Archive of Our Own

Over the past 2 years, Shane had heard more about Irina Rozanova than he had in the seven years prior. Those few weeks at the cottage had led to Ilya opening up, both for his own sake and the sake of the Irina Foundation. He had seen the few pictures Ilya had managed to salvage from Moscow, brought with him over a decade of plane trips and hidden in the cracks of his home in Boston (and now, Ottawa) as though he was using them to patch up his own heart. Shane had never met the woman in question, but she he saw bits of her in Ilya every single day - in his light brown curls, his cooked smile, the way he seemed to hold the weight of the world and then some on his shoulders - and this led to an adoration and reverence for the woman who had given the world Ilya Rozanov.

The past 2 years had given Shane so much, allowed him so much, but he still rarely let his guard down. The few times Shane has felt truly weightless, truly without fear or discomfort, were the times he was with Ilya, curled up on the couch at either one of their own homes or that of his parents, or when he was driving. He hadn't felt this way before, driving for a sense of peace or relief had always been more of an Ilya thing than a Shane thing, but he had learned to appreciate the quiet relief that came with knowing he could simply turn on the playlist Ilya had made for him and drive - no need to worry about cameras or slip-ups.

It was in one of these quiet moments, driving from the cottage to his parents' home to grab something before a quiet night in with Ilya, that his world came to an abrupt halt. He had been listening, humming along, to the newest addition to his playlist, when it happened.

A flash of headlights.

Loud honking.

The sound of glass breaking as his body lurched forward.

And then nothing.

Shane imagined, in that odd unaware state, that he would open his eyes and see either his mother or Ilya. He knew it simply depended on timing - who heard first, who drove faster, or simply who happened to be in the room when his eyes decided they were sick of being closed - but part of him truly hoped it was Ilya. He wanted nothing more than to reassure him, let him know that Shane was okay and that Ilya would not be left behind yet again.

What Shane did not expect, however, was to awaken to an ice rink - the ice rink. He hadn't been back to the rink in Saskatchewan since…probably the day he met Ilya. It made no sense, then, that he would be here now, lying in the middle of the ice in the same clothes he had worn for his drive.

Sitting up, he noticed three things immediately:

1. The rink was empty - no players, no coaches, no staff.

2. Despite the fact that he was wearing next to zero layers and sitting on the ice, he didn't feel cold. Why did he not feel cold?

3. Maybe he was incorrect when he noticed that no one else was here, because, there, in the stands, someone with curls he would recognize anywhere was waving at him.

The figure was too far away to make out, but he would know Ilya Rozanov even if he lost grasp of all 5 senses. He would know him if he was little more than a whisper in the wind. Those curls were Ilya's curls, and because he knew this he ran.

He ran off the ice, not even sparing a moment to think about the fact that he felt too light, that there was no need for proper balancing at all.

Once he got off the ice and into the stands, he stopped. He would have kept running, his body was screaming at him to, but as he glanced into familiar hazel eyes and scanned over the face attached to them, his entire being halted. He finally felt the weightlessness, and somehow decided that it was the heaviest feeling he had ever felt.

Because the person in front of him, the one who had waved from the stands, was not Ilya Rozanov.

It was Irina.

Ever since she saw those two lines, Yuna Hollander has been envisioning what Shane's future would look like. She knew from the moment she was aware of his existence that she would do anything to give him a bright future, that she would take whatever life threw at them and turn it into something that would help him rather than hurt him.

She didn't know how to do that now.

She wasn't unfamiliar with the sight of Shane in a hospital bed. When your baby decides that their life is going to revolve around a contact sport, especially one with added risks such as blades and ice, you learn to prepare yourself for the sight of them in a sling or high on pain medication.

Nothing prepared her for the sight of a tube down his throat, his entire body bruised, and a long line of stitches stretching from his forehead into his scalp. She prided herself on her ability to keep moving, to keep pressing on in the face of adversity at every single turn, but the second she entered the room time stopped.

