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On July first of 2018 Ilya Rozanov shocked the hockey world when he decided to sign a contract with Ottawa in free agency. The insiders jumped on the story like rabid dogs…
Elliot Friedman: “I had heard that Rozanov was going to sign in Ottawa early in free agency, but I didn’t report it because it was so unbelievable.”
Chris Johnson: “Ilya Rozanov signs in Ottawa for an 8 year, 96-million-dollar contract with a full no-move clause.”
Emily Kaplan: “No reports from Rozanov’s camp regarding the move to Ottawa, a choice that took the league by surprise.”
Meanwhile, Ilya was enjoying his free agency signing at the cottage in Ottawa after finalizing the deal with his agent and the Centaur’s management. Shane had been a bit of a nervous wreck all day while the agent negotiated with the Centaurs’ president and general manager over the terms of the contract.
The management team in Ottawa had been taken aback when Ilya’s new agent, Farah, reached out to them regarding his availability. All of the teams with a reasonable level of cap space next season had reached out to Farah about Ilya’s plans for the following season, but it seemed the Centaurs expected to be turned down.
Now that the contract was signed, and the plan that Shane and Yuna had meticulously designed was moving smoothly, Shane allowed himself to breathe. Ilya watched as the tension Shane had carried all day seeped out slowly as he allowed himself to cuddle up into Ilya’s side.
Ilya was browsing through social media aimlessly as he began to see both the confusion and speculation online regarding his signing in Ottawa. None of the speculation was even remotely close to the truth, which lay cradled under Ilya’s arm and tucked into his side.
There was even a hashtag about his strange behavior on several socials platforms (#IlyaRozanovSigning). Ilya idly scrolled through posts under the hashtag before finding one that made him snort…
@Bostonstrong81: “Rozanov turned the Bears into a contender, got bored of winning all the time, and decided to go to the Centaurs to fix them too. What a legend. Boston will miss you.”
Shane pulled back from Ilya’s side to look at him, “What’s so funny?”
“The internet thinks I got bored of winning.” Ilya looked down at his boyfriend and grinned.
“What?” Shane looked confused, “Why would anyone ever get tired of winning?”
Ilya felt a rush of fondness for Shane rush over him, “They are trying to find reasons why I decided to sign in Ottawa.”
“Oh, I guess that was inevitable” Shane’s nose scrunched slightly, “What are you going to tell the media when they ask?”
Ilya had to give that some consideration for a moment. Obviously, he couldn’t exactly tell anyone the truth. Maybe, he could use these questions as an opportunity to entertain himself while living in the world’s most boring city.
“I will figure it out. No more worrying today; you worry enough.” Ilya brushed the hair out of Shane’s eyes and tucked it back. He lowered his face to press a gentle, chaste kiss to Shane’s lips. He barely pulled back before feeling himself pulled back in for another kiss, this one much hungrier.
The couple spent the rest of the day, week and summer relaxing, enjoying each other and planning for the following season. Ilya faced the media not long after showing up for training camp for the 2018/2019 season for the Ottawa Centaurs.
Ilya was asked by the PR staff to do an availability with local media outlets as his first media session after the signing.
A local print reporter for an Ottawa news outlet was the first of many to ask him, “Ilya, why did you decide to sign in Ottawa?”
Ilya had been thinking of ways to respond to this inevitable question all summer long. The answer came quickly and naturally.
“Is too warm in Boston, here in Ottawa is more like home.” Ilya said with a cocky grin and a joking tone.
No one knew that what he meant by ‘home’ was not the frigid, impersonal Moscow, but rather the proximity to his family, his found family: Yuna, David and Shane Hollander.
Of course, the internet took that and ran with it.
@Voyaghers: “Obviously, you can’t feel the cold when you are fucking your way through the entire city.”
@Admiralsfan027: “There is no way that is the real reason, right?”
@Floridastan: “The concept that someone thinks Boston is “too warm” has me shaking in my boots”
Obviously, the media and the fans were not particularly impressed with that answer. The next time Ilya was asked for an interview was post-game after the Centaur’s first home game. The team lost, despite a valiant effort from Ilya, because the roster was generally very lacking in the depth department.
A national reporter for Sportsnet asked this time, “You said before the season that you signed here because of the weather, is that the only reason?”
