Rating:

Explicit

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandoms:

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

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Additional Tags:

Time Loop, Because the only thing better than Tuna Melt Day is unending Tuna Melt Day, Angst, Fluff and Angst, Internalised homophobia (I'm Shane Hollander nice to meet you), As little actual hockey as I could manage, Feelings Realization, Love Confessions, Shane Hollander Is Bad at Feelings, Ilya Rozanov is not much better, what's in a name, an awful lot as it turns out, Ilya Rozanov Loves Shane Hollander, Shane Hollander Loves Ilya Rozanov, just don't ask them to confirm or deny that, D/s vibes because we've met these guys before, Blow Jobs, Deepthroating, Anal Sex, Good Friend Hayden Pike, Coming Out, canon typical metros homophobia, ONLY happy endings in this house

Language:

English

Series:

Part 1 of a step to the right

Stats:

Published: 2026-02-06 Completed: 2026-03-29 Words: 75,752 Chapters: 7/7

a step to the right

Summary

Shane thinks about Ilya; thinks about the glorious gasping surprise of Shane and considers that he has made an absolutely fucking massive mistake somewhere along his way here but he has no idea what it was. Behind his eyelids he thinks about his own name choked out like a confession and thinks about the Ilya that seemed to come so naturally, and wishes desperately that he'd done something differently. Something, almost anything, but he doesn't know what, can't pin the thought down. He has no idea what he's wishing for except for different.

As it turns out, once they're in motion there's nothing that can keep his eyes open, and he sleeps.

There's a dream that feels like turning inside out, like stretching and rebounding, like a path cleared and his is the first skate that touches the ice after the Zamboni leaves it, and he wakes —

He wakes.

Head thick and foggy until he shakes it and it clears, but he wakes —

— and they're back at the hotel.

Notes

Hey is this the gay hockey show bandwagon? Good to be here, I'll be over in this corner by the drinks table. I was going to do a nice gentle little toe in the waters fic here but then I tripped and fell on my keyboard and now I've got what's shaping up to be 40k of timeloop fiasco. Oops?

With much love to Hbyrde for the handholding and convincing me me characterisation was on track, and hitlikehammers, we both know this wouldn't exist without you. Thank you so, so much for your enabling and your cheerleading and the pretty dividers and putting up with my many ramblings xxx

My Russian used to be functional but is now rusty as fuck: I apologise for any massacring of the language that may have taken place. I also do not watch hockey and have gone out of my way for my entire adult life to not have to understand any professional sport in any kind of detail: I love this show but I am too old to give up on my active avoidance strategy now. Please let this serve as apology and explanation for the 'hockey' in this fic.

Title is of course from The Timewarp: the joy of working titles that get stuck.

Chapter 1: One

Chapter Notes

Shane strips off his borrowed clothes standing in Rozanov's foyer. His own clothes are where he'd left them — folded tidily in a pile on the first chair next to the kitchen island before Rozanov had bent him over it — and he swaps them for Rozanov's sweatpants and t-shirt, that are both far too big for him anyway, as quickly as he can, terrified that Rozanov is going to follow him from the couch and listening for the sound of footsteps over the hockey commentary that's still coming from the TV.

Getting dressed with Rozanov near has never been something he's done with urgency, not like taking his clothes off for him — but he's in enough of a rush now that he puts his white t-shirt on backwards in his haste and has to start again, then his fingers fumble, trembling, with the button on his jeans and he almost puts his shoes on the wrong feet, so by the time he pulls open the heavy front door and makes it outside, stumbling over his own steps to get down the driveway and back to the road, every item of clothing he's wearing feels itchy and uncomfortable, not sitting right against his skin.

That feeling doesn't settle as he walks a long way in what, in hindsight, is probably the wrong direction — he never has gotten to know his way around Boston — before he thinks that he's safely far away and he should probably get a cab back to the hotel before anyone recognises him; he's not sure he can manage smiling for a picture if he's asked, having someone standing so close in his space, not until he's taken off every single thing he's wearing and put them all back on again properly.

He's forgotten about Hayden. Although, not exactly, he knows theoretically about Hayden but until he hears the lock on their hotel room door click when he waves his keycard in front of it he hasn't actually considered that Hayden is probably going to be in their room. It's getting dark now and there are messages in the team group chat planning where to go for dinner so they'll all be heading out soon — but Hayden's sifting through his suitcase when Shane lets the door swing shut behind him.

If Shane actually had stayed at Rozanov's place tonight — would they have eaten together? They couldn't have gone out, but ordered in, maybe — probably there wouldn't have been much in his kitchen that Shane would have eaten and he wonders if they would have agreed over a takeout menu or argued. Probably argued. Would they have watched a movie? Fucked again, made the most of the time, and —

Shane hears the echo of his name, hears fuck, Shane sound in his ears like Rozanov's right there moaning it again, and he snaps out of the what-if daydream with a blink and a spill of cold down his spine.

"You alright, man?"

Hayden is staring at him, holding a pair of socks in one hand and frowning.

Shane's phone buzzes and he looks at it automatically; more group chat messages. They've picked a restaurant; Thai food.

There is absolutely no way Shane is going to be able to leave this room again tonight. He feels like it would pull him apart at the seams.

"I'm fine," he says, and his voice is steady. Hayden frowns harder, though, and turns properly to face him so Shane carries on before he can manage to get a word out. "I'm just going to take a shower."

The bathroom is only two steps away and the lock turns behind him with a decisive click right before he leans back against it and lets his head thud against the wood. Pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes Shane cannot understand how this day has gone so wrong; how two words have sunk their claws so deep into the careful paper walls he has built in his mind around the things that he and Rozanov do together.

It's not even — not that much — the Shane.

It's the Ilya.

Hearing Shane had shot through him like lightning; had pushed him headlong into his orgasm, had filled him up with something glowing and molten-hot. But Ilya had fallen off his tongue in the aftermath; rolled straight out into the world as natural as anything like his mouth had been waiting to make exactly that shape.

It seems to have cracked something open in him on its way out and no matter how hard he tries, he can't gather it all back together again, can't stuff the whole mess back into his chest where it's been lurking.

There's a knock from the other side of the door, and Shane starts and realises that he's meant to be taking a shower in here. Hayden's said something through the door, but Shane wasn't listening so he guesses.

"I'm just going to get room service tonight," he calls back, "I'll have an early night, I'm really tired."

Shane leans over the side of the bath to turn on the shower — at first the better to sell the lie, but then he realises that he didn't shower after him and Rozanov — after the couch — and his skin feels immediately and completely disgusting, like the sweat and the come and — and Rozanov's sweat and his come and his spit, it's — it's —

Shane strips; kicks off his shoes and yanks his jeans down, hears Hayden tell him to have a good night before the hotel room door opens and thuds closed, but Shane's already under the spray by then, turning the water temperature up high.

He washes. Scrubs. Cleans every part of himself and then does it again and wants to stay in there all night but he hates the feel of his skin when his fingers have wrinkled from the wet, so he shuts the shower off before he's been in there long enough to prune.

He dries himself: fresh hotel towel, white, a little scratchy. It's not a good enough hotel for properly soft towels, but they rarely are on road trips. They almost always stay at this exact one when they're in Boston and they always have the same not-quite soft white towels.

There are no lights on in the bedroom and it's full dark outside the windows now, so Shane flicks on the lamp next to his bed and opens the drawer he'd unpacked his clothes into. Clean underwear. Pyjamas. Comb through his hair, then towel the water out of it so that it doesn't drip down his neck. The clothes he took off go back in his suitcase to be washed when he gets home. His jacket he hangs up in the wardrobe and his shoes go on the bottom of it.

He screws his eyes shut and tries not to hear fuck, Shane.

Tries not to think Ilya.

His head is empty and buzzing; racing.

He wonders if he's ever said Rozanov's first name before, since they met under a no-smoking sign in Saskatchewan, since Shane said them both together in introduction: Ilya-Rozanov-Shane-Hollander.

Rozanov says his name all the time; his full name all together. It always sounds like mockery.

Shane orders his room service, because they have a game tomorrow and he needs to eat. They leave it outside the door so he doesn't have to speak to anyone — salmon, grilled; brown rice, steamed vegetables — he eats it but doesn't taste it and puts the stack of plates on its tray back outside the door when he's done.

Hayden returns when Shane's pretending to sleep, and he pretends not to wake as Hayden moves around, gets ready for bed, eventually settles and his breathing steadies.

Shane thinks Ilya, thinks about the glorious gasping surprise of Shane, and considers that he has made an absolutely fucking massive mistake somewhere along his way here but he has no idea what it was.

He wakes when the alarm goes off on his phone, which means that he slept, but he remembers looking at no new messages on his phone a little after 2am, so the actual number of hours' sleep he got is really not enough, going into a game day.

Rarely has he been so grateful for his routine: it takes him to the gym for a morning workout since there's no morning practice, it carries him through breakfast and lets him smile blandly and pretend he doesn't see Hayden's concerned glances, then it gets him packed up and on the bus to the rink all nicely on schedule. He hasn't actually considered that he's going to have to see Rozanov again today and as he warms up, stretches, knows exactly where Rozanov is on the other side of the ice as the stands fill up, a sticky pit of dread forms in him alongside the countdown to their face off.

He doesn't know what he'll do if he hears that familiar, careful pronunciation around all of his syllables. That Shane Hollander that sometimes sparks his anger and sometimes firms his determination and sometimes just makes him want to watch Rozanov's mouth making the letters. They take their positions, no avoiding it, and Shane risks a glance up — to see Rozanov is concentrating, eyes down.

Shane feels — does he feel disappointed?

He has no idea.

He's can't even put a word to it when they win, not after that shitshow of a game, scraping out a lead that didn't even feel like one and leaving the ice knowing that Rozanov hadn't glanced at him once tonight, not for anything. Shane's not even sure why he minds.

Probably he's being weird — a win is still a win — but he's tired, now, the no-sleep catching up with the exhaustion of his whirling head that still can't seem to pin down any thoughts through its static, and although he can tell Hayden wants to say something to him Shane manages to put him off, to get dressed fast and make it out to the bus before he gets pinned down to answering.

It doesn't stop Hayden from sitting next to him, though, so Shane lets his head tip back against the headrest; lets his eyes close. He can hear kit being stowed in the bus' luggage compartment, comforting known-quantity thuds, and even though the trip back to the airport isn't that long Shane thinks it would be good to rest. He rarely sleeps well on planes; it's probably now or never until he's back in his own bed.

Behind his eyelids he thinks about Shane choked out against his own lips like a confession and thinks about the Ilya that had seemed to come so naturally, and wishes desperately that he'd done something differently. Something, almost anything, but he doesn't know what, can't pin the thought down. He has no idea what he's wishing for except for different.

As it turns out, once they're in motion there's nothing that can keep his eyes open, and he sleeps.

There's a dream that feels like turning inside out, like stretching and rebounding, like a path cleared and his is the first skate that touches the ice after the Zamboni leaves it, and he wakes —

He wakes.

Head thick and foggy until he shakes it and it clears, but he wakes —

— and they're back at the hotel.

Did they forget something?

"Did we forget something?" he asks to no-one in particular, but Hayden is nearest to him so he looks his way for an answer but Hayden just shoots him a confused smile.

"What? No?" He stands while the bus is still slowing, and lurches a little when it comes to a stop. "C'mon, let's get off this thing, I have a whole afternoon of uninterrupted hotel time waiting for me."

He's pulling his bag down from the luggage rack and all the rest of the guys are doing the same, those at the front starting to disembark.

Shane feels suddenly, entirely incorrect.

"We aren't going to the airport?" he asks, and Hayden laughs.

"I didn't think you were asleep that long but man, you were really out of it, huh?"

He passes Shane down his carry-on from the luggage rack before he joins the rest of the team as they file off the bus, but Shane is still looking out the window, not quite understanding, trying to put together that he has in fact missed something very fucking important, and so he lets the case sit on the seat next to him, his grip white-knuckled on the handle.

JJ's the last to pass him, saying with a raised eyebrow, "You coming, Capitaine?" and Shane nods and stands, collects his carry-on and follows JJ off the bus.

He's never been more confused in his life so he stands in the drop-off bay outside the hotel's front doors, watching as his team, the coaches, the med staff — they all file inside chatting shit and laughing like this is totally normal, when their flight should be leaving in a couple of hours, they need to be checking in, they —

Shane glances at his phone for the time and it's — it's ten twenty-three in the morning.

Which is not right, not at all, because he's just finished playing an afternoon hockey game and their flight is scheduled to leave at eight, and — then he notices the unread text, under the time.

From Lily: See you soon.

He's read that. He's sure he has. Rozanov had sent it to him yesterday just before they arrived at the hotel; Shane had showered the airplane off and gone straight back out to meet him at his house.

Hadn't he?

Because he is clearly standing in their hotel lobby right now watching a member of the hotel staff calling out names from a list and handing out room keys — some of the guys are heading for the elevators and — and Miitke, who'd taken a fist to the jaw in the game that afternoon that was coming up angry purple by the time they reached the locker room is — he's fine. He's fine. Not a bruise in sight as he presses the button for the fourth floor.

Shane thinks he might not be able to breathe; his vision is beginning to blur around the edges and he works to drag himself back together: he cannot be seen losing his shit like this in a public place — but there's Hayden, pressing a keycard in a little cardboard wallet into Shane's numb fingers. It has 3312 written on it in green ballpoint, which he remembers having already thought was weird — who writes with a green ballpoint when surely you must have to go out of your way for it, to not just use blue or black? So that doesn't make sense either, but the fact that there's a keycard inside the cardboard means he has somewhere to go, at the very least a bathroom he can shut himself in to freak out quietly where no one can bother him.

This plan, at least, works perfectly: he is incredibly proud of himself for not curling in a ball on the floor of the elevator while he listens to his teammates talk about where they're going to go for dinner that night, how they're going to kick Boston's ass tomorrow afternoon and Shane valiantly manages not to blurt out we did that already, that was hours ago, not until he's shut himself back in the bathroom in his and Hayden's room, throwing over his shoulder that he's going to wash the flight off him.

And he does feel … sticky, uncomfortable and dry-skinned and still also somehow sweaty like he always does when he's come off a plane. He doesn't feel like he just had a postgame shower and he's — he realises for the first time — he's not wearing the same clothes he left the stadium in, he's wearing the soft clothes he prefers to travel in, sweats and a hoodie a size too big, the one with the fraying thumbholes.

He sits down on the closed toilet lid, his chest tightening, and puts his head between his knees and his hands behind his neck and he makes himself breathe as deeply and slowly as he can; stays there until Hayden knocks on the door some amount of minutes later that Shane doesn't keep track of, but things are starting to calm a little by then.

"Shane? You all right in there, man?"

Shane doesn't want to lift his head, but he does. He hadn't thought to lock the door, he can see it from here, and he licks his dry lips.

"Can you come in here?" he calls out in the end, and the handle turns but then stops before the door opens.

"Are you naked?" Hayden says back, "Is this a naked problem?" and Shane manages to huff a laugh, roll his eyes.

"No, I'm not naked."

Hayden still cracks the door only slightly at first, then opens it all the way when he can tell there's nothing untoward going on in here except for Shane's absolute breakdown of reality. Hayden stands in the doorway, watching him with concern.

"What's going on?"

It's a reasonable question, and Shane wishes he knew. He takes a deep, shuddering breath in, and lets it out slow.

He does not believe in the supernatural — dumb superstitions aside, the world is what the world is and Shane knows this in his bones. He also doesn't feel like he's gone suddenly, irretrievably insane: outside of the walls of panic that are now starting to recede from him and which, themselves, were oddly comforting in their familiarity, he feels — he feels fine.

"I think," he says, in the end, "that I had a really weird fucking dream on the bus."

Hayden's eyebrows shoot up. "A dream. You're freaking out in the bathroom because you had a dream?"

"Yeah." Shane tries for a smile, makes it into a laugh, but it falls flat. "I think I dreamed about the game? The game tomorrow." He fiddles his phone back out again, swipes to the MLH website from his favourites and can see, right there, Raiders vs Metros, still on the schedule on a one-day countdown. "Woke up convinced we'd already done it."

"Well, did we win?" Hayden asks, and Shane nods.

"Course."

"Shame we can't beat them that easy, Cap," Hayden smiles, but there's still concern around the corners of his eyes.

"Sorry," Shane says, and stands, "I didn't mean to," he flaps his hands around a little uselessly, then shoves them in his pockets, "Weirdest dream I ever had," he finishes on in the end, and this time he does laugh, lets go some of the tension in his shoulders. It's the only thing that makes sense, even if he's never really been one for vivid dreams, the kind that felt like reality down to his bones. He can see what's in front of him and so it must be — must have been — just that.

A dream.

He looks down at his phone, at his one unread message from Lily.

That means that he has plans for today. Getting off the plane it had been all he could think about — meeting at Rozanov's place and the privacy that comes with it, not having to worry about thin hotel walls or anyone seeing him arriving or leaving, and the chance to sate his curiosity perhaps, just a little, to see Rozanov's place; to fuck in his bed. In his dreams it already happened, but dreaming about that at least is nothing new, even though this one had felt so much — so different, and as he thinks it he remembers Rozanov's voice, strangled, tripping over fuck, Shane, and he thinks Ilya, fucking crazy shit for his brain to dream up, and snaps back to the bathroom as Hayden clears his throat.

"Are you sure you're all right?"

"I'm sure," Shane says, then again more confidently, and makes the point of meeting Hayden's eyes to try to convince him too, "I'm ok. Really."

And he is, now, feels like he's starting to level back out some as the certainty that this was just a freaky fucking dream settles around him and he reminds himself of his eagerness to get out of here, to not waste time in a hotel when he could be wasting it in much more enjoyable ways with Rozanov. In his dream Rozanov had bent him over his kitchen counter and fingered him until he couldn't talk for gasping, then they'd gone to bed and Shane had ridden him, needy and unrestrained; he can almost still feel the phantom ache in his thighs from the effort of it. If reality lives even halfway up to his imagination Rozanov will fuck any remaining spinning, clouding thoughts right out of his head.

**

The house looks just like Shane had imagined, but that makes sense because he'd looked the place up on Streetview days ago to make sure he knew exactly where he was going, and if Ilya is dressed exactly as Shane imagined too, well, that makes sense to him as well. He knows by now what Ilya wears when Shane comes to his room, this is something he could have guessed with fair accuracy any time. And if Ilya sits him on his kitchen worktop and then bends him over it, pulls lube from his pocket and works Shane open until he's begging — well, this is what Shane wanted, had fantasised about and so he capitulates, encourages every step, sinks down into Rozanov's dick once they reach the bed with a greedy moan and doesn't think about how he didn't have to be told the way to the bedroom — Rozanov had more or less steered him here, in any case.

It's only after they're done that Shane feels a wobbling uncertainty, when he steps out of Rozanov's shower and knows exactly where to look for a towel — but, he tells himself as he dries himself off, it's just a logical place for them to be kept and to think differently is just imposing reality on wisps of dream-memory. There's no such thing as psychic visions, as seeing the future, dreams that predict reality. There hadn't really been much detail in the interior decor, in his dream — which is true to life; it's not something he tends to notice — but there's still a familiarity about this house that he shouldn't have and he can't shake the feeling that he's been here before even though he knows that it's not true. It's not.

It's not.

Shane has almost convinced himself of it all has he leaves the bathroom and walks back into the bedroom that he knows that he's never seen before today, but then as he gets back into bed, sitting upright a little awkwardly at Rozanov's side, he doesn't look in Rozanov's direction when he says, "I should go," which — was that what he said in his dream? He's not sure but he thinks so, and it makes sense that he says it rather than just leaving since the routine here is all upset; they don't usually have so much potential time together and potential decisions to make on what to do with it, and just because in his dream Rozanov had curled into his side and told him —

"Or you could stay."

Shane's breath freezes in him, and it takes a couple of tries to choke out, "Stay?"

Rozanov nods, his lips curling in a little smile. "Here, tonight." his smile turns into a soft, intimate smirk — just a small one. "I'm not done with you. And we have afternoon game tomorrow, so no morning practise."

Shane swallows, tries to talk, swallows again then starts, "I told Hayden —"

"Is Hayden your mother?"

He shakes his head, "No —"

"No, he's not?"

"Fuck off," He feels like he's reading from a script, but in his dream he thinks he was smiling even though in this moment he couldn't guess what his face is trying to betray.

"Who cares what you told Hayden?" Rozanov asks him, then leans in to place a kiss on Shane's mouth, soft and not trying to initiate anything more, and says quiet and a little wanting, "Stay."

Shane's heart is racing; he feels like Rozanov should be able to tell from so close, and long heavy seconds pass in which the rest of this afternoon — this afternoon that already happened yesterday and hasn't actually happened at all — flashes before his eyes. He has no idea what to do in this situation, this sort of thing doesn't just happen to people, not in reality, but he — he does have an outline. A script, of sorts, that he can follow until he knows what's going on in his head. So, before he leaves it too long, because Rozanov's soft mouth is starting slowly to firm downwards, Shane says, "Ok," and Rozanov's face breaks into a sort of relief.

"Ok?"

Shane nods and tries out a smile the same as Rozanov is wearing. "Ok."

**

They sleep for a little while, more because Shane wants both to know what waits for him in dreams and to shut out whatever's happening to him in reality, but he wakes warm and comfortable and held, which sets his pulse racing at his first conscious breath. It's just the same. Exactly the same, and five minutes later he knows that something is wrong, absolutely, critically wrong with the balance of the entire fucking universe, because he's opening a can of ginger ale while Rozanov says:

"You want tuna melt?"

"You want to make me a tuna melt?" Shane asks, and he hears his voice, edged with panic, as if from a very long way away.

He absolutely could have dreamed up Ilya Rozanov making him a tuna melt, because weird shit happens in dreams all the time — that wouldn't even have been the weirdest dream he'd had this month, although it'd make the top three. But, as he looks at condensation forming on the side of his can of Canada Dry, Shane knows that there's absolutely no way on this earth that he could dream this — precisely this — for it to happen in front of him just the same. He thinks next — next Rozanov asks him about his road trip, his next city, even though making conversation isn't anything that they've ever really bothered with. It can't be, it can't, except —

Rozanov turns to the fridge and starts unloading little containers and asks, "You head to Florida after this, right?"

Shane can't answer. He doesn't understand. He still hasn't answered by the time Ilya's turned back around and laid out all his little containers, ingredients already prepped just like he remembers. He's staring at them in incomprehension.

"Hollander? What is it?"

Shane stands slowly, with a scrape of his chair on the floor tiling.

"Is this a trick?"

Rozanov abandons the fridge, and the door swings slowly shut behind him. "Trick? What trick?" He looks genuinely confused and, sure, Shane's not sure how anyone could pull this off, if a trick's what it is.

He waves a hand at the kitchen, the containers that Rozanov's taken out of the fridge. "We already did this. Didn't we? Already do this?"

Rozanov looks down at the tuna, the open can of ginger ale. "Did what, lunch? Did you fall in shower, Hollander? Hit your head?" The words come with a teasing smile, but there's something worried at the edges of it.

Shane shakes his head, panic tightening his chest. "No, no, we did this, then we went in there," he waves his hand behind him towards where he knows the massive TV lives, "and watched hockey and ate, and, and then —" and then, Shane, and then Ilya. He stares at Rozanov, lost.

"You have never been here before, Hollander, we have never watched hockey. Is this strange Canadian sense of humour? Not very funny." He smiles in a pained sort of way.

Shane takes two handfuls of his hair and pulls, scrunches his eyes shut. When he opens them they fall on the neat pile of his clothes on the first chair by the kitchen island, right where he left them when he took them off and he remembers — remembers — pulling them back on in a hurry, the uncomfortable rub of his socks because one had gone on inside out, how desperate he'd been to take them off when he'd gotten back to the hotel.

Shane doesn't know if he's losing his mind, but if he is he absolutely cannot stand letting Rozanov see it happen.

This is the second time in two days — or one day? One day and a nightmare? — that Shane's stripped in Ilya Rozanov's kitchen in a hectic bid for freedom, and he's not sure if it's made better or worse by the fact that Rozanov's standing watching him do it this time and with a look on his face that's trying so hard not to be disappointed that Shane would hurt, just a little, in sympathy, if he wasn't busy worrying about his apparent oncoming mental breakdown. He supposes that no matter what the circumstances are, no one wants to see the guy they've just got done fucking literally flee the premises like his ass is on fire.

"Hollander," he says, and Shane wishes madly in that moment that he had called him Shane; it just feels like the the person that's witnessing the last fraying ends of his sanity should be someone who calls him by his first name. "Hollander," again, more insistent, and this time Rozanov catches his arm as he flails trying to shove it into the sleeve of his jacket. Shane stops; freezes. "What is happening? You look — not well. Was something I did?"

Shane pauses, considers a different reason that the guy you've just finished fucking might be fleeing the premises.

"No," he says in the end, and he feels Rozanov's grip loosen a little on his arm, "Not something you did, I just feel — really weird, I felt weird when I woke up," he stumbles a little but soldiers on with, "this morning, and I feel weirder now and I — I just need to go."

Rozanov looks like he doesn't know whether he wants to argue and Shane doesn't want to give him chance to make his mind up, so he turns for the front door, but stops and looks behind him, at where he knows — thinks — believes there's a huge TV, couch opposite, one of those U-shaped ones, dark coloured and deep. And — he lets his eyes close for a second to remember it — behind it there are pictures. Two: balancing rocks, one on either end of the wall. Shane remembers them, had thought the first time he'd seen them that he was glad they were behind him when he sat down because he hadn't liked them, they'd made him feel precarious.

Rozanov's grip loosens from his elbow as Shane walks forward, until he can see the U-shaped couch, the TV, that weird fucking hedgehog-looking decoration on the table, and two balancing rock paintings on the walls. They still make him feel precarious.

There's a rushing in his ears, so he doesn't realise that Rozanov's saying his name until he steps completely in front of him, filling his field of vision. He's close, and he puts his hands on Shane's face to make him look at him.

"Hollander, what the fuck is happening? You are freaking me out."

"You? I'm freaking me out." He takes a stumbling step backwards, and Rozanov's hands fall from his face.

"Hollander," he says, low and quiet.

"I'm just going to go." He isn't moving yet, though, and he remembers this from — before, Rozanov's face when he'd left.

"Hollander," once more, and Shane wavers, but catches sight of the paintings over Rozanov's shoulder — precarious — and turns for the front door. Rozanov doesn't call after him again.

At least, Shane thinks, he's probably not going insane. Probably.

**

He makes it back to the hotel much earlier in the afternoon this time and does not at all want to encounter Hayden already, so he finds a corner of the hotel bar to sit in and spend an hour madly scrolling on his phone, looking up prophetic dreams.

The only conclusion he comes to is that he is not having prophetic dreams, and the people that think that they are are almost certainly whackjobs.

Deciding in the end that he probably just needs sleep, he treks upstairs and says as little as possible to Hayden before he strips to his underwear, gets into bed and pulls the covers over his head. He hears Hayden moving around, the sound of steps that stop and start and stop again and Shane just knows that he's standing by his bed trying to decide what to say.

"Do you need anything?" he lands on in the end, and Shane thinks that he does, probably, but he has no idea what that might be and saying so won't help, so.

"No, I'm good. Tired."

There's another ten, fifteen seconds before Hayden moves away and Shane hears the creak of his bed as he sit back down.

Shane is determined to sleep — given that's what seemed to fuck things up, maybe it'll fix them — and he manages to make himself do it in the end, but wakes later in that disoriented way that he always has if he sleeps in the middle of the day for more than a few minutes: unsure how much time has passed, when it is and where he is and with a sense of unease that he's forgotten to do something. Hayden is shaking his shoulder.

"Hey, man, we're all going out to eat, you wanna come?"

Shane rubs his eyes and looks up at Hayden. He remembers the group chat yesterday, in his dream; the discussion about where to go. They'd picked a Thai restaurant in the end; somewhere not on their usual Boston rotation. It had a weird name.

"Where are you going?" he asks, thinking: Titanic. That was it. The Thai Tanic. He'd thought it was kinda funny in that dumb way that didn't make him want to eat there any more than he would have otherwise.

"Some Thai food place," Hayden says, fiddling in his pocket for his phone. "I had a look at the menu, I'm pretty sure you can make it work." He scrolls; scrolls. "Oh hey, there it is. The Thai Tanic. Funny."

Shane stares at the ceiling and wonders if he died and didn't notice.

"No, I'm good. I'm just going to get room service, watch a movie."

Hayden nods, unsurprised. "And you're sure you're ok?"

The fact that he is absolutely not ok does not make this any more annoying of a question, given it's about the fiftieth time today. "Fuck, Hayden, yes, I'm fine. Go, have food. I'll see you later."

Hayden holds up his hands in surrender. "Ok, ok, I'm going. You want me to bring anything back?"

Shane hesitates, thinking about a fried banana pancake thing he'd had at his mom's birthday dinner, years ago in a Thai place in Ottawa that's shut down now. It had been delicious, crispy outsides and sweet with condensed milk.

"No thanks, I'm good."

"All right. See you later."

"Later."

Shane watches Hayden leave, then flicks on his bedside lamp and pulls out his phone again. He has an unread message from Lily: You ok? sick?

Not knowing how to reply he doesn't, then opens a private browsing tab before he flicks to Google and looks up living the same day over again.

He knew it was dumb before he did it, but half an hour later all he knows is that there are a lot more movies in this genre than he'd ever suspected, and also that he seems to be living in one. Which is dumb, because he lives in actual reality, and this is all going to be proven to be a stupid mess of overthinking when he gets on the plane out of Boston tomorrow night.

**

They win against Boston again. It's more of a respectable game, this time, since he's not so thrown by the Shane and Ilya situation, even though he suspects that one's just lurking in his subconscious waiting for him to not be freaking out quite so existentially before it rears its head again.

He gets on the bus, dropping wearily down into a window seat, determined to stay awake — he will make it to the airport this time — but as soon as the engine starts his eyes start to droop. He hears the thudding as kit bags are loaded into the luggage compartment and the doors are slammed shut and no amount of rubbing at his eyes is making them stay open. He shakes his head, exhaustion covering him like a weighted blanket that he can't fight against, and he's asleep almost before they pull out of the stadium's parking lot.

He wakes up, a time later that he can't measure, blinking into mid-morning sun as they pull up in front of their hotel.

Shane sits on the end of his hotel bed, looking at the green biro scrawl of 3312 on the little cardboard envelope that his keycard lives in.

Hayden is standing by the other bed, tumbling through his suitcase for his phone charger. On Shane's lockscreen, there's an unread message from Lily: See you soon.

"Hayd?" he says, carefully marking the message as read. "Can I ask you something?"

"Well that sounds serious," he says, "but shoot. Do I need to be sitting down for this?"

Shane shrugs. "You could sit if you want," and he does, on the edge of his own bed, opposite Shane. Shane stares at where the knee on Hayden's jeans has a loose thread. Hayden doesn't say anything; lets him get his thoughts in a line. He's always been good like that.

"Do you remember," he starts, eventually, "being here before?"

"Here? Like Boston here, or this hotel, or —"

"No," Shane shakes his head, "and, yes — this hotel, but this room. 3312. And, today."

Hayden tilts his head, confused. "Yes, we are here today in room 3312."

"No, no that's not — What did we do yesterday?"

Shane knows what answer he's hoping for, but he gets the one that he expected instead.

"Home game against Toronto. 4-2, Hollander hat trick." Hayden smiles bright, and it dims when Shane sighs.

"Yeah, that's what I thought you were gonna say."

"What, was there some other highlight of yesterday I should have thought of first? JJ's good luck underwear? That's gotta be a lowlight if it's anything, man, he definitely needs to wash them more often."

"No, no that's not it," Shane says, then stares at the miscellaneous beige carpet in between his feet. "You don't remember playing Boston? Playing Boston here, yesterday, we won 3-2?"

There's a silence, and Shane can't look at Hayden for it. He knows what he sounds like. "We played Toronto yesterday. In Montreal. You scored a hat trick." He says it slowly, carefully, like he's not sure why he has to explain this.

"Are you sure?" Shane asks, still staring at the beige carpet.

"Yes, I'm sure. Shane, man, what's going on?"

Shane is not at all sure he should say what he's going to say, but he has to. "I played Boston yesterday. Miitke got punched in the face. We won 3-2 in overtime."

He risks a glance up at Hayden, who looks — worried. Really, really fucking worried.

"No," he says, awfully, "No you didn't."

And that's that, isn't it. There's no point arguing the point: Shane might have played Boston yesterday, but no one else did.

"I need to wash the airport off," he says instead, "and I'm tired."

Hayden doesn't say anything else as Shane shuts himself in the bathroom.

**

He stays in bed the rest of the day. He scrolls on his phone and finds out that the rest of the world definitely still thinks it's Thursday, too, even though he knows for a fact it was Thursday yesterday. He gets texts from Lily that he reads and ignores:

Lily: Are you coming now?

Lily: Hurry up and get here and I will make sure you do 💦

Lily: Are you on way?

And then, eventually, when the sun is closer to the horizon than it's peak:

Lily: Ok.

He feels bad, but has no idea what to say back and his head is too full to be near Rozanov right now, he feels like all his carefully built safeguards around what he can and can't, does and doesn't say to him would melt to nothing. He doesn't go out with the team for dinner but Hayden makes a valiant effort to convince him, today, and Shane almost caves, but then he wonders if Hayden's going to be asking him the same thing again tomorrow and can't make himself put his shoes back on.

The morning drags and the game against Boston is awful. He doesn't think he's ever played worse, not since before the MLH, before the World Juniors, even — he has never been so completely off his game. He can see Rozanov looking at him, and at their third face off he asks outright:

"Hollander, what is wrong with you?"

But Shane doesn't answer Rozanov back since he has no idea what's wrong with him so he's got nothing to answer with, and then he loses the face off again. He gets pulled from the ice at the end of first period and doesn't get sent back on. It's the right decision; they score once after he's taken off and still lose by four.

The locker room's quiet afterwards, save for the vibrating of his phone that he knows must be his mom calling. He can hear the team getting ready to leave around him, apathetic getting-dressed sounds on all sides, and he knows that they're all probably looking at him, shooting glances and murmuring to each other, most probably about him given he's the reason they lost. He doesn't know how to explain that he is in circumstances that he has no framework for, doesn't understand the point of, can barely comprehend. Time does not work like this except that today it does, and Shane doesn't understand how he finds his way back to a day that makes sense to him.

Sleep drags him under like suffocation as soon as the bus is loaded, and in a flash he's waking once more to the drop-off zone at the front of their hotel.

Shane lets himself go through the motions; he follows Hayden upstairs to their room; he showers, he gets dressed. He's waiting for the other shoe to drop, for one of the people he encounters in the world to crack and tell him it's all been a joke, but that is feeling increasingly unlikely. Whatever's going on, it is happening to him and no one else and he might not know what's happening or why or what might stop it, and it's true that all the rules he knows to live by in the world seem to have flown out of the fucking window, but —

"Hey, Hayden?"

"What?" Hayden calls, shouting to be heard from the bathroom.

"Good game yesterday, right?"

"What?"

Shane turns his hands over, palms up, then palms down again. "Toronto. Good game."

"Uh. Yeah, it was good. I'm not watching it with you already though, it's barely even been twelve hours."

"No, that's fine, that's — 4-2 was great, right? Toronto have been strong this season."

"Hollander hat trick!" Hayden calls, and Shane leaves it there.

All the rules he knows to live by seem to have flown out of the window, but that doesn't mean that there aren't any at all, others made in their wake. He wishes very, very badly that someone could explain to him what they are, but if he has to work them out for himself he thinks he's already got a few down.

The bus ride out becomes the bus ride in. Yesterday they played Toronto. Tonight the team goes to a badly named Thai restaurant while Shane orders room service and tomorrow they play Boston but Shane doesn't make it to the airport afterwards. And this afternoon — he checks his phone, where he has one unread message from Lily (See you soon) — Rozanov is expecting him.

Rozanov hadn't seemed to realise anything was amiss the second time Shane had been there, and the first time had been really, really good. He takes his jacket from where he's hung it up in the wardrobe on one of those annoying, fiddly hotel coat hangers that he hates because they won't detach from the rail, and slides his arms through the left sleeve, then the right. It had been really good, both times. Uninhibited and frantic, like it always is with Rozanov, but then the first day, after — they'd had time, they'd — Shane has always wondered what it would be like with them if they had more time, and it had been good — right up until Shane and Ilya, at least, and whatever that did to his rattling nerves.

But, he thinks, hopping his way into his shoes, he could follow the broad strokes that the day sets out for him without necessarily having to follow that part of the script again. He could have the good bit, the sex bit, without the Shane and Ilya bit that he still can't bring himself to look directly towards. If the universe has stuck him in some sort of hellish repetition — and it seems that it has, at least for now — it likes him enough to have done it to him on a day that him and Rozanov have had starred in their calendars since the game schedule went up on the locker room wall at the start of the season. If he shoves that mess of something that fell out of him on the first day as far down as it'll go, out of the way where it belongs, then he can go to Rozanov's, he gets to have a good afternoon, and he's just following the pattern, the schedule. This is what he's supposed to be doing today.

Hayden comes out of the bathroom as Shane's shoving his phone and his room key in his pocket and Shane clears his throat unnecessarily.

"I'm heading out for a bit," he says, "just meeting a friend."

"Cool."

Shane checks his watch. "I'll be back later."

Hayden smirks down at his carry-on and tells him, "I won't wait up." Shane remembers this back and forth. He'd been mortified the first time around but he's not sure if he needs to be again, not if he'll be standing here tomorrow on the edge of another clean slate. Maybe he doesn't need to follow this script to the letter, either.

"It's not like that, it's just a friend," he adds, but not leaving yet — just waiting to see.

Hayden widens his eyes at him, faux-innocent. "So Lily's just a buddy?"

"Oh." One of his hands digs its nails into the back of his other hand. "Uh — no?" That had sounded like a question, he's pretty sure, so he tries again. "No, uh. Not a — a buddy. I guess."

"Wo-ow," Hayden grins, dragging the word out, "I really didn't think you'd fess up to that one so easy."

Shane shrugs and worries he might be blushing, and Hayden gives him a gleeful little laugh.

"Whatever, go get laid, weirdo."

Shane's courage dies away, there, and he leaves without saying anything else, the door closing on Hayden's shout of, "Have fun!" as he hustles to the elevator.

**

There's a look that Rozanov gets on his face when he's really into whatever they're doing, or what Shane's doing to him, an expression like whatever he's seeing is so fucking hot that he doesn't know what to do with it, can't even decide where to put his hands or his eyes, and he gets that exact expression when Shane's on top like this. It's heady, the closest Shane ever really gets to feeling drunk, and the feeling doesn't go away even after Rozanov rolls them over to put Shane on his back and fuck him like he can't stop himself. It's the only time in the world that Shane wants to be as important as someone else is making him out to be.

Shane looks at himself in the bathroom mirror after and wipes a hand through the condensation on the glass. When he goes back out to the bedroom, Rozanov's going to ask him to stay. Then they'll eat and Rozanov will tell him about his girlfriends; Shane doesn't want to hear that again, doesn't want the churn in his gut that had gone with it, but after that Shane wonders if he will, again, want very badly to put them as close together as he can make them, to press his skin against Rozanov's until they become Shane and Ilya again.

His stomach drops just a little, but enough that he knows it's a bad idea.

But it doesn't have to go that way, today; he can follow the plan for the day without doing it word for word and then prove to himself that it was freakish the first time; a fluke. That's not what they are.

Shane goes back out to the bedroom and tells Rozanov he'll stay and then they nap; they watch hockey sitting on the sofa with the precarious rock pictures behind them and after they eat Ilya stands to take his phone call, his, "Здравствуй, папа," disappearing behind him as Rozanov walks away.

This is where it went sideways the first time, Shane thinks. The sex had been good and Rozanov had been so needy for him which was heady as fuck but at the end, at the end —

He thinks how easily Ilya had fallen out of his mouth, and how that's not them. That's never been them.

It doesn't change the fact that when Rozanov comes back from his phone call and pulls Shane in to his side, lets him rest his head on his shoulder and puts his hand in his hair, Shane feels —

He feels —

He lets himself slide down, put his mouth against the shape of Rozanov's dick and taste cotton and fabric softener as he sucks until he feels him harden. It doesn't take long; it never does, and Shane's lifting himself and sliding into Rozanov's lap like he was made to fit there. He remembers this so perfectly from the first time round, the way Rozanov had looked at him, the press of their faces against each other and the feel of them both together in his hand and how quickly Rozanov had gotten close, gotten to a stifled groan and —

"Fuck, Hollander."

"You gonna come for me Rozanov?"

And again, "Fucking make me," that sets something in him on fire, so that even as Ilya spits in his palm and he gets them closer — closer — he can't remember why this was meant to be a bad idea, why he was going to skip this step in the order of events, not until he's pressing his face to Rozanov's, gasping the same air as him and —

"Fuck, Shane."

Shane's eyes fly open, and he comes over Rozanov's stomach with a shudder that wracks him and he hears himself sigh on an exhale, "Ilya," just as natural and just as incorrect as it had been the first time, his wild panic bubbling up and over him before the sweat has cooled on his skin.

What is he doing, this is — this is not them.

He doesn't bother changing his clothes on the way out, this time, but as he walks away Ilya's face — the line of his mouth downturned and unhappy even though it's still pink and puffy from kissing and his eyes are asking something but Shane still doesn't know what, and how he sits there, just lets Shane go — it haunts him until the next day, after he's beaten Boston 2-1 without making eye contact with Rozanov once, when he falls again into his unnatural sleep on the team bus.

Ilya is breaking something in him — perhaps breaking something open in him — that he needs desperately to keep intact and put away. But, it's fine, it can still be meaningless: once is just a mistake, after all. Twice is a coincidence.

Three times would be — Shane can't let there be a third time.

Chapter End Notes

I did not make up The Thai Tanic. It’s a meme I saw kicking around ages ago and filed away for careful theivery at a later date. Here we are: a later date.

Chapter 2 is mostly there and should be good to go next week.

tumblr. <3

Chapter 2: Two

Chapter Summary

Rozanov's disappointment is not something that should bother him; is not something that's his responsibility, shouldn't even be something that's in his power to cause. His trips around this loop surely now number in the dozens and every time he sees the ornamental trees outside the hotel from the bus window he thinks about Shane and more, thinks about Ilya, and wonders why the triangle that those two words make with Ilya's disappointment makes him feel so empty.

Makes him so scared.

Chapter Notes

"I told Hayden —"

"Is Hayden your mother?"

"No —"

"No, he's not?"

"Fuck off."

"Who cares what you told Hayden? Stay."

"I can't. Mandatory team meeting tonight."

Rozanov's disappointed expression is all the worse to see because Shane can tell how quickly, how ineffectually, he tries to cover it with indifference.

"You are not such a good liar, Hollander."

"I'm not lying," he insists, but knows he's convincing no-one. "I should get dressed."

"I told Hayden —"

"Is Hayden your mother?"

"He may as well be. If I'm not back by curfew he'll get all weird about it."

Rozanov laughs, weak. "Fuck him, Hollander. Stay."

Shane looks at Rozanov, the bedhead scramble of his hair and the softness of his mouth and the warmth of his body and the comfort Shane finds in him and he thinks of how later he moans, fuck, Shane, against Shane's mouth, and he thinks of how easily Ilya had fallen out of him so he says, "I'm going to go get dressed."

