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It’s Wyatt who notices first.
Because nothing gets past that man. Perceptive fucker, that one. It’s a good thing he’s on their team, and not someone else’s.
In Ilya’s defense, he hardly pays attention to the things that come out of his own mouth. He’s been warned many times that it’s a terrible habit. Most of those warnings come from Shane, and the rest from poor Harris, who has to keep censoring their social media content.
But Ilya should’ve known.
That’s what bothers him the most. Not the change itself, but the fact that he didn’t even notice.
“No, that’s impossible.” Ilya’s immediate reaction is to deny it, fuelled partly by offense, but mostly by guilt. Because how could he have let this happen?
“Hey, it happens,” Wyatt shrugs easily, pulling off his gear. “Lisa hardly sounds Texan anymore, either.”
Ilya tries to think of what Lisa sounds like. She’s a beautiful woman, he remembers that. But he doesn’t recall a Texan accent at all. But then again, Wyatt has been in Ottawa for longer than Ilya. So, maybe he never really got to hear what Lisa actually used to sound like.
Would it happen to him, too? Would one day people be surprised if he told them he’s actually Russian?
The mere possibility makes his stomach turn. Ilya tears off his own gear more harshly than necessary.
“You’re wrong,” Ilya tells him, and ignores how he has to roll his ‘r’s intentionally, not instinctually. “Russians don’t lose their accent.”
Ilya doesn’t think much of it.
He ignores it, in fact.
Maybe Wyatt is getting old. Ilya will get him hearing aids for Christmas.
Ilya just needs to be careful with his accent to make sure it really shows when he talks to people.
People who have an accent don’t have to actually try to show it, you idiot, a voice inside his head tells him.
He ignores that one, too.
He ignores it until it happens again. And then it just keeps happening.
It’s an interviewer first, who compliments Ilya’s English, saying he sounds like a native speaker. Ilya is deeply offended by the whole thing. It’s the man at the bakery next, who smiles proudly when Ilya asks for butter tarts and the words roll off his tongue like butter itself. During their weekly puzzle night, when Ilya uses a big English word without having to think twice about it, Shane’s Dad makes an off-handed comment. Ilya, who usually revels in the man’s praise, feels a tight ache in his chest instead.
But the worst one, the reckoning of what he’s been trying so hard to ignore, comes a month later during their game against the Admirals.
Ilya is in the penalty box, second one for the game, when the rookie joins him, his scowl deepening as he plops down on the next seat. He’s Russian too, but unlike Ilya, he grew up in the States, so he hardly speaks it. Ilya has been speaking more and more in Russian to him. Petrov probably thinks Ilya is trying to give him secret tips because of their shared background. He doesn’t need to know that Ilya has his own ulterior motives.
Ilya pats him on the back as the boy all but throws his stick away and then winces softly when he extends his arm.
“You need to lift more in the gym,” Ilya advises the young boy. “Focus more on your forearm and shoulder. Wrist curls and farmer’s carries.”
“Sure,” the boy murmurs, as if the last thing he needs right now is workout tips.
“And you need to actually warm up during warm-up,” Ilya points out. “I know you sneak your phone into the rink, Petrov. Whoever is texting you can wait. It’s not the end of the world if you don’t text them back immediately.”
“Easy for you to say when your husband is right across the rink,” the boy scoffs.
Ilya would’ve smacked him on the head—affectionately, of course—if he had said the words in English for anyone else to hear.
He’s got a bit of attitude this one. No respect for the elders. Ilya finds it all a bit irksome. Shane finds him charming, though, which only irks Ilya even more.
But gone are the days when he had rookies like Haas who worshipped every word that came out of him. This new one is an absolute menace.
“This is serious,” Ilya says, seriously, and lightly smacks the man on the arm, making him wince again. “You need better muscle support and do proper warm-up before the games. Maybe wear tighter gear, too. Or else you’ll get Bursitis.”
“Get what?” Petrov looks at him blankly.
Ilya tries not to roll his eyes. These rookies. “Overuse injury. It’s when you have swelling because you flex it too much.”
“Flex what too much?” the boy asks in confusion.
And Ilya has to pause. Because Ilya has to think.
The whole world narrows down to the roof of his mouth. He parts his lips, but the word doesn’t come, only dry air.
He can’t remember.
He can’t remember the word for it. He can’t remember the fucking word.
He hisses out a breath in frustration as he desperately searches for the word his brain knows but can’t remember.
Elbow. Elbow. Elbow.
What’s it called again? What the fuck is it called?
Ilya is familiar with the frustration of it all—of having the word on the tip of his tongue, at the edge of his fingertips, but not being close enough to reach it.
But that’s for English. It’s never been the other way around.
He remembers Russian. He is Russian.
He knows the Russian word for elbow. He fucking knows it. Even if he can’t remember it for the life of him.
“Captain?” Petrov says, breaking Ilya out of what felt like a mini panic attack. “Flex what too much?”
Ilya, defeated but refusing to use the English word, points at the boy’s elbow.
“Lokot’?” Petrov asks, and Ilya all but shouts in relief.
Lokot’. Lokot’. Lokot’.
He knew it. He knew it was that one.
Of course, he knew. How silly of him to think that he’d ever forget a word in his own mother tongue?
“Yes.” Ilya nods calmly and taps the boy’s elbow. His lokot’. “Warm-up and forearm workouts. Okay?”
Petrov only nods. “Okay.”
It’s fine. It’s not a big deal.
Everyone forgets stuff every once in a while. Especially as they grow older, right?
It’s all fine.
If Ilya stays up that night, going through the entire human anatomy because he’d rather throw himself into the Baltic Sea than ever forget another word again, then that’s between him and the Russian Wikipedia.
