Chapter Text
August 2017
It had been longer than a week, or even two.
The thought slid like honey across Ilya’s mind, slow and sweet, as he drifted back towards consciousness. Even before he opened his eyes, he knew the sun was rising bright in the sky, as the insides of his eyelids glowed the burnished copper that he had finally allowed himself to get used to. He breathed deep, then exhaled, feeling the muscles relax in his chest, his throat, as the sun drifted warm over his skin. They hadn’t closed the shades at all in the last two months, not since Shane had tried on the first day, and Ilya had taken the remote control and tossed it over his shoulder. He wondered, idly, where it had landed.
Without opening his eyes, Ilya rolled to his back, flopping an arm out in search of Shane. His hand skimmed across the sheets, warm with sun and body heat, but found only empty space. That, finally, had him crack open one eyelid. He huffed. The pillow beside him bore the impression of Shane’s head, but Shane himself was nowhere to be found.
Ilya sighed, letting his gaze drift up to the wood-paneled ceiling. Before the cottage, he had expected Shane to keep a rigid workout routine — up before the sun, five miles every day, full stretching and cardio regimen, terrible smoothie, tape review. When he had teased Shane about that a few days after they had arrived at the cottage, Shane had laughed, and acknowledged that that was more or less what he was like during the season. But he tried to ease up a little while at the cottage. “Besides,” Shane had added, “my priority is spending time with you.”
For that, Ilya’d had no choice but to tackle Shane off the dock and into the lake, even as Shane had shouted curses at him before they hit the water with a splash.
Ilya sighed and let his head loll to the side, his eye catching the morning sunlight where it glinted off the surface of the lake. He had fallen in love with Shane in bits and pieces, in shadows and stolen hours, over a stretch of what may well have been years, and he couldn’t quite believe that was how Shane had come to love him too. But here, at the place Shane had described as his favorite place on Earth, Ilya felt like he was seeing Shane without his many, many walls up for the first time. It was as if the request he had made to Ilya on that first day, that they both be honest about what they thought and felt, had broken down a dam inside Shane’s chest, flooding Ilya’s riverbed with the most direct, straightforward, bluntly delivered statements of love he had never dared to imagine. Ilya knew he was lucky, in a way hardly anyone ever had been, to see Shane at this most honest version of himself. To see Shane look up and smile, unguarded, when Ilya entered a room was a gift. Ilya would never admit it, but a few days ago he had pretended to forget his phone in the bedroom just so he could leave, and reenter the living room, and see Shane beam at him again. Ilya couldn’t imagine going back to a world where he didn’t have this every day. Multiple times a day.
It also made the sex better, Ilya thought as he blinked slowly against the glitter of the sunlight on the water. It turned out that trusting someone with your heart and your soul made it easier to trust them with your body, too.
Suddenly, he missed Shane too much to stay still. Ilya sat up, scrubbing a hand down his face as he yawned, then rooted around in the sheets for his boxers. After he found them, he carried them loosely in his hand to the bathroom, and pulled them on after he had pissed and washed his hands. The whole time, he strained his ears to listen for Shane in the rest of the cottage. He didn’t hear anything, but that didn’t mean much; Shane wasn’t really an “ambient music” kind of guy. That worked for Ilya. More aux privileges for him.
When Ilya stepped through the threshold between the TV room and the rest of the cottage’s open floor plan, he paused. Shane was seated at the dining table, back to Ilya, working on his laptop as a steaming cup of coffee rested at his elbow. Ilya took a minute to just look at him — at the way the buttery soft morning light caught Shane’s black hair, at the delicate arch of his ears, down the graceful curve of his neck, on the way the fabric of his T-shirt stretched taut across the muscles of his shoulder and back, at the strong calves visible beneath his chair. It still took Ilya’s breath away sometimes — Shane was good, and kind, and so fucking hot, and he loved Ilya. He said Ilya was the one he wanted a future with. Fuck.
Ilya shook himself and approached Shane quietly. When he reached his boyfriend — his fucking boyfriend, fuck — he gently slid a hand from Shane’s shoulder to his neck, rubbing the spot where Shane’s muscles could occasionally get tense.
“Hey, baby,” Shane murmured, smiling up at Ilya. Something about the lack of surprise, of wonder, in Shane’s face made Ilya’s heart swell. Shane wasn’t surprised by him. Shane had expected him to be there, and was quietly pleased to see that expectation met. “There’s coffee.”
“I see that. Why are you working so hard?” Ilya let his hand slip from Shane’s shoulder as he walked to the coffee pot in the kitchen. He poured himself a cup, adding the Dunkin Donuts branded vanilla-flavored creamer that Shane had bought, just for him. Ilya would never, in a million years, tell Shane that he only ever drank iced coffee, or that the Dunkin grocery store creamer tasted nothing like the syrup in the cafes. This stupid bright orange plastic bottle was precious to him, because Shane had gone out of his way to remember something about Ilya, and to act on the memory. He might sneak the empty bottle into his carry-on when he left.
“Regular season schedule is out, so I’m putting together a shared Google calendar for us,” Shane responded, but then he looked up, blushing. “I mean — I’m sorry if that’s weird, and you don’t have to add it to your account or anything. I just wanted us to be able to see each other’s schedules in one place. Is that too much? I can—”
Ilya was already striding back to the dining table, coffee mug forgotten on the kitchen counter. Shane’s nervous voice was cut off as Ilya braced a palm flat on the surface of the table, leaning across it to grip Shane’s jaw with the fingers of his other hand. He pulled Shane in for a kiss, fierce, bruising. Their teeth may have clacked together. A muffled “oomph” made its way out of Shane’s mouth.
“I love it,” Ilya gasped, breaking the kiss and breathing hard. He pressed his forehead to Shane’s, unable to leave his space. “I love it. I want us in the same calendar. Send me the link. Whatever.”
“Okay.” Shane’s voice was soft, and Ilya leaned back to see his face. Shane’s eyes were ducked down, towards the table. “I know I’m… I like a plan, you know?”
Ilya’s lips twitched, but he gently released Shane’s face and decided not to remind Shane that Shane had woken him up at four in the morning not that long ago and planned out the next ten years of their lives, with nothing to go on but Ilya’s own vague desire to join a Canadian team and a bluff about marrying Svetlana.
