Rating:

General Audiences

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandom:

Heated Rivalry (TV)

Relationships:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov, Shane Hollander & Ilya Rozanov & Svetlana Vetrova

Characters:

Shane Hollander, Ilya Rozanov, Svetlana Vetrova

Additional Tags:

Childhood Friends, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Sharing Culture, Good Friend Svetlana Vetrova, POV Svetlana Vetrova, References to Tea Sins, Beginnings

Language:

English

Stats:

Published: 2026-05-10 Words: 4,201 Chapters: 1/1

Food, Language, and Complaints About American Tea

Summary

From his first nervous smile, Shane started tearing down Svetlana's understanding of who he was beyond hockey. Within moments, she made up her mind to build a friendship with Ilya's other favorite person. Fortunately, he was just as determined meet her halfway.

Welcome to the beginning of a friendship built on two people's love for Ilya and a desire to see him happy.

Notes

Nervous was not a word Svetlana would normally associate with Shane Hollander, but, as he stood, too straight and still in Ilya’s kitchen, it was the first one that came to mind. Her heart softened immediately. She had driven to Ilya’s house that night, braced to protect her friend from the man that held his tender heart.

Ilya bounced on his toes as he glanced between them, his eyes bright. He grinned as he introduced his two favorite people to each other, but there was a manic shiver underneath it. He met her eyes, full of trust, and her heart melted the rest of the way.

As Shane held out his hand, smiling tensely with his shoulders tight, Svetlana let go of her prepared speech. Ilya didn’t need her to defend him; he needed her to accept his choice.

Svetlana smiled. She stepped past Shane’s extended hand and wrapped her arms around him in a firm hug. He froze against her, but she still kissed his cheek. “I’m glad to finally meet you, Jane.”

Shane took a breath and held it. Then, just as she was shifting her weight to release him, he settled his hand on her back. His grip was gentle and very proper, reminding Svetlana of celebrities at public photo ops.

Ilya laughed, spontaneous joy bursting out of him, and his familiar warmth settled against her back. He hugged Shane around her, kissing him on the opposite cheek.

“You’re going to crush her,” Shane protested, laughing.

“I am stronger than I look,” Svetlana assured him. She leaned into him as his hand shifted from her back to Ilya’s hip. When she dropped her head onto one of Shane’s shoulders, Ilya mirrored her pose.

Shane shifted his feet, bracing to support their combined weight. He was warm and smelled nice, his cologne and Ilya’s complementing each other pleasantly. Ilya slumped even further into the hug, and Shane grunted.

“You’re heavy,” he complained, but he didn’t try to break away.

The heat from two athletic bodies built up quickly, and Svetlana could feel her curls wilting against her neck. She elbowed Ilya in the ribs, avoiding the side that Shane had hit during their game that afternoon.

“Get off me, Ilyusha. You’re wrinkling my dress.” He shifted obediently, though not without pecking a kiss to Shane’s jaw.

Shane frowned, and Svetlana held her breath. He pursed his lips and tilted his head. “Why don’t they make women’s clothes out of wrinkle free fabric? Or just make everything out of it really?”

She laughed, delighted at the question. “Probably for the same reason they can’t design well fitting jeans with pockets that can hold a phone.”

“Ugh, tell me about it.” Shane rolled his eyes, leaning back against the counter. “I have two pairs of jeans that I got from a brand deal, and the pockets are worthless. They’re so tight that I can’t wedge my phone in any of them. I complained about it to Rose, but she had no sympathy.”

Ilya dragged his eyes down Shane’s torso and stared intently at his thighs. “You should send me a picture of you in these jeans. Is the problem the front pockets or the back ones?” He licked his lips.

Svetlana slapped him on the arm, rolling her eyes. “Do you have any wine? I refuse to put up with your flirting without alcohol.”

Shane flushed and looked down at his feet. His shoulders curled toward his chest, and Ilya narrowed his eyes at her. She shrugged one shoulder and turned toward the refrigerator, hiding a frown at her misstep.

“I’ve read that you don’t drink during the season, Shane. Is that just on days that you play?” She opened the cabinet where Ilya kept his nice glasses and took down one for herself. “I’m sure your boyfriend has something without alcohol that you can drink if you prefer.”