It was a rather tactful way to ask the question, all things considered. They could have called him a liar, which would only be half true, but still probably justified.
“Yes, is not the only reason. I also wanted to move here because of very nice Italian restaurant in Ottawa with the best Chicken Parmesan.” Ilya grinned a wide, sincere grin as the reporters looked at him, a bit befuddled.
The same reporter recovered and asked, “what is the name of the restaurant?”
“Joe’s Italian Kitchen in Little Italy.”
Ilya didn’t wait for the reporters to ask another question; he just turned his back and walked away with a fond grin on his face. David had taken Ilya to that restaurant to Ilya when he first moved here and had no food in the house. The two of them sat in the unassuming Italian restaurant and talked about Ottawa and the season and how Ilya was going to settle in.
Of course, following the interview, Joe’s Italian Kitchen received a large influx of traffic, mostly thanks to Ilya’s nationally televised endorsement. Fans flocked there to hopefully see Ilya at his professed favorite restaurant. The owner of the place reached out to Farah to thank Ilya for the good publicity and to let him know he was a guest of honor at Joe’s.
Ilya took advantage of that frequently and every time Joe insisted on comping his bill, Ilya would pay the bill for another family at the restaurant. This was a great success for Ilya because he got to eat amazing chicken parmesan and he got to make the half-truth he told the reporters seem more genuine.
Of course, the internet had things to say about his second explanation regarding his signing in Ottawa.
@Centaurs4ever: “Ok, don’t mind me, just going to make a stop on my way home from work today.”
@joesitalkitchen: “Our favorite customer! You are welcome any time @Ilyarozanov81”
@Hockeyheathen: “This somehow makes less sense than the first explanation he gave about the move. They didn’t have good Italian food anywhere else?”
One strange answer about Ilya’s decision to sign with Ottawa had caused a stir, but two contradictory and unsatisfying excuses had the media abuzz. The media began asking for Ilya after every game. Each time, he gave them a similarly unsatisfying half-truth about why he left Boston for Ottawa.
“I have a thing for boring.”
“Lakes are nice, yes?”
“Birding here is better than most cities.” (Ilya had to google the name of the bird-watching hobby to sell this one)
“Is easier to find privacy in nature in Ottawa.”
The media ate them up because the fans were always rabid to hear about the most recent response that Ilya provided to the same question, no matter how many times they asked it.
None of these answers were false, and all of them had small hints of the influence of Shane Hollander on the life of Ilya Rozanov. Ilya kept at this for over an entire season; not revealing the truth of why he was in Ottawa but revealing enough to give him some relief from his perpetual discomfort with hiding his relationship with Shane.
After a full season of silly half-truths, Ilya and Shane were spending their summer at the Cottage. Shane had his head in Ilya’s lap and Ilya carded his fingers through his hair, much longer now than when they first met outside that rink in Saskatchewan.
Shane smiled, eyes still closed, “I think the responses you give to the media are sort of sweet.”
“Sweet, how?” Ilya didn’t understand how sort of lying to the media and fans was ‘sweet’.
Shane opened his eyes, “None of them know the whole truth, but I do. Hearing your answers feels like an inside joke, just for us.”
Ilya was not thrilled about how content Shane was with hiding. Shane didn’t want to open the door to the closet, and Ilya was about ready to rip the walls down barehanded.
“Would you ever want them to know? The whole truth?” Ilya swallowed nervously, knowing the answer he wanted wasn’t the one he was going to get.
“Yes and no?” Shane’s eyebrows drew closer together as he considered this, “I mean, I want to be out one day, but that doesn’t mean I want everyone to know.”
Ilya wasn’t sure he understood this, “Being out means everyone knows, no?”
“I mean I wish we could be out the way normal people are out. Like our friends and families and coworkers know; not that the whole world speculates on our relationship.”
Ilya at least understood what this meant, even if he didn’t understand how it felt. He wanted the whole world to know about his love for Shane. He didn’t care if they speculated, gossiped or made fan art about it.
He knew Shane was a very private person, it wasn’t surprising to Ilya that he wanted privacy about this too. Ilya was fairly certain that if Shane could play hockey with a bag over his head without compromising his performance, he absolutely would.