“And I know it can be a lot,” Shane went on, tapping his fingertips on the tabletop. “That I can be a lot. So if I ever… do something overwhelming—”
“Hollander, I will not be upset that you are planning for us to be together, okay?” Ilya straightened up, raising his eyebrows at Shane before he went to retrieve his coffee cup. “I want this. I’m in. Yes?”
At that, Shane allowed himself a soft smile. “Yes. Okay.”
“Okay.” Ilya pulled out the chair across from where Shane was seated and dropped into it, sipping his coffee. “When are our games?”
“We’re actually opening preseason against each other, in Quebec City.” Shane’s smile grew, and Ilya felt something in his chest relax. Barely two weeks after they both had to be back for Rookie Camp, then. That was a relief.
“Sneaking into a hotel room.” Ilya waggled his eyebrows. “Like All Star Weekend. Hot.”
Shane huffed a laugh but otherwise didn’t respond. “Then I come to you in early October, you’re in Montreal in December, then the All-Star break in late January, then I go to Boston in February, and you’re in Montreal in early April.” He grimaced as he ended the list. “That last one will probably be about finalizing playoff berths.”
“Hey, maybe you can still make wild card.”
Shane flipped him off without looking up. “So that’s six times, just on the NHL calendar alone. We’ll have to add our practice schedules when we get them. Would you…” Shane bit his lip, gaze still fixed on the computer screen. “Would you be okay if I tried to find gaps? Where we can get away for a day or two and… meet up?”
“Hollander, can you look at me?” Ilya set his cup of coffee aside, and reached across the table for Shane’s hand. Shane slid it to him, slowly, and Ilya entwined their fingers. Ilya waited until Shane lifted his gaze, then said, “Please believe me when I say this. I want time with you. As much as we can manage, I want. Don’t doubt that, okay?”
“Okay.” Shane exhaled, and Ilya watched as relief flitted across his features. “I was just… I can’t go back to just every other month, or four times a year, or whatever. I’d go insane.”
He said it flatly, matter-of-fact, and Ilya swallowed hard. He knew that tone. It sounded like Holy shit. I love you too.
It was the sound of Shane’s certainty.
“We won’t go back, solnyshko,” he promised, squeezing Shane’s fingertips.
Shane wrinkled his nose. “Little… something?”
Ilya reared back slightly, surprised. “What?”
A blush crept up Shane’s face, but he only looked away from Ilya’s gaze for a moment before finding his eyes again. “Don’t laugh, but a couple of nights ago, I downloaded Duolingo and started the Russian course.”
Ilya felt a grin creep over his face. His heart thumped, delighted. “The owl?”
“The owl, yes. You said you wouldn’t laugh.” Shane lifted his free hand and scrubbed at the back of his neck. “It’s only been a few days.”
Ilya knew he was beaming, and he thought he felt something prickle in the backs of his eyes. “Say something in Russian.”
“Absolutely not. I just told you it’s been like four days.”
“Hollander. Shane. Please.”
Shane sighed, then rolled his lips back and forth against each other. “Okay. This isn’t from the app, it’s from you, so if I pronounce it wrong it’s kind of your fault.” Ilya watched as Shane squared his shoulders, as if he was getting ready to deliver an important presentation. “Ya t-tebya loo-bloo.”
Ilya froze for a second, his breath caught in his throat. He slumped back in his chair, keeping his grip tight on Shane’s fingers, but raising his other hand to pinch at the bridge of his nose. He squeezed his eyes shut as the prickling intensified.
“Fuck — it was that bad?” Shane’s voice drifted up to him.
Ilya cleared his throat but couldn’t lower his head to face him just yet. “No. I mean. Yes, your pronunciation is fucking terrible, but—”
“Okay, asshole —”
“But it was perfect.” Ilya sniffed, then dropped his hand from the bridge of his nose to the tabletop, and sat up in his seat. Shane was watching him, concerned, hopeful.
“I’m practicing. I’m going to get it right.”
“I know you will.” Ilya lifted Shane’s fingers to his mouth and brushed a kiss across the backs of his knuckles. He took a deep breath, and reminded himself that he had promised Shane he would be honest. And hey, that honesty shit had been paying off pretty well so far. “Thank you. I don’t get to hear it a lot. In Russian.”
Shane drew Ilya’s hand back towards himself across the table, and cupped it in both of his own. “I’m sorry.”
Ilya shrugged. “It’s not your fault.”
Shane frowned. “This is one of the only times French would be better,” he muttered. “Because there’s a difference between je m'excuse and je suis désolé.”
“Ah, Mr. Polyglot, yes? Mr. Linguist.”
“Fuck off.” Shane rolled his eyes, even as he squeezed Ilya’s hand. “I love you, okay?”
“I love you.” The words felt too small in Ilya’s mouth.
Shane smiled at him nevertheless. He gave Ilya’s hand one more squeeze before setting it down on the table and turning back to his laptop. “Without knowing our practice schedules yet, I think our first real chance to be together outside of games and shit is American Thanksgiving. I have an afternoon game the day before so I can fly out right after that. And you have a game on Friday, so it’s not perfect, but at least it’s in Boston, so I can stay until you have to leave for pre-game. Does that work?”
Ilya swallowed around the lump that lingered in his throat. “That sounds perfect.”
“Okay. Good.”
Moments passed, Shane clacking away at his laptop, Ilya studying him. This sweet, intense, awkward, brilliant, dedicated man. Ilya’s man, now. Somehow. The light slanted in from the wall of windows and caressed Shane’s face, dusting his freckles in gold. The beloved spots had darkened since July, with all the time they’d spent outside. There had been a moment that Ilya had realized that Shane, if exposed to the sun long enough, developed freckles all over his body. He hadn’t let Shane get dressed all day.
“It means sunshine,” he said, breaking the tranquil silence that had floated down around them, and watched as Shane looked up. His brows pinched in confusion. “Or maybe it’s more literal to say it means little sun. You were right about it being ‘little something.’”
“Oh.” Shane’s expression cleared, and he smiled that quiet, shy smile that Ilya treasured. “Can you say it again, please?”
“Solnyshko.” Ilya stretched his leg out under the table, caressing Shane’s ankle with his own. “Moyo solnyshko.”
