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Ilya headed for morning practice at TD Garden, taking out his favorite sports car, his Spyder. He put on the radio, trying to keep his thoughts away from how much he missed Shane.
Shane. Who he could finally call his boyfriend. Who he'd spent the whole summer with, at his cottage in the middle of nowhere in Ontario. What a perfect summer it had been. Where they could be themselves, with no fear of getting caught... Almost.
They did get walked in on by Shane's father, but that led to what ended up being Ilya's favorite day. When he met Shane's parents as his boyfriend. Not lover, Shane had been adamant about not using that name for them.
Since then, he'd been added to the Hollander family group chat. It'd made his heart swell. He'd never had a family group chat before. Heck, before David made him pasta, he'd not had a home-cooked meal in years.
But now it was November, and Shane was all the way in Montreal while Ilya was in Boston. That'd change soon, though. He'd started talks with the Ottawa Centaurs to plan for his new contract for next season. Though even that was months away.
He'd be seeing Shane in another week, and that should've brought him comfort, but it only made it worse somehow. He wondered now how they ever went months without even talking. He tried to focus on what the RJ was saying to pull himself out of his thoughts of his boyfriend.
The RJ seemed to be talking up a storm. "Taylor Swift has surprised the world by dropping a brand new album. It's dark, it's edgy, and it's something we haven't seen from the singer before. Amidst all the public outcry against the pop star, she's here with a clear message. The old Taylor is dead. Here's her new avatar. I'm putting on my new favorite from the album, let me know which ones are yours, Boston.
"Here's Dress by Taylor Swift."
That intrigued Ilya. He'd heard a few of Swift's famous songs, it was hard not to since they were played everywhere. Wildest Dreams, had been a horrible earworm for him once. He'd heard it at a coffee shop, and then it'd tortured him for days until he had been able to find it on YouTube. But he'd never really been a big fan, it wasn't his kind of music, to be honest. He was more of a Wiz Khalifa kind of guy. "Black and Yellow" was the Boston Raiders anthem. And that had been his initiation to his songs. Still, it was a good distraction he pondered as the song started. Perhaps this would be a new earworm. Distract him from thoughts of one freckled Canadian beauty.
“Our secret moments in your crowded room
They got no idea about me and you
There is an indentation in the shape of you
Made your mark on me, a golden tattoo”
Blyat! Did this Swift woman know about him and Shane somehow? How was she singing about them? How did she know about the glances Ilya and Shane gave each other, that were inconspicuous except to just them. How a nod here, a wink there, could mean anything from “Let’s head out” to “Hey, sexy I missed you.”
“All of this silence and patience, pining in anticipation
My hands are shaking from holdin' back from you (ah, ah, ah)
All of this silence and patience, pining and desperately waiting
My hands are shaking from all this (ah, ha, ha, ha)”
Ilya was reminded of their all-star game in Tampa that year. At the bar when Shane walked in looking like sex on a stick in his white suit. Ilya’s mouth had gone dry at the sight, wanting to ravish him right then and there. He’d been freaking out the whole previous week over seeing Shane. And then he’d appeared, looking like a movie star. Ilya had dreaded it, but then something amazing had happened. He’d slipped into the seat next to Ilya, told him how he and Rose weren’t compatible. Ilya wanted to kiss him yet again right then and there.
That’s when his hands had literally been shaking from not touching Shane’s. He’d ended up drumming them on the bar counter because it was so hard having Shane’s beautiful large hands so close and yet so far. God, what the fuck was this song? Was this woman a witch?
“Say my name and everything just stops
I don't want you like a best friend
Only bought this dress so you could take it off
Take it off
Carve your name into my bedpost”
He was reminded of last November, when he'd blurted out the name he'd been stopping himself from saying for years.
“Fuck, Shane," he'd said. Shane had looked so startled. It had felt so good to say it out loud, after all these years. And Ilya couldn’t help but kiss him, sweetly, gently, like he was the most precious thing in the world. Unlike their usual combative kissing style. For a second, he’d allowed himself to be hopeful when Shane had whispered back, “Ilya.”
His heart had almost exploded. He thought his plan had worked. To push their relationship to something more.They couldn’t be boyfriends, but they could have more than an hour every few months, couldn’t they? But then everything had fallen apart. Shane had rushed off, from Ilya’s couch into Rose’s arms. That day, Ilya sat on his couch for hours and hours. Unable to move from there.
Still, thinking back now, Ilya realised the importance of that moment. Shane had needed to figure out his identity, that wasn’t something Ilya could do for him. It was that moment that eventually led to where they were today. Boyfriends, lovers, partners. Even if it was a secret, even if the secret was already killing Ilya a little. It was something Ilya would willingly guard with his life.
“Everyone thinks that they know us
But they know nothing about”
What a line. That resonated with Ilya so much. The whole world, sports journalists, the public, the NHL, hell, even Shane’s parents before last summer, had thought for years and years, almost a decade, that oh yes, Hollander and Rozanov. They hate each other. They’re rivals. They can’t stand each other. They tolerate each other.