It’s easy to ignore and pretend like it’s not a real problem. Ilya is good at that—at pretending that scary things he sees with both eyes don’t exist.
Like when he first saw a boy in his U9 hockey team fracture his collarbone and pretended like it never happened. Because he didn’t want to believe that playing hockey, the one thing he is good at, could get him hurt.
Like when he saw his mother slipping, slowly but surely, during those last days, but never told anyone about it. Because he was afraid that they’d take her to the hospital again, and he’d miss her too much.
Like when he saw Shane in that Las Vegas hotel room all those years ago, aching for him in every way it is possible to ache for someone, and still sent him away without a kiss. Because it was easier to be alone and unloved than to have it all, only to inevitably lose it one day.
It’s a lot harder to pretend these days. Which is a good thing, he supposes.
But fuck if it isn’t annoying.
All of this would be so much easier if he could slip back into his old ways and pretend like this problem doesn’t exist either.
But he can’t. He can’t pretend anymore. He’s not good at pretending anymore.
Just like with most good things in his life, he has Shane to thank for this one, too.
“Do you think I’m losing my accent?” Ilya asks him point-blank over breakfast one day.
Shane, who is spreading vegemite over his egg white omelette, looks up and blinks at him. A small frown appears between his brows as he takes in the question.
Ilya can pinpoint the second it sinks in.
Of course, he hasn’t noticed.
Shane’s observation skills are only slightly worse than Ilya’s emotional regulation skills.
But still, Ilya can’t help the way his shoulders relax at the realization.
Because the truth of it is that he doesn’t care what others think. It’s Shane’s opinion that matters. Sometimes, it’s the only one that matters.
And it’s different with Shane.
Ilya knows Shane likes his accent. More than likes it, in fact. His husband, even before he became his husband, has never hidden how much it turns him on.
Ilya wasn’t entirely surprised by the discovery. After all, it’s not been much different from his other sexual encounters. He doesn’t know what it is about the Russian accent that seems to turn people on. He’s always thought that people would find it scary. Maybe that’s just Hollywood propaganda.
But people seem to find it sexy enough. At least in his case. He knows Shane definitely does.
So, he can’t help but be a little nervous as he waits for Shane to finish his internal freak out over not noticing something important, so he can actually answer Ilya’s question.
“Oh my god, Ilya. Have you actually?” Shane gasps, looking predictably apologetic, like the good Canadian boy he is. “I can’t believe I didn’t notice. I’m so sorry.”
“I don’t know if I’ve lost it.” Ilya shrugs. “I’m asking you to tell me.”
“Hm.” Shane frowns again. “I don’t know. Say something.”
“Like what?”
“Like anything. Let me hear you.”
That little phrase in a different context would’ve unleashed words that could fill up an entire book. But right now, Ilya struggles. He looks for the right words, worried which ones might lead to the answer he doesn’t want to hear.
But it’s too early for all of this. Refusing to torture himself any longer, he simply resorts to what’s in front of him.
“Knife. Eggs. Bacon. Potatoes. Plate. Glass. Coffee. Vegemite.”
“Not that.” Shane slaps his arm. “Say something else. Like a sentence.”
“Like what?” Ilya asks again.
“I don’t know. Just say something,” Shane groans. “Talk properly.”
“Well, I don’t know what to just say,” Ilya grumbles. “If you want me to talk properly, then maybe ask a question.”
But Shane doesn’t ask him a question. He simply stares at Ilya and then tilts his head.
“Huh.” His husband hums in amusement.
“What?” Ilya frowns.
“Properly,” Shane repeats, saying the word slowly and carefully. “That didn’t sound Russian at all.”
Fuck.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
What next? Will he pronounce his name differently, too? Emphasize the Ro instead of the Za? Like everyone else seems to do?
Ilya has never been bothered by the North Americans absolutely butchering his name. God knows they do a lot worse for other players with more syllables. But he’s got to draw the line somewhere. He can excuse them. But he’ll never excuse that kind of behaviour from his own tongue.
“Hey,” Shane says, and he’s leaning over their dining table and touching Ilya’s face, vegemite fingers be damned. “It’s nice.”
“It is?” Ilya asks, unsure. He’s never been told he sounds nice before. He doesn’t know what to do with it. “I sound okay?”
“You sound like you’re Canadian,” Shane says.
“Ugh.” Ilya makes a face.
“You sound like you’re mine,” Shane adds.
“Oh.” Ilya softens.
Well, that settles it then. Crisis averted.
Except, weeks later, long after he convinced himself—and convinced Shane—that he is fine with this change, he finds himself mulling over it for no reason.
It’s not a problem. He doesn’t know why he is making it one, to be honest.
It’s a very Shane thing to do, to turn something into nothing, and let his anxiety take the wheel and allow it to drive him off a cliff.
Yuna once told him, sometimes married couples merge into the same person—that it is an inevitable side effect of sharing a life together. They’ve been married for a few years now, and Ilya doesn’t mind turning into Shane. He likes that he’s become a little boring and predictable. He likes it even more when Shane gets reckless out of nowhere. He likes sharing a life with Shane. He likes sharing parts of himself with the person he loves the most in the world and receiving even prettier parts of Shane in return.
But sharing an accent, though…that feels like crossing a line.
It’s ridiculous. This whole thing. Why is it even a problem?
He knows for a fact that a lot of other married people deal with worse. He’s seen it firsthand, the struggles his mother had to bear. So, if the worst crisis he’s got to deal with in his midlife is sounding Canadian, then he should consider himself lucky and shut the fuck up about it.
