Chapter Text
It’d been a month since he walked out on Ilya. Shane was still trying to get the hurt, confused look that had been plastered all over the other man’s face out of his head. They chirped at each other all the time, teased and insulted one another, but none of that had ever led to so much pain on the Russian’s face. At least, not until Shane practically ran away from him.
He hadn’t done anything wrong either, which only made the guilt in his gut a million times worse. No, Ilya had been affectionate, caring. More so than he’d ever been before. Hell, he’d made Shane a tuna melt. It’d been almost…domestic?
He’d been having a good time. Shane couldn’t remember the last time he’d been so relaxed. There was so much pressure, so much attention on him all of the time, but when he was with Ilya, everything was easy. Natural.
But then, Shane had come to the terrifying realization, right there in Ilya’s penthouse, that he was falling in love with him. Hell, not even falling. He was already in love with him.
And if there was one thing that Shane knew with absolute certainty he wasn’t allowed to be, it was being in love with Ilya Rozanov.
It was bad enough that it would ruin his career if anyone else found out. What only made the matter worse was that he knew Rozanov could never feel the same way. Ilya liked casual hookups, he liked fun. He wasn’t in it for feelings.
So Shane left, as quickly as he could. He left before he could fall for the man even more. He left while he still could.
Because the longer he stayed, the harder it would’ve been to leave.
After that day, he vowed that enough was enough. He was going to focus on hockey, on bringing another cup home to Montreal. No more distractions. No more breaking the rules.
That was part of the reason he started going out with Rose. Sure, she was gorgeous and funny and easy to be with. The fact that the rest of the world seemed to think it was perfectly natural for Shane to be with her only made it easier.
His whole entire life, he’d always done the right thing. He focused on hockey, ate well, and practiced hard. He followed the rules that had been set out for him.
And being with Rose, well, that was the right thing. Wasn’t it?
“You ready to kick Hunter’s ass, Hollander?” JJ asked as he entered the locker room, carrying a duffel bag over his shoulder.
Per usual, JJ was one of the last ones to arrive, meaning the locker room was already bustling with activity as everyone got ready for their game against New York.
Hayden let out a scoff, laughing a bit.
“Please, it’s Hunter. The guy’s accident. Shane could take him any day,” Hayden remarked, to which a few other guys around the room chorused their agreement.
Maybe, on a different day, Shane would’ve stood up for the guy a bit more, but the past few weeks, he hadn’t had much energy. He went out with Rose, showed up to practice, played in games, and that was about it. Doing anything else seemed like too much effort when his heart still had a massive gaping hole in it.
Drapeau, who’d been sitting in his stall, scrolling on his phone to waste time since most of his gear was already on, suddenly looked up.
“You guys hear Rozanov’s not playing tonight?”
“What?” Shane asked, voice a bit higher than usual with panic, quickly turning his head to look over at the other man.
Ilya wasn’t the type of player to miss a game. Shane was pretty sure the guy could be dying of the flu, and he’d still try to lace up his skates. If he was missing a game, well, that meant it had to be something serious.
Hayden shot him a confused look, and Shane took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. Or, at least, not be so obvious. It wasn’t his problem anymore. Ilya was probably fine. Even if he wasn’t, well, Shane shouldn’t care. He wasn’t supposed to care anymore.
As he’d unfortunately been learning, not caring was a lot easier in theory than it was in practice.
“ESPN just posted about it,” Drapeau confirmed with a shrug, tilting his phone so they could see the screen. “Some sort of family situation, apparently.”
A bit of tension leaked out of his shoulders at hearing that Ilya wasn’t sick, or worse, injured, but a family situation still didn’t make much sense either. Granted, he didn’t know much about the man’s family, but it was pretty obvious he wasn’t close with them. And if he was dealing with a family situation, then that almost certainly meant he’d gone back to Russia.
“Guess Buffalo might actually have a chance tonight,” JJ remarked, causing Hayden to snort a laugh.
Even without Ilya, the Bears were still a great team. Buffalo, well… even on their best day, they sucked. For Buffalo to stand a chance against them, the whole first two lines of the Bears would have to be out.
“I want everyone on the ice in ten!” Theriault announced loudly from where he’d been talking with some of the rookies, causing the locker room to instantly quiet down.
Shane went back to lacing up his skates, forcing any thoughts of Ilya out of his mind. He had to win tonight, and he knew there was no chance of that happening if he spent the whole game thinking about the man he could never have.
Despite how hard he tried not to, Shane couldn’t help but continue to keep tabs on Ilya. Any time an ESPN report mentioned him, he scanned the whole article twice. His concern only grew when it was announced that Ilya would be out until the All-Star game in January. Again, there was no mention of an injury, only talks of a family situation.
But what sort of family situation would mean Ilya taking six weeks off of hockey?
Shane distracted himself with Rose and hockey, anything to keep his mind off of Ilya.
Unfortunately, that got significantly harder to do once he and Rose broke up. The break up itself wasn’t that upsetting. He and Rose had agreed to remain friends, and he, of course, understood why she’d ended their relationship. But once he came to the realization that he was gay, it made it a hell of a lot harder to move on.
When he’d walked out of Ilya, he’d told himself that it was fine. That he could move on and have a normal relationship, one the world would be accepting of. But he’d never be able to have that, not really. Not when he couldn’t love a woman. Granted, the backlash wouldn’t be nearly as bad as long as he didn’t date his archrival, but there was no way the entire MHL would be supportive of their golden boy loving a man.
So, if Shane’s only choice was loving a man or being alone, then it seemed he really only had one option.
He tried not to be angry at the unfairness of it all. Rozanov could still go and have a normal relationship. He liked being with women. The end of their… well, whatever they’d had together, it didn’t mean being alone forever the way it did for Shane. He could have it all, a relationship, a family, a career.
Shane would only ever be able to pick one or the other.
Would only ever be able to have one or the other.
And really, what kind of life was that?
By the time the All-Star game came around, Shane was practically vibrating with anticipation to see Ilya. He’d accepted that he’d never be able to have a normal, public relationship. At least, not until he retired. But maybe he and Ilya could just keep doing what they were doing. Sneaking a moment here and there. Being together when they could.
It’d be enough for Shane. It had to be.
Plus, he was dying to finally make sure the other man was okay with his own eyes. He’d heard nothing from Ilya since November. No texts, no calls, nothing. Granted, Shane couldn’t blame him. He’d been the one to walk out, and it wasn’t like he’d reached out to check in either. But something serious had to have happened for Ilya to take so much time off of hockey, and Shane desperately wanted to make sure Ilya was alright, if only to relieve the vice around his heart, to lessen the anxiety coursing through his veins at the thought of anything happening to the other man.
When he finally spotted him sitting at the bar, dressed in a hawaiian shirt – which was certainly a sight he didn’t think he’d ever see – and looking perfectly fine, at least physically, he let out a small sigh of relief before making his way over.
“Can I offer you something to drink?” the bartender asked as Shane sat down on the stool next to Ilya, feeling the other man’s blue eyes trailing over him.
“I'll have the same as my teammate, please,” he replied politely, not even bothering to see what Ilya had in front of him.
He didn’t really care what it was. Perhaps he might have, if he was here to drink. But Shane had a different mission entirely.