shane’s fingers. They’ve gone stiff and brittle with death, and Yuna was afraid of snapping something if she tried to pry them open.

“I cannot bring him back,” Miko finally says. The words suck out all the air in the room.

Yuna dips her head. She expected this. Truly. She’s never believed in the occult – why would she be rewarded for a lifetime of skepticism?

Having Shane the first time was already a miracle. How dare she ask for a second?

Miko’s eyes open. Her sclera are gray and frosted over, completely unseeing, yet she meets Yuna’s wrecked gaze. “I cannot bring him back alone.”

What the hell does that mean?

“But you – you can bring him back? If you need more helpers, I can make calls. I’ll pay whoever you need. I promise.”

Hope is dangerous. Volatile. If Yuna climbs up on her hope and it doesn’t lead anywhere, she’ll surely die from the fall.

Miko clicks her tongue. “He is not alone. There is another soul tied so tightly to him that they will not separate. Not again.”

He is not alone.

The prospect is both bone-chillingly terrifying and unbelievably relieving. Her outcast son. Her baby who invited his hockey team to his second grade birthday party and only got two of twenty-five to show up. Her celebrity son who would rather take his hockey stick on a date to an empty rink than any of the wonderful girls lining up down the block. Her strong captain who never quite learned how to lower the walls of authority and connect with his teammates as peers.

Her catatonic Shane, who hasn’t gotten visitors in weeks.

Wherever he is now – somewhere Yuna can’t reach, can’t accompany him, can’t make up for what’s missing – he isn’t alone.

Not anymore.

Yuna never makes snap decisions. She prefers to explore all the potential consequences, make endless lists of pros and cons, and develop action plans for each way something could go wrong. She gathers all the information first and makes the most educated guess possible to avoid mistakes she can’t fix. She hasn’t jumped feet-first into a decision since she snapped at her mother that she would not leave David and in fact would be marrying him someday.

Fuck it.

As long as Shane comes back, Yuna can handle anything that comes with him. Whatever leech has latched onto her boy’s soul can be dealt with via exorcism or kitchen knife or bare fists as long as Shane can hug her back first.

“I swear, I don’t care if the devil himself is stuck to him. Bring my baby back.”

Miko nods sharply. She tangles another string of bones around Shane’s hand, intertwining it with the delicate gold chain. She clasps her hands together and rests them over Shane’s heart.

“篠田の森に住む老狐は、昼間は鳴くが、夜は鳴かない。篠田の森に住む老狐は、昼間は鳴くが、夜は鳴かない。篠田の森に住む老狐は、昼間は鳴くが、夜は鳴かない。”. (The old fox in the Shinoda woods, when he cries during the day, then he does not cry in the night.)

A spell. A plea for balance to be restored. A mother crying out for her child at the same time every night. Ritual. Order. Balance.

Yuna just glimpses a tremor in Shane’s lower lip before a headache splits her thoughts and turns her vision white at the edges. Miko’s hands, still clasped, move from Shane’s chest to cover Yuna’s eyes.

“Let the spirits settle,” Miko encourages her. “The world is readjusting. You must, too. Remember your promise.”

The air thickens, dense and soupy. It presses and presses until the weight of it nearly crushes her. All her senses slowly go numb, like the universe is shying away from her so it can bend and break and reform in peace. There’s a haunting ringing in her ears. On an exhale, she feels another pair of thin, feminine hands in hers. It can’t be Miko’s, which are still cupped over her eyes. The hands squeeze once before letting go. Yuna blinks away a vision of long blonde curls and sad eyes and that gold chain again.

Above the blood roaring in her ears, she hears an unfamiliar voice. No – not unfamiliar. Not at all. She’s heard it before, her head just hurts so much, and she – can’t quite place it. If she didn’t know better, if she didn’t know it was impossible, she’d think it was–

“Моя душа. (My soul.)”

Yuna bats Miko’s hands away and makes direct eye contact with Ilya Rozanov, curled around her son on a bed of rice and salt and bones, before she passes out.

Chapter End Notes

look im so nice i even combined the first two chapters so that i revived them sooner

ive always wanted to write a 'came back wrong' fic but never really knew where to go with it...i like to come at my longer fics with a specific angle and i just didnt have one til i fell into HR and realized how delicious outsider POVs can be!!!! so here is me killing two hockey players with one plane crash (lol).

it'll be a long journey (finished, just proofreading!) but i'll try to make the hurt good <3 please leave a comment or kudos if you enjoyed and see you soon!

(also i just crossed 1k user subs on here....which is an insane amount of emails!!!!! thank u all so much it means the world to me 🥺 i'd love to do something to celebrate but i'm not sure what!!)

twitter: pixeljunnie
alterspring: pixinoa

information on itako and japanese witchcraft and spiritualism came from here and as always the code for my hover text translations is from here!

(also also lowkey....sorry if the title made this sound funnier than it is KJDNFDSJK i giggled)

Chapter 2: Get One Free

Chapter Summary

Of fucking course the soul tied to her son’s would be the one who never left him alone in life either.

Chapter Notes

i heart underexplained supernatural phenomena as a vehicle to explore character relationships and internal motivations

mind the tags! some references to suicidal thoughts/tendencies

So the devil’s name is Ilya Rozanov.

Yuna should have guessed.

She’s near hysterical again when she wakes up in her bed with her heart in her throat, disoriented and scared and desperately needing to see her son. Her Shane.

David is sitting beside her without making eye contact. He squeezes her hand, and she barely gathers the strength to squeeze back. He quietly fills her in – coming home to find Yuna crumpled on the floor. A note on the counter written entirely in Japanese. Two bodies in Shane’s deathbed. Both breathing.

“Sweetheart,” David whispers. “What did you do?”

Yuna leaps up. On shaky legs, she stumbles over to Shane’s room and throws the door open. A slice of lazy afternoon light cuts in from the window, washing the bed in a warm glow.

It’s impossible. It’s completely impossible.

Ilya Rozanov died a fiery death on AC44218. His blood was smeared on bits of debris. His bones were burned to ash in the fire. The world buried him weeks ago.

Shane Hollander’s heart gave out three days ago. Maybe four now, depending on how long she was out.

Both are true. Both happened.

And yet.

Ilya Rozanov is sprawled over her son, head pillowed on his chest and arms constricting his waist. Shane is gripping him even harder in turn, one hand tangled in Rozanov’s mess of golden curls and the other braced where his neck meets his back. He’s cradling Rozanov against him in his sleep.

Yuna watches Rozanov’s hair rustle from Shane’s breath. She tracks the subtle rise and fall of his head against Shane’s chest. Shane’s moving chest.

Holy shit.

Yuna’s knees buckle with relief. David catches her again, like he always does, but they manage to stay standing this time.

Shane is alive. He’s deeply asleep, but the flush is back in his cheeks and he doesn’t look quite so haunted and his face is relaxed for the first time in months and he’s alive again.

“My baby,” she sniffles. “I’m so sorry. I should’ve done more, I should’ve helped you. It’s okay. I’ll do better this time, I promise. Whatever you need.”

The words are more for her than for him. He probably can’t even hear her. Suddenly overcome with the need to speak to Shane, to hug him and feel him hug back, to press her ear to his chest and listen to the proof of his heart beating under his skin, she lurches towards the bed.

Something blocks her way. Yuna looks down in shock, having completely forgotten about the Rozanov of it all. Shane hates being touched by people he doesn’t know or trust. He’ll be so upset when he wakes up to find Rozanov invading his personal space. The intruder is fucking crushing her son, wrapped around him like a snake. Or a leech.

That’s right – Shane’s soul had some sort of pesky hanger-on that followed him back to the realm of the living. A hitchhiker. An uninvited tag along.

Somewhere, deep deep deep in her core, the place Yuna likes to pretend she doesn’t have where all the ugliest emotions hide, she finds it incredibly unfair.

Yes, a miracle has brought her son back. She said she would do anything to have him back, and she meant it wholeheartedly. She knew there could be consequences, knew something could go wrong, even knew that she’d need to revive two people to bring her son home safely. Just.

Of course.

Of fucking course the soul tied to her son’s would be the one who never left him alone in life either.

Ilya Rozanov is the reason Shane was never the unquestionable top talent of his generation. Any award Shane lost, he lost to Rozanov. He came second in the NHL draft to Rozanov. He lost MVP to Rozanov. When magazines publish stories on Shane they have to call him a top two player instead of the best there ever was.

Ilya Rozanov has haunted the Hollanders for years and even in death he won’t let Shane go.

“Get off him,” she says thickly as she scrabbles for her son. Rozanov doesn’t budge. She’s crying again, probably. David is at her back, trembling like a leaf in a storm. “He’d hate this, David. He’s going to hate me.”

Shane’s eyebrows draw together from the commotion. The ritual restored his soul but not his body, at least not all of it. He looks like he did days before death, frame still impossibly thin and frail, lips cracked and limbs weak.

Blearily, Shane opens his eyes.

Yuna’s hands freeze. Shane stares at her, glassy-eyed and dazed. His mouth quivers, barely forming around the word mom.

And then his gaze flickers downward and locks into place.

“Ill,” Shane rasps as fresh tears well up. His fingers tighten in Rozanov’s hair.

David panics. “No, son, no crying. You’re already dehydrated, you need to hang on to every drop, okay?”

“Ill? Is he ill again? David, he’s – his heart is okay, right? Right?” Yuna’s voice climbs higher and higher as she feels her world flicker at the edges.

She’ll never forgive herself if she managed to bring her son back to life just kill him again because Ilya fucking Rozanov got involved and gave him another fucking heart attack.

Shane cringes away from their worried touches, just like Yuna feared. But he doesn’t shove Rozanov away. Maybe he’s too weak to do it? Yuna tries to help, presses a hand to Rozanov’s shoulder and pushes, but Shane immediately smacks her away.

Eyes wide with shock, she stares down at her son as he rolls Rozanov to the side. Away from them. Like his parents are somehow the threat here. He doesn’t let go for a second, doesn’t even loosen his grip, just wriggles until he’s pressed forehead to forehead with the stranger in their house.

“Lyah,” Shane is muttering, over and over. Yuna leans in to hear him better. She just wants to hear his voice. “Yah…luh-shah…”

Shane frees one hand and cups Rozanov’s cheek. He caresses the skin reverently, like he can’t believe what’s right in front of him. As if Rozanov is the most beautiful sight to a dead man’s eyes.

And then Shane leans in, thumb digging hard enough into Rozanov’s cheekbone to leave an indent, and slots their lips together.

A startled yelp bursts from Yuna’s lips. What the hell is Shane doing?

“Илюша (Ilyusha).” Shane murmurs as he kisses Rozanov again. And again. “Проснись. Быстрее, Илюша (Wake up. Hurry, Ilyusha.).”

David’s hand is steady on the small of Yuna’s back, even as he breathes out his own shocked, “Oh.”

After a few more kisses, Rozanov’s face pinches. Yuna’s kneejerk reaction is to get between them – somehow, considering there’s not an inch of space separating them – and protect her son. Rozanov is from Russia, a place that is not notorious for their widespread love and acceptance of gay people.

If Shane is even gay? Fuck.

What if Rozanov is disgusted? What if he attacks Shane for kissing him like that, in his sleep no less? What if he–

“Oww,” Rozanov complains before he even opens his eyes. He fumbles with one hand until he prods at the sore spot on his cheek left by Shane’s thumb. He then catches the offending digit and presses a kiss to the pad of Shane’s thumb. “Kitty has his claws out this morning, hm?”

What.

The fuck.

Rozanov’s eyes fly open in panic when Shane responds with a bitten-off sob. “Oh, солнышко (sunshine), don’t cry. Hey. Hey, hey, shh. Bad dream?”

He doesn’t question the unfamiliar room, doesn’t even spare a glance at Yuna and David, just gathers Shane against his chest and smoothes a large hand up and down his back.

“Ilya, Ilya, Ilya,” Shane cries. He pats weakly across Rozanov’s body like he’s trying to confirm all his edges. Yuna is only half-comforted by the way Rozanov looks just as confused as they feel.

Rozanov grabs his hands to calm him down, but freezes upon contact. Yuna catches his fingers rubbing over the protruding bones of Shane’s sickly wrist. “Shane, you – what happened?” His accent thickens with fear. He peels Shane away just enough to get a good look at his frame. The pallid hue of his skin, the haunted eyes, the hunched shoulders. “So thin, солнышко (sunshine), you are sick? You are disappearing.”

“No, you did!” Shane wails. The sound trickles like cold ice down Yuna’s spine. Her baby sounds tortured. “Ilya you left me, you left first, you died and you left me behind.” Shane’s malnourished fists pound against Rozanov’s chest and the man just lets it happen in shocked silence.

“Was bad dream?” he tries again, but there’s a terrified look creeping into his eyes as well.

“You burned to a crisp. There wasn’t even a body to bury. I didn’t – didn’t even get to say goodbye. Fuck you. That’s not fair. Fuck you. You got to text me and I got nothing.”

“Plane…was real?” Rozanov’s breath hitches. He shudders hard, gasping like he’s on the verge of hyperventilation. “I do not understand. How…?”

“A million memories,” Shane chokes out. The phrase clearly means something to both of them, because Rozanov’s eyes immediately water. “Safe in your heart, I – I believe it. You believed it. But you were wrong, without you my — my heart — fuck. Fuck. How could you say that?”

“Ok. Ok.” Rozanov pulls him back against his chest. “Crash was real, or you are mind reader, I do not know, do not care. I am here now. Is ok. We are ok.”

“...You’re really alive.” Shane presses his ear to Rozanov’s heart. “God. Fuck. I’m never letting you fly again.”

Rozanov hums. “Ok. I will teleport for roadies. No problem. Моя любовь (My love) wants this, I find a way.”

“Fuck you.”

“Hmmm. Not yet. Like this, I will break you. We will eat greasy meals until your beautiful cheeks are back and your arms are not twigs and then we will see.”

“You want McDonalds?” Shane offers in a wavering voice. Rozanov snorts. Exhaustion is starting to cloud his features again, but he’s smiling softly.

“Shane Hollander buying McDonalds. Who are you and what have you done to my Шаня (Shanya)?”

For the first time in her life, Yuna wants to agree with Ilya Rozanov. What has happened to her Shane?

“Hell, I’d exclusively eat McDonalds from here on out if you asked me to.”

“Oh? You become like Supersized man?”

“How do you even know that documentary?” Despite himself, a wobbly smile balances on Shane’s lips. “I’ll get you anything you want. Anything, for the rest of our lives. I mean it. I won’t waste this chance.”

“Eh, such big promises,” Rozanov teases sleepily. “Fries and a nap will do for now, I think.”

Shane’s gaze doesn’t peel away from Rozanov until he’s sound asleep. Even then, he refuses to lift his head from Rozanov’s chest as he angles himself towards his parents.

“Hi, Mom. Dad.”

Yuna’s breath catches at the word she was terrified she’d never hear again.

Shane swallows hard as he glances back to Rozanov, then up at them again. He – why does he look scared of them, and not Rozanov? “I’m…sorry. For everything. ”

“Sweetie, it’s okay.” Yuna doesn’t think she’s lying. She’s confused and scared and hurt and grieving and wants to throw out the intruder in her home and curl around her wounded little family in private, but Shane clearly has no intention of untangling himself from the man in his bed.

So it’s okay. It’s okay because it’s Shane and he’s alive and that’s all that matters, really. But this isn’t like him at all. Cuddling up to the rival he hates, kissing said man, agreeing to eat junk food. Her Shane would never.

Right?

Shit. Is he safe? Does he need help getting away? Does Rozanov have something against him? Is he being blackmailed into acting like one of Rozanov’s flings?

“I know a lot has happened, you must be…distressed. We’ll explain everything–” Yuna falters when David clears his throat from behind her. Her stomach sinks. Right. David is just as in the dark as them. “I’ll explain everything. Is there anything we can do for you right now, Shane?”

Her beautiful son blinks up at her with those wide, trusting eyes. Like she was magic again.

“Yeah. Can you get us fries?”

_____________________

“I fucked up,” Yuna realizes a little too late.

She’s sitting across the kitchen table from David, head bowed and hands clasped in confession. They’re still shaking. Maybe her whole body is.

Shane and…Rozanov, are still in bed, completely absorbed in each other. Yuna left the door cracked when she had staggered out to the kitchen for some air, because even in her confusion she couldn’t bear to have a barrier between her and proof of her son’s beating heart again. It doesn’t seem to bother the duo as they snack on the fries David ordered to the house.

David reaches across the table and gently calms the tremor in her hands. Unfortunately for every other middle-aged heterosexual lady out there, Yuna managed to snatch the kindest, most understanding husband ever created. She would feel guilty if not for the overwhelming sense of relief of knowing she can tell him anything.

“My family has…ties, to shamanism,” Yuna settles on. “I never really believed in it, but I was just so desperate. I called in a practitioner to see if there was anything she could do. She was the one that wrote the note after the ritual, since I passed out. Not sure when she actually left. Sorry.”

“I’m not concerned about a stranger in our house,” David reassures her. His gaze slides towards the open doorway. “I mean. Maybe a different stranger.”

Yuna cringes. “I know. She warned me that Shane’s soul was intertwined with someone else’s and she’d have to bring both of them back. I just didn’t expect the stowaway to be…him.”

She gestures in place of any suitable words to describe her emotions towards the man. In all honesty, they’re not as complex as they probably should be. Shane’s thrumming pulse echoes in her ear like cymbals crashing, even though he’s in another room. She can’t focus on anything else.

It’s going to be complicated. Yuna has brought not one but two men back from the dead. The logistical and spiritual ramifications hang over her like an anchor hoisted on fraying rope. Two of the most famous hockey players in the world have clawed their way from unmarked graves to land in her home, and she has to figure out a way forward.

Granted, the world only knew about the passing of one of them. They could pretend that Shane made a miraculous recovery – no one had visited in weeks, anyways, so it’s not like there’s proof to the contrary – and handwave the whole Rozanov thing on account of his body never being recovered. They could put Shane in therapy and ship Rozanov back to the Centaurs and life could go back to normal.

It’s still messy. Rozanov’s blood was found on the debris, and Yuna doesn’t understand necromancy enough to figure out if his remains could still be discovered somewhere around the crash. Reviving people certainly costs some sort of karmic debt, or else no one would ever die for good. What if this causes a horrible butterfly effect? What if Shane is on limited time, and she only earned herself a few precious extra minutes with him? What if he’s not the son she remembers? What if he’s different?

What if he hates her for it?

Still, she can’t bring herself to regret anything.

Her son is alive. That’s all she wanted – all she’s ever wanted. During the ritual and before it. Before the plane crash, before hockey. Before Shane was even born, just a twinkle in her eye. All she ever wanted was a healthy baby.

And despite the rivalry, Yuna has never hated anyone enough to wish them dead. Minus a few politicians. And the NHL commissioner.

David gathers her up in his arms. It’s the safest place in the world, and Yuna hangs on for dear life. “I’m so happy,” he confesses into her hair. He’s shaking too. “I’m so happy he’s alive. Whatever comes next, we can handle it. And for what it’s worth, I’m glad Rozanov is back too. Even if I don’t understand it. No one deserves to die like that.”

Yuna nods her tearful agreement. They give the boys another few minutes of privacy before they can no longer stand being apart from Shane again. Yuna is half-terrified that he’ll stop breathing again if she looks away for too long. He’ll fade away like a desert mirage. A cruel taunt of what she no longer deserves to have.

David raps his knuckles against the open door and clears his throat. His eyes are still rimmed red, but he’s trying to maintain an air of normalcy. To her surprise, Shane and Rozanov don’t even flinch. They’re still laying in a crush of limbs.

“How are you feeling?” David asks.

Shane acknowledges them with a fleeting glance before returning to stare at Rozanov’s face. He’s seemingly avoiding blinking, as if not even a millisecond of darkness is allowed to interrupt his view. “Better,” he says hoarsely. Rozanov smiles sweetly down at him. “Everything’s better now.”

Rozanov. Sweet.

What?

Nervously, Yuna perches herself on the edge of Shane’s bed. She wants to tiptoe around the topic forever. Shane’s mental state has been pieced together with tissue paper and school glue and it all feels so very fragile. He deserves the truth – she just doesn’t want it to kill him again.

“How much do you remember?” She starts gentle. After a heartbeat, she nods towards Rozanov too. They’re in this mess together. Unfortunately. “Hi. I’m Shane’s mom, Yuna.”

“Hi Mrs. Yuna,” Rozanov rumbles low in his throat. His mouth tightens like he’s fighting back tears. "I remember nothing after plane."

