Chapter Text
The copy comes in a sturdy envelope early the one afternoon he's off at home in November.
Shane had been anxiously awaiting its arrival, obsessively pasting the tracking number into Google for status updates every day since the shipping confirmation arrived in his email. It was scheduled for two-day delivery, and still he checked its whereabouts, as if the system lied to him last time he looked.
Honestly, the compulsion embarrassed him. He was 30 years old and playing his 11th season in the NHL. He didn't need to be so hung up on the drivel any reporter might write about him.
But this article is different. Shane has spent half his life in the spotlight and until the day that woman walked into this house, he'd never been vulnerable with a complete stranger before. And he had been so vulnerable.
The idea of a massive audience getting that close a look into his life makes him shake even now. His story is In Print. He's got an early copy but nothing can be changed. He won't be able to look back after it's released to the rest of the world.
He should probably wait to open the magazine until he's not alone.
He drops the envelope on the kitchen table and goes about making his post-workout smoothie. He dumps protein powder into the blender, a couple spoonfuls of Greek yogurt, some berries, some kale, some chia seeds, as many things as he can think of. As the ingredients churn in the machine, he stares out the window at the gray sky. The clouds look heavy, like the might dump snow at any moment. He hopes the streets are sufficiently prepared this time.
Unsurprisingly, that train of thought leads his mind right back to the envelope. Leave it, he repeats in his head, all the way through pouring the smoothie into an appropriate vessel, spraying down the inside of the blender for easier cleanup later, and pulling a prepped quinoa salad out of the refrigerator.
The moment he goes to take his utensils in hand at the table, his resolve breaks. He drops the silverware onto the place mat, pushes away his food and pulls over the very real proof of what might be the bravest thing he's ever done.
The First Husbands of Hockey
How Two Rivals Teamed Up for Their Longest Game Yet
By Perenna Webb
OTTAWA, Ontario
"I downsized," Ilya Rozanov says as he leads me down a set of stairs in his sprawling mansion on the outskirts of the city. I grow more skeptical of the statement the longer it takes us to arrive at the bottom floor. Then a series of overhead lights flicker on, bouncing off the polished concrete under our feet and bringing four vehicles into clear view.
Rozanov picks up his train of thought. "I had many cars in Boston. I didn't want them after I came to Centaurs. But I needed this." He pulls up in front of a bright red motorcycle and gestures with a flourish. "Ducati. My baby."
Rozanov points next to the metallic gray Mercedes SUV parked behind a gleaming white Jeep Cherokee. "Sensible cars. For winter," he explains.
"This is my favorite," he says, leading me the opposite direction to a car much more befitting of a millionaire hockey star at the top of his game. It's a peculiar shade of blue, lower to the ground than one might think a superior athlete of Rozanov's build would be comfortable folding himself into. He beams over its hood at me, and that's when I notice a glint in his eyes. "Lotus Evora," he continues. "Shane got it for me in the summer."
That would be fondness in his gaze then. More than that, it is love. Because the "Shane" he means is Shane Hollander, arguably an even more prominent hockey star than Rozanov. He joined the Ottawa Centaurs as a free agent this past July, the length of the contract and the admittedly paltry sum he agreed to making waves across the world of sports.
He is the man waiting upstairs for Rozanov to stop distracting the reporter here to chronicle the story of how they met, how they became entwined and how they grew up to be the first out queer couple in the 100-year history of the National Hockey League.
"A wedding gift?" I ask.
Rozanov's smile grows impossibly wider, his eyes inexplicably brighter. He looks down at the Centaurs t-shirt he wears. It bears a highly stylized image of Hollander, who rolled his eyes at his husband when he joined the two of us in the entryway of the house some 30 minutes ago.
"Anya threw up on me," Rozanov said with an unmistakable hint of amusement in his tone. "You know she doesn't like the crate." Hollander didn't buy the excuse about their dog, but he didn't press Rozanov. The damage had already been done.
When he replies to my question, "I don't know what I did to deserve it, but yes, a wedding gift," the idea that Rozanov was derailing this interview before it even left the station evaporated from my mind.