“Would you like to talk about the adoption process today as well?” Galina asks him, making Ilya look up from the carpet.
It’s one of those Bessarabian rugs. Achingly familiar.
The small yellow flowers are gentle but bright. Much different from the pale, sombre white carnations that used to decorate the rugs in the house Ilya grew up in.
He wonders why he didn’t notice it before.
What else does this room have from Russia? What else has slipped his notice? What else has he forgotten? What else has he taken for granted?
He stares at Galina and wonders if she, too, lost parts of Russia to time. He wonders whether this rug was a gift from someone close or if it’s the only thing she has left from home.
“Could we do the session in English today?” Ilya asks her.
For once, Galina seems surprised by his request. But then she smiles, switching to English comfortably. “Of course. Adoption involves a lot of jargon, so maybe English might be easier.”
He doesn’t know. He doesn’t care.
He only wanted to hear what she sounds like in English. And she sounds more Canadian than he does.
It makes sense, sure. Galina mentioned once that she moved to Ottawa as a child, so of course, her English sounds more local. But does she miss it? Did it make her feel guilty, too? Like she did something wrong? Like she betrayed a close personal friend?
“And for future reference, we can do all our sessions in English, if that’s more comfortable for you,” Galina adds into the silence.
“Why would that be more comfortable for me?” Ilya bristles immediately, and then it sinks in, almost as immediately. “Have—have I been talking in English with you?”
It happens sometimes. When you speak more than one language, especially with someone who is the same, you’re not always sure which words you’re using or where they come from.
But again, it’s always the other way around.
He switches to Russian out of habit and comfort.
He’s never switched to English. English isn’t comfortable.
It’s just a habit. Because everyone around him speaks in English.
But it doesn’t seem like a habit now. It’s become instinct.
Fuck.
“Sometimes, yes,” Galina nods, making the pit in his stomach sink lower. “Mostly when you are talking about hockey.”
“Why didn’t you say something?” Ilya groans.
“I wasn’t aware it’s something you’d like to know about,” Galina tells him, eyes amused. “You’ve been living in Ottawa for almost a decade now, Ilya. This is completely normal.”
“Normal for whom?” Ilya scoffs.
Whom.
Fucking gross. God, just shoot him at this point.
Galina hums at that and picks up her notebook. Ilya hates it when she picks up the notebook. It makes him feel like he’s going backwards, like there are things inside him fucked up enough for her to write down and make a list.
“We were going to talk about adoption,” Galina reminds him. “But would you like to talk about this instead?”
No. No, they are supposed to figure out this adoption thing.
It’s why he started seeing Galina regularly again, as opposed to his quarterly visits in the last couple of years.
He knows becoming a parent is going to fuck him up in new ways, and he wants to be prepared. He needs to not fuck this up.
For Shane. For their kid. Maybe for himself too.
“No, let’s talk about adoption,” Ilya tells her, sticking to English and sticking to what actually matters. “We don’t have to talk about the other thing.”
Because why bother talking about it when you can actually just fix it?
He tries. Of course, he tries.
Ilya is a fighter in every sense of the word.
So, he fights the urge to use English, and he tries to stay true to his blood.
He’s just not sure how to go about it.
He considers speaking in Russian more, even with his team, and sometimes with Shane’s family, too. But he can’t.
He tried it once. When he was just a 19-year-old boy, wondering why he needed to accommodate everyone else. If they want to speak to him, they can learn his language.
But nobody bothered, of course. Nobody except Shane. It’s one of the many reasons why Shane is so precious.
Ilya can talk to himself. But it always gets really depressing really fast.
Besides, speaking is not enough.
He remembers the years when he was trying to become fluent in English. He immersed himself in it. Got super desperate and read the New Yorker too.
So, he does the same now. He listens to more Russian music. His Spotify is confused about his newfound patriotism. He watches more Russian movies, the old ones he used to watch with his family; the loud action movies Shane doesn’t like but watches with him anyway because he wants pieces of Ilya that are too far away to reach by himself.
But nothing feels enough. He’s terrified that he’ll forget again.
Not just a word. Maybe a whole sentence this time.
What if one day, years from now, he wakes up on a Thursday and doesn’t remember Russian anymore?
Can that even happen?
Ilya doesn’t know what to believe. Google? The voices in his head?
It’s hard to hear anything else over the loud thumping of his own heart, which always beats a little faster when he thinks of the future.
He’s not like Shane. He doesn’t like thinking about the future much. He certainly doesn’t like planning for it.
But he needs a plan now. He needs to figure this out. Now.
He can’t be having a midlife crisis once the baby is here. They won’t have time for any of this nonsense then.
One weekend, out of pure desperation, he almost calls Alexei. He disconnects the call before it can even ring, letting out a loud curse in Russian, and then apologizing to Shane, saying he stubbed his toe.
Not Alexei. Not this shit again.
He can’t go back to that place. He can’t have Russia, even small pieces of it at a time, not when Russia brought with it some things that he could really do without.
He can’t go to Russia. But maybe he can find a way to bring Russia to him.
It’s a simple plan, but a good plan.
Ilya is absolutely certain that it will work.
Svetlana has never once let him down, and he doesn’t think she’d start now.
They talk almost every day now. They speak often, of course, but not as often as either of them would like. But now Ilya almost calls her every day. Sveta was suspicious of his sudden neediness, but then, when he explained his predicament, she went all soft and sad about it. She agreed to help almost immediately. Mostly, she was just happy to have him by her side again.
It helps, of course. It really helps. Because when he talks to her, it flows so naturally. Maybe it’s the familiarity of it all, since she was the only person he had from home when he moved to this unknown world. He hardly trips over his words or feels the need to switch to English.