***
For the first time since being named Captain of the Boston Bears in summer 2013, Ilya wished he could skip Rookie Camp. It wasn’t like he had to be there, technically. It was just… he had been at the last four. And sure, part of that had been a reason to get the fuck out of Moscow a week earlier every summer, but more importantly, Ilya genuinely cared about the prospects. He wanted to get to know them, who they were, if they would be a good fit for his locker room. Ilya wasn’t stupid; he knew he had a reputation as a loud, abrasive asshole. In a lot of ways, he had cultivated that reputation deliberately. But he wasn’t mean. It was never personal, with him. It was a psychological strategy, to get into opposing players’ heads by criticizing their games, to throw them off their play or make them draw unnecessary penalties. And to Ilya, there was a stark difference between that and going after people’s deeply held vulnerabilities, about their lives off the ice. And he needed to ensure that any prospects who made it onto the regular season roster fucking understood that. His Bears played aggressive, but not dirty.
Especially now that Scott Hunter had come out. Ilya hadn’t spoken to him since Scott Hunter Night at that bar in New York after NHL awards. At the Awards themselves, Hunter had been guarded, and surprised when Ilya spoke to him, but had sounded appreciative nonetheless. And Kip, the boyfriend, had been a delight. Ilya had wished he’d been at their table, just because Kip seemed fun to be around. But even so, Ilya had noticed that Hunter’s shoulders had been tense, that his eyes had darted around the room, that Carter Vaughn hadn’t left his side all night. And Ilya would be damned if his rookies, or any of the guys wearing Bears colors, were the reason that Hunter had to carry himself like that.
And Ilya had already said as much to the vets who had been in his house the night that Hunter won the Cup, but he knew that the first step in making that shit real for the whole team was going to Rookie Camp. So did Shane. They had both acknowledged to each other, begrudgingly, as they had been curled up together on the couch in the TV room, Ilya’s head pillowed on Shane’s chest, half-watching one of the Fast and Furious movies, that they both needed to get back to real life in early September. They needed to meet with their coaching staffs, and check in with Pike and Marly respectively, and generally start getting their heads on right for the season. Ilya knew all of that, and he fucking hated it. He hated it, but he had booked a flight back to Boston anyway. It was a deeply strange feeling, caring about something more than he cared about the Boston Bears. But that was fucking Hollander, always determined to be the top at everything he put his mind to.
Ilya had chosen a flight early in the morning, so as to minimize the chances of his being recognized in the Montreal airport. Not that it was completely unreasonable that Ilya Rozanov would be in the city during the off-season — the NHL had an office there, and multiple international airlines had flights from Moscow into Montreal — but still. Why invite extra problems before he and Shane had even had a chance to launch their new, tentative, public friendship?
Ilya kicked those thoughts around in his head as he traipsed through the cottage for the last time, his backpack’s strap over his shoulder and the handle of his carry on reluctantly tucked into his hand. The sun was hours away from rising, so he couldn’t look out over the lake. He found Shane standing near the front door, fidgeting with his keys and staring off into space. Ilya slowed as he approached him, and Shane only startled back into awareness when Ilya set his case down beside their feet.
Shane swallowed hard and dropped his gaze to Ilya’s shoulder, as if that would hide the faint sheen in his eyes. “Do you have your passport?”
Ilya nodded slowly, not needing to check. He lifted his hand, drifting his fingers along the strong line of Shane’s jaw before tucking them under Shane’s chin.
He felt it when Shane nodded back. “And you checked in? So you have your boarding pass?”
“Yes, solnyshko.”
Shane’s voice was wobbly when he spoke again. “And those cookies my dad made?”
Ilya nodded one more time before leaning in, gentle, and tilting Shane’s head up. They kissed slow, soft. Ilya felt Shane’s hands come to rest on his waist, fingertips digging into his skin through the hoodie Ilya had stolen from Shane’s closet.
“Sorry,” Shane murmured, his lips brushing Ilya’s. “I’m just — I’m really going to miss you.”
“I’m going to miss you too,” Ilya promised. He was not going to cry, not yet. Shane was already so upset. Ilya would cry in one of the private bathrooms in the Air Canada lounge. Rich people privileges.
They didn’t speak much on the drive through the pre-dawn darkness to Montreal. They exchanged a few words — about Ilya’s upcoming Zoom meeting with Yuna to officially bring her on as his manager, about the kids that both the Bears and the Voyageurs had picked up in the draft, about their plans to get back into their regular season workout routines as bulking season approached its end. But mostly they sat in silence, and Ilya watched the black and purple landscape outside the car change from forest, to farmland, to suburbs as a pit grew in his chest. At least this time, when he held Shane’s hand in his lap, it didn't feel like a leap of faith. Now, it was security. He caressed Shane’s calluses with his fingertips, thinking about how they matched his own.
When they reached the Montreal Airport, rather than pull up to the Departures curb, Shane instead navigated the Land Rover into the long term parking garage. Ilya stayed quiet as Shane drove up to the top floor, and found a parking spot tucked into a corner where no cameras were pointing into the front windshield. Shane cut the engine, and the sudden silence roared up around them.
Shane reached his hand back out for Ilya’s, and cradled it in both his own. “I’m really gonna fucking miss you,” he said, his voice low as he stared straight ahead at the concrete wall of the parking garage.
Ilya tried to smile. “You’ll miss my dick.”
Shane turned, glaring at him. “Ilya.”
At the sharpness in Shane’s voice, Ilya swallowed hard, closing his eyes for a moment. When he opened them again, he found Shane’s, earnest and intense, waiting for him. “I’m going to miss you too,” he whispered. “Thank you. For inviting me. For…” he made a small gesture with his free hand, as if it could encompass all the sunshine, all the magic, all the freedom of the last two months. “For making me be honest.”
Now Shane smiled, squeezing Ilya’s hand. “Nobody can make you do anything, Ilya. I asked, and you said yes. So thank you for that, you know? For being honest too.”
Ilya nodded, and they stared at each other, quiet, for a long moment. Ilya’s eyes traced Shane’s freckles, even though they were dulled by the shadows of the parking garage. Then, Shane spoke again. “I love you.”
Ilya felt his face crumple as he reached across the arm rest and cupped Shane’s cheek in his empty hand. He kissed him, soft at first, then fierce, and felt Shane’s breath hitch. When the first slide of Shane’s tears caressed Ilya’s thumb, he slid his hand around to the back of Shane’s head, pulling him in tighter.
How the fuck was he supposed to leave? His fingers tangled in Shane’s hair. How was he supposed to know that it was possible to feel love like this, to feel loved like this, and walk away from it? Already he could feel the air in his lungs thicken as if dust was mixing in with the oxygen. How was he meant to know what it was like to belong to Shane Hollander, and then walk away from him?
