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Therapy helps, except when it doesn’t. Like when Ilya walks out of his most recent session with Galina, feeling like his insides have been scraped raw.
It seems like your partner has a support system. You’re allowed to have one too, Ilya.
Sure, easy for her to say. Because Dr. Galina is a therapist, not a world famous hockey player concealing a decade long gay affair with their rival. Tell someone, as if Ilya coming out to another queer teammate in need hadn’t caused a fight. Somehow, Ilya’s locked into the closet, and everyone he loves is on the outside. Including Shane. His fucking boyfriend.
Ilya loves him. As previously noted. But his chest is also spread through with fault lines, that keep shaking further and further apart. With every day alone, with each loss, with each moment Ilya understands that this is forever. Or maybe not forever, but for a long fucking time. He doesn’t regret it, can’t regret Shane. Would choose it all again. But he’s so fucking tired. And so, so fucking lonely.
He goes to the rink, hoping to squeeze in an extra workout before the game tomorrow and exist around other people. Ilya knows he’s been a terrible Captain to the Centaurs. Done a terrible job pulling them together into a unit, when both his hands are occupied holding his own ribcage in place.
You’re a great Captain. The reassurance sounds like Shane. But it rings strangely faded, strangely hollow, like Ilya can’t remember his boyfriend’s voice. There’s no excuse for it, they’ve spent longer away from each other. It’s simply bad luck, that Shane’s roadtrip ends when Ilya’s begins. Bad luck, that Shane continues to room with Pike by choice, and insists on being terribly considerate with how frequently they call. Ilya doesn’t want to be considerate. Ilya wants to hear his boyfriend’s voice, so that maybe for ten seconds he can pretend someone stands with him, bracing against the black wave threatening to drag him out to sea.
Christ. Ilya exhausts himself. Spiraling into gloom like some god awful Russian novel written by a man who loves the gray of Moscow more than any sunshine.
He doesn’t run into a single fucking soul at the rink. Because not even fate will inflict Ilya on someone else today.
Maybe Shane’s better off on the road. Better off far, far away from Ilya. Maybe this is contagious, this sadness, and Ilya caught it from his mother, and everyone around him is in danger, and he will ruin his precious things by simple association, and–
Maybe, maybe, maybe.
He gets McDonald’s delivered. Thinks about Shane’s disapproval and wishes he had a cigarette. Wonders why the Big Mac still tastes of ash, when there’s not a pack in the house. The store forgot his fucking french fries, too.
Ilya takes a sip of his soda. He grimaces. Fucking Dr. Pepper.
~
Ilya sleeps like shit. Nothing new, especially not lately. But he lays there for a long time. Limbs leaden, head aching, the phantom of his mother’s fingers slipping through his own. She would know with one glance. She would see his face, and her brow would furrow, and she would cluck her tongue, and she would brush his limp curls off his forehead and crawl into bed next to him and hold him.
Shane would know too, if Ilya ever let him see a morning like this. But Ilya doesn’t, and won’t, and can’t when they aren’t even in the same country half the season.
He crawls out of bed eventually.
There’s nothing to be done about the dark circles under his eyes, but Ilya settles the mask of Captain on well enough by the time the team trickles into the locker room for warm-ups. Troy’s so silently anxious about the first Toronto home game that Ilya considers sedating him. Everyone else, from Haas right through to Bood requires another piece of Ilya, another ounce of reassurance drawn from a well Ilya used to think was bottomless. No one likes playing Toronto, and no one likes playing Dallas Kent.
“We leave it all out on the ice,” Ilya demands. “We are better people and better players than Toronto. We will prove it.” He wishes desperately that he could trick himself into believing it.
Crouched for the first face-off, eyes locked on Dallas Kent, Ilya’s lip curls. Waste of space of a human being.
“Rozanov,” Kent sneers. “Guess it’s true what they say about Russians. You must be dumb as a bag of rocks to move to a backwater team like Ottawa.”
Ilya feigns a yawn. “Yes, yes. This is old news, Kent. You need new material. Maybe try some anonymous Reddit threads. They are good at sharing the truth.”
“Fuck you,” Kent snaps. His cheeks flush a bright, angry, red. It makes him look like Ilya’s niece, when she still threw tantrums. “I used to look up to you, man. Fast goals, fast cars, fast women. Now you’re just a pathetic has-been on his way out, pretending to be some kind of saint.”
