Rating:

Mature

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories:

Gen, M/M

Fandoms:

Heated Rivalry (TV), Game Changers Series - Rachel Reid

Relationships:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov, Shane Hollander & Hayden Pike, background Hayden Pike/Jackie Pike, J. J. Boiziau & Shane Hollander

Characters:

Shane Hollander, Ilya Rozanov, Hayden Pike, J.J. Boiziau

Additional Tags:

Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Relationship Reveal, Character Study, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Shane thinks Ilya is dead for half the fic, Shane Hollander Loves Ilya Rozanov, Ilya Rozanov Loves Shane Hollander, Shane Hollander Needs a Hug, mourning everything you could have had, Angst with a Happy Ending, Suicidal Thoughts, Prayer, Good Friend Hayden Pike, J.J. Boiziau is trying, Jackie is there in spirit, Hurt/Comfort, Book 6: The Long Game (Game Changers)

Language:

English

Series:

Part 2 of found family *hockey edition

Collections:

hollanov for the heart <3, Relationship Reveal HR, HollaNov fanfics I Love, No thoughts just gay hockey, The best pairings to bask in, HR, Heated rivalry fics I must not lose, Hollanov Plane Crash

Stats:

Published: 2026-01-09 Words: 5,220 Chapters: 1/1

i pray this love changes me (this grief will)

Summary

Shane put God on a back burner sometime between the ages of eleven and twelve. It was around that time that he barely stepped foot off the ice. His dad would joke that he was born with skates on, while his mother cursed out a grown man for a bad play. God, religion, faith came second to the rush of adrenaline as he flew on the ice.

It takes seventeen years and the love of his life being dead for twenty-eight minutes to relearn how to pray.

-

Or, Shane's game is cancelled and he reads Ilya's would have been last messages in a tiny hotel room with JJ and Hayden at his side.

Notes

i give you yet another alternate relationship reveal where Shane get's Ilya's plane texts in real time and absolutely loses his shit! Starring Jackie Pike once again saving the day, a surprising amount of emotional intelligence and physical comfort from hockey players, friendship saving the day, and Shane refusing to apologize for loving Ilya

TW: Shane has lot of suicidal thoughts this fic that are along the line of - If Ilya is dead there is no point to me living/I physically could not survive that

btw this could be conceived as canon in the same universe as my other fic, but regardless, it shares similar details of jackie having pregnancy complications and almost dying while hayden and shane watch - it's nothing graphic, just implied bc in my head canon world hayden is absoultely losing his shit when his bestie goes through the same thing he did

In another life, he’s in the middle of a game and by the time he gets off the ice, Ilya is alive and safe on the ground again. When Shane reads his could have been last texts, it carves out a hollow in his chest – although maybe it’s more like it just peels back the skin and reveals the years old emptiness because Ilya Rozanov stole his heart right from beneath his ribs the day they met. It hurts, it kills him, it makes him realize how much time they’ve lost by hiding.

In another life, the plane crash is a small blip that ends up with him proposing to the love of his life, for once unwavering as he awaits the upcoming storm.

In this life, the game got postponed for flooding and Shane is in a hotel room with his closest friends while the world ends.

If JJ tossed one more sock at him, Shane’s going to go to jail. They should be playing a game, adrenaline burning in his veins as he made pass after pass, the team a well-oiled machine that could win it all. Instead, they were all cramped up in a small hotel room just outside the city and away from the flooded streets that stopped the game.

Turns out it’s hard to play hockey if half your team floats away.

A balled up, thankfully clean sock hits his face, and Shane is only stopped from murdering JJ by Hayden pressing a hand to his shoulder. “Okay one of you has to go.”

JJ, the fucking child he is, just sticks out his tongue as he lays back in the other hotel bed. Why Shane had decided to ride out his boredom with these two, he has no fucking clue. “Why are you in such a bad mood, Cap? Missing your girl?”