“We gave up normal a long time ago. Best realistic situation, what happens?” Ilya wanted to know where Shane hoped this was going.
“We wait a couple years for the last bit of the league-imposed rivalry to die down. In the meantime, we come out as gay and bisexual. Once the league no longer cares about the rivalry thing, we come out as a couple, tell people it happened during our partnership for the Irina Foundation.”
Ilya isn’t terribly upset about that timeline. It was better than the ‘wait until we have been retired for a while and we are a thousand years old until we come out’ plan. He had waited for almost a decade at that point, what is a few more years?
“Do you want me to keep telling them silly reasons for moving closer to you?” Ilya felt lighter with the realization that Shane wanted to move up the timeline. The burden of hiding felt less immense as soon as Ilya knew he didn’t have as long to go.
“You know what? Yes, I do. Also, you can get a little less… half with your truth.” Shane said carefully, seeming uncertain.
“What does this mean?” Ilya wasn’t sure what Shane was giving him permission to do.
“I mean, you can add more truth into your half-truths if you’d like.” Shane was being brave right now, and Ilya felt like breathing wrong would snuff that bravery out.
“Are you sure?” Ilya wanted him to be sure more than anything.
“Yes, I’m sure but you have to take it slow. I have two more years on my contract, and I already know my team is probably not going to handle it perfectly if some internet sleuth puts it together.” Ilya was shocked by Shane’s resolve on this.
“Okay, a little more at a time until we are ready, and then the full truth?” Ilya was getting excited; his chaos juices were flowing.
“Yes, exactly. I don’t know how long it will take for me to be ‘ready’, but we have to start somewhere and easing them into the idea of ‘us’ is probably wise.” Ilya made sure to show Shane exactly how much he appreciated this gift that Shane had given him, over and over for the rest of the summer.
Training camp was upon the NHL again, this time for the 2019/2020 season. Ilya had been brainstorming, and vetting with Shane, several of his answers to the question he had become so accustomed to answering for the past year.
Ilya was more excited for media on the first day of training camp than he was when he was using it as an avenue to flirt with Shane. Those first three years of knowing each other and not having a way to directly flirt with (and pick at) Shane had been hell.
Ilya got his chance after the first day of training camp. He got called aside to be part of the Centaurs season opening press conference along with Wyatt Hayes and Zane Boodram.
After the typical ‘beginning of the season hockey questions’ get out of the way, a reporter asks Ilya, “I know you are probably sick of answering this, but the fans want to know; why did you sign in Ottawa?”
There is a smattering of laughter from the reporters and even the representatives from the team. Even the PR people had been having fun with this question and Ilya’s strange responses to it over time.
Ilya knew exactly what he was going to say but gave a pause and a thoughtful look for effect, “Ottawa lost local hero and second-best NHL player, Shane Hollander, to Montreal. City needed new favorite.”
There was a long pause before a loud eruption of laughter from all present, the reporters, the staff, as well as Bood and Hayes. Ilya was thrilled, no one was taking it seriously and he had just gotten to say his boyfriend’s name on camera.
For the rest of the 2019/2020 season and the first several months of the following season, Ilya very slowly ratcheted up the level of truth he told with each of the subsequent answers he provided.
“I am double agent and need backup plan if anyone finds out.”
“I decided to become mail-order husband for a nice Canadian, but apparently I needed a job!”
“I wanted to move closer to my good friend, Shane Hollander, but I couldn’t live within 100 miles of Hayden Pike.”
By the end of 2020, Ilya and Shane were both out to their teams and internally around the league. There were some players that suspected there might be something going on between the two of them, given the foundation. Well, that and the fact that Ilya kept referencing Shane (with decreasing subtly) in his answers to the question that had become something of a post-game ritual in Ottawa.
The ritual was so well known at that point that there was a reddit thread before every Centaurs game speculating on what Ilya would respond with that day. Sometimes, Ilya’s answer would get reported on national news if it was a national broadcast or if he gave a particularly unhinged answer.
In January, things changed for Ilya and Shane. Shane and Ilya broke down on the phone together after the Centaur’s plane nearly fell out of the sky. Shane’s carefully constructed act to avoid public outing transformed from a warm blanket to strangle hold. His dedication to staying in the closet had been thinning for the previous couple years, and it’s last few threads finally snapped.
