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Shane stirs to the sounds of shuffling at the bedroom door and a familiar voice.
“…Papa?”
He blinks awake; it can’t be after six, his alarm hasn’t even gone off.
“Hey, baby,” he murmurs. Ilya is snoring; usually Shane takes the morning shifts because he naturally wakes up earlier, but that doesn’t stop Yara from calling for Ilya by default. Even so, it’s very early by Yara’s standards. Even Anya lifts her head from her spot in the corner and puts it down again with an irritated snort.
“Dada?”
Two-year-old Yara pads over in sleep-rumpled pajamas, her stuffed loon—looking a bit worse for the wear after two years of devoted attention—tucked under one arm.
“You wanna cuddle?” Shane mumbles hopefully, reaching out, ready to pull Yara into his arms and catch a few more minutes of sleep with her tucked against his chest. Sometimes they can eke out an extra half hour this way, if their early riser isn’t too eager to start the day.
Not today, apparently. She shakes her head, pointing at the door. “Wun? Wun?”
Run?
“Okay,” he whispers, swinging his legs over the side of the bed, yawning and stretching the sleep out of his muscles. His shoulder protests, it does that often now. He’s newly 36 and everything seems to take longer to heal, plus he took a hard hit during the playoffs. Their season finished two weeks ago and he’ll be feeling it for a while. “We’ll let Papa sleep, huh?”
Yara immediately puts her arms out as Shane stands. “Uppa!”
He obliges, taking them out of the bedroom and closing the door partway to give Ilya some distance from the morning chaos. He gives Yara a kiss in greeting and gets a sloppy, open-mouthed toddler kiss on the cheek in return, then she pushes her stuffy into Shane’s face.
“Woofee? Tiss.”
Wolfie, kiss.
Shane masks a grimace at being assaulted by the raggedy thing, but he gives it a perfunctory kiss on its scruffy beak. Yara grins sleepily, pleased, and rests her head on his shoulder.
They go to the kitchen first, as always, unlocking one of the many baby gates that controls the flow of their lives.
“Down?” he asks once they reach the kitchen, knowing what the response will be. He’s found it’s best to offer choices anyway—saves both of them a potential meltdown if he doesn’t correctly anticipate her desires.
“Uh,” Yara says, clinging tightly to him, arms around his neck, legs wrapping his side, a human cling-on. That’s a no, then.
“I can’t make your smoothie if I can’t put you down, silly goose,” he reasons, giving her an affectionate squeeze. “How about you sit on the counter…but you have to promise to stay on your bottom. Do you promise?”
“Mm,” Yara offers, as close to confirmation as he’s going to get this early in the morning. Shane sets her on the counter, subtly blocking her in with a hand while he opens the fridge.
“Purple or pink?”
It's the same question every day, but Yara thinks for a minute, putting a finger to her chin, tiny furrow appearing between her brows in an exaggerated thinking pose.
“Puh-pee,” she decides.
“Purple it is,” he says, pulling out a box of blueberries, a container of yogurt, whole milk, and the last half of yesterday’s banana, setting everything on the counter. He slides the blender out and opens the blueberries, grabbing a handful and putting them in a bowl to be rinsed. He stays close, working one-handed with the other on Yara, letting her watch as he washes the fruit and measures out the other ingredients the same way he does for his own smoothies, lining everything up on the counter.
“You gonna help today?” he asks, and Yara nods emphatically. He holds out the blender to let her drop in the peeled half banana and a handful of blueberries from the bowl. A plastic measuring cup full of milk goes in, as does the yogurt. Only a few blueberries end up on the floor, and the counter is speckled with yogurt and splashed with milk when she’s done—all part of the charm of having a toddler.
And it’s far better than the battle of wills that will ensue if he doesn’t let her assist. He’s learned that the hard way.
“Thank you,” he says when the blender is full, surreptitiously wiping away the overspill and adding the rest of the berries. “You want to push the button?”
Yara covers her ears with both hands and shakes her head, eyeing the blender warily. The noise scared her the first few times they’d tried this.
“Ow! Ow.”
Loud! Loud.
“Good idea,” he nods gravely. “Okay, here goes…”
The blender whirs, and Shane keeps a watchful eye on Yara to make sure she doesn’t try to stick her fingers in it or something, but she keeps her hands planted on her ears. When it’s done, he pours the concoction into Yara’s spill-proof thermos and hands it to her for sampling.
“Taste test, please.”
“Mmmm, num num num,” she says, smacking her lips dramatically, grinning with tiny blueberry-stained teeth.
“Good, huh?” he smiles.
“Mm, tank-oo.”
“You’re welcome, good manners,” he praises, the response almost a verbal tic at this point.
(He said the same thing to Haas the last time he thanked him and the rest of the guys ragged on him about it for weeks. Ottawa’s beloved Shane Hollander became “Mister Manners” in the locker room.)
Yara puts out her arms again, but she gestures to the floor as soon as Shane has her. “Dow.”
With her loon under one arm and the smoothie gripped in her other hand, she’s feeling less clingy—convenient, because Shane needs to get dressed.
She follows Shane to the guest bedroom where he stores his running clothes, which has the intended effect of keeping Yara out of the main bedroom so Ilya can have a few more moments’ peace. Yara climbs onto the bed and sits with her legs dangling off the side as she sips at her smoothie. She’s always a bit subdued in the morning, so Shane takes his time, changing into shorts and a tank top and brushing his teeth.
Once he’s dressed, he stops by the main bedroom to fetch Anya. Ilya has rolled to his front, one arm thrown over the side of the bed, chest rising and falling steadily.
“Walk?” Shane whispers into the quiet room. There’s a rustling from the other side as the dog gets up—slower than during her puppy years, but still wagging her tail gamely. She stretches and trots out to join them, poking Yara with her nose in greeting. The baby giggles, frees a hand by putting her thermos daintily on the floor, and pats Anya on the head, fingers splayed, her touch so light and careful she almost doesn’t make contact.
“Goggy?” Yara asks, looking up at Shane, who has paused to watch their routine morning greeting. “Anana.”
“Yes, good morning, Anya. Ready for our run?”
“Wun,” Yara nods, picking up the smoothie again and toddling down the hall, down the little set of stairs, and straight to the front door.
Soon Anya is leashed and Yara is buckled into the shaded jogging stroller with her drink and her stuffed loon, then they set off. Shane can’t keep up a real training pace with the stroller so he does a fraction of his regular route, Yara talking to him from the stroller as they go. She gets more talkative the longer they’re out, the smoothie and the fresh air doing their job to wake her up. Shane does his best to respond, in between controlled breaths and keeping an eye on the road and making sure Anya doesn’t stray too far. It’s a finely honed balancing act.
When they return, Yara is babbling nonstop about trees and birds and a bunch of other stuff Shane can't quite make out—she speaks a fair amount of Russian interspersed with English. Half the time he can’t tell if he's just shit at Russian (probable) or if she’s talking in baby speak.
As soon as Shane shuts the door behind them, Yara heads straight for the kitchen. Shane wipes his sweaty face on the bottom of his tank.
“Goggy? Goggy foo?”
Doggy food?
She thrives on routines, this kid. If she weren’t adopted, he’d swear she was biologically his. Although according to Hayden, all of his kids were the same, so maybe it's just a two-year-old thing.
“Yup, I bet Anya is hungry after such a long run.”
“Ong wun,” she murmurs to herself once, then again, and again, like she's practicing the words, running language drills in her head.
He lets Yara pour the kibble into Anya’s bowl, adding a scoop of brown rice and shredded chicken with green beans and a splash of water before giving Yara a spoon and letting her “mix” everything, brown rice flying everywhere, before she carries the dish to where Anya waits patiently. This results in a fair amount of the food getting scattered and spilled in a trail from the counter to Anya’s dinner mat. Shane bites his tongue; the mess is a constant in toddlerhood. At least the dog will clean it up before either he or Ilya can.
Speaking of Ilya, Shane expects to see him any minute, but the other end of the house remains quiet.
“Guess Papa's sleeping in,” he muses aloud.
“Ny-ny Papa?”
“Yup. How about…Cheerios? Or Kix?”
“Oh-oh's peez.”
Yara goes in the highchair without a fuss—a promising start—and Shane sets a tray of cereal and more blueberries in front of her, alongside a toddler-sized spoon. The snack is mostly there to keep her out from underfoot while he works in the kitchen, anyway, blending his protein shake and scrambling some eggs. Yara makes a show of putting her hands over her ears when he uses the blender again.
He sips at his shake while he beats some eggs and Yara holds forth in between bites of blueberry and cereal.
“Dada! Dada, oh-oh’s!”
“You like those, huh?”
He slices half an avocado into bite-size pieces and adds them to her tray. She's never been a fan, but all the research suggests offering a variety of foods; someday she might surprise them. Part of him thinks the literature is lying, because Yara’s tastes seem firmly entrenched. Blueberries and raspberries and peas are all approved. Avocado and sweet potato, no. Broccoli is okay sometimes, but only when steamed and then only the green tops. Chicken is fine, salmon is better, pasta is a no-go but rice is acceptable.
