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It’s possible Ilya might have slightly lost control over his plans for Shane Hollander staying over at his house for the first time. 

This happens approximately the moment Hollander gets on his lap and reaches for his cock, so he thinks it’s probably pretty understandable. 

He’s not sure exactly what prompted this, what about curling up together on the couch got Hollander so turned on so quickly, but his brief moment of confusion is infinitely less important than the pleasure of Hollander’s hand on him, so he decides he can puzzle it out later. 

Hollander’s mouth is open, smearing damp half-kisses across his face, and he chases his mouth with only half of his focus, managing to catch him in a kiss only a couple of times before Hollander pulls away again, like he can’t focus enough to commit to kissing despite wanting it. Ilya, who is also still spinning a bit mentally over going zero to a hundred in approximately five seconds, can relate. 

“You gonna come for me, Rozanov?” Hollander asks, and Ilya can’t help the way it sends him lurching even closer to the edge, Hollander on top of him, confident and in control, taking the lead for once in a rare little taste of something that feels dangerously good. 

“Fucking make me,” he manages to grit out, trying and mostly failing to not flex his hips up into the pleasure, trying not to do anything to risk Hollander’s sinfully-good grip, trying to be a good participant in Hollander’s experiment, trying to make sure Hollander doesn’t get frustrated at something not going the way he wants. He’s fun to frustrate, of course, to tease and cajole and wind up, but Ilya knows by now that Hollander’s first attempt at something is never the time to play with it, to risk knocking his feet out from under him and making him shy away from trying again. 

And Ilya would really, really like him to try this again. 

In light of how good it feels, Ilya considers that he could probably feel a little embarrassed about how little he’d actually thought about the “having sex” component of things when he’d prepared for today. He’d had half-formed fantasies and plans about getting Hollander to ride him after their last round of sexting had reminded him of how long it had been since he’d last gotten to enjoy it, but that was about where his planning had ended. It hadn’t seemed necessary, really. Of everything between them, sex has always been the easiest piece. 

It’s everything else that had felt up in the air. 

Ilya had played with the idea a few times, proposing staying over with each other. At All Stars last year they’d even been on the same floor at the hotel, and it had really been a temptation then, how easy it would be to stay the night and still both be back to where they should be the next morning. He’d even thought Hollander might propose it, had noticed him lingering just a bit when the sex was over, and llya had fucked it up by pushing before Hollander had decided for himself, his teasing, “You want something else?” spooking him into bolting instead of serving as an opener for him to ask to stay the way Ilya had intended it. Since then, he’s had a bit of time to refine his strategy. 

(To a degree that’s going to be humiliating if anyone finds out about it, frankly.)

He’d known Hollander wouldn’t stay over if it risked missing even optional practice, so he’d picked a day there wouldn’t be any. He’d known Hollander’s mind would probably spin out too quickly if Ilya had sprung it on him when he first got here, so he’d waited until he was sated and relaxed from pleasure (well, as relaxed as Hollander ever manages to get). He’d known Hollander wouldn’t take the bait if he didn’t think Ilya really meant it, so he’d teased and coaxed and kissed until it was clear he wanted it, too. 

Everything else from there had fallen into place pretty neatly. 

“Fuck, Sh-” The name is cut off when Hollander’s mouth happens to find his again, unknowingly swallowing his own name before pulling back to pant, breath heavy and humid. 

“Fuck,” he agrees, still trembling slightly the same way Ilya is in the aftermath, the muscles of his thighs relaxing slowly until Ilya is holding up most of his weight on his lap. 

He doesn’t mind. 

“You always are turned on by hockey like this?” He teases when he has the breath to do it. 

“Fuck you,” Hollander says back, but his head still drops to rest on Ilya’s shoulder, and when Ilya wraps a hesitant arm around him, holding him up, holding him closer, Hollander just nudges his face to rest against the side of his neck. 

They sit together in the background noise of the low hum of the game on the television until the mess between them starts cooling and prompts Hollander back into motion, pulling away and pressing Ilya back down by his shoulder when he moves to follow, bringing Ilya–who ended up with the majority of it on his stomach thanks to the angle they were both sitting at–a damp cloth in a rare reversal of their usual dynamic. Another new thing, Ilya thinks, wiping himself clean as Hollander wanders off in search of another for himself. 

Another new thing that Ilya likes very, very much. 

*

Shane wouldn’t say that he’s settled into the newness of staying over at Rozanov’s house, per se, but the longer it happens, the less it scratches at him. 

Unexpectedly, it’s finding a box of tampons in Rozanov’s linen closet while looking for a washcloth for himself–the one he handed Rozanov was the last on the shelf, so it’s a justified nosiness–that serves to settle him the most. It doesn’t seem like the kind of thing that would be on hand just for any hook-ups who might need it, even if Rozanov is the kind of thoughtful in bed that doesn’t make the idea impossible. It seems like the kind of thing that would be around for someone who stays for longer than a couple of hours at a time, someone who would be here long enough to get a surprise period but comfortable enough to remain afterwards. 

Someone like the girl in Boston that Ilya mentioned earlier. 

Shane can’t stop the stupid and irrational little flicker of jealousy it prompts in him, this piece of a woman’s life left in Rozanov’s like of course it would be there, but he gets hold of himself quickly. Old friends from Russia, Ilya had said, and apparently friends comfortable with each other enough that she would keep a stash of tampons at Rozanov’s house just in case. That makes sense, Shane considers. 

It also tells him that he’s not the only fuckbuddy who’s been invited to stay before, which is strangely reassuring and also offers a hint about why Rozanov has been so nonchalant about all of this. 

It still feels new, of course, but that’s because it is new for Shane, the first time their schedules happen to have aligned in a way that made it possible. He’d been trying to make guesses about the motivation behind it, trying to read what it means, but maybe it means for him the same thing it means for the woman whose tampons these are: when possible, Rozanov doesn’t mind his hook-ups staying the night. It doesn’t mean anything more than the fact that Rozanov just isn’t particularly protective of his space, that he doesn’t mind someone he’s sleeping with lingering if nothing else comes up. After all, he and his friend in Boston aren’t committed, and Ilya had even said he might find someone else to sleep with, something that Shane refuses to think about any further after remembering it because it makes him feel something that is very stupid and pointless. 

“You are planning to rob me or what?” He hears Rozanov call, and he can’t help but smile slightly even as he rolls his eyes, closing the door to the linen closet and feeling strangely lighter than when he opened it, reassured that he’s just trying to read into a blank page, that today doesn’t mean anything more than Rozanov doesn’t mind him being around, which is strangely flattering. 

“I don’t know,” he calls back. “Don’t Russians like diamonds and fur and stuff? Where should I start looking if I want to know what my options are?” 

He hears Rozanov laugh, and it makes him smile. 

When he joins him in the living room once more, Rozanov tugs him down to lean against him again. Shane goes easier this time, settling into it, knowing it doesn’t mean anything other than the fact that he just happens to be the closest warm body, the person on Rozanov’s roster who filled today’s slot. 

(And if he feels a little flicker of something almost sad when the realization settles on him, well.) 

(He has Rozanov’s abs under his hand as a convenient distraction.) 

*

It turns out that Shane Hollander is a clingy sleeper. 

Ilya wishes he found it more annoying than he does. 

Instead, he’s embarrassingly charmed by it, waking up half-buried under a slack Hollander mouth breathing near his ear. The shirt Hollander borrowed–well, the shirt Ilya tossed at him after subtly knocking Hollander’s own clothes behind the dresser so Hollander would have to borrow something of his–has ridden up until it’s basically useless, resting up around his chest and leaving them pressed stomach-to-stomach, and Ilya feels the give and take of each inhale and exhale, flesh pressing together before giving way for the other person to breathe. There’s probably something that could be very gross and poetic in this, their heads close enough together that they’re sharing the air their bodies are then keeping pressed together. 

For his own part, Ilya is just enjoying the novelty of getting to run his fingers over Hollander gently without having to worry about getting swatted away if he does it outside of the grace period of afterglow. 

He shifts back just enough to look at Hollander’s face, and he can’t help but smile faintly when Hollander lets out a low, complaining noise through his nose at the disturbance, brow furrowing in his sleep in complaint of being moved. Ilya shushes him because no one else is awake to call him on the tenderness, and he gently strokes Hollander’s hair until he settles once more, something wordless grumbled under his breath but his body going slack and trusting once more, wriggling slightly like he’s trying to get comfortable and then letting out a content sigh. 

Ilya feels a fondness so intense that he nearly wants to bite him about it. 

He would like to lie and say that this is just how waking up with one night stands usually goes, but he honestly doesn’t have too many experiences to compare to, and the ones he does don’t even come close. He’s always enjoyed sex, enjoyed making other people feel good, but he’s never really been interested in anything beyond a good fuck, a little touch to enjoy the comedown, and maybe a shared cigarette to finish. He’s had plenty of people, especially girls, playfully whine at him to spend the night, but offering some head as an apology usually gets him grudging acceptance of a refusal to stay or a pointed invitation to go, uninterested in figuring out the awkwardness of sharing a bed with someone for what’s never going to last more than a night. 

Sharing a bed with Hollander, as it turns out, hadn’t involved any awkwardness, which is its own kind of problem. 

The whole day before was so good that Ilya, hedonist that he is, already wants more before this one is even finished. He wants to restart it like a record, pick up the needle of time and drop it right back at Hollander knocking at his door. He wants to be amused at losing Hollander’s focus immediately in favor of the architecture of his house, wants to feel the smug satisfaction of then taking his attention back and crowding him against the counter, wants to grin and laugh as they strip each other again, clothes left in a trail behind them on their way to the bedroom, wants to kiss and touch and suck all over again, wants to feel the high of making Hollander feel good, of making someone with so much restraint crumble apart and get greedy in pursuit of their own pleasure. 

Wants to fall asleep for a nap spooned close behind him and feed him food and do what can only be called cuddling on the couch and showering together–warm and a little giggly with exhaustion and novelty both–and curl up in bed together to talk about nothing in particular until sleep claims them both. 

Wants to wake up feeling satisfied in a way he can’t ever remember feeling before. 

He wants to do this again, he realizes with a rush of certainty. He wants to do this again and again and again, wants even more, really, maybe, even if he’s not quite brave enough to think about what the specifics of that “more” might be. He wants to go into a game knowing that his night will end with Hollander in his bed or him in Hollander’s. He wants to know what Hollander likes to put in his oatmeal in the morning. He wants Hollander to have preferences about what sheets are on his bed. He wants to know if Hollander sings in the shower when he’s not thinking about a witness. He wants Hollander’s pillows to feel familiar. He wants to know if Hollander always curls close when he sleeps or if Ilya will have to reel him in in the future. He wants, he wants, he wants.

He wants Shane Hollander, end of sentence. 

But he doesn’t know how much of him Shane Hollander wants in exchange. 

He suspects he isn’t in this alone, not with the way Hollander looks at him sometimes, eyes big and bright and wanting. He isn’t one for many words, but he arches into Ilya’s touch, always, chases his lips for more kisses and goes sweet and slack and trusting beneath him, rests against his chest to catch his breath like it’s the most natural thing in the world. He thinks Hollander might want more the same way he does, but he needs to know, needs to have the reassurance of a soft place to land before he jumps. 

He lays in bed and holds Hollander close and tries to work out how to do it. 

*

Shane’s first sensation when he wakes up is warmth, and he curls into it, his first thoughts vague memories of his heated blanket at his parents’ house. His dad used to tease him about being a lizard the way he curled up with it, and even with his bedroom sufficiently warm at his own place, he misses it sometimes, the snuggly comfort of-

His blanket is breathing under him. 

He jerks back at once, alarmed. 

Rozanov looks back at him, looking vaguely amused. 

“Good morning,” he says, and Shane wishes he could say that the sleep-rough rumble of Rozanov’s voice in the morning didn’t immediately go right to his dick, but biology is a motherfucker, and even the last strands of sleep clinging to him like spiderwebs can’t erase the want a sleep-rumpled Ilya Rozanov sparks. 

From the way the bastard smirks and looks down, he gathers the physical element of his interest hasn’t gone unnoticed. 

“A very good morning,” he amends, and now his voice is a deliberate purr that definitely is doing good things for Shane’s libido. 

When he crowds him down to the mattress, Shane allows it, easily. 

“Morning,” he says, hips rolling up into the warm solidity of Rozanov above him. He spreads his thighs more to accommodate him better, and his breath catches when one of Rozanov’s hands fits against the muscle and grips, stretching him wider yet. They can’t fuck again this morning, not without the risk of being too sore to play well–not an acceptable risk, no matter how tempting–but the possibility of it is delicious in its own way. 

“Did you sleep well?” Rozanov says, right into his ear, his free hand sliding down down down until he reaches territory that makes Shane’s breath catch. He arches into it, head bowing back, and he hears Rozanov chuckle, mouth against his skin, the sensation enough to give him shivers. “Yes?” Rozanov prompts, sounding amused. 

“Yes,” Shane manages to grit out, willing to say anything if it means Rozanov touching him like this more, “now-please-” He rolls his hips up into the pressure of Rozanov’s hand against him. 

“Hm,” Rozanov says, and he can hear the exact smile that’s on his face right now, the one he wears when he’s feeling especially indulgent, when Shane whining and saying please is enough to get him everything he wants. 

What he wants right now is everything. 

Unfortunately, what he thinks he should probably get is whatever will let them both start their day the fastest. He has a routine, after all, and he can’t let a little-

His thoughts stutter to a halt when Rozanov’s touch gets more decisive. 

“Fuck, Roz,” he grits out, and he feels it when the words make Rozanov’s hips flex against him, a reflexive little gesture of want. He smiles, faintly, eyes still closed. He’s noticed it before, the way his pleasure sets off Rozanov’s, like a tuning fork catching a vibration. Caught still in the safe unreality of early morning in Rozanov’s dim bedroom, he feels a little daring, enough to nudge at Rozanov’s head until he can put his mouth by his ear. “Fuck,” he grits out again, the word chased by a moan he doesn’t intend to make. 