The words don’t sting, not really. Kent’s chirps on the ice usually default to slurs, because he’s bad at thinking on his feet. And Ilya knows himself better than that, knows that he’s no saint and that he could die happy with the knowledge that Kent hates him. But Ilya also can’t deny that losing fucking sucks. That sometimes it feels like all the skill, all the potential that made Shane fall in love with him is gone.
Ilya grits his teeth and wins the face-off.
Kent’s opening chirps apparently used up his creativity. Bood drops gloves first, over something sneered too quietly for Ilya or the refs to hear. Troy receives merciless check after check into the boards. Ilya fights through the neutral zone to score a single goal, unassisted. But the game is a bloodbath. The Centaurs are not a bad team. They shouldn’t be a bad team. Hayes in goal is a fucking beast, Ilya, Bood, and Troy make a solid first line. Luca has barely tapped his potential. And yet.
Something is missing. Something stops them from winning games. Whether it’s a mental block, resignation to their status in the MLH, or Ilya’s failure as a Captain, they can’t get it together.
Midway through the third period, Toronto is up 3-1. Kent crushes Ilya against the boards, fighting to steal the puck. His elbow bruises Ilya’s ribs, even through all the padding. With an awkward and vaguely painful twist of his wrist, Ilya manages to send the puck sloppily in Bood’s direction. Kent shoves him against the boards again just once, and quickly enough to get away with it. He doesn’t skate away immediately.
“Heard your friend Hollander’s a fucking cocksucker,” Kent spits. “That how he convinced you to do that stupid charity shit? Maybe you’re both faggots, and the league should protect the rest of us–”
Ilya’s fist connects with Kent’s jaw before his gloves have even hit the ice. Kent swings back, clips him in the chin, but Ilya doesn’t feel it. Only lashes out again. Savors the familiar crunch of a nose breaking under his knuckles.
It’s a stupidly dangerous thing to drop gloves for. To keep his composure almost all game, and start swinging when Shane’s name leaves Kent’s mouth? Obvious, risky, exactly the opposite of every conversation Ilya and his boyfriend have had on the subject. But Ilya’s so. fucking. tired.
Hitting something feels good. For one terrifying second, Ilya thinks he understands his father and brother. That sucks the fun right out of Kent’s tooth plinking onto the ice. Instead, Ilya’s stomach turns and he disengages, skates backwards with his hands raised.
A ref gets a hand on his chest, and he sees another grab hold of Kent, who’s still on his feet. Bood’s there too, fist knotted in the back of Ilya’s jersey. “Christ, Rozy. Can’t say that wasn’t satisfying to watch.”
By the time Ilya escapes the penalty box, Toronto’s scored another goal and a third of the fans have trickled out. The Centaurs lose at home, 4-1.
The mood in the locker room is subdued. Ilya can’t find it in himself to try to change it. With the game over, every ounce of exhaustion he’d pushed aside comes flooding back. His body aches, his eyes are coated in sand, and if Ilya could lay down right here on the disgusting floor he would. Let him disintegrate into the mats, just one more mess for the cleaners. It would be easier that way. No more dragging himself through gray days, waiting for their schedules to align long enough for the sun to come out.
The fantasy doesn’t feel great. It scares him, just a little. Ilya will bring it up with Galina during their next session and hope that’s enough to keep his mother’s ghost at bay.
A hand lands on his shoulder, firm through the pads that Ilya still hasn’t removed. “You alright, Roz?” Bood asks.
“Fine,” Ilya says before he’s even made eye contact. Bood looks at him. More serious than his usual stare, more assessing. Like he’s noting down Ilya’s dark circles, the slight vacancy to him, the nearly imperceptible exhausted sway that he can’t stop. As if Bood is proving every hockey player stereotype wrong, and doing the complicated calculus to figure Ilya out. Ilya can’t let him. No matter how badly he wants it, that’s not what he and Shane have agreed.
“Listen, if you ever want to talk–”
“Ilya!” Harris appears at their shoulders. He glances between them curiously. “Am I interrupting?”
“Interrupt all you want,” Ilya says. A bit too honestly, judging by Bood’s sharp look. “Especially if you have brought Chiron?”
Harris laughs. “No puppy today, sorry. I need you for media.”
