Chapter Text
Shane’s phone is dead, so he can’t check it when he gets onto the bus to head back to the hotel. It sucks, sure, but, also, he’d just lost against Washington, which was annoying, and he just knows that Ilya is going to give him shit for it later, considering he won his match against Carolina.
So, there’s at least some plus sides to his phone being dead.
He shuts his eyes and leans all the way back against his seat, stretching his neck to the left and the right, trying to tune out all of the noise in this bus right now when J.J. gasps practically into his ear (even though he’s not even right next to Shane), “Woah, shit. The Centaurs’ plane crashed earlier.”
Shane has never moved so fast in his entire life, his eyes fly open, widening as he twists his head to stare straight at J.J., who’s in the same row as him across the aisle, “Wait, what? Are you sure?”
“Yeah,” J.J. nods, turning his phone to Shane but he can’t even read the words on the screen.
Panic is flooding his veins, worry has him entirely encompassed, everything goes completely quiet except for a ringing deep inside his ears. He reaches for his phone in his pocket, trying to turn it on when he remembers it’s fucking dead.
“Shit,” He mutters to himself, looking around, just trying to figure out what the hell he’s supposed to do right now. Okay, um, this is fine, this is okay, he looks at J.J., “Is everyone okay? Everyone’s okay, right?”
J.J. frowns a little bit, shrugging, “I am not sure, they do not say here. Are you okay?”
“I’m-” Shane nods, trying to calm himself down because it’s really not a good look for him to be panicking right now, “I’m fine.”
He has to be fine.
And Shane doesn’t mean himself, he means Ilya.
Ilya has to be fine.
Right?
He holds his breath, riddled with nerves, and, like some kind of angel, Hayden, who’s sitting next to him, hands him a portable charger, silently and knowingly.
“Oh my god, thank you, thank you so much,” Shane whispers in relief, frantically plugging his phone in.
He misses the first couple of times and has to force himself to take a deep breath so his hands steady a bit.
“What is going on, Shane?” J.J. asks, turning his entire body in his chair so that his legs are in the aisle and he’s facing Shane entirely, “You don’t seem fine.”
He taps at his leg anxiously, impatiently staring at his phone, waiting for it to just turn on. It’s taking way too long; he needs it to turn on, he needs to make sure Ilya is- God, alive.
His entire body feels heavy and full of dread as he thinks of the possibility of Ilya being dead in a crashed plane right now, he can’t think straight knowing that Ilya is more than likely, at the very least, injured in some way right now and Shane has just been oblivious and playing hockey..
He tries to take a deep breath but the air won’t come in properly, it’s shaky and unsure.
He needs to be fucking normal, he’s surrounded by all of his teammates right now and he really doesn’t want to bring attention to himself, not right now.
But he just doesn’t know how he’s possibly supposed to act normal right now knowing that the love of his life has been in a plane crash and he has no idea if he’s okay.
Finally, before he can spiral into even more thoughts of tragedy, his phone lights up and starts to power on. He stares at it and swears this is the longest it’s ever taken to power on before.
Hayden leans over and whispers, just loud enough for only Shane to hear, “He’s gonna be okay, dude.”
Shane wants to snap. He wants to tell Hayden that he doesn’t know, that he has no idea if that’s true. He wants to scream and say anything is possible, tell him not to jinx it.
But he can’t.
No words come out, his eyes are entirely focused on the phone screen until it finally turns onto his lockscreen. He swipes up and types in his password quickly, scrolling down to check his notifications, any sign of life from his partner.
He sees a few missed calls from his mom and a couple from his dad and his mind goes insane with possibility. He can’t even breathe right now as he scrolls some more and sees Instagram DMs from Ilya’s account, all he can read at first is, ”I love you. Always. Maybe from th…”
He doesn’t hesitate in clicking on the notification to bring him straight to their DMs. There’s not much there in it, they rarely use this to talk since they have each other’s phone numbers, of course, but it’s useful when they only have access to wi-fi and, there, in front of Shane’s eyes, on his phone screen, there are messages that make him grip his phone harder.
Ilya Rozanov
I love you. Always. Maybe from the first time I saw you.
I am thinking only about you right now. A million memories. Thank you for those.
Whatever happens, I am with you. Safe in your heart. I believe it.
Shane feels a stinging in the very back of his nose as his eyes start to fill with tears. He tries to bite them back, he’s surrounded by all of his teammates right now and they- Fuck, they can’t know anything because what he has with Ilya is a damn secret.
