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Everyone had always told Ilya that he would eventually get in trouble for his ‘big ass mouth’ as his coaches called it. He had never been particularly worried. His teams always had good defensemen, and no one really wanted to be the first one to punch Ilya Rozanov. When it came down to it, the first person to throw their gloves down and come at him was none other than Shane Hollander, who had given him an impressive bloody nose and split lip. He had a photo of it printed, framed, signed and sent straight to the older man’s house. He’d seen it at the cottage years later, a bloody smile watching over the hallway. After that, he still wasn’t worried about fights. It happened to everyone, and his metaphorical cherry had been popped by his very own rival, really he’d been lucky. Now, lying on a stretcher in the back of an ambulance, cradling his definitely broken wrist and feeling the pulse of a broken nose, he definitely didn’t feel lucky.
Ilya had been in his fair share of hospitals. He volunteered at children’s hospitals all the time, and as team captain, he visited any players that had to get checked in. But he was very rarely the one sitting on a stretcher, looking very disgruntled as he was rolled into a room one of the doctors called ‘South 7’. “I am fine. I do not need to be here,” he complained to one of the EMTs. “Mr. Rozanov, you can’t move your fingers,” she said back, helping him into the bed in his new room. “Who even needs fingers? You don’t need fingers to play hockey.” She rolled her eyes, and walked back to her partner, who hadn’t been able to string together a full sentence while they were in the truck. He really hoped those sheets or bloody bandages wouldn’t end up on eBay or some creepy shit like that. Did that count as human trafficking? It was still a part of him. He stared at his mangled wrist as he thought, lower lip pushing out into an almost pout. The EMTs had said he was still hopped up on adrenaline, which was why he wasn’t writhing in pain. He assumed whatever doctor came to care for him would have him chock full of drugs in no time. The curtain surrounding his… room? Cubicle? The curtain opened, and a young man ducked into the room. He looked awkward, and exhausted. A tag hung from his neck that read ‘DOCTOR’, so at least he was going to help.
“Hello Mr. Rozanov, I’m Dr. Whitaker, and I’ll be looking after you today. What…” he paused, looking at the stream of blood that went down his mouth, jaw and neck, soaked into the only shirt the EMTs hadn’t cut from him. “What happened?”
“Hockey game,” Ilya said simply, shrugging. The man nodded, and scribbled something on his notepad. “Right. Well, first, I’m going to get you into a gown, then we’ll get that blood cleaned up, then we’ll send you for some x-rays, yeah?” He nodded.
“Is there anyone we can call?” His eyes, which had been darting around his body the whole time, finally settled on his eyes. Ilya couldn’t remember the last time someone he wasn’t fucking had looked at him with that much care and concern. He shook his head.
“My coach knows. He is only one who needs to know.” It sounded sad to say out loud, but it was true. After his dad died, and he cut off his brother, he had no one. Teammates, sure. Shane, of course. But they all knew. Shane would find out through the network of WAGs and the gossip mills that goalies were, and Svetlana had probably been watching the game. Who else was there? He hissed softly when Whitaker gently took his arm away from his chest. “Does that hurt?”
“Ah, yes.” He thought for a moment, running gentle fingers over his wrist, staring as if he could see his bones.
“I’ll get you some pain meds. Jesse, our night nurse, will be with you shortly.” Then he ducked back out of the room.
As soon as he was out of South 7, Santos fell into step with him so smoothly it was almost like she hadn’t been waiting outside. “Is it actually him?”
“Is it actually who?”
“Rozanov! Ilya Rozanov, he’s basically a hockey god.” Dennis sighed. He’d watched one too many hockey games since living with her. While Santos didn’t present as someone who would like hockey, she was a major fan, and she had a special place in her heart for rivalries. So yes, he knew who Ilya Rozanov was, he knew who his so called worst enemy was (he thought they were probably fucking), and he knew that he gave no shits.
“He’s my patient, Trin, hockey god or not.” She groaned, staying in pace with him as he ordered morphine, tapping his card.
“Could I give him the drugs? You know, you have a lot of cases right now, I could just take him on entirely.” Dennis cut her a glare.
