Archive of Our Own

I know

'Cause I'd spend half this morning

Thinking about the t-shirt you sleep in

I should know

'Cause I'd spend all the whole day

Listening to your message I’m keeping and never deleting

November 2016, Boston 

Idiot. 

Idiot. Idiot. Idiot. That is the only word that echoes inside Ilya’s head as he sees Shane awkwardly put on his shoes once he is away from his sofa, getting away from Ilya’s house.

Getting away from him.

Ilya stays right there where he is, his arm still as extended as it was when he unsuccessfully attempted to keep the other man there, wishing he could undo what he did and unsay the words that scared Shane off. 

For a moment, when Shane agreed to stay, crossing every line both of them had wordlessly settled years ago, Ilya really thought he could have it all. Well, maybe not all, but definitely more than what he was having.

For a moment, as he looked at Shane’s sleeping figure in his arms, he allowed himself to wish. 

But no. He had to push it, he had to pressure Shane into giving him more than what he was able to give. There is a small voice in Ilya’s head that reminds him that, maybe, it is not a matter of being able, as much as it is a matter of wanting. That maybe Shane simply is not interested in having more than a quick fuck every now and then, because it is easy and convenient and helps him release the pent up energy after a game. 

After all the years they have been doing this it almost feels like routine at this point: they text, they face each other on the ice, they fuck afterwards. And back at the beginning again. 

And Ilya knows Shane Hollander well enough to know that if that man is fond of something, that something is routine. It didn’t take a lot for Ilya to catch up with this, to be honest. Probably it happened when they were together in a hotel room for the first time and, among the lust and want, Shane took a second to carefully fold his clothes. 

Ilya is pretty sure he was intrigued and attracted since the first time he saw the other man, but he also believes that very first time was the moment when he realised the warm feeling inside him was more than just desire. 

During his lowest moments, when he was alone at home with a glass of vodka in his hands while he watched Shane Hollander’s games, he even dared to admit to himself that he had been, perhaps, a bit enamoured by the man and his mannerisms.

Precisely because Ilya knows Shane, he doesn’t understand why he would want to change what they were having. Why would he want to break that beloved routine of his, for… What? Ilya?

Idiot.

Ilya stands from the sofa as soon as he hears his front door close, a bit louder than it is probably necessary. And somehow he knows that Shane flinched with the sudden noise, that he considered turning around to apologise for being so rough instead of carefully shutting it. Because that is what Shane does: being polite, being kind. 

Being way too good for you, Ilya’s mind helpfully supplies.

For a moment Ilya waits for the knock, almost sure he is going to hear it. He just stands there in the middle of his living room expecting, hoping. But seconds pass, and the only thing he can hear is the maddening silence that floods this place he can’t call home, not really. 

Idiot. 

He takes the plates back to the kitchen with the intention to clean them and keep himself busy with it until the moment he has to go to the rink, but Ilya’s brain keeps going a thousand miles per hour. His mind pesters him, repeating in both Russian and English hurtful remarks that he makes a great effort to ignore.

All the thoughts he tries to keep at bay most of the time are barrelling in with full force, winding through the crevices in the walls he built to guard himself the moment his mother died. Walls that used to be solid until he let a freckled boring Canadian get way too close to them. 

Usually overlooking these thoughts and keeping with his day doesn’t take a lot of effort, just a bit of focus. Not in vain, he’s had years and years of practice.

Unfortunately for him, his focus is nowhere to be found. Probably, if he had to take a guess, it left with Shane and is already on its way to his hotel. 

So right now, unfocused and shocked by the whiplash of the mirage that was having Shane just to lose him immediately after, his mind is a free realm for all the cruelty to wander.

This is the first time in over a decade that you let yourself feel something, and for what.

What did you think was going to happen? That he was going to stay because you bought Ginger Ale for him? Because you made a shitty sandwich?

Because you said his name?

Why would he stay.

Why would you be enough.

You are never going to be enough.

You scared him.

You are lazy, you couldn’t even make him want to stay.

Your father has been right all along.

The last one comes with a crack. Literally. 

For a moment Ilya thinks the noise is also a product of his mind, but then he looks at his hands and realises the plate they were holding is now on the floor, shattered into many pieces.

It takes a very conscious effort for him to refrain from thinking about other things that feel completely shattered today, and he forces himself to focus on kneeling down on the floor and picking up the broken fragments of ceramic.