“I’ll have a glass of wine, thanks.” He smiled at her as Ilya slid his arms around Shane’s waist. Shane took a few deep slow breaths as he relaxed against Ilya’s chest. Ilya leaned in and pressed their cheeks together, closing his eyes in contentment.

She opened the bottle of wine that she found in the back of the refrigerator, a nice one that she had noticed last time she visited. “I was surprised to see this in your kitchen, Ilya. Am I stealing something you planned to use for a date night?”

Shane chuckled, “I bought too much last month.” He turned his head to Ilya, and their eyes caught, soft and sweet. “It’s what my dad always buys to serve with chicken parmesan, and I wanted to make Ilya something nice for dinner.”

“You cook?”

He shrugged. “I can follow a recipe.”

“That is a good skill to have.” She swallowed a laugh as she remembered some of her and Ilya’s kitchen misadventures as children. “I’m afraid I get creative and then have to order take out when it tastes bad.”

Ilya locked eyes with her and chuckled. “I remember when we couldn’t agree on how to make the grenki for your mama’s birthday.” He pressed a kiss to Shane’s temple. “Grenki is like French toast, but it is not always sweet.”

“What happened?”

“Oh, so many things went wrong!” She tossed her head back and grinned. “First, we used condensed milk instead of ordinary milk.”

“Gross.” Shane wrinkled his nose.

“We thought it would taste better,” Ilya defended. Shane leaned into him, a smile flirting with his lips.

“Then, Ilya added too much sugar to the milk and eggs and left the bread to soak.” She shook her head, leaning against the counter to sip her wine. “So, I decided to start poaching eggs for a topping, because I knew my mother preferred that to jam. But I wanted to eat soon, so I cracked all the eggs and added them into the pot… without boiling the water first!”

Ilya’s eyes danced and he swung one arm out wide. “I went over to see what was wrong, and we started arguing about whether we should try to take the eggs out of the water or just turn the heat all the way up.”

“Jesus fucking Christ.” Shane laughed, dropping his head back onto Ilya’s shoulder. “How did you think you were going to get raw eggs out of a pot of water?” His head rocked forward when Ilya shrugged.

“We tried using a spoon, but they kept sliding off. The one time I got a yolk on the spoon, Ilya tried to help and broke it.” Since Ilya was still cuddling his boyfriend, she took the initiative and poured Shane his glass of wine. “By that point, the pan for the grenki was smoking and the bread had dissolved into soup. So, we had the brilliant idea to add the rest of the bread and pour the whole bowl into the pan.”

“Oh, no, please tell me you didn’t!” Shane frowned, pursing his lips in thought. “Isn’t condensed milk what you use to make caramel sauce?”

“I don’t know,” Ilya replied. “But that would explain why the mess smelled good for a few seconds before it began to bubble and burn.”

“Only a few seconds!” Svetlana shook her head. “Have you ever smelled burned sugar, Shane?”

“Unfortunately.” He shifted in Ilya’s arms to sip his wine. “My grandmother used to make sugar cookies for us to decorate at Christmas. One year, my cousins and I tried to help. I misread the recipe and turned the oven up too high.” He glanced at Ilya through his lashes. “That’s when Mom figured out that I needed glasses.”

“Hmm… lucky for me.” He stared into Shane’s eyes and licked his lips. Svetlana wanted to make a joke about his libido, but she wasn’t sure how Shane would take it.

Ilya’s phone began to ring, vibrating against the counter. He sniffed and scowled at it as Marly’s name appeared on the screen. He stepped away from Shane and snatched up the offensive device. “What?” he demanded, curtly. He listened for a moment, glowering. “Jojo is where?”

Shane and Svetlana met each other’s eyes. Jojo had just come up from the farm team, young for a rookie, though not as young as Ilya and Shane had been. If the alternate captain was calling about him during a three-day break, there was an urgent reason.

“Fuck, stupid kid,” Ilya swore as though he had never been a stupid kid himself. Svetlana had hours of stories that said otherwise. “And you’re still at your sister’s?”

When he hung up a moment later, his phone buzzed with several incoming texts, likely the promised address and details for retrieving young Jojo. He faced Shane, clenching his jaw. “Sorry, but Jojo had a fight with his girlfriend and decided to go tour every bar between her apartment and his. One of the bartenders is friends with Marly’s girl. Says he’s blubbering in a booth at the back of the bar over a fucking Cosmo.”