“You…”

“Yes. I remember the crash. Fire, hitting the ground, pain. Screaming. Lots of screaming and pain. Then nothing.”

From the doorway, David whistles in horror.

Running a hand over Shane’s arm, Yuna nudges carefully for his answer. He takes a few deep breaths. “I remember the plane, too. Finding out about it at the presser, having a–” Shane worries at his lower lip as his finger finds one of the moles on Rozanov’s wrist. “Being in a lot of shock.”

Yuna scoffs before she can help herself. “That’s a nice word for a heart attack.”

Rozanov shoots up in bed, panic flooding his face as his jaw drops open. “Shane, what?”

“Not now,” Shane begs. “Please. Not now.”

Pliant like a well-trained dog, Rozanov folds easily when Shane tugs him back down. Distantly, Yuna wonders when he started calling her son Shane.

“It’s all blurry from there. I remember not being able to get out of bed, or eat, or do anything really. I felt so lost and empty and hopeless. Lonely, even though I know you guys were trying your best. I’m sorry. After Ilya…after the crash, there was nothing left for me anymore. I know that’s not fair. But I couldn’t go on without him. I can’t.”

“Дорогой (Sweetheart).” Rozanov’s breath hitches. Yuna doesn’t know what the word means, but Rozanov’s voice breaks over it like its something precious. “Fuck.”

Yuna reels at the admission. Shane had declined so quickly and severely that she was never able to dig out the core of his anguish. Obviously she knew Rozanov’s death had triggered it, but she assumed it had merely been the catalyst for Shane grappling with the fragility of life for the first time. Some sort of misplaced survivor’s guilt. She didn’t realize how much of her son’s life was truly tied up in the man himself.

A pit grows in her stomach, festering under her ribcage and sowing rotten seeds through her capillaries. Shane’s wellbeing cannot depend on a man best known for speeding in flashy sports cars and pissing off hordes of burly rich jocks.

Rozanov can’t have that kind of power over her son. He can’t. Yuna can’t bear to lose Shane again if – when – Rozanov inevitably does something stupid and drags Shane down with him.

Eyes still wild, Rozanov tucks Shane’s head into the crook of his neck. He’s breathing hard as he rubs small circles into the base of Shane’s neck. His fingers are trembling.

Rozanov appears equally frightened by the life he’s holding in his hands. Yuna wishes it was a comforting thought. Instead, he just seems like he doesn’t trust himself not to break Shane again.

Maybe he’s smarter than she thought.

Shane exhales long and slow against Rozanov’s collarbone. The tip of his nose rubs back and forth against Rozanov’s skin like he’d climb in there with him if he could. Yuna stares at the physical intimacy, the way Rozanov doesn’t seem shocked or confused by the contact, just holds Shane tighter and tighter. Shane exhales again. And again.

“You died three days ago,” Yuna says suddenly.

Rozanov’s eyebrows furrow. He glances towards the flowers blossoming just outside Shane’s window. “Is January?”

“Not you. Shane.”

Rozanov goes rigid as a board. Yuna had expected more of a reaction from Shane to his own death, but he just sniffles against Rozanov with a mumbled apology. Very carefully, Rozanov extracts Shane from his arms and runs his hands over his shoulders and down to his wrists. Checking.

Checking?

“You didn’t…любимый (darling). Tell me it wasn’t that bad, tell me you never– that it was not your choice–”

To Yuna’s surprise, hot tears are welling up in Rozanov’s eyes. Somehow, she never fathomed that Rozanov could cry. It’s an unfair thought; he’s a human like the rest of them. He just always acted so unshakable, like he was above pesky emotions.

He’s crying now though. Ugly, chest shuddering sobs, cheeks flushed and snot dripping from his nose.

Over her son.

This finally elicits a reaction from Shane. He sits up and dabs worriedly at Rozanov’s eyes and nose. The hem of his sleeve darkens with tears and mucus and Yuna has no idea how her fussy son isn’t freaking out from the germs or the sensation of damp fabric against his skin.

“No,” he gasps. “No. Ilya, listen to me. Never. I mean I – I wanted to, sometimes. I was scared like you get scared, because it hurt so much living without you, but I couldn’t do that to you, Ilya. I couldn’t.”

Yuna freezes. She had known, buried in that horrible hidden part of her, that things with Shane had truly gotten bad. She hadn’t known – hadn’t wanted to confront – just how bad. To the point where Shane lost the will to live but hadn’t quite scrounged up the will to seek death himself.

But he was scared that he would, and he didn’t mention anything about Yuna or David or Hayden or his parents or Montreal or Yuna or hockey or his mama who loves him or any other reason to fight another day.

Just Rozanov. Ilya.

Rozanov had kept Shane alive. He had also killed him, little by little.

“Then what happened?” Rozanov asks desperately. He turns to Yuna, eyes wide and scared like a child. His tears have slowed, but he’s still pale and clammy.

“We’re not sure. I assumed it was another heart…incident.” Yuna swallows around the razor blades in her throat. “I found you in bed with a necklace in your hand and an open package on the floor. No pulse. We didn’t call anyone because…”

Because I couldn’t let my baby go yet. Yuna lets the words trail off unsaid.

Rozanov gingerly touches the hunk of gold around his neck. It’s misshapen and melted, but it looks like it might have been a crucifix. Was Rozanov religious? “Sveta must have sent it to you. She knew I would have wanted you to keep it. Safe against your heart. I am sorry it caused you pain instead.”

Shane shakes his head. “It doesn’t hurt anymore. It sent me to you.”

And took you away from us.

Yuna takes a deep breath and pushes her own hurt down, down, down. Compresses it to the size of her heart and then stores it deep in her ribcage with all her other tragedies.

Grazing a hand against the lump Shane’s ankle makes under the bedspread, desperate for any contact, Yuna admits her sins. “It’s a long story, but we found a way to, um, bring you back. There were just some…complications.”

Rozanov frantically scans Shane’s body for injury before returning to meet Yuna’s gaze. Mouth slowly parting in realization, he points to himself. “Ah! I am complication.”

“We didn’t expect you, Rozanov,” David pipes up. He speaks as if Yuna had clued him in on the plan from the jump, and Yuna is unbearably grateful that even now, especially now, they’re putting up a united front. “Sounds like the two of you got your souls all tangled up wherever you went. It was an all or nothing deal.”

Rozanov hums at that. A small smile climbs back onto his lips as he gently prods Shane’s side. “We are like special offer, yes?”

“A bargain?” Shane is starting to smile too. “Like buy one get one free. A BOGO deal.”

“Yes, yes, bongo deal. Whatever.” Rozanov brushes his thumb across the smattering of freckles on Shane’s cheekbone. “Revive Shane, get bonus Ilya. Is not bad marketing.”

“Right.” Yuna mostly speaks up to remind the pair that her and David are still in the room. It seems easy for them to forget.

Shane suddenly straightens and skims her face with those sparkling round eyes, perceptive even if he doesn’t quite understand what he reads. Then his expression crumbles into relief, and he dives into her arms.

Yuna takes her first real breath of air since the plane crashed. It tastes sweeter than anything she’s ever feasted on. She holds her baby and rocks him like she did when he was young, small and scared and anxious over nothing, tiny fingers wrapped around her thumb for support.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” Shane is chanting into her ear. “Thank you for bringing him back.”

Him.

Not ‘me’. Him.

Rozanov.

It doesn’t matter right now because Yuna has Shane in her arms again. She runs a hand up and down his back, assures them that they’ll always be here for him, hell they’ll even be here for Rozanov if he’s so important to Shane. Whatever Shane wants they’ll do in a heartbeat, even if they don’t understand. Whatever he needs.

Whenever he’s ready.

When Shane calms down and pulls back, eyes still glistening with tears and gratitude and life, Yuna closes her mouth and knows they’re done dissecting this for the day. She presses a kiss to Shane’s forehead, then one to each cheek because she can’t help herself.

David switches out with her for his own healing hug with their reborn son. Afterwards, in a baffling move, he wraps Rozanov into another hug. It’s much quicker and Rozanov visibly stiffens in surprise. David just claps a supportive hand to his shoulder and tells him to rest up.

Rozanov’s uncertain gaze flicks to Yuna. She’s glad he’s not dead anymore – low bar, maybe – but she’s not really ready to offer an olive branch yet. She flashes an awkward smile instead.

Neither of the boys express any intention to leave the bed, so Yuna doesn’t bother offering Rozanov the spare room even though it feels foreign. Shane has a visitor. A guest. A…friend?

A something.

Before today, Yuna would have said a rival. Maybe an enemy, though Shane never seemed to hate him enough to earn that title. Now, Rozanov is a something. An unnamed specter in the Hollander house. A part of Shane she’d never known.

Eyes shutting, Yuna leans against the closed bedroom door for support. Exhaustion hits her all at once. The exertion of the ritual, the emotional whiplash of mourning her son’s body and then witnessing him reanimated, the Rozanov shaped elephant in the room. She’s so tired.

She’s so fucking happy.

“Shane,” she says, and then can no longer speak through her tears.

“I know. Shh, I know.”

Outside their son’s childhood bedroom, David holds her steady in their grief. When Yuna is finally able to collect herself, she confesses something against his shoulder that she barely allows to pass through her teeth, lest the words make it real.

“He’s not the same.”

“You don’t know that. He doesn’t look any different, he’s not missing any memories that we know of, he’s just a bit shaken up. He’s okay. He’s still our Shane.”

To prove his point, David creaks the door open again. “Goodnight, boys. We’ll make breakfast in the morning, if pancakes are okay.”

It’ll be protein pancakes, which are the only kind the Hollanders stock, but Shane always asks just to be sure. He loves being sure of things.

But the question never comes. Rozanov is the first to acknowledge the offer. “Да. (Yes.) Yum. Thank you, Mr. Hollander.”

“David,” Shane corrects. He’s staring at Rozanov with big, syrupy eyes.

“Thank you, David. Goodnight.”

Rozanov offers Shane a forgotten fry from his takeout. Shane automatically opens his mouth and lets Rozanov hand-feed him the cold, soggy McDonald’s abomination. Like instinct, his tongue darts out to lick the leftover salt from Rozanov’s fingertips.

“Okay,” David concedes as he closes the door on whatever that was. “Maybe you have a point.”

_____________________

Yuna has ruined her son.

Something clearly went wrong with the ritual. Shane is back in body, but not in mind. Yuna ripped him from the afterlife and accidentally forged a fucking codependent bond between him and the guy he despised.

Shane came back wrong. Maybe they both did.

That’s the only explanation for how the boys are acting. After much coaxing from Yuna and David, and eventually from Rozanov himself, the pair finally move from the bed. Yuna nearly collapses seeing her son up and moving for the first time in months. Every passing second it hits her again that he’s alive. Miracle after miracle.

The only thing is that Shane can’t move by himself. Or he won’t. Yuna isn’t sure which is true, which is worse. He’s literally glued to Rozanov’s side, matching every step. She thinks they even went to the bathroom together.

It’s incredibly strange. Okay, so their souls ended up stuck together by some sort of poor afterlife office management. Yuna can come to terms with that. It’s absurd enough that a shaman was actually able to raise the dead. She doesn’t have to stretch too much further to believe that some sort of cosmic entanglement could have happened.

That doesn’t mean they have to sit in each other’s laps to eat breakfast. Jesus Christ.

“Mm. These are protein?” Rozanov asks. Yuna isn’t used to him looking this nervous. He tries to wipe his sweaty palms on his pants, but he’s struggling to reach around the grown man on his lap.

“Yeah. Do you make these at home?” Bless his heart, David is trying his best to reduce the awkwardness as much as he can.

It’s not going well.

Rozanov shrugs and seemingly tries to search for an answer. Shrugs again. He lands on, “Shane likes them for cheat meal breakfast. They are not bad, for pancake made of sawdust and tears of small children.”

“Fuck you, they taste good. We have sour cream in the fridge if you need it. You can put it on your half.”

Rozanov looks pointedly at the man pinning him to his chair. “Well. Now I understand pet owners who cannot move after their pets fall asleep on them. I think if I went to fridge right now you would bite me, котенок (kitten).”

Shane flushes from neck to ear at the word. It must mean something rude. The audacity of Rozanov, seriously, to call Shane a bad name in his own house.

Before Yuna can scold him, Shane shoves a forkful of sawdust pancake in Rozanov’s mouth and hops up to get the sour cream. He doesn’t turn his back or break eye contact the whole time. When he gets back to the table he casually perches in Rozanov’s lap again, then plops a dollop of sour cream on a corner of pancake and sticks it down Rozanov’s throat. The poor man hadn’t even finished chewing the first bite, spluttering out, “You are suffocating me, дорогой (sweetheart).”

“Good. From now on you’re only dying if I get a say in it.”

“So bossy,” Rozanov drawls. Oddly, it doesn’t sound like an insult.

Perhaps it’s too early for jokes. It doesn’t take long for Shane’s brain to snag on his own words.

You. Dying.

When Shane’s hand shakes lifting his water glass to his lips, Rozanov frowns. He steadies the cup before liquid can go sloshing over the sides and gently guides it back down. “I’m full,” he announces abruptly. “Time for hockey, yes? You must fill me in on what I missed. Montreal are still terrible, obviously this has not changed, but I am dying to – ah, no, I am eager to know if Scott Hunter has gotten artificial hip yet. Very common for the elderly.”

There’s no way a pancake and a half is enough to satisfy a 200 pound wall of Russian muscle, but no one protests as Rozanov pushes away from the table with Shane in tow. After a brief pause, he nods gruffly. “Thank you for pancake.”

“Montreal isn’t terrible,” Shane grumbles as Rozanov leads him away. “And I think Hunter had a good season, I don’t know. Didn’t really go back to hockey after…everything.”

Rozanov’s steps falter. Shane Hollander without hockey. It must be just as absurd to him as it was, and still is, to Yuna. He doesn’t press it though. “Montreal was extra terrible then, if they did not have you. Come. We will catch up together.”

The two finally disappear into the living room. Yuna hears the television click on and the sounds of announcers and scraping blades quickly fill the house. She hadn’t really registered the suffocating silence of the past four months until it was gone. The heavy blanket of grief lifts and underneath it chimes the sounds of living that have been so achingly absent. Game tapes. Singsongy commercials. Chirping at bad plays. A return to the world outside, no matter how thin the thread is.

But something is still wrong.

“Rozanov knows Shane’s cheat breakfast. Not just what he eats at catered awards shows or something, but his off-season breakfast,” Yuna hisses to David when she’s sure they’re out of earshot.

David’s mouth opens and closes. “Shane has done many interviews over the years. Maybe he’s talked about it somewhere? Shane likes keeping tabs on the competition, I bet Rozanov does the same.”

“Shane knows how Rozanov likes his pancakes.”

“Same argument. Rozanov does less magazine spreads, but surely there are hookups posting every detail about his life online.”

Yuna’s eyes narrow. “They were eating off the same goddamn plate. We don’t even do that after thirty years of marriage.”

“Because it’s gross…” David replies automatically, then gives up. Yuna sits back with her arms crossed in victory.

“I rest my case.”

David still tries to rationalize the situation, which is an objectively comedic tactic for discussing their undead son’s relationship to his undead rival post-necromancy. “So they’re closer than we thought. Is that such a bad thing? We’ve always wanted him to make more friends.”

“I know, I know. If this was any other situation, any other person, I’d be jumping for joy. I just can’t help feeling like I fucked something up with the ritual and he wasn’t supposed to be like this. If he came back liking Rozanov of all people, who knows what else is wrong?”

“Not wrong,” David says slowly. “This new dynamic with Rozanov is strange, of course, but I wouldn’t call it wrong. Nothing about our son could ever be wrong. Even as a zombie, he’s still our Shane.”

Yuna flinches at that word. Shane isn’t some Halloween monster. His heart just stopped a little longer than most and needed a spell instead of an electric shock to get it back on track. “But he’s changed.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. Perhaps they were always friendlier than they let on. The rivalry makes the league a lot of money. It would be a big scandal if anyone found out that they’re secretly friends, let alone something…else.” David waves a hand in place of elaborating. Yuna can fill in the blanks. She’s just scared.

This is far from Yuna and David’s first conversation about Shane’s preferences. When he was younger, they were more concerned about his lack of interest in girls being a consequence of struggling to fit in socially. It’s hard to get a girlfriend if you don’t know how to make a friend first. After a few years though, it was clear that any expression of attraction to women was him conforming to the status quo.

Whenever he was prompted about a celebrity crush, he floundered and said something egregiously un-heterosexual, like Britney Spears.

Then Shane’s hockey career took off, and the girls started coming to him. His scant relationships were always halfhearted and shallow. He never came home and gushed about how pretty his date was or when he could see her next. He just shrugged, said dinner was nice, and talked about landing early morning rink time for the weekend.

So maybe Shane wasn’t straight. It was fine. Yuna read a lot of articles about parenting gay children, though she struggled to map their experiences onto hers. Shane never wanted to play with dolls as a toddler. He never auditioned for the school musical or had a suspiciously close ‘best guy friend’.

Stereotypes aren’t foolproof, but Yuna had nothing else to go on at the time. Eventually she considered the possibility that Shane wasn’t into women or men. That spurred her towards a deep dive into asexuality, which seemed promising until she noticed how he swallowed hard and averted his eyes at the male love interests during family movie nights.

Yuna and David will love him no matter what. He knows that. So they had left their observations unsaid and waited for him to broach the topic.

And waited, and waited.

But the day never came. Shane never sat them down and confessed to kissing a teammate under the bleachers at the rink. He never brought a boy home or took anyone other than girls to school dances. He dated Jessica and seemed to like her well enough until hockey separated them. Then there was nobody until Rose Landry, who meshed so well with him that they’re still friends to this day.

Their understanding of his preferences went back to square one, so Yuna and David shelved it all and agreed that they’d support him no matter what. That’s still true.

Just.

“He would’ve told us.” Yuna fiddles with a hangnail. “He doesn’t keep secrets like this. If he was gay and he knew it, he would’ve told us. Didn’t we make it clear that we’d love him no matter who he brought home? Even if it was Rozanov, we would’ve come around. He knew – knows that.”

Maybe the repetition will make it true.

This thing with Rozanov has to be new. A side effect that will fade with time. The alternative is that Shane never trusted them enough to open his heart all the way, and Yuna can’t bear that truth.

If Shane had felt like this since the beginning, Yuna would have known. Shane would’ve trusted her with it.

Wouldn’t he?

Apparently the secrecy doesn’t rattle David. “If he was involved with Rozanov before the incident and was too scared to tell us, all we can do is reiterate that he’s safe here. Forcing him won’t help. At least he’s happy.”

Yuna glances towards the living room. She can just glimpse tufts of the boys’ hair poking up from where they’re slouched on the sofa. Their heads are leaning against each other, Shane slowly drifting towards Rozanov’s shoulder. Rozanov’s big paw lifts and a flicker of nerves runs through Yuna until his fingers settle on the base of Shane’s neck, stroking rhythmically. Shane’s blissed out purring is loud enough to reach the kitchen.

She wonders if that’s what happiness looks like on Shane, or if it’s yet another side of him she’s never seen.

Chapter End Notes

happy reunion to our hollanovombies! srry for the wait ilya is talking again which means russian translations and hover text which takes some extra time to prep 🥹 this week on the job hunt has been hell omg if anyone is hiring biomedical engineers hit a loon up...💔

you may have noticed this is a series now! i have an 18k shane pov of this fic that i originally wrote as a bonus chapter (im not a huge fan of pov shifts but i was craving to get back inside hollanovs heads for maximum yearn potential) though i'm thinking it might make more sense as a standalone sequel. i'll probably post that after i finish uploading this fic!

thank u all SOOOO much for the love so far!!! i'm glad you enjoy my weird quirky hollanovs as much as i enjoy writing them! mwahmwah to everyone who comments and/or kudoses <333

 
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Chapter 3: While Supplies Last

Chapter Summary

With startling clarity, Yuna realizes she’s being handed an ultimatum.

Chapter Notes

Yuna searches for the chance to speak with Shane privately. It doesn’t come easy.

The family – plus Rozanov – has settled into an unspoken compromise. Shane and Rozanov won’t separate from each other, but Yuna and David are too weepy to let Shane out of sight for long. Thus, the duo conduct most of their canoodling in the common areas.

Sometimes when Rozanov gazes at Shane, Yuna catches sight of the same fear that burns in the back of her own throat. As if Shane is going to crumble to dust in front of their eyes. So even though she still doesn’t understand, she begrudgingly allows everyone to get equal Eyes On Shane time. Rozanov included.

Shane doesn’t appear to have the same level of emotional awareness. In sharp contrast to how differently he acts around Rozanov, he treats his parents with the same reserved affection Yuna always assumed was his only form of self expression.

