Chapter Text
Shane barely held back an instinctive groan as Ilya sauntered over to them, Wagner and Breezy not being aware of their impending doom until he was right behind them. He had known better than to hope that Ilya wouldn’t make a scene like this, but he had at least hoped they’d be spared such an intimate audience.
“Boys,” Ilya said, startling both Wagner and Breezy, who quite literally flinch slightly as Ilya smacks a hand on each of their backs. Shane has to fight a grin back; he reminds himself that, obviously, he’s still pissed.
“Rozanov,” Wagner acknowledges him with a grin of his own, though quite obviously strained. Breezy gives him a nod, wisely saying nothing.
Ilya smiles more broadly now, glancing between the three of them. “What are we talking about?”
A private conversation that you had no right to barge in on is what Shane wants to say, but lets it stay in his mind. Instead, he opts for a raised eyebrow and dryly says, “Your crappy season. What gives?” Wagner and Breezy both whip their heads over to Shane, mouths slightly agape. Shane feels rather proud of himself for that one, a smirk showing on his face.
Of course, Ilya just throws his head back and laughs, delighted. Shane doesn’t get why that makes his chest flutter weakly.
+++
In his peripheral vision, Ilya can see Wagner and Breezy looking vaguely confused. He’s not surprised.
He was surprised that Shane still had it in him to be snarky. This was good. This meant that Ilya could still get under his skin. That was his opening, his foot in the door, whether Shane realized it or not.
He was always amused when Shane fought back. It reminded him of a house cat swiping at you with sheathed claws and a hiss. How easy it was to gently laugh and then correct the behavior with a scruff behind the neck.
Obviously, the two of them were not in a place to be physical– not yet, anyway.
But now, Ilya was certain. He could fix this. He would fix this. He wouldn’t lose Shane forever.
Shane would know that soon as well.
***
Those flutters intensified as Ilya’s head came back down while his grin stayed in place. While he could always say with certainty that Ilya would do something, he was still widely unpredictable. So, Shane wasn’t prepared for what came out of Ilya’s mouth next.
“Ah, perhaps I am lovesick, no? But maybe I found the cure,” Ilya drawls out, raising an eyebrow as well. Shane’s smirk falls instantly as Wagner and Breezy look even more bewildered.
After a brief, charged moment of silence, Wagner slowly places his glass on a nearby table. “Well, not sure whether to say sorry or congrats about all that, but I’m gonna go take a leak and check out the pool. Breezy, Hollander, you guys coming with?”
Breezy looks relieved for the easy out and eagerly nods, copying Wagner’s movements. Shane knows he surprises both of them by not moving with them.
He’s sure he looks vaguely constipated as he shakes his head, replying with a negative. “I think I want to commiserate with Rozanov for a bit. I’ll catch up later,” he says, also internally cringing at the idea of enduring their questions about this impending conversation. He makes a mental note to try to avoid the two of them for the rest of the weekend.
Wagner and Breezy quickly shuffle away, with only Breezy throwing a concerned look back over his shoulder. Shane attempts to meet his eyes with his own, hoping he can reassure Breezy that everything is fine and normal.
Even if it’s not.
As the two Admirals players disappear from view, Shane’s confidence goes with them. He’s honestly not sure how to handle this impending conversation. It’s long overdue, but it was never up to him to start it. It was up to him.
Ilya.
Ilya, who is staring directly at Shane, still with a slight shit-eating grin on his face, but with more serious eyes. Ilya stares so intently at Shane that he almost feels tempted to bolt.
But he had done that before. And then he came back. And then Ilya ran. And, apparently, now Ilya has come back.
Maybe it was time they both stopped running.
So Shane takes an audible deep breath in before fully turning to face Ilya. He nods once before he speaks, a sharp, jerky motion. He imagines rebuilding his composure and confidence inside his mind as though he were repairing a wall.
“Maybe we should take this elsewhere?” he suggests. Ilya nods. He looks around quickly before grabbing Shane’s hand, slipping a key card between them. Shane does not react to the slight squeeze around his fingers.
“3022,” Ilya quickly turns around, heading towards the elevators in the opposite direction that Wagner and Breezy had left for just a few minutes prior. He doesn’t turn around to see what Shane does; Shane knows that he’ll be waiting in his room.
It’s not even a choice. Shane knows that he will follow him. He may have recovered from the initial shock of Ilya’s rash decision, but that doesn’t mean he’s over the pain.
It doesn’t mean that he doesn’t still miss him terribly.
Only now does Shane realize how much lighter his chest feels. He had felt an anxious, heavy pressure on it since Lily first texted last week. It had hung around him like a dark cloud until that brief contact with Ilya lifted it. Shane feels like he can finally breathe a little bit easier.
He’s definitely anxious about this conversation, and he thinks about it incessantly as he waits a few minutes more, right where Ilya left him. He doesn’t want to head up right away– not because he wants to make Ilya wait longer, but because he’s used to the ruse they have to pull before they can meet. In some ways, it’s like nothing’s changed.
And in other ways, everything has.
It’s not like they “broke up” almost a year ago. They hadn’t been anything. At least, not out loud.
Inside, however, Shane knows that both of them knew it was something more, something serious. Which is what has led to his current dilemma.
