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Ilya felt his concern wash over him and he hated it. Hated the way Hollander was looking at him like he was fragile. Like he gave a damn about how Ilya felt. As if they’d ever texted about their feelings. Ilya wanted to punch him.
“Yes, okay,” he said instead. “Now you will go?”
Hollander looked at him and for a second Ilya thought he would refuse. He hated the way the thought made hope flare in his chest, a muted spark against the weight settled around his shoulders.
“If that’s what you want,” Hollander said.
“Of course is what I want, I just fucking told you!”
Ilya had barely drifted off into an uneasy sleep when his phone vibrated on the bedside table, throwing him abruptly back into the waking world.
Cursing to himself under his breath, he grabbed for it from under the cloying sheets. He squinted down at the screen, the brightness painful in the otherwise dark room.
Jane
I’m outside, can you let me in?
Ilya blinked at the text a few times blearily, trying to make the combination of letters make sense, trying to get his brain online again.
What the fuck?
Hollander had left. Ilya had watched him leave after telling him to go away and meaning every word. Watched him close the door and leave behind the room key. Leave behind Ilya, drowning in his own wretched misery and weakness under his covers. Had Hollander forgotten something? Why the hell was he back at his room at close to midnight?
Ilya swung himself slowly and unsteadily out of the bed, head swimming slightly from the abrupt change as the blood rushed from his head. After the almost stifling heat under too many covers, the coolness of the room was sharp enough to raise goosebumps along the bare skin of his chest and arms. He padded barefoot through the dark room towards the door, still half-convinced he’d dreamed the text, and he was about to open the door to an empty hallway.
Ilya opened the door to peek outside and was almost thrown back onto his ass when Hollander darted into the room, shoving past him like his life depended on it.
“You always take so long,” he muttered, while Ilya just stared blankly at him.
When Ilya didn’t move for a few more seconds, Hollander reached across to close the door. The light from the hallway cut off abruptly, leaving them standing inches apart in the darkened room, the only sound their respective breathing.
Ilya, miraculously, regained his senses first.
“Did you forget something?” he asked.
His voice was flat, gravel-rough around the edges. He barely recognised it as his own.
Hollander shook his head. He wouldn’t look at Ilya, wouldn’t meet his eyes.
And suddenly Ilya felt the invisible charcoal weight resettle around his shoulders. Shock had lifted it temporarily, but it remained, stubborn, invisible.
“Then why the fuck are you here?” Ilya asked, his voice unusually sharp.
Hollander fiddled with his sleeve for a few seconds awkwardly while Ilya looked at him expectantly. He felt stupid suddenly, standing there in his boxers. Exposed. It was ridiculous really, Shane had seen all of it before. But this felt more vulnerable than stripping off and hooking up.
“I know you said I should go, that that’s what you wanted,” Hollander started awkwardly, his words tripping over one another, jostling one another as he tried to get them out quickly. “But you didn’t seem fine. And I was worried. So, I came back.”
Ilya stared at him as conflicting emotions warred in his still sleep-slow mind. On one hand, it was less than ideal for Hollander to be in his hotel room. He had to be up in a handful of hours for press, he was already exhausted in a way he knew even a solid eight hours of sleep wouldn’t make a dent in.
But on the other hand, Ilya wanted Hollander to stay.
More than he was willing to admit, even to himself.
“What is it you want, Hollander?” Ilya asked, more softly.
“I know it’s late, I know it’s a bad idea, but I want to stay. Here. With you.”
The confession hung between them like something neither of them could look at directly.
It wasn’t what they did.
Stay.
Their clandestine hook ups ended with one or the other sneaking from a hotel room like a dirty secret, back to opposing teams and so-called rivalry. They didn’t stay over longer than needed. They didn’t care about emotions or feelings or how the other was really doing.
It just wasn’t what they did.
Ever.
But here was Hollander, standing in his darkened hotel room, and offering to do just that. Willing to put a foot over one of the invisible lines that limited their interactions. In his sincere, too-honest way that endeared him to Ilya, painfully so.
Ilya suddenly felt hot tears flare up in the corners of his eyes and he blinked them back quickly before they had the chance to fall, to betray him. Even in the dark, there was a chance Hollander would see.
Then his mouth did the betrayal for him.
“Okay.”
Hollander’s head jerked up so fast that in any other situation it would have been funny. His eyes had gone wide, scanning over Ilya’s face with rapid movements like he wasn’t sure he’d heard him properly.
“Really?”
