Chapter Text
Shane Hollander is a patient man. He has to be. Between daily assignments, weekly dinners with his family, and a part time job he’s really starting to hate, patience is a virtue that he’s been practicing for many years. He’s got it down to a routine, for the most part, and at the age of twenty-two, he’s starting to become more accustomed to his body. He knows when he needs to take a break, when he should stop and eat something, when to sit with his head between his knees and count in fours for breathing. He knows he should do all this, but it’s difficult sometimes.
It’s especially difficult when the new tenant in apartment 25 has an infant screaming bloody murder all through the night.
Though Shane is patient, he’s not a saint. He’s been bothered by noise his whole life. He remembers being a child, having to sleep with a white noise machine because the simple sound of the walls buzzing was enough to drive him insane. He hates repetitive noises, hates when he can hear people breathing or chewing or, worst of all, when the kid behind him in nutrition won’t stop sniffling. It’s enough to make him twitch, make his body rock slightly in his chair, make his skin itch like it’s melting off of him.
So, he tried to be patient. Tried to let the baby scream it out. But he has an assignment due in two hours, and the cafe kept him late for inventory, and he doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing before he’s standing outside of apartment 25, fist raised after banging on the door.
Shane’s not a confrontational person. He’s let people walk on him his whole life. Treat him wrong, call him names, pick on him. He’s never been one to walk up to a problem and sort it out. He’s grateful for his mother, who took no shit, and for all the years she spent in meetings with his school psychiatrist and guidance counsellor, sitting across the table and telling them quietly about Shane’s quirks. How he’s different. He’s tired of being different.
He’s tired of being a lot of things, actually. Tired of being yelled at by nasty customers at work. Tired of waking up and living the same day over and over. He’s itching for a change, but if there’s one thing that scares Shane more than confrontation or repetitive noises- it’s change.
So, when Mrs. Lawsinsky moved out of the apartment next door, after dropping off enough freezer meals to get him through until winter break, Shane sort of freaked out. Mrs. Lawsinsky was always kind, always understood that Shane doesn’t excel at small talk, and paid him good money to look after her cats when she spent a week in Florida over the spring. She knew his parents, knew his life, knew his friends who frequented his apartment.
He hadn’t even met the new family, but as the door clicks open in front of him, he realizes he’s about to find out.
Shane’s heart is pounding in his ear as the door handle turns. He realizes he must look psychotic. He’s wearing old, baggy shorts, and an oversized shirt that Rose gifted him last Christmas. It says I paused my game to be here, which doesn’t even make sense, as the only game Shane knows how to play is cribbage. It’s nearing ten PM, and by the way the wailing child only gets louder as the door opens, Shane finds he can’t care too much about his appearance.
Still- he feels a little self conscious. He hasn’t even prepared what he’s going to say. Can you tell your baby to shut the hell up doesn’t seem like a good start. Especially when the door opens all the way, and Shane is suddenly standing in front of the most attractive man he’s ever seen in his life.
Shit.
He straightens his posture, trying to keep his face pleasantly neutral, but the model-esque man in front of him looks equally rough. He’s got eye bags darker than Hayden after his weekend benders, his tank top is covered in a clear stain- likely spit up- and his hair is a complete mess. He raises his eyebrows at Shane, who suddenly remembers he has a motive here other than oogling the man’s impressive biceps.
“Uh. Hi.”
Shane winces at the awkward pause in his greeting. Can he do anything right? He shuffles a little on his feet only to remember he’s wearing the pink fuzzy slippers Rose left here last time. He should just leave.
“Hello.”
The man has a strange tilt to his voice- at first, Shane thinks it’s just exhaustion- there’s no denying the man’s sleep deprived demeanor, but Shane picks up on a slight accent.
“Can I help you?” He asks, staring at Shane expectantly. Shane clears his throat. He really should have planned this out.
“Just- I, uh, I have an… an assignment due. At midnight. And it’s kind of hard to. You know. Focus.”
“Is a shame,” the man says, then promptly closes the door in Shane’s face. He blinks, and knocks again, giving the man a fake smile when he opens it once more. “What?”
“I’ve… I realized I’ve never introduced myself,” Shane restarts. “Shane Hollander. Hi.”
The man looks down at his offered hand and takes a deep breath before shaking it. “Ilya. Rozanov. Goodbye.”