From the way it feels like it shakes Rozanov to his bones, though, it seems like it was a good thing. 

“Fuck, Hollander,” Rozanov grits out, an intoxicating echo. “You are close?” 

“What-” His breath catches, and it takes him a moment to finish the tease. “What do you think?” 

“Hm,” Rozanov says, sounding breathless and smug in equal measure. “I think–fuck–I think you are easy.” 

“Pot-pot meeting fucking kettle,” Shane says, half a laugh. “I’m not the one with a reputation for–oh, fuck, please, please, don’t stop.” 

“What about my…reputation?” Rozanov pants in his ear, breath going satisfyingly heavy when Shane gets a hand on him in return. He makes a noise of frustration when the glide is too dry and pulls away, Rozanov stopping at once and pulling back. “You are okay?” He asks, eyes searching. “Did I-” 

Shane lunges up to get a hand on the knob of the bedside drawer, yanking it open with enough force that he almost sends it flying, having to stretch even further to catch it with his other hand long enough to grab the lube out before letting it clatter to the floor. 

If Rozanov minds the wanton destruction of his property, Shane getting a slick hand on him seems to make amends quickly. 

*

His shared shower with Hollander can only be described as playful. Their time together for today is coming to an end, so there’s a mutual understanding that this shouldn’t progress into anything sexual, but that doesn’t keep them from flirting around the edges of teasing, hands on hips for “balance” when reaching around the other, particular body parts suddenly seeming to look like they could use a little extra attention from a helping hand. 

A showerhead “accidentally” angled in just such a way to hit the other in the face with a spray of water. 

“Motherfucker,” Hollander says this time after his third splashing, but the heat is ruined by the way he grins, reaching for the showerhead and trying to wrestle it away, managing to get Ilya right in the face before he regains enough control for neither to have full control over it, a shoving match ending in it pointing to the ground. 

“Was an accident,” Ilya lies blatantly, unable to stop grinning. He shakes his hair out just to get Hollander yet again, repaid for the mischief with a slap to his side. 

“You’re such a fucking child,” Hollander complains, shaking his head but still smiling. “Knock it off, or I’m getting out.” 

“When you are still soapy?” Ilya challenges. 

He sees Hollander see what he’s doing right before he does it. 

It doesn’t save him from yet another faceful of water. 

*

The morning feels easier to settle into than the day before did, the newness of being in Rozanov’s space for something beyond a scheduled fuck worn in enough to not sit so strangely. Nothing catastrophic happening has helped soothe his initial nerves, and Rozanov remaining, well, Rozanov has helped more. He knows he absolutely has to go soon, but Rozanov bullies him into breakfast, and he takes his place at the bar once again. 

It feels more natural than he knows what to do with, sitting and watching Rozanov move around his kitchen. 

“You only eat certain things for game day?” Rozanov asks. “Or is anything okay?” 

Shane starts to open his mouth, to tell the truth, but he knows from past experience that other people don’t find his routines normal, reactions usually ranging from confused acceptance to judgmental attempts at convincing him to change. His nerves from the day before pop up again, making him suddenly reticent to admit to something Rozanov might find strange, but reticent, too, to fuck up what he’s always done on-

“Hollander,” Rozanov says, sounding amused as he sets down a carton of eggs and then leans forward, resting his weight on his forearms against the counter and tilting his head slightly in what Shane could read as fondness if he was feeling particularly stupid. “I already know you are very strange. You will not surprise me. What is your special secret breakfast?” 

Almost despite himself, he feels his shoulders go a little looser. He’s right, after all. Rozanov’s known him for years now, even if only in the context of fucking each other. He’s already ridden out plenty of things Shane thinks others would find strange, and he’s still here, still in front of him, still inviting him to spend the night. 

Still willing to hear him out about his very specific game day breakfast habits. 

Shane’s nerves dissolve into nothing once again. 

*

Ilya knows he has to let Hollander go now, has to let this little bubble of together pop. They’re both captains and have work to do, and they can’t spend all day fucking and flirting and teasing around the edges of something Ilya knows damn well isn’t remotely casual. 

There’s a difference between knowing and doing, however. 

“I have to go,” Hollander says now, but he doesn’t fight the way Ilya has him crowded against a wall that hard. 

“Mm,” Ilya agrees, still nosing along his jaw, “yes, you have said that for ten minutes now.” 

“Yeah,” Hollander agrees, and Ilya can hear the smile in his voice, “and it’s extra-true now, ten minutes later.” 

“So boring,” he teases. “And so ungrateful. I make you super secret special game day breakfast, and you run away now?” 

“It’s not running,” Hollander says, nudging at his chest without any real force. Ilya leans back a bit and feels a stupid little thrill through him when Hollander rests his arms lightly on his shoulders. It feels…

It feels like something Ilya knows he can’t want. 

Not that it stops him from wanting it anyway. 

He tugs Hollander into a kiss, knowing this needs to be their last one for now. He’s hopeful they’ll have some time together tonight, but he knows Hollander’s plane leaves relatively early tomorrow, so he isn’t sure of their chance to sleep together again in a way that goes beyond fucking. Despite his earlier insistence, Hollander lets himself remain in the kiss, melting into it until Ilya is pretty confident that at least 50% of Hollander remaining upright is down to his efforts. 

He doesn’t mind. 

This is dangerous, he tells himself, this wanting what he knows he can’t have. It’s dangerous to enjoy holding Hollander like this, dangerous to enjoy making him his endearingly specific breakfast, dangerous to want to tell him he’ll practice enough to be even better at making it next time. 

Dangerous to want a next time. 

But he does, fuck, he does. He wants whatever he can get tonight, and he wants to look forward to a next time, wants to count down the days until he’s next in Montreal and know that he’ll get to celebrate reaching it by sharing a bed once more. He wants to curl up together on Hollander’s couch and heckle his choice in television no matter what he actually puts on. He wants to see him half-awake and sleep-soft, wants to see how long he can coax him to remain in bed and be lazy together before his discipline outweighs his desire. He wants to text him for no reason and send him pictures of random dogs he sees on his runs. He wants to hear about his day and commiserate when he’s annoyed. He wants to know his other little quirks, wants to know if he has game day-specific lunches and dinners, too. He wants the intimacy of borrowing clothes and “forgetting” to return them. He wants little pieces of himself in Hollander’s life and wants little pieces of Hollander in his, too, little ties to keep them together in ways that move beyond texts and brief snatches of time. He wants to think about the future and know that Hollander will be there. 

He wants to be able to call him something less formal than Hollander. 

Fuck it. 

He pulls back from the kiss, smiling slightly in a way he can’t help when Holl-

When Shane chases it. 

The thrill of the first name, even in his own head, makes him feel similar to the way seven consecutive shots of vodka do. 

He wants, and he wants, and he wants, and God help him, the wanting is too much for him to crush. It has to come out. He has enough self-preservation to choose his words carefully, but he knows there are questions he wants to ask. 

“Did you have fun?” is his first one, and it takes Shane a gratifyingly long time to process it, blinking owlishly in a way that makes Ilya just have to stroke over his cheek with the backs of his fingers, a small, quick caress. 

The way he doesn’t recoil from it fills Ilya with a dangerous kind of hope, that he isn’t the only one greedy like this, that Shane might be wanting in the same way. 

That Shane might be equally stupid enough to try peeling a layer of casual off of whatever it is that they are. 

“Did you?” Shane challenges, because to his core he is a competitive asshole. 

Not that Ilya has much room to talk. 

“I asked first,” he responds. 

“I’m the guest,” Shane says, tilting his head back smugly. The angle exposes his beautiful throat in a way that makes Ilya want to press his mouth to it. 

Ilya resists with a self-control he has to grip by his fingertips. 

“I did,” he admits, willing to offer the first hand up in this conversation. 

“I did, too,” Shane says, like he’s offering honesty for honesty. 

“Would you…want this?” Ilya asks, picking his words carefully. “More? If we could?” He knows Shane has to know what he means, knows Shane has to be feeling the same newness between them. He can only hope Shane feels the same as he does about it, but there’s no way he wouldn’t have taken note of this new…thing, between them, whatever it might now be called. He’s willing to let Shane pick the label for it. That seems like the kind of thing he would like. Ilya will let him. 

Ilya thinks, in his most pathetic moments, that he’d probably let Shane do just about anything he wanted. 

“This, like…” Shane trails off, tilting his head slightly. “Last night and this morning?” 

“Yes,” Ilya says, unable to keep from smiling at the shy kind of muted hope he can see in Shane’s face at the question. He knows from fucking him for so many years that Shane doesn’t always have words for what he wants, but Ilya is used to reading between lines, used to reading Shane in a way that doesn’t require him to say anything. 

Right now, what Ilya is reading is that he isn’t the only one who wants more of this little bubble of more than casual. He pulls Shane into a kiss, once, twice, three times, unable to keep from smiling into it. 

“It is nice, yes?” Ilya says, pressing his cheek to Shane’s, feeling Shane lean into it in a way that’s immensely satisfying, trusting Ilya to take his weight. He does, naturally. “You and me? Doing this?” Acting like…well, acting like words Ilya can’t actually say even in his own head, but acting in a way that’s certainly not the way they usually do. 

“Yes,” Shane says, and if he sounds a little distracted, it’s just more fuel on the fire. Ilya knows he has to reel it back, knows he’s exciting himself into something dangerous, but he’s too happy to pull back completely the way he knows he should. He’d started out with plans to couch this whole thing in language he could have plausible deniability with, and that urge is still there, but it’s tempered enough to get a little daring. He nudges Shane’s head enough to speak into his ear better, pleased beyond reason at how lax he is in his arms, slack and trusting and-

Addicting, in a way Ilya doesn’t think he’s actually strong enough to keep trying to resist. 

“I think I like you for more than your mouth,” he says, softly, ready with something sharp in case he needs it, but Shane just remains soft and near-boneless against him, cheek still warm against his. It makes him a little daring. “Maybe we are-” He hesitates, one last little flare of self-preservation, but Shane is still here, still clearly happy and relaxed in his hold. “Maybe we are more than casual, yes? Just a little?” 

He can feel his heart pounding with the nerves of it, of offering so much up, but Shane is still relaxed against him, and Ilya smiles, pressing him a little tighter. He rubs their cheeks together affectionately and then pulls away, kissing the skin of his cheek before pulling back. Shane blinks at him, looking a little dazed. 

Ilya knows the feeling. 

“You have words, maybe?” He teases. 

*

Shane blinks back into awareness at the question, surfacing from the comfortable intoxication of letting Rozanov hold him up, letting his words fade to background noise, no doubt just more things meant to try and tease him into poor decisions. 

(It doesn’t make them less tempting, knowing that they’re bad ideas, but he still knows they’re bad ideas.)

Rozanov is looking at him like he expects an answer, and Shane is a little embarrassed that he might have focused a little too hard on tuning out the temptation, happy to float on the warm rumble of Rozanov’s voice in his ear and fairly confident he wasn’t missing anything too important. He scrambles to remember the last question he can recall actually catching, something about him having fun? Something about him wanting to do this again? He did have fun, and he definitely would like to do this again, even despite the lingering newness. He should probably clarify exactly what question he’s answering, but well…in the end, he’s not too worried about it. 

Telling Rozanov “yes” usually goes pretty well for him, after all. 

Whatever he just agreed to appears to please Rozanov enough for him to smile like there’s sunshine behind his eyes, and Shane can’t help but smile back, which gets him a kiss that really threatens to make him keep delaying his departure. Thankfully, he prepared for this eventuality. 

His phone going off with his, “No seriously, you have to go” alarm cuts the moment neatly. 

“Blyat,” Rozanov says with feeling, dropping his head to Shane’s shoulder just briefly. Shane laughs at the melodrama and is moving before he can think about it, lifting a hand to pat Rozanov’s head. 

“You’ll survive,” he says. “We have next time, yeah?” 

For some reason, this makes Rozanov give him another kiss that makes his toes curl, but it’s Rozanov who steps away this time, even tugging Shane’s jacket straight in a gesture of fussing that’s oddly nice to receive. In the mood to reciprocally tease, he playfully brushes Rozanov’s hair back, neatening it into kind of order before he steps back, reaching for the doorknob-

“See you in the rink, Shane.” 

The last word comes with enough of a delay that Shane has his mouth open to respond to the first part of the statement before it registers, and then he turns back, heart rate increasing at once, back to newness but in a way that feels a little too heavy this time, blurring the lines of casual into-

“Sorry you’re going to lose, but at least you had good night before, yes?” 

Ah, Shane thinks, with a wave of relief that makes his hold on the doorknob structurally integral to him remaining on his feet, now he gets it. 

Chirping. 

It’s a new one, Rozanov breaking out a first name to tease someone with, but Shane thinks he can safely flatter himself that they’re probably better acquaintances than most of the people Rozanov pisses off for his own enjoyment. The thought–bizarre as it is–makes him smile faintly, feeling oddly special at getting his own personalized method of trying to fuck with him. 

It also makes it easy to know how to return it. 

“In your fucking dreams, Ilya.” 

The way Rozanov grins says he’s happy Shane caught onto the joke. 

*

In the first few days after their agreement to try out something beyond casual, Ilya is still cautious about how often he texts, testing the waters with hockey-adjacent commentary or pictures of maple syrup. 

Primarily because it gets under Shane’s skin. 

the food of your homeland 

He sends today, next to what’s absolutely artificial syrup in a bottle the shape of a woman. 

The response comes back within a minute. 

Maple syrup is not the food of my homeland, and that fake shit is DEFINITELY not the food of my homeland. 

hm, no, it says real maple flavor. you are embarrassed by your culture? 

That is not my culture. That is corn syrup colored with who knows what. 

is okay to be canadian, shane. you do not have to be embarrassed. 