And, thanks to Ilya’s influence, french fries are always okay.
(Ilya likes to claim that she gets her pickiness from Shane, until Shane reminds him there is zero genetic explanation for that, and when it comes to nurture, one of them is clearly the more influential parental figure at this stage of her life. That usually shuts him up.)
In any case, there’s a good chance Shane will be spreading Yara’s untouched avocado on a piece of toast for himself when her breakfast is done later. He’s pretty sure his nutritionist didn’t account for the baby's leftovers in his macros, but he can’t let a perfectly good avocado go to waste.
Anya plants herself at the base of Yara’s highchair, a furry sentinel waiting for any stray bits to make an appearance. More than once, they’ve had to discourage Yara from simply throwing her dinner overboard on purpose, a lesson in cause and effect. Thankfully that game was only interesting for a few months and she's mostly content to keep her meals to herself…much to poor Anya’s dismay.
Then the eggs are done and he divides them into three portions, placing Yara’s in front of her and the others on the warmer. Still no sign of Ilya, but he’ll be out soon. He pops a couple slices of bread in the toaster.
“Use your fork, please,” Shane reminds Yara as he walks watches her take a fistful of scrambled eggs in hand. She looks at him—a blank, unaffected stare that she definitely picked up from Ilya—before wrinkling her nose and stuffing the food in her mouth.
Gross.
Shane sighs. Well, at least she’s eating.
She takes her time with the eggs while Shane slices the remaining avocado for himself and adds the finished toast to the warmed plates and washes the few dishes he’s used. When she’s done, he wipes his hands on a towel and turns to her.
“You ready to go wake Papa up?”
“Papa!”
Yara claps her hands—now covered in flecks of egg and blueberry juice—and squirms in her seat to let him know just how excited she is. Sometimes Shane can’t help but feel the faintest twinge of jealousy, that his husband has become the parent of choice. But then he sees Ilya and Yara together—in the stands at his games, when he comes home after a roadie—and his heart has no room for jealousy, only a deep, aching love for the family they’ve built together.
He fetches Yara from the highchair after a perfunctory wipe down with a damp cloth—somehow she’s managed to get blueberry juice on her forehead, her pajamas, everywhere. She tolerates this for about three seconds before whining and wriggling away from his fussing.
“No!”
Ahh, the first no of the day. He’d been waiting for that. Shane stops, but he hands her the damp cloth. “Okay, you can wipe yourself.”
She makes a face but obliges, giving her mouth a few rough swipes with the cloth before holding it out to him. “Da!”
Done!
Pick your battles, he thinks, an oft-used mantra now, and resigns himself to cleaning blueberry fingerprints off the walls and windows later.
“Woofee!”
As soon as her feet hit the floor, Yara toddles off to fetch her stuffy from the sofa before demanding uppa again.
“Let’s go get Papa,” Shane says, carrying her down the hall and into the darkened bedroom. Ilya is a shadowed lump under the covers.
“Hey, sleepyhead…breakfast’s ready,” Shane whispers.
Ilya gives a muffled grunt as Shane draws up beside him. He’s surprised to find his eyes open, his face oddly pale and drawn in the dim light.
“Papa!”
Yara reaches for Ilya, leaning down over Shane’s arms to try to get to him, already bouncing and scrambling, but Shane holds her back. Something feels off.
“Hey…you okay?”
He directs the question at his husband, who blinks up at him, a slow, glazed stare. In the dim light, he can just make out wet tracks drying under his eyes.
“Ilya? What’s wrong? Talk to me…”
Shane perches on the edge of the bed, trying to keep their wiggly toddler contained as she babbles and reaches for her Papa.
Ilya’s response is a single word, thick-throated and raspy. “Can’t.”
“You can’t…? Can’t what?”
No answer.
“Ilya? What do you mean?”
Still no answer. Shane wracks his brain for an obvious explanation. Was an old injury acting up? Did Ilya drink last night? No, he’d had a beer with dinner, not enough to cause a hangover. Is he sick? He wasn’t up during the night, not that Shane noticed, anyway.
“Ilya? C’mon, baby, talk to me.”
He rubs a careful hand over Ilya’s bare shoulder, but he flinches away from the touch. Now there’s a familiar alarm ringing in the back of Shane’s head, a blurry picture slowly coming into focus.
They’d come to expect a low period for Ilya at the end of each season, an annual adrenaline crash, the pattern dogging him despite therapy and medication. He’d go quiet, distant, slow to respond, often staring off into space until someone physically touched him. The cigarettes came out, smoked outside by the water so as not to invoke Shane’s disapproving glare. Sex was more frequent as Ilya made a desperate attempt to feel through the fog.
And once in a while, it meant Ilya spent a day or two in bed, pinned down by the weight of simply existing.
Shane tries to recall the last time it happened, what had helped, how long it lasted, but his memories are vague. It’s been a while, he realizes. Last year had been different, their playoff run violently cut short by an end-of-season injury that landed Ilya in the hospital. The depression seemed to grant him a reprieve that year, or maybe his weeks-long recovery masked his usual symptoms.
The year before had been all about Yara—months of planning and preparation, the on-edge wait for her to be born…and then they were new parents, wrapped in a sleep-deprived fog of elation. Ilya had been incandescent with happiness all summer and the following season. The depression was almost an afterthought by that point, managed easily with a daily pill and regular therapy sessions.
But Shane sees it now in his husband's deep, shuddering sigh, his exhausted, vacant expression—all the signs of a depressive crash.
Well, that…changes the day ahead.
“Okay,” Shane whispers, standing. Yara begins to whine, a prelude to a bigger tantrum. “I’m going to get your meds.”
Ilya sighs, squeezing his eyes shut. “I…don’t—”
“Meds,” Shane says in a tone that brooks no argument. “That’s all you need to do today, okay? Just take your pill, then we’ll let you rest.”
Another sigh. Shane takes that as a yes.
Yara is working her way into a meltdown as Shane leaves the room. This poses a problem on two fronts: A toddler with a disrupted routine is a nightmare, and depression doesn’t give a single solitary fuck about a toddler’s routines.
“Papa! Papaaaaaa,” she wails, genuine tears forming in her eyes.
“Papa’s okay, baby,” Shane says, trying to sound soothing, not pulling it off. “He’s just…not feeling well. We need to let him rest today, right? We’ll have a Dada-Yara day.”
“Dada? Yarska?”
Her gaze stays fixed over his shoulder toward the bedroom as he takes her to the kitchen, attempting to keep his tone light.
“Yup, just Daddy and Yaroschka. It’ll be fun, right? A special day, just for you and me.”
“Fun?” Yara says, all sniffling and warbly, and if Shane weren’t so worried about Ilya he’d laugh at her clear skepticism.
Right there with you, baby, he thinks.
He opens the cupboard and gets Ilya’s antidepressant from the topmost shelf, shaking out a small white pill and placing it on a clean plate. Did he not take his meds yesterday? No, he definitely did. Shane remembers giving him shit for swallowing the little pill dry, as if there was some kind of tough-guy badge of honor to be earned by not taking it with water like a normal fucking person. Shane’s lips twitch in a fleeting smile at the memory, but it’s swiftly quashed as his mind races with anxious questions.
Yesterday had been normal, easy. They’d spent the day together, enjoying being back at the cottage. Ilya seemed fine. What had changed that today was so different? Had Shane missed something obvious?
Yara lets him put her down while he works, although she clings to his leg, Wolfie clutched in her other hand, and stays fixated on the hall leading to the bedroom. Every few seconds she asks him about Ilya—Papa? Papa go ny-ny?—and Shane reiterates that Ilya is okay, he’s just…tired.
This is a new problem. How the fuck does he explain depression to a two-year-old? She barely grasps “happy” and “sad” at this stage, let alone more nuanced emotions. The crushing weight of a troubled childhood and a genetic predisposition to mental health issues wasn’t covered in Yara’s How Is Baby Feeling? board book.
He puts two slices of toast on the plate, and after a thought, grabs the jam Ilya loves from the fridge—raspberry lemon, fresh from the farmer’s market. It’s a pitiful breakfast compared to their usual, but the goal is to get some calories into Ilya however he can…and maybe the sugar will cheer him up a little. He heaps the toast with jam, then fills a thermos with ice water and a second with coffee, extra cream and sugar. Yara stays glued to his leg as he carefully navigates the kitchen, and he narrates what he’s doing without thinking about it—it’s something he’s done since she was a baby, in hopes the sound of his voice will soothe her even when he's focused on something else.
When everything is prepared, he kneels and holds out the thermos of water. It’s mostly airtight, designed not to spill even if Yara waves it around. When in doubt, let her help.
“Can you carry this for Papa?”