He looks toward the window so that only Hayden can see the emotion on his face, so that he can hide it from everybody else.
He hates it all so much, the love of his life was just in a plane crash and he can’t even react emotionally because it might out them or, at the very least, raise some kind of questions- Or, maybe Shane is overthinking it. People know they’re friends now and-
He takes a sharp intake of air, trying to get himself out of his damn head so much as he rereads the messages over and over again. They were obviously sent before the plane crashed so the very last ounce of logic that Shane still has left in his brain tells him that there’s still a possibility that he’s okay.
Somehow, someway.
And, also, this is making him realize that maybe he’s being a bit of an idiot, being so dead set on keeping them a secret. Maybe Ilya was right to kick him out, to tell him to go home. Maybe Shane needs to loosen up a little bit, maybe he should’ve agreed to go to the damn party and-
Fuck, he really needs to get in contact with someone who knows something about whether or not his boyfriend is still breathing right now because he can't keep thinking like this. He squeezes his eyes shut, forcing the tears to go away and he calls his mom back, holding the phone up to his ear, hoping that she, somehow, has some kind of update for him; he knows that Ilya made Yuna her emergency contact a while ago, just in case, so if anybody is going to be able to tell him anything it’s going to be her.
Unless she hasn’t heard any news, unless he’s dead at the crash site and they can’t identify his body, unless they-
”He’s okay,” His mom says the moment she answers the phone, barely even letting it ring one time and, yeah, she really does know her son. She knows that that had to be the very first thing out of her mouth before anything, otherwise Shane would spiral.
(As if he hasn’t already been spiraling.)
He takes in a breath and lets it out, shakily, “I’m on the bus right now, with my team,” He says, just above a whisper; he could talk normally, he knows that, the bus is loud enough that nobody except Hayden and maybe J.J. would be able to hear him but, honestly, he doesn’t think he has the energy to speak any louder.
”Okay,” Yuna answers, understanding that that means he can’t speak as freely as he wants to right now- he can barely do this around all of his teammates but he just needed to make sure Ilya’s alive.
He would not be able to finish this bus ride not knowing if Ilya is alive or not.
”He’s in a hospital in Florida right now, I’ll text you the name. He’s broken his arm and had to have surgery to repair something in his abdomen, debris from the plane hit him, the doctor says he’s gonna be out for the rest of the season. The doctor also said that he might need another surgery soon but this one can wait until your dad and I are there. We’re flying out tomorrow afternoon. We’ve booked the flight and looked at-”
Hearing about Ilya’s injuries makes his stomach twirl into knots, he needs to be with Ilya, he needs to be there right now, “I’ll be there by the morning.”
He settles on, knowing it’s impossible for him to make it to Florida instantly.
”What? The soonest flight out of Washington to Florida isn’t until noon tomorrow, we checked for you and-”
“I’m gonna rent a car and drive there,” Shane says without skipping a beat. He doesn’t care about anything except being with Ilya right now.
”Shane,” Yuna says in her very best mom voice and it would intimidate Shane if he could focus on anything but Ilya right now, ”Do not be reckless. You just played a difficult game, you need to rest, then you can fly out tomorrow.”
“I can’t rest, mom,” Shane whispers, trying his very best not to completely break down but he feels so vulnerable, “I need to see…” He trails off, not wanting to say him in case someone - J.J. probably - is listening.
Yuna sighs and the next thing she says is, ”Give the phone to Hayden.”
“What-”
”Shane Hollander, I know you’re sitting next to Hayden, so give the phone to him right now or so help me-”
“Okay, okay,” Shane quickly shoves the phone and battery pack into Hayden’s hand, “She wants to talk to you.”
Hayden furrows his eyebrows but brings the phone up to his ear nonetheless. Shane can’t hear what his mom is saying but he hears Hayden humming in agreement and nodding his head, saying, “Yes, of course. No problem.”
Then, when he takes it away from his ear, the call is over.
“What just happened?” Shane asks.
“I’m coming with you, apparently,” Hayden slowly gives Shane his phone back, “She doesn’t want you to do that drive alone and all emotional, so you just signed me up for a very long trip. Also she says she loves you.”
Shane shakes his head and rolls his eyes, “She’s just being protective, you don’t have to come. I know you want to get back to Jackie and the kids and-”
“I’m coming,” Hayden says very sure of himself this time, “I just keep thinking that, y’know, if this were Jackie, I’d want you there with me, so…”
J.J. then finally chimes in, “Okay I am very confused, what is happening? Where are you guys going together? And why are we comparing whatever is going on to Hayden’s wife?”
