Chapter Text
Ilya’s POV
When he was told he had a manager, he didn’t like it one bit.
Someone who would be with him all the time and control his actions? Not happening.
Of course, the Raiders’ team didn’t describe it like that, but Ilya wasn’t stupid. He knew they were terrified of what he would say and what he would do when given the spotlight. Good. He liked it when people were scared of him. So instead of calling whoever it was being his manager, a manager, he decided on the much more appropriate name: assistant. He saw it on an American television show, Assistant to the Regional Manager. He liked that. He liked watching TV shows to help teach him English, and The Office was very funny to him.
When he first met the person who was supposed to be his manager, he was slightly surprised. Not only had he seen this person before, at his game that he pathetically lost to the stupid Canadians, but also for the fact that they were so… unintimidating. Nothing about this person was threatening, so Ilya didn’t have to worry about being bossed around too much. Great.
He was happy with that choice. They would run around, grab him coffee, arrange him rides, sponsorships, anything. And went by a stupid nickname, which was neither here nor there. He did notice the small things they did for him, printing out Russian translations for contracts, making sure he sat on the window seat for plane rides, and even being able to somehow rewrite the CCM contract to include Hollander in it. He was almost impressed. Almost.
What really ticked him off was the fact that when he told his assistant that he was going to score 50 goals in his rookie season, they specifically wrote it off and wrote the statement as 40. Why were they trying to make him seem humble? Weak? Ilya was none of those things. He set the record straight on a post-game interview a week later, stating that a liar told them the 40 goals, and telling the press his true goal count. He wanted the world to see that he was the new, threatening, bad-ass face in hockey, and he wouldn’t let some idiot assistant tell him what was what.
Of course, the assistant kept trying to tell him what he had to do during time off from games, and after they happened. But he would never listen, of course not. If he wanted to go out, he would go out. If he wanted to meet up with a certain Canadian hockey player, he would. No one, repeat, no one was going to tell him what he could or could not do.
September 2010, Boston
When you came up with the idea to get to know Ilya by setting goals for the season together, you did not expect this. He left the room a while ago, leaving you with the paper where his goals were written out in crisp handwriting. It really did look like he was learning from a book. You read the paper once more, trying to wrap your head around it:
Goal for Season
- Win cup
- Score 50 goals
- Beat Canada
- Learn more English
You made him put that last one there, truthfully. All of his goals were about hockey; the guy was so driven to be the best that he literally was going to neglect learning the language he should probably learn to play hockey. The other three goals were definitely Ilya Rozanov to a T. Win. Score. Beat. Be the best.
50 goals. That’s the worst one. You keep focusing on it because it seems almost impossible. 40 goals are tough, hell, 30 goals. But 50? The press was going to eat this up. They would call him overconfident, with an inflated ego. They would say he would put himself over any of the players on his team. Would he probably be captain in a matter of years? Yeah. But we don’t want any of the older players thinking he's an asshole, or any of the other teams thinking that’s a weakness. So you decide that when you release these, you will decrease the number from 50 to 40. It seemed reasonable. Humble, even, for Ilya at least. So you send it off without another thought.
2 weeks later, your coworker sends you a link via email, with the subject: haha nice try.
You open it to a post-game interview with Ilya.
“Are you still looking to score 40 goals this season?”
“40? No, no- liar told you that. I said 50.”
Murmuring goes around the room as he walks off, and you close the tab, burying your face in your hands. Well, you tried at least.
You head to the Raiders arena and go in through the back entrance, dropping your bag off in the small office they thankfully provided you. You head over to the vending machine in the meeting area when another figure pops into the room. Cliff Marlow. Marly, as the team calls him.
He gives you a subtle nod as you insert coins into the vending machine and start clicking buttons; you can tell he keeps glancing over at you.
He walks up and stands next to you, eyeing you up and down.
“You’re the new kid, huh? Rozanov’s assistant.” He smirks at the thought.
You nod as you bend down to grab your snack. “He likes to call me that, yes. Officially, I’m his manager. And I’m not that new, I’ve been here 7 months.” You open the bag.
“Ah, well… good luck with that. He’s annoying enough as a teammate.” He laughs slightly. “I can’t imagine having to control the bastard. Fuckin’ good hockey player though. It pisses me off more than anything.”
You can’t agree more.
If he were anyone else, you probably would’ve quit by now, or had some kind of outburst, but holy hell is he amazing at hockey. Confident, aggressive, precise. An obvious pick, and a wet dream to anyone who enjoys Boston hockey. You either love him, or hate him, but you literally can’t pick which.
“It is what it is. Although, I need to find a way to PR train the guy, at least a little.” You pop a pretzel into your mouth, and Cliff huffs.
“Yeah, right. I’ll eat my socks after practice if that guy says anything positive in an interview- hell, even vaguely neutral about another team would be insane. You might as well just try and minimize it, because the way that guy plays hockey says enough about his personality.” Cliff walks away and picks up his bag. “I’m heading out then, see you around, kid.” He pushes open the door and walks away, leaving you with another sense of dread.