He’s happy to eat meals with them and he hugs them long and tight every night before bed, but he doesn’t really seek them out beyond that. She had expected to be grilled for answers about the ritual, or his friends, or at least his future in hockey.

For the first time, her deeply inquisitive son seems to be perfectly content not knowing the inner workings of everything around him. Shane just pretends nothing ever happened, as if questions could shatter the illusion and take Rozanov away again.

Yuna finds her chance when Rozanov finally showers alone. She’s been vaguely trying to ignore the shared showers thing; maybe Shane came back from the dead with a passion for water conservation.

She just wants to understand her son. So she beckons him to their bedroom and he follows like a child being called to the principal’s office. Fingers twisting nervously in the hem of his shirt, he peers up at her from underneath those long eyelashes. “Yeah, mom?”

“We never touched base after you, ah, got better. I just wanted to check in. How are you feeling?”

Shane visibly relaxes. “Oh. My heart? It’s fine now, I haven’t had any symptoms. Ilya listens to my pulse every night and has never raised a red flag.”

Ilya. Yuna’s eye twitches. That’s a red flag on it’s own. “Speaking of…him. I think some wires might have gotten crossed when you were coming back. You’ve always hated him, but now you’re acting,” she waves a frustrated hand at a word just out of her reach, “sweet. Like partners.”

“Ah. Yes.” Shane blinks at her with those doe eyes. “That would make sense, because we are. Don’t call Ilya sweet to his face though, he’ll say something dumb like Russians are not sweet, we are bitter like strong vodka! It’s all a facade. He’s a softie.”

At Yuna’s stunned look, Shane frowns and tries to walk it a few steps back. “Sorry. I know it’s a lot to process. I should’ve been honest when we first woke up, but it’s been an emotional few days and I haven’t been ready to talk about it.”

Shane isn’t meeting her eyes. He’s picking at his nailbeds like he used to do when he was seven and anxious for school to end so he could go to practice. “I’ve actually been trying to figure out how to tell you for a long time. I swear. But then there was the c-crash, and it felt pointless without Ilya beside me. He had wanted, I mean he still wants, to come out so badly and it wasn’t fair to do it when he no longer had a say. When he died I knew no one would understand that I was grieving my own soul, our future together, because how could anyone believe it without seeing it? Right?”

She fights the kneejerk impulse to interrupt and snap at him to get to the point. It’s been a long time since she’s heard Shane ramble like this. There were the preceding four months of silence, of course, but even before that she struggles to recall Shane being so open and talkative about something that’s not hockey. She lets his voice wash over her, soaking it in even though none of it makes sense.

His voice edges on hysterical. “And we’d been so careful. So stupidly careful that there was no evidence left behind. It’s what I wanted, or what I thought I wanted, until he was gone and I had nothing to show for all our years together and no one who would understand why my world fell apart. After he came back to life it still felt like words weren’t enough without proof to back it up. So I figured it would be easier to just show you.”

“Show me what, exactly?”

“Oh.” The question makes Shane slow down. He smiles. It’s a soft, private look that Yuna has never seen before. “That we love each other.”

Like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

Yuna’s eyes bug out of her skull like a cartoon character. “Love?! Honey, what are you talking about? You hate him. You’ve always hated him.”

She feels utterly disoriented. Did she accidentally yank the wrong Shane Hollander back from the underworld? A parallel version of her son hailing from the exact same timeline, except one where he and Ilya Rozanov are lovers or something?

Parallel-Yuna must have done something to make Parallel-Shane believe he couldn’t trust her. Not this Yuna though. She would never make such a mistake. Her Shane never felt that way about Rozanov, she was certain of it.

But Shane – her Shane? – shakes his head like he had expected that reaction. “No. Maybe on the ice, but never personally. I’ve loved him since the day of the draft, though he’ll tell you he loved me the moment we first met in 2008. Competitive fucker.”

The swear isn’t imbued with any of the genuine distaste Yuna swears she used to hear when they shit-talked Rozanov together. Desperately, she searches her memory for examples of Shane expressing genuine resentment towards his rival.

She comes up empty.

There was Shane’s first Prospect Cup where they sat in on the Russian team’s practice to size up the competition. Drunk on her son’s winning streak and thoroughly convinced of his impending triumph, she had split the session between analyzing Rozanov’s technique and making cheap jabs at the boy in order to ease Shane’s obvious nerves.

Shane didn’t contribute much, bouncing his leg restlessly as they watched, but his gaze dutifully tracked Rozanov the whole time. He was still getting the hang of chirping, so Yuna didn’t mind his quiet focus on strategy.

Then the day of the draft. Wasn’t it Shane who scoffed at Rozanov’s placement and called him a cocky asshole who would get swiftly humbled by the brutes in Boston?

Or was that Yuna?

What about the CCM commercial that Rozanov weasled his way into, insisting on sharing Shane’s spotlight? Rozanov was unprofessional and caused shooting to run late because he kept cracking. Shane had been media trained since the day scouts set their sights on him, and Rozanov still managed to get under his skin and distract him. Yuna remembers meeting Shane for an early dinner after wrapping – he was flushed bright red and couldn’t say Rozanov’s name without stuttering. From anger. Right?

Every time Boston and Montreal faced each other. Ottawa and Montreal, in the later years. Every face-off, every Olympics, every All-Star game, every awards show.

Was Shane only ever matching her ire for show? Did he ever offer up anything more biting than a standard he’s an asshole in agreement?

Maybe not. But he never stopped Yuna either.

Noticing her turmoil, he offers her a sad smile. “I know it sounds unbelievable. We used to be much better at hiding. God, I would’ve never touched him in public like I have been the last few days. After everything we’ve been through I just can’t bear the thought of keeping our distance again and pretending it’s not killing me. Killing us.”

The water turns off in Shane’s ensuite bathroom. Shane perks up like a puppy hearing the front door open.

“So you…love him?” Yuna tries out the word. It lodges weirdly against her teeth. Though it’s hard to swallow around, it isn’t impossible. Especially not when he turns those beseeching eyes on her.

“So much. So much it used to scare me, because I couldn’t imagine my life without him. Then I didn’t have to imagine and every second was exactly the agony I thought it’d be. Now I know I’ll do whatever it takes to be with him.” There’s a foreign firmness to Shane’s voice, like he’s scripted out a counterpoint to every argument she could make and won’t be dissuaded. “I really want you to understand. I hope you aren’t mad at me. But I love him, and he loves me, and I’m so happy.”

In another world – perhaps earlier in his personal journey, or with a different boy, or navigating a less developed relationship – they might be having this conversation through tears of shame. A younger Shane would try to convince her that he could still be a role model for young kids despite the sin of loving a man. That this didn’t have to be the end of his hockey career because he could hide until retirement.

Maybe he’d apologize for not growing up into the son he thought she wanted. Maybe he’d bend over backwards to ensure she wouldn’t get upset with him. Maybe he’d make himself small at her feet and beg for absolution.

But Shane is almost thirty years old now. He’s apparently been with a loving partner for years. He still loves her, still seeks her approval, but he doesn’t need her anymore. Not like he used to.

With startling clarity, Yuna realizes she’s being handed an ultimatum. Accept his relationship with Rozanov, or be slowly and methodically shuttered out of his life.

He’s not asking for her permission or acceptance. He’s telling her and hoping it doesn’t blow up in his face. She won’t let him down.

She can’t lose her son again.

So Yuna fights through the confusion, the rewriting of Ilya Rozanov, the recontextualization of her son’s entire young adulthood, and surges forward to wrap Shane in a hug.

“I love you. I will always love you,” she whispers into his hair. “I could never be mad at you. The Rozanov thing will take some getting used to, I won’t lie about that, but I’ll get there. As long as he treats you well.”

“Yes. The best. He’s my person,” Shane chokes out.

Floorboards squeak on the other side of the bedroom door. There’s a sound like someone pacing, then the light streaming under the door is abruptly cut off. The wood creaks against the weight of a waiting body.

Shane untangles himself and opens the door, letting Rozanov’s crouched form spill into the room from where he was leaning. His curls are still dripping from his shower and the wet patches seeping through his shirt imply a rushed dry job.

“Моя любовь! (My love!)” Rozanov says cheerily. “Hi. Missed you.”

“Missed you too.” Shane tugs him up from the floor and straight into his arms. While Shane inhales the tangy scent of his curl cream, Rozanov makes eye contact with Yuna. Between the aftershocks of emotion visible on Shane’s face and Yuna’s contemplative appraisal of the scene, he draws some conclusions.

“You told her?” Rozanov mumbles into Shane’s ear, low enough that he assumes Yuna can’t hear. He’s wrong.

Shane nods against his shoulder, and Rozanov beams. “So proud of you, мой лев (my lion). Not so scary, hm?”

Wrinkling his nose, Shane pulls back. “Лев? Lion?”

“Yes. You are like courageous lion from yellow brick road, telling your mom that you are gay.”

There’s few things Shane loves more than correcting someone. But instead of piping up with the correct title of the movie, he just freezes and slaps a hand to his forehead. “Fuck.”

Rozanov’s lip twitches with mirth. “You forgot the part about being gay?”

“I forgot the part about being gay.” Shane suddenly turns to Yuna. “Right. I’m gay, if that wasn’t clear. We’ve been exclusive for years but I know you’ll have questions about the women, so just so you know Ilya is bisexual. I’m just gay.”

“Not just gay,” Rozanov complains. Yuna barely has time to wonder if there’s a more complicated sublabel she should research before he keeps going. “You undersell your gayness, you are super gay.”

“I’m a normal amount of gay.”

Rozanov blows a raspberry. “Objection. You are wicked gay, as we say in Boston.”

“Good thing we’re not in Boston and you’re not an attorney.”

The banter dies down as both of them realize Yuna hasn’t said anything. Shane shifts his weight back and forth, growing nervous again like Yuna would somehow accept his gay relationship but draw the line at him actually being gay.

She fumbles for something to break the awkward silence. She’s already done the much harder task of trying to understand Rozanov as her son’s partner. Her emotional energy is sapped, so for some reason she blurts out, “I think David’s workplace has pride pens.”

“Pride pens…” Rozanov furrows his brows. Shane leans over to explain.

“Pride month has gotten pretty corporate over the years. Companies make branded rainbow stress balls and shit to hand out at parades. I guess the Board of Treasury does pens?”

“Ah! Yes, this is now ringing bells.” Rozanov snaps his fingers. “I think Hazy has complained about rainbow capitalism. I would like gay money pen. I will write you love notes with it.”

“Fuck off,” Shane says, but he’s smiling. Has he always smiled like that when he bickers with Rozanov?

“I kind of caught on to the gay thing after our conversation, but I’m still proud of you for telling me,” Yuna interjects even though the moment for sincerity seems to have passed. She’s not trying to sow any seeds of misunderstandings for later tonight when Shane’s brain analyzes this whole interaction with a fine-tooth comb.

“Thanks Mom.” He looks a bit sheepish. “I’m going to talk to Dad now. I’ll lead with the gay thing this time, it might make the rest of it easier to digest?”

Yuna doubts it, but she doesn’t voice that. Shane disappears down the hallway with Rozanov trailing after him like a loyal dog. He looks back and dips his head to her. “Is not personal. The hiding, I mean. He is safe with you, I have never been worried about this. I think his logic mind has also known this all along. But his heart was scared.”

Instinctively, she bristles. She doesn’t need Rozanov bridging a gap between her and her son. Especially not a gap she’s fervently trying to deny exists.

Luckily, Rozanov realizes when to stop pushing. He’s surprisingly perceptive. Perhaps that’s how he gets under players’ skin so efficiently – he can see their boundaries, he just disregards them.

Admittedly, it makes for some pretty good TV. Especially when he is mic’d up.

For some reason that thought sticks with her for the rest of the night. They soldier through a lasagna dinner that is apparently only awkward to Yuna. Shane and Rozanov are somehow even more shameless, which she didn’t think was possible after the whole shared-custody pancakes debacle. David’s eyes are red and he keeps sniffling, but he fills Rozanov’s glass with the good Russian vodka and Yuna knows that the talk went over better with him than it did with her.

David tells baby stories about Shane that gets Rozanov’s eyes watery too, and they both start crying for real when David unearths an old photo album.

“Oh, мой крошка (my crumb), look at those squishy cheeks! You were fifteen minutes old!” Rozanov blubbers. He’s hanging onto David’s arm as they turn the pages.

Shane rolls his eyes. “I was literally eight.”

“You were just born,” David agrees tearily.

“Dad. I was learning long division.”

She’s glad at least one of them can be the gung-ho parent that Shane needs right now. Yuna is still hung up on the Rozanov she knows from the ice, the man who plays dirty and hits below the belt and never shows mercy.

Surely that includes Shane. There must be evidence out there of Rozanov antagonizing him: needling him about how he doesn’t fit in, making fun of him for having an overbearing mother, maybe even slipping in some remarks about his features that sailed right over Shane’s sweet little head.

It wouldn’t surprise her. A lot of hockey players resort to bigotry to shake others, especially a player as formidable as Shane.

She’s not sure what it would prove to herself or to Shane to find such evidence. There doesn’t seem to be anything that could change Shane’s mind about the man. It would be better in the long run to ignore the likelihood of her son’s partner having a paper trail of cruelty.

Like a dog with a bone, Yuna just can’t let something go until she cracks a tooth on it and chokes on her own blood.

She goes looking.

The clock ticks hours into hours. There are plenty of Rozanov chirping compilations to scrub through. Methodically, she starts from the very beginning, when Rozanov was at his most angsty teenage boy.

He’s definitely more abrasive, a tad edgier than she remembers from recent years, but still not anything egregious. There’s a lot of poking at Scott Hunter’s age. Half of the time Rozanov just pretends to not speak English anymore when someone tries to get a rise out of him, which gets them to fume without him lifting a finger.

There are some pointed jabs, like when he tripped a player on the Guardians and snarked about how lack of coordination is a symptom of inbreeding, but he’s overall more of a pest than a bigot.

Later in his career, his chirps are more about flaunting his own achievements and making his opponents feel inferior and emasculated. He sometimes tries this tactic against Shane, but it rarely works because Shane is the only player with more to brag about than Rozanov.

Shockingly, Rozanov has never dropped gloves against Shane. Yuna already knows that Shane doesn’t get in fights often; the penalty points aren’t worth it and neither is the elevated risk for injury. But she assumed Rozanov would’ve tried at some point, at least.

Rozanov doesn’t play easy against Shane. He slams him into the boards and Shane shoves him right back. They fight tooth and nail for the puck and never let their guards down.

But Rozanov also smiles a bit too widely around his mouthguard when he lines up for a face-off with Shane. He tells him how beautiful he looks, and instead of getting his honor as a man insulted, Shane just blushes prettily. When Rozanov winks at him as they file off the ice, Shane winks back.

It’s not at all what Yuna expected to find. Not just the way he interacted with Shane all these years.

Rozanov is still a menace, no doubt about it. But he’s not the straightforward asshole he plays up for the media.

What finally jolts Yuna from her skate down memory lane is a clip from 2017. Yuna remembers it all too vividly. She and David were watching the game from home, well-stocked with organic popcorn for her and fruity cocktails for David.

David’s drink sloshed over the rim of his glass when Shane hit the ground and didn’t get up. The carpet was sticky for a week.

At the time, all she could see was Shane. Not Shane the grown man with protective padding and years of training on how to take hits, but baby Shane toddling out on the ice for the first time, clutching her hand for safety.

She was out the door and booking a flight to Boston before the refs even called a pause in play. Afterwards, even with her baby safe and recovering on her couch, she couldn’t stomach even a mention of the incident.

She never knew how distraught Rozanov had been, hovering over Shane while the medics strapped him to a spinal board.

Is he okay? the Rozanov on the screen shouts to no one in particular. He’s breathing hard and it’s not from the exertion of the game.

Please please please be okay, is what Yuna reads on his haggard face.

It’s precisely the same expression he made when he woke up from the dead and heard about Shane’s broken heart.

I need you to be okay.

Yuna slams her laptop lid shut. Maybe neither of them came back wrong.

Maybe she just never understood them from the start.

She’s parched all of a sudden. Swinging her legs over the side of the bed, she creeps out of the bedroom without waking David and goes to get a glass of water.

The television is still on in the living room, but it’s turned down so low it might as well be muted. She peeks into the room to turn it off if no one’s watching it, but halts at the sight of two boy-shaped lumps on the couch.

They’re both curled up with their backs to the doorway. Rozanov is tucked up tightly in a blanket, only a mound of blonde curls visible. Yuna can’t decide whether he looks like a happily swaddled baby or a prisoner in a straightjacket. Shane is spooning him from behind, nuzzling into the wing of where Rozanov’s shoulder must be under the blanket.

Yuna wonders if Rozanov runs cold. It’s quite endearing for a Russian kid. Rozanov would probably never admit it though.

“I still can’t believe I died before Scott Hunter,” Rozanov grumbles. “Years of good chirps wasted. Is not the same now if I joke about beating his senile ass in bingo during old folks home charity visit. Or putting practice ice over his grave so we can skate on him.”

Shane audibly swallows at the mention of his undeath, but tries to relax. Exposure therapy. “I mean, he also outlived me.”

Rozanov makes an unhappy snuffling sound against the couch. “Doesn’t count, you were just copying me. And you are old man, too.”

“I’m a month older than you, Ilya.”

“Yes. Age gap relationship is very hot.”

Shane manages to laugh. “At least you didn’t die of old age before Hunter. I think the dinosaur jokes are still fair game.”

They don’t speak for a few moments. Yuna can’t bring herself to move.

“Do you remember it?” Rozanov says hesitantly. He sounds younger than Yuna has ever heard him. “Death.”

Oh.

Shane takes in a shaky breath. He exhales in a pattern Yuna recognizes as a breathing technique for anxiety. David taught it to him when he was eight and being kept up at night by panic attacks.

“It was not what I expected,” Rozanov continues. “I had thought about it a lot, you know. Thought I’d get to see my мама (mama) again.”

“Ilya…”

Rozanov tries to burrow further into the blanket, but Shane props himself up on an elbow and leans over him, peeling enough of the fabric away to free his face. Skin brushes against skin as Shane clears away his tears.

“It was not peaceful. Was not easier than living. I do not know why I ever thought it could be,” Rozanov admits. “Was just dark and lonely. Until I felt you, and then I was even sadder. I wanted to be with you again, but not like that.”

“Yeah,” Shane murmurs. “I mean for me, the first thing I felt was relief. I can’t lie about that.”

Yuna’s heart shatters. Rozanov’s does too, if the wounded noise he makes is any indication. Shane presses a kiss to the shell of Rozanov’s ear to soothe him. “It was brief and mostly because I sensed your presence again for the first time. But it wasn’t enough. I missed kissing you, touching you, laughing with you.”

“I missed these too. Very hard to do when you have no body.”

“We agree then?” Shane’s voice wobbles. “That death was terrible and not worth rushing towards? That it won’t solve anything even if it feels like it will?”

Rozanov exhales slowly. Sadly. “My Шаня (Shanya). I am not cured. Maybe I will never be. But I am no longer scared of being like my мама, (mama) no matter how bad it hurts. I will just remember that lonely place where I could not reach you, and I will find help.”

“Good. That’s – that’s good, Ilya, that’s all I could ask for. Call me, call Galina, call Sveta, call your team. Hell, call my parents now that they know. Anyone. Everyone. We’ll all come running.”

“Yes. But my love, you should take this advice too. I cannot stop thinking about you wasting away in that bed.” Rozanov’s voice cracks. “It scares me how I ruined you. You have family and friends that love you and yet you did not lean on them. You let me kill you. You cannot do that again.”

“Can we pinky promise?” Shane asks in a small voice. “We’ll trust each other, we’ll get help, and we’ll stay alive. Let’s swear on it.”

“This is not the custom in Russia,” Rozanov says just to be difficult. He pokes a hand out of his cocoon and links their fingers. “We do special phrase when making promises instead. Repeat after me. Бля буду.”

Clumsily, Shane works through the short phrase. “What does it mean?”

“I will be a whore if I lie,” Rozanov grins. “I could not use this phrase when I was younger, but I have been retired whore for a long time now.”

“Jesus Christ, Ilya!”

Rozanov grins and untangles their pinkies before kissing each of Shane’s fingertips. His lips trail down the lines of his palm and he licks the thin skin between each finger. Shane shivers and starts making that happy purring sound again.

“So we’re going to stay alive for as long as we possibly can, right? Just to clarify. Like, you’re going to quit smoking and start listening to me when I tell you to go for early colonoscopy screenings?”

