Chapter Text
The Aftermath
2006 - Russia
Ilya was not sure how to deal with the conflict or the sadness of losing his mother so tragically so he did the only thing he knew worked as a coping mechanism: he skated and he worked. His fingers glanced off his mothers chain and cross that hung from his neck infinite times a day. It had become a habit, a prayer, an oath, an apology. It had somehow become all of those things and absolutely none of them at the same time. He has carried her with him with every step he has taken on his journey, hoping that they all lead him away from a land he loves, but a family that, with the exception of his mother, never truly felt like his.
His father had either ignored that Ilya commandeered the treasured piece of jewelry or simply did not realize the significance of him wearing it. It could honestly be either and he was not sure which would have hurt more. Ilya suspected it was the latter, as the name Irina may as well have been a curse in their home. His mother did not just die, her entire existence seemed lost to time and memory, all but his memory. No one said a word. No one asked him how he was doing, and maybe it was better that way because he would not have known what to say if asked. It would either be silence or he would cry and never stop speaking, about her, about the loss of her and about how he wasn’t sure on most days if he even wanted to try and cope with the sadness. No one wanted to hear that from him, so he kept quiet and he played. He played harder than he ever had before, once he had nothing else to care about hockey was what he cared about exclusively. And wasn’t that an odd way he could make his father proud.
It had been three years since he lost his mother and sometimes he still did not know what to do about it. In the immediate aftermath of his mothers death his father covered it up as was expected. If Grigori Rozanov's wife died in any way that would affect his presence within Moscow society it would have been bad optics. So Irina had fallen down the stairs in a nasty drunken accident while Grigori was out of town.
It had been such an unfortunate turn of events that it had been his young son who had found her. His son, who, for everyone's sake including his own, decided that he was going to fully embrace the silence that followed. The funeral had been a silent affair for Ilya, but he heard every whispered word disparaging his mother, and he folded inward in a way that was uncharacteristic for a child who had always been so self-assured.
Ilya spoke to friends, classmates and teammates, but to his family? He had nothing to say. Nothing he wanted to say. His father had let his mother suffer and actively made her life worse until she could not handle it any more. As far as he was concerned after the cold, sad day in 2003 he was an orphan. He decided that his promise to her- to get out- would be one that he would make sure to keep.
At 15, he had been the youngest player on the Russian junior team. The youngest and the best. By a lot. Traveling outside of Russia was right around the corner. An escape was right around the corner. A promise that he never got to fulfill to a mother that he would miss for the rest of his life was just around the corner.
He started drinking and smoking heavily shortly after his mother passed. He figured anything that dulled the pain or helped him ignore the constant tug at his heart was welcome. There was vodka and pot and pills to start. Ironically perhaps, he started with the handful he found scattered around his mothers body. It was his penance, he figured. He wanted to live in a haze, and the fact that his hockey did not suffer from it only encouraged his destructive habits further.
He had just started experimenting with sex, and a string of girls both his age and older were more than happy to oblige him in any number of ways if he showed the slightest interest. He showed the interest with a wink and a half grin that he had learned early on really worked for him. He was talented, handsome and well known without certain circles. For some, he understood that he was the ‘prize’. He would not claim to care anything about these experiences, other than what they provided for him physically. The girls, the women seemed to feel the same. He would serve a purpose and duck out doors, or leave the bathroom at a party never to see them again.
The one unexpected thing had been Sasha. The son of his coach, Sasha, was always around the team. The sport of hockey bored him to tears but he carried an air of superiority watching from the stands that captivated Ilya in a way that felt new and weird and wrong simultaneously. When Sasha first kissed him on the way out of practice Ilya almost punched him, which made Sasha laugh.
“Just trying something new,” Sasha shrugged dismissively and went in for another kiss, which Ilya eagerly allowed. Since then he and Sasha stole moments away for months, just small pockets of time when no one was looking.
Ilya had to admit that his interest in men was just as present as his interest in women, as much his life would be easiest if he ignored those feelings, they were present and unmistakable. He knew this would be a secret he would have to keep close- very close and potentially for the rest of his life. Russia had a history of not being kind to boys like him and it only further fueled his desire to get out.
2006 - Canada
Shane was tired. Bone deep tired. There was a house party going on around him that he did not want to be at. His friend and goalie of his high school team had the house to himself and decided that he should invite endless streams of people from their school and neighboring schools to trash the place all in the name of unsupervised fun. He looked around and knew immediately that if he was to throw a party like this (he wouldn’t) that Yuna Hollander would never let him see the light of day again (to put it mildly). Even the thought of this scared Shane Hollander into compliance. His mother had always been a loving but formidable human being.
He had been named the captain of the varsity hockey team, an unbelievable feat for a 15 year old, and it had been his unofficial duty to show up to parties and other events that he had no interest in attending.. He had to be seen by people, it was part of the mask he put on at school and during practice to not feel out of place. Years spent in locker rooms had left him with an awareness of what he had simply gone along with to get along. The jokes, the mockery, the sexism, and homophobia had always struck him as something not related to him because he did not give a voice to it. He didn't agree with it. But it turned out it was part of him. He had been there and said nothing.
His teammates teased him gently about being boring, about being a goody goody and following rules that the others treated as a mere suggestion. He had grown to hate the word boring, because to him what his teammates loved, the loud music and spilled beer and sticky floors were all a level of boring Shane could not understand. These situations, where he was expected to be a “normal” teenager always made him feel as if he wanted to escape his skin.