When they finally broke for air, Shane was gasping, his eyes squeezed shut. “Nothing’s going to change, right?” he asked, his voice small, a shimmer of tears still threaded through it.
Ilya shook his head, even as his forehead rested against Shane’s. “Ya tebya lyublyu,” he whispered, a vow against Shane’s lips.
“Ya…” Shane hesitated, and Ilya could feel it in his forehead when Shane frowned. “...toshe? Ya toshe tebya lyublyu.”
“Close,” Ilya smiled, forcing himself to sit back, drawing his thumb back and forth across Shane’s freckles.
“Say it for me?”
“Tozhe. Sharper on the ‘s’ sound.”
“Tozhe,” Shane muttered, brow pinched as he committed the feeling of the word in his mouth to memory. “I’ll keep saying it until it’s perfect.”
Ilya swallowed hard, and kissed him again.
Across the floor of the parking garage, another car pulled into a spot. It was far enough away that Ilya could barely make out its color, but he still took it as a sign. He gave Shane’s face one last, soft caress, then dropped his hand to the button on his seat belt.
“Text me when you find your gate?” Shane asked as he watched. “And when you’re about to take off?”
Ilya smiled at him, fond. “Yes, Hollander. If the gate disappears, you’ll be the first person I tell.”
“Fuck off.” Ilya was glad when Shane rolled his eyes, lips twitching up. “And let me know when you get home safe, please.”
Ilya’s heart seized. Fuck, he loved him. He pulled on a baseball cap, bill forward, before he stepped out of the car and slammed his door shut behind him. He retrieved his case from the trunk and shoved his sunglasses onto his face, but before he could force himself to walk away, he rounded the car to the driver’s side window. Shane rolled it down, and Ilya rested his hand on the edge of the door.
“I’ll see you soon, right, Hollander? It’s not that long until the preseason game.”
He watched as Shane forced a smile. “Yeah. My rookies are going to destroy your rookies.”
“Ah, you wish.” Ilya wanted desperately to lean down, to kiss Shane one more time, but he settled for tapping his knuckles against the door frame before he dragged himself away.
Shane’s Land Rover stayed still as Ilya crossed the gray expanse of the garage floor to the elevator. It was still there as Ilya stepped inside the little steel box, and he could almost feel Shane watching him in the rearview mirror. “Skoro uvidimsya,” Ilya muttered to himself as the doors slid shut.
***
Sveta🔪
August 31, 5:07am
Ilya: at the airport
Sveta🔪: Noted. How are you?
Ilya: Fine.
Sveta🔪: Ilyusha.
Ilya: I love him.
Sveta🔪: I know.
Sveta🔪: You sure you’re getting on your flight?
Sveta🔪: That was a joke
Sveta🔪: You have to come back.
Sveta🔪: Ilya.
Sveta🔪: If nothing else you have to win us one more Cup
Ilya: I know. I’m coming.
Ilya: fuck, how do people do this all the time?
Sveta🔪: Have a rival secret boyfriend who they live in a different country from and only see sometimes?
Sveta🔪: They don’t.
September 2017
Ilya remembered, back when they were prospects, and then during their first years on NHL ice, that it had started out as something of a joke that Shane Hollander’s manager was his mommy. Hollander hadn’t been the only North American kid to start out managed by his parents, but Yuna sticking around after Shane officially made the Voyageurs roster had drawn some snickers in the Bears locker room back in fall of 2010. It had stopped being funny around the time that Yuna had negotiated a nineteen-year-old Hollander a multi-year, multi-million-dollar contract as the face of Rolex, the largest sponsorship any NHL player had ever had during his rookie season.
Yuna Hollander was not a woman to be fucked with.
Some of the whispers came anyway, tiger mom, dragon lady, pushy bitch, but Ilya had never seen either Shane or Yuna publicly acknowledge them. Yuna had kept her foot on the gas, both for her own career and Shane’s, and Ilya had watched from a distance as the results spoke for themselves. Shane had been the beginning of Yuna’s own career in sports management, even if she kept it close to home at first. She stuck to the NHL, and for those early years of Shane’s career she had kept her clientele to just the younger players in Montreal. As Shane moved off his rookie bridge contract, Yuna had started adding players in Ottawa, managing to get Josh Boyle and Evan Dykstra some smaller deals even as Ottawa slowly sank, year by year, in the NHL standings. Then, in the last year, Yuna had made her United States debut, collecting a small roster of clients from Buffalo, New York, Brooklyn, and Jersey. She had told Ilya and Shane, in the same matter-of-fact tone that Ilya was so used to from her son, that it made sense for her to reach out to Ilya, even separate from his relationship with Shane.
“You’re one of the highest paid players in the States,” she had pointed out, swirling her wine glass. “Why would I want to start with anyone else on the Bears?”
David and Shane had both laughed lightly, so Ilya had smiled, even if he hadn’t been sure what to make of her. Yuna must have seen something in his face, because her own had softened. “Honey, I’m kidding. I want to know that you’re protected, and this would be a good narrative to spin in case people look too closely. And I don’t trust anyone but me to do it.”
Later, when they were back at Shane’s cottage, Shane had told Ilya that this was how Yuna showed her love. Ilya had decided he was just going to have to take Shane’s word for it.
Ilya plopped his laptop down on his stupidly large dining table, next to the massive iced latte (extra caramel) he’d picked up from Dunkin after Training Camp had ended for the day. He wasn’t nervous for his first extended one-on-one conversation with Yuna Hollander. Not even when it was in the context of their first meeting with her as his manager and him as her client. He could handle himself. He just wanted to make a good impression. He almost scrubbed his hand through his hair, then heard Sveta’s voice scolding him about leaving his gel cast alone until it had fully dried from the quick shower he had taken when he got home. He glanced over his shoulder at his kitchen, scanning to make sure it was actually tidy, before he opened the lid of the laptop and clicked the link to start the call.
Yuna had already logged on. “Hi, honey!” she said, her voice bright. Ilya smiled at the sight of her wire-rimmed glasses. “How are you doing? How’s Training Camp?”
Honey. Ilya grinned. “Good so far. You saw that kid we drafted in the first round, Michael Oakley?”
Yuna pursed her lips. “The center? Played NCAA with Michigan, right?”