Yara sniffs wetly but she nods, two swift jerks of her head, and carefully takes the thermos in two hands, Wolfie stuffed under one arm. Shane’s heart clenches at her careful, dutiful attention as she toddles off toward the bedroom, and he follows close behind.
“Papa! Papa?”
She continues her chant until they’re at Ilya’s side. Shane sets the plate of toast and the thermos of coffee on the nightstand, just in time to stop Yara from shoving the water in her father’s face. Ilya doesn’t seem to notice.
“Thank you, Yara,” Shane murmurs. “Let's put it on the table for now, ‘kay?”
“Papa? Papa go ny-ny?”
Ilya doesn’t respond, doesn’t seem to have heard anything they’ve said.
“I brought your pill,” Shane says, encouraging Ilya to sit up until he’s propped on one elbow. Shane places the pill in his hand and Ilya puts it to his mouth robotically, swallows it dry before Shane can give him the thermos to wash it down. It’s a tiny thing, a silly thing, but it gives Shane hope. Still a lovable asshole, just…a sad, lovable asshole.
“There’s coffee, and I made toast with that jam you like. Try to eat something?”
Ilya hums but doesn’t look at him, eyes unfocused. Only then does he seem to notice Yara, who stands with her hands on the mattress, barely tall enough to look over the side. When Ilya realizes it’s her, he grabs Shane’s wrist.
“Shane. I don’t want her to see,” Ilya whispers.
“See what?”
Ilya’s eyes fix on him, a little wild.
“Please.”
“Ilya—”
“I can’t,” he croaks, turning his face away. “Don’t let her—please, Shane, don’t—”
“Okay, okay, shh, it's okay,” Shane rushes to reassure him, even though he wants to press, wants to stay, at least keep an eye on him. He can't just…leave him?
But Ilya looks so desperate, so insistent, he’s begging and Yara is pawing at him again, her little voice chattering and getting more frantic by the second.
“We’ll…we’ll go, I just—”
“Papa go? Papa go ny-ny?”
Yara is bounces on her feet, trying to get Ilya’s attention as she pushes Wolfie at him, smacking it against his shoulder. “Ny-ny Woofee? Ny-ny Papa.”
Shane’s heart breaks even more as he realizes she’s trying to give Ilya the stuffed loon.
“Baby, that’s…that’s so nice,” he says thickly. “But…I don’t know if Papa is—”
Ilya accepts the loon and tucks it under his chin.
“Thank you, Yaroschka,” he says lowly. “Now go play with Dada, yes?”
“Ny-ny,” Yara says, patting him on the head and looking up at Shane as if for confirmation. Shane can’t help it, he scoops her up and hugs her, whispers good job, baby, in her ear.
“I’ll check in in a bit,” he says thickly, putting a hand on Ilya’s shoulder. “We love you. Feel better.”
Ilya whispers an almost imperceptible ya tebya lyublu and pulls up the comforter, burrowing deeper into the mattress.
“Tebooboo,” Yara offers in a small voice, one of the few Russian phrases she speaks that Shane fully understands.
Ya tebya lyublu.
Out in the hall, Shane hesitates, torn. Yara cuddles against him, clearly unsettled—hell, he’s feeling pretty unsettled, too. It seems wrong to leave Ilya like this. But he’d been so adamant, and it was true their spirited little girl wasn’t going to tolerate a day spent lounging in bed.
Shane considers calling his parents but decides against it…for now. If this lasts more than a day, he’ll revisit the idea, but Ilya hates being the center of attention when his depression is acting up, and Yuna Hollander can be…a lot. If nothing else, maybe his parents can take Yara for a couple hours so Shane can figure out what to do next.
But that’s for later. For what if. For all he knows, this is just…a bad day. And right now, Shane has more pressing problems—the squirmy toddler literally breathing down his neck, for one.
“It's okay, baby. It's okay…”
Normally at this point in the day, Ilya and Shane would take turns with Yara while the other showered. Shane would also try to get a workout in…but that’s not happening now. It’s fine, he reminds himself—it’s early in the summer. One missed gym session won’t set his training back.
“Hey, it’s okay,” he repeats, filling the quiet in an attempt to think, bouncing Yara the way he did when she was small. She drives her face into his neck and whines and he rubs her back, looking out the big windows to where the lake is shining in the distance. What would they do on any other day at the cottage?
Oh; the answer is right in front of him.
“Yara…hey, Yaroschka,” he says, gently poking her in the side and lowering his voice. “How about a swim with Daddy?”
She lifts her head, lower lip trembling, but her eyes are dry. “Sim?”
“Yeah! We can go to the lake and swim. You love to swim, huh?”
He tries to inject the words with a cheer he doesn’t quite feel, but it seems to work, because Yara gives a tentative nod and clings tighter to his neck. “Sim.”
“Okay, let’s go find our suits.”
“'Tay.”
He ducks into the en-suite and pulls his trunks and Yara’s swimsuit off the hooks near the shower, then takes them to the guest room to get changed. Yara is whimpering but compliant as he helps her into a swim diaper and zips up her rash guard. He slathers them both in fancy organic sunscreen, then fetches Yara’s water shoes from the front hall and dons his Adidas slides.
“Anya, swim?”
Shane clicks his tongue and Anya rouses from her spot on the living room carpet, and she dutifully trails him as they step outside.
“To the lake!” he declares, making a dramatic, sweeping exit down the cottage’s stone steps and getting a giggle from Yara for the trouble.
Anya perks up once they reach the water, bounding in and barking when she spies a pair of ducks paddling around at the end of the dock. The ducks flee but that doesn’t stop the dog from patrolling the shallows, ready to discourage any further encroachment on her territory.
“Goggy sim?” Yara points, intrigued. This is exactly the distraction Shane was hoping for.
“Yeah, Anya loves to swim.”
“Wack wack? Duck sim?”
“Uh-huh, the ducks swim, too. You want to go in with me?”
She nods her approval and he wades them in until the water is just to his waist and her feet and legs are dangling in the lake. She shivers and kicks, arms tightening around his neck.
“Cohd Dada!”
“Yeah, it’s cold this morning. Sometimes it takes a bit to get used to it,” he admits. The water feels especially chilly because the air is stifling and it's not even nine o’clock. “But it’s not so bad once you do.”
Yara frowns and kicks at the water again, as if trying to make a decision, then demands, “Mo.”
More.
So Shane wades in until they’re both chest deep and Yara shivers but she’s smiling, expression lightening. They spend a while like this, Shane making slow circles with Yara clinging to his side. She puts a hand on his chest, patting his tattoo.
“Yarska fower?”
“Yup, that's your flower tattoo. Я-Р-А,” he says, pointing out the Cyrillic characters that make up her name. She leans in and gives the tattoo a kiss, making the mwah sound for emphasis.
“Oh…thank you,” he smiles, returning the favor with a kiss to her cheek. She grins, face alight, before bouncing in his arms and splashing so wildly, he gets a face full of lake water.
“Thanks for that, too,” he sputters. “You’re definitely your father’s kid.”
She lights up at the sound of his name, head snapping around as if hoping to see Ilya coming down the dock. “Papa?”
Oops. Should have kept that thought to yourself.
“Oh, look,” he redirects, thinking fast. “Anya is swimming!”
“Goggy Anana?”
“Yup, see over there?”
The dog is not actually swimming, just sniffing around in the shallows by the dock, but it’s enough to pull Yara’s attention away from her missing father and back to the task at hand. She claps and cheers and splashes Shane some more in the process. Crisis averted.
Eventually they return to shore; they don't leave the lake yet, though. He sits in the shallows with the water just covering his legs, a safe depth for Yara to play. She unwinds herself from around him and leans down, slapping a tiny hand onto the surface of the lake.
“Pash! Pash Dada! Dada pash!”
Splash!
“I know, you like to splash,” he says, letting his free hand skim the water’s surface. “You wanna try a swim?”
“‘tay.”
She loves the water, and they can probably thank Ilya for that—he’s been taking her to baby swim classes since before she turned one. Thinking of Ilya, Shane glances up at the house, gaze drawn to the bedroom where the shades remain closed against the light. A small part of him hoped Ilya would hear them in the water, that the noise would lure him out of his sadness…but he supposes it isn’t that simple.
“Dada! Seeny!”
Yara points up at the sky, a pale blue with fluffy white clouds floating gently along. It’s a perfect summer day. “Seeny?”
“Da. Seeny.”
“Okay,” Shane says, resigns himself to figuring it out later.
“Dada! Dada! See!”
“I'm still here,” he reassures her, cooing with praise as Yara sticks her face below the surface and blows bubbles the way she’s been taught, popping back up with a grin, eyes crinkled shut, water dripping from chubby cheeks. Her eyes blink open and she cackles, letting both hands land in the water, sending up a wild spray.
The lake has the intended effect—Yara has forgotten about her Papa for the moment, and Shane no longer wants to itch the post-run sweat from his skin. It’ll do.
