Chapter Text
“Come on my girl, you can do it, take a step.” Shane said.
Alyona had been trying to take her first steps for days now. Her wobbly legs failed her each time, but this time she looked determined.
Shane was sitting a few small steps in front of her, arms stretched outward. Ilya was beside her, urging her to try. This was the moment Ilya had dreamed of from the moment they decided to become parents. One of those moments straight out of a movie.
“Go on, my light you can do it,” Ilya’s soft words spoke in Russian.
My Light, the new nickname he had given their daughter. It didn’t make much sense in English, but Ilya loved giving Shane and Aly odd Russian words as loving names. This one is definitely sticking it seems. Even Shane admitted it was adorable, and fitting. Alyona really was the light of their lives.
Then, she moved. Very slowly Alyona picked her left foot up, just barely. Then her right.
She was really doing it, her first steps.
She toddled toward Shane, reaching for his hands.
“Oh my god, that’s it honey! Keep going Aly!” Shane’s excitement coming through his words. “Ilya I can’t believe it! She’s walking.”
She made it to Shane and bursted into soft baby giggles. Making Shane giggle too, tears falling from his eyes.
Ilya thought it was the most beautiful sound he had ever heard.
***
“I think we should go to Montreal on Thursday instead of Friday. Amber is playing at home that night so we should go to her game,” Alyona said. They were on the way back from the rink where Aly practices. She had been looking at her phone the entire ride so far, not even chiming in on her parents conversation regarding dinner. Bickering about dinner was a nightly ritual in their household, Shane won those fights 90% of the time.
“I think we could probably do that. About time Montreal has a Pike that is good at hockey,” Ilya smirked in the rearview mirror at Alyona.
“You are never going to let go of the whole ‘15th best player on the team’ thing are you,” Shane sighed, the smile on his face was not missed by their daughter.
Amber Pike may have been several years older than Alyona, but they were very close. Aly was too young for the rest of the kids to actually play with or anything but to 8 year old Amber, baby Alyona was the greatest gift her uncles could have given her. The girls were inseparable, especially once Alyona could walk and talk. They would play dress up, dolls, makeup, etc. Mainly Amber dressing up Aly, but once she was big enough it was the two of them playing together for hours. Their parents couldn’t have asked for anything more for their girls. “Built in best friends for life,” Jackie had dubbed them. It couldn’t have been more true.
The littlest Pike wasn’t so little anymore. She was also the only Pike kid to go into hockey professionally, no one was surprised that she had gone into the PWHL. She was extremely talented in many ways and always had been. Amber was the Victoire’s new goalie, and likely the best one in the league according to her current player stats.
“Are you going to tell me who it is you have been texting all night, Alyonushka?” Ilya asked in Russian, sliding up to the counter next to Alyona.
“Jesus Christ Papa,” Alyona replied quickly in Russian, then switching to English, nearly jumping out of her skin, “It’s no one, just Amber.”
“If it is just Amber, why did you hide your phone from me? You are bad liar just like your Dad.” Ilya smirked.
“Ilya leave her alone and come help me with dinner,” Shane said to his husband. Ilya took one last look at Alyona before leaving the kitchen island and helping Shane cut vegetables for their dinner.
If Alyona wanted them to know who she was texting she would tell them, and while Ilya knew that, he had a sneaking suspicion that it was not in fact Amber Pike on the other end of those messages. Considering Aly had been scrolling through an Instagram profile, not texting anyone at all. He would definitely be making a note of that, it was very unusual for her to so openly lie to her dads. Her eyes always gave her away and this time was no different.
The deep brown eyes she had were much like Shane’s, framed by long dark lashes. (The only thing missing from her face were the scattered freckles Ilya loved so much.) They say eyes are the window to the soul, Aly’s would let anyone who got close enough see directly into hers. Her face may have remained schooled in a practiced expression of indifference, but her eyes were proof enough that Ilya had caught her. What she was hiding Ilya did not know but he decided to let it go.
Ilya was not sure whose profile Alyona was stalking, but whoever they were, he hoped would be better than that little bitch Justin.
The week seemed to crawl by between school and practice, Aly was worn down to the bone. Shane could see it, he had been that student athlete before. School, homework, practice, gym. It was never ending work, but he loved hockey so much and his goal had always been to end up in the NHL, which he was. He also wanted to be a Stanley Cup Champion, which he became. Multiple times, on two different teams, he would add. It was hard to be the best, he knew that for sure. Alyona knew that too, which is what worried Shane. He recently started noticing things about Alyona, things that he used to do.