Shane was at Ilya’s house when he returned from Florida and proposed. As Ilya held Shane in bed that night, he heard Shane whisper something unintelligible.
“What was that, moy steteskop?” Ilya ran his finger along Shane’s shoulder.
Shane didn’t move, but Ilya could almost hear the gears turning in his head, “Steteskop?”
“The thing doctors use to listen to your chest.”
“Oh, that makes sense. Stethoscope.”
Ilya hummed and tapped Shane lightly with his forefinger, “What was it you said before?”
“Oh, I said you can tell the truth.” Shane pulled his head off Ilya’s chest to look at him directly, “When they ask you why you signed in Ottawa next game, you can tell them the truth.”
“You are ready?” Ilya held his breath awaiting the answer.
“I mean, we are getting married this summer. Marriage licenses are public record so they will find out either way.” Shane let out a deep breath, as if he had been holding it in for his entire adult life, “At least this way it’s on our terms.”
“As you wish!” Ilya exclaimed as he pulled Shane into a deep kiss.
Shane let out a theatrical sigh, “I wish my mother had never shown you that movie.”
“Is a good movie! You don’t want me to have nice things?” Ilya gave an equally theatrical rebuttal.
The next Centaurs’ game was against the Admirals; it felt like a stroke of fate. He gave a rousing speech to his teammates before the game. None of them knew about his plan to reveal his engagement to Shane after the game. He would have done it pre-game, but there wasn’t a great time to announce it privately beforehand.
The game ended in a 4-2 win for the Centaurs and Ilya approached the media for his usual post-game meeting, he felt terrified giddiness wash over him. The team was really coming together, and he was about to take a step he had been waiting to take for several years.
There were a couple of questions about the team and the game. Right before they let him go a junior reporter asked, “So Rozanov, why did you sign in Ottawa? Was it because you saw this coming?”
A large genuine grin spread across Ilya’s face as he said, “I am happy for the team success, but no. I moved to Ottawa to be closer to my fiancé, Shane Hollander.”
Apparently, the media hadn’t figured out the difference between Ilya’s ‘I am being an asshole’ grin and his ‘I am in love with Shane Hollander’ grin. To be fair, they were sort of similar.
The entire room filled with raucous laughter from everyone except Ilya. You see, Ilya hadn’t considered this eventuality. He had spent almost two and a half seasons keeping up this act where he gave the media a half-truth and they believed it to a whole-lie. He was now being confronted by the repercussions of allowing the entire world to believe him to be a habitual liar.
It was like a really poorly applied case of ‘the boy who cried wolf’ because he was never really lying, they just assumed he was. He didn’t actually need to be lying for this problem to present itself, they just had to assume he was this entire time.
Before Ilya could even correct the record that he was absolutely telling the truth, and that he was actually getting married to Shane Hollander this summer, the PR team was already ushering in Troy for his time with the press.
Ilya went back to the locker room to finish getting undressed from the game and ready to head back home. The entire time Ilya felt a war of emotions storming through him. He was angry they brushed it off. He was kind of proud that he had been so convincing at being full of shit for so long, they still believed it when he wasn’t trying to be. He was embarrassed that he was going to have to call Shane when he got back home to explain he had failed to come out, despite his best efforts.
When Ilya called and told Shane the bad news he laughed, “Yeah, I saw the clip, I guess we just need to make All Star Weekend actually interesting this year.”
“Are we talking full Scott Hunter situation?”
Shane huffed a small chuckle, “No, I’m pretty sure kissing you on the ice would be copyright infringement at this point.” Shane paused for a moment, “Nothing on the ice. What if we just started pretending like we have been out forever?”
Ilya realized what he meant, “Like normal people? Holding hands and kissing in public, but not at work to avoid HR violation?”
“Yes, lets… what was that word Rose used… gaslight? Yes, let’s pretend like we are just another couple. Like they are the ones that are crazy for making it into a big deal.” This was frankly the most feral plan Shane had ever constructed to Ilya’s knowledge. Shane had plans about what to eat every month, how to brush his teeth and how to take Ilya apart in bed. Plans were Shane’s modus operandi, but somehow this specific plan was the opposite.
“Are you ok, do you need doctor?”
