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The lights in the apartment are dimmed when Shane walks in, the TV on but the volume low. It’s a welcome difference to the buzz of the arena, of the locker room and the post-game press interviews. It helps calm some of the chaos in Shane’s head.
He’s so relieved to be home he feels like the breath he takes in is the first full one he’s gotten in hours.
He drops his bag next to the door. He’ll deal with it tomorrow.
He sees Ilya’s head pop up behind the back of the couch, then the rest of him as he sits up. His hair is mussed up like he’s been running his hands through it and he’s smiling.
“Congratulations,” he says as he stands up and rounds the couch to start walking towards Shane.
Shane looks down at what Ilya is wearing and he rolls his eyes, giving Ilya a pointed look even though he can also feel a blush rise to his cheeks.
“What?” Ilya asks, even though his smirk makes it obvious he knows what Shane means. His next words confirm it. “I’m wearing my favorite player’s jersey while watching his game.”
Ilya does a little twirl before he reaches Shane, making sure Shane sees the name on his back before Ilya is cupping his face and kissing him softly. Shane brings his hands up around Ilya, his fingers toying with the raised fabric of his name over Ilya’s shoulderblades.
In an ideal world Ilya would have been at the arena, watching the game live instead of following it from TV. The ideal world would be able to look past their rivalry and Ilya could wear Shane’s jersey in front of this whole imaginary world. The thought sends a heady rush through Shane. He kisses Ilya a little harder.
Ilya responds in kind and it’s eventually Shane who pulls away, resting his head on Ilya’s shoulder. He’s absolutely exhausted and knows he doesn’t have energy for much tonight. Ilya’s hand moves to cradle the back of Shane’s head gently, the other on his shoulder.
“You played well tonight,” Ilya murmurs.
“We almost lost,” Shane says, already having gone through multiple ways they could improve in his head.
They had won, the final score 1-0. But it had been close, all three periods full of skating from one end of the rink to the other because neither of the teams seemed to be able to keep the puck in their possession for long. A couple of Montreal’s forwards had been sick with a nasty stomach bug so Shane had had more time on ice than normal, his shifts long and frequent.
“Was a tough game,” Ilya agrees. “Remind me who scored the winning goal?”
Shane had scored the goal, in the back half of the third period when their opponent had taken a necessary penalty by tripping Shane in their defensive zone. After the goal they’d had to fight hard to keep the lead, their opponent pushing the game to Montreal’s side of the rink constantly, hungry to settle the score and take the game to overtime.
Shane’s so glad it hadn’t come to that. By the time he scored the goal, his muscles had already been burning from exhaustion. Even now he’s painfully aware of his legs. And it’s not just the muscles on his legs that are aching. He took a couple of nasty hits and he knows that there’s bruising on his left side.
“Who scored the goal?” Ilya asks again when Shane doesn’t answer him.
“I did,” Shane says, unable to keep the smile from rising to his face. He turns his lips to Ilya’s neck instead, leaving a kiss there.
Ilya hums.
“You played well,” he repeats, the arm around Shane’s shoulders squeezing a little harder.
Perhaps contradictorily, the physical pressure helps relieve some of the pressure Shane still feels in his head and his chest. It’s like something locks back into place.
“I’m exhausted,” Shane confesses. He feels like he could fall asleep right there, if they just stayed like that for a couple more minutes. “Sorry.”
They have a few days together, Ilya having arrived the day before yesterday and able to stay until tomorrow evening. It’s more time than they usually get during the season but Shane still thinks they should be making the most of it.
“No sorries,” Ilya says. “We can relax together, yes?”
Shane doesn’t argue. He reluctantly pulls away from the hug to look at Ilya’s face. His boyfriend is smiling and Shane can’t help but smile as well, “Okay.”
“Come,” Ilya says and leads Shane to the kitchen island, gesturing for him to sit down. “I already ate but I will warm you some food.”
Shane watches as Ilya moves in the kitchen. It hits him hard in the chest sometimes, the familiarity with which Ilya treats this apartment like his second home. And it is. They exist in this Montreal apartment and the house in Ottawa and the cabin by the lake and each one of those only truly feels like home when they are together. They say home is where your heart is and Shane thinks his heart is only whole when he’s with Ilya.
Shane startles back to the moment when Ilya places a plate in front of him.
“Where did you go?” Ilya asks, his eyebrows a little furrowed.
“Huh?”
“Here,” Ilya says, tapping Shane’s temple gently. “You went somewhere.”
“Just-” Shane pauses, aware how sappy he’s going to sound if he tells the truth. He’s almost embarrassed but then he decides that Ilya deserves to know. “Just thinking about how much I love you.”
Ilya’s smile is bright, “I love you too. Now eat, I will be back soon.”
