Chapter Text
Shane hung up the FaceTime call with Ilya and stared at the wall of the hotel conference room he'd barricaded himself into for a moment. He'd managed to stop crying for last couple of minutes of the phone call, but now that Ilya was gone the tears came back with a vengeance.
"Holy fuck." Shane whispered.
A knock sounded at the door, followed by Hayden's voice.
"Shane? Hey buddy, it's me. Just me."
Shane couldn't make himself choke out the words to either send Hayden away or let him in, just scrubbed at his eyes and tried to pull his shit together.
"Hey." Hayden shuffled in, closing the door behind him. "You okay?"
Shane shook his head, wiping his nose on his sleeve.
"Jackie called and told me I was sleeping on the couch for the foreseeable future if I didn't come down here and check on you."
Shane nodded.
"She also said to tell you a couple other things. Can I?" He pulled out one of the meeting room chairs and sat in it. Shane shrugged.
"She said that she, I mean, we love you both. And she wants you over for dinner as soon as possible. She also said to bring you tissues and coconut water, which I admittedly had neither of, so please accept your comfort committee at its worst."
Shane laughed wetly, and Hayden continued.
"She... Um, also said that Ilya's ring size is a 10. And that he likes gold more than silver, though you probably could figure that yourself."
The two men stared at each other over the table. Shane blinked.
"Do you get what we're saying here?" Hayden asked, his blue eyes seeking Shane's. Shane blinked again, and took a shuddering breath as it clicked. Fuck, he'd probably be arriving at the same conclusion in the next hour anyways.
"The last thing is from me, but I know Jackie would totally back me up. Bear with me here because I'm going to go totally off brand and do something very un-manly because I love you."
"Why do I need Ilya's ring size if you're the one proposing to me?" Shane ground out, his voice rough from crying.
"Okay, fuck you. But also listen the fuck up."
"Swear jar." Shane whispered. "Two times."
Hayden rolled his eyes, but grabbed Shane's hand in both of his. His blue eyes sobered and he seemed to deflate a little.
"Shane, man. I love you, but you're an idiot. You just almost lost him in a plane crash. What the fuck are you doing?"
"Huh?" Shane asked. "You just told me his ring size, I need to go look-"
"No, what are you still doing in D.C.?"
Shane felt the oxygen leaving his lungs. He'd told Ilya he'd thought about renting a car, but what about a plane? A train, a fucking charter bus? Why hadn't he run off the bus and directly into a taxi to the airport?
Because he was a shit boyfriend, apparently. A shit boyfriend who was at the stupid hotel because he thought about fucking hockey more than the man he wanted to spend his life with.
"There we go." Hayden said, reaching out to pat Shane's shoulder. "Let's go get your stuff, I already booked you on the red-eye out of Reagan."
"W-what?" Shane asked shakily.
"Come on. Jackie and I have it all ironed out, because we knew you weren't going to get there without a push."
Shane felt his breath hitch in his chest, and then he was full-out sobbing again, because what the fuck kind of partner was he that everyone else knew he was too scared to make his move even in the face of some dumb karmic event like a plane crash? Why was he the kind of person that needed a fucking push to do anything right? Was this the kind of person Ilya would shackle himself to for the rest of his life?
"I already chose you."
Ilya's words from their fight had haunted him, but never more so than in this moment. Ilya was ready, had been ready, would continue to wait for Shane to cast off his self-imposed chains and do the right thing. But could he actually go to Tampa? He'd be seen at the airport, at the Centaur's hotel, afterwards... All that secrecy would be blown to dust. Could he really do that?
"I can't go to fucking Tampa, Hayd..." He said brokenly. "I... I can't."
He was panicking. Full on having a panic attack in Hayden's arms. This was... yeah, a lot.
"Okay, buddy. Breathe for me." Hayden was saying, and just letting Shane fucking sob on his shoulder. Oh god, he was a mess.
"Ope, Jackie's calling." Hayden fished his phone out of his pocket while still holding Shane, gently rocking him back and forth a little. "Hey, Baby. Yeah, I got him. I told him." Hayden was saying into his phone. "He just said he can't go to Tampa. He's... uh. You can probably hear him, can't you? Oh. Yeah, let me give you to him."
"Hi Jackie..." Shane choked out as Hayden held the phone up to Shane's ear.
"Hey, sweetie. I know, I know everything sucks. But you have to get to Tampa, okay? Trust me. Trust us. Please."
Shane whimpered in pain. It fucking hurt. He wanted to go to Tampa so badly, he should be there. He absolutely needed to go. Ilya needed him.
