Chapter Text
“Papa?”
“Yes, solnyshko?”
“Can I tell you something and you promise not to tell Dad?”
Ilya glanced up in the rearview mirror. His son was staring out the window, most likely deliberately avoiding eye contact after a request like that. The afternoon sun streaming into the car made his wild blonde curls glow like a golden halo. Some of it was falling into his eyes. Shane was right, it probably was time for a haircut.
He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. Mikhail was only 12 but sometimes Ilya swore it was like there was an old man living inside his child, the way his eyebrows knitted together in such a serious expression as he continued to stubbornly look out the window instead of up at Ilya. Ilya wanted to reach back and smooth the wrinkle out, like he did with Shane.
“Depends on what it is,” Ilya said carefully. “Why don’t you tell me and we’ll figure out what to tell Dad together?” He directed his gaze back on the road, giving Mikhail the space to keep talking. It was something he did, their oldest, shyest child. Something about being in the car made him feel safe enough to have hard conversations. He’d told Ilya about his bad math grade in the car, had waited until they were in the car driving back from Yuna and David’s house to fess up that he was the one who knocked over the lamp, not Anya, had admitted to Shane in the car that, even though he loved his cousins, why did the Pike kids always have to be so loud and that’s why he spent the afternoon in the kitchen with Aunt Jackie instead of the backyard.
Shane thought it had something to do with not having to make eye contact in the car. Ilya thought it was being in an enclosed space together for an extended amount of time, no distractions. Maybe it was both.
Today, they were driving back home from Montreal after the last day of Irina Foundation hockey camp. Shane was in the car in front of them with Yuna and their middle daughter, Yelena. Based on the time, their youngest, Lilia, was most likely napping under the watchful eye of Grandpa David (and Anya).
Mikhail still hadn’t spoken again. Ilya flicked his eyes up to the mirror. The boy had his lower lip between his teeth, gnawing at the dry skin. He would keep doing it until he bled, and then probably keep doing it some more.
Keeping his eyes on the road and one hand on the wheel, Ilya reached back and gently rubbed his son’s knobby knee. “We have a little less than two hours until we reach home. Tell me, Mischa. I am sure there is nothing we cannot figure out together in two hours, da?”
Ilya watched through the rearview mirror as Mikhail released his lip from its trap and took a deep breath, in for four seconds, hold for four, and out for four, just like Shane had taught him.
“Willdadhatemeifidon’tplayhockey?” He let out in one breath. Okay, maybe they needed to work on deep breathing some more.
“What, malysh? Of course not, your Dad could never hate you.” Ilya responded immediately, but there were already tears streaming down his son’s face, like letting that fear out had broken the dam holding back whatever fearful emotions had been brewing in him. God, he was so much like Shane, their little boy.
“But if I don’t play hockey–”
“If you don’t play hockey, nothing will change. Nothing. Not how much your Dad loves you. Not how much I love you. Not how much your sisters or your grandma and grandpa love you, nothing. We love you because you are you, solnyshko, not because you play hockey.”
Mikhail rubbed harshly at his cheeks but the tears didn’t stop. He’d always been such a sensitive child, tears welling up at the slightest provocation. Ilya wanted nothing more than to pull over, climb into the backseat, and hold his baby in his arms. But that would make Shane pull over too and then Mikhail would clam up from the added attention of his sister and grandma.
So Ilya kept driving and tried to figure out the source of his little sun’s tears. “Do you want to stop playing hockey? Or take a break? Either of those are okay, Mischa. No one will be upset with you.”
Ilya and Shane (and Yuna) had talked about this, when Mischa first showed interest in playing hockey like his dads. They were on the same page of making sure hockey felt like a game, like fun, and never like an obligation to their children. And this week at hockey camp, just like all the other weeks and years Mikhail and Yelena had been playing, Ilya watched them closely for any signs of boredom or distress. But both had looked to Ilya like they were having fun, skating and falling and celebrating with their teammates. Mikhail’s team had lost their end-of-week scrimmage, but only by one point and only because they’d had to play with a goalie from one of the younger teams since there was only one in their age bracket.
“No, I like hockey.” Another sniffle.
“Did you not like playing wing? It was just for that game, Mischa. You will still play center on your home team.” Ilya wouldn’t have pegged his son for a hockey diva but well, he could be a drama queen sometimes. Something he definitely got from Ilya.
“No, Papa. Left-wing was fine.” The tears had slowed on Mikhail’s face but Ilya was no closer to figuring out the source. Maybe he just needed to let the car-silence work its magic. So Ilya didn’t speak for a minute. Then another. And another.