There's a pause with a giving up inside it. "Ok."

"I'm going to get dressed."

A pause; a little deciding hesitation. The only thing worse than this moment are the days that Shane gets off the bus then gets straight into bed in room 3312 and doesn't come here at all, but those days are few; Shane has to work to stay away from Rozanov when presented with such a perfect chance to be with him, and he daren't face in to why.

"Ok."

"I'm going to get dressed."

That pause again; time after time, every time they do this as weeks stack against weeks there is always that little space for a breath.

"Ok."

"I'm going to get dressed."

Shane has grown to hate the little silence that sits here and he doesn't know what makes it so unbearable, but it always ends in the same capitulation.

"Ok."

Rozanov's disappointment is not something that should bother him; is not something that's his responsibility, shouldn't even be something that's in his power to cause. He's done this day enough times now that he's lost count; can barely remember the order that the first time went in unless he concentrates, pieces it together from its bits and pieces, but he's still not sure if he's getting the sequence completely right mixed in as they are with the repetitions, the aborted visits where he works to not want to stay. His trips around this loop surely now number in the dozens and every time he sees the ornamental trees outside the hotel from the bus window he thinks about Shane and more, thinks about Ilya, and wonders why the triangle that those two words make with Ilya's disappointment makes him feel so empty.

Makes him so scared.

He thinks about the very first time round, sitting on the bus as they left the stadium for the airport, how much he'd wanted to have done something differently even though he couldn't have put words around what.

They lost the game today — 4-2 because Shane is really struggling to care enough to pay attention to where the puck is — when he wonders if that's the problem. He's not doing anything all that differently — not really, even if he's telling himself he is by trying to convince himself that he's looking for how he can spend the day with Rozanov and not feel like Shane's tethered to him; orbiting. He's tweaking things, doing a little re-ordering to the sequence of events but the bones of it are all the same and so he's getting nowhere to feeling like he's able to stay away from Rozanov or facing why being there still makes him feel so on edge: like he's standing at the lip of a cavernous drop with no idea what's at the bottom.

Packing his stuff up in the Raiders' visitors' locker room he feels in the side of his bag the outline of the pair of scissors he keeps for cutting his stick tape, because he doesn't like the uneven edge you get if you tear it. Shane thinks about the bruise that's blooming on Miitke's jaw, because he's gotten himself punched in the face every time they've played this game even though every time they've played it has gone a little differently.

It's probably completely unnecessary to do something so purposeful as this given that he's just coming off a game and bits of him ache all over — but there isn't time for these new bruises to bloom, for new puddles of colour to light up his skin, not before they get on the coach — and it makes him feel better to be quantifiable about it. The back of his thumb, between his first and second knuckle, is bare, and it takes him about five seconds to open up the blades on the scissors and make a quick, careful scratch there. Not deep, it's barely even bleeding and it won't impact his grip at all, but he thinks, as he puts his scissors back away in his bag, it might answer a question. It might ask about a million more, but it only needs to answer just one.

A bare few minutes later he lets his head rest against the cool window at the back of the bus and his eyes drag themselves closed, insistently shutting against his every effort to stay awake as he listens to the kit being loaded, and he presses the nail of one thumb into the scratch on the other, just to remind himself it's there.

And when he wakes to the familiar view of ornamental trees framing the main entrance to their Boston hotel, Shane presses his nail into that same spot, searching for the sting of it, but it's gone.

"I told Hayden —"

"Is Hayden your mother?"

Shane heaves an enormous fucking sigh. He's sick to the back teeth of this conversation and how it ends: stepping through the course of this day over and over has given him no better idea how to make it past Friday and into Saturday and as good as being with Rozanov feels, as much as he can't keep himself from coming here over and over he hates the minefield of extricating himself from it, especially since with every repetition he finds himself wanting to leave less and less. He's seen Ilya every day for so long now he's forgotten what it's like to have to go weeks in between glimpses and although the sex hasn't stopped being fucking incredible there's something that he misses, and he has a horrible feeling that it's that thing that he felt on the couch the two times that he's stayed long enough to get there, that's all wrapped up in Shane and Ilya.

He's been trying to make himself not want to stay like that would prove that him and Rozanov are still only as much as they're supposed to be, but wanting to be here doesn't even feel like it's the problem any more — it's how much he's starting to crave what happens next when he does.

"What?" Rozanov asks, then feigns shock, gripping Shane's bicep as if in surprise, "Is he your mother? Hollander, I was joking, and now I have discovered terrible secret!"

Shane snorts a laugh. "Fuck you." He tips his head back; looks at the ceiling. "I miss my apartment."

"You played in Montreal yesterday, yes? Toronto. Which — you should have scored four times, not three, missed chance on rebound from Pike in second period."

Shane knows that, he'd thought it in the moment and had seen it on the tapes when he'd re-watched after the game, but no one else has suggested to him yet that he should have been able to score off of it. He could have, though, and Rozanov knows it — although that also means, he realises, that Rozanov watched his game; must have watched him play, particularly.

He just sighs in the end, though, and says, "Yeah, I know."

"So you did not sleep at home? Wild night out?"

Shane has to roll back the conversation, but — right, he would have slept in his own apartment last night if today was actually Thursday. He's got no reason to be missing it.

"No, I — I did."

"Did what? Crazy night out and wake up in stranger's bedroom, sneak out in morning to make it to airport on time?" Rozanov kisses his shoulder softly and Shane winces and shakes his head. He's never done anything like that.

"I meant I slept at home last night. No crazy night out or whatever."

Rozanov smiles and kisses his shoulder again. Shane shivers. "Boring."

"Fuck you," without heat, then, "Never mind. It just feels like it's been a long time since I was there."

"Could maybe feel better, then, you not sleep at hotel tonight."

Shane thinks he might have a point. He's sick of room service salmon and scratchy towels and sleeplessness while he listens to hotel sounds — the elevator pinging down the hall, footsteps, doors banging. Rozanov's house is quiet; peaceful, and Rozanov's bed smells like them. He'd like to spend the night in it.

That's a long way off script, though; awfully close to something shaped like Shane and Ilya.

Shane looks at the backs of his hands, at his left thumb where, yesterday, his tape scissors had drawn little red pearls of blood that he'd sucked away right after. It had only been a small thing, not even a couple of centimetres, but it should still be healing only the day after; there should be a hairline redness, a little fissure and tenderness when he presses there, but there's nothing at all to suggest anything's ever broken the skin. It's a clean slate.

It feels like he's talking himself into it — or maybe just that he's exhausted with talking himself out of it — but he supposes he could stay at least for a while, if not all night. It's him that's misstepped before, said Ilya's name and turned a light on something that — something that isn't who they are. He can steer around that if he stays, he's sure of it: he knows what he needs to avoid, now, and the thought of not having to go, not having to stand Ilya's eyes watching him as he dresses and leaves, is blissful. They can fuck some more and then go and play hockey tomorrow and get on the bus and then it'll be like he never gave in to any of this and he wants it so much; it feels like a kind of homesickness.

"I could stay here tonight." he says, and Ilya smiles small and private and kisses him for it.

Shane follows the footpath of the afternoon that he remembers through them napping and eating together and watching hockey, and he grits his teeth through listening to Rozanov talk about his girlfriends and thinks that if he does this again he has to find a way to skip this part of the conversation entirely. When Ilya comes back from his phone call with his father and Shane's tucked into his side in a way that makes him feel safe, deeply and terrifyingly so, the urge to sink into Ilya aches in him, all but irresistible. With Ilya's hand cording gently through his hair he lets himself slide down, lets his hand and then his mouth find Ilya's dick in his sweats.

There's enough coherency in his head for him to know that he can't let this go the same way as it has before; this needs to be part of the maze of today that he steps around because twice is one thing but three times is proof of — of something else. He can't let his voice make Ilya unbidden again but he also can't talk with his mouth full, so he closes his eyes and concentrates, mouths Ilya through his sweats until the fabric's soaking and Ilya's hand, petting through his hair, starts to tug and hold with impatient shifting of his hips.

Shane's loved doing this since the first time, but every time he ever has it's been frantic: he falls to his knees as soon as he hears the door lock behind them and they're always both so desperate for it that there's no capacity for taking his time. Now, as he eases Ilya's waistband down and Ilya lifts his hips and shoves at the fabric to help, there's nothing to stop him going as slow as he likes and so he does, setting his tongue flat against the head of Ilya's cock and waiting there until Ilya stops trying to urge Shane on with the press of his hand and Shane can sink down and drag back up slow, then do it again, again, again.

He's never been able to take Ilya all the way in even though he wants to: he's just so fucking big, he's thick and long and perfect and Shane often wishes that he knew what it felt like to have his throat filled up with him, wishes he could take the time and drive Ilya to distraction while he teaches himself — and he could, he thinks, now he's in this unending day and he has all the time he could want — but he puts the idea away since has no idea how he would explain to Ilya on the other side of this mess where exactly he'd learned to swallow him all the way down.

For now he takes as much as he can and, for as long as he's out of his head enough that he doesn't care about the mess, lets himself do whatever feels best and makes Ilya's breath hitch just like that. He moves so that he's not bending over so awkwardly: arranges himself laid out on the couch with one knee on the floor and his head in Ilya's lap which means that he can rock himself lazily down against the couch cushions, the washed-soft fabric of his borrowed clothes dragging against his own hard-on in a way that's going to drive him insane soon but he doesn't want to upset his rhythm by reaching down to touch himself.

Spit drips down to where he's holding Ilya's cock at the base to let him stroke as slowly as he's working his mouth up and down; he pulls back to hold just the head in his mouth so that he can press his tongue into the slit until it gives up more precome for him to lap up along with a wracked moan from Ilya, lost in a choking gasp, then lets the head rest in the pocket of his cheek so that his fingers can work the shaft. He repeats it: sinks down and sucks back up slow and wet with broad stripes of his tongue over and over, lingering for as long as he can make himself until his jaw aches and he can feel the tension in the thighs underneath him and Ilya chokes out, "Fuck, Hollander," and Shane thinks — oh, he's tried to make it different but he's made it just like before, he's made it slow and close and just as lovely and there's a tangled mess of something in his chest that he thinks he's starting to understand the shape of and that aches, now, for something more than Hollander.

He can't help himself, pulls way far enough to murmur against the wet skin of Ilya's dick, "You gonna come for me, Rozanov?"

"Fucking make me," Ilya gives him back — and never let it be said that Shane would back down from that challenge — he certainly hasn't any time it's been thrown down yet — sucks him back in and feels the groan rolling out of his chest as Ilya fills him back up and bumps the back of his throat. Shane's hips are grinding harder against the couch and he becomes suddenly awfully sure he's going to come first and there's nothing he's going to be able to do to stop himself; he tries to hold himself still but can't bear to, not when Ilya's hand is tightening in his hair and Ilya’s dick is rigid in his mouth, the skin around the head taut — Shane understands this better than he does even his own body, knows Ilya is riding that perfect tipping point.

He remembers the echo of the first time here, the Fuck, Shane that had filled his head so perfectly and he's coming himself with a choked-back cry just from the memory of it about a second before his mouth is flooded with come; he doesn't have a hope of swallowing it all, gasping and shivering through it instead. Ilya seems to come for ages, makes little soft noises as Shane finally releases him with a gross, slick noise. He loves the filth of himself even as he knows it's going to be about thirty seconds before he hates it, and as he waits for his breath to steady with his forehead resting on Ilya's thigh, he realises that he hadn't been paying enough attention through the sound of blood rushing through his head to know whether Ilya said his name, this time. He'd only heard the one in his memory.

Eventually he pushes himself up and scrubs the back of his hand across his chin but Ilya pulls his arm out of the way so that he can lick his way into Shane's mouth, little scattered words in Russian whispered against his lips. Not for the first time, Shane wishes he knew what they meant.

"Move," Ilya says, nudging at his shoulder, and Shane goes where he's bid, "Lie on your back. Fuck, Hollander, I said you have a good mouth so you decided you had to prove me right?"

Shane lies down on his back and Ilya reaches for his dick as he turns to settle between his thighs but Shane catches his wrist to stop him.

"You, ah. Don't need to." He's blushing, he's sure. His face feels hot.

Ilya's fingers spasm and he grins. "Did you come in my pants, Hollander?"

Shane thinks about snapping back at him but he still feels warm and soft and he wants to know what happens next — they've never done this part before — so instead he just says, "Yes."

Ilya drops on top of him, rests his forehead against Shane's breastbone and mutters something in Russian, and Shane's mind freezes. He bites his lips between his teeth and works to keep his breathing steady and understands entirely and all of a sudden that it wasn't actually about Shane and Ilya at all. It's about how Ilya's weight on him feels like a comfort, even though there's more than two hundred pounds of him and there's no one else in the world that Shane could imagine touching him like this without him wanting to shove them off and scrub his skin raw in the shower. It's about how much he wants to put his hand in Ilya's hair and wind his curls around his fingers; it's about how he doesn't just not want to sleep at the hotel as much as that he wants to sleep here, with Ilya, it's about how — he sees it now he does, fuck — how he'd felt angry hearing Ilya talk about other people, his girlfriends, when the only person that Shane's been interested in, properly interested in for years is — is —

"Ilya," he breathes, and feels like he's choking.

For a second Ilya's entire body stills, then he makes a wordless, needful noise and lifts his head to kiss Shane softly, so softly just like he had after that first Shane and Ilya. Shane can tell he's smiling and can't help but kiss him back, just once.

Shane turns his face away so that he can speak and says, with a nudge to Ilya's ribs, "Off. Get off."

Ilya does, shifting away with an apologetic, "Sorry, I am too heavy?" but Shane's dragging himself out from underneath, planting his feet on the floor. Ilya's hand is still resting on Shane's thigh and it falls away when he stands. He can't look. He can't.

Everything about him feels disgusting, from his sticky hands to his face and he came in his pants and he needs a shower and clean clothes and he has to get out of here. He has to go, right now he has to go.

"I have to go," comes out of him even though he's still not moving, but then Ilya's fingers are tugging at his.

"Shane, what is it?"

Shane's shaking his head before he can stop himself. He turns for the kitchen where he's left his clothes and again — three times he tells himself, that's three times he's stayed and three times he's said Ilya like a benediction — he hears Ilya saying his name behind him, flat, and back to, "Hollander."

Shane doesn't look back, and Ilya lets him go.

**

Shane doesn't have a problem with people being gay, conceptually. Shane's had friends who were gay actually and that's fine. It's just them. It's who they are.

But Shane — Shane can't be gay. Shane has a career that almost completely hinges on being rampantly heterosexual. Shane isn't allowed to be gay.

They lose miserably against Boston, 5-0 and Shane doesn't give a shit except for the effort he has to put in to not looking at Ilya when they're on centre ice together.

He's been taking the easy option, with Ilya, not putting himself out there and not even making an effort to find anyone else. He just needs to try harder.

But tomorrow he gets a clean slate; he can do better.

Shane has had to google 'bars in Boston', then 'clubs in Boston'. 'Places to meet women in Boston' was less helpful and took him to a lot of questionable Reddit posts, and any variation on 'dating in Boston' is too serious, too boyfriend-girlfriend-ish. Shane barely has more than a day before he resets again, he's only out to prove to himself that there's someone else out there that can make him want to — someone who's not Ilya who can make him want. He could have asked someone on the team where would be good, he knows they go out sometimes when they stay here, but he doesn't want to risk anyone wanting to come with him since he's pretty sure this is going to take a few tries to get right and he doesn't want to be humiliated with an audience, even if the audience won't remember.

But it's going to be ok, this time, and he drags his right thumbnail down the back of his left thumb to remind himself of it. He gets another try tomorrow, if this all goes to shit.

He spends most of the day trying to find somewhere that's far enough away from the hotel to mean that probably no one else on the team would trek out that far, but that's not in the fucking suburbs or something; somewhere that there should be some sort of a crowd, even on a Thursday night; somewhere that's not a sports bar and somewhere that's not a dive.

Shane does all of this with his message notifications on mute, and although, as he's shoving his feet in his shoes, he sees the little circle with a six inside it next to Lily's name, he doesn't look; can't bear to.

He checks his hair in the bathroom mirror; he looks fine, he's pretty sure, and he's wearing the same clothes that he's been wearing to Ilya's, which are still probably the best ones he has for this kind of thing.

Finishing fiddling with his hair, sure that he's not doing anything that makes a difference to it at all, he turns to Hayden. It's later in the day than they usually have this conversation and Hayden will be heading out with the team to the Thai Tanic soon.

"I'm, uh. Heading out for a bit."

Hayden's sitting stretched out on his bed, and he glances up from his phone. "Cool."

"I'll be back later."

He grins. "I won't wait up."

Shane shuffles his feet and shoves his thumbs into his pockets. Usually he denies it; can't let even the thought that he might be spending the night with Ilya take up space in Hayden's thoughts, even though he has no idea that Ilya's involved at all. Tonight, though if he meets someone he likes — maybe he will stay out all night.

"Right," he says uselessly in the end, "I'll, uh. Right."

Hayden laughs at him as he leaves.

**

Shane hates this immediately. It's loud and it's dark but bright at the same time, neon strobe lights scattering over the dancing crowd, pulsing in time with the music that makes his skin vibrate from the bass and that he hates instantly.

There are a lot of people here, though; a lot of women.

He doesn't understand at all how people do this for fun.

He finds a space at the bar and orders a beer from a bartender who doesn't seem to have a flicker of recognition for him, which helps, and when the bottle's in his hand he turns around and leans back against the bar; sips his beer to make it last as long as he can since he doesn't want to have to drink another one. Shane doesn't think he's ever come to a place like this by himself. He would never choose to — there are so many places he would rather be on a night away from his team — although his mind stumbles a little when it suggests that there's really only two or three: at home alone, visiting his parents, with Ilya. Still, he comes to clubs and bars when he gets dragged on a Metros night out and then hides in a corner. He's not sure where to start.

He wishes he'd gone to Ilya's instead, and then does his best to shove that thought into a box in the back of his brain where it belongs.

As the next hour passes, Shane doesn't regret being here less and a headache starts to build behind his eyes. He's tried to talk to one girl who was standing next to him ordering a drink — not because he was particularly attracted to her although he's sure she was very pretty, just to — to try, but she'd turned away from him back towards some guy who'd put his hand on her ass and looked at him like he wanted to fight about it and Shane had purposefully moved another foot further away down the bar.

He is aware that he's not going to find the love of his life in here and even if he does he's not going to know, he's only got the one night before he goes back to the beginning of today again, but he just needs a spark. He needs chemistry. He needs to want to put his mouth somewhere other than the very top curve of Ilya Rozanov's neck, under the hinge of his jaw where touch always makes him shiver.

By the time Shane admits to himself that the night is a bust and lets himself leave, he's started conversations with two girls: a short, blonde girl with lovely dark eyes and a great smile but who'd stood too close to him and smelled of some awful flowery perfume that made his nose itch, and a brunette in impractical heels that didn't seem interested in talking to him at all but had guided his hands to her waist and kissed him, opened mouthed and wet and with a strange sticky sensation from her lipstick that Shane had wanted to wipe off his face afterwards. It had been fine and he's pretty sure that she'd wanted him to follow her into the restrooms but he'd had no sense of wanting at all to go with her and that's what this is meant to be about — finding that wanting — so he'd let her head that way first and then left when she was out of sight, calling an Uber back to his hotel before his feet hit the sidewalk.

She wasn't his type was the only problem, but one failure doesn't mean anything. Tomorrow he'll have a replay and he can go somewhere else. Somewhere quieter.

He showers when he gets back to the hotel to get the feel of too many people in too small a space off of his skin; Hayden's already in bed and has the grace to not say anything at the fact that Shane's back late — or maybe that he's back early, or possibly that he's back at all, and Shane throws himself into his own bed and tries to sleep and wishes that he'd seen Ilya today.

Friday is usually a routine day: breakfast, workout, rink, warmup, play, bus, sleep. The only thing that's varied in all of the repetitions of it has been the hockey: the score, depending largely on how much Shane has had in him to work for it that time around. They're about to step out onto the ice when he takes his phone out of his bag: he's still got his notifications muted and he finds himself wanting to know what Ilya sent him yesterday, even though it's certain to be something that's going to make him feel bad for not showing up — but the little bold number six that had been next to Lily yesterday is now an eight, and he has a missed call which makes him feel even worse.

His phone goes back in the bottom of the bag. This is not his problem any more. He's going to find a girl he likes enough to sleep with and never have to think about Ilya Rozanov again.

Her name's Stephanie, and she's slim and a bare half inch shorter than him, curly blonde hair down her back and soft, generous curves and eyes bright blue that crinkle when she smiles. She's lovely and funny, has a sharp sense of humour and she doesn't know hockey or who he is beyond his first name, and she lives three blocks from the bar Shane met her in. She's confident and forward, tells him he's cute when he trips over his words, and she pulls his hands onto her body to show him how she wants to be touched as she pushes him up against her bedroom door with a soft thud of impact and the sound of her low laugh, and the only thought in Shane's head is how absolutely he does not want to have sex with her.

None of the other girls in the bar had done anything for him either, but she's the one that had been interested in him, that had asked him if he wanted to come home with her, and he'd thought that once he got here it would start to click, but it's gotten less and less something that he feels capable of the closer it's gotten to seeming an inevitability. She guides his hands up to cup her over her bra and he feels — he feels like he's cheating, like he's gone behind Ilya's back, like he's doing something wrong as well as something he has no heat for.

His hands stutter and he lifts them away from her.

"I, can I — bathroom?"

She grins and kisses him again and he dredges up a smile for her. "Sure."

Stephanie points him to a door off to the left and Shane tells himself he walks through it normally; he closes the door behind him and doesn't bolt like he's fucking terrified, tells himself that she can't tell how violently he doesn't want to be here. Staring at himself in the little mirror over the sink, he understands that he has no surprise for this path of events. If he's going to face up to himself standing in this bathroom with it's cracked blue tile and flowery purple shower curtain that's mildewing at the bottom — and it seems as if, like it or not, he is — he can acknowledge that this desire he's trying to manufacture has never been his. It's borrowed, assumed; expected.

He gives up so much for the expectations that gather around him and does it willingly for the life he gets to have for it, but — not this. He can't make himself into this, too; it isn't a shape he can press himself into, not when he knows through undeniable repetition how it feels to let himself take up a most perfect shape in the world in a house in Boston where he can be part of Shane and Ilya.

He closes his eyes and sees a flashing, sharp smile behind them; imagines he can feel pressed to his skin a stubbled jaw and wide hands and feels more for that wisp of imagination than the woman waiting for him in the next room.

Fiddling his phone out of his pocket, Shane feels like an absolute lost cause when he texts Hayden: Call me? Right now. — and then a moment later a forgetful, apologetic 'please.'

He flushes the toilet and runs the water in the sink to make it seem like he didn't come in here expressly to freak out, then heads back out as slowly as he can, sure that Hayden will be either still at dinner or maybe back in their hotel room by now but either way have his phone in reach. He knows that it's cowardly of him to not just be able to say outright to Stephanie, who seems lovely, really she does, that he needs to go, which feels especially ridiculous of him given that he's living in the land of no consequences.

His pocket starts to buzz just as Stephanie is putting her hands back on his chest with a proprietary gleam to her eyes and he smiles apologetically, steps away from her and slides his thumb across the screen of his phone to answer.

"Hey, man, what's up?"

"You tell me," Hayden says. Shane can hear the sounds of chatter in the background; can hear JJ's cackling laugh — the team's still out at dinner. Shane pauses, nods, pretends to be listening to something more than four words long until eventually Hayden says, "Shane, you still there?"

"Wow, man that's awful," Shane says, doing his best to put worry into his voice, "you ok, you need me to pick you up?"

"Pick you up, what the fuck are you — wait, am I calling to get you out of something? Where are you, what are you doing?"

"Oh, ok," he glances at Stephanie, "sure, I mean, it's important, I can come get you."

"Shane, buddy, I'm never letting you live this down," Hayden says, laughing, and Shane imagines he hears Ilya's voice sing-songing boring in his ear.

"Give me twenty minutes?"

"Oh, fuck you, I'm going to need so many details later."

Shane hangs up and turns to Stephanie to apologise, but she's already stepped away, arms folded across her stomach. Her face is disappointed and he can't tell if she believes him or not, but he's breathing sharp, cold outdoor air two minutes later with absolutely no regrets as he feels his apprehension leave him, the sense of the world pressing on him lifting with every step he takes back towards his hotel.

**

Shane makes it out on to the ice and all the way through warm ups without looking at Ilya, although he feels like there's a string tied between the two of them, a constant tug. Shane definitely can't hear Ilya's voice as he talks to his team, not from the other side of the ice over the sound of the arriving crowd, but he imagines he can and it makes him want to skate over there and tell him to just shut the fuck up so that Shane can think, doesn't Ilya know that his voice fills Shane's head until there's no room for anything else?

A morning of chirping from the team and relentless questioning from Hayden about what exactly he'd needed to be rescued from the night before hasn't helped calm him down, and by the time Shane takes centre ice for the puck drop he feels wired, feels like he's vibrating. He focuses down: his body, his awareness of himself and the players around him, the cold of the air and his stick in his hands, his feet in his skates. His opponent, opposite, and it doesn't matter who it is, it'll only throw his concentration, it doesn't —

"You did not come yesterday. Why?"

Shane flushes, clenches his hands on his stick. He can't believe Ilya would bring this up now.

"Hollander, answer. Why?"

"Fuck you," spat out harsh on a reflex, and then the ref's there and they're starting, but now Ilya knows he has a sore spot to nudge at and he don't doesn't stop, each puck drop they face each other there's something:

"You get suddenly very busy yesterday?"

"You are not talking at all today?"

"Is simple question."

"Fuck you, Hollander, say something."

Shane doesn't have anything to say that he can be sure won't sound like a confession, something that won't make clear that he'd spent the evening trying to make himself be something he's not and he'd rather have been with Ilya doing more or less anything at all.

It's still fresh in his knowledge of himself: pink and shiny like new-healed skin and not ready to be poked and prodded at, can't risk opening his mouth for what might fall out.

They leave the ice having scraped out a 3-2 win and Shane changes as quickly as he can, slams his way out of the locker room and into his seat at the back of the coach. He wills sleep to come, this time: needs to start again and do differently more than he has for any other unwinding of this day.

Shane still has no real idea how this whole thing works — and he works really hard for the sake of his own sanity not to think the word magic — because although everything physical, bruises and cuts and aches, all that goes away when he starts Thursday over again but his mood, his state of mind — that carries over.

So he wakes up on the bus in the drop off zone of his stupid fucking hotel in Boston and doesn't wait for keys to be handed out; he slams his way up the stairs to the third floor because if he has to stand in a tiny metal box with another human right at this second there is a good chance that he's going to do, or at least say, something very inadvisable, and so having stomped his way to 3312 he slouches against the door waiting for Hayden to come up and find him, which he does about five minutes later. Hayden holds his keycard out to him in its little green biro abomination cardboard folder, and gives him a frown, then glances behind him to the elevator.

"You didn't —?"

"I took the stairs," Shane grumbles, unlocking the door and pushing his way inside.

"But how did you know where to come?" Hayden asks, trailing in behind him.

"It's always the same fucking room, Hayd," which isn't fair even though it's true, and door safely closed behind them both he throws the chain and the deadbolt. "Can you sit down?"

Hayden is giving him his half panicked lost a twin at the mall look, which feels a little judgy, but sets his carry-on by the wall and perches on the end of the left hand bed. "What's up, buddy?"

Shane — just isn't quite there yet, even though he wants to be so he waves a hand and mutters, "Fuck. Wait, hold on a second," as he yanks open the room's cupboard doors until he finds the minibar, then takes all the little bottles in there and drops them onto the bed next to Hayden with a collection of sharp clinks.

"Isn't it a little early in the day?"

Shane ignores Hayden, and counts the little bottles: there are an even dozen, but they're tiny and will need to be split between them both. "I think we're probably going to need more, but it's a start."

Hayden's eyebrows have never been higher, and he's holding his hands out in a placating, peacemaking, stop cutting your sister's hair and put down the scissors sort of way. "You know that you'll have to pay for that when it appears on the room bill? And Coach will have your balls for it?"

"Least of my problems, most if it's for you."

"For me? Shane what the fuck is happening?"

Shane stands in front of Hayden, collection of tiny bottles at his side. He's never done this before. Never spoken out loud to anyone about it, not even Ilya, but if this goes badly then in twenty-four hours and change they won't ever have had the conversation, as far as Hayden's concerned.

It doesn't get less risky than this.

Shane takes a breath to speak, then lets it go and doesn't start talking. Dutch courage is a thing, he's sure — alcohol and the loosening of inhibitions is a proven cause and effect and he'll take anything that'll help him face into this particular conversation, this thing that he never thought he'd say out loud that he now finds that he wants to say, if only just once. He isn't going to like the taste of any of the little dollhouse-sized bottles so he snatches up two at random, snaps off the stupid tiny caps and drinks them both from their stupid tiny bottlenecks, then drops the empties in the trash.

"Shane, I'm not gonna lie, I'm starting to get worried."

"It's fine, I just need to tell you something."

"Oh god, are you sick?"

"What? Fuck, no, that's what you went for first?"

"Well I don't know! What then?"

Shane opens his mouth; stops. Feels the residue burn of the alcohol in the back of his throat, and coughs out, "Lily."

Hayden has a moment of confusion while he joins the dots then his entire face lights up. "Lily? As in the girl you text Lily? You're fessing up? This is amazing. Shoot, go, tell me everything, can I meet her?"

"Hayden."

"Right, right, you go. Lily." He looks absolutely gleeful.

"You know I text a girl called Lily," Shane parrots, and Hayden nods, "and most times that I'm in Boston we meet up."

"Hook up though, right? I mean it — if she's in town today I would love to meet the girl that got you to look away from a hockey puck, I swear I'll behave —"

"You're wrong," Shane interrupts.

Hayden waits, but he's stalled. "About ..?"

This is it: moment of truth. He can still change his mind. But. But.

No consequences. When has he ever in his life had no consequences?

"Lily. Is a fake name."

"O-kay…"

Shane breathes in; exhales. No consequences.

"Lily isn't a girl. She's a guy. He. He's a guy. I'm sleeping with a guy. I've been sleeping with a guy. Lily's always been a — a guy."

There's a silence so quiet Shane thinks he can hear the water moving in the pipes, the elevator going up and down at the end of the hall, can hear the sound of his own fucking hair growing.

"Oh, oh hey, Shane," Hayden starts, then he stands and throws his arms around Shane's shoulders. Just for a moment and not too tight because he knows Shane well and he's a damn good friend, but — Shane's eyes are tearing — he does it. His first reaction. Shane shouldn't have doubted. "So you're gay?" Hayden asks once he's let him go, but Shane steps around the question.

"Sit back down? There's more."

Hayden does, and Shane looks at the headboard over Hayden's shoulder, the wall, the lamp on the nightstand, and he gently scratches the nail of his right thumb over the back of his left thumb and thinks, no consequences.

No consequences.

"It's Ilya Rozanov. Lily is Ilya Rozanov. The person I'm sleeping with is Ilya Rozanov."

He's said it: it's said, and he breathes out and in and the sky doesn't fall, but looking at Hayden's face, he looks —

"Holy shit, Shane."

"Yeah, I know."

"Holy shit, Shane."

"Minibar's right there."

"Right."

**

"It's been how long?"

"It probably sounds like a lot when I put it like that."

"Because it is a lot, Shane, fuck." Hayden screws the stupid tiny cap back on a stupid tiny empty bottle. "So what, you two are…" he trails away and Shane waits, but Hayden waves his hands in a get on with it gesture and says, "boyfriends, what is it? Come on," and Shane realises that he's meant to be filling in some blanks.

"No, not boyfriends, we're not," he swallows, breathes, "anything really."

"Oh, well that was convincing."

"It's true, though. We're not anything."

"Jesus fucking Christ, man, that is literally the most pathetic you've ever sounded."

"Fuck you," Shane tries to snap back, but even he can hear there's no heat in it.

"Well do you, you know," Hayden makes that get on with it gesture again but Shane doesn't know what he wants, so he stares and waits instead. "Like him?" Hayden says the words with a kind of disdain wrapped around them, like anyone liking Ilya Rozanov is an actual impossibility.

Shane looks down between his feet at the beige carpet between their beds, at where footprints over time have started to wear at the pile.

"I can't like him."

"Because he's an asshole, right?"

Shane shakes his head. "No, he's not that bad, really, not off the ice. He can be, you know. Funny."

"Man that is — no, no, I can't imagine it, sorry. But if that's true, tell me again why you can't like him?"

Shane picks at the corner of a stupid tiny label on a stupid tiny vodka bottle, its contents sloshing gently inside the glass. His eyes are starting to burn, but he will not cry. He will not.

"You know why," Shane whispers, and his voice sounds hoarse. "He's who he is, and he's a guy."

The quiet after that is heavy. The word itself feels heavy: a guy, which is maybe something that Shane can start to accept about himself but it doesn't mean that any part of this life he lives will accept it about Shane. Someone walks past their room outside, footsteps heavy from one end of the hallway to the other.

"Right," Hayden says. "I'm gonna get room service, you want room service? I'm hungry." He leans over to snag the menu off the little nightstand between their beds. "Then we'll eat and talk about why you don't let that stop you."

He reaches out and ruffles Shane's hair as he sits back down, and Shane huffs out a laugh that carries relief with it, that at least this part of his life, this friendship has a space for Shane in it that's just the right shape for him, even if he never realised it before.

**

"Does it matter?"

Shane frowns and picks disconsolately at his room service salad. He's ordered this from them a load of times and it's never any good but trying to explain what he wants seems so pointless when he'd only have to repeat the process every day and given his fairly extensive experience of hotels, they'd still probably get it wrong.

"Does what matter?"

"Well," Hayden waves his fork around like he's conducting an orchestra of one, "I mean let's say that I see a hot woman, like smoking hot. I don't, like, want her, not properly, 'cause she's not Jackie. And it's not about being married, even, I just — I love Jackie and I don't want anyone that's not her —" Shane opens his mouth to protest that his situation is not at all the same, but Hayden's moving right on. "— and if someone tried to tell me I had to want her like that I just couldn't, that's not how it works." He spears a piece of broccoli with his wandering fork, chews and starts talking again before he's finished swallowing. "So let's say there's someone out there that would be the hottest person you ever saw. They're perfect, they press every button you didn't know you had, they've got whatever —" he grimaces, "Can I just call him 'Lily'?"

"Fucking — fine, yes, you can call him Lily."

"Ok, so this person's got whatever Lily's got and they're someone you could take home to mom, right, no hockey rivalry anywhere to be seen. They appear right in front of you, they're totally available and they want you, they're just waiting for you to give them the word. Does it make a difference? Do you feel differently about Lily? Or do you still just want him?"

"I —" Shane stops and eats another mouthful of lettuce that is both too wet and too cold and sets the plate on the room service tray to his side. He tries to imagine it: what the person would be like that would make him look away from Ilya.

"All I'm saying is," Hayden continues, saving Shane from managing to say nothing at all, "it might not be logical. Hell, why the fuck did Jackie stick with me when I'm never even home most of the year? She loves me. Because if you're sure you think Lily's —" he pauses, grimaces and clearly has to make himself carry on, "the one for you, you know, if he's the one you want you just do. Why make yourself unhappy, what, just on fucking principle because you've got, let's face it, seriously questionable taste in men? Life's too short, man."

This doesn't sit entirely right with Shane, always having believed that this is something that he should be able to choose: he can't make himself find Stephanie, the pretty blonde woman who'd liked westerns and swimming and had never heard of the Montreal Metros hot; that might not be something he's capable of but within the lines of who he is he should get to choose who he — his brain trips, like a hiccup in a thought — he should get to choose who he cares about.

And that's where he is teetering, he understands, on the pivot point to tip between Shane and Ilya and Hollander and Rozanov: he's sitting in the middle between allowing himself to care and not and now he needs to decide which way to lean.

He can break everything off and he thinks that will hurt, possibly more than he ever would have suspected, or he could — lean the other way. He's still living in no consequences limbo, he could try to find out what Ilya means when he says Shane, if it's the same as Shane feels when he can't hold in Ilya. He can take his time; be sure, pull apart this tangled mess in his chest and see what it's made of knowing that the world isn't staring at him while he does it, and anyone that might see him stumble, laid bare — they won't know it with the turn back of the clock.

It doesn't change the fact that he's fucking a man and living, working, breathing professional hockey, but Shane feels like he's only capable of tackling one part of this shitshow at a time.

His phone is face down on the bed next to him and he turns it over: he has seven unread messages and a missed call from Lily. He feels bad for just not showing up again with no word, and he wonders if it's too late to go over there anyway; it's been a couple of trips around the cycle since he last saw Ilya and even if the last one did end with Shane fucking up again — letting this be something it never has been again — Shane misses him.

"Fuck, Shane, are you really telling me that Ilya fucking Rozanov is the one that puts that look on your face?"

Shane freezes and schools his face to stillness. "What look? I don't have a look."

"Ri-ight," Hayden drawls, mocking, and eats a forkful of fries.

Shane feels heat in his face and looks down at his lap where the lock screen of his phone glows up at him. Maybe, he thinks, his fuckup the last time he saw Ilya wasn't that he made it all into something it isn't — maybe instead he was letting himself be who he wants to be, when he's under Ilya's hands.

He's not sure if that scares him more or less, but whispering through his head is a voice that reminds him of no consequences, and he thinks that maybe he could see what happens; what's in him other than Ilya's name that might claw its way out of him if he lets it, because it's only a disaster if Ilya doesn't want the same, but — no consequences, and at least then he might know himself just a little better.

Fiddling for his phone, Shane stands and shoots off a message to Ilya — a quick sorry, held up, on my way — before he stands and looks around him for his coat.

"You're going out, then?" Hayden asks, and Shane winces. He hadn't forgotten Hayden was there, but something has started buzzing under his skin, something that reminds him it's been a couple of times around the loop since he last saw Ilya and that feels like too long already. Hayden's smiling at him, though — and although Shane would bet that doesn't mean he's happy about this at least he's still his friend, he's not horrified, he's not spitting awful words like he does sometimes in Shane's worst, most ungenerous imagingings.

"Yeah," he says, fighting to keep a smile off his face as his anticipation rises.

Hayden looks like he's tasted something bad. "All right, fine. But you know," his voice brightens, "Jackie's brother's gay."

Shane rolls his eyes and looks around for his shoes. "No, Hayden."

"He's a great guy! And he's single; he's good looking, really funny, not a raging dick all the time — hey, let me see if Jackie can send me a picture."

He starts fiddling with his phone and Shane thinks that it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how hot Hayden's gay brother-in-law might be. It doesn't matter what he's like, or if he's interested in Shane. It doesn't matter.

"Don't bother, Hayd."

Hayden stops, message thread loaded; he looks at Shane and sighs, fond. "Fine. Whatever, go get laid, weirdo."

Chapter End Notes

tumblr <3

See you next week for Chapter 3!

Chapter 3: Three

Chapter Summary

Ilya looks less put together than he normally does when he answers the door; his hair is curling out of its gel and his eyes are perhaps a little wild when they find Shane's, but he likes to think there's some relief there as well as he steps inside the house. Shane takes a fistful of Ilya's tank top and pulls him close as the front door clicks closed behind him and he finds Ilya's mouth with his, licking his way inside without hesitation and kissing him wet and filthy, trapping his bottom lip between his teeth and tugging a little as he pulls away. Ilya's hands come to his waist and rest there.

"Hi," Shane says, aware that he's smiling probably a little too brightly.

Chapter Notes

Every time Shane's been to Ilya's house he's copied the very first steps of what he did the first time around, when he didn't know he was going to be doing it over and over and over until he's had weeks' worth of this little window of time, like a record skipping. He has always rung the bell then knocked on the door; Ilya answers with his chest bare and the delicious vee of his obliques there for Shane's eyes to trace vanishing into low-riding sweatpants for a glancing second before Ilya follows Shane to the kitchen.

Today, though, Shane is buzzing out of his skin as he rings the doorbell and it's a minute before he hears sounds behind the door: he's arriving later in the day than normal, and he considers belatedly that Ilya might have given up on him. He thinks, too late, that he probably should have read the messages Ilya had sent rather than just sending off his own, but it had seemed too important to get moving, get on his way — and in any case, Ilya's opening the door to him; he's still wearing those black sweatpants but there's a black tank top too, now, which Shane has always loved seeing on him; it makes him want to put his mouth on Ilya's arms and bite. No consequences, he thinks, and steps inside.

Ilya looks less put together than he normally does when he answers the door; his hair is curling out of its gel and his eyes are perhaps a little wild when they find Shane's, but he likes to think there's some relief there as well as he steps inside the house. Shane takes a fistful of Ilya's tank top and pulls him close as the front door clicks closed behind him and he finds Ilya's mouth with his, licking his way inside without hesitation and kissing him wet and filthy, trapping his bottom lip between his teeth and tugging a little as he pulls away. Ilya's hands come to his waist and rest there.

"Hi," Shane says, aware that he's smiling probably a little too brightly.

"Well that is different to last time," Ilya whispers, quiet like a secret, and Shane finds that after so many visits to Ilya's house he's not sure when the last time before here would have been for them — for Ilya. Shane's place in Montreal, he's sure, but the specifics are getting mixed up in his head. Still, it's true, it wouldn't be like the last time: Shane usually tries not to let himself be so eager straight out the gate. Ilya carries on, loud enough now that Shane knows he's meant to be able to hear, frustration tinging his voice. "Hollander, fucking finally, you never look at your phone?"

That's probably fair, Shane shouldn't have ignored him all day.

"Sorry, I got caught up with Hayden."

"Fuck Hayden, I need you to tell me when you last saw me."

Shane freezes. He feels every muscle in his body lock up for a moment, possibly including his heart, and he has to make himself unlock; make himself relax enough that his body doesn't think he's about to panic. His hand, he notes, is still fisted in Ilya's tank top.

"That's a weird question," he says, stuck between trying to remember when they would have seen each other before the first time around of today, before this whole mess, and why the fuck Ilya would be asking about it.

"So what? Answer it anyway."

Shane licks his lips and answers, after a slow count of five, "Montreal."

"That took a long time to come up with."

"It was, though, right? Before today, we last saw each other at my place in Montreal." Shane wishes he sounded more confident; less like that was a question.

"I did not ask," Ilya starts, stops for a breath with an uncharacteristic hesitation, then carries on, "when we last saw each other before today. I asked, when we last saw each other."

"Fuck," Shane breathes out, because he can really only think of one way of interpreting that sentence and it's insane — but exactly the same kind of insane that Shane's life has been for this last forever. "You remember."

There's a spark of recognition in Ilya's eyes, a sudden brightness. "I knew it. Everything else, all the same, everyone else, all the same, but not you. You did not come here like first time. Three days and you did not come here. Game tomorrow and three times on ice you were different."

Shane feels like the world is tilting; not the awful whirlpool of panic that he'd felt when he'd first realised that things were repeating themselves, but a realignment, a shift to accommodate that he might not be the only one in the eye of this bullshit any more. For a minute, Shane wonders if he's actually going to say this next part out loud, but he figures that if he's wrong and Ilya thinks he's lost his mind then he won't think it anymore when everything starts again in twenty four hours — no consequences dances through his head like a promise — so he breathes deep and holds on tight to Ilya's shirt and says:

"You've done today before."