"Shane, what are you waiting for?" Jackie said softly into the phone. Shane gasped. What was he waiting for exactly? More NHL players to come out and roll out a carpet for him? Crowell's handwritten permission? Some cosmic event bigger than a plane crash to come along and force his hand?
"Y-y-you're right. You're both right. Let's go." Shane said in a rush, before he could back the fuck out or compromise on his relationship one more fucking time.
"Oh, thank fuck. Get off of me, you're ruining my good suit." Hayden replied, pulling the phone back to his own ear and gently pushing off of Shane. "Yeah, Jackie, we're going. I love you I love you I love you. Thank you for using your scary oracle powers for good. By the way, I love you." He kissed the phone's mic and hug up.
"Okay, here is the fucking plan, because I know you love a fucking plan. We have ten minutes before the cab is here. Give me your room key. I'll grab your bag while you go in the bathroom and try to fix your face."
"My face?"
"Shane, you look like the saddest clown at the circus right now. If the saddest clown was hungover and lost a fight or two."
"Fuck off, man. I don't look that bad."
"You're right. Just like you sobbed and snotted all over my fucking good suit. You're worse than Arthur."
"Swear jar. So many times." Shane wiped his face.
"You ready?" Hayden asked him seriously, hand on the doorknob. Shane slowly nodded.
"Hey, Hayd?" He asked, and before he could stop himself from being utterly selfish, added: "Can you come with me? To Tampa? I think I need my best friend with me when I get engaged."
Hayden grinned. "Dude, why do you think my bag's already in the lobby?"
"So, do you have any ideas yet?" Hayden asked him, as the plane to Tampa sat on the tarmac waiting for takeoff. Shane took out his earbud and raised an eyebrow.
"For the ring? For the proposal? Any of this?" Hayden prompted.
Shane's eyes went wide and he turned to look blankly at the seat back in front of him. Fuck. He'd been entirely too busy panicking about Ilya, and then whether his suitcase had everything in it, and then about whether they would make the flight in time, and then back to Ilya, that his brain had not trekked over to that topic yet.
"Ooookay, I'm gonna bring Jackie in. We'll use the wifi once we're in the air. I'm not a big plan guy, but I know you love a plan, so let's work some magic in the next two hours."
"Hayd, it's like four in the morning-"
"And Jackie has been planning for this day for years now, plus she's up with the baby already. She just texted me."
Shane tried to make sense of his racing thoughts. He needed to get his act together and make a plan. He was good at that. He liked plans, loved them, even.
"You really have no idea, do you?" Hayden asked him.
"Is that bad?" Shane asked. God, this was actually kind of embarrassing.
"No. I flew by the seat of my pants when I proposed to Jackie."
"I know, Hayd. I was there."
"I guess I just thought you'd have a big plan, put all this crazy effort into it. Granted, I don't think even Shane Hollander can orchestrate an almost plane crash to happen just for the sake of his plans. But I guess I thought you'd already have this in the bag."
"I feel like a piece of shit about it, but no. I don't have anything in the pipeline."
"Well, let's fix that." Hayden got out his iPad, scraped at some errant peanut butter one of his kids had gotten on the screen, and pulled up his notes app.
"If Jackie were here, she'd probably say something wise about starting with the vibes, like how he makes you feel or some shit. But we are only mere men, and we have two hours to discover fire in. So let's brainstorm what he might like, as gross as it makes me feel to try and do this."
"Thanks, Hayd." Shane smiled. "You're a really good friend."
So they began to plot. And yeah, it really did feel like two apes trying to type Shakespeare, or discover fire. Despite knowing Ilya's body better than his own, and coexisting in time and space with the man for a decade, Shane was feeling weirdly shy about planning to propose to him. How had he not thought about this at all in the last couple of years?
Because you probably thought he'd be the one to ask, dumbass.
"Candles." Shane said aloud, a thought swimming to the forefront of his brain. "He said once that he wanted to cover the dock at the cabin in candles when he proposed."
"And, let me guess, you..."
"Told him it was a fire hazard." They finished at the same time, laughing. Someone on the opposite side of the plane's aisle from them glared over at them, and they grinned sheepishly.
"Okay, candles. We can work with that. Party City won't be open, but Wal-Mart will. Let me look if the hotel has a dock or gazebo or some shit."
Shane's stomach dropped at Hayden's words. Hayden's eyes flicked up to his, and he raised an eyebrow.
"Party City not being open made me think: how the hell am I going to get a ring?" Shane said, swallowing.
"Dude. Have you not been answering Jackie's texts?" Hayden shot back. Shane blinked and looked at his phone. There were 5 messages from Jackie from the last half hour, while he'd been rubbing his brain cells together furiously to come up with one singular thought about candles.