Ah. Fuck. Maybe a conversation with Bood would be better after all. The last thing Ilya wants to do right now is find another mask and slip it on. He does not want to smile for the cameras and pretend that he is okay with losing. That he is okay with playing a hockey game where the slurs were as numerous as the goals. That he is okay.
“Of course, I am big star of the game,” Ilya smirks. “Maybe more punches than goals this time, but still very impressive, yes?”
“I threw some punches, too,” Bood mutters.
“And they were very pretty. But I am prettier.”
Stripping down to his compression layer, Ilya lets himself be led away. As if bending over to remove his skates didn’t make his vision spotty. As if Ilya’s eyes aren’t gummy with exhaustion.
He sweeps into the press room and drops down to sit behind the microphone. “Let’s get this over with, yes?” Ilya tells the gathered crowd. “I have very important date with my pillow. Cannot be late.”
Most of the reporters at least chuckle. “Tell us about the game, Rozanov. What do you think went wrong for the Centaurs tonight?”
Ilya shrugs. “Sometimes it is just not our night. We are still adjusting our lines, getting used to new blades on the ice, figuring out plays. Is still early in the season. Toronto won’t be ready for us next time.” There, that’s diplomatic enough.
Except reporters are sharks. “Are you saying the loss is due to the Centaurs’ newest player, Troy Barrett? He left Toronto under less than auspicious circumstances, and a mid-season trade can be disruptive,” a man in an ill-fitting suit says, voice leading. Probably from Barstool.
Harris frowns at Ilya from the back of the room. But Ilya’s no idiot and he honestly likes Troy, believes he’s trying to be better. “No. Losses are never because of one player. Barrett is settling well on the team. He is great addition.”
The questions keep coming. Most, Ilya answers on autopilot. Though he will never be as media-trained as Shane, Ilya has done enough of these that he can practically sleepwalk through them.
“That fight between you and Dallas Kent in the third looked nasty. Can you tell us what sparked it?” A woman with a severely cut bob asks.
Ilya smiles, even if it kills him. “Ah, some hockey players, they have this problem where their mouth opens and shit falls out. I am a good samaritan, yes? I try to help Kent close his mouth.”
That gets him more laughs.
Other questions hurt, even when Ilya should be numb to them. “Boston netted another win against Washington just a few hours ago. Nights like tonight must make you regret trading in gold for red, right, Rozanov?”
Fuck them, fuck this. The same question, asked a million different ways, for going on three years. What will it take them to stop? Because even tonight, after a shitty game, and a shitty day, and a shitty week, Ilya wouldn’t take it back. Wouldn’t walk back into the Raiders’ arms. Shane is worth it. Even when Ilya only gets to steal pieces of him during the season, even when they spend so much time apart, it’s all worth it. Ilya loves him more than anything. And he knows that Shane loves him almost that much too.
“No regrets,” Ilya says firmly. “I am a Centaur. I care about Centaur games, not Boston.”
Ilya’s about to drop, by the time Harris signals he can wrap it up. Mind already drifting to a shower, to falling into bed, to sleeping until at least midafternoon as long as the dreams leave him alone, Ilya points to Frankie from the Ottawa Citizen.
She likes him, likes the team. She never picks at him the way the other reporters do, and seems perpetually optimistic about the team’s future. Ilya picks her, because whenever she gets the last question she always throws him a softball. What are you looking forward to on your off-day? What’s the team’s go-to karaoke song right now? Any word on a logo redesign?
“Ilya, nice to see you again. Tough loss tonight after a string of rough games. If you could be with anyone right now to help you through it, who would that be?” Frankie smiles at him.
Another easy one to answer. Even if it’s just one more hit to the fracturing ceramic of his heart. Because Ilya says My team, of course, we support each other, but what he thinks, what he wants so badly to say, is, “My boyfriend.”
Silence. Complete and total. Ilya doesn’t understand Frankie’s widening eyes, the shifting energy of the room, the blood draining from Harris’s face.
“Did, uh,” Frankie starts. She sounds faint. “Did you just say your boyfriend?”
Ilya’s stomach drops. Oh. Oh, fuck.
He doesn’t know what his face does. There will probably be pictures of this moment all over the internet by tomorrow morning. He doubts it’s flattering, considering there’s a non-zero chance he’s going to throw up all over the microphone.