It wasn’t anything to do with the way she was skating, that was consistent as she always was. It was her demeanor, she was pulling back from them. In her defence, she was almost 18, her birthday being a few days into the Olympics. It’s not unusual for teenagers to pull back from their parents while they find out who they really are, at least that’s what the parenting book Shane had gotten from the local library has said.
However, it is also what Shane had done when he met Ilya for the first time at Junior Worlds and he needed time to deal with all of those feelings. And also what Shane did when he felt like he had no one in the world to talk to about those feelings, he felt like he couldn’t even talk to his parents back then. Of course, until Rose Landry came into the picture and laid it out to him.
Rose had solved the puzzle of Shane’s sexuality for him in less than a month when he had been working on it for almost 7 years. So she was obviously Shane’s first call for help once he realized what might be happening with Alyona.
“Hey Shane! I’ve missed you, you never call me!” Rose said.
“Rose, we text almost everyday. We have for the past like 20 years,” Shane rolled his eyes even though Rose could not see him, “How are you and Svetlana?”
“Ugh, she’s beautiful as always,” Rose replied.
They talked through all of the basic conversation formalities before Shane finally got to his original point for the phone call. He told Rose everything he knew, Aly was pulling away from them like he did to his own parents and that he and Ilya were concerned.
“I mean, Shane, are we sure she isn’t just stressed about the competition this weekend? Obviously she is going to do extremely well, but isn’t this the last one before Olympic qualifiers? She may be your daughter but she’s also a high schooler, she has a lot going on! Between maintaining schoolwork, friendships, and everything else? You know what that pressure is like, both you guys do.”
Shane sighed, “I know, and I know I’m not the best at reading people, but Rose I just don’t want to miss anything with her. She’s everything to us you know? I hid so much of myself for so long, I don’t want that for her.”
“Shane, you and Ilya are excellent fathers. She will come to you when she needs you! You have to trust her, and yourself for that matter. You are always so hard on yourself to be perfect, this isn’t something you can be perfect at. You just have to be there for her, yeah?” Rose was once again correct.
She always knew the right thing to say, truly the best friend Shane could have ever asked for.
Shane agreed, he thanked Rose before letting her go. She was right, If they pushed too hard Aly would continue to recede. That’s what he always did, and honestly continues to do sometimes.
Once the car was fully packed for the long weekend ahead of them they were headed to Montreal. Ilya still had mixed feelings about the city, it had been so long since the Voyageurs had thrown Shane out on his ass for being gay. Maybe time could heal most wounds, but not that one for Ilya. He can still hear the slurs Shane’s former team hurled at them on the ice. He could also remember the absolute joy he got from beating the shit out of them every time they played against them. All of the minutes in the sin bin had been worth it to him.
This time this drive was being made for their daughter to kick ass at one last contest before qualifiers in December. Once she makes it, because she absolutely will according to all 3 of them, they have to choose her for the main team. That was Alyona’s main goal, she has been saying it for years.
Hayden and Jackie decided to host everyone over at their house for an early pregame dinner once they heard from Amber that the Hollander-Rozanov crew would be coming in early for her game. So after dropping all of their bags and equipment off at their hotel in the city, they headed to the Pike house.
“I think it’s just going to be Uncle Hayden, Aunt Jackie, and Amber. Arthur is working late again, Ruby is out of town, and I have no clue what Jade is up to these days,” Alyona said from the backseat.
“Maybe if they didn’t have an entire hockey team worth of children, they would all be able to come to dinner,” Ilya laughed.
“Ilya please, can you be on your best behavior? We don’t need a repeat of last time we were over for dinner,” Shane tried to sound stern but failed because well, Ilya wasn’t exactly wrong about the insanity of having 4 children. They were all snickering as they pulled in the driveway at Hayden and Jackie’s place.
“Amber!” Alyona shouted as Amber walked out to greet her best friend, wrapping her up in a hug.
“Oh, little Pike! Do not forget your favorite Uncle,” Ilya said, holding his arms out.
“I would never! Uncle Shane, I missed you!” Amber said, ducking under Ilya’s outstretched arms to get to Shane.
Ilya gasped, “Amber Pike, I know you did not just skip me for Shane of all people.”
“Oh she definitely did. How are you? I missed you too,” Shane said, hugging her.
“This is the most disrespect I have ever felt in my life. Worse than Shane being friends with Hayden all this time.”
“Dude. I am right here!” Hayden huffed from the open front door, “You are about to come to dinner at my house and you are already shit talking me?”
Ilya heard Alonya and Amber giggle at that.
“Ilya!” Jackie pushed past Hayden to hug Ilya.
“Ah, Jackie. How’s my favorite Pike?” He asked.
“Hey!” Both Amber and Hayden said simultaneously.