Shane laughed, “I know this isn’t exactly my style. We are getting married this summer and we need to come out.” Shane’s voice hardened into something more serious, “The League has taken a lot from us; too much for too long. I don’t feel bad about making a little fun for ourselves at their expense.”
A few weeks later Shane and Ilya flew out to Anaheim for the All-Star Weekend festivities separately. They met up with each other the night before the league events for a date night dinner at a nicer restaurant halfway between the rink and Disneyland. The hotel was not that far from the restaurant, so they decided to walk back together, hand in hand.
On their walk back from the restaurant, a fan in Anaheim for the All-Star game snapped a picture of them holding hands walking down the sidewalk. Ilya turned to Shane and pulled him into a tender kiss. Both of them could hear the surprised yelp from the fan as his camera worked to capture the moment.
As Ilya pulled back, he grinned, “How much do you think he’ll get for the photo?”
“I guess it would depend on whether the media outlets believed he’s not full of shit.”
As it turned out, the media was all over the story and had run it before Shane and Ilya had even woken up the next morning for the opening press conferences. Before Ilya and Shane sat down at the press conference with Scott Hunter and Dallas Kent, Scott pulled the two of them aside.
“What is the deal with the photo?” Scott looked like he couldn’t make heads or tails of what he saw on all of the social media platforms and sports media sites this morning over breakfast.
Ilya could never pass up the opportunity to poke at Hunter, “What? You need your eyes checked, old man? Was pretty clear, no?”
Shane gave Ilya a long-suffering look before turning back to Scott, “What do you want to know?”
“Where do I begin?” He began listing the questions, “First, is the photo real? Second, was it some sort of prank? Third, were you trying to get photographed?”
Ilya raised three fingers, one finger for each word, “Yes. No. Yes.”
“I’m sorry, what?” Scott looked to Shane, as if he needed to speak with an adult.
“We decided to come out this weekend. No statement, no fanfare, no big thing. We were going to act like it’s no big deal for a little fun.” Shane shrugged his shoulders simply.
“That’s insane. A little funny, definitely, but insane.”
The three of them were then called over to sit down to begin the press conference with Kent. Ilya looked at Shane and gestured with a look about the presence of Kent as if asking ‘is he going to be a problem’. Shane again shrugged.
There was a tense atmosphere in the press room. It appeared that the representatives from the league had prohibited mention of the photo published of Shane and Ilya. Ilya wondered how long that would last.
The first question was asked by a senior reporter, “All of you have had several All-Star games appearances. What about this one is unique or interesting?”
All four All-stars on the interview panel looked at one another. The All-Star competition and game have been the exact same every single year for years. The last time something even remotely interesting happened was 2016 with the ‘John Scott situation’.
Scott took one for the team to answer the question, “Anaheim is a great city and it has been fun to explore it more than usual. We don’t get much time in each city between games, so having a little more time here will be nice.”
Ilya nearly rolled his eyes at the typical hockey player answer. What Ilya wanted to say was ‘nothing, there is nothing interesting about this city or this league mandated song and dance’. Instead, Ilya just sat there with a neutral expression and picked at a hangnail.
The next question was far more interesting. While it was clear that the reporters were not allowed to ask directly about the ‘elephant in the room’, they were completely willing to talk around it.
“Did any of you get a chance to explore a little last night?”
This time, Dallas Kent took the opportunity to start the group off with answers, “A couple of the single guys and I went to a nice place last night for dinner. Most guys who brought wives and kids took them to Disney.” He said the last part with a shrug, as if he didn’t understand the appeal of taking your family somewhere for the children to enjoy.
Scott Hunter followed up after that, “A couple of guys from the Admirals and former Admirals went to Schmidty’s place and played poker.” Ilya recalled David Schmidt, a player that got traded from New York to Anaheim earlier in Scott’s career, before the team was any good.
Ilya and Shane looked to one another and smiled; the room went still in anticipation. Shane broke the silence, “We went to a steakhouse last night. We don’t have as much time as we would like with each other, given the distance and game schedules. It is nice to have some time in the same place for a couple days.”
Ilya grabbed Shane’s hand where it rested on the table; there were more than a few pointed flashes from cameras at the back of the room. They had come a long way from resting their shoes against one another underneath the tables at press conferences. Ilya felt like he was soaring when Shane intertwined their fingers on the table.