Trying to retrieve one that has fallen close to the counter he suddenly feels a sharp flash of pain in his hand. When he looks at it he sees a cut on the side, covered by crimson blood that falls in big fat drops over his floor. 

He is so, so close to giving up right there, to finally surrender to everything he’s feeling but trying to contain, and it takes every ounce of energy in him to avoid slumping down on the floor and simply ignore everything around him. The only thing he wants to do right now is crawl back to bed and stop existing, even if it is just for a while.

A new voice, a nicer, kinder voice that sounds quite similar to the one he remembers as his mother’s, stops him with a simple word. 

Don’t. 

It doesn’t come as a surprise, truth be told. Since she died he’s heard her when he needed her the most. Well, he knows he is not hearing her, but her presence follows him everywhere he goes, and works as a constant reminder of why he can’t give up. 

He knows she would have wanted him to be happy, so he’s been trying every single day. To feel good. To be better, someone to be proud of. For her.

And, more recently, for Shane.

Idiot. 

With a deep breath Ilya stands up from where he is and goes to the trash to throw what is left of the plate, sweeping the pieces that were too small and sharp to pick up with his hands and scrubbing the blood before it dries.

He resumes the task of cleaning to keep his mind busy, but as soon as he gets to the living room he realizes it is not going to work: it only takes one glimpse at the forgotten stupid Ginger Ale can in the middle of his table for all the thoughts to come back. 

Ilya grabs the can and walks back to the kitchen while he mutters a never-ending list of profanities in Russian. Forgetting about the cut in his hand he hits the counter with it out of pure frustration, and the immediate burst of pain makes every other thing on his mind to shut up, his brain focusing on it. 

He can’t forget what happened today.

He knows he won’t forget it, as well as he knows he won’t be able to forget Shane’s face when he said his name, not even if he lived a thousand years.

What he can do, though, is push through it, as he has done with every other painful situation in his life. 

With this new resolution and his brain already scheming the busiest of days to avoid a single thought to break through his defenses again, he finishes cleaning up because he doesn’t want to find a single trace of that evening when he arrives back home. Hopefully, if everything goes according to his plan, he will be so tired he will be moving on autopilot and barely conscious. 

Exhausting himself to the point of forgetting is not new for him, and it is definitely not the unhealthiest thing he has done to try to ease his mind for a while, so he cleans his wound, covers it and grabs his gym bag on his way out of the house, wishfully thinking that by the time he comes back everything will be better. It worked before, it can work again.

Ilya spends half the evening in the gym, pushing himself on the treadmill until his legs are shaking. With every mile added to the counter he feels a bit closer to his goal. What goal it is, he can’t tell. But he needs to think there is something in order to avoid breaking down.

The thoughts keep coming, of course, and at some point during his training they start following an almost regular rhythm.

By the time he is lifting weights, they are barely white noise in the background of his head.

Weights up.

You shouldn’t have said his name.

Weights down.

You are not made for domesticity.

Weights up.

You can’t be more than a fuck.

Weights down.

You don’t know how to be more than a fuck, no matter how hard you try.

Weights up. 

He will never love you.

It’s the last one that makes his arms tremble, the surprise of the verb love almost causing them to give up. He puts down the weights with a frown and stands to sit, trying to pinpoint when love from Shane became something he wanted. Something he craved. 

Once again, his mind is very quick to remind him that it was what he has wanted all the time, possibly since Shane approached him and told him he shouldn’t smoke where he was standing.

That is a reminder he really doesn’t need right now, so he feels relieved when he sees the rest of his team entering the gym. Seeing people is not something he wants to do today, but being alone with his thoughts won’t bring anything good, so he puts on his trademark smirk and joins his teammates in their training.

By the time all of them get to the ice he is already on the verge of exhaustion, but he keeps pushing. 

Because that is what he does. He pushes and pushes and pushes until there is nowhere else to go, nowhere else to run.

As much as he wants to keep going, tiredness starts to get the best of him so he ends up snapping at his teammates, slamming them against the boards harder than needed for practice, hitting the puck with more strength than he should use.

They are halfway through their practice in the rink when his coach calls him and dismisses him, telling him to go shower and change. Ilya simply nods and leaves the ice, and none of the men around him utter a single word.

Ilya stays under the shower for a while and lets the warm water ease his muscles. The pain doesn’t go away because it is not his body that is hurting, but the tension starts to leave him nonetheless.