He loves Ilya. He loves him still, even after all this time. He loves him despite all the heartache. He can hardly remember a time when he didn’t love Ilya. It’s almost unfair– at least, he thought it had been at first.
Shane remembers the few months following his injury. How many times he had to stop himself from texting, from searching for Ilya’s face in every room. How many times had he called Rose late at night, near tears? How many times had they ended the call in tears, waking up basically hungover the next morning from the emotional turmoil?
And then at the beginning of their current season, how many awkward-as-hell games had he played against the man in question, where he almost risked his own career to avoid him? And yet? Times where either of them could have– should have– slammed each other against the wall for the puck. The face-offs that were once filled with playful chirps were now frosty with silence.
And yet, somehow?
Shane Hollander loves Ilya Rozanov.
It’s a fact, for better or for worse. And that is why, despite Shane’s mounting trepidation as he begins walking over to the elevators, he still walks forward. He still heads over to Ilya’s room.
Love isn’t the cure to all the world’s problems– Shane knows this. But love does mean he will open himself up to risks that he would not otherwise take. So Shane will hear him out, hear what Ilya has to say. But it doesn’t mean that all will be forgiven. Shane needs Ilya to prove himself, to prove he is apologetic. And to show it with his actions.
Shane is also a bit of a hopeless romantic– why else would he have let Ilya lead him around on an invisible string for so long?
He pauses when he reaches the call buttons for the elevator, pulling his phone out to text Rose.
He asked to talk.
Rose doesn’t even have to ask who, even though the two of them hadn’t spoken about Ilya in months.
Do you want to?
Shane takes a beat before responding.
I need to.
He can practically see in his mind how Rose would shake her head before responding.
Not what I asked, Shane :(
This time, Shane’s response is immediate.
More than anything.
Rose doesn’t respond for a second, and Shane briefly wonders if she’s going to call him. They aren’t much for talking on the phone unless it’s an emergency, but he supposes running into your ex-situationship, and all that then ensued, counts as an emergency. But Rose doesn’t call.
You have such a big heart, Shane. Follow it!!!
And she punctuates it by sending a !! reaction to her own message. Shane feels a bit better about his decision to go to Ilya’s room now. He knows he would have gone even if Rose advised him not to, but he’s reassured by her faith in him and his feelings.
Shane wasn’t always so self-aware when it came to his heart. Ilya brought that out in him. Ilya brought both the best and the worst out in him. And because that happened to him, he knew the reverse was also true.
He’s self-aware enough to know that now he is definitely stalling. He’s not scared that Ilya will hurt him– Ilya never would harm him physically (off the ice), and he couldn’t hurt him emotionally any more than he already had. And Shane had seen the look on his face at the bar. He knew Ilya truly wanted to talk.
But he doesn’t know why Ilya wants to talk.
What if he’s just looking for more hook-ups?
Shane doesn’t think that’s it. He has his pick of the litter in Boston. And Shane just knows in his gut that if that’s all Ilya wanted, he would have been able to tell. And he would have used that intuition to tell Ilya to fuck right off.
Is he just looking to apologize?
That would be nice, but Shane had long ago accepted that closure doesn’t always come with apologies and warm hugs. Sometimes, closure is accepting that there is no actual closure. There is no apology, and life moves on. There just is.
So if it’s an apology, Shane will say thank you, and maybe take a little bit of comfort in it. But he also knows that it realistically won’t change much, if anything, about where they are now off the ice. Maybe the games would at least be a little less weird?
What if he’s asking for a real chance? Like I did a year ago?
Shane feels his knees tremble slightly at the idea. He’s actually not sure how he would react to that. If someone had told him a week ago that this was even a possibility, he probably would have laughed in their face. Part of his path to closure was accepting that this moment, this ability to talk to Ilya, would never actually happen. And the main reason for that is that Ilya had made it very clear that they were over as a concept, let alone as a physical manifestation.
The phone, still in his hand, buzzes– he had completely forgotten he still had it out. It’s another text from Rose.
Stop overthinking it.
He smiles. She knows him so well. He once again laments the fact that women, even one as amazing as Rose, just can’t do it for him– it would really be so much easier than whatever this was. Still, he appreciates her friendship immensely.
He takes a deep breath in, counts to three, and releases. With the hand not holding his phone, he reaches over and hits the button to call the elevator to the lobby. He sends a heart reaction to Rose’s message before turning the display off and shoving it back in his pocket.
Playing guessing games about Ilya’s intentions won’t help either of them. He builds a wall around the anxious thoughts, just like Rose once taught him. He needs to meet Ilya where he is at, which means he cannot arrive with any preconceived notions about what he may or may not say or do.
Shane takes stock of what he knows in that moment.
Ilya texted me with no context and approached me in person a week later. He asked me to his room. He seemed earnest and genuine. I am going up to his room to hear him out.
He lets the thoughts end there. He acknowledges his hesitancy; he lets the anxiety wash over him.
The elevator doors open in front of him.
Thankfully, he enters the elevator alone. He hits the button for floor 30.
Figures that Ilya would book the penthouse somehow.
The elevator doors slowly close as Shane takes a moment to close his eyes and compose himself.