“Well maybe if you two were actually kind to me like Jackie has always been, you could be my favorite,” Ilya said plainly.
Everyone cracked up at that before heading in for dinner. Jackie had made an amazing meal for everyone to enjoy, and these days Shane really did enjoy food.
Shane didn’t follow his ridiculously strict macrobiotic he did when he was younger. He still ate cleanly but he didn’t use food as a weapon against himself anymore.
He started to see his therapist Leanne at the suggestion of Ilya’s therapist Galina. Ilya had mentioned to her Shane’s eating habits on a few different occasions, Ilya didn’t really think too much about it until she put a label on it.
Of course Shane immediately denied the fact that he had an eating disorder, there was no way. He was an athlete, in his eyes he was just trying to maintain peak performance level with his diet and rigorous training schedule. To prove his point, he did hours of research. The problem was, everything he looked into only proved Galina was right. Maybe Shane Hollander, Canada’s Golden Boy, really did have an eating disorder.
So he met Leanne for the first time, then a second, and before long he was seeing her almost every other week. She specialized in disordered eating, specifically among athletes. She really opened his eyes to the real reason he was even doing the diet at all was to try and outrun the inevitable, that one day his body wouldn’t be able to handle playing hockey anymore. The control he always felt he needed when it came to food and his body was never really about the food. He thought if he controlled himself enough he could be the perfect son and the perfect hockey player. In reality he just needed to be Shane, and being himself is good enough.
Years of therapy and self actualization really helped him see that, and he promised to never push those negative feelings he had toward himself onto anyone else, he absolutely would not push them onto his daughter of all people.
Laughter and conversation filled the dining room as dinner went on. Ilya pretended not to notice Aly and Amber whispering about something, he couldn’t make out a single word over Shane and Hayden discussing the latest NHL game. He strained his ears, trying to hear even the slightest piece of what looked to be juicy information. Not that he cared for gossip or anything like that. When he glanced up, Jackie was staring at him, one eyebrow raised as if to say, What is that about? Ilya just shrugged back at her, if even Jackie didn’t know, whatever the girls were talking about had to be top secret.
Montreal beat Seattle 3-1 that night, the whole arena was filled with excited energy. Shane really hoped it would feel like this again the next few nights during Aly’s competition. She always did better when the crowd buzzed like they are now, the cheers lit a fire in her like nothing else ever did.
“I’m going down to wait for Amber by the locker room, I want to say goodbye in person,” Aly spoke loudly in Shane’s ear, it was hard to hear her over the crowd slowly filing out of the rink.
He nodded at her, “Don’t take too long, we need to be back to the room soon. Meet us by the doors in about 15 minutes okay?”
Alyona nodded before making her way to the hall where the locker room was. When she reached the door to the locker rooms she picked a spot on the wall a few feet away, leaned against it and popped one foot up. She was chewing on the strings of her Victorie sweatshirt Amber had given her for Christmas the year she joined the team and scrolling aimlessly. She didn’t even notice someone was standing next to her until they cleared their throat.
“Um, are you Alyona Hollander-Rozanova?” The voice spoke softly.
Aly looked up quickly and her brown eyes were met with soft blue ones.
The woman before her had her light brown hair pulled back, still wet from a post-game shower.
“Uh, yes I am, and you are?” Aly asked, even though she was pretty sure she knew exactly who was standing before her.
“Oh yeah, sorry, I’m Daisy Royer…I play with your friend Amber? I just had to say that I’ve seen some of your routines and stuff, I think you are an amazing skater. It’s really cool to watch,” Daisy said, her cheeks flushed a bright shade of red.
Shane checked his watch again, they were waiting for Alyona so they could get back to the hotel. Those 15 minutes Shane had given her were slowly turning into 30.
“Oh my god, where is that kid?” Ilya said to no one directly, but Shane replied anyway, “Relax, I’m sure she’s on her way.” His Russian was by no means perfect, but Ilya’s heart always warmed when Shane spoke to him in his native tongue. It took him several years to become what Shane considered mildly fluent, but Ilya didn’t care. It just meant the world to him that Shane cared so much.
Just then, Alyona turned the corner towards them.
“Papa, Dad, I am so sorry. Amber and I were talking and I wasn’t paying attention to what time it was,” Aly was nearly breathless from hurrying over to them.
“My Light,” Ilya said, pulling her into his side and pecking the top of her head, “Is no big deal, just pay attention next time. We need to get back so you can rest, you have two days of competition ahead of you.”
They walked out to the car talking about everything that needed to be done for the following days ahead of them, but Alyona wasn’t really paying attention.
She was pretty sure she had just met the most beautiful girl she had ever seen and she had no clue what the fuck she was going to do about it.