He almost convinces himself that everything is totally fine when his plan completely backfires on him.
Because, unlike his husband, Ilya has never really been good at multitasking. He doesn’t have plans, systems or lists that help him stay on track. What he does have is an obsession, and when he puts his mind to something, everything else fades into the background.
Even the most important things.
He walks back inside from the lawn, after spending an hour arguing with Svetlana on the phone about memories that neither of them remembers properly, his chest buzzing pleasantly from the nostalgia, to find Shane sitting in front of the TV and watching an old hockey game.
Ilya is immediately endeared, because no matter what life throws at him—forgetting Russian or forgetting how to breathe—he’ll always have this. His Shane. His dependable Shane, who is always the same.
He sinks to the couch next to his husband and shuffles around so his head rests on the man’s lap, squirming expectantly until he feels Shane’s fingers in his curls.
“How is Svetlana?” Shane asks after a moment.
“She is a liar, Shane,” Ilya complains immediately.
“Oh?” Shane says.
“We were talking about our school camping trip. In junior year, you know. And she was saying things that never happened,” Ilya grumbles.
“You guys have a lot of memories together,” Shane notes.
“Fake memories,” Ilya scoffs loudly, crossing his arms in indignation. “Ilya Rozanov is not afraid of Siberian Tigers. Or Canadian Wolf Birds. You must tell her when we see her next week.”
“We’re seeing her next week?” Shane asks.
“Well, we have a game in Boston,” Ilya points out. “I thought we could get dinner afterwards.”
“Do you want me there too?” Shane asks quietly.
Ilya chuckles at that. For Shane, sometimes having dinner with their friends is as unappealing as doing a press conference.
“You don’t have to come,” Ilya reassures him gently. “Maybe you can stay back in the hotel, hm? Get some rest?”
He hopes it puts Shane at ease. But for whatever reason, Shane’s entire body flinches at the words as he carefully pushes Ilya away and climbs off the couch. “I’m tired. I think I’ll go to bed. Goodnight.”
Ilya stares in confusion, wondering what had just happened.
It’s not that he’s not used to it. Sometimes, Shane has a separate conversation in his own head while he’s talking to Ilya, and Ilya doesn’t always know what his head is telling him. Not immediately.
It takes him a while to catch up. But he always does.
He’ll never let Shane be alone, even inside his own head.
He turns off the TV and follows the other man into their bedroom, where Shane is already under the covers, which is not a good sign. If Shane forgoes his careful seven-step night routine, it’s never good news.
“Moy lyubimyy,” Ilya says gently as he approaches their bed. “Are you okay? Are you not feeling well?”
“I’m fine. I’m just sleepy.”
“Okay,” Ilya says, unsure. “Let’s go brush our teeth then, yes? And change out of your day clothes. Otherwise, you’ll be cranky in the morning.”
“Why do you care?” Shane mutters.
Ilya blinks before he chuckles and leans closer, nuzzling his face against the half-covered head of his husband. “Because Cranky Shane doesn’t give me my morning kisses and then I become Cranky Ilya. And Cranky Ilya is not good at practice. And then the team will all get cranky too.”
“Stop saying cranky,” Shane grumbles, turning his head away from Ilya.
“Why? You’re being very cranky,” Ilya observes, refusing to move away as he nibbles at Shane’s jaw.
“Ilya, leave me alone,” Shane groans, pushing him away.
“No,” Ilya refuses, shaking his head, dragging his lips down the man’s neck. “Are you going to tell me what’s wrong, kotenok, or do I have to fuck it out of you?”
“Why don’t you go fuck Svetlana?” Shane hisses.
Ilya pauses at that and pulls back a fraction, staring at Shane in surprise.
He is not hurt by it. They’ve been together for too long for that. He’s just annoyed that he didn’t notice it sooner.
Because it’s not at all surprising that Shane is angry—or jealous. Those are, in fact, very familiar.
He gets like this sometimes, angry and frustrated and borderline nasty when he thinks—very incorrectly, of course—that Ilya is even remotely interested in anyone whose first name isn’t Shane and last name isn’t Hollander.
It is a mild turn-on, Ilya must admit. After all, what is jealousy if not love with no place to go?
Besides, Ilya knows a thing or two about jealousy. But his own beast is a different one. Much less nasty, and a lot more pathetic. If Ilya even considers that Shane is remotely fascinated by another man, he doesn’t get angry or frustrated. His heart gets too sad before his brain can even get there.
Because it’s never ‘Shane likes someone else’ and is always ‘no one loves you all the time, not even Shane’.
Ilya pulls back completely now and sits back on his heels. “Why would I fuck Svetlana? I’m married to you.”
“Oh, so you remember. Good.” Shane rolls his eyes.
“Shane,” Ilya says tiredly. He’s usually patient about this. He indulges Shane’s frustrations until the real reason spills over. But he’s tired tonight. He’s been tired since he woke up one morning and couldn’t remember the word for elbow. “Is this because I’m having dinner with her next week?”
“I don’t care if you have dinner with your friends,” Shane mutters. “I’m sure you’ll have a lot to catch up on.”
“Hollander,” Ilya sighs, deeper this time. “Just tell me what’s wrong, please.”
“If I have to tell you, then what’s even the point?” Shane says in annoyance.
“The point is to communicate,” Ilya reminds him, even though he feels like an absolute hypocrite as the words leave his mouth.
“Why would you even be interested in communication, Ilya? You barely even talk to me anymore!”
Ilya’s hands drop from Shane’s face, falling limply at his sides, as his stomach drops somewhere even lower. “Have I been neglecting you?”
He hates that word. Neglect.