The hospital had called her 3 hours ago, 10 minutes after she had left Ilya a voicemail asking if he knew what was taking so long. He had been in practice, she knew, but part of her hoped that he could give her some kind of insight into why Shane, who had always been exactly on time, was nearly 25 minutes late. She hadn't wanted to answer the phone when she got the call, her gut screaming at her that if she did, her life would be forever changed.

She answered it anyway. Then she called Ilya again. Then she ran.

Now, she was standing in an unfamiliar room, looking at an unfamiliar bed at her unfamiliar son. She knew she needed to move forward - knew that Ilya was behind her, that David was behind him - but she didn't want to. A part of her was screaming that this wasn't real, that she needed to wake up.

Then she heard Ilya gasp.

Then he pushed past her, still moving her ever-so-gently as he made his way over to the body in the bed.

Then, when the last of her resolve was wavering, the last of her denial hanging by the tiniest thread, Ilya reached out to grab a bruised hand before letting out a heartwrenching sob.

She had seen Ilya in many different states over the past 2 years - happy, sad, frustrated, numb - but not once had she seen this - this shattering, visceral despair that seemed to soak the entire room in darkness. She had never watched as those hazel eyes - the same eyes that winked at her as they played cards at the kitchen table, that watched the way her mouth moved when she spoke to ensure he understood her, that gazed at her son with pure adoration - filled with tears, scrunched together as he sobbed over the unmoving body of her son.

Yuna Hollander watched as the son she had found sobbed over the son she had birthed, and that last little thread finally snapped.

David was barely able to hold her up as her knees buckled, as she let the tears stream down her face and the sobs escape past her lips. She felt as her husband shook behind her, his own tears splashing into her hair as he brought the two of them over to the chairs on the other side of the bed.

Her eyes met Ilya's and she could choke on the pain in between them.

"Irina?" Shane felt rather than heard his voice tremble as he stared at the woman in question. "How- how is this-"

She shook her head as she moved closer to him, walking down the handful of stairs between them until she could cup his face in her palms.

"Hello Shane," she whispered, her voice soft and accented, that soft Russian lilt sounding so familiar it physically pained him. Her hands on his face felt warm and soft, just like his own mother's. "It is nice to finally meet you, sweetheart."

And oh didn't that sting?

Shane's eyebrows furrowed as he took in both Irina and their surroundings, the silence in the gym feeling more opressive than it had before. Irina remained quiet, seemingly giving him a moment to process just as Ilya always did.

"Am-" Shane cut himself off as he cleared his throat, trying to keep himself from choking on his own worry. "Am I dead? Is this- did I die?"

Irina shook her head again, her hands still cupping his face for a moment before she moved her right hand up to caress the locks of his hair closest to the top of his ear. "No, love," she mumbled. "No, you aren't quite dead yet."

"Yet? What do you mean?"

Irina sighed, looking at Shane with something that could have been pity, could have been sadness. Maybe both.

"Why don't we sit for a moment, hm?" She darted her eyes over to the stands closest to Shane, nodding at him before helping him shuffle over to take a seat. She sat beside him, her lilac colored dress fanning across her knees as she turned to face him. "Better? Good. Now, I know you're confused, it is very confusing, but everything will be okay."

Shane shook his head a bit, feeling the frustration bubbling under his skin. "How can you be sure," he asked. "And how are you talking to me right now? Ilya said you never learned English."

"Oh," she laughed softly, "I'm not quite sure, to be completely honest. There's something about death, about this place. To me, you are speaking Russian, to you, I am speaking English. Here," she paused, glancing around the rink with a small smile. "Well, these things are not so complicated here. The important thing is that we understand each other."

"Oh," Shane mumbled, unsure of what to do next. He let his mind wander for a moment, drifting, as it always does, to Ilya. What is happening with Ilya now? Did his practice end? Is he okay? Will I ever see him again?