“Yes, him. He’s looking good. Might put him on the second line with Hammersmith and Carmichael.”
“Wow.” Yuna raised her eyebrows, smiling. “That’s great, sweetie. And you need depth at center this year. Still not sure what your front office was thinking, trading Ivanov for a defender.”
“Me neither.” Ilya shrugged. He had protested the plan when LeClaire had told him about it, but clearly it hadn’t mattered. “Anyway. How’s Mr. Hollander?”
At that, Yuna rolled her eyes. “It’s David, Ilya. And I’m Yuna. We’ve been over this. You’re family.”
Ilya shifted in his seat. “Right.”
“And he’s good. Has to travel to Vancouver next week for work, so I’ll be rattling around in this house by myself. I’ll tell him you said hi.”
“Please do.” Ilya smiled. He liked David. He wasn’t nervous around David. It was just… going to take him some time to get used to David, he thought.
“All right. Let’s get down to business.” Ilya watched as Yuna flipped open a binder on the desk in front of her. He figured that this sunny room, with its sage green walls and its dark wood finished bookshelves, was her home office in the Hollander house in Ottawa. The house Shane had grown up in. Ilya still hadn’t seen it in person. “You’re meeting with Farah next week, right?”
Ilya nodded, taking a sip of coffee through the bright orange straw. Cutting ties with the agent he’d had since his rookie season had been Ilya’s own idea. Lev Povetkin had been recommended by Svetlana’s father to Ilya’s, and he and Ilya had communicated maybe a dozen times over the past seven years. Ending the business relationship, his last real financial tie to Russia, had been a one-sentence email. Farah Jalali, meanwhile, had been Shane’s agent for years, and Shane had promised Ilya that he trusted her. Plus, she knew the Canadian market.
“Okay, good,” said Yuna. “She can talk to you about timelines with Ottawa and putting off Boston when they start asking you to resign, so I won’t get into that too much right now. I just want to say that the closer we can push confirmation to the trades deadline, the better. Make it harder for them to try to get you to move.”
Ilya snorted. “They can’t pressure me into waiving my no movements clause.”
Yuna smiled, fond. “I believe you, but that doesn’t mean they won’t try. But let’s not borrow trouble, okay?” Borrow trouble. Ilya rolled the phrase around in the back of his brain as Yuna continued. “On to other things. Thanks for sending me that information I asked for. I have three things I really wanted to go over with you today, if that’s all right?” She didn’t wait for Ilya to respond either way. “First, because it feels most urgent — I didn’t realize you don’t have US citizenship. It seems like you never even started the process. Do you want to get that going?”
Ilya let his eyes drift off the screen of his laptop, to the massive windows that ran the entire south wall of his house. Sunlight glinted off the crystal blue water of the pool.
Yuna filled the silence. “God knows the US government moves at a glacial pace, now more than ever, and who knows what’s going on in the State Department these days — but having it in process could provide an extra level of safety, even if it’s not finalized by the time you’re in Ottawa.”
Ilya’s fingertips flicked at the edge of the lid of his cup. “Keeping my citizenship meant I could still play for Team Russia,” he muttered, then hesitated. He wasn’t sure how to tell Yuna that his father had barely cared about the NHL, about the Stanley Cup, about Ilya’s captaincy. All he had cared about was Ilya’s ability to represent Russia well. Then, in Sochi, Ilya had failed. The plan had been for Pyeongchang to be where he redeemed himself. And then the NHL had banned its players from leaving in the middle of the season to compete.
His father had still accepted the playoffs bonus Ilya had sent home after his Cup win, and the Pyeongchang announcement hadn’t come until a week after he died, so Ilya supposed it didn’t matter either way.
Even so.
“I understand that.” Yuna’s voice floated through his laptop’s speakers. “But after the announcement in April that you all can’t compete, and especially after the 2016 election… I guess I’m just surprised nobody on your previous team brought it up.” Ilya swallowed and made himself look up. Yuna’s face on the screen was concerned. “We can get going on this now, file the EB-1A petition paperwork as soon as possible. But like I said, it might not be done before your move to Ottawa.”
“Would it mess anything up with the Canadians? To have American citizenship in progress?”
“I don’t think so. After all, at this point you haven’t officially made any decisions to leave the US. But listen, there’s an immigration attorney I’ve used before for a couple of my guys in the States. I’ll reach out to him, keep your name out of it, and ask. How does that sound?”
“Good.” Ilya nodded. It had been his idea, after all, to move to Canada. He had meant it when he told Shane that he’d love to not have a Russian passport, and the United States had never felt like home, even if he had carved out a space for himself in Boston. With his father dead and his brother as good as, there was nothing for him in Russia anymore. Especially if things ever changed for him and Shane, and it was safe for them to love each other openly… there was no place in Ilya’s heart for a Russia that would punish him for loving Shane. Ilya knew he would always love the Moscow of his childhood, and he would miss the little ritual of taking flowers to his mother’s grave, but both Moscow and his mother were gone. And North America, Canada, had Shane. We just want a future together.
This was a necessary part of that future. He would find time to visit the Harborwalk by UMass at sunrise soon, and talk to his mama like he had on the shore of the lake at the cottage. His fingertips drifted up to rub her crucifix where it sat against his skin, beneath the fabric of the hoodie he’d stolen from Shane. He knew his mama would want him to be safe.
“All right, good.” Yuna crossed something off of a list in front of her. “Next thing. Finances.”
Ilya sighed and reached up, tugging at his own earlobe. Yuna laughed lightly.
“Come on, it won’t be that bad. So we’re going to set you up with a proper financial planner. I’ve chatted with Mark Sullivan — I met him because he works with Chase Duquesne in Jersey, and I’ve referred him to a couple of my other US guys. But you have slightly less liquid cash than I would have expected, and fewer long-term investments.” Yuna peered at Ilya over the rims of her glasses. “Can you tell me what’s going on there? No judgment zone, I promise.”
Ilya rubbed at the back of his neck, and heard the feet of his chair squeak against the tile floor. “I, ah… I sent a lot of money home. Not only for my father’s medical care, but just… in general. For life. My brother and his family, and cousins, you know?”
“I see.” Yuna nodded, slow, and Ilya looked away from the understanding that spread through her features. “Remittances. My parents sent money home to Japan until my grandparents passed.” She glanced back down at whatever mysterious paperwork existed in her binder. “How do you feel about setting up a budget and a schedule, going forward? It would be safer and more stable than wire transfers in different amounts at odd intervals.”