He doesn’t know how long he stays there with his forehead pressed against the tiles of the wall, but he registers some noises coming from the changing room and he takes them as his cue to start moving again. 

With a towel around his waist he enters the room where his teammates are starting to take off their gear, and there is a brief pause in the conversation when they see him. Nobody says anything for a couple of painfully uncomfortable seconds, but thankfully Marlow does and the chatting starts again. Ilya nods his head towards him in a silent thank you, and Marlow pats his shoulder as he walks by him on his way to the showers. 

Ilya knows everything is fine, that they are not going to hold today against him. In all the years he’s been playing this is the first time he’s behaved like this, and he trusts these men to forgive him for having a pretty shitty day, in and out of the ice. 

He knows it, but that doesn’t stop his mind from keeping him company as he dresses, the noise around him becoming indistinguishable as the voice inside Ilya’s head tells him he is not a good captain. That he is a shame. That he is useless.

Your father has been right all along.

To shut that last though down he closes his locker with a loud bang, startling the teammates that are closer to him. 

Ilya knows he has a reputation among the rest of the teams. Among the whole league, actually. And he embraces it, because he knows it is true: he is kind of an asshole in the ice, he loves getting under other players’ skin and messing with them during face offs or right before scoring a goal, winking at the defeated goalie after. 

However, the people with whom he’s close know he is not actually an asshole. He knows it too.

And that is why he mutters a quiet “I’m sorry” that he knows his team will understand for what it is. He is not only apologising for closing the locker too strongly, but also for his behaviour today. Because his team deserves it. 

“It’s fine, cap,” Carmichael assures, and the guys around him nod enthusiastically to show their support.

“Yeah, don’t stress yourself, Roz”, says Marlow before patting Ilya’s shoulder again. “We all have days, man.”

Ilya nods again, a quick subtle thing that conveys more emotion than what he wants to show right now, afraid he won’t be able to stop if he starts. “Won’t happen again.” 

The words come rushed and with that very strong accent that always reappears when he’s feeling off. 

He is ready to leave after that, but Marlow asks him if he wants to go have dinner somewhere. Ilya doubts for a moment, but ends up accepting the offer. He knows Cliff won’t pressure him into telling anything, and today he will take every distraction he can get.

Ilya waits for Marlow outside, a cigarette lit in his hands, and looks at the smoke as it goes up. For a moment he forgets everything and feels lighter, as if it was himself who was dissolving in the air. Wishful thinking, perhaps. 

“You ready, cap?” 

Marlow’s voice brings him back to reality, and both of them walk towards their respective cars while they discuss where to go. 

After a whole day pretending to be fine and composed, burnout finally takes a toll on him and as soon as he crosses the door of his apartment Ilya rests his back against it and closes his eyes. 

Dinner was, in fact, quite nice. As Ilya thought, Cliff didn’t ask him a single thing. He entertained him with silly stories told precisely to make him laugh, or at least smile. But even if Ilya is grateful because he doesn’t know what he would have told, he also feels slightly sad. 

Not for the first time, Ilya realises that he feels a tad alone. 

He has friends, of course, and he has had hook ups and teammates and everything.

But at the end of the day the relationship that makes him feel more grounded and settled, as if he belonged somewhere, is the one based on random texts under a pseudonym and meetings every time Boston and Montreal face each other in the ice.

Ilya has left many things.

He left his parents’ house, full of memories of his mother. He left Russia, a country that was his home but didn’t know him. He left parties with people and, hours later, he left those people’s beds before the crack of dawn to avoid seeing faces whose names he didn’t remember in the morning.

He has been leaving and running away half his life, and for the first time in many years he didn’t want to. 

He wanted to stop, to stay, to take a risk. 

And he wanted it with Shane.

He knows can’t do this right now or he’ll collapse right in front of his door, so he moves away from it after properly locking it, lets his gym bag fall on the floor and starts walking towards his bedroom.

He takes off his clothes while he moves, only capable of thinking about throwing himself on his bed and sleep for hours. His plan worked, the need to fight exhaustion to get to bed occupying such a prominent spot in his brain that everything else doesn’t exist, so at least there’s that.

But then.

Then Ilya reaches the door frame of his bedroom and sees it. 

There is something crumpled on the floor at the feet of the bed. 