“Yes, sweetheart. I will make sure we are first people to live to five hundred years old. We are spiritual mystery already, why not add medical mystery. We can get banned together from elderly hockey clubs for skating circles around everyone else. We will terrorize nursing home with hot old man sex. You can keep track of all the medicine we need to keep our bodies working and I can stock our home with brain games to keep us sharp. Everyone will hate us and it will be perfect.”

“I know you’re joking, but that sounds really nice. I want to grow old with you. I want all of that and more.”

Rozanov tries to laugh it off, but his voice is thick with emotion. “Even the nursing home sex?”

Shane leans down and kisses him deep. “Especially the nursing home sex. Old people fuck all the time. So much that STDs are on the rise in senior centers and other facilities for the elderly.”

“Of course you would know that.” Rozanov sounds impossibly fond.

“It was on the news!”

Rozanov rustles under the blanket. He rotates in his blanket burrito until he’s facing Shane. The back of the couch still blocks Yuna from view.

He licks a playful stripe up the side of Shane’s neck and grins when it earns him a shudder. Stretching out his words, he drawls. “So. I hear your soul is stuck to mine?”

“It’s the other way around, actually. Your soul wouldn’t let go of me. You’re the one obsessed with me.” Shane sounds entirely too thrilled by the prospect.

Rozanov laughs, small and sincere. “You have caught my red hands.”

“Caught you red-handed, you mean.”

“Yes, officer.” Rozanov squirms under the blankets like he’s trying to salute but can’t free his arm enough. “God you are so hot when you are know-it-all.”

Shane snorts. “Control yourself. We’re in my parents’ house.”

“Mmm. I don’t think is what you reeeally want.”

Yuna’s face flushes and she nearly takes that as her cue to turn tail and flee back to the safety of David’s snoring. But the sexual tension mellows out again.

“Is nice idea though, да (yes)?” Rozanov nips a mark underneath Shane’s jaw. “Me and you. Inseparable. No one can deny anymore that we are perfect match, our souls are literally bonded. Fuck you, Rose Landry.”

“Oh my god. Leave her alone!”

Ilya rolls his eyes. “Fuck her. Actually please do not, I was so miserable. But fuck the rivalry and fuck the league. They don’t know us.”

Shane kisses him once, twice. “Yeah. I like that there’s no doubt how much we belong to each other. Even after we die, we’ll be together.” Three times. Four. “Though I obviously want to live a long life with you before we get there.”

“I feel it, a little bit. The bond.” Rozanov pauses. “Is that crazy? I have always thought that I carry you in my heart. A little piece of Shane wherever I go, nagging me about smoking and speed limits. It just feels more real now.”

“Baby, this whole situation is crazy. Maybe being soul-linked is why we could never stay away from each other, even when it was casual. Even when we knew it was such a bad idea.”

“Was never casual for me.” Rozanov blanches under the look Shane fixes on him. “Casual with others for some years, ok yes, but never casual with you. Too many feelings involved. I liked you too much from the start. I was very stupid boy.”

“I guess I don’t need to feel retroactively jealous anymore since I know you’re stuck with me for good.” Shane hums playfully. “Do you think we still need to get married, or are we past that? I guess a soul-bond doesn’t really hold up on legal documents.”

Marriage. Yuna nearly staggers back at the casual use of the word. She’d barely seen her son talk to girls, let alone seriously enough to consider marriage before. She was worried that even if he wanted to settle down, he’d never find someone who truly understood him and loved all his quirks and eccentricities.

But here he is, talking about marrying Ilya Rozanov someday like it’s always been in the cards for them.

Like he’s always known he was the one.

“Любимый (Darling!)!” Rozanov shrieks, scandalized. “How could you say that!”

“What? I’m feeling pretty secure here,” Shane teases, but he can’t keep the amusement out of his voice. “No one else can say their soul is fused with Ilya Rozanov. Marriage is just paper, it’s not nearly as cool.”

“Noooo! Don’t you dare. Take it back! You have to make honest man out of me!” Rozanov wiggles in Shane’s arms like a fussy kid. “I want to be Mr. Shane Hollander so so bad. I already practiced new signature. You cannot deprive me of this.”

“Okay, fine!” Shane giggles, finally breaking his flimsy poker face. “But we will have to change the vows. Death can’t part us. It’s already tried.”

Rozanov hums. “Ok. We brainstorm better vows. Or I get to altar and say to hell with talking, is obvious nothing can take my Shane away from me. Of course I will love him through sickness and health, blah blah blah, this is a given. Let me skip to kissing my husband.”

“So romantic,” Shane deadpans. He dips his head to capture Rozanov’s lips, again and again. “I love you too.”

Yuna goes back to bed without her water. She doesn’t sleep.

Chapter End Notes

i hope i'm getting yuna's complexities across -- i think shane gets a lot of his rigidity/resistance to change + his one-track-mindedness from her. so even though shes smart enough to put all the pieces together, she just Refuses to update her worldview unless presented with undeniable proof. i also think grief is twisting her perspective a LOT. she's mourning the relationship she thought she had with her son, plus actually going through his death and feeling helpless and out of control. she's in such deep denial she just wants everything to return how (she thought) it was before. but she's getting there!!! :')

also i had to slip in my personal agenda (little spoon ilya) <333

i'm so touched and honored by the amount of love this fic (and honestly all of my HR fics lately!!!) has been getting especially on the last chapter!!!!!!! thank u endlessly to everyone who comments, kudoses, recommends, links, reviews, etc etc. i always write to satisfy myself but i share for all of u, so thank u for making it such a lovely and rewarding experience (´,,•ω•,,)♡

 
twitter: pixeljunnie
alterspring: pixinoa

oh i grabbed a few pet names from here! great resource. i thought 'my crumb' was soooo adorable but i almost used Булочка моя (my bun/muffin) hahaha

Chapter 4: Terms and Conditions Apply

Chapter Summary

“I am sorry you found him.”

Chapter Notes

making good on my promise (the YUNA ILYA HEALINGS YAY tag)

The next day, the Hollanders and Rozanov get down to business. The relieved tears of reunion have dried, and the reality of their situation is hitting them again.

The Hollanders are harboring a dead man.

It’s not like they can thrust Rozanov back into the public eye and say haha whoops, you know that horrible plane crash? The one that had zero survivors? The most famous man on board actually did survive, without even a scratch. He’s just been hiding out with his coincidentally depressed rival with whom he definitely has no other notable relationship. Plus said rival’s family. For months. Letting the whole world grieve him and not saying a word.

Right. That will get Rozanov killed all over again and probably throw the Hollanders in jail.

So Rozanov stays dead to the world. He can’t go home, but he can’t hide in the Hollanders’ Ottawa house forever. Yuna goes to get groceries one morning and feels like every single eye is boring a portal straight through her shopping bag to what’s waiting for her at home.

She can just picture the fan accounts. Yuna Hollander buying Ilya Rozanov’s favorite brand of chips. Going to a specialty shop to pick up the weird congealed meat jelly he apparently likes to snack on between workouts. Any little move, under the wrong eyes, could expose her family.

Fan speculation becomes web articles, which spin into real headlines, which manifest into phone calls she can’t answer and public scrutiny that could tear them apart.

Yuna would love to dust her hands of the situation. After all, it’s not her son haunting the world. No one knows about Shane’s death, let alone his undeath. He could drive to Montreal right now and show up to morning skate and be welcomed with open arms. Probably.

She could kick Ilya Rozanov to the curb – drive him to his Ottawa mansion – and tell him good luck. Maybe set him up with an agent who knows how to keep their mouth shut, if she’s feeling charitable.

But then she remembers soft blankets and TV volume dialed low and her awkward son saying I love you to someone other than his mama and even though it felt like a dream after the light of dawn finally illuminated her room, she knows her Shane doesn’t say things he doesn’t mean.

Yuna still has her doubts about their relationship pre-plane crash. That doesn’t change the fact that this Shane and Rozanov are clearly…something. Lovers, or something of that ilk. So Yuna tries to go with the flow, something she is infamous for not being able to do, and work around this new version of the Hollander-Rozanov dynamic.

Which means not abandoning Ilya Rozanov.

Unfortunately.

“We need a plan,” is how Yuna gracefully opens the dinner conversation. “Rozanov can’t stay here forever.”

Rozanov’s shoulders slump as if he had been expecting their hospitality to have a limit. The flash of hurt on his face is so quick Yuna wonders if she’s making it up before his aura toughens again.

Shane’s fork scrapes against the plate. Everyone else cringes at the sound, but it’s like he doesn’t even hear it. “What.”

David jumps in to save her. “Your mother doesn’t mean it in a bad way. Realistically, we can’t keep Rozanov shut away in this house forever. We have neighbors, colleagues, friends. Even if he never goes outside again, which isn’t healthy or safe, someone is bound to see him. Rozanov, don’t you feel even a little cooped up?”

Rozanov shrugs. He twists up another forkful of spaghetti and shoves it in his mouth to avoid answering. After a beat of silence, he finally offers up a gruff, “Shane is here.”

Shane’s separation anxiety has eased to the point where he can sit on his own chair at mealtimes, but Yuna catches his ankle hooking around Rozanov’s under the table.

“My cottage,” Shane says suddenly. “It’s much more private. We could pretend we’re on vacation while we figure out what to do next.”

Yuna’s brows furrow. Shane’s cottage is his sanctuary. He’s incredibly strict about who comes and goes, and even his parents are barely allowed. The last few years he’s taken silent retreats there during his summers, only surfacing for the occasional dinner at Yuna and David’s cottage down the street. Not even Hayden has been to the cottage, and now he’s going to take Rozanov?

“Honey, are you sure?”

Shane tilts his head like she’s the odd one here. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Yuna glances at Rozanov, who is staring down at his pasta without a hint of acknowledgement as to how special this invitation is. She tries not to let that irk her.

“I know our cottage is close by, but I think your mother and I are still a bit nervous about leaving you alone. Nothing against you Rozanov. The last few months were hard on everyone.”

“Is okay. Shane? You have many guest rooms, they can stay with us, yes?”

Shane’s eyes flick between Yuna and David, then to Rozanov, then back to his parents. His head bobbles a little in what seems to be a nod, but his jaw is clenched and his knuckles are turning white around his silverware.

With a shuddering breath, he pushes his chair away and bends over to hide his face in his folded arms.

“Shane?” Rozanov’s fork clatters against his plate, spraying out a foot-wide radius of parmesan cheese. Without sparing a glance across the table, he claps a big hand against the nape of Shane’s neck.

“Breathe, солнышко. (sunshine) I will count and you will follow.”

Who does Rozanov think he is, ordering Shane around like that? It rubs Yuna the wrong way, but before she can yell at him, she notices how Shane melts under the display of authority.

Rozanov counts slow and gentle until Shane matches his breathing. All the while, he rubs circles against Shane’s skin to ground him. Once Shane has come back to Earth, obvious by the embarrassed red tinge to the tip of his ears, Rozanov hooks his finger around his jaw and presses a chaste kiss to his lips.

“We can stay here,” he says quietly. “I find disguise instead. Russians, we are great spies, will be no problem for me to go undercover. I can dye my hair black. Or shave it off. Boom! Ilya Rozanov is no more.”

Shane cracks a smile. “But I like your curls.”

Rozanov tries not to look too pleased at that. “You would not love me if I was bald?”

“I’d love you less,” Shane rolls his eyes, but he’s grinning. He pulls himself upright like a wilted flower tasting rain. “Although you’d probably pull it off. You’re annoying like that.”

“I could find very good plastic surgeon. Make Lily real.” Rozanov waggles his eyebrows. The joke goes over Yuna’s head, but obviously not Shane’s, because his cheeks erupt with color.

“That’s enough from you,” Shane says in a high voice. Rozanov’s mouth snaps shut instantly.

Interesting.

“We’re coming to the cottage,” Shane decides. It looks like the weight of the world has been lifted off his shoulders. “Ilya is right. We have plenty of space. It’ll be nice.”

Rozanov beams. Shane kisses him. David tops off Rozanov’s glass of vodka. Yuna stares into her pasta like it can arrange itself into the answers she needs.

After dinner, Yuna manages to catch Shane’s arm on his way out of the kitchen. She searches his face for any signs of uncertainty. There’s nothing, but she still has to ask.

“You really want Rozanov at your cottage?”

Shane’s expression shutters. “Yes, mom. And by the way, I think you can call the most important person in my life by his first name.”

That sends Yuna reeling. She’s – she’s not the most important person in his life? She knew, of course she knew that one day her baby boy would grow up and find someone else to center his world around. She was excited for it, even.

She just thought she’d be eased into it more.

A close friend into a girlfriend into a wife into a family of his own to focus on. Someone she would gradually grow close to, learn to respect both as their own person and as her son’s partner. Someone she could trust to take the reins.

This feels like being plunged into cold water without ever realizing she was in a dunk tank.

“Okay,” she whispers, because there’s no other way this conversation ends. Shane squeezes her hand. She barely feels it.

(It isn’t until they’re halfway through packing that it hits Yuna. She drops a bottle of shampoo and it explodes all over the bathroom.

“Lily?!”)

_____________________

Shane’s cottage is not what Yuna remembers.

Granted, it’s been a few years since she’s actually been inside, but the last time she visited it still had the carefully manicured aura of a hired interior designer. Much like his Montreal apartment, everything was set up perfectly. Shane bought all the right art pieces, all the finest furniture, all the throw pillows and fancy chairs listed on catalogs that famous people buy from. It was like he was checking all the boxes he assumed he had to.

The cottage was tailored to Shane’s tastes, but that showed more in the facilities than anything else. He designed his own well, built a beautiful dock into the lake, constructed recreation areas, and made sure each room had the perfect amount of natural light.

But he only stays there in small bursts, never long enough to make it feel truly lived in.

That seems to have changed. There are sweatshirts in his closet that Yuna doesn’t recognize. Extra manual toothbrushes in the drawers, when she knows he prefers electric. Scented body wash in the shower even though fragrance breaks out his skin.

When they arrive, Rozanov – Ilya – immediately toes off his shoes and stacks them on the rack by the door. Shane pats his head in approval.

“Home sweet home!” Rozanov Ilya chimes as he struts through the mansion. The layout isn’t particularly confusing, but he still navigates like he already knows his way around. He flops onto the couch and buries his face in a pillow, inhaling deeply.

“Does anyone want a drink?” Shane calls from the kitchen. At everyone’s noises of assent, he starts distributing the goods.

When he yanks the fridge open, Yuna spots a neat row of Cokes lining the door. She doesn’t even have time to be puzzled before Shane is handing one of the cans to R…Ilya. Damn.

This is going to take some adjustment.

Despite Yuna’s initial misgivings, it becomes abundantly clear that the cottage was the right move. Rozanov-Ilya comes alive under the late April sunshine. He kicks a ball around with Shane outside. Despite both of them being professional athletes, their coordination skills apparently don’t apply to anything other than pucks, so they end up clumsily punting the ball into the bushes.

But Shane is laughing harder than Yuna has ever heard. Ilya, who has ended up sprawled on the ground after completely missing the ball and kicking himself off balance, just grins back.

With Shane above him, head perfectly blocking the sun and edging his frame in afternoon glow, Ilya melts. “Pretty halo. Like an angel.”

Shane stops laughing. “I don’t want to be an angel. I want to stay here with you.”

Ilya stares up at him. Then his leg darts out and sweeps Shane’s feet out from under him. Shane collapses over Ilya and they roll around until they’re covered in dirt and grass stains like a couple of rowdy neighborhood boys.

“Then stay.”

On his back, Ilya traps his willing victim in his arms and squeezes. Shane is putty long enough to make Ilya lower his guard before he plants both hands on the ground and surges forward to bite the tip of Ilya’s nose.

Ilya’s jaw drops. “Bad kitty!”

They roughhouse for a few more minutes before Yuna calls them inside to wash up before dinner. The boys traipse past her, still bickering. The nervous edge in Ilya’s eyes when he normally interacts with Yuna is gone. He’s high on Shane, Shane, Shane.

The joy radiates off both of them. Shane looks as carefree as he did the day he first stepped on ice, before league rankings and scouts and legacies muddied the waters.

Yuna thumbs away a smudge of dirt on Shane’s cheekbone. His eyes scrunch up in a mixture of embarrassment and pleasure. He leans into the touch and Yuna savors every second.

Ilya grills up dinner with David while Shane and Yuna set the patio table. “See?” Ilya points to the assembly line of waiting burgers. “Recipe makes twelve, but we are not football team, so we cut it in half. Easy!”

“Will you ever let that go?” Shane swats at his shoulder.

“Never.” Ilya purses his lips and smacks them together, pestering Shane until he earns a kiss.

The boys tuck into the burgers with gusto. The air is starting to warm with the promise of incoming summer, but the chill rolling off the lake has all of them pulling on their sweatshirts. Oddly, Shane takes the Centaurs hoodie while Ilya begrudgingly dons the mark of his enemy, Montreal.

Wind rustles softly through the trees lining the lake. The water is still, only disturbed by ducks gliding towards the opposite edge. Toads croak as evening descends on them. A bird calls from the neighboring forest, and scares Ilya so bad he chokes on his burger.

“Every fucking time,” he grumbles into his next bite. Yuna wonders if there’s anywhere else he could’ve heard a loon before. She’s pretty sure his house in Ottawa is in the middle of the city without much wildlife nearby.

Ilya clears the dinner table without being asked. After putting everything away, they go to set up their respective rooms. Yuna pauses when they enter the guest room she’s sharing with David. It slipped her mind that they used some of Shane’s spare rooms for storage. It’s mostly overflow from his childhood.

“Oh, I forgot about those. You can use the room next door if you want?” Shane pops up next to her. Ilya trails after him obediently.

“It’s fine. We should probably go through this stuff anyways.”

Yuna slices open a box of books. Shane doesn’t read much anymore, so they should probably donate it to a local library.

Surprisingly, Ilya is very intrigued by the boxes. He pulls out a book of idioms that they got for Shane when he was younger, and looks at it quizzically.

“Shane was a very literal child,” Yuna explains fondly. “I once said that a woman talked my ear off, and he was beside himself because he thought my ear had actually fallen off. It was really cute, but also made it hard for him to understand some social interactions, so we got him a little translation guide.”

“Hmm,” Ilya says meaningfully.

“What? He gets it from me.”

“Hmm,” David echoes.

Well now Yuna feels ganged up on. They continue rooting through the boxes, pretending not to notice Ilya slipping more than one photograph of little Shane into his pocket. They snicker over the comment on Shane’s fourth grade report card – a nice boy with highly anxious tendencies – and unearth some old art projects that are little more than sentimental blobs of clay.

At one point Ilya pauses at a brown paper bag decorated to look like a man. Hapy Father’s Daye! is written on the back in messy children’s scrawl. Yuna vaguely remembers it as a craft in Shane’s second grade class.

“I bet all your childhood stuff is at home in Russia, huh?” David comments.

A wistful glimmer crosses Ilya’s eyes. He seems so young, all of a sudden, so far away from home. Yuna’s heart twinges.

“No,” he says simply. “And Russia is not home anymore.”

With that, Yuna decides they’ve unpacked enough for one night. She goes to bed, stares at the ceiling, and wonders what Ilya Rozanov was like as a child.

Time passes in a peaceful haze. The original reason for coming to the cottage gets shelved because no one wants to think about death certificates or media strategies when the sun is shining and the air is fresh.

Well, Yuna is always thinking about brand reactions and public opinion. Shane has just looked so bright lately and she hasn’t wanted to dampen that by reminding him that his partner – boyfriend? Fiancé? They clearly talked about marriage, but Yuna wants to believe she would know if they had already proposed – is technically dead.

In the end, Yuna isn’t the one that reminds him.

They decide to turn the television on for the playoffs. Everyone has been abiding by the unspoken rule to stay off social media or any source of news. Neither Shane nor Ilya have anything to gain from reading fan speculations and somber memorial posts.

However, the lack of hockey is starting to get to them. Yuna feels the itch too. Usually by this point in the season she’s knee-deep in strategic analysis, cheering her son through his playoff series or keeping a careful eye on other teams to make predictions about who will be taking it home this time.

She used to bond with Shane over hockey. Now, as they sit down for a game as a quartet, maybe it’ll bring her closer to Ilya too.

It’s the second round of the playoffs, with New York facing Toronto. The program opens with an acknowledgement to Toronto’s fellow Canadian teams.

“Canada’s hockey representation in the Eastern conference has been plagued with tragedy this year. The nation’s hopes now rest with Toronto, in light of the sudden passing of Ilya Rozanov from the Ottawa Centaurs, and the withdrawal of Montreal Voyageurs’ Shane Hollander from the remainder of the season.”