If only they knew. If only they knew what they really meant to each other. Would they ever know?
Flashback when you met me
Your buzzcut and my hair bleached
Even in my worst times
That line took Ilya back to a cold parking lot in Saskatchewan. To when Ilya had been trying to get his stupid lighter to work, and then a cute Canadian boy had walked up to him. Introduced himself, rambling on about Ilya. He remembered thinking, “Who's this nerd?”, until his eyes had seen the freckles that were scattered across his face. After which all he could think was how he wanted to count every one of them, how he wanted to kiss them.
He’d barely heard the rest of Shane’s rambling. To make matters worse, the boy had to go and shake Ilya’s hand again. It was so endearingly cute, Ilya couldn’t help but blush. Hoping at the time, that Hollander didn’t notice or attributed it to the cold.
“Even in my worst lies
You saw the truth in me”
Ilya was a pretty good liar. He'd had to be, growing up where he did, hiding the things he had to hide, about himself. Usually no one could spot it when he lied. Except perhaps Sveta. He’d lied to even himself for years, about what Shane had meant to him. About why he kept going back to him again and again. How he searched for his face, in everyone else he slept with. But somehow, in that hotel room in Tampa, Shane had spotted the lies coming out of his mouth. When he tried to be nonchalant, tried to pretend the last time they met, the moment he’d nicknamed Tuna Meltdown, hadn’t destroyed him. That it hadn’t caused him to play some of the worst hockey of his life. That he’d finally realised everything he’d been holding back from feeling about Shane.
“We get together, we fuck. Is simple. Is simple for me.” He’d tried saying, but Shane had seen past it. Seen the truth reflected in his eyes. It had never been simple. Not from the day he kissed him, not from the day they slept together for the first time.
Simple was not something that could encompass the depth of what he felt for Shane. And how lucky was Ilya that Shane had felt it back for him, had said it back to him.
“There is an indentation in the shape of you
Only bought this dress so you could take it off”
There was indeed a Shane-shaped mark on Ilya's whole life now. Aside from the life-altering plans they'd come up with during the summer, Shane's imprint was in every part of Ilya's life now. From the kale he'd forced him to get in his kitchen, to the whey protein Shane liked that was stocked up in his cabinets. To his hoodies (the non-Montreal ones because Ilya had standards) that he left at Ilya's house now, and the boring SUV cars Ilya was researching to buy in Ottawa. Even the tape that Ilya now used on his hockey stick was the brand that Shane had recommended.
As the song ended, Ilya found himself missing Shane more than ever before. And he definitely needed to hear this song again, but in the privacy of his own house. The team would never let it die down if they ever got to know he'd liked a Taylor Swift song.
Later that night
Once Ilya got back from practice, he'd spent the rest of the day listening to the rest of the album, Reputation. What a fucking beauty of an album it was. It was moody, it had emotion, it had anger, pain, love. It was like a giant Fuck You to the world. Ilya wasn’t sure why Taylor was in the mood to say that, but he understood the sentiment all too well. It was exactly what he’d done when he won the Stanley Cup in 2014. He’d won it, and shoved his win in the face of everyone. A fuck you to his perennially disappointed father, to his leech of a brother.
Look What You Made Me Do was the core of that feeling clearly. The music video for it had been a thing of beauty. It should be studied for how good it was. Ilya had noted down to himself that he would read up on what had been going on in the singer’s life that led to something like this. He knew there was some context he was missing. But what lyrics, what beats, what visuals. Ilya was fanboying hard. It had been a long time since something moved him so much.
What was interesting to him, was that even though it was an album clearly about revenge, anger, betrayal, it was also very romantic. He’d of course heard Dress on the radio in the morning. Since then he’d heard it at least another 10 times, looked up the lyrics, used Google Translate to ensure he understood the meaning correctly. He would’ve loved to get the lyrics tattooed on himself if it wouldn’t be embarrassing. But even her other songs, like Delicate, for example.
This ain't for the best
My reputation's never been worse, so
You must like me for me
How could Ilya not relate to that? The media always loved calling Ilya - the bad boy, the Russian menace, the womanizer, the party boy. No matter what he did, that image had been formed in his rookie season, and it had stuck. It wasn't like he didn't do those things, and yes, he liked having a good time, he had been a bit of a man whore. But that wasn’t all he had been. He was also the man who always cleared his schedule to goto the children’s hospitals in Boston, who remembered to bring signed jerseys for the kids. The one who remembered every team member’s birthday, their anniversaries. Who always gave money to multiple charities. Especially mental health ones. But that never got covered much. It was always a stray line here or a single line of comment there. Unlike the article upon article about who he was seen with, how much he drank, what car he bought.