Ilya scrambles. Too tired, too shocked at his own brain’s betrayal to know how to fix this. “Blyat,” he spits. Then he laughs, and even he can hear that it sounds more wild than genuine. “English language is hard, yes? I meant my boys, my boys who are my friends. The Centaurs, yes? They are all my boy friends.”
Fuck, fuck. That was about as convincing as Shane’s insistence that he enjoys his terrible smoothies. Fuck. Shane.
Then Harris is there, as the noise crescendos and the reporters begin shouting over each other. Frankie isn’t shouting and she looks terribly guilty. So much for a softball question to end things. Ilya wishes the ground could split and swallow him whole.
“Alright! That is all we have today. Have a good night everyone,” Harris calls. And then Harris takes him by the arm and yanks him out of the scrum.
Stumbling over his feet, Ilya allows himself to be tugged into an empty tape review room. They’re already most of the way back to the locker room. Harris walks fast in a crisis, apparently.
“Did you mean to publicly come out as the second active gay player after a random mid-season loss against Toronto?” Harris asks, voice pleasant. He looks like how Ilya feels. About to vibrate out of his skin.
“No, definitely not,” Ilya croaks. He thinks this must be similar to Shane’s panic attacks. The absolute surety that he’s fucked up his entire life and that his chest is caving in and the walls are caving in too. “I am bisexual, not gay.”
“Oh, right, of course!” Harris sounds hysterical. “My mistake. I can’t believe I thought you were homophobic when I started!”
That surprises Ilya enough that he forgets to panic. “You thought I was homophobic?”
Harris throws up his hands. “What was I supposed to think? You kept staring at me and trying to keep me away from the guys in the locker room!”
Ilya winces. “I was trying to keep you safe, yes? Most teams would not react so well, having a gay man in the room. Thought I could make sure they didn’t start things.”
“You made yourself my gay– sorry, bi bodyguard,” Harris says faintly. “Sure, great. But what the hell were you thinking, just now?”
And the panic returns. “I was not, was not thinking,” Ilya says clumsily. “I’m tired, I did not sleep. I was doing the interview on automatic, yes? Meant to say ‘my team’ but the truth slipped out instead.”
Harris softens. “You do look tired. But Ilya, it’s out there now. You get that, right? We’re going to have to put out a statement–”
“No.” Ilya swallows, startled by his own sharpness. “I mean. Statement, yes, probably. But not yet. My boyfriend, he is a secret. I was not supposed to say anything. I need to talk to him first.”
Harris sighs. “Okay. I can buy you a little time until tomorrow. But you should talk to him, fast.”
Christ. What is Ilya even going to say? Hi, sweetheart. Remember when we fought about me telling a single teammate that I was bisexual less than a month ago? Well now I accidentally told the entire planet and I can never return to Russia and also I told them I had a boyfriend. Please don’t leave me.
Ilya, embarrassingly, wants to cry. He’s become increasingly familiar with the feeling over the past few months.
“Okay, yes,” he manages. “I will do this.”
Harris starts pushing him toward the door, as if he plans to hold Ilya to his word imminently. Then Harris freezes. “Shit. Do the guys… know? About you?”
Ilya’s glad that he’s facing the door. That means Harris can’t see the way his face crumbles. Ilya has barely let himself have this, too afraid of holding onto the Centaurs too tightly, too caught up in his own shit to let them in. “No.”
Harris’s voice turns fierce. “If they give you any problems, let me know. I’ll make their lives hell.”
It’s… sweet. Ilya isn’t worried, not as much as he thought he would be. The team is good, they’ve never balked at Harris, and while a queer Captain is certainly more than a queer member of staff… Ilya doesn’t think he’ll lose them to this part.
But, as Troy proved, knowing that Ilya is bisexual and that he has a boyfriend leads to some pretty obvious conclusions. Shane might not be publicly out, but word has traveled through most of the league. Connecting the dots won’t be hard. He’s surprised Harris hasn’t called him out yet. The shock must be too much.
If Ilya thought that the reporters were loud, it’s nothing compared to walking into the locker room. He and Harris both flinch when they open the door.
“–won the bet then?” Chouinard demands. “Because I had money on a girlfriend and that’s basically–”
“All of us had money on a girl!” Boyle interrupts. “You’re not fucking special man. And didn’t you say that you thought she was married?”
“Well–”
“Pretty sure Pointy had money down on some type of international art heist,” Young calls. “So he’s definitely out at least.”