After the lake, he bundles Yara in a towel and takes them up to the lawn, intending to soak up the sun while the temperatures are tolerable. There’s a blue plastic kiddie pool leaning against the side of the cottage, and in a moment of inspiration, Shane drags it over and grabs the hose.
“Seeny?”
“This is the pool,” Shane corrects as he twists the nozzle on the hose. Fresh, cold water spurts out and lands with a splat in the blue plastic.
“Poo.”
“Close enough.”
Of course Yara gets a turn with the hose, and of course she spends half the time trying to spray Shane with it instead of filling the pool.
“Tiny menace,” he chirps. Yara just wrinkles her nose and points the hose at him again, soaking his shins.
When it’s full, Yara carefully dips her little foot in and goes wide-eyed and very dramatic.
“Ooh, cohd! Ooh cohd Dada!”
“Is it cold?” he asks, biting his lip, and Yara nods solemnly.
“Cohd.”
He re-applies her sunscreen and, after a thought, fetches the mesh bag of water toys they store under the porch. There’s the usual pail and shovel and sandcastle molds, but there’s also a selection of rubber ducks—superhero themed, a gift from Hayes. Shane recognizes Spiderman and Batman and the Hulk among them. Yara makes a game of throwing them in the pool then fetching them and lining them up on the lawn before throwing them back in to bob and drift in the eddies created by her play. She circles the pool, gabbing in Yara-speak, occasionally pausing to hold up a duck and exclaim, “Uck! Wack wack!”
While she plays, Shane spreads a towel on the grass and does some yoga—or what passes for yoga with a toddler underfoot. Anya abandons her explorations of the lake to flop down in the warm grass nearby. Yara pauses every now and then to look up, to check that her father is paying attention, and once in a while she brings him something to admire—one of her ducks, a rock, a piece of grass. He lines her offerings up at the edge of the towel in between sun salutations and downward dogs.
Soon the water is warm enough that Yara gets into the pool and sits among the floating ducks and other toys, scooping water into the pail and letting it fall out in a mini waterfall. She pours it over her head, soaking her deep black hair until it’s shiny and glistening and covering her eyes.
“Dada baff! Baff!”
“Are you taking a bath in the pool?”
She grins and nods and dumps another pail of water over her head, giggling when it cascades into the ducks and sends them bobbing and spiraling in all directions.
“You’re a water baby,” Shane teases.
“War baby,” Yara agrees in sing-song. “War baby poo.”
They hang out on the lawn, Yara alternating between splashing in the pool and wandering the yard while Shane stretches. He has to bite his tongue to stop from calling out warnings when she gets too far, to not quash her curiosity. As long as she’s within sight, she’s fine. Anya helps, too, some ancient herding instinct kicking in when Yara gets too close to the forest, the dog not so subtly nudging the baby in the opposite direction.
“Good girl,” Shane praises Anya when she returns to his side, panting and grinning, pleased with herself.
When the usual toys and tricks aren’t enough, Yara gets bolder—purposely walking away and looking back to make sure Shane can see, testing her limits.
“Yara,” he says as she approaches the side of the cottage and peeks around the corner. “Stay in the yard, please.”
She giggles like he’s told a funny joke and takes another step toward the front. Thankfully, Shane is in fine toddler-chasing form; sprinting after a runaway kid is not so different from chasing a center on a breakaway or corralling a wayward puck.
“Yara,” he warns, and then she’s off with a happy screech, little legs pumping way too fucking fast for someone so small. But this is a familiar pattern, and he’s already on his feet, closing the distance in several long, sure strides.
“Got you, bug,” he says, snatching her up and throwing her unceremoniously over his shoulder. Yara squeals, happy to have been caught, even happier when Shane takes the moment to tickle her sides.
“Dada! Dadaaaaaaa!”
He takes them to the pool and plunks her down on her butt in the water. Breathless and red-faced from laughter, she’s already getting up and climbing over the side, ready to run again. This time, he doesn’t let her get as far.
“Where do you think you’re going, silly goose?”
He mumbles the words into her neck, plants a wet kiss on her cheek and tickles her more, putting her down near the pool. She takes off again, in a different direction, and he lets her get a little bit of a lead before repeating the act—fetch toddler, tickle toddler, put toddler in pool.
The game continues this way until Yara gets dizzy and tired from so many quick turnarounds, her steps getting slower and more wobbly. The next time, Shane foils her escape, he simply grabs her and flops onto the lawn with an exaggerated groan, holding her to his chest.
“Nighty night,” he yawns dramatically, closing his eyes and pretending to fall asleep cuddling Yara, the baby doing her best impression of a wiggly stuffed animal.
“Dada! Uppa! Dada uppa,” she demands, getting in his face and lightly smacking him on the cheek. “Uppa!”
“Can't,” he gasps, pretending to snore. “So sleepy.”
“Noooooo Dada, no ny-ny!”
“Okay, okay,” he says, heaving a sigh. “So bossy.”
“Hee,” Yara says, clinging to his neck as he sits up. She cuddles into him, a little tired; the heat is getting to be too much.
“Let’s play inside for a bit,” he murmurs, and she just nods and stays tucked under his chin, surprisingly compliant. “Anya? C’mon.”
Anya comes running, tongue lolling out of her mouth. They all need a break from the heat.
The house is cool despite the big windows and the plentiful morning sun; the central air must have kicked on.
He carries Yara down the hall and stops outside the main bedroom, putting a finger to his lips. Yara makes an exaggerated shushing noise that’s more spit than shush—points for effort, he thinks, wiping the result from his cheek.
“Yeah, good job,” he whispers. “We have to be quiet so Papa can rest and feel better, right?”
“Wite!”
He tries not to wince as she barks the word directly into his ear at a distinctly not-quiet volume.
Shane peers into the room, relieved to find the toast he’d left that morning a little more than half gone. Ilya appears to be sleeping, too—actually sleeping, not just staring blankly at the wall—which Shane takes as a positive sign.
Not wanting to risk disturbing him, he takes Yara to the guest room shower so they can rinse off and change out of their suits. They shower together, Yara propped against Shane’s hip, a slippery little wiggle worm. He sets her down in the tub to give himself perfunctory rinse before throwing a towel over his shoulders and carrying her out to the bed.
Of course, the moment she’s toweled off, Yara wiggles off the bed and streaks out of the room to run butt-naked down the hall. Shane has to hop on one foot to quickly get into his underwear before taking off after her.
“Yara!”
He catches her just outside the main bedroom, damp footprints on the hardwood leading him right to the closed bedroom door.
“What are you doing, baby?”
“Papa ny-ny?”
She turns her sweetest, most hopeful expression on him and Shane’s stomach sinks.
“You miss Papa?”
“Papa,” she whimpers, little voice all watery, chin trembling. Even when she’s putting on a show, big brown eyes full of crocodile tears, it breaks his fucking heart. So these tears, genuine as they are, have his voice going thick.
“I know, baby,” he murmurs. “Let’s get dressed and then you can have a snack, yeah? Maybe some Goldfish?”
“Fiss?”
“Mmhm. You love Goldfish. Yummy Goldfish.”
“Fiss,” she sighs, her earlier exuberance drained.
He gets them dressed, letting Yara pick her outfit because it’s easier to get her to wear clothes if she has a say. She chooses a cotton summer dress in a fruits print that’s just this side of too small, neon green polka-dot leggings, and a play hardhat that somehow snuck into her closet from the toy boxes in the living room. Shane makes an attempt at combing her hair, giving up on a ponytail because she barely sits still for the comb as it is and he’s not as adept at the hair stuff as Ilya. He considers it a success that she doesn’t scream when the comb touches her head, that there are no visible tangles. In the end, most of her hair is hidden by the bright yellow plastic hardhat, anyway. The complete outfit makes for a pretty funny image; he takes a pic on his phone to share with Ilya later.
Back in the living room, Yara is content to snack on her Goldfish crackers at the coffee table while Shane figures out what to make for lunch. Something simple enough he can prep it in…approximately five minutes, or however much time the toddler appetizer buys him.
He turns to the stove and finds his uneaten breakfast of eggs and avocado toast where he left it this morning, all rubbery eggs and brown mush. No wonder his stomach is making angry gurgling noises. The toast is a lost cause, and though he can’t bring himself to eat the eggs, he scrapes them into a covered container to use for Anya’s dinner later. It’s not a total waste.
When that’s done, he peeks over the counter and finds Yara where he left her, sorting her crackers into little piles by color—red, green, and orange. So far, so good.
Deconstructed sandwiches make for an easy lunch—rolled up sliced turkey, tomato and cucumber slices, bread spread with cream cheese. He’s just finished plating everything when Yara calls from the living room.
“Dada?”
“Yes, baby?”
“Goggy fiss?”
Dogfish? Doggy fist?
It takes a minute for the question to make sense, at which point he realizes it’s too late. He watches helplessly from across the room as Yara feeds a fistful of the little cheddar crackers to a thrilled Anya.