His eye twitches, because yes, he’s certainly missing someone. JJ just might have a stroke and die if he realized it was Ilya Rozanov, one of their biggest rivals and asshole of the decade. Shane’s gripping his phone too hard, these days it’s as hard as it’s ever been – biting back the urge to say Ilya, my Ilya, my boyfriend, mine, mine, mine. You’ve never known a version of me that didn’t love him so much it ached.

As time passes, as he grows older, as the rookies seem younger and younger, it slowly stops mattering, what they’d all say. It still keeps him up at night, thoughts of his teammates, people he’s known for years, his friends looking at him in disgust, the reaction of the world, the NHL and everything beyond it. It terrifies him, but one day, Shane thinks he’ll love Ilya more than he fears them.

One day.

Hayden saves JJ’s life again, “You’re just pissy he has someone when your closest friend over the years happens to be your right hand.” JJ glares at him, tossing yet another fucking sock in his direction.

This time though, it soars over his head and clocks Hayden right in the forehead. Hayden throws it right back and – nope, Shane slides off the bed to get out of the way. He’s not being apart of a sock war. They’re almost thirty for Christ’s sake.

He sags down in an armchair. Cuck chair, Hollander, says the Ilya-voice in his head, and you already have a show. Eleven years and he can’t even escape Ilya when they’re a country apart. Shane never wants that to change, ever. He pulls out his phone, scrolling through texts from his mom, agent, one from his dad, and a couple dozen from Rose. The Wi-Fi is crap with the storm, but they still pile through.

Rose is complaining about her co-star, a pretty blonde who, and to quote her, “Is so infuriatingly cocky that only a slap could wipe that smile off her face.” Shane doesn’t bother with an actual suggestion on how to deal with her, instead hearting the right messages and letting her rant. He secretly thinks of him and Ilya every time she talks about her but he’s wise enough to keep his mouth shut.

That’s friendship, he finally learned, even if it took him a few years. A give and take, shouldering the burden when necessary one moment and just being a shoulder to lean on in the next. Rose may have saved his life, he can listen to the same “Who does she think she is?!” and “Her hair, Shane, her hair!” as many times as she needs.

Her little text bubble has been hovering on the screen for about thirty seconds when he gets a notification from Instagram. It’s Ilya – Ilya’s notifications, on all platforms possible, are always turned on for reasons his twenty-year-old self couldn’t understand. Shane frowns, Ilya should be on a plane to Tampa, not messaging him on Instagram for the first time ever.

ilyarozanovofficial: Shane

For some inexplicable reason his heart leaps in his throat – it’s not as romantic as the books make it seem. It’s nauseating, his stomach turns and he clutches the phone a little too tightly.

ilyarozanovofficial: You are the best thing in my life.

JJ and Hayden’s squabbling fades into background noise as Shane sits up straighter. It’s not the first time Ilya’s said something to the same sentiment, but not like this, not over Instagram, not when he should be flying to Tampa for a game.

ShaneHollanderHockeyPlayer: Ilya? What’s wrong?

The chat bubble pops up again, it’s only seconds before the next message comes in but the moment drags out for an eternity.

ilyarozanovofficial: I love you. Always. Maybe from the first time I saw you.

ilyarozanovofficial: The plane is crashing, on fire, I am sorry.

ilyarozanovofficial: I am thinking only about you right now. A million memories. Thank you for those.

Oh, so this is what it’s like to die.

His heartbeat is blurring in his ears, his limbs feel like they’re anchored to the ground, his fingers are numb. Nothing makes sense, except that it does in a sudden horrifying click – like the sound of his skull hitting the ice, jarring, sharp, definite.

Ilya’s plane is on fire.

This is his goodbye.

Shane is not prepared to live in a world that doesn’t hold him.

ShaneHollanderHockeyPlayer: ilya please

Unlike every other time, Ilya doesn’t bend for him. He doesn’t reverse gravity, doesn’t fix the engine with his bare hands, doesn’t cross time and space to gather Shane in his arms and soothe away his grief. There’s movement beside him, and vaguely through the disconnect between his heart and his body, he’s aware that something is shaking him.

But Shane’s heart is beating on a burning plane two thousand miles away. Shane’s heart is on a plane falling out of the sky.