I’m not! But that is not real maple syrup. 

the bottle lady says it is real. you are calling her a liar? 

Yes. 

😱 and canadians are supposed to be so nice. i should buy this and send it to you, maybe? remind you who you are? 

If you send that to me, I will set it on fire. 

Next time you come up here, I will buy actual maple syrup and let you try it. 

you can buy things like maple syrup without YOU catching on fire?? i am proud. next you will tell me you buy twinkies. 

I am turning my phone off.

😢

🖕

Ilya smiles the entire rest of his grocery shopping. 

*

“Jesus, man.” 

Shane looks up at Hayden’s groaned complaint, reflexively putting his phone facedown on the bar. Hayden rolls his eyes at the gesture, but his expression when he leans forward and rests his cheek on a fist is fond. 

“No, no, don’t let me interrupt true love-” 

“It’s not-” 

“But you might as well have not agreed to come out with us if you weren’t going to actually party.” 

Shane gives him a dubious look, glancing from the still half-full beer bottle in his hand and over to the group of guys clustered around a pool table to heckle anyone stupid enough to try to beat Jackie, who’s taking full advantage of babysitting courtesy of her cousin to apparently fleece what seems like half the team for all they’re worth. 

“Hey,” Hayden complains at the silent commentary, not seeming remotely offended despite the protest, “I’ve got kids, man. This is a party to me.” 

“Your wife hustling our teammates while playing pool is a party to you?” Shane asks, lifting his eyebrows. 

Hayden grins. 

“Someone’s got to fill up those college funds, and my money’s tied up in ginger ale for the weirdo who comes over to haunt my house all the time.” 

Shane gives him a look that’s ruined by the way he looks back to his phone the moment it buzzes, making Hayden groan and extend his leg to kick his ankle lightly. 

“C’mon, man, if you’re going to be distracted enough to miss out on watching my wife make grown men cry, I should at least get to know when I’m going to meet this girl.” 

“There’s not-” 

“Yeah, so you didn’t stay out all night and get back late the last time we were in Boston, and you’re definitely not mostly checked out now texting Boston Lily like you’ve been away at war for twenty years and not texting her every five minutes for three weeks now.”

Shane feels his face heat and takes a sip of his drink to try and cover it, barely resisting the urge to grimace. In lieu of ginger ale, he’d been offered Sprite, and the bartender had already been filling a cup as she was asking, “Sprite fine?” so Shane would have felt rude saying no. 

(Even if his real answer would have been fuck no.)

“Jesus, man,” Hayden says. “You don’t have to drink it.” Shane starts to take another sip to prove a point that he’s perfectly fine with his disappointing drink, but Hayden huffs a laugh and reaches for it, pulling it out of his grasp and downing half of it in one chug before putting it back on the bar. “There, now you look polite and appreciative of the drink the bar tender doesn’t give a fuck about you drinking because you already paid for it. You can stop suffering now.” 

“You shouldn’t drink after people,” Shane says dryly. “What if I had the flu or something?” 

“Then I have full confidence you would have used it to get out of coming out tonight,” Hayden says cheerfully, sliding the half-empty Sprite out of Shane’s reach. 

(Not that he was trying that hard to reach it in the first place.) 

“And,” Hayden says, “now that I’ve rescued you from the horrors of lemon-lime soda, you owe me.” 

“Oh?” Shane asks, already with a pretty good idea of what he’s going to cash it in on. 

“Yep,” Hayden says, popping the p. “In exchange for saving your life-” 

“It’s Sprite, Hayden, not arsenic.” 

“-I want to see a picture of Boston Lily. C’mon. Let me get a sneak peek at the chick who’s trying to steal my best friend away to fucking Boston.” 

“I don’t have any pictures,” Shane says, realizing too late that he should have picked a different part of the statement to answer. 

“So it is serious enough for her to be trying to steal you away,” Hayden says, sounding surprised. “What? She can’t move up here?” 

“No one’s moving anywhere,” Shane grumbles, wishing now that he had his Sprite back just to have something to do with his hands. “We’re just friends.” It might even be true now, honestly. He and Rozanov text back and forth pretty much all day now, which feels pretty friendly. It’s more than anyone else texts him, but Rozanov is more social, so maybe it’s not that much of a surprise. Maybe passing the “good enough to stay the night” threshold automatically signed him up for the “texting multiple times a day” tier of knowing each other. 

His phone buzzes again, and he barely has time to look at the picture of the puppy he was sent–Rozanov apparently volunteered with his team at an animal shelter today, which makes  this approximately puppy picture number forty–before Hayden is reaching for the phone. Shane slaps it down, pinning Hayden’s hand in the process. 

Hayden blinks, looking equally startled and impressed. 

“That’s rude,” Shane says, pretending his heart isn’t pounding as hard as it is at the idea of Hayden seeing anything from “Lily,” innocent as today’s texts are. 

Hayden nods, expression softening. He nods and slips his hand out from under Shane’s, wrapping both around his beer like he’s proving a point about keeping them to himself. 

Shane still slips his phone back into his pocket, just to be safe. 

“Sorry, man,” he says. “I was just teasing. I’ll knock it off. You’ve just never really been into anyone before. I’m just a little curious about what this girl has to look like to lock down infamous bachelor Shane Hollander.” 

Shane feels his ears going hot and pretends very hard that they aren’t. 

“Nobody’s locked me down,” he says, extending his leg to kick Hayden’s leg lightly. “We’re just texting.” 

“Awful lot of texting for ‘just a friend,’” Hayden observes dryly, “but I’ll take the hint and stop asking.” He hops off of his barstool and then pauses, leaning in slightly. “But if it ever becomes serious enough for her to reach the ‘meeting your friends’ level, you’ll both be welcome at mine and Jackie’s, you know that, right?” 

Shane feels a little sad, unexpectedly, kindly as the offer was made. He and Rozanov aren’t anything remotely serious, and even if they were, well…

He doubts Hayden’s hospitality would still be on offer. 

He makes himself shake it off. 

“If I ever meet someone,” Shane says pointedly, sliding off of his own barstool, “you’ll be the first to know, Hayd.” He bumps shoulders with him. “Now let’s go watch your wife make people cry.” 

“Fuck yeah,” Hayden says, wrapping an arm around him and jostling him lightly. 

He feels the phone buzz in his pocket again. 

(He makes it about three more texts before he sneaks away to start answering again, heckling Rozanov about his striking resemblance to a puppy that seems to be mostly made of wrinkles.) 

(And he tells himself sternly that it’s not the most fun he’s had all night.) 

*

“If you are going to ignore me to keep sexting Jane, you could at least read me the good parts.” 

Ilya looks up at the sound of Svetlana’s voice, finding her watching him, one eyebrow arched with clear judgement. 

“You are not happy with the car man you were seeing?” He asks, turning the conversation sharply. He has been texting Shane more–in slow increments at first, but now basically all day, on and off–but that doesn’t mean he wants to actually admit that to anyone. “You need details from my sex life now?” 

Svetlana tsks, extending her leg down the couch to kick his hip lightly and kicking him again when he playfully captures her ankle and tugs, sliding her closer so he can climb over her. 

“He does not know how you like it by now?” He asks, playful. He leans down and closes his teeth over her earring, pulling briefly until she pops him on the cheek. “Poor baby,” he says, an obnoxiously saccharine coo, “no one to eat yo-” 

“Well, you’ve been no fun,” Svetlana says dryly, getting a hand under his chin and pushing him up so she can look at him. 

“Aw,” he pouts. “You are jealous?” 

The look she gives him is cutting, and she reaches up to flick his ear. 

“You know I am not, but you do not do your best work when you are thinking of someone else while fucking me. I have standards, Ilyusha. I have put too much effort into training you to accept subpar fucking now.” 

“Subpar?” He demands, playing at offended. He shifts enough to start sliding a hand down her stomach. It has been a while since they’ve fucked, and Ilya doesn’t really have any real interest in it now, but if she just wants an orga-

She catches his hand, sliding it back up. 

He looks back to her face, thrown. They’ve fucked on and off since they were teenagers, and even if there’s always been an understanding that there’s no pressure between them if one isn’t in the mood, he doesn’t think she’s actually ever declined an offer before, usually perfectly happy for some fun. 

“Like I said,” she says dryly, moving her hand to squish his face until he pulls it back, scowling. “It is not fun when you are thinking of someone else.” She gets a knee up to lever him off, and he goes, falling backwards on the couch and landing with a slight bounce. 

“I am not thinki-” He starts, cut off when she reaches over her head to throw a pillow at him. 

“We have known each other too long for you to lie to me now,” she says, resting her hands over her stomach and tilting her head slightly, considering him. “Is it serious, then?” 

“You are imagining things,” he scoffs, subtly sliding his phone under his thigh to muffle the way it buzzes again. 

“Hm,” Svetlana hums, clearly doubtful. “Do I get to meet her, at least?” She asks. “If she’s taking reliable, good sex from me, I should at least-” She cuts herself off with a laugh when he pulls her by the legs and threatens to dump her to the floor before settling back, her legs still stretched over his lap. He rests a hand over her shin, thumb stroking over the bone gently, and starts to look back to the television where a game he hasn’t been watching for at least twenty minutes is still playing. It isn’t one of Shane’s, so he’s not especially interested, but he’ll pretend if it’ll stop Svetlana from having questions. 

Naturally, though, it doesn’t. 

“You’ve seemed happier recently,” she observes. 

He makes a non-committal noise in response and gets a light knee to the stomach for it. 

“I don’t get good sex or gossip?” She complains. “You are getting very selfish in your old age.” 

“There is nothing to gossip about,” he says, admittedly feeling a little guilty at blatantly lying but not quite ready to talk about it with someone else, especially someone who knows him as well as Svetlana does. 

Someone who would know this is the first time he’s ever done something like this before. 

The first time he’s ever wanted to do something like this before. 

“Fine,” Svetlana says, sighing dramatically and then sitting up enough to reclaim the pillow she threw earlier, tucking it under her head and getting comfortable. “If it makes you happy, I will let you have your secrets.” She gives him a severe look. “For now.” 

“So generous,” he says dryly, pinching the skin on the side of her knee just to be annoying before settling back, dodging the way she tries to pull his hair in revenge. 

And trying very, very hard not to think about how much he wants to check his phone again. 

*

Shane’s still a little unclear on what exactly he agreed to the last time they saw each other in person, but the way Rozanov texts him the day before their next game together asking if it’s alright if he just brings his bag with him lets him know that it has something to do with Rozanov staying over, which is…kind of nice, honestly. 

It’s the one moment he’s still not sure of even this many years in, after all, knowing at exactly what point he’s supposed to leave or start making motions to hint that Rozanov should leave. He feels like he’s guessing every single time, all the way back from their first time together at Shane’s house, when he’d settled in to cuddle because it seemed like the thing people would usually do after sex only for Rozanov to suddenly get up and start putting clothes on again. He’d been confused, then, about exactly what signal he’d missed, and it hasn’t really become clearer over time. 

Usually, he gives himself until his legs stop shaking plus however many weeks they last saw each other times two in minutes and goes from there. Sometimes Rozanov stops him and sometimes he doesn’t, and Shane still can’t accurately predict which way it’ll go until the decision is made for him. If Rozanov has something similar, it’s different enough that Shane can’t pick up on it, and he envies him, sometimes, for the way he apparently always just knows the perfect moment to pack up and leave, right when Shane was just getting comfortable, leaving him wanting more instead of overstaying his welcome. 

Maybe it just comes down to practice. 

It’s nice, then, to have apparently agreed to a new normal, to remove the necessity of a “how and when” discussion ahead of time. He’s a little nervous about returning the favor of hosting, honestly, but he had enough fun at Rozanov’s house that he’s willing to push through. It’s nice, too, knowing that Rozanov also had enough fun that he wants to come over and stay the night. It’s comfortable, having the plan ahead of time, setting up a mutually-agreed-upon normal so that Shane doesn’t have to make any guesses. 

He does wonder exactly what prompted Rozanov to want this new normal, just like he wonders about exactly what has Rozanov suddenly being such an eager texter. The best guess he’s been able to come up with centers around the conversation he overheard while there. Even if he didn’t catch the actual words, he caught the tone and the word for father, so he can make what he thinks is a pretty solid guess that things are rough at home right now. It makes sense, then, that Rozanov would want a friend. 

Or at least…someone kind of like a friend. 

Given how little Rozanov reveals of his past in his interviews, Shane can take a pretty good guess that it’s not just a him-exclusive reticence to share details. It must be hard, then, to have something going wrong and no one to talk to about it, especially for people like them, whose secrets sometimes have a financial value. He doesn’t know if he and Rozanov are friends, per se, but he’s at least a trusted place for secrets to live. 

What’s a little, “Hey, things are complicated with my family right now, and I just need someone to send memes and jokes about Scott Hunter being old back and forth with” between two ultra-secret fuckbuddies, after all? 

It’s like how lawyers are sworn to secrecy about their clients, probably. 

*

Despite their trial run at his house in Boston and their now-frequent texts, Ilya had been more worried about his first time staying over at Shane’s place than he would ever admit to. He’d been slightly worried that things would be awkward now, that he wouldn’t be able to find his feet in a slightly new dynamic, that he’d do something that would ruin things or at least make them tense. He’s never actually tried dating someone before, or whatever this is now. It’s not casual, certainly, but the idea of the word dating makes him twitchy. 

…but maybe a little less twitchy when it’s applied to Shane. 

As it turns out, though, he needn’t have worried. There was a slightly-strange little shuffling at the doorway between them, but he’d made a joke about being left on the doorstep like a sad girl scout, Shane had punched him on the shoulder and laughed, and then…

Then it had become this. 

“What the fuck is this?” Shane demands, holding up a bell pepper slice. 

Ilya lifts his eyebrows, fairly certain it should be obvious, especially when Shane was the one who bought it to start with and then handed it to Ilya along with a cutting board when he insisted on helping to make dinner. 

