Chapter Text
SHANE'S POV
A week.
It's been a week since what happened over at Ilya’s place.
I stared at our chat, “lily” as its contact name—my fingers hovering. The moment I want to type a word my finger never moves—still hovering.
I feel guilty, sad, anxious, and worse of all. I wanted it. I wanted that feeling of comfort to be forever. Just me and Ilya in our own world, no press, no media, no gossip sites, no teams, no hockey, just us.
That alone is scary. I felt extra guilty for running away but how can I comprehend the fact that my rival, the one I'm supposed to hate—oh who am I kidding—we passed that stage clearly.
I miss alpha
‘Shut up you mutt’ I told my omega internally, I can't have these types of thoughts outside the rink, and of all places the parking lot. It’s bad enough that for the first time ever I'm late, I can already hear the teasing from the guys and their pity eyes when they see the state of my person. My omega whimpered and kept calling out for the Alpha, Alpha come back, I need you Alpha.
I need Ilya.
I let out a deep sigh, hiding my face unto my hands as I took a deep breath, mentally preparing for the chaos and questions I would be bombarded with. Flipped the overhead mirror and yep—I look like a mess, my hair going all over the place, the rim of my eyes looked close to bloodshot with some puffiness under my eyes, and my nose having a red tint like I was Rudolf the red nose reindeer. Yep, definitely wasn’t crying over my complicated situationship listening to “Back to December" by Taylor Swift playing over the radio driving to practice.
Fuck I need to get a hold myself or else my scent will stink up the place. Taking another deep breath to stabilize my scent further, I grabbed the scent patch from the glove box and put it over both my neck. I looked at my watch ‘8:30’, okay yeah I need to go in or else I’ll get chewed out by the coach.
Walking up to the locker room felt nerve wracking, every senses of my body says to run away, to go back, needing my nest, needing ily—
“And our prodigal son returns!”
I hear JJ yell, the rest of the team howled with excitement their scents exploding, fuck i wanna go home, i cant do this. JJ, not noticing my demeanor, walking up to me with open arms and a wide smile on his face.
“CapitaineCaptain this the first time you’ve been late—“ then I felt a hand on my shoulder.
“Shane, you okay? Have—have you been crying?” That was Hayden’s voice, immediately my shoulders that were once tense eased up as I smelled Hayden’s mint cooling scent. I tried to hide my face but that didn’t go over well.
“Holy shit you have”
“CapitaineCaptain, did someone hurt you?” JJ asked, now everyone was taking notice of my appearance. I wanna go home, I can't deal with this, this is too much.
fuck, fuck fuck, fuck, fuck—
Alpha, alpha, alpha, Ilya, Ilya, Ilya—
My eyes started to sting and the urge to scratch it, close my eyes—something, anything. My heart is beating like it was running away from something while my stomach wanted to crawl up my throat and hurl my breakfast, my body couldn’t move—stucked as if my shoes were in quicksand.
“Shane?” Who was that? I couldn’t hear who that was like I was hearing it from underwater.
Then I felt a heavy weight unto my chest and unto my back rubbing it. Cinnamon, I smell cinnamon, that’s JJ’s. As if that was the magic word, my eyes started to clear up taking in my surroundings more clearly. JJ was hugging me, well more specifically scenting me, I would have shoved him and said that it was inappropriate in front of our teammates since we’re both unmated omega and alpha but something in me felt that it was needed—necessary even.
Not alpha. Not alpha’s scent. Need Alpha’s scent now.
“ChériDarling, you’re safe here, we got you don't worry” JJ reassured me, i might not have wanted this type of affection generally but right now that’s all i need at this moment. Another set of hands rubbed my back, I looked who it was and it’s Hayden but with a tight smile.
“Can you give us some deep breaths Shane?” Not trusting my voice I nodded along, Hayden nodded back as if acknowledging my muteness. “Okay take a deep breath, hold it,” I followed, “then release it slowly,” I did as he said. We did it about three times, enough to get me to settle my heart down and get my breathing back into my lungs.