Nothing is real.

ilyarozanovofficial: Whatever happens, I am with you. Safe in your heart. I believe it.

“-ne! Shane! Dude, you gotta breathe!” It’s Hayden’s voice that cuts through the disconnect, but only just a little. It reaches the tiny, crumbling part of Shane that can exist beyond Ilya. It’s not enough.

His fingers are slow, or maybe the world is slow, or maybe this is just a bad dream. Maybe the roof will fly away, and JJ will turn into a tree, and he’ll wake up with Ilya breathing against the back of his neck. Ilya will pout when he nudges him awake but won’t hesitate to comfort Shane when he sees the terror painted on his face. Ilya will kiss away his fear and love him enough to save them both.

Shane doesn’t wake up and Hayden keeps shaking him, keeps shouting like he’ll snap out of it.

ShaneHollanderHockeyPlayer: you’re my heart

A tiny x pops up beside the message, again, and again, and again.

Shane can’t breathe, he can’t think, he can’t – There is no him without Ilya, there hasn’t been a version of him Ilya hadn’t touched in over a decade. There is nothing without Ilya, no point, no rhyme or reason. Nothing.

Shane can’t breathe.

He can’t

He’s on the ground and his phone is gone. His fingers are clenched in the fabric of Hayden’s sleeve as he spirals into nothingness. Maybe it’ll kill him, that seems right. This sort of grief feels like the type of thing that kills a person. Maybe Shane Hollander, best hockey player of his generation, will die in an unremarkable hotel room minutes after Ilya Rozanov’s plane became his pyre. Please, he thinks, he gasps, he claws at Hayden’s arm, please take me with you.

He’s on the ground and his phone is gone – the last trace of Ilya’s existence, of his love, is gone. Shane breathes again, stilling suddenly as the room sharply comes back into focus. He’s on the ground, Hayden braced on one side, an arm wrapping around him, keeping his hands from tearing at his skin while JJ stares down at his phone with wide eyes.

Shane lunges forward, a hint of pressure sliding against his throat for a brief second before it’s gone. He rips his phone from JJ’s hands, Ilya and his chat still open.

ShaneHollanderHockeyPlayer: ilya

A tiny x.

ShaneHollanderHockeyPlayer: please we were supposed to have time

ShaneHollanderHockeyPlayer: kids a dog a life

ShaneHollanderHockeyPlayer: don’t leave there’s no me without you

x

x

x

The sound he lets out is a damn near keen, it scrapes at his throat, it hurts. It’s nothing compared to the pure agony of breathing in a world where Ilya isn’t. Ten years, they wasted ten fucking years hiding in shame of what the world would do if they found out. Ten years compared to what, the thirty, forty, fifty years he’d have without Ilya? A fraction of time spent loving him compared to the decades he’ll spend grieving his absence like a lost limb.

No. He knows instantly that there is no living beyond Ilya. There is nothing beyond Ilya.

I’m so so sorry lyubov' moya, I am not you. I am not strong or brave enough. Forgive me.

The room emerges around him again. He’s shaking, hunched over his phone, holding it with trembling hands, and – JJ and Hayden are on their knees in front of him, both watching with wide eyes, both with a similar sort of fear flashing across their faces. An hour ago, Shane would have felt embarrassed, an hour ago Shane would have had a panic attack because JJ knows. Now he lives in a world where Ilya could be dead. None of it matters.

His words come out as a wheeze, a broken, pathetic whine, “Hayd, ten years – we wasted so much time.”

Hayden and JJ flinch, but it’s Hayden who surges forward. He clamps a hand down on the back of his neck, forcing him to stay grounded on the shitty hotel floor, forcing him to stay there and not float away with Ilya. “You have to breathe, Shane. We don’t know anything just yet, they could be making an emergency landing and the Wi-fi went out. We don’t know anything yet. You. Have. To. Breathe.”

Breathe? The idea is laughable. Breathe without Ilya. How could he? Why would he?

If Jackie were to die – had she bled out on a hospital bed years ago while her daughters took an eternity to cry beside her, then Hayden would have ceased to exist. He’d have kept living on of course, for the twins, but his life would have ended the same millisecond hers did.