“Who taught you how to cut peppers up?” Shane asks, trying to shoulder him out of the way. 

Ilya holds his ground, pulling his knife out of the way. 

“Ah, ah,” he says, stretching his arm further when Shane tries to confiscate it. “Peppers are my job, Hollander. Go boss your chicken around.” 

“Peppers were your job, Rozanov,” Shane corrects, making another reach for the knife until Ilya pushes him away by his face. “Then you did this.” He makes a gesture to indicate the perfectly fine slices of bell pepper on the cutting board in front of him. 

“No,” Ilya insists, barely resisting the urge to smile so he can keep pretending to be stern. “Bell peppers are on my team.” He draws an imaginary line down the counter with his forearm to indicate their respective territories. “I am bell pepper captain.” 

Shane rolls his eyes. 

“Well, Captain Bell Pepper,” he says, hip checking Ilya once before conceding and returning to his part of the counter. “Chop them up correctly, please.” 

“Is bell pepper,” Ilya says, equally exasperated and amused. “There is no correctly.” 

“Well there’s definitely wrong,” Shane says, pointedly. “Because you just did it.” 

Ilya thinks it’s possibly strange to be enjoying a stupid conversation like this so much, but Shane is fun to wind up under ordinary circumstances, and arguing about the right way to chop up a vegetable feels domestic in a way that’s…well, enjoyable enough to be embarrassing if anyone else knew about it. 

“Okay,” Ilya says, turning the knife enough to offer Shane the handle. “Then show me how it is done, bossy pepper man.” 

Shane makes a face, but he’s also a control freak, so he complies, nudging Ilya back out of the way and setting to cutting the peppers thinner, which Ilya thinks slightly mockingly he could have just said. He starts to move to the side, to either bother him from a new vantage point or find another vegetable to fail to chop up to Shane’s apparently-exacting standards, but he pauses, considering an alternate option. He waits until Shane has paused with the knife to scoot his pile of thinner peppers to the side to avoid making him cut himself by accident-

-and then he presses himself to Shane’s back, one arm around his waist, his chin hooked over his shoulder. 

He smiles faintly when it makes Shane twitch in what would appear to be surprise. 

“What are you doing?” He asks, turning his head to look at him as best he can at this angle. 

“Observing,” Ilya says, pressing his chin down a bit more firmly. It feels nice, holding Shane like this, and he’s reluctant to give it up now that he’s tried it out. “You are very bossy about your peppers. I am learning so I do not get in trouble for next time.” 

“You’re not in trouble,” Shane scoffs, returning to his work. “You just suck at cutting bell peppers.” 

Ilya snorts, turning his head enough to kiss behind Shane’s ear, smiling when it gets him a half-restrained little shiver in exchange. 

Shane complains a couple of times when Ilya attached to him makes reaching for something harder, but he doesn’t make any moves to actually do anything about it, doesn’t shrug him off the way he could. He just lets Ilya remain where he is, curled around him like a cloak, holding and observing and sometimes heckling, which does get him an elbow to the stomach but not an order to let go. When Shane leans back into the hold while the vegetables are cooking on the stove, Ilya nuzzles at his face. It feels nice, holding for no other reason than to hold. 

Shane apparently enjoying being held makes it feel even nicer. 

“This is nice, yes?” He asks, unable to resist, wanting to hear it. 

“This is a terrible way to make dinner,” Shane corrects. Ilya bows his head enough to nip at his neck, making him scrunch to one side. Shane leans into him a little more heavily, tilting his head enough to rest it against Ilya’s. “Yeah,” he says quietly, “this-it’s nice.” 

Ilya smiles, ducking his head enough to kiss Shane's shoulder before resting his chin over the spot once more, happy to continue holding him for no other reason than that he wants to. 

He settles into bed to sleep that night after they’ve fucked–clean-up made easier by Shane putting a towel down first despite Ilya teasing him–and Shane barely hesitates at all before he curls up against him, head settling on his shoulder. He smiles faintly when Shane wriggles a bit before settling, badly hiding a yawn as he finds how he wants to lay. 

“Okay?” He asks, when he’s apparently made his decision and gone still. 

Ilya smiles a little wider, stroking a hand along his side in smooth, slow motions. 

“Perfect.” 

And it is. 

It really, truly is. 

*

Rose Landry is cool and funny and surprisingly easy to talk to. 

She also takes it well when he turns down her thankfully-clear attempt to ask him out with a no as gentle as he can make it.

He doesn’t even know why he says no, really. It doesn’t make sense. He knows in a life like his, Rose Landry would fit into it perfectly. She’s beautiful and famous and used to crazy schedules, and she even knows and enjoys hockey. On paper, she should be the perfect combination of factors to equal girlfriend. 

And yet the first thing that had popped into his head after the thought dawned on him is that getting a girlfriend would mean having to stop seeing Rozanov. 

And for reasons he can’t really articulate even in thought, that idea had filled him with something that felt almost like fear. 

“Seriously, Shane,” Rose says, and her smile is bright and understanding, and her hand on his is warm when she leans forward and squeezes it kindly. “Don’t sweat it.” 

“You’re really cool,” he says, because that’s something an ex said to him during a breakup that kind of made it feel not as bad. “But-” 

“But friend cool, not dating cool,” Rose says, and part of Shane envies her, honestly, for the confidence to take a rejection in stride and seem so completely unbothered. “I mean, I hope at least friend cool, right?” 

“Definitely,” Shane says, wishing he’d had both and less to drink, wishing he had better words to offer up, wishing-

-wishing there wasn’t a part of him that could look a gorgeous actress in the eyes and turn her down even though he knows he shouldn’t. 

“Okay then,” Rose says, sitting back, still smiling. “We’ll be friend cool, and you can be my cool local friend who tells me where the best coffee is, because I cannot keep paying $12 for disappointment. It’s actually going to break me.”

“I mean, I’m not really a coffee person,” Shane says, and there’s a note of apology in it. 

Rose, though, just laughs, overdramatically sighing and tossing her hands in the air. 

“Well, I guess if you’re the Shane Hollander, you get to have some weird vices somewhere along the way.” 

It could be an insult. Delivered by someone else, it probably would be, something flirting with the edge of cruel the way commentators and fans online get. From Rose, though, it just feels like acceptance. 

When Rose holds her hand out for his phone with a teasing demand that she’ll still figure out some way to make him her personal Montreal concierge, he offers it up freely. 

*

Ilya would like to say that Saturday night found him out in a club, surrounded by beautiful women, or in someone’s bedroom, having filthy, athletic sex with a beautiful man or woman. He would like to say that he hasn’t started to become boring. He would like to say that he still has interest in other people who don’t have beautiful freckles and dark eyes and strong, athletic bodies that make him engage his muscles to haul around in a way that’s immensely satisfying. He would like to say all of that. 

Unfortunately, he can’t. 

It is, of course, Shane’s fault. 

He’d taken the teasing in stride when he’d bowed out of going to another bar after meeting up with the guys at their usual first stop on a night out. He’d done the requisite group shot but had then nursed a beer far past when he should have been going back for another drink or ushering them all along to the next stop of the night, steward of fun, wild debauchery to show the rookies how to have a good time and to remind everyone else that their captain can lead them on the ice or on a dancefloor with equal ease. 

Tonight, however, he hadn’t wanted to go to a string of clubs, hadn’t wanted beautiful women grinding against him, hadn’t wanted to down shots and let loose and make some decisions he may or may not regret the next day. He’d wanted to curl up on a couch with Shane Hollander and then fuck each other like they had something to prove and then fall asleep twined together like a couple in a romantic movie that’s definitely going to die by the end of old age. 

In lieu of that, he’d planned to kill the night texting Shane until his very boring texting partner finally said good night because even for sexting, he will only push his sleep schedule so far even on a weekend. He’s boring that way. 

Ilya wishes he didn’t like it as much as he does. 

“You’d better be putting a ring on it if she’s going to have you this whipped, brother,” Marly had said, jostling Ilya playfully when he’d been putting his jacket on and getting ready to leave. 

“The fuck are you saying to me,” Ilya had shot back, straightening his jacket in a way that he hoped looked much less like an angry bird settling its feathers than it felt. He feels gross that he even knows what that looks like, courtesy of a documentary Shane made him watch with him one night in the space between dinner and fucking. He’d complained, naturally, tugging Shane to lay back against him and stroking fingers through his hair as he learned more about the birds of the Amazon than he ever wished to know. 

(He desperately wishes it wasn’t one of the best nights he can remember having in recent memory.)

(Jesus, he’s gotten so disgusting.)

“You at least gotta bring her around to meet us,” Marly had insisted. “If Jane’s neutered our captain, we should at least get to meet the chick holding his balls now.” 

It had devolved into a playful wrestling match then, Ilya managing to get Marly in a headlock because his balls are still perfectly intact and functional, thank you very much. 

Marly had taken it in stride, laughing it off and shoving Ilya on the shoulder once before peeling off to go join the rest of the degenerates still looking forward to a night that was still young for people in the right mindset. 

“I’m glad for you,” Marly had said. “All jokes aside, man, I’m glad she makes you happy. You deserve some happy.” 

Ilya had naturally responded to this by pretending to gag and then asking Marly exactly what romance novels he’d started reading, and then he had gone home like a very pathetic domesticated dog looking forward to ear scritches in the form of text messages from his long distance whatever-Shane-is. 

Only to be foiled by Shane being the one to go out for once. 

If it wasn’t annoying, it would be funny. 

He kills time by wandering around his house and pretending he’s not doing it to kill time, wondering exactly when he started wondering what someone else may or may not like about it, what someone else might prefer. There’s a throw blanket on the back of the sofa now because he’d noticed how Shane always curled up under one in his own home and the way he always tucked his feet under the cushions here, like he just enjoys feeling contained when relaxing. Ilya had felt a stupid amount of pleased when Shane had pulled it over himself immediately the first time he was over here after Ilya bought it on impulse, and it had only driven him to further heights of being disgusting after that, pleased in being able to please, new pillows, a shoe rack by the door, a heavier comforter, a particular brand of microwave popcorn with so little taste that it seems more like an activity than a snack each time Shane pops some and tries to offer Ilya a handful as if he has any interest in it at all. He always accepts it, of course, lets Shane feed him piece by piece while rolling his eyes, like it’s a great trial and not something he’s choosing to do. 

Really, the first text coming in is a much-needed save from wondering if he should change out the lightbulbs in his lamps to be closer to the warm yellow they are at Shane’s house, wondering if he might prefer that. 

I think I might be friends with a movie star now. Does that get me cool points? 

Ilya smiles in a way that would be incredibly embarrassing if it happened in front of witnesses. Instead, he just settles on his side on his couch, pulling Shane’s throw blanket over himself as he goes. 

no, you get cool points for nothing ever. you are too uncool. you are uncool black hole where cool points get sucked in and die. 

Ilya wants to kiss him so badly he can almost feel his lips tingle with the urge. 

You’re such an asshole. I was going to ask if you wanted me to get anyone’s autograph, but just for that, you can go fuck yourself. No autograph for you. 🖕

Ilya smiles at his phone. Shane is always so careful of his image around other people, always saying please and thank you and minding every manner he has. It feels like a kind of intimacy every single time Ilya gets to see his pricklier parts in person. It makes him feel more than slightly flirtatious. 

what if I want yours? 

Why do you want mine? 

because you are my favorite celebrity ❤️

The text is out before he can think to second-guess it, and he winces immediately after hitting send, knowing he’s toeing the line of what they don’t talk about with each other. His one saving grace is that he’s famous for his emoji usage, so Shane at least doesn’t seem to find the heart strange, moving on without commenting. 

I thought I was boring. 

Yes, Ilya thinks, you are. It is one of the things I like the most about you. Naturally, he doesn’t send it. 

yes, you are famous for how boring you are. is really very impressive. 

That gets him an actual picture of Shane giving him a middle finger. His face isn’t on screen of course, and there’s nothing particularly condemning in the background of the shot, Shane’s hand centered in the frame with a middle finger facing the camera. The one point of interest is that he appears to be in the back of a taxi, and Ilya feels absurdly pleased about this, about being the first person Shane texts after a night out, before he’s even gotten home, like Ilya is the person he wanted to talk to the most to tell him how it went. 

It makes him feel a way he probably shouldn’t think about for too long. 

(It feels perilously close to what he thinks might be love.)

Naturally, he decides the conversation could use a palate cleanser of sexting and gets right to work. Shane tells him to fuck off with each suggestive message he sends. 

All the way home, in fact, where he settles on the couch and walks Ilya through a very clinical round of imaginary sex. 

In the aftermath, Ilya lays on his couch, breathing heavy and with a mess to clean up and the knowledge that there is no one on earth who makes him hotter than Shane Hollander. 

He’s so, so fucked. 

Okay, I have to go to bed now. Thanks. That was hot. 

Ilya smiles at his phone, hopelessly and helplessly endeared by Shane being polite enough to thank him for some sexting even when it’s definitely not the first time they’ve done it. 

was just okay. i want dick pic back next time. 

Not happening. 

i will convince you eventually, i think 😉

Not fucking happening. Do you know how often nudes get leaked? You might be cool with your dick getting plastered all over the internet, but I’m not. 

but is such a pretty dick. she deserves to be appreciated. 🥺

My dick is not a she, and I am going to bed, you fucking weirdo. 

Ilya smiles as if it was an endearment. From Shane, who uses asshole the way others use petnames, it feels almost like one. 

fine

goodnight, shane 

He types and then backspaces on a heart at the end, tempted but not quite bold enough to commit to it. A response comes in immediately, like Shane was waiting for it, like he wouldn’t actually go to bed without texting Ilya first. It’s become their routine, actually, a quick little back and forth before Shane goes to bed, sometimes with sexting, sometimes not. 