Ilya nodded, dashed a shaky hand across his eyes in a way he hoped desperately didn’t betray the fact he was seconds from bursting into tears. Over Shane Hollander, of all things.
“Yes, stay,” he managed to choke out.
Then he turned and made his way back over to the bed, trying to salvage what little fragments of his dignity he had left. He wouldn’t let Hollander see him cry. Not here. Not like this.
He sat down heavily on the edge of the bed and stared down at his bare feet. Surreptitiously watched Hollander out of the corner of his eye as he stripped of his jeans and sweatshirt and folded them up neatly. Thought about telling Hollander he’d changed his mind.
Then the bed was dipping as Hollander sat down beside him, careful to keep distance. Like he wasn’t sure of the rules anymore now they weren’t here for the explicit purpose of having sex.
“You will need to leave early,” Ilya whispered into the darkness. “We leave hotel at six.”
“Ok,” Hollander said, like it was easy for him, like it wasn’t a problem. “I’ll set an alarm.”
Silence.
Then Hollander was up again, walking around the bed and fussing with the rumpled sheets, fiddling with his phone, all while Ilya sat like he was carved from marble. He felt too heavy to move. Every breath felt like it cost something he didn’t have reserves for.
Warm hands pulled him to his feet and gently guided him around so that he could lie down in the bed again. Arranged the pillow under his head so that he would be comfortable. Pulled the covers up so that he would be warm enough. Ilya let it all happen, because he was just so fucking tired, because he didn’t know if he would have been able to get there on his own.
And then, best and worst of all, Hollander got into bed as well.
“Is this ok?” he asked cautiously, maintaining inches wide as oceans between them like they hadn’t slept together weeks ago. Like they weren’t intimately familiar with each other’s bodies. Like Ilya didn’t know exactly what Hollander tasted like on his tongue.
Ilya nodded against the pillow, not trusting his voice.
“Can I hold you?” Hollander asked quietly.
Ilya turned slightly to look at Hollander, still sat upright, stiff and awkward because he was trying so fucking hard not to do anything wrong, and Ilya’s eyes were swimming with tears again.
“Yes,” he choked out.
Hollander didn’t hesitate anymore after that. He slid across the gap between them, pulled Ilya’s head onto his chest, warm arms wrapped around his body. Pulled him in close enough that Ilya could hear his heartbeat steady where his head rested on Hollander’s chest. He could feel tears soaking into the cotton of Hollander’s shirt and he hated himself for every single one. For being so weak. For not just telling Hollander to fuck off and leave him alone.
Hollander started to run a hand through his hair, slow and careful, oddly soothing. His fingers were gentle on his scalp. Like Ilya was a fragile thing, like he needed to be handled with care, so he didn’t shatter into a thousand pitiful pieces in Hollander’s arms.
“You want to talk about it?” Hollander asked, and Ilya could feel the vibrations of his voice in his chest.
“No,” Ilya said.
Because he was worried that if he opened his mouth now, he’d never stop spilling fears, would never stop haemorrhaging secrets like they couldn’t turn to ammunition in Hollander’s hands if he chose to turn them on him. He’d talk and cry and tell Hollander all of it, the whole sorry lot, and then there would be no way to reclaim what he had given.
It wasn’t worth the risk.
“Ok.”
Hollander pressed a gentle kiss to his hairline, innocent and sweet and enough to make Ilya want to fall apart despite himself. He shifted his head so Hollander couldn’t see his face, couldn’t see the clear relief written there that Hollander wasn’t pushing the matter. That he wasn’t saying anything about the fact Ilya was clearly crying now.
“Try to sleep,” Hollander whispered. “I’ll stay here.”
“You’ll be tired tomorrow,” Ilya sniffled pathetically.
He wondered if it was too late now. If they’d crossed too many lines in the last few minutes for him to tell Hollander to get dressed again and leave. Forget the whole thing had ever transpired. Never talk about it again.
“It’s fine.”
Suddenly, Ilya didn’t have it in him to fight it anymore. Not when Hollander’s fingers felt the way they did in his hair, not when he could listen to the steady thrum of his heartbeat. Not when Hollander was so warm and real and solid, holding him like he actually cared about Ilya as a person and not just as a means to an end. It was so rare to have this. It didn’t happen often that people touched him for any reason other than violence or lust.
He curled up tighter against Hollander and closed his burning eyes. Tried to take deep breathes to slow the flow of tears soaking Hollander’s shirt. Tried to turn off his brain and just accept the comfort being offered.
Ilya breathed in Hollander’s soft smell and allowed himself to drift into a fitful sleep against his chest.