Shane doesn’t have a daughter with Ilya’s curls and laughter. Shane has never held a little girl who stared at up at him with bright blue eyes, with her Papa’s eyes, and knew the world began and ended in her smile. They never got the chance, they never got that far – ten years, ten years and half of them barely even counted.

“Nope, you’re not spiraling again. You’re going to pass out if you do and you don’t want anyone else to see you like this.” Hayden’s usually right, but Shane just laughs, body tilting forward with the force of it.

He didn’t give a damn if the entire team stormed into the room here and now. He didn’t care if JJ started filming this entire thing and live-streaming it to millions of people. Ilya was dead. Let them all know that Shane loved him – loves, loves him with everything that he is.

“You think I care?!” He’s crying, maybe he never stopped since the moment it became possible to exist beyond Ilya. “He’s – Ilya is – Hayden, please.” Shane’s phone slips into his lap as he grasps him again, this time purposeful as he sinks his nails into the fabric of his sweatshirt. Maybe if he tries hard enough, he’ll cut through skin, all the way down to the bone. Maybe if he tries hard enough, he’ll cut through the universes and find a Hayden who lives in a world with Ilya Rozanov still being a smirking asshole for the sake of it.

“I know, I know, I know,” Hayden’s eyes are watering as he leans forward, pressing their heads together like he’ll be able to shoulder some of Shane’s grief by doing so.

“It doesn’t matter, none of it does anymore,” Ten years, he should have married him, he should have kissed him on the ice, he should have said to hell with it and loved him out loud. He should have; he should have –

“Their plane’s tracker is still on.” JJ’s voice cuts through his grief.

Shane had forgotten he was even in the room, had stopped giving a damn when Ilya said The plane is crashing, but now the world centers itself around JJ. He’s a foot away, separate from the grief drenched tangle him and Hayden make, holding his own phone. He’s staring at Shane, he knows and –

“What?” It’s torn out of him with a desperation that would be surprising if it weren’t for Ilya.

JJ doesn’t flinch this time. “Fans track our planes all the time with them. I just happened to know the plane number because of Dykstra. The plane is somewhere in North Carolina, but it’s still moving.”

It could be an error, it could be the path of the plane’s descent, it could be the map of the end of Shane’s world. It could also mean that Ilya is alive, that the Wi-fi is out and the plane is making an emergency landing. It could mean that Ilya can still come home to him.

He and Hayden move at the same time, JJ taking his weight easily as he shoves himself into place beside him. He stares at the phone, the incomprehensible green and blue tracker, the tiny yellow plane icon that meant Ilya’s heart, his heart is still beating. Please, he thinks as it drifts a little more north, please don’t take him.

“Fuck it. I’m calling Jackie, she knows all the WAGs and she’s friends with Cassie, maybe she’ll get something out of her.” Hayden stands up, moving out of Shane’s narrow view for his phone. He should be terrified, two, three, an entire team potentially finding out about them. But nothing is more important than knowing if Ilya is safe – nothing matters if Ilya is dead.

He imprints the tiny yellow plane onto the back of his eyelids, eyes darting over the faint curves and lines that somehow made up North Carolina. It’s still moving, still fluttering in the middle of JJ’s phone. It’s still moving, there’s still hope. Please, please, please.

His hand rose, fingers digging into the hollow of his collarbone. The pain stole a little of his fear, so he pressed harder and harder, like he could pull himself apart and find the space Ilya always managed to hide in. Don’t leave me you motherfucker, don’t you dare leave me yet.

The room blackened at the edges, his lungs stopped working, his heart was already long gone. Ilya, Ilya, Ilya, Ilya.

Shane could almost taste the pain when JJ grabbed his hand and pushed it down, tucking it between their bodies and keeping it trapped. “He’s – Rozanov is not gone yet, stay.”

There’s a quietness in JJ’s voice that shoves away the darkness, a soft, gentle edge to his words. JJ is brash and loud and unapologetically himself, he is so many things that Shane is not and will never be. But he’s quiet now, holding Shane while Ilya lives or dies depending on how he spirals.