(Ilya wishes he could honestly say that the latter aren’t some of his favorite times, just hearing little pieces of how Shane’s day went, talking for no purpose but just to talk, like they’re unwinding together the way they do when they stay over with each other.)

goodnight, ilya 

Ilya gets ready for bed still smiling. 

*

“-still think she could at least learn merci, but she keeps saying she’s too American to learn a second language,” Shane says, reaching for protein powder to add to his overnight oats for the week. 

He’s not exactly sure how this happened, really, these Sunday night calls with Ilya, but they’ve happened enough to be a little routine by now, Ilya on the line while Shane goes about his routines to get ready for the week ahead. He’d been embarrassed at first, honestly, to have a witness for something so routine and domestic, but Ilya had rolled his eyes and told him to get to whatever he was so twitchy about the second week they’d done this, and ever since then, Shane hasn’t hesitated, answering the call and then going about his routine. 

He’s even started to look forward to it, to someone keeping him company while he sets his week up. 

“Maybe you should just stop answering her calls then,” Ilya says. The phone is laying face-up so Shane can’t see his expression, but his tone seems…off. 

Shane sets his protein powder down and goes to pick his phone up, leaning forward on the counter to look into the screen. 

“You okay?” He asks, trying to work out what’s making him sound like this instead of the way he normally does during these calls, usually perfectly content to sit and heckle Shane about being boring like he’s not choosing to be on the call with him in the first place. 

“Fine,” Ilya says, in a way that makes it very clear he’s lying. “I am confused about why you are letting Rose Landry use you like personal Google Translate, but is your choice to make.” 

Shane frowns. 

It’s felt silly, playing translator the few times Rose has called and asked him to translate for her, but there is a part of him that’s pleased to be useful, and Rose is always laughingly grateful. He’s not sure why Ilya of all people would be so upset about it. It’s not like he’s the one doing it. 

“Are you…mad at me?” Shane ventures, trying to work out exactly what he could have done to have made him mad. 

He hears it when Ilya lets out a heavy breath, and then he shifts slightly, the screen lighting his face up better. He’s curled up on his couch, he thinks, and a part of Shane that he tries desperately to quiet feels a little pang of want at the sight, wishing he was there to curl up with him. 

He makes himself focus. 

“Did I do something?” He asks, because he’d rather not try to guess if he doesn’t have to. 

“No,” Ilya says, and Shane sees the effort behind it when he makes himself smile. “I am just in weird mood today. Ignore me. Keep making your sad oat paste.” 

“Ilya,” Shane starts, “seriously, if I-” 

“I am not mad at you,” Ilya says. “You are fine, luchik.” He pauses for just a second too long, and Shane wonders if his reception is bad or something. He doesn’t know what the last word means, but he won’t ask Ilya to translate, not when he already seems down about something. He’s heard the word before, a couple of times now, usually in bed when Ilya is teasing him, but he hasn’t bothered to look it up, sure it’s something filthy he’s probably better off not knowing for the sake of not giving Ilya material to tease him about if it makes him blush or something. 

It does give him an idea of what Ilya might be angling towards, though. 

“Let me finish prepping breakfast first,” he says, reaching for the protein powder again. 

Ilya looks confused. 

“What?” 

“Let me finish prepping my breakfast first,” Shane calls back to the phone, trying and failing to find his maca powder. “Then we can do phone sex, okay?” 

When he glances back at the phone, Ilya looks surprised, but then he smiles, clearly pleased. 

“Finish your lunch, too,” Ilya says. “Or you’ll be grumpy later and blame me like it’s not your fault for being horny.” 

“You started it,” Shane points out, mixing oats as quickly as he can without slopping them all over the counter. 

“Is not my fault,” Ilya says cheerfully. “I am video calling very, very sexy person right now.” 

It’s ridiculous, the way that makes Shane’s stomach go tight with want. 

Doesn’t stop it from happening, though. 

He gets through prep and takes his phone upstairs, tossing it onto the mattress and then kneeling to pull out his lockbox underneath where he keeps his sex toys, a collection that’s grown in recent history thanks largely to the motherfucker currently on the phone with him. Shane’s sent him texts messages to tell him to fuck off every single time a new package has arrived on his doorstep, but it hasn’t stopped Ilya from sending them. 

(…or Shane from washing them, drying them, and putting them away in this box.)

(But that’s not an important detail.)

“I want the new purple one,” Ilya calls from the phone, obviously guessing exactly what he’s doing, probably from the fact that this isn’t remotely the first time they’ve done this. “I was good and let you finish all of your boring mealprep. I deserve to watch you use purple one for being so good.” 

“I don’t know,” Shane says, peeking up above the bed and tilting the phone enough for Ilya to see just his eyes over the mattress. “You got weird and wouldn’t tell me why. Maybe I should just turn the camera off and make you listen and guess what I’m using.” 

The way Ilya’s eyes light up at the suggestion says it’s not remotely a punishment. 

(Shane does indeed use the new purple toy, Ilya guessing correctly without needing any hints at all.) 

(When they hang up, Shane is satisfied to note that Ilya looks much, much happier.) 

*

It’s really his own fault for not seeing it coming, the threat that should have been obvious and yet still hit him on the face like a slap right when he started getting comfortable with the verb dating in relation to Shane. 

Rose fucking Landry. 

It starts with little things, little gossip site videos, little raised eyebrows and twittering giggles on talk shows, little blurry photographs on social media of Shane and Rose Landry standing just close enough to be worth speculating about, the starlet orbiting Shane Hollander like an unwanted little moon. If Ilya were feeling more generous, he might understand it; after all, he’s felt Shane’s gravitational pull since that first day in a parking lot in Saskatchewan. 

Ilya, however, isn’t feeling fucking generous. 

He is, in fact, feeling the opposite, greedy for each of Shane’s texts, which he can’t help but feel are sparser than they should be. He hasn’t bothered to count them up, hasn’t bothered to run the numbers, too afraid of what they might show. They still have their phone calls, but one has been interrupted with, “Oh, Rose is calling me, hang on, she was asking for directions earlier. I think she might be lost.” and another was interrupted with a voice that could only have been hers calling Shane away, apparently to a dinner he had agreed to. Shane had called him afterwards, both times. 

But it hadn’t removed the sting of him hanging up in the first place in favor of her. 

He wants to tell himself he’s being ridiculous. He and Shane have years behind them, an understanding between them. Even if they haven’t used the words, they have some kind of connection binding them, something that can’t be easily tossed aside, surely. He has pieces of Shane like Shane has pieces of him, binding them together like the notches of a puzzle. They can’t be torn apart like nothing, especially not by Rose Landry. 

Which would probably be easier to keep in mind if she hadn’t shown up to the fucking game tonight. 

It had really been the final insult to already-raw nerves, Rose Landry appearing on the big screen in a Hollander jersey, the 24 across her back hitting like a punch to the teeth, especially with the associated cheers and whistles and nudges from Shane’s teammates. 

(Really, if Ilya had checked Pike too hard tonight the way the ref said before tossing him in the penalty box, the bastard had it coming for jostling Shane’s shoulder like there was something to jostle him about, like-)

“Oh fuck,” Shane pants beneath him now, head arched, throat on display, vulnerable and trusting beneath him, stripped of his jersey that matches the one on Rose Landry tonight. 

Sex with Shane always demands his full focus, but he feels an extra demand on his skills tonight, like he needs to prove this is worth it, that he’s worth it. It feels like the last few seconds in a tied game, the knowledge that this is it, that Ilya needs to do what he was made for and get the job done. He knows that Rose Landry is the easier choice, probably the better choice, pretty and famous and female, someone Shane could show off. 

Someone Shane could be with in places other than stolen bubbles of privacy. 

It’s not fair, he thinks, gritting his teeth against it. It’s not fair for someone else to want what Ilya has, to want Shane in a way that Shane could accept if he wanted to. This is little enough, but it’s his, it’s supposed to be his. The world, the NHL, his fucking family, they’re all complicated and painful and difficult, but this with Shane is simple and comfortable and-

And so easily taken away that he’s gotten to watch it start to happen post by post on fucking Instagram. 

The worst part is that he can’t even blame Shane for it, can’t hold it against him if he wants everything Ilya can’t be. Rose Landry can wear his jersey in public. Rose Landry can get photographed at a coffee shop with him. Rose Landry can kiss him on the cheek in a photo that Ilya has tortured himself with at least forty times by now. 

Rose Landry can fall in love with Shane Hollander and have it end in nothing but stupid people getting giddy. 

“Oh fuck,” Shane groans out again, stomach flexing in the way that says he’s close. Ilya knows that about him by now, knows every sign of Shane close to orgasm. He knows where to touch, where to kiss, where to press, where to lick. He knows when Shane is uncomfortable and needs to be reassured. He knows when Shane is playful and needs someone to tease back. He knows when Shane is stressed and needs to be taken out of his head. He knows when Shane is hungry and needs to be pushed past what he thinks his limits are. He knows when Shane wants a cock, wants a caress, wants a chirp, wants a blowjob, wants a kiss. 

He knows Shane. 

And now he knows there’s another person trying to get to know him the same way. 

“Can I–oh, fuck yes–can I bite you?” 

Even in his own twisted feelings, Ilya can’t help but smile as he moves his shoulder in range, nudging Shane’s head towards it gently before returning his hand to the mattress. The biting started only in the past couple of years, and Shane still asks each time, so polite, so careful. 

So delicious in the pressure-pain of his teeth on Ilya’s skin. 

“Fuck, Shane,” he groans now, rhythm stuttering for a moment. He was never really into biting before Shane. He didn’t hate it, but it didn’t do much for him, not until it was Shane Hollander biting him, Shane Hollander’s teeth sinking into his skin like he just can’t help himself, Shane Hollander leaving little indents in his flesh, a claim that will fade soon enough but still a claim. 

Shane manages to get out some vague attempt at “Ilya” around his mouthful, tongue sliding over his skin hot and wet as he tries to sound it out, and Ilya huffs a laugh, charmed and tormented in equal measure. His beautiful echo, so eager even with his mouth occupied with a bite full of flesh. 

He wonders if Rose Landry would appreciate his bites, and the thought sours his joy in an instant, his brain providing the immediate image of Shane’s teeth sinking into her smooth, slim shoulder. 

He reaches up to gently press at the hinge of Shane’s jaw to make him release, prompting a complaining whine through his nose, and he soothes him with a quick kiss to his now-slack mouth before nudging him to turn over. Shane obliges, and the sweetness of it just serves to flare his temper higher. No one else deserves this sweetness. No one else will appreciate it properly. 

He holds Shane by the hips now, hard enough that they’ll likely bruise. 

It’s not fair to be this annoyed, and he knows it. No matter what his own feelings might suggest, they aren’t actually formally anything to each other, not really. He might not have much experience dating, but he knows enough to realize that it doesn’t always mean exclusivity. Ilya’s essentially stopped sleeping with anyone else completely, but that was his own prerogative, driven primarily by a lack of interest in people who couldn’t compare to what he really wanted anyway. They don’t actually have a formal claim to each other. They haven’t agreed to be exclusive. It’s fine if Shane fucks other people. 

It’s so fucking fine, in fact, that Ilya feels a vindictive little thrill at the idea of Shane having to explain bruises the size of a man’s hands on his hips the next time Rose Landry hops in his bed. Maybe he won’t let her, even, a thought that makes Ilya squeeze even harder, fingers indented deeply in the flesh of Shane’s hips, hard enough that it has to be hurting a little, not that Shane Hollander has ever shied away from a little pain in his pleasure. Maybe Shane will want to hide them until they fade. Maybe leaving his claim like this will mean Rose Landry out of his bed until-

“Wait. Ilya, w-wait, stop.” 

Immediately, he obeys, stopping at once, ashamed of himself in one quick rush for letting his stupid jealousy distract him from making sure Shane was okay. He doesn’t pull out, not yet, not until he knows what’s wrong, but he releases his hold on Shane’s hips at once, fingers tingling from the pressure he was applying. His hands leave behind red marks, and they make him feel ashamed, suddenly. 

“I hurt you?” He asks softly, leaning down to kiss Shane’s spine, his shoulderblades, the soft skin at the back of his neck, so ashamed of himself that he feels nearly sick with it. Shane isn’t clenching around him in a way that would suggest he’s currently in pain, but Ilya was so busy trying to brand him that he hadn’t been mindful of his angle, and he wonders if he just drove in the wrong way. 

“No, I’m good,” Shane says, still sounding a little breathless but not in pain. The relief is almost enough to make Ilya go boneless. Instead he bows forward again, crowding Shane’s body under his own, gently pushing him down to the mattress, rage deserting him and leaving behind only shame at his mind being anywhere but on making Shane feel good. 

“You want to stop?” He asks, already moving to pull out. It would be the first time Shane’s ever asked to end sex, but if Ilya wasn’t making it good for him, if Shane was-

“No, no!” Shane says, hand flying back to catch Ilya’s hip. “Just don’t squeeze that hard, okay? I’d rather not have to explain those bruises in the locker room tomorrow.” He looks over his shoulder and grins, sweaty and flushed and beautiful. 

Ilya ignores his noise of protest when he fully pulls out this time, rolling Shane back onto his back and settling over him so he can kiss him the way he needs to, sweet and deep and consuming. Shane makes sweet little noises that make Ilya feel drunk when he collects them in his mouth, and he happily swallows the gasp his first thrust in this position gets him. 

I love you, he thinks, helpless to stop himself from it with every motion of his hips, every little noise Shane makes for him. Fuck, I love you. 

He drives Shane to his pleasure and then follows him over, tucking his face into the safe darkness of the crook of his neck. 

*

Shane floats for a long while in the warmth of Ilya on top of him, daring to wrap him up tight in his arms and press their cheeks together. He feels happy and calm and satisfied, mind quiet for once, floating along the way he always does in the comfort of a bed shared with Rozanov. 

