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When Ilya gets home it's eerily quiet.
He toes his shoes off and starts making his way upstairs and towards Mali's room. The stairs creak under his sock-clad feet and he winces quietly at the sound.
By now their daughter should already be asleep but he always makes sure to kiss her goodnight when he comes home anyway. Having her wake up because of the stairs would be less than ideal though so Ilya tiptoes up the rest of the way. Before he can call out for Shane and let him know he's home he hears a faint noise coming from the other side of Mali's door.
When he opens it the sight that greets him makes him want to bite down on his lower lip to keep from laughing. He knows that if Shane caught even a whiff of amusement coming off of him he'd be in trouble. So he does his best to keep it in.
Because there Shane is; staring at the broken comb in his hands, tears of frustration in his eyes.
He looks like he's been in a fight.
Correction, he looks like he's been in a fight and he's lost.
Shane Hollander doesn't do loss.
His normally perfect hair is standing straight up and sticking out in every direction, his cheeks are red with exhaustion, his sleeves are rolled up to his elbows and he looks just about ready to give up, sitting on the floor with their kid.
In short, he's a mess. A beautiful mess but a mess nonetheless, Ilya thinks.
Mali babbles happily next to him, playing with a toy train on the floor. The kid looks perfectly fine, a complete opposite to her father.
"This is your fault," Shane says by way of greeting. There's anger in his voice. Frustration. He sounds bone-tired and weary. Drained. Like he's given up.
And suddenly Ilya feels a lot less amused.
Because here Shane is, doing his best to take care of their child. Here Shane is, obviously frustrated and overwhelmed. Here Shane is; the man who fought Commissioner Crowell and won, ready to wave a white flag in the face of their daughter's hair.
Ilya sighs, closes the gap between them in a few short steps and comes down to Shane's level. He sits down next to him, pulls him close and smiles when Shane doesn't resist it.
It can't be too bad if Shane is letting him touch him, he thinks.
"Another broken comb, huh?"
Shane lets out an exasperated breath.
"That's the third one this week, Ilya. The third one. How can someone so little have such strong hair?"
"That's the famous Rozanov hair, sweetheart," Ilya chuckles.
Shane rolls his eyes and sighs heavily, his whole body moving with the gesture.
He looks so sad. Ilya hates that.
Tentatively he pries the comb out of Shane's hands. He's got a death grip on the thing but when Ilya runs his fingers over freckled skin the grip loosens.
"I knew I shouldn't have married you," Shane mutters as Ilya puts the comb to the side and away from Mali's curious gaze. "Your family's hair is cursed."
Ilya gives a low laugh, pulls Shane closer with an arm around his waist until he's basically sitting in Ilya's lap.
"Hm," he says into Shane's ear. He can feel Shane suppress a shiver under him. He smiles into his neck, delighted that he still has that kind of effect on his husband. "Now that's a lie and you know it. You love my hair."
Shane stays quiet. He's not gonna deny it. He does love Ilya's hair. Loves to run his fingers through it. To play with the little curls at the nape of his neck. To pull it when Ilya's mouth is on his body.
"Maybe," he says eventually and it's a whisper in the moonlit room.
He gestures towards Mali, who's now laying half on top of the trains, slowly blinking in a futile attempt to stay awake past her bedtime.
"But I can't keep dealing with it on her. We spent an hour like this. She's missed her bedtime, the comb is broken and—"
He pauses there, unsure of if he should say what he wants to. Unsure of if he can.
Ilya waits quietly the way he always does. He knows this isn't easy for Shane. Expressing his emotions. Admitting something is hard. Asking for help. But he's gotten better about it over the years and Ilya has learned not to push. To just squeeze him tight, hold him close, let him know he is there.
Eventually Shane continues.
"And she cries and I hate it. I hate it so much and then I want to cry, too. I don't want to hurt her. I don't want to be making her sad. I hate it, Ilya. It's the worst sound in the world, her crying."
There's tears in his eyes again but this time they start making their way down his cheeks even as Ilya hurries to kiss them away for him.
"Hey, it's okay," he says, shushing the man in his arms. "It's okay, it's okay. We'll figure it out, da? I'll talk to Svetlana, ask how her parents handled her hair when she was a baby, okay? It's okay, sweetheart."
Shane buries his face into Ilya's neck and Ilya does his best to pull him closer still, a hand coming up to cradle the back of his head while the other one runs up and down his back in a soothing motion.
He's trying to reign it in. He doesn't want to upset Mali. Doesn't want to wake her up either, now that she's so close to falling asleep. So he muffles the sounds of his sniffles and sobs into Ilya's neck, lets himself be soothed.
"Sorry," he mumbles eventually. "I'm just really tired."
"No," Ilya replies. "None of that, you don't apologise for feeling, okay? You're allowed to be tired. How about you go take a bath and I'll put her to bed, yes? And then we can fix some food and relax on the sofa together. Does this sound good?"
Shane sniffles again, wiping at his face with the sleeves of his sweater. If his mother saw him now she'd be scolding him, he thinks absentmindedly.
He nods eventually, takes Ilya's hand into his own. Kisses each and every knuckle softly, sweetly. Just because he can. Just because he's allowed to. Just because he wants to.
"I love you," he whispers against his hand. "Even with your terrible hair."
He can feel Ilya laughing, feel the kiss he leaves against his hair.
"I love you too," he says before he starts pulling them both up.
They turn towards Mali at the same time, ready to pick her up and put her to bed. What they find instead is a toddler in her hockey-themed pyjamas, laying halfway across the train tracks, eyes closed and drooling all over the floor.