Ah, crap. Rookie mistake, Hollander.
“No, no, fishies aren’t for doggies,” Shane says, and the ridiculousness of that sentence will only occur to him much later in recounting this to Ilya. He makes it to the living room just in time to see Yara feeding Anya the last handful of her snack. Anya laps the remaining salt and crumbs from Yara’s palm and Yara giggles sweetly.
“Tickas!”
Tickles!
It takes much longer than it should for Shane to wrangle dog, toddler, and lunch, but he manages to get everyone fed without further incident—even if, in his case, “lunch” is a few turkey rolls and leftover cucumber slices housed while standing at the kitchen counter. Once again, his nutritionist would not approve.
The day seems to drag on the later it gets. They go for a walk after lunch, leaving Anya and the stroller home. It’s hot, and Yara has agreed to swap her yellow plastic construction hat for a floppy blue sun hat that shields her face.
Or, she had agreed in theory. She pulls the hat off about ten steps up the drive and drops it on the ground.
“No hat. No seeny.”
“Okay, but if you won’t wear the hat, we can’t go for a walk. The hat protects you from the sun.”
Simple terms, straightforward explanations, and a calm but firm tone. Sometimes parenting a toddler isn’t much different from mentoring the rookies or captaining a team.
“No hat!”
“Okay, then we go home.”
Yara narrows her eyes and crosses her arms. “No home! Yara no hat, Dada.”
“I know you don’t like the hat,” he sighs, kneeling to get to her level. “But it's either that or more sunscreen, and the sunscreen is at home.”
She huffs. “No hat,” she huffs, but she picks up the target of her ire and puts it back on.
They don’t make it all the way up the long drive before Yara whines and demands to be carried. Shane had anticipated that—it’s a long driveway, it’s hot, and she’s small—so he lifts her into his arms and keeps going at a leisurely pace. They’ve walked maybe half a kilometer together when she yanks the sunhat off and tosses it on the ground.
“Yara,” Shane sighs, picking it up. “You gotta wear the hat.”
“No!”
In a last-ditch effort to turn the mood around, Shane places the hat on his own head, where it sits well above his ears and looks comically small.
“Okay, guess it’s mine now.”
Yara blinks up at him, stunned silence quickly giving way to outrage.
“Noooo mine! Mine, mine!”
“But you threw it away!” he teases.
“No Dada! My hat! My seeny! Mine!”
“If you insist,” he says, fixing the hat in place over her dark hair. He’s feeling pretty clever until she flings it to the ground again.
“Yara—”
“No!”
Well, he tried. “Time to go home.”
“No! No home!”
“I know, but you don’t want to wear the hat, so we go home.”
“No, no wanna! No home Dada!”
He starts walking back the way they came at a slightly faster clip and she twists and turns in his arms, her whines escalating to a wail. At least their nearest neighbor is several kilometers down the road and this isn’t happening in the middle of the grocery store or something.
“Aren’t you tired?” he mutters, adjusting her more solidly against his hip as she squirms and writhes.
“No!”
“Because you’re acting tired.”
“No tank oo!”
Shane has to turn his face away, stifling a laugh and the nonsensical urge to praise her good manners despite the vehement delivery.
Yara has gone boneless and is doing that half-sobbing, half-angry-babbling thing as they walk through the door, long strings of vowel sounds interspersed with no and Dada and Papa. Shane doesn’t bother trying to reason with her, just keeps up a soothing stream of nonsense, the kind of things he’d say when she was an infant.
“You’re okay, Yaroschka,” he murmurs, wincing as she screeches. “I know, shh, you’re okay. It’s just a lot, I know, I’ve got you.”
He takes her to her room and draws the shades, then paces in circles in the dark and rubs her back. Her sobs quickly dwindle to little hiccups and whines and she fists a hand in his t-shirt. His collar is soggy with tears and snot and he is once again reminded how badly he needs a real shower.
In an unexpected twist, she goes down for her nap voluntarily. After several minutes of quiet back and forth, she raises her head from his shoulder and points to her toddler bed.
“Dow.”
It feels a bit like a miracle—or maybe a trick—when she curls up on her side and lets him tuck her in. She hums and closes her eyes.
Not tired my ass, he thinks wearily, but he gazes at her face, already going slack with sleep, and marvels at how such a tiny person can somehow drive him to the razor’s edge of sanity and snap him back to pure adoration in the same breath.
“Night-night,” Shane whispers, pressing a kiss to her crown. “I love you.”
In the hall, he sags against the closed bedroom door, ears ringing from her cries. He wants to take a nap, too. He wants to eat a meal not standing at the kitchen counter. He wants to take a hot shower.
And he has maybe forty-five minutes to do all of these things before she wakes up and they forge ahead with the rest of their day.
But he does none of these things. Instead, he goes to check on Ilya. The temptation to crawl into bed with his husband is too strong to resist, and he goes, wraps Ilya’s waist with his arm and nuzzles into the warmth of his broad shoulders. His husband wakes gradually with a low grunt.
“Hey,” Shane whispers.
“Mm.”
“How are you feeling?”
There’s a long pause before Ilya answers, the word falling out of his mouth with an exhausted sigh. “Tired.”
“Can I help?”
Ilya gives the slightest shake of his head, his curls brushing soft against Shane’s forehead. “Just stay.”
And he can't think of any place he’d rather be, so he does.
“She wore the fruits dress again…she’s almost outgrown it,” he murmurs offhandedly. “With neon green leggings and a hardhat. I got a picture.”
He gets a hum of acknowledgment; Shane takes that as his cue to keep talking, settles in and holds Ilya tighter as he speaks to the back of his neck.
“I don’t claim to know anything about fashion, but I’m ready to fire my stylist and let her dress me for our next presser. Better than a stuffy old suit.”
Another hum, tinged with amusement.
“I had to remind her not to give the dog her crackers,” Shane mutters. “And on an unrelated note, Anya is eating like a queen today, so…you don't have to worry about her.”
He can’t tell in the low light with Ilya facing away from him, but he thinks maybe his cheek twitches with a small smile.
“We went for a swim. She’s great in the water, those swim classes were a good idea. I think she’d live in the pool if she could. Oh! And Anya did that thing again—”
He keeps going, talking softly about the rest of their day so far; lunch, the walk and subsequent tantrum.
“She’s your daughter when she gets like that, y’know,” he finishes, lightly poking Ilya’s side to make it clear he’s just chirping.
Ilya’s voice is rough but steady. “Mm…this is not true.”
It’s a mild response, but it’s something. Shane grins, encouraged.
“Nuh-uh. The attitude? The stubbornness? All you,” he continues. “Explains why I love her so much. She's basically a mini Rozanov.”
“So…she is perfect.”
“A perfect menace,” Shane smiles. “Just like her father. Good thing she’s even more adorable than you.”
Ilya sighs, shifting backwards until Shane is snugly curled around him.
“Miss you today,” Shane murmurs, nuzzling behind Ilya’s ear. “We both do.”
“I’m…sorry.”
“I don’t mean it like that, okay?”
“Mm. I know. I am…not so good with words…right now.”
“S’okay. You don't have to be.”
They fall into a comfortable quiet, Shane settling against the pillow, breathing in Ilya’s sleep-warm scent. Ilya’s hand finds his, strokes over his fingers in a slow, hypnotic rhythm that has him relaxing deeper into the mattress.
Shane doesn’t even realize he’s dozed off until the cry rings out from down the hall, and then he’s awake and on his feet before he’s fully processed his surroundings.
So much for getting anything done.
Ilya is asleep again, so Shane leans down and gives him a quick kiss before heading down the hall to Yara’s room.
He’d hoped a long nap would have a restorative, calming effect on their daughter, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Shane finds Yara sitting up in bed, sobbing, hair a black snarled halo and sleep lines streaked down her face.
“Hey, baby girl,” he murmurs. “What happened, huh? Bad dreams?”
He gets a wail and two arms up in response, the demand clear: Pick me up.
So he does. Pulls her into his arms and cuddles her while she huffs and cries against his shoulder.
“I know, waking up is the worst,” he murmurs, then yawns. “I don’t like it either.”
More sobs, indignant and strained.
“What do you need, huh? You want a snack?”
She shakes her head, but at least she’s starting to calm down. So he walks them out to the kitchen, gently brushing his fingers through her hair and whispering nonsense until she’s melted into him, breaths coming slower and steadier under his hand. Eventually she straightens and gives him a shy smile.
“Hi, sweet girl,” he says, returning the smile. “Feel better?”
“Dada,” she confirms, placing her hands on either side of his face. “Goggy?”
“Mm, Anya is in the bedroom.”
“Papa?”
“He’s sleeping.”
“Ny-ny,” she sighs, but seems a little more settled now that everyone in the family has been accounted for. “Seeny?”
He’s not sure what that means, but he takes a wild stab in the dark.
“You want a snack?”