“Wait-“ Shane shoves a foot in the door before it closes. Ilya looks down at his fuzzy slipper and back at him, eyebrow raised. “Have you, uh, have you fed it?”
“It is my niece,” Ilya corrects, opening the door again to take the pressure off of Shane’s foot. “And yes. Have fed, have changed, have held. No stopping.”
Shane looks behind him into the apartment. It’s a complete mess- toys thrown everywhere, takeout bags on every surface, and a small crib in the corner of the living room where Mrs. Lawsinsky once had a fish tank. Shane clears his throat.
“I’m… uh, I’m good with babies. Can I try?”
Ilya looks at him as if he’s grown a second head. Which, frankly, Shane doesn’t blame him for. If he wasn’t so sleep deprived he poured orange juice in his cereal this morning, he’d probably think he sounds insane too. Ilya’s jaw tightens and he looks Shane up and down.
“What if you are robber?” Ilya asks, voice wary. Shane cringes and reaches into his pocket, pulling out his phone and ID.
“Collateral.”
“You are trying to buy my niece?”
“No, Jesus-“ Shane exhales. “You have my important stuff, so if I, you know, take off with your kid, you can report me. Plus, I live next door. Can’t go very far.”
Ilya blinks at him. He slowly reaches out and takes Shane’s items, holding them carefully, and opens the door a bit more so Shane can come in.
“I, uh, I like what you’ve done to the place.”
Ilya closes and locks the door behind him. He leans back against it, big arms crossed over his chest, and takes a deep breath. The screaming infant seems much louder than it does in Shane’s apartment, which says a lot, because Shane texted his group chat earlier and compared it to the decibel level of a plane landing. Ilya walks past him toward the crib, picking up the small, bundled child inside and frowning down at her.
“She won’t stop,” he says, his voice breaking slightly. “Whole plane ride, screaming. Whole time we move in, screaming. She is so sad.”
Shane’s eyebrows pitch together. The child in Ilya’s arms is squirming, her tiny face scrunched up in displeasure, and her mouth open as she bawls. Shane’s heart aches in a way he’s never felt before- he feels pure, unadulterated pity for both of these people he’s just met.
“Can I?” Shane asks quietly, holding his arms out. Ilya seems to consider it for a long moment, but desperation wins, and he moves closer, carefully depositing the child into Shane’s arms.
Shane grounds his feet, keeping his weight steady, as if being passed a football. He tucks the child into one arm, the other cradling her neck, and frowns down at her.
“Hey, hey,” he coos softly, rocking her gently. “It’s okay. You don’t have to scream. We hear you.”
She makes a little gasping noise, something close to a sob, and reaches out, her tiny fingers wrapping around Shane’s thumb. She snuggles against his chest and, to both of their surprise-
She stops crying.
Instantly, the world quiets down. Shane’s ears stop ringing. He can hear the slight buzz of the air conditioner, of Ilya’s fridge cycling through. He smiles down at her, shaking her little hand gently, and uses his other finger to brush a curl away from her face.
“See? You’re okay,” he says quietly to her. Her breath is still hitching, her eyes still leaking a steady stream of tears, but she’s stopped screaming. When Shane looks up, Ilya is staring at him with horror.
“How… how do you do that?” He asks. His voice sounds a lot weaker without the background noise of a sobbing infant. “I try everything. Nothing works.”
“I don’t know,” Shane admits. He carefully walks backward, sitting on the couch, and holds her closer. “My mom owns a daycare. I spent a lot of time helping her with the babies.”
Ilya flops down on the couch next to him, hand coming up to rub his temples. “Fuck. You are magic.”
Shane chuckles softly and looks down as the baby’s eyes shut, her breath slowing down. “What’s her name?”
“Irina,” Ilya responds quietly. His eyes are shut as well.
“Well, I think Irina just needs a good nap,” Shane says, brushing his thumb over her chubby cheeks. Though her lungs are powerful, she looks very healthy- well fed and pink in the face. Shane guesses she’s around five months.
When Shane looks over at Ilya next, he finds the man passed out, mouth open as he snores quietly. He can’t help but laugh quietly, switching Irina to one arm and reaching out to grab his phone from where it’s fallen out of Ilya’s hand. He opens up his word document and shifts on the couch, bouncing Irina to sleep as he types the rest of his assignment one handed.