“Boo!” Ilya throws a piece of organic popcorn at the screen. Like a nice boy, he immediately picks it up. “They do not know me at all. I would rather Wise Elder Scott Hunter win a billion times over shitty Toronto.”

Then the screen changes, and Ilya goes impossibly still.

“Despite the horrific loss of their captain, the Centaurs rallied hard for the end of their season. Zane Boodram stepped up as alternate captain, though he refused to officially take the C over from the late Rozanov.”

A clip of Boodram at a post-game presser is edited in. There’s a box of tissues in front of him. Actually, every Centaur on the panel seems to have one. Boodram sniffles wetly. “No way are we replacing Roz. He’s still our Cap, even if he’s chirping from above.”

“More like below,” Troy Barrett cuts in. He’s teary-eyed too. “I swear whenever I’m about to give up during drills, I hear him yelling at me to keep going or else he’ll tweet until our social media manager quits. He makes us better every day, even when he’s not here in person. We couldn’t ask for a better guy to lead us. Every game we play is for him.”

“We miss you, Cap,” Luca Haas adds quietly.

Against the voiceover, the program flashes various clips. The Centaurs and Svetlana acting as pallbearers, carrying Ilya’s empty coffin. Hundreds of mourning posts, highlight reels of Ilya’s career, and photos of memorials peppering cities across the globe. There are endless flowers, stuffed animals, and little flasks of vodka offered up in Ilya’s name.

The screen fades back to the somber-looking commentators. “In an enormous showing of strength after hardship, the Centaurs went on to earn themselves their first playoff spot in decades. While the absence of their star center knocked them out early, it’s still quite the feat for the underdog of the league.”

Another post-game presser plays next, and Yuna’s stomach sinks. There’s no audio on this one, just the sickly color of Shane’s face and a single word on his wobbling lip.

Crash?

“Rozanov’s greatest rival, Shane Hollander, also found his season cut short this year. Hollander’s last public sighting was the day Rozanov’s plane went down. He appeared visibly shaken when learning about the incident via reporters after a game, and went on long-term injury recovery soon after. Very little has been said by the Voyageurs or the Hollander family with regards to his hiatus or level of involvement in further team activities. The Voyageurs struggled to find their footing without their captain and missed the playoffs for the first time in years. Our thoughts are with both the Hollander and Rozanov families. After everything, everyone in Canada is hoping Toronto will make us proud tonight. It’s been smooth sailing for them since—“

David is the first to react. He shuts the TV off and gently pries Yuna’s nails out of her palm. Shane is gripping his ginger ale so hard it has dented beyond recognition. Beside her, Ilya has gone silent in the same terrifying way that Shane did after he lost the will to interact with the world.

“Stupid boys,” Ilya sniffs. “I was terrible captain. This was perfect chance to get rid of me.”

The fault lines in Yuna’s heart deepen, then slice straight through to the other side. There’s no trace of modesty in Ilya’s tone. He genuinely believes he doesn’t deserve to be remembered as a good leader, a good person.

“You must have done something right. They clearly love you.” Yuna lays a hesitant hand on Ilya’s arm. He doesn’t shake her off like she half-expects.

“They shouldn’t. I hurt them.”

“Sometimes,” she searches for the right words. Maybe there aren’t any. “Sometimes you hurt the people you love. It doesn’t make them love you any less.”

Every time Shane looked at her with those empty eyes, every time he ignored her pleas for him to get help, every time he turned away when he heard her open the door, Yuna hurt. She kept digging in her well of love, pouring everything she had into him, expecting one day to come up dry.

She never did. She hurt, and she loved, and she hurt and she loved and she hurt so deeply and she always loved again.

Somehow.

Ilya beckons for David’s phone, since his own is currently scattered in charred bits and pieces somewhere over Ottawa. He scrolls and scrolls, other hand tightening around Shane’s with every swipe. Dumbfounded, he says, “I did not realize so many people would miss me.”

With a pang, Yuna thinks about Shane’s quiet hospital room. About the outpouring of love and support from his fans, but the meager attempts to reach out from his team. Even visits from his closest friends grew sparser and sparser as they lost hope in his progress.

Alone, Shane had sobbed about Ilya. It was one of his last words. But in life, in death, and in his legacy, Ilya was surrounded by people.

At the end of it all, it was Shane who suffered alone.

“Fuck, Ilya.” Shane clambors onto his lap and cradles him against his chest. “You’re fucking crazy if you thought you could leave us all behind and we wouldn’t bat an eye.”

Ilya locks the phone again and casts it aside. He stares at the dark television screen, still processing. “My coach, my team, Sveta. Is hard to see them grieve when I am right here.”

“Do you want to call Sveta?” Shane twists his fingers through Ilya’s curls. “I trust she can keep a secret.”

Although he looks pained to do it, Ilya shakes his head. “Not yet. She will track me down and beat my ass. And I have to be ready to face the world again before I undo all the healing she has gone through. It will wound her all over again and I cannot be reckless when I do it.”

“We’ll work on it,” David promises. “We’ll find a good excuse to have you back in the mortal realm.”

Finally, Ilya tries on a wobbly smile. “Everyone will be very embarrassed when I come back from the grave. No more pretending like I actually irritate them. I have seen them all ugly cry over me now.”

That earns a snort from Yuna. Hockey players are notoriously allergic to sincerity and emotions. She foresees a lot of Instagram posts getting quietly archived after the big reveal.

In sharp contrast to the airs he puts on, it seems like Ilya doesn’t think highly of himself.

Maybe Yuna will go through and screenshot messages of support from his fans and colleagues before they reintroduce Ilya to the land of the living. She can put together a collection of nice words for him to read on bad days, when he’s convinced himself he’s worthless to the world.

She remembers him promising Shane that he’d never feel like that again after experiencing the unfulfillment of death. That doesn’t mean it will always be easy for him to fight those thoughts off.

It doesn’t mean Yuna can’t help in her own way.

Shane and Ilya remain wrapped around each other for the rest of the night. Eventually, David turns the TV back on. They mute everything that isn’t active gameplay, and find a rocky rhythm between ripping apart Toronto and discussing some injuries on New York’s roster.

Everyone tries to act as normal as possible, but the specter of Ilya’s funeral proceedings and Shane’s stricken face in that press room loom over them.

Yuna can’t sleep that night. Every time she closes her eyes she sees her son’s glassy-eyed stare. He dies over and over again on the back of her eyelids.

Shane and Ilya have started sleeping in their own bedroom again. It’s been difficult to have a door block her line of sight. She just has to trust that the night will pass smoothly and Shane will wake up in the morning.

But once trust is broken, it’s extremely difficult to rebuild.

Like she’s been doing every night since they got to the cottage, Yuna slips out of bed and creeps towards the master bedroom. She listens intently for any sign of activity. The last thing she wants is to walk in on them during an…intimate moment, just because she’s traumatized by her son dying in his sleep. She doesn’t need more emotional scarring.

Gingerly, she turns the handle and peeks into the room. The two lumps in the blankets are shrouded in darkness. Just seeing them in bed isn’t enough. She needs irrefutable proof of her son still breathing before she can rest.

Easing the door shut behind her, Yuna tiptoes further into the room. She stands at the side of their bed, feeling uncomfortably like a child in their parents’ bedroom after a bad dream.

Shane’s death was worse than a nightmare, though, because she never woke up.

Shane is laying on the far side of the bed from Yuna, flat on his back. Ilya is curled against him with his head pillowed on Shane’s pec. He has one arm thrown across Shane’s stomach and their legs are slotted together.

Yuna stares into the pitch black until she sees the gentle rise and fall of Shane’s chest, the soft puffs of air escaping his parted lips. She prays her eyes aren’t playing tricks on her in the dark. Leaning closer closer closer, she hangs onto every twitch, every sigh, every sign of life. As if seeing will prevent it from happening again.

“I am sorry you found him.”

Yuna leaps back with a gasp, hand pressed over her racing heart. Ilya’s eyes are open. How long have they been open?

How long has she been standing here?

Ilya presses a kiss to Shane’s bare chest before slowly and tenderly extracting himself from his grip. Sensing the loss of warmth, Shane lets out an irritated whine in his sleep. Ilya runs a fond hand through Shane’s scruffy hair as he shushes him.

Yuna pointedly averts her eyes from the teeth marks exposed around Shane’s nipple. “I didn’t mean to disturb you. I’m so sorry. I just…needed to see him. Alive.”

“Is ok. I understand. I am sorry you found him,” Ilya repeats. “No one should ever have to find the body of someone they love.”

Yuna senses a story there. When Ilya doesn’t throw her out, she decides to perch on the edge of the bed.

Ilya seems torn on how much to divulge. Perhaps the late hour or the emotionally charged evening have loosened the chains around his heart. “I did the same thing after I lost my мама. (mama) I found her in her bed. She took so many pills and made sure no one would find her until it was too late. I just hugged her until the cops came. She was so cold.”

Oh, God.

Yuna suddenly recalls the devastated look on Ilya’s face when he heard about Shane’s death. Tell me it was not your choice, he had begged.

Ilya looks up sharply, stricken. “She did not expect me to find her. I do not want you to think she was cruel. I was home early, my practice was cancelled.”

Yuna furiously blinks away tears. “I don’t think she was cruel. I think she was in pain.”

Ilya hesitates, then nods. “I saw her body in my dreams every night after we buried her. I would wake up and check her room hoping to find her alive under the covers. I was twelve, so I had not slept in мама’s (mama’s) bed for many years, but I imagined climbing in with her and listening to her breathe as she slept. But she was never there.”

Twelve. God. Ilya discovered the scene of his mother’s suicide at just twelve years old. He held her, like Yuna held Shane. He grieved her, like Yuna grieved Shane. He prayed every night for her to come back to him, like Yuna prayed for Shane.

Yuna’s ghost opened his eyes again.

Ilya’s ghost stayed dead.

“I’m so sorry,” Yuna manages to squeeze around the lump in her throat. She dives forward to gather Ilya up in her arms. His body goes limp against her and she feels her shoulder growing damp. When she presses a kiss to his forehead, he chokes on a sob.

Yuna wonders how long it’s been since Ilya has felt a mother’s warmth.

She vaguely remembers a sullen Ilya flanked by an older man and a concerningly younger woman at fancy league events. If his father remarried, it does not seem like he ever grew close to his stepmother.

“I do not blame you if you check on him every night for the rest of his life,” Ilya says. “I would do the same if мама (mama) came back. But I want you know I am checking on him too. I watch him fall asleep and often wake up before him to see him breathe. I am always listening. He is the most important person in my life and I will always protect him. I promise. I love him.”

“I know.” It’s not a lie. After peeking under Ilya’s brash exterior, she can’t deny how much this man adores her son. No matter what she used to think of him from the other side of the rink, all that matters to her is how well he takes care of Shane. “Thank you, Ilya. I’m glad he has someone like you looking out for him.”

Ilya sniffles. “I am glad he has you, too. I could always tell there was love in his home. Is special, to have family like you.”

Well damn if that doesn’t make Yuna feel proud and heartbroken all over again.

“Ilya. You deserve a family too. You have one here.” She’s not sure what possesses her to say it. A brief bolt of regret runs through her as she fears being presumptuous, but Ilya’s arms only tighten around her.

“You remind me of her when you say my name,” he confesses out of nowhere. Seemingly equally shocked by his words, he draws back and tries to scrub at his cheeks to mask their redness. “I mean. Obviously you are not Russian, you do not sound Russian. Ignore me. Is very late at night.”

Impossibly, Yuna understands what he means. She remembers the first time David’s parents called her name. Yuh-nah, they had tried, stumbling over the foreign sounds. It was a far cry from how her own parents would say it, but she barely even noticed. All she heard was the warmth in their voices.

It’s when she realized she had been welcomed into the family.

“Get some sleep, Ilya.” Yuna smoothes down his tangled mop of curls. “You don’t need to wake up every time Shane twitches. It’s okay to rest. I could never blame you for that.”

“I see. Sneaky Mrs. Yuna wants to hog the midnight Shane check-ups,” Ilya sulks. She recognizes it as his way of getting her to relax her vigilance as well. Slowly, she’s learning to read him.

“Fine. We’ll both sleep through the night and trust Shane’s heart to handle itself. If we’re worried or restless, we can confide in each other. I make a mean cup of chamomile tea, and there are always game tapes to critique. We’ll protect Shane together, but we’ll take care of ourselves at the same time. Promise?”

She offers a pinky. Ilya hooks his massive finger around hers with a sober nod. He doesn’t make her recite the Russian vow. She grins. He’s a good boy after all. Take that, tabloids.

“Good night, Ilya.”

Yuna goes back to bed as a mother of two.

(The next morning finds her searching up the proper Russian way to pronounce Ilya. She’s been putting the stress on the wrong syllable this whole time – not that she’s been calling him by his first name for very long.

Two syllables. Eel-YAH. She mutters it under her breath until the shape of it feels comfortable in her mouth.

“Good morning Ilya,” she says as casually as possible. She tries to discreetly monitor his reaction from the corner of her eye.

He does a double take. Then, a smile breaks out on his face that makes his whole presence glow.

Yuna can’t replace his mother. But she hopes when she calls his name, he hears just a little bit of her in Yuna’s voice.)

Chapter End Notes

i think the convo between yuna and ilya in this chapter is one of my fave parts of this fic. i honestly didn't even realize the parallels between them two until this fic was well under way, and i was like wow. epic trauma bond. i am really soft for ilya finding his place among the hollanders and when its a lil messy and they have to work for it >>>>> so delicious

fun fact of the day: when this idea first hit me it was originally a hayden pov 🫢 scandaloussss. i dont even remember bc it evolved into this fic so quick but i think the gist was like, hayden majorly fucks up and causes ilyas death and after seeing shane fall apart he searches for a way to bring ilya back, but bc its hayden pike he also fucks that up. i think that version of this fic would be a lot more zombie-ish and body horror compared to this one which ended up much more thru the lens of the hollanders' family dynamics LOL

every time i get a comment on this fic (or see it recommended somewhere out in the wild!!! that makes me lightheaded fr) i do a little happy hop skip and jump around my room hehe its so much fun to see what you guys are thinking!!!! thank you all so much mwahmwahmwah <3333

twitter: pixeljunnie
alterspring: pixinoa

also yes i did get an idioms book from my parents when i was a kid. no i am not diagnosed with anything (yet)

Chapter 5: No Refunds or Exchanges

Chapter Summary

The Ilya Thing, Yuna discovers, is only the tip of the New Shane iceberg.

Chapter Notes

Yuna shows up to the breakfast table with her laptop, a list of lawyers, and a whiteboard. Shane barely looks up from his whole grain oatmeal – or as Ilya calls it, his cattle slop. Said man looks vaguely nervous at the array of colored markers Yuna meticulously arranges in front of her.

David just gives her a kiss and nudges a stray marker back into line. God how she loves this man.

“No more putting it off,” Yuna announces like she’s broadcasting her voice to a stadium. “Ilya Rozanov, we are bringing you back to life.”

Sleepily, Ilya blinks down at his hands, and then back up at her. “I think we have already done this?”

“Well unless you want to be Shane’s attic wife for the rest of your life, we need the outside world to get on board the Ilya Rozanov resurrection ship.”

Ilya perks up at the word wife. Jesus Christ.

Before he gets too lost in whatever fantasy that sparked, Yuna levels him with a stern look. Spine straightening and hands folding politely on the table in front of him, he nods solemnly.

Yuna starts to scribble some notes on the whiteboard. This strategy meeting is secretly a brainstorming session – she actually has no idea what the best path forward is here. “I don’t think we can pretend that Ilya never got on the plane. Traces of his blood were found at the scene, and there will be logs of him boarding. The simpler the story, the less room we give for people to ask questions, the smaller chance of us backing ourselves into a corner.”

“So Ilya boards the plane,” David concludes. “Then what?”

The front of the plane, where Ilya was sitting, was completely pulverized upon impact. There’s no way Ilya is walking away unharmed. No matter how they spin it.

“A couple of things actually work in our favor here.” Yuna switches to a green marker because it feels right. “First, Ilya’s remains were never recovered. Likely scattered or decimated by – actually, it doesn’t matter.”

Ilya sighs in relief. Shane grabs his hand and presses a kiss to his knuckles.

I am sorry you found him.

It probably sets Ilya’s mind at ease that his body was never found. Yuna wishes she could tell him that burying an empty coffin doesn’t spare anyone the pain of losing a loved one.

“It’s horrible, but no one else survived the crash. There’s no one to testify against whatever story we present.”

“No one?” Ilya echoes. His voice barely scrapes the air.

Yuna worries at her lower lip when she sees his eyes cloud over. Maybe she should have approached that more gently. Ilya barely knows anything about the crash, just that it was bad enough to kill him.

Can someone have survivor’s guilt despite not surviving?

“Let’s say Ilya goes to the bathroom mid-flight,” Shane pitches. “Or he switches seats to let people sit together. Some sort of last-minute change that only people on board would know. His survival is a little more believable if we don’t place him at the front with the worst of the damage.”

“The blood spatter?” David points out.

Yuna twirls the marker between her fingers thoughtfully. “We aren’t going to find an explanation for everything. I’m sure investigation crews are using the landing positions of debris to reverse engineer the anatomy of the crash. We can say the bits with Ilya’s blood on them got dispersed by the impact, but we may just have to hand-wave this part. Pick our battles.”

David agrees. “It isn’t our job to understand the crash. And it’s not like the agencies will look a living, breathing Ilya in the eyes and say hmm, your blood was found in the unsurvivable part of the plane, you must have been raised from the dead. A lot of heavy lifting will be done just from seeing Ilya alive.”

“Worst case, we bribe,” Ilya says offhandedly. When the Hollanders snap their heads towards him in horrified unison, he throws up his hands. “What? In Russia is very simple. You want something to go away, you pay.”

“Ilya I work for the government. I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that.”

“We’ll find you a financial counselor, honey.”

“How much?”

Everyone turns to Shane in surprise. He just shrugs and squeezes Ilya’s hand. “I’ll do whatever it takes.”

“Illegal measures are a last resort.” Yuna puts her foot down, but maybe not firmly enough. She can’t believe she’s even putting it on the whiteboard. Moreover, she can’t believe her son – the same little boy who accidentally took a spoon from his grandparents’ house and cried for a week about being a thief – would be in favor of it.

“Do not spend your money on me.” Ilya sours at Shane’s newfound attitude towards the corruption of authority, but for all the wrong reasons. “Fine. No bribes. Boo, you are all so boring! I knew it was genetic.”

Yuna expects to be irritated at the dig towards her family. But Ilya says boring like its the best thing someone can be.

He’s had a rough life. Maybe a little boring is good for the soul.

Back to business. “If we stick with the Ilya-on-the-plane route, we need an explanation for why he’s in such good condition now. Even if he was airlifted to a hospital, he wouldn’t be this healed after only five months.”

Ilya hums casually around his mug of coffee. “You should hit me with car.”

“What?!”

Everyone turns on Ilya again. He has the gall to look confused. “I need injuries to be believable, yes? So I get some injuries. We don’t like car, fine, I fall down stairs. A couple scrapes, maybe a broken bone, plus I fake concussion. Will it match the crash? Meh, maybe not, but is much less suspicious than being perfectly healthy.”

Shane pinches his nose between two fingers. “I take it back. I will do whatever it takes besides causing you bodily harm.”

“Okay, we found a last-er last resort than police bribery.” Yuna scrubs a tired hand over her face. This is going swimmingly.

“The concussion angle isn’t bad,” David says. “If we add amnesia or another type of neurological injury, it’ll make more sense for you to have been alive this whole time without the world knowing.”

“It’s either memory loss or you got stranded in the woods for months and just found civilization again. We’ve been feeding you too well to sell that story.”

Ilya holds up a couple fingers and folds them down as he speaks. “Ok. I board the plane. I have terrible cut on my palm from cooking, and oops! It opens during flight and I bleed on seat. Lovely flight attendant switches me to clean seat at the back of the plane. Crash happens, I am very close to emergency exit, I am thrown out on impact but something breaks my fall? I don’t fucking know I am knocked out at this point so no one ask me about it.”

Yuna leans back. “And the months after?”

“I wake up confused in forest, no memory of who I am or what happened. I wander until I run into my good friend Shane Hollander, who is recovering with wonderful family on this peaceful wilderness retreat. His beautiful face jogs my memory, and we re-enter society together.”

Hmm. It’s corny, but not an entirely bad plan. And it doesn’t require inflicting bodily harm on Ilya, which is a bonus. Probably.