He remembers the first time he learned it in English, when some dumb reporter asked if he was neglecting his captain duties when Boston faced one too many losses in a row. Ilya had blown him off with a crass joke. But he had looked it up later.
Neglect.
Fail to care for properly.
He doesn’t need a definition. He knows what it means, and he knows what it feels like.
And he always promised himself that he’d never make someone he loved feel that way, like they weren’t worthy of his attention.
Especially not his Shane. His Shane, who is worth everything.
“Moy lyubimyy,” Ilya swallows tightly. “Please. Have I been neglecting you?”
He reaches for his husband again, hands shaking ever so slightly. Shane must notice because he immediately sits up, grabbing Ilya’s palms and wrapping his fingers around him.
“No. Fuck. Ilya. It’s not like that. Sorry. I’m probably being a drama queen—”
“Don’t do that.” Ilya shakes his head. “Be truthful. Have I been neglecting you?”
“No,” Shane says quietly, eyes cast down. “I just…I just felt like you’ve been talking to other people more lately.”
“Other people?” Ilya asks. “Svetlana?”
“And Galina,” Shane adds carefully. “And Petrov.”
Ilya curses inwardly.
Shane doesn’t always notice everything around him. But Ilya takes his obliviousness for granted sometimes.
Because once Shane notices something, he never lets go.
“Are you…Are you homesick?” Shane asks, biting his lip. “Because that’s totally understandable. I get it, Ilya. I do. We’ve been talking a lot about starting a family, and we’re always around mine. And I know you don’t like to talk about yours. But it’s okay to miss them. Maybe we can reach out to your brother-”
“Stop,” Ilya snaps before he can help himself.
Shane recoils immediately, and Ilya feels awful, more so than he’s been feeling these past few weeks.
Because it’s one thing to be an idiot who forgets his own language, but completely another to hurt Shane.
That’s not okay. That’s not acceptable.
“I’m sorry,” Ilya sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose.
“No. No, don’t apologize,” Shane shakes his head vehemently. “Just tell me how to help you.”
“There’s no need to help. Everything is fine,” Ilya tries to reassure him and wraps his arms around Shane’s waist, pulling him closer. “Come here. Give me a kiss.”
Give me a kiss.
The words echo loudly inside his head.
It’s not how he used to say it.
Back when words didn’t come so easily and back when he was too scared to ask for what he wanted, everything was simpler and smaller.
Gimme kiss.
He remembers the first time he said it. He remembers how endeared Shane had been, granting him a kiss immediately despite Ilya being cold and wet.
And, since then, every time Ilya said those words, Shane would have the same besotted expression on his face, like Ilya was the cutest thing on the planet.
Now Ilya is no longer cute. He speaks with proper grammar now. He is boring now.
And soon enough, he won’t remember his Russian and have no trace of an accent. Then he won’t be sexy anymore either.
And Shane won’t be endeared by him. Shane won’t be turned on by him.
“Ilya.” Shane sounds worried now. “Ilya, what’s wrong?”
It’s only when he feels Shane’s fingers on his face, his thumbs wiping away the tears, that Ilya realizes that he’s crying.
He ducks his face into his shoulder and tries to reel it all back in. But Shane doesn’t let him hide. They’ve had to hide so much, the two of them. Neither of them likes doing it anymore. But old habits die hard and all that.
“Ilya.” Shane tries again, gentler this time. “I need you to tell me what’s wrong.”
“It’s stupid. It doesn’t even make sense,” Ilya says, shaking his head in frustration.
“That’s okay. It doesn’t have to,” Shane whispers. “Tell me anyway?”
Ilya finally looks up and sniffs. “I forgot the Russian word for elbow.”
A small crease appears between Shane’s brows. “Lokot’?”
Despite everything, a laugh escapes Ilya. “Always have to be better than everyone, don’t you, Hollander?”
Shane doesn’t look any less confused when he bites his lip and leans forward. “Is that why you’ve been watching more Russian stuff lately? Because you forgot a word?”
“It’s one word for now,” Ilya points out with a grumble. “I’ve already lost my accent. What if I lose my words too?”
“You know, I don’t remember all the words in French either,” Shane tries to reassure him.
Ilya smiles sadly. “It’s not the same, moy lyubimyy. Russian is not just a language to me.”
It’s everything. It’s home.
It’s not just random words and phrases.
It’s a whole life.
It’s the curse words he learned at four because his father didn’t bother being gentle. It’s knowing the difference between moy lyubimyy and moy solnyshko because gentleness was all his mother knew.
It’s the inside jokes with Alexei before the two of them stopped smiling at each other, let alone joked at all. It’s all the movie references only Svetlana would understand because he spent most nights in her home watching TV because he didn’t want to go home to all the fighting.
It’s not just the words. It’s all the people who said them.
He’s losing them, too.
He’s already lost almost all of them, sure. But losing his language feels like he’s losing them all over again. Like a bonus funeral. One he didn’t think was coming for him.
Ilya walked away from Russia a long time ago. He doesn’t regret it. Of course not. Because when he walked away, he still knew that he had taken parts of Russia with him. He is still Russian, in heart and blood, and that’s never going to go away.
Or so he had thought.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” Shane asks when Ilya is too quiet.
“No.” Ilya smiles. “No. You do enough for me.”
“It’s not enough if you’re still sad,” Shane points out. “Maybe I can talk in Russian more? Would that help?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so. It’s…It’s not about you, Shane,” Ilya says, hoping it isn’t hurtful. “If I lose my Russian, I will lose so much more with it.”
“Like your home?” Shane asks.
“No. Not just that,” Ilya sighs tiredly, looking down at his hands.