He wonders, sometimes, exactly what it is about Ilya that lets his mind go calm around him, what specific little thing he does or says or is that manages to tell Shane’s overactive brain that it’s time to take a break. It’s so easy with him, to turn it off, to shrink the world down to the little bubble of Ilya beside and around and inside him, steady and…

And safe. 

He sinks his fingers through soft curls idly when the thought drifts to him in his warm, fuzzy brain. It’s the best word he can think of, the most accurate one, the way his body goes loose and slack because he can trust Ilya to hold him together, the way his mind stops overanalyzing and whirling because he can trust Ilya to guide him to what feels good, the way his worry fizzles out to quiet because he can trust Ilya to take control for a while. He thinks it might be this he misses the most when they’re apart, even more than he misses the sex, the simple comfort of putting everything down for a moment in this little bubble of safety. 

He makes a noise of protest when Ilya lifts up and pulls himself out, a small breath of laugh escaping him when he kisses Shane again, as if in apology, before carefully settling on his side, disposing of the condom into the waste paper basket at the side of the bed. Shane makes a pleased noise, unable to help it, when he’s gathered close again, a kiss pressed to his forehead, his temple. It’s newer, this open affection, but he can’t lie and say he doesn’t like it. Rozanov has always been what can only be called gentle with him in the aftermath, especially when the sex has been especially intense, but it’s like there’s been a new level to it recently, a layer removed from between them. He knows he should push back, pull the barrier back up. 

But it also feels too good to actually summon the strength to do it. 

“I missed you,” Ilya says, and Shane smiles a little, unable to help it. This is new, too, little things like this, offered without a joke to pop the moment and drain the sweetness from it. 

“I missed you, too,” he says, and it’s true. He did miss him. 

More than he should, really. 

“Hm, you are sure?” 

Shane frowns and looks up, still a little bleary, not bothering to lift his head from Ilya’s shoulder. 

“What?” 

“You seem very busy in all of the news recently,” Ilya says, and now there’s an edge to it that’s really fucking with Shane’s afterglow. 

“Is this because I’m beating you in the scoring race?” He asks, his only guess. 

Ilya’s responding laugh is devoid of humor. 

“You are not enjoying so many people interested in your lovelife?” Ilya asks, and Shane’s frown deepens, wondering if Rozanov has actually managed to fuck his brains out this time given how little the question makes sense. 

“What lovelife?” He demands, sitting up. 

“You and Rose Landry?” Ilya asks, looking straight forward. “You two seem to be quite in love from what news says all of the time. Is hard to even turn on television without talk show hosts talking about it.” 

The answer isn’t remotely what he expected, and Shane pulls back, confused. 

“You think I’m sleeping with Rose?” 

Ilya shrugs, still looking at the ceiling. Shane tries to pull at his chin, to make him look at him, but Ilya obeys only long enough to kiss him and then tuck Shane’s head back onto his shoulder. It’s comfortable, so Shane just rolls his eyes before obeying, but his mind is spinning, trying to work out why Ilya of all people would care. 

The closest he can get to a guess is that Ilya would want to know if he was sleeping with other people just for health reasons, to know if maybe he should get tested more often, but that would be more than a little hypocritical coming from a man who hops beds like a rabbit. He also knows that Ilya already gets tested fairly often and is diligent about always using a condom anyway. Shane had had a minor freakout the one time a condom had ripped back in their early days, and Ilya had pulled up his test results right there on his phone and also talked him down from the edge by assuring him he didn’t fuck anyone without protection. Shane had still gotten tested later and gotten an all-clear–and let Ilya know his results because it had seemed polite after Ilya did it first, getting a text of “honor roll even for sex, good job 👍” in response that had made him send back a middle finger emoji–and it hasn’t come up again since then. 

Which means he’s especially confused as to why it would come up now. 

“I’m not sleeping with Rose,” he ventures, and when it gets him Ilya glancing at him, he continues. “Rose and I are just friends. We’re not dating or anything.” 

“Would be fine if you were,” Ilya says, and even Shane can pick up that there’s something under the words even if he doesn’t know quite what. 

“I wouldn’t do that,” Shane feels the need to say, a little insulted, honestly, that Ilya thinks he’s the kind of person who would date someone and still fuck another person on the side. “Not when you and I are…” He trails off, making a vague hand motion that he hopes somehow conveys fuckbuddies without him having to actually say the words. 

For some reason, that seems to catch Ilya’s attention in a way that feels a little intense. 

“So you are not…seeing other people?” 

The honest answer is no. He’s tried out sex with a grand total of one (1) other man, and it had been straight ass (no pun intended given the fact that Shane had only gotten halfway through receiving a subpar handjob before he called it a day to go back to his hotel and sext Rozanov instead), and he hadn’t been motivated afterwards to go looking for more. That seems kind of pathetic to admit, though, so he decides to go for a joke. 

“I see you,” he says, nudging Ilya with his elbow. “That’s-” 

The “good enough for right now” gets cut off under the force of Ilya kissing him like he’s trying to suck his soul right out. 

Under the pleasure of it, finishing his sentence seems wildly less important than kissing him back. 

*

I see you, Ilya hears in his head, on repeat like a chorus. I see you. I see you. I see you. 

It knocks a three word response of his own loose from where he’s been keeping it behind his teeth for longer than he would ever admit to, and he can’t help it when it slips free, whispered to the line of Shane’s jaw. 

“Ya tebya lyublyu,” he says, pressing it to Shane’s skin like a kiss, following it with his lips. 

His, all his, not shared with anyone, even pretty Hollywood actresses who get far too handsy in front of cameras. The relief of so much weight dropping from his shoulders in one rush makes him feel stupid with giddiness, and he says the words again and again, unable to make himself stop after popping the cork on them. He knows Shane doesn’t understand them, but he doesn’t ask questions, used to Ilya speaking Russian at him over the years. 

He wonders, sometimes, what Shane imagines he’s saying. He asks, sometimes, and Ilya usually lies or hedges around the truth, embarrassed by the sweet things he calls Shane in the safety of words he can’t understand. Kitten makes a regular appearance, prompted by the way Shane arches into affection like a cat and the little purr-like noises he lets out when he’s pleased. Sweetheart and sweet boy have a place in the rotation as well, Shane always so eager to please, so quick to listen, so very, very sweet beneath him. 

“Moya lyubov,” he says now, again and again, unsure if he’ll ever be able to stop. 

Unsure if he’ll ever want to. 

*

Shane is annoyed when Ilya pulls away from their makeout session in the doorway at first. His plane got in late, and he’s reluctant to waste any time when this whole thing is starting three hours later than he’d expected after weeks apart, except for one brief 36 hour period of Ilya taking the train to see him in New York when he was there for a photoshoot, both of them fucking each other senseless and then curling up in bed together, ordering room service and watching stupid movies purely just to heckle them together. 

Ilya, though, just pulls away far enough to pull a key out of his pocket and press it into Shane’s hand before leaning in again. 

“What’s this?” He asks, not particularly bothered about the answer in this moment but his brain running on autopilot to ask anyway. 

“Key to here,” Ilya says, pushing his head to the side. 

“To your house?” Shane asks, surprised now. 

“Is St-Simon’s birthday,” Ilya says, sounding vaguely annoyed even as he noses his way along Shane’s jaw, following the path with his lips. “I won’t stay late, but I have to go out for a while after the game. You can just let yourself in. Is a copy. You can keep it in case you need it again.” 

“I mean,” Shane says, distracted for a moment by teeth on his earlobe followed by a warm tongue. “I can wait…for…” Finishing the rest of that sentence becomes abruptly less important than finding a good angle to press against Ilya’s thigh, wedged between his own and too tempting to resist. 

“Hm, no,” Ilya says, sounding amused. “My house is better than hotel, yes?” 

“Y-yes,” Shane agrees when the moment has stretched long enough to let him know he’s supposed to tune in enough to offer an answer. “Your shower’s way better.” 

That makes Ilya laugh, and Shane feels it against his neck when Ilya presses his face there.

“Besides,” Ilya says, and now there’s a thread of something in his voice that sounds almost…nervous? “Is probably normal, yes? For you to have key by now?” 

That throws Shane for a moment, wondering what’s normal about him having a key, but with the half of his brain that’s free for actual thinking, he supposes it does make sense. Ilya certainly knows him well enough to know he’s not going to rob him or anything, and Shane having a key to let himself in probably makes it easier for Ilya to plan, knowing he doesn’t have to be home to let Shane in at a certain time. 

It’s also not like Shane doesn’t have keys to other people’s houses, after all. He’d threatened to make JJ start paying him a locksmith fee after his fourth round of having to come get the spare he keeps at Shane’s place after locking himself out again last year. 

“I’ll get a copy made for you to my place,” Shane says while gently pushing Ilya’s head back where he wants his mouth against his neck, because that seems fair, an equivalent gesture of trust. His social life isn’t nearly as packed as Ilya’s, of course, but it also feels like it saves some face, pretending he might be busy enough to not be there to let Ilya in at some point. 

As if he doesn’t count down the minutes each time because he is truly, truly pathetic. 

He feels Ilya’s smile widen, but he also feels his hand slip under the front of his jeans, so he makes a mental note to get a copy made and calls it a day. 

*

Tonight was supposed to be fun, a tiny sliver of time stolen because their schedules aligned enough to make a trip up to Montreal possible, a stolen 48 hours together before they’re apart for weeks again. It’s a big enough risk that he’d thought Shane might refuse, but he hadn’t. He’d just asked Ilya for his flight information to know when to expect him. It was supposed to be exciting and sexy and fun, the first time they’ve done something like this. 

Naturally, his brother has to fucking ruin it. 

He’s supposed to be curled up on Shane’s couch with him right now, fighting over Shane’s claims that Ilya hogs all of the sourdough chips in the Chex Mix–true, of course, but Ilya maintains that Shane likes the little crunchy squares more anyway even though he denies picking them out–and maybe flirting their way into a quick pre-dinner fuck. He’d even sent Shane a new toy in anticipation of the weekend and made sure he was stocked up on lube. There are drinks in the fridge and food waiting to be made and a boyfriend waiting for him inside. 

And here Ilya is, freezing his ass off on Shane’s balcony to try and shield him from the ugliness as best he can. 

It’s nothing new, nothing inventive. More demands for money. More accusations of abandoning his family. More reminders that their father is sick and Ilya is all the way here, an ocean away, useless as anything other than a voice over the phone when papa is upset and confused and needs him-

He grits his teeth, hard, head bowing forward under the weight of Alexei’s voice on the phone, angry and hurting and knowing that the knowledge that he’s ruining Ilya’s weekend would only make his brother happy. That’s the worst part, maybe, knowing that Alexei is getting exactly what he would would have wanted if he knew what he was interrupting. 

It’s not new, his brother hating him, but he thinks it’s the kind of thing a person never truly gets used to. 

He about jumps out of his skin when he hears the door open behind him, and he’s horrified, worried that Shane heard something, that Ilya spoke English and let him know exactly how fucked up he is, how little there is in Ilya’s life that’s worth-

It’s cold out here, Shane mouths, holding up the blanket he’d apparently been bringing him. 

Ilya loves him so fiercely in this moment that it hits him like a wall, filling his chest right alongside the hurt until he feels like he might pop from it. Shane hesitates for only a moment, as if questioning if he would be welcome, and Alexei’s voice fades out in his attention slightly when Ilya gestures him forward. He doesn’t want Shane to ever feel like he isn’t welcome at his side. Not for anything. 

Especially not for Ilya’s fucking family. 

Shane shakes the blanket out and then settles it around his shoulders so gently that he’s afraid he might break under the softness of it. He swallows, hard, and he sees Shane catch the motion of it, eyes darting down before looking up again. He glances at the phone, considering, and he wonders what guesses he’s making. He doesn’t know the words, but he can probably guess the tone, can probably understand that-

Slowly, like he’s afraid of moving too suddenly, Shane’s hand reaches for the phone still held at Ilya’s ear. 

Confused into meekness, Ilya allows it, Shane’s hand pulling his down until the phone is between them, screen lit up. Alexei’s voice is still coming through the speaker, tinny and angry and sharp. For once, Ilya finds it easy to ignore him, too focused instead on trying to figure out what Shane’s doing. Shane looks at him, then down to the screen, hovering his thumb over the red End Call button. He looks up to Ilya again, and there is a question in his eyes now. 

Ilya hesitates. 

And then he nods. 

Shane’s thumb tapping the button seems almost anti-climactic as Ilya stares at his screen, like he’s waiting for the phone to explode. 

It doesn’t. 

“You looked upset,” Shane says softly, and Ilya glances up at him. 

“My family,” Ilya says, voice a little rough. “My brother.” 

“He sounds like an asshole,” Shane observes, and there’s none of the warmth in the last word that there is when Shane says it about him. 

“You don’t even know what he was saying,” Ilya says. 

Shane shrugs. 

“He made you upset.” 

He says it like it’s a crime, like it’s all he needs to know, like he doesn't need any of the details because he knows that Ilya was hurt, and that’s enough for him, like-

It’s the cold that lets him know he’s started crying, tears cooling at once in the frigid air. He pulls back at once, cursing, scrubbing his arm over his face, humiliated. 

“Hey,” he hears Shane say softly, and he shakes his head, reflexively. 

“Sorry,” he says, confused and embarrassed, nerves still raw. He just needs a second, just needs a moment to compose himself so he can-

Shane’s arms come around him, solid and strong and steady. When Ilya returns the gesture reflexively, the blanket goes with him, wrapping around Shane, too, like he’s forming a cocoon. Shane gently guides his head down to rest on his shoulder, and Ilya lets him, meek in his humiliation. He expects Shane to turn away at any moment, disgusted by the weakness. He couldn’t blame him, really. He signed on to date someone hot and fun and exciting. He didn’t sign up for pathetic. He didn’t agree to a weekend of Ilya being weak and stupid and embarrassing. 