Shane grins with pride. “Look at you, planning like a real Hollander! I must be rubbing off on you.” At the sudden gleam in Ilya’s eyes, Shane raises a hand in warning. “Don’t.”

“Are people really going to believe that you survived alone in the woods, during the winter, for potentially months after a plane crash?” David challenges.

Shrugging, Ilya says, “I am Russian.”

“That explains nothing.”

“I say wilderness preparation is common practice for children in Russia, we are pros at surviving. Ottawa winter is like Moscow summer. I make up bullshit story about fending for myself in the woods as coming of age tradition, foraging berries and drinking from streams, whatever. Not a far stretch for stupid people here, who only know Russia through vodka and war.”

“Fair enough,” Yuna concedes. “But can you convince everyone that you’re buddies with Shane Hollander?”

This finally seems to stump Ilya.

Shane squeezes Ilya’s bicep in support. Or just to touch his muscles. “We could work this in our favor, actually. We’ve been trying to figure out how to shift the narrative of our rivalry. I have a, uh, a reputation for being a kind person.” Adorably, Shane’s face flames red as he praises himself. Outside of hockey, where his ego has been deservedly inflated since he was young and a prodigy, he’s quite humble. “Even if we actually hated each other, I wouldn’t abandon someone in need of help. Everyone should be able to agree on that.”

“You just want to be Universally Beloved Canadian Superhero,” Ilya complains. Shane smacks his arm, then goes back to squeezing. He’s definitely just feeling him up at this point.

“Shut up, this is a good angle. I find you and take you in while we try to understand what happened. While you’re here, healing physically and emotionally, we realize we have more in common than we thought. Trauma brings people closer together. People will buy that.”

“Ok. So my new friend Shane Hollander,” Ilya amends, “he is very private person, you see. He has personal doctors who treat me. They legally can’t release information about this. So sad for media. I go on Zoom interview with fake casts. I say, um, maybe that Hollander doctors advised I lay low until memories return fully. Stress disrupts healing process or something. League must accept that I could not mess around about head injuries.”

“I like this better than the car idea,” Yuna offers. Everyone nods in agreement except Ilya, who rolls his eyes. “The forest where the plane crashed is pretty thick and isolated, but it’s not that far from where we could feasibly have been camping after the search was called off. And it’s good that this explanation avoids the issue of you not being recognized or caught on camera while you were ‘concussed’. You don’t exactly blend into the crowd.” She scribbles a few final notes on the whiteboard to bring it all together, then nods approvingly. “Good work.”

Ilya beams at the praise. “So, what next? We do a press conference? I just go to grocery store and wait for people to notice me? We find shit hockey podcast and do tell-all?”

Crossing her arms, Yuna thinks. It would probably be best to reach out to Centaurs management first, then Ilya’s close friends and family – just his friends, maybe. It’ll be harder to sell them the story, especially the Cens. Upper management will want an explanation for not informing them immediately, and the medical team will be sorely disappointed when the Hollanders’ imaginary private doctor can’t forward them Ilya’s record.

But it’s better to start with Ilya’s inner circle to mitigate the betrayal they’ll feel when the news goes public.

Before Yuna can voice any of this, Shane speaks up. “Can we…can we hold off for a little longer?”

Ilya quirks a brow. Shane scooches closer, winding both arms around Ilya and nuzzling his face into his neck. “I want more time,” he confesses to Ilya’s collarbone. “Just us. It’ll be a shitshow once we start telling people and who knows how long it’ll last. There will be so many questions, so many people banging down our door, so many eyes. I’m sorry. I’m not ready. I spent so long missing you, I don’t want to give you back to the world yet. You’re mine.”

Ilya blinks furiously. His eyes shine wet under the fluorescent kitchen lighting. Long fingers tangling in Shane’s shaggy hair, he tilts his head and lays a kiss on Shane’s lips. “Yours,” he whispers so softly sweet Yuna isn’t sure he’s aware it slipped out. “Ok. Then shall we relax?”

“I would like that.”

Yuna stares at the picture the two boys make across the table. Despite graduating to separate chairs, Shane is coiled around Ilya like his skin will slough off bone unless every inch is pressed to Ilya’s. Ilya is equally wrapped up in him, murmuring in tender Russian as he scratches Shane’s scalp just right. Every so often he steals a kiss, as if it’s his way of reaffirming that Shane is real in his arms.

Yuna assumed this whole thing would be weighing on Shane. The secrecy must be burning underneath his tongue, begging to be set free.

Little Shane had been so guilt-ridden over every tiny thing. He once cried on Mother’s day because he was worried his card wasn’t as good as the one he made for Father’s day, and that Yuna would feel unloved and upset. Yuna thought he knew that nothing he did could ever make her love him less.

He had to know. She said it all the time.

(With every passing day now, that confidence dwindles. When did Shane stop believing her?)

Shane is always cognizant of how people are perceiving him, and what he can do to make the greatest percentage of people pleased with him. She can’t imagine the stress he’s under now, knowing he could scab over the wounds of so many mourners with just one statement.

So why is he reluctant to come out with it?

Shane has always been honest to a fault, to the point where David had to coach him through interactions with his peers because he never knew where to draw the line or how to conform to the social sugarcoating that the rest of the world came programmed with. He’s a take-charge person, Yuna’s own flesh and blood. A mover and shaker. He rushes towards problems with a spreadsheet and a script and a heart bigger than the world can handle.

He doesn’t push off pressing issues. He doesn’t hide. He doesn’t lie.

Except maybe he does. Maybe he has, for a long time, and she just never noticed.

He never let her get close enough to notice.

The Shane Yuna remembers would be crushed under the weight of a secret like this, especially when a game plan is in the palm of his hand. The Shane nibbling on Ilya’s earlobe across the table is content to lie to the world for love.

If Yuna wasn’t the one who brought them both back, would Shane be lying to her too?

“You can’t hide forever, Shane,” she cautions gently. Shane looks at her for a long moment, lips parting like there are words pushing against his teeth, but ultimately he says nothing. She feels a little like they’re back at the mall, a worried mother shouting for her lost son, just one hallway off.

Close by, but separated all the same.

When David rests his hand against the small of her back, she finally relents. “Okay, we hide Ilya for a little longer. But there are people out there that miss him like you do. Just remember that. They want Ilya home.”

Ilya’s expression splinters like a gunshot to a mirror. His mouth opens as if to protest against the very idea of being loved when he isn’t around to see it, but the sorrow of hurting people he cares about quickly seeps through the cracks. Then he looks down at his armful of grown man, squeezes him close, and the longing deepens. “I am home. But yes, we will tell the world when we are ready.”

Suddenly, Yuna feels like she’s only participating in half the conversation.

After taking a picture of her whiteboard, Yuna erases it with the specialty cloth David gifted her and starts to write a new outline. She loves her spreadsheet trackers, but sometimes a game plan needs to be handwritten to make it click.

“I guess we can table other Ilya-related topics for now. When you’re ready to face the world, we can talk brand strategies and potential leads. Your current team is missing some huge opportunities, it’s always amazed me. I guess I can’t make any preemptive calls, so we’ll just focus on Shane for now.” Yuna opens her laptop and navigates to the email folder that houses her most recent correspondences with Shane’s brands.

“As for you, honey, you’ll be relieved to know most of your sponsors stuck with you after your…hiatus. The Speedo talks sort of fizzled out, but I thought that was a weird fit from the beginning. Whichever established brands dropped you were quickly replaced by other parties looking to embrace a more mental health-forward message.”

“Mom.”

Neatly organized inboxes. A place to communicate with all of Shane’s current and prospective collaborators. Color coded spreadsheets tracking leads and bites and denials. Digital calendars meticulously scheduled to fit in a new photoshoot or marketing meeting every week.

Control, control, control.

“We could spin some great campaigns out of this, if we’re careful with how we handle it. The hypermasculine brands really showed their ass with their attitudes towards men’s mental wellbeing, but with every closed door another one opens, right?”

“Mom.” Shane’s voice wobbles dangerously.

“Really, the media storm should settle down pretty quickly once you get back to normal life. Just because Ilya can’t leave doesn’t mean you’re on house arrest. We can get you back on the ice with some training at the rink nearby, get your face back out there with well-placed public outings, start putting out feelers for new brand relationships. And Farah is fantastic, but maybe it’s time we bring on a dedicated person for PR? To handle the fallout of everything. It’s nothing we can’t fix, I promise, b–”

“Mom!” Shane shouts. He’s surgically removed himself from Ilya’s neck for the occasion, and he’s trying to make eye contact – aiming just down and to the left at her cheekbone, which is how she knows it’s serious.

Shane, her sweet, accommodating Shane, who sometimes digs in his heels when he gets overwhelmed but ultimately softens for her at the end of the day, stays rigid.

Yuna’s furious typing stutters. Shane always thought it was witchcraft. She’s always been painfully, painfully, human.

She wants him to look at her like that again. Like he can lean on her, knowing she will move heaven and earth to keep him safe.

Like she’s magic.

“No.”

Yuna blinks, and suddenly a different Shane is speaking. This Shane has blue lips and graying skin and hasn’t eaten in three days and hasn’t left his bed in longer than that and is staring straight through her as she pleads and sobs and begs for him to accept help.

Shane says no with that rigid rigid voice and it’s the last thing he ever says.

“You know I love you, Mom.”

Shane’s words pry Yuna’s mouth open and drop an anchor down her esophagus. She chokes on it as it sinks into her stomach, thudding against the ocean floor. It’s supposed to ground her as the storm brews. Instead, it scrapes her up inside and the salt water stings the wounds.

“I need to scale back. I’ve been needing that for a long time, I think. I don’t want to – I can’t spend every second of hockeyless time traveling from set to set. I’m grateful for all the work you do, of course I am, I literally wouldn’t be where I am without you. But I need balance.” Shane draws in a shuddering breath, like he’s facing a dragon instead of a mother who loves him. Ilya’s hand rubs up and down his back as he silently encourages Shane to keep going. It’s a perfect mirror of David’s hand, supporting her against the incoming collapse.

“I don’t need my manager right now. Not yet. I just – I need my mom.”

Yuna scrubs the tears out of her eyes so fervently she almost misses Shane doing the same. It hurts, of course it does, because she promised to always protect him and his career. Managing Shane kept her in orbit of her little speck of stardust, who grew so big planets revolved around him. This was how she contributed, how she supported him, how she loved him.

Scaling back feels like she’s failing as a mother. Her love comes in the shape of security and stability, in contrast to David’s warmth and sensitivity. If David walks alongside him, Yuna is the wind at his back pushing him forward, forward, towards the future he deserves. Managing is her magic, and without it she’s just...her.

But nothing is worth hurting her baby.

If this is what Shane needs from his mother, this is what Yuna will be.

“This has always been for you,” Yuna manages to say. She reaches across a table that suddenly spans miles. Underneath the mahogany is a rushing river, a yawning chasm she didn’t know had opened up beneath their chairs. She cups Shane’s face in her hands, ever reverent. Her miracle. “I’m sorry if I haven’t been what you needed.”

Shane sniffles. He’s given up attempting eye contact, but her firm grip on his face prevents him from cowering too much. “When I was younger, that’s exactly what I needed. All I wanted was to be the best and you got me there. But my life isn’t just hockey anymore.”

Ilya, who had disappeared into the background of the conversation, gently makes his presence known again. “It is still mostly hockey.”

That earns a watery smile. “You are not hockey.”

Ilya scoffs. “I am as hockey as you can get. Dating me is like dating hockey. And vice versa. I think instead of blood cells you have little hockey pucks, that is how much hockey you are.”

“Whatever. I’m obviously not quitting hockey, and I’m not trying to cut off all my existing partnerships either. Just…for the moment, definitely while we’re recovering out here, and maybe for the foreseeable future, I want to slow things down. Enjoy time with my loved ones. Live a bit quieter.”

I can’t play hockey again, a Shane from another world had once told her. At the moment she would have given anything for him just to lift the spoon from her hands, never mind pick up a hockey stick and skate.

He’s gripping the spoon now, strong enough to hold it all his own. That’s Yuna’s miracle. Even if he’s pushing her back with his other hand.

Inhaling deeply, Yuna closes an inbox. Then another. The increasingly passive-aggressive messaging thread between her and Voyageurs management. The constant stream of endorsement requests and travel plans. The document full of half-drafted statements and timelines and caption candidates.

“It’ll all be here when – if – you want it. You can tell me in three months or three years that you want to step back into things, one day at a time, and I’ll make it work. If you decide to never get on camera in your underwear again, I also understand.”

“No, no,” Ilya protests. “That one we keep.”

Face perfectly neutral, Shane stomps on Ilya’s foot under the table. He hisses something below his breath that sounds suspiciously like, “Perv.”

Yuna closes her laptop and pushes it away from her. It feels a little like cutting the umbilical cord. Becoming a mother again.

“Okay. Taking my manager hat off now. We’ll table all the brand and re-entry strategy talk for later.”

Shane nibbles on his lower lip. The confidence that had carried him through his self-advocacy is falling flimsy at the edges. “Are you…okay with this? You’re not disappointed with me? I don’t want to sound ungrateful, and there’s still no one I’d rather trust with my career, but right now I just…I need rest. Real rest. I’m sorry.”

“Oh, honey,” Yuna fights back tears. “You could never disappoint me. Never. I’m sorry that I ever made you doubt that. Even if you decided to quit hockey – I would be sad for you, but I would still be proud. So, so proud.”

Instead of responding, Shane ducks his head. The front of his shirt darkens droplet by droplet.

Yuna finally stands and closes the gap between them. It’s a little awkward trying to hug Shane when he’s still firmly tangled with Ilya, but they hug and they cry and they apologize to each other and it doesn’t take long for David to join the huddle. He had been quiet, allowing Shane and Yuna to hash out the long-overdue topic, but he presses his own apologies and words of parental affection into Shane’s hair.

Ilya, who had been making himself very small every time the conversation took an emotional swing, gets folded into the sappy mix as well. Why the hell not.

Once everyone’s eyes are dry, a headache climbing behind Yuna’s temples from exhaustion, they consider the meeting adjourned. It had been very productive, if not painful.

David tries to lighten the mood. “Now we can relax. Like a real vacation. Not whatever we’ve been doing these past few days where we’re all tense like we’re on the run from Interpol.”

“It’ll be just like your silent retreats, Shane.” Yuna lights up. Shane says he needs rest, and there’s no better place in the world for that than his cottage. “I don’t think we’re ready to leave you alone here, but you don’t have to speak. In fact if you need us to stay away from a particular part of the cottage for the full experience, just say the word.”

“Ah yes,” Ilya bites back a laugh for some reason. “So silent. Ты ведешь себя очень тихо, когда рыдаешь над моим членом. (Very silent when you are sobbing around my cock.)”

“Behave,” Shane warns. Yuna doesn’t know why Ilya deserves to be scolded for acknowledging the silent retreats. Shane already likes yoga, so a more intense form of meditation isn’t that weird. Regardless, she trusts that the scolding is warranted.

“Mmm. And if I don’t?” Ilya smirks, leaning so close that Shane goes cross-eyed.

Instinctively, Yuna and David make themselves scarce. They don’t need to be present for whatever path that conversation is headed down.

Later, while Ilya and Shane are in some far corner of the house occupied with…whatever they’re doing, Yuna and David have what her pop psychology articles call parallel play time. Basically Yuna has her feet in David’s lap, reading a book while he works on some form of puzzle. He’s been on a real Sudoku kick lately.

“Isn’t it crazy that our son is in love with his zombie rival?” Yuna blurts out. She’s been reading the same paragraph for the last ten minutes with no progress.

David doesn’t look up from his page. “Shane is a zombie too, by that logic. Still counts even if we didn’t report him dead.”

“You know what I mean. We didn’t trust Ilya when he was alive the first time, but now…so much has changed.”

“I don’t know. I think they were in love way before the whole zombie-soulmate thing. We’re the ones late to the game.” David’s mouth twists to the side the way it always does when he makes a mistake in pen. Wordlessly, Yuna hands over the portable white-out she snatched from the study since David always forgets.

“I guess.”

The Ilya Thing, Yuna discovers, is only the tip of the New Shane iceberg.

It’s not just that Shane has stopped asking about the macros of their morning pancakes. He’s loosened the reins on his diet in general.

For lunch, Ilya makes a big show of assembling them all tuna melts. This seems to hold some emotional weight for the pair, which is the only reason why David schools his expression and downs the sandwich even though he hates tuna. Yuna, David, and Ilya are still in that awkward phase where they’re trying to be their best selves as if every new interaction is a fresh first impression.

Shane is entirely unaffected by this social dynamic and thus could easily turn down Ilya’s cooking. Yuna waits for him to complain about the slices of cheese exceeding his dairy intake for the day, or refuse to eat anything made with bread that isn’t so wholly wheat it may as well be a loosely connected string of seeds, or turn it down entirely since it fails his nutrient-to-calories ratio criteria.

Shane smiles, kisses Ilya on the cheek, and says, “That’s all you’ll be getting until we brush our teeth again, tuna-breath.”

Despite having already made and plated the sandwiches, Ilya reassesses everything with a grave look, as if he’d rather trash it all than go kissless for twenty minutes.

In the end, Shane eats two tuna melts and Ilya brushes his teeth over the kitchen sink in record time.

Well, Shane has been away from hockey for a while now. Yuna rationalizes that he’s always been a bit more lenient in the off-season, and maybe Shane intends on extending his long-term recovery for another half season. Or even a full season. He’ll still need to get back to training at some point, but if he’s not revving up for rigorous conditioning yet, it’s not that strange to see him indulge in a burger or David’s highly acclaimed chicken parm.

Even in the off-season, though, Shane is calculating. Yuna sees it every time he ladles out a portion. He just isn’t as strict with himself after he crunches all the numbers.

Yuna waits for it – the mental math, the weighing of each morsel down to the gram, the sacrifice. It never comes. Shane still eats clean because he likes it and he knows he feels good when he does, but that meticulous rigidity he got caught up in around food has eased.

This is a good thing. But it’s different.

Another thing Yuna quickly catches onto is that Shane understands fucking Russian. This really takes some time for her to wrap her mind around.

It’s subtle. He doesn’t speak it back to Ilya, at least not around his parents, but Shane snickers softly when Ilya uses Russian to deliver what Yuna assumes to be an unsportsmanly chirp towards Dallas Kent while they’re watching a game together.

The more overt instances are when Shane shyly guesses the meaning of nicknames Ilya calls him.

Yuna hears them in the kitchen one morning. Ilya insists on washing the dishes, and Shane hovers nearby because he still treats being apart like a cruel and unusual punishment. Ilya proudly presents him with a sudsy spoon. “Is you! Моя маленькая ложка. (My little spoon.)”

“That doesn’t even work.” Shane laughs. “You are my little spoon. Глупый. (Silly.)”

While Shane has always been unbelievably hockey-smart, he was never the top of the class in school. In fact, Shane nearly flunked Spanish in high school. They thought he just had no aptitude for languages beyond the French he learned in that prime window of development as a child in immersion school.

Yet here he is, an adult with far less neuroplasticity working in his favor, on the way to being fluent in Russian.

There are even some Russian children’s books in the living room bookshelf. They’re obviously too young to be Ilya’s taste, but they’re well-worn. Ilya’s family — whatever remains — doesn’t seem like the type to save his childhood books, so that can’t be it. Shane is dedicated to learning and appears to have been for a while.

Shane also wants to come out. Soon.

It feels sudden to Yuna and David until they remember that Shane has been repressing this for years. To him, it’s long overdue.

That doesn’t make the burst of courage any less foreign feeling.

Shane’s relationship with his own public perception has always been complicated. Yuna accepts responsibility for a lot of that, with how much she emphasized his position as a role model for Asian youths, but Shane’s introverted personality was also a factor.

Even when he dated Rose Landry and was bombarded by questions from all angles – media, internet, friends and family – he always plastered on a PR smile and smoothly diverted the topic. He was a perfect mask of hockey professionalism, separating out the different parts of his life into neat little boxes that he could open and close at will.

Now everything is spilling over, and he’s not even trying to get the lids back on.

Ilya talks about missing authentic Russian meals from a hole-in-the-wall family restaurant in Boston, and Shane promises that they’ll visit together as soon as they can.

Shane hands his phone to David and asks him to take a picture of him and Ilya cuddled up on the dock. Yuna later sees him organize that picture into a folder labeled Coming Out Post Options.

Shane asks to borrow Yuna’s whiteboard. It gets returned with some marker residue because Shane used a new pack. If she holds it against the light just right, she can discern names. Centaurs. A few Bears. Suspiciously few Voyageurs. Svetlana. Rose. Yuna and David. It’s faint, but it’s obviously a guest list.

A wedding guest list.