A white t-shirt that Ilya knows for a fact that isn’t his. 

He approaches it as if he was approaching a wild animal, his expression guarded in a way that probably makes no sense when faced with a piece of clothing. 

The problem is, it is not only a piece of clothing. 

In his rush to leave Ilya’s house, Shane didn’t even retrieve his clothes, and now they lay forgotten in the middle of the empty bedroom. Ilya hadn’t even thought about it until now, he didn’t even process that Shane left wearing his clothes, those he lent him to eat the tuna melts and relax on the sofa. 

Ilya can’t decide if having a piece of Shane right there is a punishment or a miracle.

He blames the utter shock for what he does next.

With trembling hands he grabs the t-shirt and without giving it a second thought he brings it to his face and inhales. 

After the emotional rollercoaster the day has been, Ilya learns that his breaking point is Shane’s smell. 

Somehow, that simple cotton white t-shirt that has been hours on his floor smells like home, and Ilya knows he is deeply, utterly fucked. 

Ilya stumbles to bed holding the t-shirt until his knuckles whiten, clinging to it like he should have clung to Shane. 

He lies down and hugs the t-shirt close to his heart, keeping the embrace tight as he had kept Shane earlier. 

Ilya knows it is a terrible, terrible idea and that the consequences tomorrow are going to be awful, but he can’t help it. He needs as little consolation as he can get, so he indulges himself.

Closing his eyes and in a useless attempt to ignore the unshed tears that were threatening to fall, Ilya buries his nose in the soft fabric and breathes deeply one more time.

He can’t have Shane, but maybe he is tired enough to trick his brain into believing he is still there with him. 

Idiot.

September 2018, Boston

“Why do you have so much stuff?”

The tone is bordering desperation as Shane looks around him, his gaze going over the half full cardboard boxes occupying most of the living room floor.

“You are one to talk, Mr. Pillows,” is Ilya’s retort as soon as he emerges from behind one particularly big box, the one destined to keep his ridiculously extensive collection of tracksuits. Shane doesn’t know the exact number, but he is pretty sure there are at least five different Adidas pants there, those that Ilya seems to love, the black ones with white stripes.

Shane lets out a grunt, grabs a sweatshirt from the sofa next to him and throws it to Ilya. “There are not as many pillows as you like to joke about, Rozanov.” 

Ilya picks the piece of clothing without being hit by it, and there is a smirk on his face as soon as he hears his boyfriend’s words. He drops the sweatshirt in the closest box and walks towards Shane, placing his hands on the other man’s hips as soon as he is within reach. “Rozanov, huh? I thought we were past that, Hollander.”

Shane would like to say he is over the way his surname rolls out of Ilya’s mouth, he would like to say he is so used to the accent that it doesn’t affect him anymore, but it would be a lie. Whenever he hears it his legs feel wobbly and something inside him twists positively. “Old time’s sake, maybe.”

Shane’s hands move on their own accord, without him even noticing they are on top of Ilya’s arms until he feels the goosebumps he causes on his boyfriend’s skin. A smile forms on his lips, happy to confirm that he can also get a reaction out of him with the simplest touches. 

“Old time’s sake, I see… There are many things we could do for old time’s sake, better than using surnames.”

And isn’t it tempting, the way Ilya doesn’t have to say more for Shane to understand what he means. Their first encounters as a couple in this house appear in Shane’s mind as if they were a movie.

After the incident the first time he visited Ilya’s house and once they established themselves as a couple, Shane was adamant to going back to Boston and erase that terrible first day there with new memories. Better ones. Definitely less painful, for both of them. 

In these visits there was no panic, no rushing out of the house, no questioning or suppressed emotions between them. 

There were calm nights watching movies on the sofa until one of them dozed off and the other lovingly woke him up to go to bed. The continuation of those nights, feeling safe with Ilya’s arms around him.

There were dinners with Shane’s parents, Ilya and Shane cooking for them while bumping into each other as they moved around the kitchen. 

There were easy afternoons reading together. An extremely memorable one when Shane was reading some biography with Ilya’s fingers gently massaging his scalp and going down to his neck, caressing him and driving him crazy until he muttered a “fuck it”, closed the book and rode his boyfriend right there. Ilya liked to say that was the day the sofa was exorcised from the bad memories. 