"You will," Irina spoke again, catching his eyes as they darted up to look at her. Her own eyes were red, glistening with tears as she watched him. At some point in the midst of all his pondering, her hand had landed on top of his own, the two of them perched on his knee as she rubbed circles over his knuckles. "I promise you will see him again. You are not in good shape right now, not fully alive, but I will do anything to make my son happy, and right now that means helping you fight this."

"I don't want to leave him," Shane whispered. Not like you did, he couldn't help but think. He knew it wasn't her fault, knew that, like so many others, she had been taken by an illness. From the time he spent researching mental health, going down rabbit holes about depression and suicidal ideation, he knew that the stigma never did it justice. He knew that those who had never struggled with mental health disorders could never fully comprehend them. Irina had been ill, had fought against her own mind for so long, smiled through the pain to try to protect those around her (especially Ilya), but sometimes the sickness wins. Just like cancer or pneumonia or a whole host of other diseases, depression could not simply be laughed away. The medications available could help, sure, could make the weight feel a little lighter, but it never fully went away. He had seen it in Ilya, in the way he couldn't get out of bed sometimes, the way that his smiles sometimes looked more like wincing. He knew she didn't mean to, knew that it had simply become too hard to win the war after fighting so many battles.

But still, a part of him, a very very large part of him, wept for Ilya. Ilya the 12-year-old, who walked into his mother's room to find her lifeless corpse on the bed. Ilya, the 26-year-old, who cried into Shane's shoulder as he informed him that his mother was dead, then cried again on his lap as he stared into the fire-pit at the cottage and described a woman he had loved so dearly and missed so deeply. Ilya, the 28-year-old, who still had nightmares of finding his mother's body, of Shane's body on the ice flickering into hers.

Shane wept for them, for both of them. He felt no anger towards Irina for having to leave Ilya behind. That anger was reserved for Grigori Rosanov instead.

"I know," Irina whispered, patting his hand as he looked back at her, tears falling down both of their cheeks simultaneously. "I know, Shane. We're going to figure this out, okay?"

Of all the terrible things Ilya had seen in his life, this had to be the worst. He thought nothing could ever top finding his mother, pill bottles scattered around her on the blanket, but at least then he had known. He had known she wasn't coming back.

This was torture.

Shane had been in the bed for three days. Three days of machines beeping, tubes pumping air in and out of his lungs, bruises barely fading enough for Ilya to feel comfortable holding Shane's lifeless hand.

Shane Hollander had always been boring - calm, steady, quiet - but he had never been lifeless.

Ilya thought that, perhaps, Shane Hollander was the most alive thing he had ever seen. It was in the way he moved on the ice, the way he kissed Ilya after a win (or after a loss), the way he spoke to his parents, Hayden, all of the Pike kids and the kids at camp. Shane was quiet, stoic, and had trouble with eye contact, but all of these traits just served to endear Ilya even more to him.

He gripped onto Shane's hand, staring at the still-bruised face of the man he had loved since he was a teenager. All Ilya could think in this moment was that he needed Shane to wake up. He didn't care if there were complications, if Shane needed assistance or consistent healthcare appointments for the rest of his life. He didn't care about the fact that, upon receiving Yuna's phone call at the tail end of practice, he had broken down in the middle of the locker room, unable to say anything after hanging up other than the name of the man he loved. He didn't care what that meant for him, what the consequences would be. He didn't care that he had missed a game, that he might miss more games. All he needed was to see those eyes, those beautiful, brown eyes. All he needed was to know that Shane was still in there somewhere, that he was looking at Shane and not just his body.

He loved Yuna and David, loved that Yuna had taken to stroking his hair and murmuring in his ear, to telling him that it would be okay and that she loved him. He loved that David had provided that quiet reassurance he was so good at giving.

But in these moments, when all he could hear was the whirring and beeping of the machines keeping Shane alive, when all he could see was freckles and eyes that remained closed, he had never wanted his mother more.

"Mama," he whispered as he kept vigil beside his love, the Russian rolling off his tongue as he spoke to a woman he always needed, but never had. "Please. Please don't let them take him from me. I'm not ready."