“Where are you going?” Shane asks but Ilya doesn’t reply.
Shane starts eating and true to his word, Ilya is back just as Shane has finished his plate. He’d been starving, his body in desperate need of food to fuel itself. Now, pleasantly full, he feels even more tired than before.
“Thank you for the food,” Shane says as he rinses the dishes and puts them in the dishwasher. The food had been tasty and Ilya had made sure to make something that fit Shane’s diet, the consideration warming Shane’s heart.
“You’re welcome,” Ilya says. He’d taken Shane’s jersey off while he was gone, now wearing just his sweats and a sleeveless shirt. The sweats are light grey so Shane can easily see that they are a little wet just below the knees. Before he can question it, Ilya reaches a hand towards him.
“Come.”
Shane walks over and takes Ilya’s hand in his and Ilya starts leading him through the apartment. They come to a stop at the bathroom door and Ilya opens it.
The lights are off, the only light in the room coming from a few battery operated candles near the sink. The air is warm and humid and smells like their body wash and Shane realizes why when he sees that Ilya has filled the tub.
“I know you showered after the game but maybe a bath would help you relax?” Ilya says, his voice fittingly low for the atmosphere as he tugs Shane into the room and closes the door, not letting the warmth escape. “You are sore, yes?”
“I love you,” Shane breathes out. It’s not what he had planned to say but it’s all that occupies his thoughts as he takes in his surroundings and soaks up the love and care that’s so clear in everything Ilya’s done tonight.
Ilya kisses him softly, “I love you too. Now, get in before the water gets cold.”
“Will you join me?”
“Do you want me to?” Ilya asks, as if the answer isn’t perfectly clear.
“I always want you to.”
“You’re very sappy tonight,” Ilya remarks with a smile and a hint of teasing in his voice.
“Shut up,” comes Shane’s eloquent reply. He knows he’s being sappier than usual but there’s something in the contrast of the tranquility of their home and the stress and noise of the game before that has lowered Shane’s filter. “Get loved, you idiot. And get naked.”
“Yes, my love,” Ilya continues to tease.
Shane ignores the teasing and walks over to the laundry hamper. When he takes off his shirt he hears Ilya suck in a sharp breath through his teeth. Shane turns to look at him where he’s also shirtless, still holding his shirt in his hands.
Ilya throws his shirt in the hamper as he steps closer, the earlier signs of teasing gone from his face as his fingers come up to gently brush against the dark bruise at Shane’s ribs, “Ouch.”
“Yeah,” Shane agrees as he throws his shirt in the hamper too. “It’s from a stick.”
“You sure nothing is broken? No damage to ribs?” Ilya asks, still looking at the bruise.
“No, just the bruise,” Shane says. It’s not the first time, won’t be the last time and Shane knows from experience that in a couple of weeks it will be gone. In a week it will mostly stop hurting.
“Okay,” Ilya says, also not a stranger to the common injuries their job brings.
They finish undressing and get in the tub and not for the first time Shane praises his past self for opting to go with a large tub when he got the bathroom remodeled years ago. He’d never been much of a bath person before Ilya but he’s quickly found out that being in the warm water with Ilya, holding him or being held, is one of the peak ways he can get his body to relax. Tonight the water feels extra nice as he feels his muscles relax when he melts back to Ilya’s body. Ilya has one arm around Shane’s body, his hand on Shane’s chest and the other lies on top of the tub’s edge, careful not to touch the side with the bruise. Shane covers the hand on his chest with one of his own, the other resting near Ilya’s knee under the water.
They talk but there’s also some stretches of silence and it’s all comfortable. Maybe a little too comfortable.
“Shane.”
Shane hears Ilya’s voice near his ear and he realises that he was dozing off.
“Hmm?”
“We should go to bed,” Ilya says. Shane doesn’t particularly want to move but he can tell that the water is getting cooler and the relaxation he feels right now won’t last for long if they stay in. He also doesn’t want to fall asleep and drown in his big comfortable tub.
“Yeah.”
They get out of the tub and quickly rinse out the soapy water from their skin in the shower. Shane goes through the bedtime routine on autopilot and it doesn’t take long until they are mostly dry and in their underwear and getting under the covers.
It’s truly a miracle how in just a couple of hours Ilya has managed to get Shane from the stressed and overwhelmed mess that he was when he came home to this, where he feels like there’s room for only two thoughts in his head:
1) He’s about to fall asleep.
2) He really loves Ilya.
Both of these thoughts are facts and probably obvious, but he feels the need to voice one of them, sappy or not.
“I love you,” he mumbles.
Ilya gives him a gentle squeeze and kisses the back of Shane’s neck.
“I love you too.”