Finally, Mikhail spoke. “I just, all week, everyone kept saying to me that I played just like Dad, that I’m going to be just as good as him when I get to the NHL. Even Scott Hunter–”
“Scott Hunter has dementia, don't listen to him.”
“Papa!”
“Sorry, sorry. Keep going. What did your great-uncle Hunter say to you?”
“He said – when he was helping us figure out our plays for the scrimmage – he said that I saw the ice just like dad.” More sniffles, and more tears. Ilya was going to kill Scott Hunter.
“So what? You are sad because coaches compare you to boring Shane Hollander and not the great Ilya Rozanov? This is understandable. Your dad may be sad about it, but do not worry, I understand,” Ilya teased. He knew this was not what Misha was actually upset about.
When Ilya had gotten the call eleven and a half years ago, that his brother was dead, that his brother’s wife was dead, that his brother had an infant son named Mikhail and that Ilya was his only next of kin, Ilya had retired from professional hockey that season. It was three seasons earlier than they’d planned, before he could win a third cup with the Centaurs and with his husband, but it was the best decision Ilya had ever made. And so Ilya spent the next four seasons bringing their little sun to every game, holding him up against the glass so Shane could kiss him after a goal, bringing him down to the ice to help lift Ottawa’s third (and fourth) Stanley Cups.
So it wasn’t that. Mikhail had grown up with WAG Ilya and hockey god Shane as dads. It was every hockey-playing kid’s dream to be compared to the seven-time Stanley Cup-winning Shane Hollander. Every kid, including their son.
And their son, for all Ilya knew, loved hockey. He loved it in a way Ilya never really had. Ilya loved hockey because he loved winning, and hockey was what he was the best at. It could have very well have been ice dancing, or football, or boxing. But no, Ilya was the best at hockey. Mikhail, though, he loved hockey the way Shane loved hockey. Fluent in hockey stats, most comfortable on the ice (and a little awkward off it), Mikhail was obsessed with hockey to the point where Ilya often had to drag him from the rink after practice. So it wasn't that either.
“No, Papa.” Mikhail rolled his eyes at Ilya and huffed out a half-laugh, an exasperated look on his face at Ilya’s teasing. But it was fleeting.
“I just–” Mikhail let out a groan, like he was frustrated with his own emotions, aggressively scrubbing away the tears on his face again. Ilya didn’t like that, didn’t like that his son was angry at his own tears, at his own feelings. Ilya wanted his son (and his daughters) to cry whenever they felt like it and he would follow dutifully behind with a mop and tissues.
“Just what?” Ilya asked, no longer teasing, his tone soft and intent, the same tone he used to coax difficult things out of Shane when he’d bunched himself into knots over something.
“Just, what if I’m not really as good as Dad? And you?"
Oh. Of all the things that Mikail could’ve said, Ilya wasn’t expecting that. Shane and Ilya had talked a lot about what it would be like to raise kids with hockey superstars for parents. They’d talked about keeping their children out of the spotlight, no posting them on public social media, deals with the sports press to not photograph the kids at games. They’d talked about not pushing hockey on their kids, about letting them try everything and choose whatever interested them the most. They’d talked about what would happen if their kids chose hockey but then decided it wasn’t for them, and how they’d support them in whatever choices they made. But they hadn’t talked about this, about what it would feel like for their kid to choose hockey, but play in the shadow of two giants.
But Mischa wasn’t just good at hockey, he was good at hockey. Every single one of the coaches comparing him to Shane this week was correct. He was fast, accurate, and sure on the ice, just like Shane. He was a playmaker in the making, just like Shane. Even bias aside (which to be honest was impossible), Ilya had no doubts Mikhail would play in the NHL, would play for Canada in the Olympics.
Pushing a tiny bit of parental jealousy aside that his Mischa wasn’t being compared to him, even Ilya could admit that Mikhail’s game was a lot like Shane’s. And it made sense. It was Shane who had laced up their son’s skates for the first time, had held his tiny hand and taught him how to move on the ice. Ilya doubted Mikhail even remembered, he had been only three and half. The skates had been a Christmas gift from, believe it or not, Cliff Marleau. They’d arrived four days before Christmas and Marleau had harassed Ilya to open them immediately and send him a video. That was how Uncle Cliff’s skates beat the three other pairs of skates Mikhail received that Christmas (from his Aunt Sveta, Uncle JJ, and “Guncle” Harris). Ilya still had that photo, Mischa on the ice in a little Rozanov Centaurs jersey and matching red toque, holding Shane’s index finger in his tiny hand, folded in his wallet.