The press were not done with their interrogation of the new developments in the Hollander-Rozanov rivalry, “Hollander and Rozanov, it seems as though you two have come a long way from being rivals in your rookie seasons. How much of that change is attributed to Rozanov leaving Boston?”
Ilya took the lead on that question, “For you or for us? For you, probably a lot. For us, not at all.” The room filled with confused murmuring.
“Follow up question, what does that mean?”, a different reporter jumped in.
“For you guys,” Ilya waved his hand gesturing vaguely, “the rivalry died down when our teams had less history.” Ilya looked at Shane with his big, dumb heart eyes that he only wore for Shane, “For us, rivalry didn’t end when I went to Ottawa. For us, rivalry never existed, not really.”
A stunned silence filled the room. It seemed that no one knew what to do, the players, media members and the representatives from the league.
Dallas Kent was the one to break the silence, “Are we just going to act like this isn’t insane? What the fuck is going on?”
Shane looked down the table to Kent and put on his best attempt at confusion, “What exactly are you riled up about? There is nothing insane that I can see.”
Ilya added on, “Yes Kent, you are being very dramatic.”
When Scott added on, Ilya nearly laughed out loud, “I know consensual monogamous relationships aren’t really your thing, but they are nothing to be angry or afraid about.”
That was enough to get the league PR staff to immediately step in and call an end to the press conference.
Ilya and Shane were ushered out of the room and directly into a meeting with the league PR staff. They informed the two of them that the commissioner needs to be consulted about their ‘situation’, but he is in meetings with the owners and player association nearly all day negotiating the upcoming collective bargaining agreement.
Ilya could feel Shane thinking beside him as the PR team continued to tell them a bunch of rules that they were absolutely not going to abide by. After the two of them were dismissed. Shane half-led and half-dragged Ilya back to their hotel room.
“I have an idea that I can’t believe we didn’t think of earlier.” Shane smiled, wide and honest.
“Da? Tell me.” Ilya was nervous about the league’s reaction thus far about their sudden public coming out.
“The league has the union reps here to discuss the upcoming CBA. If the CBA isn’t signed soon, it is likely to drag on until it expires. This means a lockout and the league wants that about as much as an enema.”
“Enema?” Ilya asked, thinking he understood the general idea of the plan, but didn't understand that particualar word.
“Its when they squirt medicine up your ass when you can’t shit. Listen, that isn’t important.” Shane kept barreling through explaining the plan, “We need Farah to get a meeting with the union. If we can convince them that protecting us, and by extension other queer players, in the union contract, we could do a lot of good.”
Shane had a point, so Ilya and Shane called Farah later that afternoon before the skills competition to ask if she could arrange a meeting with the union team negotiating the CBA. Farah managed to organize a meeting before Crowell was able to demand one from them in turn.
The three of them worked on a list of things they wanted to present as protections the CBA could include for queer players. Among them included: prohibition against being forced to stay in the closet or lie about sexual orientation, prohibition against team or league management to organize meetings to discuss personal conduct of a queer player that would not be also applicable to straight players, responsibility of the league and teams to prevent hate speech of any kind in the arena, equal treatment of partners and spouses of all genders by the teams and league.
The meeting with the union went well. Farah helped Shane and Ilya lay out what they hoped to see in the next CBA. What the union rep told them in response was somewhat shocking.
“We were already strongly considering similar protections, along with other protections to allow players to be themselves at the rink.” The shock on Ilya and Shane’s faces must have been obvious, because he continued, “Scott Hunter coming out was viewed by the owners as a doomsday scenario. The thing is, if we look at the fan and sponsor response, it has been largely positive.”
Shane hesitantly asked, “That doesn’t make sense. If Hunter coming out benefitted the league, why is the commissioner still trying to keep a lid on other queer players?”
“Well, the commissioner represents the owners and most of them trust him to inform them about things that are good for business or bad for business.” The man ran his hand through his short, greying hair, “The problem is that when one person with a lot of power has some… old fashioned perspectives, it can lead to worse outcomes for everyone involved.”
Ilya spoke up for the first time in a while, “So him being homophobe is costing the owners money?”
