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Shane didn't have to look away from his book to realize Ilya had fallen asleep. Shane was sat against the headboard, with his fiance's head in his lap and arms around his waist.
It was barely past noon, but Ilya had trouble sleeping the night before, so he dozed off as soon as the two of them laid down in the living room.
He explained to Shane that his therapist had touched a nerve, and even though they had talked about it, it still nagged at him a little. That, combined with the recent stress of being publicly outed, and keeping calm for Shane's sake, caught up to him.
Looking down at Ilya in that moment, Shane felt an overwhelming sense of anger, directed at anyone who had ever dared to hurt him.
Putting down his book, Shane ran a gentle hand through Ilya's curls, happy with the content little noise that came as a result.
Ilya was a light sleeper, but his fiance knew exactly how to avoid waking him while still showing his affection.
The soft rain outside gradually turned into a full blown storm, and it got slightly chilly, so Shane reached for a blanket to throw over them, careful not to disturb Ilya's sleep.
Anya, who had been gnawing at a chew and raging war against one of her puzzle toys, abandoned her activity and hopped onto the couch next to Shane, laying down beside him while looking at Ilya.
"We're lucky, right?" Shane whispered and gave her a few scratches.
It was true, Shane felt like the luckiest person in the world to have Ilya. To have all of him, not just his body or just his highs, but also the lows, and the vulnerability, and especially to have moments like the one he was in.
To have someone so guarded be so open with him. For Ilya, stone cold Ilya Rozanov, to allow Shane to see this side of him, was a privilege, and Shane knew it.
It wasn't that Ilya's walls had come down, it was simply that Shane had been let in. Past the moat and into the castle walls and up into the highest tower.
The rest of the world still mostly saw Ilya as an arrogant asshole, hockey world especially, but there were some improvements there too. The charity helped with how the public perceived him, and the womanizer title had faded after they had been outed.
But there were only two people in the world that Ilya would say fully knew him. Shane and Svetlana.
There had been a bit of jealousy on Shane's part, but then he met Svetlana and realized that if it hadn't been for her, Ilya would've been truly alone.
He and Svetlana also shared the trait of being fiercely protective of Ilya. Svetlana had told Shane, when she found out about the engagement, that she believed he was the best thing that could've ever happened to Ilya.
So it was only the two of them who knew it all, and Shane was honoured to be trusted like that.
Ilya had once compared Shane's freckles to stars, and once Shane had gotten over how flustered he got, he informed Ilya how it was unusual for the Sun to hand out compliments.
"You are cute when you are in thoughts." Ilya remarked.
Shane hadn't noticed he was awake, but there he was, looking up at Shane with a lazy smile, like a very content house cat.
"They were thoughts about you." Shane chuckled.
"Yes? What about me?" Ilya kissed his arm.
"Just you." Shane shrugged. "How lucky I am to have you."
Ilya closed his eyes and smiled. He was used to getting compliments about his looks and his hockey skills, but he struggled with accepting things like the one Shane had just said.
"I mean that."
"I know you do." Ilya said.
Shane leaned down to kiss his forehead, he took a couple of moments to actually put together the words he wanted to say, because even though he himself wasn't too good with words, he knew Ilya deserved to hear how loved he was. "Good. I know you haven't been feeling the best, but you're okay now. Not that I mean you have to be okay straight away, I mean you can relax now, it's just us."
"I know what you mean." Ilya assured him, still not moving from his cozy spot. "Thank you."
"You don't have to thank me."
"I do, for being best thing that ever happened to me."
Shane felt himself blush. "That's mutual."
Ilya put his head down in his fiance's lap and closed his eyes again, and then he let out a long, content sigh. "Любите нас черненькими, а беленькими нас всякий полюбит."
"What's that?"
"Gogol'."
There was another thing about Ilya that not many people knew, how smart he actually was. Obviously he knew a lot about hockey, but he knew a whole lot about pretty much anything.
Sure, Shane had an encyclopedic knowledge on hockey and some other select topics he was interested in, but he was yet to find a topic that Ilya knew nothing about.
Shockingly, Ilya's favourite department was literature. A little stereotypically, his favourite writers happened to be Russians.
"Can you translate it?"
"Is more poetic in Russian, but it is like 'love us when we are black', or dirty in English, I guess. And then 'because everyone can love us when we are clean'. Sounds better in Russian, though. English is not poetic language."