He was right, of course. Ilya would never willingly be trained to speak kindly about his team, so forget any other team. You bunch up the pretzels and head back to your office, brainstorming. The worst part of it all was the fact that even if you worked your hardest, and somehow found a way to press train him, he didn’t know enough English to be up there and sound charismatic and sportsmanlike. You even thought maybe he didn’t know words that were nice, because he hadn’t even learned them yet. You’re sure he knows them in Russian, but something gets lost in translation.
Bingo. It hits you. If he doesn’t sound great in English, maybe bring some kind of translator out there and get him to speak in Russian instead. You write that down in your notepad, and spend the next hour thinking of more ways to help Ilya.
You text Ilya, which he hates, to tell him to meet up with you at the restaurant across the street from the Raiders HQ to go over some things. He responds: “No”, like an asshole.
You text back and forth for a while, and finally get him to commit to a place across town, some deli you’ve been to, like, twice.
You show up early and find a booth, he likes booths, and set up a couple papers to make sure everything was good and organized before he even stepped through the doors.
Sure enough, he’s 15 minutes late, wearing a dark hoodie, and sunglasses; you told him to do this so he wouldn’t attract attention, but damn if he isn’t grabbing everyone’s eyes in the place as he walks in. He’s a tall, buff, blond guy. Of course he will get noticed. He spots you and sits down across from you, subtly pleased by the seat choice. A waiter comes over and takes your order, Ilya just pointing at what he wants, not even trying to pronounce it, then he takes off his sunglasses and looks at you, and the array of papers out in front of you. His eyebrows lift and his head nods forward, clearly wanting me to get on with whatever I had to say, so he could eat and leave. You look down at the papers and begin your practiced speech.
“So. I saw your post-game interview. The 50 goals.”
He nods. “Yes. I said truth. I score 50 goals. By end of season.” He takes a large sip of water, and you exhale softly.
“Well, I’m not sure if you knew, but I was trying to soften the message you were sending out by stating 40- but we aren’t here for that.” You pick up a paper in front of you. “I’ve prepared a statement to send out before the first game between Boston and Montreal next month that I’d like you to review.” He takes it from your hand, and you continue. “I’ve also comprised a list of default statements that you should say in post-game interviews to make them easier for you, and so we don’t have to keep doing these things.” You hand him that too, and let him take a second to read.
“Finally,” you say. “I’ve arranged for another interview for a sports magazine, but I’ve included a translator this time, so you don’t have to do it in English.” He looks up at you for this, a slight disbelief to his expression.
“Translator. So I can speak in Russian, yes?” He says gruffly, and you nod.
“Yes. I assume your vocabulary may be better in Russian and you may be able to get more across if we did this format instead while you’re still learning. Oh! Speaking of…” You fish something out of your bag, a card. “I’ve hired you as a language coach.” His eyes lower at that, seemingly offended.
“I can learn to speak on my own. No need for other guy there.” He scoffs.
“Well, he’s on retainer, so you won’t actually need to have any formal lessons, just take his phone number and text him any questions, and he’ll answer. Super simple.” You shake the card for him to take, and he does, staring at it.
“Is that all?”
“For now.”
He stays quiet for a moment, taking in all of the information.
“OK. I will maybe read these stupid things.” He folds up the papers and shoves them into his pockets more aggressively than you’d like. You can just imagine those crumpled pieces of paper going into the trash, but there’s a slight hope if he’s at least keeping them.
Your food comes and the two of you eat quietly, him barely giving you a glance.
After you eat and pay, with the company card, he stands up and waits for you to do the same. You walk out of the restaurant together and he turns to you outside, and clears his throat.
“You will send me interview time?”
“Yes, I’ll send you an email with the time to show up.”
“Good.” He stands there awkwardly and stares at his sneakers. “It is a good idea. Translator. Will make me seem… smart.”
Your heart almost explodes. After almost a year of no praise or commendations, this feels like winning the lottery. “Good idea.” Good idea! You keep your face neutral to not seem too excited over this, but holy shit.
He clears his throat again at your silence. “You need to try again on the statement. It is not true to what I would say. I would not say-” he pulls it out of his jacket and reads directly off of it. “ ‘I wish both teams best of luck and may best team win. It will be a good game.’ No. I would not say this. We will win because we are not losers.” He shoves it back into his pocket and you make a mental note.
“Got it.” You give him a flat smile and shove your hands into your jacket. “Do you need me to get you a car back to your apartment?”
He shakes his head. “My apartment is here. Did not want to go all the way to office for this.” He salutes goodbye and walks across the street and into a building, as you glare daggers into his back.
Damn him. He only thinks about himself.
You pull out your notepad and make a note to yourself to make Ilya sound more confident in himself in the statement, then you go to grab yourself a cab to go all the way back across town
October 2010, Montreal
This was an anticipated game for many reasons.
Of course, there was the never ending rivalry between the Boston Raiders and the Montreal Metros, but this game was the first to include Shane Hollander vs Ilya Rozanov.