It was Shane who’d taught Mikhail how to watch game tape, how to study other players and the way they telegraphed their next move, how to bring that knowledge to the ice. And while Ilya had taught their son how to take (and give) a hit safely, how to lace his skates properly, how to rally his team after a loss, it was Shane’s game that Mischa emulated. Ilya couldn’t have been more proud.
“Mischa, it has never mattered to us how good you are at hockey, how many goals you score or how well you skate. All we care about is that you are having fun. You are having fun, da?” Ilya reached back again for Mikhail’s hand and squeezed. His hands weren’t tiny or soft anymore. They were big and rough, hockey player hands.
“Yeah, I am, but – even if –”
“Even if you never score a goal again. Even if you quit hockey tomorrow, or next month, or next year. Even if you stop playing in juniors and go to university. Even if you stop playing after university. Even if you play in AHL for all of your career. Even if you play on shitty NHL team and never win a game. Even then.”
“But what if–”
“But nothing. Mikhail Andreyevich Hollander, there is nothing in the world that you could do that would make your Dad and I stop loving you. Nothing.” Ilya couldn’t help the firmness that slipped into his voice, but he needed to make sure his kid was listening. “Sometimes our brains have bad days and tell us things that we know are not true, and that is okay. Because I will remind you every single time you forget.”
“What about my–” his lip found its way back between his teeth but he was still looking right at Ilya. “What about my other father?” The tears had stopped now but the expression on his son’s face still broke Ilya’s heart.
“What? Your father, he–” Ilya was at a loss now. But it wasn’t lost on Ilya how Mikhail avoided the word real. He had never asked about Andrei, even when Ilya and Shane had told him in no uncertain terms that it was okay to be curious, okay to want to know more about where he came from. But no, Mikhail had never shown interest. He was plenty interested in Russia, though. He loved the cartoons and sweets and tracing his cyrillic letters. He took great pride in teaching his baby sister the Russian name for absolutely everything and telling his Dad that Russian was much more fun to learn than French.
So Ilya hadn’t pushed. He was content in letting Andrei fade into a memory that only belonged to him, letting Mikhail be Ilya’s son, just his.
“His brain was mean to him too, sometimes. And it made him do things that– that were not so good for him. But that does not mean he didn’t love you. Your mother and father, they loved you so much. So much, that they made sure if anything happened to them, you would be safe.” Ilya didn’t know how much of that was true. Andrei and his wife had died of a drug overdose, that was all he’d been told. Before that, Ilya hadn’t spoken to his brother in years, had no idea he’d gotten married, had a son. It wouldn’t surprise Ilya if Andrei had been depressed, if that had contributed to his addiction. Genetics, after all.
Ilya wasn’t sure if Andrei had loved his son. But Ilya thought about how much he loved Mikhail now, how much he loved all three of his children, like there were little pieces of his heart and Shane’s heart stitched together and walking and dancing and laughing all around them. He thought of how fiercely their mother had loved both of them, Ilya and Andrei, like they were the most precious things on the earth. He even thought of Grigori and how he, in his own cold, hardened way, had loved his sons, had provided for them for as long as he was able.
So he must have. Andrei must have loved his son, this little angelic gift he’d been given. It would be impossible not to. He’d loved him enough to name him Mikhail, one who is like God. He’d loved him enough to pay whatever he’d had to to make sure if anything happened to him, Mikhail would be safe with Ilya.
Mikhail was back to silent, back to staring out the window. “Does that make sense, solnyshko?”
“Yes,” was all Mikhail said. But the tears were back. Ilya felt like his heart was about to explode from grief.
Fuck, Shane would have been better at this, would have known what to say from all his books and blogs and podcasts on raising adopted children. Ilya racked his brain for what to say. He knew there was something else bothering Mikhail, something more than being nervous about not playing well. Ilya thought back to how this conversation had started. Can I tell you something and you promise not to tell Dad? So it had to do with Shane, had to do with being compared to Shane, and it was something Mischa was afraid to let Shane find out. And if he was bringing up Andrei, maybe it had something to do with being adopted. Ilya glanced at the clock. They still had over an hour before reaching home, so he tried again.
“What is it that you’re really upset about? Does it make you feel bad to be compared to your Dad?” Ilya was pretty sure the answer to this was no. Mikhail glowed under praise, especially from his teachers and coaches. So he was at a loss as to what about this was bothering his son.
“Sometimes,” the response was so quiet, Ilya almost didn’t hear it over the car engine and air conditioning. He could tell admitting this hurt Mikhail, that it was something he was scared to reveal. But why?
“That’s okay,” Ilya responded, remembering the thing Galina told him about how it is important to validate feelings, to show that feelings aren’t wrong. “Do you think you know why?” Another Galina trick.