“Yes. That is a succinct way of putting it. After Hunter came out, as well as after his awards night speech, his jersey sales jumped pretty significantly. It also looks like the Admirals ticket prices increased a great deal as well.”
Shane had his brows furrowed together, “That makes no sense. Hockey has never been welcoming for queer people.”
Farah stepped in, putting it all together, “By having queer players, it opens the league to new viewership and fanbase markets. A good proportion of the North American younger population identify as queer or allies. Moving away from 'lip service' with actual change can show them that hockey can be for them, it opens the league up to a large untapped market.”
The union rep nodded, “The union is here for the players and making sure their needs are met to the best of our ability. The owners mostly don’t care about the way the league runs, as long as it pads their wallets. Ensuring the protection of the queer players does both at the same time. We just need to keep Crowell out of it.”
Farah, Ilya and Shane left the meeting satisfied that the union heard the concerns they were having, as well as confirmation that the union rep would be attending their meeting with Crowell the following morning.
When Crowell met with Shane and Ilya, he was surprised when they were accompanied by the union rep and their agent. Crowell barely started up with his predictable spiel regarding the appropriate conduct of players before both Farah and the union rep stepped in.
“That is not a topic of discussion we are willing to entertain right now.” The union rep jumped in before Crowell could truly get going.
Farah made sure to add, “Or ever again, for that matter.”
A flustered Crowell ended the meeting shortly thereafter and Shane and Ilya were left to continue contributing to the All-Star weekend. After the end of the All-Star break, things were icy in the Montreal locker room. Meanwhile, in Ottawa the team rejoiced over the news that Ilya and Shane were engaged.
The Centaurs had been worried for some time about Ilya being a lonely and miserable bachelor who needed a partner to cheer his spirits. They had had no idea what Ilya actually looked like single and miserable, certainly not like the Boston Bears did during the great Rosepocalypse of 2016/2017.
Tensions in the Voyagers’ locker room continued to mount, but management did not want to trade Shane during a year that looked like a cup contention year.
Montreal played horribly down the stretch to the end of the regular season; Shane carried Montreal to the playoffs kicking and screaming. Due to the cliff dive in performance, when the playoffs began, Montreal was only third seed in the Atlantic division. They played second seed, Tampa Bay, in the first round, rather than the wildcard team, the Ottawa Centaurs.
Shane pulled the Voyagers through the first round of the playoffs valiantly. Ilya and the rest of the Centaurs put up a valiant effort against Carolina, but the team was fairly lacking in playoff experience, and thus promptly eliminated, but not before pushing the Hurricanes to seven games.
Shane continued to carry the team through two more series, all the way to the Stanley Cup Final. Ilya attended all of the games in Montreal, standing alongside Shane’s parents, wearing his fiancé’s jersey. The Voyagers lost that playoff series, and for the first time in his life, Shane cared little about winning the team trophy. Shane won the Conn Smythe, only the sixth player in league history to win the trophy despite being on the losing team.
Shane was secretly and vindictively thrilled by that outcome. It meant that the league recognized and rewarded his contributions and that none of his scummy teammates would get their next contracts padded by a Stanley Cup win they didn’t really contribute much to.
That summer Shane and Ilya were married and Shane signed in Ottawa. When the new CBA was announced to replace the agreement expiring in 2022, Shane, Ilya and Scott Hunter were there to support the PA during the announcement. The PA made sure to mention the contributions of the queer players into their newest privacy and protections clauses that they had negotiated for.
The head of the players association spoke to the press, “The league has said for a long time, ‘hockey is for everyone’ without taking the necessary steps to make sure that is truly the reality of the situation. The Players association is proud to stand behind all of the players, and we mean all.” He paused and looked at Shane, Ilya and Hunter, “In this new agreement we made sure that all players have protections to allow them to be themselves, in any capacity they choose to, on and off the ice.”
Ilya and Shane were able to take some of the weight off of Scott insofar as the queer representation in hockey was concerned. Additionally, after the announcement from the PA, more players felt comfortable coming out. Having very clear and specific protection from retaliation from the league and their individual teams made them feel more confident making that decision. The number of out queer players rose steadily over the following years.
While there were always players that did not like sharing the league with queer players, coaches, staff and fans, their voices were drowned out by the influx of queer fans that found community in hockey for the first time.