Fuck.
Okay.
So J.J. has been listening.
Shane doesn’t know what to say, he doesn’t know if he should just tell J.J. the truth once they get back to the hotel or if he should just try to make up some sort of excuse. He thinks about the argument he had with Ilya about how Ilya doesn’t tell people but that Shane has told so many and-
Shane feels completely conflicted but he also feels like maybe, just maybe, he’s done hiding. This has put things into perspective for him more than anything else ever has before and he hates that he can’t just easily be honest about what’s going on.
He hates that it has to be an entire battle in his mind.
Shane decides to just be sort of honest with him without telling him the explicit truth, “Uh- Um,” He sighs, “I can’t tell you right now, honestly, I just- I just can’t tell you but I…” He trails off, trying to find the right words to use, “will. Eventually.”
J.J. looks like he’s about to protest when Hayden cuts in with, “C’mon, J.J., man, it’s really not the time to argue.”
“Okay, fine, fine,” J.J. holds his hands up in the air defensively and turns his body back around so that he’s sitting in his seat normally again.
Waiting for the bus to stop is probably the most grueling thing Shane has had to go through in a long time. He stares at the seat in front of him, just waiting and waiting, unable to pay attention to anything else.
Once it finally stops, he rushes off before anybody else can so that he can get up to his hotel room and make rental car arrangements. Hayden shows up in the room not too long after and Shane’s never been more grateful that he’s rooming with Hayden.
“He’s okay, you know,” Hayden whispers as if there might still be people around who can hear them, “Yuna said that his surgery went well and-”
“And he might need to have another one!” Shane snaps, turning to look at Hayden, “He’s hurt, Hayd. He’s hurt and I’m not with him and I should be with him, I should be there and-”
“Hey,” Hayden whispers, shaking his head, “There was absolutely no way you could’ve known that this was going to happen, don’t blame yourself for not being there. The important thing is that we will be there, right?”
Shane clenches his jaw and turns away from Hayden, finally letting himself cry. The tears fall down his cheeks quickly and he reaches up to wipe them away, “What if-” He tries to speak through deep breaths, “something happens and I’m not there with him and he-” He sniffs through his nose and looks back to his best friend, “what if he dies, Hayden?”
“That is not going to happen,” Hayden assures him, taking a step forward to place a hand on Shane’s shoulder, “It’s not going to happen, your mom said that the doctors are very hopeful for a full recovery, he’s going to be okay.”
Shane knows that, logically he knows that, but he can’t stop his mind from jumping to the absolute worst conclusions.
“We need to go,” Shane decides, his brain kicking into panic do something mode, “I looked it up and it’s a 13 hour drive. I spoke to a rental car place that’s open right now and I already paid, we just need to go there so I can sign some papers and pick up the car. I called an uber already and-”
“Okay,” Hayden places his other hand on Shane’s other shoulder, “Take a deep breath and calm down, yeah?”
Shane nods. Yeah. He’s right, he’s really definitely right.
Shane takes a deep breath and tries to ground himself.
“Alright,” Hayden smiles and brings his hands back to himself, “Let’s grab our things, go tell Coach that we’re leaving, and then we can go wait for the Uber outside, okay? I already called Jackie so she knows I won’t be home, it’s going to be okay.”
Shane nods again, not able to find it in himself to say anything.
Luckily, they never really fully unpack stuff so it’s easy for them to grab their bags and head out. They make their way to their coach’s hotel room and knock on the door. It takes a few moments for an answer but eventually the door is swinging open and their coach is on the other side, looking tired, “Hollander, Pike, what can I do for you?”
“Uh,” Shane starts, “I have a family emergency so I won’t be on the flight with the team tomorrow and Hayden’s coming with me.”
“Um,” He looks taken aback, “Okay, where are you guys going? How are you getting there?”
“It’s personal,” Is all that Shane answers to the first question, “and we’re renting a car.”
“And we have to go, our uber is almost here,” Hayden adds, not allowing for anymore conversation.
They make their way out of the hotel and to the point that Shane had declared as the pickup area. The uber gets there about a minute after they both do and toss their bags into the trunk before making their way into the back seat together.
The driver is an older woman and, thankfully, she doesn’t seem to recognize who they are, which is a relief to Shane because he doesn’t think he could handle being noticed by a fan right now, not in the state he’s in right now.
He stays silent the entire drive and he’s thankful for Hayden being there at the moment because he’s handling all of the small talk with the driver. Eventually, they pull into the rental car place and get out quickly, tipping the driver well, and even more quickly getting out to gather their things.