There's a moment where neither of them is breathing; Shane can feel the stillness of Ilya's chest before he lets the air out all in a rush, sagging forward so that for a moment his forehead rests on Shane's. "Слава Божья, fuck, Shane I thought I was losing my mind."

"No," Shane says, offering up a smile, and he untangles his hand from Ilya's shirt to stroke slow down the length of his arms instead, soothing, "not losing your mind, you're ok." He stops, considers. "Well, I guess I don't actually know about 'ok' since I have no idea what's happening or why or how to get out of it, or —"

"This is getting less helpful."

"Sorry."

"Not crazy, though," Ilya says, but enough like a question that Shane feels like it needs an answer. He shakes his head and kisses Ilya once, soft, on the corner of his mouth.

"Not crazy. Unless we both are but in, like, the exact same way."

"Again, less helpful," Ilya says, but he's starting cautiously to smile now. "Come, we talk." He turns to walk to the kitchen, tugging on Shane's arm to get him to follow. Shane kicks off his shoes before he does, stopping as he looks at them on the floor. He thinks, most likely, that this means Ilya remembers the last time they were here together. Remembers the slow, messy, practically worshipful blow job and the Ilya that Shane hadn't been able to hold himself back from afterwards.

He bends down to line up his shoes, with the wall and with each other. Three times after they've fucked here he's accepted Ilya's invitation to stay — although not until now, as he stands here tucking his shoelaces out of the way so that they don't trail along the floor, has he ever before thought of it as an invitation — but all three times he hasn't been able to hold in Ilya, and all three times Ilya has — Shane remembers the sound Ilya had made, the last time, the need in it; the way he'd kissed Shane like he'd been waiting to hear his name in Shane's voice. Some things seem always to be true.

The tangled mess of emotion in Shane's chest that he is so good at ignoring shifts and twists and he wonders, for the first time, if there might be something like the twin of it, in Ilya.

There's the sound of the fridge door opening, and Ilya calls, "You want ginger ale?"

"Please, thanks, yeah," Shane answers, walking round to join him, but once he gets there he can't work out how to be so that he feels like he's not standing in the way, so he boosts himself up to sit on the worktop next to where Ilya is standing — it's more or less where he tends to start out when he comes here, so it feels like the thing to do — and picks up the ginger ale for something to do with his hands. "So, uh, just to be totally clear, when is the last time you saw me?"

Ilya sets his coke down on the counter and places his hands on either side of it, his left pinky finger just barely touching the left knee of Shane's jeans. He's tense, fingers pressing hard against the worktop, shoulders tight and his jaw clenched.

"You were here. We fucked on the couch, you," his eyes flicker up to Shane's, then away again to his memory, "left. Next day we played game, all normal, you lose very badly in shutout, still all normal —"

"Fuck you."

"Then after, I went outside, sat in my car and I felt —" there's a hesitation, like he's looking for the right word, "tired. I felt so tired." For a moment Shane thinks he's going to stop there but then he shrugs, and carries on. "I did not mean to fall asleep but I could not help it and when I woke up I was in my bed." He shrugs and sets his left palm on Shane's nearest thigh. "There was knock on door, my PT. I say no, he is wrong, has wrong day but he says no, is Thursday. Then the rest, all the same. He leaves and grocery delivery arrives, later I get call from my father and then call from Sveta that night, all day there are texts arriving in my phone I am sure I already read."

"I thought I was dreaming," Shane offers. "The second time — or the first repeat, or," he shakes his head, "whatever, I thought the first time had been a dream."

"Mm," Ilya's fingers on Shane's thigh have started moving in soft circles and he takes his hand away and moves to lean against the worktop opposite, putting a couple of feet between them. The buzzing under Shane's skin that had driven him here hasn't completely dissipated and he feels a little bereft at the imposition of even such a small distance.

"I understand, is a way of thinking of it," Ilya says, his eyes directed to Shane's face but no with focus in them, "but no, I thought I had lost my mind. I sleep and next day play Montreal again and I fall asleep in my car and wake up in my bed and then my PT is at the door."

He drinks his coke and Shane remembers he's still holding a ginger ale and cracks the can open; sips.

"But I think, first time I have this day Shane Hollander comes to my house, sits on my dick and rides me like champion." Shane flushes, feels his face burning. "But not second day, or third. Everyone else is the same but not Shane Hollander." His eyes focus on Shane then, and Shane lets his own drift to watch Ilya's mouth as he speaks. "First game you are hardly there, lose in shutout. Second you play," he shrugs, "fine. Third ok too but you will not look at me, will not answer me when I speak. I think, Shane Hollander is only one also not doing the same thing every day."

Shane smiles. "That's really smart." And it is; Shane's not sure he would have worked that out so fast if it had been the other way round — and actually he didn't, and he wonders what the texts sitting unread in his phone say, if they would have given something away — but then he thinks about it again, and, "Fuck, all the messages — you never usually send so many — and you called, you never call just from me not coming over."

"But you —" Ilya stops and looks at him, assessing. "What do you mean that I never call when you do not come?"

"I mean that you never call if I don't come over?"

"What do you — has been three times, I call two of them."

Shane feels suddenly guilty and takes a slug of ginger ale to put off answering. He's got nothing to feel guilty about, not really, but he feels somehow like he's been keeping secrets.

"I, uh — well, it's been more than three times."

Ilya blinks at him; stares. "No. Three, I counted."

Shane winces. "No, it's been more than three, only — you didn't remember the others. You reset the same as anyone else for ages, it's only — I guess, the last three? — that you've remembered too." He looks down and smudges his thumb through the condensation on the outside of his ginger ale can. "It's nice. To be able to talk about it without someone thinking I'm crazy."

Ilya is staring at him, a little disbelieving. "So more than three, for you." Shane nods. "How many more?"

Shane considers. He should have kept count better at the beginning, really, because by the time he realised that he might want to know how long he's been stuck in this day, that he might be in this long enough that the repetitions would blur, he'd already well and truly lost track.

"I don't know really? It feels like it's been," he lets his mind drift, tries to catch a sense of time from himself for how long ago he'd gotten off the plane in Boston, "a couple of months, maybe? I don't know, it's really hard to keep count."

Ilya starts and takes a step towards him. "Months? Months?"

In hindsight Shane thinks that Ilya might not take this as good news. "Yeah. Maybe?"

"What the fuck have you been doing for months, Hollander?"

"Just kinda following the day, mostly." He wonders if he can try to explain that he was trying to feel differently; trying to make himself feel differently, but there's no part of it that Shane feels capable of putting meaningful words around. "Not always, sometimes I stay at the hotel or I — I went to the aquarium once. But mostly I come here, I go back to the hotel, I —"

"You come here?" Ilya has taken a step forward, has his head tilted in a question.

"Yeah, I wake up on the bus coming into our hotel, I get changed and I come here, and —"

"And we fuck? Do we fuck like we did three days ago?"

Shane licks his lips, feels like he's confessing something when he nods. "Mostly, yeah."

"You have been fucking me every day —"

"Fuck you, not every day."

"Almost every day for months you have been fucking me, and I remember that I have fucked you one time. Is not fair. Uneven."

Shane's gut twists, uncomfortable, and he remembers Shane and he remembers Ilya. He needs to say something about it but he has no idea what. He hadn't expected Ilya to remember.

"Sorry?" he offers instead, but Ilya just wraps his arms across himself.

"If you have been fucking me every day for weeks, you run away every time too?"

And there it is.

Shane grips the worktop beside his knees tight, tighter, until his fingertips hurt.

"No," he allows in the end, "not every time."

"Ah, so last time was special, then?"

It was, Shane wants to say, the words are climbing up the back of his throat: it was special, that's the point and the problem, it's why he ran and it's why he can't stop himself coming back. Ever since that first Shane and Ilya, all he can think about is why it matters to him so badly.

But he can't say any of that, not when they're in the middle of working out why Ilya's now stuck in this loop with him too, so instead even though he knows that he must have let too long pass without saying anything for him to move on and sound natural at all, he says;

"What did you do? The first time you fell asleep in your car, what did you do?"

Ilya looks at him, then seems to make the purposeful decision not to call Shane on his obvious avoidance tactic, for which is is pathetically grateful.

"Nothing." He slouches back against the worktop again. "I do nothing. I get in car, I am tired. I think about day, I think about," his eyes, which are looking somewhere over Shane's shoulder, drift to his face and away again, "lots of things. I think about some things I wish were different, wish I had," he shrugs expansively, arms wide at his sides, and sighs, "done some things differently, I do not know. I am tired, I sleep, I wake up here."

Shane thinks back to the first time; that first afternoon that he's played over and over in his head.

"I thought," he starts, then starts over, "I fall asleep on the team bus, when we we're leaving the rink for the airport after the game. The first time round I remember thinking that I wish I'd done something different, but I didn't know what. Then I woke up on the bus arriving at the hotel and it was Thursday again."

"Are you saying we fucking wished our way into this? That is fucking stupid."

"Do you have a better explanation?"

"I do not believe in wishes, Hollander."

"Hey, why do you think I know what's going on? If I did I wouldn't still be stuck doing this."

"No. No, cannot be, every day half of planet says, had shit day, wish I had done different. Is just words, thoughts."

Shane sighs and slides himself down off the worktop.

"Look, I don't know, ok? I don't know."

Ilya's face is twisted in frustration, but he lets it go, looks at Shane assessingly instead. "You are taking this all very well."

"Yeah, well, it's been a few times around the block, I've had chance to get used to the idea." Even so, he's almost alarmed at how calm he feels about this whole thing. Still, it feels like it changes things for today because it's not just Thursday any more, it's three days since Thursday, for Ilya, so Shane sets down his ginger ale and shoves his hands in his pockets, feels his shoulders rising to his ears. "Do you want me to go?"

There's panic in Ilya's face, Shane's sure of it, there and gone in a moment.

"No. You are only other person who is not crazy today. Don't go, tell me what you have been doing over and over."

Shane smiles, and says, "Sure, ok," and thinks that don't go isn't the same as stay; it pleads against undesirable solitude rather than asking to keep a wanted presence, and of the two he much prefers to hear Ilya's voice ask him to stay.

**

Shane hadn't actually thought he was doing too bad at this repeating day business; he had thought he'd been handling it pretty well, making his way through without too much incident. He hadn't thought there even was a way to do it wrong, per se, except now Ilya's looking at him from a couple of feet away on the couch and Shane feels like he's failed a test.

"Not once? Every time you show up to the game? I bet you are early to warm up."

"Well," Shane hedges, "it's not like I haven't done anything kinda … wild."

"Wild? No no, you are doing everything, just the way you are supposed to."

Shane thinks about his ill-fated trips out into Boston. "Not everything."

"Do you ever even sleep past alarm?" Shane knows his face is telling Ilya the answer to this; it never occurred to him not to follow his routine on Friday as normal, as the cascade of calendar alarms in his phone lay out for him. He always gets up on time, eats, goes to warm up, plays hockey.

"Fuck, Hollander, you are more boring even than I thought."

"That's not boring! I figure if I get it right then the loop will stop!"

"And that is working so well for you?"

"I just haven't got it right yet," Shane offers weakly, although if he's honest with himself he hasn't been trying for a while now. He is, all things considered, taking as much advantage of this situation as he can — although looking at Rozanov's bewildered expression, he thinks maybe it's more that he's only taking as much advantage as it's occurred to him to take.

"It's been kinda nice, knowing what's coming. Not having to worry so much. Come on, what would you have done, huh?"

"I don't know, you could have robbed a bank, whatever, makes no difference like you said."

"That's illegal."

"Is it? This I wish someone had told me before I came to America." Ilya rolls his eyes dramatically but he's smiling just enough that Shane can see the curve of it in his cheeks. "No, cannot be you have always done same thing every day, this is terrible. Tell me something better."

Shane thinks about the last time he was sitting on this couch, and wonders if this is an opportunity to work out some of that anticipation that was buzzing under his skin when he arrived at Ilya's door; he'd been thinking that the opportunity would be lost, that now that Ilya remembers he would want Shane to go but now he's here, invited, one more time. Shane's come here, he brought his no consequences here for a reason after all, and Ilya will remember this now, it seems like, but if he's lucky that might even be better and if Shane doesn't carry on and say what he came here to say, or at least something like it, it's going to burn its way through him. He doesn't want anyone else but Ilya and it's almost heartstopping how sure he is of it: being so close to Ilya he could touch him he can't even imagine there being someone else he wants — so why can't Shane try to have him, even if it's only as long as this bubble of no consequences shimmers around them?

"I told Hayden this morning," he starts, then finds he can't quite look at Ilya's face and focuses on his collarbones instead, "about you. You and me." There's an inhale, audible, from Ilya's side of the couch and Shane sees his chest rise suddenly with it, so Shane rushes on. "He'll forget as soon as the day turns over, I just wanted to —" he chances a look up at Ilya's face, but is no better educated in what he's thinking, "talk to someone about it. I never have and it felt like, you know. The best opportunity I was going to get."

There's a long pause until Ilya asks, "What did you tell him?"

Shane is sitting sideways on the couch to face Ilya, legs underneath him, and wants very much to be close enough to touch him; surprises himself by wanting the reassurance of it — but it's not really a surprise at all; looking at Ilya's body sprawled out a couple of feet away like he has every right to take up every centimetre of space that he does, Shane wants to give up reason entirely and crawl into his lap.

"I told him that we're sleeping together," Shane starts, and Ilya laughs, incredulous.

"Oh, and how did he take that?"

"Not that bad! He wanted to set me up with his brother-in-law, but —"

There's a scattering of annoyed-sounding Russian from Ilya and Shane finally manages to bring his eyes back to Ilya's face so he can try desperately to parse his expression, and it's sharp and focussed wholly on him and it takes his breath.

"Do not let Pike set you up. He definitely would pick someone even more boring than you and you would be too polite to tell him he does not know how to fuck you properly."

Shane swallows; his mouth is dry. "Is that the only reason? He might set me up with someone boring and I'm too polite?"

There's that quiet again, and Shane wants desperately to know what words are waiting behind it — because there are words, he can almost see them dancing behind Ilya's eyes.

"I told him," Shane carries on, "how long we've been doing — this, and how bad an idea it probably is and how I —" he stops, his words strangling in his throat.

"How you what, Hollander?" Ilya asks, soft and quiet and dangerous.

"You know I really liked it better," he says instead, feeling his heart starting to beat so hard, god, so fucking hard, "when you called me Shane."

It feels like the world halts in its turning, and Ilya is staring at him now: Shane is pinned by it, he can't move.

"I did not think you liked it that much, since you ran away right after." Ilya's hand where it rests in his lap is clenched tight; Shane shakes his head.

"I'm sorry about that, really I am. I needed a minute but I shouldn't have left like that."

Ilya makes a derisive noise and shrugs a shoulder. "Does not matter."

"It does, because," Shane finds command of his body again and moves, crawls into Ilya's lap like he's been wanting to and Ilya doesn't stop him as he rests with his knees either side of Ilya's thighs and he wills himself to sound sincere, to be believed, "because I care about you."

"No, you don't," Ilya interrupts, dismissive, and Shane makes an annoyed noise. Ilya's not going to talk him out of this now; Shane might not understand what the tangled mess in his chest means but he knows that at the centre of it is care, knows that calling it that might still be severely understating the depth of it in him, but if it were anything less it wouldn't pull at him how it does whenever Ilya's in the same room as him, like if he doesn't have chance to touch him he'll burn to nothing from the wanting of him.

"I've been here with you over and over for weeks and all I want is more of you," and it kills him in that moment that Ilya can't remember it, that Shane has all those times together and Ilya doesn't, "You're in my head all the time, I can't think about anyone else," he kisses Ilya, fast on the mouth; Ilya's hands are starting to clutch at his sides. "You can't tell me you don't feel it too, I won't believe you," Shane continues, trying to be careful, trying not to push too hard, but oh, how he wants to, and he puts his hands on Ilya's face to keep him there, make sure he can't look away. Ilya's eyes have fear in them. "Do you care about me too?"

"It doesn't matter what I —"

"Of course it fucking matters. Do you care about me too, Ilya?" It's purposeful, this Ilya, and his heart sings for it and more so when Ilya grips him, clings to him, makes that sound again — the needful wanting noise — but this time he makes it against his lips and when Shane says it again, says, "Ilya," into the half-breath of air between them Ilya makes that sound into his mouth so that Shane can kiss it away and swallow it down. "When I won the cup all I wanted was to talk to you," he says, another little confession that he's giving up to both of them, "ruined my fucking phone, they were pouring champagne over me but I couldn't put it down, I had to talk to you, I was only thinking about you. Do you think about me too?"

"It doesn't ma—" Shane kisses Ilya like he wants to so often and doesn't because he fears it'll give too much away: desperate and searching and with his whole body pressing close so that he's out of breath when he stops.

"If you don't care then say so," although it might take something out of Shane if that's the way this goes, something that he won't be able to replace, "but if you do, please, Ilya, please —"

Ilya kisses him again, sets his hands into Shane's hair to keep him there, hold him where he's wanted, and stops in the end only with a panting, "Shane," that makes Shane whimper, makes something in him light up, dizzyingly. "Yes. Yes I care about you, although I do not think it helps anything to say it out loud."

"Fuck anything else," Shane snaps out, "it's you and me in this day until it's not, we can do whatever we want, we can —" Ilya's mouth is back on him and it's hungry, his fingers push under Shane's t-shirt and dig fierce into his sides and Shane thinks of fingerprints and teeth marks, he thinks of how they will all disappear when the clock winds back again and there's no reason to hold back, no reason to hold anything back and Shane feels something in him untether, the mess in his chest unspooling in him and spilling itself out and he moans into Ilya's mouth and pulls at him, starts to scramble away from him to stand and the words fall out of him like a dam's broken, "Take me to bed, Ilya — please, please take me to bed and fuck me, Ilya, please—"

Kissing him up off the couch, Ilya's with him every step and moves with him on feet that trip over one another towards the bedroom. They leave a trail of clothes in their wake; Ilya's tank top on the floor by the couch, Shane's t-shirt over the arm of a chair and his socks kicked under a side table; Ilya's sweatpants puddle in the bedroom doorway and Shane follows them down to the floor so that he can put his mouth to the shape of Ilya's dick in his underwear, breathe him in and let his mouth water for the imagined feel of it weighing down his tongue.

Ilya's hands are in his hair and on the sides of his face; he pushes a thumb into Shane's mouth and says, "I want to fuck you," with an edge to his voice that Shane's rarely heard, desire held barely in check making his accent thick with blurry vowels, so Shane doesn't suck, only lets Ilya's thumb press on the centre of his tongue and pull his jaw open so that spit pools quickly and he starts to drool from the corners of his mouth.

Ilya's lips part in wanting and he drags Shane up by his shoulders, turning them sharply and pushing Shane back onto the bed; he bounces as he lands and moves himself up toward the headboard against Ilya's hands pulling hard at his jeans which come off with his underwear in one firm tug and end up tossed to the floor somewhere near the door to the en-suite, Ilya's underwear following.

Shane starts to turn onto his front as Ilya comes up to cover him, but Ilya's hand on his hip holds him still and he shakes his head, pushing Shane's thighs apart with indelicate shoves to set himself between them.

He says, "No, like this, I —" and breaks off when Shane crashes his arm over into the nightstand, blindly searching out the corner of the top drawer where the condoms and lube are, because Shane's been here many times before and he knows where they're kept. Ilya takes the lube from him and squeezes some into his hand then asks, as he circles two fingers around Shane's hole, "How many times did I fuck you in this bed?" and presses both unrelenting, insisting fingers inside together and Shane whines, scrambles with his hands above his head to grab at the pillows and slap against the headboard.

It's so sudden, it's — "Fuck, fuck," — different from what Ilya usually does; Shane always gets here to Ilya in the same mood, the same amount of anticipatory, wanting the same kind of delicious slow escalation and he hasn't had Ilya be like this in — in — Ilya's fingers fuck in and out of him, circle his rim and then push in again, urgent.

"Yes, 'fuck', that is what I said. How many times did I fuck you, Hollander?"

He wants to ask for Shane, but there's something else, something at the corners of Ilya's eyes.

"Are you jealous? Of yourself?"

Ilya's fingers push in and up, searching and pressing and Shane arches, cries out sharp and lets his legs fall as far open as he can to give Ilya all the room between them which Ilya takes without hesitation, then insists on more as he moves over him, bracing on his left arm as he stretches Shane open with the fingers of his right.

"No, not jealous, interested. How many?"

"I don't know, I didn't keep count, Ilya please, fuck," and he tries to grind his dick up against Ilya's stomach but he just doesn't have the room, the freedom of movement to get proper friction.

"You kept coming back here," Ilya tells him, not a question, and Shane surges up to kiss him as Ilya makes two fingers into three and Shane, pinned, squirms for him.

"Of course I did," he gasps out; and what else would he have done — of course he came back, he couldn't stay away; he'll always come back.

"You could have found someone else," Ilya says, words falling soft, uninflected between them; Shane's already shaking his head. "Could have. Can do whatever you want on this day, would start over and all would go away."

Shane can't stand it, can't stand the thought of Ilya thinking that of him; the sense of wrong in him for it is staggering, even more than the knowledge — unfathomable, astounding — that he'd thought about doing it, even though all he'd proved through trying was that he couldn't; wouldn't. He takes a handful of Ilya's hair, grips tight and holds him still and tells him, low and dark and desperate, "I don't want anyone else. No one but you, Ilya, please," he lifts up, sucks a kiss against Ilya's bottom lip, "fuck me, come on, I'm only for you, I am."

Shane's still not really stretched properly when Ilya rolls on a condom and positions himself and Shane shouts at the first press inside, throws his head back and groans and hisses out a stuttering chorus of yeses in case Ilya might feel in any way like he needs to stop; even a pause to breathe would be too long and Shane's already trying to fuck himself down onto him as Ilya settles one of Shane's legs onto his shoulder, grips his calf to keep him there and starts to fuck in, hard and deep and miserably, deliciously slowly so that Shane can't hold together thoughts outside of needing more of him. Ilya's face is red and flushed and Shane wants to earn the attention, the focus that's directed at him.

"Say it again. Милый, Shane, tell me one time more?"

It's a question, uncertain, like Ilya thinks Shane won't want to promise himself again and there's a moment where Shane sees the need in Ilya's face and understands that it's something he's never seen there before — something that's not about fucking even though Ilya's hard and hot and in him and Shane's leaking a puddle all over his stomach and knows that he'll be done for the second he touches himself: Shane sees it and realises as Ilya drives into him perfectly hard and grindingly slowly just how very wrong he was when he'd told Ilya he cares about him.

There's a four-letter word that would have been the truth, he understands that now, but care doesn't begin to describe it, doesn't stretch nearly far enough.

He's ruined; gloriously, completely.

Shane pants out his promises and means every word, tells Ilya, "I'm yours. Just yours, I swear, I'm yours," again and again until Ilya gives up on slow and fucks him like he has something to prove, as if he wants to imprint himself into Shane's skin, leave something behind in evidence that he's been there and Shane doesn't have the words through his breathless moans to explain that there's a place in his chest shaped like Ilya, and he thinks perhaps there always has been.

When he can't stand the knife-edge of it for another second, Shane takes hold of his cock and drags his hand through the slick of himself, jerks himself to the time of Ilya's increasingly ragged thrusts and comes as Ilya tells him, "Yes, Shane, yes, all over yourself," so he does, his whole body locking tight and making Ilya feel huge inside him, impossible, the high of it wracking through him in waves that drag all the way into sparkling oversensitivity as Ilya doesn't stop, doesn't slow.

Once Shane has finished coming, the tension bled out of him until he's there just for Ilya to make his own pleasure in, he slurs out a near-drunken sounding, "Ilya," and Ilya makes a sound like a sob and fucks him harder and comes, hips jerking and hands on Shane's thighs tightening to pain as he shudders through it.

After, once Ilya has eased off of him and dropped the tied-off condom on the floor by the bed, he drags his tongue through the mess Shane made on his belly and gives it back to him in a filthy open-mouthed kiss that Shane knows he'll find gross in about ninety seconds but for now is hot and perfect, and when they separate Ilya's eyes are bright and soft.

"You ok?" he asks, and Shane hums an affirmative. "Good."

The air carries only the sounds of their breathing as it calms, Ilya's weight resting heavy down the length of his body and Ilya's head thuds to Shane's shoulder and Shane hears him inhale and press his mouth, wet and soft, to Shane's chest. Shane drags his fingers through Ilya's hair, not wanting to lose this moment in the need to move and shower and dress, until Shane can't stop himself from saying, "I meant it. About there being no one else, even if it's no consequences or whatever." He stares up at the white-painted ceiling. "I thought about it. The first time — first couple of times, really, that I did this day here with you it," he winces, "didn't go so well, I didn't handle things well, and I — I thought about it, I thought if I could find someone else I wanted…" he trails away, wordless, and focuses back on Ilya, who is watching him with sharp attention. "But I don't want someone else. Only you."

"Only me." Ilya says, with what sounds like a little disbelief, so Shane nods.

"And you," he starts, but then wishes horribly that he hadn't, because, "do you want someone —" what if Ilya does; that might actually kill him, would rip his heart from his chest to know that —

"No, Shane," Ilya replies, propping his chin on Shane's chest so that he can look at him from a handful of centimetres away, eyes wide and blue enough for Shane to drown in. "I only want you."

Shane nods and his eyes blur with relief so he closes them and kisses Ilya again until the cooling sweat and come on him start to feel disgusting, but Ilya's standing then anyway and tugging him to the shower.

Watching Shane work the overly complicated controls to Ilya's waterfall shower without the first flush of difficulty, Ilya's eyebrows raise.

"So it has been a lot of times, then, that you were here."

Shane shrugs and pulls a pair of towels out of the cupboard under the sink. "I guess."

"And never you wanted to do anything else? No life of crime for you, sure, but something?"

Stepping into the shower, Shane turns it over in his head. He thinks he gets points for confessing his darkest secret to Hayden, but that's about all he's got and it feels strangely like he's been a let down.

"No. I guess I mean, not yet. I went out into Boston a couple of times, which was," he cringes and sets his hands on Ilya's shoulders as he joins him under the spray, "bad, that was really bad. Went to the aquarium like I said, walked around the city some. But I liked coming here, you get that, right? I wanted to, because I —"

"Because you care," Ilya finishes for him, soft.

"Well. Yeah." As a word, Shane supposes, it'll do.

Ilya pushes Shane's wet hair back off his forehead and brushes water drops from his cheekbones and looks much too serious for it when he says, "I care about you, too, Shane Hollander."

Shane can't help his smile, or the kiss that follows.

**

"You never asked me for anything weird?"

Shane stabs at his pasta with his fork. "I don't know, define 'weird'. We, you know. Fucked."

Ilya looks at him from a foot away, incredulous, his dinner apparently abandoned in favour of mockery. "All those times and you knew I would not remember if it was not good," Shane rolls his eyes, "and you did not ask me for a single dirty fantasy?" Shane huffs and eats his pasta and tries to think if there was anything that might count as a dirty fantasy, but he's coming up empty. "Nothing? You tell me there is not one thing you wanted to do, nothing you wanted to try with your," Ilya waves a spoon at him, "no consequences?"

Shane's silence is fairly damning; Ilya reaches across him for the parmesan and says a flutter of words in Russian that Shane doesn't need to understand to know are not flattering, and he searches his memory for anything he might have thought of, anything he might have wanted even if — he brightens.

"I never did it, but I thought about trying to see if I could learn how to, you know," he looks over to Ilya, sitting on the stool next to him at the kitchen counter, and glances down to his crotch and back, "fit all of you," he feels his face burn in embarrassment, "in my mouth." Ilya freezes, and Shane looks away, back to his plate. "But, you know, how would I explain that to you after everything goes back to normal, that suddenly I can do this thing?" He shakes his head. "You'd have thought I'd …. practised. With someone else."

And that should have been enough, Shane thinks, in perfect hindsight, that alone should have been enough for him to realise that he felt something for Ilya that ran deeper than he'd wanted to confess to himself, that he wanted Ilya should never have to think something like that of him.

There's a screech of Ilya's chair on the floor and his cutlery clatters back to the worktop.

"Yes, this," he takes hold of Shane's arm and pulls, "I agree, we will do this thing, we start now."

"Fuck off, asshole," Shane laughs, "eat your fucking food," and Ilya moves in to his side, lets his hand span broad across Shane's thigh, his fingertips pressing hard on the delicate inside part and he murmurs into Shane's hair:

"You kill me, Hollander."

The tangled mess in Shane's chest grows, just a little, swells and gleams woven through and twisted around his heart as it is, and as Ilya pulls his stool over to sit pressed against Shane's side Shane tries not to smile and promises, "Later."

**

Shane looks at the new toothbrush in his hand, still foamy with toothpaste, and rinses it under the bathroom tap. He's still wearing his boxers and a pair of Ilya's sweatpants, but he's never made it this far through the day before and still been in Ilya's house and he doesn't know — does he sleep in what he's wearing, or strip to underwear or just strip completely — he's assuming he'll be sleeping in the same bed as Ilya and the thought that Ilya might kick him into a guest room is gutting, completely, as well as unlikely but he hasn't actually said he wants to spend the entire night sleeping next to Shane, but what if Shane gets into Ilya's bed and that's not what he intended and he has to ask Shane to get out, or —

"What is wrong?"

Shane finds Ilya's eyes in the reflection in the bathroom mirror. "Nothing, I'm good." His voice is still wrecked and even though he's cleaned his teeth he feels like he can still taste Ilya in his mouth, and if they hadn't just finished with each other he'd want to get on his knees again.

"That was convincing," Ilya says into his shoulder blade, sliding his hands around to span Shane's stomach, one above the other. Ilya's whole body — his whole naked body is pressed to his back and Shane has never felt so warm and kept.

"I am, I'm fine," and it's not untrue; he is good; he's amazing, he aches in places that give him flashbacks that make him shiver, he has the memory of Ilya looking him in the face and telling him that he cares, he has the reality of Ilya holding him in this bathroom just because he can, only, "Only —" Ilya looks at him in their reflection, eyebrows raised in expectation, "Only, we never made it this far in the day before. You would ask me to stay but I didn't, except for —"

He doesn't explain; they both know what it's except for, and Shane doesn't want to talk again about how he left.

Ilya's arms around him tighten, and he kisses the side of Shane's neck.

"You stay here with me tonight. In morning I suck your dick for you until you cry, and then we play hockey. Is simple."

"Simple, huh?"

"Да, yes. Simple."

Shane sets down his toothbrush and turns his head in toward Ilya's face, presses his nose against Ilya's cheek and closes his eyes.

"Ok," he mumbles, thinking that it isn't at all, but for tonight at least he can pretend that it is, "simple."

**

When Shane wakes, the pillow under his face isn't covered with the slightly scratchy perfectly serviceable hotel pillowcases that he's grown unfortunately accustomed to; they're soft, high thread count like the ones on his own bed but they don't smell like the fabric softener he uses. The light in the room is strange and he's warm; overheated almost and — and there's a weight on his back, heavy and body-warm and breathing, and as he blinks open his eyes he understands that it's Ilya on him, weighing him wonderfully down, at the same time as he feels the hard-on that's pressed against his ass.

Ilya's still sleeping, and Shane screws his eyes shut and makes his breathing stay steady; bites his lip not to make a sound.

He's never slept in the same bed as someone before. Never spent the night, never woken up with anyone, never wanted to.

Ilya's head is next to his on the pillow, his breath on the back of Shane's neck; an arm is wrapped around to his chest and one leg is slung across his hips with the bulk of him sprawled across his back.

It should be uncomfortable.

It's not.

Shane breathes in heavy and breathes out shaking and never wants this moment to end, just in case when Ilya wakes the world looks different to him in the morning.

The world looks different to Shane, too, but clearer; sharper. Simpler.

Lovelier.

Shane's not sure if it's him that wakes Ilya or if it's the rising sunlight, but he feels Ilya begin to shift and his breathing becomes shallower, more deliberate, and Shane waits; braces.

There's a moment where Ilya freezes — understands, Shane thinks, where he is and who's here with him — and Shane wonders if he's going to find himself suddenly cold and weightless but instead Ilya shifts purposefully closer, like he's trying to press Shane down into the mattress and keep him there; Ilya's mouth brushes against the back of his neck and Shane can't help it, tucks his head down to give him more room. Ilya sucks on his first vertebra and rocks his hips, his massive fucking dick dragging against the rise of Shane's ass and the small of his back and Shane melts for it, turns his body more toward the bed so that Ilya can blanket him, can move all the way over him and fuck slowly against him with more purpose.

Ilya's arms trace the length of his body; they drag up his ribs lightly enough that it feels almost ticklish until they find Shane's arms at the shoulder and smooth down them to his wrists and then his hands where they hold, grip, press, and Shane isn't proud of the noise he makes for it but there's nothing he could have done to hold it in. It gets him his own name gasped sharp into his hair as Ilya starts to grind rhythmically against him, then there's the sharpness of a there-and-gone scrape of teeth against his shoulderblade.

Shane wants to move. Wants to get his hand around himself or even just shift enough to get friction on his dick — he can feel where the sheets underneath him are becoming tacky, sticking to him as he gets harder and more wanting — but Ilya's too heavy and has him too tight and there's nothing he can do but feel the drag of Ilya's dick against the curve of his ass, sliding between the cleft of his asscheeks, the hotness of Ilya's breath damp on his skin.

It gives Shane nothing; no part of Ilya is touching anything that would be able to get him off but still, every part of him that could get him there is aching and desperate like he's already been teased into a frenzy.

"Ilya, fuck, I —" he doesn't know what he wants to say, what he wants to ask for, and he closes his eyes and feels the weight of Ilya along his back, the stickiness where Ilya's dick rubs against him and his balls where they press against his ass, his face where it presses to his spine.

"Ok? Shane, fuck, is ok?" Ilya's movements slow, but Shane can't have that, needs Ilya to finish on him, and nods desperately.

He chokes out, "Yes, yes, don't stop," and Ilya moves faster; his knees are planted on the mattress just outside of Shane's and he drags them inwards, pushes Shane's legs tighter together and Shane finds that he's shaking; he's never felt so safe as he does now, held down so perfectly and desired so badly — so much that it's the first thing Ilya's body wants on waking — he can barely fit in his heart how it feels to wake up warm and kept and needed by the man he loves.

Ilya's breath is unsteady and his thrusts turn frantic in short minutes and he pants out Shane's name as he gets closer and Shane gets harder and needier, as Ilya's grip on his hands tightens almost to pain and his whole body tenses and he groans out Shane's name and finishes onto his skin. Warmth spreads between them making Ilya's last few stuttered thrusts slick and wet-sounding and the sounds his mouth lets out are thick and choked off in his throat.

Ilya collapses onto him afterwards. Shane never wants him to move except that he can't keep himself still; can't stop himself trying to grind out his own orgasm, allow this wanting that's born entirely of being used to crest in him, and he sobs at the relief of it when Ilya rolls off but pulls Shane with him, keeps his chest pressed tight to his back and reaches around to take Shane's leaking dick in his broad hand.

"So wet already, Hollander, I have barely even touched you."

It's growled into his ear, morning-rough and dirty and Shane feels as if he should be embarrassed about it but he isn't, has no room in his head for anything that isn't sensation.

So he reaches up and behind him to get his fingers tangled in Ilya's hair how he loves to and he pants out, "Yes," and "right there, please," and when he comes it's Ilya's name that he moans, that he begs with.

Ilya doesn't let him go after; wipes his hand on the sheets and puts it back across his chest and stays there; doesn't seem inclined to let him go at all and Shane closes his eyes and lets his pulse calm and basks — until not even a minute later, when a low chirping starts up from Shane's nightstand — or, rather: from the nightstand on the side of the bed that doesn't have Ilya's things in it.

Shane tries to reach his phone to make it shut up but it's just a little too far away, and it's with a put-upon sigh that Ilya lets him go so that Shane can reach over to snag it and drop it on the bed. He thumbs the alarm off without looking.

"Sorry," Shane mumbles into the pillow as the chirping cuts out.

"What the fuck, Shane. Is too early."

Ilya has resumed his position tucked into Shane's back, arm across his chest pulling him close. Shane shuffles, gets his arms in a position where he's comfortable and sighs his way backwards into Ilya's hold.

"It's not too early. It's when I get up. I do a workout before breakfast today usually."

"Bet you are worst roommate on road trip. Up at dawn always for no reason."

The come is cooling on Shane's belly and becoming increasingly unpleasant and he's probably starting to stick to Ilya horribly, but he doesn't want to leave the glorious containment of Ilya's arms, of the leg that's hooked over his. He can hold out another minute.

"Hayden mostly sleeps through it. He usually rooms with me so I guess he's used to it, he'll get up for breakfast with the guys in an hour or so."

"Really? Hm."

Shane turns his head as far as he can in Ilya's direction; he can't see his face, still, but the shape of him is there in the corner of his vision.

"What really?"

"Nothing. Come on."

Ilya is moving, then, leaving Shane sticky and cooling on dirty sheets, but once he's standing he pulls Shane up him with him too, and toward the shower.

"We should strip the bed," Shane says as he stands, "we need clean sheets."

Ilya looks at him, bewildered. "Hollander, I am not getting back in this bed. I will beat you at hockey and fall asleep in car and when I wake up will be like you never came all over them. Will be clean again by magic."

Shane doesn't really have an answer to that although he objects on principle to the word 'magic' despite not having a better one, and he follows Ilya to the shower.

**

Shane had thought it was weird when Ilya had come out with him to his Uber after a rushed shower and selection of some borrowed clothes, and it got weirder when Ilya got in the Uber back to Shane's hotel with him, although he couldn't help but be a little bit charmed at the same time, and as they march across the early-morning desertion of the hotel lobby with reflexive glances to either side even though no consequences thrills through him, he knows that Ilya's nonchalant expression is absolutely a cover.

"What the fuck," Shane says, as pleasantly as he can manage, watching their reflections on the inside of the elevator doors, "is going on?"

Ilya shrugs. "Am walking you home. I am gentleman."

"You are not a gentleman, you're an asshole."

"I am hurt, Shane. I will see you to door."

"Yeah, but then what?"

In the elevator door reflection as the lights flit past a yellow-glowing 2, the back of Shane's left hand is not quite touching the back of Ilya's right. A twitch; a half-twist at his wrist, that's all it takes and Shane's hand touches skin. Ilya's face turns to his, eyes dark.

"Then," he says as the doors ding open at the third floor, "I kiss you goodbye and go home."

Ilya steps out of the elevator first and Shane follows a second later before the doors can close on him, waiting for the other shoe to drop. The promise of no consequences is the only reason he's not currently freaking the fuck out in the stairwell but still, he's usually finishing up in the gym at this time, coming back upstairs for a shower before breakfast and he's never bumped in to anyone else in the hallways. He glances at his watch. Hayden will be up sometime around now, he's usually just finishing in the shower when Shane gets back from his workout, so —

"You want to fuck with Hayden."

Ilya stops a couple of steps ahead of him then turns and comes back to him. His face is bright and guileless and Shane doesn't buy it for a single second. "Fuck with, no, I do not need to fuck with Hayden. He should know his friend makes good choices; has excellent taste. Besides, he knows about us today, yes?" Ilya's hands rest on his hips and Shane's eyes are on his lips. Shane wonders what it would feel like to kiss him here, where anyone could see. "Come on," Ilya says, stepping away and twirling Shane's hotel room keycard between his fingers — it had been in his pocket and Shane hadn't even felt Ilya's fingers seeking it out.

"Hey, asshole," he hisses, catching Ilya up at the door with the little numberplate spelling out 3312 screwed to it just above the cutout for the peephole.

Ilya catches him around the waist as he gets close and Shane hears the beep-click-click of the door lock disengaging; Ilya's mouth is on his as he pulls them through the door and turns Shane so that his back is up against the wall inside. Shane's weak, hopelessly so, and he recognises he can hear the sound of the shower still running as Ilya's thigh presses between his.

"What are you doing?" he asks, but sounds a lot closer to breathless than annoyed.

"Pike knows, yes?" Shane nods and Ilya hms in response. "You tell him you are fucking the hottest man in MLH, maybe he thinks you are all talk, you are trying to make yourself sound less boring. Cannot let him think you are liar."

Shane's arms have come up to rest on Ilya's shoulders. He loves this feeling so much, having Ilya with him, and hates all the time that he's wasted pretending that he doesn't.

They have the time now, though: they have a day that doesn't end.

"So you're doing this for my — what, my reputation?"

Ilya nods, grins. "Yes." His grin fades into something a little wistful and he brushes his thumb across Shane's cheekbones, one and then the other. "Besides, in this room no one needs to be kept secret, yes? Not today."

No secrets is heady, is wishful and wonderful and Shane moans and kisses Ilya hard enough their teeth click, takes a harsh handful of Ilya's hair as Ilya sucks on his tongue. He pulls away when he realises that the shower isn't running any more and Ilya tries to follow against the resisting tug of Shane's grip in his hair. Shane has time for one more quiet, "Ilya," before the bathroom door opens with a cloud of steam.

Hayden's voice precedes him, a cheerful, "Shane, you back? How'd it — go."

Tugging his t-shirt down over his stomach, Hayden has a look on his face like dawning horror.

He's looking in between him and Ilya, eyes flicking back and forward like he's waiting for one of them to burst into flames or disappear in a puff of smoke like a magic trick. Ilya has taken the smallest step back; they're still standing close but at least Shane isn't half riding his thigh any more — there is in fact, he realises, a thin sliver of sunlight between them — but Shane's hands are still in his hair and Ilya's mouth is flushed from Shane's lips and there's really no question of what they were doing.

"Rozanov," Hayden croaks out. "So, you two worked things out, then?"

Ilya's eyebrows raise and Shane does not at all want to rehash with Ilya everything he talked about with Hayden so he coughs, awkward, and says, "Yep. Yes we did."

"He does not look very happy about it," Ilya says, looking at Hayden but talking to Shane, and Hayden's face turns to a scowl.

"Yeah, well, Shane can do better."

Ilya's eyes narrow but he doesn't say anything else, just turns back to Shane and kisses him soft, ignoring Hayden standing right there, then pulls away to look him in the eyes.

"I will see you at the game, милый."

"Yeah, I'll see you at the game."

Ilya steps away with a lingering touch to Shane's stomach and it's all so very normal, it takes his breath; it's not any more intimate than when he's seen Hayden kiss Jackie goodbye at the door, it's just as if they're two people who kiss and it's no big deal, and —

It's as if, in this room, no one needs to be kept a secret.

Ilya opens the door, pulls his sweatshirt hood over his head and, with a nod at Hayden and a lingering glance at Shane, steps back out into the hallway. The door clicks closed behind him and Shane reaches over to slide the deadbolt and the chain into place.

Hayden scrubs his hands over his face.

"Sorry, I know you told me and it's not like I didn't believe you, but seeing it's a whole thing, isn't it."

"Yeah, I guess," Shane answers, absentmindedly.

"So … you coming to breakfast?"

"Yeah. Just let me get changed."

Hayden nods and goes to finish getting himself ready to check out, and Shane stands, still staring at the inside of the door.

Ilya had come all the way here when the sun had barely chased away the predawn, risked — if not a real actual problem given that in a few hours it would be yesterday again — but at least risked the drama of scene, an incident, walking all the way up to 3312 just so that he could shut them both inside and kiss him goodbye before he left, sweet and near-chaste.