"Did you hear that?" Shane felt his neck crack as he whipped it back and forth. Irina gave him that same smile, the one laced with sadness, as she nodded.

"It's Ilya," she whispered, the name sounding different on her tongue. Ilya had always lamented about the way North Americans pronounced his name, but Shane had trouble hearing the difference until Irina whispered it in that soft, reverent tone. "I can hear him, whenever he speaks to me. I imagine you'll be able to as well if you could hear that."

"He sounds," Shane trailed off, unsure of the word for it.

"Broken," Irina whispered. "He sounds broken."

Shane turned toward her, feeling the determination ignite in his bones the same way it did when he took to the ice. If there was one person, on or off the rink, who could make him feel like this - this hot rush of adrenaline, of pure determination to win - it was Ilya Rozanov.

"How do I get back?"

Irina's smile turned down at the edges, becoming sadder by the second.

"I'm not sure," she whispered, "but we need to try."

The rink was growing warmer, Shane noticed as he and Irina walked closer to the ice. He may have spent years getting acclimated to the stark cold of the rink, but he knew for certain that this was not what he should be feeling.

"Irina," he mumbled, pausing in his descent. "What does the ice feel like to you? Are you warm or cold?"

"I'm always warm," she said, her face puzzled as she watched him. For a moment, they simply stood there, staring at each other, before their eyes widened at the same time.

"What's happening?" Ilya shouted, gripping his hair as he stared at Shane's body convulsing on the bed. The machines beeping incessantly had awoken both Ilya and David, Yuna having gone to get water for them from the vending machine down the hall a few moments prior. She had ran back with the nurse and doctor, card still in her trembling hand as she latched onto David's.

Shane was still convulsing on the bed when the three of them were ushered out of the room by another nurse. It took 3 minutes for the convulsing to stop, 2 minutes for a nurse to make her way out of the room and over to Ilya and the Hollanders, and 1 minute for her to tell them it had been a seizure and that they would need to do further imaging to assess what had caused it.

Ilya felt his heart stop as she explained the possibilities. She was trying to keep her tone positive, he could tell, but he could see it in her eyes, the fact that she didn't think this would end well.

While Shane was brought for tests that would hopefully tell them what was happening, Ilya sat sandwiched in-between the Hollanders. He was gripping onto Yuna, hugging her from behind to comfort her as David rubbed his hand up and down Ilya's back. They were a unit, a family, but Ilya knew that none of them would feel like a family until Shane was back with them.

"Please, Mama," Ilya whispered, David and Yuna stilling for a moment as they listened to the unfamiliar language pass through his lips in choked whimpers. "Please bring him back to me. Please tell him I need him here. I can't do this without him. I can't live without him. Please. Please."

Shane had just began moving again when they heard it, the desperate whimpers of the man he loved begging for Irina to help, to deliver Shane back to him.

Irina whimpered, choking on a sob as she continued toward the rink.

"I think I'm dying," Shane whispered, feeling the warmth spreading through him again before slowly returning to that odd state of neither hot nor cold.

"You're not," Irina said through clinched teeth. "I will not let you. You can't leave him, not like I did."

Shane had a split second thought that this was where Ilya got his stubbornness, his unwavering faith in his ability to make whatever he wanted a reality so long as he spoke it into existence.

"It isn't your fault," Shane said. Irina whipped around to face him, a fierce glare piercing through him, but he knew the anger wasn't targeted at him.

"I left him," Irina spat, refusing to pause for Shane to slip a word in. "I left him and he found me. I will never forgive myself for that. I could have stayed, could have fought it. I was tired, so tired, but I should have just pushed through it. For him."

"Irina," Shane whispered, watching familiar eyes fill with tears too quickly to be stopped. "You are not to blame for what happened to you. You-"

"It did not happen to me," she barked. "I did it to myself. I know he has told you. I know you know. I've seen every second, watched as you held him, as your mother held him through things I should have been there for. I've watched as he grew in a home without love, in a country that loved him for what he gave it but would murder him for who he loves, who he is. I watched as my son, my baby, was targeted by his father when I was no longer there. I thought that it was just me, that if I was gone, Grigori would feel less anger. Instead, he used that anger to hurt Ilya, to mold Alexei into a monster like himself. It is my fault that I was not there to defend him, to hold him, to love him."