Shane laughed at that. "The language Shakespeare wrote in isn't poetic enough for you?"
"Shakespeare was amazing writer, so he still wrote good even in dumb language." Ilya laughed along. "But slavic languages are more...."
"Romantic?" Shane offered.
Ilya nodded. "Yes. Kind of. More emotional."
"Guess I'll have to start reading in Russian."
"Much better than English."
Shane laughed again. "I think I'm a little far from reading Crime and Punishment in it's original form."
"Is difficult language, takes time, you will learn. You are smart with languages." Ilya lifted his head to kiss him. "Until then I will translate for you."
Shane kissed him a few more times, and the only reason they stopped their little make out session was that Anya started whining, since it was mealtime.
When Ilya got up, however, Shane guinded him back onto the couch. "No, you relax. I'll feed her. And I'll get us dinner too."
Ilya, who usually loved cooking and who would've usually insisted on at least helping Shane, was way too exhausted to force himself to do anything, so he let himself sink back into the soft couch and warm blanket.
"I'll be right back." Shane assured with a kiss. "See how meal prepping pays off?"
"Shut up." Ilya laughed, then stole another kiss before letting Shane go. "Will you give Anya the medicine?"
"Yes, yes. Just because you're her favourite doesn't mean I can't do it."
There was nothing strictly wrong with Anya, but she had developed an allergy and needed to be given pills. For a while it was only Ilya who could get her to cooperate, but Shane soon figured it out too.
Some twenty minutes later, Shane came back to find Ilya pinching the bridge of his nose with his eyes screwed shut, a habit he had whenever he felt a headache coming on.
"Are you okay?" He asked, putting down their plates.
Ilya opened his eyes, looking almost apologetic. "Yes, is not that bad."
"I'll get you an ibuprofen." Shane kissed his forehead before turning to go back into the kitchen.
"No, is not bad."
"You take painkillers before it gets bad." Shane said from the kitchen, paired with the sound of rummaging through their medicine cabinet.
Ilya just sighed.
Shane returned with the pill and a glass of water. "When you get a raging migraine there's no painkiller that will help you. Come on."
"You worry too much."
"This isn't worrying too much, this is taking care of you."
With a fond look, Ilya took the pill and the glass and drank it, after which they ate the dinner they had meal prepped a few days ago. When Ilya wasn't able to finish his plate, Shane knew he must be feeling awful.
With a gentle kiss he said. "Go lay down, and I'll be there as soon as I clean up."
"You hate dishes." Ilya pointed out, it was usually his job, since Shane hated touching dirty dishes and bits of food.
"I'll survive." Shane assured him with another kiss. "Now go lay down, I'll only be a few minutes."
Ilya's expression was so soft and loving it made him look like a lovesick fool. He was a lovesick fool, and he didn't mind it one bit. They shared another kiss before he finally got up and headed towards the bedroom, Anya at his heel as always.
A few minutes later, once he loaded the dishwasher and then washed his hands several times, Shane made his way into the bedroom with a tall glass of water and set it onto the nightstand.
"Come here." Ilya mumbled without opening his eyes, but reaching for Shane.
Shane laid down and Ilya put his head on his chest, arms wrapping around his waist. "You should sleep some more."
"Mhm." Ilya agreed, already half asleep.
Gently, Shane started combing his hand through Ilya's soft curls. "Does this help?"
Ilya melted into the touch. "Da."
With a satisfied little smile, Shane let them fall silent. There was only the sound of the storm outside and the rustling of trees in the wind.
There was nothing at all special about the day they've had. A lazy day at the cottage at the start of summer.
At first Shane had worried it was all too boring for Ilya, who's summers up until then consisted of clubbing and parties and seaside vacations and fast cars(well, he still had two of those cars, but those were parked back home in Ottawa at the moment). Even still, Ilya had gone from someone who couldn't bare one minute of boredom, to someone who was perfectly content spending a whole summer in a lonesome cottage and not complain once.
Shane had spent so many nights laying awake, worried Ilya was finding their life together dull or uneventful. It wasn't until Svetlana came over one day, and informed him that Ilya looked the happiest she'd ever seen him.
Then Shane noticed it too, he noticed how often Ilya laughed, most of all. When they finally talked about it, Ilya explained that all those parties had only served as a distraction.
