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They’re tangled together in the middle of the bed, the sheets kicked half to the floor, the sunlight cutting through the blinds in thick, hazy stripes. Shane is warm all over, boneless in the way that only happens when he’s been awake for a while but has absolutely no intention of getting up – a guilty pleasure he sometimes gives into if it means he can become pliant under Ilya’s touch.
Speaking of, Ilya’s mouth is lazy against his – unhurried, more about staying close than anything else. Shane hums into the feel of his lips, curling his fingers around the jut of Ilya’s hipbone, reveling in the feeling of his skin. Ilya shifts closer in response, one arm heavy around Shane’s waist, the other braced above his head like he might pin him there and never let him go.
“We should get up,” Shane murmurs, not meaning it at all.
“Mhm,” Ilya mutters, clearly in nonagreement.
They kiss again instead, slower this time. Shane drags it out on purpose, lips parting just enough to feel Ilya smile against his mouth. He’s grinning back, in a clash of teeth, when the doorbell rings.
They both freeze.
There’s a beat of silence, like the entire cottage is holding its breath. Then the doorbell rings again, longer this time.
Shane groans and buries his face against the smooth curve of Ilya’s neck. “No,” he whines.
Ilya laughs softly, the sound vibrating against Shane’s cheek. “Ignore it.”
“They’ll keep ringing,” Shane complains.
“Mm,” Ilya hums. “Always do, yes?” He presses a kiss to Shane’s temple, then his cheek.
Shane tilts his head to squint at the blurry numbers of the clock on the nightstand. “It’s probably Dad. Mom said he was dropping off leftovers at some point this week.”
“Ah,” Ilya says, starting to shift, subconsciously making the decision to get up at the mention of David’s leftover pasta.. “Food is important.”
Shane sighs dramatically, but rolls away from Ilya’s touch. He sits up and reaches for the faded Boston t-shirt draped neatly over a nearby chair. He tugs it over his head, his hair sticking up wildly. It’s ridiculously large on him, the sleeves grazing his elbows as he slides it on over his bare chest. The hem nearly hits mid thigh, almost covering his boxers entirely. It’s comfortable. Familiar. Clearly not his.
Ilya watches him with his soft, unreadable look he sometimes gets. The one that feels like being quietly claimed. Shane catches it and can’t help the smirk that paints his face.
“What?” he asks.
“Nothing, solnyshko,” Ilya says, leaning over to kiss him once more – quick but lingering, like the punctuation at the end of a sentence. “I will shower. You go deal with Papa and his glorious pasta.”
“What if it’s not pasta?” Shane asks, but he’s smiling as the words pass his lips, knowing it would be pasta.
The doorbell rings, cutting off whatever smartass remark about being the favorite child Ilya was planning on giving to Shane instead of an actual answer.
“See,” Shane sighs. “Persistant.”
Ilya slides out of bed, stretching, completely unbothered and devastatingly attractive about it. He brushes fingers over Shane’s hip as he passes, just enough to make him shiver.
“Tell Papa we are alive,” Ilya says over his shoulder. “And to tell Mama that favorite son says hello.”
Shane smiles, and there's the favorite child remark. It doesn't matter, because he loves that his parents have become Ilya’s.
Ilya turns to face Shane again. “And tell him that I will fight him if he stays too long.”
Shane snorts, “You will not.”
Ilya pauses his slow walk into the en-suite bathroom. “I might.”
Then he disappears inside, bare feet slapping against the tiled floor, the shower turning on a moment later. Shane pads down the stairs, toward the front door, tugging the shirt down absentmindedly, warm and thinking about leftovers.
Forgetfully he doesn’t check the peephole.
He wraps a hand around the cool metal of the doorhandle, lips in a half-formed smile.
“Hey, Dad–”
The rest of his words die in his throat.
The guy standing in the doorway is not his father. He’s young, broad-shouldered, wearing a delivery uniform that looks a size too small, one hand braced against Shane and Ilya’s doorframe like he owns it. He’s holding a small package and an electronic signature pad in one hand, but his eyes aren’t on the items in his hand. They’re on Shane.
They travel. Slowly.
Shane becomes aware of several things all at once: that fact that he’s barefoot and the cold from the wood is seeping into his toes, that the Boston shirt is hanging off one shoulder, that it’s long enough to pass for decent but short enough to still be telling, that the delivery man is smiling like he’d just won a prize, and the thought that he really should’ve put on pants.
“Oh,” the guy says, drawing the word out. “Hey.”