The woman did not crumble, did not fall to the floor as one might expect. Instead she stood, chin raised, eyes forward, as she choked on her grief and her tears. Shane from 2 years ago would not have known what to do. Hell, Shane from nowdidn't know what to do, but he walked toward her anyway.

Without preamble, without a single sound escaping his mouth, he pulled Irina into his arms, holding her the way he held Ilya, the way she would have held Ilya, the way Irina herself should have been held. His shoulder was wet, his body still warm, but all that mattered for now was allowing her this moment, allowing her the grace she didn't allow herself.

"He forgives you," Shane whispered into her ear, feeling her stuttered movements as she choked on her sobs. "I promise he forgives you. I promise it isn't your fault. You didn't cause Grigori's anger and you couldn't have stopped it either. You were all victims in that house, and Ilya would never blame you for what happened. I know it must have been hell watching all of that, but I promise you, Irina, we've got him. I will never let him go without being held, never again. I don't care what it takes to hold him through whatever life throws at us, I will be there to make sure he isn't doing it alone. He isn't alone anymore, okay?"

Shane didn't know if it was the right thing to say - if there even was a right thing to say - but he hoped she understood, that she knew he was being truthful as he spoke.

"He always feels alone," she whimpered into his shoulder. "He has no one, no one, other than you. He feels alone and scared and I can't fix it."

Shane felt his own tears fall as he pictured Ilya, alone in his house in Ottawa, no one to hold him through his bad days, no one to talk to outside of Shane and his parents. He wondered if Ilya had ever spoken to his parents about things he couldn't tell Shane, and then realized that Ilya would never do that, would never feel safe enough to tell Yuna about the stress of not seeing Shane or missing him during hockey season, would never feel comfortable enough to ask David for advice on how to speak to Shane about concerns regarding their relationship. He couldn't talk to anyone about Shane, he realized. Ilya had never really said much on it, had never asked for more than Shane could give him, but Shane knew Ilya needed other people to rely on, and he knew that when he made it out of this damn rink he was going to help him find those people.

"I'm going to go back," he mumbled into Irina's hair, "and I am going to make sure he never feels alone again. I swear."

Both of them turned around, intent on continuing down to the rink, when the screen on the jumbotron lit up and Shane's stomach dropped.

Ilya was glued to the chair again, gripping onto a hand that wouldn't squeeze back, when the doctor entered the room. He watched as Yuna and David turned their attention toward the man, but couldn't bring himself to do the same. Instead, he counted the freckles on Shane's cheeks as the words floated past him, as he heard Yuna and David break down, as he felt the tears fall down his own cheeks and onto his lap.

Shane wasn't dead yet, but it didn't look good.

Words floated around in Ilya's head.

Life support.

Call friends and family.

Say goodbyes.

He wanted, so badly, for this to be something lost in translation, for his English to be worse than he thought. He wanted to be wrong.

He wanted Shane.

Conversations and people drifted around the room for the rest of the day - Yuna and David whispering to Shane, trying to get Ilya's attention around noon, Hayden and Jackie visiting, Jackie crying softly as Hayden sobbed over his best friend, Rose facetiming on Yuna's phone, talking softly to Shane and then the Hollanders - Ilya heard all of it but absorbed none of it.

It was late at night when he could finally feel his mouth again. Yuna and David were asleep on the cot in the corner of the room, and all Ilya could hear was that same wretched silence punctuated by the beeps of machines and pumping sound of the ventilator. He gripped Shane's hand in both of his, pulling it up to his mouth to kiss it before moving one of his hands to brush the hair out of Shane's face and run a knuckle down those freckled cheeks.