What really pushes Yuna to the brink is Montreal.

The TV stays on these days. It’s a good way to microdose re-entering society, and to desensitize themselves on the whole Dead Ilya thing. Yuna is making herself a cup of tea in the kitchen when a tribute to Ilya plays, cycling through clips from his youth hockey days in Russia, to the Bears, and then to the Centaurs.

She freezes on instinct, worried the somber tone will throw Shane into a flashback, but he just hums appreciatively. “Black and red looks the best on you.”

“It will look even better on you, моя лисичка.” (my little fox.)

Yuna almost overlooks the comment as Shane barrels on. “Foxes are mainly just red. Not red and black. So that doesn’t really work.”

“Пофиг. (Meh.) Details.”

After a moment, Shane speaks up again, voice warbly and pitched high with nerves. “You really think they’ll want me?”

Ilya snorts. “This is not your problem. You are Shane fucking Hollander, everyone wants you. Your problem is, will Montreal let you go?”

Fabric frays and snaps, like Shane is picking at the blanket. “I think so. They already weren’t happy with the long term injury recovery, especially not for mental health. I don’t think they’ll be thrilled about the us thing either.”

“Shane…”

“It doesn’t matter anymore.” he sighs. “All this does is move the timeline up a little. The transfer was going to happen regardless, I just don’t have to wait for free agency if they want me to waive my no-trade clause now.”

Transfer?

Yuna halts like she’s been taken prisoner inside her own body. There’s a faint ringing in her ears and the sink is still running even though the kettle has been full a minute now.

“You are not going to regret this?” Ilya ventures, words hesitant to brush the air.

The breath whooshes out of Shane. “Never. Especially not after you already made a sacrifice coming to Ottawa. It was better than Boston but the distance was still killing us, and now…well, now even pissing is a two-man job. Be serious. We can’t go back to how things were before, pretending like driving two hours for half a night together is enough. And frankly, you’re an idiot if you think there’s anything in Montreal worth leaving you for anyways.”

“So romantic, my Shane.” It’s probably meant to be a taunt, but Ilya’s voice is too thick with emotion to carry the light tone. “I am getting very worried about our vows. You will run out of material at this rate.”

“Asshole. How do the Cens even put up with you?”

“They love me. Apparently.” Ilya shakes his head as if to clear away the confusion. “Unsure why. Soon you will be able to ask them in person.”

Some of the tension bleeds out of Shane’s voice. “And you promise they’ll be good about us?”

“Oh yes, yes. I think they will only be upset that I got you first. The rookies all had posters of you growing up. I think Luca made freaky Swiss paper dolls of us and made them kiss.”

Shane giggles. “Well he’ll be one happy customer.”

“If anyone has a problem with us I will crush them. Is my right as captain. But really, sweetheart, they will be happy for us. They will be – what was idiom from that childhood book, over moons? Yes, that. They will be all over mooning us.”

“You’re getting that wrong on purpose.”

“Bood may cry, he is very sensitive soul. Loves love. And hey, even if somehow they are not personally invested in our relationship, they will still be excited to have us both on the ice on their side.”

A kiss. Then, softly, “Go Cens.”

“Go Cens.”

Yuna drops her mug into the sink. It clatters against a dish loud enough to startle everyone in earshot. From the kitchen, Yuna sees Shane tense and then relax as Ilya tugs him further into his lap.

“You are okay?” Ilya calls to Yuna.

“Yeah.”

Hands shaking, Yuna abandons her tea.

Shane would leave Montreal? No, that’s not it – he’s already chosen to leave Montreal. Yuna’s hometown, the team that drafted him, the place he once shyly talked about retiring his jersey in, the populace he’d become a champion of, his home. He’s going to leave a winning team, a city that loves him, all the routines and safe corners he’s painstakingly established, for what?

If Yuna slows down and thinks about it for more than two seconds, past the initial sting, she can appreciate where he’s coming from. Sort of.

If his relationship with Ilya has been as solid and enmeshed as Yuna has understood it from the past few weeks, it becomes obvious that they’d be on the path to co-habitation. Long distance is hard for any couple, and long distance with no end in sight is even worse. Moving in together is inevitable, Montreal holds such a grudge they wouldn’t buy Rozanov if Ottawa sold him for a dollar, and no one would be stupid enough to turn down a trade option for Shane Hollander. If anyone was going to yank a nosediving team up from a spiral, it would be Shane – even better with Ilya at his side.

It makes sense.

Underneath that first wave of shock rushes an undercurrent of hurt. Because Shane sounds like he’s thought about this for a long time.

He never told her. Not as his mom. Not as his manager.

He’d decided on something this important for both his career and his personal life, and she was completely left out of the loop.

It’s not about her. She knows that.

She’s not entitled to every thought that goes through her son’s brain. So her son is gay, and in love with his career rival, and planning a wedding with him, and transferring from his legacy team to move to a shit team in Ottawa, and God knows what else, and he never told Yuna about any of it.

Whatever. It’s his life. It’s not about her.

Except it kind of is, because somewhere along the line there was something she did or said that made him think he couldn’t confide in her about these changes.

That breaks her heart more than any trade request could. It’s not about Ottawa. It’s not even about Rozanov.

It’s about trust.

At one point, Yuna tries to broach the topic. Gently, because her knowledge of what sets Shane off is likely outdated, she prods, “Still feeling okay? You seem different lately. Bolder, maybe?”

Reckless feels like a more apt word. Alien.

Without taking his eyes off Ilya, who is watching nail art tutorials on Youtube and painstakingly trying to recreate them with his non-dominant hand, Shane shrugs. “You think?”

“Well, yeah.” Yuna doesn’t know how else to articulate the total personality shift her son has undergone. How could he not notice it himself? “You’ve always been brave. You just…I don’t know. You used to be more cautious.”

“I don’t think I’m any different. Just less willing to pretend I don’t want what I want.” Shane finally makes eye contact, for a fleeting second. “Dying puts a lot into perspective.”

Well damn. Yuna can’t argue with that.

Ilya also seems to have changed. Yuna obviously has less of a benchmark for what he was like pre-crash, since she only knew his media personality. But there are little behavioral hints here and there that catch her attention.

He’s a lot less angry. She remembers the icy, unsmiling teenager who skulked around dark corners during NHL events when he wasn’t actively turning on his charm. She’s familiar with the cockiness of his pre-game interviews, the violence of his plays on ice, the raunchy tales that follow him from city to city.

But this Ilya giggles when Shane stumbles over a word in his clunky Russian. He’s so gentle with Shane, perceptive enough to dim the lights when he starts to cringe into himself, ever patient when he talks Shane out of a spiral.

While Yuna didn’t think he was going to bust out of the house in a wig and mustache to pick up women in the sparse nightclubs of Ottawa, she also didn’t anticipate him to be so thoroughly sated by the Hollanders’ boring Scrabble nights. It’s not at all his speed.

But he looks genuinely happy to be learning Sudoku from David and discovering his hidden talent for the art of jigsaw puzzles. He ends up at the kitchen table with Yuna in the wee hours of the morning more often than they’d like, and they drink tea and chat aimlessly about the cottage’s landscaping and watch the sun wash the horizon in warm swaths of light and it’s so, so serene.

He probably enjoyed the clubs and the women and the adrenaline, Yuna doubts that all of it was a front, but the tranquility suits him even more.

Surprisingly, she likes this new Rozanov. Was he always like this – a loverboy hidden under a mask of indifference?

When Yuna reaches under the sink in the guest bathroom for more shampoo, her fingers close around a square box. Confused, she extracts a carton of cigarettes from the cabinet.

Shane has displayed a lot of changes ever since the crash and most of them Yuna has been able to roll with. If he’s been fucking smoking, though, they’re headed towards a very unpleasant conversation.

Passing through the hallway, Ilya pauses on the open door and then pales when he notices what’s in Yuna’s hand. He unceremoniously plucks it from her and tosses it in the trash. A deep flush stains his cheeks and he avoids eye contact like a child ripe for a scolding. “This is old stash. I am quitting, I swear.”

"Old stash," Yuna echoes blankly while Ilya takes off in a blush-red blur. "How...old?"

Hm.

Yuna is starting to suspect Shane's silent retreats aren't what they seemed.

At least Ilya appears true to his word, emptying out all prior hidey holes and just occupying his mouth with Shane’s whenever he gets the urge (which is often, it seems). He isn’t abstaining on the vodka consumption front, which is honestly a relief because that would simply be too far-fetched. But little by little, he’s changing.

One night finds Ilya and Shane wrapped up in a heated conversation about selling more of his sports cars.

“This was your idea,” Shane reminds him. “Stop turning those sad eyes on me.”

“My idea, but because I know it will make you happy. So still your fault.”

Shane rolls his eyes. “You said Svetlana is a genius with cars. She’s already inherited your estate, though I don’t know how much she preserved. I’m sure she’ll find them new forever homes if she hasn’t already. They’ll be driving around the big race track in the sky or something. Christ. You’re even keeping the ugly orange Porsche!”

Gasping, Ilya clutches his heart. “You keep Pasha’s name out of your mouth!”

“Can’t fucking believe I’m in love with a guy who names his cars.”

“Is very believable, especially coming from guy who names his hockey pucks. We are perfect match.”

“Ugh. We really are.”

It’s like Shane has siphoned the fire from Ilya. Ilya mellows out and Shane comes alive and maybe they really are two halves of the same soul.

The more Yuna sees of them, the more she understands how it was impossible to bring one of them back without the other.

Although she’s still struggling with some of their shifts after the ritual – really, since when did Ilya Rozanov have such a passion for classical literature? – Yuna can tell that their love has been unchanged. It’s a beautiful thing, what they have. What they’ve had for their entire careers.

She just hopes the rest of the world will see that way, too.

Chapter End Notes

a lot of you were worried about Operation SIKE ILYA IS ALIVE so i hope this somewhat appeased you! honestly its a pretty impossible situation and logistics were Not my focus when initially writing this fic (hello japanese shaman lady) so lets keep that belief suspended ok we're here for codependent hollanovombies <33333 if ur curious the table convo is pretty close to how i worldbuild/plot more complex stories -- i basically interview myself !

thank u all for reading and commenting i LOVE YOU! last chapter up sometime next week and thennnnn shane pov will be posted sometime after that (it's a lot more to edit in one go lol) this has been such a fun ride tysm <3

twitter: pixeljunnie
alterspring: pixinoa

 
btw i've been really into discovering non-english music lately (having a slavic edm moment in particular) so recommend me a song if you'd like :3

Chapter 6: All Sales Final

Chapter Summary

“It’s not such a bad thing, I’ve discovered. To love enough to be changed by it.”

Chapter Notes

“Honey I’m telling you, there is no casual way to suggest to Shane that he gets a brain scan. And you can’t trick him into one either.”

“Work with me here, David!”

Yuna paces their bedroom. She really, truly, had been doing well adjusting to her sons’ new quirks.

But last night Shane wanted to Doordash a Crunchwrap Supreme from Taco Bell, and Yuna has to draw a line somewhere.

“Tumors can cause personality changes.”

“So can dying,” David reminds her.

Groaning, Yuna flops onto their bed. She drapes an arm over her face to block out the light, and stares at the swirls on the back of her eyelids as if the answer will be revealed to her there. “It’s just all so…uncertain. I can’t shake the feeling that nothing in life comes free. If they came back different, that’s one thing. If they didn’t – if they’ve secretly been like this all along, then where’s the catch? Are they on borrowed time? I was reckless and desperate and didn’t ask any questions before the ritual, and now I’m scared that’s going to come back to bite us.”

“So ask,” David suggests. He goes back to folding laundry.

“What?”

“Call the shaman lady again. Ask if there are any warning signs to look out for. Ask if what we’ve been noticing from them is normal. You never even spoke to her before she left, and from what Google Translate told me, the note was just a formality to say ‘I’ve done my job, goodbye’. Nothing super useful there. So call and ask your questions.”

And this is why she loves David Hollander. One of many reasons. He possesses an uncanny ability to blow past all the bullshit and drill straight to the heart of the problem. He wades through the complicated thought patterns that cloud Yuna and distills them down to a problem and solution.

She has concerns about the outcome of a service. Therefore, she should contact the provider and ask.

It’s that simple.

“I love you,” Yuna announces. David grins, kisses her, and folds another pair of socks.

There’s nothing to gain from delaying. Later that afternoon, she wanders out towards the water because a call like this warrants a decent runway for pacing. With a deep breath, Yuna arranges the questions in her mind, carefully translated into Japanese to capture her concerns, and dials.

It rings. And rings. And rings.

Eventually.

“Hello?”

“Hi. This is Yuna Hollander. You, uh, saved my son a few weeks ago.” Yuna bites down on her thumbnail.

Miko pauses. “I remember your boy, yes.”

All of Yuna’s preparations slip out of reach like grains of sand between her fingertips. When she opens her mouth, all that escapes is a choked out, “Thank you.”

“Hmm. This is not why you’re calling,” Miko assesses wisely.

“No,” Yuna agrees. “But I didn’t get to say it before. Actually there was a lot I didn’t get to say. Or ask.”

Miko’s voice hardens. “You have concerns or regrets? I gave you fair warning and you accepted the consequences. No refunds. My services are one-way, from death to life only. You will need to hire someone else if you wish to…reverse the path. Goodby–”

“No!” Yuna shouts. “No, nothing like that. Don’t hang up. Please. I’m so grateful that you brought him back – brought both of them back, actually. I’m calling because I’m worried about this potential…‘reversing’.”

At Miko’s contemplative hum, she barrels on. “I know I never asked about side effects or consequences or anything like that. I didn’t care at the time. All I wanted was my son back. But I need to know now – I need to brace myself for the cost.”

“Huh? I received the money.”

“Not like that. I’m talking about karmic debt.” It sounds ridiculous coming out of Yuna ‘facts and stats’ Hollander’s mouth, but she doesn’t know how else to word it. “I’m worried the ritual changed them. That there’s been some sort of unseen price.”

Time to pace. Yuna’s flip flops slap against the dock. “Like, are they truly restored to their former states, or was the resurrection a temporary phenomenon to grant us closure and we’re going to lose them again soon? Or maybe I traded years off my life to compensate for their revival? I don’t mind that, but I just need to be prepared.”

Back and forth. Creaking wood. Back and forth. Water lapping at the rocky edges of shore.

“Maybe they’ll be normal for now but suffer psychotic breaks somewhere down the line, or they secretly came back with shortened lifespans, or I used up all our lineage’s good luck and misfortune will follow them forever.”

Backward and forward.

“What if their life forces are tied together and if one dies the other will follow? Although I guess that one already happened. What if–”

“The ritual was a complete success,” Miko says.

Forward.

“Their souls returned whole and strong, though refusing to let go of each other. Their physical vessels were as if time reversed and their tragedies never befell them.”

Yuna pauses.

She kicks off her shoes, sits down at the end of the dock, and dips her toes into the swirling water. Like a true Hollander, she keeps pressing. “I don’t understand how it’s possible to bring two souls back from the dead and suffer no backlash from it.”

“As it was, their deaths should not have happened like that. It was not their time. In a way, a debt was owed to them. Not the other way around.”

Yuna’s voice pitches high with cautious hope. “Really?”

“Yes. However, there are many ways the universe balances out. Not all of them are as cruel as losing a life, and they don’t always occur at the time of the ritual. Sometimes it’s a surrendering of the status quo or a tough decision made later down the line. Sometimes it’s the exact fear you are grappling with, where you will never know if the son you gained was the son you lost.”

Strangely, Miko’s voice warms with appreciation. She sounds like she’s smiling. “And sometimes, people have suffered enough already.”

Yuna thinks about the secrecy. The years of hiding. The self-repression. The constant weight of fear on their shoulders from trying to convince the world and themselves that there was no spark between them. Ilya cycling through meaningless hookups to fill a void. Shane trying so hard to fit the archetype people expected from him that he dated Rose Landry in hopes of forcing an attraction to women.

Ilya, abandoned by his family. Shane, too afraid to trust his own. Longing glances across rooms of people who would be disgusted if they knew, across bloodthirsty rinks and dim hotels and anti-homosexuality propaganda laws and fluctuating timezones and threats of losing it all in an instant and always always always distance.

The tears glimmering in Shane’s eyes as he watched Ilya hoist the cup for the first time, masking his pride with flimsy jealousy. That haunted look on Ilya’s face as he witnessed Shane’s body go still on the ice.

How lonely they must have been. How scared. How horribly sad.

Yet they never stopped. They protected the beautiful, fragile thing between them, cupped their hands around the flickering flame even when the wind whipped at them from all sides.

“Your boys have earned their happy ending. Many lifetimes over, at this point.”

“Yeah,” Yuna whispers. A wet laugh bubbles at the back of her throat. “They have, haven’t they?”

Generously, Miko remains on the line while Yuna internally works through her revelations. It almost feels like too much to bear, this knowledge that her sons are alive and well and aren’t headed towards another brutal untimely end due to her careless decisions.

She occasionally pipes up with more hypotheticals, but Miko shuts them all down quickly. Apparently the shaman is not concerned about the technical classification of spiritual resurrection as a major injury or not.

(Hey, Yuna’s in charge of two grown men whose careers involve getting beaten up on a daily basis. Injury tracking is very important.)

“Thank you again, for bringing them back. Without you I would have lost two sons without truly having known either one. They got their second chance, but so did I. I will always be in your debt.” Then, because she’s Yuna Hollander, she says, “I’ll write you a great Google review.”

Miko laughs, high and clear, and ends the call.

Across the lake, the sun ripples through the treeline. Faint streaks of orange and gold stain the sparse clouds drifting across the sky. She should make dinner before it gets too dark.

“Mom?”

Yuna startles, water splashing around her feet. Either nature had masked the sound of approaching footsteps, or Shane had been standing behind her for a long time.

Shaking the droplets off, Yuna scrambles up with her flip flops pinched in one hand and her phone in the other. The dock is still warm from the memory of blazing sun. “Oh! Hi, honey. Do you need something? Are you hungry?”

Shane isn’t listening. His gaze traces a slow path from her wide-blown eyes to the trembling grip around her phone. “Who was that?”

For some reason, Yuna’s first instinct is to play dumb. “What do. You mean?”

It comes out stilted and fake. She cringes. Maybe he’ll buy it anyways?

From her peripherals, she sees Ilya burst into laughter, because of course where Shane goes Ilya follows. She’s well aware of this by now. “Being terrible liar is also genetic, I see.”

Yuna sighs and fixes her gaze back on the setting sun. Shane softly tells Ilya to go wait up on the porch, affording them some privacy without obscuring Shane from his sight. After watching Ilya trudge up the path, Shane hovers next to her. They both sit down.

Breaking the silence first, Yuna says, “Why did you never ask how we brought you back to life?”

Shane tilts his head in contemplation. “I guess for once the details didn’t really matter to me. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned over the years, it’s not to overthink a good thing.”

A small smile climbs onto Yuna’s face. “You’re wiser than me, then.”

The sky purples around them. Yuna watches a bee feast on a nearby flower. Across the lake, two squirrels chase each other around the base of a tree.

“I called in a Japanese necromancer to resurrect your dead body.”

“You what?” Shane splutters. “Mom, what the fuck?”

Okay, so Shane had overheard less of the conversation than Yuna thought. Whatever. Too late to backpedal now.

She leans back, bracing her hands behind herself on the dock. “Shamanism runs in the family. Kind of. It’s much more common among our relatives in Japan. I’ve been…estranged from that culture for a long time now.”

“You don’t believe in the occult,” Shane says slowly. “Not witches, or spirits, or zombies, or anything like that. You veto Dad’s horror picks every family movie night because you think ghosts require too much suspension of disbelief.”

“I know. Trust me, I know. But Shane, I didn’t know what else to do. You died right in front of me, in your childhood bed, and I couldn’t bring myself to do the logical thing and call for people to come take you away. I couldn’t bear it.”

“So you cast a spell?”

“...Technically I hired someone else to cast a spell. But I admit it was a spur of the moment decision, especially when she told me the ritual would only succeed if she brought Ilya back as well. I didn’t know it was him at the time. I didn’t know anything except that I’d get you back, and that was enough.” Yuna swallows hard. “And I don’t regret it. But the past few weeks have made me scared that I’ve done something to you that I can’t take back. I needed to hear it from her that everything went as planned and that I hadn’t, I don’t know, doomed you to a life of misery or something.”

Shane blows out a long breath. “Wow. Messing with the balance of life and death. Reviving a random soul. Rushing such a big decision. It’s – it’s like I don’t know you at all.”