Shane wonders, as he goes to find some clean clothes of his own to wear to breakfast, if Ilya had come all the way here just because he wanted them, for less than a minute, to be entirely unconcealed.

**

Shane is paying no attention to what the score is; only knows that it's almost the end of the third and he's counting down the minutes to the clock hitting zero, to the changing rooms, to the bus. To the hotel again, and starting the clock over and the possibilities that this next time around seems to be full of.

This game stopped feeling important a dozen repetitions ago.

At centre ice, Ilya looks at him as he skates into position. He's been quiet this game, uncharacteristically so, but as Shane bends, readies for the puck drop, Ilya says sudden and sharp like he doesn't really mean to, "Will I see you tomorrow?"

Shane blinks, surprised. He'd planned to be at Ilya's house from the minute he could get there, had wanted to make long and indulgent use of this swathe of time they suddenly find themselves in possession of.

"Yes. That is," something in his heart twinges, "if you want to?"

Ilya smiles, small and private and soft. "I want."

Chapter End Notes

Yes, the chapter count went up again. Am I probably kidding myself that that '6' doesn't want to actually be a '7'? Also, yes. Anyway, see you next week to find out how Ilya's getting on :)

I am loving all of your comments, and even though I am horribly desperately awkward about these things and know I am taking a while to get to replying, please do know that I appreciate them and you all so much.

tumblr <3

Chapter 4: Four

Chapter Summary

Ilya presses his fingers into his eyes until he sees lights in the black behind his eyelids. He's lying to himself if he thinks he wants to let any cell of himself touch someone who isn't Shane; there's no one else who's gotten him hard in months without him closing his eyes and picturing the arch of Shane's back, the curve of his ass, the feel of him at the very first press of Ilya into him and the sound, low and desperate and unapologetic, that Shane makes when he's all the way inside. Just the thought that what Ilya feels might go both ways between them — in even the smallest, most fractional capacity — is filling his head with stupid ideas.

This is going to end in disaster, but Ilya does not see how he could bear to extricate himself now. He will see this through to it's ending, however it might come: there is no part of him, ruled as he seems now to be by his useless delicate feelings, that could have withstood the desire to know what it feels like to be cared about by Shane Hollander.

Chapter Notes

When Ilya wakes it's to the blaring of his alarm: the loud, annoyed siren sound that means that he slept through the first alarm, the more gentle sounding best intentions one, and he now really, definitely needs to get up. He turns it off and lies in his bed, staring at the ceiling.

He's alone, and he doesn't need to look to know it's almost nine in the morning. In about fifteen minutes Finn is going to be at his door to drag him through the scheduled PT session that Ilya cannot dredge up any motivation for: given that any benefit he might technically gain from it will be nullified in less than thirty-six hours, there doesn't seem any point in doing it.

Finn is an attractive man with an impressive body, and there might be some part of Ilya that would be inclined towards seeing if he wanted to fuck, given the relative safety of this hideous repeating day sanity trap, if it wasn't for the most unexpected development of yesterday's repetition — not that anything about it, in the end, was a repeat.

Surprising, certainly.

Still a terrible idea — without doubt.

But irresistible, absolutely: Shane sitting in his lap, calling Ilya by his name and telling him that he cares, giving Ilya almost everything that he's been telling himself he doesn't want for months; more than he'd ever hoped he would get when he'd convinced himself he would try to convince Shane to stay the night with him; would try to steal a few more precious hours for himself.

Ilya presses his fingers into his eyes until he sees lights in the black behind his eyelids. He's lying to himself if he thinks he wants to let any cell of himself touch someone who isn't Shane; there's no one else who's gotten him hard in months without him closing his eyes and picturing the arch of Shane's back, the curve of his ass, the feel of him at the very first press of Ilya into him and the sound, low and desperate and unapologetic, that Shane makes when he's all the way inside. Just the thought that what Ilya feels might go both ways between them — in even the smallest, most fractional capacity — is filling his head with stupid ideas.

This is going to end in disaster, but Ilya does not see how he could bear to extricate himself now. He will see this through to it's ending, however it might come: there is no part of him, ruled as he seems now to be by his useless delicate feelings, that could have withstood the desire to know what it feels like to be cared about by Shane Hollander. Still, his bottomless wants are entirely at odds with what he knows he could ever hope to keep, and so even as Shane lets him see his care Ilya can stand to mirror back only his own carefully measured portion of it. The excess he will continue to keep to himself, deep enough to drown in.

Taking his phone from his nightstand and dragging it into bed with him, Ilya considers. Shane would do his scheduled PT. It wouldn't matter to him that it is entirely pointless — it's in his calendar and his trainer is on his way, so Shane would do his PT.

Ilya, though: Ilya is comfortable and warm and has some hours to burn before Shane arrives — assuming he does, assuming he doesn't wake to the day full of regrets, which Ilya half fears and half doubts will be the case, although if it is at least it will take away the weight of the unknown around how and when this pretty house of cards will come falling down around him.

He remembers the sound of his name in Shane's voice, the break in the middle of it when he'd moaned it while Ilya was in him, the desperation of his mouth on Ilya's as he came.

He thinks about telling Shane that he cared for him; choking out care as he swallowed back love like not saying it would make it be not true.

They are in this strange little bubble together for now, and for all that Ilya is still not totally convinced that he hasn't just lost his mind there's not a lot he can do to change what seems to be happening to them when grander forces than Ilya can comprehend have hands on the cogs of the universe — and he's not a strong enough man to turn Shane away when he can have him so freely; so without consequence.

He'll deal with the end of it when they finally reach Saturday.

When his doorbell rings — his trainer arriving, spot on eight fifty-eight — Ilya gets out of bed.

**

Ilya's been killing time and he knows it, replaying Shane's words on the ice — that he'll be here if he's wanted — and not entirely believing them, but Shane's smile is bright for him and his mouth finds Ilya's before the front door has even closed behind him. He kisses Ilya soft and welcoming and Ilya's useless heart is so, so fucking full; full to crippling, burning; bursting.

"You came."

"Course, I said I would."

As if it's that easy, as if Ilya just gets to have what he wants with such little fanfare and no resistance. Although, he thinks, as he steers Shane further into the house, as long as this day lasts, perhaps he can.

He guides them to the couch rather than the bedroom, wondering what might happen if they don't head straight to a place with such an obvious conclusion in it — he can't remember the last time he lazily made out with someone, touched them without care for time and made slow, syrupy kisses last for as long as they both could stand.

Shane lies down on the couch and welcomes his weight with a soft, pleased hum, and Ilya puts his mouth to the soft part underneath Shane's jaw.

"It was weird this morning," Shane tells him, opening his thighs in welcome, "Hayden didn't remember anything."

"You know that would happen though, yes?"

"Yeah, but it was still weird."

Ilya breathes the smell of Shane from the curve of his neck; he sucks, bites, bruises, listens to the uneven turn to Shane's breath.

"Probably he likes it better that way. Does not want to think about his captain being so very easy for Ilya Rozanov."

He says it with a tease, with intent to rile Shane up, but he gets a thoughtful sound back instead.

"Does it bother you that no one says it right?"

Ilya pulls back far enough to see Shane's face.

"Says what right?"

"Ilya," Shane says, the usual American way, vowels not sharp enough and all the sounds mushed together.

Ilya shrugs and sits back on Shane's hips; he can feel the start of Shane's hard-on pressing against his ass and he wriggles against it, just to be a dick about it; Shane's hands find the muscle of his thighs and rest there, fingertips digging in.

"Is fine. Is what everyone here says, so would be pointless to get upset about it."

"Still, it's your name."

Ilya isn't quite sure what Shane wants from him, so he pushes his hands inside Shane's t-shirt, reaches his chest and squeezes; fuck but he loves the perfect fucking handfuls he can take of Shane, can't imagine ever getting bored of them.

"Ilya," Shane says, trying to copy Ilya's pronunciation and coming in a strange halfway of American-accented Russian, and Ilya laughs, delighted.

"Does not exactly roll off the tongue in America, hm?" He grazes the pad of his thumb over Shane's nipples until Shane grabs the hem of his shirt and pulls it over his head with a shimmy and an arch of his back that is genuinely sinful.

"Fuck you, I'm not American." Ilya makes a face and lets go of Shane's chest long enough to make a so-so gesture, flat hand tipping from side to side; Shane rolls his eyes and Ilya loves the spark in them. "Say it again? I want to hear what I'm getting wrong."

He sounds so earnest Ilya can barely stand it. It's true that he's used to how the people here say his name but that's not how Ilya thinks of himself in his own head and even though he's lived here for years, sometimes when he hears someone call out that American eel-yuh he thinks that they want someone else's attention entirely.

So he lets his hands span Shane's belly and says again, "Ilya. Say all of the letters, do not squash them together."

"Ilya," Shane says, all but perfect, near accentless, and Ilya feels something in him spark and catch light. "Ilya," one more time, with a little joy behind it because Shane can hear he got it right. Something in Ilya starts to burn.

He demands, "Again," as he climbs off of Shane to strip him of the rest of his clothes and when Shane says it, Ilya whispered a little bewildered as Shane's jeans are yanked off — but said true: it's the sound of him, the name his self knows to answer to. It's like an itch in the back of his brain is being scratched, this man that he loves saying his name, really his name — reaching into the heart of him and making a home there; Ilya can barely stand it.

Putting himself back between Shane's legs Ilya fumbles for the condom and lube in his pocket and starts to hurriedly get Shane ready to take him; he remembers dimly the vague plan he'd had for lazy making out and can't believe how quickly that has evaporated in place of this need, to hear — to hear —

"Say it again while I fuck you," Ilya demands, rolling a condom over his dick, which has gone from interested to aching hard in a blink, in the breath needed to make a word.

"Ilya," Shane tells him as he pushes inside, his head tipping back against the arm of the couch and the word ending on a sucked-in breath; he says it again as he fucks him, again so that Ilya can kiss it away and swallow it and again, broken in the middle, when Ilya takes hold of Shane's dick and starts to stroke. Stamina has gone out of the window in favour of need and desperation and the requirement to fuel the wildfire in Ilya's chest with more perfect little iterations of his own name; Ilya has a horrible thought that he's never again going to be able to tease Shane about finishing so fast when Ilya's about to get there first and so very soon and completely out of his power to hold back.

It's a close thing, Shane tightening on him and moaning, moaning it, "Илья," like he knows just who Ilya is and wants him this badly anyway, and Ilya comes on the tail of Shane's aftershocks, helpless to stop himself, his orgasm wrenched out of him, violent.

Ilya drops his forehead to Shane's chest after, feels the calming race of Shane's heart beneath his breastbone, and Shane's hands find his hair and stroke as their breathing slows and Ilya knows to his bones that he is completely, irrevocably lost; there's no saving him from a painful end no matter how fate might have that end be reached. He feels like if anything tried to take away the man under his hands, who's pressing a kiss into the top of his head and sighing in satisfaction — satisfaction that Ilya has given to him —

He feels there would be nothing left of him but empty, if Shane were to go away.

Ilya is still mostly dressed, had barely shoved his pants down far enough to get himself inside Shane, and as he pulls out and ties off the condom Shane is naked and spent underneath him and for a hot-burning moment Ilya wishes he could keep him like that always.

"Fucking hell," Shane sighs out, letting his legs relax back down to either side of Ilya's, "so that's a — a thing?"

There's just a hint of a question in it and Ilya wants to say no, no it's not, only apparently when it's you - but satisfies himself with a smirk that feels like it takes a little too much effort to put on, and a hand to tug Shane up from the couch.

"And here I was going to blow you," Shane says, eyes watching Ilya's mouth in the way he does that makes Ilya want to lick his lips, "I've got practise to get in, you know."

"Oh, I have not forgotten, there is time for that later. Will make sure of it."

Ilya pulls Shane along to the shower and considers what they could do with so much time — it's something he's thought about often, the time he gets with Shane so unavoidably apportioned out into little parcels of hours and minutes, and what it would be like between them if they had more of it. Time that didn't need to be watched on a clock, time that they could waste together in knowledge that there would be more coming.

Time, always there has never been enough time. Until now; today — this day that doesn't seem to want to give up its hold on them.

Now, he thinks, some sort of hope warring with fear in his chest, they can see what happens when they have time.

**

"Coming to bed, Милый?" Ilya asks, standing in the doorway of his en-suite.

Shane's head turns away from the bathroom mirror to look at him. There's a look on his face Ilya can't work out; something serious that's not quite worry.

"Yeah," he says after an empty beat, and smiles, "I'm coming."

"I don't understand."

"What is not to understand?"

"I've seen this."

Ilya frowns and tips the popcorn into a bowl. "You said you have not?"

"No, I haven't, but — they're street racers? And they do crime, or whatever, heists, only they're in sports cars?"

"Yes," Ilya nods. Shane's face is twisted into total confusion and Ilya cannot hep but find it delightful; he wants to press his fingers to the wrinkles in Shane's forehead.

"But I saw that — only it was, what, ten years ago? Longer even, but you said this is pretty recent?"

Ilya scoops up the popcorn bowl and nods to the drinks; Shane picks them up and follows Ilya through to the couch.

"Could be you saw one of first ones."

"First ones? How many are there?"

"This is seven, there will be new one next year. All very good, hot cars, hot people. What's not to like?"

Shane stands in front of Ilya, between him and the TV where the DVD menu screen is cycling its twenty-five second preview, waiting for them to hit play.

"But you said it's the same as the first one. They do crime in fast cars, are all seven of them —" Shane glances behind him like he's checking he's not misunderstanding the nature of the movie, but the long row of sleek, low cars parading through the hi-def are fairly unambiguous, "But I haven't seen all of the first six, shouldn't I watch those first?"

"Shane, no, it is not that complicated. Sit the fuck down."

Shane looks, perhaps, a little horrified, but comes to sit with Ilya, halfway into his lap as if he belongs there. He has quickly adopted this particular place that he sits on the couch and a side of the bed and a specific mug from Ilya's cupboards for if he has coffee and a spot by the door where he puts his shoes and Ilya worries that these places will still all be Shane's, even when this is over and he leaves.

He smells of Ilya's shampoo and feels like comfort, like heartbreak waiting in reserve for its moment to shine, and his warmth rests perfectly at Ilya's side until the credits roll.

**

"Ok in here?" Ilya asks, and Shane startles as if he's been caught doing something he shouldn't even though he's just standing in the middle of the bathroom; he turns away from the bathroom mirror, that same look of not-quite-worry on his face that Ilya has seen before, here. "Thought I heard you talking."

Shane shakes his head. "No, it's nothing. Bed?"

Ilya fucking loves Shane's mouth; loves its warmth and his eagerness and the soft, distant look that his eyes take on when he's been down there a while letting Ilya make a mess of him until his face is flushed and his jaw's covered in spit and precome and he's humping mindlessly at whatever's underneath him.

Ilya also loves watching Shane at his most focussed: on the ice, determined set to his eyes and his mind directed singularly, sure that he's going to master anything that he's presented with.

The fact that these are both the same man unspools him; makes him feel lightheaded and weak. That Ilya can coax all of the control away from Shane Hollander until all that's left of him is base, unfiltered need is intoxicating; unparalleled.

Somehow, though, Ilya hadn't considered what putting the two sides of Shane together would do to him, and now he finds that he has become practise; now he has to work his hardest not to come as Shane builds himself into a blissful frenzy as he tries to work out how to let Ilya into his throat, as he says things like, "Fuck my mouth? Please, I want it," and, "You already know how to do this, will you teach me?" and Ilya has to ride the absolute edge of coming for as long as he can stand in the spirit of Shane's hunger for improvement.

As Shane gasps to catch his breath with his face pressed to Ilya's sweaty thigh, and Ilya realises dumbly that he came so hard that his fingers are actually tingling, Shane tells him:

"That seemed good, was it good? I think I'm on to something," and Ilya considers that he has deeply underestimated what it means to be the subject of Shane Hollander's focus.

"It's ok," Shane tells him with a sucking kiss to the crease of his thigh, "I'll do better next time."

**

This is becoming something of an unfortunate ritual, and Ilya can almost not stand the thoughts of what Shane is telling himself in he bathroom mirror; if he's already regretting having fallen into spending this ever-repeating day as much together as they possibly can.

Still, Ilya nudges open the bathroom door and stands just inside to see that, as he'd expected, Shane is staring at himself again in the bathroom mirror. As Ilya watches he takes a deep breath and lets it out, turns to Ilya with determined eyes and Ilya braces; wonders how exactly he's going to do it, what words he'll use to put a stop to all of this. Ilya isn't going to hurry him along, though; waits for Shane to open his mouth and say —

"I'm gay."

Ilya stares; blinks, is entirely uncertain what he is supposed to do with this information but Shane seems to be expecting some sort of a response, so he says, "Yes."

Shane's face flickers; annoyed. "That's it?"

Ilya leans back against the bathroom doorframe and wraps his arms across his stomach. "I am not sure — why are you telling me this?"

Shane gestures around him, at the room empty except for the two of them. "Who else am I going to tell?"

"Ok. Is — I mean I did not really believe when you said you like girls, but — it is who you are, just — just is, yes? Does not change anything." Ilya feels like there's an answer he's supposed to be giving that he is lacking the right information to piece together but he is carried along on a tide of relief that Shane doesn't seem to be ending this strange little arrangement they've worked out for themselves.

There's a flicker of something unhappy behind Shane's eyes and Ilya feels like he's failing some sort of test. "Maybe not. I just," he looks Ilya in the eyes, straight on, and Ilya finds himself holding his breath, "I care about you. So fucking much. And I'm worried what happens when this is over, when we stop having this day over and over and you're not gay, not, not —"

Ilya nods. "Not completely."

"You have," Shane stops, swallows hard; his eyes are wet, and he chokes out, "options," like it hurts him to say it.

Ilya wants to tell him that he doesn't, not really. In theory, sure, but in reality there's no one he wants touching him except for Shane; Ilya's worried about what happens when this is over too, but his worry takes the shape of Shane realising what Ilya already knows: they can't work in a world set against them, and eventually Shane is going to choose his priorities. Still, that time isn't here yet and he can't bear to draw Shane's attention to the inevitability of it, not yet, so instead he smiles and reaches out to take Shane's hand and tells him the best truth that he has.

"Today is not over yet, sweetheart."

Ilya's father still calls every Thursday afternoon as it rolls back around, and Ilya still answers. He's tried not picking up the phone, but then it rings and rings and rings, incessant for an hour and Ilya can't stand to turn it off and can't stand to listen to it, so instead he prefers just to answer at the first ring, knowing what to expect, and get the conversation over with quickly.

He often sees Shane watching him afterwards with questions in his eyes that Ilya looks away from but he should have known that wouldn't last forever, that Shane wouldn't be able to let it go, and so when this time around Ilya is struggling to stop staring at his hallway wall with his phone clenched tight in his hand and the muscles in his shoulders tense and knotted, he isn't as surprised as perhaps he should be to feel Shane's hands on his waist and Shane's mouth soft against the back of his neck. He's not kissing, just being: his slow warm breaths make a peaceful rhythm of air on Ilya's skin, raising goosebumps; his chest presses up tight against Ilya's back until Ilya finds that their breathing has fallen in time, and the offer is there, unspoken, to talk if he wants to take it.

He still hasn't actually made a decision about whether or not he's going to when he says, "My father is sick."

Shane makes a soft, acknowledging noise, and wraps his arms around Ilya's middle, holding him. Ilya's head drops to his chest so that he can look down and see Shane's hands wrapped over each other, resting on Ilya's stomach, and the warmth of him is lovely and reassuring and present down the whole length of Ilya's body.

"Ilya, I'm sorry," Shane murmurs. He hasn't stopped saying Ilya's name the Russian way, like if he's going to use it he's damn well going to use it properly, and it does something wonderful, awful, to Ilya's stupid heart every time. "Is it, like, cancer?"

Ilya shakes his head. "No. Dementia."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. He deserves worse."

Shane kisses his neck, so carefully it hurts. "But you don't." Ilya's eyes are starting to burn. "And your — your mom, is she —" He breaks off in the middle of his sentence like he doesn't know how to finish it. Ilya shakes his head again.

"Dead. When I was young."

Shane's arms tighten on him, and Ilya puts the effort that he needs to into his breathing to make sure that it doesn't shake, stays slow and constant, but Shane knows the lie in it anyway and moves around to Ilya's front somehow without ever letting him go, and when Shane's face settles in the curve Ilya's neck makes with his shoulder and Shane's hands span his back and hold, Ilya holds back, he can't help it: his arms come up around Shane and he clings.

**

Later they fuck, Ilya leaning back against the headboard with Shane in his lap. Shane makes little lifts and drops, barely moving Ilya in him; he grinds out perfect little circles with his hips and he gasps, a continuous stream of quiet breathy noises from his throat all while his eyes stay sharp and searching on Ilya's face. He kisses Ilya without stopping; little fluttering things to his cheeks and his closed eyelids and his forehead and long, slow presses of their mouths together. Ilya's belly grows damp from Shane's dripping cock but Ilya keeps his hands off of it, holds Shane's thighs and his ass and his chest and his arms instead, content to let this drag out as slowly and sufferingly as they can stand it.

He wishes there were no condom, wishes that every single part of his skin were touching every single part of Shane's, and although it takes a long time as they keep moving only so slightly Shane eventually begins to shake with the pleasure of it, begins a tripping stutter of, "Ilya, Ilya," that perfect pronunciation of himself like Shane is whispering directly into the core of him. Ilya shifts, takes hold of Shane's thighs firm and plants his feet on the bed to fuck up into him: slow, still, but hard enough to turn Shane's gasps to cries.

Ilya has to force his mouth to make Shane's name when he comes instead of other words he wishes he could, other words that he won't be able to take back, and so he chants I love you, I love you in his own head only, and holds Shane as if the strength in just his hands is enough to keep him there always.

Ilya does not always answer the phone to Sveta. She's only ever calling to check in, say hi, confirm the date of her next flight into Boston and she doesn't call back if he doesn't answer — but if she does she can hear it in his voice, that there's something he's not saying. She knows him too well.

But when she calls while he's making dinner and Shane's in the shower and he thinks —

He thinks of being able to kiss Shane goodbye in front of Hayden Pike like it was nothing. Or not nothing, perhaps, but at least largely unremarkable. No permanent damage and they were back to being a secret the next day, but it had been — it had been wonderful, to be seen.

Ilya picks up his phone and slides to answer, but doesn't lift the phone to his ear for a moment, deciding; he hears her voice saying his name from the phone's speaker, confused, and lifts the phone to his ear.

«Hi, Sveta.»

«Ilya, I thought we'd been disconnected. You ok?»

«I'm good, are you ok?»

There is a pause as long as half an inhale and she says, «I'm fantastic and you are lying, my dear.»

Ilya grins. Five words and she can hear it in his voice. «I'm not lying, I'm good. Really very good.»

«Ah, you have someone there?» Her tone has flipped to annoyed, «Ilya I have told you before you will not drag me into some weird halfway phone sex threesome, I —»

He laughs, and hears sounds of Shane moving around in the bedroom. He's out of the shower. «No, no, not that, I wouldn't dare. I do have someone here though.»

«And so you answered the phone to me because…?» Her voice trails off, expectant. Ilya's fingers are trembling, just slightly, from the anticipation.

«I am making dinner. I can talk to you while I make dinner, I am a brilliant multitasker.»

«You are making — you —» She stops, and Ilya can see her in his mind's eye, settling one hand on her hip and holding the other up in the air to demand he pause while she gathers her thoughts. He feels a little bad about toying with her, but only a little. He's probably not going to get a chance at this after reality rights itself, so he's going to drag it out if he can. «Ilya, you tell me right now, are you cooking dinner for someone?»

«Yes,» he answers, firm and unapologetic. Shane has emerged from the bedroom wearing a pair of Ilya's sweatpants, towelling his hair dry. Ilya can see his own teethmarks low down on Shane's stomach. He holds out a hand for Shane to join him.

«Ilya stop playing with me, you have never cooked for anyone you've fucked except for me, what the fuck is going on? Is it — is it Jane?»

Ilya licks his lips as he traps Shane between himself and the kitchen worktop, mouths the word Svetlana at him so he knows who's on the phone even though they both know she always calls at this time, and puts his face close to Shane's; presses his nose to his cheekbone.

«Yes, Jane is here.» Shane starts, just a little; he might not understand the Russian words but he would recognise the name, recognise Jane, and Ilya tilts his head in question.

He can almost see Shane squashing his reactive panic, and he says in a whisper quiet enough that Ilya's not even sure it was meant for him to hear, "No consequences," and then he nods.

«So you are owning up to her at long fucking last! Ilya, I am so proud of you.»

«Hm, you might not be proud of me in a minute. Or — maybe more proud, we'll see.» He flips his phone round in his hand so that he can find the button to put the call on speakerphone while Shane watches him with raised eyebrows, then he continues in English, "Say hello to Svetlana, Jane."

«What, you mean she's there, as in she's right there? Ah fuck you, Ilya,» then slips seamlessly into bright, sharp English, "Jane, I am Ilya's friend Svetlana, he has told me absolutely nothing about you."

Shane pauses, covers his mouth like he's trying not to laugh, then forces himself sober. "Hi, Svetlana."

There's a heaving inhale, then Ilya is very glad that they are doing this on the phone.

«Fuck you, Ilya, I knew, I knew that —» she reins herself in, but Ilya knows that if she would remember this call, if the other side of Friday were to happen, he would be hearing about it for months; years. "As I said, Ilya has told me nothing at all about you. Do I get to learn your name today?"

It's a genuine question, he knows that they could decline and she would accept it, and Ilya loves her dearly for that.

"Ah, yeah. My name's Shane. Shane Hollander." He says it with a lift at the end like it's a question, wondering perhaps if she'll recognise it and know who he is — which she does, of course.

"Ilya," she says in the end, after a full five seconds of staticky air, "you have been keeping all sorts of things from me. We will be talking about this."

"I am sure we will." He kisses Shane softly on the mouth, feels the shape of his lips making a smile. «Sveta, I'm going to suck Shane Hollander's dick for him now, you are welcome to stay and listen if you like, he makes such pretty noises, but —»

"Jesus Christ Ilya — Shane it has been lovely to speak with you, we will talk again." She somehow manages to sound both beautifully polite and also just a little menacing, like she will ensure that they talk again regardless of anyone else's opinion on it and Ilya has a brief pang of regret that she won't know to insist on it, the next time they speak.

"Nice to, uh, meet you," Shane stammers out, and Ilya hangs up over Sveta's goodbye so that he can pin Shane hard to the worktop and kiss him like his mouth is only Ilya's to press into.

**

The kitchen floor is not a sensible place to do this, being as it is unpleasantly cool and uncomfortably hard and Shane had made more than one comment about this being unsanitary as Ilya dragged him down to the tiles, but the sound Shane makes — the absolute wrenching sob that comes out of him when Ilya swallows insistently around the head of his cock makes sure that he's not going anywhere.

Or he wouldn't be, except —

"Wait, wait —"

Ilya pulls off; Shane is shoving at his shoulders and scrambling out from under him. His dick is a flushed angry red, hard and wet from Ilya's mouth; he doesn't doubt that Shane only would have needed another minute at most before he came.

"What is it? Shane, did I —"

"That," he insists, pushing Ilya back until it's him lying on the cold tile and Shane is pulling his underwear down.

"What? What, that, what's going on?"

"Explain to me how to do that, exactly that bit." He sounds desperate; insistent.

Ilya gets as far as, "Shane, I —" before he loses his words in a rushed exhale, Shane's tongue licking the precome from the head of his dick like he's thirsty for it; Shane hisses as his own dick finds contact with the cold kitchen floor and lifts himself up on his knees, but it barely slows him down.

"Tell me how," he says, breathless, "Ilya please," and he sets to taking Ilya as far in as he can — which is almost everything now, his practise has been paying off — and Ilya tries to keep his eyes open, locks his hand in Shane's hair and works to find the words in English to explain how to do this thing that he doesn't really think about, just lets his body do, while Shane fucks his mouth over him perfectly; expertly.

Ilya isn't sure all of his words are in English by the time his thighs are quaking with the effort of holding his orgasm back, as he tries to recite all the MLH teams and the names of their home ice in his head while he listens to the thick wet sound Shane's throat makes as Ilya fucks it. Shane stops moving on him, then, and Ilya makes the mistake of looking down at him. Shane's nose is pressed into Ilya's pubic hair, his eyes are watering and glassy and blissful and his face is red; his hips are moving mindlessly against empty air and he's moaning, Ilya can feel the vibrations of it and he presses his hand to the back of Shane's neck to keep him there, wants to live buried in Shane's throat while he makes whorish noises around Ilya's dick like he can't get enough of it. He's beautiful stretched wide just for Ilya and it thrills him that no one else gets to see this, no one would even think to imagine that perfectly put together Shane Hollander would love choking on dick so much and no one ever will, no one will ever see Shane like this but Ilya, Ilya couldn't stand it, this is just for him like — like Shane meant it, means it when he says just for you —

"Such a good fucking mouth, Shane you're so good, мой — Боже мой —"

Shane's eyes actually roll up when Ilya starts to come down his throat; there's no no way Ilya can hold himself back for another second as Shane moans and swallows him and clings to Ilya's hips like he's never letting him go; Ilya bends forwards, clutches Shane's head to hold him right precisely there and empties himself into Shane in unending waves of perfect devastating pleasure, recognising as he does the uncontrolled jerking motion of Shane's body and realises that Shane's coming too with nothing to help him, untouched and all over the kitchen floor.

Shane stays down there and doesn't pull off until Ilya has collapsed back, gasping, his hand on Shane's neck eased to a trembling petting through his hair. Then there's an obscene slick sound that accompanies Shane's choking cough, and then he feels the press of his forehead against Ilya's hipbone; his wet open mouth and heaving breaths are hot against Ilya's skin and when Shane recovers enough to lift his head to look at him Ilya can see the victory in his face, even with his eyes still blurred with tears and looking as close to drunk as he's ever seen Shane be.

"I did it," he says, voice giving away his excitement of it despite the croaking ruin of his voice.

Ilya wants to laugh but doesn't think he's got enough energy left for it in his entire body.

"Are you happy you worked out new skill, Hollander, or are you happy you made me come so hard I can't move?"

There's a spark of something — some sort of pleased little realisation and Shane grins, wide and delighted, then crawls up Ilya's body so he can look him properly in the eyes.

"Really?"

Ilya rolls his eyes; knows Shane will understand the game in it. "Do not let it go to your head. Now only option is for me to keep you tied to my bed, cannot let you near anyone else with this," he drags the pad of his thumb down the centre of Shane's pink, swollen bottom lip, "dangerous mouth."

Shane's eyes soften a the corners. "Not a chance," he murmurs, "I'm only for you."

Ilya's calming heart starts skipping triple time; hope bleeds out of him faster than he can stuff it back inside and he pulls Shane in to kiss him so that his eyes can't betray the extent of what he feels, and because he can't help himself he murmurs softly against Shane's mouth where he knows that Shane won't be able to make out the sounds, "Я тебя люблю."

When they separate again, there's a whine in Ilya's voice when he says, "This floor is cold."

Shane huffs. "Well it was your genius fucking idea to fuck in the kitchen." He stands and offers Ilya his hand to help him up, then grimaces at the floor. "Ilya, I think there's come in the grouting."

"Don't worry," Ilya tells him with a fluttering kiss to the side of his neck, "this time tomorrow it will never have happened."

"You don't have any books."

The way Shane says it sounds almost accusatory. Ilya raises his eyebrows expectantly at Shane — at the part of Shane's face he can see tilted up at him from where his head rests comfortably, familiarly, on Ilya's belly — and waits to see if there's more to come.

It takes probably ten more seconds; Ilya's phone screen dims where it dangles from his fingers.

"Why don't you have any books?" There is a scrunch to Shane's nose; he looks mildly offended about the concept and Ilya bites the inside of his lip hard for a second while he gets over the urge to smooth the lines of Shane's face with his fingertips.

"I have a kindle."

Shane blinks at him. In his hand is a paperback book he'd brought with him; it has a black and white picture of a man in hockey gear on the front and Ilya would put even money on whether it's a biography or some sort of hideous analysis of something dreadful like the impact of MLH uniform regulations over time. Ilya is sure there will be charts, graphs; it will be painfully boring, and it makes Ilya have to tame a smile and insist to himself that he must leave his hands exactly where they are and not seek out any more skin, in case he gives himself away.

"A kindle," Ilya says again, "Screen for reading books, can put lots on there, hundreds of books —"

"I know what one is, asshole."

"Then I do not know why this is confusing."

Shane half sits up, his frown deepening. "I just — like books."

"I read," Ilya shrugs, "just maybe not life story of dead ancient hockey player or whatever this is," he flicks at the cover of Shane's book, "I am reading for fun, Shane, not for — I do not know, is this meant to be teaching you something?"

"Fuck off, it's not a biography, it's a history of the MLH's —"

Ilya scoffs dramatically and Shane rolls his eyes and whacks him on the chest with the closed paperback.

"It's fun, I — this is not the point."

"There was a point to this?"

"Yes, it's that you don't have books."

Ilya shrugs and thumbs the corner of Shane's paperback. "You like books."

"Yeah, I — the words feel better reading off of paper."

Ilya finds himself smiling a smile that steals across his lips until they form a gentle curl, soft and besotted and entirely out of his control.

"I do have one."

"One?"

"Book, a paper book. Hold on." He squirms far enough to the edge of the couch to be able to reach over into the drawer in the side of the coffee table and pull out a thick novel that's badly scuffed on the corners of the cover, spine broken and the pages yellowing. He settles back under Shane and holds it above them both so they can see it.

"Svetlana left it last visit. What you think, I could read to you, practise my English, hm?"

The woman in the ragged, revealing regency dress on the front cover promises the kind of novel this is even without the shirtless, leather-pant wearing man bending her backwards over the arm of some sort of settee, and Shane is shaking his head before Ilya has even flicked it open.

"No, no," Shane says, his eye widening in alarm, "you don't need to do that, really, I —" he makes a grab for it and Ilya stretches it over his head out of Shane's reach, but Shane follows, snatching for it, so Ilya grabs him around the waist and becomes aware that he's laughing — really, properly laughing just for the joy of doing something silly, and with Shane there to do it with Ilya feels like he lights up inside and he feels iridescent; unbearably wonderful.

**

The Raiders' locker room is always feverish by the time Ilya gets there, but the more times he's had to play this exact game on this exact day the less he's been able to rouse himself enough to meet the atmosphere. What is the point when, no matter how it ends, the score won't count?

Shane would say it always matters; that if the score doesn't count then it's practise and you can never practise enough, never run out of things to improve on and no matter how badly it might go or how pointless it might seem you always learn something.

Shane is infuriating and on this occasion entirely wrong; it still makes Ilya feel weary for him even as he knows that the tenacity, the dedication — Shane wouldn't be himself without it, and so it's part of what makes up this bleeding mess of feeling that Ilya carries with him; the love that he doesn't know what to do with.

Still, Marly is telling a terrible, terrible story about a one-night-stand he'd picked up last weekend and if Ilya has to listen to it one more time he's going to punch him in the fucking face, friend or not.

A chance at having this kind of time with Shane is something Ilya would do a lot to get and he can't make himself regret a second of it, wishes that part would never end, but he is becoming so tired of this game day over and over, this same locker room and Marly's same description of —

"—and it just looks so fucking familiar, you know, this little fat dude statue in the hallway and I'm thinking I have to have been here before, but then she's taking her top off, right, so —"

Ilya grits his teeth. Him and Shane can play at outing themselves with Hayden and with Sveta but doing that with anyone else would just be unimaginably awful, a memory of spitting hatred that only they will carry with them as the subject of it; Friday is just a day they have to grind through to get back to Thursday.

"—and I'm trying to be quiet, right, get out of there without waking her up, who wants to have that conversation, you know what I mean? But —"

Ilya hates that he has no say over this, that he has no power over how this day starts and stops and when it might end, is starting to grow distrustful of the sight of the walls of his own house for the day that he might wake somewhere else; he now makes his trainer take him on long, meandering runs just to be elsewhere but he can't stop himself coming back to the beautiful torture of time with Shane, pretending like they're together almost properly, like Shane cares about him in a way that Ilya can fool himself mirrors the mess of his own choking love; treating each other like this time together won't end. It's been weeks of this now and Ilya is starting to understand that his own heart is going to live always in Shane Hollander's chest, there's no extracting it and no taking it back and he doesn't know how a person lives with such a crater in them, in the agony of knowing such a critical part of them is at the mercy of someone else.

"—so that's when I realise it's her mom, dude! I met her at some MLH dinner like last year or whatever and she was all over me, total fucking MILF I swear to god, and I'm standing in her kitchen with my pants only half on and I've just fucked her daughter —"

"Marly, fucking stop it, no way I believe that you fucked the mom again in same night. You going to make shit up at least make it not sound completely stupid."

Marly cuts off mid-laugh, and his forehead pinches in hurt. Ilya tells himself that he doesn't feel bad about it.

"Hey, I didn't get to the end yet."

"That wasn't what you were going to say?" Ilya asks, pulling his shoulder pads on and adjusting the fastenings.

"Well, I — oh, fuck off." He shrugs and turns back to his locker to carry on getting dressed. "Fuck, Roz, what crawled up your ass?"

Ilya doesn't reply; doesn't think he says anything else at all until he's leading the line and they're moving out to the ice. The guys are passing uncertain glances between themselves and are in absolutely no headspace to go out and play a half decent game of hockey and any other day Ilya would feel guilt for it — this is no way to captain fucking anything — but he'll worry about it when it's tomorrow. Right now, as he sets his left skate on the ice to the roar of the crowd, he has sight of Shane stepping out on the other side and wishes they were here to fuck around, fight each other for the puck just for the fun of it, maybe run some drills and chirp and when they were tired Ilya would press him up against the boards and kiss him, and then take him home.

But he can hear sections of the crowd starting to chant his name and he joins the rest of his team in warm ups. He stretches and he watches the clock tick down to the first face off until by the time he's only a few inches from Shane's face again his heart is running itself ragged like the game's already half over.

They always have the first face off against each other. After that it depends how the game goes; they're always different because him and Shane aren't having the same day or playing the same game and that means that everyone else plays a different game around them.

But this first face off: this is always them, and Ilya can look into his eyes and breathe the same crisp air as him and watch as his blush spreads hot across his cheekbones. Ilya wants to lick his freckles.

"Hollander," he says, "something bothering you?"

He shakes his head, glances away and back, says eventually, "No, I'm fine," in a voice that croaks, that's ruined still: bruised from the perfect long minutes before he left Ilya's house today where Ilya had him on his knees just inside his front door, dressed to leave with his shoes and coat on with barely enough time to make it to the rink on time afterwards. Ilya had fucked into his throat for as long as Shane could stand it precisely so that Ilya could have this moment: so that he could stand on centre ice and hear Shane's voice break for him.

The ref is coming over; they've got seconds.

"What time will you wake up?"

Shane shoots him a frown. "Wake up?"

"In morning. Yesterday, you arrive at hotel. When?

Shane's eyes flicker to the approaching ref, and he answers fast, "Ten-twenty." Ilya nods in satisfaction then looks at Shane's mouth and smirks to see his blush spread.

Ilya wins the face off, the Raiders lose the game, and Ilya walks out to his car afterwards welcoming the unnatural exhaustion that's already pulling his eyelids closed. Some days when he settles into the driver's seat he feels a sensation like a stuck lock almost turning, puzzle pieces struggling to snap together, a release a breath away without the touch to get him there.

Today he just feels tired, and he lets his eyes close.

Next time around, he's going to make today a different kind of day.

Ilya wakes when his angry, get-the-fuck-up backup alarm blares in his ears, and he snatches his phone off his bedside table and sits up. He doesn't really need to cancel Finn; he can just send him away when he gets here, but he'd rather not have the interruption at all so he shoots off a text telling him not to come then loads up the app to cancel the groceries that are due to be delivered right after. His fridge is completely empty, but that won't matter today.

He's got a little more than an hour until Shane wakes.

Ilya showers, dresses; finds a bag and puts in it his essentials, things that he might need for a day spent away from this house, and shoves some granola bars and a couple of bottles of water in a side pocket, just in case. He's ready to go well before ten and, after a minute of debate as his fingers dance over the keys to his cars, he takes the one with the silver-winged Aston Martin logo. It's not as sexy as the Ferrari, but it's a delicious sleek blood red and the leg room is better; they'll be more comfortable for the drive.

Pulling up in front of Shane's hotel, Ilya stops in the no parking zone just around from the front doors, kills the engine and waits. It's fourteen minutes past ten. It only takes a few minutes for a valet to come and knock on his window; Ilya winds it down and looks at the twitchy, pasty-faced child in his blue waistcoat and a nametag that says Jeffrey.

"I'm really sorry sir," Jeffrey starts, "but there's no parking here?"

Ilya tilts his head and thickens his accent. "I park here."

"Right, right — sorry, I mean that you're not allowed to park here? There's a sign?" Jeffrey points to the No Parking Zone sign that Ilya is clearly parked next to. He glances at his watch: ten-nineteen.

"I park here." Ilya repeats, then rolls up his window.

"Ok, sir, I'm going to — I'll have to get my manager if you —"

Jeffrey stays put for a good half minute after Ilya's window closes, then wanders off to do — Ilya doesn't care what, and he drums his fingers against the steering wheel, fiddles with the buttons for the climate control and watches the main entrance in his side mirror.

He hears the bus' grumbling engine before he sees it then watches its meandering roll into the drop off zone in front of the doors; Ilya grins in satisfaction and starts the car. Shane is almost the last one off and when Ilya catches sight of him he fishes his phone out of his pocket to type out a message, then he revs the car's engine — it has a most perfect growl, one of his favourites — and sends:

Behind you.

Chapter End Notes

A good chunk of this fic for myself has been trying to tease out how their relationship could develop in this scenario - how they get from where they are post Tuna Melt Incident to something closer to end of ep 5 - when their two key external influencing factors (Rose and Scott) aren’t/can’t happen and they have to get there themselves. The loop scenario gives them time and there’s nothing holding them back like months of not talking/girl-dating/physical distance etc etc ... but there’s also no active shove to get them over their emotional hurdles or extremely valid anxieties over reality, either. In canon once Shane became comfortable with himself and accepted where he was emotionally he was all ahead full - whereas Ilya's hesitation lived out of putting what he wanted up against cold hard reality and the fact that he doesn't believe he deserves to have nice things and needing the push of Skip to make him believe there was hope for them - and those things, for these two guys, are really interesting to consider in a vacuum.

Which is all, for no particular reason other than that I quite enjoy rambling about these two delightful morons, hopefully a little bit of superfulous background stuff as to what's going on in this chapter and the next one (and the one after at the rate I'm going, hey you remember when I thought this thing was going to be four chapters long? Those were the days).

It has been lovely reading all your comments and seeing what you think! I remain very, very bad at replying but I love them all 💜

Next few days are looking a bit manic for me so next part is likely to be up towards the end of next week.

tumblr <3

Chapter 5: Five

Chapter Summary

Shane hears Hayden say something to him although he doesn't listen, only turns and walks away to the sleek red car where it's waiting just past the end of the hotel's frontage, and something flutters in his stomach as the passenger side window slides down when he approaches.

Leaning down to look through the open window, Shane's smile breaks out full force. Ilya looks good, comfortable and confident and in his element, sprawled in the driver's seat with a lazy grin on his face.

"You're in a no parking zone," Shane tells him, stupidly. Ilya's grin grows a little.