Ilya was already shaking his head. “No, no need. Now that my father is dead, there’s nothing to pay for.”
Yuna tilted her head, studying him. “I realize that, but what about your brother? Or your mom?”
Ilya felt himself startle. “Shane didn’t tell you?” he blurted.
“Tell me what?” Yuna frowned.
“My mother is dead. She died in 2004.” The words tasted like plastic, the way they always did.
“Oh, honey.” Yuna softened immediately. “I’m so sorry. And no, Shane didn’t tell us. If you shared that with him in confidence, he would never —”
“No — of course. I know he wouldn’t.” Ilya scrubbed a hand down his face, then took a big sip of his iced coffee, just for something to do with his hands. “And, ah, my brother — that’s over too. There will be no more cash going to him.”
Yuna’s eyes narrowed slightly, and Ilya was worried she would ask why, but instead, she just made another little note in her binder. “Fair enough. Family can be tough.” A shadow crossed her face, there and gone so quickly Ilya wasn’t sure if he’d imagined it. “So we’ll just eliminate that line item going forward.”
“There is one thing.” Ilya cursed at himself for having forgotten, for letting it slip his mind during his sun-drenched summer at the cottage. “I do want to set up a… a trust fund? I think that’s the term in English? For my niece.”
Yuna smiled, soft, familiar. “That’s very sweet of you, honey. I’ll let Mark know.”
“I meant to do it,” Ilya felt pressure in his gut to defend himself. “But… with the end of the season…”
“Ilya.” Yuna set down her pen. “You don’t owe me an explanation about this. I think it’s a kind thing to do, and I appreciate you telling me. I want to help you get it done.”
“Okay. Yes.” Ilya pressed on the top of his straw, bending it until it creased, sprouting sharp corners. “Thank you.”
“Of course. It’s literally my job, now.” Yuna grinned, and Ilya felt the corners of his mouth twitch up to match her. She continued, brisk, with the air of a woman trying to change the subject. “And it seems like your only real estate holding is your home in Chestnut Hill?” Her eyes darted around the screen, and Ilya imagined that she was studying his kitchen. He was glad he’d checked that it was clean. “No investment properties?”
“No.” Ilya huffed a laugh. “Shane is already bothering me about this.”
Yuna pursed her lips. “Real estate is a solid investment! I’ll make a note for Mark to look into opportunities for you. Now… it seems like your biggest expense other than the remittances is… the cars.”
“They’re fun.”
“I’m not doubting that they’re fun.” They were back to Yuna peering over her glasses. “Well, I guess I am a little. How often do you even get to drive them in Boston?”
Ilya shrugged. “Enough.” He swirled the ice around in his cup. “But honestly I had already thought about… selling them. Not all of them, or all at once, but… in time for the move. To put the money into the foundation.”
“Shane has mentioned offloading some of his investment properties too,” Yuna muttered, mostly to herself, and Ilya hid a smirk behind his hand. He knew which particular property Shane was selling, even if Yuna didn’t. “But hold off for a minute on selling all the cars, because that brings me to something else.” Ilya watched as Yuna straightened up in her office chair, and got the sense that this next thing was what she was most excited about. “Let’s talk about sponsorships.”
Ilya let a laugh slip out before he could stop himself. “Shane says this is your love language.”
“Well, he’s right.” Yuna flipped through her binder again. “All due respect to your old team, but they were really underselling you. Looks like you had a couple of deals with Russian brands running this past year — a fragrance, a smaller sportswear company, and a vodka brand — and that netted you about a million dollars combined. When your CCM contract from your rookie year lapsed, they switched you to Sherwood, rather than negotiating you a bigger second contract. We can do better than that.”
“What do you have in mind?”
Yuna twirled her pen around in her fingers. “Well, first of all, I want Adidas for you. You’re photographed in their stuff all the time, I can’t believe they haven’t reached out, but with your permission, I’d like to reach out to them as soon as tomorrow.” She looked at Ilya expectantly.
Ilya raised his eyebrows. “And Shane is still with Rebook? You are going to make Nike very afraid of you.”
“That’s the dream.” Yuna grinned. “Is that a yes?”
Ilya snorted. “Of course. I can still be Slavic in the ways that truly count.”
“That’s the spirit. Now.” Yuna flipped another page in the binder, then steepled her fingertips together. “Another big untapped well of potential with you is luxury car brands.” She laughed when Ilya sat up straighter. “I thought you might like this. So, of the cars you own, do you have a favorite? I can only reach out to brands in the same market one at a time, so we may as well start at the top.”
Ilya ran his tongue over his teeth, considering. Did he have a favorite car? He felt like he drove the Porsche and the Ferrari the most often, but if he was being honest with himself… “The Ducati.” His glossy black Superleggera V4 was the closest thing he’d ever felt to freedom (or at least it had been, up until a few months ago).
But Yuna made a face. “Have you seen the statistics on motorcycle accidents?”
“Yes.” Ilya rolled his eyes even as he smiled. “Your son sends them to me fairly often now.”
“Yes, well, my son is very smart.” She scribbled a note to herself. “But I’ll see what I can do. In the meantime, just promise you’ll be careful on that bike, okay?”
Now it was Ilya’s turn to grimace. “It’s not a bike, Yuna.”
Yuna glanced up at her camera, and smiled. “Good job.”
Ilya frowned and went over the last few minutes in his head. “For what?”
“That’s the first time you called me ‘Yuna’ without trying to call me ‘Mrs. Hollander’ first.”
“Oh.” Ilya suddenly found the ring of condensation spreading around his iced coffee fascinating. “And that was… okay?”
“Honey, of course. Like I said, we’re family.”
Ilya made himself nod. “Okay. Good.”
“Good,” Yuna echoed. “Now, one last thing about sponsorships.” Ilya looked up at the screen to see Yuna lace her fingers together and lay her hands flat on her desk. “I am going to say this next thing as your manager, not as the mother of your boyfriend, okay?” She waited for Ilya to nod, and he braced himself. “I’m worried about your reputation when it comes to attracting new sponsors.”
Ilya had been wondering if this was going to come up. He had expected it, he reminded himself, even as his chest tightened. “I understand.”