They shared so many good moments in this house, and a part of Shane is still a bit sad that they have to say goodbye to it. He knows it is for the best, that it is part of the plan and Ilya moving to Ottawa is definitely something good for them. But this house is special to him. 

Even when he ran away the first time he was there and started what are now referred as the Dark Times, this is the place where he felt for the first time that maybe for Ilya it was more than just sex, too. Yes, he didn’t know what to do with that information at that time, but eventually he learned. 

Not everything that happened in that house had been perfect, of course, but right now, with Ilya looking at him with that glint in his eyes which evokes everything they have done here during the past year, it feels difficult to remember anything besides the good parts.

Shane knows Ilya is going to kiss him before he actually moves to do so, because he pressures his hips a bit stronger for a second, so he has enough time to take a step back, earning a whiny sound from Ilya.

“Hollander…” 

“We have to finish packing all your things, Ilya.” 

“We could sex the house goodbye.”

“You can’t kiss a house goodbye.” 

“Da. I know, that’s what I said sex,” he says as he wiggles his eyebrows in the most ridiculous manner, making Shane laugh again. Seeing this side of Ilya, the carefree one that jokes around and feels comfortable to do it, is probably Shane’s favourite thing in the whole universe, the one he’s more grateful about. 

“And I am the one with the real estate fetish, somehow.”

“I have a Shane Hollander fetish, don’t really care about the house.”

Ilya said those words very quietly, almost as if he was telling a secret or admitting something very private. And he is, somehow. That’s why Shane budges and doesn’t take another step away when his boyfriend kisses him.

It never gets old, kissing Ilya. Shane is pretty sure it will never do. 

They kiss for a while, Shane’s hands going up through Ilya’s arms until they rest in his arms and Ilya’s moving until they are grabbing Shane’s ass. They kiss just because, without the intention of escalating things (at least not for now), and when they part for air both of them have smitten expressions and smiles on their faces. 

Shane takes his hand to Ilya’s forehead, playing with one of his curls as he speaks, a little out of breath. “We really need to finish packing your things, baby…”

The sound that comes out from Ilya’s mouth can only be described as a tortured, extremely dramatic whine. His hands, as he complains, never leave Shane’s butt. “Why are you doing this to me?”

“You were the one who told the company to come by eight, so we could finish it early and have the rest of the day free.” Shane laughs as Ilya’s head rests against his shoulder, and his hands move to caress his boyfriend’s nape. “And you refused to pack until today because, and I quote, you were perfectly capable of doing it in a day.” 

Those last words earn him a glare from Ilya, even though both of them know he is right. The moving company arriving at eight means that Shane has to leave before that, so they don’t have much time in the morning to finish the packing, and they still have a lot to do. Shane kisses Ilya’s neck as an apology for bursting their bubble. 

“I promise when we finish I am all yours,” he whispers, his lips moving against Ilya’s skin before kissing him again. “And tomorrow morning, as soon as the moving company leaves, we can christen your new house.”

“Our,” Ilya corrects, the glare gone and a fond smile replacing it. “Our new house, kind of.” 

Shane smiles too and nods, pecking his boyfriend on the lips before agreeing. “Our new house, kind of.” 

Ilya sighs quite dramatically, and takes a step back from Shane. “Okay, you are right, you are right… Then go.” 

He gently pushes Shane, forcing him to move away from him and causing a startled expression to appear. “Go?”

“Da, move. I can’t focus if you are here being so…” Ilya moves his hand in the air pointing at Shane, unable to find the words to express what he wants to say. “Being so you, so distracting.” 

“Do you… You want me to go?”

“Yes. No, no! Not go, go, just, go to the other room, or something, where the desire to fuck you in every surface of this house won’t distract me that much.”

Shane feels his cheeks warm up at Ilya’s words, and finds himself once again surprised by how easy it is for the other man to fluster him with his bluntness. It’s not that he doesn’t know how to do it or anything, since he is learning how to verbalize what he wants when it comes to Ilya, but whenever his boyfriend simply states the desire he feels for him, with that expression full of want, Shane still feels what he felt the first time he desired Ilya, back in that gym.

Ilya turns around to keep putting stuff into boxes after making another gesture telling Shane to leave the living room.

“You are ridiculous.” Shane snorts again and goes closer to Iya to give him another quick kiss before actually leaving. “I’ll be in your bedroom.” 

After a last glance at his boyfriend, Shane moves his activity to the bedroom, ready to finish with the clothes that are a mess on top of the bed and even part of the floor.