Chapter Notes

There's a red car parked in the hotel's emergency access zone. It's flashy, expensive, and its engine is revving like the driver's going out of their way to make sure that all eyes are pointed that way. That car isn't usually there.

Shane's sure he would have noticed it if it was usually there.

His phone buzzes in his hand and he looks down at it to see a new text notification blinking onto the lock screen.

Lily: Behind you.

Shane stops walking; someone bumps into his shoulder and he mutters a reflexive apology as he turns and looks and — he looks again at the red car and knows that there is absolutely no way that Ilya isn't the one behind the wheel of it. Shane's mouth goes dry with the anticipation of something unknown and surprising and hopefully lovely, and he struggles not to smile.

"You ok, man?" Hayden asks, calling over to him from the hotel doors. Shane had been almost last off the bus and even the stragglers are trailing inside to collect their room keys now, leaving Shane standing indecisively in the drop-off zone.

"Yeah, I'm good. I'll just be a minute, ok?"

He hears Hayden say something back although he doesn't listen, only turns and walks away to the sleek red car where it's waiting just past the end of the hotel's frontage, and something flutters in his stomach as the passenger side window slides down when he approaches.

Leaning down to look through the open window, Shane's smile breaks out full force. Ilya looks good, comfortable and confident and in his element, sprawled in the driver's seat with a lazy grin on his face.

"You're in a no parking zone," Shane tells him, stupidly. Ilya's grin grows a little.

"Then you had better get in so that I do not get ticket."

"Get in? Where are we going?" Shane glances back over to Hayden, who's standing on the hotel steps watching him. "This is not subtle."

"I don't give a fuck. Shane, get in."

Shane feels daring which is stupid given all he's doing is getting into a car, but still, there's excitement firing down his spine as he puts his carry-on bag in the back seat that absolutely wouldn't fit an adult person in it, making this car painfully impractical as well as, he's sure, abysmally expensive and terrible in any kind of adverse weather conditions. Turning to open the passenger door, he hears a shout of his name and looks over to see Hayden standing by the hotel entrance; he's alone, everyone else has already gone inside.

Bending down, he tells Ilya, "Just a minute, ok?" and — ignoring his "What the fuck, Hollander?" — jogs over to Hayden, who meets him halfway.

Hayden's looking behind Shane at Ilya's car with more curiosity than suspicion, and Shane's glad for the sake of the brevity of this conversation that there's no way he can see from here who's driving; Hayden asks, still eying up the car, "What's going on?"

"Look, I, uh," Shane glances over his shoulder, just a quick look as Ilya revs the engine impatiently, "I'll be back later, ok? Everything's fine, I'm just going to go see a — a friend." It's only a slight stumble, and Shane twinges with guilt for it. Two times now — two more times and stumbling over his words a little less each time, he's told Hayden as he's booked his Uber to Ilya's house that Hayden's right as well as wrong; that Lily is real but isn't a woman.

It's gone — fine; consistently so. Hayden has reacted more or less how he did the first time, up to the point where Shane brought up Ilya, which he hasn't done again; that's not a short conversation and each time he's had somewhere else he wants to be. But it's been nice; settling. It makes it weird in times like now, when he sees reality as if with double vision and forgets, almost, that Hayden doesn't know this thing about him yet. He wonders if maybe, when they're out of this and the world turns like it should again, he might be able to tell Hayden that part of the truth for real; the part about himself, even if not how Ilya fits into it.

Hayden's eyes narrow. "Is that Lily? Lily your Boston girl?"

"Uh, yeah," he laughs, squinting out a little smile, "yeah it is."

"Fuck, I didn't think you'd 'fess up to that so easy." He's grinning, and holds out Shane's awful green biro keycard to him. "Don't wake me up when you come in, ok?"

Shane takes the keycard, pockets it, and rolls his eyes as Ilya leans on the horn. Two men wearing hotel uniform blue walk past Shane toward the no parking zone that Ilya's waiting for him in, and he starts that way too, walking backward.

"I'll see you later."

Hayden grins at him and yells out, "Go get laid, weirdo!"

Shane laughs and turns to jog back to the car, reaching it just before the two hotel-blue men get to Ilya's window; he slides into the passenger seat and closes the door with a satisfying thunk at more or less the same moment that Ilya puts his foot on the gas. Shane yelps and scrambles for his seatbelt.

"Fuck, Ilya, I don't have my —" he clicks his seatbelt buckle home just as Ilya pulls out onto the road and Shane stares in disbelief at the side of Ilya's face. "Are you trying to kill me?"

Ilya glances over at him, confused, then sees Shane's hands still gripping tight on the seatbelt where it sits across his chest and rolls his eyes as he turns back to face the road.

"What, you think I get into crash between the hotel doors and the end of parking lot?" Shane doesn't, not really, but it's the principle.

"Road safety is important."

"I am a good driver, Shane, you don't have to worry."

Ilya actually sounds a little — hurt, perhaps, at the implication, and Shane reaches over to put his hand on the back of Ilya's neck, scratch through the hair at the base of his skull and rub softly with his fingertips. Ilya smiles, and Shane aches for him and lets the lovely tangled mess in his chest beat out an I love you along with the frisson of excitement and wanting that accompanies it.

It takes him longer than it probably should to realise that they aren't going in the direction of Ilya's house. Shane's become pretty familiar with the route as he's passed it by through the window of his Uber, and he realises that none of the roads they're travelling down look remotely familiar right around the same time that he realises that they're following the I93 north straight out of the city.

"Where are we going?" Shane asks, and Ilya's face is calm and smooth and suspiciously innocent and entirely betraying that he's been waiting for Shane to ask and is looking forward to telling him.

"Home."

"We are not going home, I know the way now and this isn't it."

"No, no, not my home." He glances over at Shane and back to the road, which Shane finds he's glad for given the number that's showing on the car's speedometer. "Yours."

Shane frowns. "I live in Montreal."

"I know this. I have been to your house, you not remember time I fucked you over arm of new couch? You were very upset about it, said you cannot clean —"

"But Montreal is — is —"

"Four hours away," Ilya shrugs, "five. I haven't driven in a long time, I miss it and I promise only to speed a little bit."

The words themselves make sense, but Shane just can't fathom that, "You think we're going to drive to Montreal?"

"I know so," Ilya says, and his hand comes to rest on Shane's thigh, comfortable. Shane widens his legs, gets himself as close as the car's confines will permit, and only realises what he's doing after he's settled there. "I have my passport, you just came in on plane so you have yours, no problem at border control."

It's good that Ilya thought of that, but it seems so stupid, such a pointless trip to make — Shane just came from there, he's only just arrived at the hotel from the airport and — does Ilya not like the time they've been spending together at his house?

"But —" Shane splutters, "Why?"

"Do you remember what you said first time around, first loop — for me, at least, first one that I remember — when I asked you to stay?"

Shane shakes his head. He probably would if he thought it through, but he wants Ilya to explain, to keep talking with those little glances over to him as he drives, his eyes bright and excited and hopeful.

"You said you missed your apartment. Did not make sense to me then, but for you has been months now, you have not been home, yes?"

Something burns behind Shane's eyes, and he has to press his lips tight together for a minute before he can answer.

"I can't believe you remember that."

"Hm, but I do. So, I think: we drive home, to your home. We stop on way, maybe fuck in back seat —"

"Ilya, there isn't enough room for anyone to fuck in the back seat of this thing."

"Then I have you bent over hood like in movies."

"What movies are you watching?"

"Not the point, Shane, listen: I think we drive to your apartment, spend the night, sleep in your bed. Then your alarm will go off at fucking sunrise like normal and that will have us up early enough, we drive back for game in afternoon."

Ilya shrugs like it doesn't mean anything, but Shane wants to lurch across the space between them and plaster himself to Ilya; wants to press kisses into his skin, suck softly on that place, high up on his neck just below the curve of his jaw that always makes Ilya's eyelashes flutter closed and the softest sound escape his mouth.

Shane wants this man always and can't imagine how it took him as long as it did to work it out; he wants him now, in this moment, and now in this day that they're living in and he wants him every day after even though he knows it'll be hard; knows that when this bubble bursts and the world turns again that they will have secrets and distance and their own privacy to protect more than ever before, but it'll be worth it.

He knows it as truth: it will be entirely worth it if it means they get moments like this.

"I can't believe you'd do this," he says, instead of something longer and less coherent, and his voice sounds unsteady, "go all that way just so I can sleep in my own bed."

Ilya shrugs one shoulder. "Maybe I just want to fuck you over new couch again."

"Thank you."

"No, you say that after I fuck you, Shane, not —"

"Ilya," Shane interrupts, and waits until Ilya glances towards him; until Shane knows he's listening. "Thank you."

A flush stains Ilya's cheekbones and his mouth twists for a moment, but in the end he says only, "You are welcome, Shane."

**

"It's a long way," Shane comments, scrolling through the route on his phone.

Ilya makes an acknowledging grunt. "Will need to stop for gas. Thirty more minutes, maybe forty."

"Oh, sure," Shane says, still scrolling, "but I meant, more — well, driving's more inconspicuous than flying, right? A lot fewer people would see us than in an airport, but it's still a long way. I wonder if there's somewhere halfway that we could meet." It's maybe a little boring, looking at the logistics of it all, but Shane likes getting it straight in his head, putting their plans together; it's a good use of the drive time.

There's a silence from his left which Shane takes to mean Ilya is thinking, but turns out to be confusion when Ilya says, "Meet, why are we meeting, we are going to your house, yes?"

"Yeah, yeah, not today, sorry — I mean after."

"After? After your house?"

"No, after, after. When we're out of the loop, when time moves like normal. It'll be easier if we can meet halfway."

Ilya doesn't say anything back, and Shane drops a couple of pins in the map to look at properly later.

**

"You want snacks?"

"No thanks," Shane says, working hard not to pull a face looking at the collection of prepackaged processed meat products in a rack by the candy. The little convenience store in the gas station doesn't have any ginger ale so Shane's holding a couple of bottles of sparkling water and he's pretty sure there's nothing else here he wants to go anywhere near.

"Live a little, Hollander. One chocolate bar will not kill you."

"Mm," Shane hums, "didn't say it would, but there's better ones if I'm going to have something that's all sugary." He eyes the display critically. "They don't even have any Snickers."

Ilya huffs a laugh and takes Shane's water from him; he sets it on the counter alongside a bottle of Mountain Dew and — Shane thinks that looks like three candy bars, which he would like to think Ilya surely can't be buying just for this drive, but he's unfortunately sure he knows better.

The guy behind the counter turns away from the tablet he's poking at when he sees he's got customers, and Shane stops breathing just for a moment and has to tell himself: no consequences, no consequences, because the cashier in the Boston Raiders t-shirt is looking at them like he knows that there's something to know here.

He rings up their gas and their food, frowning at Ilya critically the whole time, but doesn't say anything right up until Ilya pulls out his wallet to pay.

"Hey, uh," he starts in a thick Boston accent, "you Ilya Rozanov?"

It's a surprise, although Shane doesn't know why, but he's put enough effort into Ilya's name for long enough now that it feels natural in his mouth to make it using the sounds that drove Ilya wild that first time and that still make him curl into Shane possessively whenever he says it when they're close — and Shane doesn't ever plan to stop, slide back to saying it the American way — so he hasn't heard it said like that in days; weeks, and so: No, Shane thinks, no, he's not.

"Who?" Ilya asks, bluntly.

"You're Ilya Rozanov, right? Captain of the Raiders."

"I do not know who this is," Ilya says as he hands over his cash, and Shane has to look away to hide his smile at the obvious roughening of Ilya's accent.

"Right," the guy replies as the cash register chings at him, then carries on with his eyes flicked toward Shane. "You're familiar. Sure I know you too."

"Know him too?" Ilya asks, collecting their food from the counter, "You fan of curling?"

The guy blinks. "Curling?"

"Yes. Winter sport. Must slide big rock along and polish ice with little brooms to make rock go faster." He tilts his head towards Shane. "He is excellent at boring ice rock game. World famous for his little broom."

Shane turns away, pulling Ilya along with him to the doors and biting at his lips to keep from laughing.

The cashier calls something else after them but Shane's too busy dragging Ilya to the exit to hear it, and it doesn't matter anyway, not today.

Shane doesn't say anything until they're back on the road, then he looks over at Ilya, his face pinched in a determined frown as he merges back into traffic.

"Little broom?"

"In curling. They have these little brooms, you have not seen them?"

"World famous for his little broom?" Shane insists, trying his hardest not to smile.

Ilya's face breaks into a smirk, finally, and he lets his hand travel up Shane's thigh to press insistently, momentarily, at his crotch.

"Eh, maybe not so little."

**

Nobody at Border Control had given a shit about who they were as long as they could show their passports, and now they're officially back in Canada Shane feels like he wants to open the window and dangle his head out of it like a dog in a cartoon. His legs ache from being cooped up in the car for so long and they're so close to the end now that he can't wait to get out of it and move himself around but he feels like he's home for the first time in such a long time, like the air here is somehow different; he's so close to —

"Holy shit, my parents."

Ilya glances over at him, surprised. "What about your parents?"

"I haven't called them. I — not this whole time, I spoke to them before I got on the plane to Boston and I never call them on game days, not until after 'cause my mom can be a little — but I never really get to the after the game part. Usually I'd have called her from the bus or the airport, but I never get that far and I — I haven't spoken to them in months, Ilya."

He's horrified; can't think how this is only now occurring to him. He's such an asshole.

"They do not know anything is wrong, Shane."

"But I haven't spoken to them this whole time, I —"

"Yes, but for them you called this morning, yes? Before you got on plane. Always for them is fine, they have just spoken to you."

Ilya's right, Shane knows he is, but it doesn't do much to dampen his guilt at the sudden realisation that he's been going through all of this — not just the repeating day which he never would be able to get them to believe anyway, but the — the understanding about himself. He's almost — could almost use the word comfortable in his knowledge of himself, that he's gay. He's gay and he's with Ilya, and they need to properly work out what that means for them outside of this loop, still, but having this knowledge in him makes him feel like a different person to the Shane Hollander that got on a plane in Montreal this morning a million years ago and his parents have no idea about any of it.

"I guess," he says instead. "Yeah, I guess."

"Hey, you call them after, yes? You call them when your plane lands in Florida on Friday night." Shane nods; feels himself start to calm. "Call them before if you want, call them now."

Shane thinks about it, but he has no idea what he'd say to them that doesn't just sound weird and make them worry, and he doesn't want to blurt out something that he feels like he didn't ought to say unless it's going to stick: if he's going to come out to his parents he doesn't want to do it if they aren't going to remember it. It feels like cheating.

"No, I'm good," he says instead, and rolls his head on his headrest so that he's looking at Ilya, then remembers and asks, "Where's your phone?"

Ilya nods to the centre console, the little space where his phone is sitting behind his wallet. "Why?"

Picking it up, Shane presses down the power button until it turns off.

"No calls for you today." He cups his hand to Ilya's jaw, angle awkward with Ilya needing to watch forward. "Only good things for you today."

Ilya's mouth twists and when he nods his eventual agreement his eyes are suspiciously bright.

**

Shane's never really had reason to use the guest parking in his building; his parents come there sometimes but more often than not they'll stay at a hotel and they'll all eat out so in the balance of it they don't come to his apartment that much. He doesn't have the team over; can't stand the idea of all those trampling feet in his space, moving things and spilling things, breaking things and picking his stuff up and putting it back in a place that it doesn't belong. His parents come here, sometimes, and that's it.

And Ilya. But always before through the back door, through the fire exit.

Ilya kills the engine, finally, parked up against the back wall of the parking underneath Shane's building, and Shane thrills a little. They're home, and Shane's going to take Ilya in through the front doors.

They get out of the car and Shane retrieves both of their bags as Ilya stretches; laces his hands together and pushes them above his head to ease out the cramp of the drive. His t-shirt rides up as he does it and Shane closely eyes up the line of stomach that he gets to see as it lifts and doesn't pretend that he wasn't looking when Ilya catches him.

"Come on," Shane says, "it's this way."

They walk in to the building to the elevators and ride one up to Shane's floor; they don't encounter anyone, but Shane hardly ever does. The units in this building are big and expensive and Shane owns two of them with one sitting empty; there aren't that many other people who even live here for him to bump into and that's how he's always liked it. It feels even more stupid, in hindsight, that he's insisted for all this time that Ilya sneak in through the fire exit like something shameful.

They stand close as the elevator rises but Shane can see from Ilya's half-closed eyes that he's tired from the drive, and he bumps Ilya's arm with his own.

"Shower when we get in? I'm still covered in airport. Then maybe a nap?"

Ilya makes an agreeable hm, and adds, "And proper food, after."

That's easier said than done as the last time Shane was here he was heading out on the first leg of a roadie that was going to have him away for a while so he's pretty sure his fridge is completely empty, but they'll work it out.

He nudges Ilya to the left as they leave the elevator, round toward his apartment door, and tells him, "The code for the door is nineteen-nineteen, by the way."

Ilya looks at him, face blank, and repeats, "Nineteen-nineteen?"

"Yeah. You know, for next time, for after, whatever. You can come right in with that."

Shane punches the code in the keypad by the door, which unlocks to let them step inside.

Somehow, he had expected dust. A layer of disuse, a sense of stale air, but the place feels like he was just in it. It's actually still kind of warm in here, that sense of the cold leeching into the walls that happens when it's been sitting empty for a while not having had time yet to settle.

He was here this morning, after all.

The door swings shut behind Ilya and Shane looks back to see that he's leaning against the inside of the door, head tilted back against it as he watches Shane.

Shane goes to him, fits their mouths together.

"I can't believe you brought me here."

"All those hours in car, Hollander, I am sure you can believe it if you try."

Shane's heart beats for him; it pounds.

"Come on."

**

The shower and the mutually satisfying handjobs that had happened in it had ended with both of them in Shane's bed, not exactly awake and not exactly sleeping but warm and settled against each other just as they've grown accustomed to spending their nights.

Shane feels blissful; the sound and the smell and the comfort of his own bedroom, his own things, his own bed, and Ilya in it with him — he feels like he's floating on clouds; he's never been comfortable quite like this in his entire life.

Except that, as they've come back to proper wakefulness, Shane knows that Ilya is staring at his ceiling and frowning; he's thinking, and about something more serious than where dinner is going to come from now that Shane's fridge is confirmed as empty. The frown doesn't go away and worry starts to gnaw at Shane that he's missed something; gotten something wrong, and so eventually he curls fully on his side, facing Ilya and props himself up on his arm so they can look at each other.

"What's the matter?"

Ilya shakes his head a fraction. "Nothing. Is ok."

Shane puts two fingers to the side of Ilya's jaw and nudges to turn his face so that they're looking at one another. His eyes are pinched; unreadable.

"You're sure?"

Ilya nods and gives him a smile that doesn't reach his eyes.

"Yes. I'm hungry. We should order something."

"What do you feel like?"

Ilya shakes his head and Shane doesn't think he's imagining the unhappiness in the shape of his mouth. "I don't mind, you choose."

Shane had put the heating back on when they'd arrived so the air is gloriously warm when they get out of bed, and Shane pulls on clean sweats from his dresser and heads down to the kitchen as Ilya disappears into the bathroom.

Another despondent trawl through the kitchen confirms that there's nothing worth eating in the whole place and Shane pulls out his phone and orders Thai food because he's been thinking about it more or less ever since Hayden first tried to convince him to come to the Thai Tanic; he orders more than even two hockey players could probably eat and he gets the good stuff, the things that sound delicious in their ingredients, that he knows will taste moreish and sinful that he usually skims past on a menu without reading their descriptions. By the time he's done he looks up to tell Ilya it's on its way, expecting him to have come back downstairs, but Shane can't see him; realises that he hasn't heard his footsteps coming close.

"Ilya?"

There's no answer and Shane walks through the apartment, listening, eventually following cool air and city sounds toward the partway-open balcony doors where Ilya is outside leaning against the railing, scowling and stubbing out the end of a cigarette on the top rail.

Something's definitely wrong, Shane knows it; it's making a sickly feeling flush though his veins, head to toe of incorrect, and when Ilya turns to come back inside and catches sight of Shane watching him he flinches like he's been caught doing something he shouldn't then sighs and slips back through the doors, closing them behind him.

"What is it?" Shane asks, shoving his thumbs in his pockets so that his hands have something to do, and makes his best guess. "I'm sorry I made you drive all this way. It wasn't fair, not just for one day."

Ilya's face flickers confusion, then he shakes his head. "No. Was my idea, I wanted to do it. I'm happy we came."

"You're not happy."

"I am, Shane."

There's no reason in the world for Shane not to believe him, except that his eyes won't meet Shane's, except that Shane finds himself for the first time in so long trying to catch them, stepping close in until Ilya has to look at him.

He waits. Doesn't know how to drag this out of Ilya with his own words when he doesn't understand the start of what the problem even is so he waits, unsure which one of them is going to break first as the sickly feeling in Shane's veins settles into his chest, into his lungs, squeezes the mess of his heart until he isn't sure how he can still breathe in and out and he's about a half a second from begging Ilya to just explain this to him when Ilya sighs. He sounds defeated, and it's horrible.

"You told me the code for your front door. For the next time I come here, when time moves forward again."

That is not at all what Shane was expecting to hear, and he's thrown enough that he can't think of anything to say before Ilya carries on talking.

"I think that you don't see that there can't be us like this, once this day ends. One day I will get into car after game tomorrow and not fall asleep, and then what we have today will be over. I will never — I will not come here and let myself in with code for the door. There will not be any meeting halfway to Boston."

Shane makes a noise; it's sharp and awful and he thinks, perhaps, it might the sound of his heart stopping.

"You —" He falters. His head is swimming and his mouth is too dry to make easy sounds but he can only see one meaning to Ilya's words. "You want to end this. Us. When things go back to normal, you want —"

Ilya is shaking his head; he moves forward all the way into Shane's space and puts his hands on Shane's face to hold him just right so they can see only each other.

"No, no, no, not want, Shane, never — I am terrified of that day. The day I do not fall asleep."

"But then, then what —" His eyes are tearing up and he hates it. "I don't understand."

"You have to know that we can never be like this, not when the world is normal again. It will not let us."

Shane wants to deny it; wants to rage and say it's not true, but he understands, he knows what Ilya means and hears the truth in it and he can barely breathe for the injustice of it all — but no part of it is a surprise, not for either of them. Shane knows what the word expects from him and what it doesn't, always has; they haven't spent years hiding themselves for no reason. But Ilya wants to give up in the face of it, wants to slide back to what they were rather than keep what they're making and it tears him open to hear it.

"That's not fair." He feels like a child.

"It is still true though, you know it is. We can never be anything real, Hollander. Hockey would never be the same, they would never forgive either of us." He takes a breath, licks his lips and says like he's testing to see if it hurts, "I would never be able to go back to Russia."

Shane jolts, a tiny lightning strike. He can't stand the truth in it and is so disappointed in himself that he'd never even considered that Ilya would have other things to worry about; could have to be willing to give up an entire country.

Ilya brushes a thumb along Shane's cheekbone. "It would cost you too much and I could not stand to see you hate me for it —"

"I could never hate you, Ilya, I —"

"You say that now when things are easy but it would not stay this way. We can never have this, not truly."

It hurts like he can't comprehend that Ilya would draw a line there; that he would prise them apart rather than try to make them work in spite of it, like what they have isn't even worth the effort — that he thinks the strain of it would make Shane turn on him when Shane can't imagine anything that could force this love he carries sour, nothing — if Ilya doesn't understand that then maybe he doesn't feel —

They've never said the words and Shane has always just assumed, fuck he's been such an idiot —

Shane breathes carefully, slowly; swallows the dread that's growing around the understanding that he's been blithely making plans and thinking through the logistics of an after that Ilya might not even want — he makes sure to level out his voice from the quaver that wants to run through it.

"Would you want to, if we could?"

Ilya shakes his head, his eyes unfocussed and inward-looking. "It does not matter what I want."

"Yes it does." Shane puts his hands into Ilya's hair, takes hold of him, wants to shake him. "It does, Ilya, please." Ilya shakes his head and Shane's grip on him loosens; he lets go and his voice starts to wobble. "Please. Please, Ilya, please tell me you want me enough to try and make us work — I couldn't stand it if we —" He scrubs wetness from his eyes with the heel of his hand and carries on, miserably. "I love you, Ilya. I love you so fucking much, please tell me that matters."

Outside, the wind is starting to pick up, buffeting the windows in an insistent rattle; the sky is grey and heavy and making a promise of rain later. It's always sunny today in Boston; Shane hasn't seen rain in months.

Ilya still hasn't said anything and Shane can't make himself look at him, not even when he hisses out, "Shane," like it tears something on its way out of him.

"I guess it must not fucking kill you, too," Shane tells the overcast sky out of the window over Ilya's shoulder, and rubs a thumb absently at his breastbone where he's — he's cracking open, he thinks; it's the only thing that explains how much, how fiercely — how crucially — he hurts.

He takes a step away. It's as much as he can manage — a couple of inches, perhaps — but Ilya grabs for him. Shane had never put on anything but sweatpants after they got out of bed, so Ilya's nails dig into his sides; they scratch.

"Shane."

Ilya crowds back into him and Shane can't bear it. He'd believed they felt the same, or close to it; hadn't known how else to understand what they've been doing together this whole time, and if —

"Shane, I —" Ilya's voice sounds thick, almost unrecognisable, and Shane forces himself to drag his eyes back, makes himself look at Ilya's face which is open and stunned; he looks sort of like he's going to cry, like he can't believe he's saying the words when he tells Shane, "I love you," and kisses him.

Shane doesn't kiss him back. He's too surprised: even though it had only been a momentary belief that Ilya didn't want him it was a moment that his world had turned awfully around, and the rise of relief, the cascade of it takes the length of a dull thudding heartbeat to carry through him, warm him, make the tangled mess of love in his chest grow; multiply until there's nothing else he can feel. Shane wraps his arms around Ilya's shoulders as Ilya buries his face into Shane's neck and Shane feels the wetness of tears on his skin and holds on tighter; they fasten themselves together until Shane thinks that they might never be able to be separate again.

"It matters," Ilya says in the end, muffled against his neck, and Shane makes a hm of question, so Ilya lifts his head; his face is blotchy and red and the way he's looking at Shane — the unmasked emotion that pours out of him — Shane kisses him again, because he has to. "It matters," Ilya repeats, a little clearer and from only a half a breath away, "It means everything."

"Then there has to be something after this for us. Isn't it worth trying?"

"Shane, this day — all the things I could do with it. No consequences." He smiles, soft, and Shane knows that Ilya isn't saying the words as much as he is quoting them back to him. "The only person I want to spend it with is you. If you want —"

"I want," Shane interrupts, and Ilya smiles, the private one that Shane's only ever seen on iterations of today, only between the two of them.

"You did not let me finish."

"I don't care what you were going to say," Shane insists, "if it's with you then I want it."

"You are so sure?"

"You aren't?"

"I am sure of you. I will always be sure of you."

They stay there, faces close, as Shane tells Ilya that he loves him and Ilya says the same and there are so many unanswered questions around them that don't matter at all as Shane understands that the jumbled mess in his chest has just been waiting for Ilya to hold up the mirror of his own, that matches.

When Shane has to answer the door to collect their food he's glad the delivery guy won't remember meeting him, shirtless and rumpled and with watery eyes and a lovesick smile on his lips that he can't force away, Ilya hovering half a foot behind him with his hands pressed against Shane's back, low down and either side of his spine, like he can't stand even that little bit of distance.

The delivery guy is staring at them with undisguised curiosity as the door swings shut and Ilya's hand reaches over Shane's shoulder to turn the lock, with Shane's hands full of bags of food.

"You having whole team over? Fuck, Hollander, how much did you order?"

"Fuck off," Shane mumbles, even though he doesn't want Ilya anywhere but right here and there really is far, far too much food for two. "C'mon, kitchen. Plates."

Shane turns but Ilya looks down at the bags of food in his hands and shakes his head. "No."

**

"I can't believe you talked me into this."

"I cannot believe you needed to be talked into this."

Shane licks oyster sauce from his thumb. "There'll be crumbs, I fucking hate crumbs. And something's definitely going to get spilled, it'll be gross."

Ilya gestures around them with a forkful of shrimp. "Which is why we are in guest bedroom, Shane, fuck, you want to take all this back to kitchen table?"

Settling back half against Ilya's chest, feeling the warmth of him, the skin of him flush against Shane's shoulder like he belongs, Shane shakes his head and tells him truthfully, "No," then smiles as Ilya bumps a kiss into his hair. Shane lets them be silent for a minute, looking at the collection of takeout containers scattered in front of them over the guest bedspread.

"Sometimes when I get on the bus," Shane starts, "there's this feeling I get, like a — like when your key gets stuck in a lock. You know it should be turning but it won't."

"Yes," Ilya agrees, "I know this. Like something should fit but it does not go."

"You too?"

"Mm-hm. Some days more than others. I think maybe like you said at start, we need to get the day right. Then the lock will turn."

Shane digs another dumpling out of its box with his fingers, because Ilya had insisted that if they were going to eat in bed they couldn't use plates and somehow Shane feels vaguely outrageous because of it. He bites into it; the skin of it is fried golden and crackles wonderfully as his teeth cut through it. "And then we don't fall asleep. We carry on."

Ilya is quiet, and unhappy when he says finally, "Yes, that."

Putting down the box with his food in it on the bedside table Shane turns so that he can look Ilya in the face, wanting to see him properly. "I don't want this to end either, but we might not have any more of a choice in that than we did in it starting in the first place. And after — even though we'll have to be careful to keep it all secret I'd rather be with you like that than have to be — not with you. Or go back to before."

"Before?" Ilya asks, after a careful pause.

Shane rests his forehead against Ilya's, then presses a kiss to the bridge of his nose; his cheekbone. "Only seeing you half a dozen times a year. Pretending I don't love you."

"You love me," Ilya says, with something like wonder, and Shane answers:

"Yes," because it's true.

"Я тоже тебя люблю. I love you too, Shane Hollander."

"Enough to try this? Really try?"

There's enough of a space in their conversation before Ilya speaks again that Shane knows he's thinking about it — genuinely turning it over in his mind, so that Shane knows that he means every word when he answers, at last, "I think perhaps, enough for anything," and the last threads of uncertainty release in him.

"Then we work it out. We've not been trying to get out of this, we've just been," he stops, unsure what to call it, can only think to say that they've been living, "doing whatever, but what if we really do try? The first time it started over, for both of us, we wished we'd done something different. But what if we make today perfect and wish we get to keep it?"

"Wishes, fuck —" Ilya spits out, flickering a roll of his eyes, then sighs and shoves in a mouthful of noodles and asks "You think that is it? We need to wish to keep it?"

Shane shrugs, "You got a better idea?"

He doesn't, Shane knows, and the pinch between his eyebrows shows that he's not happy about it, but neither of them has a rule book for how this is meant to work.

"Ok, so we make a plan then, right? To make today perfect."

Ilya rolls his eyes, but Shane knows enough now to see the affection in it.

"Sure, we make bullet point plan, there can be schedule, I get you coloured pens —"

"Fuck off, we make a plan, something so that when the day ends we can want to keep it as much as we wanted to change it that first time."

"Ok. Fine, we make a plan."

Shane puts a hand on Ilya's arm to still him, make sure he's looking.

"And for after. We make a plan for after, too."

Ilya nods, tight. "And one for after."

**

"We'd have Christmas. The off-season. I can come stay with you when I have a bye week, if you're playing at home. We can call whenever we want. Visit whenever we're close by or we have a night or two. There's all Star weekend and the Awards, we can plan it out."

The guest bed is a disaster, empty and part-full takeout containers scattered across the foot of it, and Shane is deeply glad he doesn't have to sleep in it or properly clean it up although he knows he's going to end up stripping the bedding into the laundry basket later to get it out of his mind. He's working on ignoring the mess for now to stroke his hand through Ilya's hair, which is starting to go wild from Shane's restless fingers. Ilya's head rests on his thigh and the game on the TV is the replay of the one from the afternoon that they've watched at Ilya's house so much now Shane could probably recite the whole thing start to end, play by play. The volume is low enough he can barely hear it; it's just light and movement and Ilya can't see it anyway, facing in toward Shane as he is.

He turns the scenario over; over. "People might still ask questions, though."

Ilya blinks up at him. "We do not have to answer. We can be private — careful, yes? And is no one else's business."

"You'd be ok with that?"

Ilya turns to kiss Shane's leg. "Working visa stays safe as long as there is no talk, no proof. And we would be," a fractional hesitation; a half-breath, "together."

Shane makes a small, pleased hum, and considers that eventually there will be surer ways to secure Ilya's legal presence here than a working visa, but that feels like too big of a conversation for this moment, and too transactional — Shane doesn't want Ilya to stay with him for paperwork. There will be a right time for it, though, Shane knows it. He's not planning for the short term.

Shane nods, wets his lips. "So hear me out, ok, but I was thinking — I've been thinking for a while now — about starting a charity. But what if we do it together? We find something cool, something that means a lot to both of us, something that we could both work on, that would give us a reason to be seen together any time."

Frowning, Ilya looks up at him, then props himself up on one arm and repeats, unconvinced, "A charity."

"Yeah, and it wouldn't be bullshit either, we really do it. We start a charity and we say that we got to know each other, working on this thing, this cause, and we became friends. Other guys have friends on other teams, everyone would get used to it after a while — then it's not weird when we talk to each other or if we visit. Because fuck, Ilya, I can't keep up this fucking rivalry shit until we retire."

There's another one of those hesitations, pauses that feel like they race with Ilya's thoughts. "Retire?"

"Yeah, when we retire and no one gets to care what we do any more and we can — we can just be together. Like we are now."

Ilya looks at him and says nothing for seconds that carry weight. "You think so far ahead, Hollander?"

"About this, yeah, I do. I've had a lot of time for it, this has been a really long day."

Ilya smiles fondly. "I want that. To be together, even if we have to wait to have it properly." He settles himself back into Shane's lap and pushes his head back into the movements of Shane's hand and Shane thrills at the silent demand; at his touch, wanted. "I wish we did not have to be a secret. We do not have so much choice now, but know that I wouldn't stay away from you for a second if I could. I would shout about us from rooftops, tell everyone."

"Is it enough to just know that you've got me? Because you have. Got me."

"It is more than I dreamed of." He leans up, tilts his face to Shane's and asks, "Kiss."

Shane bends forward, far enough for their lips to press together, chaste.

**

In Shane's own bed with the curtains pulled closed over the rain-drenched night sky, he looks down at his phone screen. His calendar for tomorrow is all mapped out for him: alarms set for fifteen minutes' notice of every event, the first of which being his early morning wake up alarm. It's meant to be so he has time to work out before breakfast, but this time it'll be so that they can be up and out in time to make it back to Boston for the game.

Shane's fingers tap the screen; his alarms scroll down in their sequence, one after the other.

This might be their last loop. They've spent so much of tonight talking it through and it feels like they're almost there now, to how today should go, for them to get it right, and if on the next reset they do everything they're supposed to, if the key turns in the lock — this could be the last time they can waste away Friday doing nothing that they don't want to do.

"You are thinking very loudly," Ilya tells him, pulling at Shane's arm. "Stop. We came here so you could sleep in your own bed, get fucked in it, maybe. Not think in it."

Shane scrolls through his alarms once more, then, one at a time and starting with his wake-up alarm, deletes them all. He puts his phone in its cradle on his bedside table and lies down; finds the cool side of the pillow and arranges himself on his stomach, shifting until he's as comfortable as he possibly can get, and then he stills, closes his eyes, sighs out the last little bit of tension that's in him because he's home, finally and there's nothing he wants and doesn't have. Nothing, except for —

The moment he stops moving Ilya blankets him, like he's been waiting for Shane to be still so that he can take the opportunity, and Shane squeezes his eyes shut tight, bites his lip not to do something embarrassing like moan just for being so comfortable, so perfect and kept. They've slept like this before — they sleep like this a lot in Ilya's bed but to have it in a place that feels to his bones to him like sanctuary feels like more, and more still because Ilya was the one that made sure that he could have this.

Ilya kisses his shoulder before he settles his head on the pillow next to Shane and, holding him tight, tells him, "Good night," and quiets.

**

The bedroom is still dark when Shane wakes, the sun hardly having risen enough for its first tentative fingers to spill through the windows; even though there's no alarm to get him up today his body clock is as good as one, trained on a lifetime of early mornings. They've hardly moved in the night and Ilya is still lying over him, breathing deep and restful, and Shane closes his eyes and, after a few minutes of convincing his brain to quiet, he lets himself drift back into sleep.

**

It's Ilya that wakes him later, with a languid shift-stretch of his body that ends with him pulling Shane flush back against him with a possessive little sound, all but a growl, that makes Shane want to bare his neck and whine. Ilya stills, though, after about half a minute, and reaches over Shane to scrabble at the bedside table for his phone to, Shane figures, check the time.

"Shane —"

"I turned it off," he says, mostly into the pillow. "The alarm, I turned it off." He squints at the time on his phone where Ilya's holding it in the air above their heads. It's later than he's slept in years.

"The game," Ilya starts, and Shane hums.

"We could probably still make it if we left now, or in the next half hour at least, and we head straight there." He twists his head to see Ilya's face. "We can still go if you want to. But if…" He trails away, and shifts more fully onto his back. Ilya looks at him, searching. "If we're going to try to do it right, get the day right, this might be the last time we can say fuck it all and do what we want. For a while at least."

"For a while," Ilya echoes, and Shane doesn't think he's imagining the sadness that colours it.

"And we should make a plan, if we want the next loop to be the one that sticks, we need to decide what to do with it."

"You do not want to play hockey today," Ilya says, flat, and Shane shakes his head.

"I want to be with you today."

"Half an hour, you said?"

Shane works to not to let the unhappy twinge he feels for that show in his face; they can still go, if Ilya would rather.

"Yeah, depending on traffic, we'd still make it."

"No, no, not that." Ilya slides down his body, bites the soft skin of Shane's belly with sharp teeth then props his chin there. "Can think of better use of half an hour."

When Ilya finally lets him come precisely thirty minutes later by the timer he makes Shane keep track of for them, Shane is a sobbing desperate mess, incoherent in his begging and covered in spit and lube and mouth-shaped bruises; his nipples are a throbbing angry red and his whole body a taut, arched line.

Ilya doesn't get him off with his mouth even though that's how he made most of the wreckage of him; jerks him instead with one clever determined hand while he presses three broad fingers of the other into him, stretching and pressing and grinding the width of his hand against him from the outside. For a horrible moment as he gets closer and closer to his release Shane thinks that Ilya's going to hold this orgasm back from him, just like he did the others that he had almost reached while thirty minutes has counted down, and he shakes his head in denial of it and begs for it with a voice that's hoarse from more of the same.

"Slut," Ilya accuses, but his eyes are dark and bright and drunk and focused only on him and Shane knows that he is and it's true but only ever for Ilya, only because Ilya loves to bring him to this just as much as Shane loves to be brought; he could never trust anyone else with himself this way and he's never wanted to.

And so it's only the truth to slur out, "Yes, yes for you — oh fuck, Ilya — only for you, I — ah, ah —" and he comes helplessly, one hand twisted in the sheets and the other gripping tight to Ilya's forearm, still half-believing he'll be denied again if he lets go, his hips rolling uncontrolled into Ilya's grip as he rides out the pulses of it. He's barely sunk back down to the bed afterwards when Ilya finishes on him, cries out harsh and covers Shane's softening dick and his stomach and his chest in spattered come, shuddering like he's coming with his whole body.

Ilya collapses to the bed on his front and to the side of Shane, pressed against him from shoulder to knee as he chases his breath, and stares at him with hooded eyes; surveys what he's made out of Shane with a look on his face that says clearly that he'd be doing it again right this second if only he could force his body into cooperation so soon.

"No time to make it to game now, yes?" he asks, his mouth red and wet and still panting. Shane kicks him in the ankle.

"Jesus christ, fuck off."

"What? Am only checking." Shane laughs, recognising horribly that the sound he makes is something closer to a giggle. Ilya drags three fingers through the mess on Shane's flushed chest and rubs it idly into his skin.

"And what if today is the day that does not start again, hm? If the universe laughs at us and we are still here tonight watching game replay three hundred miles from where we should be?"

Shane tries to make his smile just a little braver than he feels. "I won't regret it. People would be pissed but they'd get over it."

Ilya smiles, unconvinced, but nods anyway. "Ok."

**

"But the big shock this afternoon is the absence of both the Metros' Shane Hollander and the Raiders' Ilya Rozanov from their teams' respective rosters."

"That's right, neither side has yet given an official explanation for the absence of their captain although word from the locker rooms is that this was not a planned change for either team."

"It seems unlikely this is a coincidence but there is no suggestion of what could possibly have knocked both captains out of the game at such sort notice. More on this as we hear it, folks."

"And in the mean time the Assistant Captains on both sides will need to step up as we proceed to today's game without Hollander and Rozanov. The Metros' Coach Theriault has —"

"Hayden must not have said anything."

"You hardly told him anything. Pass the popcorn?"

Shane reaches for the bowl without looking and passes it over, grinning. "This is so cool."

Ilya pulls a face and takes a swig from his can of coke. "I am not sure that is what I would call it." He puts the can down on the coffee table in front of him and Shane whacks him on the arm.

"Use a fucking coaster, c'mon."

"Fucking christ, Hollander, so fucking boring." He does it anyway, though, then sits back to slouch against Shane's side and drop a kiss to his shoulder. "You sure you want to watch this?"

Shane glances over. "Why wouldn't I? You know how long it's been for us since there's been a new game — or a, a new anything."

"I know, yes, only probably will be very sad for you, to watch your Metros lose so badly."

"Fuck off, they'll be fine." He sounds more confident than he feels, though; Montreal's players are strong but they don't do well with the rug pulled out from under them and they'll be wondering too hard why Shane wasn't in the locker room with them to concentrate properly. Hayden's obvious frustration at Shane's insistence that he was fine and hadn't been kidnapped by the person in the strange car he'd gotten into outside the hotel and no, the police did not need to be involved, had been tempered by trust and friendship in the end, but Shane doubts that much of the rest of the team would be that forgiving of him. He'd bet a whole lot of shit's being thrown at him in his absence; they'll be pissed off and that'll make them sloppy and distracted — but with any luck, the Raiders won't be any better off.

"We shall see, hm?"

It's a strange feeling, watching his team take to the ice without him, but the sensation he'd expected of wrongness, the feeling that he should be there never materialises. He'll be there tomorrow, when he needs to be, but for now Ilya is warm against his side and Shane couldn't want to be anywhere else more than here.

The game passes unimpressively, the Metros letting in two in the first fifteen minutes with an offence that can't keep the puck and a defense that doesn't seem to know where the other team even is on the ice, and Shane squints at the screen and wonders how they're even going to get a playoff spot this season if this is the baseline they're starting from. It's difficult to care like he should, though, when Ilya is breathing steady next to him, his long limbs sprawled out on Shane's couch and quiet commentary and soft shittalking bouncing back and forth between them.

It's the middle of the second when a fight breaks out over a bad check and on the edge of it Shane sees — "Why does Miitke always get punched in the face? It's not like it's always even the same guy doing the punching."

"Universe says he has it coming, obviously."

"One time — early on, before — before you, it was JJ that punched him."

"Boiziau? He get confused who the blue team is?"

"He was aiming for Marleau but Marleau ducked."