“You have 3 patients, and you’re helping in chairs. He’s my second patient. Back off.” She groaned again, even louder the second time. He took it as his sign to walk away, sure she wouldn’t follow this time.
“You’re just keeping him because you think he’s hot!” She shouted after him, absolutely no shame in the middle of the crowded ER. Whitaker just flipped her off from over his shoulder. At the nurses station, Robby tracked him over his glasses.
“Looking better already,” Whitaker greeted, slipping through the curtains. Rozanov was in a gown, and all the blood had been cleaned from his face. Jesse was a whiz with wet wipes.
“Yes, I am ready for red carpet,” the man muttered, something teasing clinging to his tone. He was curled around his arm protectively, and his jaw was clearly clenched.
“Sorry for making you wait, but I have pain meds.” He stepped up, bottle of morphine in one hand, and a small needle in the other. Rozanov flinched imperceptibly, before dropping his non hurt arm out and towards him.
“I was not waiting, is fine. But I would still like the medicine.” One thing Whitaker never thought he would experience is leaning over a sweaty, world famous hockey player who had been covered in his own blood not even ten minutes ago, and the hockey player was polite. He tapped around his arm for a few seconds, before locating a good spot, and pushing the morphine. He watched Rozanov’s face, counting the seconds until his jaw unclenched.
“Better?” He asked, rubbing his gloved thumb over the place he’d pricked. The man nodded peacefully.
“Great. You’ll need an x-ray for your wrist and your nose, even though I don’t think I’ll need to set it.”
“Broken nose looks much cooler,” he muttered.
“Unfortunately, looking cool isn’t exactly the top factor in this type of thing.” Rozanov didn’t reply beyond blowing a raspberry. He left to get Jesse.
Mateo was next to appear next to him, eyes bugged wide. “Do you have Ilya fucking Rozanov as a patient right now?”
“Are you guys betting again?” He asked in lieu of a response. The board in the attending office had originally been used for notes in between attendings, but after years of Jack and Robby simply debriefing, it had become the Betting Board. He squinted towards it, just in case he could see Rozanov’s name plastered across it anywhere.
“It’s not a bet. Well, not a bet for here, me and some friends have a bet going on the cup this year, but that’s not- are you or are you not treating Ilya Rozanov?” He squinted. Mateo tended to be very cool headed, but he seemed… frantic.
“I am,” he said finally. The other man visibly calmed down, tilting his head back as if in shock.
“Ilya Rozanov is in my hospital,” he whispered. He turned on his heel, and he walked away. Whitaker stared after him. Hockey fans were weird.
He put a rush on Rozanov’s x-rays, wanting to get him out of the hospital as quickly as possible. Having celebrities in the beds made it hard for everyone to work, especially the nurses, and they were already short. Dana would keep a handle on it, but as an avid penguins fan, she might also slip Rozanov something lethal. Robby sidled up to him as he scanned the boards.
“Dr. Whitaker,” he hummed, settling a hand on his shoulder. Something in his chest warmed at the contact.
“Dr. Robby,” Whitaker said back, smiling up at him.
“I heard you and Dr. Santos. What’s this about a… hot patient?” At the start of his student rotation there, the question would have shaken him to his very core. His superior, his teacher, asking him a question about an attractive patient? Surely it was a trap, set perfectly to get him to admit something inappropriate. But now, he just bumped his hip with Robby’s, and dropped his voice.
“You have nothing to worry about, it’s just Trinity being Trinity.”
“Yeah? Not looking to replace me with a younger model?” Oh, his anxious, insecure boyfriend.
“No, I’m very happy with my current edition.” Robby’s soft smile, the one that crinkled his eyes and forced him to squint, took over his face. If they weren’t in the middle of the ER, Dennis would have kissed him. But they were, and he could hear a Russian accent chatting up the porter bringing him back down.
“I’ll be right back,” he promised, patting his forearm, before rushing off to collect his patient.
Rozanov was in a temporary sling, talking the poor porters ear off about birds. More specifically, the way migratory birds communicate, and how he wished he could learn how to do a loon call. “Hey! He’s mine,” he called, stepping up next to the bed. The porter, a young looking girl, sighed appreciably.
“Can I see your ID?” He held out his badge, and she let her shoulders fall.