-
Ilya Rozanov is not a patient man. This is known by just about anyone in his immediate circle. His circle being his one best friend, really, so it’s more of a direct line. Svetlana is probably the most patient woman alive, however, and she rests her manicured fingers on his leg to stop it from bouncing as they wait in the sterile office. The walls are white with shitty drawings all over it, his neck is absolutely aching from the flight here, and all Ilya wants to do is go to sleep. But he can’t.
Drunk driving, the man said when he called Ilya 24 hours ago. They left the baby at home.
The baby that Ilya didn’t even know existed, mind you. He and Alexei hadn’t spoken in nearly two years since Ilya left for Toronto after being disowned by the family. Well- as disowned as on can be, whilst still being next of kin to an infant.
Svetlana phoned him the moment the police officer hung up, already having heard the news, and apologized for nearly an hour about not being the one to tell him. Ilya dismissed her, but there was a pit in his chest. Not for Alexei, but for the baby.
Ilya knows what it’s like to grow up without parents.
We can put her in foster care, the man said over the phone. We can’t promise anything, but a child under six months is in high demand for families who can’t conceive naturally. She’ll be adopted likely by the end of the week.
Ilya didn’t even realize what he was doing, head completely empty, when he told the man not to take her anywhere. He wanted to be in charge- wanted to decide which family she went to, wanted to interview them himself.
But, the moment he laid eyes on her, he couldn’t bring himself to say goodbye. She has golden curls, a toothless smile, and eyes as bright and wide as his mothers once were. Finding out Alexei named her after their mother was the final nail in the coffin.
So- Ilya went from being a normal twenty-four year old living alone in a bachelors suite in downtown Toronto, completely isolated in a big city, to being the single parent of a 20 week baby. She’s in the office, getting checked by the doctor before she’s cleared to fly back to Toronto, and Ilya can feel the crushing weight of everything he has to do in the next twenty four hours.
He’s drowning.
Svetlana doesn’t let him.
She keeps her face straight, her gaze serious as she questions every authority figure in their line of sight. What will be provided for him and the baby? She asks, negotiating the answer like she’s his wife. What kind of arrangements did Alexei have set up? He wishes she could come with him, but she can’t.
Svetlana googles apartments with him as they wait for her checkup. She finds a nice one, quiet, next to a university campus and a cafe and a grocery store. She’s submitted the security deposit before Ilya can even blink.
They check his record, make sure he’s an eligible caretaker, and then a day and a half later, he’s back on a flight to Toronto, holding Irina close as she screeches and wails. Ilya spends half of the flight crying his own tears, holding her close and begging her to just go to sleep. It’s like she knows how painful this is for him, to return home, to leave Svetlana, to have to learn how to be a father when he never had one.
Irina settles for the first week of their living together. She sleeps well, eats well, and doesn’t fuss when Ilya has to move her to and from his old apartment. They get settled, and as if Irina has some kind of sensor for Ilya’s blood pressure, she starts losing it again 8 days after they moved in.
“Please,” he begs tonight, sitting across from where she’s laying in the brand new crib. “Please. I do not know how to help you.”
He brings his hands up to his hair and rips at his curl. She won’t stop screaming. He’s tried everything- feeding, burping, changing, rocking, checking her temperature, singing to her. He’s done everything he can think of, but it’s not enough. He’s not enough. He hasn’t slept in days, in ten days, to be exact. He passes out for minutes at a time and is woken up by Irina screaming, or by nightmares of something horrible happening to her.
So, when a knock is heard at the door, Ilya is too exhausted to check the peep hole. He opens the door, face to face with the mousy-est looking nerd Ilya’s ever seen, and for some stupid reason, he lets him into his apartment.
Ilya should feel betrayal for the way Irina instantly shuts up the second she’s in Shane Hollander’s arms, but all he feels is bone-deep relief. His nearly two weeks of not sleeping catches up to him on the couch, and for the first time since his life changed,
Ilya rests.
He sleeps fucking amazing. Head bent on the couch, neck aching, but he sleeps like he’s never slept in his life. Not a single dream, not a single twitch. He wakes up the next morning to a still sleeping Irina in her crib, and a note taped to the edge of it
Stole your extra key to lock your door. Had to get to class. I’ll bring it by tonight :)
- Shane
Written underneath is a phone number, and Ilya wipes the sleep from his eyes as he enters it in as the second contact on his phone. It shows up first, the ‘h’ before Svetlana’s ‘v’, and he feels his head stop pounding as he looks down at Irina, sleeping restfully.
For the first time, Ilya feels like asking for help.