Or even when it came to hockey. They’d always cover how many goals he’d scored. Hardly mentioning that he was not only one of the top scorers in the NHL (only tied with Shane) but also was one of the players with the most number of assists. He was a supportive team member, not one to hog all the glory only for himself. He was literally behind only fucking Hayden Pike in assists. But no mentions of that in the hockey media. Ugh, Hayden, he thought, rolling his eyes.
All of this made him think, why was Shane with him. What did he see in him? What made him come back to Ilya year after year, season after season. Shane was hockey's golden boy, he was attractive, sweet, talented..... Ok Ilya could write soliloquies on Shane's qualities. The point was, that given everything, Shane could literally have anyone he wanted. Even if it was a man, even if it had to be in secret. He could’ve found himself in Montreal, some nice sweet man. Someone who'd go to all of Shane's games, who would be liked by his parents, someone who would have a normal boring job, someone who could be with him without it costing Shane his career. Someone who was happy, uncomplicated. Someone who didn't have a darkness that bubbled up inside him from time to time.
Even David had said it to Shane when he met Ilya. “Weren't there any nice men in Montreal?”. It was a fair ask. It’d hurt at the time to hear it, but Shane’s immediate response had warmed Ilya’s heart. Oh if only David knew. His baby boy didn’t want nice. He wanted someone who was a bit rough around the edges, Ilya thought, smirking to himself.
Mr Good boy actually liked Ilya's asshole side. He liked Ilya being a little mean, being a tease. Ilya had clocked that early in their relationship. But he figured, maybe it was about just letting loose, getting to do something bad for once, and also of course Ilya was very good at sex. That he couldn’t deny. He could see the appeal in that.
But this? Them being in a relationship, them being exclusive with each other, them risking everything, just for the chance of getting to be together. That was something Ilya still didn’t fully understand. Why Shane loved him, why he chose him. He was just relieved that he had.
Call It What You Want, was another instant favorite for Ilya. The whole song screamed Shane to him.
“Cause my baby's fit like a daydream
Walkin' with his head down, I'm the one he's walkin' to
So call it what you want, yeah, call it what you want to”
How could these lines not be about his Shane? The man was literally named the hottest man in the NHL as per People Magazine. And Ilya couldn't agree more. He did think he too deserved at least the 2nd spot, not 5th. But Shane was definitely no. 1.
The photoshoot Shane had done for that had been stunning. It’d been so different from Shane’s usual slightly stilted poses. They had taken him to some rink, and Shane was wearing a large black coat, with nothing beneath it, showing off his gorgeous abs, along with tight leather pants. He looked so sexy, it’d made Ilya hard instantly when he’d seen that shot. When the magazine came out, Ilya had secretly bought 5 copies of it. He kept them hidden in the back of his closet, and loved looking at it, jerking off to it, fondly unabashedly staring at it, whenever he missed Shane. Which was basically every fucking day.
I did one thing right
I'm laughin' with my lover, makin' forts under covers
Trust him like a brother, yeah, you know I did one thing right
Starry eyes sparkin' up my darkest night
Ilya’s brother was an abomination of a human being. He’d not been so bad when they were growing up, at the time he’d been almost tolerable. But something had snapped in him when their mother died. Something had snapped inside Ilya too, but not like it had for Alexei. They’d never been particularly close, but after Mama passed away, it was like a rift had formed which only grew more and more every year. Ilya certainly trusted Shane more than he did his brother. And not just now, that he was his boyfriend. Always. Even when they were rookies, when they hooked up the first time. He trusted Shane, he was able to admit he’d hooked up with Sasha in Russia. He’d felt safe doing that.
The last line reminded him of Shane’s beautiful brown eyes. How they actually did look like they were sparkling, whenever they bent for a face off, whenever he looked at Ilya, when he’d said “I love you too.”. For all the darkness, mess, complications that came as part of being with Ilya, Shane loved him. That much even Ilya could see, he saw it in those chocolate brown eyes. Shane said so much through his eyes, Ilya could spend the rest of his life just mapping out the different expressions it held.
Like when Ilya had almost jokingly mentioned marrying Sveta, back at the cottage, and Shane had looked up with what could only be described as murderous eyes. He’d only been thinking of ideas to figure out his citizenship issue, because he wanted to be with Shane. But then he’d seen his expression, and couldn’t help himself from needling Shane a bit more. He’d teased him so much that Shane had stayed up the whole night coming up with a plan for the rest of their lives. A plan that had so thrilled Shane, that he’d woken Ilya at 4 am to discuss it. How could Ilya have not confessed his love for him after hearing that?
So here he was at 8 pm, in the midst of listening to “Ready for it?”, another banger, contemplating if he could get by with playing this one in the team locker room. This one wasn’t mushy, it might just work. Might. That’s when his phone pinged. Shane was home. Ilya called him immediately. God, he was whipped.
Don't blame him, love made him crazy, ok?
He made another mental note to check out Taylor’s other albums later. After he read up on what led to her releasing this album.