“He’s all yours, Whitaker.” Rozanov did not seem pleased with the statement. He swung his head around to stare at the other man, eyes narrowed.
“I am not yours.”
“No, of course not, but you are my patient. It just means anything about your care has to go through me first.” He still looked indignant.
“I do not belong to you, I have a boyfriend,” he said, just as he rolled his wheelchair back into South 7.
“I belong to him.” Had it not already been 11, not even halfway through his shift, maybe Whitaker would have reacted more, it’s not every day a hockey player proudly proclaims that he has a boyfriend. Well, besides Scott Hunter, and how ever many others since then, (Santos made flash cards) but either way, he didn’t much care.
“Okay, you belong to your boyfriend, then.”
“Shane,” he said firmly. “Shane Hollander.”
Ilya’s mind felt… soupy. He was tired, and it felt like his skin was buzzing, but in a good way. Morphine was nice, when it meant he couldn’t feel the bones in his arm that were ‘not where they were supposed to be’ or whatever the tech had told him. He had been explaining his tattoo to the girl taking him back to his cubicle and when his doctor had taken control of his wheelchair, saying that Ilya was his. But even in his current drowsy state of mind, Ilya knew that he was NOT Doctor Whitaker’s, which he made sure the man knew. As soon as he said who he did belong to, however, the doctor froze.
“Hollander? Like from the Metros?”
“You do not look like you would watch hockey.”
“You don’t look like you’d have a boyfriend,” the man shot back. Ilya shrugged.
“Was not intentional. He was pretty, and I was 18. Things happen.” He wasn’t supposed to say these things, Shane had told him not to, but Doctor Whitaker wouldn’t tell Shane anything. But the other man appeared to be distracted, staring at the x-rays that had been sent up with him. Shane would like that, the doctor not listening. Shane would also like to see the x-rays.
“Can I have those? My Shane would like them.”
“Pictures of your shattered arm?” He shrugged again. Plenty of hockey players collected art, not necessarily because they thought it was nice, but because it was expensive, and they needed things to blow their money on. Shane wasn’t like that, he didn’t even like art. Its intricacies didn’t make sense to him, there was no meaning in the paint strokes beyond an already obvious photo. But he could pretend to collect art, if it gave him a reason to hang up Ilya’s shattered wrist somewhere nice and public.
“He has a picture of what I looked like after he punched me, he says it’s to remember how stupid I am.” Whitaker nodded, like this was something people said every day. Hockey players didn’t really do romance. He knew plenty of guys who had collected their teeth that got knocked out, plated them in expensive metals and given them to their wives. That was the closest they got to something sweet, but that wasn’t the type of thing Ilya would ever give Shane. Not that he had knocked out any teeth, he had a top market mouthguard to protect against the possibility. His blinks felt longer, and the next time he opened his eyes, the doctor was staring at him.
“Am I dying?” He asked nervously.
“In my professional opinion, no. You just need a nap after a long game of hockey. I’ll leave you for a while, you’ll need to get your arm set anyways.” He nodded slowly, settling against the uncomfortable bed. Morphine, luckily, made it feel like a cloud.
As a doctor, Dennis had a moral and legal responsibility to keep every goddamn thing Ilya told him to himself. But good god did he want to drag Robby into a closet to tell him that the biggest names in hockey at the moment were dating. It was hard to believe. He pinched the bridge of his nose, letting out a slow hiss of air. Behind him, Rozanov shuffled against the bed, adjusting himself until he sniffed, and stopped moving. He seemed anxious. After he said his boyfriend’s name, (which Dennis was actively avoiding thinking of, because surely if he thought too hard someone would be able to read his mind), he’d pouted a little bit. Even as he kept talking, he acted like he knew he wasn’t supposed to be saying anything, which he definitely wasn’t, but he was still glad the man got to be open. Even if the secret relationship between the biggest hockey rivalry in 15 years was all he was going to be able to think of. He ducked out of the room, beelining for Robby, who was still at the nurses’ station. His eyebrows had raised above his glasses.
“Was that..?”
“Ilya Rozanov, Russian hockey god? Yes.” The older man hummed.