Ilya still enjoyed music, and he did like having a drink here and there. But now he preferred hosting a dinner party for their friends and having drinks with them, and he preferred blasting his music while he did things around the house, much to Shane's dismay as the music got so loud the floors vibrated.
Once, Shane had expressed the concern that his 'boring' was contagious, after one of Ilya's old teammates remarked how he had calmed down.
To that, Ilya declared that he was thankful Shane had made him boring. He was all too happy to listen to all of Shane's nagging about smoking, all too happy to bring it down to a minimum. A pack of cigarettes could now last him a month, sometimes longer. He was all too happy to comply with every last one of Shane's little quirks, ones he had believed would cause trouble.
Since Shane hated doing the dishes, Ilya took it onto himself immediately. Since Shane had pretty strict night and morning routines, Ilya always double checked their bags before going somewhere, just in case they didn't forget anything that would end up stressing Shane out.
"You say 'don't smoke, is bad for you' and I hear 'I love you', you say 'you have to eat dumb peas because they are healthy' and then you say a lot of big biology words, and I hear 'I love you', you say 'get out of lake, is cold outside' and I hear 'I love you." Ilya had explained. "You care about me, you say it many different ways, but they all say you care."
Shane smiled at the memory. He couldn't believe he used to be insecure in what they had, not when Ilya slept so peacefully in his arms.
As he did whenever he had a headache, Ilya slept through most of the day, but the next morning Shane woke up to the sound of someone shuffling about in the kitchen.
"You're up early." He remarked when he found Ilya preparing breakfast.
Ilya smiled, placing Shane's tea on the table. "I sleep wbole day yesterday."
"You're feeling better?" Shane kissed him, taking up preparing Anya's food while Ilya took care of theirs.
"All better. I have amazing nurse." Ilya stole another kiss.
"I gave you painkillers and told you to sleep, not exactly a nurse." Shane rolled his eyes.
"Good enough for me." Ilya finished up their breakfast and set the table, then went to hug his fiance and pepper kisses along his face and neck. "Perfect for me."
Shane smiled, enjoying everything about the moment. They had been outed fairly recently, but he had finally calmed down, he had survived the rest of the season with Montreal, and his move to Ottawa was to be announced later that morning. His mother said she would handle it and sent the two of them off to the cottage to relax.
So there they were, at their cottage, standing in a sun spot, holding one another and not caring what anyone else might say.
While they ate, Ilya's phone rang.
"Marley?" Ilya looked surprised, then a little skeptical before picking up. "Yes?"
"Ice terminator one and two on the same team?! That's just unfair, Roz." Cliff yelled out so loudly Shane could hear him even though Ilya was holding the phone to his ear.
Ilya laughed out loud, relief washing over him. "Scared?"
"You'll fucking kills everyone!" Cliff despaired. "I mean everyone's still comparing me to you, but now I also don't stand a chance of leading them to a cup!"
Shane laughed too, unable to contain it.
"That Hollander laughing at me too? Fuck both of you." Cliff chuckled. "No, no. That is you two plotting everyone's demise."
"Yes, you are dead." Ilya agreed.
"Traitor." Cliff teased. "And Hollander, you are evil too. You two are like some wicked tyrant royal couple."
"Jesus." Shane kept laughing.
"Anyway, just called to tell you two to go fuck yourselves- wait no. Now you'll be fucking on my account."
Ilya snorted in a laugh.
"Anyway! I'll go tell the guys to make peace with second place forever. Also good for you Hollander."
"Thanks." Shane managed to say.
"Yeah. Good for you, man. Horrible for everyone else." Cliff mumbled. "Roz, I'm expecting you in Boston this summer at least once."
"Yes. We make plans later." Ilya promised.
After they hung up, Ilya kept on laughing and laughing at the reaction, and Shane couldn't help but laugh as well.
As hurt as he was about the way his teammates had reacted, he was equally happy that Ilya's teammates had been mostly supportive, that they stood behind him during his last season in Boston, and that Connors and Marlowe in particular stayed good friends with him. Ilya deserved people like that, he deserved the world, in Shane's opinion.
Shane wasn't sure if he could give him the world, but he sure as hell would try. And something he knew he could give him was the safe space to be the way he was in that moment.
Laughing in ths sunlight, all golden and happy and free. Shane would make sure Ilya remained golden and happy and free his entire life. He would make sure Ilya always had a reason to laugh.