“Nobody’s angry with you,” Yuna rushed to reassure him. “I just know that with your skill level, we should be able to get premium brands pretty quickly, but keeping them…”
“I’m a club rat,” Ilya supplied, filling in the term that Victor St. Simon had introduced to his vocabulary a few years ago. Once, it had been a point of pride.
Yuna wrinkled her nose. “Oh, I hate that. Please don’t say that. And listen, you have certainly slowed down over the past year. I don’t want to take away from that.”
Ilya nodded. “I hope you know that the… the picking up women is over.”
At that, Yuna smiled again. “Well yes. I see the way you look at my son. I have no concerns whatsoever on that front. Okay?” She paused, and again waited for Ilya to nod before continuing. “The public knows people grow up. I’m not saying you can never go to a club with your team again, but—”
“But no more stumbling out of them drunk.” Ilya rubbed a hand at the back of his neck, hoping the floor would open up and swallow him.
“You may be being a little harsh on yourself,” Yuna said gently. “It seems like you haven’t done that in years. I’m just asking you to be safe, and be smart, okay? Because if I can pivot back to ‘boyfriend’s mom’ here for a minute, I don’t want to think about you getting into trouble in a way where we can’t help you quickly, and we can’t get Shane to you.”
Ilya nodded. “I will.”
“Okay.” Yuna snapped the cap back onto her pen. “I know that was a lot. Thanks for hanging in there. Are there any questions you have for me? Anything I’m missing?”
Ilya shook his head. “No. Thank you for… taking me on.”
“Like I said, you’re family.” Yuna shrugged. “I look after my family, honey. Remember that, okay?”
“I will try.” Ilya found himself smiling. “My best to Mr…” Yuna raised her eyebrows, and Ilya changed course. “My best to David.”
“There we go.” Yuna grinned. “I’ll let you go, Ilya. Take care, okay?”
“You too.”
Ilya waited for the screen to go black, then exhaled hard, slumping back in his chair and staring up at the ceiling.
***
My Jane ❤️🍑💦
September 12, 4:46pm
My Jane ❤️🍑💦: How’d it go with my mom?
Ilya: She is a very formidable lady
My Jane ❤️🍑💦: Is that good?
Ilya: I think so. Just a lot of information. Things moving quickly.
My Jane ❤️🍑💦: Yeah, she does that.
My Jane ❤️🍑💦: Are you okay?
Ilya: Yes, моя любовь. I promise.
My Jane ❤️🍑💦: Okay. Good.
My Jane ❤️🍑💦: Listen, I have a team dinner tonight, but can I call you after? Around 9?
My Jane ❤️🍑💦: I miss you
Ilya: I miss you too
Ilya: Yes, please call.
My Jane ❤️🍑💦: ❤️
***
Ilya had been vibrating out of his skin for the last twenty-four hours.
He was about to see his Shane. See him again, for the first time since that shitty airport parking garage. And sure, on the ice, he wouldn’t be able to kiss him, or touch his skin, or even really smell him, but still. He would be in the same space, breathing the same air. God, how had it only been three weeks?
“Jeez, Cap, how much fucking coffee have you had today?” Carmichael demanded, popping his head out of the neck of his jersey, peering at Ilya from across the visitors’ locker room in Centre Vidéotron. “You’re like a sugar-high nine-year-old.”
“Fuck off,” Ilya snapped back, almost as a reflex, forcing his leg to stop bouncing up and down as he laced up his skate. “First preseason game, and it’s Montreal. Why are you not excited? Get it together.”
Carmichael shrugged and left Ilya alone, and Ilya exhaled. It was a good thing this was a split squad game and Marly wasn’t here, or the questions about Montreal Jane would already have started, even here, 260 kilometers away from Montreal. Not that Ilya had looked it up.
As it was, Ilya glanced around his locker room. His reduced team — mostly draft picks and AHL call ups, with a few veterans sprinkled around to test how the new people would play with them if given the chance — was almost all dressed, and the rookies were starting to shoot him nervous glances. For his part, Ilya looked over at LeClaire, who nodded at him to go ahead.
“Okay, listen up!” Ilya called, rising to his feet. Something hollow thumped inside him at the thought that this was the last time he would do this for the first time with the Bears. He pushed that thought away. He didn’t have time for it now.
The nervous chatter in the room ceased almost immediately as Ilya spread his arms. One of the rookie defensemen looked like he was about to pass out. “First preseason game in the league, right boys? So what kind of season are we going to have?”
A murmur swept through the room, and Ilya cupped a hand around his ear.
“I cannot fucking hear you! Are we going to have another season where the best we can do is just get close? Are we going to have another season where we disappoint Boston right before the finish line?”
“No, Cap,” called back the veterans, prompting the rookies to follow suit.
“No,” Ilya agreed. “No, this year we go back to the Stanley Cup finals, and this year, this fucking year, we win the Stanley Cup! Boston deserves another fucking Cup from us!” He grinned as a cheer went up, feeling it stretch, feral, across his face. “This is our fucking year, boys. And that means we act like it! Starting tonight! Tonight, we go out there, and we fucking show Montreal, we show the NHL, we show the world that this year we are coming for the whole thing! We will bring the Cup back home where it belongs! We will deliver it to Boston because that is what Boston fucking deserves from us!”
“Fuck yeah, Cap!” yelled Connors, and St. Simon led a round of sticks thumping against the floor.
“So if you want a spot on this team, you fucking show us tonight, and you fucking show Boston!” Ilya shouted. “If you want to be there when we win the Stanley Cup, prove it! To us, to yourselves! Prove it to fucking Montreal!”
Riding the wave of a final cheer, the Bears piled out into the hallway and waited to be announced onto the ice. Ilya found the rookie center, Oakley, somewhere in the crowd, and clapped his shoulder. The kid glanced up at him, pale but determined. “You got this,” Ilya muttered to him.
From there, the next few minutes were a blur. The Bears had been designated as the visiting team, so it was the Voyageurs’ garish blue and red branding that dominated the pregame light show. But Ilya was able to overlook that, and instead let himself be filled up by the smell of the ice, the rush of his skates, the air whipping past his face, as he and his team circled the Bears side of the rink.
Then, finally, the lights and music and bullshit all died down, and Ilya skated towards the face off circle. He didn’t bother to hide his smile as Shane approached him, because Shane was beaming too. Fuck, he looked good, even in that ugly-ass Voyageurs blue. His strong shoulders were set back, his smile big and easy under the visor of his helmet. Ilya watched, fascinated, as Shane’s laugh lines pulled at the freckles that lingered on his lower face from the summer.