“He is pretty hot.” Dennis cut him a glare, and he chuckled.
“Walk with me?”
“Where to?” He shrugged, hands in his pockets. No one would say it out of fear of jinxing it, but it was a quiet night. The attending and a resident disappearing wouldn’t be too bad. “Somewhere romantic.”
Hospitals had always been locked down. There were drugs and weapons everywhere, as well as expensive machinery and medical waste which was a surprisingly popular target for looters. So PTMC was covered in cameras, mirrors, and keycard boxes. But, when you were a resident with a boyfriend you weren’t supposed to be dating, you found the best places to make out pretty quickly. Namely, room 3 in radiology. Downsizing in the hospital had them shutting down rooms and selling non-essential equipment, like the radiograph. The room was a bit creepy, with its blue walls, minimal lighting, and heavy bolts in the floor from where machines used to sit, but with Robby’s hand on his ribs, Dennis found it hard to notice. There were no cameras in the corners, and no one used it beyond storage from time to time, making it their favourite room to hide away in. Not that they left often. Only when no one was actively dying, or in danger of dying. Robby’s hand crept down his waist, before slipping under his shirt to grab at his skin.
“Pervert,” Dennis whispered against him, one heel hooking behind his leg to pull him closer.
“You love it,” Robby hissed back, nipping his lip. Dennis chuckled, arching into him. Eventually, the sneaking around would get old, he was sure of it. Trying not to grin so wide when he saw him in the mornings, lying to Santos about where he spent the night, being tugged into small closets when either of them wanted a fix… surely it would start to ebb at him. But for now, it was just exciting. Momentarily, he wondered if that was what the hockey player downstairs felt; excited at the idea of hiding, the romance of no one knowing. As Robby pressed a leg between his, leaning down to mouth at the junction of his neck, he knew that he didn’t. Ilya Rozanov didn’t want to hide, he wanted everyone to know. Robby cradled one side of his neck to continue kissing the other, humming when Dennis ran his fingers through the older man's hair. He supposed he was going to have to talk to his new patient a bit more.
When Ilya woke up, still in the hospital, he found that he was crying. Hot, rapid tears dripped down his face, sinking into the pillow below him. He still felt floaty and soft, and high off his ass, but there was a sunken feeling in his chest. His arm hurt, he couldn’t grasp his own thoughts, and more than anything, he missed Shane. Shane. He remembered why he was crying. He had told Dr. Whitaker about Shane, and for all he knew, the whole world could know now. Maybe Shane had already publicly dumped him, telling the world that he’d never loved Ilya, no matter how much Ilya loved him. He hiccuped a cough, more tears soaking into the pillow. He was in public, the last place he should ever be crying, but he couldn’t reign in his mind. Dr Whitaker stepped into the small room, and immediately froze at the sight of him. Curled around his arm, a huge hockey player sobbing on the folding bed like a toddler. Would they kick him out from pure embarrassment? But then his bed was being raised, and Whitaker was placing a warm hand on the back of his gown.
“Hey, take some breaths for me. You’re having a panic attack.” Ilya shook his head. Shane had panic attacks, when he stopped being able to breathe, and every part of him shook, and he cried until he fell asleep, this wasn’t a panic attack.
“You don’t get to argue until you can take a 5 second breath.” The cold disk of a stethoscope landed on his back, but he barely flinched. Whatever thunderous noise his heart and lungs were making didn’t surprise Dr. Whitaker, but he again crooned for him to take deep breaths. Ilya’s non-broken hand gripped at the bars on the bed, and he closed his eyes. His mother’s voice whispered in his head, reminding him to focus on the ground under his feet and the air around him. “It’s scary, but you are brave,” she would say, holding his hand. The stethoscope lifted off of his back, and Whitaker handed him a cup of ice water.
“You doing alright?”
“I’m fine,” he said tersely. “You… you cannot tell anyone what I told you. About Hollander.” Dr. Whitaker made a sad sound, and sat on the chair at the side of the bed.
“You’re not out?”
“No. Nothing like that, is not like that.”
“You’re not in love?” The word slipped off his tongue like it didn’t shoot a hole through Ilya’s chest. He only barely stopped himself from outright whining at the word.