Shane, I have a place that you two can stop on the way to the hotel, but I need to send the jeweler some ideas. What are you thinking?
Do you like either of these?
She had sent a picture of two bands, side by side. One was swirling gold, the other was a checkerboard pattern.
Or maybe something like this?
These two were blockier, but one had vertical lines with a diamond in the center while the other had horizontal lines cradling the diamond.
Here's the link to the website's available stock, look at it and let me know.
Shane? Help me a little here?
Shane quickly typed a reply that he was sorry to miss her texts and that he was looking through the stock.
"Good, we've got that part out of the way. I have a car for us, we'll go to the Jeweler, then to Wal-mart for a fuck ton of electric candles. Or maybe I can get some of the Cens to get those for us? Do you think they'd help?"
Shane blinked, pausing between scrolling pages of gold bands.
"Yeah. I think they absolutely would. They love him."
"Huh." Hayden snorted, as if he couldn't quite wrap his head around it.
"Look, I know you don't like him. But he's different when you're playing with him, and not against him. When he lets you in, he's..."
"He's what, fine? Just okay?" Hayden teased.
"I was gonna say radiant, but I guess I can settle for admirable, if that's okay with you." Shane poked back.
"I have Wyatt's number from All-Stars, and might have Barrett's too. We'll loop them in and see if we can make some magic happen. Radiance deserves radiance, after all."
"Aw, admirable." Shane joked. His eyes caught on another band, but the design wasn't what made him pause, it was the title. It was just a plain hammered gold band, scalloped from the hammering. It was called "The Instigator".
"Oh shit, that's the one, isn't it?" Hayden said, leaning over Shane's phone screen.
"Pretty on point, don't you think?" Shane murmured. He screenshotted the listing and sent it to Jackie with a text that said "This one."
"Click on that button there, see what it pairs with." Hayden said, reaching over to poke at the screen.
"Why?"
"You need a ring too, dumbass." Hayden replied. Shane rolled his eyes. He could get himself a ring later, if Ilya said yes.
The page took a second to load on the plane wifi, but when it did, Hayden let out a barely concealed snort of laughter.
"You have got to be kidding me."
The website assumed that the matching rings would be for women, which was fine, but the first listing on the suggested popup was a diamond ring labelled "The Lily". Shane unironically loved it, and he knew Ilya would love it even more.
"You're getting it, right? Like it's too funny not to."
"You think I can pull off this giant rock?" Shane asked, holding it next to his left hand and trying not to let his stomach do too many backflips over it.
"Hell yeah, I do. And you know it will probably drive him nuts seeing it sparkling. I still get hot when I see Jackie's ring paired with a formal dress. Or paired with nothing at all."
"Gross, Hayd." Shane pushed him away. He screenshotted The Lily and sent it to Jackie. "What step of the plan are we up to?"
"Um, kind of nowhere near any steps. But we have rings, and we have candles, and I have Wyatt Hayes' cell phone number. What could go wrong with that winning combo?"
"Okay. Fuck. We have an hour until landing, Hayd."
"I know, I know. I'm texting Hayes to find out where their hotel is and to bring him under the cover of secrecy, if that's okay?"
"Sure. Fuck it." Shane replied. The Centaurs were going to find out everything in a few hours, might as well start ripping the band-aids off now.
"They're probably not awake yet." Hayden offered.
"I mean, that's fine. We have errands to run first, even if..."
"All you want to do is show up to team breakfast and drop down on one knee?"
"Hayd, no. Scratch that step of the plan out."
"Okay, okay. But we're still going to crash team breakfast, it's just kind of inevitable."
They formed a shaky plan. It really was just pieces of a plan stuck together with duct tape. Him and Hayden were operating on exactly no sleep, too much adrenaline, and a lot of nervous enthusiasm. Shane might have chickened on the entire thing, except that the plan drastically improved once they asked a very exasperated Jackie and a very confused Wyatt Hayes for help improving it. By the time the plane touched down in Tampa, Shane could sit with the level of anxiety he felt, knowing that in just a few hours he would be seeing Ilya, and if this insane plan went accordingly, would be ending the day an engaged man.
"Hey, you don't think your mom would kill you if you just signed the paperwork here, or planned a layover in Vegas on the way back?" Hayden asked.
"Definition shotgun wedding, Hayd. Except you and I are getting shot by my mother for my getting married without her."
Maybe it was the fact that they hadn't slept in over 24 hours, or that the idea of Yuna Hollander with a shotgun was entirely too easy to picture. Or maybe it was that Shane and Hayden had cooked up an insane proposal plan while on a flight in the middle of the night. They laughed until tears were streaming down both of their faces and they could barely breathe.