Shane loves him. He’ll be one of his pallbearers if Ilya’s nothing but bones in a random field.

Shane breathes, forces the air through his lungs because Ilya is not gone yet. He does not have to live in a world without him, at least not for a little while longer. Please, not him, I have fifty years of love left in me, please.

Hayden is talking to someone, Jackie. Jackie who will definitely cry at his funeral, and Ilya’s, because she doesn’t know him, not really, but she’ll mourn him for Shane’s sake. Someone should, the whole world should. Ilya is so good, nobody sees it and if he dies now they won’t. His legacy will be a cocky smile and brutal words.

They won’t talk about how the sun made his hair golden when it crested in the long mornings they shared together. They won’t talk about the weight of his hands cradling Shane’s face as he brought him back from a panic attack. They won’t talk about how his voice softens when he’s talking to a person he loves, syllables gentling in his mouth for Svetlana, for his mother, for Shane.

They won’t talk about all the love he had to give, even when Shane didn’t deserve it.

He’s not breathing, or maybe he is, maybe the world is just numb and nothing. Either way Shane doesn’t feel much of anything when JJ grabs him by the back of his neck and tugs him even closer. He wonders how they know to do that; a steady, firm touch to ground him. He wonders when they began to know him like he knows them. He wonders why he kept this a secret for so long.

“JJ,” He gasps, it hurts, the tiny yellow plane has slowed, “JJ, I can’t, I can’t lose him.” Not like this, not when they we’re supposed to have so much more time.

Years and years and years and children’s laughter floating through the cottage’s hall as a dog chases them. His hair greying, a set of glasses on the bridge of Ilya’s nose, lines slowly settling into the creases of his face as he smiles more than he cries. A set of gold rings glinting in the sunlight, Ilya’s heart slowly beating beneath his head as they lay in bed and know peace.

Years, they were supposed to have years.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Shane.” JJ’s staring at him and he’s staring at the tiny yellow plane, and everything is wrong. He’s muttering under his breath, “Okay this isn’t working, twitter will know, twitter always knows. Crazy stalkers.”

He swipes out of the tracker, his hand still clamped around the back of his neck, fingers nearly bruising as he keeps Shane upright. He’s scrolling and typing and – JJ is warm, not like Ilya who is a walking furnace, just warm and unmoving. He’s still here, he’s still helping, he’s looking for more information and Hayden is talking to someone in a low voice.

They’re helping, they’re trying to drag the love of his life back to him. They’re helping, they’re his best friends and they’re helping and it’s still not enough to save him if Ilya were to go. Hayden’s on the phone with Jackie and at least two other WAGs, JJ is scouring the internet for any new information about Ilya’s plane and – Shane closes his eyes, clutching his phone in his lap like a bastardized rosary and prays.

Please, if you are just and kind and good, don’t take him. The world is cruel, it is so cruel, but Ilya makes it a little kinder. Just once, spare him, spare him and spare me and I’ll believe. I’ll believe for Ilya, who believes for his mother. Faith found in a chain-link of love, isn’t that how it’s supposed to go?

Kids, a home, the ability to kiss him in broad daylight – I don’t want a miracle, I just want him.

I know I’ve been ungrateful and fickle and faithless, but I’ll believe again if you just give him back. Let the world keep another good thing, let the world continue on with just a little bit more kindness left and I’ll believe in your own. Let me hold him and feel the warmth of his skin and the beating of his heart as he loves me enough to change how this story ends.

Let him come home this time.

I love him.

Please.

Then, when he runs out of words for God, he prays to Ilya.

I’m with you, I’m always with you. My heart’s been yours since the day we met, the click of your lighter might as well have been the cracking of my ribs as you reached in and stole it. You’ve never been alone, even when we’re continents apart. You’ve never been alone. I’m with you, I’m with you, I’ll be with you soon no matter what.

Don’t be afraid. I love you. Ya tebya lyublyu. Please, come back to me, please, baby, please.

Ilya. If you have to go, if you’re going, if you’re gone – wait for me.