“Why?” Luca asks LaPointe.
“Ottawa’s got a lot of museums, man.”
“We still don’t know who he is,” Bood says firmly. “Once we know, we can decide who gets the pot. I think it’s fair to just have our bets change genders. Maybe he’s married, or famous, or a politician, or Shane Hollander’s dad.”
Ilya coughs. Every head in the room turns toward him in sync. Like the animatronics Ilya pretends aren’t terrifying. “You think I am dating Hollander’s dad?”
“Roz!”
Ilya finds himself jostled and yanked around by an entire pack of hockey players. He ends up in the center of the room. The only person who looks as surprised at this reaction as Ilya feels is Troy Barrett. The newest Centaurs player is leaning against his locker looking painfully overwhelmed. Ilya relates.
“I can’t believe you didn’t tell us you have a boyfriend, Roz!” Dykstra sounds offended. “Did you move to Ottawa for him?”
“Can I send his number to Cassie?” Bood asks. “She’s pissed he isn’t in the WAG chat already, or something.”
“Is he hot?” Young calls.
“Is he another player?” Hayes asks, studying him carefully.
“Is it Justin Trudeau?”
“Can we–”
Ilya claps his hands. “Okay, okay, enough!” When the room quiets, he continues. “I did not plan to do this today. My relationship is very private, for many reasons. Was an accident, but now you know. I need to talk to my boyfriend before I say anything else.”
They might look disappointed, but no one protests. And no one, not a single person, looks angry with him. Excited, curious, neutral, but not angry.
“But our questions…” LaPointe says, sounding pathetic.
Ilya sighs. “Fine. Yes. Maybe. Yes. Yes. No. Probably. Figure it out.”
A beat of silence. And then the argument starts up louder than before, over who asked what question in which order and–
Ilya takes the attentional shift to breathe. His knees still feel like they’re about to give out at any moment. His phone lays silenced in his locker, screen down, a ticking bomb.
Troy sidles up next to him. “They weren’t mad,” he tells Ilya quietly. “No one called you slurs or anything.”
Ilya hopes his smile looks convincing instead of the wrong side of manic. “I told you. This team is good.”
He pulls his game-day suit over his sweat-stiffened compression layer. There’s no way Ilya can wait to shower here. He needs to get home.
“Roz.”
Ilya lifts his head, letting his duffel drop half-filled. Bood assesses him silently, probably noticing all the little things Ilya can’t keep suppressing. The tremble of his hands, the bitten-raw lip, the pallor of his skin.
Bood reaches out and squeezes his shoulder. Just like he’d done before Harris pulled Ilya for media. “We got your back. You should bring your boyfriend to the Christmas party at my place. We’d love to meet him.”
“Maybe,” Ilya says, after a moment. “Maybe. We will see.”
He just hopes he still has a boyfriend to bring, by the time Christmas rolls around.
~
Ilya unlocks his phone in the relative privacy of his car. Notifications keep flashing along the top of the screen as he tries to navigate to his call log. Texts, Twitter, Instagram, fucking emails. Who is emailing him about this? It’s 10pm. Do people even watch post-game press for a boring game where one Canadian team crushes another?
He has no missed calls or messages from Shane. He must be asleep. He has an early flight tomorrow.
Yuna’s name and picture take over Ilya’s screen. He can’t ignore her. He accepts the call.
She sounds frazzled. “Ilya! Are you okay? What happened? Did the Centaurs–”
David’s voice cuts her off, further away from the phone, but still audible. “Honey, let him breathe.”
Ilya’s eyes burn. He digs the heel of his hand into his left eye, as if he could smother all the complicated feeling. “Centaurs were okay. They did not care. I think they had a bet.”
“A bet?” Yuna demands. “Well. Are you okay? You looked tired, Ilya. David and I have been worried about you.”
And oh. What is Ilya supposed to say to that? How does he tell his boyfriend’s parents, no, I am maybe not okay, because loving your son is ripping me apart, and now, after I fucked up this badly, he might not even let me keep loving him.
He must have been silent for too long, because Yuna hums. Her voice changes from worry to that familiar tone Ilya loves so much in Shane. “David and I can head over to your house now. Have you eaten dinner yet? We can bring–” A Hollander with a plan is an unstoppable force, but if Ilya has to endure one more person looking at him today he will shatter. He will shatter so completely and profoundly that he won’t be able to put himself back together again, and he can’t, can’t do that without talking to Shane first. Without knowing if it’s worth trying to superglue his pieces in place for a while longer.