“I am, we are. But we cannot be.” The doctor sat in the chair next to him, apparently comfortable with his breathing. He was quiet for a moment, staring at the curtains surrounding the bed.
“I’m in love with someone, too. I’m not allowed to tell anyone, because he’s my boss.” His voice was quiet, eyes still pinned to the entrance like he was scared someone would walk in. He was either telling the truth, or a very good liar. He looked too Mormon to lie.
“There’s forms we could fill out, have the hospital approve our relationship and let us work together, but it wouldn’t stop the problems. I was a student doctor just last year, under his instruction.”
“People will think you fucked him to get a job?” Whitaker let out a sad laugh.
“Something like that. Slept my way through school, got to where I am without deserving it. Something slutty.”
“I do not think you’re a slut,” Ilya said earnestly. “You’re too… southern.” Dr. Whitaker fucking giggled, and Ilya immediately knew that he didn’t sleep his way through medical school. No one would pass someone this cute based purely off of sex.
“Cowboys can’t be sluts?”
“You are not a cowboy, you’re a gentleman.” He stood up, marking the close to the conversation.
“I think my boyfriend is the gentleman.” Ilya hummed, sipping some of the ice water he had been given. He was feeling much better. The doctor leaned over his bed, face serious. “I know it’s scary. But love was never meant to be quiet.” The words were like tiny blades against his skin, but he knew they were true. Whitaker straightened up, and glanced down at his notepad.
“I’m going to get you more morphine, and I’ll set your arm. Then, you’ll just need a cast, a few weeks off the ice, and you’ll be as good as new.”
Dennis had said too much. He was very drunk, watching yet another game between the raiders and the metros, and he’d hinted at the relationship between star players Rozanov and Hollander.
“They are not fucking,” Trinity sighed, downing a few more sips of her beer. “They hate each other! It’s kind of their whole thing.” Even without having Rozanov as a patient, he could tell from their interactions just how much they knew each other. Maybe he wouldn’t have thought they were in love, but he definitely would have thought that they were sleeping together. He took a long sip of his beer while Trinity shoveled popcorn in her mouth, still going on about how they weren’t together. They were in the last third of the game, Ilya clambering over the boards to do a face off against the one and only Shane Hollander. With nothing better to do, Dennis had been psychoanalyzing how they acted around each other, and come to the conclusion that they were both absolutely fucking terrified. Of what, he didn’t know, but he of course had a few guesses. None of which he would vocalize, he didn’t want to get his hopes up. Trinity stopped babbling to defend the ‘sanctity of the face-off,’ whatever that meant. All he knew was that once when he had been on the phone with his mother, his roommate had thrown an empty can at his head to shut him up until the face off was over. She was especially defensive over her rules when it was the playoffs, and since they had been drinking their beer out of bottles and not cans, Dennis really didn’t want to risk it.
Ilya had been with, around, inside of Shane for the last 10 fucking years. For only the last year, they had been exclusive. No Rose, no Svetlana, no random hookups or make outs in alleyways, just him and shane. He’d been worried it would get boring, after all, it was Shane. But it wasn’t. They texted all the time, traded pictures and videos, and had phone sex much more often than he ever would have thought. When they were together, it was perfect. Getting winedrunk on his couch, kissing lazily over home makeover shows and happily ignoring random hockey facts Shane would spout when he got worried. Now, crouched on the ice, helmet nearly bumping Shane’s, he tapped the curve of their hockey sticks together. A soft smile curled his boyfriend’s lips, and he wished he could kiss him, but he wasn’t allowed. Not yet.
“Okay?” He asked softly, trying to catch Shane’s eye. His smile widened.
“I’m okay. You ready for this?”
“For me to kick your ass, or for… after?” He knew he sounded vulnerable, saying ‘after’ like he might be rejected, but he didn’t care. He just wanted Shane to hear it, to say yes.
“After,” he affirmed, squaring his shoulders. “But you won’t be kicking my ass.” They smirked, and the puck fell between them.