The rental car place worker that Shane had spoken to on the phone meets them as soon as they walk into the building. She already has all of the paperwork ready for him to sign - which both he and Hayden have to do since they’ll both be driving - and then hands him the keys after leading them to the car.
They put their things into the trunk and they decide that Shane should drive first just because he knows that he won’t be able to sleep so it’ll be useful for Hayden to get some sleep before taking a turn driving.
Shane pulls up directions on his phone and starts the drive, Hayden in the passenger seat, “Are you sure you’re okay to drive?”
“Yes, Hayden,” Shane assures, hands gripped on the steering wheel, carefully watching the road, “I’m not going to start having some sort of breakdown while driving.”
“Hey, you never know,” Hayden crosses his arms, leaning backward in his seat, “but if you’re sure you’re not gonna crash and kill us, then I’ll get some sleep.”
“I’m sure.”
So, Hayden falls asleep and, for the first hour, Shane is very much focused on the road. He tries not to think about Ilya in a plane crash, he tries not to think about Ilya in an operating room or a hospital bed. He’s successful at first, it’s easy for him to drown out those thoughts with the road and paying attention to the other cars around him.
Then hour two hits and Shane is getting a little less good at turning away the thoughts of Ilya. They’re overwhelming and he’s just scared for him, he wants him to be okay, he knows he’s alive and, as of right now, doing well, but anything could change in any instance.
Hell, it only took one second for Ilya’s plane to start crashing, right?
Shane manages to keep his focus on the road, though.
Hours three and four go by incredibly slowly, mostly just because Shane wants to be there already. He wants to be at Ilya’s side and he doesn’t feel okay right now because he isn’t.
Hayden wakes up during hour five, asking Shane if he wants to switch at all but Shane says no. The driving is helping him have a distraction, it’s helping him not think so much about Ilya and he wants to keep it that way for now because thinking about Ilya hurts.
Hayden doesn’t argue and he sleeps again for the rest of hour five but wakes up again near the start of hour six without any intention of sleeping anymore.
They make conversation about hockey and Hayden’s family, Shane mentions needing to come around to see them all again sometimes soon. They start listening to an audiobook for a while, it’s never really been Shane’s thing but Hayden likes to listen to them so it doesn’t really matter to Shane much.
Halfway through hour seven, they decide to stop for gas. They still have an okay amount, this rental car gets really good gas mileage and they got it on a full tank, but they don’t want to risk being stuck in the middle of nowhere, so they decide to fill up before continuing on.
“Alright,” Hayden says after filling up the tank, “we’re switching now, okay?”
Shane wants to argue but decides against it because he knows that Hayden is right, he really shouldn’t do the entire drive himself. So, he climbs into the passenger seat and lets Hayden do some of the driving.
Shane tries to distract himself by staring out at the road, scrolling on his phone, talking to Hayden, and, honestly, just trying not to think of Ilya at all.
(It doesn’t work.)
Hours eight and nine are slow going but it’s hour ten that gets Shane’s heart skipping a beat.
His phone rings and Shane is very ready to press ignore until he looks down and sees, ”Lily,” flashing on the screen in front of him.
He’s pretty sure he’s never answered a call so quickly before.
He takes a deep breath, ready to speak, when Ilya’s voice is already ringing into his ears, ”Shut up,” He says in that beautiful Russian accent that Shane adores, the one he’s missed, the one he’s absolutely needed to hear ever since he heard that Ilya had been in a plane crash.
The sound of Ilya’s voice almost renders him speechless but he manages to mutter, “I didn’t even say anything.”
Ilya chuckles softly on the other line but it sounds a little painful for him and, from his voice, he sounds exhausted, ”I know you did not but you were going to say something sappy and I do not want to handle sappy right now”
“You’re such an asshole,” Shane scoffs into his phone in an attempt to seem annoyed as he tries to ignore the way his heart beats faster in his chest, relieved to be hearing Ilya’s voice, and he lets out a deep breath, “Actually, I don’t even care. It’s so good to hear your voice, I’ve been terrified, Ilya.”
”I know, Sweetheart,” Ilya says it with complete ernest, no teasing lilt in the tone of his voice like there was earlier, ”For what it’s worth, I am sorry.”
“You don’t need to be sorry, you just need to be okay,” Shane settles on, “and I know we have a lot to talk about but right now I just…”
”Later,” Ilya agrees easily, ”That can be later.”
Thank god.