Chapter Text
“Bood’s throwing a party tonight.”
Ilya was trying to say it as if it were no big deal. As if he hadn’t been thrown off balance while waiting for Shane’s reaction.
“Oh, Zane Boodram?” said Shane. “If you want to go, I can stay home and wait for you. You should have fun with your friends,” he finished.
“I want us to go,” said Ilya. “For us to go.”
“I can’t meet your teammates, Ilya, you know that.”
“Why not? Hunter did it, Troy did it. Why can’t we?”
Shane was taken aback. Yes, they’d been hiding for years, they’d been living like this for years, and they’d keep living like this until they retired. That was the best plan.
“We can’t, you know. If you want, you can go, but I...” Before Shane could finish, Ilya suddenly exploded;
“I want to go to that party with you, Shane, with my boyfriend. I want to tell people about you—why don’t you get it?” Ilya was furious. It was just a simple party—why couldn’t they do it? Why...
“What exactly is the problem?” Shane was used to Ilya acting this way. A problem would arise, and Ilya would bottle it up for weeks before finally exploding. He’d tried to talk to him about it constantly, but Ilya had always found a way to derail the conversation or brush the topic aside. And yes, here it was happening again—there was a problem.
“What’s the problem? The problem is that I can’t go anywhere with my boyfriend, I can’t introduce him to anyone, and I can’t talk to anyone about him. That’s the problem—I don’t want to be a secret anymore, Shane. I don’t want to be with you only behind closed doors. I want to be able to hold your hand freely now.”
Ilya finally turned and looked into Shane’s eyes and said, “I don’t want to hide anymore.”
Shane didn’t know what to say. Shane, too, wanted to love Ilya freely; he wanted to go on dates with him outside, hold his hand in the streets, talk to everyone about Ilya, and boast about his perfection—but they couldn’t, not yet.
“We have our friends, my family—Hayden, Jacki. We’re safe with them; you can talk to them. But you know it’s not the right time yet, Ilya. We can’t do it yet.”
“But I have no one,” Ilya said. “I have no one I can talk to about us.”
Ilya tossed his head back and walked toward the living room. Shane followed him.
“What?” Shane said; both of their nerves were frayed. “We’re both making sacrifices, Ilya, this...”
“What sacrifice, Shane? What have you given up?” “I left my country, I left my mother’s grave, I left my friends, I left the team I played for and came to a terrible team just to be close to you—so what about you? You’re in your own country, your family is with you, your friends are with you, you’re playing on a good team—what have you given up?”
Shane knew—of course he knew what Ilya had been saying for years. He knew what Ilya had given up since that plan at the summer house, and he was grateful to him. But hearing these things this way—hearing them from Ilya as if he’d done something wrong, as if he were regretful—that was something entirely different.
“Are you serious? If we come out, our careers could be over—everything I care about could end in an instant, Ilya!”
“Everything you care about!” Ilya said, his expression sharp.
Before Shane could say another word, Ilya continued:
“I’ve been alone ever since I came to Ottawa, Shane. Even though we’re closer now, I’m still alone. I want to talk—I want someone to talk to about us. And I trust this team. I saw how they supported Troy. They’ll support us too, they will. They’re good people, Shane.” Ilya looked at Shane with that pleading expression, searching for a last shred of hope.
“We can’t,” said Shane. “It won’t work, Ilya.”
Ilya was furious. They’d been hiding for years, and now they weren’t alone in the league anymore. Why didn’t Shane understand this? Why was Shane doing this?
“Maybe we shouldn’t have taken this this far,” the words burst from Ilya’s mouth like a burst of flame.
“What?”
“Maybe we should have stayed the way we used to be. There was no need to go this far. All these plans...” He turned away and sat down on the couch. Yes, Ilya was hurting, and to hide it, he did what he knew best: “hurt the other person.”
“What are you talking about? You can’t be serious,” Shane said, his voice trembling, his eyes brimming with tears at Ilya’s words.
“I’m just saying what’s on my mind—maybe things would have been better then. We’d just make love, simple. But now it’s complicated. Even speaking this language is complicated, living in a different country, playing on a bad team.” Ilya regretted his words, but he couldn’t take them back. Both their voices were trembling.
“Are you sorry? Are you sorry for being with me, Ilya?” Shane could think of nothing else. Ilya was sorry, Ilya was very sorry, and he was sick of Shane. But Shane needed an answer; his damn brain worked that way.
Ilya wasn’t saying anything. Not a single word had come out of his mouth.
“Answer me,” Shane said.
Ilya was just staring out the window. As if he’d already given his answer, as if he’d said everything there was to say.
“Go home,” Ilya said. “Please.” Then he quickly went up to his room.
.......
Shane was standing in Ilya’s living room. Everything that had just happened—the man he loved, everything he had spent years trying to build and create—was crumbling.
Ilya felt remorse.