He will never listen to Ilya again when he insists on leaving things for the last moment, that's for sure.

Shane takes a deep breath, turns around his head to crack his neck and starts working. 

He moves around the bedroom with the ease that gives all the nights spent here during the last year, classifies the clothes and folds them between putting them in their respective suitcase or bag. Once he’s done with the clothing, he moves to the objects around the room. Sunglasses, perfumes, watches. Slippers. A pair of socks that god knows why appears on the floor, next to the bedside table. 

Shane loses track of how much time he spends doing it, focused as he is, and only comes back to reality when he hears Ilya asking him from the living room if he wants to order in for dinner from his favourite restaurant. 

Once he agrees, he looks around the bedroom again and feels quite proud. There are noto more clothes splattered around, everything is packed and ready to be taken away to Ottawa.

However, a last round of checking that there is nothing inside the wardrobe and bedside tables won’t hurt, just in case. And he has time until dinner arrives.

He opens every drawer and every door, checking that there is nothing forgotten behind. He has always considered movings extremely stressful situations, and he is grateful he has only had to do it once, when he left his parents’ house to live by himself in Montreal. The closest thing to a moving was when he had the cottage built, but he didn’t really have to move things, he just… Well, bought what he wanted there and packed for the week whenever he went. So Ilya’s moving is causing him a bit more anxiety than what he is willing to admit. Probably more than what it is causing Ilya, to be honest. 

He is almost finished with checking every part of the furniture, when he gets to the drawers in the bedside table of his side. Shane smiles at the fact that he has a side of the bed in Ilya’s house, and squats to open the drawers just in case. He is pretty sure he won’t find anything, because Ilya’s one was already emptied and he knows that in this one the only drawer used is the one on top, where he himself puts the things he needs when he spends the night. 

Shane opens the first two drawers and finds them empty, but when he opens the third one he sees something odd.

There is a t-shirt inside. 

One perfectly folded white cotton t-shirt.

Shane grabs it carefully, although he can’t actually say why he is treating the piece of clothing with so much care. It is just a t-shirt, so nothing special about it. And yet. For some reason, Ilya thought it had to be folded and kept in the bedside table, away from the rest of the t-shirts he owns. 

It could be anything, really. A plain white t-shirt that was accidentally misplaced and somehow ended in that drawer, could happen, he guesses.

When he unfolds it he sees its tag. Funnily enough, it is his favourite brand for plain t-shirts. They are from a European random brand he found years ago, and he orders them regularly because he can’t find them physically in Canada or the States. But the hassle is worth it because they last a long time and they are soft and comfortable, in a way that soothes him when his brain is being annoying and he gets easily overwhelmed by things that feel scratchy against his skin. And Shane is quite meticulous with his clothes. Maybe he doesn’t pay a lot of attention to how they look from an aesthetic point of view because he usually chooses comfortability over style, and that’s why when he finds something he feels comfortable with he sticks to it. 

In any case, he didn’t know Ilya liked that brand, too.

Actually, he is pretty sure Ilya doesn’t have a favourite brand for t-shirts, he just wears whatever he feels like wearing, and surely he wouldn’t order a plain white t-shirt from an european website that takes like a week to arrive. 

And then Shane remembers. He remembers so vividly that he can physically feel it and needs to sit down on the bed as he grabs the t-shirt tightly. 

Maybe it is because he has been thinking about all the times he has visited this house since that very first time, but suddenly Shane remembers how that first day he arrived with a white t-shirt and left with a black one.

I can’t do this. 

That’s what he told Ilya as he left him on that sofa, a heartbroken expression on his face that Shane didn’t want to look at for long.

He never changed his clothes, he just left with the ones Ilya had given him when they left the bed for eating. Shane never thought what had happened to his clothes, he didn’t even think about them at all. 

“Shane?” Ilya’s voice comes from the door of the bedroom. “Dinner is here, didn’t you hear…? Oh.” 

Ilya stops himself when he sees what Shane is holding, and Shane looks at him with a flabbergasted expression. Ilya is a bit blurred, and Shane knows it is due to the tears that are flooding his eyes and threatening to fall right now. “This is mine.” 

He states it, not as a question, and Ilya simply nods before walking towards him and retrieving the t-shirt from his hands. He folds it again, and keeps it close to his chest as he speaks. “I was waiting until tomorrow morning to pack it. It felt… It felt weird, sleeping here without it in the room."