“No,” Ilya starts. Yuna tries to speak, but he continues, cutting her off as gently as he can manage. “No, please. I think I need to be alone. And…” Ilya trails off.
Yuna’s sigh crackles over the line. “Have you spoken to Shane yet?”
“Not yet,” Ilya says. He’s embarrassed to hear his voice break.
“Okay. We’ll let you two talk, then. But we’re coming over first thing in the morning,” Yuna declares
David’s voice comes through clearer, as if he’s pressing his mouth close to the receiver. “You two are going to be just fine, son. We love you.”
“Love you too,” Ilya manages, before he hangs up to save his dignity.
His teammates are starting to trickle out of the building. There’s still nothing from Shane, and Ilya doesn’t want to have this breakdown in a parking lot in full view of the Centaurs. He drives home, anxiously checking for a message at every stoplight.
Ilya makes it inside. He strips off his suit jacket and button-down and drops onto the couch. He can’t bring himself to do anything more before calling Shane.
Shane sleeps with his phone on Do Not Disturb. Very few people bypass it. Ilya, his parents, Farah, and Pike. Not even Theriault makes the list, which Ilya has always been secretly pleased by. Ilya crumples his dress shirt in one hand while he waits out the ringing.
“‘lya?” Shane mumbles. He sounds groggy, clearly woken from a deep sleep. “What’s wrong?”
“Shane,” Ilya says. He opens his mouth. And then closes it. “Shane.” This time his voice cracks.
“Ilya, hey.” Over the line, he hears the rustle of bedsheets. He pictures Shane sitting up, the phone pressed tight to his cheek. “What’s going on? Are you okay?”
Somewhere in the background, Pike’s voice says something. Ilya can’t decipher the words, and he doesn’t care. He’s too busy trying to remember the way Shane sounds, the way his lips shape Ilya’s name like something important. The idea of sliding backwards, of Shane returning to a distant Rozanov turns Ilya’s very blood to acid.
“I fucked up,” Ilya chokes out. “Shane, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to.”
“What? Is this about the game? I know it was a tough loss, but–”
That’s Ilya’s boyfriend. One track mind, because everything comes back to hockey. Ilya snorts. Hopes Shane can’t hear that the sound is wetter than it should be. “No. Fuck Dallas Kent, I don’t care about the fucking game. Did you watch after?”
“Your post-game press? No, I was falling asleep. Why? Did something happen?” Shane asks. He sounds so confused.
“I fucked it up, Shane. I didn’t mean to, I promise,” Ilya says again.
Pike’s voice this time is loud enough for Ilya to hear. “Uh, Shane buddy? You might want to see this.”
Ilya waits. Waits in painful silence because the video isn’t loud enough to hear his own voice damning them. He knows when the video ends, because Shane’s sharp inhale is perfectly audible. “Well, shit,” Pike says.
“Hayd, can you–”
“Of course man. Call me when I can come back.”
More rustling, and a distant door closes.
“Ilya–” Shane starts.
And it’s too much. It’s all too much. The loneliness, the sadness, the losing, the secrecy. Ilya’s certainty that he is important to Shane, but not as important as Shane is to him. The knowledge that there are years more of this, of this half-existence. Of sleeping in a bed half empty, daydreaming about Shane there beside him.
The tears Ilya has been fighting since the stupid press room, since the game, since last night, spill over. He can’t breathe. The feeling is bigger than the morning after Halloween. So much bigger, like the dark wave has swallowed him whole and swept him away and he’s lost sight of the shore. “I’m sorry, please. Shane, please don’t–” Ilya barely notices that he’s speaking in Russian.
“Ilya,” Shane’s voice is alarmed. “Hey, can you take a deep breath for me?” Ilya tries, but his head pounds and he feels so tired and Shane is so far away. “Ilyusha, listen to me, baby. Deep breath.”
Ilya hears Shane’s breathing over the line. Faster, shorter. Not quite a panic attack, but probably held back only because Ilya’s busy falling apart like some kind of child. Everything is so big. He tries, for Shane. Tries to apply the superglue with trembling hands. “I’m sorry,” Ilya says again, when he manages two deep breaths in a row.