I gulped my saliva, wetting my parched throat as I cleared it out, “thanks guys” coming out more like a whisper but it will do for now.
“Okay everyone, do some practice drills and come back in thirty minutes, captain needs space and I doubt a room full of alphas would help,” Hayden ordered using his alternate captain authority to use. I hear the others shuffle out of the room one by one, leaving me with JJ and Hayden alone in the locker room.
“Hey, you back with us? Here, some chocolate, was gonna eat it but ‘think you need it more,” I looked at the opened chocolate bar that’s in JJ’s hand, I hesitated before moving my hand and took a bite of. I know I shouldn’t, I had my whole diet down to its science but at this point the sweetness of the chocolate made me forget all about it and devoured it.
We didn’t speak for a while, it wasn’t uncomfortable but I know they have their questions, might as well take the band-aid—
“I'm guessing this is about Boston lily then Shane?” And there goes my plan. God what is up with people and ruining my structured plans? I played with the wrapper, needing to keep my hands busy or stimulated or just something to keep me grounded before I wanted the floor to eat me.
“What made you guess that?”
“You smell like a heartbroken omega cap, like someone-took-out-your-heart-and-smashed-it type of heartbreak,” more like I took my own heart and got a hammer just to smash it myself. “I put on my scent patches, how could you smell it?” I asked but a part of me didn’t want to know.
“You smelt like disinfectant Shane, I don't smell that from you except when you get your panic attacks,” Said bluntly from Hayden. Okay, note to self: need to buy military grade scent patches after this.
“Wanna fill us in on what happened, cap?”
My mouth opened then I paused, not knowing how to explain what happened. Yeah sure, what happened was I ran away after my alpha rival decided to use my first name and gave me tuna melt like we were domestic, married, real.
I keep thinking what words to say, over my years of speaking and understanding the English language yet none could ever describe my situation, not one. Also, would they even believe it? Would they be mad? Shock? Or would they reject me? That thought made my omega and myself whimper. I see JJ and Hayden as my small pack, the people I can be myself with, the people I'm proud to be my teammates.
“Shane,” that snapped me out of my thoughts.
“I…” I started, careful of my words. “I wish I can say…but I’m not in a good mental state right now, don't even know where to start” I let out a small laugh, giving some type of attempt at humor. I glanced at their faces, both wore a smile with no teeth and gave me pity eyes.
“Look, I'm sorry for being emotional this morning but I'll get through practice. If anything I need a distraction,” I stated, not wanting this to be part of the long list of weaknesses I already have, number one being an omega. They both looked at each other, almost like they were having a conversation in their heads then nodded to me.
“Sure Capitaine, but you let us know if you need us, oui?yes?”
“ouiyes,” I replied.
Door opened and in came Drapeau with a worried look on his face, “uh cap, there’s a crying pup out there and we need your scent to calm them down or else they’ll collapse”
A pup? Why would a pup be here at a hockey practice rink of all places? Did someone leave their pup here? Is it one of the staff?
“Okay, lead the way” I follow him out and slowly I hear a pup crying, borderline distraught. Pup crying, my omega called out, that’s strange it never said a thing about kids before, why now? Once we got closer I immediately stood still. The pup in question is a boy with black hair wearing a blue puffer jacket on him, he’s sitting on the ground hugging his little legs sniffling, sobbing heavily, and hiding his face behind it. Then I smelled it—the pup was an omega. An omega pup, he’s omega and he’s in distress with a scent that’s burnt wood almost.
Take pup. Calm pup. Pup needs us.
That confused me, it's like my omega knows him for some reason—like a connection. The team parted the path getting me direct access to the pup. I let out my scent slowly so as to not overwhelm him, people said my scent can be very calming especially with the lavender mixed in it, this seemed to work as the pup stopped shaking. I crouched down making myself small to not scare him away.
“Hey pup, can you tell us where your parents are?” I asked calmly, not wanting to spook the pup. Shortly after I said it, the pup looked at me swiftly, there I saw his eyes—icy blue eyes, his eyes.
“mama!” The pup cried out and hugged me, knocking me down instantly. Wait—
Mama?!