Time passes, or maybe it doesn’t, Shane doesn’t know anything but the weight of his phone in his hands, JJ’s bruising grip, and the ghost of Ilya’s lips on his. Time passes until it snaps suddenly with Hayden’s shout, “Where?! Harnett Regional? Okay, okay, thank you Jack, I love you.”

Some terrible, wretched thing like hope swells in his chest. Shane opens his eyes as Hayden strides over and hands him his phone. It’s not Ilya on the other end, of course not, but it’s the second-best thing – Jackie, with news.

 “He’s alright, Shane, they’re all alright. An engine failed or something, the plane caught on fire, but they made an emergency landing at Harnett Regional. It was a rough, long ride, but they’re okay, they’re going to be okay.” Alive. Ilya is alive.

Shane would have doubled over if it weren’t for JJ, instead he grips the phone so tightly his knuckles ache, “Is anyone hurt? He hasn’t – I – There’s no call – Jackie, is Ilya okay?!”

It’s a strangled, wounded sound, his name. Ilya, Ilya please.

Jackie makes a tiny noise, before the words nearly tear out of her, “He’s fine, Shane. He lost his phone at the worst of the turbulence. Cassie’s talking to Bood using Lisa’s phone, I can see if they can get Ilya on the line but,” Her sentence trails off and Shane knows exactly why.

He can’t comprehend why people think he gives a fuck about who knows when Ilya could have died, when for all intents and purposes he did die in Shane’s mind for about thirty minutes. “I don’t care!” He practically bites at her, then forces himself to take a breath at the sharpness. JJ’s grip is still bruising, and Hayden’s knee is pressed against his own. He’s here and Jackie says Ilya is alive, she wouldn’t lie about that, she would never. “Jackie, please, I need to talk to him.”

Shane doesn’t need any more words because Jackie gets it – She’s been on the other end, the one bleeding, the one gone and going. She knows the terror he’s feeling because she’s kissed it off Hayden’s lips. She knows the desperation, but mostly, she knows him.

There’s shuffling, Jackie’s voice blurring with others he doesn’t recognize then a mechanical click and, “Shane?”

He nearly knocks Hayden over as his entire body seems to give. He’s almost folded in half, the phone pressed to his ear as his forehead brushes against his knees because it’s him, it’s Ilya. It’s Ilya’s tired-nervous-afraid voice, hesitant and small and more Russian in certain, soft places. It’s Ilya, saying his name, breathing the same air he is.

The world continues to spin.

“Ilya, Ilya, Ilya,” He’s crying again, he’s in a cramped hotel room in an awkward pile of his friends and he’s crying. “I thought – I sent texts, I tried to, but they didn’t go through and I thought. God, I love you. I love you so much.”

Shane says it in French, in clumsy Russian, he says it over and over again until a sob catches in his throat. Ilya’s voice is slightly muffled over the line but it’s him, that’s all that matters, “I know, I love you too. I’m so sorry for scaring you. I thought that it was, you had to know, I needed you to know. You’re my life, I need you to know that.”

He nods even though Ilya is two thousand miles away and he can’t possibly see it, “I know, you’re mine, you’re – it all starts and ends with you, everything.”

Ilya sniffles, and his hands ache to reach out and brush away the mess of tears dripping down his face. He always hates crying in front of people, especially people who don’t know every inch of him like Shane does. Oh, the thought finally clicks, they know now.

Not everyone of course, but Ilya’s team does, at least a handful of them. JJ knows now. Shane should tense up with fear, should let panic swallow him whole, but now that his grief has slipped away with the sound of Ilya’s voice, there’s nothing left. He’s empty, he’s exhausted, he has no capability to be terrified, to be consumed by panic and fear because they know.

They know now and the world keeps spinning.

Shane breathes in and out, and for the first time in thirty minutes it doesn’t feel like a betrayal. “I chose you, Ilya, over everything. I’d give it all up for you, without hesitating, without question. I’ll always choose you, and I’m sorry I haven’t been.”

JJ tenses a little behind him and – Shane doesn’t give a fuck.

