Work Text:
“Give me your phone,” Lily said, holding out her hand expectantly. Jane stood for a moment, unsure. “You have a phone, don’t you?” Lily prodded, and Jane acquiesced, handing it over to Lily in a split second decision.
Did this mean that they were moving up to the level of situationship? Jane wasn’t sure, but damn if she didn’t want to meet with Lily again. The bubble of Hollywood seemed vast, but when it came down to it, eyes were on them at almost all times.
Lily handed the phone back. “So, what’s my name gonna be?” asked Jane. Her parents absolutely couldn’t know about this. Rose, on the other hand, would be thrilled.
“Shane,” Lily winked, and Jane giggled in response. “See you soon.”
—
Rose felt better after talking to Shane, and she really did intend to stay friends with him. Half of her friends were gay anyway. Her phone rang as she hailed a cab.
Ah, another one of her closet cases.
“Jane, baby, how are you?”
Jane sounded almost giddy as she answered. “I got her number.”
Rose did a small fist pump, opening the door to her cab and climbing in.
“That’s right, you went to that red carpet tonight, didn’t you? I guess you had fun at the after party.” She quickly covered her speaker and told the cabbie her address.
“Yeah,” Jane laughed. “We, uh, we actually went to my place tonight.”
“Sounds steamy, I want details,” Rose demanded, excited to hear about Jane’s new development with her crush.
—
Are Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov in a Relationship?
PopCraze
New texts leaked by an anonymous source reveal “Shane” and “Ilya” to be in a relationship. This steamy forbidden romance details a relationship plagued by longing and secrecy, and the evidence speaks for itself. These arch-rivals have been pitted against each other since their rookie season…
—
This was a fucking nightmare. Shane actually had to be the unluckiest person alive. Jane Dalton and and Lily fucking Spittey were the reason that he had been outed?
Of course, it wasn’t really their fault. Shane vaguely knew that Dalton and Rose were friends, so the girl couldn’t be a terrible person or anything. Actually, it was kind of funny in a way.
Shane tried to remember that as he suppressed his panic attack.
“Hey, Shane, it is okay.” Ilya tried to comfort him as he paced around the room. “We can still deny, no? Is just coincidence. They are just hockey fans.”
Shane focused on taking deep breaths. Since the article, hockey twitter had absolutely blown up, and clips of him and Ilya filled his timeline.
The article had been debunked within hours, with Dalton and Spittey each releasing statements claiming the leaked texts as theirs and condemning PopCraze. Still, fans had taken the original article and ran with it, and they were starting to find some pretty damning evidence of he and Ilya’s relationship.
God, they may not have been as careful as they could’ve been, but Shane was certain that no one would’ve gone digging if they hadn’t randomly had a spotlight shown on them.
The names, too, were so fucking ironic. What were the chances that a Jane and Lily would use their names to hide their relationship?
“They’re making fucking clue boards, Ilya, someone is going to find something damning. What the fuck do we do?”
Ilya’s large hands on his upper arms stopped him in his tracks, grounding him. “First we call Yuna.” Shane slumped a bit. Ilya knew that he liked actionable steps. Of course a plan would calm him down.
“We call Yuna and she help us with this.” Shane nodded, allowing Ilya to steer him to the couch.
“But Ilya, people know. Do we have to, like, come out?” Shane tried to wrap his mind around the idea, something they had decided not to worry about until they got married. Shane, of course, worried about it anyway.
“Do you want to come out, Solnyshko?” Ilya asked, pulling Shane gently into his lap. Shane allowed himself to relax a fraction into the man, grateful not to have to make eye contact for this conversation.
“I don’t know. It just- it just feels like-” He took a shuddering breath. “Do we even have a choice?”
Ilya pondered that for a moment. “Is not real evidence. We always have choice. I do what you do, I support you.” He squeezed Shane a bit. “You know this, yes?”
“Yeah, yeah okay. You’re right.”
Ilya kissed his forehead gently. “We call Yuna now? I think you have million missed calls,” he joked.
A smile pulled at Shane’s face. He felt a bit calmer now. His hands still shook, but the nausea had retreated from his throat to his stomach. He put his game face on.
“Ok, let’s figure this out.”
—
Rose hit the phone icon over Shane’s contacts for the third time in an hour. She had already talked to Jane, who had called her almost immediately in a panic. Having become a hockey fan after Lily had made her watch a few games had tapped her into that world, and she had realized what had happened immediately.
Rose couldn’t fucking believe it. After talking to Jane for a while and calming her down a bit, she had started calling Shane. She knew that she was on the list of his contacts that ignored do not disturb, but he still didn’t answer. Fuck.
As the phone rang for the umpteenth time, she was surprised when he picked up.
“Hi, Rose.” He sounded wrung out, and her concern immediately spiked.
“Shane, hi, are you okay?”
“Yeah.” There was a pause. “Well, no, but I think I will be.” Then, in a very Canadian fashion, he asked after Jane.
Rose chuckled wetly, barely having noticed how emotional the pure relief at hearing his voice had made her. “She’ll be fine too, hon, don’t worry. I talked to her a few hours ago. She saw the article right away.”
Rose could imagine the way his eyes hardened on his flat expression. “Motherfucking article.”
Then, from somewhere near him, in a strong Russian accent, “Fucking PopCrave.”
“Ilya’s with you?”
She heard the sound of something shifting and a much louder, “Am here. Shane is alright. I am alright.”
Rose smiled to herself. Good. It was good that they were together.
Shane had told her a few months ago who the mystery boy that she had heard so much about actually was. Needless to say, she was shocked, but she thinks that not living in the hockey world had eased that conversation quite a bit. She could only imagine what kind of backlash the suggestion of their relationship was having within the community.
“We’re going to come out,” Shane said, voice a little shaky.
“Really?” A year ago Shane hadn’t even come out to himself. This was a huge step. She wasn’t really sure whether to be happy for him or not, as she knew this decision was out of his hands. Rose settled for neutral.
“I mean, people already know, and- and Ilya is okay with it so-”
“Like I tell you, I do what you do. Russia is not issue for me now, you know this.” She heard the sound of a soft kiss.
Shane continued, voice stronger after the interruption. “So we’re going to come out. And it’s going to be okay.” If he somewhat sounded like he was trying to convince himself, Rose wasn’t going to call him out on it.
Rose settled a bit. “Okay, okay, that’s good. You know you can come to me if you need anything, right? I’m here for you. Both of you.”
Echoed assurances of “we know” filtered down the line. “Thank you, Rose,” Shane added.
“Get some sleep, okay?” Rose couldn’t help but fret, even with her friend’s promise.
“We will,” Shane replied, fond.
Rose felt warm knowing that Shane could rely on Ilya throughout this. “Goodnight, I love you both.”
“We love you too,” Shane responded, smile evident in his voice.
The last thing she heard before hanging up was Ilya’s huff.