Yuna’s heart drops. “Shane…”

When she gathers the courage to face him, what she finds isn’t revulsion or disappointment. Rather, Shane is smiling. “You keep asking if I’ve changed. But what about you?”

“What? I’m still me. I’m still your mother.” A kernel of indignance lodges in her throat. “I think I’ve always had an impulsive streak. I was just never desperate enough to act on it. I guess…it’s hard to be unchanged by grief.”

“Love, too.” Shane cranes his head back, casting his gaze across the backyard to where Ilya is watching over them with arms folded against the patio railing. He lights up under Shane’s attention, waving enthusiastically. They wave back.

Shane turns back to her with a twinkle in his eyes. “It’s not such a bad thing, I’ve discovered. To love enough to be changed by it. To be a little different.”

It comes in flashes: Ruddy-cheeked toddler Shane who delayed speaking for so long they worried about hearing problems. Teen hockey phenomenon Shane, rising above the crowd for both his genes and his talent. Shane rebirthed, sobbing into Ilya’s neck in the same bed that had carried his corpse, refusing to deny himself for a second longer.

Shane in a Centaurs jersey, kissing Ilya at the altar. Happy, breathing, and in love.

Changed by it. Freed by it.

Alive because of it.

“No,” Yuna agrees as she swipes away the tears spilling down her cheeks. “It’s not bad at all.”

Shane leans his head onto her shoulder. Once she feels her shirt grow damp, she turns and swallows him up in a hug. Her baby. Her miracle. Her six foot tall beefy professional hockey player.

Her baby, her baby, her baby.

With a final squeeze, Shane climbs out of her arms and pulls her to her feet. “Let’s go get dinner. Ilya said he wants ice cream for dessert.”

“Just Ilya?” Yuna asks with a knowing grin.

Shane returns it. “I could be convinced.”

They trek back up to the cottage. Unable to sit still, Ilya scampers down to meet Shane halfway, throwing those big burly arms around his waist and swinging him in a circle. Shane yelps and smacks at his back to get him to let go, but he’s laughing through it.

When Shane finally wriggles out of Ilya’s arms like an overstimulated cat and breaks for the sliding doors, Yuna tugs Ilya back. His first instinct is to complain about Yuna sabotaging him so Shane wins the spontaneous race, but the protests fall silent when he catches the shine in her eyes.

“Wha–”

Yuna slams into him with a hug. “You’re exactly what he needs,” she says tearfully. She’s not sure what possesses her to say it, but Ilya’s mouth drops in shock. “We trust he’s in good hands with you. Thank you for taking care of him all these years, and all the years to come.”

“Oh. Of course,” Ilya croaks. His eyes are glossy as he nods fervently. He’s not even trying to hide the amazement on his face, wondrous as if Yuna is offering him a coveted opportunity to plead his case for why he’s worthy of her son. “I will treat him well. I love him. I will always love him.”

“I know. You don’t have to prove anything to us.” Yuna leans back and ruffles Ilya’s curls. “You’re family now.”

He looks at her like she’s magic.

Before he can open his mouth to doubt his place in their hearts, Yuna turns him by the shoulders and nudges him towards the house. “What’s this I hear about ice cream?”

Ilya flashes a crooked grin at her. “David was going to get one pint from the store, then he got two. Special deal!”

“Well aren’t we lucky,” Yuna murmurs. She sets out dishes while her boys get everything ready. The fourth table setting no longer feels like an afterthought or an awkward concession. It’s just instinct.

Yuna and David, Shane and Ilya. Her strange, lively, loving little family.

Her miracles.

_____________________

Ilya Rozanov’s life restarts quietly.

Six perfect weeks are spent at the cottage, swimming in the lake and warming their hands against the bonfire and lighting candles during storms. Ilya fits into their family like the final piece of a jigsaw puzzle, lost for years between the couch cushions but slotting seamlessly into place once finally found.

Yuna starts sleeping through the night again around the two and a half week mark, and by week four she’s practically fleeing the cottage with David to avoid walking in on Shane and Ilya for a fifth time.

Or maybe sixth? It’s hard to keep track. They’re astonishingly bad at locking doors.

By the time Yuna and David are emotionally stable enough to live apart from their sons, Shane and Ilya have made up their minds.

“I am ready to be alive again,” Ilya announces one afternoon. Yuna is halfway through hooking up an old camcorder to the TV. They bought it when Shane was born. Ilya, teary eyed just thinking about baby Shane, demanded to see every single clip. “Is time for me to win Stanley cup and kiss my Shane on center ice. Show old man Hunter how it’s done.”

“I think you mean when I win the cup. And who said I’d let you kiss me in public? Have some shame. No one needs to see that.” Shane jams his socked foot into Ilya’s side.

David clears his throat meaningfully. “Agreed.”

Shane goes white, then bright red. “Dad, again, we’re really sorry. We didn’t expect you to drop by…”

“Boys, you’re either both winning the cup or both losing it.” Yuna taps the stack of papers on the coffee table. They have everything lined up for the trade. Farah facilitated the negotiations with Ottawa, and Montreal was not nearly as protective over their star center as they should have been. Yuna was angry on Shane’s behalf, but the lack of a fight from the front office played in their favor even though it stung.

The paperwork is done. Their cover story is as airtight as it’s going to get. They have Instagram posts and statements drafted for their respective health hiatuses, coming outs, relationship reveal, and eventual marriage. The boys have been getting their edges back on the practice ice at the cottage, drilling lines and passes ahead of the preseason. Everything is in place to re-introduce Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov to the world.

While they are all a little reluctant to burst the blissfully domestic bubble they’ve been living in for the last few weeks, it’s time to move forward.

Ilya Rozanov needs to rise from the dead. And the first stop on his reunion tour, naturally, is Svetlana.

“Save me, мой лев (my lion)!” Ilya cries out, cowering against the sofa like Svetlana could reach through the phone and throttle him as soon as the phone connects. “She will be so mad. She’ll kill me dead.”

“You’re being dramatic. She’ll at least want to hug you before she kills you. How long is the flight from Boston, a couple hours?” Shane does a quick search. “Yeah, you’ll have about two hours from when she picks up. Make it count.”

“So mean to me, my Shane.” Ilya sulks against Shane’s pajama pants.

It isn’t difficult to peel back his theatrics and see the nerves jittering at his fingertips. They’ve spent a long time building this beautiful comfort zone to lick their wounds in, and now it’s time to step into the fresh air again.

Svetlana picks up on the second ring. “Shane? You are okay? It has been a long time.”

Her voice is pleasantly deep, accent fainter than Ilya’s but still clinging around the edges of her words. Ilya’s expression crumples into devastation at the sound. “Sveta,” he chokes. “Fuck.”

Across the line, Svetlana’s breath hitches. “What the fuck was that?” she demands. “Shane?! Please. This joke is cruel.”

Ilya smushes his face into Shane’s shoulder, inhaling his scent to steel himself before he sits up straight again. He taps the button to request a video call.

Svetlana picks up immediately. Her jaw drops when she sees Ilya’s face staring back, tired eyes quickly filling with tears. The camera shakes in her grip as she leans closer and closer, unable to believe the dead man on the other end of the line.

“Missed me?” Ilya says tearily, but accompanied by a shit-eating grin because he’s still an asshole at the end of the day.

As prophesized, Svetlana lets loose a long angry string of Russian that would sound threatening if not for the tears of relief pouring down her face. Yuna does catch some English mixed in, assorted fuck you’s and I’ll kill you if you die on me again’s and even one how the fuck did you survive a plane crash you stupid stubborn little bug oh my god I’m so grateful you’re alive fuck you fuck you fuck you right up that perfectly round perky butt.

Very eloquently put. Yuna approves of her.

Svetlana is way too smart to buy their lies, so Ilya caves and tells her the full story. She grills Yuna for more answers, which just makes her like the girl even more, but it ultimately doesn’t take too much for her to believe. It seems Russia, like Japan, is also a place where the veil runs thin.

Besides being Ilya’s oldest friend and a great person to have in their corner, Svetlana is very well-connected. She promises to personally vouch for their story, and also to call up a person who can fake medical records from the Hollanders’ totally real private doctor. Yuna gratefully accepts the first offer and tables the second, since it falls under the ‘illegal measures’ outlined as a second to last resort.

(Svetlana also gives two thumbs down on the true last resort, the ‘hitting Ilya with a car’ plan, but she does take a moment to think about it.)

She books a flight within the first three minutes of learning that Ilya is alive and arrives in a cloud of sequins and designer luggage. She hugs Ilya for a long time, occasionally interspersing punches to the arm to ‘check if he’s really real’. Allegedly.

“Was my funeral fun?” Ilya later asks around a mouthful of rice. Svetlana thwacks him on the forehead. “What? This is unique opportunity. Not many people get feedback on their own funeral.”

“No, the funeral for our thirty-year-old friend who died in a horrible plane crash was not fucking fun, you idiot. God, I’m going to have to destroy any videos people might have taken of the eulogy I gave. Now I’m just embarrassed.” Svetlana pauses and lays her fork down. “It was a very busy service. You have a long list of apologies to make.”

“Sorry,” Ilya says quietly. Under the table, his foot hooks around Shane’s ankle. Shane scoots closer and nuzzles into his side.

“Even though it hurt, none of us regretted loving you. We wouldn’t trade any of it for the world. Not a single second. Глупый мальчишка. (Silly boy.)”

One foot in front of the other. It takes Ilya a while to recover from the Svetlana reunion. Svetlana had mourned by Ilya’s side when he lost his mother, and he struggles with the guilt of putting her through that grief again, alone.

Being loved is both a blessing and a burden.

When he’s ready to take another step, Yuna organizes a meeting with the Centaurs. She reaches out to Coach Brandon Wiebe first. Ilya advocates for him as an entry point to the rest of the team, since he’s apparently open-minded and truly cares for his players. He assures Yuna that Coach Wiebe will hear them out.

For the Centaurs’ sake, it better be true. Otherwise they’ll be facing down years worth of expertly crafted corporate torture in the form of Yuna Hollander’s emails.

“This is not about Shane’s contract,” is how Yuna decides to kick off the Zoom meeting.

Wiebe fiddles with his settings for a moment. “Oh? Well that’s good. I was worried about him. I know it can’t have been easy leaving Montreal.”

Most of the trade details had gone through Farah and her team, but Yuna had needed a reason for Wiebe to agree to her meeting. Though, most of the hockey world would be remiss to ignore any meeting request from Yuna Hollander.

Yuna chews on her lower lip. She stares Wiebe in the eyes as she carefully enunciates, “This is about Ilya Rozanov.”

“Ah.” Pain flashes across Wiebe’s face. He drops his head low, shoulders hunching. “If you’re talking about the C, I’m sorry. The boys won’t take that from Roz, and neither will I.”

“That’s good to hear,” Yuna says mildly. She fights a tone-inappropriate smile off her lips. Her heart warms anew every time someone in Ilya’s life makes it clear how much they care about him. “He will be needing it.”

Wiebe freezes. “What?”

“Ilya is alive.” She can’t help it. The smile grows. “Coach Wiebe, I must first apologize for not alerting you immediately when we found him, but his mental state was very fragile and the road to recovery was long and treacherous. But he’s okay. He survived the crash.”

“This – I don’t understand. His blood? They found his blood on the debris?” Wiebe’s voice climbs higher and higher. “He’s a-alive?”

“Yes, I think so,” Ilya chips in. He leans into the frame of Yuna’s webcam with a cheery wave. “Probably.”

Wiebe doesn’t move for so long that Yuna double checks her internet connection. Finally, he cracks.

“Fuck. It’s good to see you, son.” Wiebe sniffles. “It’s really, really good to see you.”

Amazingly, Wiebe doesn’t even bring up hockey. He asks about the head trauma and the amnesia, but not in the sense that he’s trying to poke holes in the story or rush Ilya back onto the ice. He just genuinely seems invested in Ilya’s wellbeing, beyond how useful he is for his team.

Yuna’s heart eases. Both of her boys are in good hands.

Finally, Ilya brings it up. “Since I am healthy as horse – ha! – am I back on the roster, or did you blow our whole salary budget on Hollander?” Before Wiebe can even respond, Ilya waves off the comment. “Eh, does not matter. Pay him everything. Gives me an excuse to make him spoil me.”

Wiebe quirks a brow.

Ilya perks up. This is his favorite topic by far. “Oh! Yes, forgot to mention I am in gay love with Shane Hollander. We will probably be gay married by the start of the season. Telling whole world soon because life is very short.”

Wiebe doesn’t even bat an eye at that. “Right. Buddy, you could be married to the Pope for all I care. You’re alive and you’re playing again. I think you’ve earned it.”

“Glad to hear it. Shane!” Ilya calls out behind them. Shane comes trotting out of the kitchen, flicking water off his fingers. Ilya fists his hands in the front of his shirt, yanks him down, and kisses him hard.

Even Yuna has to avert her eyes when she spots Shane slipping in some tongue. Jesus Christ. Finally, Shane leans back and scrubs a hand over his spit-slick mouth. “Oh, you’re on call. Hi, sir.”

He looks embarrassed, but not to the degree he probably should after making out in front of his coach and his mother. With tongue! Thank God they’re preparing to come out as soon as they re-enter the public eye, because there’s no way they’d be able to keep their hands to themselves after all this.

“Just Coach is fine. Wow Roz, you were serious,” Wiebe squeaks. “Obviously still supportive, but like, holy shit. Rozanov. Congratulations on so many levels.”

Ilya beams. “See, sweetheart? People are much cooler about us being in love after I lead with the back-from-the-dead thing. All along we just needed bigger story to distract everyone.”

“I would have been cool regardless!” Wiebe protests. “But yeah, you’ve somehow discovered the one headline that would be juicier than a secret gay romance between the two biggest rivals in the league. Color me impressed.”

Ilya’s gaze slides to Shane, who just sighs and hands him a book.

The call is quiet for a moment as Wiebe takes it all in. He’s not fazed at the way Shane and Ilya are fused at every possible point of contact, or even that Ilya is in Yuna’s house. He’s just staring at Ilya’s face in wonder.

“Fuck, Roz. You’re going to make a whole locker room of grown men cry.”

“Ah,” Ilya’s grin sharpens. “So just like any other day I play Montreal?”

Shane shoves Ilya for the quip, mostly out of habitual loyalty. Wiebe snickers. “Maybe when you were in Boston, kid. Although with both of you on the team…hot damn, we might stand a chance. Roz, Shane, how do you boys feel about a Stanley Cup for a little welcome home present?”

“Only if we can take it on our honeymoon,” Ilya says as he plants a wet kiss on Shane’s cheek.

Wiebe laughs, bright and teary. “We can arrange that.”

They end the call with Wiebe promising to work with Yuna to circulate the news through the rest of the Centaurs’ upper management. They decide to leave the boys themselves to their Captain.

Naturally, Captain Ilya chooses to handle it in the most obnoxious, dramatic way by casually waltzing into practice with Shane by his side. Shane begs him to send a text, a warning, something so they aren’t completely jumpscared by their zombie Captain, but Ilya dismisses him. Apparently the Centaurs are good sports.

Shane doesn’t fight him too hard on it. Yuna isn’t sure whether he’s just unwilling to dampen Ilya’s clear excitement from being a menace to his boys again, or if he’s secretly relieved to take the attention off himself for his first interaction with the team.

Actually, maybe that’s exactly Ilya’s plan.

It’s not unthinkable for Ilya to thrust himself into the hot seat to spare Shane’s nerves, but Shane also has to convince Ilya not to show up in a bedsheet with holes cut out of it. So.

It’s definitely not all altruistic.

They don’t come home for a long time. Yuna obsessively checks her Life360 crystal ball and considers syncing her phone with Shane’s Apple Watch biometrics just to monitor his heart rate.

(Unfortunately that would make her a hypocrite, since she barely convinced Ilya out of the same idea. Damn.)

When they finally arrive, they’re entrenched in a blob of blubbering hockey players. It’s quite fascinating. It operates like an amoeba with Shane and Ilya as the reluctant nucleus.

“Sorry for unexpected entourage. Could not shake them off,” Ilya tries to scoff, but he’s grinning too hard to make his ire believable. “They all cry Cap! Cap! Best hockey player in the world! We are your biggest fans! We kiss your feet! Who is Shane Hollander, he sounds very boring and slow! Don’t leave us again! So I have no choice, I bring them home.”

Home.

Wisely, the cell walls are Yuna-permeable. She doles out motherly pats on the shoulders to the ugliest, snottiest criers as she wades through the weeping crowd. When she reaches the center, she steps over whoever has coiled himself around Ilya’s legs – Lucas Haas? – and throws her arms around her boys.

Yes. They’re home.

David stares forlornly at the modest pot of stew simmering on the stove, then the writhing mass of hundreds of pounds of pure hungry hockey player on his doorstep.

“...I’ll order pizza.”

_____________________

Deep in a drawer in the Hollanders’ Ottawa home, a strange array of items are stashed like precious gems.

Ilya Rozanov’s obituary. Shane Hollander’s medical file. A copy of their marriage license. A small animal bone leftover from the ritual.

It serves as a reminder to Yuna – and to her boys, when it gets hard – just how far people will go for love.

(It’s also handy to keep her sane when Ilya eats all her cookie dough ice cream or Shane asks why they would need chairs for a ceremony. God, raising boys can be such a pain. Yuna wouldn’t have it any other way.)

She buys things in fours. She and David switch off wearing Hollander and Rozanov jerseys to Centaurs games, until management moves forward on production for Hollander-Rozanov merchandise. Ilya and Shane are rarely apart, but Ilya will sometimes swing by the Hollanders’ house by himself for quality time. He’s perfected David’s chicken parm recipe, and Yuna secretly adores the sappy Hallmark movies he picks out.

All Yuna ever wanted was a healthy baby.

They struggled for a long time before having Shane, the absolute light of their lives. Yuna had thanked her lucky stars every time her little boy reached his arms out for her with that gap-toothed grin, every mama from his lips a novelty, a new blessing she was terrified she didn’t earn.

She humbly bows her head to those same stars now, forever grateful that they relinquished him from their warm embrace. In this new life she will hug him harder, listen to him closer, never again let him fear terms and conditions to their love.

The ritual brought Shane back from the dead, but it’s Yuna and David who truly received another chance at life.

Seeing tiny, wrinkled, precious Shane take breath for first time was already a miracle. Secretly, she always felt that the way he grew up – loving, kind-hearted, dedicated, and fucking incredible at hockey – was her second miracle.

The third is bestowed upon her with Shane’s second first breath. A wiser, meeker person would accept three as all the absolute extent of grace the universe will dispense.

Three genie wishes. Three strikes and you’re out. Three periods to a hockey game.

(Unless there’s overtime. Or you keep swinging after everyone tells you to stop. Or you wish for more wishes. Or you are Yuna Hollander, and you do not relent even when it kills you. Especially then.)

And thus, because all good things now come in fours, Ilya Rozanov becomes her final miracle.

Unbeknownst to her, he’s been working small wonders in their lives long before Yuna forced his soul back into his body on Shane’s childhood bed. He’s the player who challenges Shane, pushes him towards his greatest self, keeps the game alive and enchanting. He’s the loving partner they always fantasized about for Shane but quietly feared he’d never find. He’s the second child they could never birth, though they gave him life all the same.

Have one son, get one free – or for the price of one resurrection ritual and a marriage certificate.

It’s a pretty good bargain.

Chapter End Notes

aaaand that wraps up yuna's pov!!! 🥹🥹🥹 i'm quite sad to let go of her because i had so much more fun than i expected peeling back all her layers.....BUT at the core of it as much as i enjoy outsider pov i love hollanov for hollanov and i just couldnt perfectly scratch that obsessive possessive codependent itch without getting back into one of their heads to wax poetic about them!!! plus there was no reason to put yuna in the centaurs locker room for their reunion LOL...soooo shane pov of this story will be posted into this series soon!

genuinely thank u all so so so much for coming on this journey with me. i loveee putting these characters in (often slightly supernatural) situations and exploring their personalities and dynamics!!!! !!!!!!! and im elated so many of u trusted my bizarre premise (and depressing as fuck first chapter...if u have been reading since ch1 i will pay ur therapy) and stuck with me hahaha

as always, i truly appreciate every last comment and kudos 😽 i'm bad at responding to everyone but trust and believe each one brightens my day and fuels the worm in my brain <33333

OH AND!!!!! a special thank you to anyone who has recommended my fics on other platforms!!! i dont have threads, only twt (which u cant search for shit anymore) and just recently discovered the hr fic subreddit 🤯🤯🤯 it means the world to me that anyone enjoys my work let alone thinks highly enough of it to rec it to others. so thank u!!!

ok thats enough from me HAHAH see you soooon ❣️

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