“You kept it,” Shane mutters, his brain still trying to process a detail that could be insignificant but definitely isn’t.

“Of course I did.”

“Why?” Shane knows it is a silly question, but he needs help to understand. Or, at least, he needs to recover from the surprise of finding the t-shirt a year and a half later.

“What do you want me to tell you?” When Ilya looks away from the t-shirt and back to his boyfriend, Shane thinks for a second that if he was standing his legs would have given up under the undeniable adoration that he can see in his boyfriend’s eyes. “That I loved you back then? Because I am pretty sure I did.” 

Something about Ilya’s quiet tone shatters Shane completely, and suddenly he understands it.

This t-shirt was not just something Shane left behind when he left the house, it was something Ilya kept for comfort, as a piece of him he could reach to when they were apart, when he couldn’t have Shane with him.

Both of them were so afraid that day, but Ilya chose to be brave for it. For him.

And he left. 

Something on his face must show how guilty he feels, because soon Ilya is putting down the t-shirt on the bed and places his hands on both sides of Shane’s face. “Eh. Eh, eh, moya lyubov, it is fine.”

“It’s not fine, Ilya, I…” 

Ilya interrupts him with a gentle kiss, and smiles at him as his thumb caresses his cheekbone. “It is fine, Shane. It was not fine that day, you are right. But it is now, da?” 

Shane wants to fight him, to apologize to him for running away back then. But the way Ilya is looking at him means he won’t take any of that, so Shane decides to drop it, at least for now. He will have many other chances to apologize or to make Ilya up for it, although he is pretty sure that, somehow, Ilya has already forgiven him. The look on his face certainly seems to mean that.

So Shane places his hands on top of Ilya’s and nods, muttering just one word. “Da.”

Ilya smiles as he always does whenever Shane says something in Russian, and next thing both of them know is that the t-shirt is once again forgotten on the floor, the dinner gets cold in the living room and there are clothes scattered all around the bedroom. Again.

But Ilya is right: it definitely is fine.

October 2018, Ottawa

Ilya roams around the house trying to fight the sense of emptiness he is feeling right now. 

He loves this house, he really does, and he is very happy to start this new chapter of his life in Ottawa. It is not Boston, where he has spent all his life as a professional hockey player, but he is sure he will be fine. He is doing this for Shane, to make things easier, so a little bit of adjustment is definitely worth it, because Shane is definitely worth it.

Shane.

Ilya will never admit out loud that just thinking about him makes a fond smile appear on his face and a warm feeling awakens inside him. He is so in love with him it is even ridiculous. 

And maybe that is why he is feeling so empty right now, because Shane has just left after their last weekend together before the beginning of the season.

They have spent the last week in the cottage, and the past weekend both of them finished unpacking with Yuna and David’s help. But the season starts tomorrow, so Shane needed to go back to Montreal. 

He tries to remember they are just two hours apart, so meeting this season will be easier than the previous ones, but that is not as much consolation as Ilya needs right now. 

How can it be, when Shane is going to fly to Las Vegas in three days and Ilya is going to be on the road for like a week, their schedules not allowing them to see each other in, at least, a fortnight?

With a sigh Ilya picks up his phone from his pocket and opens the chat with the name “Jane” as he walks towards his bedroom. 

He is just texting Shane so he lets him know when he arrives in Montreal when he sees it: in the middle of his bed there is a perfectly wrapped package. 

Ilya’s curiosity is definitely peaked, so he blocks his phone and lets it fall into the bed next to the package.

There is a note on top, written with Shane’s handwriting:

Take this as your welcome gift

I love you

Je t’aime

я тебя люблю

- Shane

Ilya smiles with the note, tracing his index finger over the Russian words, Shane’s usually elegant calligraphy being a bit messier, but pretty good for someone who is not used to the cyrilic alphabet. 

He puts the note in the bed next to his phone and opens the package, letting out a laugh as soon as he sees the t-shirt in it.

Without giving it a second thought, and exactly as he did more than a year ago, he carefully picks up the t-shirt and takes it to his face, closing his eyes and inhaling deeply.

Contrary to what happened the last time, however, this time there are no tears, just an overwhelming feeling of love that threatens with making his heart explode. 

With the t-shirt on one hand and his phone on the other, Ilya heads to the bathroom.