Shane hushes him. “Keep breathing. Have you been sleeping? You looked so tired. I didn’t notice before now.”
Ilya speaks without thinking. A hallmark of tonight it seems. “I keep dreaming of my mother.”
For a long second, Shane says nothing. When he speaks, it’s tentative, hesitant, “Are they… good dreams?”
Ilya laughs, short and bitter. “No. I don’t know. I’m so tired, Shane. Was trying very hard, but I think I am like her. Sad.”
“Oh,” Shane breathes in sharply. “You don’t think about–” There’s fear in his voice. Ilya hates that he’s the one that caused it.
“No,” Ilya tells him. But he remembers before the game, and it feels like lying. “Or not really. Not– Just, sometimes I think it would be easier for everyone, if I wasn’t–” He’s not explaining this right, but his ability to manipulate words, to express his jagged inside in a way his boyfriend can understand has left him entirely.
“It wouldn’t be easier,” Shane says immediately. “Ilya, I– I wouldn’t survive it. Losing you. It would kill me. Don’t–” Fuck, Ilya’s a terrible boyfriend. Because Shane sounds on the verge of tears, and Ilya’s not even there to hold him, to be held. Because hearing Shane’s terror is oddly reassuring, a sign that maybe Ilya matters to him just as much.
“I wouldn’t,” Ilya promises. “I won’t. I’m seeing someone, a therapist. She is helping me, Shane, you won’t lose me.” Maybe he shouldn’t promise. Ilya’s sure that his mother believed the same thing once. But Ilya likes to think that he has more to live for than she did. His mother had him and his brother and nothing else. Just a cold, empty house and a husband that hated them all.
Ilya’s house is empty and cold, but he knows, knows that people love him.
“Okay,” Shane’s sigh is shaky. “Okay. We can talk more about that later. Are you safe, baby? The Centaurs didn’t…” Shane trails off. When Shane came out to the Metros, they hadn’t been kind. Things are better now, barely, but Ilya understands his wariness.
Ilya’s dress shirt is wrinkled beyond repair. He loosens his death grip and brings a sleeve up to his face to scrub at the wetness there. It’s gross, but Shane isn’t there to judge him. “I’m safe. The Centaurs, they do not care. Well, they care but not in a bad way. They had bets on why I moved to Ottawa. Now they think I am dating your dad or Justin Trudeau.”
“What?”
“Shane,” Ilya says again. “I know you did not want this. I wasn’t thinking. It was a mistake. Can you forgive me, solnyshko?”
“Ilya…” Shane’s breath crackles through the phone. “Baby, I’m not going to be mad at you about an accident. We always knew this could happen. I’m freaking out a little, but I guess this is better than someone leaking pictures of us or something.”
Ilya winces. That would be… bad. The only thing worse would be a video of them making out. “What do you want me to do? I didn’t mention your name but–”
“We can talk to Farah in the morning. She’ll probably have ideas about a press release. I don’t–” And here Shane cuts himself off. He starts again. “I think we should keep our relationship out of it, but I don’t know if that’s…”
If that’s realistic, Ilya finishes silently. No one called him out on it in the locker room, but it’s only a matter of time, right? Once they know that Ilya’s bisexual, it’s inevitable that they connect him to Shane. Farah will probably want them to get out ahead of it. “I’m sorry.”
“Ilya, stop. I love you. I love you so fucking much. We’ll figure it out,” Shane says firmly.
“I wish you were here,” Ilya confesses.
“Fuck, me too.” They sit silently. Even just the sound of Shane’s voice is enough to lighten some of Ilya’s darkness. He’s still at sea, but now Ilya can see the stars. Can start to navigate his way to shore. “Have you eaten dinner yet, baby?”
Ilya laughs. Perhaps not all similarities between mothers and sons have to be bad. Perhaps, sometimes, they can even be good.
~
“Are you sure about this?” Ilya asks.
It’s early evening on Boxing Day. They’ve parked up the street from Bood’s house, a chickpea salad made with protein pasta in the backseat.
In the weeks since Ilya’s accidental outing, the media response has begun to die down. Ilya released a statement with the help of Harris and Farah that confirmed his bisexuality but asked for privacy. The internet appeared to be full of men absolutely horrified that their idol liked sucking dick and every woman Ilya ever fucked confirming that yes, he was also good at eating pussy.