She nods eagerly.
“Okay. Table or highchair?”
“No.”
Shane swallows his frustration with a measured sigh. “Okay, but I have to put you down while I get your snack—”
“No!”
“But then we can sit together on the couch after you eat.”
Yara whines and shakes her head so hard her hair flops in her eyes. “No dow!”
“But there’s watermelon,” he prompts, trying to make his tone sound upbeat! And fun! “You love watermelon!”
“…wummamom?”
Watermelon?
“Yeah! But I can’t cut the watermelon if I don’t put you down first. Knives are sharp, remember? Ow.”
“Owie wummamom?”
“Yeah, owie watermelon,” he nods. “So will you sit in your highchair so I can get you some watermelon?”
She looks around, searching for alternatives…then she sighs and seems to resign herself to being put down.
“‘Tay.”
Grateful she’s open to reason for now, he buckles her into the highchair and sets to cutting a fresh watermelon into pieces. He presents two slices of melon on a plate alongside a green sippy cup of milk and a handful of cheese cubes. She shuns the cheese, as expected, but devours the watermelon and asks for more.
When that’s done and her sticky cheeks and fingers have been wiped down as much as she’ll allow, he unbuckles her from the chair and tries to set her down. The second he does, she whines and sticks her arms up.
“Ehhh!”
“You want up?”
Little feet hit the hardwood in a stomp. “Ehhh!”
“Use your words, please.”
“Seeny!”
“You want up?”
“No! Seeny!”
She whines again, reaching up toward the highchair, to the green cup sitting on the tray.
“You want your sippy?”
“Da.”
He gives the green cup a shake—it’s half full—and hands it to her. This was, apparently, the wrong thing to do. She wails, an open-mouthed cry of deep, unrelenting anguish and lets the cup fall to the floor.
“Noooooo! Seeeeeeeny!”
“But this is your sippy,” he explains.
She crumples to the floor alongside the offensive cup with impressive dramatic flair. Shane might find it amusing if he weren’t getting precariously close to the end of his rope. Come to think of it, dropping to the floor and yelling about it doesn’t sound half bad. He wishes he could do the same.
“You want…Wolfie?!” he tries.
“Nooooo, SEE-nee!”
He cycles through a random list of things she might want that sound vaguely like seeny, all suggestions met with increasingly desperate and angry howls. He knows what it’s like to feel misunderstood, has plenty of personal experience with being unable to find the right words, so he sympathizes deeply with his daughter’s plight. But that doesn’t change the fact that he can’t make sense of what she needs…and he’s running out of patience.
Then he has an idea. He kneels, putting a hand on Yara’s arm to get her attention.
“Yara. Yaroschka. Can you show me, please?”
Yara sniffles and nods, so Shane picks her up. She points. He follows.
Now they’re standing behind the kitchen counter, looking at the open shelf where they store the glasses and cups.
“Seeny!”
“You want a…cup? But you have a cup already.”
“Seeny,” she sniffs, ignoring him and pointing again to the shelf.
“What do you—”
“Seeny! Seeny, seeny, seenyyyyyy,” she chirps, bouncing herself on his arm until he moves her closer. She reaches out…and points to the blue sippy cup.
“But you already have a cup, baby,” he tries again. “It’s—”
“Seeny!” Yara says, only satisfied when he brings down the blue cup and hands it to her.
“You want that one?”
“Eh! Eh!”
She clutches the cup then points down.
“Dow,” she demands, and he sets her down, relieved that they seem to have found a solution and also deeply confused. She toddles over to the discarded green cup and grabs it, turning back to Shane and holding both cups out with a whine. “Eehhhhhhh!”
“You…want to put your milk in the blue one?” he guesses.
“Seeny! Seeny,” she nods rapidly.
“I—okay, okay,” he agrees, wondering how he missed that she has a favorite cup. Guilt threatens to sink its claws in; Ilya would have known what she was saying, would have known to use the blue cup in the first place. But there’s nothing like an enraged two-year-old to turn even the most competent person into an idiot.
He makes the switch and gives Yara the cup—the blue cup, which is exactly the same size and style as its green counterpart but is, for some reason unbeknownst to Shane, superior. Yara gives an excited giggle and takes a long drink.
“Does blue taste better?” he sighs.
“Beh-er,” Yara says with a decisive nod, smacking her lips for emphasis. Shane leans against the counter as his daughter wanders off to the living room, all earlier drama seemingly forgiven.
It’s going to be a long night.
~*~
The rest of the afternoon passes with a similar rhythm—lots of playtime interspersed with small-scale tantrums, an outfit change when Yara works the lid off her sippy cup and dumps milk down her front, more time outside, another walk, two more diaper changes (she’s supposed to be potty training, but Shane isn’t up to fighting that battle today), and constant negotiations with a small person whose ability to manage her emotions wears paper thin as the day goes on.
It’s not that he doesn't know just how much work Ilya does for their family by staying home with Yara. Shane spends so many hours at the arena, at practice, on the road, so Ilya and Yara have their own fine-tuned routines. Summering at the cottage tends to upend all those routines, the tradeoff being Shane gets lots of quality time with their daughter and Ilya gets a reprieve from being the primary parent.
But Ilya’s partial absence—being here, but also not—is a stark reminder of just how primary he is. As Shane approaches hour ten of solo parenting, he decides he owes his husband a nice bottle of vodka, maybe. Or flowers. Or a new car. Or maybe all three.
He distantly wonders how Ilya gets anything done as he changes her milk-soaked outfit, as he chases her butt-naked form down the hall (again) when she’s wiggled out of his grip because he turned away for two seconds, as he eyes the natural entropy that toddlerhood wreaks on their home. They have a lot of help in Ottawa—cleaning and laundry services, and even the occasional nanny—things they forgo at the cottage in favor of privacy. Even so, Shane usually comes home to a clean house and a cheerful husband and a content little girl.
And then there’s the boredom. Something no one told him about parenting, something that none of the books thought to mention, was just how repetitive and frankly monotonous this stage of parenthood could be.
He loves their daughter fiercely, but there are only so many things they can talk about, so many times they can play the same simple games, before his mind starts to wander and wish for something a bit more stimulating. Shane has never been a particularly intellectual person, he can admit that. But keeping Yara entertained and out of trouble doesn’t leave time for anything else—he can’t read, can’t work out, can’t focus on anything because he will inevitably be interrupted by a voice asking for (nay, demanding) his undivided attention, little hands grasping for his and begging him to see, Dada, see, Dada? Dada! See!
It's not that he minds, it's just that Ilya is genius at this part of parenthood and Shane is…less so. Ilya has a seemingly infinite well of patience for their daughter and all her playful rituals and quirks. Shane recognized this well before they had children with the Pike kids—how Ilya could get just as absorbed in their games as the kids and not grow tired after ten minutes the way Shane does. Ilya is content to follow Yara’s lead, whereas Shane has never been much for play. Even in childhood, he didn’t understand the appeal of make-believe or quiet, focused time with a pile of toys or a box of crayons. His mom said that as soon as he could walk, he was on the move—if it wasn’t hockey or skating, he was kicking a ball or running circles in the back yard. Better yet if there was a competitive element.
But Yara has no concept of competition, and while she’s an active toddler, she’s also very playful. Ilya is better at all of it—roughhousing, pretending, building with blocks or playing with dolls. It makes Shane laugh to think of his husband in his youth—with his love for fast cars, loud music, parties and clubs and wild nights—now being led around by a tiny, bossy human, pondering flowers and butterflies and snails, playing dress-up, splashing in the tub.
And Ilya seems more content with this arrangement than ever; exactly where he belongs.
“Eh! Eh!”
Yara’s voice and a pat-pat-pat on his arm brings Shane out of this latest thought spiral. He’s sitting on the carpet, back propped against the couch with the contents of three baskets of toys scattered around them. Now she holds out a plastic DUPLO building block.
“That’s a red block,” Shane offers.
“Da,” she says, examining the block carefully…before dropping it and toddling back to the toy basket to fetch another, then another, until there’s a pile of blocks at Shane’s feet.
Once in a while, she wanders over to the gate at the top of the small staircase leading to the bedroom, waiting for Ilya to come down the hall. She points and looks at Shane with the same pleading expression, the one that makes his heart feel twisted and wrung out like a used rag.
“Papa?”
“I know, baby. He’ll be out soon.”
It’s more a hope than the truth, but a two-year-old’s attention span doesn’t account for the difference. She sighs and returns to her pile of blocks.
The boredom has another drawback, too—it gives Shane too much time to think.
His mind goes off on unhelpful tangents in between acknowledging Yara’s contributions, his brain doing absolutely nothing useful.
What if Ilya doesn’t get better? What if we have to change his meds? Shit, did I take my meds this morning? Fuck, I don't remember. What if he needs more help than I can give him? What if—
Yara interrupts this train of thought, presenting him with another block.