But Shane says nothing, just holds him close, rocking them gently back and forth. 

They don’t fuck that night. They don’t do anything but curl up together on the couch and then eat dinner, Shane guiding him up to his room afterwards, nudging him into brushing his teeth, and then pulling Ilya to lay across him like a blanket, tucking his arms around him tightly, pressing Ilya’s head over his heart, pulling the covers up over them like something they can hide under and then telling Ilya he can talk if he wants. He’s not sure if he wants, really, but he still does, in slow fits and starts and sometimes in Russian, telling Shane things he can’t even understand. Shane doesn’t complain, doesn’t ask for a translation. He just holds him and listens. 

“I’m sorry,” he says, choked and pathetic and ashamed. 

“Don’t be sorry,” Shane says, like it’s just that simple. “It’s okay.” 

Such small words, to hit Ilya the way they do, to shatter him so completely. He squeezes his eyes shut and fails to hold back his tears anyway, pressing his face tight to Shane’s neck and knowing he feels the trickle of them against his skin. Shane doesn’t comment. He doesn’t pull away. He just holds him, steady and gentle and reliable, a place to take shelter in the hurricane of his own emotions. 

He doesn’t know how long he cries. He just knows arms around him and gentle kisses to his head and a heartbeat beneath his ear. 

He falls asleep to the thrum-thrum, thrum-thrum, thrum-thrum of it. 

He falls asleep feeling loved. 

*

Shane can sense that something is different between him and Ilya after the weekend he cried about his family. They haven’t spoken about it, haven’t addressed it all, but it certainly doesn’t feel like the kind of thing that casual fuckbuddies do. 

He doesn’t really think about what else it might mean until Rose calls him on it, though. 

“Seriously, dude,” she says, nudging him with her foot. He looks up, a little embarrassed to have been caught on his phone again so soon after it happened the first time. He knows it’s rude of him, especially when Rose is giving up a night in her busy schedule to come watch movies with him instead of trying to drag him out to a club, dressed in a pair of his sweatpants because she spilled a glass of wine on her jeans earlier and blatantly hogging the bowl of popcorn. “If you’re going to be sexting Mystery Lily, I at least want details. I haven’t gotten any action in months. Let me live vicariously.” 

“What about coffee shop guy?” Shane asks. “I thought you guys were seeing each other.” 

Rose groans, tossing her head back and stretching until her feet are resting against his thigh. He’s amused to note she apparently grabbed a pair of his socks, too, when she was grabbing a pair of sweats out of the clean laundry basket he hadn’t put away yet because he’d been busy sexting Ilya, the mood only hotter because he’d known he was on a time limit. 

“Trust me, even the best sex in the world wouldn’t be worth putting up with having to listen to another hour of that guy talk.” She rolls her eyes. “If I never have to listen to how ‘woke culture,’” she makes air quotes with her fingers, “is ruining Hollywood these days, it’ll be too soon.” She rolls her head to the side, smiling slightly. “Judging from how blushy you were getting down there, I gather your love life at least isn’t hopeless.” 

“It’s not-” He starts, but he pauses. It’s reflexive to reject the “l” word about anything involving him and Ilya. It’s casual. It’s always been casual. 

…except that lately, it’s been feeling pretty fucking not casual. 

“Not…?” Rose prompts. She shifts slightly, looking like she’s considering something. “You know, you’re pretty cagey about this Lily person.” 

“No I’m not,” he says at once, and he barely resists the urge to wince at his own defensiveness. 

Rose considers him for a moment and then sits up, bringing her legs in and crossing them. 

“You know, I’m a pretty good listener,” she says. She tilts her head slightly, smiling. “And I’m a savage from the wilds of woke Hollywood, so it’s really hard to surprise me.” 

Shane only realizes he’s been holding his breath when his lungs start to burn. The breath he releases shakes a little bit on its way out. 

“If I’m making a guess that’s out of line, you can feel free to tell me to fuck off and get out of your house,” she says, and Shane can feel how carefully she’s picking her words, “but if there’s something about this Lily that might be…surprising, to other people, you can tell me. If you want. Sometimes secrets feel a little less heavy when you don’t have to carry them on your own.” 

Shane looks away so he won’t do something humiliating like cry the way his stinging eyes are threatening. He still feels Rose’s gaze on him. 

“Lily’s not…Lily,” he says, and he tenses, reflexively, expecting the jab, the punchline, the mockery. It’s little enough to admit, but it’s still something. It’s enough to hurt him with. 

Rose, though, says nothing, just shifts slightly. When Shane glances at her from the corner of his eye, she’s just sitting there, waiting, holding a pillow in her arms loosely, not looking shocked or horrified. He wants to say it, he realizes suddenly. He wants someone else to know something about him that’s true for once. 

“That’s just his name in my phone.” 

His throat feels like it swells shut after it’s out, and he clenches his hands into fists to stop the way they’re shaking. He looks away from Rose, waiting for…

For what, exactly? 

“Hey Shane?” Rose asks, and he glances at her. She smiles, small and gentle. “I need you to take a breath, okay? I’m a little afraid you’re going to pass out, and you’re built like a brick wall, so I don’t think a trust fall situation is going to end well for me.” 

He laughs, startled and relieved and a little hysterical, maybe. He presses his hands to his face, still feeling shaky. 

But feeling…lighter, too. 

“Is that the first time you got to say something like that to someone?” Rose asks softly, and he nods, face still covered. “Wow. Has to feel…big, huh?” 

He nods again. 

Rose waits him out, sitting quiet and still while he gets himself together. He appreciates it. It’s one of the things he appreciates about her. She doesn’t try to break quiet moments. She knows how to just sit in them with him. 

When he drops his hands from his face, she’s still there, patient and calm and steady. 

“So is it…serious, with him?” She asks, when she’s apparently decided he’s not at risk of passing out on her. 

He’s more surprised than he should be at the question, honestly. 

“I…I don’t know,” he says, only realizing it’s true when he’s said it out loud. “It’s complicated.” 

“Oof,” Rose says, sympathetically. “Been there.” She gives him a playful salute. “I mean, for me, it was more ‘Hey, you’re great, but I’m super gay,’ which I think isn’t a problem here, so…” 

“You dated a gay guy?” Shane asks. 

“Three fucking times, dude,” Rose says, exhaling heavily. “The hazards of a dating pool of theater kids.” 

Shane doesn’t really know what she means by that, but he feels better, for some reason, knowing that he’s not the first guy who likes guys that she’s dealt with before. Statistically, he knows it was unlikely that he would have been anyway, but something about her saying it, about acting like it’s no big deal…

“What’s complicated with your guy?” Rose asks. 

He feels a quick little flicker of mixed terror and joy at the use of “your” here, like he has any claim to Ilya at all, like they’re not casual, like…

Like they’re something, maybe. 

He’s not sure if he wants to smile or puke. 

“I mean, it’s supposed to just be casual,” he says slowly, glancing at Rose to see how she’s taking this. 

How she’s taking this currently is to start eating popcorn again, which is oddly comforting. 

Now that the thought has occurred to him, he can’t stop thinking it, can’t stop gnawing at it like his grandmother’s dog used to do with her toys. Yeah, it was meant to be casual, but if he’s being honest, it hasn’t felt that way in a while now, and it certainly doesn’t feel like it after their last weekend together. It has to mean something, doesn’t it? Ilya feeling okay crying in front of him? It didn’t feel casual, Ilya shaking to pieces, clinging to Shane like he was the only way to avoid drowning. 

It felt…it felt like something. 

“Is it still casual?” Rose asks. 

“I don’t know,” Shane says, leaning back further into his couch, tucking the blanket around his legs a little tighter. 

“Have you guys…talked about it?” Rose asks. 

“No,” Shane says, immediately. 

“Do you think it would go badly?” Rose presses. 

“I…don’t know,” he says. “It might.” 

Or…or it might not. 

The thought feels both dangerous and tempting. 

It’s the way a lot of things with Ilya feel. 

“Then maybe it’s worth asking him,” Rose suggests. “I mean, I only know what I can see from you looking smitten at your phone all the time-” 

Shane swats at her foot. 

“-but it looks like it might be something real, Shane.” She smiles, like she’s happy for him. 

“Maybe,” he allows, glancing back at his phone. 

would be more fun with very boring canadian here with me ❤️

It’s the latest message in the string they’ve been maintaining all evening, Ilya out and about in Boston’s nightlife, and yet still texting him, still saying he wishes Shane were there with him. 

Still acting like…

Well, acting like something that doesn’t feel very casual. 

“If you guys have hot feelings sex afterwards, you’re legally required to tell me all the details, okay?” Rose says, and when he turns to her sharply, she just grins, clearly delighted. “And I mean details, Hollander, down to what flavor condoms you-” 

She makes a wordless noise of protest when he steals the popcorn bowl, kicking him on the hip as he tosses a handful into his mouth. 

It tastes like butter and possibly-reckless hope. 

(But mostly butter.)

*

After how much he’d been looking forward to this year’s All Stars, excited to be on the same team as Shane for the first time, Shane seems oddly…distant, when he arrives, distracted, almost. He looks beautiful because he always looks beautiful–he’s even dressed up this time, better than he usually is, something Ilya wishes he had the space to be amused by–but he looks nervous, too, like something’s bothering him. 

Something, Ilya thinks with a little swell of unease, that he hasn’t brought to Ilya yet. 

“You are okay?” Ilya asks, under his breath, when Shane finally finishes mingling at the arrival mixer and comes to sit next to him, a little closer than would probably be normal for two people but nothing too striking. 

“Fine,” Shane says, in a way that Ilya could read as a lie even if he didn’t know him as well as he does. “I’m-I’ll have the same as my teammate here,” he interrupts himself when the bartender stops by. 

“You drinking doesn’t exactly make me think you’re telling the truth,” Ilya observes as Shane is handed his drink, taking a sip of his own beer. 

“Maybe I’m just feeling wild,” Shane says, and if Ilya couldn’t sense the nerves coming off of him in waves, he might be amused. 

“Your version of wild is not matching your socks before putting them away,” Ilya says. “I think you drinking during the day might count as a cry for help.” 

It’s an opening, an offer. 

You’re holding something heavy, Ilya thinks. I can tell. Let me hold it with you. 

“It’s one beer, Ilya,” Shane says, sounding amused now, which feels like a small achievement, at least. “No need to start organizing an intervention.” 

“Hm,” Ilya observes doubtfully. “Okay. But if you start doing shots, you are grounded.” 

That makes Shane laugh, fully, and it’s absurd, the way the brief touch of Shane shoving his shoulder sends little prickles of electricity through him. 

“Yes, mom,” Shane says dryly, standing up. He pauses, and Ilya wishes there weren’t so many eyes all around them, so many witnesses. He wants to pull Shane towards him, wants to wrap him up in his arms, wants to block the world out so Shane doesn’t have to worry about whatever he’s worrying about so hard. 

The biggest hazard of having a secret boyfriend: having to keep him a secret. 

Shane glances around and then leans forward, like he’s just retrieving the napkin he’d had under his beer. He turns his head just slightly, speaking under his breath. 

“Can I come to your room later?” 

Ilya is honestly a little thrown that he even feels the need to ask. At this point, he’d thought it might be a given that they would be in each other’s rooms. He’d even asked for a second key card at check-in just so he could give it to Shane if he wanted it. His concern, then, only feels larger at the idea of Shane feeling unsettled enough that he feels the need to ask if he can share Ilya’s space, like it isn’t his whenever he wants it. 

“Of course,” he says, just as quietly. It’s now his turn to glance around, hiding it under the excuse of stretching his shoulders and neck out. “You know you’re always welcome.” 

The smile Shane gives him is quick, and Ilya wishes he could kiss him so badly that he can feel his lips tingle with it. 

He presses them to his beer bottle instead and tries not to start counting the hours down until sunset as he watches Shane walk away. 

*

Standing at the door to Ilya’s room, having already texted Rose about doing it so he can’t chicken out, Shane thinks he might actually have been less nervous the night Ilya took his virginity. 

He’s still running the numbers to compare when Ilya actually opens the door, and the way he looks hesitant as well doesn’t exactly fill him with confidence. 

Still, he knows Rose will never let him live it down if he doesn’t go through with it, so he makes himself enter, cross to the bed, and sit, patting the space next to him in invitation. 

“This looks serious,” Ilya observes, but he still obeys, resting his hand over Shane’s when he sits down. 

Shane tries to take comfort in the soft little squeeze he gets. 

“It’s-well, it kind of is,” he allows. 

Ilya’s hand goes a little tighter around his. 

“I, um, I wanted to talk to you about something,” he says, feeling nervous and stupid and wishing he’d never let himself be talked into this. 

And yet hoping, too, for how this still might go. 

“Hey,” Ilya says, and Shane lets himself be coaxed into straddling his lap, Ilya’s hands resting at his hips. 

It’s one of Shane’s favorite ways to sit, this way, and he wishes he could risk a kiss right now. 

“Shane,” Ilya says, and despite himself, his chest feels like it goes a little less tight at the gentle look on his face, “is just me, yes? No reason to be so nervous.” 

Despite the words, Ilya seems a little nervous, too, and that also makes Shane feel a little better. He wonders, feeling amused in a way that borders on hysterical, if Ilya might have been thinking of doing something similar, if Shane might just be beating him to the puck on this. 

Because he is who he is, it’s that thought that actually gives him the courage to suck it up and say what he’s been rehearsing in his head. 

(And sometimes with Rose, a fact she’s been sworn to secrecy about.) 

“Things have been different between us recently,” Shane says. “And I think you’ve felt it, too, haven’t you?” 

*

The whirl of Ilya’s mind comes to an abrupt and jarring halt at the question. 

Despite the sticky Florida humidity that’s inescapable even in air conditioning, it feels like ice trickles down his spine. 