“Hi,” Shane says, brain on autopilot as it scrambles to catch up. He shifts his weight, tugging again at the hem of Ilya’s shirt. “Uh, sorry…I thought– I was expecting–”
“Your Dad?” the guy offers, grinning widely, eyes wild and bright with interest. “Sorry to disappoint.”
Shane doesn’t like the tone of his voice. It’s the tone that Ilya – his husband – uses. He laughs awkwardly.
The delivery guy seems to remember the package, lifting it slightly. “Got a delivery for Shane?”
“That’s me,” Shane says, then immediately regrets how much it unintentionally sounded like an invitation.
“Nice,” the guy says. He doesn’t move to hand the package over or ask for a signature. Instead, he leans in just a little, lowering his voice as he begins to penetrate Shane’s bubble of personal space. “Didn’t expect this nice of a welcome this morning.”
Shane feels the heat crawl up his neck, settling on his cheeks, behind his ears. “I– sorry. I just got up.”
“Makes sense,” the guy replies easily. “You look comfortable.”
There’s a pause. A beat too long. Shane reaches out for his package, fingers brushes the guy’s hand by mistake. Except the guy doesn’t break that accidental contact.
“Sign here,” he says, tapping the screen to life and still smiling. “Or I can just mark it as delivered if you don’t feel like bending over the paperwork.”
Shane blinks. “Sorry, what?”
The guy chuckles like Shane’s the funny one. “Relax,” he says.
Shane does not want to relax. He signs as quickly as he can, his usually crisp lines shaky and distorted. Finally, he takes the package, cradling it against his chest like something invaluable.
“Thanks,” he says, polite and tight-lipped.
“Anytime,” the man replies, eyes roaming over Shane’s body. “So…you always answer the door like that?” He nudges closer through the threshold, wedging the toe of his shoe against the heavy weight of the door.
Shane tightens his grip on the package. “Like…?”
The guy’s eyes flick downward, slow and appreciative, allowing his imagination to create what Shane was hiding underneath the hem of his shirt. “Casual,” he smiles, like they’re sharing a joke. “Makes a guy curious.”
Shane steps back instinctively, but that only gives the guy more room. The door stays open, the cool air filling the entryway, settling deep in Shane’s bones.
“Yeah well,” Shane laughs nervously. “Like I’d said, I thought you were my dad.”
The delivery guy laughs like it’s the funniest thing he’d heard all day. “Yeah, well, I’d like to think I’m a little better than your dad,” he smirks at Shane. “Y’know, I might even have another package I can give you.” He winks, his confidence growing as he manages to force the rest of his foot over the threshold.
He actually fucking winks. Shane thinks he might throw up.
The man is close enough now that Shane can smell his cologne. His back brushes the edge of the coatrack that Ilya had bought specifically for Shane. The Boston shirt slips lower on his shoulder and he tugs it up, suddenly hyper-aware of how exposed he feels.
“You live here alone?” the guy adds, his voice lower now.
Shane opens and closes his mouth, afraid to speak, too nervous to move.
Upstairs, Ilya is toweling off, shoving a towel through his damp curls, when he hears it.
Not David’s laugh – no this laugh is too light, too smooth. Not the easy candance he’s used to hearing drift up the stairs when Mama or Papa stop to visit. This voice is unfamiliar, pitched a little too friendly, carrying the kind of confidence that assumes he’s welcome wherever he is.
Ilya stills.
He listens. He can hear Shane’s voice, polite and careful. The tone he uses with strangers.
Ilya’s jaw tightens.
He barely bothers getting dressed. He slides into boxers and a pair of flannel pajama pants then moves, bare feet silent on the stairs.
When he reaches the bottom, he sees Shane backed up a half-step from the door, his coatrack pressed against his spine. There’s a delivery guy, his body angled in as he attempts to spill into the space beyond the threshold.
As he steps into the narrow space behind Shane, he hears, “You live here alone?” Ilya sees Shane’s posture shift just before he sees the man’s eyes find him.
“Shane,” Ilya murmurs, a few steps behind him.
The man’s brows lift. “That your roommate?”
Ilya steps forward again, bleeding into Shane’s space, close enough that his chest presses against his shoulder. He presses a kiss to Shane’s exposed shoulder. “Husband,” Ilya answers for Shane, a hand coming up to adjust the neck of his shirt, the other finding a possessive grip around his waist, thumb digging into his hipbone.
Shane inhales sharply, leaning into Ilya’s strong chest.
Ilya leans in, mouth dusting against Shane’s ear. “Who is this?” he asks quietly.