Dennis found himself wondering if Robby was watching the game. When he and Abbot were both off, he knew they would meet up for burgers and hockey, but he didn’t know if Robby ever watched alone. They didn’t watch hockey together, partially because Dennis didn’t care for hockey, and partially because sitting in front of the TV for and hour and a half always ended with Dennis getting bored, climbing on top of Robby, and forcing him to give him kisses. Therefore, no hockey. He tuned back into the game when Trinity started tapping her feet, chanting something under her breath. Someone in black was racing across the ice, puck at their stick. Trinity’s favourite team changed on a dime, it tended to depend on her mood. But after the hospital incident, (Ilya had smiled at her when he was discharged), she consistently rooted for the raiders. She unfurled from the ball she had made in the corner of the ‘L’ shaped couch, planting her feet on the ground and continuing her soft chanting.
“Ilya Rozanov is flying down the ice with the puck, and it looks like the metros don’t want to get in his way!” Sports commentators seemed like the most excitable people in the world, but even Dennis found himself leaning closer to the TV, squinting as if he might suddenly appear in the arena.
“He shoots… and he SCORES!” The man yelled, while the screen cut to rewinds and closeups of the shot. Dennis was getting up and yelling with Trinity before he even knew what he was doing. That was his player, as far as he was concerned. But the whole stadium, and their apartment, went quiet when Shane Hollander tossed his helmet and threw his gloves down. Rozanov copied with a wolfish grin.
“That’s not a legal fight, is it?”
“It definitely is not.”
“Couldn’t they get in a lot of trouble for it?”
“That is a possibility.” People at home might be looking away, no one really wanted to watch their favourite hockey players break each other’s noses, not unless they were psychopaths. Or, in their case, doctors. But when Hollander reached Rozanov, he didn’t punch him, like expected. He grabbed the loose neck of his jersey, and pulled him downwards.
“Holy fuck you were right,” Trinity breathed. Rozanov looped his arms around Hollander’s waist, pulling them flush together. “I fucking told you.”
Ilya hadn’t really planned past where they were now. It was obvious what was going to happen, but he just didn’t know how to get from point A) hugging Shane in the middle of the rink on live television, to point B) kissing Shane in the middle of the rink on live television. For once, though, his boyfriend appeared to be in his element. He was beaming, one hand rising to grasp at Ilya’s curls, while the other remained firmly on his chestplate.
“Don’t freeze up on me now, Rozanov,” he murmured, voice lilted in something teasing that Ilya had never heard outside of their home. They’d made a deal. Whoever scored the first goal got to make the first move. When he made that shot, he cemented himself as the one to kiss Shane, and there was no chance he was going to miss that just because he was worried.
“I won,” he said softly, before leaning down to close the gap between their lips. The stadium around them exploded, with happy and angry cheers, but all Ilya could focus on was the taste of sweat on Shane’s lips, the smell of him that was all around, and the feeling of their kits still on. His two sides, hockey and Shane, were pressed together as he licked further into Shane’s mouth, clamping a hand on his hip to dramatically dip him. The cheers got louder, and he thought back all those months ago to the mousy doctor who had given him the confidence to do this, the cowboy and his gentleman.
Trinity didn’t bother getting changed before racing off to find Matteo the next morning, leaving Dennis to trudge into the lockers on his own. Robby was the only person inside, and he lit up when his boyfriend walked in. “Hey, baby,” he murmured, opening his arms. Dennis happily walked into them. “Today is going to suck.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Two hockey sensations, Ilya Rozanov and Shane Hollander, kissed mid-game last night.”
“I know, I watched the game.” Dennis stuck that tidbit away for later use.
“Well, I have no doubt it’s going to result in fights and drinking and who knows what else. We’re going to be swamped.” Robby ran his hand up and down his spine, pressing a kiss to his hair. “Today’s going to suck. But then it’s going to get better. Want to know why?” Dennis sighed, removing his face from his chest to look up at him.
“I don’t need an old man speech from you right now.”
“It’s not a speech,” Robby promised, smiling warmly. “Just a fact. The hospital got a million dollar donation last night. Completely anonymous, but all they said was that the majority had to go to improving the emergency department.” Dennis’ mouth fell open. “It also said thanks to the cowboy and his gentleman.” And Dennis kissed him, right there in the changeroom, because if Ilya could do it on live television, he could do it in an unlocked room.