Svetlana laughed and shook her head. "Go and rescue your rookie. Shane and I will get to know each other better without you here, anyway." 

Ilya lifted a brow at her and widened his eyes. “You are sure? I can get Connors to go get him.” When she blinked innocently at him, he nodded. “I should get Connors to get him.”

“Ilya, it’s fine,” Shane insisted. “Go get Jojo. You’ll have him home and be back here by the time you could get a hold of Connors… and you don’t want to risk Jojo moving on to another bar or getting himself into real trouble.”

“Fine, I will go get the idiot.” He sighed dramatically before shoving his phone in his pocket. With a quick kiss for Svetlana and a lingering one for Shane, he stomped out the door, slamming it behind him.

“Has he always been like that? So… expressive?” Shane asked, soft eyes staring after him.

“Always,” Svetlana confirmed. She eyed Shane up and down. “You know, I should have suspected that you were Jane. He was always so guarded when your name came up, so unlike himself.”

Shane’s smile fell, and he tucked his thumbs into his pockets. “I was the same way,” he admitted. “Things would always have been complicated for us but being the faces of Montreal and Boston’s rivalry… Well…” He shrugged.

She nodded, picking up her wine glass and walking towards the living room. “Did Ilya tell you that I waited until after the draft to officially choose my university?” Despite her light tone, Shane’s footsteps faltered as he followed her from the kitchen.

“No, he didn’t say.” His breath shuddered, but he still set two coasters on the table for their wine glasses.

“Ilya is one of the most important people in my life,” she said firmly. “And I’m one of the few people he has left.”

Shane nodded. “I understand how important you are to each other.” He swallowed, forcing a brittle smile. “Is this when you tell me that if I hurt him, they'll never find my body?" 

“Oh, they will find your body. I will put your head on a pike as a warning to anyone else that might hurt my Ilya." 

As they settled on the couch, Shane's eyes went distant and he frowned.  He took a breath, stopped and sipped his wine. He stared into his wine as though it might impart some incredible secret. Svetlana waited.

Finally, Shane offered, "It's funny, but when you call him my Ilya it sounds like my Lilia."

She raised an eyebrow. "And that is funny?" 

He shifted on the couch, sat back against the cushion, and then sat up again. "When he gave me his number he saved it under Lily. That's why..." 

"Lily and Jane? I would tease him for such simple aliases, but it has worked for years." She curled her legs underneath her and leaned on her arm towards Shane. "I suppose it's proof that people see what they expect to see." 

"Yeah, I guess so." His shrug was wooden, and he avoided her eyes.

She studied him for a long moment, letting the silence linger. He twisted his wine glass in his hands. Finally, he lifted his gaze and heaved a sigh. 

"I'm not good at this," he apologized. "The friendly banter thing has never been easy for me."

"That’s all right." She kept her smile soft. "You don't have to charm me, Shane. I already want to be your friend." 

He still didn't relax, and his forced smile barely flashed across his face before it was gone again. "Ilya would like that."

"Would you?"

He didn't answer, and she puzzled over his blank expression. He breathed, in and out, with an unnaturally steady rhythm. He closed his eyes and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “That’s not supposed to be a hard question, is it?”

“No,” she answered honestly, “but maybe it’s not an easy one to answer honestly?”

“Yeah.” He sat up and rolled his head back on his shoulders, working out the tension in his neck. When he met her eyes, his face was less unnaturally still; the contrast was jarring though she couldn’t have said exactly what was different. “You know I was sitting on this couch the first time I heard your name?”

That didn’t sound like some shallow attempt at getting to know each other. Svetlana tilted her head and raised an eyebrow. “When was this? Recently?”

“Not very recently, no.” He chuckled ruefully. “I probably shouldn’t tell you this story. It’s not the best way to make you like me.”

“I already like you, Shane” She decided to meet his earnestness in kind. “I like the way you make my Ilya smile. Whatever story you decide to tell me won’t change that.”

“Challenge accepted, I guess.” He shifted on the couch, mirroring her posture. He took a deep drink from his wine glass and nodded to where she was sitting. “This was back in 2016, and… we didn’t usually get a chance to do this… sit and talk.” He shrugged, fidgeting with the couch cushion. “But Montreal had flown in early on the day before our game so, we actually had time together.”