Ilya laughs, light and happy and this might be the most fun Shane's ever had watching a game of hockey; he doesn't even care that the Metros suck, that they're uncoordinated and unimpressive and that they lose 5-2 in regular time.

Tension builds in Ilya as the teams leave the ice, as the press crowd the locker room and the Raiders glance at each other and answer the question of where's Ilya Rozanov with answers so unhelpful that they have obviously all been told what to say — but Shane knows that the evidence of their absence isn't what has Ilya taut at his side, hands clenched into fists where they rest on his thighs.

"We've got a plan," Shane says, and, hoping he sounds reassuring, "it'll be ok." Ilya turns his head to look at him and god, his eyes are so fucking blue it shouldn't be allowed and they hold so much in them that Shane wants years to be able to work out and understand and Shane's so fucking lucky because he's going to get to look into them forever. "We'll do it right tomorrow and then we'll be able to wish we get to keep it and we'll mean it."

"Fucking wishes Hollander, I —"

"It's the best idea we've got, if we wish to keep it and we mean it as much as we wanted things to be different at the start —"

"Yes, I know, I know." He waves it away — they've been through this enough already today — but he's looking for something in Shane's face, and Shane has no idea if he's finding it. "You will mean it?" Ilya asks, in the end. "You will mean it when you wish we get little pieces of each other only, always hiding?"

"Not always, not forever," Shane breaks in, although he understands where Ilya's bitterness comes from; he wants as much time as he can get, wants all the time that there is to have and worries that even then, even when they have that he still won't be satisfied, can't imagine what enough could possibly look like, not when it comes to Ilya — but even to get to that they both know that there'll be some difficult years to get through, first. Still, "It'll be worth it."

"It'll be worth it," Ilya echoes. "I hope you still think so in the morning."

Shane leans close so that he can look in those bottomless blue eyes closely enough to see the flecks of green in them, enough that his lips brush Ilya's with the movement of speech.

"You love me?" he asks, because that's what matters; that's what means it all.

"I love you," Ilya tells him, without hesitation.

"Then it'll be worth it."

It's when they're watching the postgame highlights that Shane feels his eyelids start to drag down, and he startles from it at the same time Ilya grabs his arm hard enough to hurt, and chokes out, "Shane," in a way that sounds like desperation.

There's that feeling, like the key in the door that's trying to turn and he thinks no, no, not this time, I want to try again, thinks it as hard as he can and the key won't turn; he tries to force his eyes open as he scrambles into Ilya's lap, puts their faces together.

"It's ok," he kisses Ilya's cheeks, his eyelids, "we'll do it again and we'll be together, we'll be ok."

Ilya shakes his head, sudden and hard, trying to keep himself from falling asleep, and clings on to Shane like it would keep them here but Shane knows it's useless; it's got its hands around them both and it's pulling.

"Tell me again, милый, sweetheart, tell me —"

Their voices are thick from unnatural exhaustion and his body is starting to slump but he says it, tells him, "I love you, I love you, I love —"

Chapter End Notes

So. No way I saw Ilya being first up with the love declarations in our 'no external influences' timeloop bubble. He can only admit it to himself when he pretends he's not listening and is so wrapped up in the fear and ultimate impossbility of it all that he thinks there's no point laying himself open like that by saying it out loud, and nothing in the loop changes that - whereas for Shane his fear of himself was always the thing holding him back from Ilya the most. Scott Hunter was such an absolute lightbulb moment for Ilya in terms of him believing in the possibility of him being able to have what he wanted that, if he didn't get some kind of kick from elsewhere - ie Shane saying it first - he never would have said the words. Shane, on the other hand - he might not have put the thoughts together in this order, precisely, but he's spending the timeloop how he is because he loves Ilya, so Ilya must be doing the same thing because he feels the same, right?

Still, knowing Shane loves him back doesn't fix everything for Ilya because that fear of discovery, of what happens if they're found out - he has no proof of concept that this could be anything but the literal absolute worst. The fact that Shane loves him back gets him a long way, but he's still waiting for the other shoe. I invite you back for chapter six in a week (or ... so?) to consider Ilya's other shoe.

 

Yes, the chapter count went up again (I think I've got it right this time though. don't look at me). Thank you all as always for your lovely lovely comments 💜

tumblr <3

Chapter 6: Six

Chapter Summary

Ilya's alarm wakes him with a breath that shakes out of him and eyes that want to water and full of love down to the core of him, the body and breath and undeserving soul of him.

It's too much: far, far too much and he doesn't know how he's supposed to be able to stand it, how he should get up and move around and live his life carrying something this big along with him with every step. He sits up in his bed and laughs in a single, wet sound; sniffles like a child.

He'd imagined an end to this ever repeating bubble of time in so many ways, but none of them had ever stretched disbelief far enough to include hearing the words I love you said to him like that, like it was natural and obvious and inevitable and entrenched as deeply in Shane as Ilya fears his own love for Shane lives in himself. He plays the words over and over in his head and wonders if he imagined it; if maybe he has lost his mind, after all.

Chapter Notes

Ilya's alarm wakes him with a breath that shakes out of him and eyes that want to water and full of love down to the core of him, the body and breath and undeserving soul of him.

It's too much: far, far too much and he doesn't know how he's supposed to be able to stand it, how he should get up and move around and live his life carrying something this big along with him with every step. He sits up in his bed and laughs in a single, wet sound; sniffles like a child.

He'd imagined an end to this ever repeating bubble of time in so many ways, but none of them had ever stretched disbelief far enough to include hearing the words I love you said to him like that, like it was natural and obvious and inevitable and entrenched as deeply in Shane as Ilya fears his own love for Shane lives in himself. He plays the words over and over in his head and wonders if he imagined it; if maybe he has lost his mind, after all.

The weight of Shane's body still sits across his hips like a phantom, clear enough that if he closes his eyes he can imagine he's still there. And he will be again, soon.

Their plan is simple but good, and will make this day something worth keeping — and in some ways perhaps even something close to what Ilya had hoped for all that time ago when he'd first thought that perhaps he could ask Shane to stay — but more in every way that matters; more than he had ever thought he would get to have in the miserable evening after he first heard his name in Shane's voice and Shane ran from him.

It's going to be a good day, one that he's going to want to keep — and he can only hope he wants it enough to let this go — let go of their own personal no consequences, let go of this day where they can have each other however they want, in every way — all but one.

But it's a vital one; the most important.

Today will be good, and he has to hope he wants to keep it, wants it enough to give up what they have here in their isolation in favour of — of everything else. In favour of a life of secrets together with no guarantees.

But still, they would have their chance at it, that one most important thing.

A life; one that's theirs.

**

Finn works him hard just like he usually would but this time is intended to count; this effort will be something that builds him and won't be undone a day from now, and so Ilya finds it easier to push himself, to work like he always would have before and he feels more himself for it; his mind slotting itself comfortably back into a lifetime of habit.

Showering the sweat of his workout away Ilya feels the low burn of muscles used well and rolls his shoulders under water hot enough to be just a little uncomfortable. As the soap rinses away he palms his dick, half hard in a way that's almost Pavlovian when his body knows that Shane will be with him soon.

The day is going to be good and Ilya feels the anticipation of it, the potential in the buzz under his skin and the pace of his pulse and the bloodwarm weight of himself growing in his palm.

He wants to fuck Shane. He always wants to fuck him and has been waiting, in a way, for that want to fade through exposure, through having him every day and however he wants — given that Ilya has yet to suggest anything that hasn't made Shane's eyes darken and his mouth fall open just enough for him to wet his lips before he says, "Yes, yes let's do that." Ilya's been wondering if it would all become unexciting like sex always has far quicker than this with everyone else, but it hasn't.

If anything Ilya only wants him more.

He lets go of his dick and leaves the shower; dries and dresses and eventually he softens again, the unburned desire of it settling into his bones so that by the time Shane comes through his door Ilya is there to meet him and backs him up against it, his thigh bullying its way between Shane's and his hips starting a lovely slow grind. It's not that long away from from his shower and the desire that he'd buried after it lurks, coils around his spine and drives his hands to clutch at Shane's hips and eagerly seek under his t-shirt, pushing it out of the way so that his palms can press to his ribcage, span the muscle there and feel the expansion of his breathing.

Shane is always so warm.

Ilya recognises the shape Shane's mouth makes under his to be a smile and he smiles back; is grinning like a lovesick fool so that their kissing has to break apart. Instead he presses his face to Shane's neck and breathes him in; thinks of some of the stark purple marks he's sent Shane away from here wearing when it didn't matter and mourns that today it does; that today when he wants to make sure that he sends Shane out into the world in a state that makes it clear he is unavailable because he won't be coming back to Ilya at the turn of the day — he can't.

He can't, and won't be able to again; not for a long time.

He presses his mouth there instead in mimicry; humps Shane's body like he can't control himself and wonders if Shane will let him come on him, here in this doorway. Shane laughs and tips his head back and Ilya briefly sets his teeth to Shane's throat, but doesn't bite.

"Good morning to you too," Shane sighs out, sounding delightfully satisfied.

Morning, Ilya thinks: it is still, just, and he's glad. There is not a minute of today that they don't need to make count. They will play each other again in Montreal next month but it's doubtful they'll have chance to see each other before then; perhaps there could be a couple of snatched hours in three weeks' time if the stars and the departure schedule at Boston Logan align in their favour. Shane had spent a good portion of their day together in Montreal mapping out their commitments, their options and opportunities, and it had made Ilya's hopes rise to watch, that Shane cares enough to see this through in spite of it all — but his fear rose alongside, watching the distance and the unmet wanting and the risk — so much risk — mapped out in between the lines of game calendars and PR obligations.

Shane makes a pleased hum and tugs Ilya's hair until he lifts his face for a kiss. His eyes are bright and lovely and Ilya sinks in them, works his hardest to memorise the richness of them; how they brighten with his joy.

"Come on," Shane says, nudging at him, "let's do the call first, I've been thinking about it since I woke up."

Shane's plan, of course: the first timetabled part. They've talked it all through, but — still, Ilya sucks on Shane's bottom lip hopefully, presses his hard-on against Shane's body, but acquiesces when Shane nudges at him again and Ilya steps away, adjusting himself in his pants and putting his wanting away. There will be time later.

There's a nervous sort of energy to Shane when Ilya joins him on the couch. He has his phone in his hands and is fiddling with it, his hands not trembling but stuttering in their movements like they would be shaking if Shane wasn't trying very hard to make sure that they stayed steady. Ilya sits opposite him, perched on the edge of the coffee table. He catches Shane's chin in the grip of his thumb and first finger and tugs his head up, makes sure that Shane is looking at him so that he understands that Ilya means what he says.

"I know that this is what you planned, but you do not have to do this. Certainly not now."

"I know."

"You can wait, do it in person when you see them if you still want to."

"I know I could, but I want to do it today. And hey, if it doesn't go well, we can always say 'fuck it' to making this one stick, do it again tomorrow, right?" Shane asks; he sounds like he's joking and, Ilya thinks, is perhaps more than a little bit hopeful alongside the fear that bleeds tension into his eyes. Ilya nods.

"Of course. Whatever you want."

"They need to know about me if they're ever going to know about you, and I don't want to have to keep you a secret from them."

"You do not have to do any of this for me."

"Yes I do, I want to." He breathes in deep and lets it out steady, then says again with a weight to it, "I want them to know about you." Ilya's heart aches where it lives somewhere in Shane's chest. "I want to do it today. I want it to count." Ilya nods and makes a reassuring noise. Outside of Shane's optimism streaked with apprehension he has no idea how this is going to go: Ilya has never met Shane's parents, after all, and can only take Shane's lead on this. Shane's eyes meet his and they're wide and worried but his mouth has a determined set to it that Ilya's more used to seeing underneath a helmet visor. "You'll be here."

Ilya nods and brushes his thumb along Shane's cheekbones; touches with reverence those freckles that he sees inside his eyelids when he closes them. "I will. Would not be a very good boyfriend to leave if you want me here."

Shane tilts his head; bites his lip and lets it go again and asks, "Boyfriend?"

It's true that they haven't talked about that part, about what they will call what they are, but it's the best word that Ilya has even though it feels so entirely insufficient for what he feels as to be useless. He shrugs one shoulder instead, smiles and runs the flat of his hands down Shane's arms, shoulder to wrist.

"Yes, I think so, probably."

Shane's smile turns soft. "I love you."

Ilya's reply, his, "I love you," is somehow so very easy, now, to say aloud. Shane has broken him; broken him open. There will be no putting him back together.

Raising his phone so that it's in between them Shane will be able to see the screen as well as Ilya behind it, but when Shane's parents answer his FaceTime call they will only be able to see Shane. It only rings for a handful of seconds before there's a little rising chime and the call is answered, and there's a woman's voice coming from the speaker, bright and surprised.

"Shane, is everything ok, honey? I wasn't expecting you to call until tomorrow."

Shane pauses; swallows, and Ilya remembers that Shane hasn't seen his parents in what, to him, feels like a very long time.

"Hey, mom, everything's fine, it's, uh. It's good to see you."

"It's good to see you too," Yuna says, tone clearly confused, "are you sure you're all right?"

Shane clears his throat and sits up a little straighter.

"Everything's fine, but can you get dad? I wanted to talk to you both about something."

Ilya tunes out the actual words as Yuna goes to find David, concentrates instead on the sounds of her moving around and her passing chatter. He listens to her voice: the sound of it, the tone; he holds Shane's free hand in both of his own and presses his thumbs in little circles all the way down his first finger and then the next; the next. He hears Shane's father being fetched and a male voice coming over the call; he hears the tension, the wavering in Shane's voice as he exchanges bland pleasantries in the way that boring Canadians do; he hears the expectant silence of Shane's parents now that they're gathered, waiting to know what's happening, why they've been summoned. Ilya's eyes are on Shane's for every second of it.

"I know it's not the best time for this," he starts, "I really probably should wait to say this in person but it's going to be weeks before we're even back in Canada and I can't wait until then, I need it to be today."

There's a silence, expectant, and then Shane's mother prompts, "All right, what is it? You're sure nothing's wrong?"

Shane shakes his head. "No, nothing's wrong." His eyes flicker up over the top of his phone to look at Ilya, then back down again. "I wanted to tell you," he stops, breathes. Ilya's thumbs move their little pressing circles into the palm of Shane's hand; the heel of it, "I want you guys to know," he stops again and Ilya wants very badly to be able to remind him that he doesn't have to do this, not for Ilya, especially not now, that it is only Shane's own internal checklist that's bringing this up at all today. Anything he could say would be picked up on the microphone, though, so he stays silent and keeps his eyes on Shane and presses his thumbs lightly into Shane's pulse point.

"I wanted to tell you that I'm gay," he says, without a quaver to his voice and without a change in his expression and he takes a sudden tight hold of Ilya's hand and squeezes; holds on until Ilya's bones creak against each other but Ilya only holds him back. He counts: one, two, three, four —

"Oh, Shane, honey."

Shane's eyes are filling but he doesn't look sad, and Ilya hears warmth and love and perhaps — he thinks — a little relief in Yuna's voice when she says, "Thank you so much for trusting us with that."

"You — you're not —" Shane's mouth works like he's not sure how to make the words but Ilya thinks he hears them anyway. You're not mad? You're not disappointed? You're not disappointed in me? He carries on instead with, "I know it's," Shane swallows and looks down at where he's holding Ilya's hand, "it's not what you wanted for me, and —" they try to interrupt him, talk over each other to clamour with their reassuring noises but Shane raises his voice over them and keeps going, "I want you to know that I tried. I did." Ilya thinks of the years, and the trying, and is ferociously glad that Shane failed.

Yuna doesn't let him get any further, though, cuts in with a decisive, "Shane, we love you," that his dad echoes firmly and without hesitation.

"Nothing could change that, Shane," David carries on, "not anything. All right?" and Shane nods, his mouth pressed in a firm line and Ilya feels like perhaps he should feel jealous, but he doesn't. The only one of his own parents that he could ever have thought of having this conversation with would have said the same to him if she could; he's sure of it.

"I think maybe we thought you might be gay," Yuna continues, and there's a thoughtful noise, an agreement, from David.

Shane startles, and Ilya can almost see the idea sparking in his brain, that he's somehow obvious, that there's something about him that means that people can look at him and tell. Ilya holds his hands tighter.

"You did?"

"I think we know you pretty well, honey," Yuna says, like she's trying to tease, and Ilya can see some of the tension of thought starting to slink away under the knowledge of how far Shane goes out of his way to make sure that the people around him don't know him; not really.

"So, is there a — uh — a special guy in the picture?" David asks, a little awkwardly, like he's not quite sure what word to use or whether he's allowed to ask. Shane lets out a wet little laugh.

"Uh. Yeah," his eyes flicker up to meet Ilya's over the top of his phone, and Ilya wonders what he sees in them. "Yeah there is." Shane is still looking at Ilya, and it takes long enough for his attention to return to his parents that Ilya is sure it must be obvious that there's someone else in the room with him.

Yuna mutters a low, "Oh, my," that he's not sure that he's supposed to be able to hear but he understands why she says it, with how soft Shane's face has gone for him. He thinks about being Shane's special guy and fears that he might actually be blushing. "Well," she continues, and it's louder — deliberately so, like she's trying to make her voice carry, "you be sure and tell him we'd love to meet him, when he's comfortable."

"Thanks, mom, I will."

"Absolutely," David cuts in, "Shane, if you love him I'm sure we will."

There's a sharp-hissed, "David," from Yuna, and Shane breaks off a laugh that Ilya knows is stress leaving him; is hope and relief taking their place.

"What?" David asks, and Yuna's quiet admonishments start again, but Shane interrupts.

"No, it's ok, mom. I do. Love him, I mean."

Ilya bites his lip hard. It stings, but he's never wanted so badly to put his hands on Shane, to feel the steady rhythm of his pulse, and is a little worried how long he can keep himself sitting here; still and uninvolved. Ilya loves through touch, it has always been his way, and keeping his hands to himself when Shane is in his arms' reach feels unnatural.

There are more words that Ilya has missed, but his ears tune back in when he realises Shane is saying goodbye.

"And you'll come to Montreal? When I'm back from this roadie?"

Shane's parents overlapping confirmations and promises to call after the game tomorrow and 'I love you's make Shane's cheeks pink, and when he finally hangs up and tosses his phone to the side Ilya wastes no time tipping him backwards onto the couch, crawling over him and settling there, weighing him down. Shane doesn't grumble at taking his weight, and Ilya presses a kiss to the cotton covering the centre of Shane's breastbone and feels Shane's responding kiss to the top of his head. Ilya props his chin up on Shane's chest.

"Well that was embarrassing. Dreadful, really, let's give up on today, maybe rob bank, start again tomorrow."

Shane's grin is broad and open. "Good fucking job I love you, you asshole."

Everything in Ilya feels warm, and he presses his mouth to Shane's chin and says. "I love you," and, "they love you."

Shane sighs, deliberate and dramatic. "That could still change, whatever my mom says — they still don't know that you play for the Raiders."

"They will still love you. Although, Yuna is big hockey fan, yes? Maybe she will love me more since I am better hockey player."

"Fuck you."

**

"I think I'm glad," Shane murmurs after a while, quiet but still loud enough to be heard over the sound of the TV and the pregame commentary that they've already seen too many times, "that I didn't wait to see them before I said it. I'm glad I didn't have to hang around after so that they could ask me a million questions. That's probably really selfish."

"Be selfish, любимый."

Shane tugs gently at Ilya's hair. "What is that one? It sounds like when you say that you love me, only not — not quite."

"Mm, is part the same. Means … love, my love. One I love." Ilya makes a dissatisfied sound; that makes it sound so small. "English is stupid language."

"I just call you 'Ilya'." Shane sounds unhappy about it, and Ilya isn't sure how to properly explain to him how much he loves the sound of his name in Shane's mouth; how he can't think of a single word in English that he could use instead that Ilya would rather hear. Shane carries on, though, tangles his fingers into the hair on the back of Ilya's head and asks, "What about 'Ilyusha'? Can I call you that?"

Ilya stills. He tries and fails to think of the last time someone said that name to him, called him by his own name only made it sweet and precious; its three syllables settle into him like a brand as his heart trips and his dick fills and he rasps, "What did you say?"

"Did I get it wrong?" Shane asks. "I was wondering, because you always call Svetlana 'Sveta', you know, but Ilya — that doesn't really get much shorter, so I looked it up to see if there's any way that it abbreviates in Russian and I read that you guys don't always make names shorter, you make them longer, and, Ilya, well — Ilyusha. Did I say it wrong?"

"Say it one more time, I will listen closely."

"Ilyusha," Shane repeats. Ilya wants to howl at the fucking moon.

"Hm, maybe. Again?" Any minute Shane is going to feel Ilya's hard-on against his thigh, and is already squinting at him suspiciously.

"Ilyusha."

"Ok, now I think you should try moaning it."

Shane's eyes spark challenge. "I think you should give me a reason to moan it."

Ilya slides off the couch to his feet and stands, dragging Shane up to come with him by the waistband of his pants, held in a tight fist; Shane is smirking, though, and stands with him to follow where Ilya leads as he steers them towards the bedroom.

"You're so fucking easy for me, Hollander, I do not have to try very hard to make you moan my name."

Shane strips himself of his t-shirt and folds it into a careful square, leaving it on top of Ilya's dresser as they pass it by.

"You're a lot of talk, Rozanov," Shane grins back, and pushes his pants off his hips, bending to gather them up and fold them into a square the same size as the t-shirt. Ilya takes it from him and sets it on the dresser.

"I am also a lot of cock," he says, taking hold of Shane's wrist to bring his palm to the hard-on Ilya has been nursing on and off all morning, "do you want it?"

Shane sits on the edge of the bed to finish taking off his underwear, but doesn't take his eyes off Ilya as he does. He's already mostly hard.

"Yes, I want it."

Ilya strips, drops his clothes in a messy puddle on the floor and preens at the hunger Shane's face gives away as he watches, shameless.

"Lie down," Ilya tells him, and he starts to push himself backwards but Ilya shakes his head. "On your stomach, I want to eat your ass before I fuck you."

Shane's eyes flutter half-closed for a moment and he spits out a quiet, "Fuck," before he does as he's told, turns over and stretches himself out on his front with his legs spread wide enough for Ilya to fit in between him.

Ilya pushes Shane's thighs open wider just because he can and settles between them; looks up at the arch of Shane's back and the breadth of his shoulders, the definition of muscle of his arms as he settles, begins to relax into the bed. Ilya drags his fingernails down the length of Shane's back, making long lines on either side of his spine, lightly enough that even though he can see where he's been now, there probably won't be marks still there tomorrow.

It's difficult to care, in this moment, whether he leaves evidence of himself behind.

Letting his eyes linger on the thin pink lines he's made, Ilya ducks his head to breathe hot over Shane's hole, then when he hears the hitch to Shane's exhale he moves to bite softly at the delicate skin at the curve of his ass cheek. He stays there a while, making little sucking kisses and bites too light to bruise to the tender skin at the very top crease of his thigh, the lovely sensitive place behind his balls, the insides of his ass cheeks; he refuses to go to where Shane wants him to be until he's worked up enough to say it, to do more than try to move himself into Ilya's way, grind hopefully against his face.

By the time Shane finally cracks and hisses out, "Do it, Ilya please, please do it," Ilya is so hard he hurts and is as desperate to put his mouth properly on Shane as Shane is to have it. He wants to be an asshole about it, though; Shane likes that, when applied properly.

"Do what, милый?" He lets the tip of his tongue circle Shane's rim, far too lightly, and Shane shudders. "Сольничко, ask me. Ask me and you can have it."

"Your tongue," Shane says, quiet, needy.

Ilya licks a broad stripe across Shane's left ass cheek and makes a questioning, "Hm?"

"Fuck you, asshole, god, will you — will you put it in me?" He sounds demanding and not nearly as pleasure drunk as Ilya wants him to become before they're finished, so he ducks his head back down to the skin in front of him.

Ilya murmurs, "You beg so prettily, sweetheart," against Shane's hole before he lets his tongue finally press flat against it, slow and dragging and wet, and for maybe as long as a count of three Shane holds his breath and is perfectly still, and then he moans, loud and shameless and like this was somehow unexpected even after all Ilya's teasing; he shudders and grinds down against the bed in an obscene little half circle.

"No, no," Ilya mutters, pressing harder with his hands to keep Shane's hips still, "save that for me, yes?" and doesn't wait for an answer before he ducks his head again and puts his mouth to work. He ignores his aching dick — there'll be time for that, later — and fucks Shane open with his tongue, makes a slow, languorous rhythm of it until the muscle starts to flutter and loosen and let him in, and Shane's breaths heave and stutter and the muscles of his thighs start to grow tense.

He leans back and looks at Shane's hole, wet and gaping open for him; he gathers the salvia in his mouth and spits, watches it drip down the crack of Shane's ass and into the little gaping space Ilya's mouth has made for himself.

"Oh," Shane chokes out, "Oh fuck, Ilya, fuck, fuck —"

Ilya's lets up on holding Shane still to push his thumb inside him, push his spit deeper. His dick aches.

"One day I think I can make you come just with my tongue, what do you think?"

Shane makes a noise at that and drops his face into his pillow, and Ilya goes back to Shane's hole, sucks on his rim and licks around the insistent pressing in of his thumb, tugs on him and drags the sharp points of his teeth across skin that's already flushed pink and puffy.

There's a particular rhythm to Shane when he's about to come, to the clench and relax of muscles, the tightness of his breathing and the draw of his shoulders, and Ilya can see the start of it and realises that he really could make Shane come like this, if he carries on. It would be the latest hottest fucking thing he's seen Shane do on a long, long list of absurdly erotic things, but he takes his mouth away, rests his forehead for a moment on the dip of Shane's spine and with purposeful concentration lifts his own hips up off the bed. He's so close to coming all over the bedsheets it's embarrassing; no one but Shane has ever done this to him: made him so easy, so desperate without even a touch.

Ilya can't come. He's not even inside yet.

Shane is pleading now, he recognises, his voice made into words again, finally, and they're lovely ones, ones that ask him to, "Put your dick in me, fuck, Ilya I need it, I need —"

This is much closer to mindlessness; Shane has further to slide still but he's letting go of himself, inch by inch, so even though Shane can't see him Ilya nods and leans across Shane for the bedside table where the lube and condoms are kept. Shane starts to move, though, before Ilya can get any further, to wriggle out from under him and Ilya backs off so that Shane can have his way, can shove him over onto his back and straddle him, letting Ilya's hard-on rub against the cleft of his ass as he settles his weight across Ilya's hips.

Shane is hard and flushed and leaking and his belly is sticky with precome. Ilya wants to lick it off him.

Taking the condom from Ilya's fingers, Shane bites his lip then lets it go.

"I haven't been with anyone but you before today, not for a — a really long time."

This is something Ilya knows — has assumed, at least, although Shane hasn't actually said it — but the words make something in the depths of him roll over and pay attention; something that wants to make sure that there isn't anyone else for Shane, not ever again.

"And I'm yours, you know that, so," he stops with nothing following the so, like Ilya's meant to understand what he means from a stupid English half-sentence, an inference — but Shane turns the condom over in his fingers. The wrapper crinkles, and Ilya's eyes zero in on it and despite the desire that he's drenched in he understands: he infers.

"Not since summer, for me," although Ilya can't remember her face, only that she had dark hair and got on her knees easily for him and he'd closed his eyes and thought of a constellation of freckles and remembered the sound of a low shameless moan and felt like shit after. "Not since before I had preseason physical." He wants to say more; to echo Shane and tell him and I'm yours, but finds it too hard to make the words.

Shane nods and crinkles the condom over in his fingers again, then tosses it to the side and tilts his head in question. "Ok?"

The wordless sound that Ilya makes he is not proud of, but he doesn't think there's any way he could have held it back, and his hands scramble to find the lube where he'd dropped it in the bedsheets.

"Да, yes, fuck, Hollander, fuck —"

Ilya needs three tries to get the cap off the lube in his hurry but Shane's ready for him as soon as his fingers are slick with it, lifting himself up for Ilya to slide his hand underneath and press two fingers unresistingly inside. He's still tacky from Ilya's spit and relaxed from the work of his tongue and his thumb, but as Ilya slicks him up and fucks him open Shane tips his head back and moans, lets himself move just enough to fuck down onto Ilya's hand, never enough to move so far away from him that he's empty.

Once Ilya's got three fingers in him, moving easily with a filthy wet sound that Ilya can barely hear over the rushing of his blood in his ears, Shane tips lube into his own palm and reaches behind him, finds Ilya's dick to get him ready and Ilya's whole body locks up; he scrunches his eyes closed and he doesn't come, he won't, not when he hasn't given Shane what he wants yet — not when what Shane wants is for Ilya to fuck him bare.

"Oh god, you're so fucking hard," Shane says on a whine like it's something terribly unfair, "I want it, Ilya, please, c'mon," and Ilya has no power to resist those words said like that, not when it's Shane saying them, so he lets his fingers slip out of Shane and encourages him to lift himself up. Ilya takes hold of himself and lines up against Shane's hole and knows that if he fucks him now, if he fucks up into the welcoming heat of him, he won't be able to hold himself back for another moment and this will be over before they get started.

"Well? You want it in you so badly." He tips his chin and raises an eyebrow in challenge, knowing that Shane will like this better than being taken in any case: for Ilya to watch him as he takes. "Do it, I want to see."

The flush in Shane's cheeks darkens and he nods jerkily and, bracing his hands on Ilya's bent legs behind him, starts to ease himself down onto Ilya's cock. His mouth falls open and he makes a long groan in his throat as he sinks down, his dick leaking out precome in a steady trickle.

Ilya has to hold his breath; he clenches his jaw and groans through gritted teeth; forces his eyes to stay open to see Shane taking him in and feels every millimetre of it as his bare skin slides against Shane's rim, as the muscle stretches and accommodates and lets Ilya inside, and Ilya realises only when Shane is fully seated — his ass resting against Ilya's balls as he squirms from the stretch of it, panting through his open mouth —that later, Ilya's going to come in him. He's going to spill into Shane's ass and see his own come dripping out of him, and —

He tips his head back, grips Shane's hips bruisingly tight and fights urgently to find the tattered seams of his self-control, not daring to look back at Shane until he's sure he's managed to hold himself off. Ilya wants badly to give Shane whatever he needs — to be whatever he needs — and if what he needs is a hard dick to sink down onto and stretch him open then Ilya will be that for him, will make sure he stays hard for as long as Shane whimpers and grinds; will fill Shane up how he needs and let himself come only when Shane needs that from him more; when his pleading changes and he's begging Ilya to finish in him instead of fuck him.

And so he doesn't ease his grip on Shane's hips; doesn't give Shane the freedom of movement to start to ride him, and the sinuous grinding roll of Shane's hips becomes a constant squirm as he understands that he's going to have to wait.

"You didn't say fuck me, Ilya," Ilya says, aiming for conversational and missing by, he knows, a lot, "you said you wanted it in you. It's in you, is still not enough?"

It's mean, Ilya knows it, but Shane is very specific with his words always and only more so when he's lost his grip on his inhibitions, because he can't think his way out of saying what he wants, what he means, and Shane asked for exactly this. Ilya loves watching this part, when Shane blushes and stammers his way to admitting what a cockslut he is and doesn't disappoint as he struggles against Ilya's hands just to test the strength in them, trying to rise.

"You're so fucking warm," he gasps out in the end, "Ilya I can feel you."

Ilya makes a pleased noise in his throat and looks at Shane displayed for him to look at and thinks — lets Shane go so that he can snatch up the lube and spill it over his fingers — thinks that if he can hold himself off long enough for what he's picturing it will be spectacular.

Shane watches him with a little furrow of his eyebrows but does as he's told when Ilya nudges at him and tells him, "Up, sweetheart, up, that's good, yes." He rises up enough for Ilya to put his hand between Shane's legs, feeling back for where his dick holds Shane open and Shane's eyes go wide in understanding when Ilya starts to circle a finger around his rim, pressing against him, seeking carefully for a little more stretch; for a way in.

"What — wait, Ilya it won't fit, it won't —"

"Shh, it will, trust me, yes? Tell me if you need to stop."

Shane nods and says, "Ok, ok, fuck," and Ilya can see him trying to concentrate, trying to make himself relax. Ilya presses the tip of his middle finger against the place where his dick disappears inside, where Shane's body holds tight to the bare skin of him, slick and slippery; he smooths the muscle, adds more lube to his fingers and comes back to work at him again, to seek entry, and Shane makes a lovely constant whimper for him, his dick leaking all over Ilya's wrist as he reaches under him. He's desperate, and it's beautiful.

When Ilya's fingertip finally finds its way inside, when Shane relaxes and stretches and lets him in Shane shouts and grabs for Ilya's arm but hurries out, "Oh god, keep going, keep going," so Ilya does, puts his ring finger alongside his middle and works them both carefully, slowly convincing Shane's body to accept everything Ilya wants him to have, and once his two fingertips are taken into the heat of him, Ilya soothes his other hand down Shane's trembling thighs, encouraging him to sit back down, to take all of it.

It's incremental, fractional, and Ilya's wrist is starting to ache from the angle before Shane's even halfway but Shane does it; keeps sinking down until his ass rests again on Ilya's hips, his balls are flush to the inside of Ilya's wrist and he's panting like he's just got off the ice after a shift that ran far too long. He sways forward and backward for a moment, his eyes wide and unfocused, and Ilya drinks him in, tries to believe that this is something he's never going to have to give up and hopes, hopes so fiercely that it's true.

Ilya can feel his own knuckles pressed tight against the base of his dick and wiggles his fingers slightly to feel them against his shaft. Shane hiccups in a surprised little breath.

"You're doing so well. Shane, sweetheart, look at you, I wish you could see."

"Ilya," Shane slurs out, then again, "Ilya," like he can't make any other words.

Ilya's orgasm is so close he can taste it, but he will last. He will.

"Are you ready?" he asks, and Shane's eyes widen and he gasps and demands — as much as he can demand, fuckdrunk and desperate as he is, demands:

"Ready f-for — what do you mean—"

Ilya is beyond the thought needed for explanations and instead stretches his fingers in and up and forward and he knows the second he finds it, when Shane's grip on his thighs tightens and his nails dig in, when he makes a high, shocked noise and he understands.

Ilya's fingers press against Shane's prostate; they stroke and roll and demand and they don't let up, not for a moment and Shane loses himself beautifully in it, his head falling back and his chest heaving with irregular breaths that grow tighter and higher as his broken whines turn to a continuous moan.

He's so wonderfully responsive. He's made for this: to feel so very intensely, for Ilya to pour everything into and know it will be welcome and wanted and accepted, whatever it is.

Shane's tightening down on him and Ilya grits his teeth and keeps moving his fingers; Ilya can see Shane's orgasm rising in him, his balls drawing up tight and his dick flushed red and dribbling precome in a constant little stream, but Ilya's waiting for Shane to make a move to touch himself so that when he does, Ilya snatches his wrist with his free hand before Shane can get his fingers anywhere near himself.

"No," he says, "like this. I want to watch," and Shane shudders in his whole body, but he doesn't complain or try to take hold of his dick with his other hand; he's beyond it.

It doesn't take much more, Ilya forcing his cramping hand to press harder so that Shane wails and when he does come, finally, his tear-glazed eyes widen in shock like he can't comprehend what's happening to him; he scrabbles for a handhold on Ilya's thighs and he screams — once, loud, and Ilya can't take his eyes away. Shane comes without touch sometimes but it happens when Ilya is fucking him, hard and deep and relentless and for a long time until he is simply overcome — occasionally when Shane's sucking him off and then Ilya is busy coming too — Ilya has never seen it so beautifully displayed for him before, with Shane's legs splayed wide over him and nothing to disrupt Ilya's view; no movement of their bodies and no impending orgasm of his own that he is distracted in chasing, this one having been shoved so far down he's almost forgotten it's a hair's breadth away.

It's one of the filthiest things Ilya has ever seen, watching Shane sob and shudder as his dick spills over, covering them in white that makes a puddle in Ilya's belly button, dragged out in pulses as Shane shakes like it hurts until his moans become weak, pitiful, and he starts to soften. Ilya rubs his fingertips against Shane's prostate one more time until he gets the whimper he was hoping for, before he carefully eases his fingers out — which seems even more difficult that it had been to put them in, with how Shane has tightened on him.

Shane slumps forward, cries out a little as moving shifts Ilya in him, and reaches for an uncoordinated, sloppy kiss that Ilya returns with gentle brushes of his hands down Shane's sides and whispered words that he doesn't think about, only lets his mouth make.

"Come," Ilya says, nudging him, "come on, sweetheart," and tries to ease Shane off him and onto the bed, but Shane makes an unhappy noise.

"No, don't go, Ilya, I don't want you to go."

Ilya shushes and hums and quiets and helps Shane lift off him, grabbing his dick at the base and squeezing hard as the tightness of Shane's rim tugs at the head of his dick where the slightest pressure is almost enough to undo him; they settle on their sides with Shane's chest to his back and it's only after Ilya has pushed Shane's top knee bent and put himself back inside him that Shane calms. Shane calms, but Ilya presses his forehead against the nape of Shane's neck, he holds too tight to the base of his dick and he mustn't — must not — Shane hasn't even asked to be fucked yet.

There's a second where he thinks he's going to come anyway, but it passes and the need in him is pushed back down again, to wait.

He can't keep entirely still, makes the smallest thrusts he can bear to and Shane twists, puts his back flat to the bed so that Ilya can lean over and kiss him, can put his mouth on Shane's chest and his teeth on Shane's nipple and watch the long arch of his neck as he throws his head back.

"This is real, right?" Shane tells him, "We get to keep this."

Ilya's sense of reality is not what it once was, and more than that he doesn't seem to have the function of words any longer, can only watch and hold and feel his consuming absolute need and wait — so he nods dumbly, knowing that although he has no idea if they'll get to keep this he could not bear to give it up. He can see Shane's cock hardening fully again and ducks his head once more to suck on his nipple and thrills at Shane's hand in his hair, tangled and pulling until it stings but holding Ilya right there so that he knows he's exactly where he's wanted. Time has become a meaningless wash, and he doesn't know how long it is until Shane sighs out, "Fuck me. Ilya, please fuck me," and Ilya is beyond teasing and beyond reason and can only give Shane what he needs, taking firm grip on his leg so that he can fuck him like he deserves.

Shane has already come once, and hard, and even though he never really went all the way soft it's long blissful minutes of them moving together before he's making sounds like he could come again; minutes where Ilya's mind sinks or possibly is flying, where his body moves steady and without his own control, the most important thing being making sure Shane gets there one more time.

Shane takes hold of his dick and Ilya watches, his mouth gasping open against Shane's ribcage and eyes skittering the length of his body.

"Ilya?" Shane asks, licks his lips and holds his breath for a moment as the movements of his hand get faster, as Ilya sees the familiar arch of his body, hears the giveaway pace of his breathing, a sound like he starts to speak and stops; changes his mind and starts again and Ilya has forgotten entirely how they got here until Shane moans for him, "Ilyusha," and oh, Ilya is going to — there's no stopping this time, he's — "You gonna come for me, Ilyusha?"

Inside, Ilya thinks, he's going to come in Shane bare and Shane wants him like that, is waiting for it, it's — it's —

Ilya loses himself. Fucks and fucks and fucks, as hard as he can in this position: fast and ragged and uncontrolled and even the sound of Shane moaning underneath him becomes secondary. He's been on the edge of it for so long, living in drawn out pleasure that has grown bigger in him than he ever knew his body could contain; he hardly even realises he's tipped over into his finish until he feels the slickness of himself, the sound of their fucking becoming wetter and louder as he slides in through lube and come and then god, god — then the tension of it releases its backlash, the crashing pleasure overcoming him as his whole self unlaces down the seams. He can feel Shane coming too, feel the clench around him, but Ilya can't pause or stop or wait for him, it's too late. It feels like a convulsion, an ending, a pouring out of himself and Shane takes him, accepts him; keeps him.

After, he can't bear to pull away, or even to pull out. He'll move when Shane can't stand the sticky sucking mess of them any more, but Ilya is here — right here — until then.

He can feel the pound of Shane's heart, with Shane's back pressed so tight to Ilya's chest. He feels it beat and thinks: that's mine.

He turns it over, turns it around and thinks: that's mine.

And both ways, he believes entirely, are true.

**

Leaving Shane tangled still in their bedsheets, Ilya recovers his phone from the pile of clothing he had discarded at the foot of his bed on his way out of the bedroom. Shane is half asleep and scrolling on his phone and Ilya makes noises about looking at what they can eat — but Shane lets him go without protest. They both know who calls at this time and Shane knows Ilya wants to be alone for it; he always makes sure that he is but Shane always makes sure Ilya knows he's there, after.

It's not about Shane hearing the call; even if he might be starting to pick up bits and pieces of words in Russian, the meaning of the whole would be lost on him and Ilya is glad of it. There is still a wall that Ilya cannot tear down between the person that he is allowed to be with Shane and the spitting rageful version of himself that he is made into by the duty that still has its claws in him.

This is the dragging weight that makes Ilya not able to promise himself back to Shane as easily as Shane tells Ilya I'm yours, because however much Ilya might want it to be true there's a part of him that has to be reserved for this. Still, Ilya doesn't regret telling Shane he loves him back: standing in Shane's apartment in Montreal, watching his eyes fill and his face crack in a devastation that Ilya shouldn't ever have been given the power to cause, there was nothing else he could have said; no other words that could have found their way out of him. No matter how this goes if they make their wishes as they plan to, Shane will always know that he is loved and Ilya will always remember what it feels like to have had his love returned. He can't regret his words.

But as he swears down the phone to Alexei's voicemail, anger dulled through repetition until it feels slight and performative, he believes that he should regret them. That perhaps it would have been kinder to deny it all when he knows so much of him is still required by people that don't deserve anything from him; people that he would gladly see burn but who will stop Ilya from being everything he wants to be to Shane for as long as their noose is still around his neck, their hands in his pockets.

He hangs up his phone at the end of it and knows that, if they make their wishes tomorrow, the next time that he speaks to his father and to Alexei it will be a new conversation; a fresh bruise to poke at. He closes his eyes.

"Ilya?" drifts through from the bedroom, Shane's voice raised to carry, and Ilya opens his eyes and turns his head. "Come back to bed?"

Ilya goes.

On his way back to the bedroom he flips open Shane's little suitcase that he hasn't bothered dropping off at the hotel in weeks, and takes from it his incredibly boring book with a hockey player on the front in black and white — Shane has already finished it twice, but it's the only book he'd brought with him to Boston — and the little black case that Ilya knows now, although Shane had been embarrassed to show him for the longest time, contains his reading glasses.

Ilya crawls back into bed, dropping the book and the glasses onto Shane's belly as he does, and curls against Shane's side. Shane raises an eyebrow at him in question.

"Read your boring book to me, Hollander," Ilya demands, too softly to actually be demanding. He waves his phone in his free hand. "I will order sushi from place you like with horrible salmon thing."

Shane smiles and kisses him and opens his book in the middle and Ilya loves him; mourns most horribly that they are planning to not be able to do this tomorrow, and loves him, and loves him.

**

Having someone else in bed with him used to keep Ilya awake. The only person he's shared a bed with for sleeping before is Sveta and then mostly by accident through late nights and tiredness.

Then, even in her sleep, she curls up on the edge of the mattress as far away from him as she can get, body naturally seeking its own unobstructed space, and when the shift of her breathing and light movements wake him — inevitably, even though she rarely ever even touches him — he nudges her off to the silk pillowcases waiting for her in her guest room.