He was looking down at his hands now, picking at the blue nail polish his sister had put on the night before. Ilya braced himself for the fight that would erupt between the two siblings this evening when she would discover Mischa had ruined her “most perfect manicure.”
Mikhail took another deep breath. And then the dam really broke.
“What if all that makes me like Dad is that I’m good at hockey like him and so what if one day I’m bad at hockey and then what if Dad doesn’t love me anymore?” Mikhail choked out in between sobs before dumping his face into his hands.
“Oh malysh no, no that will never happen I promise you.” Ilya reached back again for Mikhail’s leg, resigned to keep his arm in this position for the rest of the drive. It was like he used to do when Mischa was a baby and the only thing that would stop him from scream-crying the entire drive was to suck Ilya’s thumb in his mouth. “Cmon, hold my hand.” And his son did. And it was wet with tears.
Ilya stared into the rearview mirror until Mikhail finally met his eyes before continuing. “If you woke up tomorrow and forgot how to skate, your Dad would still love you as much as he does this very second, as much as he did the minute he got to hold you for the first time. I promise you, Mischa. How much your Dad loves you, it has never had anything to do with how well you play hockey, and it never ever will.”
More sniffles. And a nod this time, good. But Ilya knew he hadn’t hit on the biggest part of Mikhail’s teary admission.
He and Shane had also spent a lot of time talking about what it would be like for their kids to grow up in a family where not everyone was biologically related in the same way. Even though he’d legally been adopted in Canada by Shane and Ilya, Mikhail was only blood-related to Ilya. Yelena had been adopted in Canada as a newborn from a young Korean-Canadian woman they’d been connected with through an agency, two months after Mischa’s fourth birthday. They’d planned to stop their family there, but six years later when they got a call that Yelena’s birth mother had given birth to another daughter, well that’s how little Lilia joined their family. So Yelena and Lilia were biologically half-sisters, and even though they were Korean-Canadian, they looked like Shane.
“And you know, hockey is not the only thing that makes you like your Dad.” Ilya added. “You both hate the big light in the living room, both take so long in the shower, both love nattō.” Ilya semi-feigned a disgusted shudder at that and Mischa let out a little laugh, for real this time. Better.
“What else?” Mikhail pressed, and he squeezed Ilya’s hand a little.
“Well, you’re both so stubborn, and you both get grumpy when you’re sleepy.” Mikhail rolled his eyes again but he held onto Ilya’s hand.
“You and Dad both like to wake up early, before anyone else is awake.”
“Because it’s so quiet, when everyone is still sleeping,” Mikhail explained, as if Ilya didn’t already know.
“Yes, you both like when it is quiet. You both love to read, and you both need glasses.” That one got a disgruntled huff out of Mischa. He hated wearing his glasses, even though two of his teachers, the school nurse, and an optometrist said he needed them for reading.
“You and your Dad are both very organized. You have a system for how you like your things and you don’t like it when other people mess it up. Neither of you like surprises or when plans change. That used to make you so upset when you were small, when your routine was changed. Your Dad too.” Mischa was quiet now, but he was still gripping onto Ilya’s hand, still looking at him through the mirror.
“You both show people you love them in the same way, by doing little things for them to make them happy. Like how you remember Lena’s water bottle every day, even when she forgets. Or when you save the pickles from your sandwich for me to eat. That’s another thing! You and Dad both don’t like pickles!”
A real giggle escaped Mikhail and Ilya let out a breath he felt like he’d been holding since his baby started to cry. Mikhail let go of Ilya's hand and wiped at his face again, softer this time.
“See, solnyshko. You are like your Dad in so many ways, not just hockey. You know,” Ilya said softly, “my mama, your Grandma Irina, once told me that, when someone loves you, a piece of them stays stuck inside you forever. So they are always with you, they never really go away. And your Dad, he loves you so much, so that means there is so much of him in you, always.”
Mikhail was quiet for a moment, considering. “Does that mean there’s a piece of me in you and Dad too?” he asked quietly, and instead of the old man, Ilya saw a tiny, six-month old baby swaddled in a blue hospital blanket staring up at him, too small and precious for this world.
“Yes of course. I carry all of you with me all the time,” Ilya tapped his chest, “right here.”
Mikhail just nodded, looking out the window again. But the tears were gone, and so was the furrow in his brow. He looked calmer now, more like a 12 year old boy. But Ilya needed to make sure he understood.
“Genetics do not make a family, Mischa. Love does. And you are so, so loved. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Papa,” Mikhail responded. And then, the furrow was suddenly back. “Papa?”
“Yes, solnyshko?”
“What are genetics?”