“Blue,” he says, feeling a bit like a robot. “That’s blue. C’est un bloc bleu,” he adds, wincing as he thinks of how little French he actually speaks with her.
“Seeny,” Yara nods. “Seeny.”
“…you want your sippy?”
Yara gives him a pointed look to let him know he’s not getting it and replies with something that Shane doesn’t catch.
They go through most of the selection of blocks—red, green, yellow, blue—in various shapes and sizes. She hasn’t quite got the hang of putting them together, so Shane tries to show her—look, they stick! You can build stuff! She watches with a skeptical line drawn between her tiny brows, then shakes her head vehemently.
“No! No, Dada.”
She takes the small sculpture from his hands and pulls it apart, frowning so fiercely that Shane has to laugh, and then she moves the pile of blocks from the carpet to the couch on the other side of the room. He’s lost his block privileges, apparently.
Yara loses interest in the blocks after that, turning her attention to a plastic tea set that the Pikes gifted her for her first birthday. Soon she hands him a teacup and blinks up at him expectantly.
“Da?”
“Oh, you want to drink some tea?” he says, miming taking a sip. The little cup is lavender and covered in princess stickers; the handle just fits around the tip of his pinky finger.
“No, Dada!” she protests, snatching the cup from his hand and glowering at him. “No tea! No.”
Tea privileges revoked as well. He’s not doing well on the playtime front, clearly, so he decides to get up and stretch his back, taking a moment to survey the living room and marvel at the mess. How long has it been, an hour? If that? And every toy she owns is spread from corner to corner, covering both couches, several in Anya’s dog bed. They really need to talk about gifting protocols for birthdays and holidays; she has way too many toys.
His distraction becomes his downfall when he moves without thinking, bare foot coming down on one of the smaller DUPLO blocks, sharp plastic edges digging angrily into his heel. He yelps, does a funny jump, and immediately curses a blue streak.
“Ow, shit, fucking fuck!”
He knows he’s made a grave error as soon as the words are out of his mouth.
“Fuck!” Yara echoes cheerfully.
“Noooo,” he croaks as he shakes out his throbbing foot and listens helplessly as Yara continues to curse.
“Fuck fuck fuck,” she chirps happily. “Fuck fuck!”
And isn’t it just the cherry on top that her pronunciation is fucking exquisite?
“No—no, baby, that’s not—we don’t say that word, okay? Daddy didn’t—”
“Fuck!” Yara continues, ignoring his pleas and squatting to investigate the block that bit his foot. “Dada owie?”
“Yeah, let’s not, uh—oh, look! It’s, ummm…”
He looks frantically for something to catch her attention and finds another plastic teacup—light aqua this time. “Look! Can you show me what to do?”
“Da? Fuck.”
“Cup,” he emphasizes the new word. “Blue cup.”
“Seeny,” she agrees, taking the tiny cup and putting it to her lips. She pretends to take a drink and then sighs contentedly.
“Num num num! Fuck.”
~*~
Yara’s temperament becomes less and less cooperative as the evening drags on, and by the time dinner rolls around, she’s clinging to Shane’s leg and crying about…something, Shane can’t even remember what started it. He has fantasies of giving up, letting her watch TV or play mindless games on his phone until bedtime. He won’t do either of those things because he’s read too many articles about the effects of screen time on early childhood brain development…but fuck, now he wishes he hadn’t. Ignorance is bliss.
At least she’s not swearing anymore.
Somehow he manages to pull together a healthy dinner—rice and baked salmon and roasted vegetables, thank fuck for air conditioning or he’d never be able to use the oven in this heat—without tripping over her or otherwise getting in an accident. She eats, but the meal doesn’t do much to lift her spirits. She’s barely out of the highchair when she makes it clear she’s done with him for the day by throwing herself on the floor and wailing for Ilya. Their daughter becomes a toddler-shaped puddle on the tile, pink-cheeked, hair damp, and Shane no longer has the wherewithal to attempt an elaborate distraction. He tries to pick her up, but she bats his hands away.
“Noooooo,” she wails, the same thing she’s been crying for the last half hour…or maybe longer. It feels like longer. “Wan Papaaaaa!”
“Baby—”
“Papaaaaaa! Papapapapaaaaaa!”
The syllables devolve into nonsense which devolves into sobs and eventually she doesn’t resist when Shane reaches for her again, just lets him pick her up and carry her in a wide, slow circle around the living room until she finally, finally quiets.
Bedtime is supposed to be at seven after an elaborate bathtime ritual and three stories—Corduroy, Dragons Love Tacos, and Little Blue Truck, in that order—and a white noise machine and back rubs and a nightlight that projects slow-spinning stars on the ceiling of her room.
But Shane gave up any pretense of routine about three hours and ten tantrums ago, and now it’s close to nine, and he has neither bathed or read to Yara; she’s not even in bed. Her hair is a wild tangle and she smells vaguely of baked fish and sunscreen and she’s sucking on her thumb—something she only does when she’s stressed, he knows, and shit if he doesn’t feel guilty for that.
But she’s calm and quiet and she’s made it clear she’ll stay that way as long as she’s on Shane’s chest, so that’s where they are: On the couch with the first Mighty Ducks movie playing in the background, Yara making soft humming noises around her thumb, Shane blearily watching the screen and waiting for her to fall asleep.
He’s just beginning to think he loved this movie for more than just the hockey—a young Emilio Estevez is not bad to look at—when he hears movement from the hall.
Ilya shuffles out in bare feet, a rumpled t-shirt riding up over his midsection, gray shorts hanging low on his hips. He's carrying Yara’s Wolfie in one hand. His expression is sheepish, apologetic, but all Shane feels is relief.
“Hello,” Ilya rasps, blinking owlishly at them.
Yara, who was this-close to falling asleep, comes to life instantly at the sound of his voice.
“Papa!”
She scrambles off Shane, almost falling on her butt in the process, and tears over to her father before he can fully sit up.
“Papa!”
“Yes, Yaroschka,” he whispers. “Did you miss me?”
Yara climbs into his arms and babbles a string of what sounds like nonsense to Shane, but is probably Russian-flavored baby-speak. They exchange a few words, and Ilya returns Wolfie to his owner. Shane catches a few simple Russian words—thank you, he is a very good friend—and his throat tightens. He gets up to join them.
Ilya meets his eyes over the top of Yara’s head when she runs out of steam and buries her face in her father’s chest, sighing contentedly.
“I am sorry—”
“Don’t,” Shane counters. “Don’t do that.”
“I did not mean to…to leave you with…all of it…”
“Hey,” Shane murmurs, rubbing a soothing hand up and down Ilya’s arm, then up to the back of his neck, squeezing lightly. “It’s okay. We managed. I’m not totally useless, y’know.”
He means it as a joke, but Ilya sniffs, expression drawn.
“Doesn’t mean we don’t need you, either,” he adds. “Hey…”
Shane leans in, pulls him close and holds him tight with his face pressed to the side of his neck. They stay like this for a few minutes, reunited, before Shane lifts his head and initiates a gentle kiss, lips brushing slow and soft. Ilya tastes like mouthwash; another good sign.
“Are you hungry? Can I make you something?” Shane asks when he pulls away.
Ilya shakes his head slowly, grimacing. “I am…tired. I know I spend whole day in bed, but—”
“Hey, stop,” Shane says. “What do you need?”
“I think…I am going to take her to bed,” Ilya whispers. Yara’s eyelids are already heavy, her breathing deeper, her eyes distant and unfocused, like she’d been waiting for Ilya to come back before allowing herself to sleep.
Shane nods. “I’ll be in soon. Gonna…clean up a bit first.”
He surveys the room. The toy situation hasn’t changed, all baskets upturned, their contents strewn about. The blue sippy cup lies discarded on an end table and there’s a smattering of crackers smushed into the carpet that even the dog hasn’t bothered to hoover up—the pickings today have been plentiful. Their dirty lunch and dinner dishes are stacked on the counter, the trash can in the corner is full. The kiddie pool out back is waiting to be emptied, the water now murky and dappled with grass, and it will kill the lawn underneath if they don’t move it.
“No, leave it, please. I will do this tomorrow,” Ilya says.
“Ilya—”
“Please,” Ilya whispers, voice thready. “Come to bed? I miss you.”
Shane relents. “I need to shower—”
“Yes, yes. Shower and bed. Please.”
Shane assents with a nod and a gentle squeeze to Ilya’s shoulder, and they walk down the hall together.
He spends most of the shower with his forehead resting against the tile. How can one day with a toddler feel more tiring than a playoff game, he doesn’t know, but he doesn’t have the energy to do much more than wash his hair and run a washcloth haphazardly over his body. Then he brushes his teeth, practically swaying on his feet, before making his way to bed.
Ilya is curled up with Yara tucked against him. They don’t often co-sleep—Shane has been hyper-vigilant about safe sleeping practices since she was born, and Yara is content to stay in her own room…but there are always exceptions. She’s fast asleep, latched onto her father’s t-shirt with a chubby fist, the other pressed to her lips.