He doesn’t know how to explain any of it to Shane—to anyone who hasn’t lived like this.
Someone who had to translate every sentence in their head before speaking. Someone who sometimes pretended they had nothing to say because they were worried they wouldn't say it the way they meant it. Someone who was misunderstood, time and again, simply because they didn’t manage to put the right words in the right order. Someone who had to laugh when others laughed at their mispronunciation, because it was less embarrassing to laugh than to cry about it.
“I’m actually smart, you know. In Russian,” Ilya says instead, and the self-pity makes him a little sick. “And I’m much funnier too. Without having to be mean.”
“You are funny and smart in English too, Ilya,” Shane tells him gently.
“It’s just not the same.” Ilya shakes his head with a dry chuckle. “Not the same at all.”
“Okay,” Shane accepts with a nod and cups his face. “Okay, it’s bad. It sucks. So how do we fix this?”
Ilya gives him a wry smile. “You sound like Yuna.”
Shane rolls his eyes a little. “Tell me how to fix it, Ilya.”
Ilya is too tired.
He doesn’t know if it can be fixed or if he even wants to anymore.
Maybe it’s time to let this part of himself go. He knows one day, perhaps very soon, he’ll have to say goodbye to hockey, too. Maybe this is just another thing.
A big thing. A scary thing.
But he’s an adult now. A big adult who will have a little child soon. He needs to be comfortable doing scary things, right?
“I told you how to fix it,” Ilya pulls him closer. “I asked for a kiss, no?”
“Before you started crying like a baby,” Shane mumbles.
“Wow. Why so mean?” Ilya pouts. “I will tell the baby that you’re the mean parent.”
Shane’s face softens a little. He presses a feathery soft kiss to Ilya’s jaw. “I thought it was about the baby. That you were, I don’t know, scared or something.”
“I am scared,” Ilya admits, because he doesn’t want to lie to Shane, not about this. “But no, it’s not about the baby.”
“And it’s not about me either?” Shane asks, chewing on his lip.
“No, sweetheart. I promise,” Ilya squeezes both his hands in reassurance. “But I was worried for a second that you might find me less sexy if I forget all my Russian.”
Shane rolls his eyes hard this time. “I don’t find you sexy because you speak Russian, Ilya.”
Ilya raises a pointed eyebrow.
“Okay, fine. I find it a little sexy,” Shane mumbles before looking at him fiercely. “But your accent or your language is not the only sexy thing about you. There are so many other things too.”
“How many?” Ilya asks curiously. “Will you write me a list?”
“Sure,” Shane replies, looking actually excited about doing it. “But kiss first, yeah?”
Ilya closes his eyes and falls forward into his husband’s arms. “Yes. Kiss first.”
He finds Shane in the kitchen the next morning, the dim brightness from the laptop lighting up his soft face.
“No running today?” Ilya yawns as he joins his husband and presses a sloppy kiss to his cheek.
“Good morning,” Shane says, because he is always polite, even at ass o’clock and even with his own husband. “Come sit. I have a plan.”
“Hollander, it’s 7 AM,” Ilya groans.
He anticipated this.
One of the reasons he’s always hesitant to talk to Shane about his problems is exactly this. Shane can never let something just sit. He has to fix everything. Almost always immediately.
He is so much like his mother than he realizes. Ilya pointed it out once. Shane had the audacity to look shocked about it.
“I made you a list,” Shane tells him.
Ilya, fiddling with the coffee maker, raises an eyebrow. “The sexy list?”
“That’s for later,” Shane winks and reaches out with an arm. “Come here, please.”
Ilya sighs again.
Shane always asks so nicely, and Ilya has never really learned how to say no.
He lets the coffee maker do its thing and walks over to his husband, taking his hand and wrapping it around in his own. “Okay. Tell me.”
“Okay, so I’ve been thinking about your Russian problem since you told me about it last night,” Shane informs.
“You have?” Ilya gasps dramatically.
“Don’t be an asshole.” Shane swats his arm and points to the laptop. “It’s called Language Attrition.”
“It has a name?” Ilya gasps again, genuinely this time.
Apparently, it does.
Shane goes on to explain that it’s a whole thing. Something about the gradual decline of a person’s native language skills. He says it happens sometimes because of a lack of use or exposure, or dominance of another language.
When Ilya looks a bit stumped, because all three are true in his case, Shane goes even further and talks about how this thing manifests in different ways for different people, but commonly through reduced fluency, vocabulary loss, and simplified grammar.
By the time he is done, Ilya makes a mental note to bring it up with Galina during their next session. But Shane, being Shane, is already there before him.
“I’m sure Galina can tell you more,” his husband goes on, pushing his glasses back and turning to the laptop again. “But I’ve got some ideas as to how you can work on it.”
“Just me?” Ilya pouts, even though he is deeply touched already. “This is not a team project?”
“You told me this has nothing to do with me,” Shane says, immediately troubled.
It really doesn’t. Ilya knows that much.
He doesn’t think Shane could ever understand, even if he is bilingual too. French is something Shane learned for fun, maybe for bonus points in the league. It’s not his whole identity.
Russian isn’t just something Ilya speaks. It’s also who he is. One of the things he is, at least.
But he also knows Shane doesn’t need to understand to know it hurts. There is a lot about Ilya that Shane could never relate to, but he’s never let that stop him. Not once before.
“It’s not.” Ilya presses a kiss to his hand. “But I just like it when we do things together.”
“Well, there are things here we can do together, too,” Shane informs, pointing at the screen again. “Look, the blue tab. That’s us.”
“Hm, that one’s my favourite already,” Ilya hums into his shoulder. “Tell me about the rest of it.”