“Sounds nice,” she offered with a soft smile. Internally, she did the math; this must have been before Rose Landry. Her respect for his bravery ticked up even as nerves twisted in her stomach. Would this story be enough to change her mind about him?

“It was nice,” he smirked. “Not that either of us knew how to admit that at the time… or what to do with it.”

“So, how did I come up in the conversation? Ilya doesn’t speak of home to many people.” 

“True,” he agreed, breathing out slowly. “That’s something that I didn’t understand for a long time.” They sat quietly for a moment before he shook his head. “He wasn’t talking about home though. He was asking me about girls. Said he never heard about me with girls… did I like them?”

“He didn’t!” She laughed, feeling a twist of second-hand embarrassment. 

“Oh, he did.” Shane licked his lips and pressed them together. “He mentioned you and how…” He stopped, flicking his gaze up at her then back down to the empty couch between them.

“He told you that we fucked sometimes? When I wasn’t dating someone else, and he didn’t want to go pick someone up?” She smiled at him, amused at his worry. “I know what we were to each other, Shane." She tilted her head. "Were you jealous?”

“Very,” he admitted, surprising her. “Not that I admitted that to myself at the time, but… I was jealous. Not just of you but of Ilya. I remember wishing that attraction was as easy for me.” He chuckled. “This was before I had admitted to myself that being attracted to women was more than just not easy, it was not possible.”

“A difficult thing to accept in your position, I suppose.”

“Extremely.” He drained the last of his wine and set the glass on the table. “So, there I was, hearing about his convenient arrangement with you, and I knew that that was all we were supposed to be. We were just meant to be a way… scratch the itch, as much as I hate that phrase. Just a regular fuck where we didn’t have to worry about getting outed by each other, since we shared the same secret.”

“You were more to him than that, even then.” Svetlana reached out and squeezed his hand. “He’s just shit at saying such things.”

“I’m not much better,” he admitted. “About an hour after that conversation, I realized that I felt a lot more for him than I was supposed to. I freaked out and left. A month later, I met Rose and started showing up in celebrity gossip pieces.” He sighed with gusto, lips quirking up at the corners. “So, if I help you set up the pike, will you knock me out before you put me on it?”

She threw her head back and laughed, delighted. “I think I would need to set one up for me too, if I murdered you for hurting my Ilya back then.” She set her glass beside his and shifted to sit beside him. She took his hands in hers and rested them on the seat between them. “He loves you, and he would be lost without you.” 

“I’d be lost without him, too.”

Svetlana ran her thumbs over his knuckles, gathering the courage to ask, “Are you still jealous?”

“Of Ilya?” He shook his head. “Honestly, I think… no, I know… that it’s better this way. If I had been capable of being attracted to Rose, of feeling the smallest amount of what I feel for Ilya, I would have forced myself to make it work.” He stared down at their joined hands, curling his fingers to hold hers gently. “I would have kept trying to be what people expected me to be, and it wouldn’t have been fair to anyone. It wouldn’t have been good for anyone.”

“But you are jealous of me?” When she pulled her hands back, he let them go but left his sitting within reach. 

“Not in the same way. I mean, not because you used to fuck.” He huffed out a laugh. “I had my moments with that, but, honestly, if Ilya wanted to be with a woman, he would be. As much as it still sometimes feels like I’m dreaming, he wants to be with me.”

She took a deep breath, hoping he didn’t hear it shake. “Then, why are you jealous?”

“You share so much with him,” Shane admitted. “You have all this shared history and language and culture… You understand him in a way that I can’t, and I feel like... I'm taking away something important from him, taking his home away, and I don't have anything to give back.”

Tears pricked her eyes, and she swallowed. “You are not taking Russia from him. The bigots that refuse to accept him and everyone like him. They are doing that." She blinked hard and inhaled slowly. When she offered him her hand, he took it. "I cannot take you back to our childhood, Shane. I don't think Ilya would want that for you if I could... but, if you want… I can share our culture? Help you learn our language?”

His eyes widened, and his face lit up with a smile. “You would do that?”

“You want to learn these things to love Ilya better! Of course, I want to help!” She patted his hand and stood. "Come, I will make us tea, and you can tell me what you have already learned."

"That won't take long," he admitted, following her into the kitchen. 

She pulled out the electric kettle and filled it with water. "The first time I saw an American microwave water for tea, I almost booked a flight back to Moscow."