"Shane," Ilya whispered, "моя любовь. I don't know if you can hear me, but I need you to try, okay? I know you're in there somewhere, sweetheart, so I need you to try to not be so stubborn and to listen to me."

Ilya sighed, kissing Shane's hand one more time in that same spot.

"I know you're in pain, I know you're hurting and I know it's too much. I know your body is shutting down, that the doctors say you're starting to fade away, but Shane I need you to hold on, okay? I know, I know. This is selfish, this is not-"

Ilya cut himself off, swearing under his breath.

"I know this is not done. I know that I am supposed to say words like 'it is okay' or 'you can rest,' but- but I know you, yes? I know you and you never rest. You never give up, Shane. You keep going, keep fighting. You always say that you cannot give up now, that you are not done yet. I need you to not be done yet. I need you to be stubborn, boring Shane Hollander and come back to me."

Ilya looked up at the monitor for a moment, watching as it continued beeping in that same, steady rhythm.

"You were supposed to be my forever, my husband. I want to marry you, to have boring children with you who get all of your boring. I want to play against you until our knees don't work. I want to see you with gray hair and wrinkles, want to see what your freckles look like on old man Hollander. I want to spend my life with you, любимый. I cannot do this if you are not here to live it."

He shook his head, tears flying every which way as he inhaled a stuttering breath.

"Please, Shane. Please come back to me. I have already lost everyone. I do not think I can keep going if I lose you, too. So, I will shut up. I will stop being boring and crying all over hospital bed, but if I do this you must come back to me."

He tried to look stern, moving his face into some bastardized version of his serious face, but crumpled almost instantaneously.

"Please, Shane. Please."

Shane and Irina watched, gobsmacked, as the screen flickered to life. The scene displayed was nothing short of heartbreaking, a hospital room with Shane in the middle, hooked up to so many machines he could barely recognize himself. Ilya was sitting in a chair right next to the bed, gripping onto Shane's hand as though it was the only thing keeping him attached to the mortal realm. Yuna and David were standing in front of a doctor, and Shane could only watch as their expressions crumbled, as his parents kept each other from falling to the ground in despair.

The screen flickered slowly in and out, showing the room as different visitors filtered in and out. Alongside the images, Shane and Irina heard voices from the loudspeaker - Yuna and David telling him they loved him, detailing how proud of him they were, begging him to come back, Hayden sobbing into Shane's chest and telling him he loved him, that he had been the best friend and captain in the world, Jackie and Rose giving soft and tear-filled goodbyes, Jackie pressing a kiss to Shane's cheek before helping Hayden walk out of the room - but throughout it all, Ilya stayed in the chair, barely moving except to shift his position or adjust Shane's blanket.

Shane wanted to reach out and touch him, to hug his mother and father, to reassure his friends that he loved them and wasn't giving up. He watched, helplessly, as his father tried to convince Ilya to eat something to no avail, as he finally gave up, kissed Shane on the forehead, and went to join his mother on the cot.

Ilya seemed to snap out of it hours later, and Shane knew he would do anything to make him smile, to take away his pain. Shane watched and listened as the man he loved begged him to stay, begged him to fight his way back to him.

I'm trying, Shane wanted to tell him. Your mother and I are trying to fix this.

Instead, he watched Ilya's face crumple, scrunching together as sobs wracked his body, unable to say anything other than "please" before switching to Russian to beg some more.

Shane turned to Irina, unable to watch anymore, and was about to say something, to tell her he needed to fix this now, when a shock of cold ran up his spine. He watched as a single spike lit up the heart monitor on screen, not enough to alert anyone, but enough to make Ilya cry even harder. Irina turned to look at him, her eyes catching on something behind him before pointing desperately at one of the exits.

The exit. The same exit he had gone through years ago. He had walked out that door, spotted a boy struggling to light a cigarette, and his life had been changed forever. He had met the love of his life that day, shaken his hand without knowing that he had just held the entire world in his hand.