No, he thinks, begs, really. Please don’t do this. Please don’t leave me. Please don’t-

“Different?” He repeats, and if Shane notices that it comes out a little too rough despite Ilya’s efforts at making it sound casual, he doesn’t comment. He reaches up, smooths over Ilya’s hair, rests his hand against the side of his neck. 

In this context, the gentleness feels more than slightly insidious, a farmer petting a chicken kindly before pulling a blade across its throat. 

He knows you’re weak, whispers a thought in his mind with his father’s voice. You showed him what you really are. Now he’s disgusted. 

As he should be. 

“I-” He starts, to argue, to beg, to lie. He doesn’t know, really. He just has to stop Shane from saying more, stop him from saying words that Ilya doesn’t think he can survive, stop him from shattering Ilya in a way there is no recovering from, stop him from-

“Okay,” Shane says, like he’s bracing himself for a fight, pulling his shoulders back, face going resolute. 

Please, Ilya thinks, maybe says. He doesn’t know. He can’t think past the pain, past the fear, past the knowledge that he should have seen this coming all along. Beautiful things like Shane Hollander aren’t for him. 

And yet he’d been stupid enough to want him anyway. 

“I’m just going to say it, okay? And we can-we can talk after-” 

Talk, sure, Ilya thinks, feeling sick, feeling hurt, feeling angry, feeling terrified, knowing that anything that comes out of him after Shane finishes this sentence is more likely to be a scream than anything resembling talking. 

“-but I’ve been thinking about it for a while now, and-” 

How long? Ilya thinks. Where did I fuck up? Where did I ruin it? Tell me, and I can fix it. I can fix this. I can make you see that I can be better for you. I can work harder. I can do better. I can be something you want. Just tell me. I’ll do it. I can-

“-I think I like you.” 

Iya’s downward spiral comes to a halt fast enough to give him whiplash. 

“What.” 

He doesn’t have it in him to ask it as a question. 

He’s not sure he has anything inside him right now beyond wild, mind-splintering confusion. 

*

Shane can feel himself starting to sweat as Ilya stares him, horribly, terrifyingly blank-faced. 

You fucked it up, he tells himself. You got greedy and stupid, and you ruined it. 

Still, at this point, he might as well finish ripping the fucking bandaid off. If Ilya sends him away after this, if he never wants to see him again, he at least won’t have the weight of everything he never said sitting heavy enough in his chest to crush him. 

(He’ll be crushed in other ways, of course, but there’s nothing he can do about that.) 

“I really like you,” he says. “Like, more than I’ve ever liked anyone before.” More than I think I can like anyone else, he thinks but doesn’t say. “I know we’re just…fuckbuddies,” he barely resists the urge to wince at the word, “or whatever, but-” 

“You think we are ‘fuckbuddies,’” Ilya repeats, toneless. 

Shane flinches, hurt. Jesus, okay, apparently he really misread things here, but not even giving him the courtesy of the word fuckbuddy just seems mean. 

“I know you’ve got a thousand girls on rotation,” he says, feeling sharp now, feeling stupid, “but I-” 

“You think I am sleeping with other people?” Ilya asks, and Shane frowns at the way he sounds insulted now, like a thousand just isn’t a high enough number for all the action he gets. 

Asshole. 

“Fine,” he says, acidly, “two thousand girls and a thousand more guys. Happy? You’ve fucked your way across North America like a fucking rockstar, congrats. I just-” 

“You think I would fuck other people?” Ilya demands, and now he sounds mad.

“What do you mean do I think you would fuck other people?” Shane asks, brows furrowing, thrown and also a little pissed that he’s being both rejected and gaslit for some fucking reason. “You fuck other people all the fucking time, Ilya. You’re kind of known for it. I think you even have a whole fucking Reddit page dedicated to it.” 

“Shane,” Ilya says, searching his face like he’s the one looking for a lie here. “You think I have not been-” He makes the frustrated noise he does when he can’t find the English word he wants. “You think I would be your boyfriend and then cheat on you?” 

Shane stares at him for a long, long time. 

“What the fuck did you just say.” 

*

Ilya is really wondering if he got roofied at some point today or just somehow sustained a head injury he can’t remember. He’s also wondering if Shane might have been roofied, too, betrayed by the one time he lets loose and drinks during the season like a cosmic punishment for hockey’s golden boy breaking his own rules. 

It kind of seems like the only fucking explanation for this conversation they’re having right now. 

“Your boyfriend,” Ilya repeats, feeling a little defiant about it now. He was waiting on Shane to use the word, to let him set the pace on it, but it’s the word Ilya’s been operating on. Even without a formal talk about it, Shane’s said he wasn’t dating anyone else, and Ilya’s made it clear–well, he thought he made it clear–that he isn’t, either. He might not be a fucking master of English, but he’s pretty fucking confident in boyfriend being the right word here. Now he’s wondering if he should have said it in French or something. 

Right now, Shane’s looking at him like he said it in Russian. 

“This is the word, yes?” Ilya asks, even though it’s a demand more than a question. “For two men who are dating? The word is boyfriends, yes?” 

It is. He knows it is. Because he’s the most embarrassing person in the fucking world, he’s looked it up in his translation app more than once just to look at it, liking the weight behind it, the claim of a term for him and Shane. 

A term that Shane has somehow apparently never heard in his fucking life to judge from his facial expression right now. 

“We’re dating?” Shane asks, and his facial expression looks like he might be wondering if he’s having a stroke. 

Ilya can currently understand the fucking feeling. 

*

“We’re boyfriends?” Shane repeats, not even able to be flustered by the word because he’s so fucking confused right now. “What do you mean we’re boyfriends?” 

“What do you mean what do I mean we’re boyfriends?” Ilya asks. “We are men, we are dating, this is the word, yes? You know the word boyfriend?” 

“Yes, I know the word boyfriend,” Shane says, annoyed. “But what do you mean we’re boyfriends?” 

“What do you mean?” Ilya asks, drawing every single word out like he thinks Shane might be very, very stupid. 

(With how wildly thrown he feels right now, Shane’s not entirely sure that he’s wrong to do it, honestly.)

“Boyfriends means we’re dating,” Shane says, as if this isn’t a very obvious word that Ilya would absolutely know. 

“Yes,” Ilya agrees. 

“We’re dating?” Shane repeats, head jerking back. 

“Yes,” Ilya agrees again, sharper now. 

“What do you mean we’re dating?” 

When Ilya topples him off of his lap and then hits him over the head with a pillow, he’s too disoriented to even fight back. 

*

Ilya is currently laying on his side, facing Shane, feet tangled together on the mattress. 

He is also holding Shane’s shirt with a white-knuckle grip because he has never looked more like a flight risk than in this moment, and if he tries to run away right now, Ilya might actually lose his fucking mind. 

It’s possible he has already, but that’s what he’s still trying to figure out. 

“I asked you months ago if you wanted to be not casual anymore,” he says, the second time he’s said this because this conversation is determined to be a circle. “And you said yes.” 

“You asked if I wanted to stay over at your house again,” Shane insists, a second repetition of this as well. 

“Yes, like you stayed over that night,” Ilya insists. “When we had fun and acted like boyfriends for first time.” 

“What do you mean we acted like boyfriends?” Shane demands. 

Ilya barely resists the urge to hit him with a pillow again. 

“Shane,” he says, and even amidst the annoyance, Shane looks so endearingly disgruntled that Ilya switches hands holding him in place by his shirt, resting a hand along the side of his head. “You think I treat other people like I treat you?” 

“I mean…” Shane says, and now he looks almost shy about it. 

Despite himself, Ilya softens slightly. 

“You really didn’t notice?” He asks, and Shane shrugs, chin tucking down slightly as his cheeks go faintly pink. “You think other people get treated the same way as you? Shane, how would I have the time to do this?” 

“I mean…” Shane trails off, reaching out to run his fingers over the hem of his shirt. It’s a sweet little fidget, and Ilya would like to kiss him about it. 

If he wasn’t currently so determined to figure out what the fuck happened here. 

“You’ve been with a lot of people,” Shane says, looking at his shirt and only his shirt. “I don’t know what you’re like with them.” 

“I will give you hint,” Ilya says, and even to his own ears, his voice sounds warm despite his residual confused annoyance. “Not like I am with you.” 

“That’s not a good hint,” Shane says flatly, and Ilya huffs a laugh, unable to help it. When he pulls him into a kiss, Shane goes easily, staying close enough to share Ilya’s pillow when they pull apart to catch their breath. 

“You are only person I want in my bed,” Ilya says softly. “I want to fall asleep with you and wake up with you and make your weird special game day breakfasts for you.” He pulls Shane in for another kiss. “I want to watch your terrible real estate shows-” 

“They are not terrible-” 

“-and argue about how stevia tastes gross and how that detergent in the gray bottle smells terrible and you should stop using it and steal your hoodies and let you steal mine-” 

“It’s not stealing, you get them back eventually-” 

“I want to be your boyfriend, Shane.” 

He cups Shane’s face the way he imagines other people hold holy things, kissing him once, twice, lingering with their foreheads together, eyes closed. He knows there’s more they’ll have to discuss. It’s still impossible, the whole thing. There’s still obstacles that might be impossible, still all of fucking Russia to think about-

-but Shane is here in front of him now, beautiful and soft. 

And apparently very, very bad at knowing when he’s dating someone, Ilya thinks wryly. 

“Shane?” 

“Hm?” Shane hums, sounding soft and content enough that Ilya’s question has to be put on a brief pause for the sake of kissing him again. 

“So we can avoid doing this again a few months from now: do you want to date me?” 

“Yes,” Shane says, sounding shy, forehead nudging against his a little harder. 

“Good choice,” Ilya says dryly, getting a knee to the thigh for it. He brushes his nose against Shane’s affectionately. “I want to date you, too.” 

“Good choice,” Shane echoes, imitating his accent, and Ilya can hear the smirk in his voice. 

He pulls back, cupping Shane’s cheek in his palm, thumb stroking gently over his cheekbone. He’s so beautiful it almost hurts to look at him. 

“So you’re-” Shane shifts slightly, leaning into Ilya’s hand. “You’re really my boyfriend?” 

Ilya smiles, shifting his hand enough to rest his thumb at the corner of Shane’s mouth, following the movement when it curls into a little half-smile. 

“Do you want me to be?” Ilya says, because he needs to hear it out loud. 

And not just because Shane apparently didn’t fucking know about it for multiple months. 

“Yes,” Shane says, voice quiet. His eyes are a little shiny, and Ilya’s thumb moves again to trace along the soft skin under one, leaning in to press his lips there afterwards before sitting back. “So much.” 

Now it’s Ilya’s turn to feel his eyes sting. 

“So,” Ilya says, “we should put it in a contract, or what? To make sure it’s clear this time? Write it out in terms, have lawyer look at-” 

This time it’s Shane’s turn to hit him with a pillow. 

Ilya laughs, wrestling him for ownership of the weapon, both of them sliding on the bed when they try and fail to catch themselves on the comforter only to have it slip unexpectedly. It’s stupid and probably way too loud and definitely going to present a problem when Ilya has to sleep in this destroyed bed tonight. He’s on top and then Shane’s on top, and it’s a blur of pillows and hands and lips and laughter and-

-and love. 

*

Shane’s first reaction to reaching his locker and seeing the bouquet of lilies inside is to drop his head forward and groan. 

Right. He’d forgotten what today was. 

Which he’s sure will be another mark against him on today of all days. 

The shuffle of the other Centaurs entering the locker room makes him stand up straight, and he moves the flowers to the bench behind him, knowing he’ll pay for that, too, but unwilling to try maneuvering around the vase without knocking it over. The flowers prompt a couple of playful questions from other players as they pass by, but Shane just shakes his head, and they let it go. He strips out of his practice gear quickly, and he’s down to his compression shirt when he feels his husband behind him even before the gentle hand that slides across his lower back as he steps around him to get to his own locker, right next to Shane’s. He holds his hand out without looking and hears the zip of metal on metal as Ilya pulls their wedding bands off of the chain, custodian of both when they’re on the ice to spare Shane from the sensation of a necklace against his skin. In exchange, Shane accepts Ilya’s silicone band along with it, slipping off his matching one and returning them to the box that lives in his bag, replacing it with gold. 

The flowers remain unaddressed. 

“You have a reservation, or should I make one?” Shane asks, stripping his shirt off. 

“Already made,” Ilya says, sounding more than a little smug about it. “Unless you have other plans you-” 

“You’re ridiculous,” Shane says, kicking his ankle lightly. “It’s not-” 

“What are the flowers for?” Haas asks, and Ilya looks to Shane at the same moment he looks to Ilya. 

There’s a question in his husband’s eyes, a request for permission to share something. It’s one of the things they’ve worked on finding a balance on together, finding the comfortable midpoint between Ilya’s desire for openness and Shane’s desire for privacy. It’s not a perfect balance, especially when Shane already spends most days feeling like he’s already had more privacy stripped away from him than he ever would have given willingly, but it’s a work in progress. They’ll find their way there, the way they do everything best: together

Shane nods, faint enough that no one else would catch it. 

“Is my anniversary,” Ilya announces grandly, and Shane rolls his eyes at the wink he gets, already bracing himself. 

“Oh, did you guys start dating today?” Haas asks, sounding genuinely happy for them. “Because your wedding wasn’t-” 

“Is my anniversary,” Ilya corrects cheerfully. “Shane’s anniversary is in four months.” 

Haas gives Shane a confused look as Ilya flounces off towards the showers, seeming wildly pleased at so perfectly striking a balance between obnoxious and cryptic. Shane shrugs, shaking his head with fond resignation as he gathers up his towel to follow, snagging Ilya’s as well since he was too busy being annoying to remember it. 

“Trust me,” he says dryly, tossing both over his shoulder. “It’s too much to explain.” 

With a reluctantly amused last glance at the lilies on the bench, Shane makes his way to the showers. 

After all, he has an anniversary to get ready for. 

(Even if it’s not his.)

(Yet.)