Sitting in the designated box that our traveling team gets, you gaze out at the ice watching all of the players warm up. People are chatting around you, but you are distracted by the impending game coming up.
Around the end of the third quarter, the Metros decide to put Hollander into the game, and in response, the Raiders place Ilya out there.
The face off.
You can feel the tension from even up where you are, even the crowd is adding onto it. The sports rivalry of a generation is about to play, and whoever wins this face off would get the upper hand.
The puck is dropped and… Shane Hollander picks it and wins. You know in your bones that Ilya is not happy, and will not be happy about this for quite some time.
The game goes on with exciting goals and plays from both teams, but it ends with the Metros winning. The rest of the Boston team heads out for drinks, leaving you to manage the press, of course it has to be you.
You walk down to the press rooms and start answering questions in response to the loss, and prepare to bring in some of the players to answer some questions, but Ilya is nowhere to be found, so you excuse yourself to go find him.
You look all over the away team space, locker rooms, common spaces, anything, then you remember that Ilya likes to smoke when under stress, so you walk out a back door to find him in a thick parka, trying to light up a cigarette. He looks over at you once the door clicks shut.
“What?” He asks, cigarette hanging in his mouth.
You step up to him, shoving your hands into the pockets of your jeans, wishing you also had a jacket on. “You’re needed inside. There’s a couple questions you need to answer.”
“No.” He tries to light again, but it’s getting blown out by the chilly night winds.
“It’s just a couple of questions, then you can head back to your hotel-”
“I said no, yes?” He shoves his lighter angrily into his pocket.
“You did.” You stare back at him, trying to gauge his emotions. “Well at least tell me things to say to the press about your playing tonight, I don’t want you getting pissed at me again for saying something wrong.” Your voice has a slight intonation in it that is implying anger, and Ilya picks up on it.
“You are mad?”
“No. I’m not mad. I just wish you would go answer a couple questions, so we can all go home.” You exhale loudly. “It’s freezing and I know you’re upset that you lost the game, but just suck it up and be the bigger man here.”
He scowls as he looks at you. You do look cold, and tense, there’s no doubt about it. He takes his own hands out of his pockets and plucks his gloves off, shoving them into you.
“Your fingers are blue.” He then walks past you and goes back inside, leaving you confused and holding massive gloves.
He actually was able to walk inside and talk to interviewers and he actually did a decent job watching them back. You pick up on him using a few of the baseline statements you had made last month, and it made you slightly proud knowing that he had learned those and would continue to use them.
Another video pops up on your feed, Shane Hollander’s interview. You click on it and watch as he speaks, not really understanding due to it being in a Canadian network, and him speaking an entirely different language. Man, does he sound nice though. His mom trained that boy right because he sounded so sportsmanlike and genuine all throughout the interview.
In fucking French.
You shut your laptop and turn over to flip the lights off in your hotel room, sighing and preparing for the flight back to Boston the next day.
You wake up, exhausted. You quickly brush your teeth, hair, and get dressed in your usual Boston merch. It was your job to get Ilya to the airport. How hard could that be?
Turns out, very.
You’ve been at his door, knocking for the past hour, with still no answer. He was supposed to meet you down in the lobby an hour and a half ago, so you’re already later than you ever wanted to be. Finally, as you’re about to legitimately call the police, he opens the door with messy hair and a tired gaze.
“What is your issue? It is early for this, no?” He asks slowly, rubbing his eyes as if he has no urgency. You glare at him.
“Ilya, it’s currently 10 AM, what the hell are you doing? Our flight leaves in an hour.”
His eyes stay trained on you for a couple seconds as the realization kicks in.
“And you choose now to come tell me?” He says, angrily, and you, rightfully so glare daggers into him. He shuts the door again while you call the airline and see when the next flight out to Boston is. You book the first ticket you can find and drag Ilya all the way to the airport, his headphones on the entire time.
Once you’re in your seat, you finally take a moment and look at the Russian next to you. You never thought this man, out of everything, would be fine with sitting in economy, but you’re grateful he is.
You lift off and instantly fall asleep, even though the flight is relatively short.
You wake up with you head against Ilya’s shoulder and immediately get off it, seeing his reaction, which was surprisingly neutral. The plan lands and you clear your throat.
The two of you don’t mention that incident, and you think he probably never will as he grabs his bags. He checked his while everything you packed can fit into a small carry on. You call a cab for the two of you and take him back to his apartment.
A couple days later, you’re woken up by a phone call, the name Ilya is spread across your screen as you pick up.
“Hello..?” You ask, groggy.
“Ya. I need to get my paycheck early.”
You sit up. He asked for this last month as well.
“Another advance? Ilya, I’m not sure how management will take this-”
“You are my manager, yes?”
You sit there. Silent. Did he finally call you his manager? Before you can say anything, he speaks again.
“Get it done. I need it by tomorrow.” And he hangs up, leaving you shocked, excited, and extremely tired.