Shane does.
And it’s a proper fucking plan. The kind that you know an absurd amount of thought, love, and research went into, so that you could never say it was conjured up overnight.
There is a white tab, things for Ilya to do. It includes more immersion—with movies, music, and even podcasts. Ilya doesn’t know how he feels about that last one, so Shane adds a question mark next to it.
There are other things there, too.
Journalling. Reading. Switching the language settings on his phone.
Talking to Svetlana.
“I’m sorry I was an asshole about it,” Shane winces, absentmindedly wiping at the keys on the keyboard. “It wasn’t very nice of me.”
“You know I don’t want to fuck her, yes?” Ilya asks bluntly. “It’s important to me that you know that.”
“I know. I know,” Shane sighs and looks up at him. “I just, you know, sometimes think it’d be easier for you with another Russian. Since you’d understand each other better.”
“I’m having sex, Hollander. Not teaching a class. I don’t care if they speak Russian.” Ilya rolls his eyes and leans closer, bumping his forehead against the other man. “And in case you’ve forgotten, my preference is nice Canadian boys.”
“Don’t think I classify as a boy anymore,” Shane mutters under his breath.
“Say that to your face,” Ilya scoffs and cups it with both hands. “Still so pretty. Always so pretty for me.”
Shane melts into the touch before he pulls back reluctantly. “Stop trying to distract me. We have to get through this whole thing.”
“Okay. Okay. What’s this one?” Ilya frowns at one of the items under the white tab. “Group therapy?”
“No, it’s a Reddit group thing,” Shane explains. “For the Russian Diaspora.”
“Diaspora?” Ilya frowns because he doesn’t know all the words in English either. It’s an oddly comforting thought.
“People who have left Russia and are living everywhere else in the world,” Shane elaborates, opening a new tab and showing him a pretty active subreddit. “I went through the whole thing, and it seems like they’re all struggling with different things. Like with not being able help with the stuff that’s going down in Russia. Or missing their family. And some language stuff too. I thought it might be helpful for you to see that, I don’t know, other people are struggling with this stuff too.”
“So, I have to join too?” Ilya asks carefully. “And tell people about my problems?”
“Or you can just listen,” Shane shrugs.
“Is it safe?” Ilya clarifies. “What if they figure out who I am and forget about all their problems and only talk about me?”
“You’ll obviously need a fake profile, Ilya.” Shane chuckles.
“I know, Shane.” Ilya smiles fondly. “So, I’ll join under a secret name. I’ll be undercover. I can be a Russian spy. It will make me miss Russia a little less. I like this idea.”
“You are not undercover to spy on them. You’re there for solidarity.”
“I can do both!”
The red tab is for the Centaurs. Ilya doesn’t know why they need to be involved in this, but considering that they do spend most of their time on the road and at practice and in games, Shane reasons that it’s important to involve them, too.
He suggests that Ilya only speak in Russian on certain days at practice, and others will need to accommodate him. Ilya worries that it’s too demanding, but Shane insists that as their captain, he’s allowed to make demands, especially to help him feel better settled among his own peers.
Shane has more ideas, too.
Russian music in the locker room, which Ilya approves immensely.
Shane also suggests movie nights in Russian, giving Ilya the chance to share his favourite childhood movies with the whole team.
“Is this you trying to get out of our movie nights at home? Because we’re still doing that one too,” Ilya informs seriously.
There’s also an idea to explain some of their hockey games in Russian, especially when they rewatch a game. Maybe Ilya can call out positioning or explain a play. Hockey is so ingrained into their brains that Shane is certain they’ll understand him even if they don’t speak the language.
“What’s this one?” Ilya asks, pointing at another idea under the red tab. “Chirps in Russian?”
“I thought you could teach the boys some insults in Russian,” Shane says with a grin. “So, we can trash-talk the other teams, and they won’t even know what we’re saying.”
“That’s evil, Hollander,” Ilya grins right back and leans closer, nipping at his lower lip.
“Nothing too bad though,” Shane says, pulling back with a frown. “I don’t want all of us to end up in the penalty box because you taught the whole team all the dirty Russian words.”
“Hm, no. I will save all the dirty Russian words for you,” Ilya murmurs, chasing after the other man’s mouth again.
Shane meets him halfway, laptop forgotten momentarily, as he allows Ilya to steal a longer kiss this time. And Ilya does, kiss him that is. Slow and syrupy, like most of their kisses are in the morning. He murmurs words of affection, unsure if they’re in English or Russian or a completely made-up language. Or maybe he’s just chanting Shane’s name over and over again, which is a language of its own.
“Last one,” Shane pulls away reluctantly and points at the blue tab. “Things we can do together.”
“My favourite,” Ilya repeats with a smile before he pauses briefly, his eyes drifting to the other two tabs, the ones in white and red. “Wait. Did you organize the tabs in the colour of the Russian flag?”
“Oh,” Shane says, and then smiles sheepishly. “It’s silly, I know.”
“So silly,” Ilya sighs softly, feeling butterflies in his stomach because this stupid man does stupid things that make him feel stupid emotions.
“Okay, so,” Shane claps his hands, pointing at the laptop, all business again. “We’ll do Russian-only mornings. The brain is most active after you wake up, so for the first 20 or 30 minutes after we wake up, we’ll only talk in Russian.”
“We don’t have to,” Ilya tells him hesitantly.
“Sure, but we can,” Shane shrugs. “I’m not saying we have to do it every day, or we have to do it forever. But it’s nice to know some mornings, we can do this, you know.”
“Yeah. Okay,” Ilya relents, because he does find it awfully appealing to speak to Shane in Russian first thing in the morning.