He and Irina crossed the rink as quickly as they could. As his steps quickened, he felt the same jolt of cold for a second time, then a third. This continued as he got closer to the door, only stopping when he heard Ilya sob so hard he was nearly screaming. He turned to look at the screen, but stopped when Irina caught his wrist.

"You are running out of time, Shane," she said sternly, cupping his cheeks one last time and kissing his forehead. She pointed to the door, the handle finally within reach. "Go to him. Go to my son."

Shane nodded. "Thank you," he whispered. "Irina, I-"

She shook her head.

"Tell him. Tell Ilya that I love him, that I am sorry, that he should never have been the one to find me." Tears filled her eyes once more. "Tell him I am proud of him, that he has done so well, been so strong. Tell him he was right, that I do love you, that he made the right decision. Tell him all of this, and then you hold him tight and you never let him go."

Another jolt of cold ran up his spine. Over the speakers, another loud sob could be heard. Shane swallowed, nodded to Irina, and then grasped the handle of the exit door.

Shane felt warm again, and for a moment he wondered if he had messed up, if he hadn't left in time - but then he felt the pain, sharp knives stabbing into him at multiple points, the worst headache he had ever experienced, and something lodged in his throat. The most important thing he felt, however, was a set of shaking hands gripping one of his own, something wet dripping onto the group of extremities at a steady pace. It took a monumental amount of effort to pry his eyes open, but the second he heard the first choked sob he managed to complete the task.

Ilya was just as Shane had seen him on that screen, hunched over Shane's hand and sobbing. Shane's parents had somehow slept through the sound (exhaustion, he was sure), but Shane could hear him as clear as day. The tube in his mouth prevented him from speaking, but Shane forced himself to focus on his hand, squeezing Ilya's as hard as he could. The second he felt it, Ilya's head snapped up, hazel meeting deep brown as the man let out a gasp before surging up to stand over Shane, staring into his eyes as if he was a blind man who had just been gifted sight.

"Shane," Ilya mumbled. "Shane. Моя любовь. Ты вернулась ко мне."

Shane felt the lightest pressure as Ilya moved to kiss his forehead before pressing his own against it.

"Спасибо. Я люблю тебя. Я люблю тебя. Спасибо" Ilya repeated, and god Shane wished he could talk around the tube, could tell Ilya he loved him, too.

Shane wanted to tell him everything, to give him Irina's message, but he felt the heaviness weighing him down again as his eyes fluttered and his vision grew hazy. He heard a clicking sound and then quick steps coming in his direction, and forced his eyes open for another moment to look at the nurse as she stared at him in shock for a moment before moving around him in a flustered manner. The next bit of time occurred in spurts of awareness - a light being shined in his eyes, a few questions about his pain levels, his parents rushing to his bedside and fussing over him, Ilya running a hand through hair and staring into his eyes, Ilya kissing him on the cheek and whispering in his ear that he loved him, Ilya telling Yuna they got their boy back as she side hugged him.

Ilya, Ilya, Ilya.

Eventually, Shane closed his eyes again, ignoring the small jolt of fear that he would wake back up in that rink.

Ilya held his hand the entire time.

"You need to rest," Shane rasped, his voice sill hoarse from the intubation. Ilya simply stared at him, refusing to so much as speak. "Ilya, baby," Shane shook their intertwined hands as he spoke. "Please get some sleep. You need it, okay?"

Ilya shook his head, seemingly debating with himself before speaking. "I am scared that, if I go to sleep-"

He cut himself off, shaking his head again, but Shane knew.

"Ilya," he whispered, tugging on his hand. "Come here, please."

Ilya shifted closer, resting his forehead on Shane's cheek. Shane lifted his other hand, cupping the back of Ilya's head before tapping the bottom of his chin to get him to look at him.

"I promise you I am not going anywhere," Shane said, forcing Ilya to keep looking at him. "Can I tell you something? And I need you to promise me you won't get mad, that you'll believe me when I tell you."

Ilya nodded slowly, a puzzled expression on his face.