The man looks between the two of them, recalculating.
“Delivery,” he says, less confident.
Ilya picks his head up from the crook of Shane’s neck and looks at the stranger in his doorway. His gaze is flat, assessing, territorial. He doesn’t move his hands from Shane’s waist. If anything, he pulls him closer against him, the Boston shirt wrinkling under his fingers.
“He has package, yes?” Ilya nods to the small box still clutched tightly in Shane’s hands. “So you are finished?” He phrases it as a question, but means it as a statement of finality.
The guy hesitates for a second, then decides he’s feeling brave today despite the six-foot-three Russian man staring him down. “I was just asking Shane here–”
“You will not be asking Sheyn anything.” Ilya’s accent is thick with anger now, blurring the lines between English and Russian, warping the way he says Shane’s name. “Dorogoy, go inside, please.”
Shane nods, stepping out from Ilya’s grip and finding solace hidden behind his broad back. As Shane moves, Ilya steps forward, blocking the doorway with his body. “You are finished,” he repeats, closer this time. “Leave.”
The man takes a step back, removing his foot from where he was wedging open the door. “Next time your husband answers the door, it might do you good to remind him not to dress like that,” the man hisses, clearly dissatisfied with the results of his attempted flirting.
Something in Ilya snaps. “You do not get to speak about my husband that way. I do not tell him to do anything.” He mumbles something in angry Russian under his breath.
“Go back to fucking Russia, you fucking Ruski,” the man spits at Ilya.
Shane inhales sharply as he watches Ilya from the safety of the hallway. He watches his husband's shoulders rise slowly, before falling once more.
“Get off my fucking front porch. Now.”
Ilya doesn’t move. He stares at the man, daring him to speak again. Daring him to take a step closer to his home. The silence stretches. The man must have seen something dark and dangerous in Ilya’s face because he backs up, hands lifting in surrender.
The door slams shut.
Ilya doesn’t move right away. He stays there, staring through the small window of the door, watching the retreating figure of the man. He stands frozen, until he’s in his truck and driving away.
Only then does he turn to look at Shane.
“Are you okay?” he asks gently, all anger gone from his tone.
He reaches for Shane, who falls pliantly into his arms. Ilya holds him there, waits until his breathing evens out, until the tension drains from his – both of their – shoulders. His hands are at Shane’s waist, rubbing soothing circles through the faded fabric of the t-shirt.
“He made you uncomfortable,” Ilya says.
Shane nods, “Yeah,” he whispers.
Ilya’s jaw tightens. He presses a kiss to Shane’s dark hair. “I am sorry I was not here sooner.”
Shane lifts his head, “It doesn’t matter. You still came down.”
Ilya exhales, pressing his forehead against Shane’s temple. The gesture is intimate, grounding. “Still.”
There’s a pause. The house feels different now, like it’s too quiet, too exposed. Shane shifts his weight, suddenly aware of the open space, the door, the words.
Ilya notices, he always does.
He eases Shane back a step, guiding him away from the door with a large palm pressed flat against the small of his back. Slow and careful, asking permission without words in only a way he is able.
“Come,” he murmurs. “Back to the bed.”
Shane hesitates for half a second, “Il, it’s late.”
Ilya gives him a soft look, “So? We have lazy day.”
That does it.
Shane lets himself be steered, fingers curling around the waistband of what he’s pretty sure are his pants. A glance at the significantly exposed skin of Ilya’s ankles confirms these suspicions.
They ascend the stairs together, Ilya an anchor guiding Shane back to the softness of their bedroom.
It is still warm, the scent of sleep and shower and them laying thick in the air. The sheets are still rumpled from earlier, the sunlight still slotting lines and painting the room golden.
Ilya sits first, then reaches out, tugging Shane gently down with him. Shane curls in without thinking, sighing at the familiarity of Ilya’s warm body against his own. He tucks himself against Ilya’s chest, the space that was only meant for him.
Ilya wraps his arms around Shane’s body, solid and tight, his chin resting against the dark strands of Shane’s hair. “I am here,” he says lowly. “Ya tebya lyublyu.”
Shane exhales long and slow, shifting softly. “Il’ya,” he murmurs, in practiced Russian. “Ya tebya lyublyu.”
Ilya’s heart warms at the sound of Shane’s broken accent and precise syllables. He kisses his head once before resting his cheek softly.
They lie there like that, unhurried, the world narrowing back down to nothing but warmth and breath and the familiar weight of one body pressed against another.
Exactly where they were meant to be all along.