“Rozanov,” said Shane, lifting his chin at Ilya, exposing the line of his throat. Ilya wanted to bite him.
Instead, he nodded back. “Hollander. Good summer?”
Shane’s lips settled into a smirk as he shrugged, dark eyes dancing. “Decent. You?”
“Decent is a good word.”
“You two done?” snapped the ref. “Rozanov, take your stance.”
Ilya rolled his eyes at Shane, but bent his knees and leaned in nevertheless, setting his stick down on the ice. Shane held his eyes as he followed suit. The puck dropped, and instinct kicked in. Ilya fought Shane for it, hearing Shane’s breathless laughter, before Ilya stole it out from under him and snapped it over to the rookie playing as his left wing.
The game passed quickly after that. Because the whole point of preseason was to test the rookies’ chemistry with each other, Theriault and LeClaire seemed to have come to a tacit agreement to not put Shane and Ilya against each other beyond that first face-off. LeClaire wanted to see how Oakley handled Hollander, and Ilya was sure Theriault was making similar calculations for the Voyageurs.
So, Ilya got to really watch Shane play, in a way he normally wasn’t able to.
And Shane was fucking beautiful on the ice. Ilya had known this for years, of course, but he so rarely got to experience it in person. Shane was sharp and deliberate, never for a second out of control of his own body. Every single move he made was chosen with unerring focus. Ilya sat forward on the Bears bench, leaning against his stick, as he watched Shane steal the puck out from Carmichael and pass it over to one of his own rookies. Fuck, even in an NHL uniform, famous for being kind of shapeless and ugly, Shane was gorgeous. Maybe it was just because Ilya was lucky enough to know what the body beneath the jersey and the pads looked like, how it responded to touch.
There was something liberating about not having to deny to himself that Shane Hollander was stunning, even as Ilya had to constantly remind himself not to stare. Shane himself wasn’t helping matters; at one point while he was on the Montreal bench and Ilya skated past him, Shane fucking winked at him, and Ilya almost crashed into the boards. He was able to pass it off as part of a sharp turn, and he sped away, cursing.
Boston barely pulled out a four-to-three win, and Ilya quietly hoped he’d get to fuck angry Shane about it. That was always fun.
In the locker room after the game, Ilya surreptitiously checked his phone. Shane had already texted.
My Jane ❤️🍑💦
September 18, 10:24pm
My Jane ❤️🍑💦: Have to take the rookies out, but I’m buying the first round and then coming back.
My Jane ❤️🍑💦: I pulled the captain card and got my own room. 1523
Ilya: Thank god
Ilya: See you soon
“Okay, boys, get dressed quick,” Ilya called out, shoving his phone into his bag. “Tonight we drink, tomorrow we win the Stanley Cup, yes?”
“In a hurry, Roz?” St. Simon muttered, raising an eyebrow as the rookies chattered all around them. “You can’t possibly have a girl in Quebec City.”
Ilya just winked at him.
***
Ilya had barely sent his i’m here text before Shane was yanking open his hotel door, relief and desire equally splashed across his lovely face. Ilya beamed, and darted inside. Shane barely let the door fall shut behind them before he launched himself into Ilya’s arms. “Oh my God, Ilya, I missed you so fucking much.”
Ilya swallowed hard as he wrapped his arms tightly around Shane, one hand reaching up to cradle Shane’s head, the other anchoring itself around his waist. For his part, Shane’s arms were curled tight around Ilya’s shoulders, and his voice was muffled from where his face was pressed into Ilya’s shoulder. Ilya inhaled deeply, nosing at Shane’s hair, some distant part of his brain registering that Shane had packed his pine-scented shampoo. “I missed you too,” he whispered, feeling Shane shiver as his breath drifted over his ear.
Only one of the bedside lamps were on, casting them both in a safe, warm glow. Ilya felt his lungs expand for what felt like the first time in weeks, even as he pressed Shane so tightly to his rib cage. He wondered, idly, how he could have failed to notice that he hadn’t been breathing properly without Shane.
Shane drew back to look at Ilya, but didn’t release his hold. Ilya rubbed his hand over Shane’s back, feeling the familiar muscles ripple under the fabric of what Ilya was sure was his own black T-shirt. Shane’s soft brown eyes searched Ilya’s face, and Ilya hoped he was giving Shane what he was looking for, hoped he was giving Shane everything he could ever want, as he slid his other hand from Shane’s hair to cup his jaw, to drift a thumb over Shane’s freckles. “Hi,” Ilya murmured, and was rewarded with Shane’s soft smile.
“Hi,” whispered Shane. “Fuck, it’s so good to see you.” He tipped his head forward, his forehead nudging Ilya’s. “Was it hard for you on the ice, too? Fuck off —” he interrupted himself when Ilya snorted “— I meant… when you skated up to the blue dot, I just wanted to kiss you.”
Ilya sobered at that, thinking about how fucking good Shane had looked, strong, confident, in control. The light in his eyes, the quirk of his mouth. He nodded, rubbing his nose against Shane’s. “Yes. I wanted that too.”
Shane lifted his head, again studying Ilya’s face for a moment before grimacing. “This season’s going to suck, isn’t it?”
Ilya shrugged, smirking. “For you, maybe. My season is going to be great. I’m going to win the Stanley Cup. I don’t know what you’ll be doing.”
Shane burst out laughing. “You fucking asshole!” He shifted the palms of his hands to Ilya’s shoulders, then gripped him, shaking him lightly. “I was trying to be earnest —”
The sound of Shane’s laughter rose beneath Ilya’s chest like water lifting a boat, and he cut Shane off by drawing him in for a kiss. It was wet, messy, a little desperate, and Ilya smiled into it when he felt Shane’s fingers reach up to comb through his hair. Shane had always had an obsession with Ilya’s curls, and Ilya was done pretending it didn’t fucking turn him on when Shane pulled at them.
Without breaking the kiss, he pressed a hand into Shane’s hip, gently steering him backwards, away from the door to the hotel room, towards the bed. He felt drunk with the knowledge that they were staying in the same hotel, that they were supposed to be in the same place, that he would have the gift of once again falling asleep and waking up in Shane’s arms.
It may have been a stolen moment, he thought as he lowered Shane to the mattress and followed him down, slipping a hand up Shane’s shirt. But it was theirs for now.