Ilya let out a sharp exhale, like the air had been knocked from his lungs, like Shane’s words hit harder than his plane almost falling out of the sky. “Shane.” So that’s what it takes to shut up the great Ilya Rozanov.

Good, he’ll say it every day for the rest of their lives.

“I love you.” He’ll say that too, and the world can burn if they don’t like it.

Ilya let out a shuddering breath, and Shane wants to tilt up his head and curl around his taut shoulders. He wants to become a shield for Ilya, a wall of muscle and bone so no one could ever hurt him again, a place for Ilya to break without the fear of repercussions or consequences. He wants to hold Ilya and let him break only to piece him back together in the aftermath.

But they are two thousand miles apart and all Shane could do is listen. Ilya pulls himself together enough that his voice only breaks Shane’s heart just a little, “I love you too, moya zhizn. I’ll call you again tonight, but Haas phone is broken and he needs to talk to his mother.”

Shane held back his desperate scream for Ilya to stay. He’s alive, Shane knows he’s alive, he’ll call him later. He can’t be so fucking selfish that Haas, a goddamn baby, couldn’t call his mother to let her know he was alive and fine. He breathed out, “Okay.”

Before he could get in another word, Ilya said in the smallest voice Shane had ever heard, “Wait for me?”

Ilya carves apart his ribs and tears out whatever remains of his heart. It hurt, breathing, living, loving this man so much that the absence of him was a physical wound. “Always. Always.”

“I’ll call you soon.” Shane could hear his smile and that alone saved him.

“You better, or I’ll come down there myself.” Ilya made a slight humming sound and then there was the clatter of movement again. The phone clicks off quietly, Shane still flinches.

He’s curled up between Hayden and JJ. He’s still breathing, his heart is still beating in a random airport next to Luca Haas, the world is still spinning. It’s okay, Shane will be okay because Ilya is. It’s simple.

He slowly unfolds himself, straightening his back as he takes in the silence of the hotel room. Hayden’s face is pained, like Shane’s hurt bruised him too, but he’s not the only one there. Shane hands him back his phone with a half-smile that’s more a grimace, then he turns towards the warmth at his side.

JJ’s phone is laying face up in lap, blurry pictures of the Ottawa team in a tiny airport on his twitter feed. Shane slowly looks away from a blur that could be Ilya and looks at one of his oldest friends. Hayden knew, JJ did not. It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t change anything but –

JJ is one of his oldest friends.

Shane swallows, forcing back an apology, forcing back the guilt because Ilya could have died, he felt him die. He’ll love him in the open for the rest of their lives, he won’t let anyone take that away from them. But JJ isn’t pissed, his lips aren’t pressed together in a way that gives the impression he’s one moment away from barring his teeth. JJ isn’t looking at him in disgust. JJ isn’t flinching away.

JJ looks so incredibly sad, like Shane just tore out his heart and stomped on it. Or maybe – Maybe he looks like he just watched one of his oldest friends grieve the love of their life and die alongside him for half an hour.

Oh. Oh. So, this is what it could be like, so this is what it should be like.

He’s not sure who moves first only that it ends with the two of them colliding. There’s a dull pain as their head knocks together but Shane doesn’t give a damn. JJ’s hand is back on the nape of his neck and this time he clings back. The grief is gone, but echoes remain and oh god he could have lost Ilya, he did lose him, oh god it hurt so much.

There’s a faint sob clawing at his throat, then there’s another set of arms and Hayden is there too. They’re both there, clinging to him like he’s clinging to them. Maybe JJ doesn’t understand, but he loves Shane, and this sort of agony demands to be shared.

This time when he cries it’s almost a relief, because it’s not Ilya is gone it’s Ilya could have been gone and that world is so incredibly painful. Shane loves Ilya enough to choose him over everything, of course the loss of him would be devastating, detrimental, nuclear. It’s only fair.

Shane closes his eyes again and lets himself sink into his best friends, lets the remnants of his grief slip away until there’s nothing but the pounding of his heartbeat. Ilya is alive, let everything else come as it will.

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Goodbye, Shane by Kitkatexistskindamaybe