Ilya received texts from players across the league. Most were some version of what the fuck??? but Scott Hunter had sent him an uncomfortably sincere apology for not realizing ‘why Ilya always brought people to the Kingfisher.’ Of course, Ilya reassured Hunter that he knew soft tissue like brains degraded from fossils first, so he didn’t expect anything better. He’d spent time on Wikipedia for that chirp, and all Hunter sent back was a middle finger emoji. So boring. Marlow sent him a blurry picture of the trans flag and nothing else, but at least he had the spirit.
“They basically know already,” Shane says. The bravado in his voice is paper thin, considering Ilya can see his reddened fingers twisting together. “Right?”
“I think so, yes.” The first practice back, Bood squeezed his shoulder and told him they wanted to get to know his boyfriend, ‘outside of work.’ That things must have been so hard with ‘games’ and their ‘schedules.’
But now, reflecting on it, Ilya isn’t so sure. Their reactions were more muted than he would have expected in that case. And, surprisingly, the internet hasn’t suggested Shane as a possible boyfriend. Fabian Selah, Scott Hunter, Troy Barrett, Cliff Marlow, the barista at Ilya’s favorite coffee shop. But not Shane Hollander. According to Shane, the Metros have been… unkind (outright homophobic), and yet no one has asked if they’re dating.
It’s a matter of time though. They may have to make an announcement sooner, rather than later. And Ilya wants his team to know first.
“Let’s just do it,” Shane decides. He reaches for the handle on the door.
“Wait,” Ilya says. “You forgot something.”
Shane drops his hand like it’s on fire. Ilya can practically hear him running through their checklist in his head. Ilya loves him so much. “What–”
“My kiss,” Ilya says, pursing his lips.
Shane rolls his eyes. But he leans forward across the console anyway, brushing their lips together once, twice. Their matching holiday sweaters are comfortable, rather than scratchy. Shane’s stylist is worth the money after all. “Happy now?”
“Yes,” Ilya says.
They walk up Bood’s driveway together. Ilya can hear too loud voices from the front step. “Ready?”
Shane takes a deep breath. “Yes.”
Ilya finds the door unlocked and lets himself in. He shows Shane where to kick off his shoes and hang his coat and then they follow the noise.
Dykstra spots him first. “Cap! You came! And you brought your–” Then his eyes practically fall out of his head. Ah. Ilya was right then. They came to some other, stupider conclusion.
“That’s Shane Hollander,” LaPointe says. He can’t seem to close his mouth.
“Um. Hi,” Shane waves. “Thanks for having me?”
“You’re not the mascot,” Bood winces. “Fuck. Why did we think–”
“I knew it,” Wyatt declares. He nudges Lisa. “I told you, didn’t I?”
“Who won the bet?” Chouinard wonders. “Is David Hollander closest? Or–”
Boyle immediately starts arguing and the room devolves.
Cassie takes the chance to duck away from her husband. She thanks them both for the food and gestures them into the kitchen. Ilya glances at his boyfriend and winces. Shane looks overwhelmed and even more nervous than he was in the car. Fuck.
Once the bowl of pasta salad is safely deposited on a near overflowing counter, Cassie turns to Shane. “Can I hug you?”
Shane blinks. “Uh, sure?”
Cassie throws her arms around him in a firm, but brief squeeze. “I’m sure this is a lot. I just want you to know that we’re all so happy to have you. Me and the girls had a feeling about who you were, but I can’t imagine how hard this has been for you two. Can I please add you to the WAG chat? We want to be there for you.”
Ilya’s chest warms. As he watches his boyfriend awkwardly hand over his phone, Ilya thinks that maybe they both needed this. More people who knew.
Back in the living room, the volume level falls to something resembling normal. When they dare to return, the first one to introduce himself is a red-faced Luca Haas.
“It’s so nice to meet you, Mr. Hollander. I’m, uh, a big fan.”
Shane’s ears flush pink.
Ilya looks around at his team. They are surprised and curious, just like they were after his fumbled interview. But they aren’t angry.
Maybe Ilya is still at sea. Maybe he can’t see the shore. But he has the stars to guide him, and a team to toss life preservers when he starts to sink. The sun hasn’t risen yet, but every day, Ilya feels more confident that he’ll be there to see it when it does.
And he won’t be alone.
~