"It's awful." He smiled wryly and shook his head. "Have you been to Texas? Because the things they do to tea are appalling!"

"I know!" She gestured widely, too frustrated by the memory to hold herself in. "I went to Dallas once for a convention. When I asked for tea, they brought it to me in a glass filled with ice!"

"Yes, and they put so much sugar in it!"

"Oh, I went out with a man while I was there, and he ordered sweetened tea then added more sugar to it!" She rolled her eyes and shook her head, feeling her curls dance around her head. "And it didn't dissolve so there was a layer of sugar this thick at the bottom of his glass!" She held up a hand with her thumb and forefinger spread wide. "I never knew a man's drink preferences could be a turn off, but in that case..."

"Gross. I thought Ilya's McDonalds habit was bad." He crossed the kitchen to pull out two tea mugs. "So, don't Russians traditionally use something different for tea?"

"A samovar?" She smiled at him. "You've been reading?"

"I went down a YouTube rabbit hole before we left for Sochi." He shrugged. "We didn't actually get much cultural exposure in the Olympic Village, but it was interesting to learn about."

Her smile faltered, remembering Sochi. "Perhaps it was best that you didn't. That was a difficult time."

"Yeah, I didn't understand a lot of the reasons why..." He tugged on the hem of his shirt. "Maybe I still don't. Ilya doesn’t like to talk about it."

"I will try to help you," she offered, feeling echoes of her old worry and disappointment. She felt weighed down, suddenly tired. "Perhaps, not tonight though. Let's talk about less serious things, yes?"

She turned to the pantry and dug into the back, past the stacks of Girl Scout cookie boxes and protein bars. Nestled in the shadows, there were two packages of pryaniki left from the last time she had visited the Russian grocery in the city. She pulled them out triumphantly and set them on the counter. Shane eyed the bags of cookies skeptically, squinting as though it would make the Cyrillic text easier to read.

“Pryaniki,” she told him. “They are spiced cookies. Ilya’s favorite.” She opened one bag and held it out to them. “Smell.”

He leaned over and took a cautious sniff, blinking at the bag. “They’re gingerbread?”

“Some of them.” She shrugged and pulled out two cookies, setting them on a napkin. “They also make them filled with jam, but I thought you might try this kind first.” She nodded to the unopened package that indicated the apricot filling with a cartoon pot of jam on the label.

He eyed them and then his mug. “Are they generally eaten with tea? Do you dip them in the tea?” He wrinkled his nose a little before his face smoothed back out into careful neutrality.

“I do not dip my pryaniki in my tea.” She broke one cookie into quarters and ate a bite, then she sipped her tea, closing her eyes at the warming combination of flavors.

Shane waited until she swallowed, watching her as though she was demonstrating a complex maneuver on the ice. He picked up a piece of the cookie and took a cautious bite, carefully savoring the flavor. His eyes widened, and he popped the rest of it into his mouth.

Once he had finished and taken a deep sip of tea, he brushed the crumbs from his fingers and pulled out his phone. He took a picture of both packages. “Are there any other snacks that Ilya likes?”

Svetlana grinned at him and pulled more packages from the pantry.  “Let’s go back to the sofa.”

When Ilya returned an hour later, Svetlana and Shane had refilled their tea several times and were chatting over a Russian hockey podcast. He stopped at the edge of the couch to listen as Svetlana explained, “So, he calls his brother Boriska, but it would be rude for someone that doesn’t know him well to do the same. They are not like hockey nicknames.”

Shane nodded solemnly and took a breath to ask another question when Svetlana looked up at Ilya and grinned. “Ilyusha, how is your rookie?”

“Safe, for now, but he is going to be very unhappy tomorrow.” Ilya settled himself on the couch beside Shane and wrapped an arm around him. He stole a kiss that earned him a warm smile. Ilya tilted his head at Shane. “Did you eat my pryankiki? What did you think? They are good, yes?”

“Very good,” Shane agreed, leaning back against him. “I have a cousin in Osaka. I promised Svetlana that, next time we talk, I would get him to send me some snacks to share.”

“I didn’t know you still had family in Japan.”

Ilya tugged Shane closer and stole a sip of his tea. Svetlana curled her legs underneath her and relaxed as Shane began to talk about his family. Warm contentment spread between them, and they relaxed together.