"When I was-" Shane shook his head a bit, shaking off the jitters as he began to explain. "When I got into the accident, I woke up in this place that was familiar, yet foreign all at the same time." Shane ignored the confused look Ilya gave him, forcing himself to soldier on. "I woke up in that rink in Saskatchewan, the one we met at, but it was completely empty except for one person. She was sitting in the stands, and- well at first I thought it was you. From a distance, all I really saw were curls - your curls."

Ilya sat up straight again, posture tense as he shook his head in a similar manner to Irina. He opened his mouth to speak, but all he could manage was a low, questioning noise.

"I started walking towards her, but once I got close enough to realize it wasn't you, I stopped. She made her way to me and she held my face and called me sweetheart in the same way you do, same accent and lilt and syllabic stress, and I knew. Immediately, I knew who she was."

Ilya was crying again, and Shane wondered if maybe he should stop talking, give the man's heart a break, but then Ilya nodded as though he wanted Shane to continue.

"She helped me, Ilya. Irina did. She helped me make my way back to you. We could hear you a few times - how you were asking her not to let me die - and she was stubborn enough for both of us. She was - god Ilya she was so much like you. She was beautiful and funny and kind, but she had this stubborn and stern streak that got me through the entire thing. I swear I loved her instantly and-"

Shane stopped as soon as he heard the first choked sob make its way out of Ilya's mouth. He turned more fully towards the man in question, trying to wipe all the tears off his cheek before sighing and gesturing for Ilya to come closer. He knew they shouldn't both be on the bed, knew that he was still in pain and this wouldn't help, but he had promised Irina that he would hold him, and that was precisely what he was going to do.

He lay in the pause for a moment, running his hair through soft curls as Ilya cried into his chest, kissing the crown of his head every few breaths to remind him he was loved. After the sobs had tapered off a bit, Ilya adjusting his head to stare out the window as he lay on Shane's chest, he continued.

"We were already trying to figure out how to get me back here when the jumbotron lit up. I had to watch all of you say your goodbyes, had to listen to you all cry. I think the worst part, though, was hearing you sobbing and not being able to do anything about it, not being able to hold you. I heard everything you said to me, baby. I heard you asking me to fight, but I was already fighting my way back to you, sweetheart, and your mother was helping me do it. She's the one who got me to the door, she's the one who told me I needed to fight and forced me to screw my head back on when I felt like it was too late."

Ilya looked up at Shane, sniffing again before finally speaking. "Did she- did she say anything about-"

"About you? Like a message or just in general?"

Ilya just nodded. "Both, I guess. Either."

"She did," Shane nodded, leaning down to kiss Ilya's forehead. "She kept talking about how much she loved you, how much she wishes she could have been there for you. She said she didn't know that your father's abuse wasn't solely based on his hatred for her - that she thought he would leave you and your brother alone after she died. She said she watched you the entire time, that she was so proud of you and who you've become. She wanted me to tell you that she was sorry that she left, sorry that you had to be the one to find her. She also said that- that she was glad you had someone to hold you now, to weather the storms with you, but that you were still lonely. I promised her that I would fix that, that I would never let you be alone again, that I would make sure you had a whole support system, not just me and my parents."

Ilya looked confused, but didn't say anything, so Shane finished.

"She told me you were right, that she does love me like you do, that you made the right decision. She wasn't against it - wasn't against us. She loves you regardless. She wanted me to tell you all of this and then to hold you, so I promised I would. I'm going to hold you for her and for me and for you. I'm staying with you and so is she, even if you can't see her."

Ilya broke down as soon as Shane was finished, gripping onto the hand he held like a lifeline. Shane let him, holding him through the storm.

He knew there would be more obstacles to face - recovery, coming out, life in general - but he also knew that, no matter what life threw at them, he would hold Ilya through it. He would marry him, and play hockey against him until their knees stopped working, and let Ilya know what an older Shane's freckles would look like. They would get a dog and have children, and above all else, he would make sure that Ilya never knew what it felt like to be alone again. He would only ever know love.