Ilya sleeps with as much of himself pressed against Shane as he can manage. Sometimes next to him, sometimes blanketing him, sometimes Shane weighs him down instead.

Ilya has no idea if Shane snores, or talks in his sleep. If he does it's never caused Ilya to wake.

They have a game tomorrow and it is meant to count, so Shane has insisted on a sensible lights out: ten o'clock and not a minute later.

He wonders, pressing his knees into the backs of Shane's and his forehead to the back of Shane's neck, how well he could, now, sleep alone.

He wants this. God but he wants this — this little existence they've built together, but immeasurably bigger; wants Shane in every part of his life he can insinuate his way into.

He wants to keep this: this exact, repetitious moment, and never let it go.

**

"The Metros won the first time."

"Is wrong, no, you lose in shutout. Was 5-0."

"That's the first one you remember, the actual first one the Metros won."

"Does not count, though, only today will count."

Shane shrugs, loose limbed and easy. "Then we'll just have to kick your asses again."

Ilya grins at the challenge, the fire, and glances down to the floor where Shane's little suitcase waits by his feet.

"I will text you," he says, and swallows away the closing up of his throat, "if I do not fall asleep."

Shane's hands are in his hair, stroking. "This has been a good day, though, right? Worth keeping?"

Ilya nods and tells him truthfully, "It was perfect." That makes it sound over, though, makes it sound in the past which is awful and Ilya can't think like that, not yet. "Will be even better when we win again this afternoon."

"Fuck you, no you won't."

Ilya bends to pick up Shane's case and press the handle of it it into his hand, because if he doesn't leave now Ilya fears that he isn't going to be able to let him go.

"Do your best, Hollander. So will I, and we shall see."

When Shane kisses him goodbye it is soft and familiar and not at all regretful, and it is only once Ilya's front door has closed between them that he lets himself sag against it, makes himself take Shane Hollander and pack him carefully away in his heart so that he won't leak out; so that he can't be seen around the edges.

It's a long time before Ilya feels prepared enough to face the world and not give away everything with one unguarded glance.

This, he thinks as he fetches out his game day kit bag and shoves his shoes on, is a new kind of hiding, and if they get what they ask for today it is one he will have to get used to.

**

Shane plays beautiful hockey. He is always marvellous to watch but today he plays with something that Ilya thinks might be joy, and Ilya lets himself believe that he himself is responsible for at least some of it.

Playing against him like this is the best Ilya ever feels on the ice, like the effort it takes to be the best is worth it to be pushed even higher, made even better with Shane's own skill laid down in front of him like he's daring Ilya to best him.

Shane scores as the clock tips past eight minutes, a gorgeous goal into the top right corner while the goalie's still tracking his deke to the left. Ilya wants to fucking applaud.

Ilya watches as Shane's teammates crowd him, as they celebrate to the sound of the Boston home crowd jeering and thinks: this man begs Ilya for his body; goes willing to his knees and puts himself — all his strength and skill and talent — into Ilya's hands to take care of. This man loves him, wants a future with him.

Ilya is entirely undeserving but is also selfish, and he wants that life more than he's ever wanted anything.

He barely even cares when they lose in the end, a hard fought 4-3 with Montreal scraping out their win in overtime. Shane looks happy and victorious and Ilya makes sure not to look at him any more than he does anyone else as they file off the ice.

**

Ilya can feel the key in the lock of the universe trying to turn as he closes his car door. He thinks of Shane on the team bus, wishing to get to keep this day, wishing that nothing about this time is lost or changed.

Ilya doesn't know how. He doesn't want this loop to be any different; couldn't have planned out anything better and he doesn't want to lose it; wants it to be real and to be only the start of them.

But he also doesn't want to give up the safety of this day and the time, most precious, that they have here.

But he wants a life. A life.

He doesn't know how to give up either for the other one.

The key is trying to turn in the lock, and Ilya closes his eyes and thinks the only thing he can and know that it's completely true and meant, in every part of himself: wishes I want to keep him. I want to keep him, please.

Let me keep him.

He feels the moment it happens, something releasing with a feeling like a sigh — and the key in the lock of the universe, it —

Turns.

Chapter End Notes

I realise that generally speaking in the time loop trope, it's at this point in the story that things tend to get wrapped up with a handy epilogue. But are you kidding me, you think this shit isn't going to have repercussions when they get out of it? Ha, as if, my 'conclusion chapter' is already longer than this one was and might end up needing to be broken in to two. I have no idea who's driving the train, folks.

I'm also theoretically into some 'missing scene' stuff once I finish posting the main fic. If there's anything that you think would be cool to see played out let me know in a comment :)

Also: if you were thinking that the sex scene in this is my take on how the fucking scene in The Cottage played out, you would be correct.

Last: Thank you SO MUCH for reading and kudosing and commenting. I get comment anxiety and reply when my brain feels up to it but I read every single one and have LOVED seeing what you thought of each chapter as it's gone up.

tumblr <3.

Chapter 7: Seven

Chapter Summary

Three weeks isn't a long time. Three weeks vanishes in the blink of a carefully pre-planned, meticulously scheduled arrangement of practises and games and flights and hotel rooms; in allocated time with the press and workouts and finding meals on the road that fit in with his meal plan, in calls with his agent and his sponsors and in team breakfasts and watching tape.

Three weeks is over in a turn of Shane's head. Twenty-one days; five hundred and four hours; thirty thousand two hundred and forty minutes.

The twenty-one days take no time at all, but some of those hours and minutes drag and stretch like they're never going to end.

Chapter Notes

This really got away from me and I was going to break it into two, but there were just no good points to split it and I am at the point I just cannot read it through again, so here you go all in one. This fic is the longest thing I've ever written by more than 50% and I actualy cannot believe I broke 75k on a time loop fic. What is my brain.

Three weeks isn't a long time. Three weeks vanishes in the blink of a carefully pre-planned, meticulously scheduled arrangement of practises and games and flights and hotel rooms; in allocated time with the press and workouts and finding meals on the road that fit in with his meal plan, in calls with his agent and his sponsors and in team breakfasts and watching tape.

Three weeks is over in a turn of Shane's head. Twenty-one days; five hundred and four hours; thirty thousand two hundred and forty minutes.

The twenty-one days take no time at all, but some of those hours and minutes drag and stretch like they're never going to end — sometimes for the better and sometimes, not.

The wait for an unsuspicious exit from a postgame dinner, watching the clock over the bar tick past eight o'clock and knowing that Ilya's waiting for him to call from the first solo hotel room he's had in forever, feeling the buzz of Ilya's Facetime call from his phone in his pocket and knowing that he's missing it, hoping that Ilya knows he'll be there as soon as he can and unfairly hating that anyone cares about his opinion on their chances against the Admirals' new second line because these minutes are minutes he's losing with Ilya.

Then, two and a half hours: time that they spend talking once Shane makes it up to his room that stretches endlessly; time where they talk each other to orgasm and then talk about nothing until Shane can hardly keep his eyes open and they seem to fit so, so much into a hundred and fifty minutes, except for the feel of Ilya's skin on his and the taste of his name in Ilya's mouth and the way that he can't bite away the pressing together of Ilya's lips when Shane finally gives up on staying awake and says, "G'night, Ilyusha," with his head on the pillow and his phone propped up on the nightstand.

Five minutes: how long Shane gives himself in the locker room before each game he plays, before he puts his phone away and gears up, five minutes of texting with his body and his phone carefully angled so that no one can see the screen, where Ilya reminds him about the hit the Guardians' first-line centre took two games ago that's had him favouring his left side, or to remember that Ilya still has the lead in points on him and he'd better put some effort in if he wants to catch up, or promising him a reward next time they see each other if Shane scores a hat trick.

Four days: the unbearable slog between airports and hotels and ice where the cycle of day and night barely seems to have time to turn, it flies by so fast, but they win their two games and are running on fumes by the end of them so that the second Shane gets back to his hotel room when it's all done he falls asleep in the middle of texting Ilya, not even finishing typing out his sentence before his eyes close.

Three weeks.

Shane knows that their schedules for Christmas have four uninterrupted, unscheduled days right in the middle of them, in which he hopes he'll be able to introduce Ilya to his parents. That's the longest they're going to get until maybe All Stars in February, if they both go again, and then nothing else that they can count in full days until their seasons end, whenever that is; sooner if neither of them make the playoffs, but the Raiders and the Metros are both starting out their seasons strong and even though it's still early days they're both hopeful for a shot at the Cup this year.

It'll be next summer before he knows it, and Shane can feel the days blurring as they pass him and he will grab on to their insufficient minutes together as hard as he can in the mean time and he does not, will not, can not regret this, not for a moment.

But it's hard. Harder than he'd thought it would be. They've always been apart, after all, but it had been different, before. Before Ilyusha and before I love you and before weeks and weeks of the same day spent within reach of each other, spent however they wanted. Shane misses it, fiercely.

When they'd made their plans, Shane had imagined this new thing between them to be not unlike what they'd done before, but with more allowed to exist between them making their moments together brighter and better while also making their distance and time feel greater, be more difficult to bear — although still worth it. He hadn't counted for how keenly he would feel the loss of having Ilya every day; of seeing him every day. He feels like he's missing a limb, is walking around unbalanced in Ilya's absence; he is constantly listening for a voice that isn't there, reaching for a hand that he knows is hundreds of miles away even though his body has built the expectation of proximity into him like a reflex.

It's still worth it, but it hurts — hurts worse than he thinks that he can take except that he does; keeps going through one minute and into the next, and the next.

He misses, and he can tell Ilya does too, from the sadness in his eyes lurking behind the love at the end of every video call.

Hoping for a distraction more than anything else Shane lets himself be strongarmed into going out to JJ's friend's restaurant and spends an entire evening talking, bizarrely, to Rose Landry. When the place starts to close up and they know they'll need to leave soon she smiles brightly and tugs his phone from his fingers to type in her number, and it's only then, as she's suggesting that they could have a coffee date the next day that he realises that she's been flirting with him.

He reclassifies in his memories them sharing a plate of fries and her hand starting to idly touch his on the tabletop and her foot bumping his under their table for the third time in as many minutes and feels awfully like he's led her on. He considers that before that day with Ilya in Boston he would have tried to work himself up to accepting the invitation, seeing if maybe this woman was the one that could prove wrong the thing about himself that he now knows to be simply true, but the life he lives now is after, so he carefully tucks his feet back underneath his own seat and tells her, uncomfortable, "Uh, sorry, I'm actually, hm. With someone."

She looks surprised and perhaps a little disappointed, but they keep talking and he still finishes the evening with a movie star's number in his phone and potentially a friend, he hopes.

Three weeks — and then a questionable AirBnB somewhere in the middle of nowhere, Vermont, booked under a fake name where the key is left for them in a hide-a-key with a passcode that came by email so that they don't have to see or speak to anyone the whole time. They have it for the day and until the next morning but Shane's flight had arrived in Montreal at ten in the morning and Ilya needs to be getting on his plane in Boston at eight that night, so in the end they have almost but not quite three hours together to make up as much time as they can; nearly a hundred and eighty minutes.

They fuck in the entranceway and the family room of the house they've rented and never make it to the bedroom. Ilya's wanting of him is harsh and heavy and welcome, is desperate in a way that's awful and intoxicating in the same panting breath, and before Ilya makes him come the second time Shane steers his mouth to the inside of his thigh, high, high up where no one in a communal shower should ever have cause to look and begs him for his teeth, for bruises. Ilya obliges him gratefully.

They shower together in near silence before Ilya leaves and Shane kisses him goodbye for longer than they have time for.

As Ilya backs toward the door he tells Shane, "I love you," and it feels like a question, so Shane tells him the same back because Ilya has to understand that he has no regrets for this, not a single one, even though when Ilya closes the front door behind himself on his way out Shane makes an involuntary little grunting noise, like he's been punched in the stomach.

The clock starts again as he hears the engine of Ilya's car turn over, rev unnecessarily and drive away: eleven days — two hundred and sixty four hours; fifteen thousand, eight hundred and forty minutes — and they'll be playing against each other again, in Montreal, and might have as much as two hours together, after.

**

The thing about that day, Shane thinks when it's far, far too late, is that all the moments of it that he lived that weren't spent with Ilya were like walking through a power play he'd practised a thousand times. He knows how his teammates should move around him and he knows where to be for them; there are nuances, no two repetitions ever perfectly, precisely a replica, but they're all close enough that they barely need thought. By the end, so much of what he'd done and said when he hadn't been with Ilya had been without consideration: Shane could say whatever came into his head in those moments that only existed to join more meaningful ones together.

There had been no consequences.

Shane's skin is still vibrating from the remembered touch of Ilya's hands when he makes it to the Raiders' guest locker room in November, the first time that he's been there since he was here every day for more days than he could count. His stuff is in the same stall and Hayden is still to his left and Shane is happy. He's completely fucking happy and he spent the morning in Ilya's bed in Boston and they only have to wait three days to see each other again, because Ilya's booked a completely stupid Montreal layover on his way to Toronto that will give them twelve glorious hours together behind the closed doors of Shane's apartment.

He'd gotten out of an Uber back from Ilya's house at the hotel that morning to meet up with the team — the same hotel, they almost always stay at that same hotel when they're in Boston — and Shane had handed in the keycard he'd never had cause to use while Hayden gave him the same familiar ribbing about where he'd been all night and they'd taken the fucking bus to the rink, to the same guest locker room where his gear had already been set out for him in the same stall as always and Shane — Shane forgot.

"What?" Hayden asks — chokes on — staring at him with wide, wide eyes. He's holding his shoulder pads in one hand but seems to have forgotten they're there and Shane remembers with a wash of cold down his spine what day it isn't and carefully replays the last words out of his mouth.

He'd been texting Ilya; they've got a bet on tonight's final score with a double-or-nothing on their own points scored and Hayden had asked — he'd asked if it was his Boston girl that had Shane smiling like that. He'd asked if he was ever going to get chance to meet her, and Shane had said — he'd laughed and hadn't thought, hadn't thought about what day it isn't and he'd said, sure.

He'd laughed, and said, "Sure, I'll tell him you said hi, we can have a double date."

"Him? Lily's a him?" Hayden asks, too loudly. He's still holding his shoulder pads, staring. Shane's mouth is suddenly, entirely dry. Over Hayden's shoulder, Comeau has the next stall along and he's watching them. He's listening.

Shane is blindsided, suddenly terrified, and for too long he can't bring his face under control and he knows his frozen expression, his total dumb hesitation has given away everything — everything — when something like clarity snaps behind Hayden's eyes and he's suddenly completely enthralled in getting his shoulder pads just right, fiddling with the straps to adjust them until they're exactly how he wants them, to the unnecessary precise millimetre. On the other side of Hayden, Comeau is still staring at Shane. His lip curls in what looks like the start of disgust and Shane snaps his head back to his kit bag; he starts sifting through it even though he knows he doesn't need anything that's in there. He carries on dressing when, out of the corner of his eye, he sees Comeau start to move again, to carry on gearing up.

Shane doesn't say anything else until they're on the ice. He's never really been one for inspiring speeches and no one seems to notice the edge of the spiral that he's circling around, although Hayden keeps glancing his way and Comeau — Shane isn't looking at Comeau.

All his concentration goes into not looking Ilya's way as they stretch and warm up; he knows Ilya will be able to tell something's bothering him from a glance but he absolutely will not risk them, will not risk anyone putting together Shane's utterly preventable fuckup with Ilya looking at him or talking to him or standing too close; he will not let anyone accidentally arrive at the right answer.

So Shane doesn't look. He takes his place at the red line and he keeps his eyes down and doesn't respond when Ilya talks to him even though all he has to say are bland nothing-chirps that carry an undertone of worry that Shane doesn't know if anyone else would even be able to pick up on. They play and Shane tries to forget they're in Boston, imagines he can't see the swathe of black and gold in all directions and works not to make out faces; he becomes mechanical, action into reaction and hardly even feels like he's still in his body when the final buzzer goes and they're consoling each other to the victorious cheering of the Boston home crowd.

There's no good time though, no moment that he can talk to Hayden and know they won't be overheard, not between the locker rooms and then the drive, because they were coming straight back home to Montreal after this one so they came on the fucking bus — goddamn hours where Shane can see all the questions fighting for exit out of Hayden's mouth and Shane is pathetically appreciative that he manages to keep them to himself. It's not until they're back in Montreal, past midnight and the team trudging away to their cars and — Comeau bumps into his shoulder, passing him by as they cross the lot. He throws a look back at Shane that's unreadable in this low-lit night but fear crawls its way down Shane's spine, nonetheless.

When he turns back Hayden is waiting, standing and looking at him while he fiddles awkwardly with his car keys, so Shane nods and follows him to the minivan.

Sitting in the passenger seat with all the doors closed so that Shane feels like he can finally breathe again, he glances over at Hayden, who's looking at him with bright, wide eyes. Shane knows he has nothing to fear here, Hayden was always consistent with his reaction; always welcoming, accepting — but this time whatever happens Shane is stuck with and he is scared, he realises, that this time will somehow be inexplicably different.

"So…" Hayden begins, and Shane nods once, sharply.

"I'm gay."

Hayden nods, blows out a steady breath. "And Lily…"

"He's also not out, so just leave it there for now, all right?"

Hayden nods straight away. "All right, 'course."

"I'm so sorry, I was going to — I was trying to work out how to do it. Tell you properly, you know? And then, then I —" Shane thuds his head back against the passenger seat headrest. "Fuck, I'm such an idiot, I can't believe I just let it slip out like that, all this fucking time and I let it go without even thinking —"

'Hey, no — man, come on, don't do that. I'm glad you told me."

"Thanks. You're a good friend, Hayd."

"Can I tell Jackie?"

Shane smiles and nods once; it's always been true that anything he ever tells Hayden he's telling Jackie too, and she's probably better at keeping things to herself than Hayden is.

"Sure. But no one else, ok? I'm pretty sure Comeau heard too and right now I'm just really hoping he'll forget about it." He won't forget. Shane is sinkingly certain of that: he is not going to forget, and this is not going to go away. There's a reason no one in the League has ever, ever come out.

"Of course. Your secret's safe with me."

Hayden means it, Shane knows; he'd never tell anyone as long as Shane asks him not to. Shane can trust him.

Comeau, though. Comeau isn't his friend, they're not close. Shane isn't even sure if he has his number in his phone, for all they've been on the same team for four years.

Hayden hugs him before they go their separate ways and Shane trudges to his own car and drives home and takes the elevator to his floor and lets himself inside his apartment; throws the deadbolt and finds his way to his couch to sit on the edge of it before he wraps his arms across his chest and screws his eyes shut.

Shane likes his apartment. It's his and it's home and it's comfortable but every time he's set foot in it since he got back here from the roadie that followed that day, it's felt less and less like where he lives. He misses Ilya's house in Boston. He misses the smell of Ilya's laundry detergent and the deep, soft couch that's made much more to be comfortable on than the modern stylish thing that the interior decorator picked out for his place. He misses Ilya's bed even though he'd thought it was too soft the first time he slept in it and he misses walking through the front door into a place he feels like he's home in because Ilya is there waiting for him. He misses Ilya's hands, his smell, his voice; he wants Ilya to lie on top of him so that he knows he's tethered to the Earth. Balancing on the very edge of his uncomfortable designer couch, Shane wraps his arms tighter around himself and tries to convince his brain that they aren't his own arms but it's all shit and it doesn't work and he doesn't regret choosing Ilya, not for a second, but he has no idea how he's supposed to love him and live apart from him knowing what it's like to love him and see him every day.

He's very proud of himself that his hands aren't shaking when he finally takes his phone out of his bag. He's felt it buzzing half a dozen times since he got back to the Boston guest locker room, the short-short-long-short that is just set up for Ilya so Shane knows it's him, but he hasn't wanted to look until he can read the messages without having to think about what his face is doing.

Lily: What has happened

Lily: Tell me

Lily: Text me when you land

Lily: Something is wrong, what is it

Lily: Sweetheart, call me back

Shane's fingers fumble for the keyboard and he taps out: Can I call? and hits send. He should have said something earlier; shouldn't have left Ilya to worry, but all he wants is to hear Ilya's voice and it would have hurt so much to see his messages dropping in and not be able to do anything about them.

It's a couple of minutes before his phone rings; Shane props his phone up in front of him and answers the video call then smiles because he can't help it, looking at Ilya's hair all wild with the half-lit shapes of his bedroom in the background. Shane feels bad; it's practically the middle of the night.

Ilya says, "Shane," and it's a sigh like relief. "You are home?"

"Just got back. You didn't have to wait up, I'm sorry I didn't text back, I —"

Ilya waves his apology away. "You are ok? Something was wrong at game tonight. I could see it."

Shane puts his hands over his face and lets them drag slowly down and away. "I fucked up."

There's a soft noise from his phone and Shane knows that if they'd been together Ilya's hands would be on him, soothing on his arms, maybe with his face pressed into Shane's neck. He tries to imagine it until he can feel it, and fails.

"Tell me," Ilya says, instead, and Shane looks at the camera at the top of his phone, letting himself focus on the little dot of it.

"It was the first time back in that locker room since that day, you know? And everything felt the same, it felt just like that day, I wasn't thinking. It was like it was just another time around and there were still no consequences."

"You did something? Said something?"

Shane counts slowly to five, then back down to zero again. "I let slip to Hayden that Boston Lily is a man."

Ilya nods, slowly. "That's not so bad, yes? You were thinking about telling him anyway you are gay."

"Yes but I wouldn't have done it like that, and —" Shane's hands start to tremble, "Comeau overheard."

Ilya wets his lips. "Overheard what?"

"Nothing about you," Shane rushes on, has to make sure Ilya knows this most important thing, "Nothing about you Ilya, I swear, only — only that I called Lily 'him'."

That gets him a nod and some of the clouds behind Ilya's eyes clear although he still looks unhappy. "Are you ok?"

"I don't know. Fuck, I could have rolled it back, you know, played it down at least but I just fucking froze, I might as well have put up a damn sign. I was hoping Comeau hadn't heard me, but," Shane presses the fingers of his free hand against his closed eyes, "he did, I'm sure he did, and he won't keep it to himself."

"Fuck him, he doesn't know anything, not really. It will go away."

Shane sighs. Ilya might be right, and only time will tell either way, but Shane thinks about Comeau's shoulder knocking in to him as they'd all gone their separate ways and can't convince himself to believe it.

He struggles to find sleep even with the late homecoming so he wakes up late and everything is wrong from the minute he puts his feet on the floor by his bed the next morning. Every part of his routine thrown off, from his breakfast to his workout to his shower, nothing quite fits like it should including, he thinks, his own skin, which feels too tight so that he can't move properly in it.

It's an optional skate that afternoon but Shane goes because he always goes but he's late — by his own reckoning, although still on time according to the schedule — because all his internal clocks are spinning in circles, so he walks into a half-full locker room and knows from the second he sets foot inside that his secret isn't a secret, any more. Comeau and Drapeau are talking when he arrives and they stop when they catch sight of him, watch him walk to his locker and Drapeau sneers before turning away.

It still could be nothing — he tells himself like a mantra the length of the skate: could be nothing, could be nothing, could be nothing, until his mind isn't even on the ice any more and he's running entirely on instinct and muscle memory — but the sound of the world turns back on full when he's got a towel round his waist and he's heading to the shower and he hears Drapeau's low, disgusted mutter, "I'm meant to get in the fucking shower with him there? Fuck no."

And at least, Shane thinks, now he knows.

**

It is completely illogical for Ilya to hate Rose Landry. More than that, it is beneath him — this petty, bitter feeling that he should be able to put aside — but that knowledge doesn't change anything when he sees the glee of the press over pictures of Shane — of his Shane — out to lunch with her and knowing that if it had been himself and Shane in that same picture it could be a scandal preceding the loss of at least one career and possibly his right to stay in this country.

He's glad Shane's making a friend — he is, even though a curling jealous part of him wishes she were incredibly plain and worked an uninspiring, not at all headline-worthy nine-to-five and perhaps in outward appearances were extremely stereotypically lesbian so that there would be no speculation for Ilya to read online about how Shane fucks her.

He nurses a beer in the back of a bar in Tampa that's decked out in poorly strung multicoloured Christmas lights while his team drink and celebrate and try their chances with a bachelorette party in the opposite corner, and he thinks about the weeks it's been since he last felt the beat of Shane's heart. On his phone he flips between the entertainment news — paparazzi shots of Shane and Rose leaving a fancy little Italian place in Montreal a few days ago — and his texts with Shane; the only proof he can carry with him that they are what he knows they are to each other, and even that is regularly sanitised; anything that makes it clear that Jane is not a woman gets deleted at the conclusion of every conversation.

Marly slides into the booth next to him as Ilya flips to Instagram, to the trash news feed of some awful American entertainment website that he's already read and now is just scrolling through the pictures of, nursing the last two inches of a beer and wanting to go home. Tonight though, 'home' is a hotel room he's sharing with Connors, because it's Ilya's turn on the rota to put up with his snoring; home is not his house in Boston with Shane waiting for him with reaching hands and a private smile, so he's not in any kind of a rush.

"Yeah, I couldn't fuckin' believe it either," Marly says, leaning over to look at Ilya's phone and the pictures he's scrolling past, pausing over the next post about some singer coming out of rehab to try to make it look like having Shane on his phone was a coincidence of timing. "Rose Landry and Hollander, who'd have put that together, huh?"

"Right," Ilya says back, trying to tone it so that he's showing no interest in the line of conversation.

"You all right, man? Kinda quiet tonight."

Ilya sets down his phone and forces his lips to smile. "Why would I not be good, we played well today, we won. Is a good day."

Marly nods, but he's frowning. On the table in front of them Ilya's phone screen lights up and he sees the first part of a message flash up.

Jane: Hey, do you have your flights booked for Christmas yet? I want to check that …

The rest of the message can't be seen without unlocking his phone, and Ilya flips it face down instead. Marly clears his throat.

"You know I played in the AHL with Stephanson, right?" Ilya shakes his head. He didn't know this but isn't surprised; Marly seems to know half the players in the league through his old team rosters or charity events or someone's sister or wife or brother-in-law; Ilya has no idea how he remembers them all. The fact that he knows a Metros second-line defender isn't a surprise.

"We still talk sometimes, you know, so I asked him about that Hollander thing," he nods toward Ilya's phone where the pictures of Shane and Rose Landry are still giving Ilya away, probably, even though the screen is dark, "just, you know. To see what he knows, call me curious." He sips his own beer and Ilya keeps his face nice and blank. "Seems the Metros guys don't know what to make out of it either. Hollander's not giving away anything but the word in the locker room —"

"Marly, I do not want to hear bullshit Montreal gossip."

"The word in the locker room is that Hollander wouldn't be into her anyway,"

"Marly, I said —"

Marly leans close so he can whisper, his eyes lit up with the joy of a good rumour; he's always been a shit-stirrer. "The word is that Hollander can't be into her because he's only into guys." Ilya's mouth snaps shut and he feels his fingers digging painfully into his thighs. He is suddenly, extremely, afraid. Marly sits back up straight again and gives a little rolling shrug of his shoulders. "I don't have a fucking clue whether that's true or not although I guess Hollander's taking shit for it either way, but it got me thinking."

"Marly."

"You've been different since the season started." His voice is suddenly serious; he's looking Ilya in the eyes and he nudges Ilya's phone with a finger where it rests on the tabletop. "You're on your phone all the fucking time with your Jane and you —" he gestures at the sloppy-drunk bachelorette party, "Last season you would'a been right in the middle of that. But you seem happy, man — not right this second honestly, but otherwise. Makes me think maybe you're settling down, Rozy."

Ilya picks at the corner of the label on his beer. There aren't many people in Boston that Ilya knows well enough that they would bring up Jane with him, but Marly's his best friend here, for all Ilya is careful about the distance he keeps between them. He needs to keep that distance, though, so he mutters, "Don't be stupid."

"Yeah, I couldn't work it out either, 'cause it was like someone flipped a switch, you know? Might have taken longer to realise something was up otherwise, but you think I'm not gonna notice when one day you're just you and the next you're you only, only —"

He makes a gesture that seems to indicate Ilya's whole self and Ilya isn't sure what to make of it.

"So I got to thinking: why would you never mention it, if you'd found someone who'd finally stuck, huh? You never say her name out loud, never any pictures, not a hint, not a mention, just every goddamn minute on your fucking phone so I thought, why the big secret?"

Ilya tries to be nonchalant, tries to exude uncaring, and shrugs and says, "No big secret," but doesn't think he's convincing anyone. This conversation couldn't have come at a worse time: Shane hadn't been packed away, had been half out of Ilya's heart so he could remind himself that Rose isn't what people say and it was stupid to do out here where people can see him but now his love is leaking out around the edges of him, bright enough to be noticed.

"Anyway, if it's true about Hollander, I feel bad for him. Hockey's — well, you know what hockey is, yeah, but Montreal's got some real pieces of work so it must be a shitshow for him whether it's legit or not."

Ilya sips his beer, swallows; shrugs. "Must be."

"I can understand a person not wanting to have to deal with that shit."

"Sure, must be bad for him." There's nothing Ilya can afford to give away. Nothing.

Marly leans in — right in so that it'll be obvious to anyone looking this way that this is a private conversation; that they're sharing secrets.

"Look, I know I can be a dick. We all can, bunch of guys with too much money and no one to tell us to shut the fuck up and probably I ought to try to do better. But there's being a dick and there's being a dick, you get me? I've never thought I was the worse kind. So I guess if a guy I knew were to have himself a guy he was, you know, serious about — then I'd hope he was happy. I'd hope that for any of my friends."

"Marly. I —"

"You're my friend, aren'tcha, Roz?"

There are only two ways this goes: Ilya can laugh and tell Marly that it's good that he's good with it but Ilya's all about pussy, he loves women and there's no mystery happening here. Or: there is any other reaction at all, because anything else Ilya could say — anything — is as good as confirmation that Ilya's in a relationship, and it's with another man. Ilya can't even tell if Marly's just used Shane as a way into the conversation or if he suspects everything.

He isn't sure he has it in him today to lie convincingly and he feels so, so tired of doing it, but he can't outright confirm anything, not without knowing what Marly really thinks is going on. So instead he wets his lips and swallows and says, "Yes, I am your friend."

Marly grins wide. "Yes you are." He puts his hand on Ilya's shoulder and leans over to press a smacking, enthusiastic kiss against Ilya's temple. "And if you ever want to 'fess up about whoever the fuck Jane really is, you can tell me all about," a momentary pause, barely noticeable, "him. I'm your secret keeper, dude, I'll never tell."

"I — another time, maybe," Ilya mumbles, and Marly nods agreeably.

"Oh, fuck, and Vicky," Marly hurries out, and gestures with his drink to where Victor St-Simon is flexing and letting a drunk brunette with a pink sash that declares her the Maid of Honour feel his biceps.

"What about him?"

"He worked it out first, man, we were both going to talk to you about it together but then," he waves at the remnants of the bachelorette party again, "he got distracted and you were over here crying by yourself in a corner —"

"This is lie, I do not —"

"You fucking were, you were thirty seconds from sobbing into your vodka."

Ilya hadn't been — truly, hadn't, but he thinks he might be now; he thinks that this clumsy proof of something terrifyingly close to acceptance might be what finally cracks him open. Even if they never talk about this again, which is what will be safest and what he'll probably have to do however this conversation ends, at least he has this moment. He is living his life in moments, now, and this can be one to add to his carefully hoarded pile of better ones.

There's one thing he has to be sure of, though, and after a moment of thought he picks his phone up again and unlocks it, flips back to where he was before, scrolling the entertainment news feed where Shane and Rose-fucking-Landry still smile out at him from the doorway of the same trendy Montreal cafe.

"What you think," he asks Marly, tilting the phone his way, "All fake?"

Marly snorts. "Fuck if I know, man, don't know which version's more outta the twilight zone."

The knot that formed in Ilya's gut the second Marly had said the words Hollander's only into guys loosens, the knowledge nagging at him now only that he'll have to tell Shane that the rumours about him aren't contained to Montreal — but at least no one seems to have pieced everything together. Ilya's trying to think of a subtle way of asking if Marly knows who else might be talking about Shane when St-Simon drops down at their table on Ilya's other side; his eyes are glassy and when he speaks it's a little slurred.

"Didya start yet? Roz, we love you, y'know, we just wanna —"

"Vicky, shut the fuck up, we did it already."

St-Simon's face falls. "I missed it? What'd he say?"

"I —"

He turns to Ilya and points accusingly at Marly. "Did he try to tell you this was his idea? It fuckin' wasn't, he thought you were fuckin' a married chick, but I said fuckin' no, man, this is exactly what my brother Jamie did when he got serious with his boyfriend, he —"

"Will you shut the fuck up, huh? Want whole place to hear?"

"Shit, sorry, sorry. Was I right though? The Russia thing?" Ilya looks at him blankly and St-Simon whispers loudly, "It's some guy in Russia, right, that's why so," he waves his hands at Ilya like he's trying to point to all of him, just in the way Marly had at the start of this conversation. Ilya wonders what the fuck he looks like to other people that's apparently so far beyond words.

It's a good a story as any, though, so Ilya raises his eyebrows and in a deliberate non-response, picks up his beer and drains the last of it.

"Fuckin' knew it," St-Simon gloats, "but that's some crazy long-distance shit you've got there, Rozy, fuck-ing sucks."

Ilya feels his smile drift away and his mouth turn down at the corners as his heart that beats for Shane Hollander hurts for the pressure of hiding him away inside it. "Yeah. Sucks."

**

"Boston?"

Shane nods and out of the corner of his eye, he sees his dad wincing. His mom's hand tightens on her mug until he worries she's going to break off its handle. Her tense, expectant smile has faded into something closer to horrified.

"Boston, yeah."

"When you said he's another player I knew there was a chance he's on an opposing team, but Boston, Shane —"

"Mom —"

"I should have known, really, you were in Boston when you first told us and we knew there was someone else there with you, I just never put it together with — Boston, Shane?"

"Yuna," David starts, and puts his hand on her arm.

"No, dad, it's fine, I'd rather do this before he gets here." Shane glances at his watch. From Ilya's last text, Shane needs to leave to pick him up in twenty minutes to make sure he won't be standing around arrivals attracting attention to himself. He knows that he should have done this part earlier, but somehow it's felt more daunting than coming out to them did. On the wall behind his parents, fairy lights loop from the ceiling like a garland; they dim and glow comfortingly slowly and Shane counts softly the one-two-three pause between their brightest and their dimmest.

Yuna sips her tea in what seems to be a move intended to calm herself. Shane can't tell if it's working.

"And you — you're sure about this. That you want to be with a man who plays for Boston."

"I want to be with him whoever he plays for, mom. We've been together a long time, I'm serious about this."

That seems to catch something in her and she looks at him, looks into his face for something, and eventually sighs, her tension letting go all at once like a balloon going flat.

"He really is great. You'll like him when you get to know him."

Shane's dad nods enthusiastically. "Of course we will! You saw something in him, we will too."

His mom stands from their dining table, taking her half-drunk mug of tea with her. "I'm going to get a different drink."

She marches into the kitchen and Shane hears the squeak on the hinge of the cupboard next to the fridge that the liquor lives in.

"She'll be fine with it," his dad says, consolingly, "just give her some time to get used to it."

Shane nods and glances out of the window to the driveway. He can see his car just outside; he'll need to stop for gas on the way so it would make sense for him to leave sooner rather than later.

"There is," Shane winces, "one more thing." His dad's eyebrows rise, and Shane looks quickly over his shoulder; his mom is still in the kitchen, he can hear the clink of ice being dropped into a tumbler. Shane leans forward over the table, knows that he is taking the cowardly way out but is doing it anyway: looks his dad in the eyes and whispers, "It's Ilya Rozanov."

His dad frowns, looks like he's about to ask another question and then understanding takes over and his eyes widen comically but doesn't say anything when footsteps and the rattle of ice in a glass announces Yuna's return. Shane stands abruptly with a scrape of his chair and takes his car keys out of his pocket; his dad is shaking his head like he's trying to give Shane some kind of warning.

"I have to go pick him up, don't want to leave him waiting at the airport. I'll be gone a little while so, you know. Be nice when he gets here?"

"I'll be nice, of course I'll be nice," Yuna says, but her tone is stressed; aggravated. "But do you have to go already? You didn't finish telling us about him."

Shane takes his coat down from the hook by the door and stands, facing them both. He tries to shoot an apologetic glance at his dad.

"Well, you'll meet him soon, then you can get to know him properly."

"Ok, sure, but you didn't even tell us which one of them he is. I've been trying to remember which Boston players are already married, but," she shrugs and shakes her head a little, "I don't know about that many of them."

Shane puts his coat on: one arm, the other arm; zip. His house keys and his wallet are in his coat pockets and he's already holding his phone and his car keys. His dad, he sees, is trying to get his mom to sit down.

He looks from his mom's expectant face to his dad's quietly horrified one to the window, where it's still not snowing and visibility for the drive should be fine, then back to his mom. He nods, swallows, takes a breath and says:

"It's Ilya Rozanov." His mom's mouth drops open, just a little. "Right," Shane continues, putting his hand on the door knob, "I'll text when we're a half hour out."

"Shane —"

"Got to go, mom, I'll be late. I love you."

He should probably be ashamed of himself when the front door closing behind him cuts off his mom's voice as she says his name again, but he's mostly relieved that she has the length of his round-trip drive to calm down.

Driving to the airport does nothing to calm Shane, his fingers drumming on the steering wheel and his knee bouncing even as he stays steady at the speed limit. He hasn't had chance to be in the same room with Ilya since November, since the half-day they had together when Ilya was headed for Toronto: it's been five weeks and three days since Ilya's hands were last on him: thirty-eight days; nine hundred and twelve hours; fifty-four thousand, seven hundred and twenty minutes and Shane feels every single one of them now like they are sitting on his chest, minute after minute stacked in a heap.

Shane has thought so often about making another wish; asking for a day that would never end so that they can crawl inside it and spend it together again.

Probably it would never work; he doesn't think that the universe gives a person more than one shot at something incredible like that in a lifetime — and it's not a switch that can just be flipped; it's all too problematic. They would both need to do it at just the same time and want the same thing and just as much as before and Shane doesn't know how easily he'd be able to wish his way out of it this time, and mean it.

By the time he arrives at the airport he feels like he's vibrating, the anticipation of thirty-eight days of waiting making every one of their seconds felt; when he catches sight of Ilya walking up to his car in his toque and his thick winter coat, collar turned up high against the windchill, he barely even recognises him. Ilya gets in to the pssenger seat and closes the door and Shane turns his head to look at him and wants to kiss him. He wants to kiss him so desperately, so badly that he has to tighten his grip on the steering wheel until the leather creaks to keep his hands where they are. He's staring at Ilya's mouth.

"Hi," Shane says eventually; stupidly. Ilya's mouth curves up.

"Hello."

The airport isn't that busy but there are people walking past the windows in a slow stream; there are cars passing them by. Shane is holding his breath. It's been nine hundred and twelve hours.

Ilya's hand creeps over to Shane's knee and rests there, warm through Shane's pants. Shane lets their fingers tangle and looks down: they're touching skin. Shane exhales and tells himself it wasn't even nearly a moan, probably he could convince himself it was only a lovesick sigh, and, when he can make himself, he starts the car.

They drive with Ilya's hand high up on Shane's thigh, mostly resting and sometimes massaging gently with his fingers as they talk; Shane avoids bringing up what it's been like in the locker room since Comeau, since the rumour started and he couldn't kill it even though he never said anything like it again and even though far too many people online are still convinced that he's dating Rose. Ilya tells him about Marleau and St-Simon; how he's starting to believe that what they said to him is true and nothing's actually changed. Marly still kisses Ilya soundly on the side of his helmet when he scores, they still drink together and make fun of the Metros together —

"Fucking hey," Shane interrupts, and Ilya grins at him in the diminishing daylight and squeezes Shane's thigh.

"It is good, I think. Marly still teases me about Jane just the same, makes fun of how I am always checking my phone, why my face looks like it does when I am reading your messages, nothing any different."

"That's good — although, what does your face look like when you're reading my messages?"

"Ah, so bored, Hollander. Is what I tell Marly, my Jane is hottest ass in North America but so very boring."

Shane wants to smile so he does, even though it probably makes him look besotted, and when he says, "Fuck you," it sounds far too fond to be believed.

It's dark by the time they reach the turn off for Shane's parents' cottage and he pulls up on the side of the road. Out here there's no one and they're far from in sight of the house; there are no streetlights and the night is overcast and dim so the soft glow of the car's dashboard is all the illumination that's left after Shane kills the engine. Ilya reaches for him at the same moment Shane unclips his seatbelt and leans across the car. He's honestly amazed they managed to hold off until they were somewhere that there's no one to see them.

They kiss wild; uncontrolled, teeth clicking and off-centre and biting and it's so perfect Shane could cry.

He says, "Ilyusha," into Ilya's mouth because he knows Ilya loves it and because that's his, that's only Shane's name to say; Ilya gives him his own name back against his tongue in a voice that's strained.

Shane mouths his way down into Ilya's lap, finds him already hard and waiting for him when he reaches inside his sweats; Ilya's hand skitters to the back of his neck and grips and Shane sucks him in, lets his throat open to swallow him — and the smell of him, it's like something's delivered a sharp kick to his hindbrain, waking up a desire that lives fundamental in him and had been forced to sleep.

Ilya presses on the back of his neck to keep him down even though he doesn't need to; spills out a tangle of words that are either badly formed or not in English or both, until eventually he moans out, accusing and fond and true, "Cockhungry, slut, Shane, Боже —" and Ilya's other hand thumps against the roof of the car and he comes down Shane's throat with a muffled groan; the whole thing barely takes a couple of minutes.

Shane breathes him in, holds the leftover taste of him in his mouth for a moment before he swallows it and when he straightens up from his uncomfortable lean Ilya shifts to find his mouth again as he settles back into the driver's seat. Reaching for Shane's hard-on, Ilya sucks on his tongue until Shane gasps and tenses and then Ilya bends to put his mouth around Shane when he comes, long and lovely and satisfying and not enough; not nearly, nearly enough — not for five weeks apart.

Now there's a hope at least that they'll get through dinner with Shane's parents without needing to fight back an erection, but it's worse, too: his body is waking up again, remembering what Shane's been trying to ignore since the last time they were together — and he wants.

Resting his forehead against Shane's shoulder, Ilya sighs, "I missed you," and lifts his face to let Shane kiss him, slow like they have all the time they could ever want for it.

"I missed you too." Shane presses his tongue to the roof of his mouth. He's going to walk into his parents' house with the taste of Ilya's come still lingering. He flushes. "We'll go to my cottage after dinner, it's only ten minutes from theirs, we'll sleep there."

"Mm. I do not get to fuck you in your childhood bedroom? Pictures of Scott Hunter on your wall?"

"Fuck you and no, I am not having sex in that house, I'd never be able to look my mom in the face again."

Ilya's smiling, and Shane reaches for his seatbelt so he can get them on the road before they end up stopping for long enough that it's obvious to his mom and dad that they didn't come straight from the airport.

As they cover the last couple of miles Ilya's knee starts to bounce and Shane rests his hand there; it stills.

"They're going to love you."

"I have never met anyone's parents before. Not," he waves a hand between the two of them, "like this."

"I know."