“She would not let go and I did not want to wake her,” he whispers apologetically.
Shane shrugs. He wasn’t going to argue, anyway. It’s been a weird day.
He climbs into bed, careful not to disturb her, angling his body so he can wrap an arm around Ilya’s hips and bury his nose against Yara’s side and breathes her in. Despite the skipped bath, there’s a familiar undertone of mine, the deeply primal scent that’s kept him in its thrall since she was born.
“Tell me more about your day,” Ilya murmurs, stroking a hand through Yara’s soft hair. “Was nice hearing things…before.”
Shane hesitates. “The afternoon was kinda rough, to be honest, but…we spent a lot of time outside.”
“Ah, yes. She loves ‘outside,’” Ilya smirks, pronouncing it the way Yara does—ow-sye.
“Yeah, for sure. I made her favorite for dinner. We played with toys, blocks,” Shane says, then remembers. “Oh, uh…I might have taught her a swear word. By accident.”
He feels Ilya perk up, and Shane tilts his face up to catch his husband’s expression of sheer delight. “Oh? Which one?”
“Uh…the f-word.”
“Ah…no,” Ilya says, looking sheepish. “She knows this one already.”
Shane leans up on one elbow to face him more directly. “What do you—”
“We spend many days together, Shane, and I am not as bad about swearing as you—”
“Hey!”
“…but sometimes,” Ilya gestures with a hand, smiling. “Things slip.”
“Ilya!”
“What?! You admit to me you teach her this word, yes?”
“I guess I won’t feel so bad about it, then,” Shane huffs, settling back into the crook of Ilya’s arm.
“You should not,” Ilya says, leaning down to press a kiss to his hair.
There’s a long pause in which Shane can feel Ilya readying himself; he breathes differently, maybe, or he holds his body in a specific way when there’s something he wants to say and he’s trying to figure out how to say it. Shane knows whatever it is will come out eventually, so he’s patient. He’s too tired to hurry the process along, anyhow.
“I meant it before,” Ilya murmurs eventually. “I am sorry—”
“Ilya—”
“I know you will say it is not a big deal, but I should not…be like this.”
“Ilya, you have nothing to apologize for.”
“It was different, before. When it was just us, there was no…how do you say, risk. Or…stakes? But she needs both, her Papa and Dada. And I was not here.”
Shane gives him a look. “Ilya. Which one of us spent most of the last season living out of hotels?”
“Still. Yaroschka and I were there, too, sometimes.”
“Sometimes, yeah, but…. I’m just saying, one bad day is not going to scar her for life.”
“Was not fair to you, though.”
“I’m a big boy,” he quips. “Besides, she’s tiny. I can take her.”
There’s the faintest of quirk of Ilya’s lips at that; Shane counts it as a win.
“Mm. I should have…warned you. These last days…I felt not so good, but I thought…maybe sleep…and then, sleep did not want to let go.”
“I’m not gonna lie, it was…a rough day,” Shane sighs. “She wanted you.”
“Yes, I know,” Ilya says, voice small.
“I’m not saying that to make you feel bad. I—I know you didn’t want her to see you, but…I think we might need a different system or a—a plan. If it happens again.”
“I will make appointment with Galina in the morning. She says this happens…even with medicine, but…”
Ilya shrugs, lips pressed into a thin line.
“Can’t hurt to check in,” Shane offers, aiming for nonchalance and falling short.
“Yes.”
Shane arches his back and groans softly at the stretch, swears he can feel the day’s tension in every single muscle. It’s not the best time to be having this conversation, but they won’t have a chance in the morning, when Yara wakes and demands their collective attention. Better not to put it off.
“When my mother—when she was…like this,” Ilya whispers. “It scared me.”
Shane doesn’t respond, but he gives Ilya’s waist a careful squeeze to indicate he’s listening.
“She stayed in her bed, too. I would stay with her, talk to her, but it was like…she was not there. She went away. And then…she went away for good.
“I don’t want that to be how Yaroschka thinks of me,” he continues darkly. “How she…remembers me.”
“She won’t—it was one day.”
“One day is sometimes two, then three, and then…then…”
Ilya swallows, voice growing tight as he trails off.
“Ilya, you are not your mother,” Shane says, a little shocked by his own bluntness. “Yara is going to have a million memories of you, years and years of memories. And…yeah, not all of them will be great…but the majority will.”
Ilya stares down at their girl, drawing a thumb carefully over her cheek, his tone a ragged whisper. “I never want her to be afraid.”
“Hey, hey,” Shane says, reaching up to cup his cheek even as Ilya resists. “She’s not going to be scared of you, Ilya.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do,” he says, trying to put as much conviction in his words as possible. “And maybe it’s good for her, to see…that. Or not good, maybe, but…”
He stops, struggling to find the words. It’s not fair for his husband to have to deal with this, this glitch in his brain that lies and feeds him dark thoughts. But it is what it is, and Shane would rather have an Ilya with a glitch than no Ilya at all. The thought gives him pause, and he nudges Ilya’s chin with a finger, forcing him to meet his eyes.
“What if I said I think your depression makes you a better dad?”
Ilya scoffs. “Then you are crazier than me, моя любовь.”
“No—I—I don’t know how to say it, but…I love all of you, not just the happy parts. Not just on the good days,” he says firmly. “Why would it be different for Yara?”
“Because I want to be better for her,” he sniffs, narrowing his eyes. “Not a broken, sad man.”
“But you are getting better,” Shane insists. “We couldn’t even have this conversation five years ago, remember?”
Ilya heaves a sigh of impatience but Shane presses on.
“And maybe someday, if Yara has to deal with something like this, something…hard—”
Ilya flashes him a brilliant, idiotic grin, and Shane can’t help but grin back, even as he chides, “Shut up.”
“You said ‘hard.’”
“Oh my god, you’re like, five. And the context is totally inappropriate—”
“Mm, finish your lecture so we can go to sleep, yes?”
Shane considers smacking him, decides it would probably wake the baby, so he pokes him hard in the thigh and continues.
“I’m just saying, if she’s going through a tough time, you’ll know how to help, you’ll know what to say…or at least, you’ll know where the start because you’re already an expert.”
His husband flashes him a withering look. “You are saying I win first place in depression? This is shitty award, Hollander.”
“Yeah, it sucks,” he admits, but he smiles. “At least she’ll have someone in her corner, though, you know? Someone who’s been through it. You were that person for me…after she was born.”
“Maybe,” Ilya concedes, in that way that suggests he remains unconvinced, but he’s ready to be done with this conversation. Fair enough.
Shane replaces his hand on Ilya’s hip and purposefully tugs him closer, threading their legs together. The pressure and warmth are fast-acting sedatives to his overtaxed nervous system. He’s drifting in that fuzzy place between wakefulness and sleep when he remembers something and his eyes fly open. He nudges Ilya to get his attention.
“Hey…do you know what ‘seeny’ is?”
“‘Seeny?’”
“Yeah, Yara’s been saying it all day. I thought maybe she was trying to say ‘sippy,’ but—”
“Do you mean…синий? ‘Si-niy?’” Ilya asks, drawing out the syllables.
“Yeah! Yeah, I think that’s it. What’s it mean?”
Ilya smiles and gazes down at their little girl, traces a finger along the curve of her cheek. “Is blue. The color.”
Oh…that makes more sense.
“Fuck,” Shane breathes. She’s been pointing out blue things—the pool, the cup, the block. “How did I miss that?”
“Is okay. Is new thing,” Ilya reassures him. “Only in last few days. She likes this color. Everything is blue, sometimes even things that are not blue.”
“She’s so smart,” Shane whispers, looking at their little girl with renewed awe.
“You expected less?”
“No!” Shane protests. “I just…wow…”
“She clearly gets this from me.”
“Oh, fuck off.”
“Mm. I think I will not,” Ilya murmurs, and then he leans down and kisses Shane soundly, reverently. Shane falls asleep with the taste of Ilya’s lips on his and the grounding warmth of their daughter tucked between them.
~*~
The next morning, Shane wakes of his own volition; no alarm, no little voice at the door, just abundant sunlight and an otherwise empty bed. He winces and sits up, an initial moment of panic at the unoccupied space to his left, before he hears their voices from beyond the open sliver of bedroom door.
Ilya’s is soft and low, a soothing rumble. Yara answers in a bright toddler falsetto, chattering a mile a minute. Anya barks, Ilya laughs, Yara giggles, a blender whirs—all happy sounds, normal sounds. He spent most of the night with a toddler’s foot wedged between his ribs and his shoulder throbs, but there’s a lightness in his chest that cancels out the aches and pains.
They’re at the cottage. His family is here. They have a long day of sunshine, swimming, toddler games—and, yes, tantrums—ahead. Another day of care-worn routines, of raucous delight and mindless boredom, and so, so much love.
He can’t wait to get started.