He held a beer in his hand and pretended to sip, even though he hates the taste and how it makes him feel. He found at the first house party he went to that while alcohol does take an edge off, it also makes him feel out of control. He hates feeling out of control more than just about anything.
He would wander around the house and pour small deposits of beer wherever he could so he wouldn’t be caught with a full can and get ribbed by his teammates. It was all part of playing the role of “high school jock”. He hated this part of it. He loved the athletics of it and hated the show. If he could spend his life exclusively concerned about hockey, he would sign up for that life right now and for the rest of his life.
A senior girl, Jamie if he had to guess, rubbed at his shoulder and he smiled at her plainly, not showing teeth. “Want to go upstairs with me?” she coos, her breath hot and wet and if Shane was being honest, kind of gross in his ear.
His best friend, Mike, who was playing host of this particular party located him him and raised his eyebrows - a silent ‘what the fuck? How lucky are you?’ As Jamie continued to rub his shoulders. She trailed her nails down his arm, grabbed his hand and led him upstairs. He followed her eagerly, because that was part of the mask too.
He had done this same things with several girls from his high school, disappearing at a party is also part of the act. He closed his eyes tightly and allowed an eager mouth to find him in dark spaces. Sometimes when he opens his eyes, he is surprised that is all that is expected of him. This lack of reciprocation or any enjoyment outside of an orgasam had always baffled him. He had gotten a fair share of blow jobs in his life, and had not ever had to think past that moment. The feel of a hungry mouth on him, that he could close his eyes and pretend was anyone. He was sure he could perform outside of a blow job if he had to, but he had no interest in girls his age or women older.
This made him feel broken and a little bit scared. Admitting all of this out loud to anyone, or even to himself in something other than a passing thought seemed too large of a burden for him to bear. He pushed the feeling deep down and buried it regularly with hockey drills amd complicated game plans.
December 2007 - Moscow
If all was to go the he had planned, and despite being called a disappointment, an embarrassment and ‘just like your mother’ this was going to be one of his last holidays in his fathers home. He sat in his mothers bedroom in a chair that was oversized and covered by a drop cloth. This room looked like it had been frozen in time on a cold day in 2003.
The smell of her had escaped through drafty windows and the cracks in the door. He missed her smell, he missed every single thing about her. He recalled how she hugged him, and realized quickly that outside of sex with people whose names he does not remember and people who want to fight him for being himself, that he hasn’t been touched. Truly touched in three years by anyone with any care for him. He had forgotten the feelings of genuine love and concern and care. “Fuck.” He muttered - he missed being cared for.
Ilya leaned over, elbows on his knees and felt a well of emotion that had gone untapped starting to break free. He sniffled and rubbed at his face to stop emotions from hitting him like a wave. Afterall, they would be an unwelcome sign of how much he missed his mother.
“Mama…” One tear fell, then two, then he could not have stopped the deluge if he tried. And he tried. “I’m trying.”
“ILYA!”
The voice was a command from the general of his home that he could not ignore. Guests had probably started arriving for his fathers end of year dinner and he was clearly being summoned. He was going to play nice and talk hockey and try to disappear into the walls.
“Mama…” he repeats once more as he stood in silence in the dark room that changed his life for the worse. “I can’t…” He collected himself in front of the mirror next to where all of her clothes still lie and watched himself take a deep breath, then two. He has wondered how everything around him has simply moved on and how the world has moved on, while everything his mother left in this room, including him, has been stuck in the dark for three years.
December 2007 - Canada
The Hollanders had always spent holidays as just the three of them. For sixteen years the three of them created traditions that are quiet, special and just for them. The gifts they trade on Christmas Eve, just one present - then the balance on Christmas Day. Shane and David have played along with all of the plans that Yuna has made, because plans make her happier than anything else in the world (other than Shane scoring goals- that may come first).
“This time next year we may have to amend some of our holiday plans,” David reminded them both. “Juniors in Saskatchewan. I am already excited for them.”
“Dad…” Shane groaned. As much as he loved hockey, this wishing for future days frustrated him in a way he did not know how to express. He was 16. “That’s one full year away Never know what the year could bring, Dad,” Shane starts, “I could get injured or benched and there will be nothing in Saskatchewan for me. Nothing at all.” A managed expectation by Shane was akin a curse in his house.
“Don’t you dare say that,” Yuna scolded him playfully. “They’re listening…”
“Who is listening?” Shane laughed at his mom, waving his hand around the room that is empty outside of the three Hollanders.
Yuna's eyes study him carefully and while she realizes that he is joking, she also knows her son in a way that nobody else does. Her thoughtful, careful, hockey prodigy of a son, who really has wondered somewhere in his thoughts if he was ever going to make it to Saskatchewan because of any number of things his anxiety tells him could happen, which likely never would.
“Just don’t put it out in the universe,” David laughed along with their son. “We’ll be in Saskatchewan next year and it will be perfect. A new tradition, based around hockey.”
“Everything we do is about hockey, Dad. Almost everything we have done since I was four is based around hockey, anyway.”
His mom nudged his shoulder as she passed behind the couch. “You love it.”
“Yeah,” Shane nodded, his eyes focused on the gentle fire as it cracked in the fireplace. “Yeah, I do.”