"They know it is me, yes? You have told them who I am?"

"Uh-huh. Sure."

"Shane."

"No, I did, I did! Right before I left for the airport." He can see the lights of the house up ahead and the gravel of the driveway is crunching under the car's tyres.

"What do you mean, 'right before'?"

Shane concentrates hard on the dash as he kills the engine and puts on the parking brake. "I mean, before. Before I left." The soft glow of the interior lights lets Shane see Ilya properly and he notices for the first time the Boston Raiders logo that takes up the entire front of Ilya's t-shirt. "Fucking hell, that's not going to help."

"What, they do not know I play for Boston?"

Shane rolls his eyes and gets out of the car, slamming his door on purpose loudly enough to make sure it'll be heard inside the house so that his parents won't be surprised when the front door opens. On the other side of the car Ilya is fetching an expensive looking gift bag out of the back seat which, when Shane peeks inside, he can see contains a glass bottle and a fancy bakery box.

"Ah, no," Ilya says, tugging the bag away from him, "not for you, I did not bring these all the way from Boston on the plane for you to have your hands on them first."

"You didn't have to bring gifts, I did tell you we don't really do presents so much, right?"

Ilya looks almost offended. "Shane, I am a guest at their house. I bring gifts."

Shane bumps a kiss against Ilya's cheek, and murmurs, "All right," and sees the light from the front windows flicker in a way that almost certainly means that they are being watched from between the curtains.

Taking Ilya's free hand in his own, Shane tugs him towards the door: he breathes in then out, squeezes Ilya's hand tight, then pushes the door open and steps inside. They take off their coats and step out of the entryway together. Shane's heart is pounding but he's not afraid; he has the most important people in his life all in one room and they all know who they each are to him. The two sides of his life are knitting together and the nerves he feels are, wonderfully, from hope.

His parents are standing next to each other in the middle of the room, all fixed smiles and awkward silence.

"Mom, dad," Shane begins, "this is Ilya."

There's a beat of slightly awkward silence before Ilya steps forward and says with a wobble of nerves in his voice, "Hello, Mr and Mrs Hollander, thank you for inviting me to your home."

Shane watches as he delivers his gits before Shane's mom or dad can gather themselves to decide how to reply; Shane can see his mom's flicker of surprise, touched and delighted, and her eyes are bright when she looks over to Shane as Ilya explains to his dad why the vodka he's bought him is a good one, that Shane had mentioned it's hard to find the quality stuff in Ottawa — which Shane had done, but ages ago in one of the times they'd lived that day and he has no idea how Ilya remembered such a small thing.

He tunes back into the conversation as his mom is starting to usher them through to the dining room; Ilya goes first, throwing a hopeful glance back over his shoulder and Shane knows in every cell of himself that he'll do anything to keep this; will put up with whatever he has to to protect it.

This is his family; the four of them.

*

It's December 28th when they leave Ottawa. Shane drops Ilya off at the airport before he drives himself back to Montreal and the sense that he can't breathe gets progressively greater as he starts to see signposts to Ottawa Macdonald-Cartier. Ilya gets out of the car with his coat buttoned up high and his toque pulled low and he squeezes Shane's hand so hard that Shane knows it's to try to make up for not being able to kiss him goodbye; not being allowed to hold him close before he leaves. He gets out of the car and takes his suitcase with him and Shane doesn't pull away until Ilya's disappeared from the view in his wing mirror, walking with his head down through the sliding doors towards departures.

They won't play each other in January and most likely the next time they'll have time to actually see each other will be at All Stars weekend — even if one of them doesn't get called up for it they'll find a way, an in — four days that they have to find some way to spend a part of together, they have to.

It's going to be the first weekend in February; five weeks and two days. Eight hundred and eighty-eight hours; fifty-three thousand, two hundred and eighty minutes — Shane's already worked it out and the clock in his head that'll tick down the time started turning again with the slam of his car door. This hadn't felt so insurmountable when they had been planning it out, naked and covered in each other in Montreal in a day that didn't want to end, on the back of months of time of being together.

There is a moment as he pulls out of the airport parking lot and back onto the road when Shane sees the next ten years of his life parcelled up and split out into blocks of hours and minutes, with tiny, glimmering slivers of it where he gets to see Ilya like cracks of light around the corners of a door. The time they had together that day, the unending roll of it — they aren't going to have anything like that again until hockey is over; not until Shane's knees finally give out and he has to hang up the number 24 for good: not for a decade, if he's lucky.

Maybe it's the universe laughing at him because they wished themselves into this; Shane thinks it would have been easier to slide from time that was rationed to them to time that was rationed to them but where they could be honest with each other. Instead Shane understands from living it what it is he wants, and what they have now is — is never going to be enough.

Almost every repetition of that day he'd thought it: no fucking consequences. He might have never been more wrong about anything.

Following the first signs toward Montreal, Shane tries to think of other things, anything to distract himself — but it doesn't work, and even though his mental arithmetic is unpractised and clumsy he can't stop himself from trying to work out in his head, as he drives, how many hours there are in ten years of waiting.

**

Ilya keeps his hand in his pocket, holding on to his phone as he walks. His knuckles still sting from the familiarly unpleasant crunch of them against Alexei's face, and the air, bitter cold, had numbed them as he'd crouched in the tunnel spilling his awful truthful insides to Shane where he sat five thousand miles away but with him, still and always. The pain of torn skin and bruising returns as his hands warm now, in his pockets, and Ilya pushes it away and walks.

He walks and he thinks about sitting in his car in Boston and making a wish: the first accidental, and the second purposeful.

Sitting in his car with his eyes screwed shut Ilya had wished to keep him.

He'd begged, and meant it; thought of Shane and asked with everything in him that he could summon, he'd wished: Let me keep him.

Now, as he trudges through slush on a Moscow pavement telling himself that he doesn't know where he's going even though he does, he wonders if what he'd actually wished for — to God or the universe or the man behind the curtain — was for his father to die.

If he goes where he's telling himself that he isn't, if he doesn't just turn round and go back to his apartment, then he'll be free of this place and these people: he'll never set foot on this soil again and he can block his brother's number and he can let the part of himself that is made terrible by this place that doesn't want him at all and these people that want too much of him be free, finally.

Then all that would be left of him are parts that he doesn't have to hide from Shane. He will be able to tell the love of his life that he loves him and know that he doesn't have to keep a shadowed corner of himself in reserve so that something in him can stay harsh and cold and bitter and able to deal with the demands that duty has placed on him.

His father is dead, and perhaps Ilya wished for it from a power that could answer and perhaps he didn't, but either way he wonders if it condemns him that he is relieved. He wonders what his mother would think of him to know that Ilya's first thought when Alexei had spat the news down the phone at him had been: Finally.

The ground under his feet turns from asphalt to dirt, wet and cold and hard under his shoes which are fine leather and will be ruined by the time he gets back to his apartment, and Ilya knows the way to go, remembers the rows and the turns.

There is still time to turn around and leave, but he knows that he won't. Whether Ilya wished for this freedom for himself or whether his father simply died because he was old and sick it does not matter: it is still freedom and Ilya has in his life now something that it is worth being free for.

It's drizzling when he stops. His mother's grave reflects his father's sense of propriety more than her own nature; her headstone elaborately carved and grandiose and something his father would have considered befitting a member of their family. Ilya would have done it differently, but he had been too young to be able to exert any influence on any of his father's decisions, even the ones about which he didn't particularly care.

Ilya does not believe that his mother's spirit lurks in this place. He is not always entirely sure whether he believes that her spirit lives on anywhere, but certainly not this piece of earth or its carved granite, its remains that she hadn't wanted to stay inside of anyway. He doesn't come here to see her or feel any closer to her; doesn't come here to speak to her because he can barely believe that she is here — but there is a calmness attached to being here; a recognition and a respect. There is something about having time alone in a place where no words are expected and no judgement is to be had and he can allow himself, in the undisturbed calm of this place, to turn a cautious light on the part of him that will always miss her and know that it will always hurt, but that only means that he remembers her, and loves her still.

This is the last time he will ever be here. He will need to find a new sanctuary where he can allow his thoughts of her to fully surface, perhaps, but —

He puts his fingers on the shape of her cross, through the fabric of his shirt. He closes his eyes and remembers the sound of her laugh and the warmth of her hands and the curl of her hair and knows that — there. There she is. When he opens his eyes all that's in front of him is dirt and stone and his mother — his mother will be coming with him, when he leaves.

It's deliberate on Ilya's part that he doesn't see his family again before he boards his plane home the next day, only says goodbye to Sveta and promises to text when he lands. With, hopefully, the exception only of his niece, he intends to never talk to any of them ever again.

There are no more words worth saying.

It would be better if he could have flown directly to Montreal and headed straight for Shane's place — he even would have had a reason for it, with the next game he's going to be on the ice for being away against Montreal, he could have excused it as convenience; less time in the airport — but Shane won't be home again for another two days, and Ilya doesn't want to rattle around by himself until then.

Ilya sleeps on the flight as much as he can and when his plane touches down in Boston he opens his eyes and he feels for the claws that bite into him every time he restores the distance, every time he's away from them all, and for the first time in his life they are gone.

It is the unavoidable truth of his father's illness that it would only ever end in a funeral; Ilya has spent years waiting for his father to die and he wonders at the lack of guilt he feels for the relief of it, that there's no more waiting.

They have no hold over him, any more. There is no more duty.

If he wants to be, he can be Shane's now; can whisper I'm yours just the way that Shane says it to him and know that there are no caveats and no reservations, no part of himself he needs to keep separate to look behind himself. He steps out of the airport and inhales as deeply as he can and feels like his body has more room in it for breath than it has in the last decade.

When Marly answers his front door unshaven and wearing a pair of pyjama pants and a t-shirt that's been washed enough times it has given up on black in favour of grey, Ilya considers that he should have called first, or at least checked the time — but he didn't do either of those things and it's too late now. Marly ushers him inside anyway with a backslapping hug and gruff condolences that Ilya waves away.

They don't talk as Marly makes coffee, until he shoves a mug across his kitchen counter to Ilya with a wordless grunt, and Ilya takes it and sips and says, "I'm going to ask him to marry me."

There's a little coughing sound from the other side of the kitchen island, and then Marly's mug clinks down onto the worktop.

"Woah. You're really — you're really at getting married with this guy?"

"Yes. I love him."

"Think he'll say yes?"

"Yes."

"Well then, I guess congratulations."

"Thank you."

It's exactly what Ilya needed to hear, and exactly why he hadn't told Sveta first. She would have looked at him in that way she has that makes him feel eleven years old and like he needs to quickly catalogue all the things he might have done wrong recently in case he needs to think up an alibi, and then Ilya would have been forced to drag his feelings out of himself in sentences, to explain why this isn't a knee-jerk reaction to everything that's happened in this last week even though it is, absolutely, because of it.

Even though he and Marly are friends there is a depth, a history that they don't have that makes that a sore spot that Marly can't poke at and so Ilya has a brief reprieve from having to lay himself bare.

"Guess I'll need to find myself a date for your wedding."

Ilya shakes his head, and even though it kills him that it's the truth he says, "No, we will get married. But there cannot be a wedding."

"Oh, shit, right, can you even do that in Russia?"

It takes Ilya a moment, but he remembers what he'd implied in the bar with St-Simon, that there was someone waiting for him in Russia; he's stuck to his intentions and never let the subject be brought up since however much he'd wanted to, so they must still think his obfuscation is truth. He shakes his head. "No, a man cannot marry another man in Russia, would get arrested for thinking it, probably. But that does not matter," it's barely closer to the truth, hardly narrows down anything at all to say, "he is not in Russia, he is here." Here is close enough; this land mass, this continent. Here doesn't imply anything about which side of a border they're talking about.

Marly frowns and starts to speak, then pulls a face with a grin at the end of it. "God-damn liar, Rozy."

"I never said he was Russian, that was you and Vicky."

"Whatever, man. Married in the USA then, yeah?"

Or Canada, Ilya does not say aloud. "Still cannot have a wedding. Too much, too public."

Marly's face falls. "Right. Sorry. Well, maybe I can meet him at least, some time?"

Ilya thinks that he might be able to talk Shane into that, with a little coaxing, with time and the depth of the promise that goes with a ring. "Maybe. I want to be able to be with him, Marly. Where people can see. I want everyone to know he is mine."

"One day, huh?"

"Right. One day."

**

The chances of Montreal making a playoff run this season are somewhere between slim and none, and Shane hurts for it for himself and feels vindictively happy that the others, the rest of the blue and white jerseys, are losing too. Every game he's played in months has felt like there are three teams on the ice: the opposition, Shane, and the rest of the Metros. It's been exhausting, and for as bitterly disappointed he is that his season's been ended by a broken collarbone he is equally as grimly satisfied that it'll soon be over for the other assholes that he shares a locker room with, too.

Shane's been trying to discourage Hayden from standing up for him too loudly — they don't both need to be in this mess — but for almost all the rest of them it's terrifying and horrible and so fucking disappointing what one single word has done to the team he'd thought had his back. One, single overheard 'him' that Shane has avoided repeating or talking about or acknowledging as hard as he can ever since and making it as good as a declaration by doing so; one word that didn't change how well he plays for them, and what he'd thought was solid at his foundations has become quicksand just because he won't take it back.

He misses Ilya's house and the long days there that meant nothing and everything all at the same time and just thinking about it makes him angry — makes him furious that the Metros want to hate him for something so wonderful.

An update to his and Ilya's plan has been brewing in the back of his mind for a while, and Shane thinks he's got the details lined up, now.

Ten years is eighty seven thousand, six hundred hours, give or take a couple of leap years; he's checked it on a calculator, has re-done the math a handful of times but he hasn't gotten it wrong.

He refuses to stay in this halfway house of misery and waiting for eighty seven thousand hours.

When Ilya arrives it's barely more than two hours after the Raiders' game against Ottawa ends, and so is early enough that he must have skipped doing any celebrating at all with his team and come straight here from the Centaurs' home ice. He lets himself inside with the code for the door and Shane can hear him kicking off his shoes, muttering under his breath in Russian as he takes off his coat and Shane has to close his eyes for a moment and let this feeling spread warm in him; this feeling like Ilya has come home to him.

Ilya makes it up the stairs before Shane makes it down them, and they meet in a smiling kiss halfway between the top of the stairs and the bedroom.

"You all packed?" Ilya asks, his eyes bright and excited.

"We're not leaving till tomorrow."

"But you are all packed, yes? I have sick bed all ready for you." He tugs featherlight on the strap of the sling that holds Shane's arm still. "I will be very good nurse."

"You will be playing hockey most of the time and I don't need looking after."

"Yuna sent me instructions. Is long, whole email of 'should not' and 'can not'. I think she wants to come too."

Shane rolls his eyes and huffs, not really annoyed. "I'm fine. Really."

Mouth turning down, Ilya's eyes pinch at the corners. "And I will make sure you stay that way, sweetheart."

It's going to be interesting, keeping Shane's presence in Ilya's house low-profile, but they've got a plan to keep Shane's things in the parts of the house where visitors wouldn't be likely to venture, and the secrecy will be worth it for the proximity; for the time.

When Shane falls to his knees, Ilya makes a wordless wanting sound, but pushes him away, "No, no, you're injured, you —"

Looking up at him, Shane snaps, "My mouth isn't fucking broken, Ilyusha," and he tugs down Ilya's sweats with the arm that still works and pauses to breathe him in, to anticipate, before he starts to suck him.

Fuck, if the Metros could see him now; that would at least give them something new to say to him, and — Ilya moans and he takes a handful of Shane's hair — maybe the assholes would even learn something.

"Shane, oh, fuck, I was going to fuck you, I —"

Shane makes a noise of assent and lets his mouth fall open; he stops moving. It takes Ilya a moment, but he understands and his eyes darken and, tugging at Shane's hair just how Shane likes until his eyes water, Ilya fucks him.

**

There is a bag packed and waiting by the end of the bed just as Ilya had suspected, missing only Shane's toothbrush that he'll add in the morning before they head out. Ilya has plans for the time Shane will be with him recuperating in Boston, but they are mostly wishful little scraps: seeing Shane's clothes in the empty dresser drawers that are waiting for his things and coming home late at night from a game and crawling into a bed that already has Shane in it.

He does that now, hair still damp on the ends from his shower and dripping cold onto his shoulders but getting into a bed that already has Shane waiting in it for him, sitting upright and scrolling on his phone. He looks serious, a little furrow in between his eyebrows, and it gives Ilya pause.

"Hayden says hi."

Ilya's eyebrows rise. "He does?"

"Say hi to Lily from me," Shane recites, reading from his phone, "and tell him I still promise to be cool about everything if I can come visit."

Ilya leans his bare shoulder against Shane's. "Maybe we should invite him. Make him keep his promise and be cool when he works out whose house he is in."

Shane hums an absentminded agreement and Ilya knows that that's not the only thing that's cycling through Shane's busy, busy mind.

"Everything all right?" Ilya asks, and Shane gives him back a shrug, one that's meant to be casual but it isn't; there's tension around Shane's shoulders that Ilya's only just gotten finished fucking away. He drops his phone into his lap. "Mm, yes. No. There's been some rumours."

"What kind of rumours — about you, more of the shit they say about you?"

"No, not like that, not really." He stops, and Ilya can see his thoughts gathering, lining themselves up in his mind. His Shane has been plotting. "There's talk about trades, now that we're heading out of the playoffs. Only rumours and management's not confirming anything, but the gossip still spreads, you know how it goes."

"Changing up defense? It is still shit."

"No. I heard they want Michelson. From San Francisco, you know him?"

"He is a centre."

"Yeah."

"Something wrong with Miller?"

"Nope, our second line's strong, they're gelling really well this season."

"Michelson's good. Too good on offence for third line."

"He is."

It's in what Shane's not saying, though, because if Michelson's not intended for second or third line then that could only mean —

"Shane, no. They would not. They cannot, you have no-trade clause and you are too expensive to bench."

"They all think I'm a distraction. Hayden tries, and JJ too, you know, to get the others not to say stuff. But there's only the two of them."

"Fucking idiot players can think what they like, they don't —"

"It's not just the team, ok, Theriault said it. Said I'm distracting the team from the game, told me I need to stop flaunting my personal shit and let the guys concentrate on hockey. Ilya, I can't go to San Francisco. I can't."

"Then you don't. Shane, it'll be ok, you —"

"I know, I know that, I talked to Farah about what they can do without my agreement and it's not much, but —" he kneels up in bed and turns around so that he can look Ilya in the eyes properly, and Ilya realises that Shane's building to a point; he's put together his foundations and is layering up his argument. "What if I don't leave it up to them?"

"What do you mean?"

"I could try to stick it out at Montreal. I never thought I'd leave them, I thought I'd retire there, you know that, but if I do stay then I," he puts his hand on Ilya's face, presses his thumb against Ilya's lips and strokes fingertips against his cheekbones. Ilya flushes hot and his stomach swoops and he feels so very, impossibly, loved. "I don't want to wait until I retire for time with you again. It might all just blow over with the team if I don't say anything else about it," Shane looks unconvinced, though, and they both know that hatred isn't something that gets so easily forgotten, "it might all be better next season but it might just get worse and — and why would I fight so hard to stay somewhere that you aren't?"

Shane moves in closer still, so that they're breathing the same air. "What if — they want rid of me right now, no team's ever had an openly gay player and they really don't want to be the first one, so I think they want me gone more than they want me around. So what if I let them do it?" He takes a deep breath, and Ilya feels like Shane's reaching whatever point he's building towards. "What if I said I'd waive my no trade clause, but — only if they find a way to send me to Boston."

Ilya can't breathe, for a moment. "What are you talking about?"

"Anderson's retiring, right?"

Ilya nods. "They are trying to talk him into extending for another year but he does not want to. His shoulder is nearly fucked and his family is in California, he is sad his children do not remember what he looks like."

"Right, so you're going to need a new centre on your second line. What if we can make Montreal put me there?"

"Shane, hold on."

"I know I wouldn't have the C and there would be a whole load of things to work out, but I think they'd go for it; people are still talking about how we played at All Stars, I think Boston would want us for that if they could. And we'd see each other, Ilya. Every day. Even if we couldn't be out, we'd still see each other just like before. We'd play together, be on the road together, maybe could live together more than we don't."

"Sweetheart —"

"And you can't say we wouldn't play some fucking amazing hockey, you think anyone could beat us for the Cup, you and me on the same team?"

"Shane, любимый —"

"Ilya, just hear me out, ok, I've thought about this, I —"

"Marry me."

The words find their way out of him not entirely with his say-so; they've been waiting in his throat for too long and wouldn't go unsaid another second. It's the disappearance of his fledgling plans — the slow build up with compliments and sweet words and romance like Shane deserves — but maybe what matters is that he's said it; that hearing Shane try to fit their future together like a jigsaw puzzle there was no way to not add that piece into it, to put right at the heart of it.

Shane's mouth is moving but it's a few seconds before he makes any words, landing in the end on a hissed out, "What?" like Ilya's said something unfathomable.

"Marry me," Ilya says again, and he puts his hands on Shane's face, kisses his mouth and his forehead and his freckles. "I am not just asking because of this. You've been thinking, planning, yes, but I have been thinking too, and I have been thinking that I want to marry you."

"You fucker," Shane chokes out. His eyes are starting to fill. "I was going to tell you that I never want to live away from you again, I was going to convince you we can make Boston work and, and —" He laughs, sudden and loud and says, "You had to fucking go one better, didn't you?"

"Does that mean you are saying yes? You did not answer yet, and —"

"Yes. Fuck you, yes."

Shane climbs into his lap, then, scrambles over him and kisses his eyelids and his cheeks and his mouth, deep and determined; possessive. Ilya's heart rolls out its waves of devotion until Ilya feels that he's shaking with it and he grips Shane's hips bruise-tight and then holds harder.

Shane is muttering little I love yous against him, and Ilya feels hotness in his eyes that means he might be going to cry.

"I have rings," Ilya tells him, at length. "But I was going to do this properly in Boston, so the rings are in Boston."

"You romantic shit, I can't believe you." Shane's eyes are bright; happy. Ilya only ever wants to see him happy.

"I know we cannot have big wedding, but one day, yes? And until then I do not want to wait, we can go to — what is name of place, here, to do legal part?"

"City Hall. We can do it in Canada where it won't be public record, we can go to Ottawa to City Hall and get married at seven in the morning on a fucking Tuesday when no one else is there but us, I don't care, Ilya, let's not waste any more time."

"No time with you is wasted, милый."

All of Shane's body is softened against him, his strapped arm trapped between them. Shane puts his forehead to Ilya's, his eyes wide open. "And I'll call Farah. I'll tell her to start talking to whoever she needs to."

"You are sure?"

"Never more."

**

Marly can see it: the ring on the chain around Ilya's neck. Ilya can see him looking at it and wanting to ask like the insatiable gossip that he denies that he is, but Ilya just tucks it inside his shirt and carries on kitting up.

He feels like he has it written on his face, like anyone who looks at him would know that there's a watermarked certificate in a drawer in his house with his and Shane's names written on it, one next to each other. He wonders if Shane feels the same, even though he wouldn't be able to risk even a ring on a chain round his neck in that locker room in case someone sees it and asks — it would be only something he would have to try to talk around, being too close to the thing that almost everyone there hates him for because even though he won't say it again he won't deny it.

Even though he knows that he can't, Ilya wants to scream it from rooftops — even though when he told Svetlana he had convinced Shane to be the one to say the words because she was less likely to shout at him — Ilya wishes he could tell Marly, satisfy the curiosity that is clearly bubbling over with his every blatant glance to his left.

Maybe one day, they will. If Shane's plan works, perhaps one day he could love Shane out loud, where people could see.

Shane's still staying with him in Boston, until the Raiders either get kicked out of the playoffs or win them, and then they plan to go to Shane's cottage for the summer so Shane hasn't needed to hide his ring away, has been wearing his ring on his finger — on his right hand, because Shane is at least a little Russian by marriage, now, and Ilya loves that he wants to wear it there like Ilya will himself one day.

There is something new and dark and luxurious that stretches in Ilya, that rolls over and shows its belly when he looks at Shane's hands on his own skin, with Ilya's ring settled firm there.

Thinking about it makes him smile and he ducks his head and tries to control his face, but Marly finally gives up his disinterested pretence and comes to stand next to him, bumps their shoulders together.

"Jesus fucking christ, Roz." Ilya glances over; Marly is grinning at him. "It was a 'yes', then?"

Ilya digs his teeth hard into his bottom lip but his smile escapes anyway.

"It was a yes."

**

Watching Ilya get shoved into the boards by Scott Hunter, Shane winces in sympathy even though it's a replay and he watched it happen live hours ago, saw the Raiders lose the game and their playoff hopes with it. Ilya hadn't wanted to admit that their playoff run was crumbling, but the inkblot bruises that were spread across his ribs had warned of a different story and although Shane knows that he'll be welcoming Ilya home defeated and disappointed he thinks, perhaps, that he won't be surprised. Shane's sling comes off next week and if nothing else it feels like it's his turn to play at nursemaid, for a while.

He spins his wedding ring on his finger and flips over his phone so that he can see the screen because it's been fifteen minutes since he last checked it and that's how long he's told himself he needs to wait to be reasonable about it, to not count as obsessing. There's still nothing more recent than his texts with Hayden from an hour ago.

Farah had told him to expect this. She'd warned him that Boston weren't going to make any formal moves until their playoff run was over one way or another, and he knows he's being a moron if he thinks he's going to be their priority less than — he checks his watch — four hours after they were eliminated.

He texts Hayden instead. He's got ground to make up, there, in apology for only telling him about the wedding in retrospective and even then not filling in the critical detail of the name of the other groom. They'll have to own up to everything over the summer but in an ideal world Shane wants an answer from Boston first, then he can excise all of his remaining secrets in one clean cut.

Meal prep chicken and rice is easy enough to heat up in the microwave without needing both arms functioning to do it, and he eats standing up in the kitchen. The Raiders usually go out after a loss, commiserate together in a way that Shane never really does with Montreal; when they lose they drift away from each other after, go their separate ways. It had never felt strange to him until he'd compared to Ilya's team, to how they rally around. Shane thinks, perhaps, that he might like their way better.

They're all exhausted this time, though; battered and run down and so instead, they're coming home. Shane's tracking the status of Ilya's inbound flight on his phone — but only every fifteen minutes.

He drops back down onto his couch and calls himself an idiot even as he checks for messages again knowing that there'll be nothing. He's being stupid; he'll hear in time, one way or the other.

It's becoming too much to ask to sit still, his knee bouncing without his say-so as he watches the postgame show, the discussion around the Admiral's chances in the finals against the Missions, and he's wound tight enough that when his tablet starts to chime he physically jumps. He recognises the sound though: incoming conference call request. Usually Farah just calls his phone, this means — something.

Shane picks his tablet up off the coffee table and turns off the TV. He moves to the dining table so that all that's behind him is white wall, nothing to give away where he is, and he slides his finger across the screen to accept the video call.

"Hi, Farah."

She's always down to business with him and he appreciates that, skips cheerfully past pleasantries to the point although this time he wishes she would slow down, let him live in limbo for a little longer just in case — but she doesn't, only moves their conversation swiftly along.

"You're familiar with Marcus LeClaire and Terry Margetts?"

Shane's mouth is suddenly dry. "Boston's head coach and GM."

"Yes. They want to talk to you. Now, they're waiting for me to add them in to this call."

"They want to talk to me?"

"Yes. You personally and directly, they were not interested in my assurances that they could communicate through me."

This is it, then. His answer. He nods. "Ok. Ok, sure, put them on."

Shane wishes he could have practised this. Wishes he could have had a hundred days over to have this conversation every way it could possibly go so that when it came to the one that counted, the one he's going to keep, he could put all the right words together. His palms are sweating and he rubs them on the legs of his pants. He's had important conversations before; life-changing ones; he can handle this just like he did those, even with no do-overs.

As Farah smiles professionally and thanks the two men for their time, Shane knows that this is his chance to change his mind. This is where he could tell the Boston GM that he doesn't want to play for the Raiders and it's all a misunderstanding; he's going to stick out Montreal and their hateful, fractured locker room but at least know that he's loyal; be who his mother raised him to be.

He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. He is who his mother raised him to be; he is loyal.

He's loyal to the man who deserves it.

It's the GM that talks; Shane's never spoken to him before although he's seen his face, heard him talk in interviews. He's wearing a dress shirt but no suit jacket, his collar unbuttoned and loosened; LeClaire is sitting next to him still in his clothes from rinkside. Ilya's plane will have only just landed, so they must still be in New York.

Margetts leans forward, clasps his hands in front of him on the table they are both sitting behind of. "First off, thank you for meeting with us, Hollander. I don't mean to ambush you but we're working on a bit of a tight schedule on our end. I'm sorry to jump into the middle of your day, but time is key with these things and we don't want to waste any."

"Sure, I mean. That's fine, what, uh. What is it you want to discuss?" That's stupid, Shane thinks; dumb. They all know what they're here to talk about.

"I received an interesting call a few days ago, from the Metros' management team. They're looking to set up a trade, probably a three-way, and the only part about it that seems to be non-negotiable is that they want me to take you off their hands. I've gotta be honest with you — I laughed at them. I thought it was a joke, but they only beat your agent to the punch by about a half an hour, and she was asking the same question. Having discussed with both parties I understand you've put in this request specifically. Not just to be traded but to be traded to Boston. Is that right?"

Shane nods, gives the answer he's rehearsed in hope of this conversation. "I've heard that you have players retiring this season. You need to maintain your strength in offense."

"That's as maybe, but colour me confused why you want that to be you. Let me be clear, Hollander, if this were even six months ago we wouldn't be having this conversation. I would have hung up and laughed myself sick that I'd even been asked the question — but that would be before I saw how you and our boy Rozanov played together at All Stars. Wherever it comes from I do not know but there's chemistry there that you can't learn and you can't train in; you either have it or you don't and you two do. That's the sort of performance on a line that hockey coaches have wet dreams over, Hollander." Shane pushes down a fizz of satisfaction at the words, the potential that he'd known that Boston would see and want to replicate. "But. You're the Metros' franchise player. I don't understand why they want to trade you and I don't understand why you'd pick here if you wanted to jump ship. So, I have some questions for you, Hollander, and I'd ask you for your honesty; do I have it?"

"Of course, sir."

"Why does the Metros' star centre want to give up the C on his jersey and defect to his biggest rival?"

"I want to play hockey, sir."

"You can't play hockey in Montreal?"

"Not the kind of hockey I played with Rozanov in February. I think that was some of the best I've played in my life."

"You think you could get on with Rozanov like that? Not just for shits and giggles for a weekend no one takes seriously; you'd have to get on, you'd have to be willing to make him your team."

Make him your team. Shane swallows down a lump in his throat and, outside of the view of the camera, spins his wedding ring. He thinks that Ilya's more his team than anyone else he's ever met; than any other team he's ever had.

"That wouldn't be a problem."

"You didn't have to think very hard about that."

"Me and Rozanov, sir, we get on fine. The rivalry's always been more the league than the two of us."

There's a glance that passes between the two men and Shane doesn't know what it means, but LeClaire nods and Margetts continues. "I see. And that's it? Good hockey?"

Shane breathes in; out. Him and Ilya have talked about this, they've practised. "There is a — personal element, sir. There's — someone. In Boston."

Margetts' eyebrows rise. "Is that so?"

"Yes, sir, I'm, uh," he hesitates; it's a white lie, just a little one, "I'm getting married. To someone who lives in Boston." He hopes they understand what he means; that this isn't a whim or a half-thought out notion that he's going to change his mind about in six months. Eyebrows raise on the other side of the call and the two men lean in to talk to each other, outside the hearing of their microphone. It's only for a few seconds, and Shane's eyes flicker to Farah's image, but she gives away nothing, remains quiet and watchful. This isn't news to her.

"Next question, then," Margetts carries on, "Will you tell me why the Metros want rid of you so badly they're willing to trade the man who's won them two Cups for — well, the exact the details are still being worked on, but you're not as expensive as you ought to be."

"I've been told that, sir. I didn't want to take up too much of the cap. We needed to build out defense and get a better backup goaltender."

LeClaire huffs a quiet laugh, but Shane means it; he had this argument at length with Farah when she was negotiating for his contract. It had always been about the team — the one that doesn't want him any more.

"Even so, the deal on the table is for a hell of a lot less than I would need to consider losing Rozanov, so it seems like they really want you gone." Shane works to keep his face blank. It's not like this is news to him. "Which you don't look surprised about." Shane keeps quiet, and Margetts sighs.

"I'm guessing that given we're even having this conversation, whatever it is must be causing you as big a problem as it is them — but for something like that to come up now, after how long you've been with them, I am extremely curious about what that might be. Metros' management isn't talking specifics and I would be cautious about taking an unknown quantity like that into my locker room. So; what say you?"

Shane swallows; his throat clicks. All of his practised answers have fallen out of his head with the words cautious and unknown quantity in my locker room solidly taking their place. They make him sound such a risk.

"We've have some differences of opinion, sir, around culture in the locker room. I'm hopeful I'll see more eye to eye with Boston on how a team should work together." It's weak, meaningless words that ask far more questions than they answer, and big ones. He wants to do this conversation over again from the start.

LeClaire leans forward, then, his hands clasped together on the table in front of him and Margetts leans back, lets him take the conversation. "Look, Hollander — people talk. Players talk. Some of my guys, they have friends in Montreal and I've heard —" he shrugs one shoulder, "some chatter. The kind of thing you never know whether it's true, but just in case it matters: if it is true, I do not give a single fuck, not if you're going to play for us like you did at All Stars, and any of my players who have something to say about it can say it to me."

Shane tries to keep his face bland, to not let his expression change. The freezing shock of fear that this thing about him is being so widely talked about, that it's spread this far, that it could have ruined this for him, crashes against the flood of gratitude that it doesn't seem to have made a difference at all and he has to try to speak once, twice, before he manages it. He's still sure that even though he tries to stop how he feels from making its way into his voice and betraying anything, the length of his silence as it stretches probably gives away more than enough.

"Like I said, sir. I just want to play hockey."

LeClaire leans back again, and there's another little collection of glances that passes between him and the GM, the shorthand of men who have worked together for years and know what the other's likely thinking.

Margetts sighs and offers up a rueful smile. "See, now I've got myself a conundrum. I can work out a trade that'll get my team the sort of starting line that might just be the best the league's seen in a decade — longer, even. And for that I have to convince the fans to accept — Shane Hollander. You know they burn effigies of you outside the rink when we play Montreal at home?"

Shane's pulse races; that sounds awfully like something's been decided. "I've heard that, sir."

Margetts nods slowly and LeClaire folds his arms across his chest. "All right. That's all we've got. You have yourself a good evening."

He tells them goodbye, and Farah too with her promises to be in touch as soon as she knows anything, and he sits at the dining table in the house in Boston that's starting to feel more like their house than just Ilya's, that felt like it was partway his to share the moment he set foot back in the place. While he'd been talking a message had arrived from Ilya to let him know that he's on his way in from the airport and so Shane waits. He puts the TV back on and only manages to put up with its intrusion into his head for ten or fifteen minutes before he turns it off again.

There's a sense of horror, of what have I done that turns over in a lazy spiral showing its beautiful other side that feels like I've done it.

When Ilya finally comes through the front door Shane is standing in the middle of the kitchen clutching his phone in one hand and a ginger ale in the other in an effort to calm himself down with familiar things, and it both helps and doesn't when he hears the slam of the door, sounds of shoes and bags hitting the floor and then Ilya's arms around his waist. Ilya's head thuds to Shane's shoulder and he makes a sleepy, not-English muttering against his collarbone.

Shane has just opened his mouth to speak when Ilya's phone starts to ring, and Shane stills.

"Ignore it," Ilya tells him, "Is LeClaire. He has been trying to call me for half an hour, he can wait."

Shane shakes his head and says, softly, "You should take it."

"No no, he can wait, I need you to —"

"Ilya. Take the call."

Ilya lifts his head then to look at him, and whatever he sees changes his mind. He takes his phone out of his pocket and answers the call; puts it on speaker and holds it between them. Shane recognises the voice coming tinny through the speaker and he daren't meet Ilya's eyes unless he gives something away, gives a reason to hope when nothing is certain, yet.

"Don't worry, I'll be quick, I know you're off the clock," LeClaire says, "Let's say that hypothetically — uh, that is, let's pretend that you were to play on a line with Shane Hollander. Like you did at All Stars this year."

Shane can see Ilya looking at him, but he doesn't look back, not yet. "Shane Hollander?"

"Mm-hmm. That hypothetically — uh, in theory — you were to end up on the same team as him again. Do you think you could work with him?"

Ilya's breath catches. "Hollander plays excellent hockey. We played excellent hockey together, we could again."

"That's not what I mean. Teamwork, Rozanov. Could you have him on your team?"

Shane can see Ilya's mind working; his eyes are firm on Shane's face even though Shane won't look back at him; he's almost glaring.

"Hollander is good guy. Boring person. Good player, he would make the team better. We got along fine at All Stars, if we play together again I make sure we would get along again."

There's the sound of a sigh, heaved. "All right. Might be you'll be hearing some news in a few days. Keep this conversation to yourself until then, you hear?"

"Yes, coach."

"That's it, then. Get some rest this summer, next season might be interesting."

He hangs up. Ilya looks at his phone, and Shane. He looks exhausted; under his eyes is bluish and he needs sleep and food and probably his ribs need re-taping, but he's starting to grin, too.

"Was that what I think it was?"

Shane lets himself meet Ilya's eyes; lets himself feel the very first fringes of excitement. "I think maybe it was. What do you think, will I look good in black and gold?"

**

It becomes obvious that the Admirals are going to take the cup before the third period even gets going; they're already up by one and it looks like no one's told Scott Hunter that he's down to his last few shifts because he's playing like someone is going to have to forcibly remove him from the ice to get him off of it. Not that Ilya doesn't understand the state of mind, the urgency, the knowledge that he will not let this get away from him, how it takes over when you're so close you can taste it, how there's nothing else that your eyes can see or your body can feel. Hunter's going to push to the absolute last second, even after he makes sure there's only one way this is going to end when he makes an assist on another goal with eight minutes of regular time still to play, bringing the Admirals to 4-2 up.

They watch until the final buzzer, Ilya's head rested back against Shane's chest where they're lying together on Ilya's couch. Stacked under the TV is a pair of carefully labelled boxes; most of Shane's belongings are already unpacked, here into Ilya's house that's becoming theirs, with just a few things still boxed up to be taken to Shane's apartment when he finds one, so that he has somewhere convincing for show when he needs it.

But that's not for now. They'll deal with all that when they come back from Ottawa, from the cottage; there is so much for them to still work out about how this is going to work, but lying on this couch watching hockey with his husband Ilya feels like it's that day again, like they've managed to reinstate their perfect repetition only this time they have the best of all their options: they have time — and they have their life.

It's seeping into his bones, gloriously, love and surety and permanence that fills him up from the inside; makes him feel weightless.

"I can't believe my mom was right," Shane mumbles against the top of his head.

"You can't?"

"Come on, she said it was going to be the Admirals weeks ago, no way she could have known."

"Yuna knows things," Ilya offers, matter of fact, and Shane makes some more incomprehensible grumbling words but leaves it there, probably because he knows that Ilya is as right as Yuna is.

Once the Admirals have been declared victorious and the cup is being set up on the ice for its presentation, Shane pushes at Ilya's shoulders until he shifts off him, turns them over and bullies Ilya onto his back so that Shane can straddle him with a pleased wriggle. Shane is wearing shorts in deference to the summer heat, but they're the ones that he wouldn't ever wear outside the house because they ride too high to be what Shane would consider to be decent and Ilya greatly appreciates the way they strain against the muscles of Shane's thighs as he settles himself across Ilya's hips. On the TV, Scott Hunter is lifting the cup.

"That'll be us next year," Shane tells him with absolute certainty.

"We will be unbeatable." Ilya agrees, and Shane hums happily against Ilya's mouth, so Ilya kisses him. "We should do three."

"Three?"

"Yes, aim for three. In a row, three cups. One better than Montreal."

"Aiming high, huh?"

"What is the point in aiming low, hm?"

Shane's smile turns wicked, and he glances down at Ilya's crotch. "You don't want me to aim low?"

Ilya grins at the terrible, terrible innuendo, and is deciding between telling Shane he loves him and suggesting exactly how low Shane can aim, when he's distracted back to the TV, where —

"Is," Shane starts, stops and tries again, "Ilyusha, is Scott Hunter kissing a man on centre ice?"

"Yes, I am seeing that too."

"Scott Hunter's gay?"

"Gay enough, apparently."

Ilya tunes back into the commentary, hears words like good for Scott Hunter and big day for the MLH and feels it leak into him, warm and somehow welcome as he accommodates the knowledge that he and Shane aren't alone, that the future they're planning for themselves might be brighter than they had even thought to hope for. He is distracted back to Shane above him as Shane ducks his head to use his teeth to pick up Ilya's wedding ring where it lives on the chain around his neck, resting between his collarbones. He tugs it on its chain, tongues it and lets it go and Ilya welcomes his mouth in a distracted kiss.

"Scott Hunter just came out on live TV," Shane tells him, halfway to awestruck.

Ilya nods. "Yes, it looks to be so."

Glancing back to the screen, Ilya can see Hunter and his man are still kissing, the cameras circling him. They are smiling so brightly, the mayhem around them not distracting them away from each other, and Ilya finds himself smiling for them even as his heart pounds for the implications: the possibilities. He does notice, though, as the cameras circle, that neither of them wears anything that could be mistaken for a wedding ring.

Ilya realises he is watching Scott Hunter — of all people — make out with a man on TV, and he looks away and slides his hands up his husband's thighs until his fingers slip inside the hems of those indecent shorts. He looks up at Shane who is still watching the TV with his mouth dropped open in shock, looking at Scott Hunter and his dramatics, at his splashy public declaration. Ilya rolls his eyes.

"Fucking show off."

Chapter End Notes

Two things that were really important to me in how this wrapped up: first, that Shane got the chance to choose Ilya. I believe he would have in canon but them ending up on the same team in the same city when and how they did was all largely circumstance arising from their outing being forced. I wanted Shane to look at what they had together in their repeating day and what they have apart and what they could have and decide to force circumstances to bend to them. I feel that Ilya seeing Shane do this deliberately is as significant to them as Shane realising that he wants to.

Second: Obviously Scott and Kip were massively influential in Shane and Ilya’s timeline in canon, but with how everything fell here it mattered far less to Ilya’s arc. He didn’t need Scott to give him the push to see where he could get to with Shane, they found their ‘I love you’s in the loop and worked out the rest around it — so I really wanted Ilya to look at Scott making his big gay statement and have Shane already locked the fuck down. I envision one day in the near-ish future Ilya talking to Scott about it and saying, “Yes, very flashy, making out with your smoothie boyfriend on TV, did I mention I have been married to a man since before you made very impulsive public kissing decision, hm?”

ANYWAY, that’s a wrap. Ultimately there was so much I feel I could have included in this and didn't because it would have fucked with the pacing, so I am still pondering some missing scene add-ons. Drop it in a comment if there’s anything you think would be cool to see! Thank you so, SO much to all your kudos and comments, I promise I have read every one and have loved reading them as we've gone along. These two have basically become my whole personality these last few months so I have something else cooking for them in which I expect to be layering on the angst with a shovel, so that'll be fun times if you like that sort of thing.

tumblr <3