There are other ideas under this tab, too.
A lot of them involve speaking in Russian while doing various domestic chores together. Ilya only realizes then how much of their daily conversations happen in English. They do everything—whether it’s cooking or laundry or even fucking—while they converse in English. So, when Shane suggests that they try Russian, even just a day of the week, it doesn’t feel like asking for much at all.
It took a long time for Ilya to admit that this is his home now.
Not Canada. But this house. The one they built together.
And he’s still learning, even after all these years, that he’s allowed to take space in their home in ways that make him feel safe.
But he’s getting there. With Shane, he’ll get there even faster.
“What’s this one?” Ilya points at the final item under the blue tab, sipping the last of his coffee. “Russian stories? Are you going to read me porn in bed, Hollander?”
“No.” Shane’s ears pinken at the top. “Wait. Do you want me to?”
“Only if I’m in the porn,” Ilya says cheekily. “Hayesy told me people write porn about us.”
“Why is Wyatt reading porn about us?” Shane asks no one in particular.
“For inspiration, probably,” Ilya shrugs.
“Concerning, but no. It’s not porn. I will add in a new item there if you’re serious about this,” Shane informs, sounding indeed serious about the idea. Ilya will have to circle back to this very soon. “But these are children’s books.”
“Oh?” Ilya blinks.
“Most of the people on that Reddit thing were saying they were able to connect with their culture again because of their kids,” Shane explains, clicking back to the subreddit. “Because the kids were curious about it or because they were learning it together or simply because it’s nice to have another person in their life who shares their identity.”
“Oh,” Ilya says again.
“So, I found a bunch of storybooks we can read to the baby,” Shane smiles, pressing the link next to the item and opening a new document with a whole bunch of links. “Some of these are really cute.”
They really seem to be.
But what is cutest is that Shane has organized the storybooks from ‘least scary’ to ‘most scary’, as if he is genuinely concerned about traumatizing their child with stories about gigantic turnips.
“Is this okay?” Ilya asks quietly as Shane opens a new link, humming at the cover of The Frog Princess.
“Fairytales?” Shane asks in confusion. “Of course.”
“No, I meant teaching our children Russian,” Ilya swallows. “Is that okay?”
“Of course, it’s okay,” Shane says with a frown. “Wait, don’t you want to?”
“I want to,” Ilya says with such urgency that it even surprises him how much he wants it. “Of course, I want to. But won’t it be too much?”
“Too much?” Shane asks.
“They’ll speak English, obviously. But if we’re raising them outside of Ottawa. If we, I don’t know, move to Montreal or whatever, they’ll have to learn French too. Won’t it be too much for them to learn three different languages?”
“Maybe,” Shane says after a moment. “But they’ll figure it out. They’ll be smart. Like you.”
“You know you’re the one who speaks three languages, yes?” Ilya snorts.
“Mostly two.”
“You speak fluent Russian, Shane,” Ilya says with an eye roll. “You know the word for elbow.”
“I learned Russian for you,” Shane reminds him gently. “Our children will be sweet like me and do sweet things for you, too.”
Ilya’s heart flips like a puck. He smiles fondly. “Or you’ll take away their candy?”
Shane kisses him gently on the mouth. “It’s cute that you think I’ll be giving them candy in the first place.”
“That is child abuse,” Ilya gasps in horror. “I will be complaining to my new Russian diaspora support group about your evil Canadian ways.”
“Let me know what they say,” Shane winks and turns back to the laptop, before looking over his shoulder. “Is this okay? Not too much?”
It’s a lot, actually.
It’s way too much.
And Ilya wants more. Ilya wants this for the rest of his life.
“It’s perfect,” Ilya sighs deeply and drops his head onto Shane’s shoulder. “I love you.”
“Tell me in Russian.”
And Ilya doesn’t think he’ll ever forget how to say those three words.
Loving Shane is the same as speaking Russian.
It’s not something he does. It’s who he is. It’s part of him—heart and soul and blood.
Sometimes, on the bad days, when his brain forgets how to be happy, he thinks about ending up like his father. A man who forgets everything. A man who forgets himself.
The most terrifying part is forgetting Shane.
But on days like this, on days that are not so bad and days on which Shane gives him a thousand reminders that he is unforgettable and will defy biology somehow, Ilya tells himself that he will not become his father.
Because some things you will never fully forget. There are some things you can never assign to oblivion.
Like his Russian. Like his Shane.
He might have forgotten the word for elbow, but he will remember the first time his father told him he’s proud of him, the words stiff but warm enough to make Ilya tear up. He will remember every single pet name his mother called him, and he will call his children the same. He will remember Alexei calling him Ilyushka and giving him the biggest piece of sharlotka at dinner. He will remember Sveta grumbling all sorts of insults when he struggles to get out of his own head.
Most of all, he will remember Shane.
Shane calling him Ilya for the very first time.
Shane saying ‘I love you’ in Russian for the first time. Shane ordering children’s storybooks in Russian for a child who hasn’t even born yet. Shane colour-coding his tabs according to the Russian flag.
Shane being Shane.
It helps. It always does. Because it makes Ilya just want to be Ilya.
And Ilya will always remember how to love.
“Ya tebya lyublyu,” Ilya says, and tilts his head. “Did that sound okay?”
He checks. Just in case.
Because he can fuck up and forget the word for elbow and have a whole crisis about it.
But this is not something he can fuck up. Ever.
Because if he fucks this up, loving Shane, he can never live with it.
Shane turns to face him and smiles so widely that his freckles bunch together under his eyes. “Made my stomach flip just like the first time I heard you say it.”
Yeah, okay.
Ilya can live with this.